Archive of Our Own ^beta

If he was being honest with himself, Iroh hadn’t spared more than a passing thought for Ursa since Zuko had come to live with him.

When he’d come back from his journey mourning Lu Ten, he had been too preoccupied with his grief and his new business to think too deeply about his sister in law’s absence.

While her son gritted his teeth through his third debridement, whimpering and clutching at the bedsheets despite the heavy blanket of medication, Iroh had been holding back his own tears and clinging to the boy, not wondering about his mother.

By the time her children had been scattered on Ozai’s wind, separated by the walls of an institution and an intensive care unit, his attention was split so thoroughly between them that Ursa hadn’t even crossed his mind.

But he’d woken up that morning to a text from Azula saying they’d left in the middle of the night, that they were both at Sokka’s, and that they were going to go and see their mother.

He had needed several cups of tea to process that.

It was just after three o’clock when the children came back, Zuko slamming open the door in his excitement, deepening the little dent in the wall which still filled Iroh with pride and a thrill of satisfaction that his nephew was comfortable enough to damage his property.

Zuko burst through the kitchen door and went straight to him, fingers twitching and grinning wider than Iroh had seen in the entirety of the boy’s adolescence, and the words poured out of him in pure excitement.

Ursa was close.

Ursa had seen them.

Ursa wanted him.

Iroh set his face into an indulgent smile as his nephew spoke, and let his thoughts fly, bitter edges settling in his brain.

Ursa had made no effort to contact them. Ursa abandoned her two impossibly young children to Ozai. She had not been ignorant of what that would mean. Not like Iroh himself had been.

Iroh let his gaze wander over to Azula as Zuko spoke.

She looked small and uncertain, and a thousand times less excited than her brother.

Their eyes met over Zuko’s shoulder, and he saw the raw pain on her face, guilt and anger burning at the edges.

“Nephew,” Iroh interrupted half way through Zuko’s description of their mother’s home, “I am... uncertain, about this.”

“What?” Zuko frowned. “What do you mean, uncertain?”

“You haven’t seen Ursa since you were twelve,” Iroh started before he was interrupted.

“Eleven,” Azula corrected in a monotone. They turned to face her in unison. “She left when Zuko was eleven.”

“Of course,” Iroh said gently, aching to reach out and pull her close.

“What does that have to do with anything? We found her!”

“You said she lives nearby?” Iroh’s insides twisted with some mixture of grief and anger.

“Forty minutes,” Azula confirmed like she was reading from a textbook.

“And she hasn’t reached out? In all that time?”

“No, but—”

“No,” Azula said firmly. “She hasn’t. She sent six letters, the first year and a half. Then that stopped too.”

“Six letters?” Iroh breathed. He couldn’t bear the weight in his chest, the sorrow he felt for the children before him.

Azula nodded, once, firmly, and looked up at him, mirrors of his own anger and grief warring in her eyes.

“Zuko seems to be under the impression that we’ll be going back,” she said, still without any emotion.

“Of course we will!” Zuko frowned deeply, eyes moving between Iroh and Azula like watching a tennis match.

“I will not,” Azula’s firm, tightly controlled voice echoed slightly into the silence between them.

“Why not?” Zuko scowled, eyes wide in confusion, “how could you not want to see her?”

A flash of uncontainable rage and sadness and hurt passed over Azula’s face, and Iroh felt his heart stutter in empathy.

“She left us, Zuko!” Azula’s facade crumbled and her voice cracked into a yell, angry tears which Iroh knew she wouldn’t allow to fall welling in her eyes. “She left us with him, when she knew what he was doing!”

“She wanted to take me with her!” Zuko crossed his arms over his chest, “she would have, if you hadn’t burned my letters.”

Azula flinched a little, her face scrunching up into a grimace. Iroh blinked, looking between his niece and nephew with a confused frown, translating the crackling atmosphere into educated guesses on its context.

“You said you…” Azula gritted her teeth and swallowed down whatever she was going to say, desperately rearranging her face to disguise the hurt Iroh could see there. “She could have come for you,” she hissed instead, “she could have called the authorities. She could have done anything!”

“She did do something!” Zuko defended her, annoyed, “she got out! She tried to get me out too!”

“But what about me?” Azula burst out, “what about me, Zuko? I was nine! I was nine, and she didn’t want me! She wanted to leave me with Father, all by myself!”

“She probably just wanted me out first!” Zuko threw his arms up, “you know, because I was the one getting smacked around, and you were the one reporting on me like some kinda psycho!”

“That’s not fair! I didn’t understand!”

“You think I understood?” Zuko yelled, “you think I understood fucking anything he did?”

“Neither of you should have had to try to understand something like that,” Iroh said gently, trying to calm them back down. They continued like he hadn’t spoken.

“What did she think would have happened, if you’d read those letters, huh? You were a child, he was hitting you, you were terrified, all the time. You were having meltdowns and panic attacks and he barely let you eat. You think you would have run away? You think you could have gotten yourself out? We were so little, Zuko!”

“I would have tried!”

“He would have beaten you bloody,” she snarled. “He did worse for less.”

Iroh squeezed his eyes shut at the thought. It was true. There would have been no escape. No quiet separation of Zuko from Ozai.

What had Ursa been thinking, putting the responsibility of running away on Zuko’s tiny shoulders?

“Children, perhaps we should—” Iroh tried to pacify them again, but Azula was an unstoppable force once she got going, and she was standing straight and tall opposite her brother, blinking back tears, her face warped into almost unrecognizable distress.

“Do you even remember what happened when she left?” Azula clenched her hands into tight fists, glaring at Zuko. “Do you even remember any of that whole week? Because I do!”

Zuko was pale, trembling a little as he shook his head minutely. Azula rounded on Iroh, and he had to force himself back from pulling her towards him.

“He woke us up in the middle of the night, screaming for Mom,” her jaw trembled and she clenched it tight. “He was always having nightmares, and Mom usually got to him before the screaming started. But she was gone. And Dad pulled him out of his room by his hair, kicking and crying, and he threw him into the wall.” Azula took a shuddering breath. “I just stood there. There was nothing I could do! There was blood, all over his face, and he was screaming for her, but she wasn’t there!” Her voice broke, and she shivered, looking straight into Iroh’s eyes.

He saw the horror there. The remembered helplessness.

“Zuko wouldn’t stop crying. And Dad shoved him into the bottom of the cabinet in the hall. There wasn’t even room for him to sit up. He... he locked the door, and pulled the chest over to put in front of it, so there wouldn’t be any light from the slats. I could still hear him, crying and rocking, smacking his head into the cabinet. And Father just looked at me, like nothing was happening. Know what he told me, Iroh?”

She let out an almost hysterical burst of laughter that didn’t reach her eyes. Iroh shook his head, horrified and entranced. Zuko was just staring.

“He told me she’s never coming back here. I’m all you’ll ever have. And I was so fucking scared.”

“Azula...” Iroh breathed, aching to pull her into his arms.

But she wasn’t done. She turned back to Zuko, and they both shook, tears tracking down both their faces.

“He told me to let you out, on Monday morning. Almost three days, you’d been in there. You were covered in blood and piss and vomit, and you hadn’t eaten or drunk anything the whole time. You didn’t move when I opened the door. You didn’t do anything. You just stared at the wall. I cleaned you up, and made you drink, and made you toast your wouldn’t eat, and took us to school. We walked, because he had a early morning meeting and he didn’t schedule the driver. And you could barely hobble along, because you’d been crammed in that fucking box for days. You didn’t talk, the whole school day, and when we got home, there was a letter. For you. With her handwriting.”

“Y-you read it,” Zuko said quietly, his hands fluttering sad, distressed patterns at his sides.

“Yeah,” she whispered. “Yeah, I read it. You weren’t going to. You weren’t doing anything at all. You were just standing there, three feet through the door, waiting for whatever your stupid, shut down brain thought was going to happen. So I read it. She wanted you to meet her after school the next day, so she could take you away. She wanted you to leave me there, with him, on my own. She said not to tell me. That I couldn’t be trusted not to rat you out to Dad. So I burned it.”

“I don’t...”

“You don’t understand?” She hissed. “Need me to make you a fucking list? I didn’t want you to leave, Zuko! I knew I wouldn’t be able to live with him on my own. I was selfish, and afraid, and I knew that if you weren’t there then he’d just hurt me instead. I burned it because my own mother didn’t want me. And… and I… he… he would have killed you, for trying to leave.” Azula squeezed her eyes tight shut, turning slightly away from them, trying to breathe evenly as her body trembled.

Zuko’s hands twitched in distressed patterns at his sides as Azula gathered herself enough to keep speaking.

“And I was so scared,” she whispered as the anger seeped out of her voice, “that you’d agree with her. That you’d remember all the times I told on you, or hit you, or laughed at you, and you’d agree that I wasn’t worth saving. I was terrified you’d leave me behind.”

The crest of her anger broke, and then she was crying, aching, shuddering sobs of absolute, uncountable anguish ripping from her chest, even as she bent double trying to hold them in.

Iroh rushed to her and pulled her close, and she buried her face in his chest and heaved. There were no tears. She’d learned that lesson too well.

“Shh,” he whispered, “Shh, I’ve got you, you’re alright. You’re safe. Zuko’s safe. You’re alright.”

He kept up the quiet litany of half-meaningless words, and Zuko stared at them from behind Azula’s back, a look of desolate incomprehension on his face.

Iroh felt almost wrong, to be standing with Azula opposite Zuko. On her side, and not his.

“Azula...” he whispered, taking a step closer. “I... I swear. I wouldn’t... I wouldn’t have left you. I wouldn’t have left you there alone.”

“You would have!” She choked, muffled into Iroh’s sweater, “you would have, because you had no other choice! You would have left me with him!”

“No,” he said, firmly, “no, you were still... you’re my baby sister. I wouldn’t have left you.”

“She did!” Azula’s face contorted with emotion, hands clenched in Iroh’s sweater as he rubbed his hand up and down her back. “She left me, and now you want to go b-be part of her family!”

“Zula...” he whispered, conflicted shock painted plainly across every tense line of his body. “Zula, she’s Mom!”

“You’re acting like she’s some kind of hero!” She yanked herself out of Iroh’s grip but stayed inches away from his side. Iroh felt her muscles stiffen as she summoned back the rage and swallowed down the sobs again. “Where was Mom when Dad burned your face off, huh? When he threw you out? When he fucking raped you? Where was Mom when he was standing over me, making me torture animals? Where was Mom when he was giving me alcohol and leaving me alone in that house for days at a time? Where was Mom when I was institutionalized and you were fucking dying in the ICU? She was off with her new kid and her new husband! She doesn’t give a shit about us, Zuko! She doesn’t care about you!”

“She wanted me!”

“Then why didn’t she take you?” She screamed, throwing her hands in the air in frustration, narrowly missing slapping Iroh. He didn’t step away.

“I... I don’t...” Zuko shrank back a little, eyes wide confusion. “I... she...”

“I’m sorry,” Azula spat. She closed her own eyes, taking in a deep, painful breath and edging closer to Iroh again. Her voice went quiet. “I’m sorry, Zuzu, but she didn’t even try.”

