What You Need
By Margarita Neko
Chapter 2: Tuesday/Starfire
"I think you should make friends with her."
I raised my eyebrow, shooting him an annoyed glance. It was lunchtime, and, for some reason, it seemed that this Garfield kid had decided that I was his new best friend. He'd sat down at me, Cy, and Raven's table, not even with a "Hello, may I please sit here?", and began eating. That was okay, I guess, but then he'd said that thing about "making friends with her." I didn't like people telling me what to do, especially when I didn't even know what the hell they were talking about.
"Make friends with who?" I asked, irritated. He nodded in the direction of this girl with red hair, a foreign exchange student from-Well, actually, I couldn't remember where she'd come from. She had a really weird accent, one that I wasn't familiar with.
"Starfire," he said. "She's really nice, and she needs some good friends. I've talked to her a little, but... Well, we just didn't really click, y'know?"
I sighed. "Look, Garfield-"
"Gar."
I blinked. "Huh?" I asked, oh-so-wittily.
"Call me Gar. Garfield is a cat's name," he explained as he took a big bite out of his macaroni and cheese.
I sighed again. "Okay, Gar then..." I conceded. "Listen, I don't like people telling me what to do, and I really don't want to make friends with some girl that I've never even spoken to. And besides... What the hell kind of a name is Starfire, anyway?"
He just giggled, like he hadn't heard the first half of my little spiel. "According to her, her parents were their countries equivalent of hippies," he told me, then stared off thoughtfully. "Y'know, it's weird... I'd never even heard of her country before she told me about it... And it's got this really funky name, too. I can't pronounce it. It makes my tongue do funny things."
I stared at him incredulously. Had he even heard what I'd said?
"And besides, it's not even you I really want to become friends with her," he stated after a moment, as if reading my mind. This kid was seriously weird. "It's Raven. But I doubt she'd want to be friends with anyone that wasn't friends with you and Cy, so..."
I wondered briefly at how he'd learned our names, but pushed it from my mind in favor of a more confusing issue. "Why Raven?" I asked him, glancing around to make sure that neither she nor Cy was coming back from the lunch line at the moment.
Gar shrugged. "She needs it," he said vaguely, sipping from his carton of orange juice.
I was about to ask him to clarify, but Cy and Raven ha chosen that moment to make their way through the crowded cafeteria to our table, so I just turned back to my lunch. Meatloaf. Joy.
"Hey, man, what's up?" Cy asked amiably, but he shot me a questioning look, jerking his head in Gar's direction. I shrugged to let him know that the wacko sitting with us had certainly not been my idea.
"Not much," I replied out loud. I hesitated a second, shooting a glance at Gar. He ignored me, concentrating on his mac and cheese. Great. He was going to let me make the decision of what to do. In other words, two choices: Give in and go sit with Starfire, or stay here and then have to face the guilt of leaving her all alone. He knew that if he didn't push, there would be guilt, because I couldn't get mad at him for being annoying and use that as an out.
But I wasn't going to give in.
I was stronger than that.
"Hey guys, I was thinking about maybe asking that foreign exchange girl to come sit with us. What do you think?"
...Dammit. I'd forgotten about that damn conscience thing.
Cy raised his eyebrow. "That redhead?" he asked, glancing over in her direction. "Well... She is cute, I guess..."
Raven, of course, just shrugged. If she really did "need this", then she sure as hell didn't know it. She looked like she couldn't care less. However, she did cast a slightly intrigued look in the direction of the redhead.
"I'll go get her!" Gar chirped happily, entering the conversation once again now that he knew he'd won, and I tried to ignore the triumphant grin that he sent in my direction. He hopped over to the table, two rows away, where Starfire was sitting all alone. They chatted a bit about something or another (I couldn't hear over the din of the cafeteria), laughed a little, and then Gar grabbed her hand and began pulling her through the crowds to our table.
"Everyone, this is Starfire!" he announced in his happiest voice, a cheerful grin gracing his face. Starfire just smiled joyfully and clasped her hands in front of her chest.
I stood up. "Hey, Starfire," I began, trying to be as friendly as possible while secretly wishing painful deaths upon Gar for his manipulative ways. "I'm Robin Grayson. This is Cy, and that's-"
"Raven," the dark-haired girl said, deciding to introduce herself for some reason. I found that strange; usually, she just stayed quiet and moody in a corner, letting everyone else talk. For some reason, however, she was watching this strange new girl like she was the most interesting thing she'd set eyes on in quite a while. "Nice to meet you."
