Disclaimer: Boo dee doo

Chapter thirty-nine! Cold pizza and memories of teen angst, and I'm ready to go! (: Enjoy!

It's the second day of summer vacation! I smile! I'm writing so fast now!

I need to cut my toenails.

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Beast Boy stood there with his mouth hanging partway open, gawking, as the eyes blinked a few times, and their owner backed up a bit into the dark hallway. The eyes were watching him nervously, praying for a break in the silence, praying for anything that wasn't a sign of hatred. Beast Boy stared in silence into the face that had haunted him for so long, almost in disbelief that it could still be real. After even a short time, she had become a vision. Just a faint memory of how things had once been. But never real. The concept of her still being real to him had been forgotten until this very moment.

She was just as he had remembered her. He had imagined that if he ever saw her again, even though it had only been a few days since the last time, she would be remarkably different somehow. But she wasn't. The same, short violet hair, the same beautiful, wide eyes, the same pale skin. The only difference was that now her normally deep blue cloak was a hue of consuming, unforgiving black.

"Raven?" Beast Boy asked, unable to close his gaping mouth. "What the fuck are you doing here?"

Raven winced at his tone and lowered her eyes from his, head bent in shame. "I…just needed to see you again….just for a moment…just once. I thought you'd be asleep, and I thought I could get in and out without you knowing-"

"Oh, so now I'm not even worth enough to find out when you just get a wild hair to stare at me, is that it?" Beast Boy snapped coldly.

"No, God Beast Boy, why are you saying that?" Raven asked, looking at him again. There was something strange in her eyes, something almost like fear.

"Because maybe that's what I think your motivation is. What am I supposed to think, after you just ran off and left me, and you were going to do it without so much as a goodbye?"

"Beast Boy-"

"How could you even think you can just come here? How can you think we fucking want you here?" he could feel himself getting angry without knowing why. He could feel the anger starting to go out of control. "After what you did to me-"

"Beast Boy, I'm sorry!" Raven said, and Beast Boy could hear her sincerity. "I never meant to hurt you, never. Jesus, how could I want to hurt you?" she was wounded and he could tell.

"Did you think leaving me wasn't going to hurt me? What kind of stupid bitch are you? Running out on me after everything that happened, and you thought I wasn't going to get hurt?" Beast Boy was starting to become hysterical.

He could tell this had struck Raven hard. She trembled slightly but stood her ground. "I never wanted you to get hurt. That was something I never wanted to happen-"

"Like hell you didn't want it to happen. You never cared about me, and you don't now! You could never really care about me! Fuck, do you care about anyone?"

"Of course I cared about you, Beast Boy. I always did. I do now. I could never stop caring about you!" Raven said, looking him in the eye.

"Well, you have a fucked up way of showing it, then!" Beast Boy snapped, taking a step forward, anger radiating off of him. "You never cared about me, and you know it!"

"Don't tell me how I feel!" Raven snapped, angry for a split second before she controlled herself, looking shocked by her own emotions.

"If you don't want me to think wrong about the way you feel, why don't you start showing your emotions, you goddamned little stoic?" Beast Boy barked at her. "Why didn't you just fucking tell me how you felt that made you want to leave? We could have fixed it! We could have done something. Why aren't I worth sharing your emotions with? Why? Did I do something to make you want to leave, Raven? What did I do wrong, huh? Tell me, what did I fucking do wrong?"

"You didn't do anyth-"

"Was it the fact that I cared about you? Was it the fact that I loved you more than anyone else ever could? Was it because I would have done anything for you? Or was it because I just wanted to be with you forever? Which of those things is a terrible sin, huh? Which one, Raven?" all control was gone now.

Raven's eyes were starting to tremble now. He could see tears building in corners. "Beast Boy I…I'm so sorry. I never meant to make you think I didn't care. I do care, I really do. I love you, Beast Boy. I know it's not going to make everything OK, but… please just give me a moment to explain this to you-"

