She tries to not react - to not overreact, but it feels like her heart is suddenly stuck in her throat. Like somehow she doesn't know how to make her brain work again, because she's stuck on the fact that her sober and dry brother suddenly wants a drink again. His sobriety has been a part of her family's life for so long now, that she doesn't know what to do about this now.
At the same time, Allison knows he has his reasons, that he wouldn't be throwing this away after this long over nothing. She can see the signs of it all over his face.
Just when she opens her mouth to speak, though, she remembers what she had told him in her kitchen so many years ago. That she would never force him, that she couldn't want this more than he did. That it was all his decision, not hers. It physically hurts to swallow down the words that are in the tip of her tongue, and she feels like her lungs are suddenly too small in her chest, but she had promised him, hadn't she?
"It's your choice," she finally manages quietly, standing up and following him out the door as she tries to ignore the screaming voices in her head telling her how this is wrong. This is just all wrong.
The words feel heavy, condemning, even if he knows Allison doesn't mean them to be. But they sit heavy in his mind. Living in California seems like eons ago, even though for her it's only been, what? A few days? A week?
He wanders toward the door and out into the hall, his bare feet slapping against the damp tile. He doesn't want to feel the cold of it, doesn't want to feel the sinking in his chest, the static in his mind, the sharp, needle-like tines the grief has slowly begun pressing deep into his heart. They suffocate him, winding their way up along his throat, gripping at the back of his tongue, making speech and breathing feel nigh impossible.
But he moves with the ease of a man sleep walking, feet slowly moving one out in front of the other, passing corridors with chipped paint, old drawings, the ghosts of laughter and pain from children who wanted nothing more than to be loved by someone. Anyone.
When he makes it to the main sitting room, he runs fingertips along the dusty backs of couches, display cases, books. Years and years he spent here, poring over texts for assignments, reading between the lines to try and discover himself in their pages, to crack the code to mastering his ability. When he finally comes back from his memories, he's standing in front of the liquor cabinet, all but facing it down, man to man. He opens the delicate glass door and the assortment has thinned over the years, but still ample: ornate decanters and old, vintage bottles with wax seals intact. He plucks one decanter up, crystal shaped like a swan, and uncorks it to smell the amber liquid within.
Sherry, perhaps? Scotch. The smell is so acidic it burns his nose in a way that makes him cough. Plucking a glass from the shelf, he starts to pour. A finger, first, then another, and another. Until the glass itself is almost full to the brim. He stares down at it for a long time, the smell strong and familiar, like an old, dangerous friend.
"Shit."
He could drink it, feel numb again, let the alcohol wash away the deeply cut hurt. But for how long? How long until the alcohol isn't enough, until there's one thing after another and he's back to where he started?
He suddenly, violently, throws the decanter on the ground, the crystal shattering, the sharp, tangy alcohol splattering all over the floor. The glass is next, swiped clean off the cabinet before he goes reaching for another decanter to shatter.
"God damn it." There another goes before he finally sinks to the floor, his back against the cabinet, his head buried deep into his arms.
By the time they reach the bottom of the stairs, Allison lets him walk into the other room, not willing to follow him and watch him drink. She can't. She can feel her resolve dissolving with every step, and she doesn't know what will happen if she actually watches him drink. It feels like she's choking with all the things that she wants to say but can't bring herself to, not wanting to go back on a promise that she had made him when he had been so far gone that the end of the tunnel felt so distant. Now they are here, so far removed from those days, but it feels like Klaus is about to hurl himself back into that precipice. She should stop him, she needs to stop him, but will it matter? Will it work? Will he stop for today, only to be tempted to do it tomorrow? To fall back into old patterns, like how Diego had said? Would he not tell her next time, and just do it?
It has been seven years, and suddenly that fear that she used to live with regarding his addiction suddenly grips at her so tightly that it feels like she's drowning all over again.
