Charlie’s POV

“Tony… what did you do?” Mike asked accusingly at Tony, who was looking very guilty.

Tony didn’t answer right away. Instead, the tears welling up in his eyes spilled over the side of his eyelids, racing down his cheeks.

“Tony!” Mike screamed, gripping Tony by the collar and slamming him against the basement wall. “Speak,” Mike growled, his face inches away from Tony’s.

“Mike, calm down,” Jaime said warily, putting a hand on Mike’s shoulder.

“Don’t fucking tell me to calm down, Himes,” Mike spat, shaking his hand off.

“Just let him explain!” Jaime pleaded. Meanwhile, Tony’s sobbing increased, and he didn’t even look like he would be able to talk.

Mike shook Tony’s shoulders. “What the fuck, Tony?” he yelled. “My brother was just fucking arrested, and you won’t man up and talk? You fucking turtle! You obviously know something! Jesus!” Mike hissed, looking as if he was about to take a swing at Tony.

This violence was becoming too much for me to handle. It triggered memories in my head… memories I would prefer to not remember…

I grabbed Mike’s shoulder while speaking to him: “Mike! Let him go, and then we can talk calmly about—”

My sentence was cut off sharply when I saw the back of a hand make contact with my face. I heard a few gasps and I stumbled back, falling to the ground. I held my face tenderly, feeling something warm and liquidly dripping into my mouth and off of my chin.

Every one was quiet—Tony was no longer crying, Jaime was no longer begging Mike to calm down, and Mike was no longer shaking in anger. They all just kind of stared at me as I touched my hand to my nose, pulling it back to realize that I was bleeding.

“You hit me,” I glared accusingly at Mike.

“I-I’m s-so s-sorry, Charlie,” Mike whispered, his face horrified. “I didn’t mean to… it was just a reflex… I’m so s-sorry.”

Mike dropped Tony immediately, stepping back from all of us. He was shaking again, but not out of anger—out of anxiousness.

“Ch-Charlie, I’m so sorry. Here, let me help you,” Mike stammered holding an arm out and stepping closer to me.

I didn’t mean to react the way I did—it was just an instinct.

“Get away from me!” I hissed, immediately recoiling.

‘Get away from me!’ I cried, trying to rip the grimy hands off of me.

‘Oh, no, you don’t!’ a voice growled, reciprocating my actions, but ripping my clothes off, instead. A rush of cool air whirled around me, caressing my bare skin. I shivered, my body going completely numb, as if it knew what was about to happen.

‘Please, no,’ I begged. I didn’t want to stoop down to that level—I didn’t want to give my attackers all of the power by having to beg, but I had no other choice. I didn’t want this to happen to me… I couldn’t let this happen…

A hand smacked my face, followed by a voice to telling me to ‘shut up’. I could feel the blood trickle down my face, a warm, thick liquid, but that was the least of my pains.

I whimpered in terror and agony as they forcibly entered me. I couldn’t find it within me to submit to them, though, I wasn’t about to let them violate me. I wasn’t about to go down without a fight. I couldn’t just accept what was happening and just let it happen. I just wasn’t that kind of girl.

‘No!’ I screamed, hoping someone would hear me and call for help. ‘Stop!’ I yelled, kicking my legs and flailing my arms and trying to wriggle from their grasp.

‘Don’t fight back, baby. You’re dead, anyway.’

“Charlie! Calm down!” Jaime shook my shoulders, and I gasped, relieved to see that it was only a flashback… not real life… that part of my life was over…

“I’m sorry,” I breathed, submitting to Jaime’s arms. He held me tightly, and I could sense him giving Mike a death glare.

“It’s okay, Mike. I know you didn’t mean to. I’m just really sensitive,” I said after calming down. I pulled myself away from Jaime and walked over to Mike—who had nearly pressed himself completely against the wall—giving him a gentle hug. He hugged me back carefully, whispering apologies into my ear.

“It’s okay, Mike,” I repeated, pulling away. “I got blood on your shirt, so we are even,” I half-smiled, trying to lighten the mood—as much as the mood could be lightened given the situation we were in.

Mike let out a sharp laugh—a bitter, short, almost crazed sound.

“Come on, let’s clean your face,” Jaime took my hand and led me upstairs to the bathroom, dampening a washcloth and gently dabbing my already inflamed nose. I winced a little at the contact.

