Chapter Text
"An ex thought it'd be romantic to share a meal over the burial site of his ancestors."
"And he was right. It was romantic."
-Mai and Zuko, Smoke and Shadow
Orange is such an awful color.
The thought came unbidden into Mai's mind. She couldn't help it. Sunsets were such a disgusting display of garish colors, and she didn't understand what the fuss was all about.
But Tom Tom liked them, and she was practicing being the kind of big sister that didn't consider foreign kings more important than younger siblings, and so she was sitting with him at his window watching the sun's gruesome death once again.
Tom Tom yawned and leaned his head on her shoulder. "What're we doing next day?"
"You and Mother are going to visit Auntie Mura. I'm going to the palace."
"To see him?"
She raised an eyebrow. "Fire Lord Zuko? Yes."
"Why?" he pouted. "Stay with me."
"Sorry kiddo," she said. "When the Fire Lord requests your presence, you can't say no. I'll spend the day after that with you. Promise."
He looked only mildly placated but said nothing more. The oranges in the sky deepened to reds and purples - much more tolerable - until at last the sun slipped beneath the horizon.
"Time for bed," she said, nudging him.
"Okay." He lifted his arms to her, and she picked him up, carrying him to his bed. He wriggled underneath the covers, and she tucked him up to his chin.
She leaned over and ruffled his hair. "Goodnight."
She went to her room and sat down at her vanity. She let her hair down and began to brush it, thinking about what she had said to Tom Tom.
Not that she couldn't say no to the Fire Lord; she did that routinely. No, it was that she saw so little of Zuko these days she wasn't going to give up any chance she had to see him.
She understood he was busy. The last year had been such a whirlwind of change in the Fire Nation, mostly for the better. Their relationship, on the other hand… well, it was better than it had been when he was training the Avatar. But only barely.
They weren't fighting, or anything so serious as that. They were very much in love. She turned into a simpering fool every time he looked at her, and he looked so happy when he was with her - and Zuko was rarely happy.
But with him so busy with official Fire Nation business, those times when they could be together had grown fewer and farther between. So when he said he would clear an entire day to spend with her, there had been no question.
He had always been her weak spot.
Zuko stretched out on his bed, groaning. He was so bone tired. Not the feeling that comes from a day of physical exertion, where your muscles ache but you sleep peacefully. No, this was the type of mental fatigue that sucked every bit of energy from your body only to plague you all night while you chased elusive sleep.
There was just so much to think about. The Harmony Restoration Movement, the rebuilding of the homeland, the new education policies. Taxes, military pensions, repurposing factories, international diplomacy, reparations, palace security. Those and dozens of other concerns crowded his brain, each vying for dominance, insisting that he worked through them before the night was through.
He wished he could turn it all off so he could sleep. So he could be at peace. He needed sleep tonight because tomorrow was his day with Mai, and the last thing he wanted was to be too tired to enjoy it. Or worse, to be so tired that Mai didn't enjoy it.
He frowned. Something needed to be done about their relationship, and soon. He would have proposed to her already, but he couldn't bring himself to subject her to the assassins who interrupted his life every couple of months. Which was stupid, because she could have them pinned to the wall before his inept guards even knew they were there. But it was so unfair to her to make it her responsibility.
She had already saved his life once and nearly got herself killed in the process. It seemed presumptuous of him to tie her to a lifetime of that, just because he loved her.
He rolled over, hoping that the new position would be more conducive to sleep. It wasn't.
He hoped she liked the lunch he had planned for her tomorrow. He had spent a good deal of time coming up with the idea, and he thought it was something she would enjoy. But Mai was funny like that; she had a very different notion of romance than most girls.
Not that he had much experience.
And what was he going to do about that pesky rice tax…