[ Toph has the snappy retorts of any disgruntled teenager, but she doesn't want to actually be mean to anyone, and she certainly wouldn't stop helping out as magic ambulance because she was having a bad day and got into an argument. She hadn't understood that line at first when she was first traveling with Aang and Katara and Sokka, but over time, thanks to them and especially Katara, she's come to understand it better.
That doesn't mean she just gives it up in an instant, but Ethlyn's refusal to argue with her makes her scowl more deeply. She lets out a long breath and folds her arms. ]
Fine. What do you think I should make statues of?
[ This is something like an olive branch from Toph, who means the question in complete seriousness. ]
[Well, Toph doesn't look happy to have nothing to yell back at, but she's not yelling back, so Ethlyn breathes a small sigh of relief.]
Well... what about your friends? The ones you remember from before you came here.
[It's the first idea that comes into Ethlyn's head. Yes, Toph is blind and maybe she doesn't know what their faces look like, but her earthbending allows her to perceive much--and Ethlyn's sure Toph knows how they feel to her, anyway.]
[ She certainly does. The details of their faces may not be totally clear to her (she doesn't do the blind girl thing of touching peoples' faces to learn their features, thanks) but she knows them. Toph's been painfully missing them for a while now, since even before she came here, honestly -- after the war they'd all scattered and only run into one another occasionally. Nothing like the worldwide field trip they'd been on together before.
Ethlyn's suggestion hits home more deeply than Toph wants it to, and it works. She doesn't say anything, she just turns to the pile of scrap metal contorted to look like Toph, and starts bending.
There's a clear distinction from how she'd been approaching it earlier -- it really was just letting off steam, rough and quick. Now, making a statue of a real friend of hers, she's careful and deliberate. The process itself forces her to settle, the focus required shifting the tenor of her frustration from anger to sadness. The resulting form that takes shape is much smoother than Toph's previous efforts, the impurities of the metal delicately ironed out, and there's a sense of motion to the figure that wasn't there for Toph's statues of herself, which simply stood in place.
It's Katara in a waterbending pose, and although Toph doesn't try to add the water itself in a still metal statue, her hair flows around her. There's a lack of detail to her facial features, but everywhere else a sense of care in how Toph makes sure to include the hair loopies and the water skin at her waist.
Finally she steps back, much calmer, quietly sad. ]
This is my friend Katara. ... You remind me of her.
[ And if Katara ever saw this lovingly crafted statue of her, she would never let Toph live it down, but that's the kind of sisterly friends they are. ]
[Ethlyn has witnessed Toph's earthbending a few times--when they met as Toph was skating across the meadows like a frozen lake, when Toph strode at the walls because they would open before her, and just now when she's been pummeling random junk into a self-aggrandizing display.
No, this is far more deliberate and painstaking than those efforts. What takes shape is a female form, strong, mobile, and almost liquid in its pose.]
Beautiful. [Ethlyn steps towards the statue, reaching out to touch it carefully. She's not familiar with this fighting art, but it's clear that it is a fighting art.] Did you get along with her just as well as you get along with me?
[There's a teasing tone to the question for sure, but it is one Ethlyn has to ask. She can tell how subdued Toph is, recalling this person's presence in her life--and thinking about her absence from it now.]
[ The teasing surprises a snort out of her, subtly improving her mood. It's easier for Toph to discuss her real feelings if she isn't treating it so seriously. ]
At first? Yeah, just about. We still argue sometimes. She's always trying to take care of me.
[ Why Ethlyn reminds her of Katara is probably immediately obvious. ]
So that's... [Well, she knew Toph had pride, that's not what's the revelation, it's just... the way she put it that spells it out so clearly.] No wonder. Oh dear.
[She shakes her head.]
It's not because you're blind. Or younger than me. My brother is a knight two years my elder and he used to complain about it all the time.
[ Toph huffs, grumpy, but with more long-suffering tolerance than earlier. Having to exercise her precise control in making the statue of Katara helped settle her irritation. ]
It doesn't matter why, I don't need it, [ she asserts. ] We can be friends, but not if you keep trying to act like I need a mom.
[ They seem like diametrically opposed and completely different things to her. Toph's experience of her parents is one of either submitting to their demands, or losing them entirely -- whereas her friends are the ones that really feel like family, where things are even, fair, can be negotiated between them. She probably wouldn't be able to put such a fine point on it if she hadn't had that talk with Sokka about it months ago. ]
[There's no way Toph can know the way that assertion feels. Ethlyn stops laughing and goes still, her hand still on Katara's arm.
