It's my party

[mortemscintilla]

WHO: Korra & Hei
WHAT: Everything continues to be awkward and terrible. At least there is cake.

[ Tonraq's death had cast a pall over Mai's first birthday. But the second -- navigated by the traditional lunar calendar -- falls on a different day of the year, so there is no threat of celebrations and mourning crisscrossing. Korra isn't one for funeralizing anyway, Hei knows. Her father is gone, and she won't let him out of her heart and mind -- he'll always be with her as long as she's alive. But she needs to live, while remembering her existence is defined not just by death. There's loss, but there's also joy. Old sorrow, but new life, too.  ]

[ At least, he figures those are her reasons for this little party. ]

[ Asami had phoned him the week earlier. She'd invited him to brunch at Kwong's, explaining that Korra and Mai would be there. I know you only see them once a week. Maybe it'll be nice to socialize a bit more. Aching to go see his daughter -- but wary of making Korra uncomfortable -- Hei reluctantly declined. In dreams, he saw Korra, Mai and Asami as if in a sumptuous watercolor painting. Imagined them at the restaurant, cozied under the multicolored glow of an expensive stained-glass lamp, sipping tea from colorful crockery. He dreamed, as sloppy brushstrokes filled out the scenery, that they were all relieved by his refusal. He saw Mai's face melting into blankness, a doll devoid of any recognition for him, before the dream shivered away like paper torn into soggy bits. ]

[ He tries not to think about it. Mostly, he keeps himself too busy to think. He's moved out of the dump he'd rented, to the forty-sixth floor of one of the twin high-rises that Future Industries has constructed downtown -- a sleek but affordable complex. He chooses a three-bedroom corner apartment. The place is bright, airy, larger than he needs so most of the rooms go unused. But he likes living on the top floor, with a glittering view of the city, above it all. Also, at the time he'd rented it, it was to his advantage to take a place that didn't fit the profile of what a loner, recently separated and with minimal needs, would take for an apartment. ]

[ (It wasn't his only reason -- sure. But it also wasn't the first time his wishful thinking had blurred so seamlessly with his operational instincts.) ]

[ He's still working with Future Industries. With -- not For. The quirky old tech he'd been assisting has freelanced into weapons manufacturing -- and Hei had resolved to go with him. The arms trade isn't his main interest, though. He's spent the months since returning from the Enterprise rebuilding and restructuring the network he'd left behind. In Republic City, the basis exists for a competitive, free market of intelligence. The police force needs it, the President's entourage need it, as do the Earth Kingdom, the Fire Nation, the Water tribes. The means to access terrorist cells, to infiltrate the dens of well-connected kingpins, to assassinate political rivals, to create elite military units. ]

[ He is working toward developing his own private op. Hell, ever since the furor in the Earth Kingdom, there are new outfits springing up all over, the equivalent of Halliburton and Blackwater and K-Crucible, and it's hard to tell where the governments end and the shady private sector begins. Buyers have got their choice of which faction to gather intelligence, manpower, artillery -- or cannon fodder -- from. Hei intends to make sure his product is better than best. ]

[ (He knows, if Amber were here, she'd be laughing at how his life is playing out.) ]

[ A few nights before the big day, his phone rings late, while he is in bed, his eyes getting heavy over a book. This time it is Korra, inviting him to Mai's birthday. Not a huge celebration -- just a small intimate gathering. Startled, Hei agrees -- before he can think twice about how stupid and heartbroken this will leave him once he's there. He doesn't want to socialize with Korra's friends -- or be reminded of the life he'd tossed away. Doubts, too, that he'll get much private daddy-daughter time with Mai. But it will be enough to see her. She's growing, little by little. He doesn't want her to have no concrete childhood memories of her father beyond their one-hour playtime on Fridays. ]

[ When he first approaches the Beach House, he thinks it has caught fire, but the vapor wafting out of the windows is sweet incense. Something stops him from just knocking on the door; maybe the bright undercurrents of people in the air. Peering through the window, he watches Korra bustle around, her gestures elegant and formalized, like a medieval dance, with a whole host of partners. Tenzin, Pema and the Air Babies. Jinora and Kai. Asami. Mako. Bolin and Opal. And in their midst, impossibly small, the glowy sparkle in her eyes outshining everything in the room, is Mai. ]

