Distance
Rises The Moon
“Days seem sometimes as if they'll never end”
-S-
The night drew long as the sound of brushing paint filled the room. Other than the small desk light which peered over the ship model, the room was dark. Only the wide desk that sat in the middle of the room was illuminated.
It was the perfect time for Sokka to sit and focus on finishing one of his miniature models. The house was silent, with Katara staying the night at Aang’s, and Jet home sick with a cold.
With his schoolwork all done and extracurriculars dealt with, he could spare some time to really tune into his hobby.
Sketching out each design line by line, and then piecing it together by slicing the thin wood, and molding the metal. He worked until it became exactly what he imagined. Each component being fully mechanical as if it were a life sized ship. From the weight to the density, all you had to do to make it a real working ship was to just make it bigger.
When it came to bringing in different elements to make a plan, Sokka was great. But he was amazing at creating something from nothing.
With the last strokes of paint finish it was done. Every part matching his written out plans and sketches. Sokka watched it almost nostalgically, scanning every corner. He should’ve been elated, yet his mind swarmed with a sinking dread.
The water.
So many see it as something that thrives on life. But Sokka saw it as something completely different.
Sokka had a fear of water, not because it actually scared him though. His body physically didn’t have the capability to be around it.
If someone were to ask Sokka if he was a water-bender, he would say “No.”
Which in one way could be a lie, and in another the unbridled truth. How can you be called a bender when it’s not even noticeable?
When both him and Katara started showing signs of bending they were warned of one fact:
“The weaker the bending, the harder the toll on the body.”
It’s a commonly known fact. That's why having an avatar is so logically impossible. Most people can’t master one element without damaging their body, either temporarily, or permanently. But someone being able to master all four without any drawbacks… It was unfeasible, and yet so magnificent .
If Sokka could improve his level of bending with practice, he would’ve in a heartbeat. But it’s like he was set on the lowest level, unable to climb up.
If he dove in, he would fall.
To feel waterlogged, soggy, heavy- to be suffocating under the pressure of nothing. That was another version of hell for him.
There was a single night in the South Pole when Sokka was doing patrol. It was pitch black just like his room, except for the fluorescence of the moonlight, and the sparkling of the snow and ice.
With a step and a crack he fell under, plunging into the wintry waves.
He tread, pushed, gasped for air as the chilling cold started to seep into his vessels. With every stroke he felt the water twist around his hands– bending. And as he tried to push up to the surface, his own bending pulled him down deeper and deeper into the water. He became his own anchor as the side effects kicked in. His chest tightening his limbs becoming dead weight. Like a water balloon.
Waterbending was one of the prettiest styles of bending, but when he squeezed his eyes open while deep under the water, seeing it physically push him down as if he were in a whirlpool was petrifying.
It was the last thing he saw before passing out. When he woke up, he was spread out across the surface, Katara sobbing at his side.
If she didn’t think to look for him that night, or even if she didn’t see him struggling deep under the ocean, he would’ve been rotting at the bottom of the sea by now. No one would’ve even known he was dead.
Sokka wondered how it feeled to save somebody like she did him. To bend as if you were born to do it. She didn’t even need to think.
Katara was a natural bender, instead of the side effects that Sokka got, it almost refreshed her to bend, the passage of push and pull regulating perfectly.
He shouldn’t have felt jealous. He didn’t want to feel jealous. So with as much passion as he could, he built, constructed, and worked so that he didn’t need to feel that way. The model boats he made were not just a hobby but a solace.
If he couldn’t be one with the waves, he just had to glide across them.
Sokka just had to pray that if he ever boarded his ship, it would stay afloat, rather than pull him down to the depths.
Backing up out of his chair, he stretched and sighed. It had gotten almost too late, even for him.
“Now where am I going to put this…” he mumbled.
Scanning the walls of his room, he tried to find an empty space among the completely filled bookshelves that lined his walls. Each one being packed with notebooks of model sketches. It looked like an ancient archive. But… It was just him.
Over his bed hung shelves that held all of his finished models. Dozens and dozens of them sat picking up dust, and on his clothing dresser stood more. The hobby had started to take up all of the space in his room.
He thought to do something with them, maybe sell some of them? He could put them up for a good price.
Grumbling to himself at the thought, he banished it from his mind.
“What the hell am I doing?”
--
I Know You
“Don’t ever tell me to go away from you”
With a small digital beep his pager rang. The digital screen illuminated around the transparent blue plastic, the writing scrolling across.
“Where are you: Jet”
A smile ran across Sokka’s face at the familiar name. He hadn’t spoken to him ever since the morning.
