Chapter Text
New York in February is the worst.
He likes the city well enough, likes the way the streets are never empty and the lights all around him are never dim, even when the sun sinks into the horizon and blankets the surrounding roads in frost, a cool, bitter chill that cuts through the air. He likes the way the city hums and breathes, bursting with life and sound and fullness at all hours of the night.
But the perpetual cold is really starting to get to him.
College is a little more predictable than he thought it would be; a little less cliché than all those teen dramas made it seem, and while he’s ditched the beanie, there’s still nothing he can do about his name.
He likes to think he deals with all the awkward pauses and the polite smiles and the far too many variations of, Is that really what your parents call you? that are thrown his way with a little more finesse than he did in high school.
Translation: he says, “Yup, it’s written on my birth certificate and everything,” with a grimace instead of an outright scowl.
Due to the intervention of whatever benevolent deity is watching over him, Jughead manages to score a single room. The heating is wonky, the walls are thin, and it’s approximately the size of a box, but it’s still a space that’s all his, a place where he can exist in his own mess after sharing in Archie’s for so long.
“You don’t know how lucky you are, man,” Archie says to him. They make it a point to talk on the phone at least once every two weeks. “I swear Jeremy’s going to kill me in my sleep this time.”
“I lived with you for almost a year, Arch,” Jughead points out, like Archie needs any reminding. “You’re kind of a slob.” This is a gross, gross understatement. He’s pretty sure that their pile of dirty laundry had taken a life of its own at one point.
Archie laughs in response, and Jughead feels himself laughing along with him. For a second, it’s almost like they’re back in Archie’s bedroom, two feet of space between them instead of two thousand miles.
He moved back in with his mom and Jellybean at the beginning of their junior year, a few months after his dad was arrested. Even then, even within the confines of his old room inside his old house, something in him will always consider Archie’s bedroom as the closest thing he has to a home.
“Hey, how’s your novel going?” Archie asks him. Jughead likes to pretend he can hear the crash of the ocean waves from his end of the line, even though he knows Archie’s only sitting in his dorm room, guitar on the bed and his desk scattered with sheets of music.
Jughead’s own desk is depressingly bare: a stack of books in the corner, spines worn thin from frequent use, and his laptop in the middle, screen opened up to a half-filled Word document, the blinking cursor staring at him mockingly from across the room.
“Slow going, huh?” Archie says, sympathetic, after a minute of pained silence.
He opens his mouth to tell Archie that it’s fine, that it’s normal, that he’s read Kafka’s diaries enough times to know that the guy struggled to write a sentence on a good day, and look how he turned out. Instead, “Nothing feels right here,” comes out of it.
Archie says, “Um,” and Jughead pauses, blinks. Well. He definitely hadn’t been expecting that.
“It’s just that—” Jughead rushes on, trying to piece it all together before he loses his train of thought. It’s like a dam breaking, everything pouring into him at once. “I guess I thought being here would make me different somehow.”
The thing is, Jughead wasn’t exactly surprised when the world’s most amicable breakup failed to produce anything of interest. But he is a little put off by the fact that the city that had inspired an entire generation of writers wasn’t doing the same for him.
“Maybe I’m just homesick,” he says, partly to break the silence on the other end, and mostly to make sure that Archie hasn’t fallen over and died due to the sudden emotional turn. He’s never been the best at dealing with them.
“Yeah, I miss it, too, sometimes,” Archie replies, though Jughead can tell he doesn’t really mean it. Archie is every bit as big and as bright in Berkeley as he was back in high school, the added glow from finally being able to do what he loves only adding fuel to the fire.
Jughead hums, wishes he could tell Archie that the homesickness isn’t for Riverdale, not really. He’s tired of all the pretending, misses the days when he knew who he was and it all meant something else entirely.
“Speaking of people from back home,” Archie says suddenly, voice bright. “Ronnie’s actually—”
“Ugh,” Jughead instantly responds, cutting him off. “I’m not in the mood to listen to you whine about your ex-girlfriend.” He’d played the role of the supportive best friend for weeks after their breakup, until even Mr. Andrews threatened to throw Archie out if he didn’t stop singing Norah Jones.
