it's the solstice

[arclightning]

Who: Mako, Wu, & close CR
What: They might be in a different world, but the solstice is the solstice, and that means it's time to feed everyone you care about, if you're Mako
When: Night of December 21st
Where: Mako and Wu's loft above the Raccoon Room

Content warnings: Sadness from potential memory-share stuff, homesickness, mentions of Mako and Bo's dead parents

© TESSISAMESS

If you have close CR with Mako or Wu, in the days leading up to the Winter Solstice—December 21st—you may have gotten a small text invite in your inbox. A few simple lines inviting you to the Raccoon Room on the night of the 21st for dinner "because it's the solstice." Normally the Raccoon Room is closed early in the week, but on the 21st they've opened it up.

They're actually having people over in the loft above the Raccoon Room, and their living space is decked out in lanterns and candles to keep out the long darkness. Snow falls quietly outside, but in here it's warm and it smells like ginger and pepper. Wu's put on a few scratchy records in the background. Here and there, Winter Mournings are hung, not quite out of reach. It's very easy to accidentally or purposefully touch one.

If anyone comes in early enough, Mako is still at the counter with his sleeves rolled up, rolling dumplings, covered in rice flour. Maybe help him cook? He's looking better than he was early in the month: his skin is the correct pallor without that odd gray cast, and there's no smoke rolling off his body, so that... has to be good!

For the later arrivals, Mako's made dinner, which means hot tangyuan in gingery broth, an entire bowl of mushroom noodles for sharing, and a simmering pot of broth for people to cook things in, as well as a lot of a tangy sauce that Mako gets kind of cagey about when people try. Sit down, enjoy some hot pot! It's a time to be together, after all.

[ ooc: tag around, top-level, have a good time! ]

Comments

[arclightning]

[ It is truly a toss-up in Mako's head whether Fern means "rapping" like some of the music Wu likes or "wrapping" like gifts. Can you be sick at wrapping gifts? That has to be more slang, and Mako's pretty sure it means... good? ]

Be...cause of the wrapping?

[ Maybe Fern will give him another context clue because Mako cannot possibly hazard a guess which one it is right now. ]

[laminae]

[Fern isn't even considering alternative meanings to rapping. Or wrapping, rather, because NEPTR and sick beats are synonymous in his mind.]

Yeah! Well, maybe? That makes might be more Wu's jam. But I think you'd appreciate just how far he can fling a pie!

[He makes a gesture like he's throwing a pie. At the dinner table. It's super appropriate.]

Swoosh!

[arclightning]

[ Mako, who has not had to have table manners in years, just kind of snorts as he watches Fern. ]

Yeah, he does sound pretty impressive. You got more people here, right? Who you want to be around.

[laminae]

[Who needs manners!! Not them!]

No one from home, but a whole lot of people from other worlds, yeah. Varian, for one. [He's grinning and blushing, to the surprise of no one.] I'd follow him to the end of the world and back.

[arclightning]

You... almost did.

[ Mako points out with a quiet smile as he picks up another mushroom to dunk into hot broth. He taught himself table manners out of something like survival, knowing that the way he and Bolin were percieved would mean everything. ]

Right? And he'd follow you.

[laminae]

[Fern blinks a second, then grins.]

Hey yeah, I did. [He's pretty proud of himself, that's a rarity.]

Yup. The whole reason he's here and not back in Corona is because he didn't want to leave me.

[Which is kind of sad and still makes him feel guilty, but it's still a choice Varian made and he loves him all the more for it.]

[arclightning]

I don't blame him. I know that's why a lot of people stuck around.

[ Which makes Mako think of something he really should have told Fern already. He busies himself with tugging his mushroom free from the broth and then dropping in a pickled green thing, stalling slightly. ]

Did I, uh. Tell you that Wu and I tried? To go home?

[laminae]

[He nods at that as he crams more soup into his mouth. Yeah, there were a lot of people in Deerington in his situation, people who couldn't just go home for one reason or another and had people who cared about them in the town.

Mako's next remark has him surprised.]

You did? Seriously? Why?

[arclightning]

[ Mako glances at Wu, across the room talking to Manabu and very pointedly not looking at Mako, and sighs. ]

It's... complicated. You know Wu's the Earth King. Was. The Earth King, I mean.

[laminae]

[Fern nods slowly.]

Yeah, he's told me he isn't interested in ruling. He's really into democracy.

[arclightning]

That's true. He doesn't want to be. He never wanted to be, but there wasn't anybody else left, so...

[ Mako waves a hand to indicate, you know, the entire complex political situation in the not-actually-here Earth Kingdom. ]

Point is, even though he doesn't want to rule, he knows that he's the only one who would actually lead his people into a democracy, so we... figured we had to go back. Just in case. He couldn't abandon that responsibility, even though every single part of him wanted to stay here. We told each other we would, but.

[ Wu's laughter rings out over the murmur of conversation, and Mako's heart constricts as he looks up involuntarily, seeking out green and gold. ]

Wu's a great person. He couldn't.

[laminae]

[He nods again. Wu had explained it to him, not wanting to be king. Fern, having come from a world where half his friends were royalty in some form, had initially been confused, but he gets it now.]

He was giving up his own happiness to make your whole world better, that's really selfless of him.

[Fern doubts he'd ever be able to make the same choice, if he was in a similar position.]

Both of you should be really proud of yourselves for being willing to do that.