This fic is also on my tumblr blog where my username is Kuno-chan and my blog name is Dragoness Ramblings.

Disclaimer: Legend of Korra belongs to Michael Dante DiMartino and Bryan Konietzko

Human beings are always at war with themselves. Tragically, it's only natural that we lose a battle every now and again.

The Break

"I... I failed?"

How?

She... she couldn't believe it.

How?

She had studied so long and hard into the night... into the wee hours of the morning... how could she have just failed outright? Not once in Jinora's academic career had she ever held a test of hers that marked a failure in glaring red ink. Let alone a rather horrible failure. Looking at the exam, she wouldn't have been surprised if her score was at the bottom of the class.

"That's why I wanted to give it to you after the period," said Mr. Koryu gently. "I didn't want anybody making a fuss if they saw it and having it end up disrupting class or distracting you. This was my first major exam of the year... I'm... very surprised, Jinora. This is most unlike you."

While she was grateful that nobody was there to catch a glance at her miserable excuse for a test score and make some loud ruckus about perfect princess Jinora Gyatso messing up in something school related... the silence was apparent and actually quite terrifying. It screamed in her ear louder than anything she'd ever heard in her eighteen years of life and she wasn't sure what would have made her want to cry more: absolute silence or absolute mockery.

"I-I-I... this has to be a mistake... I studied! I did!" she looked up from her paper, her eyes about as dry as her mouth now felt and unable to tear up like she knew her body wanted them too. "Mr. Koryu, this c-c... this can't be right."

Mr. Koryu frowned sympathetically. "I'm afraid it is, Jinora. I even double, triple checked to make sure I wasn't simply missing something. As I said, I was very surprised. Your answers seemed like they were half thought through. Like you weren't all the way there when you were writing them. Some of these hardly make sense to the problems. I know that Advanced Calculus and Trigonometry might not be your strongest suit exactly, but you've always done decently enough."

True to his word, Jinora had done merely decently enough in his class. Math wasn't her favorite subject, but it hadn't exactly been that hard most of the time. With a little extra effort she was usually on top of her game.

But this class had been different. It was an honors math class sent straight from Vaatu himself and Jinora hated it. The way Mr. Koryu taught was fine, but it confused her sometimes. Then, when she asked him for help or tried to teach it to herself she usually didn't get it all the way. However, with enough effort she could usually pull a more than satisfactory grade after consulting the internet for a few hours and trying not to pull her own hair out.

She had sworn she'd been ready. She'd studied. She'd had a little more coffee than she usually did this morning and even did a a little more review on the way to school. If anything, she should have been more than prepared! What had gone so wrong?

It didn't matter. How could she fix it?

"I-I can retake it! Please, Mr. Koryu!"

"Jinora, now, you know my policy. No retakes on major unit exams. Quizzes and minor tests only. If I did it for you then I'd have to do it for everyone else."

The temperature in the room dropped at least ten degrees just then. She swore it did. Was her blood running cold?

"Mr. Koryu, please. I won't fail this time! I promise I won't! If I don't retake this I'll be failing the class! I-"

"I'm sorry, Jinora," he shook his head sadly. "I really can't. It wouldn't be fair for everyone else."

No... this could not be happening... this could not. Be. Happening.

"B-but... but I..."

"It's alright, Jinora. This class is easy for some and hard for others. There will be a next time. The homework for this week will get your grade out of the failing zone as long as they're done to satisfaction. Next time around, come to me and I can help you or have someone tutor you, okay?"

She nodded weakly, feeling as if apart of her consciousness had just slipped away, and then walked out as Mr. Koryu gestured for her to get to her next class. Tutor her? Since when did she suddenly need tutoring? Had she ever really needed atutor besides her father maybe when she was younger?

What was going on in her life? She walked down the hall, not exactly watching where she was going as much as her feet just kind of remembered where to go. Opening her locker, she saw books and folders and school supplies and she just... she just wanted to burn it all.

Why was this happening to her? She'd done everything she could to prepare herself for anything school had to throw at her this year, yet she was making lower grades than any other year before. They weren't horrid, but they weren't nearly as good as her usual. Now this?

