Closed: The World is Quiet Here.

[biteybaby]

Nightmares are nothing new for Sunny Baudelaire. There was a time when she had them somewhat infrequently, before her birth parents tragically perished in a sudden house fire that may or may not have been started by an individual who may or may not have recently died any number of painful deaths, though research into the exact specifics of those events is still ongoing. After previously mentioned arson, Sunny Baudelaire experienced a period of very frequent nightmares, followed by a few months where her nightmares were lessening, a word which here means "became less frequent, though did still happen from time to time".

Unfortunately, she has been having very intense nightmares every time she has fallen asleep in recent days, and in general her waking hours have been less than ideal as well. Recently it seems like everyone but her got to be reunited with their loved ones from home, but all Sunny got was --

She wakes up, multiple times during the night, screaming at the viciously frightening dreams her subconscious has decided to inflict on her. Count Olaf, dead, getting up though and continuing to menace her. Count Olaf kidnapping her and taking her back home, away from her daddies and her brother and everyone else, and keeping her in another birdcage. Count Olaf killing Violet and Klaus in all of the many several ways many several people killed him. Magnu's mommy, who by all accounts was a very lovely person in real life, but in Sunny's dreams she's mean and horrible and laughs at her because her mommy didn't get to come here, even though they're both equally dead and therefore equally as likely to show up.

Sunny is very glad that every time she wakes up crying her daddies are there to hug her and calm her down enough to go back to sleep. She is also very glad that she is still wearing her bedtime pull ups every night. Most of all though, she is glad that Count Olaf is definitely incredibly dead, and even though she can't be with Violet and Klaus, she knows they won't be harmed by him any more. She just wishes the nightmares about the whole situation would stop.

This morning she wakes up screaming from a nightmare at almost the same time she gets up normally, and so she decides to just stay awake. She has big plans to go get groceries with Magnu anyway, and after a bit of a touch and go start to her day, she's finally dressed and out the door with Magnu.

Comments

[summerdude]

Magnus looks at her for a long, long time. "I wish they could come here, too," he says softly. He picks up a water balloon, says, "The fact that Violet and Klaus aren't here yet," and lobs it over the edge of the play structure, all without breaking the hug.

[biteybaby]

Sunny does finally break the hug, out of necessity so that she can grab a balloon for herself and throw it over the side as she says, "Don't even get visit."

[summerdude]

"Can I ask you a question?" Magnus asks, slowly and with a little trepidation. "A maybe really hard question?"

[biteybaby]

"Uh huh."

[summerdude]

"Do you think it would be worse to have Violet and Klaus visit but not be able to stay?"

[biteybaby]

Sunny thinks about this for a long while. "Some people stay. I make them stay."

[summerdude]

Gods. Okay. So it's good that Violet and Klaus couldn't come, because if they left, Sunny would be properly devastated.

"I believe you," he tells her, wiping away an errant lingering tear with his thumb and then hugging her again.

[biteybaby]

"Far sibling stay, so mine too."

[summerdude]

"Did you know Alex was my visitor last year?" Magnus asks. He sits fully down, leaning against the wall of the play structure, gesturing to tell her she can sit on his lap if she wants. "Except Alex had to go home for like four months before she found her way back to stay."

[biteybaby]

Sunny takes him up on the offer and plops down in his lap. “That long time…”

[summerdude]

"It was a really long time." He tugs on the end of her ponytail. "It felt like forever. I started to worry that she would never show up. I think I was really cranky at Dad and Hanguang-jun about that, actually."

[biteybaby]

"You big sad if no Alex here..." She doesn't want Magnu to be sad!

[summerdude]

"Yeah," Magnus says. "I was really sad. I actually started thinking that it would have been better if she never visited, because it just made it harder to wait after she left."

[biteybaby]

"Why?"

[summerdude]

"Before he visited, I missed him a lot and didn't know if I'd ever see him again and it made me sad. After he visited, I knew what it would be like if he was here, and it made the waiting hurt a lot more. Especially since at first I was convinced she would show up again any day now, and then the longer it went, the harder it became to believe I'd see her again. Before she showed up for visitor's day, I had... hm. It was easier to hope."

[biteybaby]

Sunny listens intently to Magnu's story. It all sounds so incredibly familiar, except completely the opposite from her experience. When Sunny first arrived at the mansion, she was convinced if she just looked hard enough, Violet and Klaus would show up in a room somewhere. Once she realized they weren't here yet, she switched to waiting. And she waited, and she waited, and she waited. And then she waited some more.

But another visitor's day has come and gone, and her siblings did not show up. Maybe Magnu saw Alex on the first visitor's day, and that made it harder to hope he would show up for good, but he did show up for good.

Violet and Klaus didn't even get to show up for visitor's day.

That is what makes it really hard for Sunny to hope. She thinks if they did show up, surely she could figure out a way for them to stay, like how Phelia stayed, and like how Alex came back to stay. But if they don't show up at all, they must not have any sort of way to get here in the first place. If they were here she could at least have a chance.

Her former coworker Phil was an optimist, which meant he thought hopeful and pleasant thoughts about nearly everything, even situations that were neither pleasant nor full of hope. Sunny thinks that if he were here right now, he might tell her that Violet and Klaus will probably show up any minute now, and that the fact they didn't get to come visit just means they are waiting until they can move here permanently.

Sunny, as it turns out, is not much of an optimist.

She curls up in her brother's lap, fairly certain he's the only sibling she is going to ever have here.

[summerdude]

Magnus isn't going to promise that they'll find a way, because he doesn't want to promise something so important if he can't guarantee it. "I'm just saying I know it sucks really bad," he tells her, giving her a little squeeze. "And I know I'm really, really lucky. I'm lucky to have Alex, and I'm lucky to have two great dads -- and one Jerome -- and such a great, cool, fun, smart, talented little sister. There's people I really, really miss back home, people who are like family to me, but... I know it's different than it is for you. I know it really, really sucks extra bad for you that Violet and Klaus didn't come, and the worst possible person did. And I'm sorry that it's so unfair."

[biteybaby]

"You really really lucky. I'm never lucky," says Sunny, who does not know that much of her life is chronicled in a set of books titled A Series of Unfortunate Events, or even that there's books about her at all, but if she did know, and had to guess at the title, she might guess something incredibly similar.

[summerdude]

"No? Even to have two great dads and a good second brother?"

[biteybaby]

"Three great dads," Sunny corrects. Much like how Quigley didn't stop being Duncan and Isadora's triplet when he died, Sunny's first father didn't stop being her dad when he died either.

[summerdude]

"Three great dads and one great mom," Magnus agrees.

[biteybaby]

Sunny nods. After a long pause, she finally says, "I'm lucky have here-family."

[summerdude]

"But you miss your there-family too."

[biteybaby]

She nods again.

[summerdude]

Magnus hands her a balloon. "Wanna scream and throw some water balloons about it?"