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Klaus wonders whether he should tell his brother there is a dead woman dripping blood into his cereals. Then he remembers Luther had stolen his favorite pumpkin colored nail polish to paint one of his figurines and gives the woman a thumbs up instead.
“What’s so funny, honey?” His mother passes him to place a plate of pancakes covered in syrup on the table.
“Nothing, mom. Hey, are these new cereals? They’re bloody awful.”
“Language, Klaus.”
They are all gathered around the kitchen table, except for their father and Pogo, who Klaus is sure spends their mornings sucking the souls out of orphans before they head over to suck the life out of them. Looking at them like this, dressed in their matching uniforms, one would assume they’re just about to kiss their mother good bye and head off to school. Except the Hargreeves siblings doesn’t wear their uniforms to class, they wear them as battle gear. In the mornings they drink their juice, juice, juice, coffee, juice, juice, and after they finish the food their mother place in front of them, they go into war. Klaus is hoping today is a save a cat out of a tree-kind of day, or maybe chase down some lone thief. Mostly because those days meant he could lean back and watch Number one and Number two trip over themselves in order to be the one to get the bad guy. Also, because anything that meant fighting would be sure to result in him throwing up and maybe passing out. He was still feeling the effects of whatever he had smoked last night with a kid from down the block. He had said it was all pure and good, but Klaus can recognize a bad blend, and he right now he wasn’t experiencing the clean high he had been chasing. And he was about to pay for it. He’s almost sure he’s about to either throw up or pass out as he feels all the blood in his head rush down and a cold wave wash over him. He tries to mask the sudden nausea by leaning down over his bowl of barely touched cereal. They look weird, mushy and soggy from having spent too much time soaked in milk. The more he looks, the weirder they get. Maybe his mom really had bought a new kind, a kind that moves and talks. He’s just about to turn over to Ben, who is sitting next to him and ask if he’s cereal is talking to him, too, when their father’s voice suddenly boom through the room.
“Children,” he announces in a way that makes Klaus want to scream Dad, in reply. Maybe he actually does, because Ben gives him a kick under the table and Diego gives him a funny look over the table. But their dad doesn’t even glance his way as he continues, “No time to spare, breakfast is over. We’ve got a bank robbery to stop and people to save.” Klaus rolls his eyes at the sound of chairs falling over as his brothers hurries to get ready. Before he leaves, Reginald Hargreevs, head of the house, their father, turns to Vanya. “No need to get up, Number Seven. This is a dangerous mission, you will only get in the way.” The look on Vanya’s face only feeds Klaus’ foul mood. Why is she sulking over not having to put her ass on the line every day and deal with the consequences of a failed mission or having to deal with weird, weird powers. The only ordinary in this house full of freaks and ghouls and she doesn’t realize what he would do, what he have done, to be in her place.
The mission is an easy one. A couple of guys with big guns and big muscles and grand plans. It’s a no-brainer, really. Get in, zap them with the force of six teenage superheroes, get out. It starts according to plan; Number five is going around the room, villains dropping with every flash of blue. The colors are mesmerizing. An electric blue that Klaus can’t tear his eyes away from. He follows his brother’s every move, there he is, then he’s gone, and there he is again. He wants to ask Diego to maybe throw a knife into the ball of light, so he can watch the edge reflect the shimmer before it gets swallowed up and disappear, he wants to ask Ben to do a squid dance with his arms. Around him men fall and rise, they are confused, and they scream. They wonder why they are standing up looking down on their bodies. Then they see Klaus and they scream at him, so he screams back. Someone shouts to his right, but he can’t decipher the message. Something about look out? They are in the middle of a bank robbery, so it makes sense. He turns slowly, so the world won’t tip over. The man coming towards him is huge. There’s blood gushing down his face. It’s probably Number one who’s got him with one of his strong little fists. Which means the man is probably dead, and he could just stay put and watch the man run right through him. He sighs. He told the others they should have left him back home. What good are his powers if it turns out he’s about to get smashed to pieces by a very much alive giant of a bank robber. Just as he’s about to close his eyes and wait for the impact, a giant tentacle closes around the man’s torso. Klaus watches as Ben turns the man into a human carousel and applauds when he lets go to send the man flying across the hall. Ben gives him a look before he sets off to give the other bad guys a ride.
