When She Smiles

Tenzin wrinkled his nose peering around his mother’s leg toward the pair. His mother was talking to the woman, and the girl stood before her looking important, imposing. He had seen her before, she was always with the police chief, always looking like she knew what was going on and how to deal with it; just like the blind chief of police.
Bumi had told him she was serious, all serious all the time. Kya had said it too, Kya said she wasn’t much fun to play with. They would know, they had been in Republic City with their mother while he was at the Southern Air Temple with their father learning Airbending. He had missed a lot during the past year.
She acted like Toph; that much he could tell just by looking at her. She stood like her too, feet set apart, hands behind her back, looking ahead; up toward his mother. Occasionally she looked down at him, but quickly turned back to his mother. Kya and Bumi were probably right, she wouldn’t be much fun to play with, but it was either her or following his mother around while she did errands.
“Lin, you remember Tenzin,” his mother pulled him forward out from behind her legs, she would see him.
“He was the one who left with Avatar Aang,” she looked to him like she was sizing him up. “He’s short too.”
“I’m not short,” he challenged standing up straighter and glaring over at Lin.
“So can you bend, or are you a nonbender like your brother and uncle,” she had this smirk on her face.
“I’m an Airbender.”
“Another Twinkle Toes huh,” she smiled crossing her arms, Tenzin nodded. “Can you fly yet? I love when Avatar Aang takes me for a ride on his glider.”
“I can’t support two people,” he flushed slightly rubbing the back of his neck.
“It’s okay,” she seemed a little let down.
“We can go for a ride on Appa though, Dad will be in meetings all afternoon.” He liked it when she smiled; she didn’t seem that bad when she smiled.
“Tenzin, you should probably ask your father before you take Appa,” his mother caught him as he tried to run off.
“I will mom,” he wriggled out of his mother’s hands and took off down the street with Lin.

He was thirteen and he had almost mastered Airbending, his father had told him so. He even had his own flying bison so he could travel wherever he wanted when he wanted; mainly it was going with Kya and Bumi to the South Pole to see their grandfather. But the thing was that he could go where he wanted.
And he could take Lin with him.
Bumi still made fun of him for hanging out with her, said he must have a taken a few too many hits to the head learning how to fly. But he didn’t care, Lin was fun to be around; they just got each other, in a way he’d never been able to with his siblings.
“Tenzin,” she had been with her mother, learning metal bending. “I did it, just like mom!”
“That’s amazing Lin, I told you you’d get it,” she tackled him in a hug.
Tenzin was glad they had finally finished construction on Air Temple Island, it meant he could stay in Republic City and practice bending with Avatar Aang; it meant he could see Lin every day.
“So what have you been doing today, I asked Kya where you were and she said you were working on something,” she pulled away from him with a smile on her face, her green eyes searching his face.
“Dad was teaching me another technique, I’ve reached the thirty-first tier in Airbending,” he answered.
“It seems that all we ever do is practice,” she commented fully separating from him; he wished she hadn’t.
“We always said we’d be the best.”
“Like you have any competition,” she grinned as they started toward the noodle shop they normally ate at.
“I have to compete with all the future Airbenders,”
“You don’t have my mother,” Lin returned jokingly. “If it’s not perfect the first time, it’s not perfect it at all.”
“Well she did create metalbending,” Tenzin couldn’t hold a straight face as the jib, something the two of them had joked about for almost six years.
“And your dad is the Avatar, we’re both at a disadvantage.”
“At least we’re at that disadvantage together.”
“I guess, hey,” she caught his arm just as he was opening the door into the noodle shop, “why don’t we go to this new place I heard about. They serve the same food as the shops in the Upper Ring of Ba Sing Se.”
Tenzin let the door swing shut as he was led away by Lin, he didn’t even really like the food from Ba Sing Se but he really like spending time with Lin. And he was about to leave with his father again.

Four years doesn’t seem all that long in retrospect, but when you just end four years it seems like an eternity. He had been in Republic City sixteen times in the last four years and had only been there for a day; he hadn’t seen Lin any of those times.
“Tenzin, I’m liking your arrow,” Bumi couldn’t speak quietly, and he had a horrible habit of tackling on first sight. “It’s like you’re not the same person anymore,” he mocked pretending to wipe a tear from his eye.
“Let him go Bumi, I want to see his tattoo,” Kya pushed her brother aside to catch Tenzin in a strangle hold, inspecting his shaved head with the new mastery tattoo. “Huh, I expected it to be cooler,” she grinned holding Tenzin’s neck tighter, “more like dad’s.”
“Kya let go, it’s just like dad’s, all of them are exactly like dad’s arrows,” he strained to get out of his sister’s grip.
“Alright, let him go Kya.”
“Dad,” Kya released Tenzin, more or less dropping him in her rush to tackle their father.
Aang embraced his daughter and gave Bumi a good clap on the shoulder smiling, “what have you two been up to lately?”
As Kya talked about what had been happening in Republic City Tenzin backed away from the three of them with his glider, heading for the dock. He wanted to see Lin.
She had changed a lot, he was sure he had as well, but the change in Lin; he could see that change. She had cut her hair short and wore it pulled back, he missed the long brunette hair she use let fall around her shoulders. She wore more formalized clothing now, nothing resembling the lose fitting green she had sporting during their childhood; and she was serious again.
“Tenzin, I didn’t realize you were coming back to Republic City,” formal.
“I didn’t know either,” why was this weird?
They stood in silence for a few minutes, an awkward silence that he hadn’t expected.
“It was great seeing you again, but I have to go. Mother is expecting me,” she raised her hand in farewell and turned away from him. It wasn’t what he had expected this reunion to be like.
Four years is a long time.

