This Broken Habit
by LizBee

The day after his son's funeral, Tenzin woke up in Lin Beifong's bed.

It had started a week earlier, with a phone call. Silent at first, and Tenzin thought it was a bad connection. Then Lin spoke, her voice choked.

"It's Anil," she said. "There's been an accident."

And he had run for his glider and flown to the military hospital. He found Lin slumped in a chair in the waiting area, staring into space.

"He's still in surgery," she said.

She had never wanted children, but they had made a deal: if it happened, they would manage. And it did, and they did, until the cracks between them grew too wide, and he found Pema, and Lin threw herself into her career, and Anil travelled between his mother's house and Air Temple Island until he joined the forces.

Pema arrived an hour after Tenzin.

"Is there news?"

He shook his head, and she sank into the chair beside him.

"I sent a telegram to your mother."

"Thank you."

Her hand curled around his. He wanted to bury his face in her neck and howl, but he couldn't move.

The healers and surgeons emerged from surgery.

"You should see him," said the chief surgeon. To say goodbye, she didn't have to add.

They had put him in a private room, his commanding officer by his side. Captain Wen rose as they entered, and said something. Tenzin's attention was on Anil, the bruises on his son's face, the way his body was distorted by bandages. He didn't hear the conversation around him until Lin spoke.

"What kind of shipboard accident kills a metalbender?" she asked. Her voice was low and furious.

Captain Wen stiffened. "Two waterbenders drowned this morning, Chief Beifong," she said tightly. "A tight space, experimental machines-" She broke off, nostrils flaring. "There will be inquiries."

"Good." Lin sank into a chair, the captain's presence forgotten. Tenzin spoke to Wen briefly, but he broke off mid-sentence, all his words evaporated. Pema opened her mouth to step in, but Wen just shook her head, bowed and walked away.

Anil never woke up. But he took a long time to die.

Around midnight, unable to stand the wait any longer, Tenzin went to wash his hands and face and return the message Bumi had left an hour earlier. When he came back, Lin was speaking for the first time since sunset.

"He was the ugliest baby," she was saying to Pema. "They put him in my arms, and he looked like a bald lemur. I didn't have the foggiest idea what to do with him. He cried all day and all night, and only shut up when Tenzin held him. I thought, I've made a terrible mistake."

"What changed?"

"He grew up. Learned to talk. Started earthbending." A smile touched Lin's lips. "He's the best metalbender I ever taught." The smile slipped away. "Was. Was the best."

"He might still-"

"Don't. Please."

Anil slipped away before dawn.

The sun was high when they finally left the hospital. Pema took Lin's hand.

"Come to the island," she said. "You shouldn't be alone."

Lin hesitated, then said, "Thanks."

At home, they found that Bumi had already told the children. Ikki was carrying Rohan around the island, telling him about his older brother.

"And there's the garden where we caught him kissing that sergeant, and she was so embarrassed she nearly ran away. And that's where his Grandma Toph said he was ugly, which happened before I was born, but everyone talks about it because she was blind, so it was funny. And this was his pai sho board that Grandpa Aang gave him when he was eight, and then he gave it to Jinora, and now she has to share it with me. So I guess it's yours, too, sort of."

The next few days passed in an unhappy blur that Tenzin could only remember in moments: organising for Anil's body to be brought to the island for the wake; nights spent lying awake in Pema's arms; preparing for the arrival of his mother and sister; long conversations with Lin where they treaded carefully around old arguments and memories.

"He wanted to be buried in the Earth Kingdom cemetery," she said.

"I don't mind."

"I wasn't asking your permission."

Silence.

"Will you conduct the prayers?" she asked.

"Yes."

More silence.

"Thank you."

Tenzin's mother and sister arrived, and Katara managed to draw Lin out of her room. They walked the length of the island twice, the wind whipping their faces. No one asked what they had talked about.

It was a three-day wake, and the island became crowded with visitors. Old school friends. Comrades. A squadron of soldiers played pai sho in the courtyard, watched closely by a spirit who claimed to have invented the game. The air smelled of burning ghost money.

