"You live here?" Klaus asked in disbelief, paying attention to the Spellman mortuary as he entered. His grief was momentarily abandoned as curiosity and a sense of morbid fascination took over. No wonder he hadn't visited Allison since she moved. "I'm too sober for this," he lamented, stepping fully into the entranceway in his recently revamped wardrobe consisting of both Ben's hoodie and leather jacket. The combination was a bit warm, but since both had appeared in his closet, Klaus had rarely gone a day without at least one or the other.
Really, the mortuary wasn't all that different from the dusty, too large home they'd grown up in, but Klaus was particularly gloomy and the setting was almost too much. Fortunately, Allison was there to ground him and that was why Klaus had made his way there in the first place. "Allison," he greeted, finding himself very much at a loss after that. And too sober.
Allison had gotten used to the Mortuary. It was probably due to the sounds of people constantly in it. Sabrina, the cats, Morgan, Dan, Sabrina’s aunt. Soon Abra would join them there. It was a little emptier than she liked right now all the same. She smiled as Azzie showed up, meowing. “I think she remembers him.” She lightly tugged on the coat Klaus was wearing, Ben’s coat. She reached down to give Azzie some scratches behind her ears.
“Come on. The kitchen’s a little easier. It has food and coffee.” She held out a hand for him if he wanted to take it. Otherwise, she’d just lead the way to the kitchen, offering him a seat at the table. “Do you want anything to eat? We have some leftover lasagna, I think.” She started some coffee, just glad to have something to do. She was mentally preparing herself for later when Abra would show up and she’d have someone else to get to know. She hoped she liked her. Even if it was a little hard for her to get used to the fact that Dan was dating someone. If she minded. It was hard to tell with kids.
Taking hold of Allison's hand, Klaus let her lead him to the kitchen. "Coffee," he said aloud, in answer to whether or not he wanted to eat anything. "Is there any waffles?" He took a seat at the table, staring glumly at it.
He'd actually been meaning to talk to Allison's boyfriend, because dealing with life sober was a challenge with the ghosts alone. He didn't know how to cope with all of this sudden change.
“Dan usually makes the waffles, but I can try.” She hoped that he had some sort of ingredients listed somewhere. She guessed she could always look up how to make them on the internet. She really should have tried to figure this out ahead of time. She was going to ask Dan to help her with this soon. Probably. Or she was going to find someone that was giving cooking lessons and let Dan have whatever free time he had for other things. “Maybe we’ll be lucky and there will be some batter already made. The waffle iron’s not too difficult to figure out.”
She let the coffee run as she moved to peek in the fridge to see if there was any batter. There was almost an instant sigh of relief at the fact that there was just enough to make Klaus a waffle. She wondered idly if this was magic or just the result of copious amounts of waffle dinners brought on by sad events.
She brought it out, setting it on the counter before going to grab some chocolate chips. “I assume that you want chocolate chips in this?”
"Is that a trick question?" Klaus asked back. "Especially now, with everyone here disappearing on me. On us." The sigh that followed was genuine, rather than one of Klaus's usual dramatic gestures. "Of course I need chocolate chips."
Allison gave him an apologetic look. She knew it wasn’t her fault that their mom left or that Ava left or that anyone left, but it didn’t stop her from feeling bad for asking about the chocolate chips. She got the waffle iron out and started to make it, putting plenty of chocolate chips in the batter before closing it.
“Do you need a hug?” A beat. “Not a trick question.”
Add Mimi to that list and then Ben, and it explained the utter despondency with which Klaus nodded at his sister. He was a damn mess, and may have gone to see Diego like he'd assured his brother he would before doing something stupid, but Diego wasn't big on hugs. Or emotions other than anger. And Klaus was feeling far too much and needing a hug. Or ten.
And he wasn't really certain how he was meant to deal with any of it. Usually he did his best not to, hidden behind all sorts of drugs and alcohol. But somehow remained determined to stay clean.
Allison would check in with Diego later. Even if it was just to drop food off so he wouldn’t have to cook. And then she’d be her more sad self once she was alone with Dan. For now, she made her way to Klaus and gave him a hug. “I wish I could make this easier or feel less like you just got gut punched, but I’m going to be here for you no matter what you need.” In truth, she could just rumor them into feeling better, but that was a level of bad she was trying to stay away from.
She let the hug linger for a bit before whispering, “I’ll be back. Don’t want the waffle to burn.” She thought about pressing a kiss to his head, but she didn’t want to come off too similar to their mom and make things feel all that more hollow. She checked the waffle, put it on a plate with a fork. It was not exactly the most beautiful waffle, but she’d tried. She even gave him extra chocolate chips in case it was a chocolate coma sort of day. She figured it probably was. She just wanted the smileyface made of eggs and bacon. She could probably get Dan to do it for her.
Setting everything on the table, she made them both a coffee and sat next to him, scooting as close as she could without making it difficult to eat. Still, if he wanted to lean on her at any point, she wanted to be available.