He stood out in the pouring rain, completely drenched and miserable. But it would all be worth it, as soon as he saw Lin this whole afternoon would be worth all his suffering. It was times like this he was jealous of Kya, she just made a bubble or something to keep the water off her; all he could do was air himself off; but only after the rain stopped. It didn’t look like the rain would be stopping anytime soon, and it didn’t seem that Lin would be leaving anytime soon.
It will all be worth it, he reminded himself.
Finally she came out, he grinned seeing her. She was more like the old Lin, soft greens and Earthbending shoes. She turned down the street away from him, heading for the Police Headquarters to go see her mother. He followed after her, she didn’t seem to mind that it was raining, it was like she didn’t care water stood in the streets.
“Lin,” he shouted running up to her and catching her arm.
“Tenzin, I don’t have time,” she pulled her arm away and continued walking. “Mother is expecting me.”
“Lin,” he grabbed her arm again and turned her around to face him.
This was it.
He kissed her.
“Tenzin,” she pulled away, searching his face for some reason, looking for some answer. “We can’t.”
“Why not? Why not try? We could be together,” he wanted it. He wanted to be with her so much.
“It just wouldn’t work out,” she pulled away again and left him, standing in the pouring rain.

“I think you should leave for a while, go hang in Ba Sing Se or something. Your depression is killing me,” Bumi laid stretched out on the steps to the Temple playing with one of the flying lemurs.
“Why don’t you just be quiet,” Tenzin snapped. He was tired of hearing his brother complain. There wasn’t even anything really happening for him to have a reason to complain about.
“Touchy,” Bumi laughed tossing leechi nuts up for the lemur to catch, laughing as the lemur turned a somersault. “I was only saying you should cheer up.”
“I’m leaving,” Tenzin got up and left his brother to the lemurs. He needed to meditate anyway.
“Tenzin! Why don’t you go visit the Fire Lord, maybe he can help,” he could sense the mockery in his brother’s comment, it just made his day worse.
Still fuming Tenzin made his way to one of his favorite places on the Island, it overlooked Yue Bay where a statue was being built in his father’s honor. He had liked the spot before the monument project began, but he wished the statue wouldn’t block his view of the ocean.
He settled taking a deep breath and looked out over the ocean and tried to focus on his meditation. After a few minutes and sighed and fell back on the ground, he couldn’t focus on this! Why did Lin act the way she did? She was a completely different person than she had been when he left for his Mastery Tests. He was probably different too, but surely not as much as Lin.
They had always had a special relationship, it had been what made being in Republic City worth it, to see and be with one another.
At least, that was the way he felt about it.
“Why doesn’t she like me?”
“Because you talk to yourself,” Tenzin flushed a little hearing his mother laugh behind him.
“Mother,” he sat up and made room for Katara to sit next to him.
“Kya said you’re having a little problem.”
“Really, are you sure Bumi didn’t bring it to your attention,” he asked skeptically looking at his mother in his peripheral.
“I would have said it was Bumi if it had been Bumi. Now what’s wrong?”
“Nothing you could relate too,” he muttered looking away from his mother looking for some distraction.
“Try me,” his mother smiled in a way she normally saved for his father.
“I like someone and they don’t like me back,” he admitted.
“Did you tell them?”
“That’s how Kya and Bumi know.” He was right, she wouldn’t know anything about this.
He sat in a comfortable silence with his mother for what felt like hours before his father found them. She didn’t say anything to Aang about what he was going through and Tenzin preferred it that way. Maybe he could ask his father about this later.

He wasn’t expecting it, he hadn’t even know Lin was there. But she was and she kissed him, when she pulled back she was smiling.
“We can try it,” she smiled looking deep into his eyes. “I want to know where this goes,” she smiled wrapping him in a hug.
He liked it when she smiled, she was beautiful when she smiled.

@souzia I love it!

I wrote one about their break up and it is more novel length….. http://avatarthelastairbenderonline.com/groups/avatar-fan-fiction/forum/topic/lins-story-14-about-the-break-up-of-lin-and-tenzin/ you can read some of it if you like!