Starfire, in an even more cheerful voice than Gar's, finally spoke. "And I am very pleased to meet you, as well!" she said enthusiastically, and I wondered at the accent again. "I am sure that we shall become very good friends!"
And then, the impossible happened.
Raven smiled, laughed, and responded with, "I'm looking forward to it!"
~*~
That day after school, I found myself running to catch up to Gar, who was already well past the parking lot and walking down main street, the same street I'd seen him disappear down yesterday.
"Hey! Wait up!" I called out as soon as I was within earshot, and he stopped. In a few moments, I was standing beside him, trying to catch my breath while working out what I wanted to say.
"How did you know?" I asked as soon as my throat stopped burning. He looked up at me, this innocent, curious expression on his face, like he had no idea what I was talking about.
"Know what?" he asked, tilting his head slightly in question, an action that annoyed me back then, but that I'd later find absolutely adorable.
"You know what I'm talking about," I told him, frustrated, but he just sent me one of those It's-all-Greek-to-me look. Growling slightly, I clarified. "How did you know that Raven and Starfire would hit it off like that? I've never seen her be that... *Friendly,* to *anyone* before."
Gar sighed, like I was the one annoying him. "It's just like I said... She *needed* her."
"You've already said that!" I said impatiently. "I want to know *why!*"
"Tell me," he started, staring up at me with those huge green eyes that knew something I didn't. It kind of pissed me off. "When you said 'anyone', who did you mean? From what I've seen, the people at your school fit into one of four main groups: Jocks, preps, everyone else who's lower on the food chain-Y'know, geeks and nerds and junk-and then you three. I've seen people like Raven before. She makes friends only with people that she thinks of as 'real,' and the jocks and preps are generally very fake. Then there are the geeks and nerds, but they're all generally dull, and she'd rather not associate with them. So she picked you and Cy, and just stuck with you."
I raised my eyebrow. "You picked up all this from knowing her... For *one day*?" I asked incredulously.
"I've been around a lot of people," he explained. "I can generally tell what they're gonna be like pretty quickly. So, was I right about her?"
"Yeah, I guess..." I admitted grudgingly. "But where does Starfire fit into all this?"
"Starfire... Doesn't fit in. That's the whole point," he said, wrinkling his brow in concentration, as if he couldn't quite figure out how to explain this all to me. "She's very 'real,' so to speak. She wouldn't go for popularity over real friendship, she's not too into clothes and fashion and painting her nails, and, most importantly, she was *alone*. I'm sure Raven remembers being alone. If she hadn't been, she wouldn't be quite so... Moody."
Okay, at this point, Gar was seriously starting to freak me out. Before me and Cy, yeah, Raven had been totally alone. Her mother had died when she was really little, like, five years old, practically preschool age, and her father was just an asshole, plain and simple, so no one could really blame her for trying not to socialize with him. She hadn't had many childhood friends, and she'd never had a best friend up until halfway through middle school, when she met us.
Still, I was doubtful of what he'd said about Raven needing Starfire. "That's great and all, but I still don't see why Raven would *need* her," I told him. "I mean... Why is she so different from Cy and me? Why would Raven need her when she already has us?"
"It's a girl thing," he told me simply, and I almost burst out laughing, but managed to confine myself to a few chuckles. He looked at me confusedly. "What's so funny?"
"You really *don't* know what you're talking about!" I informed him, feeling slightly relieved and a bit victorious, in some weird way. It had been a bit scary, the way he'd known everything about Raven without actually knowing her. "Raven, well... That chick's no girl!"
I laughed a bit more, but stopped abruptly a second later when he shot me one of those "Are you really that stupid?" looks. Oddly enough, there was something akin to frustration burning in his bright green eyes.
"The only reason she acts like such a tomboy is because the only friends she has are guys!" he said vehemently. "I mean, you guys must have influenced the way she grew up a lot, and I'm guessing that she has very few female relatives, to boot, but just because she's a tomboy doesn't mean she's not female! And girls need girl friends! You know, for girl talk and stuff like that. It's like, therapeutic for them or something. So, unless you wanna talk to her about cramps and boys while you paint your toenails, she *needs* a female friend!"
