I walked back from the gym, sweaty and ready for a shower, toweling my hair as I went. After dinner – another exercise in awkwardness – Tim had gone off to talk to Nightwing, Rose had slunk off to...well, who knows, and Kid Devil had gone back to his room, citing a new communique from Blue Devil that required his attention. Vic, as usual, had departed for his chamber, to...rejuvinate.

As for me, I'd gone to the gym to work off some aggression. It hadn't worked; I still felt like beating down the walls. Just one wall...it's not like anyone will care...

I stepped out of the elevator on the living quarters level and headed down the hall to my room. I contemplated a couple of different alternatives – several of which involved leaving the Tower and never returning – for my evening. As tempting as leaving sounded, I wasn't going to do it; too much of my stuff was here. And anyway, we still had several cases pending that I didn't want to go back to square one on.

"It's just that...I feel like that sort of thing should go along with love. You know, that I shouldn't do...have sex...until I really fall in love. That's just how I feel."

I stopped. Tim's room. The rooms were supposed to be sound-proofed, but the recent...refit...the Tower had undergone had left some of the amenities lacking. A lack of amenities wasn't really what caught my attention, though.

That was Tim's voice...and unless there were some parts of his personality he'd neglected to mention, the only person in the Tower he could be talking to was the Ravager. Rose. She's tried to kill us on more than one occasion, and here was Tim, explaining why he thought sex should be an experience for lovers only to her. As though she could understand that.

As though he can understand that, too.

Not for the first time, it hit me. Although some more conversation was floating out of Tim's room, I couldn't hear it. I stumbled forward, tears flooding out of my eyes. I barely made it to my room and through the door before I collapsed on my bed, absolutely sobbing.

Connor.

That night at the farm...oh God, we'd both thought it might be our last night together. We were in love – we'd been in love for what had felt like years – and we were both afraid that Superboy Prime was going to come back and go after Connor again. So really...why not? Why shouldn't we have made love?

I didn't find out until much later why not. They say the first time hurts – well, they're right about that. But they didn't mention the...the connection. I felt like he was a part of me that night, and he felt the same way about me. Our souls touched that night. We were both beyond happiness – for the first time in my life, I felt plain right. Everything felt perfect.

Then it all fell apart. I couldn't save Connor. God; he saved the whole world, all those people, and I couldn't even help him. He died there, in my arms, a hero. We memorialized him. Everyone talked about how great he was. Superman read a eulogy that'll probably be quoted for another century or two. There wasn't a person on the planet who didn't know just how wonderful Connor was and how much he gave to help the world.

When it was over, everyone went back to their lives – granted, as best as they could. But still, most of them forgot Connor in that way that people forget their heroes – they still knew his name, would still nod in respect for what he did, but they didn't think about him all the time. That was left to me.

Left...that's exactly the feeling. I was what was left of Connor. That connection was gone. My perfect world was shattered. It was, without a doubt, the best night of my life, and thinking about it hurt more than I could bear.

I punched my pillow. Then I punched it again. I didn't want to think about the pain. The logical part of my brain knew that I needed to work out my problems, but since the only times I'd tried I'd ended up in...somewhat unfortunate...circumstances, these days I preferred going out and beating up criminals.

When it finally got to be too much, I hit my pillow one more time – bursting it and scattering little bits of fluff everywhere. I grabbed my lasso off of a table and, not bothering to change out of the gym suit I was wearing, I flew at breakneck speed out of the window of my room. I shattered the glass on the way out. Vic might get upset about that – it was something Starfire used to do with alarming frequency.

If I was very lucky, there'd be a mugging going on right now that would provide me with ample reason to beat the snot out of someone.