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i.
The last time they have a sleepover in the treehouse, they don’t know it’s gonna be the last one. It’s a Saturday, ‘cause they’re only “allowed” to have sleepovers on non-weekdays (not that that rule’s ever stopped them much), and it’s early fall--nice weather, school kicking off a few weeks ago.
They had dragged their sleeping bags up with them, and Archie made sure to grab his two biggest, fluffiest pillows. It’s not so cold that it’s freezing, but it is chilly enough to pull the sleeping bag up to his chin without overheating. Jug’s arms are still out, because he moves his hands a lot when he talks and this is their favorite place to talk, because it’s all theirs.
After he’s told Archie all about the book of scary stories he borrowed from the library last week, Jug turns to lay on his side, hands resting under his cheek as he looks at Archie. Archie finds himself copying the position to mirror him. Jug opens his mouth to say something, and then hesitates.
“What is it?” Archie asks, voice dropping to a whisper in case it’s something top secret.
Jug hesitates for another moment, and then looks Archie in the eye. “We have to move,” he says, “and it’s my fault.”
The words take him by surprise, and he moves to sit up. “You have to move? Like move houses?”
Jughead, slowly, sits up, too. “Yeah,” he says, “Mom says we have to sell it.”
“What?” Archie says, uncomprehending; he’s never known anyone who’s had to sell their house before, “Why?”
Jug’s looks down at his hands, picking at his nails the way he does when he’s worried, or upset and trying not to show it, “‘Cause we can’t pay for it anymore. We—Mom says we’ve only lived here this long ‘cause we got lucky. It’s my fault we’re not lucky anymore.”
“What d’you mean?” Archie asks, trying to keep up with all this new information.
Jughead sniffs, bringing a hand up to tap at his hearing aid. “This was—it was really expensive, and it was right before Dad got… fired. And it’s my fault I busted my stupid ear in the first place.”
They never talk about Archie’s dad firing Jughead’s; Archie had almost forgotten.
“It’s not your fault you fell,” he says automatically, bunching the fabric of the sleeping bag in his hands.
“We can’t pay for the house anymore because I fell right before Dad got fired; we mighta been able to stay if we didn’t have my hospital stuff.”
“It’s not your fault hospital stuff is expensive—it’s your dad's fault for getting fired!”
Jughead shakes his head sharply, “It’s not his fault he got fired—he said it was just—just an argument. That it wasn’t fair.”
“It’s not my dad’s fault,” Archie defends, because his dad is the only other person who’s fault it could be in this scenario and Archie knows it can’t be.
Jughead frowns down at his hands, “Do you even know what happened?”
Archie does not. “Do you?”
Jug sighs, “No. Dad hasn’t said yet.”
They sit in silence for a moment, and everything starts to set in. Jughead’s family can’t afford the house anymore, which means they have to sell it and move. Jughead has to move—does that mean he’ll have to leave their treehouse here? How far will he be moving? What if they have to leave town?
He gasps, devastated at the thought. “Where are you moving?” He asks, desperate.
Jug finally looks up at him again. “We’re not leaving town or anything, Arch,” he says, huffing a laugh, “But… we’re moving back. To the Southside.”
Archie has always known, on some level, that Jughead hasn’t lived here since he was born, not like Archie has. He spent the first few years of elementary school somewhere else, and then dropped into Archie’s life at seven and has been there ever since. It’s easy to forget. It makes Archie uneasy, thinking about his friend moving to the place where Betty’s scary mom has said Bad Stuff happens.
“Are you gonna be safe?”
Jug looks at him, something sharp in his eyes, “Yeah,” he says, and his eyes soften again, “We lived there before.”
Archie isn’t convinced, “Mrs Cooper says…”
“Mrs Cooper’s not always right,” Jug says, skeptical of adults sometimes in that brave way Archie fears and admires; his voice is tight again, “It’s just another part of town. Don’t worry about it.”
“Okay,” Archie says slowly, admitting defeat. He supposes Jug knows more about the other side of town that he does. Suddenly, a terrible question hits him, and he gasps again, “Are we still gonna be in the same class?”
He doesn’t know if moving houses means you have to move classes, too, but it might.
