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- Vanya
“Number Seven, tell me what the meaning of this is?”
Klaus frowns as he sees their father bearing down on a cowering Number Seven. Her bottom lip quivers and her long hair falls in front of her face; she presses at it awkwardly, trying to hide the black domino mask she’s drawn around her eyes with a sharpie pen.
“I said tell me, you insolent wretch!”
Klaus glances around the table, specifically at Five and Six, who are meant to be her best friends, but they’re quiet, heads dipped, as if even they agree that their quietly defiant little sister has gone too far this time. He can barely make out Vanya’s eyes but he knows she must be feeling pretty sad about this. After all, you’d have to be pretty desperate in the first place to deface your skin with a sharpie pen - that stuff hurts to scrub off. Klaus should know, he’s had enough pretend tattoos scrubbed away by impatient hands the nine years on this Earth.
“I… I just wanted… to be part...”
“You’re not special, Vanya, when are you going to accept it?” Number One, that massive suck-up, says, shooting a glance at their father to see if he’s registered his loyalty. Reginald is entirely focused on Vanya, though, grabbing her chin and forcing it up so he’s better able to see her face.
She’s done a nice job, Klaus thinks, off-hand. From across the dinner table, he can barely tell it’s the work of a sharpie pen; it really looks like a mask. But he feels his stomach squirm when Vanya flinches, trying to pull away, and he sees the first hint of tears shining in her eyes as Reginald keeps her face gripped in his bony hand.
Mind racing quickly, knowing how embarrassing it is to cry in front of the rest of the Academy (Klaus had learned his lesson the hard way when Five had called him a baby once, and Allison had rumored him into sucking his thumb for the rest of the day), he tries the only thing he’s one hundred percent positive he’s any good at: distraction.
“Daddy!” he calls out, poking two thumb holes in one of the pitta wraps Grace has put out for dinner. He coats it in mayonnaise before adhering it to his face. “Do you like my mask?”
He jumps up on his chair to show it off - a blob of bread across his face, mayonnaise smearing out of the sides. He strokes a heroic, Number One type pose, a hand on his hip, knee thrust forward, as he booms, “I’m Number Four, scourge of the dead! All bad guys who see me, fear me!”
Reginald stares up at him, speechless with fury, while the others just look plain speechless. But then Klaus begins to see it: the start of a smile on Vanya’s still-trembling lips. You can do better than that, he thinks. He jumps across the table, sending a few dinner plates flying, and lands in Luther’s lap with a thud.
“Don’t worry Number One, I’ll save you, on account of you being so weak and useless and all.”
Luther shoves him off and he hits the floor, but on his way down he hears Vanya’s laughter, usually soft and uncertain, transform into an infectious giggle that sets off Klaus as well.
He grins as Reginald appears in his line of sight, pretending it doesn’t hurt as he drags him up roughly and deposits him back in his chair. Klaus leans over his plate and the wrap falls off with a soggy squelch, making Vanya laugh harder.
“I’ll deal with you later, Number Four. Number Seven, ensure those ridiculous scribbles are off your face by the next time I see you.”
Klaus smiles across at her later, and winks. She waves shyly back, her smile still very much in place. Definitely worth an hour or two in the dark place , he thinks to himself, as he wipes mayonnaise off his face.
- Diego
It’s not really the amount of bruises and cuts to Diego’s face that gets to Klaus - sure, that’s pretty horrible, but Diego will live - it's rather the hangdog expression he sports right alongside them. That’s what truly upsets him - that sense of failure that radiates from Number Two right now, a sense of failure that Klaus is well accustomed to, but has no business distorting his brother’s handsome features.
“I really messed up, didn’t I?” Diego asks, as Klaus applies a cold compress to the litany of cuts and scrapes across one of his cheeks. “Dad didn’t even say anything, that’s how badly I messed up.”
It’s true. Reginald is trying something new, where he gives them the silent treatment if they fail to meet his lofty expectations, because apparently yes, he can get bored of saying the word “Disappointment”, and it's various synonyms and conjunctions, over and over again.
“Screw Reginald,” Klaus says, with feeling. “You did the best you could.”