“She had to... she had to leave,” his hands fluttered against his thighs, “she had to get out. He would have hurt her.”

“He was hurting all of us,” Azula curled forward a little, protecting her soft parts, wrapping her arms tight around her chest, “he slapped her, what? A couple of times? He was beating you. I don’t… I still don’t really understand what he was doing to me. She shouldn’t have... we were children, and he was hurting us, and she left.”

“But... she’s back now.”

“Only because we went and found her! If we hadn’t, she would have just ignored us forever. Even though she thought Dad might have killed you. Even though she thought I was with him, by myself. She wouldn’t have come for us. She didn’t come for us.”

“She... she’s... she’s Mom,” he bit down hard on his lips, his entire face screwed up in concentration and confusion and pain.

“Zuzu...” she sighed, long and deep and full of hurt, “I... I don’t know what to say to you. I... I don’t want to see her again. I don’t want to play at being her family. I... I know I was... I was a nasty little kid. I was a liar, and I was mean to you, and I threw rocks at the ducks. But I was still her kid, and she still left me. I would... I would never try and make you be friends with Father. Please don’t try and make me be friends with her.”

Zuko stepped back, clearly as blindsided as she was with the display of frank emotion.

“She’s not like him,” he whispered. “She would never hurt us.”

“She hurt me,” Azula whispered back. “She hurt me just as badly as Father did. Maybe worse. And… she let you get hurt. She could have stopped it all, and she didn’t. She just sent a couple of letters asking a child to run away, and didn’t even follow up when he didn’t reply.”

“She loves me,” he breathed, “she wanted me.”

“Maybe she did,” she shrugged, rubbing the back of her hand over her eyes, “but it’s a little late now, isn’t it.”

“Zuko...” Iroh said quietly, putting his hand on Azula’s shoulder, rubbing little circles with his thumb, “I know that you want to believe the best of your mother. I want to be fair to her, and... I don’t know if I can even fully hold her responsible for her actions. I can’t imagine what it must have cost her to leave, the bravery must have taken to remove herself from your Father’s house. But... she shouldn’t have left you.”

“She wanted me!” Zuko insisted, turning away. Repeating the thought like a lifeline.

“I know, nephew. But—”

“There is no but! She wanted me, and now I found her, and you don’t get to try and take her away!”

“I’m not trying to take her away from you!” Iroh bit back the anger in his tone. “I’m just trying to keep you safe!”

“I don’t need you to keep me safe!” Zuko screamed, his voice cracking painfully with the sudden roar of volume.

Iroh stumbled back half a step in shock as Azula flinched away.

“You’re just jealous because you’re not the only one who cares about me anymore! You can’t put yourself on a damned pedestal for taking care of your poor little abused, retarded faggot of a nephew by yourself, and you hate it! Well screw you, Uncle! Screw both of you! I’m going back to see Mom tomorrow, and there’s nothing either of you can do to stop me!”

“That’s not—” Iroh tried, horrorstruck, but Zuko yelled over him.

“You are not my father!” Zuko’s hands clenched into tight fists, his face screwed up and distorted with rage. “Just because you wanted a replacement for Lu Ten, doesn’t mean you get to tell me what to do about my mom!”

Iroh’s heart fell as his eyes widened, unable to find the words to challenge it, unable to formulate a response at all.

“You think I would have gone with you, if I’d had a choice?” Zuko shouted, voice cracking over the words as they spewed from him. “You think I wanted to live here, with your stupid proverbs and your disgusting tea? You think I wouldn’t have gone with Mom in a second, if she hadn’t ruined everything?”

He jabbed a finger at Azula, anger lashed across his face.

“Zuko,” Azula tried, making to step towards him. Zuko flinched back, and Iroh saw the familiar terror spark in his eyes, like he’d only just realized he’d shouted.

Before either of them could say anything else, he’d spun on his heel and fled, his footsteps heavy on the stairs before his bedroom door slammed.

Iroh was left standing in the living room next to a still crying Azula, reeling from the barrage of blows.

It had never even occurred to him that he was Zuko’s second choice. That the boy would rather have been with his mother.

It made sense.

But it hurt in a way he couldn’t quite describe, even to himself.

And all those things Zuko had said. About himself. Retarded. Faggot. Replacement.

Ozai had said that to Iroh. That taking Zuko in was an attempt to replace his son. How many times had Ozai said it to Zuko, for the thought to collide into this argument?

His heart throbbed at the image of Zuko’s face, twisted in rage and confusion and fear.

His entire soul ached with the pain of it.

Tentatively, he reached forward and pulled Azula close again, letting her rest her head on his chest. He tried not to think about how he was her second choice, too. About how desperately she had wanted to go back to Ozai, for months and months.

“I’m sorry,” she wrapped her arms tight around him, nails digging into his sides. “I’m so sorry.”

“I know, dear one,” he whispered, “this is not your responsibility. This is not your battle. We have to let him find his own path.”

“I shouldn’t have told him,” she choked, “I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“The truth can be a painful, complicated thing, Azula,” he rested his cheek on the top of her head, “but secrets, and lies? They have infinite power to wound, and I am immensely proud of you for all the truths you’ve told.”

She froze, shoulders stiffening slightly.

“Really?” She whispered, voice muffled in his sweater.

“Really,” he confirmed with a tight squeeze. “I am so proud of you, niece.”

He felt the dampness seeping into his sweater as her entire body shook into sobs, and he gripped her tighter as she collapsed fully against him.

Slowly, he lowered them to the floor, and they knelt together, mourning the loss that Zuko would not allow himself to feel.

Sokka arrived to pick Zuko up the next morning, and he left without a word to Iroh or Azula, slamming the front door shut on the way out.

They drove in near silence to Ursa’s house, Zuko practically shivering with the effort of repressing the swirl of upset anger in his head, trying desperately to pull back the excitement and hope for meeting with his mother again.

“You doing okay, buddy?” Sokka asked quietly, taking in the fast tapping of Zuko’s fingers against his thigh, a sure sign that he was stressing out.

“Fine,” he bit back.

“You nervous? To see your Mom?”

“No.”

Sokka frowned at the road, unused to being shot down.

“Sure? You seem a bit—”

“I said I’m fine!” Zuko snapped. 

Sokka breathed into the sharp silence, eyes widening slightly in surprise. Zuko never snapped at him.

“Fuck!” Zuko smacked his palm against his leg, screwing his eyes shut.

Sokka pulled over. There was no way they were going to do whatever this was while he was driving.

“Zu?” He asked after a moment. Zuko looked up at him, eyes pointed firmly at his forehead, his bottom lip quivering.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “Sokka, I’m sorry.”

Sokka’s heart stuttered at the pleading, miserable tone of his voice.

“Hey,” he whispered back, “hey, it’s okay. I get it. You’re stressed, and I pushed.”

“Shouldn’t have yelled.”

“No. Neither of us really like yelling, huh?” Sokka’s mouth twitched into a half smile. “I forgive you.”

Zuko sucked in a damp breath.

“I yelled at Uncle,” he whispered. “It was really bad.”

Sokka winced.

“What happened?”

There was a long moment of quiet, and Zuko tuned away, resting his head on the window.

Sokka could still see the bruises across his forehead from the other day, when he’d spent the whole drive from his mother’s house to Sokka’s smashing his head against the glass.

“I was disrespectful,” Zuko barely breathed, quiet enough that if there had been any other noise in the car, Sokka wouldn’t have heard him.

Sokka’s heart stopped entirely for a moment, and his entire being cried out in the pain that always roared through him when he heard those words, delivered in that tiny, shaking voice.

“I was so... I was so excited,” Zuko hissed, self-hatred lacing his words, “and he... he and Azula, they… they spoiled it.”

Sokka ached for him.

“Okay,” he said carefully, slowly reaching out to rest his hand on Zuko’s arm, “well, then we have a couple of choices. We can go back, and you can say sorry, and Iroh can explain what he means. We can keep driving to your Mom’s, and you can talk it out with her. Or you can take some breaths and put it all aside, and then we can get excited about hanging out with your Mom again. What do you wanna do, babe?”

Zuko was silent for a minute, his breath fogging slightly on the glass.

“I want to be excited,” he finally broke the quiet. “I want to go see Mom, and just... I just want to be happy about it.”

“Okay,” Sokka breathed. He curled his hand around Zuko’s arm and squeezed, rubbing his thumb firmly over skin. “We can do that.”

By the time Zuko knocked on his mother’s front door, he was feeling better. Sokka had walked him through some of the familiar meditations, and he’d managed to work up some of the eagerness that had flushed out of him the night before.

He’d sent Sokka away to run his own errands, asking him to swing back around in a couple of hours to pick him up again.

Standing in front of the door, though, he felt the familiar, constricting burn of nervousness in his chest.

What if she didn’t like him anymore? 

He was a totally different person to who he’d been at eleven, the last time he’d seen her.

He was older. Scarred. Awkward. Damaged.

And there were so many ways he was still that exact same little kid. Still unable to make eye contact properly. Unable to stand the sounds and sights and smells of day-to-day existence. And he didn’t even have the excuse of being small to fall back on.

At least he didn’t have screaming meltdowns in public anymore.

But what if she expected him to be better? Expected him to have grown out of it all, or worked harder, or... or anything?

What if he told her how hard he’d tried, those years between the burn and leaving his father behind forever, and she understood just how completely and fully he’d failed to fix it?

Zuko squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, and breathed deeply. It was going to be fine. It was Mom.

Not giving himself a moment more to think about it, Zuko rapped his knuckles against the door, and heard the scuffling of someone coming to answer almost immediately.

She opened the front door, the screen still between them, and Zuko took a moment to drink her in.

She was beautiful. Almost exactly how he remembered her, with her hair down and her mouth curved into a smile as she watched him at the duck pond.

Zuko raised his hand and waved, a little awkwardly, through the screen.

“Hi,” he rasped, his throat tight and dry with nerves, “Zuko here.”

Her lips quirked into a small smile, and she pushed open the screen door.

“I can see,” she winked. Zuko flushed a little. “I wasn’t expecting to see you today.”

“Oh,” he rubbed the back of his neck, “well, I just thought... I wanted to see you.”

“Sure,” she smiled down at him, something a little tight in her face, and stepped back into the house. He followed, clenching his hands to stop them moving, and took in her home.

He hadn’t really looked, the day before, while they’d sat in her living room and barely talked, just holding on.

The house was lived in. A little messy, photos and children’s drawings tacked up on the walls.

His chest ached, just for a moment. No one would have dared put his or Azula’s drawings on the walls. And he’d only been about six when he’d been made to throw all the crayons and art supplies into the trash, his father standing over him to make sure he didn’t sneak any back, his mother’s quiet alright, Ozai ringing in his ears.

He followed her into the living room, and felt another pang at the toys strewn over the floor.

He and Azula hadn’t had those, either. And even if they had, there was no universe he could imagine where they’d have been allowed to play in the public spaces, let alone leave their stuff on the floor.

A small, real Christmas tree stood in the corner, lights off for the day, decorated with handmade baubles and little figurines of Santa. A glass angel sat proudly on the top.

“Take a seat,” she pointed to the couch. “I’ll grab you a coffee.”

Zuko winced a little. He hadn’t spent most of his adolescence with Iroh just to turn around and drink coffee.

