In-Laws
Rated: K+
"Could you get the door, please?"
It was perhaps the only thing Raven could do to help her Aunt Alice on such a busy day. No one really hosted dinner parties back on Azarath, and even with the Teen Titans, Raven had never been particularly good at planning such events, let alone executing them. So, while her Aunt hummed a jolly tune to herself, enjoying the busy work the kitchen provided her, Raven had hovered nearby, unsure of what she could do to give Alice a helping hand. She'd always been a nightmare of a cook, with the tendency to burn almost any food item she touched. This thus left her the more trivial tasks that Aunt Alice could not get to while busy preparing the meals.
Such as, answering the door.
Raven straightened out her skirt, ran her fingers quickly through her long, dark hair, and took in a deep breath, practicing a normal smile to greet the guests that had been invited.
The doorbell chimed once more until she'd thrown the locks and carefully turned the golden knob. Swinging the door open, Raven prepared the smile, only to have it fall immediately upon recognizing the stranger standing outside her Aunt's house with a tin-foiled ceramic dish in his hands.
"Hey, Rae!"
Raven's eyes were wide as saucers, her already fair skin growing paler somehow. She quickly shimmied herself outside and closed the door behind her, getting into the personal space of the green, shapeshifting Titan who nearly staggered off the steps in surprise.
"Woah! What's going on?" he called out, catching his balance.
"What the heck are you doing here?!" Raven seethed, hoping to the mighty powers beyond that neither Alice, nor her husband Jack, could hear their voices filtering through the open windows.
Beast Boy cocked up an eyebrow, puzzled by her question. "What do you mean?"
She leaned in closer, so that she could practically smell the spice of his aftershave along his jaw, and whispered in a slow, calculated voice, "You're crashing my Aunt's dinner party, Gar."
The shapeshifter glanced down at his attire — void of his classic white and red uniform — and then at the serving dish being balanced on the palm of his hand. "But I brought a casserole. People bring casseroles to these things, don't they?"
Raven leaned back, her brows drawn together in consternation as she blinked at him a few times. She studied his appearance for the first time that day, and took in his crisp, baby blue, cotton dress-shirt, tucked into a pair of ironed, beige slacks that were held in place with a deep brown belt and gold buckle. Tucked. Beast Boy never tucked in his shirts, for as long as she'd known him. Unless the event was a formal one, of course. Otherwise, he claimed it went against his sense of style.
"Wait a minute…," Raven said, squinting down at the fancy, brown dress shoes on his feet. She opened her mouth to say something else, but the door behind her opened and Aunt Alice stepped out, still clad in her frilly, yellow apron, and sunny disposition.
"Garfield! You made it! Please, do come in!" she urged, opening the door wide and motioning for them both to step inside.
All the colour seemed to drain from Raven's face as realization dawned on her. "You invited him…"
Alice cocked her head to the side, fixing her niece with a dubious look, as if she were crazy to think she wouldn't. "Of course I did! It's about time your husband met his in-laws, isn't it?"
Raven swallowed the lump in her throat, but found her voice had abandoned her entirely.
"At least, he's the one with you in the newspapers all the time," Alice added over her shoulder, taking the casserole from Beast Boy's hands.
"Oh, Azar," Raven moaned, rubbing her hands down her face in mortification. This dinner party had suddenly become far more of a nightmare than she'd initially anticipated.
FIN