“I stuttered, Klaus. In front of our m-m-ain mark. And worse than that, I got s-s-spooked by it, let him get the drop on me. I’m meant to be the best at weapons-based combat, and he just knocked my knife out of my hand like it was nothing. He laughed at me, Klaus. And fucking Luther had to r-r-rescue me. Luther! He’ll never let me live this down.”
Well, it kind of sounds even worse, when he lays it all out on the table like that. But Klaus won’t let himself be deterred.
“I heard that having a stutter is a sign of genius,” he deadpans. Diego glares at him from one eye, wincing when Klaus applies more pressure to the compress. “No, for real! You have so many interesting, incredible thoughts floating around in your head that sometimes it takes a little while for them to line up and come out in turn.”
“That isn’t how it works,” Diego sighs, exasperated.
“I also heard that singing can help with stutters. If you sing something instead of saying it, you won’t do it. It works every time. So I figured we’d rebrand you, Number Two. Henceforth you’re gonna ditch the boring knives and sing our enemies into submission. It’ll be a real ratings-grabber in interviews.”
“You are so dumb,” Diego says, his mouth jerking upwards a little at the corners.
“Seriously, hear me out! When Allison does her rumor thing, you could launch into a stunningly classy version of Heard It Through The Grapevine. When Five jumps through space and time…” He flings his arms up dramatically, “ Leeeeet’s dooooo the tiiiiiiime waaaarppp agaiiiiiiin!! ”
Diego starts laughing as Klaus wraps his arms around his brother’s shoulders and begins to sway.
“Vanya? What can we do for Vanya?” He pretends to think out loud, wanting Diego to join in. He’s thrilled when his brother’s eyes light up in inspiration.
“Sh-Sh-She’s Not There?” Number Two contributes, and Klaus claps his hands with glee.
“Her voice was soft and cool... ” He turns the imaginary microphone to Diego.
“... Her eyes were clear and bright...”
“... But she’s not therrrrreee,” they sing together, and Diego clutches his stomach in an attempt to repress his laughter, wincing a little as his arm impacts with it
“Luther! We have to do Luther.”
Klaus thinks hard about this one, knowing it has to be good. Luther is the most absurd person he knows, after all, so it has to be fucking funny. He alights on a song at exactly the same time Diego does, and they’re perfectly in synch as they bust out Madonna’s finest. “Papa don’t preach, I’m in trouble deep, Papa don’t preach, I’ve been losing sleeeeeep!”
Klaus grips the sink, pretending to take deep gasps of air, as Diego by turn bubbles up with laughter and clutches his stomach, oww-ing the whole time.
“W-w-what about me?” he urges Klaus. What’s going to be my… my theme tune?”
“You can’t sing your own theme tune, Diego! That’s Five-levels of arrogant.”
“But I need one, Klaus. A singing assassin needs to have his own theme tune!”
“You’re So Vain?” Klaus suggests, and Diego lurches forward to grab him in a sleeper hold, yowling in pain when Klaus easily sidesteps and he collides with the sink.
“Son of a-”
“We’re supposed to be in bed!” Luther says from behind them, and they both promptly fall against one another, howling in surprise. “Wow, you guys. Just... wow. You’re keeping the whole corridor awake.”
Klaus stamps his feet together, saluting, as Diego wipes away tears of mirth (and probably a few more of pain) as he lines up beside him.
“Noted, El Capitan! We’ll head for bed A-SAP.” Luther glares at him, then at Diego, before sighing wearily and turning round. “Oh, and Luther?” Klaus calls after him. “No need to… preach.”
Diego slips down to the floor in a fit of laughter, and Klaus holds his hands up innocently, making a he’s crazy face at a disgusted looking Luther. Below him, Diego turns the air blue with foul language, screeches of pain, and the occasional painful belly laugh.
- Allison
“Is that your natural hair?” a blonde haired, blue eyed teenage girl asks Allison as they make their way past the crowd on their way into the Academy. Klaus watches as his sister brings her hand up to her curls tentatively; she’d stopped Grace from ironing it out the last time she’d washed it, said she wanted to see how it looked unheated. Reginald had disapproved, telling her it had looked messy, which had made her even more determined. “It’s so pretty!”
