The house was silent. Even the clocks stood still; the one in the hall had been destroyed and the battery in the one in the kitchen had finally died sometime in the night.
The first light of dawn had just crested the trees in the orchard, warming the front room as it filtered in through the bay windows. The light was soft, but it still burned her eyes as they fluttered opened.
Her chest gently rose and fell to the rhythm of a heart that no longer needed to beat.
Sitting up, she stretched her limbs. They were stiff; sleeping on the couch was never restful. She also felt she had slept in longer than she should have.
Perhaps she had; where was everyone?
She was really hungry.
Pulling herself from the sofa, she made her way barefoot to the kitchen. It was a task; there was shattered glass littering the floor, every chair was in pieces… and was that a bloodstained knife on the kitchen counter?
Maneuvering around the granite island, she turned her squinting eyes toward the rising sun now flooding through the open doors onto the patio.
An odd noise was coming from outside.
Forgoing the fridge, she decided to investigate.
Plop.
Hope's pile of rocks was almost gone. They had been really hard to find, but it felt so good letting them go. She hurled another into the pool.
Plop.
With each throw, she felt some of the anger fade.
Plop.
She was angry with her mom.
Plop.
She was angry with her dad.
Plop.
She was angry with herself.
Plop.
She had decided; when the whole pool was more rock than water, she would go inside and begin to try to move on with her life.
Plop.
Plop.
Plunk.
"You know, someone's gonna have to clean those out eventually."
Hope froze mid-throw.
"Jesus Christ, it's you."
"You can still call me Leah though."
Laughing despite herself, Hope enveloped Leah in the tightest hug ever.
"You're alive, you're okay!"
"All's well that ends well, right?"
"You're alive," Hope repeated, this time barely above a whisper. Finally letting fall the rock still clutched in her hand, she wiped away the tears threatening to rain upon her face.
"Oh my god, your transition, it worked."
"11th hour save, literally," she joked, unable to express her gratitude any other way.
Hope grabbed her hand suddenly, pulling her back toward the house.
"Come on, we have to find Elijah!"
Someone was already standing in the doorway.
"Mom?"
But Hayley was looking at Leah, her lips parted in wordless wonder.
"Well I'll be…"
"Mom, I'm taking her up to Elijah's—"
Hope was stunned into silence at the sight of her mom hugging Leah.
Hayley pulled back, holding Leah at arms length, a hand on either shoulder; she took a moment to really take a look at Leah.
She was finally seeing what Hope saw; what Elijah saw.
Just Leah.
"Leah, I have been…a complete ass to you, and I am sorry, if it's worth anything. I can't bring back your mother, and I can never replace your mother, but you are going to need someone to help you through the next few months. And know this is not the sire bond talking when I say: if you need, anything—just yell. After all, us hybrids got to stick together, right?"
Listening from the kitchen, Klaus set out to make his own amends.
/
He leaned against the doorframe with arms crossed as he watched his brother pull suit and jacket and coat from the wardrobe.
There was a suitcase open on the bed.
Elijah was either lost in a mindless haze or simply ignoring him.
It was probably some combination of both.
"Elijah?"
He threw a garment bag across the bed, going in for another.
"Niklaus, you have nothing to say to me."
Well at least his brother was talking again. With growing confidence, Klaus stepped further into the room, surveying the mess of clothes, books and bourbon, wondering where the train was now that had plowed through this bedroom sometime in the night.
He raised an exasperated hand at the now empty wardrobe.
"Elijah, what are you doing?"
"Packing."
"Running away, more like."
Resisting the urge to snap his brother's neck, Elijah dove back into his work, continuing to empty his drawers. Most of his clothes were at the Compound, he realized. Never mind; he would have someone ship them to him when he got to wherever he was going.
He just couldn't stay here anymore. Not in this room, not in this house, not in this city.
He would leave this country if need be; perhaps the ends of the earth were far enough away to grant him the peace of forgetting everything that reminded him of her.
He wanted to forget about Leah, about her strawberry hair and her clear eyes and her stupid, infectious laughter.
"The city is yours, Niklaus, the Faction is yours to do with it what you will: keep them, disband them, kill them all—I care not. But I am packing and I am leaving."
"You can't just leave. Not now."
"Oh yes I can," he stated matter-of-factly. "I should have left years ago. I should have let you, and Hayley, and Hope have this city and I go find my own. Rebekah had it right, Niklaus: leaving is the only way I will have even the smallest chance at happiness. I will never be able to build anything here under your shadow, brother. I can only ask that you don't doom your daughter to the same fate."
