The Definitive Argument for Loving your Sister
They have been so many places and seen so many people that memories blend together until Klaus isn't sure what is real and what he has just dreamed. He isn't even positive that their parents were ever there at all. He's barely confident in his own name, or where he comes from, or what he knows. Nothing is certain, not for the Baudelaires, and nothing ever has been, really.
He looks briefly into the library; he sees Sunny reading a book. She lifts her eyes and smiles at her brother. She goes back to her reading. Klaus sits stiffly on the chair in the hall, and he rationalizes. This suit is old but he still feels awkward. He isn't sure he knows what it feels like to be comfortable.
Over and over he's justified this. It's old news by now. But rationalizing, researching, understanding—those are things Klaus knows he's good at. Or he thinks he's good at. In effect, it doesn't really matter. He's stuck to his patterns that have never previously failed him. He's made lists (pros and cons, gleaning data, genetic issues, reading endless manuscripts). He's had heated debates with himself. He's poured over every book he's been able to get his hands on, even if they're only vaguely related. In all these books, it always seems to go badly for boys who love their sisters. But what does that matter? There are more books out there. Some must be positive.
Klaus reasons that nothing that terrible can come from it. Nothing so terrible, in comparison to everything else in their lives.
It's taken him so long to get up the nerve to take her out properly, even though no one knows them here. It's taken them so long to get away from everything that hurt: Count Olaf, the constant memories, everything. They're far away from everything they ever were. They're safe now. Klaus knows it's true; sometimes he has a hard time believing it. He still wonders, sometimes. Yes, Violet is twenty now. Nothing and no one can hurt them now. And in two years, they've been—tentatively, hesitantly, but yes—happy. They've been safe. It's almost too much to believe. Klaus half-expects to wake up in that little tower room one of these days.
It makes sense, he argues with himself in the dim hall. No one else could ever do. No one else could ever comprehend how he and Violet grew up. They only ever had each other. Their parents made them promise to take care of each other. For six years, they took care of each other. And even now, that's all they've got that matters. The family. Each other. The only thing Klaus knows with certainty is that Violet is the only person he could ever share a life with. She's the only one who could ever understand. The Baudelaires stick together. They know. They were there. He and Violet—they know and they don't need to talk about it to rest confident in the love they've got. They belong together. They have to. Or—what?
Or I don't know what's good in the world, Klaus thinks to himself. He knows there's bad in it—he knows that more than his own name. So, he reasons, there must be good too. And it's Violet. He knows that immediately, without any thinking, without any books. Violet is an ultimate good. Everything about her is good. It can't be wrong, Klaus thinks. It can't be wrong because we are right.
No, Klaus Baudelaire isn't quite certain of anything. His memory is hazy, foggy in a past rank with loss. But what Klaus does know, as Violet comes down the stairs with her long hair loose about her shoulders, is that she is beautiful and they'll just have to be all right, after all.
