The Tea Shop-(Zuko x Reader)

The Failed Escape

I fumble with my thoughts, my heart beating with anxiety. As the sweat permeates my brow, I finally work up the courage to knock on the sizable door in front of me, a door I haven't seen open in quite some years. My knuckles apprehensively rapp against the door.

"Mom? I made you some breakfast..." The silence that I already anticipated reverberates in my ears. I dread these morning talks.

"I'll just leave it at the door." I pause, dimly hoping for some sort of answer, "It's not much but I got another job, hopefully three jobs can be enough to cover rent and food." I sigh and put the bowl of rice and eggs on the floor, finally giving one more hopeful knock at the door before defeatedly walking back to my room to get ready for work.

She's been like this, isolating herself in her room, silent as a monk who's taken a vow, ever since I was 14. I had just gotten home from school, a time when we had enough money for me to get an education. My mother was sitting at the kitchen table, her fingers grasping a wrinkled papyrus page, as if she had read it to fully grasp the content of the letter. Her head bowed in sorrow and her eyes glossed with pure heartache. Before, she was a kind and hopeful woman, always having something to be excited about, but on this day she had run out of the hope that was keeping her alive. The neighbors all knew, silently they all wished for my fathers infeasible return, that after ten years he could magically find us in Ba Sing Se.

I never had the blind faith of my fathers return like my mother. Whether it was because of my young age when my father left us, or the realization that he wasn't coming home after years of waiting.

After my fathers reported death, my mother became a recluse. She turned away her friends and coworkers, completely letting herself become engulfed in anguish. When I realized that I would no longer have a mother to take care of me, I quit school and got any job I could  to make money to support myself and my mother.

My body violently shudders as all my muscles tense, forcing me to sit up in the darkness. The guilt of leaving my mother in Ba sing Se still weighs heavily on my conscience, haunting my sleep as my days are haunted by life in prison. As I start to come back to reality, my breath catches in my throat. I start to remember my failed escape and how a guard carried me away from the prison.

There's no way I'm getting away with this, I'll be put on high security or worse. They probably think it would be easier to deal with me if I wasn't alive at all. My mind races with possibilities as adrenaline begins to pump in my veins. I quickly rip the blanket from my lap and immediately look for a candle to light the pitch black room that I'm in.

My feet drag along the rugged floor, I trace my hands against the walls. They feel soft and pliable, like canvas? Am I in a tent? I try to remain silent as my hands finally find a desk with a long candle with a box of matches beside them. I light the candle and shield it, trying to make myself as scarce as possible.

I take in the new scenery of canvas walls and mismatched rugs along the floor. I try to find the exit but, before I do, a hand is already thrusting through the slit in one of the canvas walls. Taking a defensive stance I try to think of any way I can defend myself.

"Oh, my apologies, I just thought you would want a change of clothes." A kind, familiar face looks at me with concern.

"Mushi? What's going on? Where are we?" My sudden feeling of safety was stripped from me when I suddenly realized the name Mushi didn't belong to that familiar face, his name is General Iroh of the Fire Nation. The expression on his face suddenly shifted when he realized what I was concerned about, somehow reading my mind.

"Please, you don't need to worry. I am not the man the Fire Nation has painted me as, in fact, I'm as much of a criminal to them as you are!" His round face creases into a grin as he lets out a hearty chorle.

I calm down and sit back on the bed. Iroh has already brewed up some jasmine tea to calm my nerves. He hands me the fragile clap tea cup, it's surface full of cracks and chips from years of being outside. But to me, this little teacup is the best thing I've ever held. I watch the leaves sway and rise as I swirl the cup in my hand. I finally take a large sip. I'm right back to my little balcony, in my little apartment, in Ba sing Se.

"I had planned an escape from the prison.Everything was going according to plan, until I noticed not everyone was chasing me." He takes a long sip of his tea before giving a satisfied sigh, "I figured I would see what was going on, and before I knew it you were unconscious on the ground. I didn't know what to do other than to pick you up and take you with me."

"So...Welcome to the old people camp!"