[ For a minute Hei just stares at her, as if he is watching some mimed play. His daughter, and Korra -- his best beloveds -- right there on the other side of the glass. A strange object lesson -- of everything he'd almost had, and foolishly squandered. ]

Comments

[anatural]

[Korra stops herself from asking if that was Asami's idea — it's the sort of expensive high-tech thing that Asami would recommend. But it was also a very Hei gesture. As utilitarian as he is, he has an incredible eye for beauty, and it shows in the most subtle ways.]

It's great. [She unconsciously reaches out to squeeze his hand, though she drops it quickly enough as she comes to her senses. You can't fall into old patterns.

A little brusquely, she adds: ] You're going to need some shelves, though — or boxes. Someplace to put her toys so they aren't lying around.

[mortemscintilla]

I'll get a few fabric bins from the store.

[ His pulse rises to a hopeful waver, though his expression remains guarded. Her response isn't a definitive Yes, but there's a promise in the way she demands that he get boxes, mentions Mai's toys as if intimating that she'll be spending more than a single hour here. His heart races at the idea -- slow steady tread, up, down -- and he thinks of the little girl superimposed in the brightly-lit blue room, her soft paddling footsteps, the way she giggles out in high clear joy as she dandles her toys or smears paint across paper with her tiny fingers. Impossible for his mind to maintain its usual cold pitch of sobriety, with memories of his daughter. Happiness always nibbles at the edges of his aloofness, infecting him with warm thoughts. ]

[ From the corner of his eye, he notices Korra's hand flutter toward his -- before hastily withdrawing. Blinking slowly, feeling torn between wishfulness and cynicism, he says, ]

You can ... make a list. If you want. Tell me all the things Mai would need.

[ Her preferred brand of diapers. Powdered milk. Cereal. Her favorite toys. ]

[anatural]

[Korra nods. Making a list sounds reasonable.]

I'll do that before I go tonight.

[She gestures for him to lead on, because he's not the only one feeling wistful. This could have been their home — they could have lived here, together, an actual family instead of broken fragments tentatively held together in Mai's tiny hands.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Held together in Mai's hands. In moments where he's hazy drunk -- sometimes late in the night, when he's a heavy-limbed heap under the bedclothes, one arm dangling off the edge of the futon -- he thinks of himself and Korra that way. Of their separate, outsized abodes, like two doll's houses, where you can lift the roofs to peer inside. He sees Korra, ensconced in bed, one little upturned hand slipping off the pillow and gliding towards the edge of the bed, in his direction. Soon their hands are in perfect alignment, so that, if this really were a doll's world, he could imagine Mai removing not only the roofs, but internal walls and buildings as well, and sliding the two bedrooms into each other, joining the couple's hands like the clasp of a necklace. ]

[ Each time, he thinks what a fucking idiot he is -- before he flips over onto his back, and sinks into restless sleep. ]

[ Quietly, he guides Korra out of the nursery. Their tour is brief -- he shows her the extra room which he's converted into a training area: a cool, austere space, no color, no furniture or scrolls or symbols, only twenty woven mats and walls framed by mirrors, like a dance studio. The bedroom, gray with shadows, is dominated by the narrow neatly-made futon, with a whole wall of windows divided into smallish panes, looking down on the quaint sakura park in the block's interior, a vibrant green-and-pink patch blurred by the dripping rain. ]

[ Back in the livingroom, he zaps their cooling teas, and offers Korra a black square of grass-jelly in a bowl. ]

[ In a stilted voice, ]

So what's the verdict?

[ Baby-worthy -- or not? ]

[anatural]

As long as she can't get the windows open... [Korra has an immediate horrifying vision of Mai discovering she's an airbender by falling out the window, which she shakes off.] And you stock up on actual baby supplies... I think we could stop by for an afternoon a week.

[She pops the jelly square in her mouth as she watches for his reaction. It's a little bitter and earthy and strangely familiar in a way she can't pin down... but she likes it.]

Have you made these before? It's good.

