This is an AU one-shot I decided to do. It's coming from a more personal place so excuse the little ramblings. I hope you enjoy. :)
Disclaimer - I do not own the Teen Titans.
He was once told by his old psychology professor that love was a series of feelings, states, and attitudes. Often his attitude toward love ranged from interpersonal affection to pleasure; though he couldn't quite fathom that this behavior was what love really represented.
He knew love meant an emotion of strong attraction and personal attachment. Though, he struggled with distinguishing the symbiosis between "love" states. The diversity of uses and meanings of love, combined with its complexity of involuntary feelings involved, made it extremely difficult for Garfield to define.
Studies in neuroscience have shown that when people fall in love, the brain releases a set of neurotransmitters and hormones. These include dopamine, serotonin, and noradrenaline. The side effects of falling in love include the following: increased heart rate, loss of appetite, fatigue, and intense excitement.
Research in neuroscience has also shown that a broken heart is a possible phenomenon. The process is still unknown, however a broken heart can lead to intense physical pain. This is believed to be due to a stress overstimulation of the vagus nerve; one that causes muscle tightening in the chest or nausea.
To diagnose the patient in simpler terms: Garfield Logan currently suffered from a broken heart because he fell in love.
To prescribe an antidote that would cure his broken heart: he grabbed a jacket, his keys, a wallet, his cellphone, and walked down the street in the pouring rain.
He wasn't sure how or why or when it occurred. He couldn't remember the time or date to fill out the necessary information for his tombstone, which would read:
Here lies, Garfield Mark Logan, who passed Saturday evening from a broken heart.
He wasn't sure why he fell for her so quickly. It was somewhat like diving in cold water headfirst—seemed like a cool idea in the beginning, but injuries always conquered later. Terra's world moved too quick and burned too bright. She could mold her own path and twist and shape her feelings. One day, he could feel her head rested against his chest and feel her slender fingertips drum against his forearm. The next, he could scream and shout at her closed door how she's too "unpredictable" and "confusing". One day, she could gaze at the fireplace for hours and confide through dying flames that he was the best friend she ever had. The next, he could lay motionless on the floor, staring up at the ceiling in an empty room, wondering how she could slide through his fingers so easily.
The worst part is when they're gone.
The long talks, the sweet names, the heavy crying, the tender kisses, the laughter, the screams, the "you're making me pull my hair out because you're driving me insane", the "I need space because I can't be around you right now", the "you're suffocating me", the first "I love you", the first "I hate you", the first time they're—gone.
The first time they've fallen in love with someone else and you could do nothing but watch.
He couldn't help but wonder why it happened that way. Why the universe was punishing him for some unexplained reason. Why someone that he was entirely devoted to suddenly stopped loving him. The real kicker of it all, was that she hadn't an entire clue of the pain and rejection that she put him through. The sleepless nights, the anger, the frustration, the wanting to beat the living daylights out of his pillows because he couldn't understand—why. He wasn't supposed to get hurt like this. Society as a whole, deemed him a man. Men weren't "supposed" to care after a breakup, they weren't "supposed" to get hurt like this. They weren't "supposed" to feel like every fibre of their being was being wrung out of them because someone they've fallen in love with, who suddenly stopped reciprocating, was loving someone else.
But men did. They felt, they hurt, they cried, they laughed, they were human too.
He could've gotten married to her. He was pretty old-fashioned, she wasn't. He could've spent everything in his bank account to assure she'd stay. He could've organized an entire banquet in her honor to let her know how much she was appreciated in his life.
But material things don't bring back feelings.
Vic called it the 'break-up phase'. The, "No way am I letting you be a Debbie-downer. Knock it off, man!"
He dragged Gar to the nearest mood-brightening place he could think of: the pizza parlor. Between the four uneaten slices left on his friend's plate, Vic was beginning to grow worrisome.