Maybe Toph's mother is very overbearing, insists on her being a proper little lady, doesn't like her excessively blunt speech and lack of decorum, doesn't want her stomping in and out of mountains like they're air. That would be a likely explanation. Maybe her mother is overprotective. Or maybe Toph just your typical head 12-year-old who thinks they know everything.
Those explanations all cross Ethlyn's mind as a reason to try and keep her composure. She's not angry at Toph, she just... suddenly feels twelve again herself.]
I guess it's hard for me to understand that about other people. I lost my mother when I was about your age.
[ Taken aback, there's a reflexive impulse to apologize, but the moment settles into a short stretch of silence instead. ]
... Katara lost her mom when she was little, too. [ Toph reaches out and gives Ethlyn a healthy punch on the shoulder. ] That doesn't mean you need to be everyone else's mom. That's how I show support, by the way.
[ Since they're making peace and having a heart to heart, Toph will offer this initial translation of her affectionate punching. ]
[A punch in the shoulder? How very boyish. Ethlyn's seen it plenty, but she's never had it from another girl, much less one almost ten years her junior.
...Fittingly, it feels like Toph saved up all the punches that Ethlyn would have gotten if she was about.]
You show it very unmistakably. [It's said with a laugh, even as Ethlyn rubs her arm. She's not surprised to hear that Katara is like that for the same reason as herself. Nobody else is there to be the mother, so you take it on because you have to.] It's not an easy habit to break, but I'll try to do better with you. I won't ask you if you ate your breakfast, or if you brushed your teeth this morning, or if you're keeping up with your studies....
Anyway, she's hardly going to convince Ethlyn to stop treating her gently if Toph doesn't do it herself in return. And she's rewarded immediately with Ethlyn laughing a little and seeming to relax. Toph smirks to herself in satisfied victory. ]
You can ask -- just don't tell me what to do.
I usually eat breakfast, I sometimes clean my teeth, and I don't study.
[ The sudden reminder of how obviously Toph had shown her sentimental side with this statue of Katara brings her to a sudden halt, flustered.
Overly assertive to make up for it, she insists, ] Okay, but if Katara shows up here and you tell her I got all mushy about her, I'll make you regret it. Got it?
[ Welcome to real friendship with Toph: casual threats that she absolutely means. ]
Oh, don't worry. I'm sure she knows how you feel about her... she won't need me to tell her about it. [So reassuring.] I can only imagine how inventive you'll get about your revenge if I let her know about this conversation.
Right, right. [Ethlyn raises her hands--she keeps doing that, doesn't she, even though it's useless for Toph.] I won't tell anyone who doesn't know, either. You have a reputation to maintain.
[Those words could be sarcastic, but they aren't. Thrust into the adult world at a young age, there are many ways to hide your own weaknesses... but the fact is, you do have to hide them.]
Twelve is no time to show everyone all your vulnerabilities. You just chose a more... aggressive method than I did.
[ Wow, Toph is totally sensitive enough to feel body language like hands being raised -- this is why she doesn't need a mom!!
Anyway, this further explanation causes Toph to raise her eyebrows, surprised and impressed at the acuity Ethlyn shows in the response. ] I'm thirteen, for the record, and glad to hear you aren't all sweetness and care packages. Why did you have to hide your sore spots?
[ It occurs to her belatedly, in the way of children everywhere, that she actually knows very little about Ethlyn as a person and about her background. ]
My family was one of high social standing. That meant we had rivals--enemies, rather. [At thirteen, Ethlyn hadn't comprehended the depths of their hatred for her father, but what she had known was hard enough.] When I stepped into my mother's place as a representative for the family, they had no scruple about seeing me as our weak point.
[Those had been hard days. She had the benefit of being trained in etiquette already by her mother and her tutors. But those lessons hadn't prepared her for women and men who behaved like snakes, just waiting for her to stumble into range of their venom.
Of course, there was nothing unacceptable about sly acid comments about clothing or cleanliness or the amount of time it had taken for the Chalphys to appear at social functions again. But to get angry--visibly angry--or even to refute such comments directly? Criminal.]
