After class, several kids gathered around Dick's desk, asking the new kid questions. Dick was used to it. He was always the new kid.

Wherever the circus came to town, Dick tried making friends with the children there. He spoke with spectators after the show. In his free time he would go into town and get to know the people there.

Language was the biggest problem - he only knew so many - his older cousin knew a little more and would sometimes act as interpreter. But that wouldn't be a problem here since everyone in the state spoke English, and English was Dick's best language after Romanian. It was hard to learn, though - Dick could never understand why it was so popular.

Anyway, Dick was looking forward to the typical question-and-answer session. "What's it like living in the circus?" "What tricks can you do?" "You're so lucky to travel around so much." Dick enjoyed impressing the new kids and feeling special, and then running off to play games with them.

Today he was having the discussion in a private school classroom. He pulled at his uncomfortable necktie again.

"You used to live in a circus?!"

He nodded and smiled. "Yes, I did."

Travis looked away and mumbled, "That would explain a few things..."

"No way!" The other kids laughed. "You're putting us on."

"No, it's true," Dick insisted. "I was born in a family of acrobats."

"You mean it? No joke?"

"Yes, I'm from Haly's International Traveling Circus. Why is that hard to believe?"

As soon as Dick asked that, he realized why. For the very first time, Dick Grayson was in town, but the circus was not.

"If you're some kind of acrobat, prove it," some kid said with a smirk. Dick would probably need to learn their names at some point. "Do some tricks."

"Okay, I will," Dick casually replied.

That answer surprised them. Dick stood up from his desk. "Give me room," he told them. He worked best on a trapeze, but he could do some simple tricks on his own. The space between the rows of desks was a little narrow, but it would work.

Travis spoke up concernedly. "Uh, Dick? What are you-"

He ran away from them and did a somersault - then another - Dick jumped from his hands to his feet and to his hands again. He pushed himself into the air and flipped over, landing perfectly on his feet. He spun to face the group with his arms raised high and proud.

"Whoa!" Several kids clapped their hands. "Do it again!" Everyone in the room had noticed him - the people who weren't interested in the new kid before moved together until the class was one big crowd. "Do another!"

Dick grinned, and he did a back flip. Jumped backwards and flipped in the air, landing on his feet.

More applause. Dick beamed brightly as he walked back to them. This is what he was used to. Showing off for some new friends. This was familiar.

"You weren't kidding, were you? You were actually in a circus!"

"Yes," he nodded, not even out of breath. "I traveled all over the world."

"Is that why you have an accent?" someone asked.

Dick blinked. "I have an accent?"

"You have a little accent. Where were you born?"

"Uh, I think it was EspaƱa - I mean Spain."

"Oh, so you're Spanish?"

"No, I'm Romani."

"You just said you were born in Spain."

"But my family's from Romania. They just happened to be in Spain when I was born."

"You really do travel around a lot. I guess that explains why you seemed a little off in class."

Dick blinked again. "Off? Off what?"

"Y'know. Just a little 'off'."

He stared in confusion. "...I don't understand."

Travis leaned over to Dick and whispered, "Just ignore him."

Before Dick could decide what to do, another kid asked, "So your parents were really acrobats in a circus? And now you all live in Gotham?"

For a very brief moment, Dick froze. Then he lowered his eyes. "Uh, n-no... It's just me... My parents are dead."

Nobody laughed.

"My aunt and cousin too. My uncle's the only one who's alive, but he's still in the hospital."

"I'm so sorry..."

Dick looked back up in confusion. "Why does everyone keep saying sorry? It's not your fault. It was a man named Tony Zucco. He killed them," he said simply. "He's the one who should be sorry."

The group looked uncomfortable.

One kid tried to change the subject. "S-So, who are you staying with now?"

"A man named Bruce Wayne."

"Really?!" almost everyone cried.

Dick stared back wide-eyed. "Yeah. Do you know him?"

"Everyone knows him. He's the richest man in the city."

"I think I heard something about him adopting a kid. That was you?!"

"He didn't adopt me, really," Dick replied. "I'm not his son, just his ward. I'm just living with him."

"But still, that's incredible!" one kid said.

"You're so lucky!" another kid cried.

Dick nodded eagerly. "Yes, I know. I couldn't stay with Mr. Haly anymore, so I don't know what I would have done if it wasn't for Bruce."

"You call him Bruce?"

"That's his name."

She laughed, as if Dick said something funny.

"What I meant is that one of the richest men in the world asked you to live with him. That's as lucky as you can get. That is hitting the jackpot!"

"Like Little Orphan Annie," someone said with a grin.

"Who?" Dick asked, which just prompted more laughs.

"How did that happen? How did you get him to take you in?"

"I didn't do anything, it's just... Bruce said that when he was my age, his parents were killed too. He said he knew what I was going through and he wanted to help. I had no place to go, so he offered to take me in, and I said yes."

"Just like that?"

"Yeah, just like that."

"Of course it was just like that," another kid said with a smirk. "Like he was gonna say no to someone with all that money."

Dick smiled and shook his head. "I didn't know Bruce was rich back then. Well, I sort of knew, but it didn't really sink in. I didn't really know anything about him." He blinked. "I still don't." His smile faded and he stared. "But I said yes anyway... Didn't even think about it... I went with a total stranger..."

Dick blinked back to awareness and grinned. "W-Well, I didn't have a lot of choices, so lucky me!"

Before any of them could say anything else, the teacher came back into the classroom. "All right, everybody back to your seats."

Dick sat down, and tried to force away the sudden discomfort inside him.

.