“That was close, dude.” Klaus turns around a little too quickly and almost tips over. He hasn’t heard that voice in months, maybe even years.
“Wilma?” he asks in mild chock. And it’s really her. “Hey, welcome back.”
“Thanks.” She looks the same, probably because the dead don’t change much. Her hair is just as cropped and her flannel shirt just as gay as the last time he saw her.
“What are you doing here?”
“Gotta be somewhere.”
“True, but why not chose somewhere sunny or quiet or not a bank robbery?”
“Well, you know, time goes faster when there’s a little action.”
“Klaus! A little help?” He looks away from his newly returned friend to find Diego being held down by a man three times his size.
“That is one huge man.”
He turns back to Wilma. “Don’t go anywhere,” and then he sighs and runs and next thing he knows he’s hanging onto the man’s back. Caught of guard, the man struggles enough to let Diego crawl away from underneath him. Klaus scratches wherever he can and when he finds the hollows of the man’s eye sockets, he digs in. The next thing he sees is an elbow coming towards him and then he’s out.
When he wakes up, he’s in his bed and he’s half blind. When he raises his hand to touch his face he realizes he’s not actually blind, but that someone – probably his mom – has put a band aid over his eye.
“Yeah, you got K.O’d good, my little dude.”
“You’re still here.” Wilma is sitting by his bedside, legs crossed with her spooky ghost cat curled up on her lap. “Did you have to bring that little monster, though?”
“Don’t be mean, she came here on her own will.”
“I’m honored.”
“You should be.” They sit in silence for a while. Klaus tries to get his head to stop aching and figure out what’s coming down from the high and what’s the getting K.O’d. Wilma watches him in silence, the only sound to be heard is the soft purrs coming from her knee. Eventually, he speaks up.
“Why did you come back? I haven’t seen you in ages.”
“I had to go look for her. I felt the time was right, that she was calling for me.”
“But?”
“But I was wrong. She wasn’t ready, so I decided to come back and check in on you while I wait.”
“You went to Sweden?”
“Yeah, it’s really beautiful this time of year. The snow is melting, and the air is so crisp breathing it feels like drinking a glass of ice-cold water.”
“You don’t breathe.”
“It’s great, you should go sometime. You look like you could use a chance of air.”
“Meaning?”
“You look like shit, Klaus.”
He remembers what he had looked like the last time they had met. He had been thirteen and just shared his first bottle of stolen goods with a kid down the block, a boy his age. The first time they had met, Klaus had told him that he thought his grandmother was wrong, and that his green and blue hair looked nice, like the earth and sky all at once. The boy had run away at that and wouldn’t come near him for weeks. Apparently, he preferred his grandmother’s opinion on his dyed hair to stay buried. Eventually, he came around and seemed to have decided Klaus was the right kind of fucked up to ask if he had ever stolen liquor from the liquor store. He had answered no. The boy had asked do you want to? He had answered yes. Over the next couple of weeks, they shared bottles of vodka, vines, spliffs and their first kiss. The haze was bliss and heaven descending and he could breathe for the first time since the ghosts came to haunt him. It got harder to talk to Wilma, the only dead person who didn’t scream at him or press cut of limbs and gun shot wounds in his face. Her flickering form was the only thing he regretted, but then she announced she was going to look for someone. A girl from her past. It was a journey that would take her back to where she should be. It was time to face the past in order to move on, she had said and given him a look. He bid her farewell, she went forward while he spiraled downwards. And now here she was again.
“Wilma, how did you die?”
“Klaus,” she sighs, “you can’t just ask people how they died. But if you must know it was a freak rollercoaster accident at Disneyland. And hear this – me? Don’t even like amusement parks!”
“Then why did you come all the way here to go to one? Don’t you have rollercoasters in Sweden?”
“Sure we do. We have exactly one – uno. And you have to fight a whole team of passive aggressive season workers and fifteen families to get on it. After a while it just isn’t a challenge anymore, you know? Anyways, it wasn’t my idea to begin with. Agnes, my-“
“Your girlfriend.”
