A/N: Ok, I've been working on this for, like, forever. I've been lazy, grounded, and uninspired lately, thus this hasn't been put up until now. But I haven't been working as long as Valentine's Day! I promise! It came in March, actually... Still, long time, neh? -sigh- I know no one was waiting for it, but sorry for the wait. First TT fic and I'm sorta proud of it so poo on you if you don't enjoy it! If you read it, review, because if you don't, you've just wased my time and hard work and effort. I think I did pretty damn well and I think I deserve your reviews in return. Thankyou, and g'bye.
Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Titans. If I did, do you think it would've been cancelled? NO! On that note, I don't own X-Men: Evolution, Firefly, or any other of the television shows I loved before they were cancelled. No, READ it already!
-.-.-.-
Starfire stood behind the couch and watched idly as the Boy Wonder flipped through the channels for no real apparent reason, but it seemed to entertain him, none-the-less. On many channels, Starfire caught a glimpse of a human man and woman pressing their lips to one another's while smooth music played. "Robin?" she asked. "The females on those channels, they are extremely grateful for what the male has done for them?" she asked. On Tamaran, a pressing of the lips was a sign of gratitude.
"Sort of," Robin replied, in a television induced trance. "Those are commercials… Here on Earth, a kiss is a sign of affection towards someone else… and Valentine's Day is coming up, so companies use commercials with people kissing to advertise." All this was practically mumbled, but Starfire understood.
"And this… Valentine's Day… when is it?" she asked, quite curious and eager to show her affection for her teammates.
"Tuesday…" Robin muttered back… and he was gone. Lost in a television program that involved giant robots knocking one another onto their metallic rear ends.
Starfire's body filled with glee, noting that Tuesday was after Monday and Monday was after Sunday, which was this day. She lifted off her feet and floated on happiness to her bedroom, planning, non-stop, how she would show her affection towards each of her fellow Titans. Of course, she would have to cook the traditional Tamaranian slimglorp, only baked on special occasions such as this would be. The only flaw Starfire could see was that she contained so much affection for her dear friends, she didn't think she could ever express it towards them!
-.-.-.-
He was going to do it. Yes, Tuesday, tomorrow, Valentine's Day, it was going to happen. Yes, indeed. Yup... Totally gonna do it... Going to happen... Really... Honestly... Going to... Oh, he just couldn't do it! It was impossible! Nope, it can't happen! No... But then... Oh, what in the world was he thinking? He had to do this. Yes, this time he'd actually gain the courage to do it. Yes, it was a plan. Something big was going to happen. It would all go as planned. He was going to do it.
This process of thinking would repeat on end in Beast Boy's mind. He stood in the Jump City's floral shop, staring at a gorgeous boquet of blue roses. This was where the one-boy-zoo had been standing for almost two hours, trying to work up the courage to actually do something. The floweres were so unreal-looking, that Beast Boy believed Raven would love them, and him, to no extent.
...Or at least, he hoped...
Raven would awake in about sixteen hours and Beast Boy would be ready for her.
With a giant breath of air, Beast Boy thrust his hand forward and grabbed the stems of the roses in such a manner that it appeared as though he thought they might bite him. In a way, they did; the thorns of a few stems poked him a bit and he instantly regretted grabbing them so forcefully. He switched the boquet to the other hand and shook the first one while he walked to the counter.
Beast Boy dug through his pockets for his cash and laid the boquet on the counter. He pulled out a ten dollar bill as the cashier girl said "That will be $144. Is this going to be cash or check?" He could have sworn he felt his brain fall out through his ear.
"$144? Are you kidding? Thats insane! Who can afford to pay that much!" he cried at the poor cashier girl, who backed up a little. Really, who doesn't get a little shook up when a weird, green boy walks into the place they work at, hangs around for hours, then starts yelling frantically about high prices?
After getting quite excited then catching his breath, Beast Boy asked, "So... How much for just one?"
The cashier replied with "O-only $6, sir..." It seemed he must have scared her a little.
Beast Boy looked sadly at the pitiful $10 in his hands. "I guess I haven't got a choice..." he told the girl, and she rung him up.
-.-.-.-
Raven walked into the kitchen the next morning, dark and pretty as ever, her cape flowing elegantly behind her. She was about to open the refridgerator to get some milk when a voice said from behind her, "Happy Valentine's day, beautiful..." She spun around to find Beast Boy sitting at the table, his legs crossed and his elbow on the table. Beneath his hand layed a stunning rose of Raven's favorite color. Her hands flew to her mouth to catch the gasp that escaped her lips.
"Oh, my... Beast Boy, that rose is fantastic!" she said, almost unaudible in her amazement. "I never knew you had such taste, such class...! To buy me such a splendid gift and present it to me with such impetuous timing! I mean to say, Valentine's Day of all days!" Beast Boy grinned with pleasure as Raven came to him, settling herself comfortably, for both of them, on his crossed legs. She brushed her nails along his jaw, cooing. "I don't think I've ever noticed how... green... your skin is... Wonderfully green. Like the leaves on this rose or like a shining emerald ring." With every word, Raven's face seemed to be getting closer to Beast Boy's and he felt his heart beating a little faster with each breath he took. It was like she was pumping adreneline throughout his entire body and was perparing to suck it out like a vampire when her lips touched his. "Or... like... cabbage..."