@souzia LOL that was great!

When the Fire Nation Attacked
“See, I told you it was fun,” Bumi cheered slapping Kuzon’s shoulder with a snorting laugh.
Kuzon laughed as he climbed out of the mail cart, “Yeah, until we crashed into that man’s cart,” he smiled watching Bumi leap from the cart and send it speeding away on the track.
“They should know better than to leave them so close to our slide,” Bumi walked toward another set of rails to catch the next empty cart. “We can’t be held responsible for accidents like that one,” Bumi snorted again. Kuzon laughed.
“So where to next Bumi,” he asked dropping to the ground beside his friend.
“We’re getting close to the palace.”
“So,” they had been closer to the palace than they currently were plenty of times, and only got in trouble for it once.
“I thought we’d try our luck again,” Bumi looked mischievously over his shoulder at Kuzon, “Once Aang finally shows up I want to ride right past the palace gates.”
At the mention of their missing friend Kuzon looked up toward the South. Three weeks prior Aang had said he needed to go back to the temple to learn the next skill set for Airbending and had left Kuzon in Omashu for that time. Kuzon could have easily made it back to the Fire Nation during that time, but he liked hanging out with Bumi, so he decided to wait until Aang came back. But neither of them had expected Aang to be gone for three whole weeks and an additional three days.
“What if he doesn’t show up today,” Kuzon asked as Bumi launched a mail train up the hill, more likely than not in the wrong direction.
“Then we’ll wait until he gets here. Aang has to be here when we ride past the guards at the palace,” Bumi dropped down next to Kuzon to wait.
After what felt like hours to both boys Bumi jumped to his feet again and ran to the rails; they hadn’t seen anything since he shot the cart up the hill.
“Hey Kuzon have you seen any of the mail carts.”
“Not recently,” he was laying on his back throwing rocks at a wall behind him.
“I wonder why,” Bumi looked up and down the hill, normally there were hundreds of the carts going at a time, and they ran all day long on every track.
“Does it matter,” Kuzon pushed himself up on his elbows looking at the track and Bumi, “Maybe all the people went on break?”
“But they always run,” Bumi commented looking up the hill, the car he had sent up before was just at the crest. He pulled it back with Earthbending and jumped in, “Come on, were going to see what’s going on. Kuzon stood and joined Bumi in the cart and they started off.
They were nearly to the palace when they hit a break in the tracks. The boys got out and started walking through the streets.
“Guards,” Kuzon ducked into an alley as a large groups of soldiers passed pulling Bumi in behind him.
“What,” Bumi stuck his head out to look down the street they had been traveling.
“Get back,” Kuzon pulled Bumi back by the collar of his shirt. “They must be looking for someone.”
“I don’t understand, it’s like they know we’re near the palace,” Bumi pouted crossing his arms and dropping to the ground.
“Well, it wasn’t like we were taking extra care not to break stuff,” Kuzon pointed out.
“That wasn’t our fault, he should have known better than to leave it there,” Bumi was still defending his position that it was not their problem, the man should have known better than to be near the mail slides.
“Well he obviously believes otherwise,” Kuzon frowned watching as another squadron of guards passed them. “They’ve sent the whole army after us Bumi,” he exclaimed hoping that his friend would realize it was their problem and this was serious.
Bumi sighed and crawled over to the alley’s entrance to see what Kuzon was talking about. He whistled seeing the dozens of troops leaving the Palace and spreading out. It was serious and they were past the reach of Bumi’s secret escape routes. “We might have a problem,” he whispered pulling away from the entrance.
“You think,” Kuzon asked shaking his head, he should have known better than to let Bumi crash in to that cart. He should have known better than to do anything with Bumi, but that was unimportant. “What are we going to do? I can’t get arrested, my parents will never let me out of the Fire Nation again!”
“I’m thinking,” Bumi crossed his arms glaring at Kuzon to stop him from yelling. “It’s takes time for my genius to work!”
“Could you make it work faster,” Kuzon looked over his shoulder at more of the troops.
“I got it!” Bumi leapt to his feet and exclaimed so suddenly that Kuzon reeled back and fell. Bumi snorted helping Kuzon to his feet.
“You have an idea,” Kuzon asked dusting himself off.
“Earthbending,” Bumi smiled smugly.
Kuzon rolled his eyes looking at Bumi. They were about to be arrested and all his “genius” could come up with was Earthbending. “Great, you’re an Earthbender and I’m a Firebender, how is that helping anything?”
“I get us through all these houses to where the tunnels start and we’re home free. I can Earthbend us across the city!”
“Bumi your genius is showing,” Kuzon wrapped Bumi in a hug before pushing him in the direction they needed to go. “Now get us out of here!”
Bumi stepped up to the wall and took a deep breath, about to begin when they were discovered. “What are you two doing here,” he shouted starting down the alley.”