He opened his mouth to ask if she had tea instead, but the words stuck in his throat.

It would be rude to decline. Disrespectful.

He shuddered, just a little, as she headed into the kitchen.

He sat down on the brown leather couch, running his fingers across the supple material, suppressing the urge to squeeze or tap against it. His palm burned for a moment with the desire to properly feel the fabric, the spaces between his fingers itching for it, and he snatched his hands away, burying them between his thighs.

He could behave. He knew how to be good. It was just hard.

But Zuko knew how to do hard things.

Ursa came back a minute later with two large, steaming mugs of coffee, and handed one over to him.

The smell was almost completely overwhelming, stretching deep into his nostrils. He wrapped both hands around the mug, letting the heat seep into his skin, trying to pretend it smelled like tea.

“So,” Ursa said quietly into the silence, sitting down next to him on the couch. Zuko looked up, forcing his eyes into the space above her nose. “I... I missed you.”

Zuko’s hands clenched tight around the mug, and he felt a lump rise in his throat. He looked down into his lap.

“Missed you too,” he whispered.

“How have you been?”

Zuko blinked. Eight years. Eight years of terror and pain and anger and recovery and falling in love and needing her.

How was he supposed to condense that into some socially acceptable soundbite to answer a question like that?

“Fine,” he bit his lip, turning away slightly. What a pathetic response.

“Good,” she sighed, and he frowned at the relief in her voice. “Me too. I... you’ll meet Kiyi, in a minute. She’s cleaning her room right now, but we’ll be spending the morning doing the little bits of homework she had for over the break.”

Zuko nodded.

He’d almost forgotten the daughter, until he’d walked into the house full of toys and children’s art.

“How old is she?” He asked slowly, feeling out each word so he wouldn’t trip over them.

“She’ll be seven in a few months,” she smiled.

Zuko nodded, smiling thinly back. The child had been born before his burn. Before his Mom thought he’d died. He thought about it more closely, reviewing the timeline Azula had told him.

The letters had stopped right around the time Ursa had to have got pregnant.

Zuko squeezed his fingers around the mug, trying not to think about what that might mean. About what the child could be. If she was a replacement for him and Azula.

“Look, Zuko,” Ursa took a long sip of her coffee, “I’d rather... I don’t want to tell Kiyi about Ozai. She’s too young to know anything about before Ikem and I got together. Do you understand?”

“Sure,” Zuko nodded. He’d had no intention of discussing his father with the little girl.

“Okay,” she breathed a sigh of relief and took another sip. “Good. So you can just call me Ursa, yeah?”

Zuko tilted his head, felt his heart beat a little faster in confusion, and opened his mouth to clarify.

But then there were light footsteps on the stairs, and the door to the living room banged open as the little girl burst in.

“Mommy!” She cried, hair flying around her face as she bounced into Ursa’s arms.

“Hi, baby!” Ursa grinned, tickling her belly and smiling wider at her daughter’s giggles.

“Mommy, I cleaned my room all by myself!” She announced happily.

“Well done!” Ursa ticked her again, “I knew you could do it!”

Zuko stared at them. Was that... was that how normal people were, with small children?

“Kiyi, I want you to meet someone,” Ursa turned them towards Zuko, and Kiyi blew her hair out of her eyes from the corner of her mouth.

“Hi!” She waved.

“Um... hi,” Zuko waved back before wrapping his hands back around the mug, refusing to let them move.

“This is Zuko,” Ursa introduced him, “he’s my friend Iroh’s son.”

Zuko froze.

He was not Iroh’s son. Iroh was not Father. Iroh was Uncle, and not Father, and Lu Ten was Iroh’s son, not him. It wasn’t true. A lie. Iroh was Uncle, and that was allowed, and he didn’t have to love Father anymore, not the way he loved Iroh, and certainly not the way he loved Ozai. Iroh was not Father.

“No, I’m n—”

Ursa fixed him with a pointed glare, and his mouth slammed closed with a jolt of fear more acute than he’d felt in years.

“Nice to meet you!” Kiyi grinned.

Zuko didn’t reply, staring at his mother’s hands, wrapped around the tiny girl’s body.

“Zuko’s going to be our new friend,” Ursa said warmly, squeezing Kiyi’s stomach for a moment. “Isn’t that right, Zuko?”

Zuko nodded automatically, holding his breath to stop it speeding up, trying not to feel the pounding, uneven rhythm of his heart.

He felt the stab of confused pain at the word friend. Not son. Not brother. Not family.

He hadn’t actually conceptualized the child as his sister. But he felt a twinge of loss at having the title ripped away before he’d even thought about it.

He put the mug down on the little table, and spread his hands out on his thighs, digging the pads of his fingers into his jeans.

“Okay Kiyi, how about you go get your homework stuff and sit down? Zuko and I will whip up some breakfast, how does that sound?”

“Sounds good, Mom,” she grinned, leaping off the couch and heading at a run towards her backpack by the door, arms straight out behind her like that would make her faster.

Zuko couldn’t remember ever acting like that. Like movement wouldn’t get him slammed into a wall. Like noise wouldn’t earn a smack to the face or a shove to the ground.

He let out a ragged, trembling breath through his nose, and blinked away the moisture in his eyes.

“Uncle Iroh is not my father,” he said quietly, not looking up at his mother.

“I know, sweetheart, but Kiyi’s too little to understand all of this. If she thinks you’re my son, she’ll want explanations I don’t want to give her. Just go with it for me, please?”

“But... Lu Ten is Uncle’s son. Not me.”

“I’m sure Lu Ten wouldn’t mind,” she smiled.

“But—”

Kiyi’s rustling in the hall was getting closer again, about to come back into the living room.

“Zuko,” she warned, and she sounded oddly like she was talking to a small dog caught chewing a slipper. “I don’t want to fight with you over this.”

He frowned in confusion at her tone.

She reached out to close the gap between them and tucked her fingers under his chin, nudging his head up to look at her. Zuko blinked, his eyes darting around to avoid meeting hers, his heart speeding up again at the contact.

“Okay,” he agreed quickly, suddenly desperate for her to let him go. His hands fisted on his thighs, subtle trembles vibrating through his fingers.

No one had forced him to look them in the eye since he’d left his father’s house for the final time.

Ursa nodded, satisfied with whatever she saw in his face, and took her hand away.

He instantly missed the warmth on his skin, even if he hadn’t liked how she was touching him.

“Go sit at the table, we’ll be through in a minute,” she raised her voice a little to speak to Kiyi through the door, and Zuko suppressed the tiny flinch at the sound. Ursa smiled at him. “Can I hug you, my sweet boy?”

Zuko felt his throat tighten. He nodded quickly, suddenly aching for the warm, comforting embrace he remembered so perfectly from the bright spots of childhood memory.

Without another word, she opened her arms, and Zuko shunted forward on the couch to nestle into her side.

She chuckled, wrapping her arms around him like he was still small enough to fit completely in her grasp, and pulled him close.

The anxiety and fear and nervousness slipped away as he buried his face in her chest, his legs coming automatically up to wrap himself into the smallest ball he could.

She smelled of coffee and toothpaste and a perfume he almost remembered. Her clothes were soft and perfect against his skin, her arms squeezing tight around him.

He sniffed, stifling the sudden urge to sob into her, biting down on his tongue to stop himself from babbling everything he’d wanted to say to her over the last few years in one breath.

It was perfect. Everything he’d wanted when he’d come that morning.

She was there. She wanted him. She would keep him safe.

“I love you, Zuko,” she whispered into his hair, her chin moving lightly against his scalp.

“I love you too, Mom,” he whispered back. “I missed you so much.”

“I know,” her voice wavered, “I know. Of course you did.”

He nuzzled slightly closer to her as her fingers buried themselves in his hair, scratching lightly at his scalp just like Sokka did.

He hadn’t felt that safe, that young, since he was eleven. And he wasn’t even snuggling up to her because he was hurt. There were no bruises across his ribs. No stripes across his back or lines over his palms. No red, hand shaped welts across his face. No blood, no crying, no rocking or screaming or pain or buzzing in his head.

Just Mom.

“Come on, Zuko,” she said quietly, withdrawing a little. “Let’s go make some breakfast.”

He nodded, reluctantly pulling away and smoothing down his sweater.

He followed close behind her as they went into the kitchen, willingly within arms reach of an adult who wasn’t Iroh or Piandao for the first time in years.

They’d barely crossed into the kitchen before his toe caught her heel and she tripped slightly, wheeling around to find him inches behind her, caught in the headlights of her glare.

She took a visible breath as he shrunk away and took a few quick steps backwards.

“Not so close, darling, okay?” She said, devastatingly gently, “I know personal space is tough for you, but try your best.”

She turned back without waiting for a response, and Zuko felt his shoulders curl forward in humiliation. He gripped his left elbow with his right hand and squeezed tight across his body, trying to keep himself from doing anything weird.

“Hi Zuko!” Kiyi grinned at him, toothy and wide, as Ursa started to move around the kitchen, preparing food.

“Hi,” he murmured back, trying desperately to prevent his fingers from twitching. 

“Come sit with me!” She shoved the chair next to her out with her foot, and Zuko sat down. “I’m doing Christmas cards for Nana and Papa.”

“Nana and Papa?”

“Dad’s parents. They’re really nice! Last year, they got me a whole set of these really cool dolls, with hair and stuff you can actually style. I asked for a bike this year, and Nana asked me lots of questions about the color and stuff, so I think I’m gonna get it! I asked for yellow, with a really loud bell, and I don’t even need stabilizers anymore because Justin at school let me practice on his bike a lot and I learned not to fall down! I did get a big graze on my arm though, and Mom says I have to wear elbow pads, which is totally unfair, because Justin doesn’t have to wear pads like a little kid!” Kiyi pulled up her sleeve and shoved her almost fully healed scrape at Zuko’s face.

He blinked, trying to catch up with the spew of thoughts.

“They sound nice,” he said after a few moments longer than it should have taken.

“What are you getting for Christmas?”

“I… I don’t… I don’t celebrate Christmas,” he looked away from the child, over to his mother. “You... you celebrate Christmas?” He asked quietly, confused.

Ursa nodded slowly.

“Course we do!” Kiyi bounced a little in her seat. “Christmas is the best! Santa’s going to bring me a whole entire lego set so I can build a bridge!”

Zuko’s hand fluttered silently by his side as his gaze slid back from the child to his mother.

She smiled slowly at him.

“Ikem’s family love it,” she said quietly. “It’s their favorite thing.”

“But you still... you still do stuff for the solstice, right?”

Ursa looked over at the Christmas tree in the corner, a slightly wistful look in her eyes.

“Not really, Zuko,” she sighed. “One major holiday in a week is enough for us.”

Zuko couldn’t quite imagine it.

Couldn’t quite see her opening gifts under the tree instead of building the traditional shrine, or lighting the candles, or bathing in citrus water, like they had done every year when he was little. Like he had done with Uncle.

“You could... you could come to ours,” he said carefully, the words awkward in his mouth. “To Uncle’s.”

“I’m sorry, sweetheart, but Kiyi’s in her school play that night.”

Zuko blinked.

