Author's Note: Rawr. Thanks to new "policy" that you can't have songfics/fanfiction with songs in them, my beloved "The Pain of Wanting" must now be lyrics-free. This really upsets me, since this is probably the best fanfiction I've written to date, and the loss of the lyrics I think really takes away a lot of the mood I tried to achieve. Hopefully it'll be as good without the lyrics, but to everyone who hadn't read this before, "The Pain of Wanting" was set to "She Will Be Loved" by Maroon 5. If you wish to see the original, unedited, lyrics-filled version, e-mail me and I'll be glad to send you the copy.
Thanks for understanding, everyone.
Beast Boy was getting worried.
Raven was acting more distant than usual, like how she had been when the five super-powered teens had first formed a posse that fought crime in an extremely accident-prone city. Although he wasn't fretting yet, he had to admit that he was starting to sweat more than was necessary and found himself wondering where Raven was going at night. He would walk down the hallway, planning on visiting her or taking her back to his room, and she'd already be out the door, vanishing in the darkness. It would be rude to ask her (and she probably would have bitten his head off besides), but he was still curious.
She had never said that they were dating. Beast Boy told everyone else that that's what it was, but she had never really agreed on the title. He just assumed that it had slipped her mind (which was far busier than his) and didn't press the matter. Still, even with the slight gestures that he made indicating that they were more than just friends, she didn't respond much.
Lately, she had been getting awful headaches and he had been right there, ready to hold her hand and tuck her into bed. Although she tolerated him in her room and even touching her, she couldn't seem to stand these instances. He didn't know if it was the headaches or his presence; he tried not to think about it.
Even on the nights when she was plagued by these, however, he sometimes found himself pushing open her door and seeing her room empty.
Robin made sure that the mechanical door of his bedroom closed silently (he had oiled it well religiously for going on two months now) as he slipped out, clad in his pajamas and with a few birdarangs hidden on his person just in case. He didn't expect his friends to leap out of the shadows and attack him, but after the incident where Slade's minions had broken into their Tower without them noticing, he had never walked around unarmed again.
Creeping silently down the hall, Robin glanced around himself occasionally to make sure that he had taken the right path (which was stupid, because he always took the right path) and that nothing lying haphazardly on the floor could trip him. When he was nearing his destination, he nearly jumped out of his skin to find Starfire standing in front of him. He cursed himself for not noticing her – that sort of mistake could lead to an accident in a fight – but tried to calm his self-loathing for a minute.
"Robin? Why are you out before the crack of the dawn?" Star asked, looking confused. She hovered slightly off of the ground, one finger tapping her chin and her bright eyes boring holes into him. Robin shrugged, trying to look natural.
"I had a lot to drink before I went to sleep, if y'know what I mean," he explained, laughing a little. Starfire joined him, understanding.
"That is alright, then," she said, and glided smoothly past him and towards her own room. He didn't ask why she was up; he was sure it would have been some strange alien custom. "Do not get bitten by the bed insects, Robin!" she called over her shoulder as she disappeared down the hall.
"Yeah, whatever," Robin muttered under his breath, clearing the last few steps to his destination. Giving his surroundings one last cursory glance, he knocked quickly on the door three times and waited with his hands at his sides.
The door opened and the shadows spoke to him. "I thought you'd never come," they said emotionlessly, and Raven stepped out of the darkness. He put an arm around her shoulder and huddled her close to him as he smuggled her down the hall and out of sight.
Raven had gone up on the roof to get away from Beast Boy and Cyborg's intense video game battle, which was being refereed by Starfire, and the winner was to play Robin. They had begged Raven to get into the spirit and be their refreshment girl, but a sarcastic response was the only part of her that they got in their competition, and she soon disappeared to the top of Titan Tower to meditate.
As luck would have it, it started to rain just as she was going through her Palace of Seven Doors A/N: I couldn't help it XD. Raven blinked and slowly concentrated on not letting her fury get the better of her at this unfortunate turn of events, and she was planning to go back into the Tower when she calmed her anger. She breathed easily, letting her mind go free, letting her emotions go; she was calm, she was filled, she was emotionless…
She opened her eyes and turned around, surprised and smiling slightly. Robin was standing in front of her with his normally spiky black hair plastered to his skull and his cape covering his uniform. His head was cocked concernedly, and he offered his hand out to her.
