To a legendary Math teacher who brought out the very best in me...
oooooooooo
For the next four days Azula managed to stay out of detention. Zyra had to admit, she did cut the girl some slack here and there, some mouthed comments during class she pretended not to hear, but other than that the effort was there. The fifth day, however, the girl shoved a classmate so hard the smaller girl almost tumbled down the stairs. Zyra had to act then, so her and Azula were back where they'd started in the, now completely painted, empty room.
"I really hoped we wouldn't be spending time here again until the library was opened."
"What do we do now?" Azula asked, looking at the floor.
Zyra hadn't mentioned what happened when she asked about the girl's mother, but she had been thinking about it. Even more that that, tying to get more information from other sources so she'd be ready if the girl decided to confide in her. But Azula hadn't. Hadn't mentioned it, hadn't spoken to Zyra, hadn't looked her in the eye too much even.
"Something a little different, a longer project."
"Longer than painting the room?"
"Probably." Zyra drew out three sheets of paper. "We'll take one of these paintings and paint a bigger version of it on this wall."
"A wall painting? Why?"
"To brighten up the room. This is a kids' school."
Azula rolled her eyes, but Zyra didn't hold it against the girl. "Fine..."
"You get to choose which one."
Azula unsurprisingly chose the least colorful painting, showing a sunset over a vast landscape. Zyra knew she wasn't much of a painter, but she was ready for a challenge and she was sure Azula would relax a bit, laughing at her silly drawing skills. This was supposed to be punishment, yes, but the girl had been through enough lately.
"First, we'll draw the outline with this and then we'll add color. It'll be easy... I'll go get the paints." And with that Zyra left to raid the art supplies closet. The school's supplies were a joke in this regard. She made a mental note to resupply it with her own money. "I just realized we don't have any green, so we'll just have to mix some yellow and..." She returned to the soon-to-be library only to find Azula was almost finished with the outline. "Blue."
"What? Is it bad?" Azula asked, standing in front of an almost exact sketch of the painting they were trying to recreate.
"No, it's absolutely amazing... But Azula," Zyra managed to drag her eyes from the wall and to the girl. "I meant to do that. I just wanted you to mix colors for me. I didn't know you were good at drawing..."
Azula kept her face still, but her eyes betrayed her and sparked at the compliment. "I'm not. It's a useless skill."
"Well, it's useful here. I can't do that... You maybe want to paint this, while I mix the colors?"
Azula just shrugged and carried on drawing the lines of a perfect tree. Then, after making a few more adjustments that seemed unnecessary to Zyra, the girl took up one of the brushes and started painting the downmost edge of the wall. After watching it happen for a few minutes, Zyra couldn't hold her tongue any longer.
"And you're sure you never practiced this?" she asked.
"Not really... At least not recently. I used to do some painting when I was a child." The girl only got a stare as a response. "Alright, when I was a younger child."
"Well, I think you should try it from time to time. See how good you can get with practice. Maybe even find a tutor."
The girl chuckled then, refreshing the paint on her brush. "A painting tutor? My father would lose it... I mean... Can you imagine? You can't."
"It's not such a crazy idea. Maybe you'd enjoy it." No one would hurt you in those lessons, Zyra had to stop herself from saying.
"I probably wouldn't. It sounds like a waste of time... I'm a Princess and drawing won't help me serve my nation. It won't help us win the war."
But it could help you feel happier.
There was some silence, while Zyra tried to get the shade of green exactly right for the grass.
"Thank you for not... Making a big deal out of Tuesday," Azula whispered, but made sure Zyra heard her. Tuesday. The day the little Princess collapsed into her arms and sobbed.
"Of course not. But I still stand by what I said. I'm here if you want to talk."
"I don't. Really." The girl diverted her gaze. "That was just a one-day blunder, I'm fine. I won't do that again."
"Azula, out of all the things I saw you do and say, that is definitely not the one you should be embarrassed of. It's perfectly normal." Zyra reached out and touched her shoulder. "I promise you."
