Chapter Eight: Family

"No! Wrong! Do it again!" Toph's loud voice echoes across the field, where Sokka is helping Katara set up the picnic lunch they'd brought (alright, the lunch Katara had brought—Sokka had mostly hovered and stolen bites of savory rice when her back was turned). Aang and Toph are supervising the children, and from the sounds of things, Toph is squeezing in some last-minute training for Lin before the festivities. Sokka absently sticks a piece of fried moo-sow in his mouth, sucking the sauce from his fingers as he watches the kids. Aang shows Tenzin how to make an air scooter, while Kya and Bumi climb a tree and discreetly pelt their younger brother with acorns.

Lin, on the other hand, is red-faced and panting, struggling under the weight of the rock her mother's put on her shoulders. Sokka double-takes, himself—it's a huge rock, bigger than the girl herself. He bites his lip and Katara puts a hand on his shoulder.

"Maybe you should go tell Toph to give it a rest for the day," she says worriedly, and he nods, standing up. Before he can get to his friend, however, there's a scream, a crash, and in a whirl of orange cloth and dirt Aang has Lin scooped in his arms, the rock the six-year-old had been carrying previously crunched into the ground. Toph's face is dark and thunderous.

"Toph, that was too much," Aang says sharply. "It could have hurt her."

"No, it couldn't," Toph replies. "If she'd been in any real danger, I'd have handled it. And anyway, she can take it. Put her down," she frowns, "because she's going to try it again."

"No," Aang disagrees, his voice going to dangerous territory, "she's not. You're pushing her too hard."

"Like I pushed you?" Toph snaps, throwing her chin up and standing toe-to-toe with her friend. Lin cowers closer into Aang's chest. "She's my kid. I think I know what she can and can't deal with. Stop babying her and let me do my job."

"No!" Lin shrieks, her voice muffled. Toph cocks her head.

"What did you just say to me?" Toph says softly. Sokka picks up the pace, because he knows that tone of voice and knows it's not going to be pretty if she's not stopped.

"I'm not gonna do it again!" Lin replies, more strongly. She scrambles out of Aang's arms and stands on her own two feet, glaring up at her mother. "I can't do it. You're always saying I can do stuff when I can't!"

"You can do it, you're just—" Toph argues, but she's arguing with a child who has every stubborn bone in her body that Toph herself has, and Lin interrupts her.

"No! I'm not gonna do it anymore!" But because her face is red and Sokka knows she's released the floodgates, she keeps going. "I hate you! I wish you weren't my mom!"

With that declaration hanging in the open air, Lin stomps away, leaving Toph with a tightly-shut jaw and over-bright eyes. Sokka looks at Aang, and after some silent conferencing Aang takes off after Lin. Katara herds her children back towards the picnic blanket, and Sokka puts a hand on Toph's shoulder.

"You know she doesn't mean that," he says softly, but she brushes him off, putting one highly sensitive hand on the rock Lin left behind. With a sharp jab she reduces it to rubble. But she doesn't stop there, continuing to pound and stomp and punch, until both her and Sokka are sneezing from the dust. He lets her take out her frustration calmly, then when all that's left is dust he takes her hand and gently leads her away, sitting with her underneath the tree that until recently had held his mischievous niece and nephew.

"She doesn't mean it," Sokka repeats. Toph sniffs, scrubbing at her eyes.

"How do you know that?" she asks, her voice rough.

"Because I knew another girl like her once," Sokka shrugs. "Tough, stubborn, headstrong. Thought she hated her parents, too, but eventually came to terms with the fact that she didn't, not at all."

Toph smears her nose with the back of her hand. "Haven't talked to them in years, though," she grunts. "I don't…I don't even…" she coughs, then rubs more vigorously at her welling eyes. "Sokka, I don't even know if they're alive anymore. They don't know they're grandparents. Or…well…if they do, they didn't hear it from me. What kind of kid does that, anyway? Just…shuts their parents out?"

"The kind that had a hard childhood," Sokka replies. He hesitates, then puts his arm around her. "I know why you're hard on Lin, but keep in mind she's still just a little kid. Just…just remember to take it easy on her, from time to time." He nudges her. "And to apologize, if you push her past her limit."

She nods absently, but lunch is almost done with before Aang and Lin come back to the picnic. Lin sits with Tenzin and doesn't talk to her mother, not that Toph tries overly hard to make conversation, but once she's eaten her fill Toph takes her aside. Sokka can't hear what they're saying, but it ends with hugging and Sokka isn't worried.

"Was she okay?" he asks Aang. The airbender nods, swatting Bumi's hand away from his plate.

"Just shaken up," he nods. "She's just like her mother, though. She was more angry at herself for not being able to lift the rock than she was at Toph for pushing her."

Sokka plays with his chopsticks for a minute before saying, "You know, she hasn't talked to her parents since before Lin was born."

Katara sighs. "I know," she says softly. "I've…been keeping in touch with Lady Bei Fong."

Sokka blinks. "And you didn't tell her?"

"Poppy doesn't want another disastrous reunion, like last time," Katara replies calmly. "I promised I wouldn't tell Toph until Poppy and her husband are ready. If they've reached out to her and she's ignored them, that's her business."

"I think she might be ready for a reconnection," Sokka says, quietly, because Toph is coming back, holding Lin's hand.

Later on Toph and Katara close themselves up in Aang's office while Aang and Sokka roughhouse with the kids, and a few hours later Toph comes out and announces that her parents are coming to visit.

