The bowl of soup steams as Aang hands it to Sokka, who sniffs and wipes at his nose. Even after sucking on those nasty frogs, he and Katara weren't entirely cured of their sickness. It really sucks, and Sokka thinks he can feel a wart forming on his throat flap where the frog had been touching it.
Aang had decided to make some soup for them, since they weren’t going anywhere anytime soon. Well, it would be at least a day or two before he and Katara would be feeling up to flying on Appa again. The soup was a recipe that Aang said his monk-dad had made for him, when he’d gotten sick from going flying with Appa in a storm. The kid wasn't a half-bad cook, though the soup could really use some meat.
But this was Aang, so fat chance of that happening.
Katara smiles at Aang, after he gives the other bowl to her and makes a joke about it not being as good as her cooking, rubbing the back of his bald head with one hand, and Sokka frowns.
The smile Katara uses is familiar.
Where had he seen that smile before?
Oh.
Oh no.
That smile… It’s a soft smile, a sweet smile, a gentle smile. But, above all, it’s not a ‘friends’ smile. It’s the same smile that Mom had given Dad when he'd done something especially nice for her. The smile she’d give him right before giving him a kiss on the cheek, because if she’d done anything more, he (and Katara, though she would never admit to it), would have started complaining about oogies. The smile that Gran-Gran said was responsible for Dad falling in love with Mom. The smile she only gave to him. It’s that smile.
He hadn’t known Katara had inherited that smile.
Sokka’s eyes narrow at his sister from behind Aang’s back. He’s not even sure if she knows what that smile means, or that she’d used it on Aang , and what that meant for them. He’ll need to keep an eye on this development for sure. Regardless of his friendship with Aang, Katara was still his sister.
Whenever
it
eventually happened though—and he refuses to put that thought into words, because
ew
—they’d better not be all
oogie
in front of him.