Chapter Text
Sokka was dancing with Suki and 100% not watching his best friend and roommate dance with Jet. Sokka hated Jet.
Jet was handsome in that irritating, effortless way—dark hair falling across his forehead, jaw like something carved. He was also a shit. And the fact that his hands kept finding new places on Zuko’s waist was driving Sokka somewhere past mad and into a territory he didn’t have a name for.
“Lovely, you could just go interrupt them.” Suki murmured against his ear, her grin audible.
Sokka’s jaw tightened. “Zuko doesn’t want that. Like yes, he can dance with whoever, date whoever, make out with whoever against a wall, but Jet?”
“Sokka.” Suki pulled back just enough to look at him. “The only person who doesn’t know Zuko is stupid over you is, well, you.”
Sokka shot her a glare. “He’s my best friend. I think I’d have noticed.”
“Sure,” Suki said, with the particular eye roll she reserved for lost causes. “Let’s go find the others and put it to a vote.”
Their group had colonized a cluster of low tables near the back—Aang draped over Katara in a way Sokka would need time to recover from, Toph with her boots up on the table and a smirk already forming, and then Ty Lee, Mai, and Azula. Zuko’s sister looked Sokka over the way a cat looks at something it has already decided not to eat.
“Has the peasant worked it out then?” she asked Suki.
“Baby girl, be nice,” Suki said.
“But I don’t like him.”
“That’s my brother,” Katara said, elbowing her.
“I know.” Azula examined her nails. “I’m still shocked he’s not adopted.”
Sokka scowled. He had complicated feelings about their friendship—Katara and Azula, inexplicably, insufferably close. But Azula had once put a man twice her size on the floor for getting grabby with his sister, and that bought her something, even from him.
Across the room, Jet’s hand slid to the small of Zuko’s back and pulled him in closer.
“Snoozels.” Toph hadn’t moved an inch, boots still up on the table. “I’m blind and even I can feel you glaring at them from here.”
“I’m not in love with him,” Sokka said.
A beat of silence settled over the table like a held breath. Azula set down her drink.
“I didn’t say that.” She looked at him the way she looked at everything—like she was deciding where it ranked among her lesser concerns. “I said my brother is in love with you. Which is, frankly, humiliating for our entire family.”
Katara elbowed her.
“What.” Azula picked her drink back up. “I said go get him.”
“You didn’t say that at all,” Katara said, but she was laughing.
“Sokka.” Aang had his chin propped in both hands, grinning like this was the best thing that had happened all night. “Do you love Zuko?”
“He’s my best friend.”
Toph cackled into her cup. “Sure. That’s what that is.”
Sokka grabbed a paper napkin, crumpling it until it resembled the sad, used-up version of his dignity. The conversations around him blended into a background hum, all sound and no meaning.
He focused on Zuko, which was a mistake, because Jet had taken the opportunity to spin Zuko in and press their foreheads together. Zuko’s face was red even across the dance floor, his mouth twisted in some mortified-but-kind-of-pleased way Sokka recognized. It was the same expression Zuko wore after Sokka made one of his best jokes. Jet said something—too quiet to hear—but it made Zuko laugh, bright and shocked. Sokka felt the impact of that laugh like a punch to the sternum.
“Excuse me,” Sokka said, shoving up from the table and nearly knocking over Katara’s drink.
Suki grinned. “Go get him, tiger.”
Sokka aimed a death glare, which, judging from Suki’s snort, did absolutely nothing.
The dance floor was a pulsing mess of lights and elbows, a river Sokka cut through by force of will and bad mood alone. Jet was taller than him, but that was fine; Sokka had wrestled polar bear pups for fun back home. He reached them just as Jet’s hand had migrated up, fingers playing with the ends of Zuko’s hair, and Zuko—Zuko, idiot, traitor, absolute disaster—leaned into it like a cat being scritched.
He tapped Zuko’s shoulder, not gently. “Hey! There you are,” he said, as if he hadn’t just crossed a war zone to get here.
Zuko blinked, processing the interruption. Someone’s sweat had gotten into his eyeliner; it had smudged in perfect circles under his eyes. Sokka wanted to wipe it with his thumb but didn’t, because social norms or whatever.
“Hi,” Zuko looked at him, which was a lot for Zuko, and then at Jet, who was still holding onto him like he’d won something.
