Chapter Text
Penelope Blossom died on a Wednesday, and theoretically, everything after that should have been simple. Just a few loose ends to wrap up: no more.
Faced with the news of his wife’s untimely passing (and after a private visit from Jason, Veronica, and Cheryl), Clifford Blossom suddenly became astoundingly cooperative. Ten minutes in the interrogation room with Kevin sufficed to confirm that the ledgers were indeed a record of illegal activity. Penelope Blossom’s collection of letters was duly examined: they held her prints, but no others. Taken in conjunction with the Riverdale Police Department’s backlogged collection of cold case files, the letters told the grisly stories of nearly 50 individuals who had come too close to the truth about the Blossoms and paid the price. The entire police department, needless to say, worked plenty of overtime that night, poring over the ledgers in an attempt to match them with cold cases and known offenders.
At eight o’clock on Thursday morning, the Riverdale Police Department knocked on my father’s door and took him away in handcuffs.
I didn't learn about the arrest until nearly nine o'clock that night, when Ethel called to offer her sympathy, having heard the news from Ginger, who got it from Cricket, who’d overheard Nancy complaining to Trula about the ruckus they made dragging him away. By the time I cleaned my face up, made it into the car, and arrived at the station, it was bordering on ten.
“We're closed,” said Kevin as I walked in, without looking up from his desk.
"I need to see my dad.” I stated it as flatly as I could, but Kevin must have picked up on the hint of desperation in my voice. He put his pen down on the desk and looked up at me. The bags of exhaustion under his eyes were almost as pronounced as mine, but not quite.
"Jug,” he said, with a drawn-out sigh. “Please. Just come back tomorrow.”
“Can someone at least just tell him that I came?” I muttered. “He’s going to think that I don't care.”
Kevin stood up from his desk. “Look, Jug, I’m headed home for tonight. I really can’t let you see him.”
I gave up. “What time do you open tomorrow?” I asked, turning to head for the door.
“Okay, fine, you can see him,” Kevin said suddenly from behind me. “Don’t tell anyone, okay? I could lose my job over this. Just tell the guard on duty that I'm calling in a favor.”
My face broke into a grin despite itself. “Thanks a million, Kevin. I owe you one.”
Kevin snorted dryly. “Are you kidding, Jug? You owe me a hell of a lot more than one.”
“I know, I know," I agreed good-humoredly, sauntering past Kevin’s desk and down into the long row of hallways that made up Riverdale’s jail. “I'll make it up to you, Kev! Promise!” I yelled back over my shoulder.
The guard on duty looked distinctly uncomfortable with the notion of letting me into the jail so late at night. Nevertheless, the mention of Kevin's name did its trick.
My father was leaning against the door of his cell when I entered, his hands sticking out between the bars. We were the only two people in the hallway, since the non-reformed Blossom affiliates had been placed in the high-security wing. My dad probably would have been placed there too, except they’d run out of room.
“Jug,” he said, making the syllable part of an exhale. “You here to bail me out?”
“Can't,” I replied briefly. “They won't let me until morning, and who knows how high they’ll set it. Sorry ‘bout all this, anyway.”
"Had it coming for a while,” he observed.
“I'm sure you did,” I agreed tersely.
“You know,” he began, “even if I go away--”
I cut him off. “You're not going away,” I insisted. “They’d be insane to do that. You haven't been involved with the Blossoms for years. The only people going away are Clifford Blossom and his longtime enforcers: no one else.”
“System doesn't work like that, Jug,” he reminded me coolly, drumming his fingers on the bars. “You talk to Jelly recently?”
“Nope. Anyway, I just--wanted to drop by. It’s gonna work out, Dad--”
He didn’t let me finish. “Stop saying that, Jug. Not everything works out.” His eyes burned fiercely into mine for a moment, as if to brand the words into my memory. Then he looked down and scratched at the back of his head. “Didn’t think
I raised a fucking bleeding-heart,” he muttered disgustedly, more for his own benefit than for mine.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. “Okay, then. I’ll play. What’re you trying to tell me here? To step up my act and make something of my life? ‘Cause I already did.”
He chuckled hollowly. “Jug, I’ve got a list of priors taller than you. Blossom’s main henchmen were smart enough not to get caught up until now. I’m going down. I--”
He broke off. High heels, down the hallway. “Who’s that?” I hissed.
