❝ignorance is bliss❞
─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

A LOUD BANGING ON HER BEDROOM DOOR WOKE HER FROM HER FITFUL SLEEP. Though she was annoyed at the abrupt awakening, Charlotte was more than happy to be free of her torturous subconscious. Sitting up with a groan, she gestured to her closed door. "Come in, I guess!"

Elena came bursting into the room, a sheen of tears on her face that made any residing exhaustion in Charlie's mind dissipate immediately. "What is it? What happened? Is everyone alright?"

"Did you know?"

"What? Elena, what are you talking about? It's the middle of the night,"

"Charlotte," Elena stood at the end of her bed, her fists clenched as she tried to sort through the onslaught of emotions she'd been going through for the better part of the evening. "Did you know that Stefan and Damon were vampires?"

Charlotte's jaw drops, but she quickly clamps her mouth shut, her brain suddenly blank of any and all responses. She stares helplessly at her sister, blankets pooling around her waist as she sits up fully. "Elena,"

The younger twin shakes her head, her identical brown eyes suddenly glassy with tears. "Did you know?"

"I'm," Charlotte lets out a shaky breath, her apology obvious in her eyes already. "I'm sorry, Lena,"

Elena's chest stuttered around a sob and she shook her head, stepping away from her sister as she stood from her bed.

"Elena, please, just let me explain,"

"No, no, don't. Just don't, Charlotte." Elena held her hand out, her fingers shaking as she withheld her tears. "You're my sister, you're my best friend. And you knew this whole time, and you didn't tell me? What– What if something happened? What if they attacked you and you were just written off as another animal attack? And you just– you let me be with Stefan knowing that he was–"

"What was I supposed to do, Elena? Tell you not to date him because he could snap and kill you at any second? You wouldn't have believed me!" Charlotte held her hand to her chest, her desperation obvious in her posture. "It wasn't my secret to tell, and even if it was, how do you tell someone that?"

Elena stiffened her chin, hurt shining in her eyes. "I would've believed you, Charlie. If it were anyone else, maybe not, but you," She shook her head, another wave of tears pooling in her eyes. "I tell you everything, Charlie. I guess I was wrong to think you'd do the same, even after everything we've been through."

Charlotte's shoulders slumped defeatedly, guilt heavy in her chest as she took another step that Elena backed away from defensively. "Elena, please, I'm sorry. I was just trying to protect you,"

"Yeah, well, it's a little too late for that, isn't it?"

Before she can plead with her sister any more, she's gone, shutting the door firmly behind her. Charlotte sighs shakily into the silence, her throat tightening as she holds back her tears fitfully.

She peels her shirt and shorts off, throwing them carelessly onto the ground as she walks into her bathroom, twisting the knobs of the shower to the coldest setting. She doesn't bother waiting before she steps into the tub, sinking down to the floor and burying her head in her knees.

The shivers begin to rack her body, hiding the way her shoulders cave with her sobs of defeat.

She wonders why she even bothers trying anymore, and she wonders what she'd done to deserve this sort of karma from the universe. She knows well enough that there's no answer to either question, though, and that in itself is an answer. One she didn't particularly like, it seemed.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

"Jeremy, who was at the door–" Charlotte stopped short at the sight of Vicki Donovan standing in the hallway, a pair of sunglasses covering her face as she stood on unstable feet. "Vicki? Are you okay?"

She groaned, stumbling forward to drop her hands on Charlotte's shoulders. "God, Charlie, I'm so hungry,"

Charlotte glanced at her brother, the two sharing a confused and concerned look over the girl's head. "Uh, there's– there's food in the kitchen, I can make you something if–"

Vicki straightened, immediately turning down the hall and heading for the kitchen. The siblings shared another look of hesitance before following after her, unsurprised to find her in the refrigerator.

"You're high? Vicki, it's the middle of the day,"

Vicki groaned, her fingers prodding painfully at her temple. "Could you just not talk so loud? My head hurts, I need quiet."

Jeremy looked away, hurt flooding his eyes, and Charlotte steps forward defensively. "Jeremy has every right to be worried, Vicki, don't be like that."

Vicki ignored Charlotte, continuing to dig through their cabinets for food. Charlotte let out a sigh, pulling her phone from her pocket. "I'm calling Matt, he's been looking everywhere for her."

"Wait, Charlie," Jeremy sighed, reluctantly pulling his gaze away from Vicki. "Are you sure? She's pretty messed up,"

"It's her brother, Jeremy," Charlotte shook her head, looking at him exasperatedly. "If it were me, wouldn't you want to know?"