Shit. He really does know what he's talking about. Right down to her having no female relatives. Creepy.
"How do you know all this?" I asked him, humbled, but not quite willing to admit that he was right.
"...One of my best friends when I was a kid explained it to me," he said, this kind of sad look crossing his face. "She was really into psychology and stuff like that. I asked her once why girls tended to be friends with girls, and guys with guys, and that was how she explained it to me. We each need someone who understands what we're going through."
I wondered briefly at the sad look on his face, but figured I wouldn't ask him about it. I had to go home, anyway. Karate started at four, and I had to do my chores before then.
"...Listen, I gotta get going," I said, and Gar nodded, that cheerful grin back in place, as if there had never been anything else. Weird.
"Yeah, me too," he said. "I've got to feed Angel."
"Angel?"
"The bird," he explained.
"Ah. Well, don't let the little bugger wait too long," I told him. He nodded.
"Of course not! If I do, he'll probably bite my hand again," he said with a giggle. "Well... See ya, dude!"
And then he was off again, jogging lightly down the street as I stared after him again. His insightfulness was... Surprising, to say the least, from someone so annoying... Although, once again, his insightfulness was in itself a major source of annoyance, so I guess it fit.
I chuckled lightly to myself at the thought, even though it was sort of disturbing, and turned to begin walking home.
~*End Chapter Two*~
Author's Notes: Special thanks to Kasen, my new bestest friend, for managing to get me to write this fic, and then making sure that I actually kept at it! ^.^ I wuv you, 'Sen-chan! Oh, and one more thing: I noticed a typo in chapter one. I'd said that it was one month earlier at one point, but then three months in another. That's just because it was originally one month, but I changed it to three later. So, that was meant to be three months. Sorry!
Review responses:
Lady Kasen: ...I already thanked you! . Curses...
Shadow Avenger: Nifty! I feel special! ^.^ I'm glad you like my fic even though it's AU. It's fun to write, so I'm happy that people think it's fun to read, too. Thank you for the nice comments!
Catc10: O.o Er... Fainting is bad, dear... *Gets out the smelling salts* ^.^ Nayways, thankies for the nice review! And please do not go unconscious on me this chapter!
^.^ Well, that's it! R&R, everyone!
Chapter 2: Tuesday/Starfire
"I think you should make friends with her."
I raised my eyebrow, shooting him an annoyed glance. It was lunchtime, and, for some reason, it seemed that this Garfield kid had decided that I was his new best friend. He'd sat down at me, Cy, and Raven's table, not even with a "Hello, may I please sit here?", and began eating. That was okay, I guess, but then he'd said that thing about "making friends with her." I didn't like people telling me what to do, especially when I didn't even know what the hell they were talking about.
"Make friends with who?" I asked, irritated. He nodded in the direction of this girl with red hair, a foreign exchange student from-Well, actually, I couldn't remember where she'd come from. She had a really weird accent, one that I wasn't familiar with.
"Starfire," he said. "She's really nice, and she needs some good friends. I've talked to her a little, but... Well, we just didn't really click, y'know?"
I sighed. "Look, Garfield-"
"Gar."
I blinked. "Huh?" I asked, oh-so-wittily.
"Call me Gar. Garfield is a cat's name," he explained as he took a big bite out of his macaroni and cheese.
I sighed again. "Okay, Gar then..." I conceded. "Listen, I don't like people telling me what to do, and I really don't want to make friends with some girl that I've never even spoken to. And besides... What the hell kind of a name is Starfire, anyway?"
He just giggled, like he hadn't heard the first half of my little spiel. "According to her, her parents were their countries equivalent of hippies," he told me, then stared off thoughtfully. "Y'know, it's weird... I'd never even heard of her country before she told me about it... And it's got this really funky name, too. I can't pronounce it. It makes my tongue do funny things."
I stared at him incredulously. Had he even heard what I'd said?
"And besides, it's not even you I really want to become friends with her," he stated after a moment, as if reading my mind. This kid was seriously weird. "It's Raven. But I doubt she'd want to be friends with anyone that wasn't friends with you and Cy, so..."
I wondered briefly at how he'd learned our names, but pushed it from my mind in favor of a more confusing issue. "Why Raven?" I asked him, glancing around to make sure that neither she nor Cy was coming back from the lunch line at the moment.
Gar shrugged. "She needs it," he said vaguely, sipping from his carton of orange juice.