"Well, I'm not upset anymore. I think that it's over now, I don't need to talk. My brother is the one who's taking it hard." The girl paused slightly there, like she wasn't going to continue, but did it anyway. "Every night, I hear him crying."
oooooooooo
Azula caught herself looking forward to working on the painting with Miss Omori. Looking forward to their talks too. The woman tried to ask about her mother, about Zuko and her friends, but they mostly talked about history. Azula read the new textbook she'd gotten cover to cover once already. She'd managed even though it took a lot of late-night reading under the light of her firebending. The teacher never shuddered at Azula's ideas or thoughts, even the ones that were particularly violent or merciless... She only offered a counter opinion, sometimes just smiled to herself. Azula even tried saying some truly heartless things, it wasn't hard to come up with them, she'd just quoted her father, but the woman still didn't look shocked, just offered her opinion.
The more time they spent together, the less Azula felt the need to challenge the woman in the classroom, so she stayed out of detention for a few consecutive days. Then one day Ty Lee tried a new hairstyle with two braids instead of one. Azula'd told her she didn't like it, and Ty Lee went to sit elsewhere during class. It was because of Miss Omori that she dared to do that without fearing the consequences. Azula wasn't just losing power there, it was nearly gone. Once Ty Lee had left, Azula heard Crooked and Chubs talking about Ty Lee's hair and chuckling. At least there was still one power she had. Azula set the fat girl's desk on fire and lied that she was aiming for her head.
Once she got to detention, Azula discovered Miss Omori had been working on the painting without her. She then insisted the addition wasn't good and made the woman paint over it in white. Azula tried to ignore it, but she couldn't. She cared about this stupid painting and she wanted to come to this room every day.
That's why the day after, when History class was almost over and she still hadn't gotten detention that day, she tripped Mouse over her foot as the girl was passing her desk for no reason. The day after that she called Crooked a low-born imbecile. And the day after that, she made Mouse cry by commenting on her singing voice.
"I know what you're doing, you know..." Miss Omori said one day, as Azula was painting the slight details of the water surface on the wall.
"I'm not really good at reflections, but I'm trying to make it-"
"What I meant was... You don't need to torture Amaya every day if you want to come here and paint." Amaya. That was Mouse...
"But this is punishment. It's not enjoyable, I just want to finish it as quickly as possible."
"Is that so?" After the teacher watched her work on a piece of the painting the size of a nail for fifteen minutes and with three separate brushes, Azula wasn't sure he strategy would work. "Then you wouldn't mind arranging those boxes over there as your punishment while I paint?"
"Not at all." Azula lied and handed over her brush. She watched from a distance as Miss Omori chose the exactly wrong shade of blue and slowly moved her hand towards the wall. "Alright, alright!" She took the brush out of the woman's hand. "I like it," she whispered and sat back down next to the teacher.
"Then we agreed. You won't do bad things just for the sake of doing bad things and you can come here and paint with me every day."
"I can't, you don't understand... I have tutors waiting for me at home, I can't delay them without a good reason."
"Azula, you are nine years old. Having fun is a good reason. Relaxing also is." The woman took her brush to get her attention. "If you told them you wanted to stay, I don't think anyone would have anything to say about it."
My father would. The Fire Lord returned to the capital two days ago and Azula still hadn't told him about Miss Omori. About detention. At first, she waited for him to ask why she returned so late, but he didn't. So she thought about going to talk to him, but then realized if she did, the face-painting in class would stop, there would be no more extra work and books, and definitely no more painting.
"I can't..."
"I guess, we could say that I'm punishing you for something you did while we were alone." Hearing that Azula immediately nodded. "But if we're doing that you have to really behave the rest of the day. I mean that."
"Alright." Azula nodded again and the teacher returned her brush. "Thank you."
"I find out you did something to Amaya or Sora or any of your other regulars in other classes and-"
"Fine!" Azula rolled her eyes. Like she was a wild animal or something... "What if one of them is making fun of me?" Or my friends?
"Then you tell me."
"What if they attack me, now that I've shown weakness?"
The woman chuckled until she saw the seriousness in Azula's face. "Of course, you can defend yourself, but you cannot attack them first. But they're not going to do that..."
Another nod. Then Azula remembered. "What if you find out about something I did before this deal?"
Miss Omori turned from the paints to stare at her. "What did you do?"
"Hypothetical."
