Disclaimer: I don't own Avatar: The Last Airbender.

Author's Note: In which I engage in another oneshot featuring numerous clichés and go through considerable hoops to avoid using any dialogue for reasons I don't quite understand myself. Say hello to my stream of consciousness.

"Slippery Spleens" would be an excellent name for a rock band.

-Dave Barry

So Hard, it Hurts

You can't squeeze blood from a turnip.

Toph thought it to be the oddest piece of advice she had ever received… and from anyone who had spent an appreciable amount of time in the presence of Firelord Iroh, that was saying something.

What was even odder was the source of the advice; those had been the last words of Princess Azula before her public execution (by beheading) the day after her father's defeat. And in spite of Zuko's personal motto (Azula always lies...), the tiny earthbender couldn't deny the nugget of truth that the crazy bitch's words contained. No matter how hard you wanted something, no matter how hard you tried to make it happen, some things just weren't going to happen.

Spirits, grant me the courage to accept the things I cannot change, the resolve to change the things I can, and the good sense to be able to tell the two apart.

And as Sokka proved one adage to be true, his lips softly meeting those of a brown-haired warrior instead of hers, he proved yet another to be false.

For they also say that you can't squeeze water from a rock, but Toph was the very definition of a rock, and the tears ran down her face nonetheless.

The heiress and the prince sat out in one of the many palace courtyards, enjoying each others' company with a simple picnic under the stars. The World's Greatest Earthbender had lowered herself to accepting charity from her friends, her own parents having disavowed any knowledge of her very existence. It was good for Zuko that she had, for without the support of the seemingly invincible Toph, he would've fallen into the hell of depression that awaited him after the liberation of the Fire Nation's political prisoners.

Whatever Azula's philosophy concerning turnips had been, she most certainly could squeeze blood from a person. The Avatar had returned from the Boiling Rock with only one of the former princess's entourage in tow. Ty Lee—her cheerful spirit long broken by the 'special' attentions of the prison guards and their new warden—had quietly relayed the tale. Mai's stay in the Fire Nation's most secure facility had been short and brutal, her execution excruciating to even watch, and her bloody corpse barely recognizable even to someone as intimately familiar with her as the acrobat had been.

And so, with the loss of both of their objects of affection, Zuko and Toph had turned to each other for comfort. Katara had attempted to intervene, recognizing—as even they subconsciously did—that their relationship was of replacement and not of romance. As was usual for the self-declared Voice of Reason whenever she tried to advise either one of the pair, she was completely ignored. In fact, Toph had suggested that she go back to the "strenuous task" of repopulating the Air Nomads, a comment that earned a frosty glare and an embarrassed blush from the waterbender and her husband, respectively.

The others had dropped off the map, after that. Sokka and Suki had returned to Kyoshi to help rebuild the village that Zuko had destroyed, and to the best (although admittedly incomplete) knowledge of the two members of the gang still in Fire Nation territory, they were still there. Aang and Katara did the whole Avatar thing, roaming the countryside on Appa, rescuing kittens from trees, and as a rule never staying in one place for longer than a month… unless the waterbender was too pregnant to travel, as she had been five times so far without an end of the procession of babies in sight.

It was in this environment, with friends long distant, under stars that only one of them could see, that Prince Zuko laid his hand on that of Toph no-longer-Beifong. She tensed, feeling his trepidation, and listened as he tried to bring himself to propose to her. He said that he loved her—which was undoubtedly true, although perhaps not in the sense he implied. He told her that he couldn't imagine living life without her—which was also true, as the loss of too many of those that he had cared for weighed heavily on him, and the loss of such a close friend as Toph would surely break him. But try as he may, he couldn't force the words from his mouth that would end the speech; he couldn't ask her that all-important question… and in a way, she was relieved, as she didn't think she could have brought herself to answer it.

She responded, of course. One couldn't leave a speech like that hanging in the air without addressing it. Toph turned to her friend and did something that she had done only once before in her life: she admitted to someone else that Katara might have potentially been in the realm of possibly being something close to what could be described as in the general vicinity of being correct… and that she herself might have potentially been in the realm of possibly being something close to what could be described as in the general vicinity of being not correct.