Depressed as he was, and Klaus was depressed, the waffle was delicious. And it reminded him of their mom. He glanced over at Allison as he finished it. "You got this mom thing down," he mentioned. "I was working on uncle." He reached into his pocket, pulling out the keychain declaring him the world's best, that Ava had given him as a joke, holding it up for Allison to see. "It was going pretty well."
And then he did lean on his sister, because she was there, and it made him feel less like he was left all alone. "This sucks."
“I’m doing my best.” Considering she wasn’t sure she’d really done her best before. Claire, if she ever showed up, would need her to be her better self and not just the same mom that was using her powers to keep from having to set actual boundaries. She smiled at the keychain. Getting to raise Ava for those few days had been nice because it showed she wasn’t as bad off as she thought and she managed to set boundaries without too much trouble. It was just that Claire was sometimes difficult.
She put an arm around him when he leaned over. “Yeah. Yeah, it does suck.” She let the words linger in silence for a moment before she quietly said, “I love you, Klaus. If Claire ever shows up, I know you’ll be a great uncle.”
For a moment, Klaus allowed himself to relax, and be coddled, by his sister. It was a welcome change from wallowing in despair on his own. But then she mentioned her daughter, and grabbed his attention. "I hope Claire shows up," he said. "I'd be a great uncle. The fun uncle! I'd take her bowling and to the arcade and get her all riled up on sugar and then drop her back here."
He smiled at that thought, trying very hard to ignore that people could show up, but then also disappear.
“I hope she does, too. Do not give her too much sugar, Klaus. I already have to set actual boundaries.” She really hated the idea. She also hated the idea of Claire hyped up on sugar, but she had a feeling that Sabrina would potentially also give her more sugar than strictly necessary. She sighed, lightly nudging him. “I’m fine with the arcade and bowling. Maybe we can drag Sabrina and Dan bowling, too.” A beat. “And Abra.” Because she didn’t want to forget her after Dan was so excited she was here.
“Dan’s niece Abra is here. Just got here.” And she hoped she wouldn’t disappear, too. For Dan’s sake.
"This sounds infinitely better than the abysmal experience we had last time we went to a bowling alley," Klaus mused. "I hope we managed to go back and time and save Kenny's birthday."
He managed a weak smile, and then sat up straight. "You've made a family here," he observed. It seemed rather dangerous, as recent disappearances had reminded him, leaving him somewhere in between Allison with her family and Diego fighting off every emotion aside from anger ever.
“I don’t know. Five might never let him have a good birthday.” She smiled a little then, turning to look at him.
“Yeah. I guess I have. I don’t think I ever really meant to, but here I am.” And she’d been kind of surprised it was something she was allowed to happen. It was just that it felt incomplete without Claire and she wouldn’t say no to having Five or Ben around. Luther would come with a lot of complications. They were all his own doing and she knew that. She wished he’d just listened.
“But I’d have one even if I didn’t end up with the one I have.” She lightly bumped his shoulder.
Klaus leaned back in to return the shoulder bump, smiling genuinely. "This is why I'm over here. You know, Diego was actually being nice to me the other day? Like not in the hidden way he's usually nice but openly nice? It looked like it physically pained him. Like it might actually kill him."
He laughed in a way that suggested it wasn't really all that funny at all, and reached for his coffee as something to do other than continue talking. "But I'm glad that we're here, even if I wish we'd stop disappearing. Don't disappear, Allison."
She gave Klaus an apologetic smile. “Diego does have a bit of complication with being...soft. Vulnerability wasn’t exactly something that Dad encouraged and you know none of us have been the best at emotional things.” She reached over and ruffled his hair.
There was a very serious expression on her face when she looked at her brother. “I can’t promise anything, but I’ll do everything in my power to stay with you.”
"Same," Klaus nodded. Maybe he should have wanted to go home and save the world or something. And maybe when it came down to it they were powerless. He didn't want to think about it. If he hadn't given it up, this was when he would have poured himself a drink. The absences of that left him at a loss.
"Oh, I've been meaning to talk to Dan because he knows how to deal with the not drinking away the ghosts thing. Can you tell him that?" There wasn't any reason that Klaus couldn't other than he was about as good as Diego was at asking for help. But he was going to need the help.
Powerless was something Allison didn’t have as much experience with. But she felt it when unusual things happened here or while she was unable to speak. Watching the moon explode was another one of those moments. But she hoped that they were okay back home. All of them.
She smiled just a little, reaching over to take Klaus’ hand. “Yeah. I’ll let Dan know to reach out to you about the not drinking away ghosts thing.” She was glad that he’d even mentioned it to her now. She just hoped that it would help. “If you ever need anything from me, I’ll be here for you, too. Okay?”
Klaus nodded, looking at his sister gratefully. "It would appear that there's hope for the Hargreeves after all." Because they were more of a family here than they'd ever been back home.