A/N: This one was inspired by a short sort of thing that Abbie (Absentia here on ff.n) wrote quite a bit ago. I got permission from Abbie to use what she wrote as a sort of Prologue and then start my story with this as an idea as Chapter 1. Well…I wrote out about 2 or 3 pages of this, and then lost inspiration. Also, I couldn't seem to figure out what all would happen in the rest of the story, although I've got significant scenes thought out. SO…today, I started my opening up old bits of writing to see if anything catches Puck's attention bit, and as I was re-reading what I had already written, I realized that it would fit into the "Figuring" theme of the Echoes set very nicely. Also, I got inspired to how to finish the scene, so I did that. And am now presenting it to you.

THIS, unlike most of my other one-shots for these themes, might someday be completely fleshed out as a full-out story. However, don't hold your breath for it. Who knows when Puck'll decide what to do with it? (I did, however, the other day figure out how it would end.)

Special Note to my Readers: Those of you who follow my other story, It Only Takes a Moment must be soo tired of waiting for the next chapter, the ever elusive, Wishes, II. It is coming. I will put status updates (and even sneak peaks sometimes) on 'emsscraps', but the update here, for those that are interested is as follows: I've had one of my betas give me their feedback. The other one is giving it to me in increments and I've been assured that a third is still working on it. I have yet to hear from one, but as soon as I get edits from at least two betas, I'll post it up. I'm sorry it's been so long!

Congratulations
(09: Figuring)
by Em

"Footfalls echo in the memory / Down the passage which we did not take / Towards the door we never opened…"
- T.S. Eliot

The funny thing about it all was that in those days, he really had no idea at all about anything. Back then, the moments stretched into hours, those into days and days into months and years. He took them all for granted, this warmth, this collection of time that slipped by. If it had even occurred to him that it all might one day end...

Would he have been able to appreciate each one more? Would he have found some way of engraving the particular feel of her hand brushing his or manage to memorize the precise scent of her hair?

He'd never been able to find a perfume to match her scent, no arms he had ever felt around him, no skin he ever pressed against his own had the softness of the briefest press of her hand on his arm as she passed and there was never any material that provided the warmth of her that lingered on his palm whenever he touched her.

How could he not have known it then?

How could he have not known it the very moment their eyes met for the first time and his breath caught? How could a moment so utterly life changing pass by without so much as a hint of it's importance?

How could he not have known that the reason he felt no qualms about telling her everything he was, letting her into his deepest, most painful self was due to more than friendship? How could her very presence have become so absolutely important to him without him having a clue as to why? He had thought he was more intuitive than that, more perceptive. Obviously, he wasn't.

He thought, even now, that he could remember bits of her voice, and in silent stillness of the dark just before the dawn, he heard the whisper of her words ghost across his memories, "You have to trust me."(1)

But then some other sound, a siren perhaps or another's voice -- an alarm-- sounded and the ephemeral memory scattered and was gone and he was certain he couldn't possibly remember the right pitch of her voice. That oh-so-particular timbre to her words and the unspoken quality of her silences were lost to him, even from his nearly eidetic memory.

He remembered times when he was so close to realization, but for some reason it never dawned. There was the time with Malchior when he'd tempered the sudden rage and possessiveness with reason, and the time he credited his primal awareness of her state of danger as they fell through the elevator shaft as nothing more than quick reflexes instead of the truth: that he was just always aware of her. He remembered the time he tried so hard to save her from Slade's grip on her birthday. He remembered the relief he felt when he managed to catch her in his arms and save her from the fall. He remembered looking into her eyes as she woke...

He remembered how very much he wished he knew the right thing to say when she was so obviously troubled by the impending arrival of her father. He was on the very verge of realization when he had watched her, helpless, as she was sacrificed to her father's rage. He had screamed out only one word, only 'no' because there were so many others clamoring for attention. 'No, don't give up!' and 'No! We can beat this!' or 'No! Stay and fight!' and 'No! Don't go away!'

If only he'd known how to say what was really in his heart.

In retrospect, it was simple. Three words: 'Don't leave me'. Or, simpler, deeper still: 'I love you.'

But he hadn't known those words then. He had busied himself with being friend and comforting Starfire who was losing a sister, with being leader and trying to think of a plan, a way to stop what was happening even then. In the end, all his worrying and thinking did was stop him from wondering why he was so desperate, why he felt as if he were loosing a part of himself, why he felt as if the very flesh were being torn from his skin.