I was about to ask him to clarify, but Cy and Raven ha chosen that moment to make their way through the crowded cafeteria to our table, so I just turned back to my lunch. Meatloaf. Joy.
"Hey, man, what's up?" Cy asked amiably, but he shot me a questioning look, jerking his head in Gar's direction. I shrugged to let him know that the wacko sitting with us had certainly not been my idea.
"Not much," I replied out loud. I hesitated a second, shooting a glance at Gar. He ignored me, concentrating on his mac and cheese. Great. He was going to let me make the decision of what to do. In other words, two choices: Give in and go sit with Starfire, or stay here and then have to face the guilt of leaving her all alone. He knew that if he didn't push, there would be guilt, because I couldn't get mad at him for being annoying and use that as an out.
But I wasn't going to give in.
I was stronger than that.
"Hey guys, I was thinking about maybe asking that foreign exchange girl to come sit with us. What do you think?"
...Dammit. I'd forgotten about that damn conscience thing.
Cy raised his eyebrow. "That redhead?" he asked, glancing over in her direction. "Well... She is cute, I guess..."
Raven, of course, just shrugged. If she really did "need this", then she sure as hell didn't know it. She looked like she couldn't care less. However, she did cast a slightly intrigued look in the direction of the redhead.
"I'll go get her!" Gar chirped happily, entering the conversation once again now that he knew he'd won, and I tried to ignore the triumphant grin that he sent in my direction. He hopped over to the table, two rows away, where Starfire was sitting all alone. They chatted a bit about something or another (I couldn't hear over the din of the cafeteria), laughed a little, and then Gar grabbed her hand and began pulling her through the crowds to our table.
"Everyone, this is Starfire!" he announced in his happiest voice, a cheerful grin gracing his face. Starfire just smiled joyfully and clasped her hands in front of her chest.
I stood up. "Hey, Starfire," I began, trying to be as friendly as possible while secretly wishing painful deaths upon Gar for his manipulative ways. "I'm Robin Grayson. This is Cy, and that's-"
"Raven," the dark-haired girl said, deciding to introduce herself for some reason. I found that strange; usually, she just stayed quiet and moody in a corner, letting everyone else talk. For some reason, however, she was watching this strange new girl like she was the most interesting thing she'd set eyes on in quite a while. "Nice to meet you."
Starfire, in an even more cheerful voice than Gar's, finally spoke. "And I am very pleased to meet you, as well!" she said enthusiastically, and I wondered at the accent again. "I am sure that we shall become very good friends!"
And then, the impossible happened.
Raven smiled, laughed, and responded with, "I'm looking forward to it!"
~*~
That day after school, I found myself running to catch up to Gar, who was already well past the parking lot and walking down main street, the same street I'd seen him disappear down yesterday.
"Hey! Wait up!" I called out as soon as I was within earshot, and he stopped. In a few moments, I was standing beside him, trying to catch my breath while working out what I wanted to say.
"How did you know?" I asked as soon as my throat stopped burning. He looked up at me, this innocent, curious expression on his face, like he had no idea what I was talking about.
"Know what?" he asked, tilting his head slightly in question, an action that annoyed me back then, but that I'd later find absolutely adorable.
"You know what I'm talking about," I told him, frustrated, but he just sent me one of those It's-all-Greek-to-me look. Growling slightly, I clarified. "How did you know that Raven and Starfire would hit it off like that? I've never seen her be that... *Friendly,* to *anyone* before."
Gar sighed, like I was the one annoying him. "It's just like I said... She *needed* her."
"You've already said that!" I said impatiently. "I want to know *why!*"
"Tell me," he started, staring up at me with those huge green eyes that knew something I didn't. It kind of pissed me off. "When you said 'anyone', who did you mean? From what I've seen, the people at your school fit into one of four main groups: Jocks, preps, everyone else who's lower on the food chain-Y'know, geeks and nerds and junk-and then you three. I've seen people like Raven before. She makes friends only with people that she thinks of as 'real,' and the jocks and preps are generally very fake. Then there are the geeks and nerds, but they're all generally dull, and she'd rather not associate with them. So she picked you and Cy, and just stuck with you."
I raised my eyebrow. "You picked up all this from knowing her... For *one day*?" I asked incredulously.
"I've been around a lot of people," he explained. "I can generally tell what they're gonna be like pretty quickly. So, was I right about her?"
