Chapter Text
Ben and Klaus made a deal when they got their first proper gig that they wouldn’t tell their siblings unless they called Klaus. All of their siblings tended to call Ben every few months to check in, but no one had called Klaus since they were 19. They were 21 when they landed that first gig at a dive bar for about 50 people. Nobody called for two years before or two years after.
Two years later Klaus, Ben, and their bandmates Amber and Jamie were sitting in a shitty motel room when Klaus’ phone rang. He looked down, expecting it to be his dealer or some hookup from the past few months, but found instead his sisters name emblazoned across the screen.
“Holy shit, it’s Vanya.”
“Like, sister Vanya?” Amber asked, stopping the spinning of her drum stick.
“Yeah!”
“Well answer it!” Jamie yelled, xir pink hair falling in xir eyes as xe flipped around to fully face Klaus. Ben and Amber both voiced their encouragement.
“Okay, okay, I’m answering,” Klaus dragged his shaking finger across the screen and put the phone to his ear.
“Hey Klaus, I’m really sorry I haven’t called you. That was really terrible and I know that doesn’t make up for not talking to you for four years but I really want to try and fix this, you know? God this must sound stupid, I’m so sorry, I’ll just-”
“Wait, wait, don’t hang up. Vanya, you have no idea how much I’ve missed you. Yeah, not talking for four years isn’t really great on familial bonds, but you’re also the only one who’s called me at all, so that’s gotta be something. So, where are you living right now?”
“Oh, uh, I’m in Boston. I’m finishing up college this year.”
“Oh my god, that’s insane, Ben and I are in Boston right now!”
“Are you serious?”
“Yeah! We’ll be here for the next three days. Maybe we could come and see you?”
“I would love that. I can text you the address for my apartment, I’m free pretty much all of the next two days besides my music theory class at 10 on Friday. When do you think you’ll come by?”
Klaus gestured wildly at his bandmates, and Ben held up two fingers. Luckily Klaus got what he was trying to say.
“Is tomorrow at two okay?”
“Definitely, So I’ll see you guys then?”
“Yup! Okay, see you the-” The three others in the room started pointing at each other dramatically until Klaus caught on, “Wait, is it okay if I bring two friends that are staying with us? They won’t stay the whole time but they wanna meet you. It’s totally cool if that’s too many people, they don’t have to come.”
“Yeah, that’s fine, as long as we get to be alone for a while I’d love to meet your friends. See you tomorrow, love you.” The end was soft, even a little scared.
“See you, love you too!” Klaus tried to sound more confident in the statement but it felt so foreign on his tongue that, though louder then Vanya’s deceleration, it was just as shaky. Once Vanya ended the call a cheer went up throughout the room.
“Someone actually called. Holy shit, she wants to see me. I’m gonna cry, wait no I’m already crying oh my god.” Tears of joy streamed down Klaus’ face as Ben, Amber, and Jamie surrounded him in a hug, “I didn’t think one of them would call. I’d almost lost hope. But she called, and she wants to fix- to fix things. I’m so happy.”
Amber pet his hair as he calmed down. Once the group hug concluded, Jamie handed Amber a twenty dollar bill.
“I swore it would be Diego,” Xe mumbled as xe walked back to xir seat. Ben gave the two of them to a look of disappointment that was really thinly veiled amusement. He’d known about the bet but refused to partake on a moral basis.
~
The next morning, Klaus woke up at 10. AM. That hadn’t happened in months. He was super jittery, jumping all over the place, putting on and taking off outfit after outfit like it was a first date instead of his sister's house. His sister he hasn’t seen since they were teenagers. His sister who he missed so desperately for four years.
They arrived at Vanya’s apartment at 1:50 because Klaus was too antsy to stay at the house any longer. They buzzed up to her apartment and as soon as Vanya opened the door Klaus felt like he would cry. She ushered the four of them in, offered them drinks and made them sit down on her small couch.
“So, who is everyone?” She asked in her usual quiet tone.
“This is Amber and that’s Jamie, and you know Ben. Jamie uses xe/xir pronouns, by the way.” Vanya nodded and shook each of their hands.
“So what brought you all to Boston?” They all share a mischievous look.
