Disclaimer: I do not own Avatar: The Last Airbender or any of its characters. Though I have been told that I remind people of Mai. XD

A/N: The idea for this story actually came to me at the same time as the idea for my other Avatar story, but I didn't get around to writing it until very recently. AKA yesterday when I really should have been writing a sociology paper. After I was through procrastinating (-coughaftermyauntkickedmeofftheinternetandIhadnothingtodobutwritecough-), I finished my paper around three AM. And then, what does any intelligent college student do when they have to wake up in five hours? Why, they write a fanfic, of course! :D

Goodbye, With Love

It was the dark before the dawn, and Mai could not sleep. In fact, she hadn't been able to sleep properly in three days. Had she even slept since then? It was hard to tell. Things were blurring together too much for her to make much sense of them.

Many were angry that Zuko had left. 'Deserted' was the word those people used to describe it. Even words like 'treason' had been used, particularly by the Fire Lord and his daughter. It hurt, to hear Azula speak of Zuko like that when she knew what he had meant to Mai. Azula didn't realize that, though, of course. No one realized that Mai had quite a different view on the matter.

'Abandoned' was the word she would have used to describe what Zuko had done. She didn't care about alleged betrayals of his country or whatever the soldiers prattled on about. What was important to Mai was that he had said he loved her, and now he was gone.

All eyes were on Zuko's family, upon Ozai and Azula, to read their reactions. No one thought to wonder what Mai felt, because by general consensus, Mai was known to feel nothing. And, of course, that was her own fault. She had put on the mask of the solemn and detached warrior, and that was what everyone now saw her as. Even her own family. Not one of them stopped to ask if she was all right, because Mai was not just unbreakable, she was untouchable.

What none of them understood was that everyone has emotions. Some people, like Mai, just did a better job of hiding what they felt.

And what Mai felt now was at once everything and nothing. There was the myriad of emotions that coursed through her veins like the very element of fire -- anger, resentment, pain, fear -- but there as also the numbness that acted as ice water, to dull the burning. In the end, it resulted in a hollow ache that threatened to tear her chest apart and refused to allow her a moment's reprieve.

Mai likened it to the time when, at age four, she had foolishly gone out after dark, gotten lost, and not made it home until her father found her near dawn. She had come down with horrible bronchitis, and even after she felt better, that horrible ache in her chest refused to subside.

Only, she now realized, that ache was nothing to the pain of having your heart ripped out of your chest.

Giving up on any pretense of sleep, Mai lit the lamp at her bedside and pulled from the pocket of her robe a simple scroll. She had read it so many times by now that she knew it by heart, or at least by the throbbing cavity where her heart had been. And, though she tried to read it from start to finish in another futile attempt to understand why, why Zuko would do this to her, her mind focused only on certain phrases.

… understand now that I was wrong…

Wrong? Mai had been wrong, wrong in believing everything he had told her. That he loved her, that she was important, that he would always be there when no one else could -- or would -- understand…

… have to do this…

But had he really had to do anything? He was the son of the Fire Lord, one of that special class of people who had to do nothing but live and rule. Good or bad, their decisions were final. No, Zuko had a choice, and he had made it. But his choice hadn't included her.

… no matter how much it hurts…

And it did hurt, more than Mai had ever imagined anything could. Did Zuko feel the same way? Had he felt anything at all when he had broken the heart that most believed was made of stone?

… forgive me…

It was an unbelievable concept, the idea that Zuko had shattered Mai's heart and asked for forgiveness in the same letter. This served to prove to Mai that he knew what he was doing, and he knew what it would do to her. Yet he had done it anyway. That could only mean that something, some power or cause, was more important to him than her.

… safer for you…

Did he really believe that he was safe, then? That she could ever be free and safe and happy, like the people at the ends of fairy tales? Zuko was the only one Mai had ever loved, the only one he had ever wanted to love, and the one who had broken her trust in humanity all over again. If the one person she had let into her heart had broken it, there would be no one there to help it mend.

… goodbye.

It was this word that made Mai's hands begin to shake. It was this word that said it all, this word that made it final. He was leaving, was now gone, and wasn't going to be coming back.

And then, there was the most puzzling part of it all. The very end of the letter, the part she had almost missed the first time she read it because her eyes kept sliding out of focus in effort to refrain from collecting tears, read simply:

With love,

ZukoWith love. That was how he had signed the letter that had broken Mai's heart and her spirit. That was how he had chosen to end it: With love.

Probably, it had just been a convenient phrase, or just the sheer habit, after signing the letters he had sent to her via carrier pigeon the same way for so long. A convenient phrase to him, but a statement of truth and devotion, for her. She had loved him, more than anyone else. More than she had known she was capable of. More, she now knew, than had ever been wise.

Of course, he couldn't have meant it, when he had signed it this last time. Mai wasn't stupid or naïve enough to believe that. He had crushed her, disregarded her, and left her behind. That was not love, and there was no way it could be seen as such. Yet…

Mai shook her head and rolled the scroll up again before returning it to its hiding place inside her robe. She wouldn't let Azula or anyone else catch her with it, not least of all because she didn't want to have to explain that. One could not easily reveal to the world that they weren't emotionless and callous after so long, and Mai would be a fool to try.

Still, however, she couldn't get the idea out of her head. Goodbye… with love. It all blended together as one sentence, one thought, one paradoxical concept that she wanted so badly to believe. She wanted to be able to trust that he did love her despite it all, that it didn't matter what else he said because that was true and it would prove itself most important in the end. Yet there was no way her heart could bear it if she let herself latch onto that idea and it, too, was wrenched away.

The dawn started to creep over the horizon and through Mai's closed curtains. She didn't want to open them; she didn't want to face the light of day. The only light she wanted was the one Zuko had inspired in her, the fire that had breathed life into her dark and icy world.

And as she raised herself to suffer through one more hour, one more day without him there, Mai whispered under her breath, "Goodbye, Zuko… with love."