[mortemscintilla]

[ An afternoon a week. Hei's stomach flutters, and some of the lines in his face relax. He's both dizzily grateful -- and quietly incredulous. He's become so used to that heavy space in his chest, the sense of constant futility congealing behind his ribs, stuck in his throat. Since he's parted from Korra and Mai he's grown so heavy on the inside, everything within him thickening and chilling and hardening. An effigy of the real Hei -- whoever that person is. ]

Okay.

[ The shocky happiness is so raw it's an effort to force the single word out. Trying to cover up for the feeling, he piles the quivering jelly-squares into his own bowl. Takes precise bites. Delicious -- not too sweet, with a pleasantly herbal aftertaste that goes straight up the sinuses and seeps right into his skull. At the window, shapes blur in the rain: the apartment swims underwater. Or is that just a trick of light? ]

[ Blinking, he glances up at Korra's question. ]

The neighbors sent them over. They're from a new bakery downtown.

[anatural]

So you've actually gotten friendly with the neighbors here? [She takes another piece of jelly and pops it into her mouth.] I'm surprised.

[Which she really shouldn't be. He's always made some kind of connection with his neighbors, at least in most of the places they've lived. That old couple in the first apartment they slept together in, the kid in his first apartment here... She's just gotten used to the way he isolated himself when they lived together.

The thought disturbs her a little. She takes another piece of jelly and goes to look out the window.]

I haven't seen Yin in awhile. How's she doing?

[mortemscintilla]

[ It's true he'd withdrawn completely while he was living with her. After filing through the countless number of roles he'd played before he'd met Korra, it was hard not to treat his new (honest, Syndicate-free) life like a deep-immersion mission in itself. It always felt odd to talk to people who weren't Korra. It was as if he'd completely inverted sky for ground, and she had become the bright little sun in his orbit. Spending time with anyone else was irrelevant. ]

[ Maybe he'd known -- in a gut-shocky premonition -- that his days with her were numbered. That their precariously-spun peace could fall apart at any moment. So he didn't want to miss any more of his sweet time-out with her than was strictly necessary. ]

[ Later on, he'd want to cherish every bit of it. ]

[ Since he's moved out -- and up, in Republic City's social ladder -- he's cultivated a new persona. It goes with the privatized intelligence outfit he's running: a discreet and slyly competent professional, his influence quietly spiderwebbing across the political sphere into an elaborate barbed-wire net. He knows that cover would lack crucial verisimilitude if he stayed absolutely reclusive. When Asami suggests a fundraiser, a formal dinner, a jet-setter get-together -- and if his silent partner-in-crime, the ex-tech, wheedles him to wrangle up venture capital backing -- he goes. ]

[ To his considerable relief, he has little to do with the typical party-manner hypocrisy at these events. The men he meets immediately separate themselves from compliant wives and mistresses, shake hands as if testing his grip, and discuss business bluntly and succinctly. Men he can relate to -- if not always respect. There is a method to his introductions: he meets no small-fry businessmen, no fronts, no lower-end politicians, but active players in military policymaking and espionage -- men who, as he rises, he'll be dealing with often. ]

[ Neutral-faced, eyes half-lidded, he watches as Korra drifts to the window. Her attention seems fixed on the shimmery rainfall across the glass; an afterimage of the shifting droplets plays on her face. Her profile is pure, throat-catchingly beautiful. It's an effort to yank his wayward libido on the right track and answer her. ]

She's fine.

[ Less subdued, less ephemeral, by the day. More human, in fact, than he'd ever imagined a Doll could be. He visits her at least twice a week; brief moments that buoy him up with a bittersweet calm, a sensation of wistful sanctuary. ]

[anatural]

I'm glad. I'll have to visit her sometime. [Korra feels bad for how she let Yin drift away once they came to her world. As fond of the other young woman as she still is, Yin became an afterthought so easily.

Korra blinks a little as a peculiar kind of fuzziness creeps up on her. Maybe I just need to sit down. She plops abruptly on the couch.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Hei blinks as she slumps across the couch, a pretty jellyfish-legged heap. He starts to get up, except there is a familiar, faint tingle of something at the base of his spine, the beginnings of a fizzy heat-wave. Breathing in carefully, he rises, then lets it out slow and evenly. Something's wrong. ]

[ Glancing up, he stares at Korra with a surface calm, a muscle in his jaw ticcing once. ]

...You okay?

