Chapter Text
Year one
Lila and Diego’s house had somehow become the default meeting place for the Hargreeves siblings. While their old home in the academy might have worked, it was a condemned pile of bricks that Luther was for some unknown reason considering buying to try and restore. Allison’s house was nice, but her problems with Ray echoed tension around the walls and made time spent there feel anything other than relaxing. But the soft chatter of the family Lila had managed to find, the scent of spiced food that filled the air and the gurgles of baby Grace gave the place a homely feel that none of them had ever really experienced before. Grace’s first birthday had been just a couple of months earlier, one of the first times the whole family had got together since they were dumped into this timeline.
The food had been delicious, seemingly hundreds of tiny dishes laid out for the siblings to dig into. Diego had talked loudly, passing food around and joking with the siblings as he did. Five watched as Klaus carefully declined the offer of a beer. And then a second more forceful offer. He caught his eye and raised his eyebrows at his brother, watched as he nodded once in answer to his silently asked question. Klaus was sober again, and Diego was oblivious. Lila glared at Diego, shook her head and then tried to direct the conversation onto something else. A not very subtle gesture which everyone in the room with the exception of Diego picked up on. But that had always been the way. Diego picked a path and carried on down it regardless of the cues he was being given. Lila put her hand onto his shoulder, tried to communicate still without words. But before she could start to talk, her face twisted, all the colour drained from it until she turned and ran from the room.
“What was that all about?” Klaus asked, his eyes following Lila down the hallway. Five turned from his brother to the space Lila had disappeared into, the same question crossed his mind as well. Diego rolled his eyes, turned back to the party and carried on trying to offer Klaus a drink.
“Nice flowers.” Allison commented, nodded her head towards the vase containing a small bouquet of brightly coloured tulips. Even Five could read the attempt as trying to distract Diego, buying Klaus some time to move away, to come up with a reason, or to decide whether he actually wanted to face telling Diego. Again. And getting the inevitable useless advice. Again. While Diego focused on Allison, Five turned back to Klaus, raising his eyebrows. The confused shake of his head said he had no idea what was going on with Lila either. “Did you get them for Lila for Valentines?” She asked.
Diego smiled knowingly. “Happy wife, happy life.”
“Alright, who are you and what have you done with our brother?” Klaus asked, only slightly scathingly, his humour returning now the subject of beer had been dropped.
“Hey!” Diego protested.
“No, he’s right.” Luther agreed, leaning back in his chair and looking him up and down.
“Well I have got life hacked.” Diego grinned smugly as he leaned forward, dropping his voice conspiratorially. “I give Lila the shopping budget, she uses it to pick out the flowers she wants. Job done without even having to try.”
“Jesus Christ Diego.” Allison groaned as she shook her head.
“What?!”
“You can’t be serious?” Luther agreed as he shook his head in disgust.
The whole point of a gift wasn’t that she should have to pick it out herself and put all the mental effort into it. It should be something that’s a surprise, even if it’s expected for the time of year. Even in the apocalypse he’d still managed to scrounge together something for Delores for Valentines, for anniversaries. Even when he’d had to keep track of the date with scratched tally marks on walls, or on pieced together pages of long since abandoned calendars. It didn’t matter if all he could scrape together was a few wildflowers plucked from between paving slabs on the abandoned streets, it was the thought that counted every single time. And there was no thought at all in his brother's actions. He takes another swig from his beer to stop himself from saying anything more. From telling him exactly what sort of idiot he is if he thought he could treat someone as special as Lila like that. The thoughts that he kept to himself, pushed down and buried in concrete. The kind that no-one needed to hear.
At least this time, the rest of the family were on his side.
“Well when any of you guys have a wife, then you can judge. Until then you can all just shut up.” Diego grumbled to himself. Five watched as Luther’s face tightened and then went blank. Even after eighteen months of searching, there was still no sign of Sloane. While his own memories of Delores were a little less fresh, he still felt his own face react as well, just for a split second before he slammed the mask back down. He threw his foot out, trying to kick Diego under the table to get him to just shut up. He was old enough to deal with this shit, but for Luther it was all just a little bit too fresh. “Besides, we must be doing something right.” Diego carried on regardless, a steamroller set on its path with no regard for what lay in front of him.