“Hey, Sokka. We were just—” Zuko started, eyes darting back and forth like he was bracing for an incoming attack.
“Yeah, I can see what you were just,” Sokka said, voice tight, “but listen. Can I borrow you for, like, two seconds?”
Zuko made a show of looking at Jet, then at Sokka, like he had to cross-reference which invitation was more likely to end in disaster. “Uh, sure?” he said. “Jet, I’ll be right back.”
Jet released Zuko’s waist, but his gaze stuck like gum. “Don’t take too long, man.” He winked, which was biologically impossible for a person to do without being a total tool.
Sokka did not take Zuko by the hand, or the wrist, but he did wedge his way in front, making himself an effective, human barricade between Zuko and Jet. Zuko’s skin felt warm and damp near Sokka’s shoulder, a little like a fever. Or maybe that was just how Sokka felt.
He hustled Zuko toward the edge of the floor, through a knot of dancers, over by the battered vending machines and a stack of plastic chairs. Sokka heard Jet’s laugh trailing after them, too loud, engineered to be heard.
“What,” Zuko said, arms folding automatically. There was a gleam of sweat at his hairline, beads on his brow. He was annoyed, that was for sure, but he didn’t bolt.
Sokka tried to get his mouth to work, but his tongue felt sized all wrong. “Look, you don’t have to— I mean, if you want—” He took a deep breath and tried again. “Jet is kind of an asshole, you know?”
Zuko rolled his eyes. “I want to get laid, Sokka, not get married.”
“Okay, but—” Sokka’s hand found the back of his own neck. “What if you did, though? What if you wanted someone who actually—” He stopped. Started over. “What if you wanted someone who loved you?”
Zuko’s expression shifted into something that looked like the beginning of an argument. “I am so tired of you acting like nobody I ever—”
“It’s me.” The words came out quieter than Sokka intended, which somehow made them worse. “I’m in love with you. That’s what this is. That’s what I’m saying.”
Zuko stared at him. Not the withering glare he used on customer complaints or the dead-eyed patience for Toph’s pranks. This was bare, unguarded, so raw it almost hurt Sokka to look at it. Zuko’s mouth opened like he was going to say something, but nothing came out.
The vending machine’s compressor kicked on, rattling against the cheap aluminum frame. Someone’s laughter burst from the crowded dance floor, distant and irrelevant. Sokka couldn’t tell if he’d stopped breathing or just forgotten how.
Zuko’s voice came out shaky, but not unclear. “What?”
Sokka felt his hands clench and unclench. “I’m stupid about it. I know I am. I—” He felt the heat behind his eyes, as if he’d been sucker punched in the nose. He refused to cry in the back corner of the student union, not over Zuko, not in front of that busted Coke machine and a stack of dented cans of beer. “But yeah, I’m in love with you. So if you want to fuck Jet, or literally anyone else, please don’t bring them back to our flat. Great. Good talk.” Sokka said before he tried to leave, but Zuko stopped him.
The thing was, Zuko had always been faster than him—in fights and in feelings, and apparently in catching Sokka’s arm mid-escape. The grip was tight, urgent. Sokka didn’t jerk away, which was either a new low or a new high, depending.
Zuko’s voice was rough but his hand was steady. “You can’t just say that and leave.”
Sokka focused on the floor tiles, a mottled blue meant to hide stains, and tried not to notice that Zuko’s thumb was resting in the groove just inside his elbow. “I thought the leaving part was implied.”
“Stay,” Zuko said. His tone stripped away all the sarcasm, the usual armor, until it sounded like a word he’d never said before. “Please.”
Sokka looked up. Zuko’s face was so close the smudged eyeliner warped the color of his eyes. Sokka might have been drunk on Mountain Dew and anger, but it was probably catastrophic, because he wanted to do something unforgivable. Zuko was looking at him like he wanted to be the only person Sokka ever looked at. All the old, dumb fights they’d had, all the times Sokka had let Zuko sleep on his shoulder on long bus rides, how he’d memorized the exact number of freckles on Zuko’s neck—it all crashed together in his mind.
“If I stay,” Sokka said, “then what?”
Zuko’s jaw flexed, like he was chewing on a retort, but what came out was soft. “Then shut up and stay, idiot.”