"Don't give me that... Come on, no consequences."
"Mai, Ty Lee and I, we were responsible for the green paint incident." Azula confessed and waited for a reaction. The teacher just buried her head in her hands, only a laugh escaping them for the next several seconds.
"I may owe Mr. Akagi an apology..." The woman finally managed.
"What?"
"I was so sure it wasn't you... It didn't really seem like your style at all. I just assumed it was one of the other teachers, and the one with access to the art supplies seemed like the obvious choice."
"What did you do?"
"I really shouldn't..." The woman thought about if for a second. "Let's just say someone dunked some pretty strong glue into his bag." Azula let out a short laugh. "Every day for a week."
Azula was sure teachers weren't supposed to do that. Or adults. Or proper ladies.
"Well, don't tell him it was you," Azula said and got another laugh out of the woman. "Why would he even do it?"
Miss Omori got back to mixing her colors. "Some of the teachers had a problem with me teaching here because I'm a woman, I thought they were trying to scare me away. One of them even wrote to my brother to get me out of here..."
"Why?"
"Those matters are a bit complicated, but you're a smart girl so I should at least try... You know, we raise boys and girls entirely differently, we separate them until they're men and women and then we're surprised when they have no idea how to act around each other."
Azula nodded because that made sense. Most of what Miss Omori had to say made sense, whether Azula wanted to admit it or not. Except one thing...
"Why are you so nice to me?" she asked, still looking at the painting.
"What?"
"The book and no consequences and... Everything."
"I just... Care. About everyone here. That's what teachers are supposed to do, care."
"No, they're supposed to have knowledge of a specific subject, that's it."
"You girls are still young, almost anyone can teach you addition. People should only do this if they really care. Care about you growing into smart, kind and strong young women."
"Then shouldn't you still be punishing me with things I don't like?"
"Would you like me to?" The teacher smiled.
"You can do that all you want, I'll never be kind," Azula said the last word with such disgust, that it made the woman's smile widen.
"Recently, I thought about it and I realized I can't use my authority to make your life horrible, if I want you to stop using your authority to make other people's lives horrible. I realized I needed to try harder to understand why you do it."
"It's not my mother! I told you-"
"I know." Miss Omori put a hand on her shoulder and Azula immediately calmed. "I believe you. I think you do it to get some fear inspired loyalty. Am I close?"
Spot on.
Azula turned her head away. "Doesn't matter. I lost it."
"And why do you think they listen to me?"
"You're an adult. You're our teacher..."
"Did they listen to the other History teachers? Or did they listen to you?"
Azula turned back violently, a small smirk on her lips. "Because they were weaklings, some of them even-"
"And you think I'm stronger?" The woman paused. "You want your people to be loyal to you, you have to be loyal to them. You're a princess and you'll be a great military mind one day, it would do you good to remember that."
"So they listen to you because you saved them from me..."
"And I never had to use fear. You're almost the only person I've had to punish."
"But you've still had to be strong. A coward can't do what you did."
"Yes, that is exactly what strength is about. It's cowardly to torture someone weaker than you. It may make you feel strong in the moment, but the truly strong protect those weaker than they are."
And as Azula thought about that, she slowly started feeling embarrassed about a lot of things she'd been doing.
oooooooooo
Zyra wasn't sure if Azula really understood everything she was trying to convey to her, but one thing was for sure, she understood the part about following the rules from then on. During the next week, every time there was someone threatening the order, Azula was there to scare them into stopping. And there was a lot of rule breaking since after the removal of Azula as a threat, every one of the girls thought they could do whatever they wanted. It took Zyra till then to realize that class never got any discipline besides Azula's tyranny.
"21 BG," Mai answered. That was new, as well. Mai was actually rising her hand in class now that she didn't fear Azula's ridicule, and she was usually correct. Not this time, though.
"It's actually 12 BG," Zyra corrected. Her words were immediately followed by laughter from behind. Azula turned and shot Sora and her friends a deadly stare. Most of them quieted in an instant, but not Sora.
"What are you going to do?"
Zyra was just about to step in when Azula said, "Do that again, and I'll gladly go to detention for you."
The girl rolled her eyes, but stayed quiet.
