"Ok it's done, who's going first?" I make my way towards the group engaging in conversation, and if by plan everyone in unison says "Toph." It's been about a week and a half since we arrived at the temple and with everything going on we hadn't had much time to find a proper place to build a tub to bathe in (Aang had been very picky about where we should build one, he doesn't want us to change much like Teo's father and their village had at the northern temple.)Earlier Toph and Haru earthbended a very large tub and I just finished filling it with water.

Our group is now laughing but Toph's expression stays the same. Cold and annoyed.

"Look I've told you lily livers that my dirt on my body is a healthy coating of my element! Come on Haru back me up on this!" She throws her hands up in the air frustrated.

"Just because I'm an earthbender to doesn't mean I like to stay dirty!" He chuckles.

Toph takes an exaggerated sigh. "And here I though we understood each other! Fine I'll go." She stands up and we start towards the bath. Before completely leaving the group I ask everyone to decide who will go next and so on.

"Well we all wanna go next how do we decide?" The Duke asks me.

I think for a moment. "Play the 4 elements, two out of three." This is probably one of the oldest games in the book. The rules are simple. All you have to do is choose one out of the four elements and make the elements motion with your hands and if your opponent has a weaker element you win.

"Alright, but I'm just saying now, boomerang counts as an element!" I hear Sokka shout as we continue walking.

"Ok Toph, it's right over here and it's made of earth as you know so you can still see. Plus it's not deep at all." She walking ahead of me now and waves her hand back at me.

"Yeah, yeah sweetness I got it."

I head back to the camp and learn of who will be bathing next. The next after Toph will be Sokka, then Haru, Aang, The Duke, Teo, and then me. As for Zuko, he's locked up in his room somewhere again. Occasionally he will eat with us and sometimes sleep by our campgrounds but for the most part he's in that room of his.

The water gets cold after first two people so I have to continuously heat the water over and over again. After about an hour it is finally my turn. I dip my toe into the water, it's lukewarm, usually I wouldn't mind, back in the watertribe we always bathed in cold water but ever since I learned how to control the temperatures, I've started to prefer to have the water hot so I heat it some more. Stripping my clothes off I enter the water. I usually leave my breast tunic and shorts on but this area is pretty secluded so I don't worry about anyone popping in besides I'm the last one to bathe. This feels so good I lower myself into the water more and close my eyes. I could spend an eternity in here.

My eyes are still closed but I hear footsteps and my eyes open slowly. I'm groggy and it feels like I'm in a dream for some reason. The footsteps near and it's Zuko.

I'm wide awake now and move to the back of the spa in shock. He has just seen me and his eyes are wide. I'm lucky, the steam is covering everything but my head and neck.

"I'm sorry!" He turns around quickly and begins to explain himself more. "S-Sokka told me you were probably done by now, that it's been more than an hour!"

I'm so flustered I don't even know what to say. "Leave!" I shout out him. I bring my arm out of the water and whip water by him. Zuko quickly walks away from the area. I'm so embarrassed, I put my hands over my face and slowly sink into the water.

…

It's late in the afternoon and everyone, even Zuko is just sitting around the fountain. We're all bored out of our minds, tired of training, and we've seen most of the temple so there really isn't much to do.

"Anyone have any ideas of what we can do?" Teo asks.

"I'm tapped out." Toph says. She's laying on the ground picking at her nails.

We all sigh and I spot Aang looking rather happy.

"Guys come over here!" He stops in front of the group and motions for us to follow.

"What is it Aang?" My brother stands up now, interested because let's face it anything could be better than what we are doing now.

"Each temple has one of the four largest pai sho tables! We can take turns playing on them!"

Sokka groans. "Pai sho! That has to be the most boring game ever, besides none of us really know how to play."

Aang is still grining though. "Come on, it's not that boring, I can teach you all to play!"

Our group looks at each other. By the looks on their faces they don't seem to mind going to check it out.

"I'll go." Haru stands up and walks by Aang. He's then followed by Teo, The Duke, Toph, eventually Sokka, and even Zuko stands to go. I glance up at him for a moment but he's not looking at me.

"Katara?" Aang says.

I'm still sitting down. "Oh, yeah let's go."

Our group begins to walk up stairs after stairs until we finally make it into a large room with a giant pai sho table in the middle.

"Ok who wants to play me first?" Aang says sitting on his knees waiting for an opponent. "Oh come on!"

Haru once again is the first to join. "I think I know about the game a little."

The rest of us sit around the table watching. Aang and Haru move their pieces for what feels like hours until Aang shouts out that he won.

"Nice game Haru."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah."

Zuko is sitting across from me and I watch him stand up and take a seat by the table. "I'll play next."

Aang laughs. "You know how to play?"

Zuko's face is plain, it must be annoying to have so many people think you're, well dumb.

"Yes, I actually do." He picks up a tile and moves it.

Aang shrugs and their match begins. It's only a few minutes when Zuko begins to talk again.

"I win." He states.

Aang looks at the board and the look on his face says that he's impressed.

