Henry had always been the failure child. His grades weren't the best, his room was always a mess, and he had to receive constant lectures from his father about how he had better start caring if he wanted to take over the family business one day. Henry the child had dutifully nodded, tried to pay attention in class a little more, and eventually slipped right back into old habits. He'd never expected to get a rival.
Timothy had always been the perfect child. His grades were at the top of the class, he kept all his toys in neat little piles, and he was always receiving glowing praise from his father when the man was home. Naturally, he was a much better candidate to take on the family business. Naturally, Henry hated him for it. Seeing Timmy smile as he handed their parents a perfect kindergarten report card made young Henry glare with envy. When was the last time anyone had praised him like that? Never, that's when. The jealousy became unbearable when his father had bestowed the gift of four new plushy toys upon the little child. Henry certainly wasn't interested in stuffed animals, but the fact that his father had given Timothy something like that when Henry had never received anything from his father except on birthdays was a great injustice to the older brother.
It had felt good to make Timothy cry that night. It was justice to knock him down a few pegs, right? The older brother had asserted himself as the one on top. And since that night, Henry had used his younger sibling as an outlet to channel his anger into. He held every bit of luck the little boy had against him and made him pay for it, all the while not noticing that Timothy was not nearly as fortunate as Henry claimed he was. Nightly he wished that his whiny little pest would just disappear. And one day, his wish was granted.
Flipping through the "help wanted" pages of the newspaper, Henry fingered the old photo of his little brother and remembered that final day in the diner. The shock when Fredbear's jaws snapped shut, the horror as they had rushed the bloody little boy to the hospital, the pure, unrestrained sadness at seeing him lying all bandaged up. One brother knelt by the other's side, pleading for something to reverse what had happened. Nothing did. The heart monitor had gone flat despite Henry's apologies. His wish granted, he was once again an only child.
Henry sighed and scanned through the list of available jobs. He found himself instead opening the bottom drawer of the desk and carefully picking the stack of pictures up from it to set down on the table. These photos were all he had left of his siblings. His parents had trashed almost everything that mentioned Timmy's existence after the boy had died. Only what Henry had managed to save was still around, and every one of those pictures was in that precious little stack in front of him. His parents didn't want it. Their way to deal with it was by trying to forget that their son had ever existed. Life had to go on and the past couldn't be constantly mourned, especially when there was another child on the way.
Katie was the new perfect child. Charming, sweet, and unquestionably cute, the little girl found a place in everybody's hearts. Henry would have loved her anyway. He had learned from his horrible mistake. He was going to be a good older brother. His father might still be lecturing him about his grades, but Henry didn't take a thing out on his precious little sister. He was being a good older brother, kind and encouraging, gentle and good. Sometimes he would look up at the sky and imagine that Timothy was watching him from a better place. I'm sorry, Henry would imagine himself telling his little brother, I should have never done those things to you. But I've changed. I'm good now. I wish I could have been this way for you. I'm sorry I couldn't realize it until too late. Then Timothy would smile and fade away. Henry hoped that he was doing what his little brother would have wanted. He was trying his best to be the good big brother that he had never been for Timothy. Henry couldn't change what he had done in the past, but he was sure that he was doing the right thing in the present. Katie was growing up to be healthy, smart, and beautiful. Her future looked bright and wonderful.
Katie never got that future. Henry had been out with friends that afternoon, watching a movie. He had walked out of the theatre, laughing and chatting, and parted with the group to head off to Freddy's, a present for his sister in his hands. How could he have expected the sight that met him when he arrived at his father's restaurant?
Who the hell had done this?! What kind of a sick, sick person -? Henry fought his way to Katie. He needed to get to her, no, she couldn't, not Katie, Katie couldn't… There was blood all over everywhere, banishing any hopes that the child was merely sleeping. Henry lost the will to resist the policeman pulling him away. As the crowd of parents surged forward, blocking the scene, all the young man could think of was how his sister must have felt during her last few moments. He numbly looked around. The only other person not joining in the fight to get to the children was his father. The man was staring up at the ceiling, blinking every few seconds. Henry had seen the same look in his father's eyes the day that the doctor had shaken his head at the side of Timothy's hospital bed. The man had already started the process of burying the memories of his daughter, just as he had with Timothy. In the present, Henry turned the page of the newspaper and gently picked up a photo of Katie smiling and holding up her little stuffed Vixie toy. The short stack of photographs was all that was left of her. The rest - her little dresses, VHS tapes of her playing, that favorite stuffed fox of hers - all of it had been burned.
