Disclaimer

This is going to be a three chapter-ed story.
I just wanted to write a really short story that
was originally just going to be one giant
one-shot but then I changed my mind...
so here it is. This isn't the best, I'll admit,
but I just couldn't help myself.

Warning: OC ahead :)

Reviews are welcome
Thanks for reading! :D

Richard Grayson knew how to dance. He could dance to nearly anything and get all of it right, no matter what the era, the style, the beat, or the sound of the song. Being a billionaire's son (and Batman's sidekick) had kind of enforced what rich people went through during childhood (dance lessons had been necessary, for some reason). But knowing how didn't mean he'd always enjoyed it. And watching Tim try ( and Jason, too, before he'd changed) and learn it had been hilarious enough, so at least all those lessons as a small child had been worth it.

Now, Dick knew how to dance. Girls loved to dance with him. Why? Because, as far as they knew, he never messed up. But there was thing called learning how to improvise over the years (being an acrobat, then Robin, and now Nightwing had had a hand in that), which worked wonders when he was clueless what to do.

He was at a party. Not a high-up-in-society kind of party. No, this was simply a party that was to be enjoyed by "friends". And by friends, Bruce had actually meant coworkers. It was safe to say that he and Tim weren't exactly thrilled to be here, among people they either knew and didn't like, people they didn't know and didn't already like, and then there were people who they just did not know.

Dick and Tim were both leaning up against the wall, and for once, they were relaxed, despite their current situation. There had been no patrol tonight - everyone else had covered that, and it was apparent that both boys had needed a day and a night off: they'd spent the day sleeping, lying around, doing nothing until Alfred had come down to the Cave and informed them that Bruce wanted them ready in an hour of some party that consisted of friends (To Dick, Jason had sprung to mind - he'd never been one for those type of parties, not even when Bruce tried to be angry with him). Now here they were, at eight o'clock on a Saturday night, in December, as the snow fell outside to Gotham's dirty streets.

"Want to go home?" Tim asked after a while, stirring his fruit punch with his straw, scowling at the little berry floating on the surface. They'd been there for nearly half an hour, conversed with a few millionaires six eggs short of a dozen (who got along with Bruce quite well), and had merely stayed side by side. If crime fighting was an option right now, they'd take it if the evening continued on like this. Bruce was somewhere in the room, probably on the other side. They were in one of the tallest skyscrapers in Gotham City - everything looked so tiny below them.

"I wish we could," Dick replied, setting his drink down on a table nearby and sighing, relaxing his "proper" posture as another song started up, and couples moved to the center of the room. It was something from before 1930 - that much he knew. They'd been playing a lot of that music since they'd arrived. They didn't even know whose party this was - whether it was one man or a group who planned this, they didn't know nor care.

Tim observed the dance and found himself tapping his foot softly to it. It was a moderately fast song, but it was nice enough that it seemed to flow nicely in his ears. His eyes roamed over the crowd - a face full of strangers, as far as he was concerned - and searched for someone to dance with.

"Have fun out there," Dick sighed, knowing exactly what was on Tim's mind, looking around for himself for a few seconds before his gaze returned to his brother. "Don't get hurt."

Tim shot him a smirk, and it reminded him of Jason's for a brief second, but shook the image out of his head. This was not a night to remember such a tragedy. Dick shot a smirk at him right back. "The last time you danced with a girl she - "

"Yeah, yeah," Tim said, dismissing the older boy's words with a wave of his hand. "I know that, but she was mad at me for pointing out a major flaw - "

"You called her shallow. To her face."

"Hey. Honesty counts, right?"

Dick shook his head as Tim drained his drink, set it down, and wandered off to one of the girls standing on the edge of the dance floor. He noticed he was heading towards a particular bored-looking girl with flat black hair that stopped right below her ears sharply, freckles that stood out sharply on her tanned-and-not skin. Her eyes - he could see even at this distance - were small but glassy, narrowed and suspicious, a frown forming on her lips as she turned to look at Tim. She was a few inches shorter than him but look about the same age. Her clunky, polished dress shoes were tapping the tiled floor nervously - probably a habit.

The first Boy Wonder had to roll his eyes as the song ended, an another, even faster one began, still sounding like it came from the exact same era, watching the sullen girl carefully as her expression turned from sour to a bit impassive, but he knew that look well enough to know that she secretly wanted to dance with Tim.

And like a fool - who noticed what Dick did - Timothy Drake grinned for all he was worth, hero or not, and it seemed to the older one that he'd momentarily every bad thing they'd ever gone through and witnessed, allowing himself to purely enjoy this moment. Most of their friends and allies couldn't purely enjoy a moment of anything.

He watched as Tim offered his hand, and after a few seconds of hesitation, the girl in the dull, grey dress took it and allowed him to lead her to the dance floor, and they were lost among the other dancers dressed in dresses and suits. Tim didn't always look for girls who were easily offended and were vain - although he loved to bother them. Tim didn't really talk with anyone, as far as Dick knew, outside of being the third Robin. Maybe he wouldn't make this one angry, and maybe he would leave this party alive, instead of near in-pieces (literally) like the last time.

While the song progressed, and more and more people joined each other on the dance floor, no longer seeming to care who their partner was (really, it was just one dance, right?) Dick remained leaning against the wall, glancing out the window. The way the lights sparkled from this high up appeared almost sinister to him, after all that he'd seen - and after all the heights he'd had to jump and fall from in order to keep himself moving.

Dick was content to stand there by himself for the remainder of the event - or at least that was what he was thinking at the moment - just as several gentlemen on the other side of the room did, sitting and conversing quietly about matters that he couldn't bring himself to care about. Among them was Bruce, who glanced at his sons every few minutes. Probably to make sure they didn't start a fight or anything with some of the other boys there.