He rushed out of his chair to get to the phone in the living room, bumping his leg on the edge of his desk hard. He flinched at the pain, yet didn’t stop to check it. He had to call back.
It rang… and rang… and with a cut of feedback, Jet picked up.
“Hey, what's up?” Sokka leaned on his kitchen counter, dimming the light just enough so he could see where he was. It gave the room an uncanny ambiance.
“Now you ask?” Jet took a moment to cough, “You haven’t called me since this morning.”
He sounded pouty and playful.
“I was going to before practice started but the coach called, and then I got distracted… Did you get the food I dropped off?
“Yeah, I did. Thanks, it was good.” Jet’s voice became more pleased and grateful. This was the Jet that Sokka knew so well. He could tell that Jet had been on edge the past few days, Sokka guessed that being sick left him too tired to be immature. A chuckle building up in his throat at what he found cute.
“So why’d you call? It’s super late– if you aren't feeling well you should go to sleep.” Sokka spoke slowly like a caregiver. He learned how to take care of others by watching Katara, now it was like second nature.
“You should come over…” Jet whispered to the point where his words barely picked up on the line, his tone deep with an underlying meaning.
Sokka couldn’t help breaking out in laughter after catching what Jet meant by coming over. It was almost too ridiculous.
“And what? You get me sick?? Nice try dude.”
“But Sokka~” He whined, “I miss you… We don’t have to do a lot, I just want you near, y’know?”
First Sokka cringed. Then the fluttery feeling came when he felt cared for. Jet’s words were embarrassing, sure, but they were filled with endearment.
“I miss you too, but you need to rest. And I really can’t get sick– I have a lacrosse game in two days and pai sho club early in the morning. Remember we have the tournament?”
“...Okay, you should go to bed then. Get your rest.”
“You too. I’ll make sure to stop by after practice and drop off your school work… Love you.”
“...me too.”
With a loud clack and beeping ring the call ended.
Sokka walked back to his room with a content feeling, he hoped that Jet would get better soon. He also hoped that Jet would start feeling better when it came to his mood, it fluctuated often and it wasn’t normal. At least he never felt like it was this bad. The two fought frequently, although they were never too bad. They usually would make up by the end of the day.
Under the light of his desk where his ship should’ve been was a vacant space. He looked around confused, as he left it right there. On closer inspection he saw it sprawled out on his wooden floor, the entire front mast being detached from the rest of the model.
“What the heckkk” Sokka drawled.
It was definitely fixable, but it would take a day or two’s time.
He sat it back on his desk reluctantly and decided it would be better to start on the repairs the next day. The under of his eyes felt like they were sagging and he noticed his yawns becoming more frequent. He could think about the ship in the morning.
Curling up in his bed, he watched the broken model under the light ominously.
Something felt wrong.
–-
Fluorescent Adolescent
“Nothing seems as pretty as the past though
-Z-
“Azula!”
Zuko roared at his sister as she held a huge loc of hair in her hands.
To preface, Zuko was trimming his hair again in the morning before school. Azula caught him and offered to do it, as watching him struggle to get the back of his head was too embarrassing for even her.
What Zuko forgot is that Azula hadn’t lived the independent life that he was forced to live as a child. The girl couldn’t put on her shoes by herself, let alone cut someone's hair. So with a snip, a blunt cut was made at the back of his head.
“It’s not even bad! You’re so dramatic.” She spoke with little to no remorse, turning her head to void eye contact.
Among their loud bickering appeared Iroh.
“You two are very lively this morning.” He yawned.
“Look what Azula did to my hair!”
“Better to cut it than burn it all off.” She grumbled.
Zuko groaned in frustration, clenching his fists at the situation.
Iroh watched the two unbothered. It appeared that he had expected they would get into an argument sooner than later.
“Azula, give me the scissors.” He requested. She reluctantly handed them to him with an irritated scowl on her face. Their uncle then gestured over to Zuko to follow him, walking out of the bathroom tiredly, and setting up a chair in the living room.
At first Zuko thought this was going to turn into another lesson. About not fighting with your sibling or whatever, but his uncle instead led him to sit down.
Zuko sat quietly as Iroh started to fix his hair. Snipping here and there, just shortening it enough to where the blunt cut wasn’t noticeable anymore. Zuko felt like a little kid..
“Why didn’t you tell me your bending was unaligned?” Iroh inquired.
“...”
Zuko had been hiding his hair problem from Iroh for a reason he couldn’t even name. He just felt like it wasn’t serious enough to mention, or that it was a regular thing with firebenders. It’s not like it had been going on for long. Maybe just a few months.
“Do you think I don’t see you bending over the bathroom counter everyday with the kitchen scissors?”
Now that was a bit humiliating.
