things left unsaid

[electric_lady]

WHO: Asami & Hei
WHAT: Hei's return throws Asami's world into chaos.

[Days pass, and Mako's words still echo in her thoughts: Li’s alive. With every echo, Asami wishes that hearts were as simple as machines.

She's happy for Korra. Korra and Li — Hei, though Asami's the only one of their group to know that — have been together for almost as long as Asami's known them. And she likes Hei. She'd been suspicious of him once, when that dorky facade of his started slipping, but his devotion to Korra had been unquestionable. Asami appreciated that about him, even envied it a little. She's never inspired that kind of loyalty in anyone, not even her own father. So she's happy for her friend. Truly.

She's also heartbroken, a fact which is as surprising as Hei being alive. His return means the end of the sweet, secret relationship between her and Korra. Not a romantic one — they're friends who share intimacies. But Asami hadn't realized just how much she's come to depend on those intimacies until now.

She wishes Korra would call. They need to talk about what's going to happen between them, what's going on with Hei, whether she's going to tell him. She refuses to let this relationship end like the one with Mako; she needs clarity. At the same time, she understands why it would slip Korra's mind. Of course she's preoccupied with Hei's return. That kind of shock would knock the ground out from under anyone's feet.

When she ends up on Korra's front porch, it's not because she intended to be there. Asami had overseen the loading of some new products at the dock, and instead of going home, her footsteps took her to Korra's place. Korra and Hei's place.

Taking a deep breath, she knocks.]

Comments

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei has been trying to settle into the interrupted rhythm of his life. Or what it used to be. Some days it's harder than others. The blown-apart chunks of time, the anxiety over his missing teammates, the effort of delicately interweaving two lives that have suffered disparate timelines, that have branched in separate directions -- There are so many things, he knows that. Too many for the patience of most people. Just quantifying them makes his mind shrivel up, an arid inner-atmosphere of bitterness and regret coming up like a wall of dry dust. ]

[ Other times, when he stops, looks away from his own dry interior to watch Korra, the beautiful, effortless way she leaps like a ray of light from point to point, stretching and coiling herself to suit the changes between them, he feels himself slowly returning from his detachment. Everything about her is still the same as ever -- so infuriatingly simple and evoking a bubbling of love, that it allows him to accept the now with a wan, sore happiness he's slowly becoming accustomed to, which aches like a bone broken and reset. ]

[ Time, he reminds himself, isn't an enemy that can be annihilated in a single blow. Time is just time. He can only take it minute by minute. ]

[ That evening, he returns to the Beach House to find Korra is still absent. In what seems like the most familiar routine in his few weeks of re-inhabiting his old life, he drifts around the brightly-lit patch of the kitchen, starting supper: rice porridge, hard-boiled eggs braised in soy sauce, pickled turnip, and dumplings stuffed with a rich stew of spicy vegetables and salted pork. ]

[ As he works, he broods about Mao and Yin, whom his relentless searches still haven't yielded solid results on. He ticks over names, faces and background info on old 'friends' who might still be in the city, and can be used to further his search. He calculates how best to get in touch with the "mountain masters" -- the deputies of the triads -- to do a few bloody jobs and replenish his reserves of cash, as well as absorbing the latest news in the Underground. Most of all, he wonders when Korra will return, because it would be good to have someone to hold off the night with until they both give into it; it would be good to fold and crumple together onto fresh bedsheets, all messy kisses and inconvenient elbows, with Korra's soft heap of hair in his mouth. ]

[ The knock on the door dispels the heating trend of his thoughts. There's a moment of silence, before a series of locks click open. When the door swings open, Hei blinks slowly at Asami, not his usual suspicious squint but an almost boyish head-tilt of curiosity. ]

...Has something happened?

[ Because he can't think of any other reason Little Miss Sato would drop by. ]

[electric_lady]

[It's surreal, having someone other than Korra open the door. Surreal that it's Hei, and that he's acting like this is completely normal, like he wasn't presumed dead for three years.]

Hello to you too. [There's a tinge of annoyance in her voice, because there's no hint of concern in his voice, only "Why are you here?" and she has every right to be here. Korra is her best friend, and while he kept himself as remote as possible, Hei is her friend too. But in the next breath, she softens, because he is her friend. For all the complications his return brings into her life, she's happy to see him.]

I heard from Mako that you were [alive] back.

