🐾

Neverland lay in a vast land that was once covered in black. The only thing that seemed to be in color was the rose garden that grew back. You stood against the large window that shone against the darkness. Your lips turned slightly as you looked at the newly grown roses; what an eyesore it was to look at. You turned slightly as you just put Bigi to sleep, hoping he wouldn't wake again.

And what reason for him to wake up? Your two other children were absolutely not being quiet. You don't know what is going on between the two of them, as they've been having this 'war' for two weeks non-stop. You closed your eyes tightly as you felt a loud bang shake the walls. You only peeked to make sure your baby didn't wake. But Bigi was still sound asleep.

You couldn't be bothered to get involved in Paris and Prince's affairs, as Michael considered it normal, but they just had him wrapped around their fingers. So you let him sort them out when he wanted to. You moved out of the room, closing the door lightly as you went to find your husband.

You found Michael sitting on the couch with his legs spread as he read the newspaper. His hair was pushed back as his glasses sat on top of his head. Only he could make such a mundane thing look so beautiful. He only looked up when he saw you stroll in slowly with a neutral expression.

"Darling." You called out as you walked through the dark house.

"Yes, my love." Michael grabbed your hand as you got closer. He pulled you down to his lap, the newspaper disregarded.

"The most terrible thing happened to me today."

Michael hummed as he listened. "Go on."

"I had-"

"I'm going to kill you!"

Your daughter's voice was loud throughout the house as you and Michael watched Prince run right past you.

"What is going on?" You questioned.

Paris stepped in fast with fury as she clenched her clothes in her hand. "He bleached my clothes!"

Paris held up the ruined garment. "I'm going to string him."

"Nothing that black dye can help?" Michael suggested.

"My darling." You hummed. "I'm sure it was an accident."

"I meant it," Prince said behind you.

You turned as he had another piece of Paris's clothes. He had a pair of scissors and cut through the fabric.

"This is for releasing my rats!" Prince said.

"I'm going to gouge your eyeballs for this." Paris retorted.

"I'm releasing the spiders next," Paris added.

"Don't you dare!"

Michael sighed next to you as you lifted your lips in a small quirk. "Children."

Both of them stopped at your voice. "If you're going to kill each other, do it outside, please."

"I just cleaned." You sighed.

Paris grinned at Prince while he dropped the dress he was holding. "You have five seconds to run."

You and Michael watched as Paris chased Prince outside. You turned towards him. "I hope our baby boy is calmer."

"My love, when is the Jackson household ever quiet?" He looked at you.

Can I ask you something, beautiful?"

"Sure, Michael."

"What was it you were going to tell me?"

"Yes, my rose garden is ruined." You moved your body in his lap, crossing your legs gracefully.

"Why?" Michael said, his hands landing on top of your thighs.

"They grew back." You laid your hand on your forehead. "All that hard work cutting them off."

"That's terrible." Michael kissed your hand. "Want me to help you?"

"No, I just need to tell somebody."

You looked at Michael as he stared at you. "What is it?"

"You're so beautiful." Michael's eyes burned with love for you, so intense.

"Stop it." You tilted your head back as Michael buried his head in your neck.

Michael breathed you in before he placed small kisses on your neck. You smiled and closed your eyes as Michael poured his love into you.

"Never." His deep voice sounded against your neck, making goosebumps appear on your skin.

You pulled back to grab his face with both of your hands. "My darling husband, what has gotten into you today?"

"Nothing."

You brought his face closer to kiss his lips in quick pecks. Only for Michael to pull back with a slight smirk.

"That was too quick for me; I want more." Michael pulled you closer to him as he slotted his lips against yours. His kiss was slower but deeper.

You pulled back, wrapping your arms around his neck as you dropped your head into his neck. His hands came up your back to rub circles on it. The moment of peace only lasted so long as Prince busted through the back door covered in mud.

You frowned as you watched him stomp past you and Michael, not even making eye contact and opting to go upstairs in a quiet fury. You held your breath as mud splattered against the hardwood floors. Paris strolled in soon after, also covered in mud, but a small smirk was on her face.

"What did you do?" Michael asked as he watched Paris pause in front of you two.

"He won't be touching my clothes again." That was all Paris said before she strolled up the stairs.

You looked back at Michael. "You deal with that."

Michael sighed. "Why me?"

"You created that."

"What?"

"You spoil them too much, love."

Michael let out a laugh. "Like you don't either."

"My love is more of necessity." You countered.

"When Prince got sick, who was at his beck and call?" Michael raised an eyebrow.

You faltered at his words. "Why would you bring that up?"

"You can try to act indifferent, but I know what your love looks like." Michael rubbed your back again.

You looked away as Michael drew you closer. "Is my darling shy now?"

"You can clean up these floors." You breezed right past what he said.

"Anything for you."

You looked back at him as he smiled at you, and you smiled slightly. You pushed the glasses that sat on his head to the bridge of his nose.

"What's the point of the glasses if you never wear them?"

"I swear my sight is worse with them on."

"Michael, it doesn't work like that."

"In my world, it does."

You raised an eyebrow at him before you decided you wanted to get up. You started to push off his lap. Michael made a slight protest as he pulled you back into his lap.

"Where are you going?"

"I'm making sure our children don't kill each other."

"I'm sure they solved whatever they had," Michael said.

"It's quiet up there; that's unusual," You pointed out.

"Why are you trying to leave?"

"Michael."

"Stay longer." Michael hummed for me. "For me?"

You stared as Michael moved his hands to your hips, gripping them lightly. "Fine."

"Thank you, love." Michael hummed deeply.

His large hand went under your chin, bringing your head closer to his for a kiss. You closed your eyes from the sensation of his warm hand.

"You don't know how much I adore you," Michael said against your lips. "What I would do."

You pulled back as you looked at him. "I love you."

You hated balls...not those type of balls, you could get around with those. You hated dance balls. You hated the fake laughter, the stiff etiquette, and the suffocating weight of the formal attire you were forced to wear.

That was the worst part of it all…the clothing…the corset. It was laced so impossibly tight against your ribs that every single breath felt like a shallow struggle. You had been standing beside Michael for two straight hours, forced to endure his quiet presence. His long fingers had stayed firmly wrapped around your waist the entire night, a gentle grip that felt less like an embrace and more like a leash. He stood there in his immaculate, tailored black tailcoat, looking every bit the pristine, soft spoken gentleman; smiling warmly at the aristocracy, engaging in quiet, intellectual conversation, and occasionally leaning down to brush his lips against your temple.

To the rest of New Orleans high society, Michael Jackson was the ideal man: insanely wealthy, deeply respectful, and utterly devoted to his sweet, beautiful woman.

To you, he was a nightmare with a pretty face.

You had spent the last several months trying to navigate his terrifying, suffocating obsession. He watched every move you made. He controlled who you spoke to, where you went, and how you spent your days. He loved you with a dark, twisted devotion that left zero room for error, and you were constantly walking on eggshells, praying you wouldn't trigger that calm, cold side of him that lurked right beneath his gentle smile.

So, when Michael was finally pulled into a conversation with a group of older wealthy landowners, you seized the briefest window of opportunity. You gave his arm a gentle, polite pat, whispered that you were going to step toward the refreshment table for a glass of punch, and slid away into the crowd before he could protest.

You just wanted a single second to breathe without his eyes burning into the back of your neck.

Standing near the tall velvet drapes near the balcony doors, you sipped at your cup, finally letting your shoulders drop. That was when a young gentleman from the North, dressed in a sharp navy dress uniform, stepped up beside you. He was polite enough, making small talk about the music, commenting on how crowded the ballroom was, and offering a pleasant, charming smile. You were completely oblivious to any romantic undertones. You didn't care about the man, you weren't trying to flirt, and you certainly weren't trying to cause trouble. You were just relieved to have a normal, mundane conversation with a human being who wasn't treating you like a piece of glass he wanted to lock in a display case. You smiled politely, made a few brief remarks about the orchestra, and took another sip of your punch, completely relaxed for the first time all evening.

You didn't see Michael standing across the room.

You didn't see the way his conversation with the landowners came to a dead halt. You didn't see the way his eyes narrowed, his jaw clenching so hard the muscles in his neck strained, or the way his fingers gripped his glass until his skin stretched against his knuckles.

Before the young gentleman could even finish his next sentence, Michael was there.

He slid up beside you with a terrifying grace, his hand instantly finding the small of your back and pressing you against his chest. His touch was firm, and possessive, and entirely unyielding.

"Is this gentleman bothering you, my love?" Michael had asked, his voice dripping with a sweetness that made the temperature in your blood drop ten degrees.

The young man had quickly backed off, sensing the sudden shift in the atmosphere, and excused himself into the crowd. You had turned to look at Michael, your stomach doing a nervous flip, but his face was a mask of pleasant composure. He didn't yell. He didn't make a scene. He simply took your empty glass, set it on a passing servant's tray, and leaned down to whisper into your ear.

"We are going home. Now."

The carriage ride back to the estate was suffocatingly silent.

Michael sat directly across from you, his hands resting flat on his knees. He didn't look out the window, and he didn't look at you. He just sat there, perfectly still, his breathing low, his face carved out of stone. The complete lack of emotion on his face was infinitely worse than if he had been shouting. When Michael was quiet like this, it meant his mind was working, and calculating, and rationalizing whatever dark thing he was planning to do next.

You kept your head down, your hands clasped tightly in your lap, counting the seconds as the wheels scraped against the cobblestone streets. You wanted to speak up, to ask him what was wrong, but the oppressive energy radiating off him held your tongue hostage.

When the carriage finally pulled up to the grand front gates of his mansion, Michael stepped out first. He offered you his hand to help you down, his grip firm and cool, but he didn't say a single word as he led you up the grand front steps and into the foyer.

The moment the heavy front double doors clicked shut behind you, the quiet in the house felt deafening.

"Michael…" you started, your voice small as you turned to face him.

He ignored you entirely. He unbuttoned his fine black tailcoat, slipping it off his shoulders and casually draping it over the back of an armchair. He unpinned his silk cravat, tossing it onto the table, his movements slow and chillingly calm.

You let out a heavy sigh, deciding you weren't going to stand here and endure his moody silence. You were exhausted, your back was aching, and this fuck ass dress with its suffocating corset was driving you insane. All you wanted to do was get up to the bedchambers, peel off the layers of stiff silk, and lie down.

You turned on your heel and started heading toward the grand staircase, taking the steps two at a time to put some distance between you and his silent attitude.

Michael walked right behind you, his leather boots clicking against the hardwood floor.

When you reached the master suite, you pushed the doors open and walked straight over to the tall vanity mirror, reaching around your back to desperately struggle with the endless rows of tiny pearl buttons and tight laces. "Can you at least help me unlace this damn thing?" you muttered, your frustration breaking through your caution. "I can barely get a full breath of air."

Michael didn't move toward you.

Instead, he walked past the bed, stepping over to the dark brown desk sitting in the corner of the room. You watched his reflection in the mirror, your heart doing a sudden, violent thud against your ribs as you saw where his long fingers were reaching.

He opened the top right drawer.

He reached inside, his hand brushing past the silver pens and leather journals, until his fingers wrapped around a heavy key ring that was filled with keys that opened doors around this big ass house.

Including the basement door.

OH FUCK NO.

The horror of the sight hit you like a bucket of ice water. Your mind instantly flashed back to that pitch black, damp cellar room beneath the estate– the cold iron chains, the tight linen gag, the days of absolute darkness and humiliation. You had sworn to yourself you would never go back down there. You had done everything right. You had been polite, you had used your words, you had let him feed you, and you had played his perfect little doll for weeks.

And now he was reaching for that fucking key? For what?!

Hold the fuck up.

You didn't flirt with that man at the ball! You didn't even know his damn name! You hadn't done a single thing wrong!

You spun around away from the mirror, you gave him a sharp, bewildered look, your brow furrowing as you backed away a step.

"Michael..." you croaked out, your voice laced with a mixture of confusion and defensiveness. "What...what are you doing?"

Michael didn't answer immediately. He slowly closed the desk drawer with a soft thud. He slowly closed his fingers around the brass key ring, the heavy metal clinking softly in the quiet room. He turned around to face you.

His expression was entirely blank. There was no rage in his eyes, no flush of anger on his brown skin– just an unbothered, terrifying neutrality that chilled you to the very bone. He looked at you like a physician preparing to administer a painful medicine to a sick child.

He began walking slowly toward you.

Every instinct in your body screamed at you to run, but you were trapped in the corner of the room, the vanity table blocking your left and the massive bed blocking your right. You took two wide, frantic steps back until your lower back hit the edge of the wooden vanity.

"Michael, stop moving toward me!" you gasped, your voice cracking as the panic began to swallow your composure whole. "Talk to me! What the hell are you doing?!"

Michael stopped about three feet away from you. He tilted his head slightly, his dark, hooded eyes scanning your distressed face with a quiet, observant intensity.

"I am caring for you, my love," he said softly, his voice a smooth, velvet purr that made your stomach drop into your shoes. "I am doing what is necessary to protect what is mine."

"Protect what?!" you shouted, tears of frustration and fear finally prickling at the corners of your eyes. "I didn't do anything! I was standing by the table waiting for you!"

"You were entertaining another man," Michael corrected gently, his tone completely unhurried, as if he were stating a simple, indisputable fact of nature. "You were smiling at him. You were allowing his eyes to wander over your body– a body that belongs exclusively to me. You allowed him to invade your space, and you looked...pleased by it."

"I was being polite!" you cried out, gripping the edge of the vanity behind you so hard your nails dug into the wood. "I didn't flirt with him! I don't even know who the fuck he was! I was literally just trying to get something to drink because my ribs are burning from this damn corset! You're making something out of absolutely nothing, Michael!"

Michael let out a slow sigh, shaking his head with a look of quiet, sorrowful disappointment. He looked at you the way a master looks at an unruly, stubborn pet that just refused to learn its place.

"It is never nothing, sweet girl," he murmured, taking another step closer, narrowing the space between you until you could smell the sandalwood on his skin. "I have given you freedom up here. I gave you the sun, the soft sheets, the fine dresses, and my absolute devotion. I trusted you to carry yourself as my woman when we stepped out into society. And at the very first opportunity...you allowed the world back in."

He lifted his hand, the keys jingling.

"You clearly need another time out from the world," Michael said, his voice dropping an octave into a low, terrifying command. "You need time to reflect on your boundaries. You need to remember who you belong to, because it seems the air upstairs has made you...forgetful."

He reached out, his long, slender fingers extending to grab hold of your upper arm.

NO.

The moment his fingers brushed against your sleeve, the terror of being dragged back down into that dark, suffocating basement overtook every single ounce of your pride, your anger, and your dignity. You couldn't go back down there. You would lose your mind. You would literally lose your mind if he locked you in those chains again.

Before his grip could tighten on your arm, your knees buckled.

You dropped straight to the hard floor, your heavy silk skirts pooling around you with a loud rustle. You landed on your knees right at his feet, trembling violently from head to toe, tears spilling over your lower lashes and streaming down your hot cheeks.

You reached up with both hands, frantically grabbing the hem of his dark trousers, wrapping your fingers into the fabric, looking up at him with wide, bloodshot, desperate eyes.

"No, no, no, Michael, please!" you sobbed out, your voice cracking and breaking into a pathetic, desperate wreck. "Please, God, no! Don't take me down there! Please, I'm begging you!"

Michael froze. He looked down at you, his eyes widening just a fraction as he processed the sight of you on your knees...weeping...clinging to his legs like a person pleading for mercy.

"Please, Michael, listen to me!" you cried, your chest heaving against the tight laces of your dress, pushing your breast up, every breath coming out as a choked, desperate gasp. "I swear on my life, I didn't mean anything by it! I'll never talk to another man again! I won't even look at anybody! I'll stay right here in this room, I'll never ask to leave the house again, I swear to God!"

You leaned your forehead directly against his leather boot, your tears soaking into the dark leather as you practically buried your face at his feet, trembling so hard your teeth were clicking together.

"Please...I'll be good," you wept, your voice broken, and bare, and entirely stripped of all resistance. "I'll be so, so good for you, Michael. I'll do whatever you want. I'll use my words, I'll let you feed me, I'll sit right where you tell me to sit, just please...please don't lock me in the dark again...please don't put the chains on me– I'm begging you...please..."

The room fell completely silent, expect for the sound of your ragged, trembling sobs echoing off the high ceilings.

Michael stood over you for a long moment. He didn't move. He just stared down at the top of your head, watching your body shake with fear, listening to you beg for his mercy at his very feet.

Slowly, very slowly, a deep, dark sense of absolute satisfaction washed across his features. The terrifying neutrality vanished, replaced by a look of profound, sickening warmth. This was what he had wanted all along. Not just your presence, but your complete, total, unbroken submission.

Slowly, Michael sank down onto his knees in front of you, bringing himself to your level on the floor.

The brass keys slid from his fingers, hitting the rug with a soft, forgotten thud. He reached out, his long hands gently cupping both sides of your face. His thumbs were so soft, so impossibly tender as he carefully wiped away the tears streaming down your brown skin, his touch trembling slightly with a sudden, overwhelming emotion.

"Yeah?" he whispered, his voice dropping into a tender tone that vibrated right through your chest. "You'll be my good girl?"

You nodded frantically against his palms, your breath coming in ragged, trembling hitches as you stared into his intense eyes. "Yes...yes, I promise. I promise, Michael. Please…I'll be so fucking good for you..."

He stared at your face for a long, heavy beat, his gaze drifting down to your soft, trembling lips. Something flipped behind his eyes- the rigid control he had maintained ever since he had stolen you away from your life completely melting into hunger.

He leaned in and kissed you.

It wasn't like the gentle, cautious kiss in the library weeks ago. It was deep, and desperate, and possessive, his lips pressing firmly against yours, taking the very air from your lungs. The shock of it made your eyes widen for a split second– this was the first time his lips had touched yours ever since he had kidnapped you, the first time he had allowed himself to break that self imposed wall of polite distance.

A low, involuntary sound escaped the back of your throat as his long fingers tangled into the hair at the nape of your neck, pulling you impossibly closer, deepening the kiss until you were completely consumed by him, lost in the dark, sweet cage of his love.

NYC, 1981

“Look! Look! It’s Spider-Man!” A little boy’s voice echoed across the sidewalk, rapidly drawing the attention of everyone nearby. Conversations died mid-sentence. A businessman stopped checking his watch. A woman carrying grocery bags looked up so quickly she nearly dropped them.

Y/N had been on her way home, struggling with all the papers and files she had been carrying, when she stopped abruptly and followed the kid’s pointing finger toward the skyline.

‘There he is.’ She thought to herself.

A flash of blue and white swinging effortlessly between Manhattan’s buildings, disappearing behind one skyscraper only to reappear from another only a heartbeat later. Graceful and weightless. So smoothly it was almost criminal. Like New York City itself had decided gravity was optional for exactly one person.

A small grin appeared on Y/N’s face as her eyes caught the afternoon sun reflecting off the rhinestones scattered across the single glove Spider-Man wore over his right hand. Nobody knew why only one of his hands sparkled while the other remained hidden beneath the blue fabric of his suit. Rumors ranged from it being good luck to some elaborate superhero technology, but no explanation ever stuck.

It had simply become part of him, you know? The sparkly glove. Whenever the sunlight caught it just right, it flashed across the Manhattan skyline like a shooting star, announcing his arrival before anyone even laid eyes on him.

The crowd collectively gasped and pointed. Some waved. A few children jumped excitedly, convinced he could somehow see them from thirty stories above.

Nobody screamed hysterically anymore, not these days, no.

Spider-Man had become less of a mystery and more of a friendly neighborhood protector. Of course, nobody knew who he was. And nobody seemed particularly interested in ruining the mystery of his identity, There was an unspoken understanding throughout the city that some secrets were meant to stay secrets. And as long as he kept catching muggers before breakfast and dangling purse snatchers from traffic lights, new yorkers were perfectly happy minding their own business.