Sokka nodded, very slowly, and tried to remember how to inhale.
Zuko stepped in, close enough that Sokka could smell the sweat and the sharp, burnt-sugar edge of the cheap drinks from the bar. He didn’t hesitate. His hand darted up, cool fingers skimming behind Sokka’s ear, and then Zuko kissed him.
It was a slow motion car crash, every synapse firing, nerves humming like high-tension wires. Zuko’s mouth tasted faintly of smoke and something medicinal, all sharp and sweet, and Sokka’s hands found his hips and tugged him closer, until there wasn’t even a molecule of air between them. Zuko leaned into it, hard, like if he didn’t anchor himself he’d just combust. Sokka didn’t know if he was supposed to lead, but he wanted, for once, to do exactly what he wanted, so he walked Zuko backward until his spine hit the wall with a thump. Zuko let out a noise, half-muffled against Sokka’s lips, and Sokka swallowed it, greedy for every sound, every little fracture in Zuko’s composure.
They broke apart because oxygen was a thing, apparently, and Zuko pulled in a ragged breath, looking dazed. There was a tiny cut on his lower lip. Sokka’s thumb found it without permission. “We can stop,” Sokka said. “I can go back to being your roommate.” He dropped his hand. “Just pick someone who’s not Jet.”
“Sokka—”
“I know. I’m sorry—”
“Can you,” Zuko said, jaw tight, eyes bright, “just let me talk for one second, you massive idiot?” He exhaled hard through his nose. “I love you too. I love you so much I thought I had to fuck someone else just to get over it.”
Sokka looked at him for a long moment. The vending machine rattled. Someone whooped from the dance floor. “Please don’t do that,” he said quietly.
Zuko barked out a laugh, ugly and raw, then shook his head like maybe that would knock things back to sense. “I’m not good at this.”
Sokka’s heart jackhammered against his chest. “At what?”
Zuko’s hands fluttered, then dropped. “At… feeling things and not fucking up.” He raked a hand through his hair. It stood in sweaty, wild spikes. “I have never been more of a disaster than when you look at me.”
Sokka tried not to smile, but it broke free anyway. God, he’d wanted this, and now it existed and was terrifying. “You know what’s a disaster? Buying a bouquet of plastic grocery store roses because you think I like them. Remember when you got me those?”
Zuko’s face twisted. “You said they’d never die.”
He had. And then he’d kept them on his desk for almost a year until Toph finally threw them out because ‘they’d passed her level of pathetic.’
“I love you,” Sokka said. “I’m in love with you. I don’t mind if you don’t—”
“Sokka.” Zuko’s voice came out almost exasperated, like Sokka had just said something profoundly stupid. “I love you. Of course I love you.”
Sokka absorbed this for a moment, blinking. The bass from the dance floor thumped through the wall behind them. He looked down at his own shirt, slightly damp, and at Zuko’s smudged eyeliner and the little cut on his lip. “I have to say,” he said finally, “in my fantasies we were wearing significantly less clothes and not standing next to a broken vending machine on club night.”
“Do you want to go home?” Zuko asked, the half-smile doing something catastrophic to Sokka’s chest.
“Yes.” Sokka pulled at a loose thread on Zuko’s collar. “But Katara and Aang and your bloody sister will murder us both if we disappear without saying goodbye.” He kissed him anyway, brief and warm.
Zuko pulled back just far enough to talk. “That’s ridiculous, we were already going home together, we literally live—”
Sokka pressed two fingers to his mouth. Felt him go still. “We’re going home. But this time—” he searched Zuko’s face, the smudged eyeliner, the little cut, the bright stupid eyes— “this time is different. So I need you to know that.” His voice came out steadier than he felt. “You’re it for me. You have been for a long time.”
They caught their breath by the vending machines, cobbling together what was left of their dignity. Zuko wiped at the streaks under his eyes, probably making it worse. His lips looked a little swollen. Sokka wanted to kiss them again, but the world kept turning and their friends were going to notice if they didn’t reappear soon.
They threaded back through the crowd. Sokka’s limbs felt gummy from adrenaline, his brain extra-tender, like a split-open sea urchin. Zuko trailed him, not touching, but as close as he could walk without it being weird. It was almost worse than holding hands. Every time Sokka looked over his shoulder, Zuko was right there, watching him, the way moon pulls at the tide.