My father’s face had blanched the instant he heard the sound, but he set his jaw as he drew back into the cell. “One of four or so people off the top of my head. All with good reason to want me out of the picture. If I don’t see you again, son, then I want you to know that I’m sorry. For all of it.”
“Way to think positively, Dad,” I muttered to myself, hurrying down a bend in the hallway. I got my gun out, though, just in case he was right.
The footsteps came closer and stopped. My dad took a long, shuddering breath, held it for a moment, and then blew it all out at once. “Didn’t you see outside? We’re closed.” His tone was caustic and biting, yet defensive: it reminded me of the first time Jelly had seen him drinking. Maybe it was some misplaced sense of masculinity, but my dad had always been at his most bitter when he was blindsided and vulnerable.
“Press pass,” said a familiar voice, the words stiff and clipped. “Gets you in most places. Plus, the guards all know I’m a bitch.”
Alice Cooper. My hand tightened on my gun, and I edged forward around the corner soundlessly.
My dad had sprawled himself out on the cot in the corner of his cell, with a mock-courteous smile stretching itself almost insolently across his face. His trigger finger, however, was rubbing nervous circles across his knee. Alice Cooper was standing just in front of the cell door, her head held rigidly upright and her shoulders ruler-straight. His eyes sought her face with a driving intensity; she made a point out of allowing his gaze to roll off her.
“Press pass, huh? You here for an interview, Al?” He flung the words bitterly, watching with hungry eyes as they struck home.
She gave a little exasperated sigh that reminded me of Betty. “No, I’m not, FP. If I was here for an interview, I’d have brought a tape recorder, not a lockpick.”
His jaw tensed at that, but he managed to salvage the tell by turning it into a sneer. “Kind of you to think of an old friend in need. Does your husband know you’re here?”
That one hurt her: I could see her head jerk back as if he had hit her, even though she didn't move more than an inch. He knew that it had hurt her, judging by the way his shoulders tensed for a counterattack, and she knew that he knew. I expected some sort of outburst, but all she did was step back a foot or so and meet his eyes for the first time. “No,” she said quietly. “Hal doesn’t know I’m here.”
The lines around his eyes sagged a bit. “Breakout it is, then. You covered all your bases?” he asked, drawing himself up.
“Do you need to ask me that?” Alice snapped acerbically.
He shrugged. “For all I know, suburban living’s made you go soft. Humor me, Allie.”
Her jaw tensed. “Not my name, FP.” Then she continued on as though the digression had never occurred. “The guard was at the neighborhood potluck today. He’s going to spend the next hour in the bathroom, and he’ll blame Mrs. Doiley’s undercooked salmon instead of my cupcakes. Getaway car’s in the back parking lot, with plates from an old Model A that Hal’s fixing up. The local kids swipe his auto parts all the time.”
He nodded, watching her with a measured, hawk-like gaze. “Cash?”
“In the glovebox, with a change of clothes and a workable fake license. Your new name is Michael Johnson, by the way. It’s my old backup, but I dripped a bit of grease on the ‘a’ in ‘Michaela’. It’ll hold up to a once-over, if you stay out of trouble.” As she spoke, she worked expertly at the lock on the cell door.
My father stepped out as soon as Alice opened the cell. She drew back as if to let him pass, but he made no move. Their gazes reached a deadlock; they were arguing, silently, and I had no idea what the point under discussion was.
“You’re going to need to lock me in,” Alice declared finally.
His face darkened. “Al--are you telling me you’re staying here?” There was a hitch in his voice that I’d never heard before.
Her eyes dipped down and closed. “Yes,” she said simply.
“With no fake license, no backup car, no cash, no escape options at all, and your shitbag of a husband?” His voice was harsh and grating now, with an edge of anger to it. Whenever he talked to me that way, I made a rule of getting the hell out.
Alice exhaled, sharply and frustratedly. “For the last time, FP. He has a name. It’s Hal, in case you forgot, just like your wife’s name is Gladys.”
My father stiffened for a second, caught off guard. Then he deflated all at once. “Gladys left. She left me, she left my son--”
“Well, then,” Alice interrupted fiercely, “you get it. I can’t leave my girls.”
“It’s not rocket science, Allie, just file for a fucking divorce. I mean, does he even love you anymore, or is he just keeping up appearances at this point?” He was right up in her face now, his hands pressed tightly to his sides as though he wanted to gesticulate with them but wasn’t going to.