Over the next few days at school, Dick noticed something strange. People seemed more interested in his being Bruce Wayne's ward than by his being from the circus. He didn't understand the big deal since - as far as anyone else knew - Bruce Wayne was just an ordinary person. Except he had money.

"I don't get it," Dick told Travis. "So he has lots of money. So what?"

"Dude, don't be a snob. You won't make any friends that way," Travis told him.

"What's snob mean?"

"It means..." He shrugged. "Well, you know... It means you're a snob."

"That's not explaining."

"Dick, a lot of kids in this school are already rich. They have to be to afford this place. But you are richer than all of them. If you can have all that money and not be impressed by it, people will think you're a snob."

"I know money is important. We had bills in the circus too, you know. But everyone acts like it's the most amazing thing in the world. And it's not my money, anyway. It's Bruce's."

"It's yours too because you're his son now - Sorry, his ward," Travis added with a roll of his eyes, before Dick could correct him again. "And they think it's amazing because you can buy anything and they can't. You can have all the newest phones, and games, and - and dirt bikes, and jet skis, and whatever."

"I don't want all that stuff," Dick said. "Why would I? I'd hate having to pack all that up."

Travis looked at him quizzically. "Pack up? Pack for what?"

Dick froze. Then he blinked. "Uh... Nothing, I guess."

In the beginning, Dick sometimes forgot that living with Bruce wasn't temporary - that he wouldn't be moving to another country in a few weeks.

"Look, the point is," Travis said, "money is a big deal. It just is. Maybe not in the circus, but that's just how it works here in civilization."

"Civilization?!" A hot flare of anger appeared inside Dick. "I was raised by traveling performers, not wolves! I'm just as civilized as anyone else!"

"You were scared by the automatic hand-dryers in the bathroom," Travis deadpanned.

"Don't change the subject!"

Travis rolled his eyes dismissively and walked off. Dick thought about hitting him, but feared he would twist it to fit his argument.

.

Dick never thought he wasn't normal before.

Well... not exactly.

He knew not everyone lived in a circus. He knew most kids stayed in one city all the time, didn't learn special tricks, and had never been around animals any bigger than a dog or a horse.

He knew there were all sorts of families in the world.

He thought he knew that.

Dick thought that traveling to so many places meant he knew more about the world. He never thought he was sheltered... but maybe he was wrong.

He was always drifting from place to place. He never really dug in deep anywhere. Never really got involved. Maybe he never learned anything...

He thought families were different all over the world. Some were stationary, some were travelers.

Dick was always an outsider. He thought he was used to it. But after spending a few weeks in a private school... This felt different. A different kind of different. There was this strange feeling in the air. Spending so much time around these people gradually made something about the atmosphere oppressive. It took Dick a while to understand what it was.

Growing up, Dick was told the United States of America was "the land of the free." It was a country that took such pride in "Capitalism" and "free speech" and "human rights". Dick used to think of it as a place where each individual was encouraged to act however they wanted... But the only thing his schoolmates wanted to do was act like everyone else.

The kids acted so high and mighty, but all they cared about was getting the newest phone or following the latest trends. It made Dick think of "The Emperor's New Clothes." He would have expected students in a school named after Andersen to understand the moral. (Dick knew about Hans Christian Andersen. One of his few material possessions was a book of his stories, translated into Romanian. He remembered his mom reading it to him.)

Before, Dick thought kids who didn't live in a circus were common. Here, people thought it was normal. And there was a difference. "Normal" was this invisible yet omnipresent concept that was either "pass" or "fail," no room in between. And everybody desperately wanted to avoid failing. Dick didn't understand why people worried about it - and that not-understanding was the exact thing that made people call him weird... and after a while it got under his skin.

He was simply that rich foreign kid who tried to impress people with tricks, and for a while it sort of worked. But after a few weeks Dick Grayson wasn't the New Thing anymore, and people looked for something else to entertain themselves.

Same faces, same crowds. There was suddenly a point in remembering people's names now. And they got used to him. Dick realized he didn't know how to make people like him after he stopped being new and interesting, because he never stayed in one spot long enough for it to happen.

When he was still the New Thing, Dick overheard some kids talking about him. He stayed hidden behind the corner to listen.

"That guy must be the luckiest kid in the world. Who else gets adopted by a billionaire?!"

"He lost his parents, so there is that."

"So what? I'd trade my folks for a billion dollars anytime."

Dick's mouth dropped open.

Who says things like that?! Is that how "normal" people think?!

Dick decided then that he didn't belong in this place. He would be an outsider no matter how long he stayed. But he wasn't traveling anymore... So he had no choice but to live with it.

...Just keep living with it.

.

"This is all very interesting," Wally spoke up. "But it doesn't really answer my question."

"What question?" Dick asked.

Wally looked in his eyes and asked, "Why did you want to meet me today?"

Dick hesitated, then he made a careless shrug and said, "I just did."

"No, seriously. You hid your identity from me for more than a year - Which I totally respected. I'm not mad - But today you decided to break Batman's rules, came all the way to Central City, popped up in front of me, and now you're telling me your life story. What brought that on?"

"Nothing really. I've been thinking about telling you who I am for a while," Dick answered. "Today seemed like as good a day as any."

"Is that the only reason?" Wally asked.

Dick hesitated again, and he said, "Does it matter...?"

.

Author's Notes: (Posted 2/28/2017) In mainstream DC Comics, Haly's Circus is a US circus and Dick was always American. But I read somewhere that the Young Justice version of Dick was Romani. I'm not sure how official that is (Grayson doesn't sound like a Romanian name), but I just went with it.