Valentine's Day, a day filled with celebrating love with the ones that you love. It was a pointless holiday in Artemis's mind because she believed that one should celebrate the love for you friends and family and significant others everyday. She never thought that she would actually have a Valentine today, but her "secret admirer" as Bette put it left her a single long stem rose on her first period desk. When Artemis first saw the rose she thought that it must be for the slutty out-of-the-bottle blonde that sat next to her, but indeed it was for the natural long blonde haired teen. She would never admit it out loud, but Artemis thought that it was sweet that someone was thinking of her in that way.
The giddy goddess didn't think much of the sweet smelling flower until she went to her second period to find a box with four gourmet chocolate. Quirking an eyebrow she carefully opened the small box and inspected the salted dark chocolate caramels to see if they were even edible.
"Quit glaring at the bite sized heavens and eat one," Barbara told her good friend. Artemis raised her half glare to Barbara, who shrugged it off, before popping in one of the chocolates. Unwillingly the archer moaned in delight of the "bite sized heaven".
In third period love letters were delivered to multiple people in the boring math class. Even if you threatened to kill her, Artemis would never admit that she was itching to get one from this secret admirer that she now had.
When she did get the letter she opened it to read:
Roses are red,
Violets are blue.
Can you believe that I fell for you?
A grin graced her lips all the way through synthetic division and lunch where she received a questioning glance from Bette, for Barbara had the following lunch.
In fourth period before a dreaded pop quiz, Artemis found a much needed Grande peppermint mocha from Starbucks. On the side of the paper cup was her name in pink sharpie and a picture of Alice in Wonderland, her favorite Disney movie. She finished the coffee and kept the cute cup after rinsing it out in her science class that was next period.
In Gothamite's fifth period chemistry class she found red, pink, and silver heart balloons tied to her chair. Her smile was a thousand watts when she untied the balloons at the end of the period.
Finally, her last gift in sixth period was a plush teddy bear much like the one that she had when she was little. The bear held a Hallmark card. The contents of the card made Artemis's brows scrunched together as she pondered over it the entire period instead of learning about mitosis.
That's how Artemis found herself walking through the streets of Gotham with three colorful balloons tied to her backpack, holding a teddy dear close, delicately pinching a rose's stem and repeatedly rereading a Hallmark card.
The archer's eyes flew over the words once again:
You made me fall head over heels when I first met you. I'll be where I first fell.
It didn't make sense to Artemis; why would he say that when she had no clue where apparently fell for me?
Questions and thoughts spinning through her head led Artemis to the zeta tube and ultimately the cave. In deep concentration on trying to figure out what the hell her secret Valentine was just exactly trying to say, she didn't see the bubbly ginger nervously standing in the vast room.
Wally was rubbing his hands together nervously as he paced back and forth at the zeta tubes. He was excited and happy all day running back and forth from Gotham to Central City all day leaving his blonde beauty little presents and treats in each of her classes. He had never done anything like this for a girl and he knew that Artemis wasn't the sweet, lovey-dovey types of girls, but he thought that she deserved something nice and sweet for such a loving day.
When Artemis walked in Wally saw the bear in her arms along with the rose and card with all of the balloons to her backpack. He smiled at her when he realized that she actually kept the gifts and showed them off as if she actually enjoyed receiving them. He caught Artemis's look of concentration and confusion as she strutted by walking right past him. Wally opened his mouth to say something to get the bombshell's attention, but quickly shut it when she walked past without acknowledging him.
Artemis walked right into her room down the hall to drop off all of her gifts and her backpack except for the rose. She walked back towards the kitchen to find a skinny vase for the single rose. Wally walked into the kitchen ask Artemis was humming and filling the vase with water. He leaned against the doorframe with a ghost of a smile on his face as he watched her pluck the rose off of the counter and place it in the vase all the while continuing her happy humming. She placed the vase on the bar countertop and turned around leaning on the sink basin looking at Wally.
"What are staring at, Gingy?" Artemis asked with no threat in her voice, but happiness.
"Nothing, you just seem happy," Wally smirked at her obliviousness.
"Well, unlike you I am likeable on Valentine's Day," Artemis smirked in a victory that wasn't even fought for.
"My Valentine just walked right past me and still hasn't noticed that it's me," Wally shrugged.
Artemis's face contorted into humor before saying, "The Wall-man just can't catch a girl. How is that not surprising?"
"I would say that I have her as a Valentine, but she's just a little too blonde to realize it," Wally said smugly as he uncrossed his arms.
"Excuse me, but I am not too blonde," Artemis snapped back at the ginger. Her hand flew up to her mouth as her eyes widened in realization that Wally was her secret Valentine.
"That was you? Don't tell me that you ran back and forth all day just because it was Valentine's Day." Rubbing the back of his neck Wally gave a sheepish smile.
"Why though? I thought that you hated me," Artemis popped her hip and crossed her arms.
"Everybody deserves a little love on Valentine's Day even if they can be a pain at times," Wally replied with his sweet as day smile.
"Is this one of your sick pranks? If it is this is not funny at all," Artemis became defensive thinking that Wally would try to take a crack at her just because it was the holiday of love.
"No, no," Wally shook his head with sincerity. "It's just that, well, Zatanna is Robin's valentine, Raquel is Kaldur's valentine and M'gann is, well, Conner's valentine. All that was left was you and no one deserves to be alone on such a holiday."
The happy smile once again graced Artemis's lips.
"Thank you," she finally spoke up. "I really appreciate it." Wally nodded his head smiling because he finally was able to see Artemis really smile for once.
"I was planning on having a date with Ben and Jerry's, Netflix and the couch tonight. Would you like to make it a double date?" Artemis offered Wally as her jester towards a Valentine's Day gift.
"I would love to," Wally beamed hoping that they could have more days like this.
"You set up Netflix while I change out of this horrid uniform," the archer told the speedster as she walked off.
Many hours later the two teens were in their sweats with a blanket over the both of them and three empty pints of Phish Food ice cream on the coffee table. Artemis ended up snuggled into Wally's side as they watched action movie after action movie then when they got bored of that they turned to comedies.
Maybe, Artemis began to think. Maybe Valentine's Day does have a point to it. Maybe Valentine's Day isn't just about celebrating the love that you already have for people, but instead the love that you find in others and newer people.
Artemis fell asleep in the middle of watching "The Croods" and Wally drifted off not long after. The two loving teammates asleep on the couch and the smell of chocolaty and sugary ice cream filled the air and you just knew that it was Valentine's Day.
A/N: Happy Valentine's Day! 3