"You know," Vic garbled between the food in his mouth. "I bought the pizza so you could eat it, not stare at it." Garfield shrugged. "Man, I'm just worried 'bout you. You've been all—mopey for a week. You've gotta just—"
Perhaps it was fear of hearing Vic explain that he needed to move on. Perhaps it was fear that Gar knew deep down inside she had always moved on. Perhaps it was the stuffy room or the bright lights, but Gar mentally and physically could not be there. He couldn't think, he couldn't speak, he couldn't eat, he couldn't. What he needed, she couldn't give him.
Answers.
Gar mumbled a quick apology, nearly tripped over a waitress when he squirmed to get out of his seat, and bee-lined for the door.
To self-loathe and roll into a ball wasn't typically Garfield's style. Neither was walking in the pouring rain—in the middle of night. It wasn't as if he were concerned with a lurking criminal or being pick pocketed of all his money, considering the crime rate in Jump City was fairly low. However, he couldn't help but mentally scold himself when he ran down the sidewalk, without an umbrella, as the rain deliberately poured on him. He grabbed the nearest handle he could find, and ended up entering a coffee shop after walking a few blocks.
The coffee shop was particularly full that evening. He looked around at the busy tables as he searched for a seat. An old couple seated across from one another, one cup of coffee each, studiously bent over the table while they spoke. A group of women in, what he assumed was their late twenties, collapsing with helpless giggles. One woman from the rambunctious group had silenced herself when he passed, but he kept his head low in avoidance of her hungry eyes. There were men in their suits lighting up cigars, and tourists trying to decipher the coffee menu. The noise level was high, the smoke level even higher. But it didn't bother Gar.
It was a coffee shop of mullioned windows, maroon-embroidered curtains, hardwood flooring, leather couches, dark chestnut coffee tables, dim lighting, and the delicate melody of a live piano. He let the cold rainwater slide down his back and melt away as the coffee shop's warmth nestled into him. The room wasn't extremely cold, for the fireplace soaked warmth into the thick old building, that it would take a month or two of winter to soak it out. Gar idly flipped through the menu when his waiter approached; each choice supposedly appealing, but in his condition he only wanted water.
He was served a tall glass of water, alongside a hot beverage, as the waiter claimed, "You look like you could use some tea right now."
His shaky fingers outlined the brim of the cup and he sighed. His shoulders were slumped and his eyes cast down in a mournful gaze. His booth was in the corner of shop, and his back pressed against the seat. Gar's hands shivered along the lined edges of the cracked table, lips quivering in a semi-pout.
The gloomy state of abandonment swallowed him whole. By dawn, she's pulled tight against his chest and her lips graze his slender neck. By dusk, he felt his reason for living slipping through his fingertips when she said goodbye. He lay his head gently on the hard surface on the tabletop, puffs of warm breath escaping his lips.
Empty.
Gar slowly raised his head, glancing around the coffee shop as waiters served tea in white teapots and coffee from silver trays. His eyes swiveled to the right, left, then back to the right; gaze falling on a more lovely sight that awaited him. Though he tried to turn away, he couldn't bring himself to do so. Not out of infatuation, not out of spite, but he watched her in mere curiosity.
There, across from his booth, sat a petite woman dining alone.
Slender, pale fingers gripped tightly around an archaic book, turning her knuckles white. She wore a thin, hooded black jacket, a violet scarf, and dark denim jeans. The waiter plumped a tray of tea down onto the table and she glanced up over the top of her book to thank him. Her eyes, of an iridescent indigo, and strands of thin black hair cascaded down her shoulders. She swept wisps of unruly hair behind her ear, letting it caress the skin of her neck and jaw.
In the midst of her reading, she raised her head and unknowingly looked directly in Garfield's direction. He saw that her eyes were dull, vacant, and dead. Then, for a sudden moment, her pupils were drawn back and she saw him as if she was just noticing the young man for the first time. She surveyed the way his eyebrows raised a centimeter, lined with something between amusement and grief. His expression was neutral, with an inkling of wistfulness, and the soft glimmer of his lucid eyes betrayed any bit of happiness.
