My head is pounding. It feels like there's someone stuck inside there, hammering away, indifferent to my pain and irritation. Whoever it is, they've been at work for a while. They were going at it all the way along my journey home.
The only thing I could think of doing once I got home was to retreat to the bedroom, curl up beneath the sheets and enjoy to the best of my ability some peace and quiet. However, I find myself sitting at the kitchen table, a newspaper spread out in front of me, and I've been frowning at it for the last ten minutes. My eyes are reading and re-reading the same sentences without taking in the words. I can't concentrate with all this noise!
The rooms are filled with the sound of our daughter's voice. I could hear her even as I walked up to the front door. I swear she started bawling louder still the moment I stepped into the house. Mako told me that he would take care of it, that I should go and get some rest. Well, I'd love to, but there's no way I'll be going to sleep with the way our daughter is crying for all the neighbours to hear.
I close my eyes against a particular pang within my skull, huffing irritably as I massage my temple. I can hear Mako's vain attempts to soothe our little girl. Cooing and shushing and pleading. I asked him what was wrong when I first came in, finding him walking to and fro in the living room with her held against his chest. He said he didn't know. He had fed her, burped her, changed her – she wouldn't stop crying. I hiss against my headache, against the noise, against his fruitless efforts to calm her down. For Spirits' sake, I think, pushing back the chair and getting to my feet, must I do everything myself?
"Mako, give her to me," I say, walking into the living room. He turns away from the window, our daughter held in his arms. Her eyes turn to me and she begins to complain, squirming in his embrace.
"It's fine, Korra –"
"Clearly it isn't."
He frowns, bouncing our daughter in his arms. "I'll settle her, alright? Go and get some rest. You need it. Don't worry about her."
"You've been trying for the last fifteen minutes and more," I say, walking up to them. She's leaning her head away from her father's chest now, eyes on me as her voice strains with effort.
"Korra –"
"Just give her to me," I snap, finally reaching the end of my tether.
His expression is sullen as he finally relents. I take her from him when he holds her out to me. Her crying is already quietening into sniffles as I lay her head against my shoulder and turn away to leave the room. When I take her upstairs, whispering as I gently stroke her hair, she turns her eyes down towards my breast, lips parting.
"You're hungry," I say, and she seems to whine her agreement, her little hands gripping the fabric of my top.
I take her to her room after she's fed, listening to the softness of her breathing. As I transfer her from my arms to her cot, I hear footsteps up the stairs and then along the landing towards our bedroom. When I hear Mako sigh, his weight settling onto the bed with a groan of springs, I begin to feel hooks of guilt at the pit of my stomach. I realise that I shouldn't have snapped at him as I lean over the side of the cot and look down at our daughter. I shouldn't have snatched her from him either, I think, chewing uncertainly on my lower lip.
"I've caused daddy a bit of trouble," I tell her as she looks up at me with his eyes. "I have to make it up to him."
I find Mako facing the window, sitting on the far side of the bed, hands hanging between his legs. His shoulders, broad and strong, are slumped, and I hate to think that I've only helped add to the weight he carries constantly upon them.
I join him on the bed and come up behind him, sitting on my knees. Wordlessly, I bring my hands up to his shoulders and begin to try and ease the tension from them. His body rocks slightly under my ministrations. Mako doesn't speak, and he doesn't turn to me. I can't see his expression, to try and read the look in his eyes. But I know that he is hurting.
"I'm sorry," I murmur then.
"It's alright," he replies, his voice empty and low.
"No, it isn't."
I can see now, with eyes that aren't clouded by irritation and impatience. I see his insistence for me to let him calm down our daughter. I see how he holds onto her even as she strains and reaches for me. I see the pain in his eyes as I take her from him and she immediately begins to quieten.
"Tell me what's wrong," I say, bringing my hands down from his shoulders to his arms, fingers ghosting along the curve of his bicep before reaching his elbow. He remains quiet as I tuck my hands beneath his arms, bringing them to the sides of his waist.
"Mako," I whisper his name, leaning close, my chest against his back. I breathe it again, just before I bring my lips to his cheek. I've known him like this before, when he becomes a stone, when he takes all his pain and his thoughts and bottles them up within himself. But I know how to reach him. I learned how to get past the walls he had become so adept at forging.
I kiss his cheek, his ear, the side of his neck, all the while murmuring his name, all the while knocking at the door of his heart, patiently seeking invitation. I bring my arms around his waist, holding him close. Here, the complications of my identity and tumultuous thoughts are non-existent. I am simply a wife, one who wishes to share the burden of her husband, to hear words spill from tightly pressed lips.
