A/N: 2x09 (also known as the Greatest Episode They Ever Made)
December 2012
Klaus isn't sure that he's ever been this happy before. Hayley is a livewire next to him, her arms folded across her body in the passenger seat, telling him about how she's going to save her pack. He's proud of her, taking her future, her people, into her own hands. His little wolf has come into her own as a hybrid, no longer unsure of her place in this world, and certainly not among the wolves. They've all been busy making the quarter a safe place for their daughter to live, and now they get to see her.
He hasn't spoken to Rebekah before now, since he gave up Hope to her, placed his daughter's tiny body in his sister's gracious arms. He's heard from Elijah that Hope is doing well, but they can't risk pictures, and Rebekah can't risk calling Klaus, because as far as anyone is aware, they're not on speaking terms.
The fact that Elijah is dealing badly with Esther's meddling is doing little to discourage either his or Hayley's anticipation, and joy. They're going to see Hope, they're going to hold Hope in their arms. Halfway to Arkansas, Hayley stops biting her nails long enough to turn on the radio, searching for stations through the static, until they land on some saccharine Christmas station, and Hayley leaves it, shrugging, like she doesn't enjoy it.
"Hope's first Christmas," Hayley breathes under her breath. Klaus looks at her from his peripheral vision. "Don't laugh at me," she warns. Klaus smiles, and Hayley does too. "We don't have to miss it," she says. She's relieved; they've missed so much – but there's still so much left. Hope's whole life is in front of them. The despair they felt over the summer dissipates with the Christmas bells as the grass around them turns brown in the cold.
"I'm proud of you, Hayley," Klaus says, in spite of himself. "For doing this, for your pack, for our daughter."
"I can't let the wolves stay under your mother's control," Hayley says, shaking her head. "This isn't a sacrifice I'm making for Hope. This is her future. The wolves are her pack too."
Klaus tries to imagine a future for his child where she isn't ashamed of her ties to the wolves, where she can embrace that side of her the way Hayley has, where her daughter inherits the pack when Hayley has moved on. His parents terrorizing the city left behind in his rearview mirror seem trivial now. Elijah is right: he will vanquish them, and Dahlia too if need be. Suddenly, they're not just making the city safe for his daughter – they're building her legacy, her kingdom.
Gravel crunches underneath his tires, and Hayley tenses next to him, straining against the seatbelt, craning her neck to see into the house, to see her daughter, waiting for her – for them. The locks on the door click and Rebekah and Elijah and Hope – all bundled up and wearing something pink and frilly that Rebekah obviously picked out –are standing on the lawn, and Hayley is already out of the car before Klaus has brought the car to a full stop.
Elijah hands Hope to Hayley gingerly, as Klaus lags behind, suddenly unsure. Rebekah meets his gaze with a soft smile, trying to thank him for these months she's had with Hope, and Klaus tries to return the sentiment without drowning in the grief of his lost time. Elijah looks at Hayley and Klaus, standing far apart, and Hayley brings the baby closer. Klaus tries not to recoil from his daughter. This is the moment that he has been dreaming of for months, for almost a year, and now that it's here – he is terrified that he cannot do this, afraid his touch is as destructive as he's always believed.
Hayley is cooing at Hope, whose big wolf-eyes – eyes like Hayley's – watch her parents with curious trepidation. Hope settles into Klaus's arms before he's even really prepared for her weight. He skin is warm and soft, her eyes clear as she looks at Klaus. She seems to recognize him as her father – a strange experience to be looked upon as father with love, not fear. Hayley's one hand is still clutched in Hope's fist, and her other is a shock up and down Klaus's spine as it rests on his back.
There is fear here, too, beneath the joy that they both feel, beneath the love. Now that he holds his daughter, the fear dissipates, a release like a hand releasing his heart. Hope. Hope smiling at him and Hayley, her cheeks pink in the cold. So alive, so human. Hope dispelling a thousand years' worth of fear. Klaus presses a kiss to Hope's forehead, slow steady, deliberate, terrified of her soft skull, her tiny hands and impossibly small fingers, that he is going to drop her, hurt her, or worse. But there is this moment – this moment where Hope is his, alive, happy, and not afraid of him, and for all his fear, he is no longer afraid of her.
He stays there, unwilling to part from his daughter. Hayley warm at his side, looking over his shoulder at their daughter, heartbeat uneven with her own joy and fear. "Okay," Rebekah says as Hope starts to fuss. She takes Hope from Klaus's arms. "It's time for someone's nap." Klaus tries not to feel so exposed without his daughter, his sister, Hayley following close behind, ignores the stinging in his eyes.
"Niklaus." Elijah's voice is loud and clear over his daughter fussing in the house. He turns away from his brother, from the house, steadying himself, afraid if he looks at his brother, sees Elijah's psyche crumbling before his eyes, he'll lose whatever grip he's got on his fear, his love for his daughter. "Look at me, Niklaus," Elijah says, his voice commanding. He is uncomfortably reminded of his mother – the first time she crawled her way back from hell. He looks at his brother, lifting his chin to him – defensive against whatever Elijah has in store for him. "Why are you here?" he asks carefully, looking past him. "Rebekah and I can protect Hope. You are needed in the city. Finn –"
"Brother," Klaus interrupts. "My daughter and you are here." He sighs. "Rebekah called me. She was worried. And – it's time. Hayley needed to see Hope. "I –" His voice breaks. "I needed to see her. Hope." From here, he can hear Hope's heartbeat as she falls asleep. Elijah concedes, but Klaus can still feel his agitation at being handled. He takes more pleasure in it than he knows is proper – the tables have truly turned. "Besides, we need to talk. It appears that it's more than just your psyche that's crumbling down around us."