Her equally blonde haired, blue eyed friend next to her simpers, “So pretty! You’re so brave to wear it like that. Is Spaceboy into it? That... like… ratchet look?”
Allison dips her head low, her confidence from the mission vanishing in a second. Rumor those bitches, Klaus wants to urge her, but Reginald is hurrying them in, and he can tell from Allison’s demeanor that she’s gone into her head a little, to a place that Klaus can’t even begin to follow. He isn’t a teenage girl being scrutinized by other teenage girls, and he isn’t a person of color. Allison is both, and she does a great job usually of standing up to idiots like this, but sometimes they just get to her, Klaus can tell.
Today is definitely one of those days.
He finds her in her room later, furiously brushing her dry hair out in the mirror, angry tears running down her face. He winces as she drags the brush through the tight coils, squeezing her teeth together in pain as it resists.
“I hate it!” she says despairingly when he crouches down next to her. She tosses the hairbrush onto her desk, disgusted. “It’s so ugly. I’m so ugly.”
He resists the urge to snort disparagingly. Allison is hands down the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen. Sometimes he looks at her and aches to be that beautiful, and it’s ridiculous to him that she doesn’t know it. But he recognizes it isn’t about him. It’s something bigger than him, than both of them; that silent monster that plants ideas in your head that have no business being there, but make themselves right at home regardless. He knows how that feels.
“I don’t… I don’t know if it’s my place to say. But, you have to know, right? Those girls are just jealous of you?”
“It doesn't matter! You saw how hot they were, how Luther looked at them as he walked past them?” (He didn’t, actually, because he doesn’t make a habit of studying Luther more than he needs to. But he supposes that makes sense.) “No matter how jealous they are, they’re never going to have hair like this, skin like this… they’re never going to be ug-”
“Hey, hey ,” he cuts in, grabbing her wrist. “That’s enough. I mean, maybe if they looked like a hotter version of… I don’t know, Beyoncé, I’d let you get away with that nonsense. But those anemic looking twins-from-the-Shining? Nope. No way. Not when you’ve got cheekbones you can literally slit your wrists on, hair that bounces like the world’s cutest bunny, and big brown eyes that look like…” he tries to come up with another simile, floundering a little as he adds, sheepishly, “Big slabs of… chocolate?”
Allison looks at him blankly and then leans over from her chair to shove his shoulder. “Slabs of chocolate?!”
“I don’t know, I was trying to be poetic!” He pats beside him on the bed, now she’s warmed up to him a little, and she plonks herself down next to him.
“I hate that he barely notices me,” she confesses. “I know it’s dumb, but he’s so… you know… blonde, and handsome, and I’m not like that. At all. I wish I could just not give a fuck, like you."
Klaus doesn’t respond to that, as he can’t bring himself to lie, and she doesn’t need to hear the truth right now. He’s here to make her feel better, not the other way around.
“Luther is crazy about you, Al. He’s just a big dumb lug who doesn’t know how to express it.”
“Maybe I need him to express it, once in a while. Does that make me selfish?” she asks, a genuinely concerned question, and he shakes his head.
“I think everyone could do with hearing something like that. Once in a while.” He smiles at her. “I’d say it myself but I personally think I’m the hot one. Only room on my love train for one.”
She rolls her eyes sarcastically, but it's not without fondness. “The greatest love story ever told: Klaus Hargreeves and his ego. Honestly, they should have been calling you ‘ratchet’, whatever the fuck that means.”
Inspiration strikes him then, and he grabs her arm excitedly. “I know!” he exclaims. He leaps to his feet and hurries over to her dressing table, grabbing the bag of makeup she’s hoarded over the years. He dips into it regularly, but today he wants to go big . She helps him apply it; thick, cakey foundation too dark for him and too light for her, but beggars can’t be choosers, garish blue eyeshadow, spidery mascara, bronzer that looks painted on, and overlined baby doll pink lips that distort his mouth into a grimace.