Zuko's seven word summary of that concept earned him a solid punch in the shoulder and an admonition against ever uttering those words again in his life, unless he wanted them to be his last.

Their mutual admission, unpleasant as it was, felt like a weight removed from their shoulders, and it was decided that they should celebrate in the classic fashion… by getting shitfaced and destroying some poor sap's bar, then paying for the repairs the next day while fighting a hangover that made them want to die.

If nothing else, they at least had a routine.

Their victim tonight was one that they hadn't been to before—a trait which all the bars they visited shared, seeing as they were never allowed back in a second time, royalty or not. This time around, The Crispy Critter was slated to meet its doom at the hands of the (soon to be) drunken duo, a fact which the bartender was blissfully unaware of as he watched the two saunter in and order a drink. After imbibing their first beverage of the night, the pair separated. Zuko headed to the poker games in the corner—it was hard to beat someone who looked genuinely pissed at every hand he got—and Toph meandered over to the arm-wrestlers, where she proposed a very sensible betting scheme to those who challenged her: a drink for her opponent if she lost, and a drink for both if she won. Needless to say, the World's Greatest Earthbender quickly became the World's Drunkest Earthbender, much to the simultaneous delight and dismay of her defeated opponents.

Deciding that she needed to find burlier men to emasculate, Toph loudly announced to where she presumed Zuko was that she was headed out before toppling the wall next to her and walking on out into the night. A short trip across the street lead her to The Fluffy Ferretmouse, where to her dismay she found no muscle-bound meatheads to humiliate. Feeling too inebriated to go looking for a manlier bar, she instead wound her way to the nearest unoccupied barstool and tried to climb up into it. Lacking both the height and the coordination to accomplish the task, she instead punched the man sitting next to her seat in the hip and demanded assistance, which he duly—and wisely—supplied, and for which he was gruffly thanked before being ignored for the rest of the night (to his considerable relief). The bartender happily supplied her with all the liquor she could drink, deciding early on that the sooner she passed out, the less likely she was to start something. His worries were soon realized, however, as Toph began listening to the ramblings of the patron adjacent to her that she hadn't struck yet that night.

The man, it appeared, was in quite the state of depression. His fiancé had left him several months ago, according to his story—something about her believing that their relationship was a "teenaged flight of fancy" that simply would never work out in the long run.

Oh, and that she had met somebody else.

He, of course, was devastated, and had fled to the Fire Nation capital to try and get in touch with an old friend, the only one of his childhood companions he knew where to locate. Sadly, it seemed the unfortunate and miserable man's troubles were not yet over, as he was unable to even arrange to meet his friend. It was at this point in the tale which Toph chose to interrupt, her drunken state getting the best of what few social graces she chose to acknowledge—specifically, the social grace which dictated that one did not call someone a spineless, whiny loser right after their life has crumbled in front of their eyes… or at the very least one did not do so to their face.

Under most circumstances, the earthbender's accusation would have been met by the man with indignant and offended denial, but the depressant qualities of significant quantities of alcohol had their way with him, and the poor bartender quickly found himself with the scene he had been hoping to avoid. Keening loudly, Toph's neighbor agreed with her acerbic assertion, launching into another rambling tale of love, loss, and luckless loserish-ness.

Apparently, the fiancé's unspoken reason for leaving was the fact that—according to her—he was in love with another woman. Some member of his gathering audience immediately threw out the obvious question: was the fiancé correct? The inquiry was met with three vehement denials followed by one resigned admission, at which point the same inquiring mind asked for the identity of said love interest. The man snapped, growing irritated at the interruptions, but nonetheless answered the question being posed by identifying his best friend as the one. With no further interjections coming from the slightly cowed questioner, he continued.

It was here that Toph's interest in the story ceased to be that of merely seeking entertainment. She listened raptly as the man spoke of how he had run away from the possibility of romance with the woman he had fallen for, afraid that any admission of such feelings on his part would irreparably damage the relationship he had already established with her. With a mirthless laugh, he reflected upon the irony of how he had lost the relationship anyway when he had moved to with his fiancé to her hometown and left his best friend behind.