Jug picks at his nails some more, and smiles at him, “I hope so.”
“We better be! If not, you have to move back.”
“Arch, I just told you we can’t—“
“You could just live with me, then,” Archie interrupts, smiling as the idea catches hold, “Like a permanent sleepover. Then we’d have to stay in the same class.”
Jug ducks his head a little, looking quietly pleased. He stops picking at his nails to fiddle with the zipper of his sleeping bag.
“Okay,” he agrees softly, “It’s a plan.”
Despite the heavy feeling in the air and the fact that his best friend is moving away to a more dangerous place and how sad that makes him feel, Archie grins at him.
He sticks his pinky out. Jug looks at it for a moment, and, instead of rolling his eyes or saying something about how they aren’t eight anymore, Archie, wraps his own pinky around it.
They lay back down eventually, and Archie takes the time to remind Jug that it isn’t his fault he fell down the stairs, and that they’ll still be best friends even if they aren’t in the same class anymore, and says it again, just to himself, once Jug’s hearing aid is laid out safely on the floor.
Archie, for once, doesn’t fall asleep first. He stares at the branches and leaves he can make out above him for a while, full of a restless energy, and then turns back onto his side and finds himself watching his friend, as well as he can in the dark. The porch light is still on, and Jug’s eyelashes cast shadows on his cheeks. Archie is struck with the fact that this might be one of the last times they get to do this, if Jughead has to move and leave it behind—that they won’t be able to climb up here and hide together anymore, that they won’t have their own place for secrets and things.
The idea scares him, a little, and makes him sad at the same time. He takes the time to memorize it all: the way the wood feels under him and the way the breeze rustles the leaves above him and the sound of Jughead breathing softly beside him. He memorizes the way Jughead sounds, and the way his long sleeves bunch up below his elbows and the way his eyelashes cast a shadow. When they wake up in the morning, huddled together and a little overheated under the sleeping bags, Archie memorizes that, too.
He’s never been good at remembering things like times tables and how to spell long words, but he thinks he’ll try his best to remember this for as long as he can.
ii.
True to his word, the Jones family is out of their house and back to FP’s trailer on the Southside within a few weeks. Archie offers to help Jughead pack, but Jug says it’s probably best he didn’t come around--he doesn’t like when I mention you or your dad anymore, he’d confided, voice low and guilty, I’m sorry. That last treehouse sleepover really did end up being their Last Treehouse Sleepover, which Archie commits a lot of time to being sad about. So much so that Dad notices, and ruffles his hair as he sits down for dinner.
“Jug can still come over whenever he wants,” he says, and Archie just sighs louder.
“Yeah, but sleeping in my room isn’t as fun as sleeping in the treehouse.”
“What about sleeping on the trampoline?” he offers. Archie is intrigued--they’ve never been allowed to sleep on the trampoline before. Mom always used to say it was dangerous--”you could roll off and break something,”--and Dad always used to agree with her.
“You’d let us?” he asks, old grievance already forgotten.
Dad nods, “I’ve been meaning to get one of those canopy things for it anyways--it’ll make sure you don’t go rolling off.”
Archie beams at the idea. “I gotta tell Jug--can we do it tonight? Can he come over?”
“Slow down, Arch,” Dad says in that familiar fond exasperation, “I gotta buy the canopy first. And I’m sure Jug and his family are busy settling in tonight.”
Archie frowns, but relents. “Can he come over tomorrow, then?”
“Maybe,” Dad says, scooping some corn onto Archie’s plate, “If he gets permission from his parents.”
An idea strikes him, and he sits up straighter in his chair, “Do you think I could go to his house instead?”
Dad’s smile dampens a little, “Archie,” he starts.
“Not for a sleepover or anything! It’s just probably boring for him to come over here all the time.”
“Arch, I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”
“Why?” Archie demands, “You let me go to his old house.”
Dad rubs at the bridge of his nose, the way he does when he’s a little frustrated. “Archie…”
“It is ‘cause of the bad stuff Mrs Cooper talks about?”
Dad’s eyebrows furrow, “What… ‘bad stuff’ does she talk about?”
