Author's Note: Wow, I've been out for a while haven't I? I sincerely apologize for both not posting all weekend, my family decided to take an impromptu trip up north, and for the absolute crap that is this following chapter. I wrote this on my laptop on the way up, so its basically rushed literary bullshit.

But, on the plus side, I did update my profile to add pictures of the date locations and Dick's hotel.

Disclaimer: I don't own the Teen Titans, BCE Place, Movenpick's, Nathan Phillip's Square or the King Edward.

Chapter 14 - To Be Rid of That Empty Feeling

Gar paced. He hardly got any sleep during his flight, every time he closed his eyes he saw her face and it just made him more anxious to get to Toronto. And now he was here but couldn't bring himself to open the door. He wasn't even in the lobby of her building; he was outside, pacing, thanking God for making it a pleasant day.

What am I going to say? What if she lost interest in me? Oh God, is she even going to be in the mood after the ordeal she went through? He rolled up his sleeve and glanced at his watch. 4:27. Okay, its 4:27. I told her I'd meet her at 4:30, if I show up now, will I seem too eager? But what if her watch isn't synchronized with mine and she thinks I'm late?

He continued the inner debate for a second longer before he decided to go for it. Walking into the lobby, searching for her name and punching in her code. He fiddled with the zipper of his coat as he listened to the static ridden ring of the lobby phone. His dress was casual today, he asked her to dress casual too. He wore a zip-up hoodie, grey with a black design on the left pocket and on the left shoulder going down the arm. Over it he had a black and grey pinstriped blazer left unbuttoned, stone washed blue jeans and black and grey bowling shoes.

"Hello, Raven."

"Raven," he said upon hearing her voice, "It's me."

"Oh," he heard shuffling in the background and smiled at the thought, "Come on up, I'm on the top floor, you'll have to take the stairs because there's no elevator, sorry. 303." With that he heard the faint buzzing of the unlock mechanism and reached for the door, then making his way up the stairwell.

Meanwhile, Raven was calming herself with tea. Ever since his phone call in the morning, Raven had been practically skipping all over the place. She even left around 2:30 so she could give herself ample time to get ready. But now was the moment of truth and she had to keep her cool.

Then she heard a knocking at the door. Nearly jumping out of her seat, Raven made her way to open the door. She found Gar standing there, one hand casually in his pocket the other behind his head. He had on the most adorably innocent face, his head was down but his eyes looked up at her. He looked like a little boy who had been caught red handed doing something bad. Raven chuckled, crossed her arms and legs and leaned on the doorframe. They just both stood there taking the other in.

"So, are we gunna stand here staring, or are we gunna go," Raven asked.

Gar smiled at her, "Oh, I don't know. I'd be happy just standing here looking at you." He crooked his head to the side if he were admiring a painting. Raven shoved him, and he reeled back jokingly.

"Okay then, come in first. I need to get my jacket." Raven pushed off the door frame and walked inside. Gar trailed behind while his eyes followed every movement of her body as she walked. He licked his lips longingly at her when she wasn't looking. What she wore was especially enticing. Dark blue jeans with a light blue knitted wool turtle neck sweater; the kind that fit tightly around her body but was loose around her neck. She held up a hand asking him to wait as she disappeared into her bedroom. Gar took this time to walk over to her window and enjoy the beautiful view from her huge loft windows. She appeared beside him and looked out the window too. He peeled his gaze to look at her, an even better view.

"The sun is going down, we should go," she said as she pulled away. Over her sweater she wore a black military style blazer with buttons running up and down the lapels. He turned and headed towards the door opening it. Raven grabbed her keys, pocketing it before joining Gar. He smiled and offered his arm which she took hesitantly, before walking through the threshold.

The main hall of the BCE Place was lit brightly with Christmas lights hanging form the ceiling. Decorative foliage was littered along the massive hallway, all of the bright yellow Christmas lights making the steel frames of the structure glow. Gar and Raven walked won the long walk, making their way to Movenpick's. It was darker now, about 7:30 at night. They had spent the past three hours walking up and down Chinatown window shopping. They had talked about the amount of culture there was in Toronto compared to other Canadian cities which were predominantly white. Occasionally, they'd see rabbit and duck carcasses hanging in store windows and Gar would gag and Raven would laugh. He'd scowl and begin a speech about animal cruelty and how 'animals were people too', then he'd realise what he just said and they would both laugh.