For a half second, they both sat there, assessing each other until she broke away and eyes cast down to her text. She engrossed herself in the book, almost in a trancelike state, removed from reality.
He wondered what it was like for the woman to ignore the world around her. Everything else was a blur, except her book. Then, he scoffed, lazily scratching the back of his ear.
That's what love was like.
Everything else was a blur, and only one person had been magnified. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else mattered but Terra.
Gar's eyes found its way back to his cup. He took a sip of water, paid for his tea that he did not drink, left a suitable tip for his waiter, and decided to leave.
Hands dug deep into his coat pockets, he brushed past the busy tables to reach the exit. By the time he glanced back at the particular booth, she was already gone.
Figures.
Grief came to Gar in heavy waves and began to consume him. He was at his wits end and it left him feeling a pang of emptiness. Perhaps his eyes needed to be washed away by tears so that he could see life with a clear view. He stood underneath the coffee shop's awning before walking down the street. Water began to pour, cold and wet, on his skin.
The heavy rain was even sharper as he turned to the corner of the shop and city lights attempted to pierce into the blackness of the hour. As he walked, he could hear the rain beat against car roofs and sloppy sloshes of his feet through large puddles. Gar looked up seeing, through the curtain of water, dimmed lights of the sprawling city and silhouetted skyscrapers. On a much clearer night the view was breathtaking, but his only thought was to return to the warmth and comfort of his own apartment. Garfield sighed, mostly irritated that his home wasn't in the downtown district of Jump and it would be a forty minute walk to get to the suburban side. Hopefully, he wouldn't have to hear any angry voicemails from Vic when he got back.
The raw, heavy rain swept into his face as he strode down the sidewalk. A slow-cruising taxicab, pulled alongside the curb, but Garfield waved it away. He didn't have any extra funds on him to invest in taxi fare, just enough for a dollar bus ride a few blocks from the apartment.
He reached the indoor bus stop and sat, protected from the rain, on a bench covered by a small roof. Gar ran his hands down his face and sighed. His hands reached his hair and he shook his head back and forth like a wet dog, to dry off his hair.
His eyes widened upon hearing, "You're ruining my book."
Gar did not say anything—did not know what to say. His hands slowly lowered to his side and he looked at her from the corner of his eye. He wasn't peculiarly conscious of the same woman from the coffee shop sitting next to him, her arm near his. She read heavily, in silence, as if abstracted, a sort of cloud on her level. Her black hair lay wetly to her scalp as her clothes had also been drenched by the pouring rain. The soaked violet scarf wrapped around her neck dripped of cold rainwater. Why Gar should have had this thought of curling under a turtle shell and never coming out, he could not for the life of him say.
"Sorry."
She didn't respond, nor look in his direction, simply letting her eyes bore into the book in her hands. The old book was thick and heavy. The leather hissed delicately as she ran her fingernails over the gold bindings. She traced the cover idly before she flipped to the next page; thin paper rustled as she thumbed through text. Her eyes flit across the page and she quickly became immersed.
After indulging in over fifteen minutes of literature, she let the book fall closed. It made an exhausted sound, like a padded door and blew out a puff of air. The softness of the sound suggests a delicate overlap of thin, powdery pages. She gently pressed the back of her head against the bus stop's wall and closed her eyes.
The bus was late, and she was growing tiresome of waiting.
"This rain sucks," Gar murmured, wringing out the bottom of his pant leg. "I should've brought an umbrella."
She had forgotten for a minute that there was a man sitting beside her. His face was familiar, though she had seen many of them every day, it was vaguely difficult to pinpoint which one matched his. Then she remembered seeing him at the coffee shop before she left. Her nose had been stuffed in her books a majority of the time that she barely kept track of faces she seen. He had been sitting there for several minutes; she saw him as a pale blur to her right, registered the sudden shift of the bench as he crossed and uncrossed his legs.