[mortemscintilla]

[ Friends. There was a time when that word would've run parallel with weakness and frivolity in Hei's mind. He's not sure when the changes manifested. When his worldview began to slowly and irrevocably shift, his concerns expanding to include people other than Pai. He hadn't been trying to change -- but the changes had snuck up on him anyway. (He'd never been trying to fall in love, either. But that's why it's called falling and not leaping, isn't it?) ]

[ He isn't sure how to take Asami's visit. He doesn't particularly care for any of Korra's friends. They're not important enough to hate, not clever enough to play politics with, not interesting enough to get to know better. Lately, though, his dislike wars with attempts at acceptance. Deep-down, the whole gaggle of kiddies are incurably amiable, hopelessly helpful. Hei isn't any of those things. But they're starting to grow on him like a rash does. ]

[ At least Asami is a pleasant package. Intelligent. Polished. Equanimous. Easy on the eyes, too -- although she lacks Korra's fire-witchy allure. But she's Korra's best friend, so Hei schleps his kneejerk unsociability, his dislike for unexpected visits, and steps back, drawing the door open. ]

More or less.

[ Still adjusting to this changed world. Feeling out of sorts, out of place, and in danger of being out of his mind soon, if something doesn't change. With heavy irony, meeting her eyes with a somehow wary but not unfriendly look, he gestures for her to enter. ]

...Come in.

[electric_lady]

Thanks. [She steps inside, her body humming with nervous energy. There are a million things she wants to ask him, but more than anything else, she wants to talk to Korra.]

Is Korra home?

[mortemscintilla]

[ Walking beside her, Hei can feel the nervousness vibrating off her. Nothing like Korra, who jigs and fizzes like a pop-can about to blow -- but perceptible all the same. He wonders: Has something happened to her? and dismisses the stale curiosity in the same breath. Asami's life isn't his concern; he's got enough on his plate already. Hers and Korra's friendship is something that goes on quite apart from him. He only has a keyhole's view into it. (There are times when he wonders if there's something going on between them. But nothing about Asami evokes a real paranoia. She's completely benign. Mostly, he dismisses it as 'girl-stuff' and leaves them to do as they please.) ]

[ (It's the same attitude he'd had with Pai and Amber -- except they'd both blindsided him so completely that he's still left reeling from the shock of it.) ]

[ At Asami's question, ]

No. [ A crawling moment, then: ] I'll fix you something to drink while you wait.

[ His way of giving in to hospitality. An inch's worth. But also a way to keep his hands busy and circumvent that desultory chitchat he hates so much. (He used to be so good at projecting an aura of warmth and courtesy. What happened?) ]

[electric_lady]

You really don't have to -- [Then it occurs to Asami that this might be his way of avoiding her. How often is politeness a facade for avoidance. Is he uncomfortable because they hardly know each other, or because Korra told him about their relationship? That's the real question.] Unless you happen to have some whiskey and green tea on hand. [Not entirely for herself. He looks like he could use a drink too. Besides, Asami's found that a few drinks together helps establish good relationships, and she wants Hei to feel comfortable with her. She doesn't want him to become Korra's ghost boyfriend yet again.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Korra's ghost boyfriend? Given his current status, that's the best designation for him. ]

[ He'd probably tell her, if she asked, that his discomfort has nothing to do with her presence. Merely that flinty misanthrope inside him that always stays aloof, measuring and watching. Much as he's always known that Korra has a whole life apart from him -- a network of family and friends -- it is still strange to realize it encompasses him. Strange to trust the friendliness in these people he doesn't care to know. People who are glad to see him, concerned about his well-being, simply because of feelings that Korra has generated in them, because of his history with her, their connection. ]

[ At her words, he blinks with a precise, almost cyborgian punctuation. How surreal, to hear Korra's friend recommending whiskey. Then, with a flicker of restrained amusement, he catches on. Alcohol smooths out the wrinkles in conversation, true. But for Hei, it just curdles the equilibrium of his worldview. Asami doesn't need to see that. ]

There's green tea. [ A beat, before he unbends enough to tip a wry almost-smile. ] Whiskey too. But maybe it's too early in the day for that.