If you let yourself be provoked, it doesn't just reflect on you, but your whole house. And then the insults get worse because now your mother and father failed to raise you properly, which is worse, and you still have to not get provoked, and then you have to keep your older brother from shouting and making it all worse. It's worse than trying to ride through marshlands.
[ She can't really be surprised to hear that Ethlyn is from the snake pit that is noble politics given her overall demeanor, and it makes Toph grimace in sympathy and distaste. She has absolutely never looked back on her decision to abandon the Beifong fortune and status. She misses her parents, but she's rather scrape her own way along than bow to useless twats who don't deserve it.
Living with it takes a kind of strength she respects, however, and she knows not everyone can afford to just ditch their whole privileged life without serious consequences. Like Zuko. If he wanted to abdicate and run off, the whole world would fall into war again. Probably it isn't that serious for Ethlyn, but dire personal consequences are still dire. ]
I know exactly what you're talking about, [ Toph answers in a dark tone. ] I can't stand all the verbal dancing around in 'high society'. [ She sounds openly scornful. ]
I left all that behind -- it was making me crazy. ... But I know not everyone can. I have no clue how you've stayed this genuinely nice if you've been putting up with that for years.
[ She has no problem whatsoever calling out strength when she sees it. It isn't threatening to Toph to acknowledge someone else excelling, especially in an area she knows she herself doesn't. Sure, she can put up the front long enough to sneak into a party, but living that way for years on end, authentically?
[Ah, so Toph is a runaway. Like Tailtiu, but with a much different attitude--while Tailtiu was defiantly flippant, Toph is defiantly... defiant.
It's still shocking that Toph is so young to have taken that step, though. Even with her impressive earthbending skills, to set off into the unknown like that must have been daunting.]
...I am very lucky in the family that I have. [Not everyone is.] My father was never as concerned with his social standing than he was for our own happiness and well-being. If we were puinished, it was for doing something that was actually wrong, not because we hadn't been sufficiently charming or witty or spoken too directly.
Even after the most taxing trial on my patience, I knew that I would go home and vent all my frustrations with my older brother, or outrun them riding alongside my father. And later on I did those things with my husband. But I know that it was far from common.
[Lucky again, because when it was time for Ethlyn to think about marriage, Lord Byron's first thought had been for his daughter's happiness. That she was happy with the prince of an allied country was more a stroke of luck than a real consideration.]
[ It actually was daunting, in that it hadn't even occurred to her as a serious option until Aang essentially begged for her help. That appealed to her pride, but it also brought into sharp focus how untenable it was to keep living the way she had been. Where was that going to go? Marriage, like Ethlyn, but in her case probably to someone who'd never respect her for who she is?
Toph was fortunate to have fallen into a different kind of family, one she trusts absolutely and one that accepts her the same way. So she has a whole support system now -- even if it isn't her parents. As for the current conversation, Toph doesn't really feel the need to compare their situations any further. It's not a contest, and she's glad for Ethlyn that she had what sounds like the best possible version of that scenario. ]
Yeah, that'll make a big difference, [ she agrees. ] Getting to go home and be yourself. That's what Katara and Aang and everyone else are for me. Whatever happens, we know we've got each other's backs.
... When we're in the same place, anyway.
[ See, she does know how to have an emotion out loud. ]
[That's what home is, when all is said and done. It doesn't mean where your blood kin reside, not always. That's why Tailtiu left, Ethlyn thinks. Now she wishes she and her sparking cheerfulness were here, just so she and Toph could know each other.
...It would be nice to see any of them here. Not only because of what she's sure happened to most of them.]
Yes... Even when you're far away from a bed and surrounded by people who would attack you as soon as they see you. [Despite the wistfulness, Ethlyn smiles.] I hope that one day I can meet yours, and you can meet mine.
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expiationlogs2024-04-14 10:44 pm
no subject
That doesn't mean she just gives it up in an instant, but Ethlyn's refusal to argue with her makes her scowl more deeply. She lets out a long breath and folds her arms. ]
Fine. What do you think I should make statues of?
[ This is something like an olive branch from Toph, who means the question in complete seriousness. ]
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Well... what about your friends? The ones you remember from before you came here.
[It's the first idea that comes into Ethlyn's head. Yes, Toph is blind and maybe she doesn't know what their faces look like, but her earthbending allows her to perceive much--and Ethlyn's sure Toph knows how they feel to her, anyway.]