The week leading up to the Bei Fongs' arrival is a hectic one; between Toph furiously attempting to finish all her paperwork with Aang's help, Sokka and Katara frantically cleaning the apartment, and Toph pacing back and forth until there's a visible path in the floor, Sokka isn't sure how much more his nerves can take.

The night before the arrival, once he's helped Aang clear the dishes in Toph's apartment and he's thanked Katara for the excellent meal, Toph takes him aside.

"I'm not sure I can do this," she murmurs, her fingers weaving and twitching worse than ever. "My mother's telegrams sounded civil enough, but who knows what my dad's gonna do?"

Sokka runs his fingers up and down her arms, because that always seems to calm her down, but he doesn't really have a good answer for her. "It'll be okay," he finally ekes out, feeling useless, and advises her to try and relax.

"It's just for a few days. You can do this," he urges.

The next morning, all four of them are there at the docks, waiting for the Bei Fongs to arrive. Aang's children (rather, the two eldest) are surprisingly well-behaved, and Lin didn't resist the hair-brushing Katara forced her into. Neither did Toph, for that matter; she's still wearing her Chief of Police uniform, fresh from the office and jittery, one of her hands around Sokka's bicep on the wooden pier.

The ship comes into view through the smog slowly, then is all too soon docking, and then an elderly Lord and Lady Bei Fong disembark, looking strangely antique in their traditional clothing. A servant follows, struggling under the weight of their bags.

It's silent, too silent, as Toph keeps her mouth shut and her parents don't say much of anything, but, to everyone's shock, it's Lin who breaks the silence.

"Are you my grandparents?" she asks. She takes a few steps forward, dragging Toph with her, and cocking her head to the side. Poppy Bei Fong leans over slightly in an attempt to get on the girl's level.

"I believe so," she says sweetly, a smile creasing her finely-lined face. "Are you my granddaughter?"

"I guess so," Lin shrugs. "Mom?"

Poppy straightens as Toph lets go of Sokka's arm and relies fully on her daughter's direction, taking a few more steps forward and looking uncertain.

"Hi, Mom," Toph says. "Hi, Dad."

The silence stretches on until something apparently breaks, and Toph is engulfed in her parents' arms, Poppy sobbing and Lao squeezing his eyes shut like he can't believe it. Toph lets go of Lin's hand and fists her own into her parents' clothes, burying her face in her father's neck.

"We're so sorry," Lao keeps saying, as though by repeating it he could repent for the years of silence, and Toph hiccups.

"I'm sorry, too."

One way or another, the Bei Fongs let go of their daughter and inspect their granddaughter, who is obliging and chatters at them all the way back to the apartment. Sokka and Toph have a quick conversation, and he heads Aang and Katara off.

"We'll visit them later," he says softly as Toph directs her family towards her home. "Right now, she needs some alone time with her parents. Reconnect, you know."

"Are we sure they're not gonna try to drag her off again?" Aang teases. At least, he tries to.

"What, big bad metalbender like her?" Katara smiles. "She'll be alright." She takes her brother's hand. "Do you want to come back with us? Stay for dinner?"

"I'll be alright," Sokka shrugs, smiling back. "I'd better go home in case someone blows out the side of a building."

Katara grins, but there's a hairline crack in her expression and Sokka can feel it in his own. Watching Toph reconnect with her parents makes them both wish theirs were still around. Aang clasps his shoulder, and for a moment he feels guilty. The moment passes, and he ruffles Bumi's hair, squatting to look his niece and nephews in the face.

"Give your parents plenty of trouble from me, alright?" he grins, winking as Bumi salutes him. "Alright, buzz off. I'll be fine."

So he goes home. He strains his ears, but he knows his hearing isn't good enough to listen in on conversations happening half a block away. However, his guessing is more or less over when, sometime after midnight, there's a quiet tap at his door.

He opens it up to find Toph, still in her uniform, bleary-eyed but smiling a small smile.

"We're alright," she says peacefully. "They're staying for about a week. And I'm gonna…" she bites her lip, sighs, and sticks her hands in her pockets. "I'm gonna try to loosen up on Lin. It's not fair to her for me to always be so hard on her. I know she's great, and I know she's talented…but trying to force her to being just like me doesn't fix anything."

"You're pretty smart, Chief," Sokka grins, leaning against his doorjamb. "The visit go well, I guess?"

"Yup," Toph smiles. "I guess it's pretty hard to stay mad when I'm Chief of Police and Dad can't be overprotective anymore."

"And when you've had some sake with your dinner," Sokka teases. She chuckles.

"He drank more than I did," she admits. "I think he's still trying to adjust to being a grandpa." Her smile fades a little. "Lin adores them."

"Big fancy rich folk?" Sokka guesses. She shakes her head.

"They're just so…understanding," Toph sighs. "I mean…I'm glad, but…"

"You wish they could've been like that when you were her age," Sokka says quietly. Toph bites her lip, but nods.

"Well, you can't change the past," he shrugs. "But they're here now. And if Lin has an opportunity to know her grandparents, take that opportunity. Family doesn't last forever, no matter how bad you wish they did."

They're silent for a few minutes, then Toph vaults on her tiptoes and plants a kiss on his cheek. At least, he thinks that was her intention; she got the corner of his mouth, instead.

"Goodnight, Sokka."

"'night," he returns, shutting the door as she walks away and fingering his mouth before shrugging and going to bed.

A/N: I'll be straight with y'all: I'm most worried about this chapter. I'm afraid it tries to do too much and I failed, but I knew that I wanted Toph to reconnect with her parents at some point. It happens late, later than maybe I'd like, but maybe being away from my own family now has made me go gooey over this chapter.