What was she going to do? Couldn't she fix this somehow? Well, she couldn't just march back into Mr. Koryu's class and beg for a retake when he'd so clearly said no. The only thing to be done was to complete her homework properly this week, but obviously she'd shown herself that she didn't know what she was doing. How could she have let this happen? It was such a mess.

And on top of it all, she felt so, so lonely. Nobody got it. Nobody understood how meaningful this all was and there didn't seem to be anybody she could go to at the moment.

Would the librarian still ask her to be a tutor now if she got wind of that? It was a little troublesome sometimes, but she didn't mind being a tutor to people and she certainly could. Would people stop asking her for help if they knew she had failed a test so horribly? People always asked her for help and she couldn't exactly say that it didn't give her a vague sense of achievement when they did.

People relied on her and she'd be a huge liar if she said that didn't make her feel something. As if... as if she were accomplished in some sort of way for others to feel like she was the go to person for all things academic. Perhaps that was why things had been so frustrating in the recent months going into her last year of high school. She felt like that was the only way to get that sense of accomplishment, but at the same time it could also be so draining both physically and emotionally.

On one hand, she wanted people to let her be so she could live her life. It made her feel bad, but she never asked to be anybody's role model. Her siblings were a given, but not the entire school.

On the other hand, she wanted them to bother her. It... it made her feel satisfied. Not good exactly, but satisfied. As if this was what she was supposed to be doing.

She'd won many academic awards over the years, been on honor roll, her parents had told her they were proud of of her more times than she could count and teachers had praised her all her years, but... was it horrible that all of those things didn't give her the sense of importance that somebody prodding her for help in their history class did?

This failing test might have just shattered that.

Then what?

She'd have to start all over.

She'd have to show people that all her hours studying extra, all those awards, all those times on the honor roll weren't flukes or just little gold stars on her record. They meant something. She didn't like to brag about them, but having them there backed her up. Damn it all to the Fog of Lost Souls, she had earned those.

One little test could not be taking all that away from her now. Not in such an important year.

She couldn't just start all over again.

"Hey."

Jinora looked up out of her locker, blinking away a wetness from her eyes. It was the strangest thing in the world to have her boyfriend come up to her and not be greeted with a kiss or a loving smile. It was downright heartbreaking to have him standing there, hands in his pockets and so much that he obviously wanted to say when she had wanted to talk to him for the last week. She wasn't sure whether she wanted to hug him, be angry with him or just run off and cry at the sight of him.

"H-hey..." she said, her voice shaking against her will.

Kai looked down for a moment then back at her, hunching his shoulder slightly. He said something about talking after that, but Jinora wasn't sure... she couldn't hear him. Her heart was pounding too hard in her ears and her mind kept trying to drift back somewhere else.

How surprised would Kai be when he found out about her test...?

Should she have cared at this point?

She was kidding herself. Of course she cared. If anything, she cared more because it was him. If there was anybody she had always loved hearing was proud of her it was Kai. Now that it came to mind... was that all over now? She kind of wanted to be angry herself because she wasn't angry with him. After all, that was how these things were supposed to go, right?

But she just missed him so much and that was probably one of the most frustrating parts. She missed him and she had tried to talk to him, but now he was approaching her and it was supposed to be as simple as him saying that he wanted to talk?

She should have been mad at him too.

She wanted to give him the cold shoulder the same way he had done to her and she was kind of hating herself in that moment for not being able to bring herself to be like that.

After all, even through all this they both loved still each other...

Was it really too late to take another shot at convincing Mr. Koryu to reconsider?

"Jinora?"

His voice brought her back. "W-what?"

"I... I said that we should probably talk..." he said, frowning slightly. "...are you okay?"

She wanted to tell him yes and shoo him away.

She didn't want him to see her like this.

In the end, she said nothing.

"Jinora... I know that we haven't really talked for a few days, but you know that if there's anything wrong you can tell me."

"Kai, do I look like I'm okay?"

Suddenly, all the hurt from the last week came washing into her chest and she just couldn't get rid of it. As much as she missed him and wanted to just hug him or kiss him, she couldn't shake that wounded feeling that had built up from him essentially avoiding her. She understood that he was hurt too, but...

"Jinora..."

"You've barely spoken to me for seven days," she said, her voice shaking now. "Seven days. And now you're asking me if I'm okay?"