Allison encourages him the whole way through, telling him how beautiful he looks, and by the end he’s a hot-ass mess who feels mildly ridiculous, but also happy, as she compares their faces next to each other in the mirror; her classy, smokey eyes and neutral lips, his baby-hooker-on-drugs... general vibe.
“Definitely cuter than you,” he says, and she turns her Polaroid camera around to take a picture of the two of them grinning into the lens.
“Let’s see if you’re still saying that in ten years time,” she giggles. “Now, where are the guys, I really think they need to see this…”
- Ben
The missions seem to get more difficult with each passing year. He used to be able to make Ben laugh as hard as any of his other siblings, once upon a time. Now all he can do is crawl into bed with Number Six, and hold him from behind, rocking him until he’s finished weeping.
“I can’t do it anymore,” Ben says on repeat. “It hurts so much. It’s going to kill me one day.”
Yeah, all he can do is hold Ben, all he can do is rock him back and forth, until he’s able to fall asleep.
It’s the only thing left that still works.
- Luther
He’ll freely admit he doesn’t have the greatest relationship with Luther. God, he loves that huge hulk of a man so much, but they’re so far from having anything in common that sometimes… okay, a lot of the time… it’s just kind of funny to piss Luther off.
But he has to confess, he’s been feeling more sorry for Luther than usual these days. They might have saved the world by averting the Apocalypse, but it has to suck to know that the man you spent your entire life trying to impress fucked you over as hard as Reginald did to Number One.
Klaus would love to be more like Diego - to say “I told you so”, before moving onto the next available distraction, but unfortunately Klaus was cursed with a stupid, predictable need to make others feel better about themselves, even temporarily, and he knows from Luther’s glum eyes, the way he’s basically ceded the leadership role to Five, that the big guy is far, far from happy.
And unfortunately, after a lifetime of using his quick wit to, well, routinely humiliate Luther, he knows that Number One is suspicious of his humor attempts, to say the least.
No, Klaus needs to think bigger, if he’s going to put a smile on that big, dumb puppy dog face.
“What are you doing?” Diego asks him suspiciously, as Klaus totters around the kitchen in high heels, a fifties style Laura Ashley dress, and a fabulous pink frilly apron. “Where’s the… y’know know… goth hooker chic look gone?”
"I’m in the zone , Diego, and I’d be grateful if you didn’t attempt to distract me from my task.”
“Your task? Oh my God, are you baking? Is that… is that a cake?”
“It will be. Once you get your dumb ass out of my kitchen.”
“Your kitchen? Since when have you ever cooked in your life?”
Klaus stares at him condescendingly. “I’ll have you know that during my wilderness years, I was able to whip up the finest space cakes known to man. Ooey, gooey, and oh so moist .” He laughs when Diego shudders at the word moist - it has, for some reason, always creeped him out. “So now I’m clean as a whistle, I figured 'how hard can it be to adapt my secret recipe for a, uh, more discerning audience'.”
Diego shakes his head and stomps out of the kitchen, clearly bored with trying to work out what Klaus’s endgame is here, and Klaus busies himself with weighing out the flour and cocoa powder together, cursing a little when he gets distracted peering at the recipe book and ends up spilling half of it on the counter.
“Oops,” he says out loud, then brushes it into his hand and drops it back into the bowl. “Nobody needs to know about that!”
It takes him the best part of the afternoon to finish, and he’s covered in chocolate frosting, icing sugar and ripples of anxiety by the end. Who knew baking a real cake - not something stuffed to the gills with blessed Mary Jane, was such a chore? But as he stares down at the finished product: the vaguely circular but probably more oblong shape, the corner that the chocolate frosting didn’t quite extend to, and the wavy, ostentatious yellow writing on the top, he can't help but feel a small sense of pride.
They have dinner that night, as usual, and then Diego says, “Well, are you going to bring out whatever that… that thing was, that you were making earlier?”
Klaus looks at Luther, who is glumly jabbing his fork into the scratched wood of the table. “Yes,” he says, trying to smile brightly. He’s going to hate it, his traitorous brain crows at him. You’re a real first class idiot for thinking a stupid cake is going to cheer him up.
But he's committed to it now that stupid Diego has shot his mouth off, and so he brings it out furtively with the cake protector still on top. He places it in front of Luther, who glares up at him suspiciously.