“Maybe I could come—” he broke off at the flash of some emotion he didn’t quite recognize across his mother’s face.

“No,” she said, almost too quickly. “There... there won’t be seats. We booked tickets.”

Zuko shifted his weight in his chair, and nodded.

He kept the thought that there was no way a seven year old’s performance was fully booked to himself.

“We’re doing Cinderella!” Kiyi explained. “I’m a mouse, which is dumb, and I’m not even a mouse with lines, cause all the bigger kids get the parts with lines. I want to be a actor when I grow up!”

“I… I like acting too,” Zuko stammered a little over the words, inordinately grateful to have something in common with the little girl. “I was… I was in 12 Angry Men last week and we’re doing Death of a Salesman in March.”

“You do plays?” Ursa turned, surprised. Zuko nodded. “That’s amazing, Zuko. I are you part of some kind of special group?”

He frowned, tilting his head in a question.

“For people with special needs, I mean.”

“Um…” Zuko started to shake his head, “no, it’s um… it’s with the university…”

“How come Zuko gets to be in a special group?” Kiyi piped up, then looked slightly accusingly at him, “I bet you get to have lines.”

“Zuko has autism, sweetie,” Ursa kissed the top of her head. “There are lots of groups for theatre and art and stuff that work with kids with disabilities.”

Zuko twitched his shoulder slightly.

“I’m autistic,” he corrected automatically.

“No, darling, we don’t say it like that. It’s rude. You’re a person, not a diagnosis.” Ursa smiled over at him, that odd expression reappearing on her face.

Zuko tensed, unwilling to argue the point further. His hand spasmed a little and he clenched it into a fist, trying not to let himself slip into the familiar, comforting feeling.

Rude.

She kept saying that.

Disrespectful.

He looked away, fixing his eyes on the far corner of the room.

“Is it bad?” Kiyi stared up at her mother, eyes wide with concern.

“Zuko’s pretty far along the spectrum,” Ursa nodded, “his autism is quite bad. But not the worst. He can still talk, and do daily tasks independently, and he was actually above average at school when he was your age.”

Zuko’s hand twitched violently, and he shoved it under his thigh, gritting his back teeth hard to stop himself from speaking.

“It’s bad?” Kiyi squealed, staring at him in concern, “is Zuko gonna die?”

“No!” Ursa laughed, ruffling the girl’s hair, “no, silly! His brain just doesn’t work very well. It doesn’t hurt him.”

Zuko pushed away from the table just as Kiyi nodded in relief, the feeling of wrongness expanding to fill his whole chest.

“It’s… it’s not a disease,” he whispered, channeling Sokka’s gentle voice as he had explained Zuko’s own diagnosis to him, the first time anyone had ever done so. “It’s just how I am.”

“Exactly,” Ursa nodded. “Zuko’s brain doesn’t work properly like yours does, Kiyi, and that means he needs lots of help with stuff you find easy. So you be extra nice, okay sweetheart?”

She bent down and planted a kiss on the little girl’s nose, and Zuko squeezed his eyes shut.

She seemed so… sure. She didn’t sound like Ozai, cruel and mean and vicious in his disdain. But she didn’t sound at all like Iroh with his casual acceptance, or like Sokka with his easy accommodation. 

“I don’t need help,” he wrapped his arms around his chest, leaning away from her in his chair.

“Of course not, sweetie,” Ursa smiled softly at him, and Zuko couldn’t help but feel patronized.

“I don’t!” He insisted, irritated to hear the slight edge of a whine in his voice.

“I’m sure you don’t,” she patted his shoulder lightly, one hand still on Kiyi’s head. “So tell me about your acting group.”

“It’s not for people with special needs,” he said, a little sharply. “It’s for students at the university.”

“Oh!” She smiled a bright, confused smile. “Did they make an exception or something for you?”

“What?” Zuko felt like he was floundering, unable to track her thoughts.

“If it’s just for university students, I mean.”

“I am a university student. I started in September.”

“Really?” She sounded so shocked it threw Zuko even further off guard.

“I’m… yes. I’m a student. I haven’t declared my major yet, but I’m going to minor in theater.”

“Honey, that’s… wow!” She shook her head, surprise and disbelief so obvious it took no guesswork on Zuko’s part.

“I’m… I did well. At school. I got decent grades. Not as good as Azula, but she’s… really smart.”

“Sorry, Zuko, I didn’t mean… of course you got good grades. You were always a smart kid. Kiyi, Zuko could read when he wasn’t even four yet!”

“Cool!” Kiyi barely looked up from her coloring.

“Wow, I had no idea! I’m very impressed, darling. I bet Iroh was so proud of you!”

“I guess,” Zuko shrugged.

“So what are you studying?”

“I took some sociology, philosophy and literature classes this semester, and theater. Have to do math next semester, but there’s a really cool ancient weapons elective I’m going to take too.”

“That’s amazing,” her smile was still a little disbelieving, like she was humoring him.

“It’s fun,” he shrugged.

“And after school? What’s Iroh’s plan for your living situation when you graduate?”

Zuko paused. They hadn’t talked about where he’d live after school. He hadn’t really thought about it.

“I don’t know,” he said slowly, “it depends on a lot of things.”

“Like what, sweetheart? Surely Iroh has some sort of support lined up for you?”

“I… I guess some of it depends on Sokka? If we’re together. I know he’s applying for internships in a few different cities for the summer, so he can explore a bit.”

Ursa frowned.

“I don’t think I follow,” she said slowly, “you’re saying you might move in with Sokka? I’m sure he’s been very kind to you, but you can’t expect him to care for you full time, indefinitely. He’s planning to be an engineer or something, right? Not a carer.”

Zuko frowned back at her, uncomprehending.

“Sokka isn’t planning on being a carer,” he confirmed, slowly, “and yeah, we… we’ve talked a bit, about living together after school.”

“But surely, if you were going to live with him, you’d have to hire someone, or at least live with Iroh too? You couldn’t just move to the other side of the country!”

“I…” Zuko shook his head, feeling knots of confused pain forming at his temples.

“I just want to make sure you’re safe, darling,” Ursa raised a hand to stroke Zuko’s scar, and he clenched himself still to stop the automatic flinch away. “Maybe I’ll call Iroh and make sure he’s… being realistic.”

Zuko had no idea how she wanted him to respond.

“I’m safe,” he said slowly.

“I’m glad you think so,” her thumb trailed across the rough skin under his eye and it took every fiber of his will not to retreat. “All I’m saying is, you shouldn’t be making those choices by yourself, okay? You can’t go off on your own, or force your boyfriend into that role.”

Zuko shook his head a little, uncomprehending.

“What role, Mom?” He finally worked up the courage to ask outright.

“Making sure you’re okay. Making sure you don’t accidentally hurt yourself or run into traffic, making sure you have food and keep up with hygiene stuff. That kind of thing.”

“I… I don’t need a carer,” he whispered, stomach churning with upset shame, “I can do those things.”

Ursa sighed.

“It’s okay, sweetheart. You don’t have to pretend for me, okay? Is it a financial issue? I know Iroh walked away from his father’s money, but is he struggling? Ikem and I could talk about sending you a little money if you need it to hire someone.”

“I don’t need to hire anyone,” he insisted, hating how his throat was tightening, and finally pulled away from her hand on his scar, “I’m not… I’m not a child.”

Ursa’s hand dropped to her side, and she smiled oddly at him.

“You’re not a child,” she capitulated, “but you need significant support, okay? That’s just a fact, I’m not judging you for it. Now, is it a money thing?”

“No,” he said, exhaustion weighing down his words, “it’s not a money thing. Iroh’s shop is doing well, and I’m applying for summer jobs. I don’t need a carer. I can shop for groceries, and cook, and shower, and do all that stuff you said.”

There was a long moment of quiet, and she slowly withdrew her hand from his scar, resting it over her stomach.

“Okay,” she nodded. “I’m sure Sokka understands what he’s getting into.”

Zuko’s stomach lurched. He didn’t want to burden Sokka. Didn’t want to stand in his way.

“I just want you to be safe,” she whispered.

The twist of hurt in Zuko’s stomach tightened and mutated, almost more quickly than he could keep up with, into anger.

“Safe?” His voice sounded so much colder, and he heard himself speak as though from far away, “I wish you’d cared this much about my safety when you left me with Ozai.”

There.

He’d said it.

And he could barely look at the grief on his mother’s face.

Ursa looked away, her hands shaking a little as she turned to Kiyi, who was eyeing them curiously from the other side of the table.

“Kiyi, baby, why don’t you go to your room and play? You can have the morning off homework since it’s almost break.”

Reluctantly, the little girl slipped off her chair and padded to her mother. She went up on tiptoes to put her face close to Ursa’s, and whispered in a childish way that meant Zuko heard every word.

“He’s sad, Mommy. You gotta be nice.”

Zuko closed his eyes for a moment, heart beating more quickly as his mother laid a kiss on her daughter’s forehead and sent her on her way with a gentle push.

Then they were alone again, and Ursa sighed deeply.

“Can you… can you explain, Mom?” Zuko whispered, “I just… I need to know.”

They were silent, for a while, Zuko trying desperately not to let his hands twitch, balled into fists in his lap, and Ursa staring off into space, her lip caught between her teeth in just the same way Azula did when she was thinking.

“Ozai was...” Ursa broke the silence, and Zuko’s eyes flicked back to her before settling on her shoulder. She smiled sadly, “he was actually a good boyfriend. We were very happy, for a while. We met at university. He was struggling in his economics class, and he came for tutoring. I tutored for freshman world literature, and we met at the tutoring center and just… clicked. I wasn’t from money, and he took me on these extravagant dates. He was polite, and friendly, and he held doors for me and kissed me and never pressured me into anything, not like some of the other boys. He was so smart, and handsome. And he was funny, Zuko. Looking back, he could be a bit cruel, with those jokes. But I hardly noticed. I felt like the most important person in the world, when I was with him.”

Zuko couldn’t imagine it. A version of his father who was gentle, and kind. A version who had loved his mother.

“After we got married, he started working at his father’s company, and it took all of his time. It was very stressful for him, being under his father’s watch all the time, trying to compete with Iroh. He’d get upset at small things. If his dinner wasn’t ready when he got home, or if his clothes had been put away out of order. The house got… tense.”

Zuko flinched a little. He knew that tension. The clawing terror of his father’s presence, always searching for something wrong, something to punish.

“And he was... he told me he wanted children, but he didn’t seem overly happy when you were born. I... it felt like everything was slowly moving under his control. I blinked, and suddenly I found myself asking for his permission to do things I’d always done. He hit me, a few times, but... it was more insidious than that. Insidious is like a meaner version of sneaky,” she explained, smiling wearily at him.

Zuko tilted his head to one side, confused.

“I know what insidious means,” he pointed out.

“Of course,” her smile became more indulgent, “I forget you’re such a big boy now.”

Zuko frowned again. He hadn’t been called a big boy since he was ten, and it seemed wildly out of place at almost nineteen.

