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He wants … well, he wants a lot of things, but the impossibility of his getting any of them is what prevents him from doing what he really wants to do right now, in this moment, which is to kiss Betty Cooper’s perfect lips.
She’s never looked prettier, with the rain sparkling in her hair, and her laughter and their short run from the parking lot leaving a rosy flush on her cheeks. They lean against the wall of lockers, catching their breath and avoiding looking at each other because that just makes them laugh harder.
“I can’t believe you said that! Veronica looked like she was going to tear your head off.”
“Archie’s hardly virgin territory, Betts. I was merely warning my newest friend to look out for her sexual health this fine, rainy afternoon.”
Because he knows, and Veronica knows, and Smithers knows that Archie has not been invited to the Pembroke to help Veronica study for her Algebra exam, and Betty knows, and Archie knows, and Smithers knows that Veronica’s generous offer to drop Jughead and Betty off at school on their way was more about getting rid of them than about her proffered excuse - something about Betty wanting to work on the layout of the Blue and Gold.
A delicate, tangled web.
No one was fooled. So sue him for being a smart-ass about it.
And, if it means that he gets to spend Saturday holed up with Betty in their dusty little corner of the school instead of mooching coffee refills off Pop ... well, no one can blame him for being a bit more jovial than usual.
Veronica’s a good sport. She’ll get over it.
Archie probably didn’t get it in the first place.
Betty just shakes her head fondly and brushes some raindrops off her cheeks. “Well, they’re probably a lot warmer than we are right now, that’s for sure.”
Principal Weatherbee doesn’t believe in heating the building on the weekends, and it is a bit chilly - a fact Jughead knows all too well. His thoughts flash to the sleeping bag and blankets he’s got stashed at the back of the janitor’s closet, but the possibilities lead down too many dangerous paths, so he shoves the idea away. For now.
Besides, Betty has a little contraband space heater under her desk, and he knows she gets a secret thrill from using it when she’s not supposed to. A true rebel, with or without a cause.
She looks anything but rebellious in her bewitchingly soft lavender sweater with sleeves just a shade too long and an enormous floppy collar, and tiny pearl earrings peeking out around the little wisps of hair that have escaped her ponytail - she looks cozy and cuddly, the personification of the old Carnation hot chocolate slogan, “A warm hug on a cold day.” That’s Betty all over.
Despite probably being the only teenager in the continental US to have keys to a high school, she fishes a bobby pin out of her hair and picks the lock to the Blue and Gold - apparently, B&E is one of those use-it-or-lose-it skills - and grins at his exaggerated scoff.
“Show off,” he teases, elbowing her lightly as he moves past her into the office.
“Moi?” She clutches her heart in outraged disbelief and falls onto the sofa in a fantastic imitation of Greta Garbo. “How dare you?”
If he was a bit more daring, he’d do his best Robert Taylor and swoop down after her, but he’s more loyal sidekick than leading man so he just flops down and drags a bag of Lays out of his bag. “I dare much, Madame.” He rips open the bag and offers it to her. “Chip?”
“Apple,” she counters, her arm vanishing into her own backpack, emerging with a shiny red Gala clutched in her hand.
“Why,” he asks, watching her polish it unnecessarily on her sleeve, “do you have an apple in your bag when you were going out for lunch?”
“Three guesses.”
And the first two don’t count, he finishes for her. He wonders if she really was full, or if she just gave him her fries because she was counting her calories. Again. “Betty, Cheryl’s a bitch. You could be thin enough to play backgammon on your ribs and she’d still make up a reason to torture you.”
“It’s not just her, Juggie. My mom’s been talking about macros and carbs, too.”
He knows better than to say what he really thinks about Mrs Cooper. “She’s crazy. It’s all in her head.”
“And on my hips, apparently.”
Jughead’s not an expert on what makes women attractive, but he has very definite opinions about all things Betty. “Your hips are perfect.”
She looks up at him with wide, surprised eyes and he (barely) refrains from diving headfirst into his bag of chips.
“What?” he mumbles. “They are. You’re beautiful.”
If she wasn’t so skilled at controlling her emotions, her jaw would drop - but she is and it doesn’t. She does, however, look bashfully at the floor and bite her lip, and he wonders who’s blushing harder, him or her.
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
She chews her lip for half a moment longer and then bounces off her seat with forced pep, slipping her little heater out of its hiding spot behind the garbage can and plugging it in. The wires heat up slowly, eventually glowing orange and spreading the smell of burning dust around the room, and he scooches nearer, leaning in to let the warmth tickle his face.
This beats the hell out of a hot water bottle filled up from a locker-room tap.
“I went by your place last night.”
Heat source forgotten, he snaps his head around to look at her, only to find that she’s steadily ignoring his gaze and fiddling with the cuff of her sweater.
“You weren’t there.”
No, he wasn’t there. He’s never there anymore.
“Your dad … wasn’t sure where you’d gone.”
Translation - his dad was wasted and wasn’t sure who Betty was, what day it was, or whether there was any more beer in the fridge.
Betty sits next to him and lets her silence speak for her. It’s her favourite interrogation technique because every good detective knows that people will talk more to fill an awkward silence than they will to answer questions.
Jughead doesn’t find silence awkward.
The old clock on the wall ticks steadily for five … ten … twenty seconds and, finally, a small hand lands on his forearm. “Jug …”
Her sympathy doesn’t grate on him like it would if Archie, or anyone else, used that voice on him - soft and cautious like she’s afraid he’ll bolt or lash out at her. As if he could ever do that.
“I was just at Pop’s. The WiFi is better there.”
“I brought you a burger from Pop’s. You weren’t there.”