"I love Christmas," Gar said, stroking Raven's hand, her arm was still woven around his. When he first started touching her, she would flinch and recoil, but the more he did it, the more natural it became.

"Too bad it's passed, huh? It's mid March."

"Yes, but you know what they say, 'Christmas is always in our hearts.'" Raven rolled her eyes.

"With lines like that, I'm surprised I ever agreed to this date."

"Aw, come one Raven. Everyone loves Christmas."

"Well, you try spending Christmas alone," the conversation suddenly went sour. Raven looked down and tried to pull her arm away but Gar wouldn't let her, turning her to face him.

"I was alone for Christmas too," he chuckled sadly, "Now if we had met each other before Christmas then maybe we wouldn't have been so lonely." Suddenly, their intimate moment was interrupted by two small kids running between them. There was a little boy about the age of six being chased by who seemed like his older sister.

"Timmy, you jerkwad! Give it back!" They ran circles around Gar and Raven before the girl tripped and started to cry. Her brother stood where he stopped and just looked on at his crying sister, a worried look on his face. To Raven's surprise, Gar hurried over to the crying little girl.

"Hey, are you okay?" Gar put a caring hand on her shoulder.

"I-I-I hurt my knee," the girl managed to say between sobs.

"Okay, here. I'm going to give you something that'll make the hurt go away okay?" The little girl looked up at him and nodded. Gar went into his blazer pocket, fished around for a minute before taking out two silver wrapped candies. The little girl's eyes widened at the sight of potential treats.

Gar motioned for the little boy to come to him, "But first, tell me, what did your brother do?" The little boy got to them and stood looking down at the floor, making circles on the ground with his toe. His hand were behind his back and his blonde hair covered his eyes.

"I took her locket," confessed the little boy. He continued to look down and though Gar couldn't see his face, he could tell he was about to cry. Gar put hi closed fist, candies within, around the little boy's shoulder. The kid set out his hand and opened it revealing a small silver heart locket on a chain.

"Why would you do that?"

The little boy shrugged, "I don't know."

"Well, now your sister's hurt. But, don't worry," Gar leaned in whispering, "I have a cure for her knee, and there's one condition," the little kids on either side of him stared, "you have to apologize to your sister and you have to forgive your brother and then both eat this magic candy. Got it?" They both nodded.

"Sorry I took your locket Jesse." The little boy brushed his blonde locks out of his eyes, revealing them to be bright blue.

"You're forgiven," Gar smiled and gave them both the 'magical' candy. He watched, smiling, as they both ate it and the little boy helped his sister up.

"Thanks mister, my knee's all better now," called the little girl before they both walked away. Gar stood up and Raven walked over to him.

"Wow," she said, "I didn't know you were good with kids." He smiled at her and wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

"There's a lot about me you don't know, and there's a lot about you that I don't know," he looked up and saw Movenpick's Restaurant, "Now maybe we can fix that." He playfully winked at her as he led her to the entrance.

Movenpick's was a Richtree establishment. Which meant it was a marketplace restaurant. Raven and Gar had both been there before and knew how the system worked. You would take a tray then go around the various stands picking out food, sometimes there would be little stands with various fruits and bread and other products which you could take also. As they entered, a plethora of smells hit them. All round were prepared salads, homemade soups, Swiss or Italian sandwiches, Indonesian specialties, and entrees like meatballs paprika or salmon steaks on a bed of curry rice.

Gar quickly hurried away from the deli section, his head turned away and his hand on Raven's, and headed for the salads, murmuring something about animal cruelty. Raven laughed at him and unwillingly followed. They spent the next half hour picking out food and shamelessly flirting. Raven would playfully put something that had meat on Gar's tray when he wasn't looking and Gar would put nonsensical crap on her, like a bunch of grapes or 50 packets of ketchup or a long string of red licorice. They would laugh and push and shove each other, pretending to fight over food.