“I think... I think it was the control,” she continued. “He was always so angry, and he’d scream at me, and at you, all the time. He took my name off the joint bank account and cancelled my credit card, so I had to ask him for cash for groceries, and show him the receipts every time. He sat in on any phone calls I made to my family, and eventually those stopped altogether. He tracked my phone, and looked through my text and call history to make sure I wasn’t speaking to anyone he hadn’t approved. When you were born, he didn’t let me go back to work. He said it was important for children to have their mother around, and I knew he hadn’t had that, so it felt... it didn’t feel horrible, at the time. I actually felt kind of bad for him. And then, when Azula was little, he was always taking her from me, and convincing her to turn against me. It was stifling, Zuko. I needed to get out.”

Zuko bit his lip, a ball of grief lodged in his throat.

It wasn’t what he remembered of his mother, back when he was small. He remembered her bright smiles and her flowing dresses and her hair always falling out of its bun.

“A-Azula says you shouldn’t have left us there,” he said quietly, not looking at her.

Ursa sighed deeply, and folded her legs up under her, perching on the chair like a bird about to take flight.

“I wanted to take you with me,” she nodded, almost pleading. “He told me he’d hurt you both if I tried, so I... I couldn’t do it. I knew he was capable of it, I knew he’d follow through, so I just couldn’t take you, not that night. You were already… he’d broken your rib, the night before, do you remember?”

Zuko’s shoulders curled forward, remembering.

“Yes,” he whispered. “He took us to see grandfather, and I messed up my kata, and when we got home…”

“He was so mad,” Ursa said quietly, and Zuko heard the familiar fear in the tightness of her voice. He nodded slowly. “He slapped me so hard my tooth cut the inside of my cheek, and then he just threw you on the floor and kicked you. I’ve never… I’ll never forgive myself for not stopping him, but I just… every time I tried to ask him not to hit you, or suggest different strategies, or even point out that it wasn’t helping, he’d hit me, and then he’d hurt you more. I couldn’t bear it, Zuko.”

There were tears in her eyes now, and she collapsed back into the chair, legs spilling out from her crouch and her body thumping down against the wood.

“So I left without you,” she croaked, “I tried to meet up with you, but you never answered my letters.”

“I never got them,” he admitted. “Azula... found them first.”

A flash of dark understanding crossed over Ursa’s face.

“She stole them?” She almost growled, and Zuko flinched a little, leaning back further in the chair. Ursa seemed to take that as confirmation, and her hands clenched into fists. “I knew it. I figured that if Ozai’d found them, he would have showed up at our meeting point, so I knew it was her.”

Zuko hadn’t expected how mad she’d be.

“She was frightened,” he whispered. “She was just a kid.”

“She was a bully,” Ursa said frankly.

Zuko flinched a little again.

“People are a lot of things, when they’re nine,” he turned away, fixing his eyes on the childish paintings tacked to the kitchen walls. “She didn’t want to be alone with Father, not when she knew what he was like.”

“She was always Ozai’s little shadow,” she scoffed, hands clenching into lose fists. “Always following him around and pretending to be like him. I should have guessed she’d done something to you when you didn’t show up.”

Zuko frowned harder, the skin around his scar tightening a little painfully.

“She didn’t know any better,” he defended in a whisper.

“There was always something wrong with that child,” Ursa shook her head. “But it was hard enough getting you to a doctor without trying to sneak her to one too.”

Zuko wrapped his arms around his chest.

“She... she had a psychotic break, Mom,” he whispered. “She was in inpatient therapy for a few months a couple of years ago. She was really, really sick.”

“Serves her right,” Ursa scowled. Zuko’s breath skipped for a few seconds, trying to wrap his head around the words.

It... it hadn’t been like that. Even when he’d been lying in the intensive care unit, strapped to dozens of monitors and fitted with a temporary pacemaker, he’d never thought that Azula deserved to have her mind turn on her so brutally.

He’d wanted her safe. Wanted her treated.

He’d offered to leave the safety and calm of Iroh’s home to let her have it.

“I don’t think so,” he said haltingly, hardly daring to believe he was actively, out loud, disagreeing with his mother.

“Oh sweetheart,” she sighed. “I know it’s hard for you to understand people’s motivations or interpret their emotions. Trust me on this, okay? She was obviously hell bent on forcing you to stay with Ozai. Everything Ozai did to you after she stole those letters and took away your chance to get out? That’s all on her.”

Zuko curled in on himself a little.

He’d thought that.

Been thinking it, from the moment she’d told him.

But... laid out like that, in a cold, dismissive tone by someone who’d barely known his sister for half of her life... it seemed horribly unfair.

Zuko bit down hard on the inside of his mouth, and he saw, for the first time, a sliver of Azula’s point. Maybe it should never have been their responsibility to run.

“You weren’t there,” he whispered.

“Well, I’m here now, darling.”

“Yeah…” Zuko nodded slowly, “I know. But… Azula says… that you’re only here because we went and found you. She says it’s not the same…”

Zuko bit down on the inside of his lip, rubbing his thumb against the inside of his finger.

“Oh Zuko,” she sighed. “You can’t rely on Azula to interpret the world for you. I know it’s hard for you, to understand how people work, but you can’t just let her tell you things and believe them. Didn’t you just tell me she was committed? I hardly think she’s a reliable source.”

“She… I don’t rely on her. But I think… Mom… why did you leave?”

His voice cracked, and he turned away in embarrassment. He sounded like a little kid.

All the fight went out of her at once as she clasped her hands together.

“I was going to live a different life, sweetheart,” she whispered, “get back with Ikem. We travelled, for a while, to keep Ozai off our tracks. We changed our names. Until Kiyi was born, we were moving every few weeks. You couldn’t have done that. I couldn’t rip you away from your routines, your stability. And Ozai could afford to treat you. Ikem and I were living paycheck to paycheck, we could hardly have afforded to feed you, let alone take you to the doctors you needed. You needed so much, sweetie, and I couldn’t give it to you. It was better—”

“Better?” He whispered, disbelieving. “I… I don’t think being with him was better.”

“You would have hated the traveling, darling,” she reached out to touch him and he flinched away.

“He hurt me,” Zuko said quietly. It didn’t quite cover it, somehow. The terror. The agony of cracked ribs and deep purple bruises and flesh melting into metal. “I… I… it wasn’t better, Mom.”

There was a long moment of quiet, and Zuko refused to look at her, staring into the top right corner of the room, trying to breathe. He heard a couple of little sniffling noises before he felt the small, warm hand come up to cup his scarred cheek.

Her thumb ghosted under his eye, following one of the lines of charred, excavated and grafted-over flesh.

There had been an infection, where her fingers grazed. A deep pit of foul smelling pus which had to be drained and washed out twice a day. It had taken months to heal properly. Months longer than the rest of the scar.

He let her touch, heart pounding in his chest.

“I’m sorry, Zuko,” she said quietly. “Knowing what happened… I can’t tell you if it would have changed anything. I… I tried to get you out, but… I’ll admit it was somewhat of a… weak attempt. I don’t know if I should have tried. If you’d come with us, that would have been a hard life too.”

“Would Ikem have done it?” Zuko whispered.

“Of course not.”

“Then… I don’t see how it could have been worse.”

Ursa sighed and ran her hand down her face in an attempt to regain her composure.

“I’m sorry it turned out the way it did, Zuko. I wish I could have spared you that. I wish things had been different. Maybe… if you’d been…”

She trailed off, and Zuko blinked up at her, waiting.

“If you’d been a normal kid,” she said, so gently it tore Zuko’s heart in separate directions, “then maybe it would have been different. I could have taken you with me when I left. Or maybe I wouldn’t have had to leave at all. But there’s no going back, sweetheart. We can’t fix it now. I think… we just have to move on.”

Zuko closed his eyes for a moment, shame beating down on him in waves.

Because that was the crux of it. The central problem. The greatest obstacle his mother and father had faced, the one that had broken their marriage and destroyed their whole family’s lives. He wasn’t normal.

“I’m sorry,” he choked out, “I’m so sorry.”

“I know, Zuko, it’s okay. It’s not your fault,” she reached out to cup his scar again, her fingers unerringly trailing across the deepest, ugliest parts of it. “I forgive you, darling.”

Zuko felt himself hunch over without meaning to, protecting his soft parts from the agony of knowing how much he had hurt her, just by existing.

“I think we should stop,” she said softly, “I don’t want you to get too… stressed.”

Zuko clamped his fists down tight onto his thighs, suddenly conscious of how close he was to breaking down, to letting the buzzing in his ears take over and drown out the outside world. He nodded slightly.

“I’m going to go to the bathroom, and give us both a minute to cool off, okay? And then… well, I have a lot to get done today and… I wasn’t prepared for you to come over, so I’ll…”

Zuko nodded again, suddenly desperate for her to leave the room for a minute, and she stood up. Her hand drifted back towards his face and cupped his scar. Zuko took in a sharp, involuntary breath, and screwed his eyes shut.

Her touch was soft, and warm, but Zuko felt the faint echos of terror and agony.

She sighed, and pulled back her hand.

“It’s okay, sweetheart. You can’t help it,” she whispered.

Zuko’s hung his head in defeat, and didn’t watch her leave the room.

There was a difference, he could see, between how Iroh had gently pushed him, and fought on his behalf for environments which would allow him to thrive, and Ursa’s casual acceptance that he would never be able to do anything.

He could almost imagine having lived here. Free from the terror and chaos of his father, but also stifled by the weight of a diagnosis his mother viewed almost as a death sentence. As something that had stolen his ability to lead a normal life.

Zuko had sort of thought that. But it had been a vicious reflection of his father’s certainty that his autism made him somehow less than human. That he wasn’t like real children, who could learn and be scared and feel pain.

He wondered, for a moment, if he would have achieved half of what he’d achieved with Iroh if he’d been with his mother. She would have had him quit martial arts because he was uncoordinated, and he would never have found swords.

She’d have had him quit trying to make friends. Have warned him off relationships.

She might have saved him from Ozai, but she could have lost him Iroh.

And now he was here, with her, and he’d shouted at Uncle. He’d been so horrible, so ungrateful, and he didn’t know if it was possible to fix.

He sat quietly at the kitchen table, head in his hands, alone, for the entire hour and a half until Sokka texted to say he was outside.

“Mom?” He called out into the house, voice raw with emotion and disuse.

After a few seconds, Ursa emerged from the living room, too many expressions on her face for Zuko’s exhausted brain to sort.

“Just Ursa, remember?” She said, some twist of snappiness or annoyance in her tone, and Zuko flinched in on himself again.

“Sorry,” he whispered.

“It’s fine.” She didn’t look at him. “I… I didn’t realize you were still here.”

Zuko glanced up at her.

“Oh,” he shrugged. “I was in the kitchen, I guess.”

“I guess,” she repeated in another tone Zuko was too drained to even try to decipher.

“Sokka’s outside. I’m going home with him.”

“Okay darling,” she said softly. “It was nice to see you. Please send Iroh my regards. I hope… I hope we see each other again.”

Zuko nodded.

“I love you, Zuko,” she put her hand on his scar again, fingers gently touching at the rough edges. “And I’m sorry if this visit didn’t give you what you wanted.”

“It’s… it’s okay,” he said, trying not to let his voice go flat.

“Maybe we can email,” she said quietly, “keep each other up to date.”

“Sure,” he nodded.