Speaking quietly for the first time that night since she had begun drinking, Toph put in her two copper pieces. The man looked at the small woman with an astonished expression, surprised at how the aggressive girl that had minutes ago been derisively mocking him was now quietly and sympathetically relaying a story surprisingly similar to his own. She kept her eyes pointed downwards and hidden from view, seemingly intently focused on the half empty mug of ale in her hands. As she progressed, she noticed that the vibrations her apparent kindred spirit was giving off were becoming more and more… nervous.

It was when she told the gathering crowd about how she had 'fallen for her best friend and never told him' that it happened.

The man whose tale of woe had started the whole "let's bare our hearts" phenomenon let his glass slip from his hands, the tumbler plummeting to the stone floor. With reflexes born of years of practicing her particular style of earthbending, Toph slammed a fist into bar, causing a pillar of stone to erupt from the floor and catch the glass without shattering it. The crowd was duly impressed, but the individual she had expected to be showing gratitude was emitting a completely different sort of vibration—that of a man terrified.

She immediately went on the offensive, asking angrily what exactly the hell his problem was. He sputtered drunkenly for a few seconds before Toph heard her name slip from his mouth. The glass—still resting on the pillar that caught it—shattered as her sightless eyes bugged out of her head. Leaping forward, she caught the front of his shirt in one hand and placed the other on his chest, feeling out for his heartbeat. Moments later, she found herself sputtering as badly as Sokka was.

The pair continued stammering at each other until Zuko appeared in the doorway a few moments later. The Water Tribe Warrior looked over in his direction in surprise, his alcohol-soaked mind trying to grasp why the Prince sported a bruise on his right eye to match the scar on his left, or what the significance of the dancing light of what looked like a considerable fire flickering behind him could possibly be. Zuko, on the other hand, assessed the situation quickly and snatched both the dumbstruck friends out of the bar before taking off running back towards the palace.

It was the next morning before anything meaningful happened, and after the owners of The Crispy Critter had been properly compensated (and Zuko banished from yet another bar) the three sat down to talk. Massive hangovers be damned, they were determined to sort out the mess before them. The first order of business was (at least, according to Toph), determining that the "best friend" Sokka had claimed to have fallen for was in fact not Aang. The next few minutes were then occupied by Zuko and Toph laughing at the swordsman's shock at the existence of the very notion that he could be in love with his brother-in-law like that. After they had gotten that out of their systems (a process which took far too long for Sokka's liking), the conversation turned serious.

Toph was, as could be expected, quite angry at the warrior. After all, she said, if he had only expressed some interest in her while they had been travelling the world, then neither of them would be in this mess. An indignant Sokka wasted no time in turning the argument right back at her, claiming as she had that some sign of her feelings towards him could have served exactly the same purpose. The debate went back and forth, covering all ranges of topics from who Toph always clung to while riding on Appa to how Sokka had given her a part of his sword—which was, he reminded her, considered to be an extension of himself. It was when they started talking about how Sokka had carried Toph around the Western Air Temple after her feet had been burned that Zuko decided it was time to intervene on both their behalves. They were lucky, he all but shouted, to even have such an opportunity as they now had. Here was a chance for them to be happy with each other, and they were wasting it squabbling between themselves. He finished his rant and stared daggers at the pair, who had the oddest looks on their faces.

In truth, both Sokka and Toph were trying their hardest not to laugh. It was obvious to them that the prince was referring to Mai, and how he would never be afforded the same chance that they now had, and that was by no stretch of the imagination something that could be considered a laughing matter. Still, Zuko was missing something of vital importance.

They weren't fighting, the pair informed the prince, but flirting.

Zuko blinked a few times before muttering darkly under his breath and leaving, deciding that his efforts were more valuable being applied to something that made sense.

A wicked grin spread across Toph's face as her friend left her alone with Sokka, and she wasted no time bending his Water Tribe butt on over next to her and planting a smooch on his cheek.

"It's still all your fault, you know."

Sokka laughed lightly at the earthbender before wrapping his arms tightly around her body and kissing her squarely on the lips.

And Toph found that, even six years later, he could still squeeze water from a rock.

Author's Note: Not my best work, certainly not my worst… I think my favorite part was Azula's last words. She is her uncle's niece, after all.

Fifteen Captain Cool Bonus Points for the first person to correctly guess Zuko's seven-word summary.