A Book
Even as the gentle waves bushed up against the shore, their soothing and placid movements seeming to slow time itself, Raven could tell her focus was slipping. She silently reprimanded herself for allowing her thoughts to wander, which only broke her concentration further. She squeezed her eyes closed tightly, grasping for control and quiet in her tumultuous mind.
Meditation wasn't something she did as frequently as she used to; it was simply becoming less necessary after the defeat of her demonic father. The dark young woman still relied on the solace and peacefulness to retain her sanity and keep her powers in check, but she had never been one so easily distracted. What did Beast Boy always say? "You love to focus more than I love to lose focus."
Her teammate's quip nudged the corner of her mouth up in a tiny smirk, but this tore her concentration away even further. Raven's eyes snaped open as she felt herself float slowly back down onto the roof of the tower. She sighed and laid her hands in her lap, shoulder drooping slightly.
This was getting ridiculous.
She had thought that a healthy session of meditation would ease her mind, help to make sense of the foreign emotions she had been experiencing as of late. Those strange new feelings.
The pale-skinned sorceress gazed out over the bay, watching the sun sink lower over the horizon. Wisps of clouds streaked across the sky, seeming to absorb the sun's radiant orange glow, preserving it for the coming night. The calm light bounced playfully off of the sleek metal and glass of Titans Tower, bathing Raven in its glow, and dappling her cloak a light shade of purple as if trying to coax a warm smile out of the stoic hero.
Her thoughts fleetingly returned to the book.
Before departing Tokyo over a year ago, Raven had paid another visit to the small and quaint book store she had visited. It was filled with volumes she had never known existed, and she relished in the vast collection contained in such a little library. One book, however, had stood out more than the others. It was tucked away in a corner, perched on a shelf directly at her eye-level as if patiently awaiting her arrival for decades. Her hands trembled as she held the book, and even as she carried it to the counter and paid the merchant, she could scarcely tear her eyes away from its tattered cover.
"The old magicks," The clerk had remarked as he input the book's ISBN. "Not many still understand those ways, let alone can harness such knowledge."
"Sometimes knowledge alone suffices." Raven had replied.
Upon return to Jump City, she had cleared a space on her bookshelf, dutifully dusting off the section and carefully placing the book in its new home. Given the extreme nature of its premise, Raven was unsure whether she would ever truly study such a tome. Yet she simply had to add such a work to her personal library.
These newfound feelings had shifted her perspective on accessing such knowledge, such dangerous and tempting knowledge as described in the little book. But as she stared at the new addition to her collection, the hesitation began to build. The book, especially one with this magnitude and potential, caused Raven to feel slightly overwhelmed by the possibilities contained in its pages as the exhilaration of its initial discovery began to fade.
"Yo, Raven!" A familiar voice called from behind her, piercing her thoughts. "You gonna come eat with us, or are you gonna stay up here and eat with the seagulls?"
Raven flinched slightly as she was snapped back into full awareness. She had been so absorbed in her own thoughts that the rest of her surroundings had completely blurred, the distraction lending a greater level of isolation than meditation had.
She turned her head to Beast Boy. "Give me a minute..."
Beast Boy saluted her and began his return to the tower's interior.
"Wait..." Raven suddenly said. She spoke softly, almost in a whisper.
"Hm?" Beast Boy poked his head back out.
Raven brushed a strand of hair out of her face, though remained where she sat with her back to the fellow Titan. She cleared her throat, speaking more clearly this time. "Can I ask you something?"
Beast Boy stepped towards her slightly. "Uhh... Sure, Raven."
She tilted her head up, closing her eyes against the sliver of sun that remained perched on the horizon. She fought for words, trying to think how to phrase what she was trying to say. Her lips parted, but nothing came out.
"What's up?" Beast Boy took another step.
She glanced behind her, but the very sight of him sent a sudden wave of heat cascading to her cheeks and she pulled her hood up to conceal the redness.
He took another step.
Raven remained frozen midbreath, on the very edge of forming something audible. "Do you think...?" She faltered.
Another step.
"...What's for dinner?" Raven lowered her head in surrender to her own awkwardness, shifting the hood again in an attempt to hide the furious blush still enveloping her cheeks. Enough, Raven. She thought harshly. He's just your teammate... He's just... Beast Boy. Pull it together. A part of her deep inside almost seemed to laugh at her as she tried feeding more lies to herself.
"Um, pizza," Beast Boy answered slowly, rather perplexed why it had seemed like such a complicated question. "Why?"
Raven sighed again. "Curious."
