I dug this out of my half-started folder to finish up for you all, but it's old enough by now that I don't remember when I had intended for it to be set. So let's say mid to late in the series, around season three or four? No spoilers for any of the show.

Also, my offer for Lin/Tenzin requests is still open! Please feel free to send me a message if you have any ideas you'd like to discuss, I'd love to hear from you.

Have a wonderful week!

Lullaby

Tenzin paused on the doorstep, feeling the cold winter air wrapping around his hand as he slid the key into the lock. It was late – far too late for him to be bothering her, even though he knew Lin was probably awake – and the lack of moon overhead made everything seem darker despite the ever-present lights of the city.

The key itself was not a new one, nor was it a standing invitation for him to return whenever he wished. In fact, it was his from when he had been living here with her, back when their relationship was solid and happy. He wasn't even sure if Lin knew he still had it; the previous two times he had come this late into the night he had knocked and waited for her to answer. This time, the third time he had acted on his longing to see her after his family and his city were long asleep, she hadn't come to the door.

At this point, though, he didn't feel as if he could go home. The large clock in the city center had chimed three in the morning ten minutes ago, and he had already told Pema he would be working all night. That, of course, was the truth. He had only just left City Hall, with several large stacks of paperwork still left unfinished to wait for his inevitable return. But when he had looked at the couch in his office, as tired as he was, all he could think about was coming here instead of sleeping there.

It wasn't that he and Lin had been doing anything inappropriate, because they hadn't. At least, as long as he could continue telling himself that, he would. He had just found himself, more and more lately, feeling a desperate need to see her. Passing in the street wasn't enough. He needed to be with her, laugh with her, be close enough to touch her. Not that he had touched her, necessarily, but the yearning had certainly hit him on more than one occasion. Which was why he both should not be here at all, and yet could not stay away.

Taking a breath through his nose to let the chilly air wake his senses a bit, he turned the key and gently opened the door.

Most of the lights in the front of the home were turned off and he had a moment of guilt, thinking she was asleep after all. But then he heard running water and saw a soft light coming from down the main hallway leading to the depths of the house.

Knowing he was being rude by intruding, he slipped his shoes off by the door next to hers in an attempt at some form of decorum. As he padded down the hall toward her bedroom, it became obvious she was in the shower, taking advantage of the bathroom she had renovated with fancy taps and light-colored granite. He sometimes missed that bathroom; it made the tubs in the temple feel ancient by comparison.

Tenzin sat on the edge of the bed facing the shorter hall that led to her master bathroom and lowered his head into his hands, deciding to wait for her to emerge before doing anything else. The silence was splintered by the muted sound of water hitting stone and, most curiously, a few snatches of song. Humming, rather. She wasn't singing.

This, hearing her while she thought she was alone, once would have filled his heart with love. Now it just made his heart ache as he understood more fully everything he had lost. Pema sang a lot – while she was cooking or cleaning or putting the children to bed. She happily shared her voice with everyone who wanted to hear it. Tenzin was the only one who had ever heard Lin sing, or hum, or make any musical sound at all, and even that had taken years of them being together. The trust, the intimacy, in that small thing was overwhelming as the memory overtook him.

But just as suddenly as he caught it, the sound stopped with the water cutting off. It was only another few minutes before the bathroom door opened and she emerged, wearing an old grey tank top with a rip in the low-cut collar and black sweat pants, ready for bed as she used a towel to dry her hair. Steamed footprints trailed behind her on the glossy wooden floors, vanishing seconds later.

Lin stopped mid-step upon seeing Tenzin sitting on her bed. He glanced up at her with an apology written on his face when words didn't come.

"Oh," she said with a small frown. "Hello."

"Hi," he offered rather meekly under her intense gaze.

"I've had a rough day. I was really hoping to go to bed now." She turned and tossed her wet towel back into the bathroom before using her fingers to comb through her hair. "Is there something I can help you with?"

"I only just left work myself," Tenzin said conversationally, realizing then that he hadn't actually thought any of this through. The first time he had intruded into Lin's home he had been intoxicated, the second emboldened by anger toward Kya. This time he truly just wanted to be near her and did not have an excuse ready that she wouldn't immediately see as a sham. Rather than drag his growing embarrassment out, he shrugged in defeat. "I was hoping to impose upon your hospitality again."

"Ah, I see."

That was neither an affirmative nor a negative response, and he watched in bemusement as she sat beside him on the bed to reach for a jar of lotion on her bedside table. He was on her side, apparently in her way, but she wasn't making him move as she rubbed the scentless balm across her arms, taking care to massage her sore muscles.

"By rough day," Tenzin hedged, "do you mean you were directly involved in handling those riots this afternoon?"

The president had been attempting to pass new laws with Tenzin's assistance this week that had people divided, and things had gotten out of hand that day. It was the reason he had been working so late in the first place – trying to find a way to make everyone happy.

Lin glanced at him from the corner of her eye and scoffed, dropping her jar into a drawer and closing it with a snap. "Of course I was. That's my job."

He didn't know why he had expected anything else.

"Look," she suddenly said, her voice soft to hide her frustration. "If you're really not going to leave, move over so I can lie down. I'm dead on my feet here and not in the mood for your act of avoidance."

