Chapter Text
On an unseasonably hot fall day in her freshman year of high school, Betty Cooper is asked out on a date for the very first time. Once it sinks in, she understands that this is the natural conclusion to a summer spent increasingly in the company of Kevin Keller, making plans for a book club at the beach by day and watching Netflix at his house by night. At first, she’s not sure it's even a date date. Not until he literally says the words ‘I’m asking you out’ does it finally click.
After the initial confusion, she’s flattered, and thrilled. Her first date, and with the boy who’s currently the number one heartthrob in her year. If she’s perfectly honest with herself, she would have preferred it if a certain next-door neighbor had finally realized they were meant to be more than just friends, but Kevin positively blossomed in their final year of middle school, growing into his teenage skin in all the right ways. He’s cute, and stylish, always smells really good, and come on, how lucky is she right now? Just thinking about it puts a spring in her step. It’s only on her way home from school that day that it hits her; that their date this Friday will likely reveal her deepest, darkest secret when it comes to boys. Namely, her complete and utter ineptitude at kissing.
“You excel at most things in life, Betty. Why would this be any different?”
The way Jughead says it, it’s not exactly a compliment. With him, it rarely is. It’s a matter-of-fact statement, delivered in an indifferent voice. While Betty sits perched on a small chair, he has resorted to half-lying on the floor of the treehouse, back hunched up against the wall, legs still a little bent in the cramped space. Though they’ve both long ago outgrown their childhood haunt in the canopy of the old maple in the Jones’s back yard, it feels like Jughead has shot up about half a foot over the summer. His hair has taken a leaf out of the growth spurt book too, sticking out here and there under his beanie. All in all, he gives the impression of a surly telegraph post with a crow’s nest perched on top.
“I don’t excel,” Betty says. “And if I occasionally do, it’s only because I’ve had practice. Lots of practice.”
Jughead sighs and worms his way down until his back is flat against the floorboards, hands behind his neck and feet now propped up on the wall. “Honestly, how hard can it be?”
She throws a glance his way. “You mean you haven’t…?”
“Oh yeah, of course,” he says sarcastically. “I’m sure you’ve seen the girls practically trample each other to get in line for a taste of this.” He motions at himself with a flamboyant sweep of the hand. “Seriously? If you want advice on sucking face, I suggest you go see Archie.”
Archie? The mere thought of it makes Betty’s heart do double time. “God, no,” she says with a little laugh.
“Anyway, it’s not like there’s anything strange about being bad at kissing. We’re fourteen. Ask The Man and he’ll tell you you shouldn’t even be thinking about Kevin Keller in that kind of way. Not for another three years at least.”
“I’m fifteen,” Betty reminds him. “And everyone’s dating now.”
Jughead grimaces. “Yeah, it’s an unsettling development to say the least.”
A thought strikes Betty then. She came to Jughead about this because, well, she trusts him. Has always trusted him. Over the years she’s told him any number of secrets; silly secrets, dark secrets, secrets she wouldn’t tell Archie, or even Polly, and to her knowledge he’s kept them all, big or small. Perhaps if he can’t give her advice, then… She clears her throat.
“Maybe we could, you know… Help each other out?”
He frowns at her. “What do you mean?”
“Like… We both need practice, right? And you already know how inexperienced I am so it wouldn’t be a total disaster even if I’m really, really bad at kissing, and–”
Jughead holds up a hand. “Wait, are you actually suggesting that we… That you and I…”
The look on his face is hard to decipher, and Betty’s stomach roils uncomfortably as she’s struck by the full implication of what she’s just blurted out. “That was such an awkward suggestion, I’m sorry,” she says. “I don’t know what I was thinking.”
He scrambles into a sitting position, pushes his hair out of his eyes and frowns down at the floor.
“No, I mean… Um... It’s cool, I guess.”
“I don’t want things to get weird,” says Betty quickly. Then she pulls a face. “Oh god, they already are, aren’t they?”
“I don’t know,” says Jughead. “I mean, this is already a weird day, and in the grand scheme of things, what you’re suggesting would barely make it into the top three of weird things to happen today.”
Betty wrings her hands together. Her palms are unnaturally damp, even in the lingering summer heat. “So, you’re saying…? Look, you absolutely don’t have to. We can forget this ever happened.”
“It’s fine. I don’t mind.” For some reason he’s avoiding looking directly at her.
“Really?”