The mere thought of his family leaving him set Klaus on edge; his sister's words rang in his ears.
Has history taught you nothing? We don't abandon you, Nik. You drive us away.
He was a slow learner but he was coming to understand: if they left, it was only because he had pushed them away.
It would be a formidable task to change a thousand years of bad habits, but Klaus knew well that you eat an elephant one bite at a time; he had to do right by his brother, and by Leah, and perhaps, one day, he would make it up to his sister as well.
It was never too late for now.
"Hear me out, Elijah. I will admit, I have been a little short-sighted in the past few months-"
"Months?" Elijah thought cruelly, ignoring the rest of his brother's self-critical posturing. He continued pulling books from the shelf; they fell to the floor creased and splayed in his desperate attempt to find his journal from last year.
He would have to destroy that too if he meant to forget her.
"—start over…Elijah, are you even listening?"
Klaus had to sidestep swiftly to avoid being hit by a bookend bust of Petrarch.
"Now, wait, Elijah, listen-"
"Spare me your empty apologies, I have no time for another one of your self-serving sermons."
"Well, yes, another time perhaps, but right now I am simply trying to get you to listen."
"Niklaus—"
"No, Elijah, I said listen."
Elijah stopped searching the bookshelf and did just that.
The ringing sound of laughter was rising in spirals from the lower level.
Hope must be outside, by the pool, Elijah thought.
Hope and someone else, there were two voices.
Hope and Leah.
Elijah questioned Niklaus with a silent, frantic look; his brother's assuring smile confirmed his most fragile hope.
Still, he would have to see it to believe it.
See her.
Out on the patio, Leah didn't need her new hybrid hearing to know Elijah was calling her name.
/
They met at the bottom of the stairs.
Elijah lifted her clear off the ground, taking her into his arms.
Moments later Hope and Hayley had both appeared at the kitchen doorway, Klaus coming down the stairs a second later. He had to sidle around the couple because they were still kissing most conveniently right in the middle of the foyer.
"I think this calls for the good scotch," Klaus offered, trying to give Elijah and Leah some space.
Hope eagerly volunteered.
"Top shelf, linen closet, I've got it."
Hayley found herself abandoned in the hallway; Elijah and Leah were still going at it like only people who didn't need to breathe could do.
"And I'll be...anywhere but here," she told herself, stepping back into the kitchen to grab the ice.
/
Hope waved the bottle in her hand as she bounced into the sitting room, joining her parents by the bar cart.
Klaus looked up arranging the glasses, taking the scotch from her.
"Are the two love birds till twittering out there?"
"No," she said, grabbing a tumbler of her own from the cart. "Elijah's taken Leah back to the Compound. That…is probably best for everyone. And if they don't ever comeback, I can't blame them."
She poured herself a generous amount of scotch.
Klaus peered at his daughter as she downed her drink.
"Last night," he confessed, "When you called me 'Klaus'—"
"That's your name, isn't it? What, did that make you feel old?"
"Very funny, Hope. No, but it did make me realize…that we are both adults now."
Hope set down her tumbler, collecting her words before addressing Klaus.
"You will always be my father, and…I will always be your little girl, I get that…but I think it's time we begin to see each other for who we really are."
Klaus could hardly contain the pride he felt for Hope at this very moment. He looked over to Hayley before refilling Hope's drink.
"I agree…completely. It's time that I start seeing you as the assertive and fearless young woman that you have become, and not the little girl we've been holding on to for far too long. In fact, I think it's time to push you from the nest and see how you fly—come autumn, your mother and I have decided that you will have your own place, in the Quarter of course, at least for now."
Hope's face lit up. She looked to her mother for confirmation; Hayley nodded.
"Maybe you can even get a job and pay for it yourself," Klaus added with a sly grin, handing her back her tumbler.
"Haha, right, now who's being funny?"
Klaus wasn't done yet.
"And…if Leah wishes to move in with you…that is fine with me."
Hope closed the distance between them, throwing her arms around her father.
"Thank you, thank you so much, dad."
Dad.
There it was.
Klaus waved over Hayley.
"Come on, you too, get in here."
Hayley held back a smile, scratching her head in rhetorical contemplation.
"I don't know, are you sure you don't want me to get the camera? I'm pretty sure this is a once-in-a-million shot."
"Mom!" Hope giggled, waving her mother over to join the family hug.
Hayley was all too happy to have her family back.
.AN: Just a few more chapters 'til the end, my friends! Thanks for hanging in there!