Themes of depression and suicide.

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Kogoro wakes up with a dry mouth and an aching head. He can't quite remember going to bed last night, and he's still in yesterday's cloths. At least he had stripped his tie off some time during the evening. It would be a shame, after all, if he were to accidentally strangle himself during the night. Yes. A shame. Ran would cry.

His grasp of time has slipped again, but he thinks it's late on Wednesday morning. Meaning Ran and Conan are both at school. Ran will be spitting mad all day, and likely confiscate the rest of his liquor when she gets home. That is, if she didn't already dump it all down the drain. Such a shame.

Kogoro wonders if he should get up at all. It seems so much effort. Eventually the need for water overrides everything else and he levers himself up off his futon. Holy hell his head hurt. Guilt and shame pound along with the ache in his skull. What worthless feelings. It didn't seem to matter how often or how strongly he felt them, the never made a lick of difference. There was no reform for him.

He fills a cup directly from the kitchen sink and drinks it down twice before filling it again and shuffling back to his room. He set the cup on a small table and reluctantly changed into fresh clothes. He should shower, before Ran came home. She would be able to tell. He would disappoint her again.

He went back into the main room and flipped on the TV. Maybe he could find some Youko-chan. That always cheered him up at least a little. She never failed to distract him, pull him into a carefree world of dramas and idols. She was by far the best and the safest of his distractions. Ran would yell if he lost any more money on the horse races this month.

He wonders why he does it. Drinking never got him anything. Gambling never paid off for real. There was never any real pleasure in bragging and flirting. He never stops wondering why he does it, when it has cost him so much. He wakes up everyday, repeating the same pattern, and wondering why.

Maybe one day he just won't wake up. He doesn't want to make Ran cry anymore.

He does enough of that already. So he does his best to clean up the bottles he left last night and shake off his mood. One beer can is still almost full. What a waste. He dumps it down the sink.

His hangover is receding as he passes the afternoon watching daytime TV. His thoughts become clearer, vibrating between his ears, bouncing around in hiss skull. God, he needs a drink. He doesn't want to disappoint Ran.

If only Eri would come back. It was always better with Eri, or it was far worse. At least with her gone, he doesn't have to see her face. He doesn't have to hear her ask 'what happened to you? To us?' He doesn't have to wonder about the answer. He wonders anyway.

He wonders who he is, really. Mori Kogoro has been a lot of thing, but who is he? Maybe Ran would know, or Eri, but he's too afraid to ask. He doesn't want them to know how lost he is. He doesn't want to disappoint them. He can't let anyone know.

It doesn't really matter, anyway. It's not that important. He pulls in enough cash to keep himself going, and he keeps himself going in order to pull in enough cash. Any extra money he blows on booze and games. Sometimes he wonders why. Sometimes he knows why and pretends not to.

It's a shame really, that he gets up everyday just to deal with hangovers, bills, demanding clients and disappointed people. But he has to. Ran would cry if he didn't.

A/N: Wow that kind of got away with me. I was going to make it longer and less introspective, but this is what happened. I know its OOC, quite a bit actually, but I was wondering about what would explain Kogoro's discrepancies. He's super cool sometimes, and a total loser other times. This is what I came up with. Please let me know what you think!