High above them, Spider-Man released one web and caught another. 

“AOW!” His voice bounced between the buildings.

The little boy burst into laughter. “Oh, he so does that on purpose!” he exclaimed, delighted, pulling at his mother’s elbow for excitement. “Awo!” He mimed in his tiny voice.

Y/N couldn’t help smiling. “He’s such a dork,” she murmured to herself, shaking her head fondly at the familiar figure.

Spider-Man disappeared around another building, only the occasional glimpse of blue between the steel and glass letting the city know he was still somewhere overhead.

She kept watching until he vanished completely into the skyline. A sigh escaped her.

It had become a small routine at this point: whenever she happened to catch a glimpse of him, her day somehow got a little better.

Y/N wasn’t one of those people who collected newspaper clippings or claimed they’d spotted him every other Tuesday. She simply liked the comfort of knowing that somewhere above the city, someone was looking out for it. It made New York feel… safer, in a way.

“One of these days,” she muttered to herself again, adjusting the strap of her tote bag, “Michael will introduce us.”

Her boyfriend, Michael, somehow, possessed the worst timing of any human ever. Which was particularly ironic considering he worked as a photographer for the Daily Bugle.

You see, the two worked for the newspaper, Michael in photography and Y/N writing. Well, now she was starting to call herself 'spider-writer', since their boss and chief editor, J. Jonah Jameson had been making her write solely for one topic and one topic only: your friendly neighborhood Spider-Man.

Y/N was starting to get bored, to be honest. People always circled back to the same tedious questions — “WHO IS SPIDER-MAN?” or“HOW DID HE GET HIS POWERS?”. But Y/N had outgrown those wonders—now she had interests in things like why did New York trust him? What was his moral compass? Would he be there whenever needed? Why on earth did he war that bedazzled glove?

At least Jonah allowed her to get into those matters.

Michael, on the other hand, had photographed Spider-Man more than one time. He had sold front-page pictures of him and even claimed the guy was ‘actually really nice’. Meanwhile, Y/N had yet to see Spider-Man do anything more exciting than swing between buildings yelling nonsensical little noises.

He always seemed to catch the interesting parts. She seemed to always miss those spicy bits. It was beginning to feel personal, truly.

What Y/N didn’t know, though—what she couldn’t possibly know— was that she had, in fact, seen Spider-Man every single day face to face. Usually over breakfast, wearing oversized sweaters and apologizing for being more than five minutes late.

🕸️ྀི

“Excuse me!” His voice rang through the air. “Oh, careful there, miss!” He swung from a traffic light to another. “Hee-hee!” He yelled. 

Michael swung through New York as fast as he could, trying to make it to his girlfriend’s apartment before movie night officially became ‘Michael’s late again’ night.

“Oh, shoot!” He cursed as his eye caught the time in a digital watch nearby that hung off a nearby storefront. He looked around for a few seconds and spotted a familiar face shaking their head negatively at him. 

Bill Bray, who Michael considered a friend and was lucky enough to have as father figure, stood with his arms crossed over his chest, a bouquet in one hand and an unmistakable scowl of disapproval on his face, staring at Spider-Man as though he were one of the bad guys.

Michael sighed before dropping directly in front of Bill. The man stood in the street in front of a little flower cart wearing a beige hat, an elderly lady standing behind said cart looking a little taken aback. Her eyes wandered from Bill to Spider-Man a few times before she mimed Bill’s disapproving expression in a very comical way. Spider-Man was truly becoming a regular client nowadays. 

“I know, I know!” Michael complained, voice sounding tired, as he tried to reach for the bouquet. Bill retracted his arm, keeping the flowers out of Michael’s reach. Instead, he reached up and fixed Michael’s blue mask, smoothing it out where it’d shifted. Then he brushed a bit of dust from one shoulder. “Thanks.” Michael said softly. 

And then Bill pointed a sharp finger towards him. “You gotta watch out, kiddo,” He licked his lips. “One day that girl will get tired of these poor excuses of yours!”

Michael sighed again and ran his gloved hand through his face covered by the Spider-Man mask. “She believes me.” He argued. 

“No, no,” Bill cut him off mid sentence. “She loves you! And it’s about damn time you fill her in, and you know it!”

“Yeah, I know, I know.” 

The lady’s eyes darted between Michael and Bill with obvious interest. Then they drifted down to the bouquet. Every week Spider-Man would show up and grab a bouquet. Sometimes it was lilies, sometimes it was sunflowers. This week was sunflowers.

“Does Spider-Man have a special someone?” Curiosity got the best of her and she couldn’t resist in asking.

Spider-Man’s body language changes completely. He scratched the back of his neck and looked away, as if someone could see the blush that crept its way into his cheeks.

Bill rolled his eyes. 

“I, uh—Maybe.” Michael said in a shy tone, a little nervous laugh escaping through his lips.

“Ya know, ‘maybes’ buys flowers every thursday.” The lady mocked, an amused smile crossing her sweet wrinkled face.

“She’s uh,…” He bit his bottom lip underneath the mask. “Ehm, she’s a… a pretty young thing.” You could actually hear his smile.

The florist’s own smile widened. Even Bill fought back a grin.

“Oh?”

“Mhm.”

“And does Pretty Young Thing know she’s dating Spider-Man?”

Michael let out a breathy laugh and shook his head.

“No, she doesn’t and it’ll bite him in the butt!” Bill answered before Michael had the chance. 

“Oh, you must tell her, then!” The lady sided with Bill and Michael (besides recognizing signs of some irritation at their persistence) knew they were right. 

But the thought of it alone made his stomach tighten. Could you imagine if one of enemies found out she mattered to him? That could go wrong really quickly. All it took was one enemy. One photograph. One wrong person putting two and two together. Suddenly Y/N wouldn’t just be his girlfriend—she’d be a target.

And sweet, caring, love-of-his-life, Y/N deserved something as close to normal as he could possibly offer her. And Michael felt selfish enough to keep her as his girlfriend, even if that meant hiding the truth for as long as he could. She was everything to him. Everything.

He let out another sigh before checking Bill’s wristwatch. “Can I go now?” He asked, softly. Tiredly.

Bill clicked his tongue and let out a huff. He extended the bouquet to Michael and let him grab it. 

“Sunflowers are her favorite.” Michael said with a tiny smile taking over his masked lips. “Thanks, Bill.”

“No problem, kiddo.”

“Thank you, ma'am.” He tapped two fingers against his forehead before pointing them toward her with a boyish smile underneath the blue mask. “See ya!”, then launched himself back into the Manhattan skyline.

The florist watched him disappear, then turned to Bill. “He’s hopelessly in it, isn’t he?”

Bill didn’t bother looking up. “Yup.”

“Sweet boy, though.”

“Too sweet for his own good.”

🕸️ྀི

As Michael swung through the familiar streets and avenues on the way to Y/N’s apartment, something caught his attention, like it usually would: an orange cat was stranded on the fire escape of a six-story apartment building, meowing pitifully while an elderly man leaned out of his window a floor below.

"Oh, Mr Buttons…” He pleaded helplessly, one hand over his chest. "Please, please don't jump."

Michael sighed. "Really?" He looked toward the skyline. Then at the cat. Then toward the skyline again. Then at his wrist, which had no watch. Well, was already late. Might as well, right?

"AOW!” he yelled dramatically to absolutely no one before changing courses. A web caught the side of the building and, seconds later, Spider-Man landed smoothly on the fire escape.

"Oh, thank goodness!" The elderly man sighed with relief at the sight of him. Michael waved politely at the man.

He placed the bouquet under one of his arms, trying and hoping too keep it at least, somewhat, secure.

The cat blinked up at him with its enormous amber eyes.

"...Hi."

It let out one tiny, pitiful meow in response. 

Michael smiled beneath the mask. “M’kay, here we go..." He reached out carefully, scooping the orange fluff into his arms.

The transformation was immediate. Claws, teeth and hisses—all at once, everywhere.

"HISSSSS!"

"Oh my god!”

The kitten twisted like it was possessed, every paw going in a different direction. Michael kept trashing around along with the feline, trying to get ahold of it.

Sharp, tiny claws latched onto his forearm. Then his shoulder. Then— "Dang it!" One particularly offended swipe caught him clean across the cheek, getting a small rip through his mask.

At that Michael nearly lost his footing on the fire escape. "Hey, hey!" he pleaded, desperately trying not to drop the tiny menace. "I'm literally rescuing you! C’mon, don’t make this difficult!” The cat responded by attempting to climb onto his head. "No, no, no—we don't need to be up there!"

It hissed again.

“Now you're just being dramatic."

Another hiss.

Michael sighed, gulped and reached one delicate hand out, trying to pet the cat. “I know you're scared." The kitten bit his gloved index finger.

“Ouch!” He jerked his hand away. “Okay, maybe you're just mean."

The cat somehow managed to hook all four paws into his suit at once, dangling from his chest like an angry orange ornament.

Michael sighed.

“Out of all the dangers in the city, this is what will take me…” Michael complained under his breath, slowly starting to turn towards the old man’s window.

He finally managed to peel the cat off his suit one tiny paw at a time, cradling it firmly enough that it couldn't launch into another attack.

The cat glared up at him. Michael glared right back through the white lenses of his mask.

"We are never doing this again." He warned, pointing a sharp finger at the cat.

It sneezed in his face.

Michael closed his eyes. “Alrighty, then.”

A moment later, he lowered the little orange menace safely into its owner's waiting arms. The transformation was miraculous--It immediately began purring.

Michael stared in complete disbelief. "Oh, so now you behave?"

The old man laughed. "Mr Buttons can be... spirited."

"Spirited?" Michael touched the fresh scratch on his cheek, grimacing at the stingy feeling of touching it. “Sir, respectfully, your cat just tried to kill Spider-Man."

The cat blinked innocently.

“Oh, don’t you gimme that look!”

🕸️ྀི

A few moments later he reached the familiar alley he always hid his suit and ‘transformed’ into simply Michael Jackson, the photographer and boyfriend, before going to Y/N’s place.

Michael caught his reflection in the rain puddle at his feet and stared. The suit looked exactly as it always had: royal blue from neck to boots, broken only by crisp white panels sweeping across his shoulders, forearms and sides like the sharp lines of an expensive suit tailored for someone who spent more time in the air than on the ground. A black spider stretched across his chest, its long eight legs blending with the white. The mask's white lenses reflected the city lights back at him, giving away nothing of the tired eyes behind them. His right hand glittered--tons of tiny rhinestones caught even the weakest light, turning the glove into a shooting star whenever he swung between buildings. Most New Yorkers assumed it was part of the costume, some flashy signature, something Spider-Man wore simply because he was Spider-Man.

But in reality, the glove served a purpose: it was stitched with fine grip pads along the fingertips and palm, giving him greater precision whenever he aimed a web or caught the edge of a building at impossible speeds. The rhinestones weren't just decoration: their texture gave his fingers subtle tactile reference points, allowing him to adjust the angle of his wrist without ever taking his eyes off where he was going. The sparkle had simply been Michael's idea.

'If I have to wear it every day,' he'd once reasoned while tailoring the whole suit, 'might as well be pretty.'

He wiggled out of the blue suit before putting it away in a handbag he kept hidden behind a metal trashcan, the rhinestone glove being the last thing he placed inside the bag. He took a deep breath and zipped it shut, placing it hidden and shooting a web at it to keep it secure. You never know, right?

His curls were messy and a few stubborn locks stuck to his sweaty forehaed. Cheeks flushed bright red and the scratch on his left one (curtesy of Mr Buttons) stood out in bloody maroon. He hadn’t notice it, since it had stopped stinging.

Michael jogged with the bouquet in his hand to the familiar building where his girl resided. He finally made his way up to her floor, two steps at a time.

A little disappointed huff left him as he caught sight of the (now ruined) flowers as soon as he reached her door. Couldn’t even get her proper flowers, he thought. Shaking his head, he finally knocked. 

Y/N opened the door about two seconds later, a wondering gaze on her eyes. She was still in her work clothes, dark pants, white shirt and black vest on top. Michael gulped, looking away for a split second. He loved her in those outfits. But then again, he loved her in anything (specially nothing).

She lifted a brow and tilted her head, leaning against the doorway and crossing her arms over her chest. An amused expression crossed her face. “Well, did they fight back, at least?” She asked while nodding towards the wrecked flowers. 

Michael looked down at the bouquet and smiled shyly. “Bravely.” 

Y/N shook her head and reached out for it. She lifted the bouquet up to her nose and took a deep breath, sighing and closing her eyes at the pleasant fragrance. Then, she turned her eyes to Michael’s face, frowning and reaching out delicately for his cheek. She softly crossed her thumb across the bloody scratch. Concern started to kick in.

“Did you get hurt? What happened? Did you get into a fight? Do you need me to-” 

“Baby, baby-” Michael cut her off and took her wrists delicately into his hands. A warm smile appeared on his lips. “I’m okay. Just a scratch, isn't it?” He shook his head, quicly trying to come up wiht a good excuse. “I just, uhm, the camera, you know?”

Y/N narrowed her eyes at his response. “Yeah, right,” She pulled him inside by the arm. “the camera.”

Michael closed the door behind him and pulled Y/N back into him by the wrist, kissing her temple before she made her way to her kitchen, searching for a vase for the flowers. She stopped on her tracks briefly, though, turning around and pecking his lips not once, not twice, but three times. Michael kissed her back, leaning in for more, but was met with nothing but disappointment as she made her way to flower-care.

He looked down in a bummer, but trailed after anyway. That was until something caught his eye. A few papers laid messily around the coffee table in front of her couch, notes scattered and some cut-out newspaper pieces with Spider-Man’s name and pictures. His heart skipped a beat.

Among the scattered newspaper clippings and notes, one hastily written headline immediately caught his eye:

'WHY NEW YORK TRUSTS SPIDER-MAN?'

“Another Spider-Man article?” 

Y/N didn’t bother looking up, concentrated on making the flowers fit the vase. 

“Mhm.” 

“I’m starting to think you have a crush on him.” Michael teased, crossing the living room and placing himself right behind her, arms around her waist and chin resting on top of her head. 

Y/N raised her brows at that, shifting around to face him. Her back was now against the kitchen counter and her front faced Michael. “Well, if anyone has the hots for him, it’s Jonah,” She slipped her arms around his neck, lacing her fingers together behind it. “The man won’t let me write about anything else besides Spidey content. It’s annoying, really.”

“Mhm,” Michael nodded, a teasing smirk on his face. If only she knew how much he enjoyed reading her words on him. “Spidey, huh?” Oh, if only she knew. 

She frowned. “Are you jealous of Spider-Man, Mike?”

“What? No! That’s ridiculous!” He immediately replied.

Y/N burst out laughing at his defensiveness. She shrugged. “Oh, well, at least Spider-Man is pontual!”

Michael let out the most offended little gasp she'd ever heard. “You take that back!”

🕸️ྀི

A few minutes later, they were curled up together on Y/N's couch, wrapped beneath a shared blanket.

Michael managed to keep the bowl of popcorn equilibrated on his stomach as he laid with his head resting on Y/N’s tights. She sat up, a hand playing absentmindedly with his curls. 

About 15 minutes into the movie he fell asleep, little snores coming out of his mouth selling him out.

Y/N was used to it by now and she didn’t mind it—stopped pretended to get upset over it months ago. She carefully reached for the bowl on his stomach, placing it on the table next to her side of the couch before letting her fingers wander back into his hair. She looked down at him and softly ran a finger through the cut in his cheek. 

Before, she meant to clean and take care of it, not wanting him to get it infected or anything. Michael had protested, of course. “It’s barely even a scratch!” He had complained. “It’ll heal on its own.”

Y/N just stared at him looking very unimpressed before cleaning it with antiseptic spray and applying some healing ointment over it.

Michael secretly loved whenever she took care of him. He thanked her afterwards with a kiss.

Now, a warm feeling took over her chest as she stared at him. He was painfully handsome. And Y/N was painfully aware of it. But not only physically beautiful, no. He couldn't walk past someone who needed help without stopping. He remembered everyone's birthday, always gave away more than he kept for himself, and carried the weight of other people's happiness as though it were his own responsibility. Sometimes she worried he cared so deeply about the world that he forgot to leave a little of that kindness for himself.

She brushed another curl away from his forehead, smiling to herself. She loved him. It almost hurt just how much.

Her gaze drifted toward the stack of papers on the coffee table, and her stomach tightened ever so slightly. Jonah had been making her life miserable over the Spider-Man article for days now, despite the fact that the deadline was still a week away.

Her thumb gently brushed another curl away from his eyes. She let her fingertips linger against his cheek, smiling when a tiny snore escaped him. Her thoughts, however, betrayed her once more.

Spider-Man.

Y/N had stopped wondering about his identity long ago. Whoever hid beneath the mask had proven, time and time again, that he loved this city enough to bleed for it. To put strangers before himself. To keep showing up. That was enough for her.

Outside her appartment, the city didn’t sleep.

If you got really quiet, firefighters sirens could be heard several blocks away. Car horns and curses from angry civilians could be heard as well. A police helicopter crossed somewhere above the rooftops. People cursing. Shouting. Laughing. 

All across the city, crime carried on. New York never slept. Neither did danger.

But just for a little while, for just one quiet evening, Spider-Man did. Just for one quiet, rare night off, the mask sat forgotten inside an old handbag hidden in a forgotten alley.

The webs could wait. So could the city. Just for a little bit.

For a moment, Spider-Man allowed himself to be simply Michael Jackson. A shy photographer who was always running late; a hopeless romantic who bought wrinkled flowers every tuesday and who fell asleep on his girlfriend’s lap over movies.

Y/N smiled down at him one last time before closing her own eyes, still hoping Michael would introduce her to Spider-Man, someday. 

And somewhere in the coffee table, an unfinished articled asked:

'WHO IS SPIDER-MAN?'

The answer? Slept quietly in her lap.

Taglist:

There were very few people Michael Jackson willingly let into the studio while working on Thriller.

Actually, that wasn’t true. There was exactly one.

And even asking her had taken him three full days.

Because Michael Jackson, global superstar and soon-to-be owner of the best-selling album of all time, somehow still turned shy and as red as. tomato whenever it came to Y/N.

Especially when something actually mattered to him. And Thriller mattered more than anything.

The pressure around the album had become suffocating lately.

Epic Records wanted another Off the Wall.

The label wanted perfection.

Critics were already waiting for him to fail.

Every producer, executive, journalist and random person on earth suddenly had opinions about what Michael Jackson should do next.

It exhausted him.

Even when he tried not to show it. Especially tonight.

The studio was dim except for the soft glow of soundboards and equipment, Quincy Jones speaking quietly with engineers while Michael sat curled into the corner of the couch scribbling lyrics into a notebook.

He looked tired. Not physically. Emotionally tired.

Like his brain hadn’t stopped moving in weeks.

Then the studio door opened quietly and immediately Michael looked up.

Y/N stepped inside carefully, almost hesitant.

Which rare for her. Normally Y/N walked into rooms like she owned them. Loud. Funny. Fearless. But this? It felt sacred somehow.

The Thriller recording sessions had already become legendary in the industry, and now Michael had invited her into that world personally.

Just her.

“You came,” Michael said softly.

Y/N stared at him. “You called.” She offered him a small smile.

Michael smiled back shyly immediately, ducking his head slightly like he regretted sounding too eager.

That smile alone nearly killed her.

Because Michael looked devastating tonight.

Soft curls falling into his face. White button-up slightly open at the collar. Long legs stretched across the couch. And those doe-like eyes warming the second they landed on her.

Y/N suddenly forgot how to behave like a normal human being.

“Hi,” she said stupidly.

Michael laughed softly under his breath.

“Hi.”

Quincy looked between them once and immediately smirked.

“Incoming,” he muttered quietly to an engineer, who nodded in agreement.

Y/N walked further into the studio slowly, taking everything in.