The Gaang was still at their table, but the energy had shifted. Toph and Suki had started a flick-spoon war that had escalated into a full-scale battle, flicking balled-up napkins and half-empty sugar packets at each other. Aang had made himself a napkin hat and was explaining the mechanics of flight to a deeply bored Mai. Katara spotted them first—noticing, immediately, the way Zuko hovered a little too close to Sokka. Her mouth twitched. Sokka braced for impact.
“There you are,” she said, and her eyes narrowed. “You guys were gone for a million years.”
“Had to talk to my roommate,” Sokka said. He slid into the booth, Zuko next to him, knees touching under the table. The contact was a fuse, burning slow and bright.
“About what?” Toph tipped the last of her drink down, slamming the cup with a flourish. Her grin was sharp enough to cut glass.
“Existential roommate stuff,” Sokka said. Maybe he was sweating. The music in here made it hard to tell.
Ty Lee kicked her heels under the table. “You look happy.”
“Why do you sound surpirsed?” Sokka asked with a slight frown as he pulled Zuko closer. Sokka shrugged, shifting in the booth so Zuko could fit beside him. “Just, you know, a lot of things are suddenly less confusing.”
Aang gave a little cheer, spilling a half-glass of beer onto the sticky tabletop. “That’s awesome, dude! You two are, like, totally in sync.”
Zuko ducked his head, hair falling right into the mess. Static from the dance floor made it stand on end. Sokka felt his own grin trying to burst through, but he smothered it with a handful of fries. He could still feel the ghost of Zuko’s hand in the crook of his elbow, or maybe it was just adrenaline.
Azula, across the booth, did not bother with any pretense. “Aren’t you going to make an announcement?” she asked, raising her cup. “I think we’re all dying to hear.”
Sokka’s mouth was suddenly dry. He was not going to make a public declaration. He was not going to be the guy who grandstanded his feelings, especially not in front of Azula, whose smirk could weaponize shame.
He looked to Zuko in silent plea, but Zuko’s face was already doing that thing where it shut down into a blank mask. Still, the air between them buzzed with something new, something that wasn’t going to go away just because Sokka pretended it wasn’t there.
Mai, who had been physically present but emotionally checked out for the last hour, said, “I’ll get more drinks,” and, in a minor miracle, Ty Lee followed her out, giggling about refilling “the lovebirds’” cups. That left Sokka in the blast radius of Azula’s attention, which was about as fun as a root canal.
Azula rested her chin on her hand, dark eyes sharp as a scalpel. “So. This is a thing now.”
Zuko didn’t answer, but Sokka took a deep breath. “Yeah. If he’ll have me.Kind of stupidly in love with your brother Azula.”
Azula scowled at him. “He could do better.”
“I agree,” Toph said, grinning wide. “He could date literally anyone. Yet here we are.” She flicked a balled-up napkin at Zuko, who caught it without looking and dropped it beside his glass.
Sokka risked a glance at Zuko, but his face was either impassive or trying to be. Sokka nudged him, just a little, and felt Zuko’s knee press back against his.
“Your standards are garbage,” Azula said. “I’ve always said so.”
Katara made a choking noise, half laugh and half protest, but Sokka cut her off before she could escalate. “It’s fine,” Sokka said. “I already know I’m not good enough for your family.”
Azula regarded him. “Correct. But I’m not the one you have to convince.”
He opened his mouth, then closed it. Suki caught his eye and gave a discreet thumbs-up under the table. Sokka felt a wormy sense of relief, which only got worse under Azula’s gaze.
“Can I ask you a question?” Azula’s voice was a slow, surgical drawl.
“I mean, you’re going to anyway,” Sokka said, bracing.
“Why you?”
“Azula—” Zuko’s voice cut in, frayed and dangerous, but she ignored him.
Sokka could feel the table go tense, like a bus braking too fast. He sucked in a breath. “Why not me?”
Azula blinked at him, as if that hadn’t occurred. “You’re terminally mediocre, Sokka. Even your GPA is exactly average. What has my brother possibly seen in you, except your ability to eat a metric ton of noodles and never pay for them?”
Sokka tried a smile. “Maybe I’m not trying to win a Nobel Prize. Maybe I just like your brother.”
