Romance novels are her guilty pleasure; if her brother knew of the stack she has hidden under her bed he'd probably throw a fit. And burn her treasures. (Some of these novels make her blush like mad because the hero and heroine of her novels do more than just holding hands and she really -- but which girl her age doesn't wonder what it's like?)

These novels make her wonder about a lot of things but mostly, they make her wonder about love and what it feels like. Because is it really always this sudden, overwhelming thing or is that just overdoing it for the sake of the audience? She doesn't know - she is a teen and she accepts the fact that never having been in love before (at least not that she knows off; there's only ever been this pleasantly strange fluttery feeling that used to make her so happy and insecure when Zuko was there, but he's her best friend and that can't have been love right because love starts only once your 16) and thus can't really say what it feels like. So she asks the people near her, with the exception of Sokka, for obvious reasons.

She asks Toph and Aang but they're both younger than her and Aang gets all tongue-tied. Toph just rolls her eyes, but nevertheless she tries to help Katara find the answer to her question.

"Love is this feeling that makes you stupidly do everything for someone else even if it hurts," she says. It sounds rather sullen but it's no answer to Katara's question.

Azula, Haru, Suki and Gran-Gran can't give her sufficient answers, either and that although Gran-Gran is the wisest woman in the whole wide world.

In the end, she asks Reverent Pakku.

"Reverent Pakku, what is love?" she inquires politely after having walked all the way to the church on her own.

"Love?" the reverent asks and scratches his chin thoughtfully. The little girl (not so little at age 14) nods her head solemnly. "Why do you want to know?"

"Because... because I don't know what it feels like and everyone says something different but I want to know what it is so I'll know it when I turn 16 and it finally happens," she says hurriedly. Pakku gives her a puzzled look.

"Why 16?"

"Because Sokka said that you have to be 16 years old to fall in love, 21 to date, 30 to kiss and 112 to get married," she replies honestly.

Pakku laughs gently and tousles her hair.

"Love knows no age; love is everywhere, Katara. It's between you and your Gran-Gran, between you and Sokka and between you and God," he explains. Katara frowns a little.

"No one can explain love," he continues. "It's different for everyone and words are not enough to describe it. Love is too big, too wonderful and too divine."

"Even the love between a man and a woman," she asks because she's 14 after all and knows all about the flowers and the bees.

"Not even, Katara. Especially," he replies. "You'll know love when it's there. Trust me."

A few years later, when she's obtained the right to date Jet (by threatening Sokka with revealing the existance of a certain photo) she kisses her boyfriend and feels a flutter of excitement. He makes her heart beat faster, brings her blood to boil and causes all sorts of delicious sensations cursing though her veins.

But she's still not certain whether it's love, whether it's the real thing. Not even sleeping with him can disperse her doubts although in all those romance novels, that is usually the point where she is head over heels in love with him.

But when Zuko kisses her just to emphasize a point, that's when she feels it and she knows its for real and that she can't marry Jet, just like Zuko said because this is too beautiful and too powerful to resist.