Archie shrugs, “I dunno, she just… says that bad stuff happens over there—on that side of town.”
“I don’t know if I’d say that,” his dad says softly, thoughtful, “but… I just don’t want you going over there right now, okay?”
“Jug says it’s just another part of town.”
Dad looks down at his plate, fingers wrapped around his fork, for a long moment. “Archie,” he sighs, looking back up at him, “Just--give them some time to settle in, okay? Then we’ll see.”
Everyone knows that “we’ll see” really means “no,” but something about how tired his dad sounds makes him nod, and go back to his dinner.
Sleeping on the trampoline will be fun, he reminds himself. And Jug always seems to prefer to come over here anyways.
(Archie never really asks if he can go to Jughead’s house again, and Jug never really offers. Archie walks him home once or twice, or Dad drives him home, but it’s never for long, and it’s never to stay. Archie never sees Jughead’s dad when he’s over, ‘cause Jughead never invites him inside, and Dad never asks about him either.
It’s all kind of weird in a way he can never put his finger on, but it’s just the way it goes. So he accepts the fact that when they say they’re gonna hang out, it means it’s gonna be at Archie’s house, and moves on.)
iii.
Archie wakes up in the early, early hours of the morning the Saturday after Jug came to stay with them, to the sound of whispers. He blinks blearily, just barely managing to look through his eyelashes. He tilts his head to see Jug sitting up on his lower mattress, on the far side near the window, the moonlight from the window casting shadows. His elbows are braced on his knees and his phone is pressed against his good ear, head tilted towards the window.
“I know,” he’s whispering, voice soft and frantic; Archie is suddenly much more awake, “I know, it’s okay—it’s okay, dad. I can’t—I can’t right now, but I can come after school tomorrow? Yeah, yeah, I know. I know, dad.”
Archie listens as Jughead whispers some soft goodbyes, gentle like he’s an adult calming down a child, the way Dad used to talk to him whenever Archie got upset. The thought makes his heart twist.
Jug sets his phone down next to him on the mattress, and buries his face in his hands, sighing long and heavy. He sits there, like that, for long enough that Archie is about to sit up when Jug lifts his head again. He rubs hard at his eyes, and turns to get back in his bed.
Archie is just barely too slow to close his eyes, and Jughead freezes when they make eye contact across the mattress.
Jughead’s eyes go wide and… scared? for a moment, before he sighs again. “Sorry,” he whispers, “I didn’t mean to wake you up.”
Archie shakes his head as much as he can laying down. “It’s fine,” he whispers back, “Are you okay?”
Jug glances down, avoiding his eyes like he does sometimes, when he’s uncomfortable. Or when he’s trying not to be emotional.
“Yeah, I’m fine.” He pulls his blanket over his knees, and goes to lie down.
Archie decides to brave the question: “Was that your dad?”
He watches Jug tense under his blanket. “Yeah,” he says, and his voice is tense, too.
Archie hums, doing his best to seem unaffected; he knows they can both get defensive about their dads.
“Is—is he okay, too? I mean, it’s like four a.m.”
Jug lets a long breath, like he’s releasing the tension, and stares at the ceiling above them.
“Yeah, he’s fine. Just… drunk. He gets—upset, sometimes. Like, sad and guilty and shit.” He doesn’t address the fact that FP is drinking in the middle of the night less than a week after he promised to make things right again. Archie feels a spark of indignation on Jug’s behalf.
“I thought he said he was done.”
“It’s not easy to give up drinking, Archie,” Jug says quickly, defensive, “You know it’s an illness, right? Like medically? There’s gonna be… mistakes, sometimes. He said he was sorry—that’s why he called, ‘cause he wanted to say he was sorry.”
Archie frowns, “And that couldn’t wait till the morning?”
“I told you he gets upset,” Jug repeats, and he doesn’t really sound mad or defensive, anymore; he just sounds tired, “It can get bad, if there’s no one to calm him down.”
Archie is silent for a moment, digesting. There was a long stretch of time where Jughead wasn’t actually living at home, and it’s not like FP’s alcoholism took a timeout. He wonders how many times Jug had gone back to talk his dad down, before he left again.