"Why? So you can lie to me some more?" Beast Boy asked, taking a few steps forward until their noses were touching. "You love me? That's bullshit! Love is bullshit! You don't love me! You never did! You loved that goddamned Malchior more than you ever loved me! I was never special to you, was I? I was never good enough for you! I was just another addiction! You never love anyone! You never loved me and you never could! I don't even think you wanted to love me! Why the fuck would you do that to me when you were just going to leave me anyway?" he was starting to cry now, but he didn't care anymore. "Why would you make me so damn happy, make me feel so incredibly loved, and then just give me a big old slap in the face?" he took several breaths to keep from breaking into uncontrollable sobs. "Maybe you loved me a little, for a while. But it was probably on accident, and it probably just got too annoying to ignore!" he was crying harder now. "Just like me, right? Just like how you can ignore me for awhile until I get annoying, and then you have to deal with me! All I am is an annoyance to you! Just like I was before I loved you! I'll never be anything more to you, will I? I tried so damn hard to make you happy! I would have done almost anything for you! But it was never good enough for you! What more did you want? Just tell me, what more did you want?"

Beast Boy wasn't the only one crying now. Tears were streaming silently down Raven's cheeks. "Please don't think that!" she said shakily. "You were good enough! You were always good enough! You made me so happy, Beast Boy! It was never your fault I left, not for even a second! I loved you! I love you now! I've always loved you, from the first time we fought you and brought you back to the Tower, from the first word you ever said to me! It took me so long to realize it, but I've always loved you! I never loved Malchior! You were always the one I wanted, the one I loved! Never anyone else! I never loved you on accident! I wanted to love you! I never wanted anything else! You were the only thing I ever needed! I'm sorry I was so terrible at showing it! I'm so sorry I made you think anything different!" she said desperately, trying to keep her crying under control. She touched Beast Boy's cheek, and he pushed her hand away angrily.

Beast Boy cried even harder as she said these things. "I don't want to hear it! Even if any of that is true, I don't want to hear it!" he covered his head with his hands, starting to shake. "Loving you was the worst mistake I ever made in my life," he looked up at her, trembling. "I was stupid to think it was a good idea to fall in love with someone who is too afraid of her damn emotions to return the feeling. You say you love me, but it's just words. Your actions show how you really feel. And your actions say you don't care about me. You don't care about me at all." he paused. "Just…just get the fuck away from me. I never want to see you again for as long as I live."

Raven was starting to sob uncontrollably, despite her attempts to quell her tears. "Beast Boy-" she said softly. "Please-"

"Shut up! I love you so much, but I need to stop, so I just don't want to look at you! Every word you say makes me want to hold you and never let go, no matter what it is! I want it to stop! I want to stop loving you! I want to stop thinking about you! Just make it stop Raven, please!" Beast Boy sobbed, collapsing to his knees on the floor. Raven knelt down before him, crying as hard as he was.

"I don't know how to make it stop. I'm sorry," she sobbed softly. "I'm sorry I made you feel this way. I'm sorry I hurt you so much. I'm just…I'm just so sorry for everything."

For a moment, Beast Boy reached out to her, dropped his hands onto her thin shoulders and rested his forehead against her chest. But then he pulled away once more, clutching his own frame and sobbing harder than ever before. "Please…go away!" he sobbed. "Don't make me feel this anymore!"

"Beast Boy-"

"Go!" came his desperate plea, eyes looking up into hers and begging for her to release him. "Now! Don't say anything! Just go!"

Slowly breaking inside, Raven stood up, looking down at the sobbing heap on the floor. It hurt so much to know he wouldn't allow her to comfort him. She stared into his teary eyes for a moment, and their eerie, unbreakable connection once more became evident to both of them at the very same moment. The world existed with only the two them for a moment. There was nothing else in the whole universe that could tear them apart.

A small noise sounded behind them. Raven slowly turned her head. Robin was staring back at her in shock.

"Raven?" he asked.

She stared at him, trembling, for just a moment. 'I'm sorry' she mouthed, trying to conceal her hysterical tears. And then she rose up and ghosted through the roof, leaving nothing but the form of a black raven of her psychic energy, and then she was gone.

"Beast Boy…" Robin dropped to his knees before the sobbing changeling. Beast Boy's hollow, tearful eyes looked back up at him. Robin just sat there in silence for a moment, watching the epitome of misery before him. And for a moment in that silence, Robin felt Beast Boy's pain. He felt every hint of misery and ache through those deep ties of friendship that he had heard of before but never experienced. He leaned forward and wrapped his arms around his friend in a tight, comforting hug. "I'm so sorry," he muttered quietly. "I really am."

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More really soon. Yeesh, this was a depressing chapter.