Chapter Text
In her dreams, Jellybean falls. She collapses over cliff edges, tumbles down through rain-beaten air, snags herself on sharp rocks. And without fail she always jolts awake before the ground smashes her skull open.
This time she is crumpled on her father's sofa, the coarse fabric rough on her skin as she dares to grip the seams of the stiff cushions and look over the edge. Her tangled hair tumbles over her cheek as the wind whips it away from her face. Her terrified eyes are captured in the reflection of a thousand windows lining the sky, screwed to the armour of a skyscraper. The city lives on below her, roaring cars and crowds of people passing by
Jellybean yelps in horror, thumping backwards against the back of the sofa. It rocks recklessly, the centre of it balanced on the spire of the skyscraper, threatening to tip any second.
Her throat fills with fear laced air. She screams. Jughead's name grates her throat over and over again. No one below her cares. None of the cars pull on their breaks to stop and look, none of the pedestrians pause their conversations to listen to her screams. She is not a person on the edge threatening to jump. She is not the hostage of King Kong.
She is just a girl on the edge of a sofa hoping that her brother won't let her fall.
The last of her voice is used to cry out his name one more time. Then her fingers slip from the seams of the sofa. And she tumbles off the edge and watches a thousand versions of her fall.
Her body jolts upright. The old clothes she wears stick to her back, her sweat like glue on her skin. The heart in her chest is rattling erratically between her ribs. It needs a minute to breathe. Jellybean gulps in a pint of air and counts to ten.
1…2…3…4…5…
She glances beside her, relieved to find her father's trailer instead of the spike of a skyscraper. The old metal creaks in the tugging wind, a whispering hum. Jellybean relaxes to the familiar sound. It's constant, like a beating heart or a steady breath. It is in places like this that she feels she can be heard.
As steadily as she can, she slips her feet from the sofa, feeling the rough carpet under her bare toes. Her face creaks as she yawns, hoping that Jughead managed to buy some fresh groceries for the fridge. Otherwise she might be having hamburgers for breakfast – again.
She'd like to see Jughead's face if she ever decided to become vegetarian.
Her heartbeat has slowed to a steady thrum as she paces towards the kitchen. The fear from her dream has been replaced by excitement. It fills up the empty cavity of her stomach. She remembers last night; the conversation she'd had with her brother, her desperate need for him to move on. She dreams of home – of heading back to the city with her brother, of spending a holiday with him outside of his nightmares. Of letting her mother wait a few more weeks in Toledo.
Those hopeful thoughts tumble out of her brain as soon as she sees it. The table behind the kitchen; strewn with notes and pictures and, underneath a flickering desk lamp, a book lying open. The book that she had hidden underneath her pillow last night, hoping jughead would never find it.
And here it was, found, lying in front of her. It's limp pages no replacement for the brother who had left it and her and an empty trailer behind.
In movies, when the code is solved, everything is supposed to slot together. The damsel is saved, the plot twist is revealed, and the villain is caught in loud, explosive, Hollywood style.
In real life it is like a limp microwavable cheeseburger. The outside packaging promises a luscious, rich burger with crisp lettuce and melted cheddar. Instead, you're thrusted with a soggy cowpat, paper thin grass and cheese that tastes like plastic.
I stare at the cypher and scoff at how much hope I'd put into it. Like I'd expected it to morph into a map with flashing neon lights leading me exactly to where Betty is. Instead it's a simple, pointless message. Something that could so easily be sent in a text message.
Happy birthday
That's what it says.
Like a morbid birthday card with a missing girl's face on the back.
I stare at the photograph in my hand, the limp realisation of my failures. I had gripped onto it so tightly, my attention so diverted by it, my hopes so stringed to it like a noose.
Now even my fingers don't put effort into holding it. A whisper of wind could blow it from between my fingertips.
I throw the photograph back into my backpack, trying to shake off the way it clings to my mind. It's somebody's idea of a joke. A cynical stab at those still grieving a girl they never had the chance to say goodbye to. A scoff at those who still possess some humanity.