“Liking him is not a personality,” Azula said but he could see the way Zuko’s fingers curled in the space between them, picking at the shredded napkin like he was worried it would bleed. There wasn’t a lot Sokka could say in the face of Azula’s blank, surgical hostility. He didn’t want to impress her. He wanted—he had no idea what he wanted, except for Zuko’s hand in his, or to just not embarrass himself further.
“Azula, you’re being a dick,” Katara said, as if reading the room’s temperature and deciding to spike it several degrees. She glared over the rim of her glass, the ice cubes inside rattling with the force of her grip. Sokka felt a weird, flickering gratitude that his sister—of course—was the first to leap to his defense, even if it was mostly so she could be the one to insult Zuko.
Aang, ever the pacifist, tried to steer the conversation away. “Hey did anyone notice all the new vending machines?” he said. “There’s a Pepsi one now. That’s crazy.”
No one responded, but Sokka appreciated the attempt. He didn’t care about Pepsi, except that Zuko’s favorite was Cherry Pepsi and now there was a machine for it. That felt like something.
The table splintered into side conversations from there, which was a relief. Katara and Suki swapped updates about a mutual friend’s breakup; Aang and Toph debated the aerodynamics of paper airplanes using the napkin arsenal. Zuko squeezed Sokka’s knee under the table, just a quick pulse, like a Morse code for I’m here.
Azula’s attention lingered, though. She was so obviously unimpressed it was almost funny. Sokka didn’t need her approval, but he could feel it, how tightly she was wound, the way her eyes flicked between them and then away, always watching. After a while she said, “So is this, like, a phase?” Azula asked, her tone so dry Sokka wondered if she was even capable of producing actual moisture. “Or is this the part where you get a matching tattoo and join a commune?”
Sokka tried very hard not to look at her. He focused on the condensation ring blooming under his glass. “Not sure yet,” he said, “but if the tattoos are on sale, I’ll consider it.”
Azula tilted her head. “You’re not even embarrassed, are you? Most people would be begging for mercy under this level of scrutiny.”
“Azula,” Zuko started, but Sokka cut him off.
“It’s fine,” Sokka said. “Not like I haven’t lived through worse. That time at regionals when my swim trunks split? That’s a real memory, by the way, and Katara took pictures.” He gave a sideways glance at his sister, who only grinned, teeth and all.
Azula didn’t seem to know what to do with that. Her stare went colder, if anything, and her upper lip did a weird little twitch, like she’d tasted something off. Then she looked at Zuko, searching his face for some secret code only siblings could catch, and then back to Sokka as if the answer might be hiding in his freckles. She made a noise—barely audible, almost a scoff, but not quite.
“You’re very strange,” she said. It wasn’t a compliment, exactly, but it wasn’t a death sentence either. More like a clinical diagnosis.
“Thanks,” Sokka said, and tried to look as unperturbed as possible, though his knee was bouncing so hard under the table he was worried he might set off the fire alarm.
Before she could retaliate, Suki returned, sliding into the booth with the smooth confidence of a person who had never once questioned her place in the world. She handed Sokka a fresh drink.
“Is my girlfriend being mean to you?” Suki asked, dropping into the booth and pressing a kiss to Azula’s cheek.
Azula’s expression curdled, but she allowed it.
“Nah,” Sokka said. “Just being a little sister.” He turned to Zuko, who was already looking at him with that careful, unreadable face, and kissed him. Not dramatically—just enough to be a fact. Something that existed now, in front of everyone.
Aang made a sound like a fire alarm. Katara’s groan was loud and sincere. Toph slow-clapped twice and then stopped, apparently satisfied.Ty Lee, in a display of Supernatural Acrobatics only she could manage without actually spilling her drink, somersaulted herself over the back of Sokka and Zuko’s booth and landed between them, beaming. “You guys are, like, so cute I might vomit,” she said, and linked her arm through Zuko’s. The table made space for her, as if this was the most normal thing in the world. She smelled like vanilla extract and gym mats.
Mai trailed in after her, all black lipstick and unbothered detachment. She slid into the seat next to Ty Lee with a sigh, resting her chin on one hand. “Congratulations on your emerging codependency,” she said, mostly at Sokka. “Hope you’re ready for a lifetime of burnt toast and surly mornings.”