Lila appeared back in the room, her face pale and her fringe stuck to her forehead in damp tendrils. She walked towards Diego, sat down next to him and smiled at them all. “What did I miss?”
“Just talking about our happy news.” The words made sense, but something about the tone of them felt off to Five. He looked across to Lila, used her as a gauge to try and make sense of his brother.
“Oh. Right.” Her voice fell flat as well, enough that Allison turned to look at her, her eyes narrowed as she tried to work the same problem Five was. He watched as her eyebrows shot up underneath her bangs, something making sense to her that he was still trying to decipher.
”We’re pregnant again.” Diego said, then raised his beer bottle in a mimic of cheers. No-one reacted for a few seconds as they processed the words. Then Allison clapped her hands together and made a happy noise of excitement, rushing forward to wrap her arms around her sister in law. Five sat back in his seat, watched as Lila accepted congratulations and Diego’s face alternated between proud and something else.
Frustration? Annoyance?
Whatever it was, it was clearly the source of the tension that had been grumbling between them all evening. When finally caught Lila’s eye, he lifted his chin, a silent question between them. She did the tiniest of shrugs, her shoulders barely moving enough for anyone other than Five to notice, a gesture of defeat. Of accepting the path that life had set out in front of her. It made him think of a conversation that now felt like a whole lifetime ago. How neither of them were exactly suited to a life of domestic bliss. Yet here they were, living that dream.
The conversation continued over them, their silent exchange barely noticed by anyone else in the room. The same way it always was. Five’s disappearance as a kid had meant he hadn’t grown up with the rest of his family, so sometimes they just forgot he was there. Functioning without him, their orbits shifted once he disappeared from their system. Now he was back, but they were still adjusting to the new addition. Lila was a new addition as well, a captured comet now stuck through circumstance more than choice. She might be Diego’s wife, but for a while she was the enemy, and those scars were still just below the surface. So the two of them existed together on the periphery, outsiders in their own family. Built their own little existence as the ones who didn’t really deserve to be there. He drifted in and out of the conversation, let the words wash over him as he contemplated how much longer he needed to stay before it would be impolite to leave.
“How’s college going?” Klaus asked, an attempt to divert the conversation back to safer ground in all likelihood. Five ran his hand through his hair as he tried to think of an answer, still not sure if he should start growing it out or to continue tolerating a stranger near him with sharp implements. But before he could answer, Diego jumped in. Of course.
”Alright for some, getting to reset at an age you can just start over again.” The barb is pointed, and Five can feel that it’s not entirely directed at him. His instinct confirmed when he saw Lila roll her eyes and push her chair back from the table.
“Fine. It’s good. But I should go, I have classes tomorrow.” He stood, mirroring Lila’s motion and nodded to his siblings as he fastened his jacket back up. He didn’t, but he could disappear from the apartment he shared with Luther for a few hours in the morning to keep up the pretence. He just couldn’t sit here and watch whatever this was for much longer and continue to hold his tongue. He didn’t bother to wait for a response before he walked out the door.
”Five?”
Her voice called across from the porch, and he spun on the spot, midway through tucking his hands into his pockets. Lila stood in the doorway, her coat looped loosely around her shoulders.
“Yeah?”
”Don’t let it be so long next time.” She grinned at him, a flash of the old Lila breaking through.
”Sure thing.”
He pulled his coat tight against the cold air of the February evening. At least it hadn’t been raining, so the walk home was bearable, the lights of the city starting to punctuate the darkness as it fell. Living without the ability to jump seamlessly from place to place always felt more of an inconvenience when it was raining. So while there was a chill in the air, there was no need for him to walk with his head tucked down against the weather. The familiar mixture of shops, restaurants and bars lined the streets back to his apartment, and while he would usually ignore them, this time one in particular caught his eye.
Without thinking, he turned sharply, pushed open the wooden door and set off the tiny metal bell that sat above it. The scent flooded his nostrils as he took in the options, then went purely with instinct. Picked up a premade bouquet and turned it over in his hands. He paused just long enough to consider if it was the right thing to do. Convinced himself that if it made Lila happy, then it was helping his brother out. Just doing something nice for the family. That was all there was to it. Absolutely nothing more.