"Of course I am... I know I was mad and, yeah, that was a bit wrong on my part, but it's not like I all of a sudden don't give a damn," he said somewhat dejectedly. "Look, it's not like we're broken up or anything. I just-"

"Really!? Because it sure felt like it!" she laughed bitterly at him now, a sense of control slipping as she felt her book bag drop to the ground. "I tried and tried and tried to talk to you! I wanted to talk it out, but you refused to so much as look at me! It was like I was a nobody to you and now you want to talk!?"

Kai frowned at her and his eyes narrowed.

"You know you could never be a nobody to me... look, I'm sorry! Alright!? I'm sorry that I-"

"You're sorry!? You're sorry!?"

"Yes, I am! I am sorry! I can't make you believe me or accept it, but I wanted to at least see if we could talk it out now! I just needed a couple days-"

"A couple days!?" she almost cried, getting louder now and it taking everything in her power not to screech that at him. The hall was empty except for the two of them and second period had started, but she couldn't have cared less right then.

He sighed. "I know it became longer than that I just didn't know how-"

"It was seven days, Kai!" she balled her hands into fists as her eyes stung. "You and your issues couldn't figure it out for seven days!?"

"Would you stop throwing that in my face?"

Thankfully, the hall where her locker was located wasn't near any active classrooms because now he growled at her and got about as loud as she did. "I get it! I'm messed up, but I don't need to be reminded about it! Maybe that's why I haven't talked to you for a week, huh? Maybe I don't want us to have to bring it up!"

"Well, somebody obviously should!"

His mouth fell open a bit, but he went on.

"What's the matter with you today!? I get that you're mad at me, but this is starting to sound like it's about a lot more than just me!"

She scowled and made to turn away from him, but her body didn't move and it was like she didn't have the strength or the will to. One part of her wished he'd go away and another part of her wished he'd just pull her into a crushing hug. The thought only made her tear up more and, stubbornly, she looked up to fight it off.

He took a deep breath.

"... just... tell me what's the matter, okay?"

"What's the matter?" she repeated, her voice cracking now. "What's the matter? I'll tell you what's the matter! I failed, Kai!"

She walked up to him and shoved her exam in his chest. Looking slightly stunned, he took a second to glance over it and furrowed his brows in sympathy.

She couldn't stop the tears now as they spilled over. Her voice cracked even more and her lip quivered.

"My life is falling apart..."

"...Jinora... that's not true-"

She looked up sharply.

"How is it not true!? Nobody's ever going to trust me again! That's what's the matter! You know what Mr. Koryu said!? That he'd get me a tutor! Me!"

Her chest was going numb with the harsh beating it was taking from the inside and her voice was getting hoarse from that same harshness coming out of her throat.

"Jinora-"

She ignored his pleas. He didn't understand. This was suffocating her. This big, fat failure of hers was undoing everything she had ever worked for.

"YOU have not spoken to me for seven days, all my grades are down, I've had a total of maybe ten hours of sleep this entire week, so much coffee that I finished all that we had in the house, my sister and I still aren't talking, my mother is trying to pry me open, my brothers are living their lives completely un-fucking-obstructed-"

He was looking at her now with widening eyes and started walking towards her ever so slowly.

"Jinora-"

"Don't JINORA me. When my dad finds out about this-"

In that instant, the entire world froze.

Her father.

Piece by little piece started falling away as that realization sank in like ice water leaking into a dark, bitter cavern.

Her father was going to hear about this exam.

Her father was going to know that she had failed so horribly.

All at once everything in her brain lit on fire and smoke must have started seeping into her lungs. She couldn't talk. She couldn't breathe.

Kai said something else, but Jinora couldn't hear him over the ticking bomb in her chest.

Her hands came up to cover her mouth and nose. She started to gasp violently for air. The smoke was going to choke her and she only gasped harder. She spun in some direction and her forehead met something. Leaning against it, she continued to gasp as a painful throbbing was coming from the bomb that was her heart.

She felt hands on her shoulder, but jerked away.

Her heart was to about to explode. That could be the only explanation for all the pain that was drumming through her ribs and meeting behind her sternum.

Raava, she was about to pass out.

There was no air whatsoever.

She clenched her eye shut.

She didn't want to see the flames about to engulf her.

Sweet Raava, she was about to die.

Wait, someone was talking to her...