Alice heaved a sigh and threw up her hands. “You know, I don’t want to get into this with you right now, FP. I didn’t break you out because I wanted to run away with you. Here’s the situation: I love him. I don’t even know why I love him anymore, but we’ve been married for twenty-five years, I’ve been on the straight and narrow path the whole time, and he still thinks I’m going to hurt him one of these days.” My father stretched his hand out towards her shoulder, but she pulled away. “Anyway,” she said, “the point is, I broke you out, so either go or don’t go. The ball’s in your court.”
She turned on her heel, marched past him into the cell, and started pulling the door shut, but his hand on it stopped her. “So if you still love him, then why the hell’d you break me out?”
Alice made a noise that was somewhere between a sigh and a laugh and a sob as she sat down, slowly, on the cot. “I don’t know. Pick one. Maybe I’m just nostalgic for criminal activity. Maybe I think you don’t deserve what they’ll do to you. Maybe--”
“Maybe,” he said slowly, his gaze never leaving hers, “Serpents look after their own.”
She looked up, suddenly, surprised by that. Her hand in her lap was playing with her wedding ring. “I’m not a Serpent anymore, FP. I gave that up. I’m Alice Cooper now.”
“You can be both,” he murmured.
Alice squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her hands to her temples. “I shouldn’t have come. I don’t even know what I’m doing here.”
“You came here,” he said, his tone measured and careful, “to interview me. I threatened your family, said I had people who could take them out at any time if you didn’t unlock the door. It was horrible and terrifying and all that.”
“Doubtlessly,” Alice said wryly.
He snorted and moved on. “You yelled for help, but nobody heard you, so you did what I said. Then I shoved you in the cell, locked you inside, and took off running.”
“Alright,” she agreed, biting the inside of her lip. “Stay safe, FP.”
“You too, Al. C’mere.” He held out his arms in the cell doorway, and she swallowed, got up, and hugged him.
“Call collect when you’re out of town,” she murmured, gripping his neck tightly.
He pressed his lips into her hair, rubbing gently at the tension between her shoulders. “I’ll pay you back for the cash and the car.”
“You don’t have to.”
“I want to,” he protested.
“Okay,” she agreed, stepping back and letting him go. He closed the door, took one last look, and jogged off around the corner. I tried to follow him, but he was already in the car by the time I reached the door, so I watched him drive off, leaning forward to try and see him for as long as I could. Then I jogged back through the empty hallway of the low-security wing and signed out at the desk a minute after Alice Cooper’s sign-in time.
That was Thursday. On Friday, the Riverdale Herald ran a front-page piece on the Blossom gang, with the byline “Elizabeth Cooper, Staff Writer.” At nine o’clock on Saturday morning, my phone started ringing off the hook with requests for consultations and interviews. A few minutes after ten, my doorbell started ringing for all the people who thought they were too important to call ahead of time.
I almost missed Betty when she came in. It was a little after two in the afternoon, and I had just finished explaining to a lady in a mink coat that I had no interest in determining whether or not her dog had been abducted by aliens, but that she should check her fence for holes to see if he could have escaped that way.
“Betty,” I said gratefully, shooing the mink lady out the door. Then, remembering the sort of stupid, horrible things the universe liked to do to me, I asked, “Is something wrong?”
I took a long, hard look at her. Nothing seemed to be wrong: she was a little flushed in comparison to her cream-colored dress, and her hat was slightly askew on her head, but her eyes were alight with mischief and joy, which meant that whatever had her flustered was decidedly a good thing. “No, everything's great. Do you need me to wait?” she asked. “There’s talk in the other room of starting a charitable fund to buy you new waiting room chairs, so you should see them quickly, before they break their backs and go away.”
I wasn’t listening; I’d caught sight of the brown paper bag she held clutched in one hand. “Betts, please say you brought that for me. They kept me working all through lunchtime, and I’m famished.”
She set it on the desk. “It’s for both of us. I’ve been busy today, too, but I wanted to see you, and I couldn’t wait until Tuesday.”
I grinned, already rooting through the sack. “Well, if you hadn’t come by today, I would have found you tomorrow. Tuesday’s been feeling very far away, recently. What do you mean, busy?”
She pulled the wicker chair up to the desk and started talking, all about how Jason and Polly had faced the music for twenty-four hours, then given up and eloped, and she’d been a witness at the wedding: her father had been furious, but her mother had dragged him off into their bedroom, where they’d talked for almost an hour and both come out crying...
