Author's Note: So I'm planning for this to be a loose modern parallel of the canon Anna/Bates trajectory. Loose being the operative word, but yeah. A little à la Lizzie Bennet Diaries or Emma Approved, but I'll stray a little farther from the source material than those do. Enjoy!

Apparently the staff Halloween party, for which neither attendance nor costumes were optional, had been the brainwave, a few years ago, of Cora, one half of the husband-wife team who ran the publishing house. It had been her idea also, he was told, to have table groupings based not on, say, department or something else logical, but instead on costume theme. Which was how John Bates, who'd been working as an editor at Grantham Books for a few months, found himself at the Literary References table, dressed as the Dr. Frankenstein to his younger friend William's Monster. They were joined at the table by a two giggly interns in Hogwarts robes; a Hobbit whom John was fairly certain worked in Accounting; a young couple from Marketing dressed as what was apparently a modernized version of Elizabeth Bennett and William Darcy from some web series adaptation of Pride and Prejudice; Thomas (a rather unpleasant fellow who was also in Marketing) dressed as Holden Caulfield, and an attractive young blond woman who John hadn't met yet, dressed as Lewis Carrol's Alice.

For some reason, looking at her was making John think of his on-again-off-again-but-finally-for-real-this-time ex-girlfriend. Well, perhaps it wasn't Alice that made him think of her. Probably it was because that afternoon, he'd had yet another frustrating conversation trying to nail down a time to meet so she could give him back his spare key, and he could get rid of the boxes of her things that had been sitting in his entryway for weeks(his ex, that was. Not Alice). So he'd been thinking about Vera, and looking at Alice(it occurred to him that he didn't know her real name. He'd been told it, he knew, but couldn't remember what. He thought it, as well, started in an "A". Amanda? Andrea? Arianna? Something like that.) Looking at her, he was struck by how she was the precise opposite of Vera in every way. Where Vera's hair was dark and course, hers was blond and silky. Where Vera's face was permanently marked with frown lines, this girl hadn't stopped smiling or laughing, it seemed, since she sat down. While Vera would have been making snide comments about people's costumes, Alice seemed to have had something nice to say to everyone. And while Vera would have probably chosen a vaguely-sinister, dark costume(a witch, probably he thought to himself), this girl was resplendent in sky blue and white.

Caught up in his musings, he was only half-listening to the conversation. He vaguely registered the song that was playing change, and the girl saying. "Oh, this is a good one, I love Avicii. Who will come dance with me?"

Really though, it was the snide remark coming from Holden, on his left "Bates will dance with you, won't he?" (balls. Have I been staring that obviously?) that brought him out of his reverie.

The girl didn't seem to notice anything odd, however. "Lovely!" She pronounced, bouncing lightly to her feet and pulling John out of his chair and onto a dance floor that was just beginning to get populated.

He could barely hear the lyrics of the song over the ambient noise, but she clearly knew them. She danced playfully, with abandon, John scrambling to attempt to keep up, and feeling horribly awkward. She danced, he thought, in a way one only can when one is thoroughly in love with the world. She was laughing, singing along to the song, pulling him in with her. Both too soon and not nearly soon enough, it ended, and they both took a moment to catch their breath. "I'm sorry," she said, looking up at him. "I forced you into that, didn't I?"

"No," he stumbled "I had fun, I just, don't dance much I suppose. And don't know that song. I promise I'm not always that awkward."

She laughed, then paused, listening, her face lighting up. "Yes! I'm almost certain you'll know this one, and it's far easier to dance. Do-over?"

By now he could make out the song that was starting as well, and he barely had time to acquiesce graciously before the lyrics began, and he had to follow directions. "It's just a jump to the left, and then a step to the riiiiight!"

As the final bars of the Time Warp ran down, John tried to get his breath, thoroughly drenched now, although he had to admit he'd had fun.

The blond imp grinned up at him. "That wasn't so bad, was it?"

He smiled. "No, it wasn't. I'd even venture as far as to say I enjoyed it. But I'm afraid I'm about beat for now."

"Not a problem," she grinned at him again, and then, oddly, endearingly formal, held out her hand for him to shake. "Thank you for your company, Mr. Bates." With that she slipped off through the throng, towards where a group of young women, including the owners' eldest daughter, Mary Crawley(dressed as some sort of Greek princess, it looked like) were waving her over.

The rest of the night, as he sat at the table with William, nursing a scotch and soda and consoling the younger man, who was vainly trying to catch the eye of one of the assistants, he found his eyes drifting back again and again, to the blond girl, Alice. She spent most of the night on the dance floor, dancing every song with the same abandon and joy she had for the first two. She was captivating. As much as he'd felt awkward and out of place, he'd also enjoyed dancing with her immensely. Her enthusiasm was infectious. She was bouyant, and dancing with her, he'd felt a bit lighter too.