Beast Boy frowned, but was still unable to yank himself from the spell Raven had him in, as odd as her last statement was. "...cabbage...?" was all he could bring himself to say to her. He could feel her soft, sweet breath on his lips now. Any moment now, their mouths would lock and his heart would soar over the room as if he'd been waiting for this his entire life.
"Yes... Cabbage..." Raven replied to Beast Boy's enquiry. He could practically feel her lips move now. They were so close. "I could just eat you... Just like you're eating my rose." Raven pulled away faster than Beast Boy would have liked. It surprised him so much, he fell back in his chair and didn't stop. He felt himself falling into some kind of endless hole filled with every color he'd ever seen in his whole life plus many more he'd probably never see again.
-.-.-.-
Beast Boy woke from the passionate dream turned nightmare to find dream-Raven had, in fact, been correct. He found that a few petals of her flower were in his mouth and he was chewing them furiously, and they didn't taste like peaches and cream. The rose itself was gripped tightly in both his hands protectively, so as to keep it safe from any harm. It would seem that Beast Boy, though, had inflicted the damage to it himself. He quickly spat out the blue, soggy petals and tried to make the rose look as pretty as it possibly could with bite marks and a bent stem, but his efforts weren't as extremely effective as he'd hoped. If anything, he did more hurt than help. He wrapped a wrinkled, old, frayed black ribbon around the bend in the stem and tried to make the petals stay upright once more. He saw no more he could attempt to do to fix the flower any further and decided that he didn't have much more of a choice but to give it to her that morning.
Beast Boy almost crawled back into bed to sleep until it was morning, but he happened to glance at his clock as he did so and caught '8:35AM' flashing in bright green numbers. He slapped his forehead in shock at the time and told himself, "Okay, so it is morning! So what? Just go down there, give her the... rose... and get the rest of the day over with. So what if she just takes the rose and thats it? No kiss on the cheek no nuthin'... Just... live with it!" He faked a grin in his mirror as he got ready. He grabbed a comb, one he'd never touched before in his life, no doubt, and attempted to comb his hair back so that he looked at least a little suave. It stayed down for a few seconds as he stared in the mirror, but popped back up afterwards. He tried one more time, pulling his hair once more and then licking his hand, sliding it over his head, giving it a nice kind of disgusting shine. After this, Beast Boy strode bravely from his room and towards the main living area of the Titans' Tower. What he discovered there made his jaw drop and his brain implode upon itself.
-.-.-.-
The little star-shaped alarm atop a certain Tamaranian's dresser rang out with the sounds of bells. Starfire jumped out of bed as though she'd already been awake, just laying and waiting for hours for her alarm to go off at 7:30 AM. "It is today!" she exclaimed joyfully. Something was obviously quite special about 'today' and Starfire had made good care to specially plan everything out. After switching off her alarm, she rushed to get dressed in her best clothes. Yes, her best. Just like all her others, but she had made sure to press it with the Earthly device which blows steam. She took a hairbrush to her long, red locks and did one final spin in her mirror to make sure she looked just perfect. She checked her clock one more time. She hadn't exactly expected her self-preperations to take an hour, yet 8:30 AM flashed at her.
Gathering the many multi-colored packages from atop her dresser beside the alarm, the young Tamaranian girl flew blissfuly from her bedroom and into the hallway outside her door. She carried the five colorful packaged items (one for each of her fellow titans and one for Silky) into the operations center of the Titans Tower and plopped herself down on the couch, waiting. Not more than a minute after she had settled into the fluffiness that was the Titan's couch, Raven entered the room from the hallway, reading, apparently, a very interesting book. She was levitating it in front of her, but low enough that she wouldn't run into anything and was walking with her cloak covering all of her body, making her appear a lot like an upside-down lily. Starfire vaulted over the back of the couch. "Friend!" she exclaimed, causing Raven to sigh, vexed, and move her book to the side.
"Good morning to you, too, Starfire," Raven replied, looking back at her book as she moved towards the kitchen.
"Do wait, Friend Raven! I must remind you that it is the Valentine of days!" Starfire started to follow Raven in the general direction of the kitchen, but ran into her friend as she stopped.
"I know what day it is, Starfire, thankyou," Raven said as she turned around to face Starfire. "And I'm merely waiting for the day to be over so that the mushy commercials on the television will cease and desist."
"Oh, but Friend Raven, I have not yet presented you with your gift or expressed my affection towards you!" Starfire explained, smiling more excitedly than usual.
"Affec--" Raven began, but stopped and had time to gasp before Starifire leaned down ever so little and pressed her lips to Raven's in her show of affection.
The book Raven'd been levitating safely at her side dropped to the floor in surprise.
