Veronica had joined them there about 10 minutes later.
She had arrived swiftly, and Charles could not remember seeing her looking so bad. Her make-up was smudged, her hair messy, and a dark bruise bloomed across her cheek. Charles suspected that Veronica's bruise matched his own.
"I need to go to work now." Fangs says shortly after Veronica's arrival. He leaves the uilding with a promise to Joaquin to be back soon.
"What does he work as?" Charles asks, curiosity over powering his desire to remain silent.
"He sells drugs." Cheryl says candidly. "I do not have any money of my own, I will not take control of the Blossom finances until my darling mumsy dies. The serpents are broke. The only income we have is through jingle jangle and um- tapes."
"Tapes?" Jughead questioned.
"Yeah. The tickle tapes didn't sell enough so we went one up. Turns out lesbian porn is pretty popular, and Fangs and Joaquin make some tapes as well. We make the tapes, and then Joaquin's brother, Ricky, takes them to a little store that deals with that kind of thing."
"You don't mean Ricky as in my sisters friend? And the store where Brett and Donna sold ponytail playmate?" Jughead asks. At the mention of Brett, Charles's winces slightly. Surely Jughead won't extract more punishment for his murder?
Charles feels his breath beginning to speed up and the familiar sensations of a panic attack threaten to overwhelm him. He can't take any more. He can't go back to Betty. He can't stomach her punishments again. He can't take this.
Standing up suddenly, he tries to prevent the rising panic. Jughead won't send him back to Betty. he'd sooner die than let himself be taken back there. Charles runs into the bathroom, shutting the door behind him and just about managing to slide to the floor as he desperately tries to get his breathing back under control.
After a few minutes, he shudders, dragging himself up, leaning heavily against the side of the bath. He rubs his eyes and realizes he's been crying. He shakily walks over to the sink and splashes water into his face. He can't help but feel that he's to weak, to broken to even be able to sit around discussing jobs like a normal person. Just one mention of Bretts name and he had gone into a spiralling panic.
Charles is disgusted by himself. Disgusted by how fragile he is, how weak he is. Disgusted by his body, disgusted by what Betty did to him. He scratches at his skin, digging his nails into his flesh, leaving long lines marring his skin. He tears at the skin on his arms, desperate to stay in control.
A gentle knock at the door makes Charles jump in surprise and hastily stand up. "Come in." he calls out.
Hermione Lodge comes into the room.
"Are you okay? It looked like you were having a panic attack back there." she asks.
"Yeah. God I'm so fucking pathetic. I can't even hold a freaking conversation with going crazy."
"You didn't go crazy. You had a panic attack. I get them sometimes. After what happened, it isn't surprising. Your allowed to lose control sometimes. Jughead told me what they did to you, and it doesn't make you weak. Going through that shit makes you strong. You aren't alone in this, you know. I know how isolated you feel right now, but you aren't the only one this has happened to. Toni and Cheryl have been through similar… as have I."
"I shouldn't be reacting like this though. I don't have the right to. Its happened to me before, when I was younger, and I didn't react this badly even then. And this time I deserved it."
"Whatever you did, you didn't deserve it. That I can be sure of. And maybe it feels different this time because it was people you trusted, it was your family."
"I did deserve it. Betty was right, it was punishment for my sins. I killed, Hermione, I killed Brett and Joan because of what they did to Betty and Jughead."
"That doesn't make you a bad person. You killed to protect them. I've killed people to protect Veronica. I killed Sheriff Minetta to protect myself. And yeah, maybe that makes me a villain, but that doesn't mean I deserved what Hiram did to me any more than you deserved what Betty and Alice and Fp did to you."