The microphones.

The layered vocal notes scattered everywhere.

The instruments.

Michael’s notebooks filled with lyric fragments and little sketches.

It felt like stepping directly into his brain. And that made her nervous.

“You okay?” Michael asked gently.

Y/N blinked quickly.

“Yeah.” She smiled awkwardly. “I just— this is weird.”

Michael tilted his head.

“Weird bad?”

“No.” She looked around again. “Weird like… this is where Thriller is happening.”

Michael immediately looked embarrassed.

“It’s not finished yet.”

“Michael.”

“I’m serious.”

Y/N stared at him flatly, eyes narrowed at him. “You could record yourself microwaving soup and people would buy it.”

Quincy burst out laughing somewhere behind them.

Meanwhile Michael physically covered his face smiling.

“Stop.”

“No, I’m serious.” Y/N sat beside him on the couch now. “This is historical.”

Michael glanced toward her quietly then.

And for a second the confidence disappeared completely.

“I just want it to be good.”

The honesty in his voice made something ache inside her. Because everybody else saw Michael Jackson the phenomenon.

The genius.

The perfectionist.

But moments like this reminded her he was still just a twenty-something kid desperately hoping people would love the things he created.

And somehow that made her love him even more.

“It’s not going be good,” she started quietly.

Michael looked at her raising a brow.

“No,” she added softly. “It’s gonna change everything, Mikey.”

Something in Michael’s expression shifted at that. Like hearing her believe in him mattered more than hearing it from anyone else.

Then Quincy clapped his hands suddenly.

“Alright genius, enough flirting. Come record.”

Michael immediately turned pink and Y/N held her breath for a few seconds.

“We’re not—” They both started, stopping mid-sentence when they realized they had spoken at the same time.

“Mhm.”

Y/N burst out laughing while Michael stood up muttering embarrassed little protests beneath his breath.

Watching him work ruined her life a little bit.

Because Michael transformed inside the studio.

Not louder.

Not arrogant.

Just completely consumed.

He moved constantly while recording.

Snapping rhythms into the air.

Layering harmonies instinctively.

Stopping suddenly to change one tiny detail nobody else would’ve noticed.

And when he sang—

Oh.

Y/N actually stopped breathing for a second.

Because hearing Michael Jackson sing live from inside the booth felt unreal.

Rawer somehow. More emotional.

His voice filled every corner of the studio effortlessly while Quincy adjusted levels behind the glass. She felt as if his voice filled her heart, a warm feeling taking over her chest.

And Michael looked absolutely beautiful doing it.

Sweat beginning to dampen the curls near his temples.

Eyes closed while harmonizing with himself.

Hands moving instinctively with the music.

Y/N sat frozen on the couch completely mesmerized.

At one point Michael glanced toward the studio window mid-recording. And immediately smiled seeing her staring.

Y/N looked away so fast her neck actually snapped. Quincy started laughing.

“Get it together, lover-girl” Y/N widened her eyes at that, her cheeks so red it looked like the poor girl had run a marathon.

“Quincy!” Michael groaned instantly, listening to everything was being said through the headphones.

Quincy looked pleased at his attempt (and success) at embarrassing the two of them. Very pleased.

Hours passed like that.

Music.

Laughter.

Michael bouncing excitedly between ideas.

And slowly the stress that had been weighing on him all week seemed lighter somehow.

Because Y/N stayed.

Not because she wanted something. Not because of fame. Just because she genuinely loved watching him create and just being around him.

At around two in the morning Michael finally collapsed back onto the couch beside her exhausted. He chuckled at the sight of her with his aviators on her face and shook his head.

“Tired, P.Y.T?” Y/N asked softly, she joked.

“Ha Ha, really funny,” But he smiled while saying it. “Just a little.”

Y/N looked at him quietly for a second and lowered the glasses on the tip of her nose. She stared at him for a few seconds.

“I think watching you work just altered my brain chemistry.”

Michael laughed softly.

“What does that even mean?”

“It means you’re…” She searched helplessly for words. “I don’t know. There’s something wrong with you.”

Michael blinked.

“That sounds insulting.”

“No, I mean it nicely!” Y/N laughed. “You just… different,” She paused. “You know, than everyone else.”

Michael got shy immediately at that, breaking the eye contact.

He always did when compliments felt too sincere.

Y/N’s expression softened.

“You’re magic, Michael.”

And there it was again.

That look.

The one he got whenever she said something that reached too deep inside him too quickly.

Michael looked down smiling faintly, almost overwhelmed.

“You really think so?”

Y/N stared at him in disbelief and hit him lightly behind the head. “Are you kidding me?”

Michael shrugged a little, suddenly looking much younger than the superstar everyone imagined him to be.

“I don’t know.” He smiled shyly. “Sometimes I worry maybe I’m doing too much.”

Y/N looked genuinely emotional now. Because how on earth could someone this gifted still doubt himself?

“You could never do too much,” she said quietly.

Michael looked at her for a long second after that.

Really looked at her.

And something changed quietly in the room.

It felt… warmer. More honest, somehow.

⋆⭒˚.⋆

Later that week Human Nature happened.

It started after one of their late-night drives through Los Angeles.

Michael liked driving around with her because it made him feel normal for a little while.

No screaming fans.

No executives.

Just music playing softly while Y/N sat beside him rambling about random things.

They’d sneak out behind Bill’s back —he absolutely loathed the idea of Michael driving with Y/N by his side, claiming they shared a single brain cell and would get themselves killed or lost— and left Encino quietly.

Tonight Y/N had been rambling about stars.

Pointing excitedly through the windshield every few minutes while Michael smiled helplessly beside her.

“You ever think about how weird it is we’re alive at the same time?” she asked suddenly.

Michael laughed softly. “What?”

“I’m serious!” She looked over at him dramatically. “Like what if I’d been born in the eighteen hundreds?”

“You’d hate it there.”

“I would die immediately, thrown into the fire!”

Michael burst out laughing.

Then quieter: “Well, I’m glad you weren’t.”

Something about the way he said it lingered afterward.

After a few moments, she said quietly:

“Well, I would’ve manage to find you even back than,” She threw a look at his direction. “There’s no me without you.”

Michael almost lost control of the car after that.

“We would’ve been timeless, you know?”

Michael gulped, not knowing how to formulate an answer.

And later, back in the studio, those feelings followed him into the music.

Looking out

across the nighttime…

Michael sang softly into the microphone while the melody unfolded around him almost naturally.

Why, why…

tell ‘em that it’s human nature…

It wasn’t intentionally about her at first.

Not consciously, no.

But then came the feeling underneath it.

Curiosity.

Longing.

Wonder.

The strange ache of wanting closeness despite how isolating fame had become.

And suddenly all he could picture was her.

Y/N laughing in the passenger seat.

Y/N asleep on his shoulder while they watched movies.

Y/N dancing around his house in socks.

Y/N stealing his shades.

Y/N looking at him like Michael mattered more than Michael Jackson.

By the time he finished the demo, Quincy threw him a suspicious look immediately.

“This about somebody?”

Michael blinked innocently.

“No.”

Quincy stared at him with narrowed eyes. “Michael.”

Michael smiled shyly to himself instead of answering.

And later that night, when he played the unfinished version for Y/N alone in the studio, she went unusually quiet afterward.

Michael looked nervous immediately.

“You don’t like it?”

Y/N turned toward him so fast he almost laughed.

“What? No.”

“Then why are you looking at me like that?”

She felt emotional. Actually emotional.

Y/N swallowed once before speaking softly.

“This feels like you.”

Michael blinked.

“What do you mean?”

She smiled with melancholy.

“Like the part of you nobody else gets to see.”

That silence afterward felt huge somehow.

Then Michael finally admitted very quietly:

“I think maybe I wrote it about you.”

Y/N’s entire face softened instantly. “Oh,”

Michael looked embarrassed immediately after saying it out loud.

Not one second later Y/N threw her arms around his neck without hesitation. “I love you, Mikey.” He wrapped his arms around her. He took a deep breath, the faint smell of her vanilla scented shampoo taking over him.

“I love you, too.”

And for the first time in months, the pressure around Thriller disappeared completely for a little while.

Because suddenly Michael wasn’t thinking about charts or critics or expectations.

Just her heartbeat against his chest.

And how badly he never wanted to lose this feeling.

⋆⭒˚.⋆

A few weeks after Human Nature, Y/N found herself sitting cross-legged on Michael’s bedroom floor while he paced around rambling excitedly about zombies.

Actual zombies.

“And then Vincent Price does this whole creepy narration thing—”

“Michael.”

“—and there’s fog everywhere and we transform into monsters and—”

“Michael.”

“—Rick Baker’s doing the makeup effects—”

Y/N finally burst out laughing.

“You sound clinically insane right now.”

Michael stopped pacing immediately, curls bouncing slightly into his eyes.

“It’s gonna be cool!”

“I know it’s gonna be cool.” She grinned up at him from the floor. “You just explained it like a seven-year-old who drank too much soda.”

Michael laughed out loud.

He’d been feeling lighter lately.

Still stressed, still obsessing over Thriller constantly, but lighter.

Ever since the Human Nature sessions, something between them had softened further somehow.

More comfortable. More honest.

Michael had started reaching for her instinctively now.

Her hand.

Her waist.

The sleeve of her sweater.

Like touching her grounded him.

And right now, while rambling about Thriller, one of his hands absentmindedly rested against her shoulder while he talked.

“I’m serious,” he insisted dramatically. “This is something else.”

Y/N looked up at him softly then, a small, playful smile on her lips. Every time Michael talked about music lately, he glowed.

“You really love this one, huh?”

Michael’s expression softened immediately.

“Yeah.” It was like he already knew Thriller was becoming something bigger than himself.

Then suddenly he looked away weirdly nervous.

Y/N narrowed her eyes immediately.

“What?”

Michael glanced away. “Nothing.”

“That’s not nothing.”

“It is.”

“It’s absolutely not.” She insisted, bumping her shoulder lightly on his. “C’mon, tell me.”

Michael sighed softly before finally blurting out. “D-Do you wanna come watch tomorrow?”

Y/N blinked. “Watch?” She asked a bit confused. He couldn’t be asking her what she thought he was.

“You know, the video shoot.”

He was met with silence. Michael immediately started regretting asking.

“I mean you don’t have to—”

“The Thriller video?” She sounded like she was in shock.

Michael looked shy instantly. “It’s still unfinished—”

“Michael.”

“And it’s gonna be a really long day and there’s probably gonna be fake blood everywhere—”

“Michael Jackson.” She snapped.

Michael stopped talking mid-sentence. Y/N stared at him in disbelief.

“You’re actually inviting me to the Thriller shoot?”

Michael shrugged awkwardly, suddenly looking like a nervous teenager about to talk to his crush on the school break.

“I thought maybe you’d wanna see it.”

The thing was Michael almost never invited people into the creative process this intimately. Not really.

The studio already felt personal.

But the video shoot?

This was his brain completely exposed.

His biggest ideas.

His weirdest instincts.

His imagination turned physical.

And he wanted her there for it.

Y/N’s chest ached immediately.

“Yeah,” she answered softly. “Yeah, I wanna come. Of course!” She smiled, excitedly. “Why me, though?”

Michael smiled instantly. “Because you’re you.” He stated like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Y/N looked down, a small, relieved smile taking over her face.

Absolutely beautiful, Michael thought.

⋆⭒˚.⋆

The set looked unreal.

Fog machines filled the soundstage.

Fake graveyards stretched beneath enormous studio lights.

Dancers wandered around in partial zombie makeup drinking coffee while production assistants ran everywhere screaming about schedules.

And standing in the middle of all of it, was Michael.

Or technically zombie-Michael.

Y/N stopped on her tracks when she saw him.

“Oh my God.” A huge grin took over her face at the sight.

Michael turned immediately at the sound of her voice.

And there he was.

Full Thriller costume.

Red leather jacket.

Pale makeup.

Torn clothes.

Messy curls falling around his face while Rick Baker adjusted prosthetics near his cheekbone.

He looked horrifying. And unfortunately still ridiculously attractive.

Y/N placed her hands on her waits and tilted her head as she approached. “You make a really cute zombie, you know.”

Michael burst out laughing immediately.

“A cute zombie?”

“Yes.” She walked slowly around him inspecting the makeup seriously. “Like, if you tried eating my brain I’d probably let you.”

Bill snorted somewhere behind them.

Meanwhile Michael shook his head and laughed.

“That’s concerning.”

“No, what’s concerning is that this is somehow working for you.”

Rick Baker pointed at her immediately.

“She gets it. I like her.”

Michael groaned, smile so big his cheeks hurt.

Y/N shrugged and handed Michael a bottle. “Here.” He stared at it confused.

“What—,” He begun, confused, while grabbing the bottle from her hands, their fingers brushing against each other’s.

“O.G.” She stated, like her bringing him his favorite beverage had not made him almost melt right on the spot. “I thought you might get thirsty with all of, She motioned to the set. “this.”

Michael’s gaze kept switching from the bottle in his hand to the girl standing before him. “Thank you.” He said with raw honesty.

Watching him film Thriller changed something permanently inside Y/N.

Because Michael wasn’t just performing.

He was creating an entire world.

Every tiny detail mattered to him.

The angles. The choreography. The timing of the fog. How the dancers moved.

At one point he stopped everything because one zombie “wasn’t walking creepy enough.”

Y/N almost cried laughing.

“No, seriously,” Michael insisted while demonstrating dramatically. “You gotta feel dead inside.”

The dancers collapsed laughing.

So did Y/N.

And Michael? He looked happiest when everyone around him was creating with him.

Like this huge impossible imagination in his head finally had room to breathe.

Between takes he kept gravitating back toward Y/N instinctively.

Standing beside her.

Talking excitedly.

Checking if she liked things.

At one point he dragged her toward the monitors, both hands on her waist as he stood behind her, the two of them watching the monitor.

“Okay look at this part.”

The playback started.

Michael transformed onscreen beneath flashing lights while the music exploded through the speakers.

Then came the choreography.

And Y/N’s breath got caught in her throat.

There was something terrifyingly magnetic about him performing Thriller.

The sharpness of his movements. The confidence. The way he completely transformed once the cameras rolled.

He looked larger than life somehow.

Not even real.

Y/N felt weirdly emotional watching it.

Because standing here, watching Michael obsess over details and choreography and storytelling with this much passion she suddenly understood.

Thriller wasn’t just gonna be successful.

It was going to become immortal.

Michael glanced sideways at her nervously.

“Well?”

Y/N looked at him slowly.

“I think,” she said quietly, “people are gonna talk about this forever.”

Michael stared at her for a second.

Then immediately looked down smiling shyly to himself.

And that somehow got her even worse.

Because despite all this genius and ambition and artistry, he was still Michael. Her Michael.

Still the boy who sat beside her in silence while writing Human Nature.

Still the boy who got insecure about whether his ideas were ‘too weird.’

Still the boy who looked relieved every single time she believed in him.

Later that night, after hours of filming, Y/N wandered onto the empty soundstage while fake fog rolled softly around her ankles. She had a ridiculous hair bow with werewolf ears on her head.

Michael followed behind her still fully dressed as a zombie.

“You know,” Y/N said thoughtfully, “this would be a terrible place to make out with somebody.”

Michael nearly choked. “What?!”

“I’m just saying.” She gestured vaguely toward the graveyard set. “Very romantic.”

Michael’s shoulders shook beneath the red jacket as he laughed at her. A sudden boost of confidence took over him.

“You’re flirting with me while I look dead?”

“Well, you do look handsome dead.”

“That sentence should concern you deeply.”

Y/N grinned. “Well, at least whatever is wrong with me makes me really funny.”

Michael shook his head helplessly before stepping closer.

And for a second neither of them spoke.

The fake fog curling around their feet.

Studio lights glowing softly overhead.

Michael still wearing zombie makeup while smiling at her like she’d hung the moon.

Then quietly: “You really like being here?”

Y/N looked at him.

Really looked at him.

At the excitement still glowing in his eyes despite exhaustion.

At the creativity practically radiating off him.

At Michael Jackson before the rest of the world fully understood what Thriller would become.

And softly, honestly, she answered:

“I think this is the coolest thing I’ve ever seen.”

⋆⭒˚.⋆

By the time filming for Thriller finally wrapped for the night, it was almost three in the morning.

Everyone looked exhausted.

Zombie dancers half-asleep in folding chairs.

Crew members dragging cables across the soundstage.

Quincy already threatening to force Michael to rest for at least six hours.

But Michael? He still looked energized somehow.

Tired, yes. But glowing.

Like creating Thriller had plugged him directly into electricity.

The only problem was he was still in full costume.

Rick Baker had removed some of the prosthetics, but Michael still wore the red jacket, dark makeup smudged faintly around his eyes and pale foundation clinging stubbornly near his jawline.

Y/N thought he looked unfairly beautiful.

Bill drove them back to Encino quietly while the radio played softly in the background.

Y/N sat curled near the window, exhaustion finally hitting her all at once.

Meanwhile Michael sat beside her still smelling faintly like makeup, fog machine smoke and cologne.

Neither of them talked much, a comfortable silence filling the car.

The kind of silence that only existed between people who already understood each other completely.

At one point Y/N glanced sideways at him and burst into quiet laughter again.

Michael looked over immediately.

“What?”

“You’re still a zombie.”

Michael groaned, leaning his head back against the seat. “I know.”

“No, but it’s really getting me now.” She laughed harder. “Like Bill’s just casually driving around with a corpse in the backseat.”

Bill snorted from the front.

Michael pointed accusingly at both of them.

“This is very disrespectful.”

“Well, I told you you,” Y/N repeated smugly. “You make a cute zombie.”

Michael shook his head, smiling helplessly despite himself.

God.

Every time she said things like that, his brain completely stopped functioning.

By the time they reached Encino, the neighborhood sat quiet and dark beneath the late-night summer sky.

Bill pulled up outside Y/N’s house first.

“I can walk her up,” Michael blurted out immediately and before Bill could even ask, he was out of the car, pacing fast around it to open the door for Y/N.

Bill looked very amused. “Mhm.”

Michael ignored him entirely.

The second they stepped out of the car, Y/N wrapped her arms around herself instinctively. “Geez,”

The California night had gotten colder while they drove.

Michael noticed immediately.

“You cold?”

“No.”

“You just shivered.”

“I’m alright.”

Michael narrowed his eyes slightly because Y/N had this deeply annoying habit of refusing to admit basic human weaknesses.

Then, without another word, he shrugged off his jacket.

Y/N blinked immediately.

“Michael.”

“Take it.”

“You’ll freeze.”

“I literally spent eight hours pretending to be undead.”

“And what does that have to do with anything?”

Michael laughed softly and shrugged before stepping closer and draping the jacket around her shoulders himself.

And the second the leather settled around her, Y/N forgot how to breathe for a second.

Because it still felt warm from him.

Smelled like him.

And suddenly she was standing there wearing his jacket while Michael Jackson looked down at her with soft tired eyes beneath messy curls and leftover zombie makeup.

Y/N cursed the universe in her head.

“You look cute,” Michael murmured absentmindedly while closing the zipper of the jacket for her. He did not know where that confidence came from.

Y/N’s stomach flipped violently. This boy was gonna ruin her life. “Shut up.”

They started walking slowly toward her front door while crickets chirped softly somewhere in the distance.

The world felt strangely still.

Like everything had quieted after the chaos of the studio.

And maybe it was the exhaustion. Or the late hour. Or watching him all night.

But suddenly Y/N felt painfully aware of him beside her.

Michael.

Her Michael.

The boy who trusted her enough to let her see the pieces of himself nobody else really got access to.

The boy who still got shy whenever she complimented him despite being Michael Jackson.

The boy who’d looked at her tonight like her opinion mattered more than anyone else’s in the room.

The boy who had been her best friend for years and years and for whom she’d move mountains.

Y/N stopped walking.

Michael looked over immediately.

