Work Text:
The first violin piece Vanya learns is Bach’s “Minuet 2”, a little too advanced for a beginner. But how else would she begin? The only way to learn in the Umbrella Academy household is to scramble to be the best for the mere promise of their father’s pride and affection. And if that involves biting off more than she can chew, then so be it.
It’s hard, but she learns it. She also plays it for Grace first because she knows the sting of mediocrity will be easier to brave with her mother’s soft hands and honeyed words. And Grace is kind, clapping politely before bestowing upon Vanya kisses and her ever-present smile. Not good enough, Vanya decides to the tune of Grace’s heels clicking down the hall. She needs to better, to refuse to perform until it is perfect.
But then Five seats himself on her bed, asking to hear her play. Ben nods shyly in agreement form the doorway, and well, who is she to refuse her two favorite brothers?
Again, she knows she’s mediocre. But the twin stars of wonder in her brother’s eyes form constellations in her night sky, and Vanya’s soaring to the moon, violin and bow in hand with no intention of stopping. She can’t stop playing, and the manor becomes a house filled with music, whether everyone wants it or not.
---
Vanya picks up the Phantom of the Opera theme to piss Reginald off more than anything.
The Umbrella Academy is a refined team of powerful children working to save the world every day; the mundanity and impracticality of pop culture holds no sway here. But, Vanya reasons as her fingers slide along the strings, she isn’t a member of the Umbrella Academy, is she? So the rules don’t apply to her. In theory.
“This sort of music will not be tolerated,” Reginald says coolly, taking the sheet music from the stand and tearing the papers in two before tucking them under his arm. “You should know better, Number Seven.”
“But you do know better,” Ben whispers to her, flashlight casting eerie shadows under the covers that night. “Because music is yours, and he can’t take it from you.”
And he’s right. She digs through her mind, rebuilding the piece note by note until the theme comes second nature to her, mournful notes echoing down the hall and permeating the walls. Her power and spite, unhindered no matter how Reginald tries.
Five blinks in, glancing at her empty stand and her fingers darting across the strings. His dimple winks at her, the pride in his eyes better than any approval she could get from their father.
---
When Five vanishes, she wears her fingers to the bone playing every song she knows and even the ones that she doesn’t quite have down. She wonders if playing more will make Five want to come back.
But then the days turn into weeks and he doesn’t return. So she stops playing altogether. Maybe playing less will show him how much she misses him.
Ben still sits with here even without the music, turning the pages of whatever book he’s devouring as Vanya flips through her sheet music, halfheartedly running the pieces in her head.
“I miss him too,” Ben whispers, hand pressed over her trembling fingers as tears fall against the bedspread. It’s been three months since Five’s disappearance. The manor is devoid of music, hollow and cold.
---
When she’s 15 and so, so angry, it’s Beethoven’s 5th Symphony that rages through her head and her fingers. It’s cliché, but it’s also furious and loud and forceful like a punch to the face that’s still frightfully elegant, like a storm that can’t be ignored.
It’s everything she isn’t.
Vanya thunders down the hall, music flowing through her veins in tandem with the stomping of her feet, until Diego pounds on the wall and tell her to shut the hell up. So she does, footsteps and fingertips once again featherlight.
But in her head, the storm rages on.
---
Things are alright because at least Ben is always there for her. He’s always there to wrap his arms around her late at night, to nudge her foot during dinner, to make a face at her from across the hall that makes her stifle her giggles as everyone is being herded to training for the morning. Ben is always there for her.
Right up until he isn’t.
Her siblings return from that fateful mission, covered in blood with tear-streaked faces and she knows in an instant that he’s gone.
---
“You can’t leave me,” she whispers into his shoulder, soaking his shirt sleeve with tears. “You’re all I have left now.”
“What else would I do?” Ben says, tone amused even as his bottom lip trembles ever so slightly. “Where else would I even go?”
“I don’t know, just somewhere without me.” She sniffles, looking up. “The world is big and I’m not strong. It’d be easy to leave.”
Ben laughs at that, swiping at his eyes before running his thumb across her cheek, collecting her tears. “Easy? Don’t be silly. Leaving you would be the hardest thing.”
---
“It was so fast,” Allison tells her in a hushed voice, a few nights later. It’s cold outside and the wind is fierce, whipping around them as they stand in front of Ben’s grave. He looms over them, tall and dark and dangerous and nothing like he was in real life. “He fell so quickly. Like, like he just…gave up. He just fell to the ground and then he was gone. Nothing left, just…just—"
Nothing is the same after that.
---
She doesn’t stop playing like she did with Five, but it’s not the same anymore. Music changes. It’s the only thing left for her and yet it’s just not the same.
---
Her first audition for an orchestra is a risky one. General consensus is to always pick something you can play to never try and push too far beyond your limits for the sake of showing off. But she pushes. She tries to show off. Mendelsohn’s Scherzo is not an advisable choice for her skillset.
But it’s good enough.
Those words haunt her through college, through orchestra, through life, like a heavy fog she can’t shake.
That’s good enough. The audition? Sounded good enough. You? Good enough.
And so she grows up, gets an apartment, joins the Icarus Theatre Orchestra, buys groceries and takes her meds. And that’s her life. Good enough.
---
It isn’t until she has no more pills to take that she feels the familiar surge of feeling that music used to bring at her audition. The notes glide from her fingertips through the air and Vanya wants to laugh, to let her voice mingle with the notes and see what kind of music that would make. The endless potential for possibilities wells up inside her as the last note fades, making way for applause that startles her out of her reverie.
Oh. So this was what it means to be more than good enough.
---
Being center stage feels good in a way that Vanya’s never felt before. In the spotlight for the first time, she wonders if this is how her siblings feel all the time. If she was truly missing out on something for all those years. Though, it doesn’t really matter. She’s here now, pulling people in with her music, driving people away with her powers. She’s in control. She’s the star of the show.
Vanya sees the familiar blue haze of Five’s abilities, the brother in question ducking behind her the seats as her solo sings through the air, rippling in waves of toe-curling power. And then for a moment, she thinks she can see Ben too, the Horror spiraling out in a ghostly haze of light. She can’t help the giddy excitement at the sight of them, finally seeing her perform in the way she’s always wanted to be seen.
The feeling lasts for only a moment before her siblings run towards her and the music must stop in favor of saving her own life. Everything is in her palm for one delicate moment, suspended in a stasis of light and energy. And then the moment shatters with Allison’s shaky exhale and the thunderous sound of a gunshot.
Maybe I don’t really know better, Vanya thinks hazily as the sound splinters through the air and pierces her mercilessly. Maybe I’ll always be biting off more than I can chew.
As she collapses to the floor, blearily watching something above her explode, she wonders what Ben and Five must think of her now. If anything, she hopes they at least enjoyed the performance. It was her best.