"Put your hood up; I don't want you to get sick," he said as she took his hand in hers. Raven rolled her eyes and used her free hand to pull her hood up, sending her face into shadow. She didn't say anything, but her hand was tightly enfolded in his, her fingers gripping at his gloves. She didn't ask what happened to the video game tournament, or Starfire, or the refreshments; all she wanted to do was spend a little more time with him.
They came down the stairs and went to the bathroom to dry off before rejoining their friends. Beast Boy had been getting band-aids from his room to put on the blisters that had formed on his hands, and he saw them go in, hand in hand. Raven had her hood down, and she was smiling.
Beast Boy dropped the band-aid and stared, slack-jawed.
Robin had been sleeping, sprawled on his bed in his pajama pants and no shirt (because his newly-acquired bruises hurt too badly for a shirt), when the knock on his door woke him up. He immediately jumped into an offensive position, back creasing and fingers curling forward, but then the fog of sleep cleared from his brain and he recognized the knock.
Three rapid knocks, and he smiled a little bit.
Yawning, Robin threw a pillow at the button for the door and it opened, emitting Raven. She was just in her leotard, and he crawled back onto his bed, an action she mimicked.
"Lay down on your back," she instructed, motioning at him, sitting up only because he was propped on his elbows. He gave her a sly smile, but she rolled her eyes and pushed him down, causing him to grunt slightly in pain. "Don't get any ideas, Boy Wonder." Placing her palm flat against his breastbone, she concentrated hard, and a blue light formed around her hand. Robin's intake of breath was short-lived, having long been privy to Raven's intimate healing sessions.
When she was sure that everything that could possibly have been hurt was better, Raven withdrew her hand. Robin immediately brought his arms up around her neck and pulled her down on top of him before she could stop; his lips found hers in the darkness, and he was happy to note that she didn't think he should be gentle with his body so soon after treatment.
Breaking away from her so that he could breathe a bit, Robin pushed a strand of her lavender hair behind one of her ears. "You're beautiful, even in the dark," he whispered, his fingers flitting over the gem on her forehead.
She groaned. "You asked for it," she hissed, pouncing on him again. Robin would have been lying if he said he minded.
Raven was angry at Robin for the first time since he let his logic escape him, when he believed Slade to be real. That had made her extremely angry at him because he let himself be hurt by his own mind, which she could relate to so well; she didn't exactly have the world's most level head. She always counted on Robin for that.
Now, however, she was angry at him. He was acting reckless again, throwing himself in harm's way if a half thought-out plan might have a chance to work. The chance could be a shot in the dark, but he would still take it, because it might mean victory.
That night when he came to her room, she grabbed him by the neck of the white T-shirt he was wearing and yanked him into the darkness. Without any lights, he was unprepared, and Raven easily delivered the slap she had planned for him. In the utter silence that followed, she could hear him clap one hand over the cheek that she had manhandled.
"What was that for?" he asked through gritted teeth, and she could practically see him glaring at her.
"For putting your own life in danger because of some half-assed plan!" she exclaimed, pressing both of her palms flat against his chest and pushing him back. He hit the metal door hard, and one hand slapped the wall beside him repeatedly, as if looking for a light switch. He knew that he was no good in the darkness, which was her territory.
"It worked!" he shot back at her when he was unable to find what he was looking for.
"But it might've fallen through and then you could have been killed," she said slowly, trying to get her emotions under control. Something in the room had already exploded because of the anger she was emanating, and that was dangerous; she could've hurt Robin.
"I'm not going to take this from you," he spat, turning and slamming his hand on the door button. It opened, and he disappeared into the grey dimness of the hallway. Raven started to go after him when the door closed in her face, and she sunk slowly to the ground in front of it, trying to do anything to keep herself from feeling bad about what she had done.
Robin was still fuming the next night. He had had a punching bag rigged up in his room long ago, and now he was pulverizing it, showing no mercy. If the punching bag was a person, he would have killed it five times over. It wasn't enough that he did everything for her, devoted himself to her – now she wanted him to give up the only thing that mattered to him more than her, which was his victory. Well, she could just forget about that.
The knock came on the door, three quick, consecutive pounds. Robin stormed across the room and punched hard on the button, preparing to deliver to her the worst tongue-lashing she had ever received. Fortunately or unfortunately for him – he wasn't exactly sure which – he never got to.
Her face was buried in his chest, and he could feel her tears through the thin material of the T-shirt. Somewhere behind him the nails in a wooden table screwed themselves out and the table collapsed, but he ignored that; he was only concentrated on Raven, who was crying. And the fact that it was him that she was crying about.