"...I'm here, okay? You're going to be alright. Okay, Jinora? You hear my voice?"

She nodded, but refused to open her eyes.

"You're fine. You're okay. Do you want to get out of here?"

She nodded again. She needed to get to somewhere where there was air.

"My hand is out. Take my hand. I'll take you away from here."

Anywhere. Just somewhere.

She took the hand and felt herself being led away. For the longest time, she just felt herself being pulled along. Her gasping hadn't stopped, one hand still over her mouth and she refused to open her eyes.

But the air was colder now.

Were the flames gone?

-:-:-:-

Groggily, Jinora woke up.

She groaned and shivered. Looking around, she noticed the frost on the ground and the bare branches above her. Roots embedded into the ground acted as a support for her legs to lay against, the trunk of the tree behind her back. Over her body, she noticed, was a black leather jacket that was tucked around her. Turning her head, she found Kai sitting on the other side of the root, his head resting against the trunk. She frowned at him only in a thin long sleeved shirt, their book bags cradled between his legs.

He seemed to have felt her staring and opened his eyes to turn and look at her. Sitting forward now, he shifted around so he could face her more and tried to smile.

"You..." he seemed to try and think about his words. "You back now?"

Miserably, she nodded.

"What..." she began in a whisper, clearing her throat and trying to talk normal again. "What happened?"

"I, um.. I think, well... in short, you were starting to freak out and you just kind of stopped talking... all of a sudden, you started hyperventilating and put your head inside of your locker. I, uh... I started talking to you and I brought you here. That's a really simple way of putting it, but that's the gist of it I suppose..."

She turned away a little.

"I've... I don't..." she frowned. "...I've never felt like that before."

They sat in silence for a few moments, Jinora trying to process whatever had just happened. It was like all her fear had taken over at once and she hadn't been able to handle it. In fact, that seemed like that was exactly what had happened.

"...how did you know what to do?" she asked quietly.

"I... I remembered there was a kid at one of the foster homes I was at. He started to freak out a little bit like you did and his sister came and just started to talk to him... I took a shot and tried to do what she did. It was more of a gamble really..."

She fell silent.

She'd read about these types of things in her health textbooks before, but living it was a completely different experience...

"It's not exactly super uncommon to see foster kids with anxiety. Especially ones who have been separated from their siblings. That was the only time I've seen it before like yours, but..."

She felt her lip quiver again and bit down on the inside. Feeling small now, she hung her head. "I..." she croaked, "I'm sorry for saying that you had... y'know. I guess I'm the one who needs to take care of her issues."

Shame and guilt washed over her as she silently handed him back his jacket. Here she'd been saying that he had issues to work out when now it seems like she shouldn't have been talking.

For a second, he didn't say anything and she felt her eyes rapidly tear up again for the millionth time that day.

"Is it okay if I hug you now?"

She nodded, beginning to cry again miserably and leaned into him. He crossed over the root between them and enveloped her in his arms.

It felt so good to feel him hold her again, but she still felt so ashamed.

"I'm so sorry," she whimpered, clutching onto his shirt and her head tucked into him. "I'm so sorry for everything. I was so stupid..."

"Ssh, shh... don't be sorry," he shushed her, leaning his head on top of hers and soothingly rubbing her arm. "I'm the one needs to say he's sorry... Jinora, I cannot believe what I just put you through and in no way do I deserve you. I'm so, so sorry. I just... I'm the biggest idiot on the face of the planet."

"No, no," she coughed through her crying as he now got them both onto their feet while still hanging onto her. "I was the one who asked you that stupid question. I just... I shouldn't have asked. If I hadn't asked then this wouldn't have happened."

Kai shook his head.

"No, you asked a question and I was too stubborn to hear you out. Jinora, you were right. I... I do have my own issues."

"No, I shouldn't have said that!"

"It's alright. It's true... I was doing to the very thing I was afraid you would do to me and there is no excuse for that. Issues or not. Look what happened to you because of me..."

She shook her head at him.

"No, I... I've been feeling that way for a while. I just- but that time-"

He shushed her again soothingly and started rubbing her back. "It's okay. It's over now. Breathe."

She did and took a deep breath to gather herself.

"Kai..." she whispered. "I felt like I was going to just drop dead right there. I felt like my chest was going to break open. I-I didn't know what to do."