And Gar would touch Raven, and she would act as if she didn't mind or she didn't feel. In fact, she did mind, every time she felt the heat of his touch, she would have to suppress a massive blush. He would do it as if it were nothing, he would drag his hand along her lower back as he made his way around her, he would wipe off a bit of sauce that was on her cheek, he would grab her arm and lead her away or grab her from behind by the shoulders and guide her somewhere. One time, he came up from behind intending to scare her and wrapped both his arms around her waist, she jumped in surprise and her shirt lifted where his hand landed. The warm sensation of his strong hand on her bare stomach was too much for her and she blushed furiously. Gar also realised his mistake and blushed, but made nothing of it. He just smiled nervously and grabbed both of their trays.

"We should go pay," he said and she nodded dumbly unable to utter a word. He walked away, both trays in his hand and led her to the cashiers. Neither wanting to bring up what just happened, nor the thrill it brought both of them.

Gar looked up from his plate and stared across the table at Raven who was eating her dinner. She had lightly breaded chicken parmigiana topped with tomato basil sauce and Mozzarella. Occasionally he would watch her take a sip of he coke and smile at him before looking down again.

"You're staring," she said after swallowing, not looking up.

He chuckled lightly, "Yes I am, but can you blame me?" She smirked and raised an eyebrow as she forked another piece into her mouth.

She nodded towards his plate, pointing with her fork, "Is it any good?"

He nodded, "Yeah, I guess." He was having gourmet pizza, vegetarian of course, "But how are you? Really, how are you?"

"You mean about two nights ago?"

"Yeah, that's what I mean. Like, are you okay? Are you sleeping okay?"

"I'm fine now." She was lying, she wasn't fine and she knew it. Ever since the robbery, sleepless nights and waking p to a cold sweat in the middle of the night were becoming regular occurrences. She kept having dreams, about one particular thief.

"Now?"

"Yeah, well I wasn't before," she had an inner debate, should I tell him? She decided against it, "But now you're here." As soon as the words left her mouth she realised how cheesy it sounded. She stuck out her tongue and made a face while Gar laughed.

"Man, and you thought I had cheesy lines."

"Shut up, I'm allowed my moments."

He threw up his hands, still laughing, "Of course you are." He regained his decorum and leaned into the table, "But how was it. I heard you came into contact with one of the thieves."

"It wasn't that big a deal. You might have heard of him, Kinyago?"

"Kinyago? The famous art thief? Di-did he touch you? Did he hurt you? Did he, umm…"

She smiled at his concern, "Yes he touched me but he didn't hurt me, and no, he didn't. He only touched me to hand cuff me to the display case. That was it." She was lying to him; she just didn't really want him to worry. He leaned back and ran a hand through his hair.

"That's good to hear."

"Yes, and I'm pretty sure I don't have to worry about them getting to the new part of exhibit. Jinx and Victor have been brewing up new ideas for a better system."

He leaned back in, "Oh? Is that so?"

"Yeah, so there's no need to worry about me." She let her hand rest on the table, she was done and by the looks of it, so was he.

He smiled, staring at her hand, laid his own on top of it and stared into her eyes, "You're gorgeous you know that?" She blushed lightly and looked back at him.

"And you, sir, are a pill." He took his heart on his other hand and feigned a heart attack, not letting go of her hand. She shook her head and threw a napkin at him. He stopped and came back to lean into the table.

"And guess what?"

Raven rolled her eyes at his little game, "What?"

"I really, really love spending time with you. You are so different from other women. Like a breath of fresh air. Intelligent and beautiful. Absolutely unbelievable."

"Where exactly are you getting at Casanova?" She said trying to lighten up the uneasily serious moment.

He chuckled, "I wanna see you again. If that's okay." Raven made a show of thinking about it. In truth, if he didn't ask her, she would ask him.

"I think that might be okay."

"Great, so how does tomorrow sound?" This took Raven by surprise. Tomorrow? Already?

"Uhh…"

"I mean tomorrow during the day. It is Sunday."

"I don't see a problem."