"Nice job Zuko." Aang now takes his place with the rest of us.

Even though this seems like the most boring and time consuming game, I actually want to play. Plus I would get to tease Zuko about it for a while.

"I'll give it a try." I stand up and take a sit by the table.

Zuko resets the pawns and our game begins.

"Make your move." He says to me.

Picking up a pawn with a ship on it I move it to the white checkered spot. Zuko makes almost the same move but with a flower on top of it. Wait I think I've seen that before, I believe it's the white lotus tile.

Our game continues for about half an hour before our viewers get restless.

"How long are you guys going to keep at this!" Toph shouts.

I turn to her. "I'm not losing." I look back at Zuko and move another piece.

"Well, I'm not losing either." He picks up the same white lotus tile and moves it to the middle.

Toph groans and stands up. "We'll I'm not gonna stick around all night, I'm out of here." She walks out and is soon followed by Sokka and The Duke.

Zuko and I play in silent for another hour and when I remember it just wasn't us in the room I turn to see that the remaining watchers had left too.

I sigh. "Look, just lose so we can get out of here already."

"Why don't you lose then!"

"Because, because you saw me bathing last night so you owe me!" That wasn't really the reason, a dumb one at that and but I was still embarrassed by the incident.

He blushes. "I owe you nothing, it was by mistake. Who takes hour long baths anyway!" He retorts back moving his tile around the board.

Rolling my eyes I move another piece. "I do, especially when I'm the one cleaning and cooking all the time."

Silence fills the room until he breaks the tension with one word that people use when they are unsure what to say.

"So."

"So what?" I ask.

"I don't know, just talk about something. I hate this quietness."

Talk to him, about what?

"Like?"

He shrugs. "Anything I guess, you can tell me about how you guys found Aang."

It is a funny story how it happened actually so I guess I'll tell him.

"Sokka and I were fishing and I was still new to waterbending then so I tried to catch one by bending it out of the water. Then he got all mad calling it magic, and after he started saying how girls should just work and cook or something like that. He got me angry and out of rage I was just throwing my hands in the air without realizing I was cracking open the iceberg that had Aang inside."

He nods. "It's crazy when you think about it, missing out on a hundred years."

I take that in and come up with a response. "True, but Aang has made so many friends, he's not alone."

I smile at an old memory, and tell Zuko of how the very first thing he said to me was will you go penguin sledding with me.

"Are you serious? That was the very first thing! Not how did I get here, who are you, nothing?"

I laugh. "Nope, he's something else."

"No kidding."

We're talking more than playing the game of pai sho, I hadn't realized how late it was getting until I looked out the window and saw the sun setting, when a yawn came over me.

I lay my head down on the pai sho table and move my piece next to Zuko's.

"How long has it been?" I yawn again. I'm so tired, I really just want to sleep.

Zuko puts an arm on the table and rests his head on it. "A couple of hours, it should be dark soon."

"You're not going to give up are you?" I ask him.

He makes a quiet chuckle. "Not a chance. Why don't we just both give up."

"Not going to happen." I close my eyes for a moment then open them again.

"You're stubborn." He makes his piece jump over two of mine and captures them.

"Me? How about you?" I make the same move so were even.

"Not as much as you are."

"Sure you're not." I pause questioning whether or not I want to ask him something else. Oh well no harm really I guess. "Hey tell me something about you I don't know."

He shifts uncomfortably and there is that awkward silence we always have when we're around each other. "Like?"

"Anything, go on I told you some stuff."

He groans before he talks. "I never actually wanted to go after Aang but after.." Zuko stops talking and a sad expression takes over his face.

"It's ok you don't have to talk anymore." I tell him moving another piece.

That seems to snap him out of whatever trance or bad memory came into his head.

"We're going to be here all night aren't we?" I say.

It's pitch black outside now and I can hear badgerfrogs croaking. They are known for coming out at night, but on occasion they'll make appearances in the morning.

"Looks like it." Zuko almost says it with a laugh, but maybe it was just a chuckle.

And with that I swore I closed my eyes for just a few moments, but the next thing I know I hear footsteps come from the other side and open my eyes halfway to see Zuko coming towards me.

…

My eyes snap open and I sit up to look at my surroundings. I'm in a room, Zuko's room. Wait how did I get here? I recall the night before. We definitely didn't finish the game that's for sure. Oh right I think I was falling asleep. Great that's a forfeit. But, did he carry me here? And why did he take me to his room? For a moment I just accept what he just did and lay back down to sleep, and if anyone came in right at this second they'd see this ridiculous smile that was on my lips.

First off I'm just realized that I have been spelling Teo's name Theo. I'm so sorry but that's what I get for not doing my research on that, so from now I will be spelling it Teo, sorry for that.

Sorry for the wait on this one, I honestly had a rough time writing it. I knew what I wanted to happen but it was hard to get it out of my mind and on to "the paper". Hopefully it's alright, not sure how all of you feel about it but yeah. Review if you can. Thank you!