He would survive without her, he knew that, but why should he?

Later, when he awoke, before wondering what had happened, he remembered, clearly, wondering why he had survived when she had not. No one questioned him when he was so certain that Raven was still alive somewhere, they hadn't had time, and so he never questioned himself...not until later. No one questioned why he felt absolutely no qualms about going with his greatest enemy for any chance to save her. And he had been too focused on saving her and averting any possible betrayal by Slade to wonder why without their questions.

When Slade told him that he might not like what he found if he did manage to find her at all, he didn't even have to think about his answer. It was easy to say he would take his chances because he wouldn't have cared if all Slade had offered him was a chance to see her one more time, no matter how fleeting.

When had he realized it? He couldn't be sure, only that going through hell with his worst enemy gave him time to really consider. But it wasn't until she came into her full power against her father, when she was floating ten feet off the concrete, long purple hair blowing in the wind of her power that every fiber of his being was flooded with the emotion so that he could hardly deny it or hide from it any longer.

He loved Raven.

He probably always had.

If life were a fairy tale that would have been the point when they'd have kissed and lived happily every after, but no one's life wasn't any sort of fairy tale and not theirs especially, and although she did hug him, their lips never met.

And if he knew he loved Raven when he saw her face off against her father, when she hugged him, he figured out, finally figured out, that he always would.

But relief and joy gave him a way to mask his realization, a way to keep it hidden under his cape and pretend nothing had changed until he could pull it out in a quieter moment to analyze it and dissect it, figure out its origins and its depth. Figure out what to do with it.

When he figured out the name for his feelings, it changed little, however. He was so used to feeling the way he did for her, that calling it love did nothing to shake his perception of the world or of her.

And in the end, what he came to realize was that loving Raven was never a problem. Loving her was like breathing, he did it without thinking about it, he treated her the same as he always had, careful and attentive, but she never figured it out on her end. For years, he wasn't certain that was a bad thing...

Years passed and he was content. He knew he wasn't happy, but content was enough. And as they grew older and more jaded, he though he was certain that it was better if she never knew, never figured out how much of his well being depended on her being close enough to talk to every day, close enough to see and share a look, even if it was across a room teeming with others. It was better that way, because if she knew, it would hurt. One way or another, it would hurt. He was protecting not only himself, but also their friendship by dating other women, even if they meant nothing to him.

But in the end, she left anyway.

Whenever he thought about it, he wondered if she'd figured it out. If she'd left because he did something to give away how much he needed her around, but he knew she wasn't that cruel. He never asked her why she left, anyway. Just in case.

One year turned into another and he kept no count of them, simply lived day-to-day, fight-to-fight. He saw her occasionally, heard about her even more rarely, and fought off the desire to go to her every moment.

And then she came to him.

~0~

"Hello, Richard."

He didn't bother to hide his surprise, and he didn't think to hide that he was happy to see her. "Raven," he greeted, coming into the room and removing his mask. "You haven't lost your touch, I see," he half-joked.

She looked at his apartment, where she had been waiting. "I thought if I had to wait outside, I'd lose my nerve for sure," she admitted. "At least in here, I knew you'd know I was here even if I left before you got back."

"Would you have?" he asked. "Left before I got back?"

"It was sketchy there for a bit," she almost smiled.

"You look good," he said after a few moments of silence.

She absently smoothed the material of her pants at her thighs and pulled on the bottom edge of the blouse. "I was in a meeting all day near to Blüdhaven, then I drove straight here rather than lose my nerve."

He motioned for her to sit down and he took the seat across from her when she did. "So, what brings you here, then?" He cocked his head at her, "I doubt its business."

"No," she agreed. "Definitely not business."

She reached into her purse sitting next to her elbow, he hadn't even noticed it there, and pulled out a small white envelope. She pushed it across the table to him. He glanced at it and saw his name and address on it in her neat, deliberate hand.

"Run out of stamps, Rae?" he asked, looking from it to her, but not reaching for it.

"You were my best friend for many years, Richard," she said and he tried not to flinch at her use of the past tense. He didn't kid himself that she would still consider him her best friend; too much time had passed between them. "I couldn't just put it in the mail."

"So you want to tell me or should I wait to open it or what?" he asked.