"Niklaus –" Elijah protests, and looking at him, Klaus thinks he looks fine looks fine, a little beleaguered perhaps, but otherwise the very picture of stability.
But he has no time to argue with Elijah, no matter how much fun it might be fun, since Rebekah and Hayley are returning from putting Hope down. Rebekah seems to have loaded Hayley's arms with firewood and calls to her brothers for them to carry some too. Niklaus obliges his sister wearily, trying to intermittently explain the danger they now face.
"Dahlia?" Hayley asks. It's clear that she is growing weary of their ever expanding family drama.
"The fable is over a thousand years old," Elijah points out reasonably. "Dahlia is long dead." Klaus scoffs, watching Rebekah layer the firewood higher and higher. His fingers twitch, fighting the desire to rip the bonfire Rebekah has been building to pieces.
"Like your mother?" Hayley points out, reading Klaus's mind. It's equally as reasonable, given that Klaus has killed his mother not once but twice already, and his very dead brothers are in his home right now inhabiting the bodies of local witches, and a long-dead sister apparently never died at all. It seems the only member of their family who isn't adept at escaping death was Henrik.
Klaus growls, frustrated with his family's inability to understand that the danger Hope faces is meaningless if they would all just listen to him. Once Esther and her minions are dealt with, they will have nothing left to fear, unless Rebekah is set on sending Esther a beacon with her bloody bonfire.
"No one is going to hurt Hope, because no one is going to find her," Klaus declares, as Rebekah adds another log to the pit. "That's enough wood, Rebekah," he barks. "You're going to burn down the whole bloody state of Arkansas."
She smiles slyly at him. "Well, we're just missing one key ingredient," Rebekah says, her smile widening to look at Elijah, eyes glinting mischievously.
"No we're not," Klaus dismisses, crossing his arms. Even as a child, this particular tradition annoyed him, struck him as silly and frivolous; as vampire he wanted nothing except what was out of his reach. Now he's got it.
"I suspect Niklaus would rather choke on the ashes," Elijah laughs, smiling at them both. Rather condescending for a man who recently slaughtered an entire truck stop in front of Klaus's six-month-old daughter.
"What are you talking about?" Hayley wonders. She is transformed since holding her daughter in her arms. Accepting ancient Mikaelson traditions left and right just as she is about to leave them, her eyes lighting up as Rebekah explains how they write their wishes and burn them in the bonfire. "Hope's first bonfire season. I like it!" she says, matching Klaus's eyes, smiling at his discomfort. "We're doing it."
She spins on her heel away from the bonfire, and Klaus looks away from all of them, staring into the sky, feeling normal, it seems, less like the world is collapsing around them. He can feel his brother and sister's eyes on him, laughing at him. Let them laugh. Rebekah says something to Elijah, clasps her hand around his arm comfortingly and takes off after Hayley to look for more Christmas decorations, but she passes Klaus on her way to the house to press a kiss to his cheek. The action so normal, so affectionate, he can forget for a moment the centuries that drag behind them. He feels like a normal brother, with his normal sister and his normal daughter, enjoying a normal Christmas together – not fleeing his deranged family.
When Hope wakes from her nap Klaus is by her side the instant she does. She looks up at him with wonder, but no fear, and pulls herself up to sit and smiles at him. "Hi, Hope," Klaus says softly, reaching into her crib and cradling her in his arms. She burrows her face in his chest and coos.
Rebekah has put on an old jazz album; it's playing in the kitchen, where he sits with Hope. He can hear Hayley and Rebekah and Elijah laughing in the other room, and maybe Klaus would have been jealous once, but it's hard to feel anything but joy with his daughter in his lap. She laughs and smiles. She looks like Hayley, and like his mother, from long ago, when he could look at his mother r and not feel anger, betrayal, shame, grief.
Hayley walks into the kitchen, holding a notepad, a pencil, a smirk on her lips. She smacks the notepad down on the table.
"I am holding a small child, Hayley," he says, turning his attention back to his laughing daughter. "This silly wish game will have to wait." Her small child, too, for that matter. Her very happy small child. Klaus remembers her greatest fear was that he would not be an active parent. Well – here's to proving her wrong. In fact, she should be overjoyed at his involvement. Besides, what could he wish for, except for the death of his parents and to never let Hope go again?
"I'll hold, you write," Hayley suggests. Persistent. Stubborn.
Klaus bites down on the irritation. It's been six months since he has been able to hold his child, and now Hayley is trying to steal his precious time with her for a game he thought ridiculous as a child. "You do realize it's not me who is to be the husband for you to boss around," he huffs without looking away from Hope.
He hears Hayley huff. "You do realize I had to endure horrendous labor and actual death to birth the child you're holding," she says, and even though her tone is light, Klaus remembers all too well – holding Hayley's broken body in his arms mere minutes after he thought Hope was lost to them forever. She's right of course, and Klaus suspects that Hayley will be able to lord that over him forever. And forever is going to be a very long time. He hands his daughter over to her, rolling his eyes lightly.
She shifts Hope to her hip to watch Klaus write his wish. "I wish," Klaus says, taking the pad of paper. "You would tell Elijah you're marrying your werewolf suitor, at which point I'll pour him a scotch and congratulate him on the bullet he dodged." He smiles up at Hayley his most devilish grin to know he's mostly joking. In a lot of ways, he's met that his match in Hayley, and she is slowly driving him insane. She rolls his eyes and snatches the paper from his hands, crumpling it up and taking it and his daughter outside to where Elijah has started the bonfire.
Klaus can only smile. If only it could always be like this.
A/N but quieter this time: the theme this week would normally be joy (Gaudete Sunday and All That. We sure are happy about miracle babies this week) so the other half of this - and the conclusion of the episode - just kind of. don't matter to the story that i'm trying to tell. also. klaus is sooo hard to write.