Letters From Iroh

Where the Ocean Meets the Sky

I woke up to the sound of snoring.

"What?" I thought to myself, surprised that I had already fallen asleep. I glanced over my shoulder, and saw iroh still in his uniform, sleeping with his arm around me. I grew somewhat annoyed that he seemed to be more interested in me than in reuniting and directing his crew, as a general should.

I nudged him. "iroh." I whispered fiercely. "Iroooooooh" I slapped his back, and half whispering, half talking at my normal-level of speaking, which was pretty loud, I may add, semi-yelped "iroh! Dammit, wake UP!" all of a sudden he shot up in the bed.

"What?" he looked confused. His hair was all messed up, tangled and matted. "What time is it?" he slinked out of the bed and trekked over to the window adorning the wall of my cabin. "It's dark out." He noted, before turning around, walking back over to my bed, and, without removing his overcoat, sliding back underneath the blankets. He rolled over, sighing, "Goodnight love."

I was thoroughly confused. "Woah. Woah. Woah." I snickered. "Wait just a minute there, lazy. What's gotten into you? Why are you not with your crew? You can't just sleep here, you know."

He groaned. I was definitely wrong about him being a morning person. He was grouchy when he was tired. He wasn't even an early-evening person when he wasn't properly rested. "It's our month off." Iroh said, raising his hand up to search for the part of the red blanket that adorned the beds in all of the cabins, and pulling the majority of the coverings over himself. "Let me sleep, love."

I was still thoroughly confused. "wait." I snapped, yanking the covers off of iroh as he groaned heavily. "You owe me some answers. Is every month your month off? Do you guys ever fight anything or anyone?"

Iroh sat up, and after rubbing his eyes a few times, regained his normal composure. He laughed a bit, noticing how he'd been acting like a ten year old. "You know, Bao." He began, "it'sfunny you should say that." He turned to smile at me. I was not in the mood to smile back. I was actually pretty annoyed.

"Why?" I asked, impatiently.

"It's been a year since you left!" he laughed a bit.

"Why is that so funny?" I asked, still annoyed at the fact iroh was in my room, and seemed to be overwhelmingly too comfortable. I had told Sidka I wanted my space. I was starting to feel scared again.

Somehow iroh hadn't picked up on that. He placed his hand on my shoulder and began speaking sternly, didactically, and almost like a teacher. "Because, love, it's the time of year when we go to Ember Island. It's been a year since last time. This is the only month we do get off a year. Don't you remember the schedule? You worked here!"

I didn't want to let on that after I had left Iroh's ship I didn't give a flying koi-fish about keeping up with the dates or times or months that passed by. I was too miserable to think of my life slowly passing away without me being able to do anything about it. "I guess I just lost track of time." I began, slinking out of Iroh's grip."And I just want to be clear on something, else." I paused, taking in Iroh's somewhat taken aback expression. I didn't want to hurt him, so I chose my words carefully. I didn't want a repeat of what happened a year ago. "I want us to remain professional as a couple." Iroh relaxed a little. "I want you to sleep in your room." I paused, as iroh wasn't getting up. "And I want to sleep here. Alone."

He looked puzzled, and then seemed to understand a bit better. I picked up on the fact that he seemed a little more comfortable with what I was getting at and continued, "it's just that I am not one to quickly jump into things, and I want the crew and some other people on the ship to respect me, and you, and not think of me as someone easy, someone who's in this for the perks and not for real love. I'm sorry if I'm being confusing, in fact I don't really know what exactly I'm saying even, and I just think it'd be better if we treated our relationship like we're dating and not like we're already married. I mean some things are just sacred and I think sex is one of them and I just-"