“-So, Agnes, my girlfriend, literally used to wake up screaming bloody Disneyland, so I booked us tickets for our anniversary and viola. Here I am. Guess that’s the price you pay to spend the rest of your days with the femme of your dreams.”
“Why didn’t she want to leave? When you went to see her, I mean. Who would want to stay in this hell hole if there is peace to find?”
“I don’t know. She was very close with her family. Her little brother is about your age and took her passing pretty hard. She’ll be ready eventually. We’ll wait.” She scratches the cat behind it’s ear. ”We have all the time in the world, don’t we?” For the first time, Klaus wishes he could reach out a hand and touch the dead. His thoughts are interrupted by Diego knocking on the door. He’s changed out of their uniform and comes into the room wearing sweatpants and a hoodie.
“Who are you talking to?”
“The dead.”
He doesn’t answer to that and says instead: “Get up, we’re going for a run.”
Klaus snorts and almost feel like laughing. “Wrong room. Luther’s next door.”
“I know, idiot. Get up. Dad’s orders.”
Damn it. He groans and makes a show out of letting his fingers run over the band aid covering his eye. “I still feel pretty beaten up. I’ll just sink you down.”
“That what I told him, too.” He hears something that sounds like Diego picking up one of the bottles he must have left laying half hidden in the mess of his room. “Rough night, bro?”
“Fun night.”
“Yeah, you look like you’ve had the time of your life. Come on, let’s go. Dad’ll go crazy if he finds you in bed.” Diego leaves the room and Klaus knows he has no choice but follow him. He drags himself out of bed and tries to fight the feeling of his stomach wanting to turn itself inside out. He thinks about putting on his newly thrifted green leather pants in and a boa in an act of protest, but in the end decides he doesn’t want to risk ending up puking all over them. He’d rather wear something discrete for such an event. After his given five minutes he staggers down the stairs to where Diego is waiting for him.
“Are you wearing mom’s heels?”
“It’s a fashion statement.”
“It’s a death wish. You do realize that going for a run means actually running?”
“You underestimate me.”
When Diego says they’re going for a run, he means they’re going to run. When Klaus says he’ll do his best, he means jog for three blocks, throw up in a bush and then lay down in said bush.
“How are you in such a bad shape?”
“Call it talent, if you must.”
Diego drops down on the ground beside him. “Why are you like this lately?”
“You wouldn’t get it.”
“Try me.” The steadiness of his voice makes Klaus want to shake him, or tell him all the ghastly, haunting things he’s been made see. They others’ powers make them powerful; they’re strong, they can fight and defend themselves. Diego calls him weak for spending his nights out and his mornings in. Their dad calls him weak for running away when the dead comes walking. He doesn’t know what good his powers are, why they were given to him or what he’s supposed to do with them. It hasn’t brought any good and he refuses to apologize for wanting to spend his days in quiet, away from all the crazy. Even if shutting the dead out means shutting out the living, too.
He sighs. “I don’t know. I feel like we’re missing out sometimes. Don’t you? I mean, you’re acting like I’m out of control or whatever. What do you think other kids our age are doing, Diego? Let me tell you, they get piss drunk and they steal their mothers make up to go party and they get to live their lives like any teenager should.”
“Guess you’re doing great then.” They look at each other in silence before Diego gives up with a sigh. “Where do you even get all that stuff from?”
“You do realize we have a brother with the ability to go in and out of anywhere. And who, for your information, is alarmingly easy to blackmail.”
“He really should hide his notebooks better.”
They laugh a little before they fall silent again. Then Klaus decides to ask something he knows they all have been thinking about.
“Do you really think he’ll try it? The time travel thing.”
“I don’t know. Probably.”
“Maybe he could go back in time and force dad’s parents to give him a hug once in a while.”
They talk some more, laugh a little and eventually they get up to head back home. For a while the world is steady under his feet.
He’s wobbling in his mother’s sky-high heels when he senses a presence entering the through the door behind him.
“Wilma?” He tries.
“You’re getting better at that,” she remarks.
“It’s not that hard. You always make this rustling sound. You’re not actually carrying around chains to scare people, are you?”
She digs up a keychain out of her front pocket and begins to spin it around her index finger. “Ring of keys, baby.”
He almost falls over as he turns around to face her. “How do you do this?”