“What?”

She stared at him quietly for a second too long.

Then smiled softly, placing her hands inside the jacket’s pockets.

“You know you’re my best friend, right?”

Michael’s entire expression softened, like those words reached somewhere deep inside him.

“Yeah,” he answered quietly. “You’re mine too.”

Y/N’s chest hurt suddenly.

Because he sounded so sincere. So open.

The silence stretched softly between them. She took a step in his direction, looking up at him.

Then Y/N swallowed once before asking nervously:

“Can I do something?”

Michael blinked as he looked down at her pretty face with confusion. “…Okay?”

And before she could lose her nerve, Y/N stood on her tiptoes and kissed him. Right in the lips.

Just one small nervous kiss beneath the quiet Encino streetlights.

Michael completely froze.

Actually froze.

His brain stopped functioning instantly.

Not a single thought crossed his mind.

Because one second Y/N was standing there looking up at him in his jacket and the next her lips were on his.

Warm. Real. Kissing him.

Michael made the faintest startled sound against her mouth.

Not pulling away.

Just shocked.

Terrified.

Completely overwhelmed.

And when Y/N finally stepped back Michael Jackson looked like he’d just seen Jesus.

Eyes wide.

Cheeks bright pink beneath the remaining zombie makeup.

Entire body visibly tense like he no longer knew how to stand properly.

Y/N immediately panicked.

“Oh my God, I’m sorry, I just thought maybe—”

“No!” Michael answered so fast they both startled. Then he looked horrified by how aggressive that sounded. “No,” he repeated quieter now. “No, don’t— don’t apologize.”

Y/N stared at him nervously, her eyes as wide as his.

Michael stared back looking completely short-circuited.

Because this was Y/N.

His Y/N.

His best friend.

Y/N who played Twister with him and stole spoons of his ice cream and fell asleep on his shoulder during every movie they watched.

And now she’d kissed him.

His heartbeat felt genuinely dangerous at this point.

“You kissed me,” he whispered stupidly.

Y/N laughed nervously.

“Yeah, I did.”

Michael’s brain somehow got even worse hearing her confirming it.

He didn’t know where to look.

At her eyes?

Her mouth?

His jacket swallowing her whole?

Meanwhile Y/N started panicking. She stared down at her shoes and cleared her throat, starting to regret every single decision she had ever made in her lifespan.

Which made Michael immediately panic because he never wanted her regretting this.

So before fear could stop him he pulled her by the belt loops of her jeans kissed her again.

Softer this time.

Shy.

Tentative.

Like he still couldn’t believe he was allowed to do this.

It was Y/N’s turn to be shocked for a moment. And then, she deepened the kiss and placed her hands on his neck, pulling Michael closer.

Her fingers tangled in his hair, anchoring herself to him as his lips moved against hers with maddening patience. It was slow. Painfully slow. Like they were memorizing the taste of each other’s lips one second at a time.

And when they pulled apart again, Michael hid his face behind one hand laughing breathlessly. “Oh my God.”

Y/N burst out laughing too.

“What?”

“I can’t—” Michael shook his head helplessly, still blushing violently. “I can’t believe we just did that.”

Y/N smiled softly. “You hated it?”

Michael looked at her immediately.

And whatever expression crossed his face made her stomach flip.

Because beneath all the nervousness and embarrassment he looked gone for her.

Completely.

Hopelessly.

Devoted.

“No,” he admitted quietly. “I really liked it.” He admitted before pulling her close by the waist and closing the space between them one more time.

⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆ ⋆⭒˚.⋆

Taglist:

When the smoke clears and the ashes fall, nothing is left of the Hometree. 

Nothing but the stump, the bulging roots and the cut-off part remain of your destroyed home. You’ve never seen one, but you think that the remains of the tree must look like a decapitated corpse — something that once was full of life, and now is just… there. A reminder of what was. 

Many managed to evacuate the branches as it fell, but just as much ended up being buried by its massive limbs; you can’t find it in yourself to understand if it was a blessing — for them to have such a quick death, one that avoided them from feeling the endless grief you’re feeling now — or a tragedy. You keep asking Eywa the same question, but either she doesn’t know, or she won’t tell you. 

She hasn’t been telling you much lately, anyway. 

As the daughter of the Olo’eyktan and Tsahìk, you grew up close to the bond you shared with Eywa. Mo’at always brought you and your sisters along with her to pray, and the three of you soon learnt how to perceive her in everything you did and everything that happened. The Great Mother is in all of us, your mom used to always say, before you fully grasped the concept. She gives, and we take. And when the time comes, we’ll be the ones to give back what we borrowed. 

It looks like, to you, that the time has come. Only, Eywa won’t seem to take anything from you. 

During the day, you’re back at the ruins of the Hometree, with a few other Omatikayas looking for the remains of their loved ones. When they are easy to remove, you do so, and then give them the burial they deserve as a part of the People; when the branches have buried them too deep in the terrain for you to remove them, you pray for them and their souls, hoping that they are, at last, at peace. 

At night, you pray by the Tree of Souls until the first morning lights shine through the outline of the mountains, when your mother wakes and gently drags you to the marui you share with her and orders — more like begs — you to sleep. “You won’t be able to hear Eywa better if you tire yourself so, daughter,” she utters as she holds you tight in her arms, humming that same lullaby she used to when you were little. “I doubt she wants you to be exhausted.” 

You sniffle brokenly, hiding in her shoulder like a child as she covers you with the blanket she had stitched with the help of Sylwanini and Neytiri when she first realised she was pregnant with you. It’s a miracle you managed to salvage it from the fall of the Hometree, as most of your belongings have been lost during it. “We still haven’t found Tsu’tey, sa’nok,” you whisper, muffling a sob. 

Mo’at sighs softly, holding you tighter. “Oeyä yawne,” my beloved, she starts, “Tsu’tey died a great death. Even if you do not find what remains of him, I’m sure Eywa will hold him close nevertheless. He fell into the ocean, after all — she’s strong there, too. We might not think of it to be our home, but everywhere Eywa is, can be considered our home.” 

Still, it’s hard to believe that Jakesully out of all people is helping rebuild your village. 

He’s supposed to be one of the aliens that came from the sky — one of the four-fingered demons that have destroyed your home. And somehow, Eywa still chose him to lead the Omatikaya. 

You don’t deny his bravery, nor his will to learn your ways, nor the fact that he is a great warrior — Turuk Makto, in fact. It doesn’t mean that it isn’t hard for you to look at him and not see the Hometree lying dead on the ground, burning, and the Tree of Voices reduced to shreds under the dozers. 

You know it’s probably just your grief talking — you’ve never had anything against the man, not even when he first came here, blabbering about wanting to learn the way or whatever the RDA had put in his head — but you don’t know what else to do. When you’re not looking around for the corpses of the fallen, or praying for them, or begging Eywa to tell you the meaning of all of this, you’re either crying or trying to sleep — and when the latter comes, it’s never restful. 

Neytiri is grieving, too, and you know it, but she takes it differently — because she has Jake, and she’s putting all she has into building a new, safe village, where maybe one day their kids will grow happily. But you feel stuck — like when it fell, the Hometree swallowed you, too, along with all the fallen comrades that you had known for your whole life. 

Your answers finally come during another restless night spent under the Soul Tree. 

Your mother has since stopped trying to coax you away from it — instead, she has taken to making salves and weaving shawls under the light of the branches as you weep silently for a sign, the terrain still against your body, unlike the usual steady beat you used to feel. Sometimes Mo’at braids your hair, other times recalls stories of your father and sister, but mostly lets you cry it out — even if her heart breaks every time a tear slips down your cheek. Neytiri sometimes comes along, chanting her songs and saying her prayers, but lately, she’s taken to spending her nights in the tent she calls home, with Jakesully. 

(Not that you blame her. If you had a mate, you’d probably find comfort in them, too. If you had a mate, maybe you wouldn’t be so utterly hopeless.) 

It’s when you find sleep while having these thoughts that finally, Eywa responds to your call in the best way she knows — a dream. 

You feel like you’re floating, and finally, finally– you can feel her presence. She’s everywhere, surrounding you with her warmth, and it’s just when you look around to understand where you are that you notice that you are underwater. Life swarms you from every angle — the fishes twirling in a dance only they can understand, anemones and corals shimmering with bioluminescence on the rocks under your feet. 

You don’t know for how long you swim, but what you know is that you haven’t felt this feeling in what seems like ages. You have missed the Great Mother’s presence, and if this dream tells you anything, it’s that maybe, she has missed you, too. 

A large, warm hand engulfs yours. You can’t see the face of the man that has taken it, but by the color of his skin, he can’t be Omatikaya. Come with me, a voice says, and you aren’t able to really distinguish it — it does not sound like a real voice, rather like a spoken thought inside your mind. Our Spirit Tree is this way. You feel the same hand on the small of your back, guiding you in the water, in a way so gentle that you already dread the moment his touch will fade. 

You wake up with your hand still feeling warm and dried tears staining your cheeks. The ground you’re lying on feels stiff and cold. Hoisting yourself up on your elbows, you notice the sky — it’s still night — and your mother, sleeping with her head leaning on the trunk of the tree. “Are you trying to tell me that I have to find my peace somewhere else?” you murmur quietly to the tree, impossibly tired in every way imaginable. And maybe it’s just an impression, or your lack of sleep, but you think the branches glow a little more than usual at that. 

The hard part is not accepting to leave behind the Omatikaya — in your heart, you knew that a part of you died when the Hometree fell, and no new village would ever make up for what the sky people have taken away from you; every camp made after that would only look like a ghost of what was, where you grew up in. 

No, no. The hard part is convincing both the Tsahìk and the Olo’eyktan to let you go. 

By the time morning comes, your bags are already packed. Your ikran, Ry’ia, is waiting for you just outside of the village chirping softly with Neytiri’s mount, Sa’atra, as you pull on your traveling shawl and wait for the villagers to wake up before your departure. Needless to say, it doesn’t take long for chaos to erupt. 

Neytiri drags you away from the astounded clan members as soon as she gets wind of what’s happening, Mo’at and Jakesully on tow when she sits you down in one of the newest tents, her face unreadable as she takes a seat in front of you. “Explain.” 

You look at her mate and your mother, sitting respectively on her left and on her right, and suddenly your heart fills up with courage you weren’t even aware of having. “I had a dream last night,” you start, “Eywa has shown me where to find my peace again.” 

As you recall your vision, you can tell that the only one fully understanding the meaning of it is your mother, because while Jakesully doesn’t look too troubled about it, Neytiri hasn’t had that betrayed look on her face towards you since you were seven, and you stole the last piece of fruit intended for her. “What?” she asks in pure disbelief, “Wha– why would you ever think of going away from here, sister? We have plenty of men who would be delighted to have you as their mate. We have the ocean. We have fishes. Do you really have to look for them from another clan to be happy?” 

You shake your head, guilt seeping through your chest. “Sister, if I could be happy while being here, close to you, I would stay. But…” Your eyes drift up to Jake and immediately go back to her, not wanting to blame him for all the things humans have done to you. “I can’t find it in myself to build a new village that Tsu’tey, father– hell, Sylwanin won’t see. And even if I could…”

You scroll your shoulders, “Eywa has shown me the way,” you say firmly, “and I will follow it.” 

Neytiri looks over to Mo’at, searching for support in the discussion. “Mother, please, tell her this is madness,”

She looks at her for a singular moment, then to you. Finally, she speaks. “When I was your age, I had a dream, too. It led me to your father.” The story isn’t new to you — everyone knows Mo’at was part of the Orangi clan before she married your father. 

Neytiri stares at her, “Mother, you can’t be serious– she doesn’t even know where–” 

“How can she know, if she does not try?” The Tsahìk interrupts her, “Eywa has shown her that she won’t find peace while living here. These things are rare, but they happened. That was my case, at least.”

Your sister gapes at her, flabbergasted, only to look back at you, getting back up on her feet. “If you leave,” she hisses, “I will never forgive you.” She storms out, her tail twitching after her, leaving the tent feeling even colder than before.

Finally, you manage to look at Jakesully straight into his eyes, trying to avoid the glare your mother is sending him, and you’re surprised to see an actual understanding of the situation there. “You do understand why I can’t stay here, do you?”

He blinks, sad. “I do.” 

You nod, “Good. I would never ask you to leave — this is your home, too, after all. And it would mean sacrificing Neytiri’s happiness. I’d rather be happy here too, but… I can’t do that. Not while my loved ones lay under the Hometree, dead.” you shake your head, ashamed of what you’re about to say, “Not while you are here living the life they deserved. I am sorry, Jakesully.”

Tentatively, he places a hand on your shoulder. “It’s okay,” he mutters, sorrowful, “I know you would stay here if you could. Just… please, do not go today. Wait until the end of the week. Let me talk to your sister– I’ll try to change her mind.”

As he leaves to go look for Neytiri, you are left with your mother. Your eyes remain downwards, all the courage of before gone after your sister’s outburst, your heart feeling heavier than ever. Needless to say, when she moves to hug you, you’re left stunned — you were waiting for her to tell you you were mad, too. “I am sorry, daughter,” she says, her usually firm voice trembling, “I did not understand your pain was so great. I thought Eywa had in her plans to keep my daughters close to me, but if having you far from me is the price for your happiness, then I’ll gladly take everything that comes with it.”

You avoid mentioning her teary eyes when she pulls back, her hands holding your shoulders. She sniffles, trying to save face. “The Metkayina are the only sea clan your father’s ever had contact with,” she manages, "their Olo’eyktan may still remember him. You should start your search from there.”

In the following days, you are smothered with gifts. 

Everyone makes something for you to take on your travels, or to give to the chiefs of the foreign clans you’ll visit. Your friends Ninat and Peyral stitch a beautiful shawl in record time, stitched beads and feathers in it. So that you may have something to remember us by, Peyral explains, emotional, as Ninat nearly bursts into tears. 

Your mother makes a Tsahìk necklace typical of the Omatikaya and tells you to give it to the wife of the chief. Showing respect to your hosts is always important, remember. Do not forget your culture, but do not force it on them, either. 

Even Jake turns up one night, giving you a funny-looking bone knife that he clearly has just learned how to carve. “As a… parting gift?” he tells you, even if it sounds more like a question. His ears bend down, “I’m sorry you feel like you have to leave to be happy. I wish things didn’t have to be this way.” I wish you could overcome our differences like your sister did. 

You look at the knife — the jaggedy blade looking ugly but clearly heartfelt — and then back at him. “You’re a good man, Jakesully,” you tell him. “I am truly sorry that my opinion on you has to be stained by what your kind has done to us — but perhaps, it’s just because things are a little too fresh. Perhaps, I just need some time away from here.” 

Neytiri doesn’t come looking for you until it is time for you to go. As you say your goodbyes to friends and everyone you grew up with, she shuffles quietly behind Jake, her hands behind her back. Still hugging Ka’ani, you look at her as she gets closer, suspiciously quiet, only to present you with a bead on her open palm. 

You gasp at the sight of it — it’s a bright blue stone, one of the ones to be found only in the ikrans’ nest, with the Omatikaya clan symbol etched on it. “For your songcord,” she explains, not looking you in the eye. “To mark your… new start. Your travels.” 

You look at the bead, taking it in your hands, then tug Neytiri close to hug her as tight as possible. “I’ll miss you, sister,” you murmur in her shoulder. 

Even if she’s supposed to be mad at you, she reciprocates the hug immediately, and it doesn’t take long for the tough facade to crumble. “Please, come back when you’re finally happy again, okay?” her voice is trained, and you doubt anyone but you heard her whisper. “This will always be your home. You’ll always have a place to stay here — with me.” 

Ry’ia is delighted in the change of scenery — you can tell by the way she reacts through the bond, but also the happy shrieks she lets out once you lower her near the surface of the ocean so that her wings may touch the water. You look behind you — to the mountains that you’ve called home ever since you came to the world — one last time before turning your gaze back to the sea, the directions your mother gave you etched into your mind. 

Awa’atlu is almost three days of travel from your village, turned into four by the stops you make to allow Ry’ia and yourself some rest. And when you finally reach it, it’s night, and only a few lights are shimmering in the Metkayina village. Not wanting to disturb their sleep, you turn your ikran to the rocky side of the island — devoid of any maruis from what you can see — and land atop the coast, dismounting from Ry’ia and patting the side of her neck. “Good girl,” you murmur, “rest now, yes? I’ll take a dip and be back here with you in a moment.”

You remove your traveling shawl as she chirps quietly, remaining in your loincloth and chest piece as you dive into the waters. 

You feel like crying in relief when you finally feel her. Eywa is everywhere here — she surrounds you with the water in bioluminescence, in the anemones that move in rhythm with the currents and the nocturnal fishes that swim around in a haze. It’s like waking up from a bad dream, being able to finally feel her again. 

Even if brief, the peace it gives you swells your heart. The Great Mother wasn’t holding a grudge against you — you simply weren’t searching for her in the right place. 

You resurface to catch some air, only to notice that you aren’t alone.

A turquoise zukzuk — an otterfin — stares at you with her big eyes, and if she weren’t an animal, you’d say she was smiling at you. She rubs her snout into your shoulders, chirping happily, and you chuckle, petting her back, “Aren’t you a cutie? Oh, yes you are, yes you are…”

She licks your cheek, and you fake a gag even as she basically throws herself in your arms. “Now, hasn’t anyone ever told you not to trust strangers? If I were a tad bit more selfish, I’d totally bring you home with me,” you’re not sure how you would manage an otterfin in the forest or while traveling, but you’re sure that if there’s a will, there’s a way. 

“Hey, you shouldn’t swim here when it’s dark,” 

The screech you let out is loud enough to wake up the whole village, you’re sure. The zukzuk — who looks more scared than you — jumps in your arms as you hug her, ready to defend her from any possible attacker. The latter — a man with turquoise skin and weird tattoos over his face — screams back, mostly startled by your yelling. 

“Sorry, sorry!” he puts his hands in front of him as your screams die down, still hugging the otterfin, “I didn’t mean to startle you, it’s just that — we’re too close to the reef, and it’s mating season for the akulas. Their cubs will start hunting for preys any moment now. It’s dangerous to stay here for long.”

You share a look with the otterfin, who’s still cuddled to you, and it’s just then that the man seems to notice her. He frowns, “Nala, is that you?” It's the same tone you use for Ry’ia when she pulls some kind of stunt you told her not to do, and the zukzuk lets out a noise while looking at you with the biggest eyes as if to say, I’ve never met this man in my life. 

The latter gasps, “It is you!” 

The pup cuddles closer to you, hiding under your chin, her tongue slipping out of her mouth like she wants to mock him. You raise an eyebrow, “This is your zukzuk?”

The guy nods, “She knows she shouldn’t swim here at night, it’s dangerous–”

A rumble from below interrupts him, and you all freeze. “…What did you say about those akula cubs?” You don’t even know what an akula is, but judging from the fact that apparently their cubs make swimming at night dangerous, it can’t be anything good. 

His hand wraps around your wrist as he starts to drag you away, back onto the shore, much faster than it took you to even get here. “Just where did you come from? Are you Ta’unui really so clueless?” Another rumble from behind you, and he swims even faster. You keep Nala under your arm, and she keeps moving her tail like she’s trying to help him move away. 

It’s only when you’re out of trouble and onto the shore, where the water reaches your knees and you’re illuminated by the bioluminescence and the moons, that he notices that you don’t look like a Tau’nui at all. He stares at your slim tail and arms, leaning his head like he’s never seen a specimen like this, and even your clothes are weird. Quite dumbly, he pulls at the feathers stitched into your top, staring intently, “What are those?”

The fact is, you’re also just noticing that he doesn’t look like normal Na’vi men, too — at least, not to the ones you’re used to. He’s broader, taller, and apparently also dumber, because he doesn’t even seem to notice that he’s just grazed and uncovered part of your breast. 

