concoursec | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

Character(s):

watertides
Location: Zuko's dorm
Rating: Uh. PG?
Open/Closed/Finished: Closed
Summary: Hours after this. Katara goes to speak with Zuko about what was left unfinished in Home EC.

It was just after dinnertime. Zuko had left the Home Ec. class early with permission from his Instructor. He had finished his gardening project and had promised his teacher he would revise his notes after his physical therapy session with Dr. Kadowaki. His schedule had looked something like this: Home Ec, physical therapy with the doctor for an hour and a half, a walk to the showers and then to the Cafeteria to grab some food, then a walk back to his room where his tray of food sat untouched on the table.

The words exchanged with the waterbender earlier had left a sour taste in his mouth and his stomach churning. He had practically accused her of being no better than Ozai, something he shouldn't have done. Zuko knew she was a good person deep down. Well, he didn't know but he had a pretty good feeling considering she'd been there to take care of him and help with the pain most of the beginning he was on the mend.

It wasn't easy to find the words to explain his thoughts properly. Not to her.

Golden eyes opened to glare at the five thick candles that sat in front of him on a low table. He was trying to meditate, a towel rolled up to hang around his neck, his hair still wet from his shower. It was frustrating, how his thoughts were distracting him from being able to find peace in the simple act of meditation.

"Why isn't this working...?!" he then growled out, jaw clenching. The flames on each of them rose a little higher, flickered, and then lowered again.

Zuko exhaled, irritated, and closed his eyes to try again.

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Zuko shrugged his good shoulder, looking down expectantly to the t-shirt she held in her hand. "Not really. Mostly during the physical therapy, that's it." He paused to shift his weight awkwardly from left to right foot. "Uh- shirt?"

He had no real problem standing around shirtless since he did most of his daily routines and workouts without one, but it was just the fact that she was there in the room with him. Alone. And it was probably better to be fully dressed for the conversation that was to follow.

"Oh, right!" Remembering that she held the article of clothing in her hands, Katara pulled the bottom opening of the shirt taunt, then held it up expectantly before realizing a small problem. "You're kind of tall-- could you duck down or something?" As if to emphasize her point, she reached up to show just how far her arms could go.

His apology was a raspy mumble and Zuko carefully eased his right arm into the shirt and sleeve first, then he ducked so she could pull it over his head as he brought up his good arm. As long as his injured arm/shoulder was in first and didn't have to go through much movement, it was fine with him.

When he ducked down, Katara pulled the rest of the shirt over his head and guided his good arm through the arm hole as well, even if he didn't need help with that. Tugging the rest of the fabric down over his torso, she then smoothed the wrinkles at the bottom of his shirt before giving a small hum of approval at completing the task. "There."

Zuko thought it was a little weird for her to be smoothing out his shirt for him. He was perfectly capable of doing it himself, that and he didn't really care about wrinkles.

He only raised a brow at her while straightening up and said, "You smooth out your brother's wrinkles, too?"

Katara realized that he isn't use to her more motherly habits, so with a small huff to hide her embarrassment, she drew her hands back to cross over her chest. "Someone has to-- crumpled and crinkled clothing doesn't look nice."

Now both brows came up, even if the scarred brow was hairless. "I didn't think a wrinkled shirt would be so distracting," he mused, snorting.

"So then? You said you wanted to talk...?"

'It's a better distraction than you being shirtless.' She couldn't help but think, and mentally scolded herself for even thinking back on the image of his bare torso. At his question, though, Katara straightened up, a slightly hesitant and uneasy look on her face now.

"You said earlier that it wasn't a good time or place to talk about what we were talking about." She gave a small shrug. "Is now a good time and place to carry on the conversation?"

And there went the semi-good mood. Expected of course.

Zuko said nothing and folded his arms over his chest. "There's nothing really to talk about."

"There's a lot to talk about." Katara gave him a pointed look, as if to warn him from even trying to suggest otherwise. "You know we need to talk about what you said."

