..Hidden Secrets..

Part One:

Death of an angel.

By DeclawedVampiricKitty.

"Every time a bell rings, an angel gets its wings."- Zuzu, in "It's a wonderful life."

The light rain continued to fall on the roof of a small cabin in the woods. The trees only blocked some of the rain from falling onto the wooden roof, and possibly into the ground level cabin. The clouds hung low in the sky, giving off the illusion of fog in the late October night as a young girl of maybe eighteen stared out the broken window. She looked left and right and stared off into the fog-like clouds before she looked down at her shaking hands and silently decided that it was no use.

She sighed before she pushed herself away from the windowsill, ignoring the shattered glass as it crunched beneath her feet. He had been gone for days now. Days without any word as to how he was doing. She hated when he did this. When he disappeared for what felt like forever, no note saying where he went or when he'd be back. Nothing. She sat down on the couch, staring at the blood-stained coffee table, wondering how much more blood would be forever stained on it after he came back. There was always more blood. Always more gashes to mend- more wounds to tend to. He never came back safe. Safe wasn't his specialty. She sat listening to the soft sound of the rain pattering on the wooden roof, the sound dulling her senses as she gazed up at the broken window into the fog-like landscape shimmering just outside the wooden walls.

She jumped at the sound of the door opening and soft, slow footsteps entering the living room. She got off the couch, rushing to help him to his feet before he collapsed. She caught him just in time and helped him to the coffee table where he laid down and gasped in pain as she left to go find the first aid kit. He looked hideous. His black hair was covered in blood. Blood that wasn't his. Blood was smeared on his face from an open wound on his cheek and she noticed his lip was swollen and bleeding. The rain had washed away most of the sticky mess, and she knew it had probably taken him longer to find the small cabin due to the clouds hanging so low in the sky. Either way, she knew that he needed her help, just like he always did.

"You won't tell me where you've been going, will you?" she asked, pulling out a needle and thread as she looked him over for any more wounds.

He muttered something she couldn't quite make out, but it sounded to her like a no. She knew he would never tell her where he was sneaking off to. He'd take the secret with him to his grave. He kept a lot of things from her, things she would never tell him that she knew. She only wished he would tell her before he ended up getting himself killed.

"Starfire, I'm not going to get myself killed." he said, as if reading her mind.

She sighed and continued sewing up his cheek. He continued to stare at her as she worked, his midnight blue eyes unblinking as he waited for a response. The rain was the only sound that reached their ears as they sat there in deafening silence. At long last, she spoke.

"You keep coming back looking like this, and you expect me not to think that?" Starfire asked as she finished mending his cheek.

"It's not that bad." At her glare he smiled. "Well, not as bad as it looks."

"Robin, You have a gash two inches long going down your cheek, you have a bleeding lip, and from the looks of it you have another gash down your forearm. Your telling me its not as bad as it looks." she said, looking at him as if he had gone insane.

She pulled up his shirtsleeve and sure enough, another long, deep gash stared back up at her. Star pulled a strand of red hair behind her ear and looked back at Robin, not at all amused by the situation at hand. Robin, however, was sheepishly grinning at her, as if smiling would lighten her mood and take away the thick tension hanging in the air.

"Care to explain this lovely number?" she asked, anger evident in her usually calm voice.

"Hey, that's just a scratch..." he started.

"Robin, just a scratch! This is a three inch long cut- no gash- that looks like it's from some sort of weapon, and your saying its a scratch? A scratch from what, a small leopard!"

"Not a small leopard. A very large, very mad, mother leopard."

"You got this from a leopard?" she asked, not buying his story.

"Yes, they're very vicious animals..." he paused, knowing full well she didn't buy anything he was saying and that it was going in one ear and out the other. "OK, it's from a sword." he said, defeated.

"And why were you fighting someone with a sword?"

Starfire started stitching his arm as he tried to come up with a reasonable answer. The rain was still tapping on the roof and the clouds weren't moving from their comfortable spot resting on the lush green grass of the wood. When she realized that he wasn't going to answer she sighed, shaking her head.

"Nevermind, forget I asked." she said, going back to her work.

"Come on, Starfire. Don't be like that, you know I don't…"

"Robin, just don't talk. I'm not interested in hearing it."

"But Star, I-"

"Done." she said, throwing the needle and thread away.

She got up and started to walk away, leaving Robin sitting at the table. He stood, walking after her as she made her way into the kitchen area of the cabin.

"Star if you would just hear me out!"

"Robin, I'm done listening to you lie to me. You disappear for days, come back bruised and bloody and you expect me not to ask questions. You expect me to bandage you up and let you go for another week or two." she shook her head, not turning to face him. "If you want to talk, you know where to find me. Unless you forgot where that is."

With that, she grabbed her keys and stormed out of the house, slamming the door behind her. Robin stood staring at the closed door as her car started and drove out of the driveway down the street. He shook his head and sighed, walking back into the living room and sitting down on the couch. He stared at the blood stained coffee table, his mind wandering to the bloody battlefields he had been on for the last few months. He could never tell Starfire where he was going, she'd never understand. He had already promised himself that she could never know about his deal with the devil, or the true stories of the battlefields. He looked up from the coffee table and looked out the window, just as Starfire had done before, and looked at the fog-like clouds as he listened to the soft rain tapping against the rooftop.

Starfire drove fast down the road, not seeing the road or even hearing the cars honking at her as she went. She was sick of his lies, and sick of him disappearing. Star barely had time to gasp when the bright lights of the eighteen wheeler shone through the thick haze. She tried to swerve out of the way, but it was too late. Her car hit the truck and went skidding across the road. The car screeched to a stop in the ditch on the side of the road. She tried fighting against the black dots blocking her vision, but it was no use. She never heard the truck driver tell her to hold on. The rain pattered against the roof of the car and the fog-like clouds continued to lay content on the grassy wood floor as they waited to carry another lost angel up to heaven, even though the angel joining them was still harboring hidden secrets.

A/N: Tweaked a few more things because I am a perfectionist and I like to have everything perfect (or close to it). The newspaper came out and I was very happy to see my story in it in all its glory. It took up a page front and back. I cant wait to see what my teacher thinks about the second part, which is a whole whopping 5 pages long on Microsoft. This is 3 pages. Hehehehe.

Happy Reading!!

DeclawedVampiricKitty