“So what? Are we going to do some soul finding to figure out what's wrong with me?” Zuko’s voice came out more sarcastic than he meant it to be.
As much as he respected his uncle and recognized how much Iroh’s advice helped him, Zuko still felt like all the “finding yourself” mumbo jumbo was pointless. There was no one to find. He was right there.
“You’re very funny.” Iroh chuckled, “...I used to cut Lu Ten’s hair like this every month, his hair grew like weeds.”
Iroh always spoke so nostalgically of his son. Whenever he did, Zuko stayed silent, just to let his uncle run through the memories. The death of his cousin dealt damage to everyone. But Zuko could tell, out of everyone Lu Ten knew, it broke Iroh.
“The same thing was happening to him right before we left to the frontlines.”
“What do you mean?” Zuko spoke gently.
“The ends of his hair…They burned. ” Iroh declared, “We never figured out why, or at least I never did.”
“Did he hide it from you too?”
“That is a story for another day.” Iroh cut off, “ You should change and get going before you are late.”
Zuko brushed a hand through his now fully cut hair. It was way shorter than before. His neck length hair was now laying at his ears, and the front pieces feathered down into bangs that sat right below his forehead.
It was good that his uncle knew how to cut hair.
As he brushed the cut hair off of his uniform, he wondered what his uncle meant by changing.
“I’m already ready to go?”
With a slow look down to Zuko’s shirt, Iroh nodded.
“Have a great day then.” He doubted.
Looking down to see what exactly his uncle was so uncertain about, he saw a mess of hair and…soot?
The more that he brushed off the debris of cut hair, the more muddled and smeared his white shirt got. The charred edges had fully broken down into ash.
It was really that bad?
Zuko rushed back into his room, scouring through his closet and ignoring Azula who had now found a comfy spot on his bed.
“Nice haircut brother.” She teased.
“Whatever…” He mumbled, too focused on finding something similar to change into.
He brooded on how he was going to survive at school that day. He had already stormed out of class the day before, and now suddenly he was going to walk back in with a new haircut and outfit. Was he a freaking celebrity?
Azula sat up from her cove of pillows, inspecting her brother more after he ignored her obvious poking.
“What in Agni’s name did you do to that shirt?”
He was too frustrated to explain to her the problem, instead he just turned over to her and complained.
“It just happened okay! I don’t know what to wear anymore.”
A grin lined Azula’s lips as she formed a thought. She got up on her feet and pushed past her brother, now combing through his closet.
“What is it now?” Zuko huffed.
“I believe what I am doing right now is choosing an outfit for you to wear…” She clarified, “Commoner clothing is very fun to style you know.”
It almost surprised Zuko of how out of touch his sister was with the rest of the world.
“You don’t know what you’re doing. You don’t choose your own clothes!” He chided.
Azula stopped what she was doing and turned over to Zuko, stabbing her finger in his face challengingly.
“Well one thing I am great at is recognizing perfection and trust me– I don’t accept anything less.”
–-
Left Hand Free
“Though your man’s bigger than I am
Oh my days he disagrees”
He wore a black zip-up decorated with silver embroidery that resembled a rolling flame. It was smaller than his other hoodies, and being paired with his dark oversized jeans which hung right on his waistline, if he lifted his arms even the slightest amount, you would be able to see his stomach.
In any other setting Zuko would’ve been completely fine wearing this. Yet walking onto campus in that clothing made him feel way more than just out of place. He felt improper.
Zuko fidgeted with his hair. It was too short to cover his face anymore. Now it seemed like he was putting his scar on full display, letting everyone stare and gawk.
And stare they did.
With every step taken, Zuko tried to avoid the gazes of others. They swarmed around him in slow motion, making him feel smaller and smaller.
He pulled his bag closer to his body, hung his head down lower. Anything to try and make the side conversations and murmurs of gossip go away.
He did what he always did and turned up the volume on his headphones.
The second Zuko sat down at his desk, something seemed different. Within himself, and the others.
The more he observed the leers, the more familiar they felt. Zuko was reminded of the expression that the audience held at the garage. Fascination, wonder, allure.
As much as Zuko tried to not stand out, he couldn’t help the fact that he liked the attention.
In the midst of his thoughts, all of his cockiness was washed away as Sokka passed by.
Zuko scanned the room for Jet, but he was still absent. There was no reason Sokka needed to be in his class.
Zuko panicked at the thought of Sokka seeing him in his new attire and short cut. Although he still felt like Sokka wouldn’t be able to recognize him.
He hunched more into his seat and hid his face, watching as Sokka wandered over to the front of the class and sparked conversation with another student.
Zuko really wanted to mind his own business, but when it came to Sokka, he just couldn’t. He slid off his headsets and listened in inconspicuously.
