After tossing and turning all night, I woke to a knock at my door.
"Mmh?" I groaned sleepily. I heard the door open and close, and footsteps making their way to my bed. A feminine hand pushed my hair out of my face, then I felt my bed sink as someone else's weight was added to it.
"Good morning, sweetheart," my mother said to me. By this time I started to wake up a little. I propped myself up in my bed and rubbed the sleep from my eyes as best as I could.
"Morning," I responded as I raked my fingers through my hair, trying to tame it slightly.
"Listen, honey, I wanted to talk to you about our decision for you and Shang…" I heard her begin.
"What about it?" I said almost bitterly. I was definitely awake now, and it felt like I'd just woken up from a nightmare only to be reminded it was real… Except, that's kind of how it happened.
"It's just that when I saw you and Shang together… People had already been talking about you two around town, you know that, right?" She put her hand on top of mine. Hearing her words, I felt sick. So they decided to have us wed on rumors?
"What of it?" I asked.
"I honestly thought you two were, you know… getting along."
"Mom, I haven't even known him for a week!" I was honestly surprised at how my mother was handling this. It was so unlike her.
"It's really not the end of the world," she said, and I felt like yelling at her some more, I really did. "And, you know, some arranged marriages can work."
"But they're never actually in love," I pointed out.
"Your great grandmother had an arranged marriage, you know," she told me.
"So what?" I frowned.
"So, she ran away from it. And years later, after having your grandmother, and after your great grandfather died, after I found your father in that iceberg… your father, uncle, and I found the man your great grandmother was supposed to marry in the Northern Water Tribe, where your great grandmother was originally from. He still remembered her, and he was still in love with her… And after the war was almost over, he went to the Southern Water Tribe to find her and this time, well, she really did fall in love with him and they wed by choice."
I sat quietly processing this information for a moment.
"But that was them… Shang and I are complete opposites! Even you and dad are at least similar in element…"
"You'll balance each other. Our entire universe is built on balance, Jade, remember that." My mother then got up and left me to think about what she'd said to me. Although, honestly, there really was no other option for me other than to just accept the fact that I was going to be the new Firelady… Oh, man… I was going to be the new Firelady.