He tilted his head towards his friend. "Are you sure that's all you wanted to ask? You seem... I don't know, what's the word for 'more than just curious about dinner?'"
She stood wordlessly and followed a confused Beast Boy off of the roof. She was a Titan. She was a hero. But she was also a teenaged girl; this battle with her feelings seemed more difficult than any foe she had dueled before, and it maddened her to no end.
It hadn't helped that Beast Boy had become so much more kind to her recently. He had not been one to shy away from her company for a long time, but these days he seemed to genuinely appreciate and include her even more than usual, gravitating towards her during the team's relaxation and down time. She lifted her eyes to the shapeshifter walking in front of her, turning her head away bashfully.
What was happening?
Even as the question formed in her mind, a warm part of her deep inside seemed to remind her that she knew the answer. No person had ever inspired such out-of-character behavior; shyness, embarrassment, and... She stubbornly refused to finish her internal dialogue.
Raven adored logic. It was a form of retaliation against lesser learned opponents, a surefire comeback against her teammates' shenanigans, and a pleasant comfort when other tactics seemed to fail. The problem was that logic told her everything she was feeling was normal. Logic would dictate that this emotion was not out of place, not sudden, and not unnatural. Logic told her to not fight it, but embrace it.
She longed to punch logic in the face.
"Man, what does that have to do with anything?" Cyborg leaned on his elbow and spoke skeptically to Beast Boy across the table in between massive chomps of pizza.
The little green Titan leaned back, a smug grin on his face. "I'm just saying..."
"What? That you think you're stronger than me?" Cyborg laughed.
"Yeah. Pound-for-pound, I'm definitely stronger than you, Cy'." Beast Boy smirked, sipping on a soda.
"As Beast Boy? Not as Bear Boy or Lion Boy?" Cyborg challenged, matching his friend's smirk.
Robin raised his hands. "Gentlemen, please. It's obvious who the true strongest man of the group is."
"Oh yeah, boy wonder?" Cyborg chuckled.
Raven took a sip of her herbal tea, a spectator to the friendly chest-pounding taking place in front of her. After solitude and meditation had failed to soothe her troubled mind reeling with unfamiliar thoughts and emotions, the petty arguments and company of her Titans brought a small measure of normalcy and comfort. Even as the source of her newfound confusion was seated right beside her, the familiar squabbling was still relieving her internal tension.
"If I may interrupt your exhibition of manly greatness," Raven spoke up. "Is anyone going to eat that slice of pepperoni?"
"That's just a name, Cyborg," Robin objected with a smile, hardly hearing Raven's request. "At least I'm actually 100% man."
Cyborg almost spit out his pizza. "Whoa, man! Not cool!"
Beast Boy laughed. "Dude, admit it. That was kind of funny."
"Alright, fine. Then half-man me is still manlier than either of you." Cyborg grinned.
Aware that nothing would distract the boys from their contest, Starfire gently pushed the pizza box across the table with a smile before leaning back and returning her soft gaze to Robin.
Raven observed the Tamaranean's expression as she reached for the slice, allowing the faintest of smiles to cross her face for an instant. It was still a shock how it had taken so long for those two to finally confess to each other. What was even more shocking was how it took a deathmatch in a foreign land to coax it out of them. But she was glad they finally admitted their hearts' desires to each other; it was as Cyborg had said: "It's about time."
There was something about those two that just seemed right. Robin and Starfire went together like... well, Robin and Starfire. Though as much as she hated to admit it, and may never profess it aloud, Raven found herself strangely envious of them. Not of either person's specific company, but of the idea of romance in general. It was this envy that had contributed so heavily to her newfound confusion.
Perhaps envy isn't the most fitting word. She thought. Intrigue?
For Raven, it seemed, that fairy tale simply didn't exist. Though much more open than she had been when they initially founded the team, she still wasn't easily approachable or welcoming. For the longest time she had feared letting loose an emotion as powerful or free as love, and she still was unsure if it was a good idea even now. Few things on earth were as powerful as her unrestrained emotions.
"Fine, call it a draw," Beast Boy said. "I'm still calling it a win for Beast Man. Right, Raven?"
She was jolted back to reality by a familiar elbow to her ribs. "Beast Boy, I should be the last person you seek for a rating of your manliness." She quipped hastily, trying to retain her usual dry tone of voice.
Raven could feel her inner conversation returning. But just as she was about to wander into more self-debate, a thought flashed into her mind. What if I just ask Starfire for advice?
Robin snickered. "Beast Man."