Tenzin found Lin in the meditation pavilion on the evening of the second day.

"Do you still think it wasn't an accident?" he asked.

"No." Eventually she added, "Anil could be careless. He thought he was invincible."

The funeral was held on a bright, windy day. Anil was buried on a hilltop, near his mother's mother's grave. Jinora held something bright and sparkling in her hands. It was the only spirit Tenzin saw that day.

He looked away as the body was put in the ground.

When it was over, he told Pema, "I think I'll stay for a while." She nodded and kissed his cheek, and turned to lead the children away.

Lin knelt on the freshly turned earth, heedless of the stains on her white funeral robes, and traced the characters on the gravestone. Beifong Anil, and the dates, and his place of birth.

Tenzin joined her, passing her the incense and the matches. The wind carried the smoke away.

"I'll take you home," he said as the sun set, and she nodded.

Her house was dark and cold.

"Are you hungry?" Lin asked, putting the light on.

"No."

"Me neither. I tell myself there's nothing I could have taught him that would change this. He was-" Her mouth twisted. "I want to walk right into the spirit world and find him before he - I want him to know that in this life, I was proud of him."

"He knew that. Of course he knew that."

"What's the point? Twenty-six years?" She took a step towards him. "That's it?"

Tenzin shook his head.

"Say something. You're supposed to be a spiritual leader. Say something."

"I can't." His voice cracked. "I've nothing. I'm-"

"Empty."

He wasn't sure which of them moved first, taking the final step to close the space between them. He closed his eyes as his lips met Lin's, one hand at the back of her neck, the other sliding down her back, brushing against her thigh. He had missed kissing her, the strength of her hands, the softness of her mouth.

Lin said, "This is the worst idea we've ever had."

"Is it?"

Her hand cupped his cheek, her fingernail tracing his earlobe while she whispered in his other ear, "You're the one with the wife and family."

"I don't care," he lied.

She became still for a moment, her cheek against his. Gauging his mood.

Tenzin said, "This is the first time I've felt anything since I got your call."

Lin kissed his cheek and led him to her bedroom.

She was matter of fact about undressing, shedding the old fashioned robes and reaching for his. Tenzin's hands were shaking. Lin was the only solid thing in the universe, riding him, directing him to touch her. He had forgotten how demanding she was. But there was no joy in her face, and her gaze was distant.

Afterwards she lit a cigarette and said, "You can stay, if you want."

"Is that an invitation?"

Lin shrugged. "I'd rather not be alone."

"One moment."

He used her phone to call his home and tell Pema he'd be back the next morning.

"Good," she said. "Lin shouldn't be by herself."

He returned to Lin's bed, and she said, "Are you going to tell her?"

"I don't know. Should I?"

"It's your marriage." She extinguished her cigarette and put the light out. Her hand curled around Tenzin's. "What happens now?"

"We go on."

"That's it?"

"I don't have anything else, Lin."

"Then what's the point?"

He had no answer.

Strange to think that in a few hours, he would return to Air Temple Island, resume his marriage and his life. And Anil's memory would fade, along with the grief, and for all intents and purposes it would be as if his son had never been born. He fell asleep, Lin's hair in his face.

He woke to the sound of muffled weeping. Lin had buried her face in the blanket, trying to smother her grief. She was rigid as he pulled her towards him, not relaxing until he, too, began to cry.

He could, he realised, stay. Throw his marriage to the flames, make it a funeral pyre for his son. Resume his life with Lin. One of his children had been raised between two households; the others could do it.

He held Lin close, and knew he wouldn't stay.

He fell asleep again as the sun rose.

It was mid-morning when he woke again. Lin's bed was empty. Tenzin climbed out of her bed and went to shower.

Dressed, he found Lin with Oogi and a dragonbird spirit in the courtyard. All three looked up at his approach.

"I should go," he said.

Lin nodded. She stepped back as he approached Oogi, so that even his cloak didn't touch her as he passed.

He didn't look back as the ground fell away behind him. High over the city, he let go of a breath he hadn't realised he'd been holding. Then he pulled on Oogi's reigns and they turned for home.

end