As they part ways, for a moment Allison almost reaches out to him to stop him, to get him in the car so they could go home now, apocalypse be damned. She doesn't, though, and instead she steps into the hallway leading towards the kitchen, leaning against the wall as she tries to get herself to breathe again. For seven years they had lived a life that was almost normal, that was happy, and all it had taken was a trip back here to fuck it all up. It feels like Reginald's one last parting gift, one last landmine to destroy everything again, and she finds herself cursing their father mentally for it all.
Most of all, she hates herself for agreeing to come. For not finding him sooner. For not getting them both on a plane the moment the funeral was done so they could go back to their old life and ignore the Academy ever existed.
Just as she's about to finish the walk to the kitchen, the sound of crystal shattering catches her attention and she's moving without thinking twice about it. She half expects the bastards from the other night to be here again, attacking them, but as she rushes into the sitting room she just sees him, hurling the decanter down. From the corner of her eye she can see Pogo approaching, but she quietly tells him to just keep everyone out of the room for now, before walking over to Klaus and sitting next to him. She doesn't know what to say, what can she say, so instead she just tries to pull him into her arms again. If he pulls away, she'll just sit there, waiting for him to be ready.
Klaus doesn't seem to notice her at first, his face buried into his arms, his knees pulled up. It's not unlike how he used to curl in on himself as a child, waiting for their father to open the door to the mausoleum and set him free. But he's not trapped inside an old, stone building in a far-off cemetery this time. It's his own body, his mind.
Trapped and cornered by the need to escape into something, to turn his mind into mush all over again and call it quits. But Allison's arms are strong and warm, they're very real and with her sitting beside him, he leans heavily into her, all but curling up on his side, his head resting on her shoulder.
"You can do a breathalyzer if you want," there's the mark of old bitterness in his voice, making the edges curl up and wither, but the heat of the words dies on his tongue, dissolving into a weak laugh.
Out in the corridor, there's the tell-tale thunder of Diego's boots, Pogo's weak insistence that things are just fine. There's an argument, a tension in the silence that follows before those boots clomp back up the stairs. If Diego could see through walls, he'd be burning a hole through the ceiling to see what unfolded in the sitting room.
Ben perches at his other side, not touching him, not talking, just sitting. Sitting in a position where, had he been corporeal, their legs might be touching, their shoulders. Small but present motions. You've got this, Klaus, he finally says and something about it makes Klaus' heart ache. He doesn't want to move forward, but he has to.
"Sorry," he says finally, weakly, his arms reaching to curl around Allison, hug her tightly as much as she is hugging him. "Dad always said I had a flair for the dramatic, right?"
As he leans against her, Allison just holds him close, not saying anything. Even when he mentions the breathalyzer, she doesn’t say anything but just tightens her hold on him. She has never used one on him, even during the worst of his withdrawals, and she isn’t planning on using one now, even if she knows her other brothers would probably take him up on his suggestion if they would have heard him. Especially if they would have seen him upstairs, telling her about needing a drink before they could continue their attempt to stop the apocalypse.
For a moment Allison half expects Diego or Luther to storm in, or even Five just to tell them that they don’t have time for this, but the room remains silent and she just lets her focus turn back to Klaus.
“It’s okay,” she reassures him, her head leaning against his when he hugs her back. “You know I’ve never minded.” She stays still for a moment, just holding him as her heart eases back to a relatively normal rhythm, before she speaks again.
“Did you get cut anywhere?” She didn’t see any blood, but at the same time she had been too busy just trying to get to his side to even properly assess for any injuries.
Klaus sighs and for the first time in all of this, he finally seems to settle down, body relaxing and going slack against her. He’s exhausted, and sleep sounds delightful, but he knows too well that he won’t be able to rest. That his family won’t allow him the time to rest, either, since the world is ending and what not.
“I’m fine. I am an expert at breaking valuable things. No personal injury necessary.”
He slowly sits up, pulling himself away from her shoulder. He runs his hands back through his hair, frowning when he realizes he’s definitely spilled some of the alcohol on his hands. He laughs at the thought, letting his head fall back against the cabinet.