[ His voice rises barely enough to make it a question; the pitch laps peculiarly at his own ears, sleep-syrupy. ]

[anatural]

I'm fine. Just a little lightheaded. [In a way that feels rather familiar... Korra tries to think when she's felt like this before. Hunger dizziness? Food poisoning?

Does it look like Hei is about to fall over? She frowns, and reaches out for his hand.]

You should sit down. [She's so close to figuring out why this feeling is familiar, if she could just think a little more clearly.]

Who gave you the jelly again?

[mortemscintilla]

[ She reaches for his hand, and the muscles flex down his arm, transmitting into motion before he can control them. Gently, he folds his palm across hers, thumb circling the pulse point -- habit and tenderness melding together -- before he lets their fingers curl together. He doesn't sit. He stays standing, while the room ripples perceptibly at the edges, her grip a warm anchor. ]

[ At her question, he frowns. There is a buzz in his ears; like fluttering moths, or maybe his own disconnected thoughts. ]

My neighbors...

[ Dubiously, he flicks his gaze toward the squares of glossy jelly. Then, with a plodding deliberation, it clicks. ]

...Oh...

[ Try it with condensed milk and tea. It will help you unwind. Their exact words, though he hadn't given it much consideration at the time. He knew their routines, their backgrounds; nothing about them set off his radar. They didn't seem likely to poison him. ]

[ But offer him loaded sweets with a well-meaning but poorly-timed generosity? Oh yes. ]

[anatural]

[If she were sober, Korra's mind would probably jump to paranoid fantasies, but she's buzzed enough right now to recognize it as an innocent mistake.]

Don't let Mai eat anything they make. [And she leaves it at that. It feels weird having him stay standing, so she tugs him down onto the couch next to her.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ She's taking this whole thing with remarkable equanimity. But, Hei reminds himself, that's likely the effects of the body-stone. His own paranoia -- always a quiet, low-level simmer -- has likewise evaporated. He has an image of someone opening up their heads like a pair of tin cans, and taking a slender needle to draw out the juice from that three-millimeter area of their brains that is the fear center. ]

[ At the tug of her hand, he glances down. With a blurred shock, he thinks she's so close, even as she seems so vanishingly far these days. That little gesture of hers, that way of tipping her face back to look up into his height, reminds him again of her teenaged self, more than any particular feature. She is still enveloped by that same, strange, wonderful luminosity: a quicksilver liveliness. ]

[ Against his will, he reaches out. A splay of fingertips across the curve of her cheek, skimming her jaw and chin -- before he gently detaches the other hand folded around hers. He settles next to her -- tilted out of alignment so they can face each other across one couch, feet nearly touching left to right, his socked foot near her leather-shod one. ]

[ His mouth feels disconnected from his brain. Blinking slowly, he wills both of them to syc up. ]

Should I call you a cab?

[anatural]

[Her eyes flutter as he strokes her cheek, and a tremor runs through her entire body. Fuck. She really ought to leave. He even offers to call her a cab, but she shakes her head.]

No. I can't go home stoned. [That's a perfectly good excuse, isn't it? When the real reason is she doesn't want to leave him, is enjoying the lack of tension and the feel of desiring him without the guilt that usually comes along with it.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ I can't home stoned. He can't explain why that tugs the suggestion of a wretched out-of-place smile on his lips. Maybe the idea of her returning to Mai -- who already babbles like she's in her cups, her cadence exactly the same as a drunk trying to explain why their pants are on that bush over there or why they've stuffed baby carrots into their socks. That perfect mix of utter conviction and complete incoherence. ]

[ What adventures she and stoned-Korra could get up to.... He imagines them on a casual sunlit afternoon, attempting to eat cereal, read picture books -- but with screwy circuitry. Shredding the book's pages into a bowl and pouring milk on it. Shaking cornflakes over the table. Morbid hilarity. ]

[ A sound escapes him, halfway between a hiccough and a hum. It is followed by another. His mouth twitches, then splits, the sound turning into a chuckle, then a barking Huh that rings off the white marble walls. Blinking in shock, he covers his mouth. Except he is sliding down the couch; on reflex, he grabs Korra's arm, but only succeeds in pulling her with him. They sit down hard on their tailbones. ]

Mai already talks like she's stoned.