If the photograph was still in my hand, I would have crushed it in my fist by now. My fingers ache. I curl them against my palm.
And lift them to crack my fist against Archie's office door.
"Happy birthday."
It's just a whisper in the wind. A trickle against the back of my neck.
But it sounds so close to Betty's voice.
My eyes dart to the end of the corridor. Half opened blinds rattle against the window frame at the end of the hall. The tall, arching plant in the corner shudders in the breeze, it's terracotta pot stark against the clean white walls. Its long, thin shadow looks so much like a ponytail.
I swallow. Why won't Betty let me forget about her?
No matter how many times I try to push thoughts of her out of my mind, she still clings on. After all these years, she's still lingering inside my chest. It's like there's a reserved sign hanging in my heart, waiting for her to return.
Or maybe those are just metaphors of guilt.
I let out a short breath, scoffing at myself before turning to push Archie's office door open. Behind me, the elevator whirs, shudders and then dings. The glossy metal doors slide open.
There's a single footstep before; "Jones?"
My shoulder twitches as I turn. It isn't Archie's voice.
A tall figure strides out of the elevator, his broad shoulders filling out a dark grey and navy raglan shirt. A curl of black hair hangs over his eyes. Slinging a hand into the pocket of his jeans, he breaks into an erratic smile.
"I didn't realise this was a school reunion," Reggie muses aloud, a brief flicker of confusion passing over his face as the elevator doors slide closed behind him. I catch a glimpse of my reflection in them. I don't recognise the man staring back at me. He's frail and weathered and his crown beanie sits limply on his head.
"How you been, Jughead?" Reggie slaps an overly friendly hand against my shoulder as he passes me and pushes Archie's office door open.
I grumble under my breath, flexing my shoulder and I trail behind him like society has always forced me to do.
"Hey, Reggie," Archie hums comfortably, slinging on a jacket as he paces towards the door. "You ready?" He falters as he spots me, one arm of his jacket still hanging off his shoulder. "Oh, Jug. I didn't know you were coming-"
"I wasn't-" I mutter under my breath, passing a sideways, irritated glance at Reggie. As if on cue Reggie's loud, boisterous laugh cuts me off as he shoves me jokingly in the side.
"I found this one loitering around your door like a lost puppy," he chuckles infuriatingly.
I feel like one. Straggly and unwanted and caught on the underside of his show.
"Actually," I stride into Archie's office, bristling past Reggie as I say, "I just came by to pick up the-"
"Oh, right," Archie jolts forwards as if he'd been dosing and paces to his desk, rattling open a drawer and plucking the envelope out of it. I reach for it too quickly, trying to pretend that I haven't been avoiding Archie. He tries to pretend that he doesn't notice. I catch it in the way his eyebrow twitches like an irritating itch.
And Reggie's sunken in eyes dart towards me, watching my rough, insistent movements. I spot the dark skin under his eyes. They're painted by insomnia. It's a face I've worn too often I recognise it instantly.
With jagged movements, I slide the envelope into my bag in an attempt to hide it.
It's probably for the best that Reggie's here. Otherwise Archie would be grilling me about what I've found out about Betty. I can't bear to say the scratchy, cracked word, "Nothing" aloud.
"Thanks," I mutter, hearing my voice break before turning swiftly towards the door.
"It was good to see you, Jughead," Reggie says suddenly, his voice chiselled to a gentler tone. It's the first time he's ever sounded real to me.
I glance at him briefly, shrug once and mumble, "Yeah" with a brief twitch of my lips.
And I leave the room, wondering where he was on the night that Betty disappeared.
The cassette tape whirs for a few more seconds before spluttering to a stop. I click the rewind button, hearing Kevin and Polly and Pop's voices squirm backwards, a tangled web of words and mutterings. Jellybean's headphones smother my ears as I slouch over the tape recorder in POP's diner, crouched in the corner of a shaded booth. I haven't listened to it since Kevin had dropped it off at the trailer when I was out. My priorities had been toyed with elsewhere.