“But now I smell like a drunk, so at least the family will have something to entertain them for a while. Who would we be without one of us playing the family fuck up, after all.”
“They don’t know you, they just think they do. They can just shove it, we have more important things to do.”
Although it’s said quietly, the fierceness for him behind it is still there. Although she and Luther haven’t discussed the phone call from seven years ago, when he called her as if to check if she had lost her mind for bringing Klaus to California with her, she can see in his eyes the same doubt she heard in his voice that day. Diego hasn’t made another quip since Allison had punched him on her way out to look for Klaus days ago, but she knows he might say something now and she can feel her defenses flare. They haven’t seen Klaus in years, haven’t seen how hard he worked at crawling out of that hole he had been in since he was a teenager. They hadn’t seen the way he lit up with happiness when he met Claire, how he’s her absolute best friend in the entire world. How he cares for her, for them, and as Allison leans in to kiss his forehead, she makes a silent promise to keep defending him and his name. She’s proud of him, so fucking proud of him, and this hasn’t changed anything.
She digs her keys out of her pocket and gives them to him. “Wait for me in the car, okay? We’ll go somewhere else for a few hours, take a break.” Maybe he can sleep in the car while she drives, she thinks but doesn’t say it. “I think we both need it. We’ll regroup after. I don’t think either of us should be here right now.”
Taking a break will give them both a chance to breathe. It’ll give her a chance to convince herself to not drive straight to the airport without even bothering to say goodbye.
"I'm going to need a burrito as big as my head, some aspirin, and maybe a couple of those weird chocolate, peanut butter wafer things with the hilariously inappropriate name. What, like, nuttybars? Who names a dessert nuttybar."
He takes her keys and looks at them, the suggestion that they are nothing if not a car ride away from being free of this place. A tiny part of him is tempted, really, to take the car and drive the whole route back to California, watching the apocalypse from the horizon.
He knows he can't, knows he won't. He loves his family, even for how fucked up they all are. But he pushes himself to his feet with a huff, not bothering with shoes as he steps over the puddle of alcohol, the shattered glass, and offers her a hand up.
"Or a puppy. Claire wants a puppy and I'll be just the best uncle in the world if I bring her back a puppy instead of handing her an apocalypse in a hand basket with a ribbon on top."
And once she's to her feet, he starts for the door of the sitting room, body sagging in a way that it usually doesn't, but he's trying. He slowly begins rebuilding the walls that crashed down in Vietnam, but for now, this will have to be enough.
Allison takes the act for what it is, but she plays her part, too. She smiles as he rambles about food, rolls her eyes when he brings up a puppy for Claire, and acts how they normally would if his world hadn’t been flipped upside down. She hates it, hates every second of it because she wishes it wasn’t needed. That Klaus hadn’t been taken, that he wouldn’t have been transported to Vietnam.
She wishes they wouldn’t have come here. Reginald didn’t deserve it, but they had come out of...what, duty? Duty is what almost drowned them as children, and now what fucked everything up.
As he leaves the room, Allison watches after him, listening for anyone that might intercept him or say anything. No one does, but it allows her to watch the way his shoulders sag, the weight of it all crashing on him.
One more day, she tells herself. They’ll stay one more day before they haul ass back to California. Hopefully by then this will at least seem somewhat worth it.
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no subject
At the same time, Allison knows he has his reasons, that he wouldn't be throwing this away after this long over nothing. She can see the signs of it all over his face.
Just when she opens her mouth to speak, though, she remembers what she had told him in her kitchen so many years ago. That she would never force him, that she couldn't want this more than he did. That it was all his decision, not hers. It physically hurts to swallow down the words that are in the tip of her tongue, and she feels like her lungs are suddenly too small in her chest, but she had promised him, hadn't she?
"It's your choice," she finally manages quietly, standing up and following him out the door as she tries to ignore the screaming voices in her head telling her how this is wrong. This is just all wrong.
no subject
The words feel heavy, condemning, even if he knows Allison doesn't mean them to be. But they sit heavy in his mind. Living in California seems like eons ago, even though for her it's only been, what? A few days? A week?
