The snow fell hard and cold that year, pouring across her vision like a fog of memories. The Christmas lights sprinkled the spectacle with gold and green, flashing red like a warning light between the glimmers of cheer. Behind her, garlands shed their glittering strands all over the floor and Christmas music made the room lonelier than it should have been.
It was her fault to begin with. She was the one who had declined the invitation to go to the Christmas party. It wasn't her thing anyways, what did she care if they all spent Christmas Eve partying it up without her? Raven didn't do parties.
Sighing she left the dreary and placid snowfall behind and only stopped when she reached the shining linoleum of the kitchen. There was no Christmas turkey burning in the stove this year, nor any stuffing to be tossed back and forth like mutilated snowballs. The Tower was empty and cold save herself.
The whistle of the teapot howled into the stillness and empty music like a scream of sorrow. Raven's hands barely kept from shaking as she lifted the stainless steel and poured the boiling water into her customary black mug. Parties weren't her thing.
But that didn't mean they had to go off and leave her here alone.
She returned to the unwelcoming couch and neatly tucked her legs beneath her shadowy blue cape. The snow outside had not subsided; the torrent of white flakes still held the city at its mercy. Raven sipped her tea and let the steam gently fog her vision into a haze.
XXX
"Terra, do you want whole cranberry sauce or the jellied kind?"
"Both!" Replied the blonde her smile momentarily dazzling a star struck Beast Boy.
Disgruntled, Raven grabbed the cans from his hands before he dropped them both.
"Pay attention." She snapped irritably. "Cyborg will skin me alive if I let you ruin Christmas dinner this year."
"Don't worry Raven, " Terra wrapped an arm covered in tinsel around the mysterious introvert, "me and Beast Boy will save you."
"Or you'll be my death." She growled good-naturedly in reply.
It had only been several months since Terra's odd return. Since then, Raven had been struggling with the new group dynamics of her friends and teammates. She liked Terra, but of course, she didn't like change.
"Friends! I wish to know how the Dinner of Thanks is arriving!" Starfire floated in from the living room, hands clasped eagerly and cheeks rosy with holiday cheer.
"You mean Christmas Dinner, Starfire, and it's coming along just fine." Raven replied patiently.
"Wonderful! I shall inform Cyborg that you are not making him regret his decision." Smiling merrily, the alien floated back to the living room, more likely to cuddle with Robin on the couch than to sooth Cyborg's fears about dinner.
"I'm surprised he even let us convince him he needed a break from cooking this year." Raven grumbled in reply. The gravy hissed ominously, demanding her attention.
"So he usually cooks for you guys every year?" Terra inquired, pulling tinsel from her hair. Her and Beast Boy had been the ones to decorate the tree, turning the whole affair into a playful quibble that quickly escalated into a full-fledged, boys vs. girls battle.
"Yeah. We agreed the first year that me and him would switch off every Christmas but he's-"
"Phobic about tofu," finished Raven with a smile.
Despite what her friends thought, Raven quite enjoyed the Christmas season. She wasn't immune to joy and happiness, and she deeply cared for her surrogate family. Christmas provided her with a reason to smile more than occasionally, though it was a conflict with her rigid training of being emotionless.
But somehow her friends didn't understand this. They treaded carefully around her, nearly tiptoeing as they passed, when Christmas season arrived. They seemed to believe that any amount of overjoyfulness would make her grumpier and more likely to break out with a rude remark or fatal glare.
Because of her powers, Raven was unable to correct their misconceptions. It was true, the Christmas spirit, though infectious, was dangerous. She had to meditate more often and found herself more secluded than ever during a time of great togetherness and celebration. If she had been able to, she might have felt quite depressed and oustracized. It seemed that Christmas, so long as her friends misunderstood her, would always be a painfully double-edged sword. For now, she contented herself with watching silently as the other Titans engaged in acts of carefree merriment. Despite the conflict of her powers and her friends' midjudgement of them, she still found ways to enjoy her favorite season.
"A few more minutes and dinner should be ready." She concluded brightly. Beast Boy's stomach growled in anticipation. "Why don't you two go join Star and the others; I'll finish here."
She watched as Terra grabbed the changeling's hand in hers and headed for the living room, the sound of laughter attracting both bright eyed jokers. Raven contened herself with watching from the cold tiles of the kitchen as Cyborg quickly engaged the newcomers in a video game, Robin and Starfire cheering from the sidelines. She felt a smile of peacefulness creep at the corners of her mouth that she simply could not deny. The golden blinking lights warmed the room while the multi-colored glitter of the Christmas tree splashed the scene with color. It was a picture-perfect evening, the night before Christmas morning when Beast Boy would leap from room to room waking their occupants with excited fervor.
Except he never went into her room.
Sighing she returned to the golden turkey, wincing from the heat as she removed it from the oven. She let it sit to cool, watching as the heat wafted off in smokey waves of boiled juices. The meal suddenly looked unappetizing. Feeling an ominous twinge of pain somewhere in her chest, she teleported to her room to meditate. It was going to be another lonely Christmas.
XXX
She hated that Terra was always in a place that Raven couldn't possibly be. She was always in the spotlight, hoarding the laughter and attention of the only people in the world that Raven might have loved. And she threw it all away. Raven would have given anything to have what they gave to that traitorous apprentice.
And yet, no matter how long she stayed with them, it seemed as if none of the Titans would ever understand her.
If they did, they would not have left her here alone when she declined the invitation. They would have forced her to come, or they might have even chosen to stay behind. But they went, with only Starfire to stare back at her with reluctance and guilt.
Starfire looked beautiful.
She had discovered the fashion of Earth and quickly put it to good use. Her green dress had made her eyes flame and her red hair had hung in loose ringlets around her face, straggling in a purposeful messiness from the elaborate style that crowned her head.