“Fuck off,” Archie says, laughing. “No, I was only gonna—” There’s a crash from his end of the line, and then Archie quickly adds, “Crap. Gotta go, Jeremy’s back. I’ll talk to you soon, Jug.”
“Bye,” Jughead says to the dial tone.
He leans back against his pillows, watches the shadows move along his ceiling. The only light source coming in is from his still-open, still-untouched laptop sitting in the middle of his desk, and this makes him think of the days of Jason Blossom, when words came to him so easily that he was almost afraid they’d never stop.
He sighs, shakes his head in an attempt to clear it, flicks his table lamp on. He’s got a fifty-page reading on Faulkner for his first class tomorrow, so he grabs that and gets to work.
—
By the time March rolls around, Jughead is fresh out of ideas and slowly running out of hope. His Comparative Literature professor, who is pretty much the closest thing he has to a mentor here, tells him to check out the screenwriting courses offered at Tisch for a change of scenery.
Translation: Jughead should devote his energy into doing something productive instead of hanging around his office after class hours.
Jughead’s always been a reader, has always used books as a means of escaping the drudgery of everyday life. But even he has to admit that if he reads Death of a Salesman one more time, he’s going to go insane.
He’s walking out of the main building, tucking the brightly colored pamphlet he’d picked up into his back pocket, when there’s a gust of wind, something that smells vaguely of home, and he looks up and finds himself meeting a very sharp, very recognizable gaze.
“Well, if it isn’t Jughead Jones,” Veronica says, and Jughead’s struck by how familiar everything is about her, from the way she moves down to her smile, like she knows something he doesn’t. “I almost didn’t recognize you without the hat.”
“Veronica, always a pleasure,” he drawls back, exaggerated, like they’re in some Golden Age movie. He’s always liked looking at his life filtered through the lens of film camera. “I almost didn’t see you without the five-inch heels,” he says, glancing down at her sturdy-looking, albeit probably designer, boots.
“Please,” Veronica says, playing along with him. She flicks her hand out, airy and dismissive. “This is New York. All that walking in stilettos? No, thank you.”
Despite the harsh weather, he grins and she returns the gesture, and they’re suddenly back in the real world, standing in the middle of a busy sidewalk, the air turning to ice all around them. “What are you doing here?”
Veronica arches a brow. “I’m surprised Archie hasn’t told you. I have it on good authority that the two of you talk almost every week.”
Oh. So that’s what Archie had been trying to tell him. “You keeping tabs on us now?”
Veronica rolls her eyes. “More like Archie told Val who told Betty who told Kevin who told me.” She pauses, cocks her head to one side, seeming thoughtful. “And if that doesn’t accurately sum up life in a small town, I don’t know what does.”
“I’m flattered to have finally made it onto the Riverdale grapevine,” he deadpans.
There’s a sudden blast of freezing wind that slices through the air, and Jughead crosses his arms over his chest in an attempt to stop his teeth from chattering. “I hate the cold,” he mutters.
Veronica shrugs. “It’s never bothered me.”
“Of course it doesn’t, Elsa,” Jughead shoots back, and three years ago there would have been an undercurrent of malice to his tone, a careful orchestrating of words designed to cut deep.
“Come on, Olaf,” Veronica says, ignoring Jughead’s indignant noise of protest at being compared to a cartoon snowman. “I’ll buy you a burger and tell you all about it if you’re still interested.”
He’s not sure what compels him to follow her, because God knows that he and Veronica had never really been friends back in Riverdale. Maybe it’s the sheer relief of finding a familiar face in the middle of such a big place, that bit of home he’d been unconsciously searching for.
Maybe it’s the unexpected ease of their interaction, like sliding back into a dynamic he hadn’t known existed. He idly wonders if this is what they could have been like all the time, if they had just let go of their pride early on and learned to coexist.
Or maybe it’s the promise of free food, because let it never be said that Jughead Jones is the kind of guy to look a gift horse in the mouth. Especially when it comes in the form of burgers.
—
The last time Jughead sees Veronica is at their high school graduation party, graciously hosted by the Blossoms at Thorn Hill.