“Wouldn’t know,” she answers and crosses one boot over the other. From across the house Klaus can hear Vanya practice playing the violin. He attempts to make dramatic spin and almost makes it before his wrist decide to fail him and he plummets to the floor. Wilma applauds. It’s late and he’s tired but he doesn’t want to go to sleep. He hasn’t managed to get a hold of his usual dealer and alcohol has never managed to block things out as effectively. It does enough for him while he’s awake, but they get him when he’s asleep. He’s about to ask Wilma if she ever had nightmare when she was alive but is interrupted by Pogo appearing at the door.
“Master Klaus,” he says, and his face makes Klaus wish he could take all the drugs in the world and then some. “Pogo,” he croaks.
“Master Klaus, you father would like to change a pair of words with you.”
“This late?”
“I’ll take you to him.”
“Pogo,” the name is just a whisper on his lips, and he clears his throat. “Pogo, I’m fine. It’s fine, there’s really no need.”
“I’m sorry Master Klaus. It’s your father’s order.”
Klaus falls silent. He knows there’s no way out. Not if he wants to get it over with smallest damage done.
He steps out of his mother’s shoes and follows Pogo to face his father. He is waiting by the mausoleum, dressed in his coat and hat, like he just stepped right out of a scene from his worst memories and nightmares.
“Dad,” he tries but is cut of immediately.
“I’m disappointed in you, Number four. To force me into taking such actions. I thought we were long pass such treatments, but it seems you have much to learn. You will never get stronger if you don’t stand put to fight your fears. You need to be in control, Number four. I hope this will be a final lesson. I will come for you at sunrise.”
He closes his eyes and hardens his heart. He will not succumb to his fathers twisted look on discipline. He would rather spend the night with skeletons clawing away at his sanity than give his father the joy of shaping him into a mindless soldier. He couldn’t even remember when Number one had stopped being Luther and he could feel them all slipping away from being his brothers and sisters and falling into line. They all call him weak, but he was finding ways to overcome them. He looks left where the entrance to the underground crypt gapes pitch black and never ending.
“I’ll stay with you,” Wilma offers. Her cat appears by her feet and walks over to streak around Klaus’ legs. She turns around to hiss at his father and then she’s leads way into the dark.
In his dream people are screaming and dying and exploding. Limbs fly across the red sky. Legs and arms and heads fall like autumn leaves, the rain is made out of blood. Someone is calling his name. Klaus, Klaus, Klaus. He wakes up with a gasp and sees a man standing by his bed. He’s dressed like he’s about to go into war; green jacket, name tag around his neck, he’s wearing a helmet and a rifle gun is leaning against his shoulder. There’s a pool of blood growing by the soldier’s feet. They look at each other in silence and just as Klaus is about to open his mouth, a loud crash is heard from the bottom floor. He jerks at the sudden sound and when he looks back the soldier is gone. Quickly he gets up to see if maybe the man just left the room. The corridor lays empty and Klaus feel an uncomfortable feeling pressing down on him. He can’t shake the feeling of having missed out on something, a great moment, an opportunity or maybe even the man himself was someone he should know. He griefs there had been a gaping whole in the man’s chest.
Wide awake and a little unhinged, he decides to go looking for the source of the sound instead. Maybe his mom is having one of her sixth sense moments and is up baking cookies. He’s not that far off. At the kitchen table he finds Number five and Vanya drinking tea and coffee and spreading layers and layers of peanut butter and jam onto pieces of bread, adding them to a growing tower on a plate.
“Hey, Klaus,” Vanya greets him.
“Hi.”
“Coming for a midnight snack?” Number five inquires.
“Couldn’t sleep.”
“I hope we didn’t wake you.” Vanya apologizes. He hates it when she does that. Apologizes for everything. It makes him feel guilty for even walking around.
“Me? No way. I sleep like the dead.”
Just as he’s taken a seat next to her, Luther and Allison show up at the door.
“Told you we should be more quiet,” Vanya says under hear breath to Number five.