Sokka didn’t know what to say, so he just shrugged, which apparently was answer enough for Mai. She flicked a stray straw wrapper at him. “I’m literally in love with him.” Sokka sighed. Zuko shot him a soft look.
“You two are disgusting,” Azula said, though something in her jaw unclenched slightly as Suki’s lips pressed against her cheek. “I’m simply noting that my brother has catastrophically poor taste.”
“Lala.” Suki set down her drink. “Azula. Singular love of my life. I dated Sokka.”
“Which,” Azula said, with the precision of someone filing a very small, very sharp knife, “is exactly why I hate him most.” She lifted her glass.
Sokka stared at her. “Hold on. You hate me because I dated your girlfriend. Not because I’m not good enough for your brother.”
Azula’s eyes cut to him like she was reconsidering every life choice that had led to this booth. “If you had half the sense your transcript implies you lack,” she said, “you’d have been dating Zuko since orientation and would never have gone within ten feet of her.”
“Azula. I love him. Twenty minutes ago you literally told me to go tell him—” Sokka started, but Zuko cut him off.
“Wait, really?” Zuko said, the smirk breaking through before he could stop it.
Azula set her glass down with a precise little click. “I don’t like him,” she said, enunciating each word like she was filing them individually. “But you do. And I suppose I want you to be—” she exhaled through her nose, “—happy. Or whatever.” She looked away, jaw tight, as if the admission had cost her something she wasn’t going to itemize.
Zuko was grinning at her in a way that was clearly making it worse.
Katara, watching all of this with the bright eyes of someone who had just spotted an opening, leaned over and nudged Azula with her elbow. “You and Sokka have both dated Suki,” she said, in the particular tone she reserved for observations she already knew the answer to. “Do you think maybe you hate my brother because he used to date your girlfriend?”
Azula turned the idea over like a puzzle box, and Sokka watched her with the kind of dread usually reserved for the last five seconds before a test you haven’t studied for. She looked at Suki, then at Sokka, then at Zuko. Her jaw flexed.
“I don’t hate your brother,” Azula said. The words sounded like she’d bitten into a lemon. “I hate anyone who thinks they’re entitled to my favorite people. It’s not the same.” Her fingers tapped against her glass, the rhythm as precise as a clock. “And I definitely hate everyone Suki’s ever kissed, due to a certain statistical likelihood that she’ll one day come to her senses and leave me for them.”
Suki snorted into her drink. “You’re so romantic, baby.”
Azula’s gaze flicked to Zuko, lingered. Something complicated passed between them; Sokka felt like he was watching a duel fought with hand signals he couldn’t interpret for a thousand years.
Zuko smiled, and it was a real smile, the kind that crinkled the skin at the corners of his eyes and made Sokka’s lungs feel like they were filled with helium. Sokka tried to focus on his fries, but the warmth of Zuko’s thigh against his own kept elbowing its way to the front of his mind.
Zuko looked at Sokka, then at Azula. “For the record, Sokka is not going to steal your girlfriend. He’s way too lazy.”
Sokka nodded. “Confirmed. Also, Suki scares me.”
“I should,” Suki said, raising her glass.
Azula’s jaw unclenched another notch. “Fine,” she said flatly, “but if you hurt him, I’ll end you.”
Sokka blinked at her, unsure who the threat was aimed at. “Noted?”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Azula said, but the ice in her voice had thawed just enough to suggest Sokka might, in fact, survive the week.
Zuko’s hand stayed under the table, fingers tracing over Sokka’s knee like he was mapping it for a science project. Sokka tried not to squirm, which, considering the attention of half his friend group, was the hardest thing he’d done all night. He looked at Zuko, really looked, and what he saw there was the kind of soft, unraveled joy that made the edges of his own mouth curl. Zuko, for once, didn’t try to hide it. The relief was dizzying.
Sokka couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt this light. Maybe as a kid, in the spring, running wild with Katara through melting fields, before there was pressure to be anything besides fast and loud and his mother’s son. Maybe never, if he was honest. He felt stripped of excuses, left with nothing to do but be happy—a state he was as unfamiliar with as what to do with having more than a one night stand.
“Do you want to go home?” Zuko said, low, close enough that Sokka felt the words more than heard them.