“Goodbye, darling,” she whispered, dropping a kiss on his forehead. Zuko leaned into her, remembering dozens of similar kisses when he was much smaller. The familiar follow up hug didn’t come, but she patted his shoulder and let him rest on her.

“Bye,” he whispered.

Slowly, he pulled away, and made his way to the door. He pulled on his shoes and pulled his hat down over his head, making sure his ears were protected from the cool air, and looked back.

His mother hadn’t followed. Her shoulder was propped against the kitchen door, her silhouette lit from behind by the stronger light.

He waved, a numb, prickling feeling making its way up his arms and into his chest, and left the house.

Left the oddly hushed atmosphere, and the awkwardness of his mother, and the pain of reopening Ozai’s wounds. Sokka’s car was parked on the curb, promising warmth and jokes and concern and gentle touches that naturally avoided his scar.

He trudged over, the short walk feeling longer with every step, and sank into the passenger seat.

“Hey bud,” Sokka grinned, ever so gently lacing their fingers together, head tilting slightly like he was evaluating. “Wanna just not talk for a while?”

Zuko could have cried.

“You’re perfect,” he whispered, “and I love you a lot.”

Sokka beamed at him and squeezed his hand a little tighter.

“I love you a lot too,” he pulled Zuko’s hand closer and kissed his knuckles. “Let’s go home.”

Zuko was pretty sure Sokka had deliberately made the drive back to his house longer than it needed to be, giving him time to sort through his thoughts. It didn’t help as much as it normally would have, and by the time they opened the bright blue front door, Zuko still didn’t really have his words back.

Sokka just squeezed his hand and deposited him at the kitchen table with a kiss to his forehead, and bounced off to grab snacks.

They sat quietly, nibbling on the sliced apples and goldfish Gran Gran always stocked up on for the weeks Sokka was home, with Zuko’s foot curled around Sokka’s, their shoulders bumping together.

It was almost lunchtime when Gran-Gran shuffled into the kitchen with several grocery bags hung off her arms, and a bag of tea leaves with the Jasmine Dragon logo emblazoned on the front.

Sokka jumped up to take the groceries from her, and, once she was free of the load, she turned to Zuko, piercing him with one of her hard stares.

“You, young man, need to speak with your uncle,” she raised an eyebrow at him, her stern tone mollified by her warm, understanding eyes.

Zuko shrank down a little, biting his lip.

“This,” she put the bag of tea down on the table in front of him, “is a gift for your mother from Iroh. Do you know how I got it?”

Zuko shook his head.

“Iroh gave it to Pakku, who gave it to me, to give to you, to give to your mother. Do you know why I’m not very happy about this?”

Zuko shook his head again.

“Because we are old, retired grandparents who have no business acting like thirteen year olds passing notes in class.”

Her stern facade broke, and she smiled her familiar, small, toothless smile.

“Pakku wanted me to inform you that your uncle lost their Pai Sho game this afternoon, which puts him in the lead for the tournament. Pakku also wanted me to inform you that he considers it cheating to win against Iroh when the man can hardly concentrate for two minutes without pining about you. Pakku also wanted me to inform you that he expects you to resolve this issue before the next game, or he will have to forfeit due to unfair advantage.”

Zuko stared up at her, mouth open a little in surprise.

“Zuko, I am well aware that you don’t have a mean bone in that entire, far too skinny body of yours. But if even Pakku picked up on how much your uncle is hurting right now, then it’s about damn time you make this right.”

“Gran-Gran, seriously, it’s none of our business,” Sokka tried.

“Ah ah ah, this boy knows I love him. Don’t you?”

“Yes ma’am,” Zuko smiled slightly through the constipated look on his face.

“Good. Now, you make it right. Don’t take too long about it, either, you understand?”

Zuko nodded, just the once.

“Alright then. You go take this to your mother tomorrow, and then you come back. You’re welcome here as long as you need, you know that. But you do not go making old men sad. It’s bad for the heart.”

Sokka rolled his eyes.

“Seriously?” He mumbled, “you old people and your hearts.”

“I heard that,” Gran-Gran swatted him gently. “You young people with your thick skulls.”

Sokka stuck out his tongue, and Gran-Gran stuck hers right back out at him. Zuko smothered a laugh, and felt another spark of hope ignite in his chest. He was going to go see his mom again. 

“Zuko?” Ursa frowned at him from behind the screen door. “What are you doing here?”

“I was just coming to see if you wanted to try some of the new tea blend we’re testing out at the Jasmine Dragon,” he beamed, “it’s good, I think. Yarrow, bergamot and peppermint. Uncle sent it—”

“That’s great, sweetie,” she interrupted, “but Ikem and I are heading out to dinner. We’re just waiting for the babysitter, she’s a little late.”

Ikem appeared behind her, looking down at his phone.

“She says she’ll be another thirty minutes,” he scowled, “apparently she got a detention for Algebra.”

“Again?” Ursa sighed. “We’re going to be late!”

Ikem looked up, and spotted Zuko, who bit at the inside of his lip under the man’s scrutiny.

“Zuko,” he nodded in greeting through the screen door. “I didn’t know you were scheduled to come over again today.”

“I wasn’t!” He tapped at his thigh, “but I wanted to give you some of our new tea blend, from Uncle. It’s yarrow—”

“We’re going to be late,” Ikem cut him off, turning to Ursa. “Can you call someone else?”

“We could try next door?” Ursa suggested half heartedly.

Zuko bounced a little on the balls of his feet, seeing the opportunity.

“I can do it!” He suggested eagerly. “I’ll look after her!”

They looked down at him, surprise and concern mirrored perfectly on each other’s faces.

“I don’t know...” Ikem said slowly.

“It’ll be fun!” Zuko quashed down the shimmer of anxiety at the idea of spending an entire evening alone with the little girl.

“I don’t think so, honey,” Ursa shook her head slowly. Finally, she opened the screen door, and the barrier between them was gone.

“But I’m here already,” he explained, “and Sokka isn’t coming back for a couple of hours.”

“You were just going to show up unannounced and stay for hours?” Ikem raised an eyebrow.

“Ikem,” Ursa said warningly, putting a hand on Ikem’s arm. He ignored her.

“Look, kid, I get it, okay? You want to spend time with your mom. But this isn’t the right way to do it. We can’t leave you with Kiyi.”

“W-why not?” Zuko felt the wind knocking out of his sails, the excitement draining from him.

“What if she needed something? What if she was loud, or touchy? What if something happened, and you didn’t know what to do?” Ursa smiled gently at him, reaching out to touch his arm. “It’s just not sensible, baby.”

“You... you don’t think I can do it,” he concluded, eyes flicking away from them to focus on the floor.

“We just don’t know you very well,” Ikem shrugged, like it was nothing, like he wasn’t talking about the fact that Zuko hadn’t seen his mother in years, “and we don’t know if you’re capable of looking after her.”

Zuko shrank back, shoulders coming up to protect his neck.

They didn’t trust him.

Didn’t think he could take care of a seven year old for a couple of hours.

“Why not?” He whispered, hating the edge of vulnerability in his voice, feeling the ache of need to know what he’d done wrong. What he had to fix.

“You know why,” Ursa smiled slightly, sympathetically.

“B-because I’m... because I’m autistic?” He bit down on the inside of his bottom lip, hard enough to force a bead of blood to escape across his gum.

Ursa nodded slowly, and Ikem leaned against the door frame, watching them with an unreadable expression on his face.

There was nothing he could do to fix that. He’d tried so, so hard already.

“Look, maybe we can do a trial, in a few weeks. We can stay in our room and you and Kiyi can hang out in the living room, and we can see how it goes.”

Zuko felt a flare of jealous anger, and wondered if the babysitter currently stuck in Algebra detention had had trial runs.

“We need to talk about this, too,” Ikem gestured to Zuko on the porch, hands desperately still, trying not to betray himself.

“This isn’t the time,” Ursa sighed, a sad, exasperated exhale through her nose.

“No, darling, this is exactly the time, and you had enough complaining to do last night.” He fixed her with a look Zuko couldn’t identify, and Ursa sighed again.

There was a long moment of quiet, and then Ikem put his hand on her elbow, squeezing so gently it almost hurt Zuko to look at it.

“You’re allowed to say what you feel, my love. Even to family.”

She seemed to sink into him a little, her shoulders dropping, her hand moving to squeeze his.

“Alright,” she turned back to Zuko, and he tried hopelessly not to flinch under her gaze. “Zuko, my sweet boy, you can’t just show up here without calling, okay? It’s disruptive to our schedule, and we need notice for guests so we can be ready. We’ll invite you over, and we can maybe see about arranging a couple of times for you to come for dinner. But you can’t just come. Do you understand?”

Zuko stepped back like she’d hit him, humiliated hurt spreading from his chest to his fingers, which broke their seal and fluttered uncontrollably at his sides.

Had she been thinking that the whole of yesterday morning?

Had he been forcing himself into their lives?

You had enough complaining to do last night.

It hadn’t even been three days since he’d made Azula drive them here in the middle of the night. He’d only spent a few hours at the house.

“But...” he tried to find the words to object, but they escaped him.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” she closed the gap he’d made between them and pulled him into a hug. Her touch was too light, too all encompassing, too wrong, and he yanked himself away, wrapping his arms tight around his aching chest.

She sighed again, deeper, sadder, and it tore at his heart.

She was disappointed in him.

“You see?” She said quietly. “Kiyi’s a hugger, and you can’t cope with it. That’s okay. I understand that you’re... limited by your disability. It’s not your fault. But we have to make sure she’s safe, and happy, and we don’t know if you can do that. I think it would be best if we just... slow all this down. You can come for dinner with the whole family in a couple of months, and we’ll see what we can do about inviting you for some of the holidays. Maybe… maybe Iroh can come too. We can take our time. But you have to stop coming by unannounced.”

Zuko’s stomach dropped.

She didn’t want him.

She wanted her daughter safe, and she was willing to send him away to make it happen, even if he would never do anything to hurt the little girl.

She wanted dinner in couple of months.

She wanted him to stop coming over.

He wasn’t welcome in her home.

She didn’t want him.

Again.

The bag of tea leaves hit the ground with a small thud.

Numb, his entire body aching with rejection and anger and pain and desperation to beg for forgiveness for whatever she was punishing him for, he stepped back. Over and over, until he was stumbling onto the sidewalk, and then he burst into a run.

“Zuko!”

He ran full out, barely even breathing as his vision blurred and his lungs screamed for air.

She didn’t want him.

She didn’t want him, and he’d ruined everything.

He destroyed everything he touched, and he was useless. A useless, pathetic failure who couldn’t even let her hug him.

And she was protecting her daughter. From him. When he had never been worth her protection.

His lungs burned, his heart pounding irregularly in his chest, and he flung himself to a halt, clutching at a street light with one hand, wrapping the other arm around his body, trying to keep himself inside it.

She hadn’t protected him from real monsters.

Hadn’t saved him from cruel words and hard fists and nights spent sobbing and shaking, slammed face first into the corner of his bedroom, blood tricking from his mouth and nose.

Hadn’t saved him from the searing agony of a hot iron to the face.

Hadn’t saved him from large, rough hands shoving him forward to bend over the dining room table.

Hadn’t saved him.

Hadn’t saved Azula.