But he realized he wasn't content with just standing there when he let his gaze slip towards the window to his left again. This time, instead of sinister twinkling Gotham City light staring back at him, there was a girl blocking his view.

She was Tim's height, with light brown hair that was pulled back into a pony tail, held loosely in place by a gray ribbon. Her skin seemed paler than pale, like she didn't see much sun. She was turned away from him, leaning up against the tall windows that stretched all the way to the ceiling. Her posture was relaxed, as far as he could tell, and her arms were wrapped around herself, as if she was cold. Her dress was a navy blue, with simple straps that clung to her shoulders, while it it hugged her hip bones snugly and frilled out just a tiny bit past the that, ending just below the knees. Black tights - or leggings (how could he possibly know?) - peeked out from under the dress, covering her slender legs, which in small, shiny flats that matched the dress exactly. Her hands were locked behind her back now, her fingers adjusting every so often.

Dick, instead of turning away and disappearing into his thoughts - as he usually would have done - his eyes remained locked on the girl. She shouldn't have caught his attention - he couldn't even see her face, she was (most likely) a civilian, and he was sure that he didn't know her. She wasn't as thin or bony as the girl Tim was dancing with. She seemed to have a bit more meat on her bones - but just a little. From the back, she reminded him of a dwarf (the thought nearly sent him chuckling), but everyone who was considerably shorter than him was envisioned as a dwarf.

The thought did send him chuckling in the end, as the dance ended.

"Hey," Dick turned at the sound of Tim's voice to see that same sullen girl with her arm looped through his, a small but genuine and polite smile on her face as they came to a stop in front of him. Tim didn't look the last bit tired from the dancing, and seemed at ease with the girl beside him.

"Hey," Dick said back, giving his brother a raised eyebrow, but smiling at the girl, who narrowed her eyes at him. It made him uncomfortable, how sharp this one was. "How was dancing?"

Tim's smile turned into a full-fledged smirk, and his eyes slid to the girl for a moment, and then returned his attention to his brother. He said nothing. The girl bristled, but there was no way either of them missed slight tint of red in her hollow cheeks. Dick also didn't miss the look she shot Tim.

"Who's this?" Dick asked, breaking the silence, and saving Tim from bursting into laughter.

"Oh, this is Kayla," he said, and the girl - Kayla - smiled at him. It was a stretched, tight smile, but still polite enough to scrape by. "Kayla Mari. Kayla, this is my older brother, Richard."

"It's nice to meet you, Richard," she said, holding out her hand, her eyes taking on their suspicious gleam again.

"I see you're getting along with Timothy well," Dick said, nearly grinning again at the flash in the younger boy's eyes.

"You should come and dance," Tim said, regaining his calm, humor evident in his eyes.

"With who?" Dick asked.

"Find someone," Kayla interjected, a frown beginning to twist her thin lips. "It's lots of fun." With one look at her slightly winded features - but up-and-go posture - he could guess that she'd had 'lots of fun'. Dick danced, but he didn't intend to dance here. Tim had been lucky. Fairly lucky. And judging by Tim's lifted mood, this girl had proven not to be anyone he would be fighting with any time soon.

"Why aren't you two dancing?" couples began to filter back to the middle of the room; he hadn't even know they'd drifted to their tables to either sip some punch or take a bite of some dainty little meal.

"Intermission," Kayla replied. With a tug of Tim's suit sleeve, she said to Dick, "now, we'll be off" and pulled him away from his brother.

Tim smirked at Dick and allowed the girl to lead him into the crowd, and soon they were lost as another seemingly ancient song started up again. This one was so much slower and soothing than the last had been.

Dick closed his eyes for a brief moment and leaned his head back against the cool wall, breathing in and out deeply a few times, relaxing again, his mind clear of the usual worries: criminals trying to destroy cities, masterminds attempting to take over the world, crazies who'd escaped Arkham and had fled to little places around the world causing mayhem - the usual, indeed.

He opened them again, looking around. They'd dimmed the lights a bit so the atmosphere of the room - for the dancers, mostly - was different, to suit the present mood that the song provided.

Dick's eyes slid back to the window, and wasn't surprised to see that the girl had moved to stand in the corner, still gazing out the window, her shoulder leaning against the wall. Her arms were back around herself, her head titled to the side, against the wall, exposing pale skin. Her shoulders moved up and down slightly and slowly, matching her breathing. If she weren't standing up, it might have seemed like she was sleeping.

A smile crept onto his feature's, the girl's words ringing through his ears.

Find someone.

It's lots of fun.

He had a feeling he'd hear it from Wally for the next few weeks if he didn't do something "fun" before the party ended. And everyone else. Maybe even Bruce would tell him - if he didn't - to have fun while he could have it. He was an adult, after all. Adults generally didn't have fun.

Or so he was told.

He studied the girl - or at least, he assumed it was a girl (how could he know, right?) - trying to decide why she had caught his attention. Few girls caught his attention. Zatanna had been a crush, a wonderful friend to have, but he no long liked her in that way. But they were still great friends. And he'd had a thing with Babs for a while, but that had been - what, a while ago? And he was still best friends with her as well.

But he usually didn't just look at the back of girl's heads and stare at them at some dim-lit party with slow-dance appropriate music.

Slowly, Dick pushed himself off the wall and walked over to where he was standing beside the girl, but at the same time completely out of sight. He took a moment to look at her out of the corner of his eyes and nearly made a noise - something that would have been akin to a gasp - at who was staring out the window. He blinked, recovering from his shock, and studied her reflection in the window.

The girl with the gray ribbon was nameless to him, but that didn't mean that she wasn't familiar.

At that moment, he wished he knew her name.