Teen Titans Fan Fiction ❯ Ten Guidelines for Dating Earth Boys ❯ Chapter 7 ( Chapter 7 )

Ten Guidelines for Dating Earth Boys

 

Chapter Seven

 

By Jacque Nicole

 

 

 

Guideline #6 - Having girl friends at hand always works to your advantage. They can be used as an aid to talk - or knock, whichever method she may use - some sense into your Earth boy.

 

 

 

Shit.

 

Starfire was mad at him again.

 

Shit.

 

Why did he always have to screw everything up?

 

Shit. Shit. Shit.

 

Robin wanted to bang his head against the steering wheel. Hard. Maybe until he was unconscious. That way, he could probably manage to stall some time before he had to see Starfire again and figure out what how the hell he was going to fix this.

 

He could already picture the scene: He would knock on Starfire's door, she would ignore him, but after about two hours of his incessant banging, she would open her door angrily and look at him with beautiful, annoyed, wide green eyes.

 

Beautiful, annoyed, wide green eyes that probably wanted to obliterate him with starbolts.

 

Shit.

 

Why was it that anytime he opened his mouth, something stupid came out? Why couldn't he, at least once, get through an entire twenty four hours without doing something completely retarded?

 

Why?

 

Why hadn't he just calmly told Starfire what effect her innocent touches had on him that night in the main room? Why hadn't he noticed the looks Todd was giving Starfire when he first bumped into his little brother? Why did he bring Starfire to that shitty excuse for a restaurant? Why hadn't he just kept his big, dumb mouth shut?

 

Why? Why? Why?

 

“Because you're an idiot,” Robin answered himself. “You're a big, stupid, possessive idiot who thinks way more with his little head than he does to his big one... or that's what Raven would say, at least.”

 

Into the horizon, the looming Titan's Tower came into view. As he drove down the street, Robin scanned the surroundings of the tower in hopes to see whether Starfire had made it back or not. He'd been looking into the distance so intently that he'd almost ran the yellow light that had suddenly flashed red before he could get by. He slammed on the brakes, causing his entire body to lurch forward and the T-Cars rubber tires to screech on the pavement. His sudden stop hadn't made the drivers behind happy at all, and they let him know with a chorus of honks.

 

Robin felt a flashing pain begin to develop in the back of his head, and began to massage his temples to ward off the imminent migraine. With everything that had already happened today, he definitely wasn't in the mood for morons with a little road rage. Suddenly, slamming his head on the wheel until he was unconscious didn't sound like such a crazy idea anymore.

 

Before Robin could resort to drastic measures, the light flashed green and the Boy Wonder was speeding down the street like a bat out of hell.

 

`I'm going to fix this,' Robin thought to himself as he sped across the bridge that conjoined Titans' Tower with the rest of Jump City, `and I know just who can help me.'

 

XOXOXOXOX

 

 

The tower was a hell of a lot quieter with Robin and Starfire gone, Raven realized. Without either of them around with their drama, Raven had actually managed to get some reading done instead of becoming the team's therapist, but the empath knew that, eventually, this short-lived bliss would end.

 

Raven sensed Starfire's approach before she saw her. It was definitely Starfire's aura that she felt, but something seemed... amiss. Usually, Starfire's energy signature was light and joyful, but Raven felt something deeper, a distress that she couldn't pinpoint the origin of. This new feeling was so un-Starfire like that Raven half doubted if who she sensed was Starfire at all.

 

Starfire was approaching quickly, which Raven found a little odd since the speeds at which she was traveling were way to fast for the T-Car to go. The only feasible explanation was that she was flying home, which made nearly almost no sense since she was supposed to be spending the day with Robin.

 

`As a matter of fact, I can't sense Robin at all,' Raven thought to herself, and as soon as she made that revelation, she suddenly realized why Starfire's aura was so off.

 

Boys truly were morons.

 

Raven sighed and sat on her comfortable bed, collapsing on her full, fluffy pillows. “I'm definitely not in the mood to be a shoulder to cry on right now,” she groaned to herself. The day had gone so well and now she was about to be back where she started.

 

Suddenly, Raven's breath hitched in her throat as she sensed Starfire's overwhelming flood of emotions entering the Tower. Raven felt Starfire come closer as she used the elevators to make it to her floor. She heard the soft ping of the machine as it unloaded its solitary passenger.

 

Starfire's footsteps were not rushed as she went down the hallway toward Raven's room. Her stride was lethargic and miserable, two characteristics that Raven never though she'd use to describe Starfire.

 

The footfalls came closer until they were right outside of Raven's door, but they kept going, as if Starfire hadn't even noticed where she was. Raven heard her red headed teammate continue down the hallway, slide open a door, and slide it shut again.

 

Slowly, Raven sat up in her seat, slack jawed from Starfire's mood.

 

`Wow, Robin must have really fucked up this time.'

 

Suddenly, Raven heard a loud screeching noise as a set of rubber tires slid violently against the road outside. The empath floated to her window and spotted the unique design of the T-Car as it sped toward Titan's Tower with Robin at the wheel, no doubt. She kept her eyes on the vehicle until it disappeared in the garage at the bottom of the building, an ingenious idea brewing in Raven's sneaky head.

 

`Star,' she thought to herself, `you'll owe me one after this.'