“It’s, uh, for you.”
“Did you spit in it?” Luther asks immediately. His eyes narrow even further. “Pissed in it? Something even worse?”
“No!” Klaus says. “Ugh, sorry, Diego is right, this is stupid.” He tries to slide it away, back into his protective embrace, but Allison leaps up, glaring daggers at Luther and then Diego.
“You’re being insufferably rude,” she snaps at them. “Especially you,” she directs at Luther. “Your brother made you a cake, and you’re going to say thank you and eat every mouthful.”
“Wait a second… every mouthful? What if we all want some?” Diego asks, suddenly alarmed. Klaus flips him the bird.
Luther rolls his eyes (when has Luther ever rolled his eyes?! Klaus thinks to himself) but apparently isn’t depressed enough to directly disobey Allison’s instructions. He takes off the lid, stares down at the cake, then blinks.
Klaus has iced across it: Sorry Dad Sent You To The Moon :(
“Um… it was a joke,” Klaus begins to explain himself. “I just-” He panics when he sees Luther start to cry: big, messy man tears. “Oh God, I’m sorry, it was a super dumb joke, I-”
“This is the best thing anyone’s ever given me,” Luther says between sobs. He grabs a handful of cake and shoves it in his mouth. “I fucking love cake. And I fucking love you, Number Four.”
He brings Klaus in for a bear hug, practically crushing him, as he uses his other hand to shove another handful into his mouth. “This is so delicious,” he says, crumbs spilling out of his mouth. “Thank you. I’m sorry Dad sent me to the moon, too.”
“You’re welcome, big guy,” Klaus says, tentatively patting Luther’s enormous back. Across his shoulder he mouths at Ben: Help. Me.
Ben, that traitor, simply blows him a kiss.
- Five
Five is his Everest. Sometimes he thinks he’s ready to conquer that massive, intimidating personality condensed into such a teeny tiny body, but he always falters at the last minute, plummeting back down to Base Camp.
He knows that Five can laugh - he seems to particularly enjoy other people’s misfortune, finding it hilarious when little kids faceplant in the street, or when the Academy takes out prominent Russian mafia figures, or when Luther tries to fit into a pair of suit pants. But Five never laughs at Klaus, even when Klaus deliberately takes a dive in front of him, or not-so-deliberately takes a shuttlecock to the head, and especially when Klaus tries to tell him a dumb joke.
So when Five comes back from a ‘date’ with Delores (Klaus imagines him simply staring at her, this dead-eyed mannequin, in a shop filled with dead-eyed mannequins), looking about as down and dejected as a thirteen year old body can look, muttering something about women, Klaus springs to actions.
“What’s Forrest Gump’s password?” he asks him. Five stares at him blankly. “1Forrest1.”
“Who or what is a Forrest Gump, and why do I need to know his password?” Five asks him.
“Do you know how many times I told dad I could see dead people?! So many! But he said that’s ridiculous, I’ve lived here for 293 years and never seen anything strange.”
“Too soon,” Ben chimes in, as Five scowls.
“Actually, yeah, I’m being mean about dad. When you think about it, he treated me like a God.” He pauses, then grins, waving jazz hands. “He didn’t believe in me!”
Five's scowl turns into a facial contortion of immense pain.
“One day, I’m going to make you laugh,” Klaus vows. “I swear it on my life.”
“Well, considering how many times you’ve died, that means very little,” Five says despondently.
Klaus wracks his brain, trying to think of one dumb joke that will make his weirdo of an older brother double over with laughter.
“Hey, do you know what the kid in the knee high socks said to the blonde store mannequin?” This is a bad idea, Klaus, a bad idea. “I want to kiss you on the Apoca- lips.”
The room goes very silent. Then, Five lets out a small, bracing donkey-laugh.
“That was… better than usual.” He smiles, and Klaus feels his heart flutter with accomplishment. “Thanks, Klaus. I guess.”
It's the greatest compliment Klaus has ever received.