“Oh,” Luther says as he catches sight of Klaus. “Don’t go anywhere, I got something for you.” He turns to run back up the stairs and soon returns with his hands folded around something. He doesn’t open them until he’s seated in front of Klaus and they’re all leaning in to watch the big reveal. In his hands he is holding one of the Hargreeves action figures that was launch last year. This particular one is one of Klaus, but instead of wearing their uniform, someone has painted a new pair of clothing over the previous one. He – the figurine – is now dressed in an orange sweater and green pants, arms raised, palms up. Hello Good bye visible.
“It’s you, raising the dead in your favorite sweater,” Luther explains a little abashed. “I couldn’t find a good color, so I borrowed your nail polish. Here,” he digs around his pocket for a second before he gets a hold of the bottle and places it on the table. “Sorry.”
He holds the figurine in his hand all the way back to his room where he places it on his bedside table. He’s glad Luther didn’t make any dead people rising up under his hands. He much rather imagines Wilma and her cat and maybe her girlfriend back in Sweden coming to gather around him. He closes his eyes only to open them a while later to find Wilma sitting beside him. “Hey, hope I didn’t wake you.” He yawns in reply. “Cool figure,” she nods towards the table.
“Thanks. My brother made it.”
She smiles and wraps her arms around her knees.
“Wilma?” he starts and when she hums in reply, he continues. “Is it nice? Being dead.”
She looks over at him. “Sure, you get to hang out with angsty crossdressing psychics.”
He wishes he could hit her with a pillow.
“Listen, Klaus,” and he can hear in her voice she’s about to tell him something he doesn’t want to hear. “It took a lot to come back here and I’m glad I did, but now it’s time for me to move on.”
“What do you mean?” He hates how his voice betrays him.
“It’s time. I can feel it. She’s waiting.”
“You mean you’re passing on?”
“I guess. I’m not sure what it means, but I can feel it. And I don’t think I can go back afterwards.”
“Okay.” He kind of wants to leave it at that and burry himself under the covers, but the words come to him anyways. “I hope you find peace, wherever you go.”
“You too, Klaus.”
“Before you leave, will you say something cool in Swedish?”
“Du är en liten skit och jag kommer att sakna dig.”
”I’ll miss you, too?”
“Take care, kid.” Klaus wishes he could let her hug him, or maybe stroke his hair like she pets her cat and he wants her to tell him everything will be alright. “Klaus,” she says. “Everything will be alright.” He rubs at his cheeks. “Will you show me off?” He gives her a small smile and raises his hand. Good bye. And then she’s gone.
He’s in a foul mood. He hasn’t dared touch his hidden stash, he knows his father and Pogo are watching his every move and he knows his dad would love to exercise his little grey ones to come up with some new wicked punishment. Vanya is sitting opposite him at the table, telling their mother about a piece she’s practicing on her violin. Klaus feels like telling her to shut up and maybe try to practice not letting the dead get to you and then he might feel like spending his morning listening to her whine. “Silly girl, complaining about having to practice the violin.” There is a woman standing behind his sister. She’s dressed in a filthy dress and wears bruises across her throat and upper arms. “She should try spending her entire childhood dancing in cha cha heels only to have your dead-beat father force you into stripping.”
“Shut up.”
“Klaus,” his mother warns.
“I don’t care about your stupid cha cha heels.”
“You know the rules, young man. No talking at the table.”
He can’t take it. He closes his eyes and cover his ears and shuts everything out. The next time he opens them it’s the middle of the night and his mother is standing above him with a hand on his shoulder. “Your brother told me you still haven’t finished your dinner, sweetie. Is something the matter?” He looks down on his plate of now cold beef stew. He looks up at his mother and sees Ben and Diego standing by the door behind her. When they see him looking at them they take off. “They’re so loud, mom.”
“Have you tried asking them to go away?”
“They won’t listen. Please, don’t tell dad.”
“Tell me what, Number four? Is there a reason haven’t finished your beef stew?”
“The meat is really undercooked. I’ve been chewing this same piece for five hours.”
“Then I suggest you chew faster if you want to go to bed before sunrise. Saving the world waits for no one. Not even you finishing your diner.”
He finds Five sitting in the library, reading a book and sipping on a cup of coffee. After making sure no one is nearby he sneaks up to him.
“Hey, Five. Hey, brother.”
“Klaus.”
“You know, you have always been my favorite member of this family.”
“What do you want?”