“Go Bumi, go,” Kuzon shouted. Bumi dropped the wall and the boys ran in before the guard made it to them.
The closer Bumi and Kuzon got to the wall of the city the harder it was for them to avoid the guards. The Earthbending troops walked in huge groups toward the wall, Kuzon become more nervous as it became harder to walk through the city, the whole time neither of the boys saw any other people. Finally they reached Bumi’s home and ducked in just ahead of a trio of soldiers.
“Where are your parents,” Kuzon asked looking around the oddly vacant front room.
“They should be here,” Bumi walked into the kitchen, it was also empty. “What’s going on?” Kuzon followed Bumi through the house; it looked like everyone had just got up and left, leaving everything behind.
“Maybe it has something to do with all the soldiers outside,” Kuzon looked out a window concerned.
His was only visible for a moment, but that was enough for someone to see them. “Hey, there are children in here,” one of the men shouted turning and starting for the house. Kuzon backed away from the window quickly looking around in a panic for what they could use to hide. “There are two boys here!”
The man dropped part of the wall and was in the room with them before Kuzon and Bumi could even consider a hiding place. When he spoke the whole house shook, Bumi looked up at the ceiling wide-eyed then to the guard.
“We didn’t mean to wreck that man’s cart, it was an accident. Honest,” he pleaded dropping to his knees before the soldier. “Please don’t take my house down!”
“Haven’t you heard,” the man looked between Kuzon and Bumi; they both shook their heads oblivious to what the soldier could possibly be talking about. “The Fire Nation is at our gates. They’re looking for the Avatar and plan to wipe out anyone else in their way in the process.”
Bumi looked disbelievingly at the man then to Kuzon. Why would the Fire Nation do something like that, Omashu had never done anything to anger the fierce Firebendering nation; they hardly fought at all given their bloody history. “That can’t be true,” he refused to believe what the man was saying. “Kuzon, tell him that’s not true.”
“Kuzon? Are you Fire Nation?”
“My friend brought me here a few weeks ago, he’s an Airbender,” Kuzon couldn’t believe it either. “But he had to go back to the Southern Air Temple for training and left me here. I don’t anything about this, I’m from Ember Island; they’re not military,” he looked pleadingly at the guard; now he really could be arrested.
“Aang,” Bumi’s breath caught in his throat. They all knew the previous Avatar had been a Firebender, and if the Fire Nation was looking for the new Avatar they would be looking in the Air Nomads.
“That’s why he never came back,” Kuzon knew it was true too; the Fire Nation had killed their friend that was why he had been gone so long. Aang wasn’t coming.
The wall shook when Bumi and Kuzon started up the steps to the towers. The guards had evacuated the city to the safety of the Cave of Two Lovers when they saw the army approaching and the commander they boys had seen said they would be safer on the wall with the majority of the army; there simply wasn’t enough time to get them out of Omashu safely.
“Get those boys into the tower!” one man shouted as they reached to top stair, several hands pushed and guided Bumi and Kuzon to a door then shut them in with a door made of Earth. Bumi ran to a window looking away from the city and motioned Kuzon to join him.
“Look at all of them,” he whispered when Kuzon stuck his head out the window.
“They could have killed Aang,” Kuzon lamented drawing his head back in. “What does Fire Lord Souzin want with the Avatar?”
“More like, why does he want the Avatar dead,” Bumi corrected going back to where the door was suppose to be.
“Where are you going?”
“I’m going to fight. The next Avatar is an Airbender, they’ll probably kill every Airbender they find. I don’t know about you, but I’ve got quite a few friends in those Temples.”
Kuzon shook his head, “I can’t fight them, they’re my people.”
“Your people! What about your friends? What about Aang, what about your friends in the Earth Kingdom; are you just going to let them die at the hands of your people?”
“What difference will I make, I’m not important in the Fire Nation and I’m not even a very good fighter,” Kuzon shook his head. How could Bumi expect him to turn and attack the people of his homeland?
“One person could make all the difference, look at the Avatar,” Bumi dropped a door from the wall and walked out to join the fight.
Second later Kuzon was beside him and smiled at his friend, “I may not be the Avatar, but I’ll do what I can.” Bumi smiled and clapped Kuzon on the shoulder.
“Who knows, maybe Aang got away.”
“Maybe he’s the Avatar,” Kuzon laughed.
“Then we’ll need to help him when he gets here,” Bumi agreed turning to face the Fire Nation army. “Ready?”
“I never thought I’d fight my countrymen,” Kuzon sighed watching the columns of Firebenders marched toward the wall of Omashu.
“Anything could happen when a Nation attacks,” Bumi offered his friend waning smile. “I’m just sorry it was the Fire Nation.”
“Me too.”