The sack contained two egg salad sandwiches, neatly cut into triangles, two covered containers of potato salad, two apples, and a tart-sized fruit cobbler, cut in half. It was divine, of course--the bread was homemade, hearty and golden, the egg salad had a sweet, juicy bite to it (maybe she put pickles in there?) and the perfect texture--
“I quit my job today,” Betty said, swallowing a nibble of sandwich.
I put what remained of my triangle down on the table. “Is everything okay?”
She took a sip of water from a bottle. “Yeah, no, everything’s fine. But I realized, writing the article yesterday, that the writing part was the least interesting bit about it. I think--I think I was in love with the concept of journalism, if that makes sense. But what I’ve always liked about journalism is the actual finding things out, not as much writing things down. I had all these grandiose dreams about being the next Nellie Bly.”
“I’m sorry, Betts,” I said. She smiled gratefully.
“Eat your sandwich, Juggie. I didn’t make it for you to stare at.” She watched me until I complied, then went on, “Anyway, it was nice to quit. They were shocked, of course, and they’re frantically trying to figure out which paper stole me away. Hey,” she paused to take a bite of potato salad, “maybe they’ll hire you to figure it out!”
“The Adventure of the Generous Contract,” I declaimed, laughing. Then I stole her water bottle from the desk in front of her. “In the interests of detection,” I asked, taking a long swig, “have you been stolen yet?”
She snatched at the bottle, but I leaped to my feet and held it over her head. “Juggie, give that back!”
“Tell me first,” I replied, dangling it teasingly. She started climbing up onto the desk as she spoke.
“No, I haven’t been st--ow! Stop tickling me, Juggie!” She swatted my hand away from her ribcage. “No, I’ve gotten offers,” she continued, “but I’m not taking them.”
I handed her back the bottle. “You need help getting down?”
“No, I don’t need help,” Betty said, beginning to clamber down. “But I would like a job.”
That brought me up short. “A job. As in, a job here? With me? You want to be partners.”
She put the water bottle on the table and stepped back carefully. “You don’t have to do that, Juggie. If it’s easier, I could just be a secretary or something. I mean, it’s your business, and I’m not taking it from you.”
“Betty, it was hardly a business until you walked in the door. I don’t think I’ve had this many clients in a year before, let alone a day,” I protested. “If you want in, then you’re in as a partner.”
Hre eyes widened just a fraction, and I felt a silly grin spreading across my face. “I want in,” she said decisively.
“Then you’re in,” I declared. “Partners.”
“Partners,” she agreed, picking up the water bottle and toasting me with it. She handed it to me, and I took a long swig.
“They say people who drink from the same cup are connected in spirit,” I began.
“Jughead Jones, are you flirting with me?” Betty gasped teasingly. Then she took the bottle and drank again. “What happens if they do it twice?” she inquired, holding it out to me.
I took it and drained the rest. “I don’t know,” I said, pretending to think. “Maybe it means they’re married--”
“My mom can only handle one surprise marriage a month, I think,” Betty cut in.
My grin grew so large that it threatened to disengage from my face and become a separate entity. “Who said anything about us getting married? No, in this case, I think it means that they’re business partners.”
Betty snorted. “You’re ridiculous,” she said impishly, and then her lips rocketed towards mine, burning and soothing all at once. I braced myself against the desk and devoted only a passing thought to the sensibilities of my clientele before abandoning the train of thought in order to kiss back.
“So is that what business partners do?” I asked innocently, wiping my mouth. “Because I think I could get behind that. It’s hard work, but I like it.”
She giggled. “No. We’re going to have to hire Ethel and Archie to do the serious work for us.”
I raised an eyebrow. “And that work is going to get done how? I mean, Ethel I can see, but Archie--”
“He has potential,” Betty insisted defensively. “Come on, admit it. You’ve missed him a little.”
“Can we get back to the topic of us being business partners?” I suggested. “I feel like we were making some real headway there.”
Betty stepped closer and took a deep breath. “I think,” she said, staring at my lips, “we should take a look at our taxation status--”
She broke off with a surprised laugh as I gripped around her waist and picked her up. Her arms locked about my neck, and I spun her around the room the way I used to spin Jellybean years ago. Her legs flew out, and her dress billowed around us.
“Juggie, I’m going to get dizzy,” she warned, breathlessly laughing the whole time. I set her down on the desk.
“Are you sure you’re ready for this? Our partnership?” I asked.
“Depends. Are you?”
For answer, I pulled her closer. “Let’s wait and see.”