[ He imparts this in a half-whisper, as if confiding a delightful secret. ]

[anatural]

Hei! [What is he doing? Is he diseased? Stop dragging her down with him! ...except his laughter is making her laugh and it's impossible to stop.]

Sh-she does not! [Korra leans into him, trying to make her point, trying to breathe. And maybe, more than anything else, just indulging herself. It feels so good to touch him like this. She winds her arms around his waist and nuzzles closer, still trying and failing to hold back giggles.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ She giggles -- a beautiful, bubble-bright sound -- and Hei dares to sling her closer, an arm around her neck. She smells of flowers, warm grass and a hint of sunbaked sweat. Against his will, he shivers all down one side and presses himself into the curve of her flank. Logic gnaws at the edges of his mind: the comfort of this stoned disorientation won't last long. When the drug fades from their systems, Korra will be livid. He can fully expect accusations, temper, threats of never seeing Mai again. ]

[ Squeezing his eyes shut, he forces the fear away. Whatever happens will happen. Right now, it's as if time has collapsed; renewing itself into something slower yet faster. Something entirely theirs. ]

[ His hand curls with hers, squeezes. Rubbing her fingers with his thumb, he is entranced by the warmth of her skin, by the way it makes all his reserve evaporate like an alcohol in the heat. He's not laughing anymore, but his face is relaxed into the cursory lines of a half-smile. Her hair is like heavy tufts of fur -- soft and fragrant. Resting his cheek against it -- that old remembered spot at the top of her skull -- he asks, ]

Hungry? That table is all set out.

[anatural]

Mmm. [She shivers and hungers for something that's not dinner. Something that is most definitely not on the menu.]

Food. Food would be smart. [At the same time, she can't bring herself to pull away from him. The wall she put up after he broke her heart, that she erected to protect her daughter and shored up with every hurt she could remember... who knew it would take so little drugs to break through? A few pieces of loaded candy and it's like it didn't exist.

It should anger her, but instead it just makes her sad. Sad that she can't build a stronger defense for herself and her daughter, sad that a defense is even necessary.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Food would be smart. Nodding in quiet agreement, Hei draws his head back and gazes down at Korra. In the light-washed darkness, her pupils are enormous, ringed by perfect blue. Her look is thoughtful, though, and sad. He feels held in place by its transparency. She's never been difficult for him to read. Right now, it's as if the drugs have brought her thoughts shimmering to the surface. ]

[ He's hurt her so many times. In so many ways. Of course that's the reason for all the sticky bits between them, the places where her sense of wariness and caution rubs too hard against her natural instinct for joy. Impossible for her to get any pleasance out of their interactions, when she's too concerned with making sure he stays well on the right side of the line. After he'd betrayed her the first time -- the first of many times? -- she can't take any more chances. ]

[ A thick, hot grief churns in his stomach. It tries to creep up Hei's throat; he swallows forcibly. ]

[ Blinking, he stares at Korra's lovely little face. His senses tilt and twirl, blown petals spun into a colorful riot by his movement, with Korra the only thing that is steadying him. His hand stays loosely threaded with hers; the other lifts to stroke that upturned face he once saw every morning over tea, before he kisses it. It is a soft, shy butterfly-peck and he knows he'll regret it later. On the surface, he can only smile, radiantly if nervously. ]

[ It is not a line crossed. It is a reassurance. ]

Let's do the smart thing, then.

[ Gently, he detaches, ready to get up and coax her to the dining table. ]

[anatural]

[She feels empty when he pulls away. She wants to continue the kiss, deepen it, but he's pulled away and she's not drugged enough to be stupid.]

Yeah. [She stands up and follows him to the dining table. The delicious smell of food is enough to soothe most of her disappointment, at least. She plops down at the table and immediately shoves one of the empanadas in her mouth, moaning as her tongue explodes with flavor.]