She leaned back to sit on the edge of the table, her hands dropping to smooth her skirt out and her eyes followed the movement. There was a pause, and Katara didn't look up when she said, "I'm... sorry if what I did made you think of what your Father did to you. I didn't know, and I shouldn't have gotten that angry with you."

"No. You had every right." Zuko stood where he was, letting his gaze drift down to her legs and then quickly off to the side. "You're hardly a wench, but... I can be a jerk.

... A pretty big one most of the time."

Edited 2010-09-07 19:05 (UTC)

That made her head snap up. She certainly hadn't expected for Zuko to actually apologize to her, especially with the way he had been actively ignoring her for the past week. There was a momentary loss of words, before she blurted out:

"Are you feeling okay?"

Zuko was staring right back at her, if not leaning back somewhat in surprise at her unexpected question and outburst of a blurt. "Uh. My shoulder's a little sore...?"

"That's not-- nevermind." Katara shook her head, and she bit her lip to stop herself from smiling. He really had apologized and even admitted he was a jerk without her having to say so. What was the world coming to?

"Do you want me to try and heal it?" Katara asked, a hand gesturing his shoulder. "I mean, I can understand if you don't want me to especially with that happened the last time I tried."

He eyed her in silence, eyes narrowing. The last time she'd tried helping with the ache, she'd shifted the bones and caused them to rub against one another. Definitely not the best feeling in the world.

"You won't poke at it again, will you?"

Katara held both her hands up in a gesture to indicate that she means no harm, her eyes wide as she slipped on an innocent expression. "I promise I won't poke at it again. Which was a stupid thing for me to have done, now that I think about it..."

"Yeah. Just a bit."

And he stands there, waiting, unsure of if he should sit or simply stand.

Katara moved away from the table and walked up to Zuko, equally unsure of how to proceed. Thankfully, she realized an important factor missing to her healing session.

"Do you have any water?"

Zuko reached over to grab his cup off the table. He held it up for her to take or do whatever she needed to with it. "Here."

With the cup held out towards her, Katara gently willed the water out into her hands, drawing it close with small tugging motions of her hands. The water then engulfed her fingers, and she stepped in closer to rest on the area of his shoulder where she remembered his bruises to be. While it would have been more effective for him to remove his shirt so the contact would be directly on his skin, she didn't particularly need that distraction at the moment.

She kept her eyes fixed on his shoulder, head ducked down slightly as she concentrated on the flow of chi in the injured region.

No words left his lips as she came up to him and began to do what she did best. Awkwardly Zuko held the empty cup in a hand before leaning away for a moment to slide it back onto the table. She was so close that even his quiet, faint breaths stirred the short baby strands at her forehead.

Zuko cleared his throat and looked away. But it didn't last long before his eyes were shifting back to focus on her and notice even the slightest of features. The delicate arch of her brows, those faint faint freckles on her cheeks, the one beauty mark at her eye. How the dark hues of the school uniform oddly enough brightened her eyes and made the blues stand out.

As much as she tried to ignore it, Katara could feel the intensity of his gaze as he looked down at her, the knowledge of their closeness causing a strange sort of flutter to stir within her stomach. Her palms had begun to move in a small circular motion to help the energy flow through the shoulder area, and after a long pause she asked, "Does it feel better?"

"Huh..? Oh- uh. Yeah..." he distractedly replied, eyes focused on her hair.

Eying the hair loopies resting against the sides of her cheeks, Zuko stood in silence as he brought his good arm up to touch one. He felt the texture of her hair, soft and somewhat cold between his fingers like cold silk. Zuko remembered her wearing her hair exactly like this in the dream he'd had of her as a child.

The backs of his fingers accidentally grazed the apple of her cheek in the process of picking the hair loopie up.

So concentrated on healing his shoulder that she didn't notice the movement of his good hand. When she felt the strand of her hair loopie being lifted combined with the light brush of his knuckles against her cheek, Katara looked up sharply, startled.

"What are you doing?" Her eyes were wide as she locked her gaze with his, her expression a mixture of confusion and questioning.

The question brought him out of his thoughts and cut through his concentration. Immediately his fingers dropped the hair loopie and he held up his hands. "So-sorry- I was just--"