Mother's face is beautiful. Her voice even more. She's running a hand through Azula's hair, humming something that sounds so ... warm. Azula can't make out Mother's eyes. They seem crinkled, worried or sad.
Azula doesn't have to time to decide. Mother's face becomes blurry.
Her mind begins to wander. She closes her eyes, and sleeps.
Azula?" a voice calls out. "Azula?"
Her eyes focus on Zuko. He's leaning on a chair next to her bed. Morning light is shining on him, showing wrinkles that she's never seen before.
"Hi," Zuko says, with a wave.
"Hi." She waves back. It's stupid. She's too numb to care.
"The nurses let me sneak in," he says, a faint smile crossing his lips.
Nurses? She blinks and groans. "Don't tell me I'm in the nursery."
"You're in the nursery."
She groans again. She's been here only once before. It was a long time ago. But now that she's looking around, she recognizes it immediately. The room's walls are light red. There's a window and a table next to her bed.
She's in the nursery. But she doesn't know how.
"Are you okay?" he says with a suddenly concerned face.
"We're in the nursery, dummy. If I was okay, I wouldn't be here."
Zuko scratches the back of his head sheepishly. "Oh. Yeah. I meant -- like, are you, feeling any pain?"
She is. And it hurts. But she's not going to tell him. Not like last night. That had been a mistake.
"Did you bring me up here at night?" She says to change the subject.
He shakes his head. "No. Mother did."
Mother? But... She only lets her eyes widen for a second. Then she returns back to her frown. "Oh."
"Mother also gave you this." Zuko grabs something from his lap. It's a book. Love Amongst the Dragons. Her finger rolls over the title as she grabs it.
"So you don't get bored. You know, since you're not getting out of this bed any time soon." He smiles like a dork.
"What about you?" She says, tossing the book to the side of the table.
He looks confused. "Huh?"
"Your present, dummy?"
"Present?" He frowns. "Who said I had to give you a present? It's not your birthday."
"I said." She says it in a tone of finality. Zuko merely stares at her with an affronted face. "I expect it by tomorrow," she says in her best princess tone.
"What?"
"I said it. No taksies-backsies."
He has no response to that. He sighs. "Fine. Tomorrow. What do you want?"
"A rice ball."
"Two rice balls," he says.
"Three rice balls."
"No."
In the evening, the nurses, in their white robes, treat her leg wound. They bring out her leg and eye it like it's the worst thing they've ever seen.
It's a look of pity. Azula wants to spit in their face every time they do that. They do it often.
When Azula sleeps that night, she dreams of what happened. She dreams of her leg getting scraped by a burst of fire, like hot iron knives piercing her skin. And she dreams of father staring at her with a shaded look she'd learned to know was disappointment.
She wakes up in hot sweat. Darkness surrounds her. She's alone. For the first time in a long time, that causes her hands to shake.
She cries for Zuko. And Mother.
They don't come.
In the next morning, Ty Lee and Mai visit when Azula's sleeping.
So Azula is greatly frustrated when someone -- most likely Ty Lee.-- starts poking her face over and over.
"Ty, stop," Azula says, slapping her friend's finger away.
She blinks. Her eyes begin to focus. The two girls are looking over her. Ty Lee on her right, Mai on her left.
Ty Lee's eyes widen. "Wait, you're awake!"
"Genius observation,Ty," Azula says, too tired to hide the irritation in her voice.
"But ... Mai told me you were in a coma!"
"Even if I was in a coma, how would poking me do anything at all?"
"That was a joke, by the way," Mai says, waving her hand half-heartedly.
"Huh?" Ty Lee's jaw drops.
"You're so dumb," Mai says with a sigh. She looks at Azula. "Sorry for that. Are you okay?"
"I'm perfectly fine," Azula says with her best face of stoicness.
"Azula, I know you long enough to know that's a lie," Mai says dryly.
Does she need to be so blunt about it? Azula sighs. "I'm ... a little fine."
"Mai!" Ty Lee says.
Mai eyes her. "What?"
"Don't ask questions. She just woke up. You're being inconsiderate of Azula's physical and mental health!"
"Do you even know what that means?"
"...yes!"
"I'll take that as a no."
Then they argue. Over Azula's bed. At first, she tries to put a pillow over her head to block out the noise. It doesn't work. Normally, she would've interfered by now. She lets it play out because it saves more energy than it would take mediating.
"Azula! I totally forgot!" Ty Lee says suddenly.
"What?" Azula says in a croaked voice.
"We brought you some things." The girl grabs something from her skirt. It's a stick figurine.
Azula grabs it numbly. "What's this?"
"It's a charm for good health. My mother gave it to me," Ty Lee says, her green eyes bright.
Azula's eyes gloss over it. "Ty, you know, I'm not on my deathbed."
"Oh." The girl's face drops immediately.
"It looks nice, I guess," she says quickly. She grimaces. She's just as bad as complimenting as Zuko is.
"I told you that was a stupid gift," Mai says from Azula's left.