Year two
He sat in one of his regular coffee shop haunts, leafed through a textbook that was nothing more than a refresh of theories he mastered years ago. He’d managed to skip ahead through most of his courses, the professors astounded by the speed he apparently mastered the material. Graduation was going to be later this year as long as he did the required assignments. But his mind was never fully occupied by the work, his inherently familiarity with the source material gave him an advantage few people could ever have. So instead while he sat and studied his brain slowly meandered around. Took in the details of his environment. Constantly monitoring, one of the many old habits that won’t quite die even though he was now in a world where he no longer needed to be vigilant about everything.
But still, she managed to surprise him. A loud bang on the window and a gleeful shout of his name and there she was, stood on the other side of the glass, waving at him. She motioned to the door, and he nodded, closed his textbook and made space for her across from him. She threw herself into the seat, dumped her bags and peeled off her coat. Lila was a cyclone of noise and chaos that it was pointless to try and fight against, and it would appear that it was his turn again to entertain her.
”Fivey. How’s things?” She unwrapped the bright pink scarf from around her neck and dumped it on the table next to her, then peeled her coat off and pulled his cup of coffee towards her, wrapped her hands around it to warm them up. Settled in for the duration, not just a fleeting visit.
”Not too bad.”
Her eyes darted around the table, and before he could stop her she reached for his notebook, picked it up and started leafing through the pages of lecture notes. Her nose wrinkled as she moved from page to page. “No notes to your friends? No doodles? You are taking this seriously aren’t you?”
He held his hand out for the book, and she passed it back with an infuriating grin on her face. “Some of us have to be.”
”I’m very serious and grown up I’ll have you know.”
He tried to stifle the snort into his coffee cup, and she pulled a face at him and pretended to throw a balled up napkin.
“Oi. I’m a mum and everything. Piss off.”
Her words were harsh, but there was no malice behind them, it was just how Lila was. All bark but no bite these days. At least significantly less bite than she’d had when she was ready to kill him. But she still kept up the words laced with anger and heat, even if they came from a place of friendship now rather than being aimed at an enemy. He stopped to consider it for a second, but then just shook his head at his own errant thought. He was right, somewhere along the way, Lila had become a friend.
“Fine. You’re a grown up.” He rolled his eyes and looked back down at his book.
“Well one of us has to be.” She muttered, more to herself than to Five, but he still looked up at her questioningly. She shook her head at him. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Escaping?” He hazarded a guess, taking in the fact that her top looks more like it might be pyjamas than actual outerwear, and that her hair might not have seen a brush yet this morning.
“Something like that. Four kids in the house can be a lot.” She lifted her eyebrow at the deliberate miscount, and he feels a pang of empathy for her. Being stuck living with Diego couldn’t be easy at the best of times. “Said we were out of nappies.”
“Are you?”
“Nope. But he wouldn’t know where I keep them anyway.” She reached across the table and picked up the croissant he’d been slowly working his way through, tore off a chunk and popped it into her mouth. He just exhaled through his nose and twisted in his chair, searching for the waitress to at least order her a coffee and some food before she finished off the rest of his breakfast.
“What are you working on?” She nudged the corner of his textbook once her drink had arrived and they’d settled into a comfortable silence.
“Quantum mechanics.”
“Like time travel?” Her voice sounded shocked, and he looked up to see her with a knowing grin on her face.
“Oh I hate that smile.”
“No. You don’t. Why are you needing to study this?”
“Because some of us need to at least pretend to be engaged in meaningful education to be allowed to exist in this world.”
“Ouch. Not so fun starting off young then?”
He lifted one eyebrow at her in reply, then watched incredulously as she dunked a piece of her donut into his coffee.
“I’m not allowed caffeine.” She grumbled by way of explanation, her own tea left untouched and without crumbs floating in it. “Which you would know if you came around more often.” She reached across the table and grabbed his phone before he could respond.
“Hey.” But she just held her hand up at him, then spun in her chair and lifted the phone in the air, lining them both up on the screen and then smiling widely at the camera.
