substances | klaus hargreeves 👻 ic inbox

"Oh, I've been to a few, or at least I was before the whole...apocalypse thing." he says, breathing the last two out words on a deep sigh, "It's easy to scramble up the money for a cover charge, way easier to get myself supplied for the night with whatever was available."

A moment after he's said it, he realizes who he's saying it to, and drops his head back to thump against the wall, "Sorry, sorry sorry sorry, that's not what...that isn't what I meant about wanting to do with you, just...that was what it was last time I went, and..."

Dropping his hands to his sides, he sighs deeply, eyes sinking shut, "Yeah. There's ghosts here, and I've been sober, so of course I have problems with it. There aren't as many as at home, thank Christ, but they're worse, somehow, they're glitchy and they...you know, they flicker, like bad TV signal and they don't scream but they follow me around and...it's fucked, Diego. It's just fucked."

He sees that regret at his words the instant it hits Klaus' face and his heart sinks. That's his fault, he knows it is. Klaus shouldn't have to be so... ashamed and self-conscious of what he says, constantly worried about Diego's judgements of him. Diego can't really help how he sees things, this situation has been going on for so long it's hard not to let those past moments influence his current opinions. Doesn't mean he doesn't feel bad about it-- but... how does he even say that? He doesn't know.

"It's okay, Klaus." he says quietly, "I... I know that... I mean, I know that a lot of your stories from before are- are gonna involve that stuff, it's... okay. You don't have to feel bad for talking about it."

When he talks about the ghosts, it's... hard. The way he just nearly curls in on himself, tries to shrink away and disappear just for it being brought to the front of his mind. Diego doesn't like being the reason his brother looks like that. "Do they talk to you? Ever- say anything useful at all?" He doesn't mean to take that Number Two position suddenly-- Leader in Luther's absence, practicality over emotions, breaking everything into missions. It just happens.

It just seems like the wrong time to mention his particular memories about going to clubs and getting high and seeing shows. They're good memories, at least the ones he can remember, but he knows how Diego feels about how he'd been then. Diego had freaked out today because he thought Klaus was going back to being like that, and now he's just reminded him of that and they're going to fight again and...

Oh. Diego is saying it's okay, that he doesn't mind if Klaus talks about it.

"Oh...oh okay, okay...yeah..." he mumbles, glancing down at his own knees. Lifting a hand, he bites at his fingernail again, and exhales, wraps his arms around his raised knees, as if making himself smaller would keep him safer from the ghosts, the monsters that are all around him like some kind of fucked up horror movie.

"I mean...no, no not really. I can't understand half of it anyway, it's all..." He lifts one hand, enough to gesture vaguely toward the side, "Garbled up, like with static and microphone feedback."

Diego is a plethora of contradictions, which is probably part of what makes it so hard for Klaus to talk to him at times. Sometimes, he goes off at the drop of a hat, others it's... this attempted sense of understanding, even when he doesn't actually understand at all. It's an amalgam of flip-flopping that makes interactions confusing, only made worse by that idea of trying to be better already so drilled into the undercurrent of everything he's doing, from his short time in the other place, conversations he'd had. Watching Allison, and the way she was trying so hard to mend things with Vanya. He could do that, couldn't he?

He nods a little at the explanation. "Right... yeah, that's..." he frowns a little. "Weird. Something about this place inferring, I guess?" He's doing it again and he silently curses himself for it. He shakes his head a little, "We can talk about something else."

Diego is...well, he's unpredictable, and that's why it's sometimes hard to open up to him. He's easier than most of the others, but Klaus feels like he can never quite tell if Diego's gonna be pissed at him or sympathetic for half of what he says to him. Sometimes, he's just not in a place where he can deal with that. Sometimes, Diego makes him feel so damn safe and sometimes so angry he just blurts shit out like he had earlier about the oxy.

Swallowing hard, he glances over at his brother as Diego asks if maybe something is interfering with them, that it's weird, and then says they can talk about something else. Staring into space, Klaus shakes his head, pushes his fingertips against his mouth for a moment while he tries to figure out how to say what's going through his head. Everything is still swimming a bit from being around the algae stuff, and Diego is unpredictable, Klaus feels a little on edge.

But Diego is trying.

"No...no no, man, it's okay. You know...it's been a really long time since. You know since any of you have talked to me about them. The ghosts. I never really felt like you guys took it seriously, like...I thought...they figure I'm just a junkie because I'm a coward, not because there's..."

He trails off and waves a hand, still just staring ahead of himself, "You know, it gets really bad. Did I ever tell you what they looked like back home?"

"You sure?" He presses a little more when Klaus says it's okay, because it doesn't exactly feel okay. Or maybe that's his own unease? It's hard to tell, sometimes. "I did." He admits quietly, biting his lip slightly. "I mean- I always kind of felt like...drugs were a coward's way out. That if you could stop being so scared of it, you could control it more." He's not completely sure that's right, but it's true, at least to his own assumptions for all these years. The honesty stings, but it's better than not admitting, isn't it?

He shakes his head a little. "No, I don't think so."

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