The mansion is packed with people, and Jughead stands alone at the back, nursing a beer and watching the crowd like the wallflower he is. Archie’s drunk as usual, holding court in the middle of the floor, oblivious to Cheryl’s rather overt come-ons. Betty’s dancing with Reggie, laughing as he spins her around, her skirt billowing up behind her as she moves.
“Why am I not surprised to find you here?” a voice from beside him quips, and then Veronica’s standing next to him, a plastic cup in her hand, gaze trained on the room.
“Sulking because Archie is over there being hit on by Cheryl?” Jughead counters, and it’s only slightly sarcastic. The two of them have toned down considerably over the years, and while they aren’t exactly friends, they’re also a hell of a lot more civil than they used to be.
Veronica snorts, shaking her head in amusement as they watch Cheryl try and drag a confused Archie out onto the dance floor. “She can have him,” she says, eyes glittering with mirth. “This is the most fun I’ve had all night.”
“I guess compared to Elton John’s after-party, this is pretty lame,” he says with an exaggerated sigh, and Veronica actually laughs, takes a sip from her drink.
He and Veronica have always been in each other’s orbits, on each other’s radars, because of the people they were dating. But after he and Betty had broken up, with Archie and Veronica following suit a week later, there wasn’t much reason for them to keep seeing each other.
“I think I’ll miss this,” she says suddenly, sweeping a hand around the room like she owns it. “I’ll miss everything.” She finally looks up at him, dark eyes boring into his own. “I might even miss you, Forsythe Pendleton.”
“I’m so touched, seriously,” he drawls, putting a hand over his heart. But Veronica’s still staring at him, watching him carefully, and for one wild, furious second, Jughead thinks she’s about to ask him to dance.
To make matters worse, for one wild, furious second, Jughead thinks he might actually say yes if she does.
But she doesn’t. “I’ll see you around, Jughead,” Veronica says, perfectly painted lips curving into an enigmatic smile, like he’s just missed the punchline of an inside joke.
She disappears into the crowd, heels clacking against the marble floor as she walks away, and Jughead tells himself that he’s not disappointed, that he couldn’t care less about Veronica Lodge, not even a little bit.
—
Veronica brings him to a Shake Shack after he makes the mistake of admitting he’s never tried it.
“What do you mean you’ve never tried it?” she demands, putting her hands on her hips and staring at him accusingly, like he’s just committed some kind of felony. They’re waiting at the crosswalk headed towards Madison Square Park, where she claims the original branch is located. “It’s practically an American rite of passage.”
Jughead scoffs, then remembers that he did once refer to the closing of the Twilight Drive-In as the final nail on the coffin of the American dream, so he doesn’t have much of a leg to stand on as far as dramatics are concerned.
“I’m surprised you like it,” he admits. “It’s a little bit…” He trails off, flaps his hand out in an attempt to find the right word.
But Veronica just goes ahead and says it for him. “Plebeian?” she supplies, grins slightly. She flicks her hair out, gaze trained on the road in front of them. “I shudder to think of the kind of lifestyle you assume I live here,” she says, and Jughead rightfully shuts up.
“It’s not exactly Pop’s,” she tells him once they’ve taken their place in line. There’s an employee passing out menus for those waiting, and she grabs one and hands it over to him. “But the shakes are even better.”
“I’ll believe that when I’ve tried one,” he replies, and Veronica smirks at him. Challenge accepted.
Veronica orders him something called a black and white shake, along with every kind of burger on the menu. When they’ve finally settled down on one of the steel picnic tables set up around the stall, she pushes the plastic cup towards him, eyes flashing.
Despite his best efforts, Jughead eventually concedes that she’s right. The burgers have nothing on Pop’s originals, but the shakes are pretty spectacular. Jughead drains the last of his own in one quick slurp, then finishes off the rest of Veronica’s while she watches, amused.
“You gonna tell me what you’re doing in Tisch?” he finally asks once he’s polished off two burgers. “I thought you were at Cornell, making a head start on eventual world domination.”
“Let’s just say the Ivy League life was not for me,” she says, makes a face like she’s remembering something particularly awful. “Reminded me too much of my old self,” she finally admits in response to Jughead’s raised eyebrow.
He tries to reconcile his image of Veronica, with her expensive clothes and flashy cars, with anything other than a prestigious, traditional university and fails. “So what are you taking up now?”