Home. Their apartment. The one with the broken cabinet hinge and Zuko’s tea collection taking up half the counter. Sokka’s chest did something complicated and embarrassing.
“Yeah,” he said. “I really do.”
Zuko’s grin was slow and a little devastating. He kissed Sokka once, brief and warm, and Sokka had to remind himself they were still in the booth, still in public, still technically at a table full of people who would never let him live this down.
“Zuko?”
“Yeah?” The word was barely sound, more breath than voice, warm against Sokka’s temple.
“I love you. Like so much it’s embarrassing.” Sokka pressed his nose into the hinge of Zuko’s jaw, felt the small shift of muscle there when Zuko’s mouth curved.
“Why did it take you so long?”
Sokka was quiet for a moment, his thumb tracing an absent pattern against Zuko’s collarbone. “You’re my best friend,” he said finally. “And I’ve never had to watch you with someone else before tonight. I know you’ve dated people. Slept with people. But not in front of me.” He pulled back just enough to look at him. “Why did you dance with Jet? You never do that. You always just—you drag me out there.”
Zuko’s gaze flickered away, then back, a split-second hesitation that Sokka caught. “Because I wanted to see if I could,” Zuko said, voice tight. “Or if it would make you jealous. Maybe both.” He picked at the condensation ring on his glass, thumbnail turning white. “I thought if I could make you hate me a little, it would be easier to get over you.”
Sokka’s laugh stuttered out, more bark than mirth. “Well, you succeeded. For about five minutes I wanted to dunk Jet in the toilet and flush.” He pressed his lips together, weighing the next words with a care that felt foreign. “Don’t do that again. Please.”
Zuko’s hand, under the table, crept to Sokka’s thigh and squeezed. Hard. The force was grounding and also a little horny, which didn’t seem like it should be possible, but here they were.
“I won’t,” Zuko said before kissing him again.
The first time Sokka got a hand down Zuko’s pants, it was because Jet didn’t know how to lose. The club was louder than a warzone, writhing with sweat and bad decisions, and Sokka should have been thrilled to have Zuko’s thigh pressed up against his. Instead, he was fighting his own body for control. Zuko’s hand gripped Sokka’s knee with enough determination to leave finger-shaped bruises.
And then Jet decided to be a dick about it.
He materialized beside their table, chin up and mouth cocked into a grin like he knew some secret about the universe. “Hey, Zuko, you up for round two?” Jet leaned his elbow on the booth, his body language all confidence and invitation. Zuko didn’t even look at him. He was watching Sokka, a question simmering on his face.
Sokka, who’d been making slow, clandestine advances for the better part of fifteen minutes, felt the way his palm had ended up on the inside of Zuko’s thigh, and it was not moving south just for warmth.
Jet either didn’t notice or didn’t care. “C’mon, man,” he said, reaching over Sokka’s drink to touch Zuko’s shoulder. “One song. I’ve got your favorite queued.” His voice was pitched for the table but he leaned in close, like there was some secret third frequency Zuko was supposed to catch. “Unless you’re too busy for me?”
Zuko didn’t flinch or pull away, but the muscle under Sokka’s fingers went tight as rebar. Sokka, who had never been possessive in his life (except for the time someone tried to steal his sandwich in fourth grade and he’d bitten them), found himself squeezing Zuko’s leg. Not hard, but enough that Zuko’s eyes flicked over to him, wide and sharp. A dare, kind of. Or maybe just a question.
Sokka had never been good at sitting still when something needed doing. He slid his hand up Zuko’s thigh, slow and deliberate, and looked up at Jet. “I’m not a possessive guy,” he said pleasantly. “But if you put your hands on my boyfriend again, I’ll break your nose.” Zuko went very still beside him, the way he did when he was trying not to smile. Sokka could feel it anyway—the small seismic shift of him, the warmth of it moving through his ribs like the first day of something.
Jet’s upper lip curled like he’d found something offensive under his shoe, and he twisted so he could look down at Sokka, all faux-friendly aggression. “Boyfriend? Since when do you keep them for longer than a night?” His voice rolled out slick and oily, loud enough to catch the attention of every human-shaped ego in a ten-foot radius. Sokka felt the entire table’s focus pinwheel to him, a prickle at the back of his neck.