“Well,” Klaus started, his eyes sparkling with excitement. “The band the four of us are in has a few gigs here this weekend.”
“Band? For how long? Ben didn’t mention anything about a band last time we talked.”
“About 2 and a half years. Ben and I made a deal that we wouldn’t tell any of you guys about it until you called me, not just Ben, so you’re the first one in the family to hear about our almost-successful rock band.” Wide smiles played across all four faces.
“That’s amazing! So, give me all the details, I wanna know what I missed.” Klaus and Ben looked at each other for a second before Klaus started talking.
“We call ourselves T.R.A.U.M.A.T.I.Z.E.D. It’s written really weird cause it looks cool. I’m the lead singer, obviously,” Everyone but Klaus rolled their eyes, “Benny-Boy plays guitar and does backup vocals, Amber plays drums, and Jamie is our bassist. We’ve been traveling around the country playing wherever they let us and recording in any studio that takes appointments. We actually have a proper album out, like, on iTunes and stuff. It’s honestly really surreal.”
“That’s amazing. I’m so proud of you.” Vanya places a hand on Klaus’ knee as she said that and it took all of his willpower not to break down in tears then and there.
After about ten more minutes of casual conversation Amber, Jamie, and Ben left the apartment so Klaus and Vanya could talk alone. As soon as the door was closed Vanya tugged Klaus into a hug and started crying, "I’m so sorry. I know what it’s like to feel left out in the family and now I was part of the reason you’re being left out. You don’t deserve that.”
“Don’t worry, I’m just glad we’re together now. You’ve heard what I’ve been up to, now spill. How’s the conservatory?” Klaus pulled back from the hug but kept his hands on Vanya’s shoulders.
“Everyone there is so talented, I always feel like they’re two steps ahead of me.”
“BS, you’re right up there with them. You got in, didn’t you?”
“You make it sound so simple.” She laughed wetly.
“I know that it isn’t. Dad fucked up our collective self-esteem pretty badly.”
They fell into comfortable conversation and Klaus only got distracted by a few ghosts wandering the apartment who felt the need to make themselves known, which he thought was a record when it came to his sober excursions. After talking for almost an hour, Klaus noticed how fidgety Vanya was getting. He could tell she wasn’t used to this much socialization once.
“Hey, we have two more concerts before we leave, would you want to come to one?” He asked.
"I’d love that. Is there one tomorrow?”
“Yeah, we’re playing at the Paradise Rock Club around 7. It’s the biggest venue we’ve ever played. It’s much smaller than the crowds at your recitals, I’m sure. And you won’t have to go out into the pit, I’ll personally set aside a table for you if you want.” Vanya smiled sweetly.
“I would love that.”
“Now I have to go get ready for tonight's show, I’ll see you tomorrow. Love you.”
“Love you too.”
The words were a little less scary that time.
~
Over the next few months, Klaus and Vanya actually consistently called each other almost every day. At one point, they ended up in Orlando at the same time. T.R.A.U.M.A.T.I.Z.ED had a couple of gigs lined up and Vanya’s orchestra was performing in a music festival. For the weeks leading up to that overlap, they’d been talking about working on a song together. They had sent each other recordings of half-written songs plenty throughout their conversations since then. Once they were all in Orlando, Klaus called a local studio and booked a session, then called Vanya and told her to get ready.
They all met at the studio two hours later and got to work. Klaus wanted the song to be about Vanya’s experiences, but he knew she much preferred writing music over lyrics. They spent the first twenty minutes of their 3-hour session coming up with a concept. They settled on a song focusing on a dancer in a glass music box wanting to be set free.
“Do you remember that really fast song you sent me a few weeks ago?”
“Yeah?”
“What if we used that for this song and wrote around that?”
“You actually want to use my stuff?”
“Of course, you’re really talented Vanya. Anyone would kill to have your stuff.” She smiled softly and looked at the ground, a small blush graced her cheeks.
A few hours of work later they had an almost finished song.