"It's an invitation," she said. "And an announcement." She looked at it as if she herself couldn't remember what it said and had to look for clues in the fine weave of the bone white envelope. She looked up to meet his eyes. "I'm getting married."

~0~

And of all the things that went through his mind, the only one that made it passed his lips was, "Oh."

"Oh?" Raven raised a brow and her voice was suddenly, achingly, resolutely light. "I come all the way here, go through the trouble to commit breaking and entering, and all you can say is 'oh'?" She did that almost smile thing she did. "It's customary to say 'best wishes' to the bride or at the very least 'congratulations.'"

"Congratulations," he said and didn't know how the word made it past the numbness creeping over him. And in some part of his mind, he understood that numbness was good. It would keep him from saying things it was obviously too late to say.

"You don't have to look as if I'd just told you that Garfield had won a Pulitzer," she chided. He met her eyes and she looked down, "Is it so hard to believe someone would ask me to marry them?" she asked.

"No," he spoke, still serious. "I suppose it's hard to believe you said yes."

She met his eyes, something like disbelief on her expression. "You don't even know who it is I'm marrying."

"Doesn't matter," he said, shaking his head, the shock wearing off enough to allow him to think.

"Why not?" she asked, and it was as if he could see the shutters coming down over her emotions, could feel the way she tip toed through her oh-so-vast vocabulary to find words careful enough to give nothing away.

He thought about it for a few moments. "We're too much alike," he finally answered.

"You're right. We are a lot alike in many ways. But just because you've decided not to give your heart to any one person, doesn't mean I'm like you there."

"I gave it to you," he said.

She smiled a little sadly. "Giving it to someone who is just a friend doesn't count," she said. He raised a brow questioningly and she sighed. "It's not enough."

He was suddenly angry, and he wasn't altogether certain at whom. "Do you love him?" he asked.

Again, he saw the careful deliberation behind her eyes, and knew that whatever answer she gave wouldn't be the whole truth – knew, too, that perhaps he hadn't asked the right question.

"Yes," she answered slowly, deliberately. "I do."

He realized then he still hadn't asked (and she hadn't told him) who it was she was marrying. He wondered briefly about it, then decided he didn't care. He had not been lying or flippant when he told her it didn't matter. It really didn't. He'd feel the same no matter who she was marrying.

"You're retiring for good, then?" he asked, because he couldn't ask what he really wanted to know – he couldn't seem to figure out how to ask it.

"I think so, yes," she answered. She was making an effort to take the conversation away from the edge of the polite, when she continued, "I'll be around if I'm needed, of course, but I—" she cut herself off when he looked at her again. "This was never meant to be my life, I think."

"You always wanted more," he confirmed. "I remember."

She nodded, looking at him for the first time, as if she actually thought she might recognize him. "Yes."

He looked away again, down at the envelope in front of him, but couldn't bring himself to touch it. "I wanted more too."

She sighed, a soft sound he almost missed when a siren blared suddenly and momentarily outside his window. "I know," she said. He felt her eyes searching him, and compelled to look at her, he did. "Why didn't you try to get it?" she asked, as if she had been wondering it for a very long time.

"I could never figure out how," he answered, quite honestly.

She looked sad, suddenly, as if he had just confirmed something she had feared might be true. "All you had to do was take it, Robin," she said.

He didn't know how to answer her, didn't know what to say. He had a sickening feeling she might be talking about more than just about being heroes versus having a life, he looked into those deep pools of violet and had a stomach-turning epiphany that she was talking about them.

She didn't have to say anymore, so she stood up, grabbing her purse, almost smiling again, but it never reached her eyes. "I hope you'll come."

And then, with all her usual grace, she stepped into the hallway outside his apartment and closed the door with a soft click behind her.

It wasn't until he heard the distant ding of the elevator at the end of the hall that he made himself open the envelope, remove the card and search the beautifully embossed words.

Ms. Rachel Roth and Mr. Roy Harper request the pleasure of your company at their wedding…

xxxxxxxxxxx

Notes:

(1) Season 3, Episode 5, "Haunted"

A/N: To be completely honest with you, if I ever make this a long story, I'm not convinced yet if I'll make it be Roy who she's marrying, or someone not involved in the Titans. That is going to depend in part on what I want some of the focus to be on, but I can't explain too much without giving away some of the ideas I've got for this as a long story, so y'all will have to trust me, that if it becomes a long story it might not be Roy, but someone not a Titan at all.