A/N: This is another one of those that just sort of hit me. The Tulip is my personal favorite flower, and I didn't know that until the first Spring I spent in New Orleans and took a drive down St. Charles Avenue, and saw all the mansions in the Garden District bedecked with tulip beds in all different colors. It gladdened my heart, every time, and made me smile. So, when I saw that this was one of the themes, I just thought I had to make the tulips Raven's favorite flower too.

The rest came relatively easily and quickly. True to Echoes form, I guess.

Thanks: To everyone that keeps reviewing this stuff...I'll respond individually through review response feature if I've got something to say, 'kay? Otherwise, I huggle you all.

Interlude
(26: Yellow Tulip; Hopeless Love)
By Em

"If I had the chance, love / I would not hesitate / To tell you all the things I'd never said before..."
- Sarah McLachlan, Dirty Little Secret

He had known her for four years before he found out that her favorite flower was the tulip.

He probably would never have found out, either, if it hadn't been for that case they took in San Francisco in early April. All five of them hadn't been required (it was a relatively simple case where the San Fransisco P.D. wanted them to consult on the possibility that some recent crimes committed in Golden Gate Park had been committed by meta-humans) so only he and Raven had gone. As they closed the case, he and Raven had taken a moment, upon Robin's suggestion, to explore the park and had stumbled upon the Queen Wilhelmina Tulip Garden. It had taken him all of five seconds to recognize the look on Raven's apparently impassive (it was never impassive and Robin knew that).

Years later, he still remembered that day: remembered how she had wandered among the colorful array of tulips, gazing at them with barely disguised wonder; how she had confessed as they sat on a conveniently placed bench in front of a span of orange-red tulips that tulips had been her favorite flower since she saw a picture of them in full bloom in Denmark. She hadn't given him a reason, but he hadn't needed one. He remembered, most of all, how being there in the bright sun, surrounded by green and so much color with Raven next to him had seemed like one of those rare moments of perfection that life offered you only rarely.

They hadn't taken the offered tour of the gardens, preferring to explore at their own pace. If they had taken the tour, however, they probably would have been told about the old Victorian tradition of assigning meaning to flowers. They weren't, though, and he himself didn't learn about it until years later, sitting in front of his computer, researching places to buy tulips out of season.

He didn't think she knew about the deeper meaning to the yellow tulip he sent her on the anniversary of the day they met. He wasn't even certain she'd know why he'd thought to send her anything at all on that day in particular. She probably wouldn't remember that the day was anything special, and it had been nearly a year since the Titans had disbanded - nearly a year since the last time he'd seen her.

She probably wouldn't remember that day, might not understand why he'd sent her anything at all, and probably didn't know the double meaning to the yellow tulip delivered to her doorstep...

But it didn't matter. If she remembered that afternoon they spent amidst the tulips and smiled, that was enough.

xxxxx

A/N: Yes, it's short. I know. But these Echoes tend to be that way sometimes, don't they? I swear, Puck takes absolutely NO cues from me on these. So...whaddya guys think?