“There are only a few more things we need to fix before it’s done, but Jamie and me can do that on xir computer with some basic sound editing software. I’ll send it to you to approve before we put it up anywhere, okay?” Vanya nodded along, “We probably won’t put it anywhere until we’re closer to having the album done, but I still want to make sure you’re okay with it being public. Now the four of us have to get to an interview in about an hour and the broadcast location is an hour away, so I’ll call you in the morning. Love you!” Klaus bounced away after placing a kiss on Vanya’s forehead.
“Love you too. Wait, what channel is the interview gonna be on?”
“It’s a radio interview, on 104.1!”
“I’ll be listening.” The siblings smiled at each other for another second before Amber dragged Klaus away.
~
“Today we have Klaus, Ben, Amber, and Jamie from T.R.A.U.M.A.T.I.Z.E.D. with us! Before we talk to them, they’re gonna do a little live performance of their most well-known song, ‘wonderful life’.”
The song started playing out of the little radio in Vanya’s rental car, she couldn’t find another radio anywhere so she had to settle for sitting in the car. She realized in that moment she hadn’t listened to any of their stuff, besides the drafts Klaus had sent her.
The song started with steady guitar from Ben and Klaus mumbling, though the incomprehensibility seemed intentional. After a few more moments of mumbled singing, Klaus yells and it startles Vanya. At that point, the drums kick in and the guitar gets much heavier. Another verse starts up and ends with the words “I wanna waste, I wanna waste, I wanna waste away.” It finally occurs to Vanya that she was going to find out more about her brother through this. She knew from their conversations about music that both of them put their heart and soul into their songs, but Klaus actually voices them. It feels like he’s speaking directly to her. The chorus begins and Vanya somehow becomes even more engrossed.
“‘Lone getting high on a Saturday night, I’m on the edge of a knife. Nobody cares if I’m dead or alive, oh what a wonderful life.” Klaus’ voice rang through the car through the tinny radio speaker. Vanya started crying. The song sounded angry, even excited, but Vanya could feel the pain behind the words. She listened intently to the rest of the song but nothing hit her nearly as hard as her brother screaming about how nobody cared about him. It made her feel shattered because it was partly her fault. The song concluded with one more chant of “Oh what a wonderful life” and Ben’s guitar playing them out softly, at least, softly compared to the rest of the song. Cheering echoed from the radio and Vanya wiped the tears from her eyes with the sleeve of her light blue sweater. Once the cheering died down, the host started talking.
“So what exactly inspired that song?”
“Well, Amy, me and Ben’s family is a bit dysfunctional. I’m sort of seen as the disappointment so my siblings generally take to ignoring me completely. Except Ben. Ben stuck around. Don’t know why, but here we are. So, for the last four years not one of my siblings contacted me which made me feel, well, not very appreciated. Actually, a few months ago my sister Vanya did call me and we’ve been working on healing our relationship since then. She’s an amazingly talented... violinist? Violin player? She’s really good at the violin, is what I’m trying to say. We wrote that song three years deep in the disconnect and I was a little bitter, to say the least. It’s gotten better since then, luckily.”
“I’m glad your family is doing better. Ben, do your siblings keep in contact with you.”
“Yeah, they call me every once in a while.”
“Ben is everyone’s favorite,” Klaus said with a laugh.
“I am not!” Ben’s voice was filled with faux offense.
“He totally is.” Everyone seemed to be laughing at that point.
“Amber, Jamie, are you involved in this at all.”
“Klaus doesn’t know this but we did have bets on who would call him first. I won.” Amber said smugly.
“You had what?”
“You heard me!”
“Wait, if you said Vanya, who did Jamie think it would be?” Jamie was silent until they bugged xem for another minute.
“Diego.” Xe practically whispered into the mic. Klaus started laughing.
“I would’ve bet with Amber,” Klaus proclaims. The laughing continued for another moment and Vanya smiled.
“Ben, who would you have bet on?” The interviewer, Amy, Vanya thought, asked.
“Myself, I’m the first sibling that would’ve called Klaus. Cause I have to call him all the time cause he never answers his goddamn texts.” Ben said, deadpan, and the laughing started up again. The interview went on for a few minutes, the questions more light-hearted and Vanya shut off the radio once it concluded. The smile on her face wasn’t going to go away anytime soon.