“Sorry,” Jaime regretted. “He really bopped you there,” Jaime frowned, touching my nose tenderly with his fingertips. “Damn bony hands of his,” he added. I nodded in agreement—Mike’s hands were bony.

“I’m not mad at him,” I said.

“It’s okay if you are. He needs to learn how to control his extremities,” Jaime said seriously, but something in his tone and word choice made me laugh.

“I was just scared for a minute,” I said in a small voice.

“Of Mike?” Jaime asked. “You know he’d never hurt you,” Jaime said. After a moment’s reflection, he added: “On purpose.”

“No, not of Mike. Of the situation. Violence. It makes me uneasy. And then Vic…” I shook my head.

“We'll figure it out, don’t worry Charlie,” Jaime said. “Besides, we have to tour in a month, anyway. Vic better get his ass out of jail soon,” Jaime said with a smirk. I didn’t react to his words though. Vic never told me that they were touring soon. “He didn’t tell you yet, did he?” Jaime must have read my facial expression.

“Damn it,” he cursed, face palming.

“He didn’t,” I said. “But it’s okay. It was bound to come up eventually, though,” I said, playing it cool. Although, on the inside, I was tense, scared, and sad. I was afraid to separate from Vic… for both of our sakes. But I also knew that I had to be an adult about this—this was their job, after all. This was their life, and I had to respect that.

“We’ll talk about it later,” Jaime said. “Now, we have more pressing issues,” he grimaced. I nodded in agreement. He finished ‘fixing’ my nose, and then we walked out to the kitchen, prepared to have a nice, long talk with the one they apparently call Turtle.

~~

TONY’S POV

“I didn’t do it,” I said, my voice monotone.

“Jesus—fucking—Christ, Tony, I swear—” Mike hissed. I flinched at his tone, but Charlie interrupted him.

“Mike, relax. Let him talk,” she said soothingly. I was surprised at how calm she was, considering the circumstances.

“I did not do it,” I repeated calmly, closing my eyes, the events of that afternoon flooding into my mind.

I stood outside the courthouse, waiting for him to come out. I guess you could say that I was stalking my prey.

“Then why the fuck—”

“Mike! I didn’t fucking do it, okay?” I interrupted with a scream, slamming my fists into the table. As I did so, Charlie’s facial expression caught my eye: twisted in fear. I immediately felt guilty—I didn’t know her as well as the others, but I knew her well enough to care about scaring her. And it hurt me to see my best friend’s girl look scared over me.

I mean, she had good reason to be afraid of me. She thought I was a murderer.

The courthouse doors creaked open. Two police officers slowly made their way through the threshold. I scoffed; why were they protecting a guilty man?

I think Jaime saw her fear, too, because he spoke up next. I gritted my teeth at Mike while he talked. “Charlie and I are going to the police station, now. You two talk it out, and come meet us there in no longer than thirty minutes,” Jaime said seriously—a mood that was pretty rare for Jaime. Jaime shot us one more look before leaving with Charlie.

Mike and I were alone, and a heavy silence filled the air, making it hard to breathe.

“Tony, if you didn’t do it, then what the fuck is this all about?” Mike asked. I took a deep breath, understanding what he meant. I had really incriminated myself when I broke down when Vic was arrested. It was just that I was so shocked.

“I was going to do it,” I said carefully. Mike raised an eyebrow at me, but I ignored his confused expression and dove right into my story of what happened, frankly feeling just as confused as he did.

My heart thumped slowly at the same pace as the police officer’s footsteps. One by one they stepped down the stairs, escorting a smug looking Carlos down with them. My heart beat in my chest so aggressively to the point where I couldn’t hear anything else but my pulse.

I had the entire thing planned out. The officers were leading Carlos down to the police car that I stood next to, the car they were going to use to escort him out of town. As soon as he was a good range away, the gun in my right hand would slyly poke out of my jacket. I was going to shoot him right in the forehead—right through his brain, right where he deserved it. I wasn’t going to shoot him in the heart because I didn’t believe that he had one. No, Carlos was going to die like Spencer. Without a chance.

I had replayed what I was going to do in my head thousands of times. In the moment, I didn’t really care if I got caught. I just figured that I would shoot Carlos, and I hoped that the commotion would be enough for me to slip away unnoticed. It was awfully crowded here, anyway...