“That’s not,” he starts, and then tries to rephrase, “You shouldn’t have to do that. It shouldn’t be your job to do that for him.”
Jug is quiet for a minute or two, rubbing at his eyes again. “Yeah, I know. But there’s no one else here to do it, and I’m not gonna push him onto your dad again. He dealt with that enough when they were younger. Besides,” and he turns to look at Archie, “wouldn’t you do anything for your dad, too?”
“Yeah,” Archie answers automatically. He thinks, to himself, that “doing anything” is a very different thing in each situation.
Jug nods, still staring resolutely at the ceiling, “It’s like that for you, too,” he says, voice impossibly soft, so quiet Archie doesn’t know if he was meant to hear it, “I’d do anything for you, too.”
Archie knows it’s true—throwing rocks at Archie’s window until Fred gave in and bought a ladder, just so he could sneak in whenever Archie called him. Archie knows, even with the whole shit show that happened over the summer, that he’d do anything for Jughead, too. If he had needed something, even while they were ignoring each other, Archie would still have come running.
He wonders if Jug knows it goes both ways—how could he, if he didn’t even plan to tell Archie he was homeless until he caught him in the act?
He has the sudden need to know, to make sure that Jughead knows that he cares, too. And not in the way he cares about most people—he cares deeply and completely, even when they fight or don’t see eye to eye.
“You too, Jug,” he says. Jughead glances over at him.
“Hm?”
“I’d do anything for you, too. I’m sorry I haven’t… been there for you. I just wanna—wanna keep you safe. I wanna take care of you,” the way that you take care of me, he can’t quite seem to say.
Jughead’s eyes widen again, big and surprised. Archie is surprised that he’s so surprised—they really have been out of each other’s lives for too long. After a few moments, they soften again.
“That’s rotten work,” Jug says, with the vague kind of smile that means he’s quoting something. Most of the time, Archie has no idea what exactly it is that he’s quoting--he gets proud of himself when he actually does.
“It’s not,” he still says, even though he doesn’t get it. “It never is.”
“You’re the only one who seems to think so.”
“Then I guess I’m the only one who’s right.”
Archie doesn’t know if Jug believes him or not, but he nods, eyes all soft and mouth twisted into something sad.
“Thanks, Arch,” like he always says, voice impossibly fond. It makes something in Archie’s chest go all warm. “Now go to sleep.”
Archie laughs, quiet enough not to wake his dad, and goes to sleep.
iv.
They’re in middle school when people start to make a big deal out of Differences. In looks, in shoes, in phones and clothes and the places people live.
By now, Jughead wears his beanie low on his ears to cover his hearing aid, ‘cause the first time someone saw it they asked if he was part robot.
By now, Reggie has also decided, ever since Jughead got in trouble for the playing with matches thing, that he and Jug aren’t friends anymore. Cause like, he’s pretty sure there was a time before all the two of them did when they saw each other was trade insults. It’s not like Jughead’s the only person Reggie and some of the other kids make a point of disliking, but he’s the one who always has things to say back.
It happens one day after school—teasing turns to arguing turns to fighting, Archie caught in the middle and trying to stop them from fighting while also trying to stop himself from fighting, too.
Reg gets around to the usual beanie remarks, but this time gets close enough to pull it off his head, exposing the hearing aid in a way it’s usually not. Archie stomach drops in dread. Reggie mock-gasps, but also does look curious.
“Oh, shit,” he says, “I forgot you’re like, part robot. You really can’t hear without that thing?”
Jughead scoffs, crossing his arms, “I’m not totally deaf, stupid. This kinda aid wouldn’t help with that.”
“Huh,” Reggie says, “So you’re saying you can hear without it? Why do you wear it around, then? You faking it?”
“Reggie,” Archie says, warningly, at the same time Jughead says, “Fuck off, Reggie, don’t be an asshole,” voice tight and just a tiny bit upset—the way that he never lets show around school.
Reggie seems to decide something, there, and then darts forwards. Archie reaches to stop him, startled, but he’s too slow.