Jeremy says nothing, and Charlotte knows she's won when his silence lingers long enough to be contemplative. Quickly dialing Matt's number, she brings her phone up to her ear and gestures vaguely to where Vicki was stuffing her face still. "Watch her, please,"

"Charlie?"

"Matt, thank god, look," Charlotte grimaced as Vicki scrunched her face up in disgust at all of the food she'd been eating. "Vicki is here, she's– she's at my house."

"What? Oh, my god, Charlie,"

"I know, just, uh, just get here, Matt. Fast."

The phone call ends quickly and Charlotte sighs down at her phone screen, contemplating calling the only other person she thought might be helpful in this situation. Shaking the thought from her mind, she pocketed her phone again and tried to remind herself of the way he'd acted with her and Caroline the other day. Reminding herself of Damon's faults was the only way she wouldn't be the next in his long line of victims.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

Jeremy's barely swung the door open when Matt storms in, his eyes wide in panic. "Where is she?"

"This way, come on," Jeremy leads him towards the kitchen and Charlie intercepts them, giving Matt an apologetic look that he sighs at.

"Matt, just," Charlotte sighs, glancing over her shoulder at where Vicki was slumped against the wall with her sunglasses still on. "Be patient with her."

Matt clenched his jaw, looking between his sister and Charlotte. "What's she on?"

Jeremy shrugged helplessly, his dark eyes full of worry. "I– I don't know."

"She showed up like twenty minutes ago," Charlotte tucked her hair behind her ears, her frizzy curls entirely unmanaged after her sleepless night. She'd had to put makeup on to cover the darkness beneath her eyes, lest Jeremy or Jenna noticed and asked her any questions.

Matt approached his sister and kneeled before her, slowly sliding the sunglasses off her face. "Hey, Vic, how you doing?"

"Not good, Matty," Vic whimpered, a few stray tears streaming down her cheeks. "I hurt."

"Where's it hurt?"

"My gums," She shoved her fingers at her mouth haphazardly. "My jaw hurts. My gums– there's something in my gums and it hurts."

"Okay, well–"

"No, no," Vicki yelped, rearing back from Matt's hands. "Just leave me alone."

Matt sighed, shaking his head. "Come on, Vic, don't be like that. Let's get you home."

"Just turn it off!"

Charlotte startled at her sudden raise in volume and she shared a concerned yet confused look with Jeremy at her side.

"Turn what off?"

"The talking, the chatter, just turn it off," Vicki stood suddenly, pushing Matt away from her and shoving past Charlotte and Jeremy. She stopped before the television, and the three others followed her, all looking between Vicki's hysterical form and the nearly-muted TV.

Jeremy stepped forward, grabbing the remote off the side table to turn the volume up on Logan Fell's news report.

"Three bodies were found dead in what is believed to be a drug deal gone awry. The bodies have yet to be identified. They were discovered today at the old Mystic Falls Cemetery,"

"That's where we were last night," Jeremy turned around, looking at Vicki panickedly.

Charlie looked at the girl, worry flickering in her brown eyes. "Vicki, what happened last night?"

"...Homicide, and are fast under way looking for suspects. They're asking anyone with information to please come–"

"Alright, I'm calling the cops."

"No, don't!" Vicki reached for her brother, halting him through her tears.

Jeremy stepped towards Vicki, his brows furrowed. "What happened after I left last night, Vic?"

Vicki lunged suddenly, shoving Jeremy backwards into the table. Charlie and Matt both lunged for him, the former looking at Vicki with a sudden sternness in her gaze that came from her protectiveness over her siblings. "Vicki, what the hell?"

"Jer, you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm fine, I'm fine," Jeremy waved her and Matt off, looking at Vicki with slight betrayal in his eyes.

Matt looked at his sister, a swirl of emotions in his bright blue eyes. "Damn, Vic,"

Charlie looked up as the front door slammed shut, though she quickly looked away in guilt when she saw Elena and Stefan in the entryway.

"What's going on?"

"She's really messed up," Matt brushed a hand through his hair exasperatedly as he looked at his sister.

Stefan looked to Charlie who subtly gestured to Vicki with a solemn gleam in her eyes that he immediately caught on to. "Elena, back up," Pushing Elena behind him, he approached Vicki, desperate hope in his voice as he took in her disarray. "Vicki, look at me."

"Focus." Whatever he saw in Vicki's eyes made any sense of hope dwindle from him in mere seconds. "You're gonna be fine. Everything's gonna be fine."

Stefan turned to them, a firm look in his eyes. "Guys, take her up to bed and shut the blinds, she's gonna be okay."