But Veronica just meets his confused gaze, leans back in her seat and crosses her arms, tells him, “Photography,” like it’s the most natural thing in the world.
When Jughead doesn’t immediately respond, too properly stunned into silence, Veronica smirks again, shrugs. “I like capturing beauty and telling other people what to do,” she says, pops a fry in her mouth. “Seems like it’d be a no-brainer to me.”
Despite himself, Jughead nods. Touché.
“What about you?” she asks, turning the tables on him. Then she pauses, drums her fingers against the tabletop. “No, wait, let me guess. English major. Am I right?”
“Maybe,” Jughead grumbles, and Veronica grins triumphantly. “I’m thinking about minoring in film. But I need to wait until next year and I don’t know if my scholarship will cover it.”
“I know the department head,” Veronica says. “I can get you in touch with him. I’m sure he’d be able to help you out.”
“That—that would be great,” Jughead says, even now unused to having people do things for him. He swallows thickly. “Thanks.”
“Don’t mention it,” Veronica says, dismissive. She’s peering around the park, watching leaves fall onto the passerby below. “Anything for a friend, right?”
Three years ago, hell, even a year ago, Jughead wouldn’t have been caught dead spending time with Veronica Lodge. But considering the fact that they’ve just spent the last few hours talking, like they’ve never glared at each other from across a booth, like they’ve never been anything other than almost-acquaintances, he thinks her assessment might be a fair one at this point.
“Right,” he echoes, and Veronica meets his smile with one of her own.
—
Jughead pushes against the glass door and hurries into the welcome warmness of the shop, the smell of roasting coffee and cinnamon buns drifting through the air. Veronica’s already at their usual table, the last booth nearest the back.
“You’re late,” she states, watching him slide into the seat across her. There’s a ceramic mug waiting for him, steam rising from the surface. “I took the liberty of ordering your usual.”
“Got held up talking to my calculus professor,” he explains, unwinds his scarf and tosses it to one side of the table. “Thanks,” he adds, takes the hot drink in his hands, inhales slowly.
Veronica lets him take two sips before she leans forward eagerly, says, “Well? Let me see.”
“Only if you hold up your end of the bargain,” he returns, and she huffs impatiently, digs into her bag and pulls out a black plastic folder.
“Got them right here,” she says triumphantly, waving the envelope in front of his face.
He sighs, opens his own bag and retrieves a stack of paper from it. The margins are scribbled over in red pen, words crossed out and then added again. “Fine,” he says, and hands his work over. “But I want your honest opinion.”
“Trust me,” Veronica replies, pushing the folder across the table, “you’re not worth lying to.” But she grins at him, wide-eyed and excited, so he knows she doesn’t really mean it.
Three years ago, Jughead would have rather streaked through the school halls naked than show anyone, especially Veronica Lodge, any of his work. The novel he’d worked on tirelessly for most of their sophomore year had turned more into an outlet for his pent-up emotions than anything else, but it had also given him some kind of direction in life.
It was Veronica’s brilliant idea to “trade their crafts,” which is how he finds himself flipping through the portfolio that had gotten her into art school.
The first shot is one of Pop’s, the night sky in the background and the bright neon lights practically jumping off the page. There’s one of Sweetwater River, the water crystalline and the riverbank covered in wildflowers. There’s a picture of Thorn Hill, mist swirling around in the foreground, the steel gates imposing and harsh.
Jughead turns the page, finds himself staring at candid shots of Betty, her hair down and her smile wide, talking to Polly’s growing stomach. There are photos of Archie, strumming his guitar and staring out his window, seeming miles way from where he is.
He keeps going and sees an image of Cheryl, holding a tube of lipstick in one hand and trying to shield her face with the other. There are a couple of Kevin, Reggie, and Josie dancing in a club, strobe lights flashing all around them. He can practically hear their laughter.
He flips the book over, and to his surprise, he’s looking down at a picture of himself. He’s sitting at their regular booth in Pop’s, forehead creased in concentration as he stares at something on his computer screen. Jughead recognizes it as the expression he wears when he’s trying to stitch ideas together, when something in his thoughts doesn’t make sense.