He wanders toward the door and out into the hall, his bare feet slapping against the damp tile. He doesn't want to feel the cold of it, doesn't want to feel the sinking in his chest, the static in his mind, the sharp, needle-like tines the grief has slowly begun pressing deep into his heart. They suffocate him, winding their way up along his throat, gripping at the back of his tongue, making speech and breathing feel nigh impossible.
But he moves with the ease of a man sleep walking, feet slowly moving one out in front of the other, passing corridors with chipped paint, old drawings, the ghosts of laughter and pain from children who wanted nothing more than to be loved by someone. Anyone.
When he makes it to the main sitting room, he runs fingertips along the dusty backs of couches, display cases, books. Years and years he spent here, poring over texts for assignments, reading between the lines to try and discover himself in their pages, to crack the code to mastering his ability. When he finally comes back from his memories, he's standing in front of the liquor cabinet, all but facing it down, man to man. He opens the delicate glass door and the assortment has thinned over the years, but still ample: ornate decanters and old, vintage bottles with wax seals intact. He plucks one decanter up, crystal shaped like a swan, and uncorks it to smell the amber liquid within.
Sherry, perhaps? Scotch. The smell is so acidic it burns his nose in a way that makes him cough. Plucking a glass from the shelf, he starts to pour. A finger, first, then another, and another. Until the glass itself is almost full to the brim. He stares down at it for a long time, the smell strong and familiar, like an old, dangerous friend.
"Shit."
He could drink it, feel numb again, let the alcohol wash away the deeply cut hurt. But for how long? How long until the alcohol isn't enough, until there's one thing after another and he's back to where he started?
He suddenly, violently, throws the decanter on the ground, the crystal shattering, the sharp, tangy alcohol splattering all over the floor. The glass is next, swiped clean off the cabinet before he goes reaching for another decanter to shatter.
"God damn it." There another goes before he finally sinks to the floor, his back against the cabinet, his head buried deep into his arms.
no subject
It has been seven years, and suddenly that fear that she used to live with regarding his addiction suddenly grips at her so tightly that it feels like she's drowning all over again.
As they part ways, for a moment Allison almost reaches out to him to stop him, to get him in the car so they could go home now, apocalypse be damned. She doesn't, though, and instead she steps into the hallway leading towards the kitchen, leaning against the wall as she tries to get herself to breathe again. For seven years they had lived a life that was almost normal, that was happy, and all it had taken was a trip back here to fuck it all up. It feels like Reginald's one last parting gift, one last landmine to destroy everything again, and she finds herself cursing their father mentally for it all.
Most of all, she hates herself for agreeing to come. For not finding him sooner. For not getting them both on a plane the moment the funeral was done so they could go back to their old life and ignore the Academy ever existed.
Just as she's about to finish the walk to the kitchen, the sound of crystal shattering catches her attention and she's moving without thinking twice about it. She half expects the bastards from the other night to be here again, attacking them, but as she rushes into the sitting room she just sees him, hurling the decanter down. From the corner of her eye she can see Pogo approaching, but she quietly tells him to just keep everyone out of the room for now, before walking over to Klaus and sitting next to him. She doesn't know what to say, what can she say, so instead she just tries to pull him into her arms again. If he pulls away, she'll just sit there, waiting for him to be ready.
no subject
Trapped and cornered by the need to escape into something, to turn his mind into mush all over again and call it quits. But Allison's arms are strong and warm, they're very real and with her sitting beside him, he leans heavily into her, all but curling up on his side, his head resting on her shoulder.
"You can do a breathalyzer if you want," there's the mark of old bitterness in his voice, making the edges curl up and wither, but the heat of the words dies on his tongue, dissolving into a weak laugh.
Out in the corridor, there's the tell-tale thunder of Diego's boots, Pogo's weak insistence that things are just fine. There's an argument, a tension in the silence that follows before those boots clomp back up the stairs. If Diego could see through walls, he'd be burning a hole through the ceiling to see what unfolded in the sitting room.
