He had three names:
Number Four. Klaus Hargreeves. The Family Junkie.
Of course, rarely did any of them say the third name out loud, but all of them thought it. Even he did, if he got too high.
Klaus was strong willed by nature, always trying to keep up with his brothers and sister - he considered them older despite the fact that they all turned the same age on the same day.
He was strong willed, but ever since he'd been trapped in that dark room with the spirits, he'd been more and more willed towards pushing them away.
The thing, he found, that worked the best to keep the voices at bay, was drugs. At the tender age of twelve, he snuck out of the house and took what little money he had to a seller on the street.
The first time he took the pills, he threw up and felt sick for a week. Grace took care of him, while Ben and the others would pop in periodically when they could get away from their lessons.
Vanya was the one who spent the most time with him; when he asked she played her violin. She played very well for have only started mere weeks ago.
However, Klaus didn't see ghosts for the first two days of that treacherous week.
He went back to the seller the night after the day he was allowed back on his feet, having stolen a golden ring from his father's room and pawned it off for cash.
Klaus bought as much as he could: it had worked the first time and those were the two most peaceful days of his remembered life.
It became a habit.
Steal something, pawn it off, buy drugs, take said drugs, push the ghosts away. Repeat.
The only ghost he either couldn't or wouldn't push away was that of his adopted brother, Ben. Most days, Ben acted as Klaus's conscienceness; as someone to banter with, someone who called him out on his bullshit, someone to tease.
Klaus almost forgot that Ben was dead some days.
When Five came back, Klaus thought that he was hallucinating. It was common, what with his power and being high consistently. But no, Five really was back.
Klaus was happy, of course, but he showed it in his own way. He went and did more drugs to numb the pain that he'd carefully hidden away since Five has disappeared.
He didn't sleep.
Every time Number Four drifted off, his mind was plagued with the dead screaming his name. So he refused to sleep. Though in the bath, he could hardly help himself - he always narrowly escaped Death in the shallow water.
When Four decided to go sober, he felt ill in a way that rivalled the way he'd felt the first time he'd taken drugs.
His skin felt like it was on fire and he was constantly gagging.
To Klaus, the worst part wasn't that he was sick. The worst part wasn't that his siblings didn't care - they just thought he was high again.
The worst part was that he was no longer numb.
He could... feel, hear, everything
And he didn't want to.