He wonders when Veronica had taken it, wonders how he’d never noticed her with a camera before. The pictures are good, the kind only someone with natural talent and skill would be able to produce, and he’s a little embarrassed by how surprised he was by her major, when this is clearly something she was born to do.
Jughead’s known Veronica for a little over three years, but he doesn’t think he’s ever really paid attention to her until now. He’s certainly never thought of her the way the boys back in high school had, and maybe that’s what had deluded him into thinking that he knew her, that he could read her like one of his books.
He lingers over the picture of himself, and something in his gut twists into knots. He feels stupid, idiotic, all of a sudden, like an illusion’s been shattered but he doesn’t know which one.
Veronica clears her throat and Jughead jumps in his seat, turns to look at her. “Your pictures are good,” he says, and she deflates in relief. It’s a minuscule movement, but he’s glad to have caught it. It makes her seem more human somehow. “Probably because of the expensive camera, but good enough.”
“Well, your story’s pretty good,” she returns, her mouth curling upwards at the ends. “Probably because you’re the poster boy for existential angst, but good enough.”
There’s a brief pause, the two of them lock eyes, and then Jughead grins. “Fuck you,” he says, and Veronica dissolves into laughter. “These are really good,” he admits, handing the portfolio back to her.
“I like what you have so far,” Veronica replies. “It’s very Vonnegut meets Orwell meets Stephenie Meyer.”
“I can’t tell if you’re making fun of me or not,” Jughead says, shaking his head in amusement. Three years ago, she would have been for sure. And three years ago, Jughead would have countered her statement with something equally as snarky.
God, they were terrible people. How on earth did Archie and Betty manage to hang out around them? He makes a mental note to ask Archie about that the next time he calls before he remembers that Archie’s unaware of the fact that Jughead’s been actively hanging out with his ex-girlfriend. Kevin would have a field day.
“Neither can I,” Veronica says. “It’s my default mode.” When Jughead groans, she actually leans forward and reaches out, holds Jughead’s chin in her hand and tilts his head towards her. “Seriously, Jughead,” she says earnestly, “you’re good.”
You’re great, Jughead’s mind supplies automatically, and he feels something within him shift and explode. Oh, God.
His eyes fly open and he immediately tenses beneath her touch, practically recoiling in his shock. Veronica withdraws her hand, shoots him confused glances which Jughead pointedly ignores, his brain reeling.
“So, that big project you’ve got due next month, how’s that coming along?” he asks, in lieu of going into catatonic shock.
If Veronica picks up on how high-pitched his voice suddenly is, she doesn’t show it. “It’s fine,” she says, pausing to take a sip from her drink. “But my professor wants me to use a male subject,” she adds, a hint of disgust in her tone. “And it’s not that I have anything against your species, but try posting an ad for a male model willing to take his shirt off and see how many creeps you find.”
Jughead laughs, allows himself to relax a little. Then he notices the look Veronica is giving him and his smile falters. “What?”
“You know,” Veronica says slowly, like she’s just slotting pieces together, “you’re really not bad looking. And, I mean this solely from an artistic point of view,” she clarifies, putting a hand up like she’s swearing on it. “Nothing else.”
Jughead says, “No.”
Veronica bats her eyelashes, says, “Please?”
Jughead says, “Fuck no.”
—
“I hate you,” Jughead tells her, tone as serious as possible. There’s a gust of wind and he shivers, hisses as the cool air hits his skin. Damn Veronica Lodge. “Really, I do.”
“No, you don’t,” Veronica replies without missing a beat. She fiddles around with the lens of her camera, checks the color balance and the light settings.
“I look ridiculous,” Jughead groans for the fifteenth time, fighting down the urge to run a brush through his hair. His hand twitches at his side.
“You look hot, is what you look,” Veronica counters, slapping his hand away. “Don’t ruin my hard work.”
They’re standing in the middle of Central Park, Veronica with a fancy camera slung around her neck, the heels of her boots sinking into the slush. Jughead’s hair is gelled and styled into a disheveled mess that’s meant to be artistic, and he’s holding onto the tattered leather jacket Veronica had thrown at him.