"Yeah, I guess..." I admitted grudgingly. "But where does Starfire fit into all this?"
"Starfire... Doesn't fit in. That's the whole point," he said, wrinkling his brow in concentration, as if he couldn't quite figure out how to explain this all to me. "She's very 'real,' so to speak. She wouldn't go for popularity over real friendship, she's not too into clothes and fashion and painting her nails, and, most importantly, she was *alone*. I'm sure Raven remembers being alone. If she hadn't been, she wouldn't be quite so... Moody."
Okay, at this point, Gar was seriously starting to freak me out. Before me and Cy, yeah, Raven had been totally alone. Her mother had died when she was really little, like, five years old, practically preschool age, and her father was just an asshole, plain and simple, so no one could really blame her for trying not to socialize with him. She hadn't had many childhood friends, and she'd never had a best friend up until halfway through middle school, when she met us.
Still, I was doubtful of what he'd said about Raven needing Starfire. "That's great and all, but I still don't see why Raven would *need* her," I told him. "I mean... Why is she so different from Cy and me? Why would Raven need her when she already has us?"
"It's a girl thing," he told me simply, and I almost burst out laughing, but managed to confine myself to a few chuckles. He looked at me confusedly. "What's so funny?"
"You really *don't* know what you're talking about!" I informed him, feeling slightly relieved and a bit victorious, in some weird way. It had been a bit scary, the way he'd known everything about Raven without actually knowing her. "Raven, well... That chick's no girl!"
I laughed a bit more, but stopped abruptly a second later when he shot me one of those "Are you really that stupid?" looks. Oddly enough, there was something akin to frustration burning in his bright green eyes.
"The only reason she acts like such a tomboy is because the only friends she has are guys!" he said vehemently. "I mean, you guys must have influenced the way she grew up a lot, and I'm guessing that she has very few female relatives, to boot, but just because she's a tomboy doesn't mean she's not female! And girls need girl friends! You know, for girl talk and stuff like that. It's like, therapeutic for them or something. So, unless you wanna talk to her about cramps and boys while you paint your toenails, she *needs* a female friend!"
Shit. He really does know what he's talking about. Right down to her having no female relatives. Creepy.
"How do you know all this?" I asked him, humbled, but not quite willing to admit that he was right.
"...One of my best friends when I was a kid explained it to me," he said, this kind of sad look crossing his face. "She was really into psychology and stuff like that. I asked her once why girls tended to be friends with girls, and guys with guys, and that was how she explained it to me. We each need someone who understands what we're going through."
I wondered briefly at the sad look on his face, but figured I wouldn't ask him about it. I had to go home, anyway. Karate started at four, and I had to do my chores before then.
"...Listen, I gotta get going," I said, and Gar nodded, that cheerful grin back in place, as if there had never been anything else. Weird.
"Yeah, me too," he said. "I've got to feed Angel."
"Angel?"
"The bird," he explained.
"Ah. Well, don't let the little bugger wait too long," I told him. He nodded.
"Of course not! If I do, he'll probably bite my hand again," he said with a giggle. "Well... See ya, dude!"
And then he was off again, jogging lightly down the street as I stared after him again. His insightfulness was... Surprising, to say the least, from someone so annoying... Although, once again, his insightfulness was in itself a major source of annoyance, so I guess it fit.
I chuckled lightly to myself at the thought, even though it was sort of disturbing, and turned to begin walking home.
~*End Chapter Two*~
Author's Notes: Special thanks to Kasen, my new bestest friend, for managing to get me to write this fic, and then making sure that I actually kept at it! ^.^ I wuv you, 'Sen-chan! Oh, and one more thing: I noticed a typo in chapter one. I'd said that it was one month earlier at one point, but then three months in another. That's just because it was originally one month, but I changed it to three later. So, that was meant to be three months. Sorry!
Review responses:
Lady Kasen: ...I already thanked you! . Curses...
Shadow Avenger: Nifty! I feel special! ^.^ I'm glad you like my fic even though it's AU. It's fun to write, so I'm happy that people think it's fun to read, too. Thank you for the nice comments!
Catc10: O.o Er... Fainting is bad, dear... *Gets out the smelling salts* ^.^ Nayways, thankies for the nice review! And please do not go unconscious on me this chapter!
^.^ Well, that's it! R&R, everyone!