Matt and Jeremy ushered her out, heading towards the stairs, and Stefan turned back to face the twins with a furrow in his brow.

"You know what's wrong with her?"

Stefan nodded, a telling pity in his eyes that had Charlotte pulling out a stool and sitting at the bar. "Yeah,"

"What is it?"

"She's transitioning,"

Elena's eyes went wide and she let out a shaky breath. "Transitioning to what?"

"A vampire, Elena." Charlotte spoke, drawing their attention her way. She dropped her head in her hands, pushing her hands into her eyes hard enough to see stars. "She's a vampire."

Stefan nodded reluctantly in agreement when Elena looked to him for confirmation. "Damon must have gotten to her, she's new. She hasn't completed her transformation yet."

"H–How does she do that?" Elena's heart pattered nervously in her chest, anxiousness flooding her.

Stefan takes a breath before he tells Elena, his eyes drifting between his girlfriend and her twin sister. "She has to feed on human blood."

Elena swallowed roughly. "And what if she doesn't?"

"She'll die."

Elena turned away from Stefan and started to pace nervously, looking helplessly to Stefan.

"She may only have a few hours,"

"She's upstairs with him right now,"

"It's okay, she doesn't know what's happening to her yet."

Elena put a hand to her head stressfully, looking at Stefan. "So when is she going to know?"

Stefan shook his head, eyes drifting to where Charlotte still sat at the counter, picking quietly at the skin around her fingernails. "Right now, she doesn't remember anything. A part of her is still human, but slowly, the deeper she gets into the transition, the memories will start to come back and then she'll know she has to make the choice."

Elena stopped suddenly, her frantic state wavering as she turned around to face Stefan. "The same choice you made?"

Charlotte scoffed and Elena snapped around to face her at the sound, her thin brows furrowed angrily. "Charlotte?"

Charlotte raised a brow, propping her head up on her hands as irritation shone through any sort of pity she'd been feeling for Vicki.

Elena shrugged, gesturing between her and Stefan. "Do you have something to contribute to the conversation?"

"Probably not anything you want to hear right now, no,"

"Try me."

Charlotte heaved a sigh and dropped her hands from her chin onto the counter, pushing herself from the stool. "I think you're being extremely judgemental about a situation you and I can't fully understand because we haven't been through it before. On top of that, you're mad at me– at Stefan, for lying about all of this when it was clearly the right thing to do since your reaction has just been anger and blind judgment."

Elena scoffed and Charlotte held up a hand, coming around the counter to stand before her sister. "I'm not trying to say that what Stefan or Damon have done is morally correct by any means, but I think you need to rationalize this all in your head a little bit more before you say something that ruins everything between you and Stefan."

"How am I supposed to rationalize this, Charlotte? Vampires aren't supposed to be real, let alone  going to school with us or dating our little brother!"

"Do you think I would've let Stefan date you, or be around any of us if I genuinely thought he was a dangerous person? Or Damon, for that matter? I invited them into our home, into our lives, I considered Damon a friend, Elena! Do you think I'm really stupid enough to put our family in jeopardy after everything we've been through?"

Elena clenched her jaw, a sheen of tears in her eyes that reflected off of the tears in Charlotte's. Though she knew Charlotte was right, deep down, she couldn't pass over all of her anger and fear at the lies she'd been told by everyone for the past few weeks. She'd barely had a day to think about everything, and she knew as well as Charlotte that she wasn't capable of compartmentalizing or rationalizing everything as easily as Charlie did.

Steeling herself for an argument, Elena lifted her chin and shrugged. "I don't know, Charlotte. Clearly you were wrong about something, otherwise Jeremy wouldn't be losing the girl he loves, and Matt wouldn't be losing his sister."

Elena braced for Charlotte's response, but instead she got a silent recoil that she knew Stefan hadn't missed from his place behind her. Elena's stiff shoulders fell as Charlotte blinked, a skittering of tears coming down her cheek that she hastily wiped away.

Reaching past Elena, Charlotte grabbed her car keys and her jacket from where she'd hastily thrown them when she'd gotten home last night.

She turned on her heel, ignoring Elena's call for her to come back. "Charlotte, where are you going?"

"I'll be back later."

The door slams behind Charlotte and Elena looks at it, silently wishing her sister would just run back in and yell at her again. Letting out a shaky, guilt-ridden breath, Elena can't help but wonder if she would've been better off not knowing about any of this at all.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ─── 

author's note; making my grand return with a boring ass chapter, you're so welcome. 

edited and published; 1.15.22. 

- liz