“Oh hey Sokka! Is Jet still sick?”
“Yeah I came for his homework. How’s your day been?”
Just as quick as he decided to eavesdrop, Zuko slipped right back out of the conversation.
Jet was sick!!
The thought of that asshole suffering at home fueled Zuko’s petty side. It felt like karmic retribution for all of the dirty glares and shoving that Zuko had to deal with. A smile peeked through his cold exterior.
By that time the rest of his class had started to notice Sokka’s presence without Jet, taking their chance to talk with him. Jet was like the boundary you had to cross to even get near Sokka. When they were together, it’s like they lived in their own world of toxicity and rainbows.
Zuko squirmed around here and there, trying to spot Sokka in the bunch.
“Umm hello?”
Zuko flinched at the sudden voice. There was a random girl kneeling down right next to his desk expectantly. He did recognize her though. She sat a few rows ahead of him, and was one of the biggest chatterboxes in his class. There was no apparent reason as to why she would approach him.
Her glasses hung low on her nose and she fidgeted with her tiny pigtails like she was nervous.
“Are you new here? You look really familiar…” She trailed on while staring at him with her grey eyes.
Zuko was surprised, and somehow amused. He didn’t even know the name of this girl yet she thought he was new. Not only new but familiar .
She suddenly gasped as she caught a thought, her voice ringing loud and full of expression.
“Are you Spirit? From Ashen Dawn!?? I go to the garage all the time and now that I’m looking at you more closely you too look really–”
OHHH NO
He shut her up as quickly as possible, throwing his hand to cover her mouth.
Zuko couldn’t figure out if he wanted to laugh. Her words ran out like a train and it caught him way off guard. What if Sokka heard?
They both turned over to the front of the class in unison. Everyone was still locked in on whatever Sokka had to say.
Zuko thanked the fact that his seat was all the way in the back… And that Sokka was the school hot-shot.
He slowly let go of her face with a sorry expression, answering her question with a silent head nod. Her eyes lit up and a bright smile planted on her face. A look of awe and admiration. She quickly stood up and walked back to her desk still facing Zuk, while giving him a thumbs up.
She was weird.
But Zuko appreciated that she was at least quick on the uptake of secrecy, and to confirm, she even mouthed to him.
“Your secret's safe with me!”
It really wasn’t a secret, and it definitely wasn’t the first time someone recognized him at school. After all, the band was really popular in the area. He always made sure to tell them to keep quiet though. It took the mysteriousness out of his persona, and he really didn’t want to be known at school.
This time was slightly different though. It was someone from his class that figured him out.
In his bones, he felt like that wasn’t going to be their last interaction. And with the slightest thought he realized that a crack had formed in his daily school life. It was wide, growing, and the bigger it got the more normal he felt.
Instead of watching the events of the student body behind a linen screen, he sat inside the affairs with everyone else.
The 7 minute bell tolled through the speakers, startling Sokka and causing him to push his way out of the mob.
“Man, I’m gonna be late… See you guys later!” He announced.
Sokka waved everybody goodbye with his usual fun charisma, while making his way out of the door. He rushed, passing Zuko without sparing him a glance.
And in a second, he was gone.
Attention from others felt nice occasionally. It didn’t really matter though if the one person he wanted to notice him, didn’t.
Zuko would hide, or avoid Sokka at times. It was only natural to keep his feelings from imploding on himself. The one thing he wondered though, is what he would have to do to make Sokka see him eye to eye.
Not as “Spirit”, or “Zuko pretending to act like Spirit”, or “loser Zuko who can’t manage his own emotions”.
Maybe he was holding himself back in that regard.
Or maybe his expectations of what their relationship could be was too high.
--
Attendance swiftly finished and with a sigh Zuko’s teacher called him out of class.
He followed her out expecting to get scolded for his stunt yesterday, and by her bemused reaction to his new appearance, he could tell it was going to take a while.
“Your uncle called this morning and explained some stuff to me.” Her voice was calculative yet compassionate.
“I understand if you're having personal problems, but when that happens you have to ask to leave politely. Not storm out of class.”
Zuko stood straight with a sorry expression. It was kind of his uncle to call, but it didn’t excuse his behaviour at all. He waited quietly letting his teacher finish talking.
“You also need to start taking your headphones when you get into class. I've been meaning to tell you but I've never had a problem with it until yesterday– you have to understand where I’m coming from.” She nagged.
“...I understand, and I’m sorry. It won't happen again.”
“I know it won't.” She breathed, “You’re a good kid.”
With a firm pat on his back she walked back inside leaving him to take a second and think.
A good kid huh?
That would be the first time he’s heard that.