He has no idea what he’s doing here, has no idea how he’s supposed to make this shoot work. Jughead’s barely able to smile for school pictures; he’s not exactly the epitome of, “Think sex, drugs, and rock and roll,” that Veronica’s apparently going for. Even with a studded leather jacket.
When he protests as much, Veronica just scoffs, says, “And you call me dramatic.”
She lifts the camera up to her face and takes a few test shots, adjusts the lighting stand Jughead had carried halfway across the city. The stares he got on the subway were not fun. “Now, shut up and take your shirt off.”
With one final, desperate groan, which is ignored by the raven-haired girl impatiently tapping her foot in front of him, Jughead does as he’s told. It’s freezing out, the cold air hitting his skin in icy pinpricks, but Veronica’s promised to pay for his hospital fees should he catch pneumonia, so he goes along with it. At least he gets to wear the jacket.
It’s probably just the cold causing his brain to short circuit, but he thinks he sees Veronica’s gaze linger for a second longer than necessary, her glance assessing and thick with a tension he can’t place, a tension he suddenly feels swirling around in the open air.
Then she seems to snap out of it, shakes her head, grins at him. “What are you waiting for?” she demands, lifts her camera upwards once again. “Let’s make some art.”
—
“You seem to be making more progress, Mr. Jones,” his professor tells him, reading over the latest draft Jughead’s sent over for his approval.
“Thanks, Jim,” Jughead says, stretches his arms above his head. He notices the glare on his elderly professor’s face and sighs. “Sorry, Professor Davis. Guess you were right about me needing a change.”
Professor Davis nods, purses his lips thoughtfully, like Jughead’s said something particularly profound. “Change isn’t always a bad thing,” he says. “I’ve never been able to figure out why students think otherwise.”
Jughead’s phone buzzes, and he knows it’s a text from Veronica. He thinks about the way she never sugarcoats her opinion, the way her face had lit up the last time he saw her, how she’d grabbed his hand and said, “Amazing, Jug, seriously.”
He thinks about the way things were three years ago, wonders how he’d ever lived his life without the presence of Veronica Lodge when she takes up such a great space in it now.
“Who knows?” he replies with a shrug. He stands, retrieves his work. “Maybe they’re just scared to live.”
—
Three weeks later, he meets Veronica for drinks at some beach-themed bar in Brooklyn, another one of her favorite haunts. He kind of likes the way New York restaurants really stick to their themes, and this place is no different. There’s actual sand on the floor, and the drinks come in colorful tumblers topped with paper umbrellas.
“When you said Brooklyn,” Jughead starts, taking in the fairy lights and the orange concoction Veronica had ordered for him, “I was expecting something a little more…”
“Edgy?” Veronica finishes for him. “Alternative? Cool? Somewhere suspenders, plaid, and, dare I say, beanies would be all the rage? Why would you ever want to go to a place like that?”
Jughead rolls his eyes. “Alright, you caught me,” he says, putting his hands up in mock surrender. “I just wanted to be with my own people.” Veronica throws a paper umbrella at him.
The surprising potency of the alcohol, mixed in with the fact that midterms season had just ended, means that Veronica ends up getting them another two rounds, leaving Jughead tipping towards her unsteadily, both of them giggling.
There’s a lull in their conversation, and then Veronica says, “Tell me about Betty.”
“She’s your best friend,” Jughead says, shooting her a curious glance. “What do you need to know?”
“Tell me why you guys broke up,” she continues. When Jughead opens his mouth to protest, Veronica holds a hand up, stopping him. “Yes, I know I heard it from her. But now I want to hear it from you. There are two sides to every story after all.”
“There’s not much to say,” Jughead replies, shrugs ruefully. “I guess after Jason’s case closed, there wasn’t much reason for us to stay together.”
He and Betty had gotten together amidst the circumstances surrounding Jason Blossom’s death, when for the first time in their lives, Riverdale had been a place of mystery, excitement, intrigue, with tensions running high and no one was to be trusted.
It was Jason’s murder and the events that stemmed from his death that had brought them together. He supposes that it was only fitting for the conclusion of the case to bring about the end of their relationship as well.
He loves Betty, cares about her, nothing about that will ever change. But something inside him has always known they weren’t meant to last, that their relationship was on borrowed time. When they finally called it quits, a pressure he hadn’t known existed eased up a little, allowing him to breathe.