“No, seriously. I don’t care what the anyone says, you’ll always be number One to me.” When he doesn’t get as much as a look in acknowledgement, he decides to go drop the smooth talking.
“Ok, so listen. I need a tiny little favor.”
“I’m not robbing the Chanel store for you.”
“Okay, fine, but what about the liquor store?”
“Are you for real?”
“As real as the dead man behind you.”
“Not funny.”
“It’s really not, he’s a mess. You should be glad you don’t have to watch people’s insides on their outsides all day long. You’d want a bottle of wine, too.”
“I’m not helping you get drunk, Klaus.”
“I’m kidding, I’m kidding. I just want something to drink for a party.”
“Who do you know that’s throwing a party?”
“Rude! I have friends.”
“Who? The dead man behind me?”
“You know what, forget it. I’ll drink water.”
“I’m not getting you out of jail.”
He plays it cool until he’s out of sight and then he has to gather all his will not to scream out lout or trash the nearest furniture. They’re so loud and dead and they won’t shut up and he needs something to shut them up. He gets his jacket and his keys and before he can give it too much thought, he’s out. He’s never actually been to the place, but he knows where to go if the situation demands it. And it does. Maybe any shady alley would do, but this one he recognizes as the name being passed around like a whisper during late nights out. In the alley there is a door and when Klaus knocks on it, he has accepted any fate that might wait on him on the other side. The guy that opens is tall and handsome and wears tight black pants and a gold chain hanging low on his tanned chest. Klaus is glad this is the man that might shoot him for coming knocking on the door of a shady side street. The man eyes him and when Klaus gives him the name of his dealer the man asks him how much cash he got and then what he wants. When he leaves, he’s spent every last dime of his and his siblings’ savings. Which, for the record wasn’t much. Any real cash was held by their father, and he’s sure his brothers and sisters won’t grieve their smashed piggy banks for long. He finds the nearest bench where he sits down and throws back a handful of pills. He washes it down with a bottle of liquor he snatched as he left his newly found dealer. The high kicks in and he screams out the relief as everything fades and explodes around him. He discovers a bush next to the bench that looks much more comfortable and he walks over to lay down on the soft green bed.
Somehow, the next time he wakes up he’s in his bed. The sensation of his brain trying to pound through his skull and anxiety so strong it makes the air vibrate hits him all at once and he bites down on his pillow. The next time he comes around, he hears a familiar sound next to him. It sounds like a small engine going. A low purr. He opens his eyes and meets two green staring back at him. The cat licks him in the face and for a second, he swears he feels the rasp of a wet tongue across his cheek.
“Cats are such little beasts. You can’t make them do anything. They do what they want, go wherever they want to go. Land of the living, land of the dead. But they always find their way back. And they always know when you’re in need of some extra love. Isn’t that right, Mian?”
Klaus watches as the cat, Mian, purrs as Wilma strokes over her unruly fur. “You don’t have much to do now, do you? Have you grown tired of Agnes and I? Is that why you’re leaving all the time? You want to stay here with Klaus for a while?”
He turns to burry his face in his pillow and concentrates on his breathing. In and out. In and out. Perhaps it was all a dream, because the next time he opens his eyes, his alone in his room with nothing but the headache and a hangover from hell to prove at least some of last night events were real. He’s still not sure how he made it home. He goes for a quick shower, doesn’t dare look himself in the mirror and decides to go with the flue if someone wonders why he looks like he spent the night sleeping in a bush. When he arrives at the kitchen table, the rest of his siblings have already began eating. They’re drinking juice, juice, juice, coffee, juice, juice and they’re all wearing their battle gear. His mother asks him if he wants pancakes or cereals and he answers both. He’s starving. He can feel Diego and Ben watching him, but he doesn’t have the energy to meet their gazes, so he focuses on following their mother as she moves across the kitchen to she prepare the next serving. He jumps as something lands in his lap. He can feel the weight and warmth of it, but when he looks down, he can’t comprehend what he sees. The cat turns around a couple of times before she gets comfortable and settles down. Klaus stares at her in shock until the soft purr coming from her chest somehow seems to resonate in his own body and he can feel himself let out a breath he didn’t know he’d been holding. His closes his eyes and tries to find comfort in the moment, for he knows the fight is far from over.