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It’s about three years in that Edwin happens to be looking at Charles when he yells a certain word - or, well, he’s generally looking at Charles when he scolds him, but this time he’s, like, Looking, in a paying attention sort of way. So this time he sees when Charles can’t stop the flinch, and Charles is pretty sure his eyes go kinda, like, wide and glassy, and it startles Edwin out of the yelling, because Edwin never means to upset Charles when he yells, really. Just vent his stress a little.
Edwin apologizes for yelling, and Charles says it’s fine, which it is, genuinely, he doesn’t mind Edwin yelling at him (the way Edwin yells means he cares, Charles figured that out very early on). It wasn’t the yelling that was the problem, it was just… that word.
His dad had really liked that word.
He doesn’t tell Edwin that.
It probably would’ve been forgotten, because Charles is really good at brushing things over, world-class, really, except the case a few days later, they’re talking to some asshole witness. A hostile witness, it turns out, who starts yelling at them, and Edwin’s gearing up to cut him down to size when the asshole yells that word, and Edwin happens to be Looking at Charles again.
The asshole ends up thrown off a bridge into traffic - he’s a ghost, he’ll be fine, it just sucks to have cars go through you, and getting tossed about isn’t as fun as it sounds. (Charles has a sneaking suspicion Edwin engineered the conversation to end in the guy getting tossed.) And Charles is really hoping that he covered well enough again, and he doesn’t hear anything about it for a few days, so he figured it’s okay.
Edwin’s as world-class a detective as Charles is a world-class brush-over-er, though.
They’re in the office, and Edwin stands up, and puts his hands behind his back, and his chin in the air, and somehow manages to get his posture even straighter, which is impressive. Charles sits up and tries to hide the sinking in his stomach, because that all looks an awful lot like a Serious Conversation, and Serious Conversations, in his experience, are always a bad thing.
“Charles,” Edwin starts, in the voice that means he’s planned this out in his head, “I have noticed that you have a distaste for a certain word.”
Charles tries not to cuss under his breath.
Edwin gives him a second in case he wants to answer, then starts again. “It is a word which I know I have employed multiple times, in our… conversations…” Charles almost snorts, even as stressed as he is, because “conversations” is a bit of a funny word for Edwin chewing him out. “…and I am concerned that this has been causing you ongoing distress.”
Charles almost chokes. “No! No, it’s fine! I don’t - I’m not even sure what you’re talking about. I mean, like, yeah, if you told me off a bit less, I wouldn’t complain, but there aren’t any, I dunno, bad words, that I know about, yeah? We’ve already had the talk about how I don’t mind you cussing at me.”
Edwin frowns at him, and Charles’s stomach twists, which it shouldn’t, because Edwin frowning like that just means he’s thinking, and even if it were the frown that means he’s cross that’s fine too, because Edwin being pissed doesn’t mean Charles getting hurt. He really, genuinely, isn’t scared of making Edwin mad, normally. His stomach’s just being a fucking idiot.
It apparently took Charles longer than he’d thought to get his stomach in line, because now Edwin seems to have come to a decision. He swallows and breaks eye contact to look at the ceiling. A deep breath, and - “I do not like porcelain dolls,” Edwin says.
Charles blinks at him. That was… not where he thought the talk was going.
“I would prefer not to discuss the details, but they remind me of something I would rather forget, and I - I experience distress when in their presence.”
Charles swallows. “Okay.”
“I would therefore prefer,” Edwin continues, sounding like he’s dragging the words out over broken glass, but for some reason determined to get them out, “if you did not force me to engage with them.”
“Yeah, of course!” Charles says, before his brain’s fully caught up with where this line of conversation is going, because Edwin’s told him how to keep him safe, and what’s he gonna say, give me a second to think about it? “You see any dolls, you tell me and I’ll smash ‘em,” he says firmly.
Edwin shudders. “I would rather just avoid them entirely, thank you,” he says, then pauses. He licks his lips, even though he’d probably tell Charles that ghosts’ lips can’t get dry. “Charles,” he says, enunciating it even more carefully than usual, “is there anything like that, for you? That you would prefer to avoid, without me needing to know why?”
Charles’s mouth drops open. Which is stupid, because now that he’s Listening, it seems kinda obvious that that’s where this was going, but at the same time, he wouldn’t’ve guessed it in a million years. His breath is coming in little pants, for some reason, even though he doesn’t need air at all, and his head’s spinning, a bit. And he wants to say something dismissive and turn around and leave, he really, really does.
But.
But Edwin had told him something.
It had hurt him, to say it. He hated actually saying what exactly was upsetting him, for all he threw the word “Hell” around, he hated people knowing anything about him, even Charles, he hated remembering things.
But he’d said it, even though it hurt, just to make it easier for Charles to say something.
He’d been brave, for Charles.
And, well. It wouldn’t be right for Charles to do any less.
“I don’t like getting glue on my skin,” he says in a rush. “Like, a little on my hands is fine, but if someone else gets it on - I mean, not that it matters anyway ‘cause we’re ghosts - and that’s, that’s a silly thing anyway, sorry, I - just forget I said that, yeah? It doesn’t - “
“Mine was dolls, Charles,” Edwin reminds him. “I doubt you will think of anything as silly as that.”
Charles shuts his mouth, because he can’t think of any good answer to that, actually. He takes several sharp, forced breaths, trying not to pant, because panting would be stupid and ‘wholly unnecessary for a ghost’, as Edwin had told him the last time Edwin himself was panting, and - “and that word,” he says, and bites his lip like he was trying to catch the words on the way out and got there a split second too late. “I don’t… I don’t like that word. Um. Especially when it’s, like. Loud.”
Edwin nods. “I will be careful with supernatural adhesives, and if I see that word in anyone’s mouth, I shall be sure to smash it,” he says, and his lip’s turned up a bit at the corner, because he’s got the mercy to joke about things instead of making ‘em too heavy, bless him. He’s the best. “Metaphorically speaking.”
Charles lets his lip go so he can smile, and it’s a real smile, he’s kinda surprised to notice, even if it is a small one. “Thanks. And I’ll keep an eye out for any rogue dolls.”
(It gets to be a bit of a habit, over time. One of them notices the other one acting funny for no good reason, and offers something up, and the other one gives them something in return. “I don’t like being grabbed around the upper arm.” “I do not like ‘food fights’.” “I don’t like the sound of leather snapping.” “I do not like being on top of desks.” And they don’t ask why, and they don’t say it’s silly. They just promise to smash it.)