The corner of his lips pulled upward, and he let out a soft chuckle, resting the back of his head against the wall as well. "When I was little," his voice was soft and faint and his eyes rolled to the back of his head as he attempted to drag the repressed memory to life. "I used to think the sky was crying when it rained. Kinda like this. My mom used to say, 'It's just rain, Gar', but I liked to think that maybe—maybe—the sky was still crying. 'Cause, you know, at the time it seemed cool and all."
She turned her head, slightly, briefly, to look at him. He wore a black topcoat, a little too big for him, it flapped weightlessly under his arms. He had a mop of unruly blonde hair laying wildly in various directions. His eyes shone at her, blue with a hint of green, like ocean water. His hands, gloveless, hairless on the knuckles, rested on his lap.
"Technically, she was right." Gar quirked an eyebrow. "Rain is basically condensed moisture in the atmosphere, falling visibly in separate drops. It'd be nearly impossible for the sky to cry."
"Oh."
The woman shrugged, continuing to stare out at the wet pavement. "Common knowledge."
Being different wasn't a bad thing for her. It was the odd looks that came along with not following the typical social conduct. It had its pros, and definitely its cons. To be one's reclusive self, especially if that meant always standing on the outside, never engaging in a conversation, or simply being herself. That self could not join in with the rest. She sighed, deeming the end of the conversation. Only did her eyes break away from the rain and back at the man's fidgeting fingers when he continued to speak.
"You ever—" He took a deep breath, lips twitching at the corner of his mouth slightly. "You ever wonder if it's true?" His head hung low. "If something's—meant to be, it will? I'm not—you know—talking about job opportunities or whatever. I meant with people. If something's meant to be it will?"
Her fingers traced the thick lettering of the cover of her book, gaze falling on the soft calligraphy. "Serendipitous events are difficult to coincide between two individuals."
"So you're saying its a chance-y thing? It's not gonna happen?"
"I'm saying—" She paused, tongue twisted over her stumbled words. The corner of her eyes wrinkled as she thought of a proper explanation. "Perhaps it is possible for such an occurrence. Then again, what is a loss for one is another's gain."
"Cliché, dude," he snorted. "That's what everyone says. If you love something, Gar, let it go. Yeah right." He puffed out his cheeks and blew a heavy sigh. The soft patters of rain drowned out their faint breathing. Gar held his head in his hands.
"She fell in love with someone else right in front of me," he whispered. The woman's back straightened up a bit; slight curiosity tugging at her with this new information.
He scoffed. "Boy, dodged a bullet there, huh? Phew." The joke did not register as a joke, portraying more a a mournful assurance. "I don't know what I'm gonna do. It's crazy, right? How—" Gar waved his hand around, searching for the right words. "Just crazy how, things change. Oh, and get this. That's—that's what she told me, you know, before she walked out and all?" He straightened up, clearing his voice to mimic his best Terra impersonation. "Things change, Gar. Things change?!"
He raised his voice a bit higher, his tone echoing off the low rumble of thunder. Though her face remained void of emotion, he could see the slight flinch in her eyes. Gar's shoulders slumped.
"Sorry. Didn't mean to yell like that," he murmured. "But, really? Things just don't change overnight. Right?"
She shrugged. "People come, people go."
"This sucks."
He didn't get a single response. She tapped her fingernails across her book cover. The bus was never fast enough on stormy nights.
"And what kinda gain is that?" he added.
She was quiet, thinking, perhaps not even listening. She broke her gaze from her book and turned to him. "Then it is her loss, and a gain for another. To wallow in self pity or to grow from the experience is a choice you must decide."
The rain was beating furiously. When it got really calm, sudden hail started falling fast. It hit the ground and bounced back.
