Chapter Nine: Heard it Through the Bookshelf

I got the title from 'heard it through the grapevine'. Kind of like the gossip … place.

After their run-in with the professor, the days seemed to go in a haze. After the first week of school, which was mostly reviews, the teachers and students really started to buckle down to their studies. It turns out that the team had an assortment of subjects that each of them were good at.

Raven was doing very well in band and choir. Beast Boy could support her statement that she was doing good in band but he had never heard her sing(even in the shower). Starfire was surprisingly good at cooking. The fact that she had instructions for simple meals probably made a difference. Unfortunately she was doing bad in French. However the team didn't blame her. After mastering two languages already, trying to learn a third was no small feat. Cyborg was doing well in a number of studies. Math, Science, Computers and especially Auto Mechanics. Robin was doing well in all his subjects, but he was outstanding in gym. And everyone's favourite(and only) changeling had an uncanny skill in Social Studies. He seemed to be an expert on maps. Especially the area around Africa.

Each titan also had a different way of getting through the day. Starfire enjoyed her roommates company. Robin would go over camera footage or compete with the dodge ball team he had joined. Beast Boy would use the computers in the library to find joke books or he would play video games in him room. Cyborg trained with the football team he had joined and if Raven didn't read from her books, she read in the libraries most unused sections.

She was just reading in one of these sections when she heard voices in the next aisle over.

"This way Jonny, no one comes back here."

Raven peered through some books and saw three pairs of legs making their way deeper into the bowels of the library.

"So who are you guys asking to the dance?"

"Brittany."

"Chelsie."

"Who are you asking Jason?"
"Rachel Roth." She tensed.

"What?"
"Man that's suicide."

"I haven't even seen her smile."

"Doesn't she hang out with that Richard guy?"

"She is pretty hot though." What?

"Totally out of your league."

"Christ guys, how do you get your underwear on in the morning?" Jason interrupted.

" ……….. What?"

"Well you don't just jump in all at once. You have to put your feet in one at a time. I'm not going to ask her right away. I'm going to have to work on it."

" …. Man, I still think your c-"

"Sshhh! Someone's coming, lets go."

The legs Raven had been watching made their way out of the library, and a new pair walked into her line of vision. Ew they smelled like tofu.

"Rae?" they called.

"I'm in the next aisle over Gar," she replied.

He rounded a corner and found her sitting in a discreet corner, surrounded by books.

"You look comfortable," he picked up some books and settled himself against the wall.

"So this is where you disappear to all the time? You just come to the library and read?" Beast Boy flipped through some of the books he had picked up. "Gathering Blue? Once Upon a Marigold?"

"Do you not like what I read?" she sent him a glare that could send grown men running.

"Um … n-no … I just-I just … found it … in-inter-interesting … that y-you read more that just um … E-Edgar Allan Poe."

"I just never got a chance to get any other books between dealing with the team and the crime in the city," she settled into a more comfortable position, which was hard to do when your against a cold wall.

"What do you do after school?"

"If I'm not working on the totally unfair amount of homework that we get! …. I'd probably be playing video games."

"Gar … I heard that they're having a Halloween dance. Have you heard anything about it? I mean I know it's a month away but …"

"Yeah I heard some of those girls talking about what they're going to wear." Beast Boy rolled his eyes and examined another pile of books.

"Gar … why did you come here? Looking for me?" he froze in the middle of turning a page.

"Well actually a couple reasons. Just wondering how you were a-"

"Beast Boy," Raven said in a very menacing voice, "Back at the tower I would stay in my room for days at a time and you wouldn't worry. It's only been about three hours since lunch, what did you come here for?" he had been a bit shifty at lunch, and looked like he had wanted to say something.

"Well actually … about the other night …" how could she forget.

"Well … we both fell asleep, I on top of you … I think I fell asleep after I put my flute away. That's the last thing I remember." Actually the last thing she remembered was how peaceful he looked asleep. "I'm surprised I didn't wake up throughout the entire night and slept as late as I did." She confessed.

"Really? I woke up a couple times and I'm a heavy sleeper." What.

"You woke up and you didn't try and get me off? You weren't embarrassed or-or uncomfortable-you didn't try and … wake me up?"

"Well you see … " he mumbled something inaudible and rubbed his neck nervously.

"What? … Gar I didn't hear you."

"Well-I … " he was so nervous that he knocked over her bag and some of her pens and pencils rolled across the floor.

"Sorry. I'll get those for you." He scrambled after them and in his haste he knocked over a tall pile of books.

They spent a few minutes picking up books before Raven turned to Beast Boy again.

"So what did you come here for?"

"Well when I first came in we had fifteen minutes until dinner …" he mumbled, checking his watch.

"What?"

"Dinner. I didn't know if you had a watch on. I mean you never wore a watch back home so … "

"Alright," she gathered up her bag and snatched her pencils from Beast Boy's outstretched hand.

"Are you just going to leave all these books here?"

"This section … nobody comes here. Unless they want to talk without being heard. Then I get to hear the latest gossip. Did you know Mrs. Rose's daughter is the one organizing the dance?"
"Really? Isn't Mrs. Rose that English teacher with all those metre sticks?"

"Yes, she has an obsession with writing everything on a straight line."

"Wow that woman has problems…"

Their conversation carried them all the way to dinner, their midnight meeting pushed out of their minds for now.

On the other side of the school a frail looking librarian leaned against the wall. He was almost having a heart attack at the site laying before him. A sea of books spread all over a single aisle, piled in stacks. The only area of floor that wasn't occupied with books was two sections by the wall, and a makeshift pathway leading to them.