[ As if he's ever given a fuck. (Maybe he should just break out the bottle. They're a pair of drinkers, by the looks of it -- she for the gloss it offers, he for the way it blurs everything -- and it certainly gives their hands something to do.) ]

[electric_lady]

[Asami is almost thirty years old and has been the owner of a multinational corporation since she was 18; she's a lot more comfortable with alcohol than Korra is. Has a much better tolerance for it, too. She picked up how to use liquor to smooth over business dealings from Varrick... And learned to be mindful of her own intake from his mistakes.]

It's just about five o'clock. I don't think anyone's going to judge.

[mortemscintilla]

[ Almost thirty years old... It's still impossible, sometimes, to wrap his mind around it. Three years have melted away like nothing. The kids he'd left behind aren't kids anymore at all. Often he wishes he could just ask for a cheat-sheet. A powerpoint presentation. Something to bring him up to speed. Korra's world and his world have always had discrepancies, but now what was semi-familiar is just distorted and smashed into unrecognizability. Nothing is the same anymore. Having to ask constant questions, to play mental catch-up every moment, makes him feel stoned, and half-blind and like a lost tourist. ]

[ He tips a shoulder at Asami, a mute All right, and goes to fix the drinks. Truth be told, these few weeks, he seldom has any idea anymore what time it is, feels beyond the need for sleep, coasting on these extraordinary events, out of time. In the kitchen, he leaves the tea to steep (his brew of green-tea whiskey is the equivalent strength and temperature of a hot toddy.) Then, on an idle afterthought, he sets butter wafers on a plate in a fan pattern, before taking down cups and saucers, and wedges of lemon, watching the steadiness of his own hands. ]

[ When the drinks are mixed, a proper blend of peaty bite and sweetness, he sets them on the table before Asami, a neat assortment that resembles sado but is really just his innate meticulousness. ]

[ Cradling the cup, he glances at her from under his lashes, something almost ruefully amused in his gaze. ]

Korra's not much of a drinker. [ Tea or alcohol ] So the crockery mostly sits around gathering dust.

[electric_lady]

[Asami laughs softly, well aware of Korra's habitual informality. It seemed the older she got, the more she decreed that formality was for Avatar stuff only.]

I feel so special. This looks amazing. [Taking a sip of the drink] And tastes even better. I forgot what a master you are in the kitchen. Have you tried Korra's cooking?

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei's smile of thanks is short, a crook at the edges of his mouth that doesn't touch his eyes. Duplicity is second nature for him and he can spot it likewise in others. Same goes for lies and flattery. Asami is capable of none of those things. Like all Korra's friends, her candor is innate; good manners prompted by a sincere wish to get along with him. So he doesn't read into her compliments the way he would with a fellow Contractor. ]

[ Instead, with a quiet neutrality, ]

She made me breakfast when I ... came back.

[ He doesn't mention whether it tasted good or bad. The meal was besides the point. The real novelty -- the surrealism -- was watching Korra cook something edible. Realizing, with a lurch of disorientation, how much time had passed for her, while for him, just the sight of her made it curl up and vanish in a puff of smoke like a piece of burnt paper. ]

[ Keeping his gaze on the cup, wafting with aromatic steam, he turns it slowly in his hands. After a beat, something distant, almost wistful, glasses his eyes. In the next blink, he shakes it off. Rolls his shoulders, and there's a muted crack, like something's sliding back into place. ]

[ When he fixes his gaze on her again, there lurks, past the mildness, a needle-sharp curiosity. ]

You must have spent time with Korra. When I was gone, I mean. You seem close now.

[ For once, it's not loaded with subtext. In his all-encompassing ignorance, he does believe they're just intimate friends, in that warm, unfussy way some women can be. ]

[electric_lady]

[Asami's too practiced to blush. A lot of time together... Yeah, they have. In a lot of ways.]

We did. I'm really grateful. I've wanted to be friends with her from the beginning, but [Mako. Equalists. Disappearances. Alternate dimensions.] life kept getting in the way.

[She speaks a little slowly, trying to consider her words while also examining him, trying to figure out if he knows, if Korra told him. There's something so pointed about the question...]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei would like to believe he's imagining it, that slowness in her tone, the exaggerated care, as if she's treading barefoot across broken glass. But instinct and paranoia are his alarm clocks; he's learnt never to ignore that shrill Screeee of triggered interest. His expression doesn't change when she examines him; no steel or ice or chrome creeps into his gaze. Instead, he continues to turn the warm round of the cup in his cradled palms, watching the small plumes of steam curl from its surface. ]

[ After a slow sip, he murmurs, ]

Some relationships are more rewarding when you start slow. Rush too fast, and it clouds your judgement with a false sense of intimacy.