Gar scuffed his feet against the ground and sighed. "Yeah. I—I guess you're right." There was a brief silence. The rain continued to patter against the pavement and they watched, casting uneasy glances at the slippery concrete. He turned his head to look at her. "Well, in case you didn't already know, I'm Gar."
"I'm not interested."
There was a slight curve of her lips, but as soon as it appeared for a split second, it left.
Gar chuckled. "Nice."
A heavy silence settled over them, thicker than the rain falling from the sky. Their unsettled eyes looked around and avoided catching one another's gazes that passed. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat, hand gripped around her book. He grasped his sweaty, nervous hands atop his lap, and shuffled his feet against the cobbles of the concrete, awkwardly tracing the outlines of each crack.
"She's out there," he sighed. "Somewhere. I mean you," Gar jabbed a finger at her. "You even said it yourself. And you told me the sky wasn't crying! I mean, that's gotta be some real logic, plus you're right about everything else. Too late to give up now, I guess." His loud chuckle reverberated across the silent bus stop.
A look of satisfaction crossed her lips. There was a small curve at her mouth's corner and light raise of the eyebrow in slight amusement.
"Man," he wheezed, running his fingers through his hair. "It's crazy how things—"
"Change," she finished.
Gar nodded. His lips lifted upward, crinkling in a small dimple in his chin. He smiled a little; with a twist, like the smile of a man who was determined not to weep again. "Yeah."
The sound of crunching gravel startled him and his eyes flicked over to the white bus. It halted with a loud, metallic screech, and hissed when the doors swung open. Gar glanced over to the woman who began to tip her hood over her head. She nestled the book under her arm and slowly walked under the pouring rain to the bus.
He wasn't sure why, or how, or when his feet decided to spring him upward. He was unsteady for a moment before he rose and followed behind her. She glanced over her shoulder when she entered the bus and gently removed the hood from her head, jacket dripping wet. The bus began to rumble, as if preparing to leave.
He stood in front of the door, not knowing what to say or do, as they looked directly at one another. She cradled the book close to her chest, pressing her back against the bus wall. Before he could open his mouth, a bitter gust of wind blew, removing her thin scarf from around her neck. Her eyes widened when it unraveled and she dropped her book, rushing for the piece of fabric.
"My scarf—"
"I got it!" he called, jumping up to catch the runaway fabric. "I got it!"
As Gar snatched the scarf between his fingers, he stepped up to the vehicle and she moved closer with her hand held out.
"Here."
Before they could reach one another, the bus doors shut, preventing them from making contact. His hand slapped against the metal door and she pounded her fists against it from the other side.
She looked frightened, mortified. In fact, it was the most emotion she had expressed that entire night. Her hand pressed against the glass as the bus rolled away. Gar's hand pressed against it too; hers looking particularly small compared to his. Warm puffs of air fogged the window and she used her elbow to clean it off. He could see her lips mouth, "Wait", when the bus wheels moved.
He ran down the street to catch up with the large vehicle, despite nearly slipping multiple times on the wet concrete. Her hand slid down the window as it pulled away from the curb and her face pressed against the glass as they grew further apart.
It was too late.
He stood there in the middle of the street for a moment under the pouring rain, letting it soak into his clothes and drench his water-filled shoes. Drops of water trickled down his body as he remained frozen in place, his gaze fixated on the horizon where her bus had taken off. His eyes traveled to the wrinkled, and now drenched, violet scarf in his hand. Water dripped from the bridge of his nose as he stared down at it.
He slowly unraveled the scarf, a white tag with smeared black lettering sticking out. His eyes narrowed as he read it.
Perhaps in that moment, things did change.
He stared at the beauty of the soft fabric, then turned on the ball of his heel and slowly walked away. Rain beat over his head and he tripped twice when sloshing through deep puddles. Gar glanced over his shoulder a final time, letting his gaze linger over the empty street; he stuffed the scarf in his pocket
Serendipitous events are difficult to coincide between two individuals.
He read over the name again. A small grin tugged at the corner of his lips.
"Raven."