You deadpan. He blinks. Nala barks. He lets the feathers go as he turns purple, “Sorry, I didn’t notice.” He’s lucky that the Omatikaya are people raised with no shame about their bodies, because otherwise, the slap you would’ve given him wouldn’t have been too nice from a girl who’s supposed to look for uturu in his clan. 

You squeeze the water out of your hair as he stares weirdly, Nala twirling around the two of you. “Why were you swimming if the waters are so dangerous at night?” You ask him, trying not to stare too much at his arms — you never thought that the Omatikaya men needed more muscles, but now you understand that if they did, it wouldn’t have been such a bad thing. His tail — twitching uneasily behind him — is thicker and longer than yours, and his arms have strange prolongments on their sides — to help swimming, you suppose. While Omatikaya grow slender and thin to avoid any difficulty in swinging in the forest, maybe the Metkayina grow to swim more efficiently in the ocean. 

“I was looking for her,” he points at Nala, “we spoiled her a little too much, and now she doesn’t know how to take a no.” He tries to smile at you, “You’re not from around here, are you? Your tail would be horrible for swimming.” 

You nod, “I’m from the forest clans — the Omatikaya.” you tell him your name, and he nods. “I came here looking for uturu, but the village seemed to be asleep when I got here, so I figured I would talk to the chief in the morning.”

He looks troubled, “I’m Tonowari,” he introduces himself, “I’m from the village. Uturu? Has something happened to the Omatikaya?” 

No matter how much you insist he doesn’t, he drags you to the village — in the literal sense, as you didn’t want to follow him and he has to take you by your wrist — and over to a secluded mauri, where he finally lets go. Ry’ia chirps tiredly beside you, huffing indignantly at him as you wrap your shawl tighter around your shoulders. “I’ll talk to Olo’eyktan and Tsahìk,” Tonowari tells you, nodding to the mauri, “wait for me here, okay?” Nala quietly follows him, dragging her little belly over the sand. 

You didn’t really explain the whole thing— you just told him that you’re here to find contact with Eywa again because you weren’t able to in your homeland. You don’t really know why he insisted so much in talking to the chiefs now, and you can’t help but wonder why he feels comfortable waking up the two most important people in his village for a stranger. 

Soon enough, he comes back out from the marui, gesturing for you to come inside; you do, and you’re greeted by two very much awake chiefs, sitting with their backs straight as ever. 

“Olo’eyktan Arvak and Tsahìk Tsika,” Tonowari tells you, nodding to them, “I’ll leave the three of you alone– keep an eye on that big bird of yours.”

“She’s not a big bird," you whisper, too tired to fully protest. He pats your shoulder, looking a bit guilty, letting the woven sheet atop the pod close back behind you, “Sure she isn’t,” 

You remain alone with the chiefs — and Nala, who you realise just now hasn’t followed Tonowari. Looking at the couple, you figure that the Metkayina must all have his same features. “Sit,” Tsika gestures to the empty space in front of them, “and tell us everything.”

Recounting the fall of the Hometree is more difficult than you thought it would be — because even if it’s been almost a month now, the wound still feels fresh. They listen, not prodding for more information when you stop to take a deep breath to avoid bursting in tears, and the Tsahìk puts a hand over her mouth when you mention your father. “Eytukan,” she murmurs, looking over to her mate. “He came here when we called for the other Tsahìks.” 

At your confused face, Arvak explains, “A little over twenty years ago, our son fell sick. Rashes all over his body, convulsions, other symptoms we’d never seen before.” 

His wife takes a deep breath, “When nothing seemed to work and we lost all hope, Arvak chose to call the other clans’ Tsahìks and healers for help. The Ta’unui sent a healer, the Aranahe some healing plants, and everyone pretty much did the same. But your father,” she pokes you in the chest, not in a mean way — in a way that says, the man you’re half a part of. “Olo’eyktan Eytukan came here himself. Excused his wife’s absence, told us she had just given birth to their third daughter and wasn’t able to travel properly. He took a look at our son’s state, and said that it probably was txumpaywll poisoning — until then, we didn’t even know that its plants had started to grow on our islands. Made a salve for his rashes, concocted the antidote and left when he got better.” 

They bow their heads at you, “It will be an honor to pay back Eytukan’s kindness. Tell us what you need, and we’ll do anything in our power to help you.”

You beg them to raise their heads, embarrassed. “I just want some time with your clan,” you tell them, “learn your ways with the creatures, how you move within the currents.” If Jakesully out of all people managed to learn the Omatikaya’s ways, you doubt it will be much harder for you. “I… I’ve lost contact with Eywa. I hope that learning your clan’s ways will help me in finding it again.” 

Arvak has got a pensive look on his face. Then, he says, “Tonowari, I know you’re listening. You can come in.” 

The man sheepishly enters the marui again, sitting beside you, a little embarrassed. You raise an eyebrow — did he really think either of you didn’t hear him? You might’ve not heard him approach when you were in the water, but back with your feet on steady ground, you would’ve known how to spot him before he was even in your line of sight. 

Nala squeals and throws herself on his knees, purring. Arvak tries to ignore her to his best abilities. “Our son Tonowari will teach you everything he knows about the reef,” ah, so that’s why he didn’t have any problem waking them up. Nice to know that the Olo’eyktan’s successor has seen your boob. On his part, Tonowari makes no protest. “Her training starts tomorrow. Go show her one of the vacant maruis — she’ll stay here for a while.” 

Ry’ia is already sleeping when you and Tonowari detach your bags from her saddle, and you try your best not to gape at his biceps as they flex while he takes the heaviest woven baskets out of your hands. “Don’t worry, I’ll take those– you must be really tired.” 

He balances them on his side and shoulder as he walks you through the maruis — with the few still awake villagers peeking out of their tents to steal a curious look at you — only to stop in an empty one, carefully leaning the baskets down to the floor. You stare at the woven walls of your new home, at the mat on the floor and the little space reserved for the fireplace, thinking that maybe, just maybe, this can work. 

You set down your bag as Tonowari stands back up from his knelt position, “Try to get some sleep,” he tells you quietly, “I’ll come to wake you up tomorrow a little before dawn — it’s when the ilus wake up. If you need anything, that–” he points to a nearby pod, “–is my marui.”

He stops for a moment and looks at you, sitting on the sleeping mat. “I’m sorry about your father and what happened to your people.” 

You press your lips into a thin line. “Thanks.” You avert your eyes and wrap your shawl a little tighter around you. “Uh… goodnight, Tonowari.”

He nods, a sad smile on his lips as he moves outside of the tent, still holding open the curtain serving as door. “Goodnight.” 

He closes the blind, and you’re left to your thoughts. 

Tonowari laughs. “Your swimming form is funny.” 

You pout. “If you're here to poke fun at my survival-level swimming form, I’m sure Nala would be happy to teach me how to instead.” 

His laugh gets even louder, and he raises his hands up. “I said it was funny, not bad! It’s like… watching a child take their first dive out of their mother’s womb.”

“Are you really saying that a kid might swim better than me?”

The son of the Olo’eyktan has at least the decency to stifle his chuckles now. “No, no, I’m sure you’ll learn soon enough.” 

This morning, the villagers were astonished to find out that the chiefs had basically sneaked you into the village overnight — but sure enough, their spirits changed when you started distributing the gifts you had brought for them. The Tsahìk seemed pleased with the necklace your mother had made her, claiming it to be of beautiful manufacture, as her people raided your baskets for the shawls and armbands your friends had stitched for them. Yovo fruits were gone in a matter of seconds, and Arvak had to set aside the dried meat you brought to assure that everyone got a piece for dinner. 

(As for Arvak’s gift, you gave it to him once the crowd dissipated. You told him it was from Toruk Makto, who even after proper Omatikaya training, unfortunately still had to work on his carving abilities. He took the dagger nonetheless, pleased that Toruk Makto himself took time out of his day to make something for him.)

Despite your gifts quietening the protests of your arrival, the villagers still stared a little too hard sometimes — no wonder, they’ve never seen a forest Na’vi before. Most of them are nice or at least cordial to you, but a few doubtful stares still linger as Tonowari tries to do his best in teaching you the ways of the Metkayina. 

You start spending your mornings — from before dawn up until lunch — with the Olo’eyktan son, learning how to juggle the currents and hold your breath, and your afternoons with the clan elders, weaving baskets and learning how to stitch seashells into body pieces. 

(The first time you asked if you could help weaving the growing side of the marui pods, they gasped, scandalized. Apparently, it’s strictly the men’s job around here.) 

After a few days and horrendous tries, you finally manage to finish your first armband — Priya, an old woman wearing the feather chest piece that one of your friends had made, insisted on it. It’s decorated with a few shells you managed to collect while diving with Tonowari, and as she inspects it closely, she hums, clearly pleased with your work. “I’m sure your mate will be delighted to wear this, one day.” 

You raise an eyebrow, surprised. “My mate?”

The other elders nod convincingly, passing around your work. “In Awa’atlu, the first piece a girl makes is always a stitched armband," she explains, revealing why she had pressured you so much in starting off with one. “The mother makes sure to save it, and when the time comes, it will be given to her husband to wear. He, in return, will give her a carved comb, usually decorated with anything that pleases the woman.”

You think about it for a moment, “So, the first ever piece the men carve is a comb, too?”

The women laugh like the mere thought is hilarious. “Of course not!” Priya hollers, “The first piece a woman stitches is important because in her life, she will make numerous beautiful works. The men give them the most beautiful comb they make, because it’s already a miracle if they manage to make one singular, decent comb.” 

At this, you laugh with them, thinking about that wobbly knife Jake made for their Olo’eyktan. Then, you snort, “This wasn’t my first armband, though,” yes, you had to learn how to properly position shells and have them not fall off the strings, but this isn't your first time stitching.

One of the other women shrugs, “So what?” She says, “It’s the first one you make here — as a future proper Metkayina — that counts as first.” 

Later on that night, back in your marui, you observe the armband and store it inside one of your woven travel bags, hoping that one day, the man you dreamt about will be able to wear it.

Whenever you are free from both weaving lessons and Tonowari’s constant nagging, you delve deep into the forest that the island offers, collecting herbs and fruits. Apparently, the Metkayina have learnt to make the most out of what the sea has to offer, and subsequently rarely explore the forest except for harvesting fruits. The seaside forest is a bit different from what you were used to, but fortunately the plants do not differ that much. 

The first time you show the Tsahìk how you used to make disinfectant salves in the forest, she stares at the concoction like it has just clicked something in her brain. She smells it, tries it on one of the hunter’s light scratches and notes how he doesn’t lament any stinging. “Why don’t you come with me and my tsakarems one of these days?” She asks finally. “I’m sure we could teach you something, as well as learn from your… peculiar ways.” 

The next day, you ask about the tsakarems to Tonowari as he gently hoists you up to an ilu. “Here, when the Tsahìk doesn’t have a daughter, she takes various apprentices under her wing,” he explains, showing you how to place your feet to avoid falling off of the creature’s back. “And then, either the most talented or the one the future Olo’eyktan chooses becomes Tsahìk, while the others go on to become healers.” 

You still fall off of the ilu’s back, but it doesn’t really matter — because Tonawari is there, ready to catch you, and immediately steadies you as you come crashing onto him. You’ll learn, he signs, still underwater. Do not worry, you’ll learn. 

The two of you have grown significantly closer since your arrival, and you try not to notice the way his touch tentatively lingers over your hips as he brings the both of you back to the surface. The two of you stare at each other then, his hands still atop your waist, and just as he’s about to say something, the moment is broken by Nala — and either she’s obsessed with his biceps at least half as much as you are, or she’s really just a little, fat bugger. You both laugh as she slobbers all over your face, his hands leaving your body, and you have to convince yourself that you’re not missing his touch to continue the riding lesson. 

Your weak spots are the signing lessons and the apnea training, mostly because your complete attention on him is needed to actually learn something. 

The first time he pushes his hand into your belly to show you how to breathe with your stomach, you thought you would’ve been able to faint right here and there — or swoon, depending on how you see it. And whenever he shows you new signs and their meaning, unfortunately all you can think about is what exactly his fingers can do. 

After lunch, you join the Tsahìk and the tsakarems in their dive for medical algae; a girl named Ronal shows you the best shells to pick to add to plants to make a paste, and the fishes that you have to follow to find a certain type of anemone with incredible healing properties. She’s a little ruffled by your presence at the lesson and you can tell, but you don’t find it in yourself to judge her; you’re pretty sure that when Jake was learning your ways, you were far more suspicious of him than she is of you.

Weirdly enough, the Tsahìk comes looking for you when you don’t show up to her lesson the day after. You come to find out that what you thought was a once-and-done offer was meant to be a more permanent position among the tsakarems, and now your evenings are filled with her lessons about spirituality and healing, too.

But the best thing about Awa’atlu is, by far, Eywa’s presence: she’s everywhere, in the waters you swim into the bonfire Avrak lights when it’s time for dinner, and for the first time in months, you feel safe. Even Ry’ia does, and it’s evident in the way she made herself a nest atop one of the highest trees in the forest.

You’ve made friends with the elders and two girls close to your age, Wali and Em’a, and the curious glances that the Metkayina sent you on that first day you spent here are nothing but memories now, as they have seemed to accept you as one of her own. 

Ironically enough, you start noticing how close Ronal and Tonawari are just now that you know her. 

Nothing much, but still noticeable, because most of the women in the clan are not close enough to him to be touching him — but she does. And for some reason, a lingering touch on his arm here and two grazing knees there are all it takes to ruin your night. 

You know it’s stupid — a lot, actually.  You’d already figured that one day, Tonowari will have to choose a beautiful and probably Metkayina woman to mate with to become the Tsahìk when his mother won’t be able to be anymore. Ronal is smart, definitely the prettiest tsakarem out of Tsika’s group, and above all, an established Metkayina in the clan. You, meanwhile, still have to properly mount an ilu, and Eywa forbids a skimwing.

When the fire dies out and it’s time for everyone to go to sleep, you sneak away from your friends to find refuge in that same rocky coast you landed on the night you arrived, and find yourself looking at the stars.

The next morning, after yet another slip down the back of your ilu, you’re ready to pack your bags and go back to wallowing in your pity in the remains of the Hometree, but Tonowari stops you by the tail and drags you back into the water, already hoisting you up the ilu’s back again. “Come on,” he encourages you, getting on the saddle right behind you. “Make the bond– I'll worry about not making you fall.”

Your eye twitches. Just how are you supposed to stay focused on the ilu when you can feel his chest pressing against your back, and his arms basically engulfing your own as he holds onto the saddle? He blinks at your staring, acting oblivious. “What?”

By some miracle, you manage to focus on your mount. The ilu’s speed causes you to completely lean on Tonowari for support, but he doesn’t seem to mind — the opposite, actually. One of his arms wrap around your midriff to keep you more stable, and while underwater you can feel his chin rest on your shoulder, when you rise back to the surface it’s his breath that you can feel on your cheek — and you know for a fact that he’s doing that on purpose, because he’s much taller than you, and he has to be crouching to be almost your height. 

“See?” He whispers in your ear. “It’s not so hard.” Well, of course it isn’t with him assuring you don’t fall. Slowly, you lift your head up to look at him, a brow raised in amusement. “Not with you here, mister.” 

Your sultry gaze makes him blush — an absolute hunk of a man who has surely had his fun playing with your closeness up until now, defeated by the batting of eyelashes. Unbelievable. His index finger traces a little pattern over your side, his eyes not leaving yours, “Then I’ll be here for as long as you’ll need me.” 

Wali and Em’a tease you endlessly about your lessons with Tonowari, and although they are terrible at catching fishes with the nets, whenever the two of you are out in the water they’re suddenly the most interested in fishing, even if their eyes are directed to anything but their supposed catches. They insist on rebraiding your hair in the Metkayina way when your braids start growing out, picking the prettiest shells and beads they can find to intertwine them in your strands. Considering you ditched your feather tops for their net-and-shell ones a while ago, if it weren’t for the colour of your skin and your tail you could probably pass as a reef Na’vi without too much trouble. 

But the main problem remains — you are not a Metkayina, not in the true sense of the word. And you are reminded of that as you see Ronal drag Tonowari away from the bonfire during dinner. 

Your mood shifts visibly. You play around with the fruits on your bowl, completely bummed, and Em’a and Wali share a knowing look. “Maybe she just wants to talk to him,” the latter whispers, as her friend nods. “Yeah, they butted heads allll the time when we were kids. I’m sure he just did an ugly marui pod and she wants to point out every single mistake he made with the weaving.”

You huff a bitter laugh, “Yeah, because I’m sure that that kind of stuff requires an immediate discussion.” 

You go back to watching the stars atop the rocky coast that night — it’s a habit by now, because even if you feel happy here, you still miss your mother and sister. The thought of the three of you watching the same sky always manages to comfort you. Alas, now it’s helping you overcome how stupid you’re feeling, because you know that Ronal is perfect for Tonowari. 

She’s been a tsakarem for longer than you, has grown up with him, knows how to ride an ilu perfectly and knows the way of the water like the back of her hand. She doesn’t come from who-knows-where, where trees grow as tall as the stars and far away from their beloved ocean, doesn’t have a useless tail for swimming, and doesn’t need to resurface constantly for a breath of air as much as you do. Wanting to be with him is selfish, because you’re fully aware that there’s already someone perfect for him out there. 

Still, that doesn’t mean it hurts less. 

The next day you opt to avoid Tonowari’s lessons, staying close to Em’a and Wali to help them stitch a wedding gift for one of the village’s couples on one of the empty, woven platform just above the water surface. The chief’s son had looked confused when he’d found you with the women instead of in your marui, but his questioning glance was met with a shrug. “Well, they need this gift done before the end of this week. I won’t be able to ride an ilu properly any time soon, anyways.”

His shoulders sag a bit and he looks like a grounded ikran, but he still nods and goes his way, back to the beach. “What?” you ask Em’a when she stares at you, gaping. “He looked so sad! Why didn’t you go with him? Me and Wali could’ve finished this alone!” 

You go back to your stitching, fiddling with the strings. Your mind takes you back to the other day — the way his finger traced your skin — and still, a little part of you can’t help but wonder how things would be if he didn’t like another girl already. “Well, I wouldn’t want to intrude between him and Ronal, you know.”  

Your friends stare at each other, not knowing what to say — it’s not like they can rebuke without knowing what the two of them talked about — or did — last night. 

You spend the day avoiding Tonowari like they pay you for it, running errands in the forest for the Tsahìk and finishing baskets with the elders, and by the time dinner time arrives, you can’t evade him anymore without half the clan wondering what happened between you two. 

You’re sitting beside Em’a — who’s arguing with Priya about what shells are best for a chest piece — when someone tugs at your braids as gently as possible. “Hey,” 

Of course, it’s him. He looks a bit sheepish, a weird leather pouch over his shoulder as he lets your hair go and sits beside you, brushing a fallen braid behind your ear. “I like the way you did your hair– it’s really pretty.”

Well, if Priya and Em’a weren’t listening before, now they definitely are. It’s a miracle Wali is on cooking duty tonight, because otherwise, you’d have three very nosey listeners instead of two. You blush, “Um– really?” Damn him and the effect he has on you. One day, he’ll be Ronal’s — but you decide that it surely won’t be a problem if you have his attention, just for tonight. 

He nods, a smile gracing his features. “The prettiest,” for some reason, it doesn’t feel like he’s talking about the braids anymore, but you’re not brave enough to point it out aloud. “You know, I was thinking that we could try again with the ilus tomorrow. Don’t let a few falls discourage you — I’m sure I fell a lot when I had to learn, too.”

You scoff, swatting him on the arm. “Really? Big, bad Tonowari beaten by a skimpy ilu?” 

He rubs the back of his neck, “Well, actually, I don’t really remember — I was little — but I’m pretty sure my bad memory is just because I probably hit my head really hard while falling.” 