[ Impartial words that could describe either a friendship or an affair. But mostly a gauge to see how Asami will react -- even if it's a pinpoint of something, a brief flicker. ]

[electric_lady]

I'm not sure I'd call it "starting slow". [It's certainly a weird way to phrase it, especially since Hei is familiar with her and Korra's complicated early history. Starting slow means taking a long time to get to know each other, not starting out as romantic rivals.] But I know what you mean. Mako and I took things way too fast, and it almost ended in disaster. [She can say that without a hint of pain now, even a fair dose of amusement. Her relationship with Mako had all the passion and pathos of being 18... it was never meant to last, only to teach her about herself. She's lucky that she also got three amazing friends out of it.]

What about you and Korra? [She already knows a large chunk of the story from Korra, but she's curious to hear about Hei's take on things.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ He's more than familiar with their complicated history. He had, in the City, once devoted a serious amount of time to studying Korra's friends -- their interactions, their histories, their patterns of behavior. Ultimately, it was a worthless endeavor. The kids posed no threat to his identity, and were hormonally confused and perceptively challenged, to boot. Not worth the paranoia and time. Still, everything he's learnt, everything he's pieced together, makes him cognizant of Asami's slip-up. The way she mentions Korra, and her flashbang disaster with Mako, in the same breath. As if both share the category of former paramours. ]

[ It could be a coincidence. But he's doubtful. ]

[ Something in him feels strange. Empty as a spent casing and just as cold. But it's not rage or jealousy. It's regret. When he's with Korra, he keeps feeling it'll be all right, when she speaks to him, when she holds him, when they eat and fuck and sleep together. But then when he's alone again he knows it isn't, it can't be. It's like having the creeps all the time, like he can't breathe. He doesn't know what his life is now. ]

[ Especially when he is reminded of all the ways Korra's life has re-wired itself. Ways that no longer include him. ]

[ At Asami's question, he hesitates, his natural reticence warring with kneejerk dissimulation, an excuse to try a false revelation, a shared confidence, as part of a campaign to get her to open up, let slip more details about her relationship with Korra. Except he'd tried for it subtly a moment ago. Asami had blocked that approach. ]

[ Well, subtlety is only a tool. There are other tools available. ]

I'd never planned to take up with her. [ The seriousness of his tone makes it almost into an admission. ] There were a lot of ... discrepancies between us. Still are. In ideal circumstances, we'd never be interested in each other. But ... [ He lets off a slow breath, and takes a sip of his drink. ] We went through some very strange ... experiences together. It sparked a pretty strong connection where there should have been none.

[ His expression is hard to read. But something sits in his eyes, a flinty resistance, a mask of bitter ruefulness. (A ploy -- but it'd be interesting to test Asami's reaction.) ]

That's not a good basis for a relationship. Not in my opinion -- though she disagrees. And after spending three years apart, I wonder why she hasn't found someone more suitable. Or if she did, and she doesn't want to tell me.

[electric_lady]

[Not a good basis for a relationship... There's a small part of Asami that perks up at those words, finding reason to hope. If Hei's breaking up with Korra, then that's one less complication. But that's only a small, petty part. Mostly she imagines how Korra would feel, hearing those words. And it hurts.]

I think any time you can make a connection, it's worth celebrating. It's not a question of suitable or unsuitable. [She hates the "optics" of romance, judging relationships on qualities other than how happy they make you.] She loves you.

[The look she gives him isn't that of a rival lover, but someone deeply concerned for her friend's happiness. Do you love her too?]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei wonders: Is she that guileless? Could she truly be concerned for nothing but Korra's welfare? Could she have no agenda, no inclination to facilitate a breakup, to get the interloper out of the way? It seems impossible for a number of reasons. Foremost being how obvious it is -- absurdly, breathtakingly obvious -- that Asami is in love with Korra. It's an ultra-soft but solid love, the way Asami is soft and solid -- a featherbed underlaid in bedrock. ]

[ He'd like to pretend it's not there. But it is, reflected like a green semaphore in her eyes. ]

[ Part of him feels bereft, confused, angry, doubting all his recent choices. She loves you, Asami says. But love and suitability aren't the same. And Asami is suitable, in a way that Hei, with his past, his fuck-ups, his badly-wired brain, the faulty thermostat of his emotions, can't really touch. A year ago, he might have dismissed the thoughts before they manifested. Just insecure garbage meant for stupid girls brewing on the rag. But it's been longer than a year. For Korra, at least. He has trouble believing she's still in love with him -- and not just a pleasant memory of him. If the memories he left her are pleasant at all. ]

[ The gaze he fixes on Asami is flat, but somehow knowing. ]

It's easy for her to love. In ways it isn't for other people. I guess that's why she's easy to love too.