Hadn’t tried to find him.

Hadn’t tried to get him out.

And now she didn’t want him at all.

Azula was right.

Uncle was right.

He sank to his knees on the sidewalk, leaning into the street light and clinging to it like it was the only thing keeping him afloat.

A horrified, agonized, high pitched whine tore from his throat, grating against his ears.

Even as his entire self curled up inside his body, he recognized that it wasn’t a meltdown kind of whine.

His brain wasn’t buzzing with the familiar too-full-too-empty feeling.

It was just... pain.

She didn’t want him.

She hadn’t come for him.

She hadn’t saved him.

And it hurt.

By the time he had his phone pressed to his working ear, Sokka’s number already dialing, all the feelings had flared up and fizzled out.

He spoke into the void, his voice monotone and flat as his brain throbbed against his skull.

“I need you to come get me.”

Sokka pulled over on the side of the road, a few streets from where’d he’d dropped Zuko off barely twenty minutes before, and threw himself out of the car.

Zuko was sitting on the sidewalk, his back against a street light, staring blankly into the distance.

“Zu?” Sokka crouched down next to him, barely breathing.

Zuko blinked a few times, his gaze slowly shifting to look at Sokka.

“She sent me away,” he whispered, his voice completely toneless.

Sokka closed his eyes for a moment before reaching out to put his hand on Zuko’s shoulder.

“She says I can come over for dinner, in a few months. She doesn’t want to see me until then.”

“Oh Zuko,” Sokka sighed, “I’m so sorry.”

“It was stupid,” he kept going in that flat voice Sokka hated. “She’d been trying to kick me out the whole time, yesterday. I just didn’t notice. It was my fault.”

Sokka’s hand clenched involuntarily on his shoulder, and a rush of righteous anger flooded through him.

“It’s not your fault,” he said firmly.

Zuko didn’t respond, staring at the sidewalk between his legs.

“Do you want to go talk to her?” Sokka asked, hoping he said no.

Zuko shook his head, and Sokka breathed out in relief. There was no way he could see that going well.

“How about home?”

He shook his head again, a little more vigorously, and Sokka nodded.

“Okay, babe. How about we do Iroh’s meditation thing? Try and figure out what you’re feeling and how we can help?”

Slowly, Zuko nodded, and his eyes slid closed. Sokka watched his muscles tense and relax, starting at his feet and working upwards until the frown evened out from between his eyebrows.

Sokka stayed crouched beside him in silence, his mind spinning between anger at Ursa and concern for Zuko.

Eventually, Zuko opened his eyes, and looked directly into Sokka’s. Sokka resisted the urge to draw back at the sudden, intense eye contact.

“I’m angry,” Zuko hissed, all the flatness gone from his voice, replaced with quivering rage. “And I want my swords.”

Piandao’s School of Mixed Martial Arts was closed for the holidays, but Zuko’d been given a spare key a few months after he turned seventeen, back when he was still barely able to practice for ten minutes at a time before his heart refused to let him move anymore.

It had been easier to come after closing with Iroh and run through his katas with plenty of breaks and without the other students staring at him. The pity had been almost as unbearable as finding himself falling from the best in his class to the worst in the whole building.

They had driven in silence, and they entered in silence. Zuko stormed towards the back and yanked open the practice room door.

Sokka breathed in the scent of leather polish and sweat, fighting off a small smile at all the memories the room brought up.

They’d had their second kiss in that room, what felt like a lifetime ago, while Iroh had averted his eyes from that row of seats.

Zuko’s footsteps echoed in the large room as he stamped over to the sword rack and grabbed a spare pair of dao.

Before Sokka had even blinked, he was moving.

The warm up katas were intimately familiar to Sokka by now, and he catalogued every micro movement Zuko made.

He frowned slightly as he leaned back against the wall. Usually, the movements were majestically fluid, like the swords were extensions of Zuko’s arms. But at that moment, everything was choppy, broken, fueled by anger rather than by the power Zuko usually found in the quiet center of his mind.

As the movements got jerkier, Zuko got visibly more frustrated, sweat beading up across his forehead.

And then, with a crash that sent Sokka lurching towards his boyfriend, Zuko threw the swords down, panting furiously.

“Stupid, pathetic, useless little boy!” He screamed into the room, his raspy voice echoing in the rafters and making Sokka yank himself to a halt a few feet away, staring with his mouth open. “Of course I wasn’t worth protecting! Of course I didn’t deserve anything other than that fucking asshole beating the shit out of me! Of course she didn’t think deserved anything better!”

Sokka couldn’t form a rebuttal, shock freezing him to the ground.

“I can’t believe I was so stupid!” Zuko swirled away, yanking at his hair with one hand as the other spasmed hopelessly in front of him. “Forcing myself into their perfect, normal life. I ruined everything! I just showed up and forced her to think about it all, and forced myself into their home, and ate their food and took up their space, and I didn’t even know! I didn’t even realize they didn’t want me there! It’s so fucking pathetic, Sokka!”

Zuko rounded on him, piercing him with that same furious, agonized eye contact he’d used on the sidewalk, made even more intimidating by the fact that he was reaching down for the swords.

He slashed a couple of violent lines through the air, exhaling loud, effortful noises whenever he moved.

“I’m so fucking angry! At Father, and at Mom, and at Azula, and Uncle. At everyone who saw me limping around with bruises and broken fucking bones and let it happen! Over and over and over again!” The swords flashed in the light, swirling and slashing in the least coordinated movements Sokka had ever seen him make. “And she just left me there!”

The swords slashed through the space in front of him like he was cutting down an army, his face screwed up in absolute rage as his voice cracked viciously over the words.

 “I hate them! I hate her, and I hate him, and I hate how they ruined me!”

“Zu...” Sokka clenched his jaw against the sob that was aching to burst out of his chest.

“I’m so angry, Sokka! I’m angry, and I hate them, and it hurts!”

Sokka kept his voice quiet, even in the face of Zuko’s yelling, even as tears welled in his eyes as he watched the love of his life fall apart.

“Baby, I...”

“Don’t,” Zuko squeezed his eyes shut, “just don’t.”

Sokka felt his lip tremble, and his voice dropped to a whisper.

“Do you remember that day, when you told me about your scar?” Zuko turned away, and Sokka kept talking to the back of his head. “You told me you didn’t hate them. Because hating them gave them power over you. You didn’t want to have anything to do with your father, or give him that space in your mind. I thought that was so fucking brave. So amazing. It was one of the thousands of reasons I fell in love with you.”

“I... I don’t...” Zuko didn’t turn around. Couldn’t look at him.

“Zuko,” Sokka finally let the tears spill down his face, his voice cracking, “you are not ruined.”

Sokka couldn’t stand the distance between them anymore. He closed the gap, and walked all the way around Zuko so they were face to face again.

Slowly, letting Zuko track his movements, he raised his hand to cup his cheek.

Sokka ran the pad of his thumb across the scar. The rough, dry, dark red skin was unnaturally warm under his fingertips. His throat squeezed tightly. 

“You’re beautiful,” he whispered. “None of this... you aren’t defined by what they did to you. You’re so much more than anything they ever said or thought.”

“I just... I thought she liked me,” he whispered, and Sokka’s heart shattered all over again at the smallness of his voice. The swords shook at his sides, clenched in his fists. “I thought she knew me. Understood. I thought... I just wanted...”

He trailed off, tears rolling agonizingly slowly down half his face.

“I know,” Sokka’s voice cracked, “I know, babe.”

“She doesn’t want me,” he whispered. He sounded like the little boy she’d left behind. His eyes closed, mouth trembling in utter, overwhelming distress. He dropped the swords, and they clattered back to the floor.

Sokka had no idea what to say. No idea how to combat the sheer hurt in every line of his boyfriend’s tensed muscles. Suddenly, Zuko pitched forward, and Sokka grabbed him around the shoulders, tugging him close as Zuko’s hands were crushed between them, long fingers fisting into Sokka’s hoodie.

And then his entire body started shaking, and his breaths went uneven again, and his entire back rippled with the force of trying not to cry.

“She doesn’t want me,” he whined into Sokka’s chest, “she’s my Mom, and she doesn’t want me!”

Sokka’s fingers dug into his shoulder with the perfect hard pressure, and Zuko squeezed his eyes tight shut, hiding his face.

“S-she, she thinks... she thinks I’m stupid! That I can’t do anything, and she doesn’t want me. She never wanted me. She left me there, with him, and she thinks it was better.”

His body shook with the effort of staying present, of staying connected to Sokka, of talking.

“You are not stupid,” Sokka whispered. “You’re smart, and competent, and so fucking strong.”

“W-what did I do, Sokka?” He let out an agonized huff of breath, “am I just... how come they didn’t love me?”

Sokka’s heart broke, and he squeezed his arms fiercely tight around Zuko’s body.

“No,” he breathed, “no, baby, you didn’t do anything! It’s not your fault. It was never your fault.”

“It must be,” a little, high pitched, choking whine forced its way out of Zuko’s throat, “if I’d been... if I’d been normal. If I’d done what he said. If I’d been good... if I wasn’t such a useless failure, he wouldn’t have hurt Mom. He wouldn’t have hurt me, or Azula. It’s all my fault. And she knows that! I ruined her life, and she knows it was my fault!”

“Spirits, Zu, that’s not—”

“I shouldn’t have gone to find her. She obviously didn’t want to be found. She has her perfect life, with her perfect kid who doesn’t fuck up enough for her perfect husband to hit her. I can’t believe I thought... I thought I could... thought I could join them or something. It’s so pathetic.” He shuddered, squeezing his eyes tight shut against the humiliation and the stabbing agony in his chest.

“It’s not pathetic. She’s your Mom, of course you wanted to hang out with her.”

“I should have known,” he whimpered, “why would she want me? I’m still so... I’m still so shit at this.”

“At what?”

“At pretending to be a person,” his head sank lower on Sokka’s chest.

Sokka’s mouth fell open for a moment, and his breath caught in his lungs.

“You’re not pretending to be a person,” he choked, “you are a person.”

Zuko shook his head against Sokka, disbelieving.

“I can’t even tell when my own mother wants me to leave,” he hissed, hands balling into fists in Sokka’s hoodie. “I’m no better than I was at thirteen, reading all those stupid books on how to make friends and getting pushed around at recess because I couldn’t do any of it.”

Sokka slumped slightly. They hadn’t been friends then. He hadn’t paid any attention to the scrawny, awkward, shouty kid who’d been in half of his classes. If he searched deeply enough through his memories, he could remember being part of groups who’d rebuffed him so firmly.

He might have even laughed about it.

He felt a wave of anger towards his thirteen year old self, and squashed it down. It wasn’t helpful.

“You... everyone’s bad at that stuff when they’re kids. I was at our school for six months before I made any friends at all, and even then it was just the girls’ soccer team calling me out for being a little shit.”

“It’s not the same,” Zuko hissed.

“I know,” Sokka sighed, pulling him more firmly close to his chest and resting his head on top of Zuko’s. “I know it’s different, for you, but you gotta be easier on yourself. You’re... you can’t go around thinking you’re not a real person, or that you’re useless, or a failure, or any of the other shit your father said. He was wrong. So fucking wrong.” 