"After that revision," Zyra interrupted the tension. "I think we're ready to move on to the next lesson."
"Miss!" Amaya rose her hand and Zyra gave her permission to speak. "Can I get my face painted too today?"
It was a tradition and it appeared to be sticking, since the girls reminded Zyra to paint her face every time they were learning something new.
"I don't see why not." Zyra walked to the girl and started painting her cheek green. "You just have to remember to wipe it off before you leave. I don't know if the other teachers would approve."
oooooooooo
Zyra honestly enjoyed painting as much as Azula did. For the first week or so, she didn't do any actual painting, instead leaving it all to the girl as not to challenge her perfectionism. Then a few weeks in she asked Azula if she could teach her some things. The girl wasn't really thrilled about it at first, but found she liked telling someone older what to do.
"You're using the wrong brush again," Azula said, not even moving her eyes from her own work. Zyra hoped she wouldn't notice.
"I prefer that one. You can't even tell the difference."
"Maybe you can't tell the difference, but I certainly can. It's sloppy. Switch."
"As my Princess commands..." Zyra mocked and shot Azula a quick smile. Since they were working on the higher parts of the painting now, the girl was standing on a chair, which made her stand taller than her teacher. It was a fact the princess noticed and enjoyed.
"And make longer strokes. Like-" Azula was in the middle of demonstrating when the chair under her feet wobbled. The girl managed to regain her balance, but Zyra jumped to steady her anyway. That's when they both saw it. Almost falling down, Azula drew a long brown line over a considerable part of the painting that was already finished.
Zyra wanted to immediately start saying how it wasn't a big deal, but she willed herself to stay still. She just watched as Azula took in what happened. As her fists clenched and tears started filling her eyes.
"It's ruined..." the Princess said, calmly at first, making Zyra think she might have worried in vain.
That's when the Princess started hitting the wall with her brush, drawing line after line, splattering the paint and smudging the parts that hadn't dried yet.
"Azula."
"It's ruined! It's all ruined and I ruined it! I'm so stupid!"
Zyra needed a way to calm the girl, a way to get her to just take a deep breath and listen. Nothing was coming to mind... Then she dipped her fingers in some red paint and gently smeared it over the girl's cheek in one quick motion.
Azula froze immediately and fixed her teary eyes on Zyra. The girl didn't say anything, just stared for a few moments, like she wasn't sure if she understood what happened, before taking her brush and painting a part of her teacher's face in a rage. Zyra retaliated with blue paint.
"You can't do that!" Azula screamed. "I'm a Princess!"
"It'll come off, Princess." Zyra moved slowly and placed the last bit of blue paint on the girl's nose before wiping her hand. "Things like that line, or this spot happen. Things get messy, problems escalate... You have to find a way to be okay with that. Do you understand where I'm coming from?"
Azula wiped her eyes, slowly turning back to look at the mess she made on the wall. It really was ruined now. The one line might have been salvageable, Zyra though, but what Azula did after wasn't.
"I can't believe we have to paint over the whole thing now. I... I'm sorry I'm so incompetent."
"Don't say that, Azula. You made this whole thing with minimal help from me."
"And I ruined it all on my own." Azula looked down and folded her hands. While it was an improvement the girl wasn't blaming anyone else, but seeing her fault, being this hard on oneself was never good.
"What if I told you I could fix it?" Zyra asked and took the girl's brush.
"I'd say you're delusional. I mean, look at it!" Azula said and watched for a few moments while Zyra connected some of the new brown lines. "What are you getting at?"
"It's going to be a tree."
Azula took a few steps back to see if she could picture it in her mind. "It'll look like garbage. It's no use. Might as well have a plain old white wall..."
"Hey! I worked hard, you worked harder, it's not going away because of a little accident. Now do you want to paint this tree over it, or should I keep going?"
"I'll do it." Azula took the brush and that's when Zyra remembered they both had paint on their faces.
"Deal. But let me clean this first." Zyra found a clean cloth and dunked it in water. While she wiped Azula's face, the girl wasn't successful in hiding her sniffling. She was really upset by this. Zyra felt compelled to say something again, even though she'd already reached that day's level of life advice with the girl.