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Ethlyn's suggestion hits home more deeply than Toph wants it to, and it works. She doesn't say anything, she just turns to the pile of scrap metal contorted to look like Toph, and starts bending.
There's a clear distinction from how she'd been approaching it earlier -- it really was just letting off steam, rough and quick. Now, making a statue of a real friend of hers, she's careful and deliberate. The process itself forces her to settle, the focus required shifting the tenor of her frustration from anger to sadness. The resulting form that takes shape is much smoother than Toph's previous efforts, the impurities of the metal delicately ironed out, and there's a sense of motion to the figure that wasn't there for Toph's statues of herself, which simply stood in place.
It's Katara in a waterbending pose, and although Toph doesn't try to add the water itself in a still metal statue, her hair flows around her. There's a lack of detail to her facial features, but everywhere else a sense of care in how Toph makes sure to include the hair loopies and the water skin at her waist.
Finally she steps back, much calmer, quietly sad. ]
This is my friend Katara. ... You remind me of her.
[ And if Katara ever saw this lovingly crafted statue of her, she would never let Toph live it down, but that's the kind of sisterly friends they are. ]
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No, this is far more deliberate and painstaking than those efforts. What takes shape is a female form, strong, mobile, and almost liquid in its pose.]
Beautiful. [Ethlyn steps towards the statue, reaching out to touch it carefully. She's not familiar with this fighting art, but it's clear that it is a fighting art.] Did you get along with her just as well as you get along with me?
[There's a teasing tone to the question for sure, but it is one Ethlyn has to ask. She can tell how subdued Toph is, recalling this person's presence in her life--and thinking about her absence from it now.]
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At first? Yeah, just about. We still argue sometimes. She's always trying to take care of me.
[ Why Ethlyn reminds her of Katara is probably immediately obvious. ]
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Ethlyn bursts out laughing.]
So that's... [Well, she knew Toph had pride, that's not what's the revelation, it's just... the way she put it that spells it out so clearly.] No wonder. Oh dear.
[She shakes her head.]
It's not because you're blind. Or younger than me. My brother is a knight two years my elder and he used to complain about it all the time.
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It doesn't matter why, I don't need it, [ she asserts. ] We can be friends, but not if you keep trying to act like I need a mom.
[ They seem like diametrically opposed and completely different things to her. Toph's experience of her parents is one of either submitting to their demands, or losing them entirely -- whereas her friends are the ones that really feel like family, where things are even, fair, can be negotiated between them. She probably wouldn't be able to put such a fine point on it if she hadn't had that talk with Sokka about it months ago. ]
no subject
Maybe Toph's mother is very overbearing, insists on her being a proper little lady, doesn't like her excessively blunt speech and lack of decorum, doesn't want her stomping in and out of mountains like they're air. That would be a likely explanation. Maybe her mother is overprotective. Or maybe Toph just your typical head 12-year-old who thinks they know everything.
Those explanations all cross Ethlyn's mind as a reason to try and keep her composure. She's not angry at Toph, she just... suddenly feels twelve again herself.]
I guess it's hard for me to understand that about other people. I lost my mother when I was about your age.
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... Katara lost her mom when she was little, too. [ Toph reaches out and gives Ethlyn a healthy punch on the shoulder. ] That doesn't mean you need to be everyone else's mom. That's how I show support, by the way.
[ Since they're making peace and having a heart to heart, Toph will offer this initial translation of her affectionate punching. ]
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...Fittingly, it feels like Toph saved up all the punches that Ethlyn would have gotten if she was about.]
You show it very unmistakably. [It's said with a laugh, even as Ethlyn rubs her arm. She's not surprised to hear that Katara is like that for the same reason as herself. Nobody else is there to be the mother, so you take it on because you have to.] It's not an easy habit to break, but I'll try to do better with you. I won't ask you if you ate your breakfast, or if you brushed your teeth this morning, or if you're keeping up with your studies....
no subject
Anyway, she's hardly going to convince Ethlyn to stop treating her gently if Toph doesn't do it herself in return. And she's rewarded immediately with Ethlyn laughing a little and seeming to relax. Toph smirks to herself in satisfied victory. ]
You can ask -- just don't tell me what to do.
I usually eat breakfast, I sometimes clean my teeth, and I don't study.
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[She steps away from Katara. Maybe one day she'll get to meet her.]
I don't know what you plan to do with all the trash statues, but you should keep this one up.