Reggie yanks the aid off of Jughead’s ear, even as he tells him to cut it out, and looks at it with a detached sort of curiosity. Then, he drops it, lifts his foot— Reggie, wait, Jug yells, voice rising in alarm, seriously, don’t —and stomps down hard. Archie flinches at the crunching sound it makes, and at the loud gasp Jughead lets out. There’s a moment of silence, where they all stare uneasily at the broken aid—Jughead pushes Reggie out of the way, snatches it up and runs. Reggie lets him go, looking uncomfortable.
“Reggie,” he starts, upset at how distressed Jug had looked.
“What ? I didn’t know he was gonna freak out.”
“You shouldn’t’ve done that.”
Reggie crosses his arms. Reggie isn’t stupid—he went too far this time, and Archie’s pretty sure even he knows it. “Whatever,” he says, purposely dismissive, “Go help your boyfriend .”
Archie bites back the usual Jughead’s not my boyfriend, god, and takes the opportunity to go find him, leaving Reggie to stew in whatever guilt he feels.
Archie finds Jughead behind the school, near the back gate, legs crossed and staring at the broken aid on the ground in front of him. As Archie gets closer, he can see that his eyes are red rimmed and shining. He curls his legs up against his chest and turns his face away when he sees Archie coming.
Archie sits down next to him, making sure to sit on his good side, close enough that he knows Jug will hear him when he talks. He remembers back when he was still getting used to existing both with the aid and without it, he would make Archie help him test how far away he could stand and still be heard. They spent hours at it, giggling like it was a science experiment.
“Hey,” he says, loud enough to be heard but not loud enough to be yelling.
Jug gives a half hearted wave back. Archie knows he doesn’t love talking out loud when he can’t totally hear himself.
“Are you okay?” He asks, scooting closer.
Jug shrugs. He tries to sign something, but his hands are shaking too hard for Archie to understand. Jug huffs an angry breath, and grips at his legs.
“Jug,” Archie says softly, “You don’t have to—“
“How am I supposed to tell my dad?” Jug interrupts, voice breaking, “We don’t—we can’t afford a new one.”
“Don’t they have insurance stuff for that?” Archie doesn’t know much about insurance, but he knows there’s medical stuff involved. Jughead had to go to the hospital when he busted his ear, so he thinks that counts.
Jughead must know more about it than Archie does, because he shakes his head. “We don’t have insurance anymore.”
“Oh,” Archie looks down at Jughead’s busted hearing aid, and then at how his hands are shaking where they’re curled around his knees. “We could go to the principal—he’d probably call Reggie’s parents, and they’d get you a new one. Like how if you dent someone’s car you have to pay for it.”
Jughead smiles for a moment, a little twitch of his lips—and then frowns again and shakes his head. “I don’t wanna make it a big thing—it’d just be something else for him to get on my ass about.”
“Who, Reggie? Who cares what Reggie thinks?”
“He could just break it again. Now that he knows it’ll… make me mad.”
Archie is quiet for a moment, “I really don’t think he meant to—“
“To break it?”
“I don’t think he knew what it meant,” Archie amends.
“It’s a hearing aid. What did he think would happen.”
Archie shrugs, picking at the grass, “I don’t know. I just—don’t think he’ll do it again. Plus, if he did, you could just make him buy you another one.”
Jughead is back to staring at the aid, and Archie is back to staring at Jughead’s hands. They’re still shaking, so Archie takes a minute to help uncurl his fingers where they’re digging into his jeans and laces them with his own instead. Jughead’s fingers flex against Archie’s knuckles, but he doesn’t pull away. He sighs instead, long and heavy, and tilts his head back against the wall.
“I don’t know what to tell my dad.” He says again.
“Just tell him what happened—it wasn’t your fault.”
Jughead closes his eyes, “I know. But he told me I couldn’t break it. Maybe I just... won’t get a new one.”
Archie frowns, “How would you be able to hear the teachers?”
”I don’t know,” Jughead shrugs, seeming very tired. “I don’t know.”
He doesn’t seem to have anything else to say. He squeezes Archie’s hand, and Archie squeezes back.
“We really could go to the principal,” Archie offers, “I’d go with you.”
“I don’t think he’d care.”
Archie blinks, “What d’you mean?”
