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Holding hands had been extremely difficult for Diego to become comfortable with, especially in public; but he loved Eudora, and he wanted to be close to her - to touch her. Diego never thought he’d feel comfortable with someone’s touch. They walked hand in hand back to their apartment, feeling comfortably full after their lunch out. Diego still felt kind of anxious about having moved in together. He liked his own space, and he and Eudora had already split up and gotten back together several times... most of those times being Diego’s fault. He hoped he wouldn’t let her down. He’d hated living with six siblings, it was hard to accept sharing his personal space again... even with Eudora.
“Why don’t you join the force, too?” Eudora mused, smiling at her boyfriend lovingly. She’d graduated from college recently, and was now in the police academy. She would be a great cop, Diego thought. Him, not so much.
“I-“ he let out a little scoff “I wouldn’t be great at that.” he mumbled, a little embarrassed even imagining himself fucking things up. He struggled with authority, and probably always would thanks to their bastard of a father.
Eudora squeezed his hand slightly, setting her gaze back onto the sidewalk. “I think you would.” she admitted gently “You care about helping people.” Diego shamefully looked away, even though he was aware she wasn’t even looking at him. His vigilantism was a sore point for them. Eudora disapproved of the violence and criminal aspects, and Diego was determined it was a necessary force to keep people safe. They’d already broken up once or twice about it.
“I can barely keep a job down without losing my shit at my boss,” he mumbled quietly, growing more ashamed “I don’t think that would go over great with a cop for a boss.” He’d considered it, of course he had - but he knew he wasn’t cut out for it. Was he? If Eudora thought he was... maybe she was right. She tends to know best. Diego glanced across to meet her eyes, he always found himself lost in them. “I don’t know...” he muttered “maybe I’ll think about it.” Eudora beamed up at him, and he beamed right back. Maybe he could learn to control his anger, with her support.
Flitting his vision back ahead of him, Diego abruptly came to a stop as he saw his brother walking in their direction. He was talking away to himself, as though that were a perfectly normal thing to do. He’d either not noticed, or just didn’t care, that the other people were parting around him as though he were Moses in the Red Sea. Eudora continued walking for a moment, causing her to tug on Diego’s hand and turn around in confusion. Diego pulled her along with him behind the door of a nearby store. “It’s my brother.” he hissed.
Eudora’s face lit up with recognition as she realised why her boyfriend was acting so weird. She began to peer over her shoulder to look, but Diego gently shook her arm. “Which one... the asshole?!” she whispered with great intrigue.
“They’re both assholes!” Diego shout-whispered, growing progressively panicked as Klaus grew closer. Eudora could not meet him. Diego winced and gently shoved Eudora into the store when Klaus was just getting close enough to notice his brother. “You can’t meet him!” he hissed to her, still wincing. She timidly peered back at Diego and mouthed a why?, leading Diego to make the universally understood crazy gesture.
“Diego?” Klaus mumbled, blowing a cloud of smoke over him. Diego glowered at him - he didn’t want cancer, thank you very much. Diego hoped to god he didn’t look too shifty, he was a terrible liar. If Klaus twigged he was hiding someone from him, he would go and find her out of pure spite.
“Klaus...” Diego drawled, looking his brother up and down. “Where are your shoes?” he murmured, almost too confused to get his words out. Why the fuck wasn’t he wearing shoes? Klaus looked down at his feet as though he was unaware they were bare, and gave a nonchalant shrug. “Follow me.” Diego instructed through gritted teeth.
—
“They’re disgusting. I’m not a high school football coach!” Klaus whined, throwing his hands at the pair of sneakers Diego had grabbed. It was extremely tempting to punch him, or maybe just throw one of the shoes in his face. Diego rolled his neck, letting out a symphony of cracks.
As long as they were cheap, Diego didn’t give a damn. “Fine. You pick, just don’t spend more than twenty.” Diego grumbled, wishing he could just trust his brother with the money and leave him to it. Eudora had probably just gone home by now.
“Twenty bucks? You sure do know how to treat a man.” Klaus deadpanned with a petty roll of his eyes. He wandered further down the aisle of shoes. Diego knew it would take him forever to pick, he was like a magpie to shiny things. As Diego watched his brother give unimpressed looks to shoes, he began to run through all the possibilities for why he wasn’t wearing any in the first place. Did he forget? Maybe they fell apart, he was homeless. Could he have pawned them? But who would possibly want to buy his filthy sneakers? That same logic applied to someone stealing them from him, too..
Ben was quite amused by how intensely Klaus was choosing his new footwear. They’d just end up gross anyway. “Are you gonna tell him what happened to them?” he murmured, glancing over to his other brother who was watching Klaus like a hawk whilst seeming to simultaneously be lost in his own thoughts.
“Who cares...” Klaus mumbled as he practically stuck his face inside one of his prospective shoes. Ben wasn’t certain what it was he was peering at, but apparently it hadn’t been good enough as Klaus huffed and shoved it back on the shelf. Ben had seen Diego holding hands with a woman, but had neglected to inform Klaus - on account of him being insufferable. He wasn’t going to tell him. He’d just tease Diego.
—
The brothers sauntered out of the shoe store, Klaus no longer barefooted. He’d finally decided on a pair of pink, light-up sneakers. Diego had seemed confused with this choice, but bought them anyway. Considering what their brother wears, Ben wasn’t sure why Diego had found it anything but expected. “Bye.” Diego grunted, making his way to jaywalk across the street, probably just to get away from Klaus as fast as possible.
“You don’t wanna hang out?” Klaus whined as he fumbled a cigarette between his lips. Diego turned back to face his brother and raised an eyebrow - seeming irritated that Klaus would even consider that as a possibility. Klaus rolled his eyes dramatically and lit his cigarette, causing Diego to lower his eyebrow back down and frown. It was very tempting for Klaus to purposefully blow a stream of smoke at his brother, he knew how much Diego hated that.
“Why would I want to do that?” Diego grunted, and received a petty cloud of smoke blown at his face in return. “Try not to die.” he begged as he turned around and ironically almost walked into oncoming traffic in his efforts to jaywalk. Klaus wheezed, finding his brother’s awkward moment thoroughly entertaining. Ben pursed his lips, wishing he could actually meet Diego’s girlfriend. The last time he’d moved, he had refused to give Klaus his new address. Ben assumed it was just the stealing, but maybe it was because of her. Did they live together? Ben hoped his brother was happy with whoever she was. Letting out a deep sigh, he flicked his gaze back to his other brother - who was now on the verge of falling asleep standing up.