+ 1 - Klaus
“I can’t believe it’s our thirtieth birthday?!” Vanya says, giggling happily, and it’s still the fucking cutest thing Klaus has ever heard. “I can’t believe,” she continues, pouring wine into her glass sloppily, “That we even made it to thirty."
She glances sideways at Ben, then, her eyes going comically wide. “Sorry, Ben, I-”
“I basically made it,” Ben says with a shrug. And really, he did, Klaus thinks. Like… the only tangible difference is that he doesn’t need to eat, or bathe, or expel bodily functions, even though he definitely does at least one of those three things, still, like the gremlin he is.
“Kind of fancy, this place,” Diego mutters to Klaus, looking at the cutlery like he’d sooner throw it then eat with it. “Obviously Allison’s suggestion.”
“I heard that!” Allison says. She lights up the table with a beatific smile. “And obviously I’m paying for all your broke asses."
“I’m not broke,” Five says. “I have a small fortune buried somewhere in Panama. I just need to find it.”
“That’s the most Five thing I’ve ever heard,” Klaus says, reaching forward to squeeze his older brother’s cheek. Five hisses at him, and he jolts back in his chair exaggeratedly. “One day I’m going to do it. One day I’m going to squeeze that chubby little cheek.”
“And one day you’ll die,” Five says in response. Klaus shrugs.
“Haven’t had any luck in that area yet!”
He’s enjoying himself, even though it’s hard, sometimes, being around this much alcohol and not splashing it into his glass, using it to drown out his numerous insecurities. Thirty. They’re really thirty, really got to this point, where they’re able to sit around the table like a (basically) normal family, and enjoy each other’s company. It feels too good to be true.
So, yeah. It definitely is.
They’re listening to one of Diego’s convoluted, highly embellished stories of his vigilante days when he feels a large hand slap down on his shoulder. At first the old panic returns to him: someone’s here to throw me out, or arrest me, or both, but when he glances up he sees the truth is much, much worse.
“Klaus,” his ex boyfriend, Daniel, greets him. Too close, Klaus thinks, trying to shuffle back a little, he’s too close.
“Who is this?” Diego asks, a little confused. “You going to introduce us, bro?”
Daniel looks around at each of them, a wide smile on his face. "I know you guys! The Umbrella Academy! When Klaus told me he was a member I barely believed him. I mean, you wouldn’t, would you? Not back then.” He scans Klaus’s face, and Klaus wants to scratch at his skin at every place his eyes trace over hungrily. “Now, though? You’re looking good, sweetheart. Finally got yourself cleaned up?”
Klaus nods, not knowing how else to respond. “Guys, this is… Daniel. We, I guess… we dated, a while back.”
“Dated. That’s a fun word for it.” He smiles at each of Klaus's siblings (they'll like him more than you, Klaus's brain helpfully supplies) pretending to be confused. “I mean, you were good, you know… so much fun. So willing. But I was under the impression it was more of a business arrangement?”
You absolute bastard, Klaus thinks. He’d tried so hard to please Daniel, had thought he was the most charming and perfect man he’d ever meet, back when he was a teenager fresh out of the Academy looking for a love that he'd still hoped he deserved. But one night he’d woken to the older man shaking him awake, telling him Get the fuck out of my apartment, my girlfriend is coming back.
“I thought we were…” Klaus had said, and Daniel had looked at him with an incredulous expression. He'd laughed, a long and cruel laugh, and Klaus had begun shaking in his bedsheets, still naked, bruised, underneath.
“You thought we were dating ? Jesus Christ, slut, get a fucking brain. Here,” he’d said, shoving a handful of notes into Klaus's hand. “Go spend it on shooting up, you're gonna need it.”
Now, Klaus chances a glance at each of his siblings, their expressions confused, some turning a little angry. He gets it. In the past they’ve said things to him, carelessly: You should be careful, guys don’t like teases; Isn’t that skirt a little short?; Jesus, Klaus, you and your daddy issues; Were you safe, at least?
Just small things, that tell him everything he needs to know about how they view his sexual history.
“Don’t you think that’s… kind of personal information?” Vanya asks quietly, and Klaus whips his head up to stare across at her, confused. Her intense gaze is directed squarely at Daniel. “Do you think we really want to know about our brother’s intimate relationship with you?”