Raven only wished she could look and act as beautifully as her dearest friend. It had certainly caught the attention of young Robin; he would do anything for the alien princess. Or at least, that was the impression he gave everyone else in the Tower. Even Cyborg remarked sometimes that he wished they would simply get it over with.
Robin of course was just as dashing and handsome as Starfire was caring and beautiful. He played the role of the leader, having more experience than any of them when it came to crime fighting. But his charisma, when he wasn't uttering some of the cheesiest lines in the book, was undeniable. Despite that, his ferocious determination made him hard to ignore. It could also make him hardheaded and fairly stubborn to the point of stupidity.
Smiling idly to herself Raven remembered fondly the many times she had barely avoided an argument with her fearless leader. She could be just as stubborn as the Boy Wonder, but she was wise enough to know when an argument would be pointless and potentially dangerous. But it stung her to think that he had not vouched for her when she stayed here alone. Usually he understood her and her actions, or at least took them without question. Perhaps that unquestioning loyalty was his reason for simply nodding curtly and leaving her alone on Christmas Eve.
Raven began to feel hopelessly lonely, her thoughts churning with the pangs of betrayal and abandonement. She had thought she meant more to them than this. She had thought that her relationship with the Titans had gone beyond the point where she was misunderstood.
Her frown was distracted as she stepped into blackness and reappeared at the base of the Tower. The wind howled around her, slipping its cold fingers under her cloak and running up her bare legs. She shivered once and let the cold seep into her skin, accepting it into her body. It became a vague nuisance in the back of her mind, one that remained unthreatening to her half-demon body.
Without thinking about why, she began to build. The snow was heavy and thick, perfect for packing and stacking. Slowly, out of the swirling whiteness, figures began to emerge beneath her fingers.
XXX
When they came home, the storm had ended. They were all pleasantly satiated from the festivities, the warmth of laughter and socialization clinging to their skin like a scent. They were still laughing when the T-Car pulled to a stop, skidding slightly on the thickly packed snow. But Starfire's gasp of surprise quickly turned their laughter into curious silence.
"What is it Star?" Robin asked as he rounded the car to meet her. She pointed a slender finger, tears in her eyes.
"What are they Robin? And who has made them?"
Robin's masked eyes widened to startled saucers, his mouth forming a tiny 'o'. "They're…I think they're us. I don't know who could have made them. Raven should know, she was here wasn't she?"
Cyborg too, sported a similar expression to his team leader. He rubbed the back of his head, apprehensive. "But, no one else can enter or leave the island without the security codes. Unless Aqualad is trying to pull something, I don't think anyone else could have done this…"
"Maybe Raven did?" Beast Boy suggested quietly. He crept forward through the knee-high fluff toward the five figures sculpted so beautifully at the base of their Tower. He came face to face with a grinning replica of himself.
"No way. You think Raven-?" Cyborg gently poked a snowy metahuman that looked eerily familiar.
"It's plausible I guess." Robin responded, admiring the detail on his own icy twin. "But I didn't think this was her sort of thing."
"There are many things about Raven we do not understand." Starfire responded sadly. Her finger traced the cheek of her merrily grinning other self, her eyes despondent. "And I believe," she pushed her way through the snow, toward a fifth figure in the background, "that there are many things about her that we take for granted. "
The others turned their attention to Starfire at her mournful tone. Behind the snow versions of themselves, was an icy version of Raven. Her back was turned to the others and at her feet, frozen and partially covered with new snow, was the clasp to Raven's cloak.
"We are terrible friends!" Starfire wailed. "We left our most faithful of friends alone on your Eve of Christmas!"
"Oh Star, I'm sure…I'm sure it isn't all as it seems." Robin tried unsuccessfully to console the distressed Tamaranian.
"We should find her, talk to her." Cyborg added worriedly.
Starfire and Robin ran together into the Tower to search for their friend. Before he followed, Cyborg paused to glance back at an oddly silent Beast Boy. The smallest Titan was watching the moon set over the water, his expression cold and uninviting.
"BB? What's up man?"
Beast Boy jerked out of his reverie and glanced at his friend. "I don't know why she did this." He gestured weakly to the statues, his expression sad. "I know she must hate Christmas but that doesn't mean she has to act like this. I mean, that was the whole reason we let her be by herself this year, wasn't it?"
"Maybe we were wrong." Cyborg whispered in reply then he too, disappeared through the Tower doors.
"You're not in the Tower, are you Raven?" Beast Boy asked the cold night air. Then he smiled weakly, unsure. "You'll come back when you're ready, won't you? Because you know we need you, don't you?"
XXX
In fact, she reappeared an hour later, placing a teapot on the stove and startling them all with her swift and silent return. They had searched the Tower from head to foot and, when upon discovering that it was empty, had thought they would never see her again.
Starfire practically wept with joy, rushing forward in a flurry of sparkles and perfume to envelope the oddly quiescent Raven in a hug. Raven put all her heart into the greeting as well, startling the others to no end. Once the Tamaranian had released her, they waited for an explanation, a quiet apology, anything at all. But the darkest Titan was silent.
"Raven." Purple eyes met green, the cowl of her cloak hiding her expression from his honesty. "We're sorry."
A tired smile split her cold façade, breaking several impressions of her on the way to her eyes. She lifted the cowl from her face, exposing herself to their scrutiny.
"No. I'm sorry. I never told you how much I loved Christmas. How much I loved each of you." She paused sadly, looking around the room and its sparkling Christmas lights. Her eyes fell on each of the Titans in turn, filling with emotion as they did so.
"I didn't know how."
A/N: It's late, but this is my Christmas one/shot that I wrote. I didn't think it was all that good until reading it over again.