"Mako," I call once more, murmuring against his skin. I'll never tire of his name upon my tongue. I can feel the walls breaking. He gives no outward sign of it, but I know.
"Tell me what's wrong?" I say, tilting my head to lightly kiss his collarbone. I smile a moment later when a sigh escapes his lips. He's always been particularly sensitive there. He brings a hand up to meet mine above his stomach, and then he begins to speak. I rest my head upon his shoulder and listen.
"I feel like you don't need me, either of you," he says. "I feel like I hardly know our daughter, like she hardly knows me. It seems like whenever I pick her up or hold her, she wants you instead. You know her better than I do. You're here with her while I'm spending all hours of the day stuck at work. She's barely awake when I leave, and sleeping by the time I get back. It feels like I'm missing every single day of her life. I just…I just don't know what to do when you leave her with me."
I don't speak as he gives pause. I know there's more he needs to say. So I give him the time and space he needs to say it.
"I'm confused, Korra. I'm lost. I love you, but you won't let me show you I do. I still think you're beautiful. And sexy. And gorgeous. I want you, more than anything. You're all I think about. The thought of you gets me through the day. But when I come home…we spend what little time we have before tomorrow arguing and complaining and snapping at each other. And even then, I still want you. I want to be close to you, to hold you, to make love to you. But you don't want to. You'll say you're tired, or you'll feign sleep before I come to bed. I can tell the difference," he says.
"I understand," he continues, "you're looking after our daughter, day after day. It isn't easy. But, Korra, I love you. Sometimes…sometimes I ask myself if you still love me."
I can hear in his voice that he thinks poorly of what he just said. He knows I still love him. I know I still love him. But perhaps I haven't really showed him I do, not for a while. I can hear the need for reassurance in his words, as a father and a husband. I'm not sure what I can say in return. But I can show him.
"Give me your hands."
He holds them up with my direction, palms facing towards the ceiling. With my arms still curved around his body, I position my hands above his, a small distance between us. I send forth my will and a spark is conjured into being at my fingertips. It swiftly blossoms and becomes a flame, bright and orange and warm. I cause it to grow further, pushing it towards his hands. It's a reckless, dangerous act – were we not who we are.
Rather than being burned, Mako brings the flame under his control, stealing the bite from its heat. I wait patiently, focused upon the bridge we are building together. The fiery bulb hangs in the air between us, tongues of flame flitting from its depths. It's not long before it can neither be defined as belonging to me or Mako. It is the perfect balance of our will, harmonious and delicate and deadly all in the same moment.
We work to temper its heat as the flame grows ever larger, ever stronger, feeling only a soft breath of warmth as its tongue licks our flesh. The true strength of its heat lies at its centre, and if either of us merely slip, this will all end in catastrophe. But we won't. He won't. I won't.
There is no need for words now. Words would have failed me had I tried to produce them. I imbue the flame with love, with desire, with passion, and Mako responds in kind. He speaks more loudly and more deeply than he ever did with his voice, and something within me swells, a spark within me struck and flaring brighter than the sun.
Warmth is flooding through my being. Walls crumble as it meets them, worries and doubts purged in a flash of heat. I almost buckle beneath its strength. I never knew; I never knew. He desires me so. He yearns for me more than food or water or air. And I never realised just how desperately I need him, too.
The flame gradually shrinks, flickering and dissipating into nothingness. But it is not gone. Mako turns, and his golden eyes are imbued with its heat.
I succumb, willingly and with a wholesome, wonderful thrill rising up from my core. His lips are upon mine without a moment's delay. His hand upon my cheek guides me into a deeper kiss, and I fall back onto the bed. My arms loop around his neck, pulling him down with me. I delight in his weight, his warmth, his fingers upon my skin, his desire to have me, all of me, no matter what I thought of myself.
Mako whispers my name as I lie naked before him. I gasp his, holding onto him for all I'm worth. He takes us towards the edge, towards that blissful horizon I once fled from. There is no shame now, no doubts or worries to hold me back. Skin upon skin; our breaths heavy and short; his eyes roving over my form, hungry and appreciative – I glory in all of it. And when we finally meet that edge, after we tumble into the depths of our passion and desire and I hold him close, our bodies tired, aching and slick with sweat, I whisper "I love you," and he does not hesitate to respond.