: - Sweet Charade

As soon as they had returned, Raven immediately picked up the book she had been reading and settled onto the couch, trying her best to ignore her overly-loud teammates. With another of Slade's minions vanquished, they were possibly even noisier than before, convinced that they had found a lead in permanently disabling their enemy. She didn't hold to such foolish ideas, and instead of joining in the tofu buffet that Beast Boy was preparing, she remained alone, completely unwilling to let this victory give her a false sense of hope.

Nobody had noticed that she wasn't sitting around the breakfast nook like the rest of them were – well, at least not yet. This didn't bother her, because it gave her more time to try and leave them behind in meditation, even if she was supposed to be reading the book she was holding up. Cyborg had already started secretly chucking plates of tofu-crafted foods into a trashcan while Beast Boy hummed excitedly and set even more out, convinced that the reason for his creation's disappearance was that Starfire, Robin, and Cyborg finished the plates put out before.

Starfire prodded a plate of tofu hamburgers experimentally, frowning at it and cocking her head as if trying to see something hidden beneath the surface. Robin was grinning beside her, his eyes unreadable behind the mask, but he didn't appear interested in the food. For a minute, as Raven observed this, she thought that something...happened. She didn't know what to call it, but she was purely convinced that something happened.

After a few minutes of food delivery and, in return, food chuckery, something seemed to click in Robin that one of his teammates was missing. Raven would even go so far as to call it frantic as his eyes searched the biggest room (besides the basement) in the Titan Tower for her, since his hands gripped the edge of the table so hard that his knuckles showed through his green gloves. Then, having located her on the far end of the couch, he seemed to relax visibly.

Raven immediately redirected her eyes back to the words in her book, not wanting to appear overly interested in the affairs of the celebratory lunch. She tried to ignore the sound of Robin's feet growing closer, tried to block it out with mental images of inside her meditation mirror, but when his feet were so close that they sounded as loud as her heart beating in her ears, she closed the book with a snap and turned to him just as he was about to put his hand on her shoulder.

"What?" she asked in her no-tone voice, her eyes narrowed slightly in annoyance. Robin's hand, hovering in midair, quivered slightly.

"Why don't you come and eat with us?" he offered with a smile, and changed his hand movement instead to offering to help her up off of the couch. She didn't see what good that would do, though, since he was standing behind it and she would have had to walk over it just to get to the breakfast nook anyway.

She set the book down on the cushion next to her, folding her arms. Robin didn't lower his hand despite the obvious rejection. "I don't trust Beast Boy's cooking," she finally said, not meeting the unofficial leader's eyes. "I'm not exactly Queen Tofu, you know."

Robin laughed, and she noted the way his unoccupied hand (the one that wasn't still extended to her) came to rest over his stomach. Then she frowned slightly, wondering why she'd notice that. "Yeah, I know," he agreed, finally lowering his hand to rest it on the back of rim of the couch. His fingers could have brushed her shoulder, then, and she scooted away from them. "But Cy's getting rid of it all, and eventually he'll run out of it and we'll get something real."

Raven eyed him skeptically for a minute, weighing and measuring both choices. If she went over there, she'd have to at least pretend that she wasn't being entirely anti-social, but then again, if she stayed, that was being rude to her best friends. Also, he was standing right there, an encouraging smile on his face that she just didn't feel like seeing fall. Not today.

She heaved a huge sigh of resignation. "Fine," she muttered, standing and levitating over the couch. Robin gave a jerky nod of his head, like his neck was on hinges, before going back to where Cyborg and Starfire were. Beast Boy seemed to be running out of options since all his tofu was disappearing, and Cyborg, dumping what looked like a tray of tofu pizza, had a hand over his mouth to keep from laughing out loud. Robin took his customary seat next to Starfire, who, like iron filings to a magnet, immediately scooted closer to him.