Oh, he thinks, heart plummeting back down in understanding. That makes more sense...she just doesn’t want to hear the gruesome details.
“I agree with Vanya,” Allison says, and it plummets further. “It’s actually kind of gross that you’d come over here, invade his personal space like that, and start referencing what sounds like an abusive relationship you had with our brother back when he was vulnerable and needed help, and not predatory behavior from an asshole like you.”
“How old was he?” Five asks, and Klaus can’t help but gawp a little, because why does Five care?
“Old enough!” Daniel says defensively. “At least… what, eighteen? Anyway, it doesn’t matter. I was just coming over here to be friendly. Say hello. Guess he wasn’t the only one in your little Academy with fucked up daddy issues.”
Klaus sits very still in his seat, remembering how he’d told Daniel about Reginald, about all the things Reginald had put him through over the years. How Daniel had hushed him, told him it would be alright, and then proceeded to kiss him sloppily, messily, before pushing him up against the wall of the bar they'd met in.
He’s inside his head, entirely, and barely notices the scuffle going on around him - Diego and Luther dragging Daniel out of sight, the scandalized whispers from the fancy restaurant-goers around them as they openly watch, like it’s halftime entertainment.
“Klaus?” Ben is calling his name. “Klaus, you with us, kiddo?”
“I’m older than you,” Klaus finally says, forcing himself back into the present. He looks round to see his entire family sat round the table again, facing him. They all look concerned.
“We’re the same age, doofus.”
“You’re Number Six, dildo.”
Ben simply sticks out his tongue in response.
“Klaus, seriously,” Diego grunts, comforting others never something that came naturally to him. “Don’t… don’t let assholes like that drag you down.” He leans over, puts his arm around Klaus, brings him in close for a hug before reluctantly letting him go as Klaus wriggles away.
Klaus nods at him, trying not to be rude, but all he can think is, Daniel was right, though.
“Whatever happened in the past… it’s the past,” Vanya tells him. “This is your thirtieth birthday. You’re sober, you’re working hard, you helped save the world. You are important , and creeps like that… they shouldn’t ever make you feel otherwise. And if we've ever made you feel otherwise... that wasn't right, either."
Klaus nods, trying to placate them, wanting the attention to shift from him. But his tears… his stupid tears... start welling up, and he grabs onto a serviette for moral support. The serviette does not give him the response he was looking for.
“I thought you had such an ego growing up,” Allison says, and Klaus nods, remembering. Everyone did. He internalised it, really believed it for a while, even when he kind of hated himself when he was alone. “I thought you were… bulletproof. That insults just ricocheted off you. And sometimes I still wish I thought that, because it would be easier for you if it was true. But you’re such a good person. You care about us all so much, even though you don’t take that much care of yourself.”
“Self-love is practically a foreign concept for you,” Five agrees, which Klaus thinks is rich coming from Mr "I can't get over my creepy mannequin girlfriend". “Did you even look at that guy, Klaus? I mean, I can understand you overlooking his asshole tendencies, but the guy had a fucking comb-over. Something tells me that eighteen year old Klaus could have punched a lot higher.”
Klaus laughs, swatting tears away from his eyes.
“I wish I’d known how much you needed protection back then. I won’t make that mistake again,” Luther adds gruffly.
“My turn?” Ben asks, smiling demonically. The others reign in their smirks. “I think you’re a huge disaster gay, and just generally a hot skinny mess of a thirty year old. But I was there, if you recall, when fucking Daniel was taking advantage of you, and…” He shakes his head, looking sick for a moment. “None of it, none of it, was your fault.” He clears his throat, rolls his eyes at his own sappiness. “And that’s the tea on that!”
“Thanks guys,” Klaus says, a little embarrassed, even as his body tingles with warmth, with relief, with something he can barely describe, like acceptance but… forever acceptance, not fleeting acceptance. “Now, can we, I don’t know, make a joke about Luther going to the moon, because this is really uncomfortable.”
They make a toast, later in the meal, to finding each other again, and all Klaus can do is stare at their stupid, beautiful faces, and marvel at how much he loves each one of these idiots.