[electric_lady]

[Asami has the terrible feeling that she's being played. His gaze is knowing, while his words are oblique. She can tell he has some sort of agenda, but she can't tease out what it is.

So she takes a cue from Korra, and the disaster with Mako, and cuts straight to the heart of the problem.]

Do you still love her?

[mortemscintilla]

[ Maybe it's her directness, more than anything, that rouses Hei's short supply of sympathy. She's a good girl. A loyal friend, too. For Korra, anyway. Hei doesn't need more friends. He already has more than is pragmatic or tolerable, even if he can count them on three-fifths of a hand. That in itself is three-fifths too many. ]

[ There's a touch of vacancy in his expression, his eyes shuttered like guarded gates. But his tone matches her honesty -- or tries to. ]

I'd leave if I didn't.

[ He's never one to stick around for a lost cause. But love seems besides the point right now. He adores Korra still -- with any still -- but the intimacy seems misshapen, brittle, and he can't feel what he can't feel. Ever since he's gotten back from that stupid space-trek, he's been trying to shrug the sense of detachment, displacement off, but all that happens is he gets further and further from her. And when he looks around at all the changes, at the ways Korra's life has drifted on, something smolders inside him, gives him no peace. He's trying to go on in the usual way, hoping the emotion will catch up with the action. It's a neat theory -- but that's all it is. ]

[ Quieter, ]

I just seem ... superimposed on her life. Like I don't fit. [ If he ever did. A beat, in which he fights down the cold, gut-level chill of unfamiliar candor. In a different tone, ] Was she happy with you? I'm asking because I have no intention of ruining something promising.

[electric_lady]

What?! [She doesn't stammer or freak out, although there's no concealing her shock. Did Korra tell him, or did he figure it out? Either way, what does she say?]

We were never like that. Not together. There's nothing to ruin.

[mortemscintilla]

But you have feelings for her.

[ His tone flattens condemningly at that statement, his face threatening to harden and reveal his private dislike at this fact. But it doesn't last long. Setting the teacup down with a soft clink, he regards her quietly, the cold edges blurring into something else. He's not inclined to be kind or generous, and yet the open dismay of Asami's face works on him, softening him up. ]

[ Finally, simply, ]

If I hadn't showed up, things between you two might have gone differently.

[ Korra might have reciprocated those affections. (If she doesn't already.) ]

[electric_lady]

But you did. That's what matters.

[He's back, and if Korra didn't love him still, she would have told him already. She's intruding. She stands.] I should probably go.

[mortemscintilla]

[ The words plink between them like pebbles into a pond, spreading ripples of something strange and sad. Still, Hei doesn't stop her. She probably needs to be alone to process her thoughts. So does he -- before the door rattles open and heralds the return of his girlfriend once-removed, anyway. ]

[ So he rises smoothly, gathering up the cups to put aside. More out of innate watchfulness than courtesy, he opts to see her to the door. It's only there, as he curls a hand around the knob, does he glance at her. When he speaks his voice is strangely subdued and his face flat and absent, the way people sometimes look when they haven't slept well or have swallowed something bitter-tasting. ]

I'm sorry. That things turned out this way.

[ He's not sure if he means that. He isn't sorry in a hugs and puppies way. It is just an additional strain, that is all, that his unexpected plunge back into their world has swept up everything in waves of complications. It will make the transition from extraordinary and uncanny to How Things Are that much harder -- for all of them. ]

[anatural]

[Too late. Asami opens the door and there's Korra.]

Asami! What are you doing here?

[mortemscintilla]

Making a social call.

[ (Who elected you spokesperson, Hei?) But despite his mild dismay at Korra's arrival, he can't help the happy relief that swells in his chest, bright and buoyant. It is absurdly like her presence has just dragged him out of a dangerous undertow. (It's easy to pretend, when she's right before him, that nothing has changed. But that fervent illusion of rightness never lasts long.)]