This time he throws her a glance and a lopsided smile. “Really. Like you said, we’re helping each other out. And in the unlikely case of me ever finding myself on a date I suppose I’d better be prepared, right?”
Betty relaxes a little. It’s not going to be the end of their friendship (or the world) after all. “Of course you’ll date what are you talking about,” she says. Silence descends on them, and she picks at the frayed edges of her jean shorts, her eyes flickering briefly to meet his. “So, um… Right now, or…?”
Jughead shrugs. “I’ve got nothing better to do.”
“Okay.” Since the mere thought of kissing Jughead while squatting on a tiny chair next to a tiny table is ridiculous, she eases herself down onto the floor next to him. For a few seconds, they sit there, looking everywhere but straight at one another.
“Ugh, how do we even start?” Betty says finally.
Cocking his head thoughtfully, Jughead reaches up to push a strand of hair behind her ear. “Maybe we could…”
“Are you two kissing?”
They fly apart, and Betty whips around to find a pair of glittering eyes under a shock of black hair in a dirt-smudged face looking at her from the hatch in the floor. The head bobs up, revealing narrow, naked shoulders.
“Jellybean, get out!” snaps Jughead.
“No, you get out!” says Jellybean, climbing up. She’s wearing a pair of shorts and nothing else. “This is my treehouse. I’m still a child, you said so yourself. And anyway you don’t even fit in here anymore. We’re going to have club now.” She turns to Betty. “You can stay if you like, Betty. It's the final time here so it'll be pretty special.”
“Why, thank you,” says Betty, exchanging a quick smile with Jughead.
Behind Jughead’s little sister follow two wary children, around the same age. Betty recognises Chuck Clayton’s younger brother from school, but the blond girl with the neat braids and the dungaree dress she hasn’t seen before.
“At least put a t-shirt on, Jelly,” says Jughead, holding her face firmly with one hand while using his sleeve to rub the worst of the grime away.
“Get off!” she says, squirming in his grip. “It’s hot out, tell him Betty.”
“It sure is,” agrees Betty, earning an eyeroll from Jughead.
“Traitor,” he says to Betty. Then he turns to his sister again. “Where’s dad?”
“Store. He said he’d buy me a gumball bank if they had one.”
“Yeah, well. Don’t get your hopes up, monkey. Come on, Betty, let’s leave them to it.” Jughead starts down the ladder.
“Please stay, Betty,” pleads Jellybean. “I’m sure Claire is tired of being secretary by now, you can be secretary if you like.”
“I like it,” says the girl with the braids quietly.
“Another time, I promise,” says Betty, making her way down after Jughead.
Inside the house, half-filled moving boxes are lining the walls, making the narrow hallway seem even more claustrophobic than usual. Jughead steps over a rolled-up rug and squeezes past a black trash bag, filled to the bursting point with wrinkled clothes. Possibly, it’s come straight from the laundry room without passing the washing machine, Betty thinks.
“Do you want a drink?” he asks, pausing by the kitchen.
“Sure.” Now that he mentions it, she realizes her throat is parched. Whether it’s from the heat or the thought of locking lips with Jughead is hard to tell.
He rummages around in the fridge for a while, then hands her a can of Mountain Dew. “All the glasses are packed away,” he says apologetically.
Betty takes the can, so icy cold that it makes her shiver a little. It’s already beading up in the heat. “What about you?” she asks.
He shrugs. “I’m fine. I thought we had more.”
“We’ll split it.”
They sit on his bed, stripped of sheets and covers alike, passing the can between them, taking nervous sips. There's a nondescript stain on the corner of the mattress, and when Jughead notices her looking at it, he moves his leg to cover it. He needn’t have worried about the stain, she thinks, because it's a drop in an ocean. His room at a glance resembles the aftermath of a tornado. Various personal items are haphazardly thrown into, or next to, boxes, and the wardrobe yawns open, vomiting a grey-and-black mass of clothes. Only one box seems reasonably organized; unsurprisingly, it's the one containing books.
“Aren't you moving tomorrow?” Betty asks delicately.
“Tonight.”
“You have a lot of packing to do,” she remarks.
“I throwing most of it out,” he says, sounding far too chill about it. “Jelly and I have to share a room.”
“Oh,” she says, biting her lip. “That's… that's horrible. Not the sharing a room part, I mean,” she hastens to add, “but getting rid of so much stuff.”