It was a few days later, that John was sitting in front of his computer, positively stumped. He wasn't hopeless when it came to technology, but he wasn't brilliant either, and this had him beat. He was just resigning himself to having to call tech support, when Mary Crawley walked by. She was the only of the Crawley children to work at Grantham, although precisely what her job title was, he couldn't tell you. She mostly seemed to float around, making sure everything was ship shape. Human Resources, maybe? She noticed his frustrated expression. "Is something wrong, Mr. Bates?"

"Oh, just my computer. It's frozen up, and I've tried the usual things. I'm going to have to call Tom," he said, naming the company's IT guy.

Mary frowned. "Tom's not in the office this week. He went to Dublin, some family thing." She brushed it aside with a wave of her hand

"That's too bad. Do we have a substitute?"

"I'm afraid not." She thought for a moment. "But Anna from Creative is brilliant with computers. I'll see if she can come take a look for you."

Anna sat, staring at her screen, trying to decide if the chapter titles for the book she was working on should be in one of the two fonts she currently had on her screen, or if she'd be better to just bite the bullet and design a new one. Just then, an iMessage popped up in the corner of her screen.

Mary Crawley: Do you have a minute to do some sub IT support? Tom's off this week and I've got an editor with a frozen screen he can't work out.

She quickly typed a reply, glad of a distraction for a few minutes.

Sure! Who & where?

The reply came back a moment later.

Mary Crawley: John Bates, cubicle 14.

A few minutes later, she was knocking on the partition beside his desk.

"Hello again"

He turned in his chair. "Hello. Thank you for coming, I hope I didn't disturb you" Anna, he thought of course. Suddenly, oddly, his computer problem seemed much less annoying

"No problem, I'm glad to help," She smiled, and walked over. "So what seems to be the problem?"

He'd been standing behind his desk chair for several minutes, watching her work, and he felt increasingly more awkward, feeling like he should say something. "So how did you become the stand-in IT person?"

"Because I used to be terrible at it!" She laughed, and looked at him over her shoulder, elaborating. "I did a fine arts major in Uni, and I wanted to do illustration or graphic design. But so much of it these days is on graphics programs, and I was useless with computers. My advisor told me to take Intro Computer Science before I took a graphic arts class, so I could get my feet wet, he said. But I enjoyed it, so I ended up doing a minor."

"So Fine Arts plus Computer Science is the recipe for a graphic designer?"

"Not really, I did a masters in graphic design after that," she explained.

"I see. Do you get a lot of people surprised that your masters isn't the same as your bachelors? I forever have people asking that."

"Yeah, sometimes," she smiled "what did you study, then?"

"I double-majored in creative writing and world issues, minored in history."

"Wow. And then?"

I was a journalist for a few years after, actually. I was overseas, covering the war. But then. . . " he trailed off. I couldn't take it anymore he thought. "Well, I came back. Did a Master's in English Lit. I wanted to be a novelist. But, this pays the bills. I don't mind it, though." He amended.

"Do you still write?" She asked, seeming genuinely interested.

"A little."

They fell silent again for a moment, Anna concentrating on whatever it was she was doing to his computer. A moment later, she swivelled in the chair, flashing him a smile. "All done! You should be good to go." She stood up, giving him his seat back.

"Amazing. Thank you,"

She blushed a little. "Not a problem."

He thought for a second. "I was thinking of going across the street to get a cup of coffee, can I bring you something back, to thank you?"

"You don't have to do that, Mr. Bates," she smiled, and then, seeing he was about to protest, held up a hand. "But, as a matter of fact, I could use a little walk, so I might come with you. If it'll make you feel better, I'll let you buy my coffee." She grinned at him.

That evening, John sat at the small desk in his flat, answering some emails before turning in for the night. Finishing up, he was about to close his laptop when he decided against it, and instead, opened iTunes. He went to the search bar, and typed in 'Avici'. He wasn't sure of the spelling, or even if it was a song title or a band, but he hit enter.

Did you mean "Avicii"?

He clicked on it. Band, it seemed. He navigated to the page for their most recent album, then clicked to preview it track by track. The first couple of songs didn't sound familiar, and he wondered if he would even recognize it. But then the fourth sample played, and he recognized the beat, if nothing else, and a few snatches here and there that he'd remembered Anna singing along to. His looked for the title. Addicted to You. Well, he wouldn't go quite that far. But, nonetheless, he found his cursor drifting over, almost of its own accord, and clicking 'purchase'

He didn't know about addicted, but captivating, at least, Anna certainly was.

A/N: Thanks for reading! I'd love to know what you think :)