I fade away into the crowd, taking refuge in the throngs of chattering students, as Beast Boy stares after me. My long blond hair and blue eyes stand out in the swells of dark-haired, dark-eyed teenagers, and not for once I curse my distinctive appearance.

Finally, at long last, he turns his back to me. He can no longer see me, but I can still see him. The pale green skin, the shaggy dark green hair and the bright, determined jade-green eyes are all familiar to me. I recall touching his arm or his shoulder, running my gloved fingers through his hair, looking into those wonderful eyes. Eyes that hold only hope and affection for me.

Those emotions are misplaced.

Beast Boy pulls out his Titan communicator. I recognize it instantly, even if he hadn't just offered it to me earlier. The distinctive black and yellow pattern, the familiar 'T', and the way it fits into my palm so well – the way it used to, when I once stood with the Teen Titans, and not against them.

He speaks something into the communicator. I can't hear what it is or who the caller is, but I'm pretty sure it's one of the other mainstream Titans. Serious leader Robin, maybe, or perhaps exuberant, innocent Starfire. It could be steady, laid-back Cyborg, or dark, reserved Raven. I won't know. I never will know.

I watch him run off, his arms and legs pumping hard as he makes for the exit.

He never looks back. The pain that stabs me in the heart is familiar, but still I am surprised. Then I rebuke myself.

Why should he?

I wait till the front doors slam shut before turning around and emerging from my hiding place. I trudge down the empty school halls. Hang the geometry test. Hang the math teacher. I need time to myself, to compose myself before any of my 'friends' come across me in my state.

Some friends. They see me as a normal girl, blond, pretty, with wealthy parents, and if there is anything that doesn't scream normal, the social castes would spit me out faster than you can say, "Teen Titans". I'm surprised the adoption actually came through for me, but it didn't matter. All I needed was a fresh start. Then Dad - my new father, not the one that birthed me and abandoned me - made the decision to move to Jump City, back where I started out. Back where the demons of my past waited.

Sheer dumb luck, I suppose. Or fate?

If Beast Boy hadn't seen me, how would he have spent his life? Would he have continued his search for me till the end? If that would have been the turn his life took, it would have been a miserable existence for him indeed. As it already is for me.

I nearly caved, I have to admit. His earnestness, his obvious heartbroken disappointment, his pleas – they almost broke down my defenses. Seeing him again, talking to him, being with him was just like old times. Those jokes that I will always find funny, that smile that I will always see as endearing, that winning personality and loyalty – they are what attracted me to him. What still attracts me to him.

But I don't deserve him. I never did.

I still don't.

Working for Slade first as a traitor, then as his outright apprentice, has steeped my soul in sin that I can never blot away. I was Slade's will born in flesh, his right hand. I thought the power and the prestige then were enough, that being on the winning side with Slade was enough. I lied for him, bled for him, killed for him. I betrayed my true friends, the Teen Titans. I broke Beast Boy's heart three times.

Still they retained concern for me. They reminded me, time and time again, that their friendship was real and that their words were only truth. Torn by hurt, by fear, I rejected them over and over. Rejected him. He never lost faith or the affection he felt towards me – something that I realize now, too little, too late.

My actions in that underground lair may have redeemed me, in the Titans' eyes, but to me I feel I can never be forgiven for all that I have done. I never deserved their friendship or their loyalty. I never deserved Beast Boy's attention and – dare I say it? – love. Raven's contempt and her suspicions were true to the letter, but now even she thinks otherwise – while I cannot look back at my past without nausea and self-loathing.

Oh, the irony.

I remember coming back to consciousness in that tomb of rock. For whatever reason that I was freed from that fate, I recall stepping off the stone dais where I once stood and seeing bouquets of flowers strewn thickly around the plaque at the foot of the dais. The words that I read branded themselves permanently across my mind. When I close my eyes, I see the letters blazing brightly, as if written in fire.

After what I had done, they still accepted me.

It's not so much the events that happened in the past as it is the tumult of emotions accompanying those events. I can never look at the Titans without remembering how I wounded each one of them in turn, be it physically or mentally or emotionally. I can never take a step into the Tower or set a foot in a battle without remembering how I used to belong so happily, and completely, in that setting. I can never live that life without being reminded every waking minute of how I had thrown this utopia away for hell on earth, and for the devil himself in the flesh.

They deserve better. He deserves better. They need a friend and teammate who will never hurt them a fraction of what I did, and who will watch their backs and who they can trust. He needs a girl who will not hide her true self with lies and a pretty face, who will support him and love him unconditionally.

Looking back now, a little voice in my head whispers that maybe there was more to Raven's resentments than anger at being burned by my actions.

Protectiveness over a sibling or a teammate, maybe? Or something else?

It's none of my business, although I can't help wondering. That curiosity is suppressed brutally by the dull ache that washes over my heart yet again.

I miss the Teen Titans. I miss Beast Boy already. I miss that life of freedom and happiness and friendship. I miss the way opportunity and choices knocked on the door.

I look back down the yawning corridor, at the anonymous classroom doors and the lockers stretching all the way past the walls. I picture my nice, ordinary home and new, cookie-cutter family waiting for me when I'm done with school for the day.

This ordinary, boring life has become my purgatory. But it's only right.

I wasted my chances with the Teen Titans. I did more wrong than right, and I can't turn back time. I made the agonizing decisions months ago so that no one else would have to be saddled with the burden, least of all the Titans. The future will be better from now on for the Titans, and hopefully, for myself. After all, things change.

I keep telling myself that every day.