Sokka didn’t rise to it. Not at first. He took a measured breath, the kind Zuko was always telling him to try before he started swinging at things metaphorically or otherwise. “Not your business,” he said, teeth together so tight it was a wonder the words made it out at all.
Jet grinned, lizard-fast, and leaned further in. “No, but it’s everyone’s business how you get around. Didn’t you hook up with the entire water polo team last year, Sokka? I hear Coach still can’t look you in the eye.” Jet’s smile was all serrated edges. “And now you’re dating the guy who got kicked out of the firebenders for ‘unsportsmanlike conduct’?” He made air quotes with two fingers, slow and greasy, his eyes flicking to Zuko’s scar, lingering just long enough to be a statement.
Zuko’s hand curled into a fist on the table. His face was blank, but Sokka could practically taste the spike of acid in his chest. He wanted to say something, to bite back, but he felt the gluey smear of old shame stick his tongue to the roof of his mouth. He’d lost count of how many times someone had made a joke about Zuko’s eye. He’d always wanted to punch those people, too.
But this was their table. Their night. Sokka was not going to let Jet plant his flag here.
He let his hand slide up a little higher on Zuko’s thigh. “Yeah,” Sokka said, “and you still couldn’t make varsity, could you, Jet?”
Jet’s face twitched, fast and ugly. “At least I don’t have to buy friends. Or dates.”
That was so off-base Sokka almost laughed. But then Jet pivoted back to Zuko, and his voice dropped low enough that only their table could hear it. “What’s it like, Zuko? Always coming in second, even with your face fixed? I was going to give you a pity fuck.” He flicked his eyes to the scar, a quick, deliberate act, then right to Sokka. “You know he’s only with you because you’re a pity case, right?”
For a second, Sokka didn’t move. Didn’t hear the music, the table, anything except the spike of heat in his cheeks and the way Zuko’s hand had gone cold and rigid on his own. And then the world snapped back into focus for Sokka, crisp and hard-edged. In another life, maybe he’d have let it roll off. Maybe he’d have made a joke, done a little bow, played the fool like he’d been trained to do since forever. But this was Zuko, and this was Jet, and Sokka’s hand was already curling into a fist.
He didn’t remember standing. Didn’t remember the moment the red static overtook reason, his body a bowstring drawn back so tight the only thing it knew was to release. He clocked Jet once, square in the jaw, with a sound so satisfying it was almost musical. Jet reeled, stumbled over his own stupid words, tried to steady himself. Sokka was dimly aware of Zuko’s hand at his elbow, trying to pull him back, but he was already gone, somewhere cold and white and so fucking tired of people treating the person he loved like a punchline.
Jet made a sound, something more bark than words, and then Sokka’s fist connected again. Jet’s head snapped back, all the lazy confidence drained out, replaced by something sharp and unfocused. Sokka didn’t stop to gloat. His hands kept moving, loud and graceless, until Jet’s arms went up instinctively, trying to shield the parts of his face he valued most.
“Sokka!” Katara’s voice, slicing through the uproar, but Sokka’s ears roared with cottony static. All he could see was the way Jet had looked at Zuko, the way people always looked at Zuko, like they were entitled to decide how much of his face counted as human.
Then a hand, smaller and colder, found the back of Sokka’s neck. The grip was iron, and it yanked him off Jet with the efficiency of a well-oiled piece of machinery.
Azula had him by the collar. Azula, in a dress that would have made half the boys in the club drool if they weren’t terrified of her, looking at Sokka like he was something she’d scraped off her heel and was nevertheless choosing to keep. “Take my brother home, water tribe. You have my approval.” She glanced at Jet, who was still finding his footing. “I’ll handle this.”
Sokka met her eyes for a moment, then nodded. His split lip throbbed. Zuko was already on his phone.
Outside, the night air hit like cold water. Sokka pressed two fingers under his nose.
“You didn’t have to do that,” Zuko said.
“Defend my boyfriend?”
“Pick a fight because some asshole made fun of my scar.” He wasn’t looking at Sokka, but his jaw was doing the thing.
“He called me a whore first,” Sokka said. “Which, for the record, I’m not. I’ve never once been compensated. I just happen to really enjoy—” He gestured vaguely. “You know. The thing.”
Zuko’s mouth twitched. A car rolled up to the curb, headlights sweeping across the wet pavement.
“Get in, Casanova.”