A/N: Hey everyone, hope you're having a great Halloween! With S04E04 out (Edward Mordrake Part II), I'd just like to say that my AU will somewhat stray from the story line, but will coincide quite a bit. Depending on how the writers will write the next episodes of Freak Show (don't wanna mention any spoilers) the ending may differ from the real thing. Have a Spooktacular day! ~Jen

Chapter 2

"Daniella, what did I just tell you?" Dora Brown said sternly as she walked into Daniella Mott's room. "Your mother's been expecting you in the country club the past hour already."

"I want to unpack first, Dora." Daniella said stubbornly, taking another dress from her luggage and placing it on a hanger. "It's not going to unpack itself."

"I'll do it." Dora snapped as she snatched another dress from Daniella's hands. "You went to London, baby girl, not a sweatshop."

"And you work for my mother, Dora, not me." She said stubbornly, thinking of every reason to not head down to the country club. But of course, Gloria Mott always got what she want-except grandchildren, though Daniella was sure she was trying to force her brother for that—and meeting her mother and her pretentious friends and shallow daughters in the club was inevitable.

I work for Miss Gloria. She could smell Dandy, imagining a part from the twins' drive from the train station to the mansion including Dandy's rants about their maid. Why couldn't Miss Gloria send that brat to England, and not Danie? She was sometimes in disbelief herself, thinking about how different these twins were in personality. "I'm not working for you, I'm helping you." She said firmly, blocking Daniella's way. "Get. In. Your. Buick…NOW."

Dora quickly reached in her pocket and tossed the keys to her. Daniella groaned, glanced at the mirror, straightening her blue polka dotted dress, before going. "I miss you too, Dora."

"I miss you too, child." Dora replied warmly. If only Dandy were more like his sister…wouldn't have to be scraping cat brains off the ground every week. "Danie…"

Daniella turned around, her brown, wavy hair flipping behind. "Yes?"

"Now that you're back…" Dora started uneasily. "…take care of your brother."

Daniella didn't need to be reminded. That hour drive from the train station to the Mott Mansion was enough time to realize what a spoiled brat Dandy had become. No wonder he's not married yet. "I will." She smiled before leaving the room.

"Right," Dora muttered, opening Daniella's luggage. "You take care of yourself, too, baby doll."

~0~0~0~

"Where do you think you're going?" Dandy called out haughtily from his playroom as Daniella passed by. "Mother said we're not supposed to leave the house unless she says so."

Speak for yourself. "Mother said I'm to meet her in the country club. Will you be joining us?"

"Hell no." He sounded disgusted. "It's boring, mother is just going to make me go out with another one of her girlfriends' daughters."

"Are they really that bad in Jupiter?" She asked, amused, knowing very well it was the other way around.

"Terrible, Danie." Dandy groaned. "They're just so...boring. And besides, I can't go—I'm being entertained."

Daniella opened the door to see her twin brother on the floor, playing with his puppets, beside the dirtiest clown she had ever seen. He had a white clown suit and had pale white make-up, but her outfit looked dirty with dust and smudges and his make-up was smudged that it looked like blood pouring down his hat and lips. But then again, if he's playing with Dandy, I guess I'd pick a bad day to wear white too.

"This is Mr. Clown, mother bought him for me." He said smugly, as though she, his educated twenty-one year old twin sister, was jealous of a man their mother paid to keep him company. At least I don't pay people to hang out with me. "Say hello, Mr. Clown. This is Daniella, my twin sister."

The clown stood up and bowed low before Daniella. Feeling sorry for the guy who was paid to like my brother, she kept the pretense and bowed, clutching the hems of her skirt like a princess curtseying.

"Nice to meet you." She smiled politely and held out her hand. The Clown shook it slowly, his hand big and sticky but otherwise gave her a warm feeling. Behind the mask that covered his lips, it looked like he was smiling. She reminded herself to get the guy better, darker-colored suits if he stuck long enough for Christmas. "Your silence is utterly provocative." She said dryly.

"Told you," Dandy smirked at the clown, who sat and continued bouncing a puppet on the floor. He turned back to his sister. "Oh, and something I forgot—since you're going out anyway, pick up your costume in Mrs. Flowers' shop in town."

"My costume?" She asked.

"Uhh, duh," He said as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. "For tonight's Halloween Ball."

"What ball?" Daniella asked. "I just got here."

"Mother's hold a ball here later—look, just get your princess costume at the tailor's before you go to the club, alright?"

"What's your problem?" Daniella asked, noting Dandy's unusual—well, unusually unusual—demeanor.

"I swear if I get another cowboy costume Daniella, mommy's gonna regret it." He pouted. "Don't you ever get tired of the princess thing?"

Last year, I was an abandoned college student in a foreign country last year. Would it kill you to remind our mother that she popped out two kids on the birthing table? "Not really. Is that all?"

The clown grew bored and began walking around the room. "No, it's not just that. I'm not dumb, Daniella," are you sure about that? "but guess who mother invited: the Pendletons, the Waylands, the Smithsons? This ball is just another attempt at getting me to settle down with some cow."

"You? And Lucy Pendleton?" Daniella asked dubiously. There was no way mother would do that. The Pendletons were a respectable family, but she knew her mother well enough that she would take no chances on her grandchild, and Lucy Pendleton did look like a cow. "I don't think mom would settle for her and you."

"But she is," He stressed. "I saw the list a few days ago: Johnsons, Sapphires, Fairchilds, Theodores—"

"The Fairchilds don't have a daughter." Daniella broke him off. Behind her, she could see in her peripheral the clown jumping. "Five minutes, Mr. Clown, my brother and I are talking."

"Sure they do," Dandy wailed. "That girl with the nose problem."

"Nicole Fairchild?" Daniella asked, and he nodded. "Dandy, she's already married."

"Then why are they invited?" He asked as though she could fix it, but she shrugged. Nicole's married, her younger sister's dating the Langdon guy, and she has no other sister, only…

Oh fuck.

"It's not a trap for you, Dandy." She said tensely. So this is what Dandy feels like—and to think mother promised the subject would be dropped when I left for college. "The Fairchilds don't have eligible daughters…they have a son. This is my trap."

Dandy took a while to comprehend, but when he did, he roared in laughter, his clown mimicking his actions.

"Shut up, shut up, shut uuuuup." She stomped her foot, the room making her feel like a child throwing a tantrum.

"Oh my god—you thought four years in London would protect you? No way are you going to avoid this!" Dandy screeched. "Good luck with that, Danie."

Daniella stormed out the room, throwing a pillow at her brother on the way out. She caught a glimpse of the clown suppressing a laugh under his mask, and she walked out to the garage and drove out the mansion as fast as she could, fighting the urge to drive off the cliff. It wasn't fair—her mother promised she'd drop the issue of Daniella's love life when she went to college. She wasn't against marriage, she was against her mother controlling her decision on whom to marry—she was going to marry for love, not the boy next door because her mother found it convenient.

And besides, this was her life, and if her mother thought she was going to control how she was going to spend it, she was deadly wrong.

Now if only she had the guts to tell that to her mother.