Ben perches at his other side, not touching him, not talking, just sitting. Sitting in a position where, had he been corporeal, their legs might be touching, their shoulders. Small but present motions. You've got this, Klaus, he finally says and something about it makes Klaus' heart ache. He doesn't want to move forward, but he has to.
"Sorry," he says finally, weakly, his arms reaching to curl around Allison, hug her tightly as much as she is hugging him. "Dad always said I had a flair for the dramatic, right?"
no subject
For a moment Allison half expects Diego or Luther to storm in, or even Five just to tell them that they don’t have time for this, but the room remains silent and she just lets her focus turn back to Klaus.
“It’s okay,” she reassures him, her head leaning against his when he hugs her back. “You know I’ve never minded.” She stays still for a moment, just holding him as her heart eases back to a relatively normal rhythm, before she speaks again.
“Did you get cut anywhere?” She didn’t see any blood, but at the same time she had been too busy just trying to get to his side to even properly assess for any injuries.
no subject
“I’m fine. I am an expert at breaking valuable things. No personal injury necessary.”
He slowly sits up, pulling himself away from her shoulder. He runs his hands back through his hair, frowning when he realizes he’s definitely spilled some of the alcohol on his hands. He laughs at the thought, letting his head fall back against the cabinet.
“But now I smell like a drunk, so at least the family will have something to entertain them for a while. Who would we be without one of us playing the family fuck up, after all.”
no subject
Although it’s said quietly, the fierceness for him behind it is still there. Although she and Luther haven’t discussed the phone call from seven years ago, when he called her as if to check if she had lost her mind for bringing Klaus to California with her, she can see in his eyes the same doubt she heard in his voice that day. Diego hasn’t made another quip since Allison had punched him on her way out to look for Klaus days ago, but she knows he might say something now and she can feel her defenses flare. They haven’t seen Klaus in years, haven’t seen how hard he worked at crawling out of that hole he had been in since he was a teenager. They hadn’t seen the way he lit up with happiness when he met Claire, how he’s her absolute best friend in the entire world. How he cares for her, for them, and as Allison leans in to kiss his forehead, she makes a silent promise to keep defending him and his name. She’s proud of him, so fucking proud of him, and this hasn’t changed anything.
She digs her keys out of her pocket and gives them to him. “Wait for me in the car, okay? We’ll go somewhere else for a few hours, take a break.” Maybe he can sleep in the car while she drives, she thinks but doesn’t say it. “I think we both need it. We’ll regroup after. I don’t think either of us should be here right now.”
Taking a break will give them both a chance to breathe. It’ll give her a chance to convince herself to not drive straight to the airport without even bothering to say goodbye.
no subject
He takes her keys and looks at them, the suggestion that they are nothing if not a car ride away from being free of this place. A tiny part of him is tempted, really, to take the car and drive the whole route back to California, watching the apocalypse from the horizon.
He knows he can't, knows he won't. He loves his family, even for how fucked up they all are. But he pushes himself to his feet with a huff, not bothering with shoes as he steps over the puddle of alcohol, the shattered glass, and offers her a hand up.
"Or a puppy. Claire wants a puppy and I'll be just the best uncle in the world if I bring her back a puppy instead of handing her an apocalypse in a hand basket with a ribbon on top."
And once she's to her feet, he starts for the door of the sitting room, body sagging in a way that it usually doesn't, but he's trying. He slowly begins rebuilding the walls that crashed down in Vietnam, but for now, this will have to be enough.
no subject
She wishes they wouldn’t have come here. Reginald didn’t deserve it, but they had come out of...what, duty? Duty is what almost drowned them as children, and now what fucked everything up.
As he leaves the room, Allison watches after him, listening for anyone that might intercept him or say anything. No one does, but it allows her to watch the way his shoulders sag, the weight of it all crashing on him.
One more day, she tells herself. They’ll stay one more day before they haul ass back to California. Hopefully by then this will at least seem somewhat worth it.