Tahnorra Week, Day 4: Imperfections

I'm well aware of my personal flaws. I'm vain, I'm arrogant, and I know it. I'm completely fine with it too. Nobody's perfect, and I'm perfectly comfortable with who I am. I think that what I love best about Korra is that she's the same as me, but neither of us lets the other get out of hand before deflating them. We see our own imperfections in each other. We're both proud, but I wouldn't say that either of us needs to change. When we're together, each of our flaws complement the other's and that brings us back down to earth.

I admit that I hadn't taken her seriously at first. I assumed she was some half-trained upstart riding on her potential and Avatar status rather than actual skill. I wouldn't ever let anyone guess how hard I trained myself, but I'd been a natural fighter and had been taught bending ever since before I could walk. I just had modest pride in my talents, but she was nothing but talk. She'd never be able to live up to what she claimed. I was completely wrong.

I can't remember the last time someone put me down so effortlessly, and that got my heart pounding. I'd thought it was annoyance at first. I just wanted to beat her in the tournament. She'd see who the better bender was. But she completely consumed my thoughts and I spent an embarrassing amount of time poring over newspapers and listening to talk around the city just to learn more about her. I doubt she knew that I attended all her matches just to see her fight. Her grace in the arena took my breath away and I had to grudgingly admit that she might be as good as she thought.

I could see all of her imperfections as plain as day, but I only admired her the more for them. She was arrogant, she was self-centered. So was I! I wouldn't be one to fault them in someone else. She could bend almost as well as me. Maybe in a few years she'd be able to catch up. I alternated between a longing to become better acquainted with her and complete irritation at such a reflection of my own personality. She perhaps bragged less than I did, but she took overconfidence to new heights.

I was half certain that when she got to know me, she'd hate what she saw in me of herself, but I was thankfully wrong. Where I only noted the similarities, she laughed at them. I think she forgave my flaws more when she realized that she was guilty of them as well. Fortunately, as we are two very arrogant people, neither of us has overwhelmed the other. I think I wouldn't be able to help being cruel to a softer person, but she takes everything I have with a smile. When she's too full of herself, I can stay unimpressed by what's only talk. We balance each other out, and I don't know if any outsider could understand how two people with identical faults can complete each other so well.