The stack of memories went back into its little box on the shelf and the newspaper was once again being looked through. Crying over events that had happened years ago could be done after he found a decent job. He had to pull himself together now that he was on his own. It wasn't as if he hadn't expected his parents to finally kick him out. There was no family business to pass on to him, at any rate, and they had always been disappointed with his grades and just about everything else their oldest child tried to accomplish. Expected or not, Henry had still flinched when his father had made it clear that he was not going to continue supporting his adult son. The young man had left his parents' house with a few sets of clothes, some money his mother had slipped into his jacket pocket, and of course the photographs of his little brother and sister. As he had set off, Henry had said one final goodbye to his father. The look in the older man's eyes was the same as the one he had worn when Timmy and Katie had died. Henry knew that he was no longer welcome in the home of the man who already saw him as gone.
Darn his grades for giving him such crappy job options. Worker at the Freshy Mart? No, that was too far to walk every day. Clerk at the gas station? Er, the last few issues of the newspaper had contained articles about gas station minimarts getting armed robbers. Henry read on. He needed to find something; the streets didn't sound nearly as friendly as this apartment and they were a very real possibility if he didn't secure a job and pay the rent within the week. All the jobs on the list were too far away to walk, though, except -
Henry froze. The face of a bear he was all too familiar with grinned up at him from the paper. Somebody had bought the rights to his dad's old restaurant, patched up the old versions of the robots, and was hiring for the night shift. The place was close by, the pay wasn't worse than any of the other offered jobs, and there was nothing to complain about as far as necessary experience was concerned. But still, it had to be Freddy's. Why did it have to be Freddy's? Even if it wasn't the same location as the one he was familiar with, the place probably reeked with memories of children long gone. If nothing else, it would be embarrassing to show up as a minimum wage night guard at a place his father used to own. It was pretty much his only option though, unless he wanted to walk a mile two times a day, so like it or not he had to take it.
"Are you to drop off for a party or are you making a reservation for one?" the front desk lady asked impatiently.
"Actually, I'm looking to respond to a job offer I saw in the paper," said Henry. He hoped he looked acceptable enough to at least be considered for the position.
"Name?" the woman asked, scribbling something down on a piece of paper.
"Um, it's Henry Fazworth. I can -"
"You're hired."
"Wait, there isn't going to be an interview or a background check or -"
"Come in at five tonight for a prep and info session if you want the job," the woman rolled her eyes. "Now if you would kindly move out of the way, there are customers behind you."
Henry exited the Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria with a frown. The place looked like a total dump and the first employee he had met had been extremely rude. Still, he wasn't going to complain if this was going to get him a paycheck. Perhaps he would have thought differently if he had known that the job that he was about to take had never been held for longer than a week.
In the daytime, Freddy's looked like a run down party place. At night, however, it shed whatever friendliness it appeared to have under the light of the day and instead took on a creepy atmosphere. Henry stared up at the building and shivered. He wasn't sure of what to expect from being a night guard and the so-called "prep and info" session had been more of a "come in at twelve tonight here's a uniform you can borrow and by the way I'll be leaving you a script to record yourself reading from so I can play it to other newbies and it's a great idea because it'll shorten this already short meeting on terms of info I have to give you and by the way speaking of info I'm not giving you any so get out" session than something he actually learned from. This was his job, though, so he knew that he better start at least tolerating it. He straightened the purple sleeve of the security guard outfit that had been supplied to him and put his hand on the door.
"Good luck in there." Henry wheeled around to see a man about the same age as him standing in the otherwise empty parking lot. "You're the new security guard, right? Henry's your name? Good luck, then," the man said.
"Why would I need luck? And who are you?" Henry asked.
"Oh, just a guy who likes hanging around kiddie party places." He laughed at Henry's shocked expression. "Nah, I just walk past this place to get home. Got some friends who work here, tell me stuff from time to time. Gossip, new employee names, just little things like that. The name's Mike, by the way. Mike Schmidt."
"Ok, um, nice to meet you." Henry was starting to feel a little uncomfortable around the overly friendly man.
"The same to you. Good luck in there. You know, not all rumors are things you want to brush off."
"What do you mean?" Henry frowned.
"Oh, it's probably nothing. The after hours just make people jumpy, see things that aren't real. A little good luck never caused any harm, though." Mike winked and walked away, leaving Henry standing by the door alone. What a weird conversation, the guard thought to himself, but he didn't have time to ponder it. His watch was beeping 11:55. His shift was about to begin.