Veronica nods like she understands, and she probably does. She’s always been empathetic, has always found a way to insert herself into narratives that aren’t hers and build from there, but Jughead doesn’t mind anymore.
He’s starting to think that maybe he never really did.
“What about you and Archie?” he asks, mainly to fill the sudden silence. They both know that Archie’s already told him everything.
“What always happens,” Veronica says, and she seems a little wistful, a little nostalgic. He wonders when this conversation took such a serious turn. “Life. Veronica Lodge doesn’t do long-distance.”
It’s the same reasoning, the same words that Archie had parroted back to him the night they broke up, but something in Jughead’s gut tells him that it isn’t entirely the truth. He realizes that it’s because he knows Veronica now, knows her mannerisms and the way she avoids eye contact when she’s lying.
But he also knows her well enough to know that prying for information will get him nowhere, that Veronica will come to him when she’s ready. They’ve got that in common, after all.
Jughead tilts back in his seat, squints against the sudden brightness of the lights around them, and says, “Your loss.”
Veronica kicks him underneath the table, and just like that, they’re back to normal.
—
Veronica lives in her own apartment off-campus, one of the only properties her mom had on her own before the court took everything with Hiram Lodge’s name attached to it. When Jughead first found out, he’d said, “Figures the rich girl wouldn’t live in a dorm like everyone else.”
Veronica gaped at him, put a hand over her heart like what he said had personally offended her. “Me?” she echoed with an exaggerated gasp. “Live with other people?”
Three years go, the acidity in his tone would have been genuine. Three years ago, she’d have shot back with a biting comment of her own, while Archie and Betty exchanged resigned glances when they thought they weren’t looking.
“I had fun,” she tells him when they’ve stopped in front of her apartment. Her cheeks are tinged pink from the cold, eyes strangely bright.
“I had fun, too,” he says honestly, surprised that it’s the first time he’s admitted this in the two months they’ve been hanging out.
It’s dark out, only a few stars scattered across the night sky, and strangely silent, like a hush has fallen over everything, blanketing the city. The only light coming in is from the street lamps further ahead, set up along the main road.
Veronica looks up at him from beneath curled lashes, dark hair and dark eyes drawing him in, like some kind of gravity-defying pull. It’s like he can’t look away, like he’s frozen in place, and almost unknowingly, his gaze darts down to her lips.
For one wild, furious second, he wonders what it would be like to kiss her.
“I’ll see you,” Veronica says, and then she’s peeling herself away from him, walking into her lobby and leaving Jughead outside, standing in the cold.
He makes his way back to the dorms, his insides surprisingly still. He supposes that this would have come as more of a shock to him if the thought hadn’t been lingering at the back of his head for weeks, maybe even longer.
Besides, Jughead had long ago resigned himself to the fact that his life was never going to go the way he expected it to. Case in point: here he is falling over the girl he had once referred to as the Snow Queen.
He thinks he would have been more surprised if this was the first time he’s ever thought about what it might be like to kiss Veronica Lodge.
But it isn’t.
—
The summer before their junior year, Jughead walks back from visiting (read: sneaking into) Betty’s room. Even though her mom’s lightened up considerably, especially in the wake of Polly’s pregnancy, Mrs. Cooper has always made her disdain for him obvious.
Besides, he kind of likes scaling the wall of the Cooper residence. Some part of him never did get over wanting to be a secret agent.
He knows that Veronica’s over at Archie’s tonight, though he’s not entirely sure why. The two of them had finally gotten together at his disastrous birthday party, eliciting a lot of disappointment from a majority of the female population at Riverdale High.
Betty had been ecstatic, Jughead had been apathetic, Cheryl had been furious, and Kevin had said, “Major plot twist, but I still ship it.”
He crosses the short distance towards the Andrews house, and in the dim light from the moon, he’s surprised to find Veronica sitting on the steps of the front porch, a vacant expression on her face.
“Not doing the walk of shame, are you?” she asks when he stops in front of her.
“What are you doing here?” he asks, too curious to bother with being polite.