 

 

XOXOXOXOX

 

Sweat beaded down Robin's forehead as he took the stairs up to the floor Starfire's room was on. He ran up the staircase, taking the steps two at a time as he neared the doors and finally bursted through them.

 

The boy wonder made a beeline, not for his girlfriend's room, but for a door that was located down the hallway from it. He pounded mercilessly on the steel until it slid away and Raven's mysterious eyes were revealed.

 

“Raven,” Robin gasped, nearly out of breath from his rush. “I've done something really, really, stupid.”

 

Raven blinked. “And...? What else is new?” she asked sarcastically as she moved out of the way, allowing her teammate to enter the room.

 

“No,” said Robin, heading straight for Raven's bed. The Azarathan teen assumed her familiar position in the corner. “I'm serious,” he continued. “I think I've ruined everything with Starfire.”

 

In the dim lighting of dusk, Robin could just make out Raven's slight shrug. “Yeah,” she said. “You probably have.”

 

At this, Robin let out a long, frustrated, tired sigh, and flopped back on Raven's bed loudly. “Is that supposed to make me feel better?”

 

She shrugged again. “Who says I'm supposed to make you feel better?” Suddenly, Raven was out of the corner and had moved to one of the darker areas of the room. The new lighting made her look ominous. If Robin hadn't known Raven as well as he had, he might have been scared of her. “This is the second day in a row that you've come to be because of something that happened with Starfire. You've obviously done something stupid.”

 

“Raven, please,” replied Robin, combing shaky fingers through his dark mane. “I came to you for your insight, not to be verbally abused.”

 

“I don't care,” Raven said. It was such a simple phrase, but for Robin it spoke volumes. “You need someone to tell you to stop taking her for granted because the rest of the idiotic male population of the team sure as hell isn't going to.”

 

Robin sat up on his elbows at that. “Raven -”

 

“No,” she interrupted holding up a hand, “let me finish. Do you know how much Starfire cares about you?”

 

The Boy Wonder suddenly wasn't feeling so wonderful anymore. “Raven,” he pleaded, “please -”

 

“Honestly, I have no idea how she could put up with your bull shit and still love you.”

 

Robin's heart skipped a beat at that revelation. Slowly, he began to sit up on Raven's bed. “Love me...?”

 

Raven stared at her teammate, aghast. “Are you that blind? Don't you see the way she looks at you? The way she holds you? Kisses you? She's absolutely infatuated with you. By the looks of things, it doesn't look like you feel the same way for her.”

 

“No.” Raven was surprised by Robin's tone. He hadn't yelled, but he may as well have. He seemed so sure of himself and so forceful, as if he were completely sure of himself and his feelings. “I do. I just never realized how much I loved her until now.”

 

Raven shrugged again. “Well, too little, too late.”

 

“Maybe,” he said, “but I don't want it to be. God, I don't want it to be.”

 

“No,” said Raven, her voice teeming with finality. “It is too late. I don't know what you did to her to make her leave you, but I can tell it's too late.”

 

Robin began to shake his head. “No. It's not. It's never too late.”

 

“So says the optimist, but who's the one with the sixth sense here?” Raven began taking slow steps, getting closer to Robin. “Who's the one who can feel her confusion?” And closer. “Her loneliness?” And closer still. “Her despair.” By now she was right in front of the Boy Wonder. She leaned down a little so she was eye level with him while he was still sitting on her bed. “Who's going to help her piece together her broken heart?”

 

Robin stared at Raven intensely. They both could feel the tension in the air and the seriousness of the situation. Robin's answer could change everything.

 

Finally, the Boy Wonder's face faltered, and he buried it in his big hands. “You're right,” he said quietly.

 

Raven's jaw dropped and she snapped up in shock. “What?” she gasped. The last thing she expected was that Robin would agree with her.

 

“I said, you're right,” he replied.

 

`I heard that, you moron, but you're not supposed to agree with me,' she thought. “I'm right?” she asked incredulously, but she decided that she should try keeping her charade. “Well, yes,” she said. “Of course I am.”

 

“I should break up with her,” muttered Robin, face still buried in his hands.

 

“...Right.”

 

“I should give her up.”

 

“...You should?” Raven asked. Maybe she was doing too well of a job with the reverse psychology.

 

“Yes,” said Robin. “I should.” Slowly, he began lowering her hands from her face revealing the most vehement eyes Raven had ever seen. Despite the presence of his mask, Robin still looked as intense as ever. “I should leave her. I should run as far away from her as possible before I hurt her again, but, damn it all, I'm not going to.”

 

His proclamation was music to Raven's ears. “You're not,” she sighed in relief.

 

“Raven, I didn't realize it before, but I love Starfire. I don't know why it never dawned on me, but I feel that if I lose her, I'll lose a part of myself. God, it scares me so much to think about it, but I can't picture her not being a part of my life.”

 

Raven nodded in understanding. “So, what are you doing to do?”

 

Robin stood from Raven's bed, still looking at her with his intense eyes. “I'm going to get my girl back,” he said before making a quick exit down the hallway and finally leaving Raven alone in her room.

 

She sighed a long, happy, tired sigh and began floating in her meditation position. “Starfire,” she said, closing her eyes, “you owe me one.”

 

…End Chapter Seven…

 

Number of Words: 2,028

Posted: May 29, 2006 (Happy Memorial Day! :^D)

Edited: August 20, 2006