"You think you'll fight on the front one day?"
"I know I will," Azula said. No doubt in her voice, no hesitation.
"Well, take it from me then, there are no do-overs out there. You make mistakes, you don't get to forget the whole thing, you have to keep going, fix what you did."
Azula pulled back hearing that, even though she still had a substantial red spot on her cheek. "But if you use your head, you can make a plan that-"
Zyra shook her head. "Plans don't really last long in war. That's why the best commanders I know are all resilient in their planning. They count on imperfection, they change strategies in a second given new information."
"You served?" Azula asked and Zyra nodded. "I knew it."
"How come?"
"Just... The way you walk sometimes."
Zyra was genuinely surprised to hear that. "There was this drill sergeant that didn't really like a noble girl in his camp, so he decided to give me a hard time about my posture. He thought I was jut there to prove a point... He was wrong, of course," She pulled the girl closer to clean the rest of her face. "I was only there because my best friend was."
"Did you let the sergeant have it?"
"I'll have you know, Princess, I wasn't some crazy vigilante. But to be fair, my friend and I did eventually try out the old scorpion-viper in boot trick on the sergeant."
"Did that kill him?"
"No, Spirits, he just whined like a baby about it for three days... It was my going away present, since I left the army soon after that. Not because of him, but because I didn't really have a high respect for the chain of command. It wasn't for me."
"You're getting my hair wet!" Azula pulled away once again.
"So? We'll let it out to dry for a while and-"
"No!" Azula dodged Zyra's hand when the woman tried to undo her top-knot. "We aren't supposed to have our hair completely down in school."
"I'm sure, given the circumstances-"
"No, I just... I don't like it down. People don't take me seriously that way."
"I'll take you seriously, Azula," Zyra tried, but it wasn't really working. "I'll tell you what, you let your hair down, I'll let mine down too."
"Okay," the little girl said after a while.
"Okay?"
"Okay."
Zyra sighed deeply and drew several giant pins from her hair, before the braid uncoiled and fell down her back. It went down longer than her waist now, but she had no intention of cutting it. She undid the braid next and caught Azula with a surprised little glare.
"Your turn."
The girl turned around and Zyra undid her top-knot too. The girl's raven hair fell down a bit past her shoulders. As Azula turned back around a few strands of hair fell over her face.
"This is what I mean..." She tried to blow the strands away, but they fell right back down. "If you call me cute, I'll-"
"I won't." Zyra smiled. "You still look like the fierce young lady you are."
She handed the princess a brush.
"You know, I've never met someone with hair longer than my mother's. Why don't you cut it?"
"What? You don't like it?"
"No, no... It suits you for some reason. I just thought it'd be impractical."
"I just like it."
Zyra couldn't tell Azula the real reason, of course. She was just a child. She didn't need to know how they cut off all of Zyra's hair when her family disowned her and she was banished with shame.
oooooooooo
"And you all want your faces painted?"
The whole class nodded. Well, almost the whole class...
"There's no way we have time for that," Azula said.
"You might be right about that..." Zyra started and the girls all sighed. "I'll tell you what, we'll be way quicker if I split the work. Azula, you could do half."
"What?"
"You're a pretty good artist, you could do half the face painting." Zyra waved for the girl to stand up. "Now, the rest of you separate into two lines."
Zyra's instructions were pretty clear, but when she looked up, all the girls were in a line in front of her, while Azula stood a few steps away, completely alone. No one was meeting her eyes.
"Girls, I promise you, Azula can do a much better job than I can. Give her a chance-"
Zyra truly felt bad seeing the look on the Princess' face. She'd been trying to be good, Zyra had seen it and rewarded it, but she couldn't make the other children do the same. Azula was their tormenter for so long, Zyra couldn't in good conscience make them accept her back. It was a part of learning how to be a good person, accepting that even though you did everything right you weren't entitled to anything. Other people weren't forced to appreciate it, or return it, or even forgive you for what you did before.
"I don't even want to do it," Azula said, and to the girl's credit, it almost sounded genuine. "I think it's a waste of time and that we have better things to do."
"Me and Mai want you to paint our faces." Ty Lee walked to Azula dragging Mai after her.