"Okay, does around… noon sound good?" She nodded and smiled. The night was hardly over and she was already excited about the next day. She shook herself mentally and scolded herself, Relax Raven, take this slowly.

Gar and Raven walked down the sidewalk in silence, hand in hand. They were both at the point where they could have comfortable silences. They reached Raven's apartment and entered the lobby. Raven fished her keys out of her pocket and turned around to face him.

"Now," she said, "The last time we were here…"

"It ended tragically," he finished.

"And whose fault is that?" She playfully shoved his chest, taking note that it was quite firm and strong. He reeled, laughing, and then quickly grabbed her around the waist, bringing their faces within an inch of one another. Raven gulped as he brought his face closer, shuddering when his lips grazed hers, soft butterfly kisses.

This time he didn't pull back. The kiss was slow and soft. Passionate and kind all at once. Her arms found their way around his neck and her fingers grabbed a hold of the hair behind his head, bringing him closer still. His grip tightened as the kiss deepened and then they broke, both breathing heavily, gasping as if coming out of the water. They smiled at each other and he rested his head on her forehead. She sighed, tilted her head up again and pecked him on the lips.

"I'm glad it was a happy ending this time around. Goodnight Garfield Logan," Raven pulled away and in one swift movement unlocked the door and was walking down the hallway. He watched, shocked at her dismissive actions, as she disappeared behind elevator doors and he raised a hand goodbye a little too late. Murmuring a 'Goodbye' before heading out into the midwinter's night.

Raven woke up late the next day. She rolled over in her bed, turning away from the light shining through the window, through the French doors of her bedroom and saw the red glow of her alarm clock. She turned around and did a double take. Fuck! She shot out of the bed and grabbing a towel ran into the washroom.

Quickly taking a 5 minute shower, Raven hurried to put on clothes. It was 11:30 when she got out of the shower. She slipped on dark blue jeans and a black shirt topped off with a light brown corduroy blazer. She looked out the window and saw that most of the snow had melted away. She quickly made herself tea and sat in her living room just staring out the window.

The phone rang and she got up to answer it. It was Gar, he was downstairs. He had offered to come up and get her but she refused saying that she could walk down the stairs by herself, she was a big girl.

As Raven and Gar laughed into the phone, Raven found the small paper butterfly on the floor and placed it on the coffee table. She then hung up and rushed out the door.

Three flights of stairs later, Raven found Gar waiting at the lobby. She smiled at him, relieved that he too was pretty underdressed. He wore khakis and a dark yellow turtle neck. His hair fell over his face as usual which Raven took as a sign of his immaturity and, quite frankly, thought was absolutely endearing. She leaned up, brushed the hair away from his face and kissed him.

"So what's your big plan for today," she asked, eyes still half closed from the kiss. He just smiled and grabbed her hand leading her out of the building.

"You'll see."

"Ice skating?" Raven asked as Gar paid for their skates.

"I thought about what you said last night, about it being mid March, and realised the Nathan Phillips square skating rink will be closing soon. And what a tragedy it would be if I didn't take you there before it closed." He led her to a bench carrying both of their skates. They watched as little children with their families and teenagers skated along the rink, most of who had taken off their jackets and sweater and wore just shirts.

"But, I've nev-"

"You've never been ice skating?" Raven blushed as she looked down at the skates in front of her feet and shook her head. Gar bent down and took her foot in his hand, slipping the shoe off.

"That's fine; I guess I'll just have to teach you," he tied the first white skate on and moved onto her other foot, "But I gotta warn you, I'm not the greatest either." He finished tying up the second skate and looked up at her. For the first time he noticed how close to her he was and blushed, standing up. He then sat down beside her and put on his own skates quickly. He got up and offered a hand for her to get up. She took it and got up only to quickly fall back down on her butt.

He laughed and said, "Come on, let's try that again shall we?" He pulled her up again and this time she fell forward right into his strong arms. She blushed heavily as she pushed away to him grinning.

"See, we haven't even gotten on the ice and I've fallen twice." He took her arm and guided her towards the ice slowly, as if teaching a child to walk.