He hastened to get out of her way, standing to pace to the other side of the bed so she could pull the blankets down. Without a backward glance, she lowered herself on her side under them, settling the pillow comfortably under her head, and switched off the lamp to cast the room into darkness. Tenzin was left standing there with his poor decisions heavy on his shoulders and a seeming inability to proceed freezing him to the spot.

"This is turning into a habit."

Lin's coarse whisper through the stillness surprised him, and he was finally able to come to the empty space in the bed, taking a seat with his back to her.

"Yes," he agreed despite himself, because he knew this was his doing rather than hers. "It is."

"Do you know what you're doing, Tenzin?"

The question was sad and laced with a hundred others left unasked. It was right on the tip of his tongue to tell her of course he knew what he was doing, why wouldn't he? But the truth was he didn't have the faintest idea. Sometimes now he was so confused, so lost, that he felt like a child again, a child whose only security lie in the fact that his best friend was a sure constant. His confusion didn't necessarily stem from unhappiness in his marriage, or even buried feelings for Lin conflicting with that bond. It was more…the culmination of so many things since Korra had arrived. The thought that continued to come to him during these times was to simply be with Lin, she would help him find himself again.

"I suppose -" He stopped, not even sure what to say. He clenched his fist in the blanket under his thigh, knowing nothing going through his mind would help his current situation. "No, honestly, I don't."

There was a rustling as Lin rolled onto her back to stare up at the dark ceiling. "I didn't think so. Is this – whatever this is – going to turn into a problem for us?"

"I'd like to hope not," he told her softly.

"All right." Lin sighed, the breath holding her exhaustion with him and her day. "Hurry up and get settled so we can go to sleep. You're making this difficult, you know that?"

"Are you sure you don't mind?" he asked, his fingers pausing at the clasp of his cloak before removing it.

She was silent for a long moment, and he could hear her breathing as she mulled over her answer. The silence made his chest tight with anxiety until he almost wished he hadn't asked. He truly was invading her space, he understood that, but if she asked him to leave a part of himself he wasn't quite ready to examine would be very hurt.

"I mind, Tenzin," she whispered into the moonless dark before he could fret too hard. Her voice sounded pained, as if she were forcing the words out despite herself. "But I don't want you to go, either."

He was unexpectedly filled with memories of his youth, of being hit with brief surges of fear during their relationship that she would suddenly leave him. Whether this was caused by her willing decision to go, or because of an accident with her job taking her from him, or some other force drawing them apart – whenever these scenarios would play out in his mind way back when, he would be overwhelmed with panic for several seconds until he was able to convince himself that she was still there with him. It had never occurred to him, during those early years, that he would be the cause of their separation when he loved her so much his body pulsed with emotion simply thinking about her.

Lin had always been one of the very few people in his life who was able to see beyond his bending and the status that gave him in the world for who he truly was. She had loved him fiercely for him, for his soul under the surface, not for his abilities. Not the way the acolytes adored him, or the way the city looked to him for guidance because he was Aang's son, or as the only one left for that horrible gap of time to preserve his father's legacy. She allowed him to be himself when he was with her, not the person the four nations expected him to be.

He wondered, in that moment, if she understood how much that had meant to him. How much it still meant.

It was that thought that spurred him to fully remove his cloak and spread out on the bed beside her, slipping under only the top blankets for warmth so the bottom sheet would continue to keep them apart. Lin turned to her side, facing him, and he did the same, gazing at her through the darkness. He could see the glittering of her eyes but her expression was indiscernible; he couldn't even tell if she was watching him back, though he could only assume she was.

He opened his mouth and took a breath to speak, but she interrupted him. "I'm going to sleep now," she said firmly, closing her eyes and not opening them again. "Don't bother me until the alarm goes off in a few hours."

"All right," he whispered in agreement. He could just make out a few strands of damp hair sticking to her forehead, coming down over her bangs, and he reached out lightly to move them aside behind her ear. So the hair wouldn't dry awkwardly, he told himself easily even if his chest burned when he felt the heat of her skin nearing as his fingertips came so close.

Her hand intercepted his wrist before he could touch her face. "I don't know what you're doing, but that counts as bothering," she muttered, pushing his arm back with her eyes still closed calmly.

"Oh, I-"

"Just go to sleep," she breathed. She sounded truly tired now, and not angry at all. He was prepared to pull his hand back, somewhat disappointed though he didn't quite understand why, when she turned her arm inward and moved her fingers to cover his, bringing them to clasp high against her chest near her neck. "Better?"

His entire forearm was held against her, the pressure from her arm twisting gently around his to press it to the smooth plane of exposed skin. He could feel her chest there rising and falling as she breathed, his hand under her neck could feel the steady pulsing of her heart, and, though he was trying very hard to focus on the first two as more important, he could feel the heat of her breasts under the soft cotton of her shirt. His face flushed like a teenage boy's.

"Yes," he answered her question.

"Good. And Tenzin?"

"Yes?" he said again, hesitation creeping in at her tone.

"Think a little harder before you do this next time. Habits are hard to break, especially the bad ones."

Next time. They both knew there would be one, despite his efforts to stay away. There was nothing to be done for it now that the door had been opened.