-.-.-.-
Beast Boy's arms went limp at his sides as he stepped on the secret relationship between the two female residents of the tower. How could she do this to me? he thought. Last night in the dream she was all over me! Now she's leaving me for Starfire? This sucks... Valentine's Day sucks... Beast Boy thought as he bowed his head and hunched over, extremely dissappointed. He turned right around and started heading back down the hallway. He was in such a haze that he barely noticed Robin and Cyborg heading for the living area. "Oh, dude," Beast Boy said, breaking his gaze away from his feet to look at Robin. "Forget about Starfire. You haven't got a chance..." And with that he began trudging back off towards the roof.
Robin blinked then looked up at Cyborg and raised a questioning eyebrow, hoping that maybe he would have an idea of what was going on. Cyborg rasied his hands, showing that he knew nothing. "Don't look at me, man," the half-bot-half-man replied. "I'm gonna go talk to my car and wish her a Happy V-Day." And with that he headed off to see the T-Car.
On the roof, Beast Boy sunk onto the edge of the tower with a sigh. Had he known before that he never had a chance with Raven because of her love for Starfire, he would have never even tried. He gently set the rose on the ledge beside him, thinking that the poor plant didn't deserve to be mistreated just because he felt lousy.
-.-.-.-
After a moment of shear shock, Raven pulled away from Starfire, who merely smiled hopefully. "Star," Raven said calmly. "That was affection, true, but you show that affection to people you intimately love." Starfire's eyes were the portrayal of confusion as she stared at Raven blankly. "Like... say you do that to Robin. He should react positively. People do that to people they love." Confusion. "Like a lov-er." More blank stares. "Think about it. I'll be back soon." And with that Raven flew down the hallway, towards the exit to the roof.
Starfire sunk to the floor and tapped her chin thoughtfully. If that wasn't how she was supposed to show Raven affection, then how was she? Lov-er... Rob-in... Nothing was making sense. Perhaps she should show Robin affection and things would make sense.
-.-.-.-
Beast Boy was in the middle of seriously contemplating what he was going to do next. Locking himself in his room was too obvious and drastic, but he couldn't just go back downstairs and say 'G'morning, Starfire, Raven, having a good Valentine's Day?' That would be even worse...
The door onto the roof opened slowly as a slightly red Raven snuck through. Beast Boy, hearing the creak of the door, turned a little to see who it was, right before turning back around to hunch over. Raven sighed and walked over to sit beside him on the ledge. There were a few moments of silence as the last of the pink washed away from the sky to be replaced by blue. "...nice Valentine's Day, huh?" she tried to break the tension a little.
Before he could stop himself, Beast Boy replied "Not really..." He instantly regretted saying that as Raven sighed and put her hand on her forehead.
"You know, Starfire and I aren't..." Raven wasn't quite sure how to word anything to Beast Boy. "We're not... Well, you know, a couple..." Raven rubbed her forehead some more as she could tell Beast Boy wasn't sure whether or not to believe her. "You walked in at a really bad time. Something gave Star the idea that on Valentine's Day, you show 'affection' for all your friends." Raven sighed and shrugged a little. "I wasn't sure how to react at first... I was kinda surprised, so I froze. Then you walked in. You... sort of snapped me out." She attempted to smile at him, hoping to cheer him up a little. She had a feeling he was upset about her, but wasn't sure how to react, so pretended not to notice.
After awhile, Beast Boy ventured a couple words. "So you guys aren't... in love?" It may have been a careless thing to ask, something that may have given him away, but Beast Boy managed not to blush.
Raven chuckled a little, seeing where BB was going. "No, I don't think so. She was a little confused and hopefully now she's figured everything out..." Beast Boy gave a small smile and looked Raven in the face for the first time to see that she, too, was smiling. She stood and offered her hand to him. "Care to go inside?" Beast Boy took her hand and allowed her to help pull him up.
-.-.-.-
Hours passed without any flaws. Starfire had made breakfst for everyone (little 'heart' shaped pancakes.) Cyborg had left the garage only to sniff Starfire's cooking, then made a heel-turn back to his car. Robin had settled himself on the couch to watch television while Raven sat on the back of said couch, reading. Beast Boy had boldly gone back up to the roof to retrieve his rose.
In the afternoon, neither Raven nor Robin had moved. Beast Boy was quietly slipping into the living quarters, holding the rose behind his back as a touch of red graced his green face. A commercial popped onto the screen and attracted Raven's attention. It was, of course, a Valentine's commercial and was, coincidentally, for the store Beast Boy had purchased his flower from. A boy on the television was offering a rose to a blushing girl, who accepted it right before hugging the boy. "This Valentine's Day, make her yours," the speakers said in a woman's smooth, seductive voice. Beast Boy smiled as he noticed Raven intently examining the screen.
He was but feet away from her, still unnoticed, when Raven said to Robin, "You know, I don't think I could fall for a guy who pulled something like that..." For the second time that day, Beast Boy's jaw fell to the ground and his brain went caput. "Its such a cliche move, you know?"
Raven returned to her book as Robin nodded in agreement and Beast Boy turned around and sulked out of the room.
Oh, well, BB. Theres always next Valentine's Day.