That manages a laugh out of you — and it’s like he can go back to breathing properly, because he had really thought he had done something that offended you in some way or the other. He was more stressed than he let out this morning, when you refused to come with him to see the ilus. 

The night goes on and you laugh like you haven’t in months. He sure knows how to make great company when he wants to, and his arm — leaned on the sand behind your back — sometimes brushes against your spine, causing pleased goosebumps to etch over your skin. Eywa, you want him to be even closer so bad. 

And it’s just when he leans down and scoots a little closer, his hand tentatively resting on your back, that you notice her. 

Ronal is glaring at you from the other side of the bonfire, her arms crossed and her fingers tapping impatiently. The charm wears off — you remind yourself that you can’t exactly pretend she doesn’t exist for a night, because even if you don’t owe her anything, you don’t want to cause any rift between her and Tonowari. It’s not like he’ll ever mate with you, anyway. 

So you gently pull away, trying to ignore his hurt stare as you get up from your previous sitting position. “I– did I do something? Are you–”

“Sorry, I just need a breather,” you disappear into the forest, but not before seeing Ronal stomping angrily towards Tonowari, surely ready to yell at him. Priya and Em’a cast worried glances at your back, but you’re too distraught to actually notice. 

The rocky coast is quiet in contrast to the continuous chatter of the bonfire, as the sound of the waves is the only thing breaking the silence. You hug your knees close to your chest, staring at the stars, wondering what and how Neytiri is doing right now — cuddled up with Jake, no doubt. Well, if Ronal wasn’t so perfect for Tonowari, you think you’d like being cuddled up to him, too–

A hand on your shoulder nearly makes you jump out of your bones — were you really so lost in your thoughts that you didn’t hear the same man you were just daydreaming about approaching? Embarrassing. If your father were alive, you wouldn’t hear the end of it. 

Tonowari sits beside you again, and you hug your knees just a little closer. “I, um,” he stutters, and you can’t believe a man of his size is able to get embarrassed. “Today, when I went hunting outside the reef, I got you something.” He grabs the pouch slinged over his shoulders, opening it to reveal a beautiful conch shell. 

You’ve never seen one so big — it’s probably the size of your head, if not bigger. The outer shell is iridescent, reacting to the bioluminescence of the waves that crash underneath you, while the inside is streaked in blue and purple. You’ve never seen anything like it, and you gape at the sight. “Tonowari, what…”

“I saw it and it just reminded me of you,” he explains, his cheeks a pleasant indigo. He holds it out for you to take, and if you weren’t sure your eyes were playing tricks on you, you’d say his hands were trembling slightly. “And so, as it is tradition, I thought I should’ve gotten it for you– if you will accept it, that is.”

You’re too dumbfounded by the seashell to really listen to him. You take it in your hands, tasting the weight of it, admiring its colors and wondering how something so beautiful could have reminded him of you. At last, you find yourself hugging it close to your chest, even if its spikes poke a little into your arm. “Thank you, Tonowari,” you say, feeling as full as anyone can be. 

He perks up, his ears twitching like he’s in disbelief, his tail moving happily in the sand. “…Really? You accept it?”

You raise an eyebrow. “Why wouldn’t I?” It's a gift, and you don’t plan on giving it back to him anytime soon. It’s too beautiful to even sit anywhere near his man-cave. 

The grin he makes takes up his whole face. “Okay. Okay, that’s great. Fantastic, even.” 

Gently, he touches your arm. “So, how about riding those ilus tomorrow?”

The next morning, you manage to mount an ilu properly — without Tonowari behind you for support, that is. It’s nothing much, but it’s still a step forward into life in the reef, and from the way your teacher claps and hollers, you’d think you’d tamed an akula. 

Later that evening, you’re still helping Em’a and Wali with their wedding gift, as well as recounting last night’s events to their flabbergasted faces. “A conch shell?” Wali asks to confirm, her thread and beads long forgotten. 

You nod, mimicking the size of the shell with your hands, “Yeah, a thing this big,” 

Em’a squeals, “No way! I didn’t think he was so straight forward!” 

Confused, you ask, “What do you mean? He was just being nice,” 

They look at each other, gaping, then back at you, “What do you mean, he was just being–”

They’re interrupted by someone sitting down next to you without asking permission, and you blanch when you see Ronal. “Oh– oh, um, hi.”

She blinks at you like it’s no big deal, then picks up a spare thread and needle and begins helping you with the netting. “So, what did Tonowari tell you last night?”

You hesitate. “Oh, um, you know — lessons stuff. A few tips on how to balance my weight on the ilus better. Um… in a– friendly way?” 

She perks up an eyebrow suspiciously, her ears twitching in annoyance. “Lessons stuff, huh?” she repeats, stitching a shell in the most aggressive way you’ve ever seen — even Neytiri bad-mouthing Jake never reached these levels of hostility. “In a friendly way? Is that so?”

You share a panicked glance with your friends, laughing awkwardly. “Yes?” It sounds more like a question than a reply, and that’s probably what tips her over the edge. Her eye twitches, and she doesn’t even bother to put the needle and thread where she found them as she rises back up to her feet while grumbling, “If you’ll excuse me,” 

“She didn’t even try to be sneaky,” Em’a mutters as soon as she’s out of hearing range, “what’s up with her?”

Your stomach churns, “Well, it’s probably the fact that–” 

A loud slap echoes from the village, making the three of you flinch. A second slap ensues. When you look up, you notice that Tonowari is standing on the shore, holding his jaw with his cheeks already turning an ugly purple, and Ronal is marching away, fuming. 

…Yeah. You probably shouldn’t have accepted that shell thinking that it wouldn’t matter if he was going to marry her anyways. 

You wonder what exactly is between them, but can’t find it in yourself to ask him — mostly because you aren’t brave enough to tell him that you like him. Em’a and Wali can keep telling you that there’s nothing between them, but recent events continue to prove them wrong. 

That night, at dinner, you mostly keep to yourself, deep in your thoughts, and even if Priya tries to drag you out of your misery, it’s all futile. For one reason or another the fruit you’re munching on tastes bitter, and you’re not sure if Tonowari’s absence around the bonfire helps or worsens your mood. It’s only when Ronal herself pats your shoulder and gestures for the beach that you get out of your haze. 

She tugs you by your arm down onto the shore, as silent as ever. “Listen, I’m really sorry–”

“Did you do anything you need to apologise for?” she asks, jumping off a rock. You stumble, “I– well, I know you and Tonowari probably–” 

“Stupid forest girl,” she huffs, not even looking at you, “thinks I want him like he’s some kind of trophy when he’s stupid like a baby–” 

“Hey! That’s not nice–” 

She tugs you roughly one last time only to let your arm go as you reach where the ocean meets the sand, and you fall down in the water, wetting your — newly made, you must add — loincloth. You groan, rubbing your backside, “Ow– I get that you’re mad, but this seems a little too much to me–”

Ronal points to somewhere behind you, looking tired of you. “Go.” 

You blink, confused — and then you turn, only to catch sight of Tonowari, only a few klicks behind, mounting an ilu. He raises a hand to greet you, the smile on his face nervous, and you notice that he’s got that pouch slung over his shoulder again. 

Hesitant, you turn to Ronal — looking for what, you don’t know. She raises an eyebrow expectantly, “What are you waiting for? Go.” 

You’re not sure you want to know what kind of game she’s playing, but something tugs at your tail. It’s Nala, you come to realize, and she’s trying to drag you off to Tonowari. 

You relent, following the zukzuk and mostly letting yourself get carried by the current until you’re in front of him. He gestures his fingers to his forehead as a salute and then holds his hand out to you, “Care for a swim?”

Still hesitant, you look at the ilu, then back at him. “No baby akulas trying to eat me this time?”

He laughs, “No, not where we’re going.”

You allow him to hoist you atop the ilu — because even if you're capable of doing it yourself, he always does that — and then climbs up in front of you, holding one hand behind your thigh to keep you steady and the other on the reins. “Hold on tight.” 

You have to admit that riding at night is beautiful. Other than the moons and stars above you, the only light comes from the bioluminescence, and you remove one hand from his waist to brush the surface of the water, in awe. Nala swims beside you, holding up with the pace with some effort, but still looking very happy to see you and her carer together. 

Tonowari stops the ilu when floating rocks and boulders — like a miniature-size Hallelujah Mountains — start to appear in the sky. “Where are we?”

He turns to smile at you. “You came here for Eywa, didn't you?” he asks, “Well, you could say we're going to visit her.”

He dives and you follow him, still a bit reluctant. He stops to let you catch up to him when he notices that you’re a bit behind him, a hand coming up to hold your smaller one — and suddenly, all of this feels very familiar. The fishes twirling around the two of you, the rocks and algae shimmering, the life you can feel buzzing within the water– 

Tonowari lets go of your hand as you stare all around you, but it’s just to sign something. Come with me, our Spirit Tree is this way. His hand comes up to the small of your back, and if you weren’t holding your breath, you’re sure you would’ve sputtered. 

If he notices the way you’re staring at him — like you just discovered a whole new person — he doesn’t mention it. He just guides you through the swarms of nocturnal fishes until you see it — the Spirit Tree. 

Never in your life you would’ve thought that something like that could’ve existed underwater. It looks like it’s made out of dreams, shining upon anything that comes close to it, and Tonowari’s hand slowly leaves your back as you approach it — he’s letting you have some space, you realise. 

Meeting the ancestors is like going back home — maybe it’s because in the spirit realm the Hometree and all the people that came down with it are alive, or maybe it’s because you didn’t do it for a long time. Either way, once you come back from it — you have to, the air in your lungs is starting to feel less and less every second that passes — you come to find out that finally, you feel truly at peace. 

You swim up to a rock covered in moss to catch your breath, taking a moment to admire your surroundings — you’ve swam up to an open cave, it seems, painted and engraved with stories from the start of the Metkayina clan to the new days. Tulkuns, ilus and Na’vi twirl across the stone, set for an endless dance across generations, and you hear the water crinkle beside you. 

“Do you like it?”

You nod, “It’s beautiful. Our Spirit Tree, back in the forest, doesn’t really offer any space for carvings.” 

Tonowari nods, looking at the artwork scattered across the walls. “This is the Cove of the Ancestors. It’s where we bring the dead to rest, where newborns have their first contact with Eywa and ceremonies are held.”

You hum, already imagining him in full Olo’eyktan attire, his father passing down his spear to him. The man clears his throat. “I… I also brought you here for another reason other than the Spirit Tree — Ronal suggested I might’ve wanted to… clear things up a bit between us.” 

You feel your heart skip a beat. Ah, there it goes. “There’s nothing to clear up,” you assure him, even if your chest feels like it’s imploding. “It’s okay. I know you have responsibilities — and we both know that Ronal’s the best tsakarem out there.”

He blinks, confused. A beat passes, slowly. Then, “But I don’t want Ronal.”

Oh. Oh.

You stutter, wondering if he’s joking — and from the way he’s looking at you, he’s not. “But– I thought you two had a thing. She dragged you away from the bonfire the other night — she’s always so close — she slapped you this morning just because we talked last night.” 

Tonowari’s laughter is sincere and without any malice behind it. “What? No!”

He removes his pouch from his shoulder, and opens it to reveal another conch shell– even bigger than the last one. It’s different, though: this one reminds you of him, all turquoise and light blue accents, and you wonder just how many hours he has spent looking for it. “Here in Awa’atlu, gifting a big conch shell symbolises the start of a courtship,” he explaines — embarrassed, perhaps? “I got so used to having you around that I forgot you weren’t born Metkayina, and probably didn’t know of the tradition. Honestly, I was too happy you had accepted it to ask myself if you knew about it — and for that, I owe you my apologies.” 

You soften visibly, but still hold a little resistance. “But Ronal–”

“Ronal is a friend,” he empathizes the word, “if anything, she sees me as a brother she can’t get out of her hair. All this time, she’s pressured me to make my move on you — before the other skxawngs in the village noticed all your qualities. That day at the bonfire? We kept arguing over what compliments I should’ve used for your hair.” 

You blush, “I kept telling her I should’ve just told you that you were beautiful — which was true — but she kept insisting for a subtler approach. And when we came back, you weren’t there.”

You fiddle with the shells of your chestpiece, “Well, I thought you went to have some alone time with her or something,” you mutter.

Another laugh. “So, you escaped to watch the stars every time we were a little too close? I’m flattered that you kept looking at me,” 

You push at his arm, “Then why did she slap you this morning? Your cheeks are still swollen, by the way.”

He snorts, “Ouli — the ceremonial tattooer — gave her a conch shell a week ago, and she has accepted it. She can’t wait to be absolved from tsakarem’s duties, but they can’t step down until the Tsahìk — and the future chief — choose who, one day, will guide the people spiritually.” Two of his fingers come up to your chin, holding your head up to stare into your eyes softly, “She was waiting for me to choose you. I told her I’d propose the shell to you yesterday, and then she found out that apparently, you saw it as a friendly talk. Needless to say, she was pissed.”

“But– I’m not even fully trained yet. She’s better at–”

He shakes his head, “I don’t care what she’s better at — I know you’ll learn everything about our ways, eventually. You’ve already proven yourself worthy enough.” he raises the shell again, his hand moving up to your cheek. “So, what do you say if we try this once more? I found another shell just to ask you again.” 

You take the shell in your hands, admiring it for a moment before throwing all your self-control out of the picture, jumping in his arms so abruptly that he falls down on his backside. The kiss is mind-shattering, his hug is everything you imagined it would be, and his body is just as warm as it was in the dream where you saw him for the first time. 

The funniest thing is that once you pull away, you both are gasping for air — something you’ve never seen him do, even after diving sessions that seemed to be hours long. Tightening the hold of your arms around his neck, you press your chests even closer, your noses brushing. “Is this the answer you wanted?”

He huffs a chuckle, his eyes already looking down at your lips again, “I don’t know– seemed a bit too friendly to me. But maybe, if you do that again, say, three or four times more, I might grasp the concept fully…” 

You’re pretty sure the two of you could’ve stayed there kissing all night — and maybe even more than that, with the way you could feel him pressing against your crotch — if it wasn’t for Nala, who, by the time you went back for seconds for the fourth time, already had enough and positively jumped over the two of you, breaking the sweet moment with barks and flaps of her tail. 

That doesn’t stop you from sharing quick, frenzy kisses whenever she’s not looking, as by the time Tonowari accompanies you back to your marui, your lips still feel swollen and are surely flushed. “I’ll see you tomorrow?” he asks you, pressing one last peck to your cheek. You nod, giving his hand one last squeeze, “‘Course,”

You decide to take things slowly — you still don’t know the Metkayina’s ways to their full extent, after all. The next few months are made of exhausting training, as now you’re the only tsakarem and still have to pass your iknimaya, and you don’t want to let anyone down. You know the expectations that everyone has about the Tsahìk, and you surely have no intention to make Tonowari look bad as Olo’eyktan when the time comes. 

And about him, he surely makes the intensive training easier. 

Everytime he notices that you’re a little too stressed he makes sure to bring you a trinket from his hunts — let it be a weird rock that looks like a heart or a basket full of shells you can make your chest coverings with. He finds flowers to put in your hair during meal times, and just swings you over his shoulder like a pouch full of water when he decides that you’re overworking yourself a tad bit too much, dragging you to his marui for a well-deserved nap.

The day of your iknimaya marks your formal entry in the clan — one who later on becomes even more real thanks to your mating ceremony. 

It’s a quiet affair — quieter than it is usual for the son of the chief — but neither of you resent the lack of festivities or celebration, because the most important thing is that you are now mated for life. Per Metkayina tradition, you rebraid each other’s kuru braids, picking beads and shells perfect for each other just for the occasion, and when the time to exchange your wedding gifts comes, you think back to Priya’s words and wonder just who she married — because the comb Tonowari carved out of coral is nothing short of stunning. 

“I’ve never been to your forest,” he tells you as you brush the swirls of the flowers and trees etched along the smooth side, “but I’ve tried imagining it so many times, I can only hope I brought it justice.” It may not be completely accurate to the forest, but the thought he put into it is more than appreciated nonetheless. In exchange, he wears your armband like it’s a badge of honor, even if it’s a little too tight on his bicep. (Not that you’re complaining — the sight is scrumptious, and you can’t believe you get to wake up next to him for the rest of your life.) 

You quickly settle in the marui Tonowari built with his father in the months of courting, and after a few months of blissful marriage, you don’t even notice when your belly starts to grow. 

You just assumed you were getting a little too comfortable in your new life with him and maybe put on a bit of weight — after all, the Metkayina are much softer than the Omatikaya, so maybe your body’s just adapting to the environment. You think so, until Tonowari points it out. 

One morning, as he’s tying his braids back, he stops to look at you — still lying half-asleep on the mat you share, barely awake yet. He crouches to stare weirdly at your belly, then pokes at your bellybutton like he’s trying to study a new species of fish. “Oeyä Tanhì,” he starts — my star, a nickname he has taken a liking to calling you since your wedding. 

You hum non-committedly. “Yes, Ma Wari?” 

He keeps poking at your stomach, and keeps doing so even when you try to swat his hand away. “Stop it, Tonowari, it tickles.”

He kisses your cheek, and continues doing so all the way to your forehead, brushing your hair away from your face as he leans his cheek over the top of your head. His chuckle is full of disbelief as he whispers, “My love, I think you’re with child. Your belly is rounder and stiff.”

A moment passes. Then, “Are you calling me fat first thing in the morning, Tonowari?” 

A terrifying silence and a visit to Tsika later, it’s confirmed — you are pregnant, already four months along. You’re confused, mostly because your people don’t show up until five months, but one look at your hunk of a husband is all it takes to explain your questions. 

Your second tattoo is to celebrate the pregnancy. While the first was above your eyebrow and went down to your cheek, this one cups the upper part of your belly and continues to your sides, still leaving some space for eventual other tattoos on your lower belly and hips. 

At night, you sit on the step going onto the ocean of your marui, letting your feet float in the water as Tonowari sits on a banked canoe below, rubbing ointment on your freshly-done tattoo. “The arch symbolises the first pregnancy,” he mumbles softly, “the sides, protection for the firstborn. If another pregnancy occurs, a piece will be added here,” he brushes against the empty, rounded sides of your belly, “for protection of the second born, and then one for the third, and so on.” 

You laugh, playing with one of his braids. “I think you’re getting too full of yourself, mister– let me give birth to this one before talking about other children, will you?” 

He rests his head in your lap, almost purring when you start tracing lines over his face and scalp, “And when the child is born,” he adds, a hand still over your stomach, “the father gets a tattoo over the heart, one that turns into a spiral as more children come.” 

A hum, “Maybe we should start thinking about names first, Ma Wari.” 

The agreement is, he chooses the name if it’s a boy, you choose if it’s a girl. He picks the name Aonung; you opt for Tsireya. 

His father’s illness comes as a bitter surprise to all. 

It starts with a cough, then he’s getting groggy when he moves a little too much, until no remedies the Tsahìk, you or the healers try to use work, as he lies bedridden in the marui him and his wife have shared for decades. 

Tonowari is understandingly broken up about it — the man who he grew up idolizing, who offered you a refuge in your grief, who helped him build the marui where you’ll be raising your child and every other one that might come after them. He won’t be meeting his grandchild, and even if Arvak insists for you to sleep properly in your own pod for the wellness of the baby, you’re not going to leave him or your husband alone in this difficult time. 

You and your mate spend every night by his side as Tsika prays and chants for Eywa, not getting a blink of sleep herself, until the inevitable comes, and Arvak’s hand finally goes limp in hers. 

The period of mourning doesn’t seem like nearly enough for Tonowari to handle his grief — he spends every night curled up into you, resting his head on your lap, trying to find comfort in you and his unborn child. He’s so big that if the situation was a little different, you would’ve laughed; instead, you just hold him close and sing him to sleep. 

But life doesn’t stop for grief, and you know that well. Soon, he’s named Olo’eyktan and you Tsahìk, Tsika stepping down from her position with tears in her eyes as she gives you her headpiece. 