Raven opted for the last seat available, which was at the end of the bench. Technically she was sitting beside Robin, only she had managed to sit as far away from him as possible without falling off of the bench. He looked at her curiously, as if wondering for the first time why she was behaving like that, but Starfire abruptly seized his arm and pointed out the window.

"That was fantastic!" she exclaimed, her green eyes wide.

"What was?" Robin replied, turning to her, a flash of seriousness on his face.

"A fish jumped out of the water," she began, and Robin, listening intently, leaned forward. "And flew." Her eyes grew large at the last statement, as if confiding something secret to him. One of Robin's eyes grew larger, and if the mask hadn't covered everything about his eyes, Raven knew he would have been raising an eyebrow.

"That's...it? Star, you know that flying fish aren't uncommon," he said, crossing his arms dubiously. Starfire tapped her chin.

"Yes, I know this," she said slowly, and twirled a lock of red hair coyly around one finger. Raven, who had been watching this whole exchange with something akin to exasperation on her face, didn't know that Starfire knew how to be coy. "But I still –"

A pained cry came from the kitchen, causing Raven, Robin, Starfire, and Cyborg all to turn anxiously towards the door. Beast Boy's head appeared, tears streaking his green face.

"We're out of tofu!" he wailed, covering his eyes with his hands. Everybody visibly relaxed, more for the fact that there was no chance they'd be forced into eating B.B.'s gross all-food-can-be-made-out-of-this substance, than that they were afraid something had happened to him.

"Booya!" Cyborg said quietly, punching the air in triumph. Raven rolled her eyes and folded her arms while Robin gave him a high-five. Starfire merely looked puzzled.

"We are not eating the disgusting white food that Beast Boy loves?" she asked confusedly. Robin shook his head in an emphatic 'no', and she clapped her hands together happily. "Yay!"

"Now what?" Raven asked monotonously. Beast Boy walked back into the main room, his eyes huge and tear-filled and his arms hanging ape-like by his sides. Cyborg and Robin sat thinking for a minute, but suddenly, out of everybody, Raven answered her own question. "Pizza." One word, no emotion, huge fuss.

"Pizza!" Cyborg shouted, jumping up and running for the door. "We're getting pizz-a!" Beast Boy, forgetting all about his lack of tofu, punched the air excitedly and tore out after the half-robot, yelling, "Wait for me-e-e-e-e!"

Starfire and Robin looked questioningly at each other while Raven sat silently. After a few minutes of prolonged quietness, Star said, "I think I will retrieve the pizza with them. They must be kept under control, yes?" Robin nodded his agreement, and the alien girl clapped her hands happily and lifted into the air, speeding out after them and waving her arms to try and make them slow down. The mechanical doors closed with a hollow bang.

A long time passed before Raven stood and went over to the door that everybody had left through a short time ago, fully prepared to go back to her room and meditate. With her hood down and her lavender hair brushing her chin, she didn't seem as foreboding, and that was probably what prompted Robin to run up and grab her shoulder.

She froze, standing stock-still for several seconds before she slowly turned her head to look at him. Robin was all-serious with an added streak of concern hidden behind his mask. She looked pointedly down at his hand, but he didn't remove it.

"You can talk to me," he said quietly, gesturing with his unoccupied hand. "I'll listen."

Raven blinked once, her face expressionless. "Thanks for the heads-up," she said in a monotone before pulling away and leaving him standing alone in the huge, empty main room. As the doors closed behind her and Robin didn't follow, Raven couldn't help but lean back against them and run a hand down her face. "Why do I always do that?" she muttered to herself, and, for the first time in what felt like years, she felt truly angry at herself.

The first part of a five-chaptered, eventually Robin/Raven fic that I'm hoping will turn out good. I'm just finishing up another of my stories, so updates for this should come pretty fast, but since its so short, it doesn't really matter. I hope you'll stick with me and enjoy it.

--:: Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Titans. I don't own the title of the story, either. It's from a Goo Goo Dolls song called Hate This Place.

Hold on, dream away
You're my sweet charade.