She came to his trailer at night and brought food? “What happened, Betts?” She wouldn’t have done that unless she really needed him. “Why didn’t you call? I would have come to you.”
“I just needed to get out for a while. It wasn’t anything specific.”
So it’s come to this - they’re lying to each other.
He powers through half the bag of chips without tasting them, chewing aggressively and wiping copious amounts of grease on his battered jeans, before he answers her. “I moved out.”
To absolutely no one’s surprise, she doesn’t react at all beyond a sharp crease lining her forehead and he knows - don’t ask him how - that she’s filling in all the blanks and forming a solution to his problem. He cuts her off before she gets in too deep; she’s got a bad habit of making a hundred back-up plans without even realizing it.
“It’s okay, Betts. I’m okay.” Debatable, but she has enough going on.
She gives a tiny, almost imperceptible, shake of her head and drags the sleeve of her sweater across her eyes. “I know you’re okay, but it is not okay.” He’s alarmed to hear the little crack in her voice and instinctively reaches for her hands.
“It’s okay, Betty,” he says again, more firmly. “It’s temporary, and trust me: it’s for the best.”
His dad’s drinking is completely out of control, the Serpents seem to be using the trailer as an unofficial hangout spot, and he thinks he’ll lose his mind if one more person hints at him doing the initiation tasks and taking the Prince’s crown.
It’s not happening.
“Where are you staying?”
“Here, for now.”
This time, there’s no hiding her reaction. She looks at him in complete horror and almost shrieks, in a most un-Betty-like way, “Here, where?! In the office?”
“No.” He doesn’t have keys and he can’t pick locks. “There’s an old storage closet at the back of the school that no one uses. I’ve been crashing there for … a while.” Her expression is pure devastation now, so he’s definitely not telling her how many months it’s been. “It’s not that bad - those apes in the athletic department are so spoiled, it’s like staying at a spa.”
That part isn't an exaggeration; the shower and laundry - laundry! - facilities in the locker room are way better than at the trailer, and he’s not above borrowing shampoo and soap from a different football player every day. What they don’t know won’t hurt them.
(Given Reggie’s grades, he probably doesn’t feel any pain, ever.)
“Why didn’t you tell me, Jug?”
That was definitely a sob and now he feels like a complete heel for even mentioning his situation in the first place. What Betty now knows clearly hurts. Honesty is a risky business. “Because you’d try to fix it, and you can’t.”
Her lip trembles, ever so briefly, and then steel creeps up her spine and she purses her lips - the closest she’s ever been to glaring at him. “I could help.”
Ice doesn’t tinge her words, she doesn’t snap, but still, he knows that she’s hurt and angry. Her quiet voice doesn’t hide anything. Not from him.
And she could help. He knows that she’d move mountains to help him, or anyone else that needed her, but he can’t put that kind of burden on her shoulders. But she still looks miserable, and he can still hear her wheels turning, and he absolutely can’t stand that he’s upset her.
“If I promise to talk to Fred, will you stop looking at me like I kicked a puppy?”
It’s been in the back of his mind for a while - summer vacation’s coming up and he won’t be able to stay in the school then - so this is as good a time as any. Fred, like his loyal and lovable son, won’t judge him, won’t rat him out to the authorities, won’t coddle him with excessive sympathy he doesn’t want or need.
“Pinky swear?”
He grins at her and extends his middle finger instead. “Pinkies don’t swear, Betts.”
She laughs and hooks their fingers together, and her eyes drop to his lips, just for a second. Then a puzzled, startled look flashes across her face before she drops her hand like it’s been burned, and looks away.
He can feel the ghost of her gaze, but she’s gone before he can process it, and he decides to shelve it for later.
“I’ll help you pack when it’s time,” she says, flexing her hands and standing up.
He breathes a sigh of relief. This is Betty code for ‘the conversation is finished for now, although the subject will be revisited if required’ and he’s thankful for the reprieve. It was probably the catalyst he needed, anyway. The uneven floor of the closet isn’t doing his back any favours but he probably would have continued to put off the inevitable but awkward, “Hey, Fred, still have that air mattress?” conversation that he’s known for a while that he has to have, if Betty hadn’t pushed.
Whatever happened to lazy Saturdays?
She slips past him before he has a chance to stand up himself - yep, her hips are definitely perfect - and sits down in the editor’s chair she’d ‘tactically acquired’ from the staff lounge, propping her feet up on the desk and tucking her favourite red pencil behind her ear.
“You said you had a new chapter to show me?”
Yes, yes he did. “Aye, Captain. I may have killed off a few people in this one.”
Choking back an indelicate snort, she puts out her hand for the stack of papers he fishes out of his bag. “You might want to change the setting before you publish this, Jug. People are going to be offended when they find out you imagined half of the Riverdale one percent at the bottom of the river.”
“Any resemblance to any persons, living or dead …”
“Sure, Jan.”
It’s Betty, so he doesn’t roll his eyes at her, but acknowledges her dig with a shrug and a smirk, and settles against the back of the sofa with the remainder of his chips. The rain is still pounding against the shuttered windows, and the room still smells vaguely of burning dust, but he couldn’t care less because Betty’s smiling again.
He watches her read through his manuscript, her glasses perched on the end of her nose and her vicious red pencil leaving bleeding gashes all over his beloved work, and she looks so perfectly Betty that he knows, without question, that he’s going to kiss her in this room.
“It’s the best thing you’ve ever written, Jug. Every chapter gets better.” She pauses and glowers at him playfully. “But let’s discuss your use and abuse of the word ‘narrative’.”
Just not today.
xx