Hi, everyone! I'm new to the Avatar fandom, but I love Zutara and was feeling inspired this Zutara month! I am a little late, but I'm hoping to catch up! Anyways, thank you for clicking on this story, and I hope you enjoy reading it!

Thanks!

~Isabelle

every rose has its thorns

She really should have expected this from him. After all, they had been together for nearly two years, and he'd been in love with her for even longer than that. He wasn't going to let her go without a fight. Still, Katara had hoped that Aang would accept the breakup with the quiet kind of grace that monks were known for. Of course, Aang had never quite been the traditional monk.

It had only been two weeks since Katara had broken up with him, but Aang had not let a single day go by without letting Katara know that he was thinking of her. He texted her nearly every hour, to the point where she was considering blocking his number. The only reason she had yet to do so was because she still held out hope that they could go back to being friends, or at least acquaintances who ran in the same friend group. But the texts were nothing that she couldn't handle; she simply stopped replying to him after the third day. That was when the deliveries began.

Katara had just begun her residency at Ba Sing Se Health Hospital a few months prior to the breakup, so her fellow medical staff knew the current situation that she was in. Most were sympathetic, sharing stories of their own failed relationships due to the strain of becoming a doctor. (Katara knew that that was the least of her problems concerning her relationship with Aang, but decided to keep that information to herself.) That was why, when she came in for her shift on the fourth day, she found the mirth-filled eyes and stifled giggles directed at her rather irritating.

"What is it?" Katara snapped at Suki, who seemed torn between grimacing and smirking.

"You should go to the nurses' station," Suki said in lieu of an answer. Katara huffed but made her way to the centralized counter. As she approached, Katara noticed a rather attractive man leaning against the counter, his gaze far away as he seemingly waited for someone. Was this what everyone was all worked up about? A cute guy?

"Um, hello?" Katara said, stopping a few feet away from the stranger. He glanced at her and straightened up. She fought the urge to flinch as he turned to face her, showcasing the harsh scar that covered the left half of his face.

"Are you Katara Nanouk?" he asked.

"Yes," Katara answered, forcing herself to look into his gold eyes rather than staring at the red mark. He had nice eyes.

"I need you to sign for this," he said, holding out a clipboard. Katara blinked.

"For what?" she asked. The man stared at her in confusion for a moment before inclining his head to the giant monstrosity behind him. Katara's mouth dropped open as she took in the mountain of flowers that took up a large amount of the counter space. It was an arrangement of some sort of pink flower that was immediately familiar. She reached forward and plucked the card that was sticking out of the top of the arrangement, reading the words in the tidy scrawl of her ex's handwriting.

Katara,

Remember the flower crowns I used to make you when we were younger? I saw these and immediately thought of you. Please call me.

Love,

Aang

"What the fuck?" The words slipped out of her mouth before she could stop them. She clapped a hand over her mouth immediately, but the man had clearly heard her. The corners of his mouth twitched, like he was holding back a smile. If she were feeling less annoyed, perhaps Katara would have appreciated the slip-up more.

"Not a fan of flowers?" the man asked. Katara grabbed the clipboard from him and glared murderously at the page as she signed her name.

"Not a fan of crazy ex-boyfriends," she muttered. The man's lips quirked once more, but he still managed to keep a stoic face.

"Well, have a good day," he said, taking the clipboard back and turning to leave. He nodded at the nurse stationed at the counter before heading over to the elevator.

"He was cute," Ty Lee, the nurse, said to Katara, leaning over to wiggle her eyebrows at the other woman.

Katara sighed. "I was a little distracted by the topiary. What am I going to do with this?"

"Don't worry. I'll put it in the back!" Ty Lee said cheerfully, hefting the thing into her arms.

And perhaps everything would have been fine after that. Katara could forgive one delivery of flowers. It was a sweet gesture; something to try and get her to reminisce about old times. But it wasn't a one time thing. It was the first of many, many flowers.

Ten days. Ten fucking days.

Each day, the man arrived with a new arrangement. Some were smaller than the one on the first day, simply in a vase with a ribbon tied around it. Others threatened to overwhelm the man as he carried them through the elevator doors. One time, it was so tall that he couldn't see around it and ran into a food cart. Despite the fact that he was bringing more fucking flowers, Katara couldn't help but laugh before going over to help the poor guy to his feet. She ignored the flutter in her stomach at his touch. He was absolutely not cute when he blushed.

But it didn't matter how cute the delivery guy was. Katara was so sick of flowers. If she never saw a flower again, it would be too soon. Today, which marked the two-week anniversary of ending her relationship with Aang, she was getting off of a 28-hour long shift. She was exhausted, drained, and annoyed; she had received a medium-sized tree the previous day. The nurses' station was beginning to look like a greenhouse.

So when Katara left the locker room, looking forward to taking a relaxing bath before crashing into bed and instead seeing the delivery guy standing at the counter, this time with a bouquet of what looked to be roses, Katara snapped.

She marched forward, grabbed the bouquet from his hands, and began destroying the delicate plants. She yanked out petals and let them fall to the floor. She twisted stems between her fingers, ignoring the sting of thorns on her already sore hands. And once she was done, she threw the tattered flowers on the floor and stomped on them in her orthopedic, white sneakers.

Katara looked up at the man, a little wild eyed. "If he calls again, you tell that… that boy that if he orders one more fucking flower, I will go to his apartment and shove it down his fucking throat!" Her chest heaved with exertion. She was sure that she looked crazy; she felt crazy. Could a person go crazy over flowers.

The man stared, smiling slightly. As she finished her rant, he let out a chuckle and ran a hand through his hair. "Noted," he said, finally flashing the full force of his smile at her. Katara felt the breath leave her throat. When he smiled, you barely even noticed the scar.

"Would you like to get coffee sometime?" Katara blurted out, tired from her long shift and slightly dazed from his golden eyes. The delivery guy smiled wider.

"Yes," he said. "I'm Zuko, by the way."

"I'm Katara, but you fucking knew that already."

"I might have had a clue."

"Walk me out?"

"Well, I am heading that way. But you still need to sign for the flowers."