Time in the village goes fast — people to heal, ceremonies to make, salves to concoct and prayers to hear. Months pass and your belly starts feeling impossibly big, so much so that the kids of the clan start following you everywhere to help their increasingly more tired Tsahìk. Tonowari always laughs when he sees them, going on about how Nala now has competition for the place in your heart reserved for children and animals, and the otterfin herself brings you a gift everyday — let it be a polished rock she found while swimming or a type of seaweed she thinks to be delicious. 

The contractions start at night. You toss and turn in pain but try to avoid waking up Tonowari, just in case it’s a false alarm like the ones you had in the last three days. It’s only when he nudges you with a gentle hand — hair still mussed a bit with sleep — and tells you that the mat is wet that you understand that your child is coming. 

Tsika and Ronal — now one of the best healers in the village and happily mated to Ouli — don’t spare any minute after your husband calls for them, and immediately have him carry you — now almost delirious with pain — to the birthing pond, where the water is warm and Eywa’s presence strong. The sigh you let out when your husband gently positions you against the rocky wall of it is one of pure bliss, and your clammy skin now surely doesn’t give you any problem. 

Aonung is born hours later at dawn, resurfacing out of the water by himself like tradition, crying out for his father to take him. Tonowari takes one good look at him, hears his strong wails and immediately passes him to your tired, waiting arms, “A boy,” he says breathlessly, brushing your braids out of your face, “a healthy, strong boy.” He presses his lips to your forehead, a tear slipping down his cheek, “Thank you, Oeyä Tanhì, thank you.” 

“Aonung,” you call out sobbing, as the babe stops his crying and latches onto your breast. “Hi, my sweet, hi,” he’s a little bigger than Omatikaya babies, but you love him nonetheless. He nestles over your chest as soon as he’s done feeding, and chooses that that’s now his favourite place to be. 

In the next few weeks, your son reveals himself to be a real mama’s boy. During the day, he stays curled up in your chest in the netted wrap that Em’a and Wali had made for you, and Eywa forbid Tonowari tries to help you by taking him — because he will cry until his ears beg for mercy, only to go back to being an angel as soon as he passes him back to you. 

The children coo and poke at him when you bring him to meet them, and one of the older ones jokes about how he looks just like your husband, but can only stand you. You laugh at that, because it is true — Aonung is his father’s copy, and maybe that’s why he likes you so much. 

It’s only when he reaches three months of age that you gather enough courage to ask Tonowari to visit the forest — not because you’re afraid he’ll say no, but because you’re not sure if you’re ready for it. It’s been almost two years since you left now, and while you aren’t exactly ready to see the remains of the fallen Hometree again, you want Aonung to meet his grandmother and aunt, and your husband to see where you grew up. 

Of course, the latter could never deny you anything, and a week later you get on Ry’ia with him behind you and set sail for the forest of the Omatikaya. The village is left to Tsika’s hands, and Aonung babbles happily against your chest as he flies for the first time in his life. 

The village is in the same place it was two years ago — it’s just grown a lot since then, marui pods where the branches once weren’t even steady enough — and you laugh when Ry’ia leaves you immediately to go back to the ikrans’ nest, ready to meet her old friends no doubt. You keep one hand over Aonung’s small back and the other in Tonowari’s palm, guiding him through the branches and groves as he stumbles many times. 

You laugh, “How does the forest feel, reef boy?” 

He pales as he stares down the branch you’re standing on, wondering just how many people die here from falling down into the void. “Dangerous, my love.”

Neytiri screams when she first sees you — alerting all the other villagers about your arrival. She runs to hug you tight, not even noticing your son nestled between you two or the reef Na’vi awkwardly standing behind you until you pull back, a soft smile on your lips. “Sister, it’s been so long–”

You laugh, nodding. “It has been, sister. I wanted to introduce you to Tonowari–” the man salutes her with his fingers going to his forehead and then gesturing towards her as you take Aonung out of his wrap and into your arms, “and little Aonung.” 

You don’t notice the way her face falls instantly. Your boy coos at her, gesturing his fat little arms towards her, and the moment is interrupted by Mo’at, far more pleased than her elder daughter at the turn of events. When your sister takes her nephew in her arms and your mother hugs you, she stares at his turquoise skin, larger tail and wide forearms with worry, “He’ll never be able to move fully in the forest with these,” 

You chuckle, still in your mother’s embrace, “A good thing we live in the reef then, no?”

Her eyes skim over your sturdier arms, the tattoos over your body and the seashells braided into your hair– and before you know it, she leaves Aonung in Jake’s arms and storms off.

Being back home is nice — because while Awa’atlu became your home in the last two years, here in the forest still live your friends and family, and it’s where you grew up. Your mother spoils Aonung rotten and watches him as you go hunting on your ikran with Ninat and Peyral, while Jakesully — upon Tonowari’s insistence — tries to show him the way of the forest. Your friends chuckle every time they catch sight of your husband, asking if every Na’vi in the reef is as big as him, and if you know any Metkayina men willing to marry in the Omatikaya. 

Neytiri, who you found out to be pregnant the day you arrived, mostly stays by herself, pondering, and whenever you ask if she wants to do anything with you she refuses, lamenting nausea or other pains. 

You talk to Mo’at about it, worried, but she just gives you a weird look. “She’s grieving, child.”

Your eyebrows rise up to your hairline, “What do you mean, grieving? Who died?”

“She thought you were still traveling,” she whispers, caressing Aonung’s curls while he munches on the beads of your braids, “and that once you were ready, you would’ve come back to living here. Seeing you with a mate and a son… it broke her heart, because now she knows you’re not coming back.” 

You think back to all the times you two talked about how your children would grow up together, being best friends and close just like you did — and your heart breaks a little, too, because in all of this, you hadn’t considered how she would take the fact of you never fully returning to the forest. 

That night, you leave Aonung with Tonowari — as your son has finally started to appreciate his father a little, too — and go looking for Neytiri at the Tree of Souls, knowing that at this hour, she usually prays and chants her songcord. 

She stops when she hears you approach, her ears perking up. You smile softly, “I thought we could pray together– like the old days?” When your father was still alive, your sister still arranged to Tsu’tey, and the both of you were less complicated. When she could still become Tsahìk, and you had no reason to. 

She scoffs a little, “Like the old days,” she mutters, “am I supposed to pretend that you didn’t turn your back on me?”

You grimace, taking a seat next to her, “Tiri…”

“Don’t ‘Tiri’ me,” she hisses, “you have no right– I was waiting for you. Waiting for you to come back–” her voice cracks — pregnancy emotions; you know them too well. “For you to come back here and marry one of our men like our ancestors did for centuries. Instead, you marry a reef Na’vi and– and move Eywa knows how far from here without saying anything–”

She breaks down, and you shush her gently, cradling her head on your shoulder. This feels familiar, because when you were kids, she was usually the one comforting you. “Why did it have to be the Olo’eyktan?” she cries, her tears wetting your skin, “Couldn’t you find someone less important — someone you could come here to live with?”

You shake your head, pressing your cheek on the crown of her hair for comfort, “I didn’t choose him, Tiri,” you say softly, “I fell in love. That’s not something one controls, and you, out of all people, should know that.”

Still in denial, she sobs harder, “What will it be of our kids?” she asks, pressing a hand over her slightly swollen belly, “Will they grow up as strangers, like they’ll be to our father and sister? Will they look at their aunt and wonder if she’s an outsider?”

“Never, sister, never,” you hush, “we’ll visit — you and Jake can visit, too.”

As her cries die down, she asks, “Does the thought of living here still scare you so much?”

And for that, to your horror, you don’t find an answer. 

Tsireya comes a little over a year after her brother, and this time, she looks like you. She still has her father’s Metkayina features — the tail, her forearms — but one good look at her face, and it doesn’t take a Tsahìk to guess that she’s your daughter. Ironically enough, she prefers her father's chest over yours — unless we’re talking about feeding time, because, let’s be real, Tonowari will never be able to beat you at that for obvious reasons. 

Aonung has started to waddle a while ago, and has been restless since. He goes from your marui to his grandmother’s, visiting Ronal and Em’a on the way, falling at least twelve times in the meantime. He loves swimming with you and his father, constantly bugs his sister when she’s stealing the milk that he’s convinced should be his, and plays with Nala on the shore when the zukzuk starts following him around. 

He’s a sweet boy who brings you flowers and pieces of fruit when he notices the smallest frown on your face, and loves cuddles from mom and dad before and after going to sleep. And even if he’s a little mean to his sister sometimes, you know he loves her very much from the way he begs you to let her swim with him or wants to share his food with her. 

You visit Neytiri a few more times, but the visits slowly come to an end when you realize that she has no intention of ever coming to the reef to see the life you’ve built here. While Mo’at visits frequently, bringing the children gifts and swarming them with affection, your older sister seems to have accepted the fact that in her eyes, you’ll never be truly close again. 

You accept the notion with far more ease than you could have ever imagined — because you have a family now, and people that look up to you for guidance. If Neytiri doesn’t want to see that, it’s okay; you’ll never manage to love her any less for it. 

The kids grow quicker than you realize, because soon, Tsireya is waddling behind Aonung too, and the excruciating process of weaning her off starts. 

Her brother had been even more difficult, so you’re actually quite relieved to see that she at least does not cry herself to exhaustion every night like he did. But every time she lets out the smallest whimper, you find Tonowari’s big eyes boring into yours, with that look that says, we could resolve the problem by just having another baby. You always glare at him when he suggests that, because two kids under three already feel like more than enough now, and you have no intention of having another one so soon. 

But as she often does, Eywa has a different plan for you. 

Tonowari hurriedly wakes you up one night as you’re resting on the sleeping mat, nearly asleep as the kids quietly snore beside you. He’d been out all evening to help his mother with some herbs while you watched the children, so you’re worried to find him so distraught. “One of the Ta’unui’s women died in birth,” he whispers, careful not to wake up Aonung or Tsireya, “they need to feed him, but none of the women in their village is nursing. Could you…?”

He doesn’t even have to ask, really, because five minutes later you’re sitting in the Tsahìk’s tent, nursing little Rotxo while the Ta’unui Olo’eyktan shares worried whispers with Tonowari. The newborn is a little chunkier than Aonung and Tsireya were, but that just means that his mom, while she could, took good care of him. 

“He’s an orphan,” you hear the chief say, “his dad died a little while ago on a hunt, and he’s only got his grandmother now — but frankly, she’s old, and I doubt she’ll be able to take care of him for long…” 

The solution seems clear in your eyes, and after talking to Rotxo’s grandmother about her new place in the Metkayina village, you introduce Aonung and Tsireya to their new little brother. They don’t ask why you didn’t have a big belly like the other pregnant women in the village, or why his skin isn’t a little bluer like theirs, and instead take to him instantly, putting shared efforts to find nice shells and smooth little rocks to put in the woven crib where he naps. 

Everyday, you bring him to his grandmother so that she can have a piece of her daughter back with her, and slowly, she takes a liking to your children as well. They start calling her grandma like they do to Tsika and Mo’at, and you don’t miss the way she seems to be rejuvenated by being around such lively children. 

“No more kids, huh?” Tonowari teases you gently one evening, the sun fading into the horizon, as you breastfeed little Rotxo while watching Aonung and Tsireya play with ilu cubs in the water. 

You swat his arm, so tired but so full of love. “Oh, shut up, Tonowari. The next kid we have, we’ll have in at least ten years.” 

He raises an eyebrow, amused, “Oh? So, we will have another kid?” 

You blush — incredible how after having two of his kids and being bare for him so many times, he still manages to get a reaction out of you. “Maybe.”  

He hums, an arm wrapping around your shoulders as he presses a gentle kiss to your temple. “Yeah? And what do you want to call them, if it’s a girl?”

You look down to little Rotxo, his hand opening and closing around the curve of your breast, his chunky belly pressing against your ribs. It’s ridiculous — the way Tonowari can get you to think about another baby while already having three small children. 

She could heal Appa far better than the physicians here ever could, and if he was being honest with himself, part of him simply wanted to see someone familiar again after everything that had happened. 

He wanted to hear Sokka complain loudly about the estate food, hear Toph mock the ridiculous formalities surrounding Hujiang, and hear Katara scold him for nearly getting himself killed in a storm before inevitably helping him anyway.

Spirits.

At this point, he felt he might genuinely cry just seeing one of them walk through the door.

The solution itself had been painfully simple.

Write to Katara and ask her to come. Have Appa healed properly. 

He knew she would arrive if he asked her, and yet, the brush still hovered uselessly above blank parchment, because hesitation had settled inside him.

He was thinking ahead. Zuko had taught him that.

Not intentionally, perhaps, though watching Uncle Iroh guide the new Fire Lord navigate politics and diplomacy for the past years had forced Aang to understand something uncomfortable about the world. 

Every action carries consequences far beyond the moment itself, and it is only amplified so for someone carrying the title of Avatar.

Usually, Aang ignored that lesson whenever possible.

He preferred simpler, kinder decisions.

But tonight he could not stop thinking.

His thoughts kept circling backward endlessly, searching desperately for the exact moment everything had begun unraveling.

Was it when he turned away from you within the marketplace to help the frightened child who had nearly collided with a merchant stall?

Or perhaps earlier, when he agreed to let you accompany him despite knowing you possessed absolutely no sense of direction whatsoever.

Then his thoughts drifted farther back.

To the storm.

To Appa screaming in pain beneath the lightning sky while Aang desperately struggled to keep control against the violent winds tearing around them.

Perhaps this entire nightmare truly began there.

He had known a storm was coming that day.

Any sensible airbender would have delayed travel entirely, especially with Appa already exhausted from weeks of flying across the Earth Kingdom beforehand. But Aang had grown too confident in his abilities recently confident in how much stronger his bending had become since the war ended, and he never stopped to considering whether Appa himself could safely withstand such conditions.

That single choice had led them here.

To Appa crippled within an infirmary. To Momo missing. To you—

Aang shut his eyes tightly.

Then came the next question.

If Katara arrived here, what then?

Lord Shuren already viewed him as the source of disgrace within his household. The advisor had taken enormous pride in personally caring for the Avatar during recovery, no doubt presenting himself openly throughout Hujiang as the man who aided the world's savior.

If Katara appeared suddenly and healed Appa within days, what would that do to Shuren's pride?

And even worse, what would happen to you afterward?

Aang had already come to understand the terrifying truth. 

You did not possess freedom within this estate. Every decision surrounding your life seemed tied directly to your father's approval, to whatever preserved appearances best before the kingdom.

If Aang angered Lord Shuren further, you might suffer for it instead.

Frustration finally snapped through as he abruptly stood from the table, the pen slipping from his grasp before striking against the wood and splattering dark ink across the untouched parchment.

Aang dragged both hands harshly across his face while pacing toward the bed.

Then he simply dropped onto it heavily, staring upward toward the ceiling while exhaustion tangled painfully through his body.

Sleep was difficult as Aang found himself trying to solve a situation where no answer seemed capable of making everyone walk away unharmed.

But he still wanted to try.

Aang had not truly realized until this morning just how separated your chambers were from the rest of the estate.

No servant would answer him directly.

The moment he asked where you resided, conversation tightened around him before polite excuses followed, each servant suddenly remembering another task elsewhere within the manor. 

Some lowered their heads respectfully while avoiding his eyes entirely, while others simply hurried away before he could ask twice.

Everyone knew.

The entire estate already understood how dangerous it would appear for the Avatar to seek you out after the events of last night. The servants did not even need instructions to avoid aiding him. 

Fear for your reputation alone seemed enough to silence them.

Eventually, he came across two of your maids walking together through one of the eastern corridors.

Aang recognized them immediately.

The older one, Lian, carried herself with the same composed firmness she had displayed the first day he barged carelessly into your dressing chambers. Beside her stood Nari, visibly younger and significantly easier to read, her nervousness practically radiating the moment she noticed the Avatar approaching them.

Aang barely managed a greeting before Lian interrupted him calmly.

"My lady is unavailable."

The tone alone made it clear no argument would alter her answer.

"Please, I just need to see her!"  Aang tried anyway.

"You should not." Lian replied simply.

Then, without another word, she continued down the corridor.

Nari lingered behind briefly.

The younger maid avoided looking directly at him while nervously twisting her sleeves between her fingers.

Aang lowered his voice slightly.

"I just want to make sure she's okay."

Nari hesitated, then finally, she answered.

"She is rather upset at the moment, so she remains alone." Her eyes darted quickly down the corridor afterward before she stepped slightly closer. 

"If you insist upon seeing her...please ensure no one notices."

Even with directions, reaching your chambers proved difficult.

Aang stood out too easily.

The blue arrows covering his skin, the unmistakable robes of an Air Nomad, the heavy red outer garment returned to him earlier that morning after finally leaving your grasp—every servant who passed him looked twice before quickly pretending otherwise.

Still, he reached your chambers eventually.

He had spent nearly the entire night thinking of you. Even exhaustion had failed to silence his thoughts properly. Every time sleep threatened to pull him under, his mind dragged him back toward the abandoned house, toward the unbearable helplessness lingering across your face while you cried beneath his robes.

At some point during the night, amidst all the panic and confusion clouding his thoughts, an idea had finally taken shape.

A possible solution.

Something that might repair your reputation without forcing you to carry further humiliation.

Something that might satisfy Lord Shuren, preserve your dignity, and allow this terrible thing to stop swallowing your life whole.

The thought alone had kept him awake close to dawn, and even once exhaustion finally overtook him, he slept so poorly that waking came hours later than usual, long after the noon sunlight had already spread fully across the estate.

Yet despite everything, he had come here with purpose. With hope.

Aang entered the room without knocking first.

He opened the doors carefully, slipping inside quietly before shutting them behind him.

You looked up immediately from where you rested against the headboard of your bed.

The curtains surrounding the room remained partially drawn against the afternoon light while blankets covered your legs entirely, though your upper body remained visible enough that the bruises decorating your skin stood impossible to ignore.

"Aang...?"

Relief struck him instantly at the sound of your voice. He exhaled quietly before walking farther into the room.

You looked alright at first glance.

You looked alright if he ignored the bruising surrounding your wrists. You looked alright if he ignored the darkened marks staining your throat and collarbones beneath the loose robes draped around your body.

You looked alright.

But you were not.

Even so, you still offered him a small smile before lowering your eyes toward the blankets gathered over your lap.

"You truly should not have come here." You murmured softly.

Aang nodded automatically before realizing you had not been looking at him at all.

"...I know, But I needed to talk to you." He admitted quietly.

He hesitated before moving toward the side of your bed and lowering himself carefully beside it, kneeling close so that he no longer needed to raise his voice for you to hear him.

You looked visibly surprised by the gesture. Still, you did not stop him.

Neither of you spoke, then, unexpectedly, you broke the silence first.

"You have woken much later than usual today. Did you struggle to sleep?" You observed gently.

Aang rubbed lightly at the back of his neck.

"...A little."

A faint smile touched your lips.

"Me as well."

The softness behind your voice nearly made the bruises surrounding it harder to bear looking at.

Aang swallowed quietly before finally forcing himself to ask the question that had followed him through the entire morning.

"What happens now?"

The silence lingered and he wondered if perhaps you would refuse answering.

Then finally—

"Nothing."

Aang frowned immediately.

"What do you mean?"

Your attention drifted toward the windows before returning downward once more.

"Gen has disappeared."

The words struck him hard, and he straightened instantly.

"What?"

"I am unsure where he has gone." You continued calmly.

Though something beneath your voice betrayed that you already knew far more than you allowed yourself to say aloud.

But Aang noticed the faint tightening around your mouth.

You knew.

Perhaps not the exact destination, nor the details surrounding his departure, but you understood.

And truthfully, so did he.

No servant escaped the estate unnoticed, especially not during the night following such scandal. Guards remained posted throughout every entrance surrounding the manor grounds, and after yesterday's chaos, the household had become even more alert than usual.