I sigh.
There's a haunting feeling about listening to voices speak backwards. Their syllables are incoherent and smothered. And yet, amidst that jumble of sounds, I half expect for every truth to be revealed. Like the Pokemon theme played backwards. Or peeling back the curtains of the universe.
Yet all it is a mess of reality.
My thumb hovers over the play button. I recognise the sound of Kevin's backwards voice jolt into Polly's. I press play.
"I don't know anything, I just-"
"Was Betty in here the day before she disappeared?"
There's a click between the two phrases. Like a rift between conversations. I press pause. The button makes the exact same sound. Click.
Click.
The tape plays again. I hear Pop respond. He's hesitant but truthful and I hear it in the way his voice steadies. But I know all this already. I've heard the tap played over and over. How Betty came here the day before she disappeared. How Kevin saw the footage. How she left without meeting anyone.
Kevin relayed all this to me over the phone. I asked him hours ago as soon as I'd heard it on the tape.
It is not Pop's words that I care about anymore. It is Polly's words. Or more accurately, the absence of them. The words lost in the space between her voice and Kevin's.
It is the-
Click.
A gloved finger presses down the pause button from across from me. The sudden silence is jarring. I glance up shortly, expecting to see Jellybean thumped down in the booth across from me, her arms crossed and her eyes irritated.
But instead the gentle, tired eyes of Josie smile back at me.
"Are you going to eat that?" She asks with an amused smile as she points at the greasy plate beside me currently at a risk of being knocked over by my elbow. On the plate is a half-eaten burger that has been sat stone cold for the last half hour.
"Feel free," I nudge the plate towards her and she cringes. My lips twitch up into a smile. For the first time in a while, it feels real.
"You look less stressed when you smile," she muses aloud. It sounds less like a compliment and more like an observation. Then, with a bristled shiver, she corrects herself. "Sorry, I didn't ask you if I could sit here."
I shrug. I've lost my energy to fight for anything anymore. Even a booth at POP's.
She relaxes. "What are you listening to?" she asks, her dark eyes glancing down at the tape recorder. I reach my hand out and scoop it towards me, hooking Jellybean's headphones down from my ears.
"You ask a lot of questions," I say shortly, tucking the tape recorder back into my bag. The sound of the zip as I pull the bag closed is sharp and metallic.
She smiles apologetically, her eyes flittering over me with interest. They're cautious, like they're hiding behind a curtain. "From what I remember, you used to do the same thing."
A chuckle escapes my throat. The crack of POP's door flying open snaps it short.
Sheriff Keller strides in, sweaty hands clipped into his belt, fingers twitching erratically. He walks over to Pop to hovers behind the counter, muttering something to the older man who shakes his head decisively.
Josie's head darts to me as I jump up from the booth. There's something not right. I can see it in the way the Sheriff's bicep muscle twitches. His fist is clenched. It's an action I find myself doing all the time when I'm anxious.
The Sheriff turns away from Pop, his greying eyes shaded by eyebrows and intense worry. They snap to cold attention when they latch onto me striding towards him.
"I don't really have time for this, Jughead," he lays low in his throat, turning towards the door, a vein in his neck twitching.
"What's happened, Sheriff?" I ask boldly, my gaze sharpening with authority. He scoffs back at me, mocking my boldness. But then his eyes weaken, and he swallows hard. It's as if he's admitting that he needs help for the first time.
"Kevin's gone," he says bluntly, his voice low so nobody else in the diner can hear him but me. There's a mutual trust between us. A tolerance that has turned to respect. I hone my ears to hear him. My breath quickens with confusion. I'd only spoken to Kevin a few hours ago. There'd been nothing in his voice to suggest he was distressed or scheming or-
Sheriff Keller's jaw tightens as if he's fighting with himself whether to tell me more. He can see the panic in my eyes. The realisation that this is all happening again. That it is all happening again, and I can't do anything. Then, with a brisk resolution, he says, "And he's taken the car."