I knew what I was going to do was the right thing. Carlos didn’t deserve to live. He deserved to go to Hell.

I made sure that I was in the front of the surrounded crowd, and then Carlos got closer and closer. I poked my gun through my jacket, reading to shoot him. Ready to murder him. Ready to give Spencer real justice. Ready to give Vic real justice. He was about halfway down the steps, now, and time moved so slow…

There was a loud popping sound, and I flinched—I guess I didn’t think this part through. I didn’t realize that the sound of a gun going off would trigger me into a slight fit, reminding me of the time Vic almost…

I shook my head of my thoughts, staring in shock at the scene before me. Carlos lay dead on the marble stairs, his crimson blood seeping from a tiny hole in his forehead. I looked at my gun, seeing that it was not smoking. I had not pulled the trigger. Someone else did… Someone else had shot Carlos before me! I stuffed the gun back into my pants, pretending to look shocked and terrified like all of the other witnesses, when, in reality, those were the last things I was feeling.

When the gunshot went off, confusing emotions pelted my skull. I should be relieved that someone else did the job, right? I should be glad that Carlos was dead, and I wasn’t going to get in trouble for it. The only problem was that I wasn’t relieved, nor was I glad that he was dead at the hands of another. I wanted to be the one to kill him. I had this burning hate inside of me for that man—the man that ruined my best friend’s love and life, and the rest of our lives, too. A wave of anger crashed down on me; I felt like I was drowning in hate. I wanted Carlos dead, but I wanted to kill him myself. I could feel the venom build up in my mouth as I stared at his unmoving body, police and other people surrounding him.

I clenched my fists, turning away from the scene. I wanted to kill Carlos myself, like the way I killed Drew Sanders, but somebody beat me to the job. The question was: why, and, more importantly, who?

“Jesus, Tony,” Mike shook his head at me, but it wasn’t an angry hiss—it was an exasperated hiss. As I told Mike what happened, I broke down again, tears flowing freely from my eyes. I was still so angry and confused! And, now that the moment of adrenaline has long past, I was also feeling appalled at myself. Despite it being a basic vigilante killing, I had been wiling to kill someone out of cold blood. Hell, it was premeditated! That would have landed me years in prison. Granted, the bastard deserved it and whoever killed him should get a high five or a promotion for it, but it was still heavily against the law. And I was appalled at myself for almost doing this, risking not only my future, but also the band’s future. Killing Drew Sanders was different—that was self-defense. But killing Carlos would have landed me in prison with serious consequences, consequences that I was not prepared to face.

“You can’t tell anyone this, do you understand?” Mike said seriously. I nodded. Even though I technically didn’t do anything wrong, we didn’t want the police to suspect me. Mike shook his head, looking like he wanted to say something, but also like he couldn’t.

“Let’s just go to the police station,” I mumbled, standing up. Mike nodded.

“Hey, listen man, I’m sorry for flipping out on you,” Mike said with a frown.

“It’s okay, really. I made it seem like I did something when Vic was arrested,” I said, shaking my head in regret for breaking down like that.

“Yeah,” Mike mumbled as we walked to the car.

“I just was shocked, and it all overwhelmed me,” I explained. Mike nodded, understanding.

“Yeah, but you really had me there for a second!” Mike said.

I returned back to my solemn state, not having anything to add to the conversation. I was still overwhelmed with the fact that Vic was arrested. It was all just stuck in my head.

I would never be able to get the ring of a gunshot out of my ears. I would never be able to get the image of Vic, helpless, out of my mind. And, most terrifyingly, I would never be able to get the jealousy of not being the one who killed Carlos out of my veins.

~~

Vic’s POV

“You’re free to go,” a police officer stuck his head into the holding room, and I jumped up immediately in excitement and anxiousness.

“Seriously?” I blurted.

“Uh, yes. Unless you have any reason to stay here,” the officer said.

“No,” I said quickly, exiting the room. The moment I left the holding room was the moment I felt like a huge weight had been lifted off of my shoulders. I was free again… free from the torture of those damn walls…

It’s been hours. I didn’t have anyway to tell time, but I knew it’s been hours since I’ve seen another human face. Since I’ve breathed fresh, clean air. I rolled to my side, groaning in agony as I did so. I was just tired of lying in the same spot on the rustic, dirty floor. I was trapped, literally, in this room, but also in my own body. My body had completely failed me—not letting me sit up or change positions. I was just a lump on the ground. An insignificant, weak lump.