“After all, it is just stuff,” he shrugs, picking up a small plush animal and turning it over in his hands. She recognizes it from some anime that he insisted they watch a couple of years ago, even though they were too old for cartoons by then.
“Why don't you sell it?” she suggests. “Have a yard sale.”
“No time.” He tosses the plushie on the floor.
“I'll do it,” she says firmly.
Jughead throws her a withering look. “Betty…”
“What! It's plain stupid, throwing perfectly good just-stuff out.”
She gets up from the bed, picks up the little toy and finds an empty moving box. “You're not keeping this?” she asks, holding the plushie out.
He heaves a sigh. “I thought we were supposed to be honing your kissing skills, not playing Clean Sweep,” he complains.
“I’m sure we’ll have time for both,” she says cheerfully, dropping the toy in the box.
Under her supervision, they spend a good hour sifting through his belongings, sorting them into keep, sell and throw piles. In the end, she has three boxes, filled to the brim with not just old toys, but everything from a brand new football and a number of unused knock-off baseball caps (“Dad had grand illusions about my sports career”) to Star Wars Lego (“Should have kept the box”) and a stamp collection.
“Where did you get all of these?” she asks, flipping through the album, looking at the stamps. Miniature after miniature of old kings and presidents look back at her, alongside tiny depictions of landmarks and flowers, birds and sports personalities from decades ago.
Jughead shrugs. “I got it from dad. I think I added, like, two. At the very back.”
“FP collects stamps?”
“Hah,” Jughead scoffs. “That’ll be the day. Honestly, I don’t know. I’ve always passed if off as one of those things that just seem to exist in every home, no matter what, or who, or where. Kind of like that bag of yarn every mom owns, whether or not they do any knitting.”
“The yarn bag checks out,” says Betty. Admittedly, Alice keeps hers in a hope chest in the attic, but she does own one.
“See also, at least three useless phone chargers for phones no one ever owned,” says Jughead.
“A weird stain on the basement wall.”
“Two boxes of like, a million tea lights each from IKEA. Because someone at some point made the crazy assumption that the first one will actually run out.”
Betty laughs. “You know, mom uses those tea lights. We’re probably on our third box by now.”
“Woah,” says Jughead, feigning shock. “I always knew Mrs. Cooper was a bit crazy, but that just takes the cake.”
His window is open, and through it, they can hear the sound of tires screeching into the driveway. With a groan, Jughead gets to his feet and pulls the window shut. A moment later, the front door slams.
“Jug?” Mr. Jones calls out.
“Yeah,” Jughead yells back.
“Get off your damn Nintendo and help me with the couch.”
The Game Cube is in fact packed into one of the ‘sell’ boxes. It had been a tough choice, and Betty throws him a supportive glance as he walks over to the door, sticking his head out.
“Just a minute,” he says.
“Now, Jughead,” comes FP’s voice, closer this time.
“Just a minute! ”
He slams the door shut and sighs. He looks drained, Betty thinks. Like he’d much rather just lie down on the bed and sleep than go out there and help his dad carry furniture. She gets up too, reaches out for the sleeve of his shirt.
“Hey,” she says.
He turns around and gives her a startled look. “Uh, thank you,” he says hurriedly, gesturing at the boxes. “For this.”
“It’s the least I could do.” She looks around the room. It’s miles better than it was an hour ago, but there’s still work to be done. “Can I do anything else? Help you guys carry–”
“No,” he interrupts her. Then, more softly, “No. Go home, Betty. And… Good luck with the date.”
The date. Somehow, she’d all but forgotten about it. And they never even got around to practicing kissing, she thinks, fleeting disappointment fluttering through her chest.
“Thanks,” she says, grabbing one of the boxes and hoisting it up into her arms. “I’ll leave these on the lawn for now, and come by later with dad to pick them up.”
“Okay,” he says. “And… Maybe we can hang. After.”
Betty smiles. “I’d like that.” And because it feels right, she plants a quick kiss on his cheek before hurrying down the hallway, trying to avoid bumping into FP.
Her dad agrees to help her pick up Jughead’s yard sale stuff, but dinner gets in the way, and then Polly has a row with mom, and by the time they finally get around to driving over to the Jones’s house, it’s dark out and the driveway is empty. The house is silent, the windows gaping curtainless, and the only traces left of Jughead are the three boxes, neatly stacked under the ladder to the treehouse.