Someone had allowed Gen to leave.

Someone had chosen silence.

You understood that already.

Very few people within the estate believed your accusations. Outside of your four maids and Aang himself, the household seemed far more willing to protect the image of a loyal servant than acknowledge the possibility of such ugliness growing quietly beneath their own roof for years.

After all, accepting your truth would require every single one of them to confront the fact that they had welcomed Gen warmly into their lives while never noticing what he truly was.

It was easier to believe you mistaken.

You smiled bitterly, though anger restrained carefully beneath your composure sharpened every word leaving your mouth.

Aang stared at you in disbelief.

"How is that even possible?"

You remained quiet briefly before answering.

"He left behind a letter for my father."

Something cold settled inside Aang's chest.

You laughed once, because your restrained anger had nowhere else left to go.

"He wrote that he no longer felt welcome within the estate after being accused of such terrible things." You explained quietly. 

"He reminded father how loyal he remained to my brother all those years, and how even following Renji's death, gratitude alone compelled him to stay within our household despite possessing no obligation to do so any longer."

Your fingers tightened against the blankets gathered over your lap.

"He claimed he had begun viewing me as a younger sister," you continued, "and that hearing such monstrous accusations from someone he cared for so deeply wounded him beyond forgiveness."

Aang felt sick.

You inhaled slowly before continuing once more.

"So rather than burden the household further with scandal, he chose to leave quietly out of respect for the family who once showed kindness to an orphaned servant."

The silence felt suffocating. Then finally, you smiled again. A completely humorless smile.

"Quite touching, is it not?"

Aang remained quiet for several moments after your bitter remark faded into silence.

Then, almost instinctively, his hand moved toward yours.

The touch came carefully this time, being gentle so that he could pull away immediately if needed.

A small part of him loosened with relief when you did not flinch from it the way you had the previous night, though your attention lowered immediately toward where his fingers rested lightly across your bruised wrist. 

Without seeming fully aware of it himself, his thumb brushed softly against the discolored skin there, tracing absentminded circles over the injuries.

"I...have an plan." He admitted. 

"And you can say no if you want to. I mean it. If you hate it, then I'll help you think of something else instead." 

He hesitated briefly before adding—

"But just hear me out first."

You studied him silently, then your eyes drifted back toward his hand resting over yours.

Slowly, you lifted your free hand and placed it gently atop his before carefully guiding his touch away from your wrist. The movement carried no rejection within it, and Aang immediately let you move him without protest while you shifted on the bed.

Your legs slipped carefully over the side of the mattress before your posture straightened properly, forcing you to sit facing him fully now rather than hiding beneath blankets and shadows.

"Thank you, Aang," you murmured softly. "But I sincerely doubt you possess a solution capable of salvaging this situation."

"Like I said, you don't have to agree." He answered quickly. 

"It's just..." He hesitated, suddenly uncertain how to phrase it properly. "I don't know how you'd feel about leaving home."

The words startled you visibly.

"Leaving my home?" you repeated slowly, disbelief threading through every syllable.

The very idea sounded impossible. Hujiang had always been your future.

You were born here. Raised here.

Even your eventual marriage would not truly remove you from these lands, merely shift you from your father's estate toward the royal palace waiting farther within the kingdom.

Your entire life had been built around remaining exactly where you belonged.

And yet—

Something within Aang's expression made it painfully clear that the place he imagined for you no longer existed within Hujiang at all.

"Yes," he answered quietly. 

"I mean... I don't know if you're still going to marry Prince Jinhai, but—"

Your brows furrowed instantly.

"What precisely does His Highness have to do with this?" You interrupted. "Are you suggesting the prince no longer intends to marry me?"

The offense beneath your voice surprised him immediately.

"No!" Aang exclaimed quickly. "That's not what I meant at all. I just thought maybe if—"

The chamber doors suddenly opened before he could finish.

"My lady..."

Lian stopped abruptly the moment her eyes landed upon Aang kneeling beside your bed.

The older maid's expression hardened instantly before snapping toward Nari standing awkwardly behind her, the younger girl immediately lowering her head guiltily beneath the silent accusation directed her way.

Then Lian addressed Aang directly.

"Avatar Aang," she began firmly, "it would be wise for you to leave the lady's chambers at once. Had another servant discovered you here, the consequences could have—"

"What is in your hand?"

Your quiet interruption cut cleanly through her scolding.

Lian paused, and only then did Aang notice the rolled parchment clutched tightly within her grasp.

The maid's fingers curled instinctively around it.

"It is a letter. Two arrived from the palace moments ago. One addressed to the lord advisor..." She hesitated briefly. 

"And the other to you, my lady."

You looked ahead quietly for a moment before speaking again.

"I see. Read it to me."

Lian visibly stiffened.

"My lady, such correspondence is intended for your eyes alone—" She protested carefully,

"I shall not repeat myself, Lian."

Your voice silenced the room instantly.

Lian looked genuinely surprised, because even if she had witnessed your tone, she herself had never been subject to it.

Slowly, reluctantly, she unrolled the parchment within her hands while Aang remained perfectly still beside your bed, his entire attention fixed upon you alone.

My Lady, I have rewritten this letter more times than I care to admit, and still I find myself unable to place these thoughts into words that do not feel cruel. For many years, I accepted our betrothal as duty before anything else, yet somewhere along the passing of time, that duty became something far more familiar to me. Your future beside mine had become so deeply woven into my life that I confess I had long stopped imagining a future in which you were absent from it. Which is why writing this pains me more than I anticipated. Had yesterday's events remained private, perhaps matters may have unfolded differently. Yet too many witnessed the aftermath, and the word of your disappearance beside Avatar Aang, followed by Gen's departure from the estate before dawn, reached my father, His Majesty. I cannot burden him more in his ill state. I shall continue searching for Gen so that the truth of this matter may finally reveal itself fully, because despite everything, a part of me still wishes to believe your words. But I would be dishonest if I claimed certainty remains untouched within me. You disappeared beside another man. You concealed your growing closeness with him from me. I do not know the full truth of what transpired that evening. And perhaps that uncertainty itself has become the greatest fracture between us. You deserve honesty from me at the very least, and honesty compels me to admit that doubt has already settled where unwavering trust ought to have remained between two people promised to one another since childhood. For that reason, I can no longer proceed with our betrothal. Please do not mistake this decision for hatred toward you, for I possess none. If anything, I regret deeply that matters arrived at such a conclusion after all the years placed before us. May the Spirits guide you toward peace in the days ahead. — Jinhai

Aang could scarcely process the contents of the letter even after Lian's voice fell silent.

Part of him felt ashamed for the relief that had instinctively surfaced inside him the moment Prince Jinhai's words confirmed the broken betrothal. 

The reaction itself felt ugly considering the devastation sitting plainly before him, because regardless of what future this might open for his idea, the truth remained that you had just lost the final thing anchoring you to the life you possessed only yesterday.

Your future. Your title. Your place within Hujiang.

Gone within a single letter.

And perhaps what unsettled him most was the realization that only moments earlier, before the maids interrupted, you had already reached the very conclusion he intended suggesting himself. 

You had heard him speak of leaving home and immediately assumed Prince Jinhai no longer wished to marry you.

Aang had denied it instantly.

Yet somehow it had become true anyway.

You swallowed visibly before finally speaking.

"Leave us."

Lian hesitated only briefly this time as no argument followed.

The maid rolled the letter shut quietly before bowing her head and exiting the chambers with Nari hurrying silently behind her. The doors closed softly moments later, leaving only yourself and Aang alone within the room.

Then suddenly, you laughed.

The sound startled him.

"So, it appears His Highness found my adventures with the Avatar considerably less charming than you did." You murmured faintly,

Aang immediately shook his head.

"That's not fair."

"Is it not?"

"He should've believed you."

You smiled faintly at that.

"No. He should have trusted me. Belief proves useless once trust has already failed." You corrected quietly

Aang inhaled slowly afterward before finally forcing himself to speak.

"This is what I wanted to talk to you about."

You looked toward him again.

And this time, Aang did not hesitate.

"I'll accept your father's proposal."

The shock crossing your face appeared immediate.

"...What?"

"I'm serious," he continued quickly before you could interrupt. 

"Your father wanted us married because he thought it would give you a better future, right? Then maybe we can use that."

You stared at him outright now.

"Aang—"

"You don't have to stay here anymore. That's what I'm trying to say." He pressed on.

Offense sharpened instantly across your expression.

"You believe marriage to you would somehow free me?"

"No, that's not—" Aang stopped himself before trying again more carefully. 

"I mean...yes. Kind of. But not in the way you think."

You looked thoroughly unconvinced.

Aang hurried onward before losing his nerve entirely.

"You wouldn't have to leave immediately." He explained. 

"Appa still needs time to recover, and I'm not leaving until I find Momo anyway, so nothing has to change right away. But once we're married, your father can't force you into another engagement just because Prince Jinhai backed out."

Your brows furrowed deeply.

"And then what?" You asked quietly.

Aang hesitated briefly before answering honestly.

"Then eventually I leave, but you'd still be my wife, so no one here could really do anything about it." He admitted.

The absurdity of the conversation nearly showed across your face.

"Aang—"

"I know it sounds weird." He interrupted quickly. 

"But listen—I'm not asking you to actually be my wife. You don't have to do anything." He rubbed nervously at the back of his neck before continuing. 

"You can stay here as long as you want. I'll visit whenever I can, and when you're finally ready to leave Hujiang...You could come to Republic City." His voice softened slightly.

You remained silent.

"You said you admired Toph when I talked about her," he reminded gently. "And Katara too. You liked hearing about how she changed things in the Northern Water Tribe." 

A faint smile tugged briefly across his face. 

"Katara would help you. Honestly, she'd probably love you."

That finally earned the faintest shift in your expression.

"And once you're settled, once you have your own life and your own place somewhere nobody controls every decision you make..." He exhaled slowly.

"We can end the marriage completely when you wish. You'd be free."

Zuko listened without interrupting you once.

The room had grown almost entirely dark by now, the torch left burning low and the shadows swallowed most of his features whenever he shifted even slightly beside the bed. Still, you could make out the tension lingering across his expression the longer your story unfolded, particularly once Aang entered it.

"He was only trying to help you," Zuko murmured quietly.

The words carried no accusation toward either of you.

He leaned his head back lightly against the side of the mattress, turning his face slightly away from you while staring somewhere toward the darkened ceiling beyond.

"Yes." you answered softly. 

"It was an incredibly ambitious idea. One I would never have expected from him." A faint breath escaped you then, almost resembling laughter. 

"But I was grateful regardless."

Zuko remained quiet briefly before asking—

"Seeing as how you are here today, I am assuming you agreed."

"Not initially." You paused. 

"I actually struck him across the face."

His head turned toward you immediately, visible surprise crossing his features despite everything weighing upon the conversation, you laughed properly for the first time all evening.

"You hit him?"

"It was not one of my finer moments."

"Why?"

The question lingered between you quietly.

"Because it angered me." You admitted honestly. 

"Not him. The situation itself." Your fingers tightened faintly against the mattress. 

"It was not his responsibility to repair what happened to me. None of it was his fault either, and yet throughout that entire night, a part of me continued wondering how different my life might have remained had he simply never arrived within Hujiang at all."

The confession tasted ugly spoken aloud.

"I blamed his presence for ruining everything." you whispered. 

"And I hated myself for it almost immediately because he was the only person trying to help me while everyone else doubted my words."

You inhaled slowly before continuing.

"The moment my hand struck him, I regretted it." Your voice softened further then. 

"Because when I looked at him, I realized he had already been blaming himself too."

Zuko's attention remained fixed entirely upon you now.

You swallowed thickly.

"Everyone around me questioned my honesty, My father, the servants, even Jinhai..." Your voice faltered briefly before steadying again. 

"And perhaps that was why I finally broke in front of Aang. Because despite everything, he was the only person beside me."

A few tears slipped free before you fully realized they had formed.

You shifted slightly on the bed, pressing your face briefly into the bedding beneath you to hide the evidence of them before finally turning back toward Zuko once more.

"I had not even noticed myself crying at first." You admitted faintly. 

"Then suddenly he was holding me while I sat there mourning the fact that my own father abandoned me the moment believing me proved inconvenient."

The bitterness within those words settled heavily between you both.

"I agreed to leave," you whispered quietly, holding Zuko's eyes through the darkness despite the tears still clinging faintly to your lashes, "because for the first time in my life, I understood Hujiang could no longer remain my home."

A bitter smile threatened briefly before fading just as quickly.

"It is a strange thing," you continued softly, "how words written upon paper can alter the course of an entire life. A few strokes of ink, a signature at the bottom, and suddenly every future you had imagined for yourself no longer exists."

You exhaled weakly.

"Gen left behind a letter. Prince Jinhai sent one of his own. Neither man had ever occupied enough of my life to warrant such influence over it, yet their words carried more weight than my own ever did."

The confession lingered heavily between you.

"I think that was the cruelest part." Your voice lowered further. "Not losing my engagement. Not even losing my home."

A quiet breath escaped you.

"It was realizing how easily a letter can decide whether your life belongs to you at all."

The silence stretching afterward should have been the end of it.

Truly, it should have.

You remained lying where you were, your cheek resting against the pillow while Zuko sat beside the bed in the dim lanternlight, both of you too exhausted to continue speaking yet somehow equally unwilling to disturb the strange quietness settling through the room. 

Outside the chambers, the palace had long since fallen asleep. Even the servants moving through the halls earlier had disappeared entirely.

Zuko exhaled slowly before lowering his head back against the mattress behind him.

"Aang would be furious if he knew you were telling me all of this instead of him."

The remark carried the faintest trace of dry humor.

You smiled weakly.

"No. He would only grow confused why I shared it with you."

Zuko looked toward you at the exact same time.

From where he sat beside the bed and where you lay turned toward him, there existed barely enough space now for either of you to pretend this still resembled proper conversation.

"You should hate me a little."

The statement arrived so abruptly that you blinked.

"Oh, I do."

A weak chuckle accompanied the remark, though it faded when he failed to return it.

"I am truly sorry for what I said this afternoon." He apologized, and the sadness that crossed his expression felt genuine enough to stir a faint guilt within you.

"You could not have known."

"That remains no excuse."

His answer came immediately.

"I spoke carelessly. Worse, I judged you before understanding the circumstances." His eyes lowered briefly. 

"I have spent enough of my life resenting those who did the same to me. I should have known better."

For a moment, neither of you spoke.

"Well, I did tell you that you ought to have been more mindful." You said at last, 

The corner of your mouth lifted faintly.

"But I shall not hold it against you. This once."

The warning earned the faintest huff of amusement from him.

"This shall be the final occasion upon which I forgive you so readily."

"You forgive me?" The disbelief in his voice nearly made you laugh.

"Do not sound so surprised."

"I had assumed I would be apologizing for considerably longer." He confessed.

"Perhaps you should." You stated with a taunting smile.

"Still, I have been informed that forgiveness is considered a virtue." You added after a moment

"And who informed you of that?" Zuko questioned, looking away from you, already expecting Aang's name.

"Unfortunately, my father."

A quiet huff escaped him.

"I find that difficult to believe."

You lifted a brow. "And why is that?"

"Because from everything you have told me this evening, he appears to have possessed remarkably little faith in forgiveness."

The observation lingered between you.

Your smile faded slightly.

"He loved me."

The answer arrived immediately.

"He loved me very much."

Zuko did not dispute it.

You had spoken of abandonment, of betrayal, of a father who refused to believe you when it mattered most, and yet there remained no hesitation when speaking of his love.

For a moment, he found himself wondering whether that made the situation better or infinitely worse.

"Perhaps." He conceded quietly.

"He was not a cruel man." You spoke, and your expression softened.

It was painfully obvious to him that you were trying to convince yourself of a lie. 

"No, I do not believe he was." Zuko agreed so as to not worsened your mood.

Silence settled once more.

Then—

"But I listened to all of that, and the only thing I could think about was how badly I wished someone had protected you sooner." He said quietly,

The confession settled heavily between you.

You stared at him for a long moment, something tightening painfully inside your chest at the sheer sincerity behind the words.

There was no performance in Zuko. No attempt to charm you. If anything, he sounded almost frustrated with himself for admitting it aloud.

For years, you had grown accustomed to people speaking about what should become of you.

Even your grief had only been met with solutions rather than understanding, every wound treated as something to be managed and endured with dignity rather than simply mourned.

Then Aang had arrived and, somehow, without intending to, disrupted all of it.

You still remembered the way he would listen without immediately offering an answer. The way he seemed far more interested in how something made you feel than in what ought to be done about it. 

It had frustrated you at first. Then it had become comforting, and without even noticing, you had grown accustomed to being seen by him.

And tonight, after listening to every humiliating and painful detail of your life unravel, the only thing troubling Zuko seemed to be the fact that no one had stood between you and the suffering.

It left you strangely speechless.

"I am not certain what to say to that." You confessed.

"You need not say anything."

The answer came quietly as his attention remained upon the torch on the wall.

"I only thought it deserved to be said." He admitted.

The room settled into silence once more, one that wasn't the strained silence of strangers struggling to fill empty space.

Your attention drifted toward him, inevitably toward the scar crossing his face.

A scar that had kept you curious ever since you had seen him, one of which you finally knew the suffering behind it.

"Does it still hurt?"

The question escaped before you could reconsider it.

For a moment, Zuko appeared surprised. Then his hand lifted instinctively toward the burn before understanding quietly settled across his expression.

You had not been asking about the scar.

"No," he answered softly.

Something in his voice eased.

"Not anymore."

The reassurance carried more meaning than the words themselves, and whether he intended it or not, it reached far beyond the old burn upon his face.

You nodded slowly.

There was something unexpectedly comforting about that answer, perhaps because both of you understood it had never truly been about the scar at all. 

Pain had a way of convincing you it would remain forever, only for time to quietly prove otherwise when you were no longer paying attention. The realization settled gently between you, unspoken yet somehow understood all the same, and neither of you seemed particularly inclined to disturb it with further conversation. 

The night had already stripped away more honesty than either of you intended to offer, leaving behind a silence that felt strangely easier to inhabit than words.

You simply stared at each other, finding an odd understanding in your vastly different pasts. 

Neither of you moved back.

Neither of you seemed fully conscious of leaning closer either, exhaustion dragging every thought slower than usual while grief and memory and warmth tangled together and you couldn't stop quickly enough.

Then your lips touched.

Softly.

So softly that for one suspended second it barely felt real at all.

You remained there in stunned stillness afterward, your breath caught somewhere painfully high within your chest while warmth spread sharply beneath your skin. 

Zuko did not move either. The weight of the moment rested quietly between you both, neither deepening the contact nor breaking it, simply existing there within the terrible intimacy of realizing what had just happened.

Then his hand rose carefully toward your face, the touch against your cheek hesitant and cold, made to undo you entirely.

And without thinking, you shifted upward, closer toward him in return.

Pain shot violently through your shoulder.

A sharp gasp tore from you immediately as agony ripped across your back, wrenching you completely out of the haze. Your body recoiled on instinct while shock crashed into you all at once, your eyes widening as reality finally caught up with what had happened.

Spirits.

Zuko moved instantly, one hand reaching toward your arm to steady you.

"Did your wound reopen—"

"Leave."

The word escaped you too quickly, your voice trembling that it barely sounded like yourself.

Zuko froze.

And then the moment reached him too.

You watched the realization settle across his face in awful silence while he stepped back from the bed, one hand lifting toward his face before stopping midway there, the slight tremor in his fingers visible even within the dimness of the room.

Neither of you spoke.

There was nothing either of you could possibly say that would not make the moment cease to exist.

Zuko walked quietly toward the doors before leaving the chambers without another word.

The torch on the wall flickered once after he was gone, casting the room into shadow before the flame steadied itself again.

You did not sleep for the rest of the night.

chapter twelve coming soon...

a/n: well.

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