Oh man, this is so good.

[mortemscintilla]

[ She still eats with the same charming gusto. Seated at an angle from her, Hei tries not to let it get to him. Except sometimes he doesn't know what to say in the face of Korra's enthusiasm, or to her literal face in which liveliness disguises such beauty that he can imagine a normal man would have thrown himself on a knife in sacrifice to it. Even now, after everything seems scattered, wrong, broken, there are moments when he looks at Korra and recognizes that he'd wanted this girl -- or someone like her -- for as long as memory stretches. Wanted these elements, at any rate, as starkly as a child wants snowfall or superpowers or a caped wonder-woman. ]

[ He'd just been waiting, like a boy standing at a fence in twilight surrounded by snow and emptiness and silence, looking at a road down which no one ever came. ]

[ Quietly, ]

I've packed a few for you to take home. With date congee for Mai.

[ It sounds like a subtle prod for her to leave. Except nothing about his manner is unwelcome. Sitting across from her -- chewing with steady precision at his empanadas -- his gaze is completely benign, a hint of chemical wonder overlapped by something close to pure, human absorption. ]

[anatural]

She really loves that stuff. [And suddenly she's gut-punched with sadness, so that she can hardly swallow the food in her mouth. She puts the rest down and stares at her plate.] She asks about you all the time, you know. Every time someone comes over, she gets really excited, thinking it's you. She hasn't figured out yet that this whole situation isn't normal... but she's going to soon.

[Korra wishes she wouldn't. Wishes she didn't have to. Wishes there was nothing to figure out.]

You can't fuck this up. You can't. I want you in our lives but you can't fuck this up.

[She's babbling and high but completely sincere.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ I want you in our lives. It should be a victory call, church bells, the meow of a lucky cat. Instead her words fill him with ineffable sadness. He wants to look away, but the seriousness of her expression pins him in place. She's right: he can't fuck this up. Not again and again. Except sometimes he wonders if that's all he's capable of. He can never tell her about the dreams he has -- where he's back in the City, watching Pai step through the shimmering gateway of their world. Except this time he isn't resigned to leaving without her. As soon as she is enveloped by that blinding light, out of his arms, he knows he's made a terrible mistake. So he takes off after her. Each time, there's a lot of running around, everything so dark and vertiginous, like at any moment he'll tip off a huge cliff and plunge to his death. ]

[ But that isn't the terrible part. Worst is that the whole time he's careening off after his sister -- Mai has been left all alone. Not just all alone, she's just forgotten, like no one knew she'd been born, that she was there. He can't explain it; it's just a chilling low-down vibration in his gut, that certainty of dreams. When he finally notices her screaming -- which he's been hearing and ignoring all the time he's stumbling around trying to find his sister -- when he goes to her, bereft of Pai, disoriented and lost, he finds she's blue and cold and motionless. She isn't ... ]

[ Forcibly, he shakes it off. He knows it's only a dream. But he keeps thinking about how he'd been so caught up in his own disconnection, so tethered to his awful past, that he'd failed Mai. He can't even describe the shame, it's like there's a sick deck of cards in his head, the memories being endlessly shuffled and dealt. He can't make it stop. Because he didn't do right by Mai -- or Korra. First he wronged her and then he wronged his own innocent child. ]

[ He lets off a wavery breath, purses his lips. His eyes are on Korra, but he seems to be looking far away. There is an old sadness in his eyes, a grief hammered so hard into him that it is just part of him by now, as if he'd been bored tired of the world. ]

[ Softly, ]

You and Mai ... You're the only people that mean anything to me. I know ... I keep making things terrible for you. I keep losing myself, over and over. And each time it gets worse. I want to do better. But -- [ He dips his gaze, exhales a sigh that is shaky and strangely self-conscious. ] Unless I'm absolutely certain I can be that person ... It's better if you keep me at an arm's length. We can't pick up where we left off. But we can take things step by step.

[anatural]

[Her secret, shameful impulses & temptations wither, die. The drugs aren't strong enough to go against his words and common sense both.

Step by step. She stands up.] I'll make that list for you. Do you have something I can write on?