"Yeah, why not." Mai shrugged.
"Great. Anyone else?" Zyra looked at the other girls one by one.
Oh, great and powerful Spirits, please...
"I'll do it if I can go first." Amaya raised her hand. Everybody looked to her. She was the shortest girl in the entire class and Azula loved picking on her. She probably did so ever since they knew each other, yet this little girl strolled up to Azula without fear.
Zyra focused on doing her share of the painting then but stole the occasional glance over to the girls with Azula to check if everything was going smoothly. Surprisingly, she even caught them smiling one time since Azula's brush apparently tickled. Once Azula was done with Amaya's face everyone stopped what they were doing to look.
"What? What is it?" Amaya asked, and Zyra handed her a little mirror. "It's... It's beautiful! I'm pretty now!"
The girl squealed. Azula had painted a simple, yet surprisingly gorgeous dragon on one of the girl's cheeks.
"Oh, I love him!" Amaya ran back to Azula. "Thank you! Could you paint another one on my arm later, so I never have to wash him off?"
Zyra didn't miss how the Princess' eyes glistened at the question and the praise.
"Yes, I could."
In a few seconds a lot of girls decided they wanted Azula to paint their face after all, and Zyra couldn't be happier to finally see them all interacting in a positive way. Azula even let each of them choose the color of their dragon.
However, it was a challenge to get all of their attention back afterwards to actually go over the lesson intended. Maybe this was the wrong day to start that tradition... But Zyra couldn't help herself sometimes. She couldn't resist making this place more fun for her students since it seemed everyone else was trying their best to make it as uninviting as possible with their strict rules and uniforms. No matter how much everyone liked to forget it, they were just little kids.
Once they finished their lesson, Zyra handed out wet cloths to everyone to wipe their face with.
"We have ten more minutes, I don't want to kill Smokey yet." Amaya whined.
"You named the dragon?" Taka chuckled, before Azula glared at her disapprovingly. "Cool, I guess..."
"I'm sorry, Amaya, but I will ask all of you to clean up now." Zyra came over and stroked the girl's hair. "Since our next topic really isn't festive in nature..."
"What are we doing next?" someone asked from the back.
"We finally came to the year 1 AG. Now, can anyone tell me what event marks the transition from 1 BG to 1 AG?"
Azula raised her hand and got a nod.
"Fire Lord Sozin's great defeat of the Air Nation's armies."
"Yes, that is what it says in your textbooks. In all the textbooks. But when I was your age, a friend of mine trusted me enough to tell me the truth. Since then I've verified it and, even though it's breaking a lot of rules, I'll now tell all of you." Zyra spared a glance at Azula, taking in the girl's confused expression. "When the Great Comet came Fire Lord Sozin used it to attack all the Air temples, that much is true, but there was no battle. The Air Nomads, they didn't have an army, weapons or a chance to surrender. The Fire Nation didn't come to win, conquer and hold, but to destroy." She stopped herself before she mentioned they slaughtered thousands of men, women and children. As she looked around at the young faces surrounding her, they all had some mix of fear and confusion.
"It's not true!" Azula yelled out, equally to herself and to the room. "It's not!"
"I know it might be hard to hear, but it is the truth. Just remember, what happened then is not our fault now. The Fire Lord today is not the Fire Lord then. We are not our ancestors and we can always do better."
oooooooooo
Azula's good at painting now... Sue me, okay, I think it's cute! And I love the idea of her having an artsy talent she basically hides because her father is...well, the worst. And I thought of singing first, but then I'd have to write song lyrics, and NO ONE wants that.
That's why the title is paint related... I was thinking about like second coat of paint, like painting over the screwed-up part of the painting and about like second coat of paint, like undoing what Azula's parents screwed up. Like a double meaning. But idk, don't give me stories to name... XD
Anyway, yeah, Azula's starts making amends. Detention is now a reward. We get some of Zyra's backstory, I'll probably get into that a lot more.
This time the dedication's for a teacher that I had in high school for one year and she managed to raise our class average by one whole grade. Not because she was lenient, but because she did her fucking job and taught us Math. Still remember her whenever I have to find the limit of a function (which is far more often than I'd like).