"All you did was bring her candy!" Ty Lee says, crossing her arms.
"It's a good gift," Mai says with a shrug.
Azula eyes her suspiciously. "Candy?"
"Here." Mai tosses her a candy bar.
She catches it. She throws it in her mouth. The taste is sweet and savory.
"Fanks," she says.
"See?" Mai says to Ty Lee.
Ty Lee merely grunts.
"Uh ... thanks, Ty Lee, Mai." Azula has to choke the gratitude out. "I--"
Azula doesn't have time for anything else. Ty Lee throws herself onto Azula in a hug that nearly causes the bed to collapse.
"Get well soon, 'Zula!" Ty Lee says. Her eyes are wet.
"Seriously? Are you crying?" Mai says.
"No!"
"She's totally crying, Mai," Azula says.
Yet, she doesn't fight back the hug. For some reason, perhaps the medicine the nurses forced her to eat, she finds that her arms embrace Ty Lee.
"I'm back?" Zuko says it like it's a question.
"Congratulations," Azula says, amused.
There's the smell of riceballs coming from the bowl he's holding.
Azula's mouth salivates almost instantly. She reaches for it. "Give me."
"What's the magic word?" he says, moving the bowl away.
"Give me it or I'll zap you."
"Woah that's definitely not the magic word."
She crosses her arms and looks away, making a great show of anger.
Zuko grumbles, so she knows she's won. "You're acting like they starve you in here or something."
He hands her the bowl. There are eight riceballs.
"Eight?" She says, her eyes lighting up. Her stomach nearly jumps out.
"Mother made extra. And also, some of them are mine."
"Oh." She stops herself from grabbing all of them. She plucks just five from the bowl, leaving the rest. "Here. You can have the rest then."
"No."
She blinks at him.
"They're yours. Crippled privilege," he says with a grin.
She glares at him. "Once I get out of this bed--"
"You'll zap me?"
"...yes."
Zuko laughs, falling back onto his chair. His ears grow red. He puts the bowl next to Azula's bed.
He meets her eyes. "I just had an idea."
His idea, was bringing a turtleduck.
"Seriously?"
Azula squints at the turtleduck. Zuko is holding him awkwardly in front of her as if presenting a gift. The turtleducks's feet dangle next to her.
"It's Good Luck!" He says.
"Hi, Good Luck." She rubs his head, ruffling its soft fur. The duck sneezes.
Zuko smiles. "He got cuter right?"
She squints her eyes. The turtleduck is cute. His eyes are like little buttons. It helps that he's still as small as a riceball too.
"Kinda," she says. Totally a lie.
"Kinda?"
The duck quacks at Azula.
"Great, you offended him," Zuko says, frowning.
"Or maybe it's because you're holding him hostage," she says with a huff.
"He likes me," Zuko says with an air of confidence.
The turtleduck shakes his head.
Zuko glares at it. "Hey!"
Azula smirks slightly. Then, she remembers.
"Are you still practicing firebending?" She says, looking at his eyes seriously.
Zuko brings Good Luck back on his lap. He rubs the duck's head. "Of course."
"Every day?"
"Yup."
"You better not be lying to me," she says. And she means it.
He looks at her, and smiles like a dork. "Just wait til you heal up. Then you'll see."
They talk for hours, about whatever they can talk about. It's stupid, silly things. But it makes the pain go away from her leg. Zuko must had guessed she still didn't want to talk about what had happened, as he didn't pry further. She's grateful for that.
Azula senses there are some things Zuko would rather not talk about either. He doesn't mention Mother anymore, or Father, though he never did mention him. And sometimes, his smiles drop suddenly, as if his mask of happiness had fallen off. But then, just as fast, they come back, as if they'd never disappeared.
Azula knows that something's bothering him.
She has the same nightmare. She wakes up in the night, with the same hot sweat, blinking at the same dull darkness. Immediately, almost off instinct, she grabs Ty Lee's charm, placing it on her chest. She grabs Mother's gift; the Love Amongst the Dragon book. She puts it in front of her face.
She does it to block out the darkness. She does it to not feel alone. She does it because for some reason, Mother's perfume comforts her.
The book has Mother's perfume. It hits Azula harder than she expects. Her body relaxes. It makes her feel strong against the dark.
Azula looks at the first page in half-boredom, half-curiosity. On it, she reads:
From: your Mother
Dearest, I love you always.
Though she'll never admit, Azula has the faintest of smiles.
Mother and Father are arguing. They yell at each other. Sometimes Mother cries. Sometimes Father breaks something, and the servants hurry to clean it up, whispering to each other.
Zuko hates it. He hates it more than anything in the world.
On the days when the fighting gets bad, Zuko runs to the secret garden. He runs as fast as he can. Then he sits on the fountain that never runs water, and watches the moon as it shines on him. It's still. The air is cold.
Lonelinless wraps around him like a rope. First, it starts with a shake. A whimper. Then it becomes tears.
He covers his face, and wishes that the wind could carry him away.