"Relax, you'll be fine. Besides, if you fall that just means I'll have to catch you," he winked flirtily at her before they set foot on the ice. At first she slipped and wouldn't let go of the guide railing. He managed to coax her to letting go on the condition that he wouldn't let go.

They both laughed as he held both her hands and skated backwards, guiding her along. Occasionally she would slip and fall in his arms and he would grin, holding her around the waist. They had spent a little over an hour there and had gotten to the middle of the rink when a bunch of racing teenagers knocked them both over, Raven landing awkwardly on top of Gar. He laughed as she blushed and clumsily tried to get up, although only making the situation worse by repeatedly falling and embarrassing herself. Gar held onto his stomach trying to suppress his laughter. Giving up, Raven sat down on the ice and crossed her arms over her chest in a huff. Gar, still on the cold ice floor, crawled over to her and pecked her on the cheek.

"How about we get off the ice and I buy you coffee," he asked in a whisper, his hot breath on her ear. She nodded and let him help her up before they started the long journey off the ice.

"Yes, well I haven't been for too long. Just started when I got to the US because, of course, there's no ice in Africa," Gar explained. Raven was awfully sore after the skating ordeal, both her body and her ego. Never had she been so humiliated in front of a large crowd. They both walked down King Street on the way back to Raven's loft.

"And then you dragged me here and decided to embarrass me, you know, just for laughs."

"Actually, no. To be honest I saw that movie 'Serendipity' and thought it was cute to go ice skating on a date. Well I think it's quite safe to say that everything doesn't turn out the way it does in the movies."

"And it only took you how long to figure that out? Hey wait, weren't you acting for a while?" Gar scratched behind his ear, embarrassed.

"He, I was hoping the world forgot about that." He turned to her and raised and eyebrow, trying to change the subject, "But hey, that means you've been doing your research about me haven't you?" He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.

Raven rolled her eyes and shrugged, indifferent, "I like to know about the people I'm working with."

"Hmm. Well. Acting was just a stupid dream of mine. Y'know, come to the States and start a big Hollywood acting career. Then I slumped."

"But I saw your movies, you weren't that bad."

"Oh, so you've been watching my movies too huh?" She shook her head and speed walked ahead; he laughed and jogged catching up to her, "Okay yeah, well acting didn't turn out too well. Yeah, I got the money and there was plenty of perks but I hated everyone having their nose in my personal business. I mean I was acting for like two years and people already knew where I lived and paparazzi were following me everywhere. It got boring so…"

"So you decided to found a multimillion drug company?"

"Yeah, simple as that," he glanced at his watch, "Oh shit. Its 4:00. I gotta get back to the Hotel to meet with Dick about the new expenses that the robbery brought on, he's probably fuming."

Raven clung to her coffee with both hands and looked down, "Well, you better go it's quite a ways to the Royal York isn't it?"

"Yes it is, but I'm not staying there. I'm staying at the King Edward," he stopped on his tracks; they were a block past The Royal Meridien King Edward hotel now, it was a mere block and a half from her building. She stopped too and faced him, he had long thrown away his coffee so his hands were free to grab her around the waist and draw her near. Raven was caught by surprise and gave a slight gasp.

"So now I'm closer to you," he brought his head down all the way and gave her a tender kiss on the lips. They stayed like that for a while, Raven's one hand around his neck, the other holding her coffee near her chest. They both reluctantly drew back and smiled.

"Well beautiful, I really must go. But I do hope to see you again," he began to pull away and walk backwards, "I'm really sorry I can't walk you all the way to your house."

"Its fine," she waved to him, "Besides, you can't keep Mr. Grayson waiting." She watched as he blew her kisses before breaking out into a full run, a while down he slipped and fell on his side. Raven inwardly giggled at his clumsiness and turned around to make her way back to her house.

A/N: So here is the long awaited Gar/Rae date, erm... datesI really wanted to get this out of the way so that I can proceed with my evil, gut wrenchingly suspensul thief scene. Actually it isn't that bad. But those parts I truly enjoy writing. I may not post as much, though i have all of the story in my mind, I have yet to get it down. And i got a ton of pre-Christmas break projects to hand in.