"I don't mean to take away what makes you happy," she said in between her choked sobs, and he was surprised to find her strangely coherent despite all of the crying. "I just don't want to see you get hurt because of something stupid, like last time. Like when you were fighting yourself, and I could have helped you…"
Robin wrapped his arms around her and rested his cheek on the top of her head. They were standing in the doorway, and he could see her faintly from the nightlights that were strategically placed in the hallway.
"You tried to help me," he whispered to her, holding her tighter when her crying escalated. "I just didn't let you. I could kill myself for letting him hurt you then, but that would only make you sadder." She tried to laugh, but it came out as more of a hiccup. "We hold out."
She echoed him, her own usually toneless voice saying back to him, "We hold out." He nodded against her hair, breathing in the scent of the soap she used – lavender, just like her eye color.
Beast Boy was going to Raven's room, but it was empty, and he walked past it, intending on going to the kitchen. You had to pass Robin's room to get to the kitchen, though, and he couldn't go to the kitchen without seeing Robin holding his supposed girlfriend as she cried her eyes out.
"Raven!"
Her name came from two mouths at once, and the owners of both of those mouths leaped up to catch the teenager as she fell, having been knocked down from a tree that she'd been using as a perch. They were fighting Cinderblock for what felt like the five hundredth time (and probably was), and Raven had been using several trees to bind his arms to his side as Starfire and Cyborg pummeled him. Robin and Beast Boy had been taking care of his feet and she had slipped both of their minds. When they saw the trees wrapped around Cinderblock's waist and arms change back to their normal color and immediately looked to her to see her falling, however, she was all they could think about.
Cinderblock had stamped one foot so hard that the tremor shook the tree that Raven was standing in and caused her to lose her balance and fall over the edge. Beast Boy didn't even have to think as he shifted into a pterodactyl and soared up to get her, but Robin, having used one of his hookshot birdarangs to wrap around the branch that she'd fallen from, was able to glide easily up to her and catch her as she fell.
Beast Boy alighted upon her branch and changed back, confusion written on his face. He was always fast, he could always catch her – weren't wings faster than a stupid hook? When Robin hit the release and lowered them to the ground with Raven's arms wrapped tightly around his neck, however, Beast Boy was unsure if he was just obsolete anymore after all.
Robin wait for the third knock on his door before pressing the button and grabbing Raven's arm when she came through. He pulled her to the bed and they tripped over a fallen shoe, collapsing onto the sheets with muffled laughter because Robin's head was buried under Raven's arm. She pulled herself away from him for a moment so that they could untangle themselves, but then Robin was pulling her back, his fingers caught in her hair as he kissed her with all of the emotions that she couldn't use.
The door had closed, and someone was knocking on it. They pulled away with a start, looking at each other quizzically. A glance at the clock showed that it was 4:03 – hardly visiting hour.
"Stay here" Robin mouthed to her, and Raven nodded, crawling off of the bed and crouching behind the side that wasn't visible to the door. Robin opened the door and leaned casually against it, hoping that no hickeys were visible with his loose attire.
Beast Boy was standing in front of him, attempting to peer around him and into the door. Robin had successfully placed himself carelessly across the threshold, a silent you-can't-come-in action. BB relented.
"Have you seen Raven?" he muttered, kicking at the carpet.
"I was sleeping," Robin said, feigning annoyance. "All I saw were the inside of my eyelids." Beast Boy nodded.
"Fine," he said, trailing off at what Robin considered an extremely slow pace. The Boy Wonder let the door close and, smirking, went back to the bed. He sat down on it and Raven crawled back up, her fingers sliding into his hair.
"Where were we?" she murmured, uncharacteristically sultry. Neither of them heard when Robin's punching back exploded as they fell back onto the mattress.
Beast Boy couldn't believe what was happening.
Raven was standing in front of him, looking very confident for some reason, with her hands tucked inside her cloak and her hood down. He couldn't fathom an adjective to describe how beautiful he thought she was at that moment – so assertive and commanding; he was falling in love all over again – but when she spoke, he felt the whole world crash down around him.
"Beast Boy, I'm not sure what you thought about us for the last year, but I'm not your girlfriend. I'm your friend, your teammate, but I never thought of myself as involved with you romantically. I'm sorry about all of the grief I've caused you, but I can't live in a fantasy world," she said, all in one big breath.
Beast Boy deflated and wanted to die for a few minutes after a forced hug, after she turned away, after she grabbed the hand of Robin, who had been waiting for her at the end of the hallway.