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It’s not like Klaus expected to sneak out of the manor without anyone noticing.
But he had figured he could do it at least without Vanya noticing.
And it’s not like he’s under house arrest or anything, it’s just that he’d like to see the world beyond the few blocks he can make on foot and everyone else is out doing legal bullshit about their father’s will.
Because god forbid Sir Reginald Hargreeves ever make anything easy for them, even in death.
“Where are you going?” Vanya asks when he passes her bedroom, the lovely sound of her violin pausing with her question, and Klaus freezes.
“Nowhere?” He tries, and Ben snorts behind him.
She looks pointedly at his coat. It’s his favorite going out coat and he’s pretty sure he’d told everyone that at some point.
“Fine,” he concedes, making sure to pout very clearly at her before leaning against the doorway. “Where am I going? Crazy. I don’t know. Downtown? Maybe,” he shrugs. That’s not the point of this. Freedom. Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. You know, stuff like that. That’s the point. “Wanna come with?”
He asks her in a fleeting, sudden bubbling impulse, and he certainly does not expect her to study his face for a moment, set her violin down, and say, “okay, let me just grab my wallet.”
“Sure,” he replies faintly, still surprised by her answer.
“Were you planning to take Luther’s minivan?” She asks, tugging him out of her bedroom and closing the door behind her.
“Yeah,” Klaus admits because at this point, Vanya is at the very least an accomplice and there’s no point in denying it. “He keeps the keys in the car like a sucker.”
“He did live in the moon for the past years,” Vanya points out, but the way she says it feels more like she’s proving he really is indeed a sucker than that Klaus is wrong. “But do you drive now?”
“Yes, Klaus,” Ben repeats, sidling up to Vanya and raising his eyebrows at him. “Do you drive now?”
Klaus politely yet firmly decides to ignore him.
“Well, I drove an ice cream truck once and didn’t die. And it’s not like we have better options, or do you know how to drive?”
Vanya grimaces, a little apologetic like she always is. “I got my license when I was twenty?”
“That’s better than me, I suppose.”
“No, it isn’t,” Ben shakes his head emphatically, following reluctantly behind them all the way down to the garage. “She hasn’t driven a car in ten years!”
Privately, Klaus kind of agrees, but as he said himself, it’s not like they have better options. Besides, from what he remembers of driving the ice cream truck while Diego screamed instructions beside him, it wasn’t all that hard. He’s sure between him and Vanya, they’ll figure something out.
Besides, Luther did leave the car open with the keys in the ignition like a sucker, so really, it’s almost a sign sent from the universe. “Okay, now,” he says, sitting on the passenger seat while Vanya takes the driver’s and Ben leans forward between the seats to look down judgingly at them both. “I think you’re supposed to step on one of those pedals there.”
“Yeah, I’m trying to remember which one it is,” she frowns at the three pedals, eyeing them critically like the answer might magically reappear. “I think it might be the one in the left,” is her not at all certain assessment.
“Great,” Ben claps his hands, mockingly cheerful, “looks like I’m about to have company in the afterlife.”
Beside him, Vanya starts the car.
*
“Do you think Luther is going to notice we scratched his car?”
“You mean the giant, glaring scratches all along the left side from where we drove too close to one of the trees?” Vanya asks, surprisingly nonchalant about it, even though her eyebrows raise impressively. “I think so, yes. But I got the hang of this again now, we’ll be fine.”
“Great!” Klaus grins, kicking his feet up the dashboard. In the rearview mirror, he sees Ben shaking his head despairingly in the back row, but Ben always worry too much anyway. This is fine, they’re doing totally fine. “Ready for some quality brother-sister bonding time?”
Vanya looks at him, making a face. “I thought I was until you said that. Now I’m a little scared, to be honest.”
“Please, look at the street,” Ben calls from the back, even though she can’t hear him.
As Klaus said, Ben worries too much.
“Don’t worry,” he says, taking the sunglasses he nicked from Allison’s room from the top of his head and clumsily slipping it on Vanya, causing the minivan to swerve several times and a symphony of horns and angry shouts. “Today, sister dearest, I’m teaching you how to have fun.”
She glances at him, skeptical, but her lips quirk up in a grin, and Klaus could swear she is almost excited about the concept. There’s even a couple of giggles, he thinks. So he turns on the radio, flipping through stations until he can find the cheesiest pop song to turn the volume all the way up. It reverberates horribly loud in the van and Vanya laughs, rolling her window down. “That’s a terrible song,” she tells him over the music.
“I know,” he screams back, noticing she didn’t even try to change channels, “that’s why it’s great!”
“I’m not sure you understand what the word means,” Ben yells, back to leaning between the seats.
Klaus laughs, waving him off. “Don’t be a spoilsport, that’s Luther’s gig already.”
“What?” Vanya briefly looks away from the traffic, quickly darting her eyes back when they accidentally cross a red light. “Nevermind. Where are we going?”
“Nowhere, anywhere! Just keep driving,” he rolls down his own window, watching the buildings pass by while he sings along the radio, grinning widely whenever Vanya hesitantly joins for a verse or two. “Oh, look– there’s a record store over there. Do you want to check that out? They might have one of your fancy classical records.”
“Yes, please? I didn’t know this place existed,” she bites her lips, looking the most excited Klaus has seen her, well, since ever, and how can anyone say no to those excited puppy eyes? “There’s just one problem, though.”
Ben rolls his eyes, “of course there is. What else were we expecting?”
“I’m not entirely sure how to parallel park,” Vanya confesses, still apologetic but at least a tiny bit amused. That’s a good start.
“That’s fine,” Klaus reassures her, slouching even further on his seat. “How hard can it be?”
If the distressed sound Ben makes is anything to go by, the answer is very hard, but Klaus has rarely listened to him before and Ben is a ghost anyway, what does he know about cars and parallel parking? Beside him, Vanya is smiling without noticing, and Klaus thinks getting her to loosen up a little and have fun, and hey, maybe even get to know his sister a little better, is worth sacrificing Luther’s dumb minivan.