She's been here everyday now. Once when the sky is blushing from the morning and he is meditating facing the window until she opens his door with her still crinkled eyes. Then at the very end of the day, when the knot has loosened in his stomach along with the topknot on his head, and she is simply brightening by the hours with the moon. Katara enters his crimson bedroom, bandages in hand, closing the door softly behind her. She smiles, always, and he finds himself smiling back, slipping off his robe and cringing into her glowing, cooling hands.

But today is the last day, she says. There is no need to keep healing--you're good. Time and rest is all there is left, she trails off.

Okay, he whispers back.

Sitting on the floor, they faced each other, knees grazing each other, bone against bone, scabs and scabs, skin under light, foreign layers. Zuko stared down at his bare chest, where the star exploding red mark met him in the eye. She blinked, gazing at the masterpiece etched into his flesh, and she could read her name over and over again, the imprints of her healing hardly noticeable on the outside. Distantly, she let her fingers roam on air across the scar, and it felt just like the other one less than a year ago. When she stops, they both look up, and she breathes a question foggily between them.

What's your favorite thing in the whole world?

Zuko tangled up his face, pinching the bridge of his nose to think of her, the still night air look blurring her face, the question.

I have no idea, he shook his head.

Fingers dipped back down against the red tattoo, just briefly, as she stared into his eyes, grasping at the answer on wasn't willing to find. He felt her hand. It made his breath hitch, it make it think, and thinking of this spun his mind far too tight, so he tilted his chin up at her, repeating the question silently. Katara only paused for a second, and then she answers confidently, Dinner. Dinner, she repeats, with all of us--me, you, Aang, Sokka, Toph, Suki. At the corners of his mouth, his lips crack loudly, as he questioned her without a word, just a strange little look at her blue eyes. She shrugged, looking down at the marble floors that made her think of crystals, brushing at her hair shyly.

I don't know, Katara looked at him again, smiling, it makes me happy, knowing we're all together, that we're safe, and full and happy.

Zuko nodded, letting her words travel between them, and slip between the gaps and holes that the scars had left in him, resting under his skin and cooling down his flame tipped blood.

I just don't want to be alone, she confessed, reaching for him from under her eyelashes.

When he bowed his head, it slipped out, I think, I'm finally figuring out what it means to be happy. I like those days, he added softly, looking to her.

It starts here, he didn't say.