“I just wanted...” he whispered, quiet enough that Sokka could barely hear him. “I thought she loved me.”

Sokka’s stomach lurched in sympathy, and he hitched in his own shaky breath. 

“I love you,” he settled on after a long moment of quiet. “Iroh loves you. Azula, and Katara, and my Dad, and Bato, and Gran-Gran, and Aang, and Toph. You are so, so loved.”

Zuko let out a shaky, uneven breath through his nose, and his entire body shuddered.

“I... I tried so hard, Sokka,” Zuko breathed. Sokka pulled his arms tighter around his shoulders, pulling him as close as possible even as Zuko shivered against him. “I tried so hard to make them love me.”

Sokka choked on a wounded exhalation.

“I know,” his voice broke again, breath catching almost painfully in his throat. “You... you shouldn’t have had to. I’m so, so sorry.”

Zuko’s fists clenched around Sokka’s sweater, holding tight.

“She doesn’t want me around her daughter,” he whispered. “She... she told Kiyi I was Iroh’s son. I... she wouldn’t let me call her Mom in front of her.”

Sokka squeezed him tighter, burying his face in Zuko’s hair.

“That’s not fair,” he whispered back. Zuko nodded slightly against him.

“I thought... I really thought she wanted me,” he let out a shaky breath, “but... she had Kiyi before Father burned me. Before she thought I was dead. She... she gave up before she thought it was over. She didn’t... she didn’t do anything.”

They stood in silence for a minute, holding each other as Zuko shook.

“And I was mad at Azula,” he croaked. “And at Uncle. I was mad at her for being nine, and terrified, and wanting her mom.”

“It’s okay to be mad.”

“No!” Zuko snapped, “no, it’s not. It wasn’t her fault. If Mom had... if Mom had asked us both to meet her, I think... Azula would have found a way. She was smart, and I know she didn’t like watching Father hurt me, not back then. She would have got us out, got us to Mom. But she only asked for me. She was the grown up, Sokka. She was the only one in the whole world who knew what was happening and had any power to stop it. And she just... didn’t. Did we...” his voice cracked, “did we mean that little to her?”

“I don’t know,” Sokka whispered. “I think... it’s complicated. Abusive relationships fuck you up, you know that. Maybe she thought you’d be in more danger if she interfered. Maybe she thought your father would, I don’t know, go after Ikem or Kiyi if she said anything, or hurt you worse. Maybe she really thought there was nothing she could do.”

“I don’t understand,” Zuko pressed his face tighter into Sokka’s chest. “I don’t... how could she have left us there?”

“I don’t know,” Sokka said again.

There was a long, long period of silence as Zuko gathered his breathing into a normal pattern.

“I don’t wanna be here anymore,” he whispered. Sokka squeezed his shoulders tighter.

“Okay,” Sokka breathed out. “Let’s go back to Iroh’s, yeah? We can sit around and have tea.”

Zuko shook his head, his hands clenching tighter in Sokka’s clothes.

“He hates me,” he whispered. “I was so horrible to him.”

“You’re sorry, though, right?”

“Of course I am,” Zuko tapped his forehead against Sokka’s collarbone, and Sokka hugged him even tighter. “I... I didn’t mean to hurt him.”

“Then he’ll forgive you,” Sokka landed a kiss on the top of his head. “He loves you, Zu. Nothing you can do is going to change that. Never. I promise.”

“You can’t know that,” he whispered.

“I do,” Sokka’s thumbs rubbed hard, comforting circles into Zuko’s back. “I’ve watched Iroh love you for years. And I’ve watched you worry you’re gonna make him stop loving you for every little thing. But he won’t. I know it.”

“How?” Zuko’s voice cracked, and he buried his face deeper into Sokka’s chest.

“He’s your family,” Sokka whispered. “Your real family. He’s how it’s supposed to be.”

Zuko shuddered, and Sokka felt his face squeeze up against his chest before his entire body went limp and noodle-like.

“He’s how it’s supposed to be,” Zuko repeated in low, rasping, almost disbelieving tone.

Sokka nodded against his head, kissing his hair again.

“It’ll be okay, Zu. I promise.”

By the time they got back to Iroh’s house, Zuko was so tense his muscles were shaking.

Sokka turned off the car and put his hand on Zuko’s knee, digging little circles of pressure into his thigh.

“Okay bud,” he said quietly, breathing in a slightly exaggerated breath for his boyfriend to follow, letting it out slowly, “remember he loves you, yeah?”

Zuko nodded slowly, his fingers spasming lightly into his palms. He was paler than normal, his good eye rimmed red from crying, his hair disheveled from tugging on it.

Sokka reached up to finger comb his hair into a semblance of his normal shaggy style, and smiled gently at him when Zuko leaned into his touch.

They took another breath together, and then Zuko opened his door and got out of the car. Sokka followed immediately, meeting him at the sidewalk, and they walked up to the house shoulder to shoulder. He wished there was anything he could do to settle the blatant anxiety shuddering through Zuko’s thin frame, but there was nothing to be done until they spoke to Iroh.

Sokka sent a tiny, silent plea to the spirits that he was right. That Iroh would immediately forgive Zuko for whatever he’d said, and that they’d be able to move past it as easily as the other times Zuko had been so afraid he’d destroyed Iroh’s ability to care for him.

Slowly, like he was heading for his own execution, Zuko reached out and knocked on the door.

They stood in silence for a few seconds, Zuko’s breathing disintegrating slightly as he stared, unblinking, at the handle.

“It’s gonna be fine,” Sokka whispered as he heard Iroh’s footsteps coming to the door.

Zuko’s breath hitched a little, and he looked up at Sokka for the briefest of moments. Sokka saw the dread and fear in his eyes, the certainty that this was going to end badly, and he barely restrained himself from wrapping his boyfriend in a tight hug.

The door opened.

Iroh seemed to freeze for a second, and Sokka felt Zuko’s entire body go rigid.

“Nephew,” he sighed, “you never need to knock here. This is your home.”

Sokka slumped slightly in relief. Thank the Spirits. He’d known Iroh would be fine.

Zuko didn’t relax.

Before Sokka could quite register what was happening, Zuko had slammed down to his knees in front of Iroh.

And then he was pressing his forehead against the ground, hands palm up in supplication, and words rushed out of him in breathless terror.

“I’m so sorry, Uncle, I didn’t mean any of it. I was wrong, I was so wrong, and you were right, and I’m sorry. I’m so grateful, Uncle, so, so grateful, for everything you’ve done, and I don’t think any of those things I said, I promise. Please, Uncle, please forgive me.”

Sokka ripped his eyes away from Zuko’s prostrations, flicking his gaze up from the trembling muscles of Zuko’s back to the horrorstruck look on Iroh’s face.

There was a beat of silence, and Zuko shivered, pressing his forehead hard into the ground, stretching his hands forward.

“Please, Uncle. I’m so sorry. You… you can…” he flinched into the ground, and Sokka saw his back convulse as he gagged on his own fear, “you can do whatever you want,” he whispered.

“Zuko…” Iroh breathed. Zuko flinched again, shoulders hunching to protect his neck.

Sokka felt sick. He wondered, without really addressing the thoughts, how many times Zuko had done this. How many times he had prostrated himself on the ground and begged for forgiveness. How many times he had offered his father his pain and humiliation in exchange for softer treatment. How many times the desperate pleas had been denied.

He let out a shaky, horrified breath, staring at Iroh.

The man looked just as blindsided as Sokka had been, hands curling into fists at his sides.

“Zuko… you…” Iroh paused, frowning deeply.

Sokka couldn’t breathe, and he looked down at Zuko again, tracing the trembles as they made their way across his back.

“Zuzu?”

All three of them looked up in unison, eyes landing on Azula. Sokka’s heart skipped a beat at the sight of her. She was wearing Zuko’s hoodie, a deep red zip up with thumb holes in the cuffs.

“Spirits,” she sighed. She reached out and wrapped a hand around her brother’s arm, making him flinch a little, and pulled gently. “You think he wants this shit from you?”

“I… I’m sorry,” Zuko whispered, letting his arm move where she wanted but making no attempt to stand.

“I’d have thought even you would have learned by now. Iroh’s not mad. Just say sorry, and then he’ll smother you in hugs and make you drink all the damned hot leaf juice he’s been pouring down my throat.”

“Please, stand up, Nephew,” Iroh scrubbed a hand down his face.

Slowly, Zuko got to his feet, eyes fixed on the ground, trembles still running down his arms.

“I’m sorry, Uncle,” he whispered, “so, so sorry.”

“I know, my boy,” Iroh’s voice cracked. “You… you were wrong, you need to understand that. I love you, with every part of my heart. I have never, not even for a second, regretted taking you in. You are not a replacement for Lu Ten, and I am infinitely proud of the man you are becoming. Please, Zuko,” his eyes slid closed for a moment, “you must believe me.”

Zuko shuddered, and a little of the tension released from his shoulders.

Sokka reached out and grabbed his hand, squeezing tightly across his knuckles.

“I… I know,” Zuko whispered.

“Tell him you forgive him,” Azula prompted, poking Iroh in the arm, “or he won’t relax.”

Sokka flashed a weak grin at her, trying to let the gratitude show in his eyes.

“Of course you are forgiven, Nephew,” Iroh stepped forward, closing the gap between them, and Sokka let go of his hand as Zuko was wrapped in a tight hug.

There was a moment of quiet while Iroh hugged Zuko, his hands rubbing comforting circles on his back, and Sokka looked over to Azula.

She folded her arms over her chest protectively, only meeting his eyes for a moment before looking away.

Sokka sighed. This must have been tough on her, too.

“She doesn’t want to see me anymore,” Zuko murmured into Iroh’s shoulder. Azula’s shoulders slumped in some mixture of relief and defeat, and Sokka’s heart cracked again.

“I’m sorry, Zuko,” Iroh whispered. “I wish she could have given you what you wanted.”

“Good riddance,” Azula scowled, crossing her arms tighter across herself. “She doesn’t deserve you anyways.”

Sokka smiled weakly at her, appreciating how she was unknowingly enforcing what he’d already told Zuko himself.

“She doesn’t deserve either of you,” he corrected, looking straight at Azula.

She inclined her head, accepting the point silently.

“I owe your mother a debt that cannot be repaid,” Iroh said quietly, his arms wrapped around Zuko and his eyes firmly focused on Azula. “It has been my greatest joy and privilege to have you both with me. I will always be grateful to her for blessing me with you. But perhaps… perhaps we need to accept that she cannot be everything we hoped she could be.”

“Wanna stay with you,” Zuko whispered into Iroh’s chest.

“You will always be with me, nephew,” Iroh whispered back, lips millimeters from Zuko’ head. “Wherever you go, and whatever you do. I will always be proud to call you my own. Both of you.”

Azula sniffed once, nodded, and turned away, pulling Zuko’s hoodie closer around her.

“Tea?” Sokka suggested.

Iroh squeezed Zuko for a moment, and then let him go.

“Tea?” Iroh bumped his knuckles under Zuko’s chin.

There were a couple of seconds where Zuko just looked at his uncle, eyes rimmed red from crying, like he was searching for something.

“Tea,” Zuko confirmed.