Like Drew Sanders had initially promised, these walls were my only friends. Except they weren’t really my friends. They were my nightmares. They were what was keeping me on the inside, keeping me away from my freedom.

I swear I saw them move. Like they closed in on me, making each hour in the room more painful than the last. I had this terrible feeling that I was going to die, and what made the feeling worse was that these four walls were going to be the only witnesses.

“Vic!” I looked up, breaking my trance, to see Charlie and Jaime.

“Hey, guys,” I smiled softly at them. Charlie immediately walked up to me, wrapping her arms tightly around my neck. I pulled her waist in as close to my body as I could, burying my face in her strawberry scented hair. The moment ended too soon, though, when I felt Charlie’s cool body being replaced with a warmer one.

Aw, Tony, I thought to myself when I realized that it was Tony who I was now hugging.

I knew now was not the time and this definitely wasn’t the place, but I couldn’t help but mumble in Tony’s ear: “Tony… did you…”

He shook his head immediately. “I’ll explain later,” he said, giving me another squeeze before he pulled away.

“Can we just go home? I don’t want to be here any longer,” I said with a shiver. Mike, Jaime, Tony, and Charlie all nodded. As we walked away, I turned around one last time to look at the door that I knew lead to the horrid room that brought back terrible memories…

“Charlie, babe, what happened to your nose?” I shook myself from my thoughts, turning my attention to Charlie. I didn’t mean to call her ‘babe’; it just slipped out. I hoped she didn’t mind.

“Oh, it was an accident,” she said, subconsciously touched her nose with her fingertips. It was swollen and purple, dried blood in her nostrils. It looked like she had rushed to clean it to get here—I didn’t know how I missed it before.

“Some accident,” I raised my eyebrow skeptically. She shrugged her shoulders.

The car ride back home was mostly silent—Charlie, Jaime and I were in one car, and Mike and Tony were in another. Mike didn’t say a word to me when they arrived at the police station, and he avoided my eye contact, as well. I tried not to let it bother me, but I couldn’t shake the feeling like he was avoiding me on purpose—like he was hiding something from me.

And Jaime was acting strange, too. He wasn’t his normal, bouncy, hyper self as he drove. His eyebrows were knitted and his mouth was turned into a slight frown. He kept glancing at me in the rear-view mirror, and his eyes would dart from the road, to me, to Charlie, to me again, and back to the road. Charlie and I were no secret, so what was he insinuating with his eyes?

“What the fuck is everyone’s problem,” I muttered under my breath.

We arrived back to the house—everyone including Tony and Jaime who didn’t even live here coming inside. I wasn’t in the mood to talk to them all, though. I wasn’t even curious as to what Tony’s issue was before. He didn’t kill Carlos, which was all that mattered.

I turned away from everyone, scooping up my laptop and headphones from the coffee table.

“Where are you going?” they all asked. I shrugged my shoulders, not wanting to talk to anyone. I wasn’t trying to give them the cold shoulder, but sometimes I couldn’t help it when I become closed off. And that was exactly what I was doing: closing myself off from everything.

“Writing,” I answered just loud enough so they could hear before I slipped into my writing room. Posters, album artworks, and other music related things covered the walls of the room, making the small and secluded room a good writing environment and, more importantly, making the walls friendly. Papers and instruments were scattered messily everywhere, and this was the only room in the world where I could be alone but not feel alone—where the walls didn’t scare me or send me into a nightmarish oblivion. I sighed as I stepped further into the room, setting my laptop down on the desk, stuffing my headphones onto my head, my hair sticking out messily around it, and closing and locking the door behind me.

Notes

Ehh

I couldn't make Tony kill Carlos--that would make things way more complicated than I could possibly handle. But if Tony didn't kill Carlos, then who did?
And they will be touring soon (it's been a while!) so yay!
Poor Vic :( Still struggling with nightmares and memories and shit and now secluding himself, poor thing

Will you guys send me suggestions or something? I have a feeling this is going to end soon, but don't worry, if I do end it I will give you fair warning unlike the ending of 'can we lose our minds?' lol

i was going to update last night, but I got too tired and didn't wanna force it. Sowwy

Oh, and if you haven't already, be sure to check out my new story and the collaboration i'm doing with the lovely Fuentits (awkward self promotion here oops)