“There. I’m officially on your phone now, so you don’t have an excuse to forget about me.”
His background was no longer the default one that came with the operating system, instead it was now a photo of the two of them. Lila’s smile was a little too wide, her eyes a little too bright if you looked closely, if you knew her well enough to spot the signs. Like she was trying to compensate for something. Behind her he looks unbothered, his coffee cup halfway to his mouth and his eyes slightly narrowed. Like he’s about to make some sarcastic remark at her. He clicked the lock button and slid the phone into his pocket, out of reach of any more tricks she might have planned. “How did you manage to get even more annoying?”
“Oh come on, you know you love me really. Besides, who else is going to tell you the truth about your suit choices?”
“Hey, this is a good one.” It was one of his favourites, crisp navy blue in a warm wool blend. The perfect remedy for the colder days and enough of a change from black to feel like he was dressing down.
“I still miss the knees.” She laughed once, then carried on tearing her breakfast into pieces to dunk into his coffee. He sighed and pushed the mug closer to her, signalling to the waitress for a fresh one for himself. Not too long ago he would have considered a quick fire comeback at her, to fall back into their easy routine of traded insults. But there was something a little too fragile about her today. Like it was all bravado and one low blow might send the whole house of cards tumbling down. Like she actually needed a friend and not just a sparring partner.
“So when can I come round and see my nieces and nephew?”
“You want to come and visit?” She sounded surprised, and that surprise hurt him more than he expected it to.
“I know I’ve not been the best Uncle.” He conceded, closing the textbook over and settling back into his chair.
“And a rubbish friend.” She added, the tiniest shake in her voice that made him think she maybe wasn’t entirely joking.
“That too. Life is just weird.” He was still trying to find his place in this world, to figure out where exactly he was meant to fit in at seventeen going on sixty-something. The kids in his college class dismissed him as too young, despite the fact he was literally old enough to be their grandpa in some cases, and the adult world was still frustratingly off limits when you looked how he did. His identity evaporated with the reset, so it was a case of trying to figure out where he could fit in.
“Yeah. It is.”
“Not cut out for the suburban hellscape huh?”
“Something like that.” She glanced down at her watch, noticed the time and shook her head. “I should go back. He’ll think I’ve got lost on the way to the store.”
“Want me to walk with you?”
“No. It’s fine.” She stood, stretched and then started pulling her discarded layers back on, preparing for the battle through the cold. She looked around the table and then checked her pockets for gloves, muttering to herself before giving up. Five thought back, realised she hadn’t been wearing any and how quickly she’d stolen his coffee cup to wrap her hands around. So he pulled his pair out of his coat, handed them to her across the table.
“Give them back to me when I come over to see the kids.”
“Thanks Five.” She smiled warmly at him and reached across the table to squeeze his arm before she stood up and walked out the shop. While he normally craved peace and silence, the absence of her chaos settled heavily around him. Until once more she shattered the calm with a bang on the window and a loud shout.
“Miss you!” Then she spun and walked away.
He laughed silently to himself, shook his head as everyone in the coffee shop turned to stare at him. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his phone, watching her as she skipped away down the street.
Five: That’s weird
She paused, reached into her pocket and then turned back to wave at him, before she disappeared around the corner.
Lila: 🤪
A couple of hours later, adequately caffeinated and brain starting to ache from reading the same material over and over again, he packed up his things and looped his satchel bag over his shoulder. He ran through the checklist of things he needed to sort with the rest of his day, assignments that were due, what to have for dinner and tried to remember if Luther was working that evening or if he had the apartment to himself. He cut through the park on his way home, his mind whirred with the equations that he’d been contemplating all morning. That and Lila. He followed his feet, automatically putting one foot in front of the other until the shift in sound around him pulls his focus back to the real world, and not the one inside his head. A collection of stalls set up around the entrance gate to the park, music drifting from a speaker set up in the corner. Some stalls laden with food, others trinkets and crafts. He let himself wander for a few minutes, picking up something for dinner and perusing a collection of antique watches.
When he noticed the flowers, it was an easy decision to make. “Do you do deliveries?”