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Overly assertive to make up for it, she insists, ] Okay, but if Katara shows up here and you tell her I got all mushy about her, I'll make you regret it. Got it?
[ Welcome to real friendship with Toph: casual threats that she absolutely means. ]
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Oh, don't worry. I'm sure she knows how you feel about her... she won't need me to tell her about it. [So reassuring.] I can only imagine how inventive you'll get about your revenge if I let her know about this conversation.
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[ god, Ethlyn, you just still don't get it ]
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[Those words could be sarcastic, but they aren't. Thrust into the adult world at a young age, there are many ways to hide your own weaknesses... but the fact is, you do have to hide them.]
Twelve is no time to show everyone all your vulnerabilities. You just chose a more... aggressive method than I did.
no subject
Anyway, this further explanation causes Toph to raise her eyebrows, surprised and impressed at the acuity Ethlyn shows in the response. ] I'm thirteen, for the record, and glad to hear you aren't all sweetness and care packages. Why did you have to hide your sore spots?
[ It occurs to her belatedly, in the way of children everywhere, that she actually knows very little about Ethlyn as a person and about her background. ]
no subject
[Those had been hard days. She had the benefit of being trained in etiquette already by her mother and her tutors. But those lessons hadn't prepared her for women and men who behaved like snakes, just waiting for her to stumble into range of their venom.
Of course, there was nothing unacceptable about sly acid comments about clothing or cleanliness or the amount of time it had taken for the Chalphys to appear at social functions again. But to get angry--visibly angry--or even to refute such comments directly? Criminal.]
If you let yourself be provoked, it doesn't just reflect on you, but your whole house. And then the insults get worse because now your mother and father failed to raise you properly, which is worse, and you still have to not get provoked, and then you have to keep your older brother from shouting and making it all worse. It's worse than trying to ride through marshlands.
no subject
Living with it takes a kind of strength she respects, however, and she knows not everyone can afford to just ditch their whole privileged life without serious consequences. Like Zuko. If he wanted to abdicate and run off, the whole world would fall into war again. Probably it isn't that serious for Ethlyn, but dire personal consequences are still dire. ]
I know exactly what you're talking about, [ Toph answers in a dark tone. ] I can't stand all the verbal dancing around in 'high society'. [ She sounds openly scornful. ]
I left all that behind -- it was making me crazy. ... But I know not everyone can. I have no clue how you've stayed this genuinely nice if you've been putting up with that for years.
[ She has no problem whatsoever calling out strength when she sees it. It isn't threatening to Toph to acknowledge someone else excelling, especially in an area she knows she herself doesn't. Sure, she can put up the front long enough to sneak into a party, but living that way for years on end, authentically?
No way. ]
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It's still shocking that Toph is so young to have taken that step, though. Even with her impressive earthbending skills, to set off into the unknown like that must have been daunting.]
...I am very lucky in the family that I have. [Not everyone is.] My father was never as concerned with his social standing than he was for our own happiness and well-being. If we were puinished, it was for doing something that was actually wrong, not because we hadn't been sufficiently charming or witty or spoken too directly.
Even after the most taxing trial on my patience, I knew that I would go home and vent all my frustrations with my older brother, or outrun them riding alongside my father. And later on I did those things with my husband. But I know that it was far from common.
[Lucky again, because when it was time for Ethlyn to think about marriage, Lord Byron's first thought had been for his daughter's happiness. That she was happy with the prince of an allied country was more a stroke of luck than a real consideration.]
no subject
Toph was fortunate to have fallen into a different kind of family, one she trusts absolutely and one that accepts her the same way. So she has a whole support system now -- even if it isn't her parents. As for the current conversation, Toph doesn't really feel the need to compare their situations any further. It's not a contest, and she's glad for Ethlyn that she had what sounds like the best possible version of that scenario. ]
Yeah, that'll make a big difference, [ she agrees. ] Getting to go home and be yourself. That's what Katara and Aang and everyone else are for me. Whatever happens, we know we've got each other's backs.
... When we're in the same place, anyway.
[ See, she does know how to have an emotion out loud. ]
no subject
...It would be nice to see any of them here. Not only because of what she's sure happened to most of them.]
Yes... Even when you're far away from a bed and surrounded by people who would attack you as soon as they see you. [Despite the wistfulness, Ethlyn smiles.] I hope that one day I can meet yours, and you can meet mine.