Veronica lets out a gusty sigh. “My mother requested use of the Pembrooke this evening,” she tells him, folding her legs closer to her body. “As it had something to do with Fred Andrews, I chose not to ask.”
Translation: “You got sexiled by your mom?”
“Ugh, pretty much?” Veronica gripes, her lips curling in distaste. “I get that she’s an adult who can make her own decisions, but I’d rather that said decisions didn’t happen in my living room.”
To his surprise, Jughead actually cracks a smile. The gesture seems to serve as some kind of icebreaker, because when Veronica shifts over to let him pass through, instead of walking inside the house, he finds himself sitting next to her.
“Mr. Andrews is great,” he says sincerely, looking out at the empty street in front of him. From his peripheral, he feels her turn towards him, those dark eyes directed at him, instead of past him, for once.
“Archie is a pretty lucky guy,” she agrees, exhales slowly. There’s a beat of silence, and then because she’s Veronica Lodge, she asks, “How’s your dad?”
FP Jones had been wrongly convicted for the murder of Jason Blossom a few months prior. There had been sufficient evidence that led to his arrest, evidence even Archie and Betty were unable to overlook. The whole ordeal had led to a lot of forced sympathy and whispers that trailed him down the halls, and the iciest treatment Cheryl Blossom had ever given him.
In the end, it had been one of Clifford Blossom’s men that had done the job. It was the classic tale of a missed target, a hired assassin gone rogue, and the heir to the Blossom family fortune and father-to-be was killed. But the other charges against FP were pretty serious, serious enough to land him behind bars for at least seven years.
“I’m not giving up on him,” he says, but the words come out hollow, empty. He’d been the weird kid with the weird name for so long; the added pressure of being the weird kid whose dad had shot Jason Blossom still lingers somehow.
“I know,” Veronica replies, her voice quiet, hushed. “Trust me, Jughead. I know what it’s like.”
Here’s the thing: Veronica does know. She knows more about this than anyone else. More than Betty, who’d stroked his cheek and said, “I know, Jug, and I’m here for you.” More than Archie, who opened his home to him, who is more like family than anyone he has left.
Veronica knows, truly and viscerally, what he’s going through.
They sit together for a while longer, and Jughead suddenly feels like they’re the only two people sitting on the fringes of the edge of the world. When the clouds shift and a breeze starts to drift through the air, Jughead stands, says, “Come on, I’ll walk you home.”
The walk back to the Pembrooke is spent mostly in silence, and Jughead thinks it’s the most comfortable he’s ever been around Veronica, when the pauses that fill the gaps in their conversations are usually so awkward and forced.
They stop in front of her building, and Veronica notices the truck still parked down the road. She sighs, lingers in front of him. In the light from the street, her features look softer, more vulnerable. He thinks it might be the first time he’s ever truly thought of her as beautiful.
“Thanks for walking me back,” she says, tone soft. She inches forward, and Jughead wonders if this is what Archie felt like in the closet: rooted in his spot and unable to move away, but not caring nonetheless.
It’s like they’re trapped in a bubble of their own creation, something that keeps the rest of the world at bay. He can’t look at anything but her, can’t see anything else in front of him, and when his eyes flit down to her lips, he wonders what it would be like to kiss her.
Their reentry into reality comes in the form of the front door opening, the sound of Mr. Andrews hurrying down the steps piercing into their moment. He seems pleased, content, and it’s Veronica’s obvious embarrassment that sets Jughead back.
“Oh,” Mr. Andrews says when he finally notices the two teenagers standing in front of him, probably staring at him like a pair of deer caught in the headlights. “I didn’t know you were out here, Jug. Come on, I’ll give you a ride back.” Then he turns to Veronica and nods. “Veronica, nice to see you.”
She gives him a polite smile in return, the corners of her eyes creasing slightly, and shoots Jughead one last glance. Somehow, he feels like he’s just lost something. “Bye,” she says.
“Bye,” Jughead calls out, but she’s already closing the door behind her.
The next Monday, when school starts up again, Veronica calls him Jess Mariano at lunch. He follows that up with, “Yeah, okay, Paris Geller,” even though Paris has always reminded him more of Betty.
He likes to pretend that Veronica pauses for a second longer than usual before ramming the tip of her stiletto into his shin.