These Little Wonders

"When our parents died I took it harder than dad even, but I kept it together for Felix. I've never seen someone handle death so well..." Louis explained. "But after a while I couldn’t keep pretending I wasn’t rotting from the inside out so... I left.

“I left her the house, most of my inheritance along with her own, and anything else I could think of to help her survive on her own without us. If she didn’t send me a picture every month I wouldn’t know she was alive."

Proof of this Louis pulled out his cell phone and began showing him random pictures that was only ever Felix.

The toe of her red converse, a banana peel on the floor of her room, all of her wigs on their various heads, set up so they were having a swanky tea party minus the rest of their bodies, and the last one, her hand holding another.

It was Brendon's hand.

"I'm assuming this is you. I think she sent it to me to let me know there was someone in her life, one of her weird read between the lines quirks." Louis mused, no longer sitting next to Brendon but thousands of miles away where he had been that morning.

"Has she always been so... eccentric?" Brendon asked, not sure how to phrase his question.

Louis chuckled and nodded. "To a certain degree. When... when mom got sick she started doing weirder things, living outside of the box just to get her to laugh or smile."

Brendon tried to imagine this Felix he was describing, a younger girl, still innocent but desperate to reclaim happiness, even when there was none left.

"You shouldn't have left her the house." Brendon said, speaking the thought from earlier before he forgot it.

"Why's that?" Louis asked, intrigued.

Brendon answered, "Because she's gotten so attached to it and now she'll never move on."

A sigh escaped Louis's lips. "I've been thinking about moving back you know, giving her a chance to move on with her life. I do feel bad for leaving that all on her; I can only imagine how she feels going there each day with the memories of what's happened there."

Brendon nodded, choosing not to tell him about what it was like.

"Did she ever tell you her real name is Anna?" Louis asked, trying to shift the conversation somewhere else.

He shook his head, unable to imagine his quirky pink haired love as anything so mundane.

"Yeah she decided when she was eleven that Anna was too boring and that she knew she deserved something better, more... her. So she borrowed our grandfather's name."

Brendon nodded, the whole subject of names bringing about a new question in his head he added to his Felix Infinite Questions List that resided only in his mind.

"What is her name? I mean, her full name."

Louis smiled. "Anna Grace Evans. You have to admit it's not her at all."

With a laugh Brendon agreed and leaned closer.

"So, can I ask you something? Like a favor almost?" Brendon asked timidly, answered with a hesitant nod. "Felix is a giant enigma to me... can you tell me more about her?"

Louis nodded, his easy smile returning. "Of course. I understand the enigma part. I've known her since she was born and I still don’t quite understand her."

Without much effort Brendon dusted off his list of questions and began.

"Why is she so afraid of commitment? She avoided anything that would've officially made us more than friends. I mean, she refused to be called my girlfriend, refused to tell me how she felt, and it was so confusing because she wouldn't explain it either."

Louis sighed and looked down at his hands on the table.

"I was afraid of something like that happening after I left." He muttered to himself before turning to Brendon. "I think she's afraid of getting attached to someone, especially someone like you, because she doesn't want to get hurt if they leave her."

"That doesn't make any sense." Brendon blurted out.

Louis shook his head. "Think about it. My mom left her when she died, my dad left her when he killed himself, I left her when I moved away, and now so are you going on tour. We've all left her and..."

He trailed off, a sudden realization filling his eyes. "We've all left her... and she's somewhere in Las Vegas alone and hurt."

Brendon finally understood what he meant, and made a move to get up from the chair, his poor attempt and running back for Felix.

But Louis's hand on his shoulder stopped him.

"No Brendon, we can't go running back to her. It's... Felix needs to be alone right now. She's been hiding under this veil of quirks and happiness for so long and not confronting all of these problems. We can't keep going back and being another distraction for her pain. I love my sister more than you'd believe but this is something she needs to do."

Unease filled Brendon and he looked over to Louis for reassurance. "Can she do it?"

Louis nodded surely. "She's strong enough."

And although his words seemed to assure Brendon, he seemed to be saying them more for himself than for Brendon.