He held her tighter now, protectively and warmly wrapping his arms around her. "To be honest, I was afraid you were too. Jinora, you really scared me."

Tears continued to leak from her eyes.

"I-I-I was terrified. Kai, I've never felt like that before. Ever..."

"It's over now. You're completely safe."

They just stayed like that for a moment, holding and leaning into each other.

Kai pulled back slightly.

"Can I ask you something?" he asked.

She nodded.

"You have nothing to be sorry for. I want you to know that. But I just want to know... why did you ask me that?"

She looked up at him.

"Kai, I... I just wanted to hear you say it. I shouldn't have listened to Meng Meng in the first place, but if you had said it then that would have made it the truth for me."

He let out a breath and, in all his sweetness, leaned down to plant a kiss on her lips. She turned her face up for it, missing his lips immensely.

When they pulled back, he sighed and closed his eyes.

"When... when my mother left me in the park that day..."

Jinora looked up, a slight frown on her mouth and a crease in her brows.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "When my mother left me... that day she gave me ten yuans. My mother had never given me a real gift before and, at first, that was what I thought it was. I stayed in the park like she told me too... I stayed there for hours waiting for her. I thought something might have happened to her and for the longest time I never really knew. Years later, I realized she hadn't given me those yuans as a gift. She had given me them to live off of."

Horrified, Jinora said nothing and let him continue.

He opened his eyes.

"Realizing that had to be the sickest feeling I've ever felt and... and I started feeling that way again with you when you asked me that. I didn't how to face that. So, I didn't."

"Kai... I never want to make you feel the way she did. Never."

"And I don't ever, ever want to make you feel what you just felt. I'm so sorry."

This time, Jinora wrapped her hands in the collar of his jacket and brought him down to kiss her.

"I guess..." she began when they pulled back. "I guess we're just both really imperfect, huh?"

"I suppose... but, in a way, facing that made us even more perfect for each other, don't you think?"

She cracked a smile in what felt like forever. "I think so."

Kai leaned his forehead down on hers and looked into her eyes.

"Jinora... I need you to know something. You're amazing. You're smart, you're sweet and you're kind. You're always willing to lend someone a helping hand and no school record, good or bad, could ever measure up to the kind of pure spirit you have and that's what I fell so madly in love with. But even to me you have nothing to prove. You have nothing to prove to me or anybody else in this world. You are not a hound hamster on a wheel. I know that me saying that is a thousand times easier than you actually dealing with it, but you being aware of it is the first step to that and... and I promise you here and now that I will never leave you alone like that again."

Regardless of the frigid air around them, Jinora felt a warmth overcome her. She sniffed, wiping her last few leaking tears with the base of her hand.

"C-can we just go somewhere?" she asked. "Just skip school for the rest of the day?"

"Of course we can," he said, his arms slackening from around her now and moving to hold her with his hands. "Mako and Bolin don't get off until later on this evening. We can just go to my place and you can take a nap. Would you like that?"

She nodded at him with a smile.

Gathering their book bags, they walked away from the tree arm in arm.

"I love you."

"I love you too."

Who said what those last two lines? I don't think it even matters :)

When I was writing this, to be honest, it felt kind of messy, but I think that was how it was supposed to feel like. This situation just got kind of messy and I think even the making up had to be messing considering the circumstances. I don't have much to say to this one here, but if you guessed it, Jinora did a panic attack. I've built up this characteristic of Jinora having anxiety and being a people pleaser and I hope that this chapter really shed a lot more light on that side of her. Everybody experiences a panic attack differently so I tried to describe Jinora's as unique to her own problems (there was a lot of stuff about suffocation in there). This isn't the end of that problem there and Jinora's panic attack incident is going to come into an important play later.

Their makeup was messy, but the face of the matter is that Jinora and Kai both have their own flaws. I personally tried to show that Kai was more wrong in this situation, but also that he knows it. And now, they've both reached this understanding their they are not perfect people and neither is their relationship, but knowing that makes them more suited for each other and for a healthier relationship in the long run. The healing process can be a messy thing sometimes.

As always, I love it when you guys drop those reviews in as they keep me motivated and keep me writing the story. Thank you for reading! Tune in for next chapter!