It's been about a day since we've arrived in Ba Sing Se. We managed to find a small home for a low price in just a day. The city was nice, I didn't have any problems with it just yet.

Zuko and I were walking through the lower ring - wait, I do have one problem with the city. The segregation. I won't complain on that too much though.

"Pretty!" I smiled down at a necklace. I picked it up and held it in my fingers. The necklace was a royal blue with as rhinestone that was a pretty shade of green dangling from it.

"Excuse me, how much for the necklace?" I asked the stand-keeper.

"12 silver pieces." He responded with a forced smile.

I frowned, "I don't have that much."

"How much do you have?" He asked me.

I pulled out the silver coins from my pocket and counted them on the palm of hand. "Uh, six sir."

He nodded slowly, "I can do six." Before he can take the money, Zuko took the coins from my hand and placed them into his pocket. I pouted, "What are you doing? I'm buying something."

"Don't you think you should be saving your money for, oh I don't know, food?" He grabbed my arm and pulled me away from the stand. "C'mon. You don't need that."

I looked behind my shoulder and mouthed 'sorry' to the stand-keeper before facing back forward.

After a minute or two, Iroh was now at our side with a smile on his face as he had a vase with lovely flowers in his hands.

While Zuko looked down at him grumpily, I sent him a smile of my own.

"I just want our new place to look nice incase someone decides to bring home a lady friend." Iroh winked at Zuko.

I tensed up at the way Iroh said 'lady friend.' I wanted to say, "But Iroh, he has a girlfriend."

I opted not to.

Pfft, don't worry about it Ruka. Who's he going to meet? Zuko isn't a very people person.

Zuko sighed. "This city is a prison. I don't want to make a life here."

"Life happens wherever you are! Whether you make it or not. Now c'mon, I found us new jobs and we start this afternoon!" Iroh said, his smile never leaving his face.

"Iroh I swear, if I have to clean up some horse-cow's poop. You're dead meat." I warned. Iroh laughed. "You'll see."

>>>

"A tea shop..." I looked up at Zuko as Iroh walked into the shop. "I should've known."

Zuko and I walked in as Iroh introduced us. "Hello. We are your new employees!"

"Welcome!" The owner of the tea shop I'm guessing smiled. "Let me see if I can guess correctly, you are Lee," he pointed to Zuko then to me, "And you are Jade."

Zuko and I both nodded. You didn't really need to guess...

"I am Pao. Let's start you guys right away. Here are your aprons." Pao handed us our aprons. Iroh gladly took them then handed Zuko and me ours.

I placed the apron over my head and before I could tie the back, Zuko was already doing it for me. When his fingers brushed my back, chills were sent through me.

I thanked Zuko with a small smile before doing the same for him.

I couldn't help but laugh when Iroh couldn't tie the back of his due to his round belly.

"Well, you certainly look like official tea servers. How do you feel?" Pao asked us. "Ridiculous." Zuko grumped. I looked Zuko up and down then shook my head. "You look... cute."

When Zuko's cheeks turned pink, I felt embarrassed. "I mean not like attractive cute, like dumb cute." I laughed.

Zuko slightly frowned, "Oh."

"No, I didn't mean- er, never mind." I sighed.

Iroh still struggling asked, "Uh, does this possibly come in a larger size?"

"I have extra string in the back." Pao said. "Have some tea while you wait." He poured steaming tea into three tea cups and handed them to us before leaving to the back.

Iroh took a sip of his tea, but quickly spit it out not even a second later. I looked down at my cup and asked, "Maybe I shouldn't then."

Iroh groaned, "Ugh, this tea is nothing more than hot leaf juice!"

Uncle, that's what all tea is." Zuko said.

"How could a member of my own family say something so horrible!" An offended Iroh walked over and grabbed the tea pot from the table. "We'll have to make some major changes around here!" He walked over to the window and poured out the tea from the pot.

"Here is your string." Pao said when he came back. Handing it to Iroh he asked, "How was the tea?"

"Oh, delicious!" Iroh lied. He placed his hand Pao's back and started to walk towards the back, "Let's talk business."

Zuko looked down at me while I looked up at him. I cleared my throat, "So, we're working now."

He nodded.

I shrugged, "I never had a job like this."

"Me neither." He responded.

"Zu- I mean, Lee, you really don't look dumb. I just-"

"Pao finally hired employees." Zuko and I turned around and a boy maybe a couple years older than Zuko and I stood there. "You guys open?"

"Uh," I looked behind me to see if Pao was in sight. "I guess so. What can I get for you?"

"I'll take some Lotus tea." He responded while taking a seat at a table. "Make it snappy."

I nodded and quickly left to the back. "Iroh, could you make some Lotus tea please?"

Iroh raised his brows, "Lotus tea? Hm, I never struck you as a Lotus tea drinker."

I pointed behind me. "It's not for me, it's for a customer."

Iroh grinned. "Our first customer! I'll have it ready for you soon."

I thanked him and walked back to the front of the store, to the man's table. "We'll have your tea ready in just a moment."

The man smirked and looked me up and down, "Y'know... that's some body you got there."

I gulped, "Excuse me?"

"How about you sit and have some tea with me?" He patted his lap slowly. "On me?"

"I'm sorry, but that-" he grabbed my wrist and pulled me down. That's when I realized he was intoxicated. And being this close to him, you could see his eyes were a light shade of red with very dark under circles. Zuko yanked my wrist from his hand then stepped in front of me, his hands in fists. "Go to the back Jade. I'll call you when I'm done here."

"Lee, stop. Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to leave." My uneasiness was noticeable.

"What? I just wanted a little fun." He licked his lips which made me quiver.

"I think that's best." Zuko gritted. "Unless," He roughly grabbed the man by the collar of his shirt. "It's only going to be me having a little fun."

The man pushed himself away from Zuko before quickly leaving. Zuko turned around and inspected my wrist, "He didn't hurt you, did he?"

"N-no," I shook my head slowly. "He barely grabbed me."

Zuko rubbed my wrist with his thumb slowly. I forced a light laugh, "This job seems... nice."

From the corner of my eye, I saw Iroh holding up a tea pot. He looked around before asking, "Where is our first customer?"