Jughead gives him a Look, which Archie usually understands but he doesn’t right now, “Reggie never gets in trouble. His parents are like, PTA members. They wouldn’t believe me.”
“Of course they would,” he says, with all the confidence of a seventh grader, “I was there, too. There’s a witness, they’d have to listen.”
Jughead smiles at him, even though his eyes still look sad. “It’s cute that you think that.”
Archie shoves him with his shoulder, “Shut up,” he grumbles.
“No, I’m serious,” Jug looks away, staring at the school gate and holding his broken hearing aid with the hand not holding Archie’s, “I hope you can think that way forever; I hope the world looks that way to you forever.”
Archie’s not quite sure what he means, but he sounds sad enough saying it that he doesn’t quite know how to answer, either. Jughead doesn’t seem to take it personally.
They don’t end up going to the principal.
Jughead does end up with a new hearing aid, eventually. It takes a few weeks, and Archie and Betty try their best to help him through the classes they share, cause the teachers don’t bother to make any adjustments. That’s not fair, Archie says, and Jug shrugs—the universal what can you do?
Archie doesn’t know how his other classes go. One day, before Jughead gets the new hearing aid, he goes to meet Jug outside after school and sees Reggie approach him for the first time since he stomped on it. Archie quickens his pace.
By the time he gets there, though, Reggie is walking away. “Hey,” he greets, and Jug glances up when he sees him.
“Reggie Mantle just gave me his algebra notes. Because,” and here, he makes air quotes with the hand not clutching Reggie’s notebook, “‘it’s probably hard to know what’s going on when you can’t hear the teacher, or whatever.’ I think he was… trying to apologize?”
He sounds so awed Archie can’t help but smile.
(Reggie doesn’t break the new hearing aid—never even mentions it any of the countless times he and Jug toss barbs back and forth. Archie thinks that must count for something.)
v.
The summer before Jason dies is… odd.
Archie knows he can get tunnel vision, sometimes, when he finds something new to care about. It was like that when he decided to join the football team and spent all his spare time practicing, and it was like that when he would make his parents or Jughead or anyone who would listen sit down and watch the Fast and Furious movies with him, and it’s like that with Ms Grundy--with Geraldine--and his music. He doesn’t mean to let other things slide, but it’s hard to put one hundred percent into everything when there are only a few things taking up all of his thoughts.
So he’s helping Geraldine spread out the blanket for their Fourth of July picnic, when the fact that he forgot to cancel on the roadtrip hits him like a fucking train. Oh shit, he thinks, fumbling to pull out his phone. Oh shit .
He has one missed call, from an hour ago. They were supposed to meet at Pop’s almost two hours ago. Shit, Archie can’t believe he forgot to tell him earlier. Even he knows that canceling the day-of is a dick move, but he kept on putting it off because he didn’t wanna think about the argument they would have about it. He stares down at his phone, trying to figure out what to say, how to explain. He can’t tell Jughead about Geraldine, and he’s never been very good at lying, even over text. Jug can read him like a book.
In the end, all he manages to say is a concise, impersonal: sorry, can’t make it.
The read receipts pop up a moment later, and Archie’s throat clenches. He watches the three typing dots for long enough that his fingers start to hurt from clutching the phone so hard, before they disappear altogether. He stares for another minute, for two. No answer.
Fine, he thinks, ignoring the odd sense of disappointment in his chest. Looks like that’s that.
He clicks his phone off and slides it into his back pocket, and lets Geraldine draw him into a kiss. He lets Jughead and the road trip slip to the back of his mind again, and then out of it altogether.
He thinks that was the last… something. The last straw? The last step they made from being best friends to being… not that. He’s pretty sure they’re still friends—he still sees Jug around, tucked into his favorite booth or out around town sometimes. If he finds himself going to Pop’s less and less to dine in and more and more for take out, or skipping out every time his dad asks if he wants to go to the Drive-In until he hasn’t been there all summer, then it isn’t on purpose. He’s not a kid anymore—he’s in a committed relationship, now, and he has a job, too. It takes up a lot of his time, so it’s not his fault if he barely sees Jug and talks to him even less. He’s just… busy. And he’s sure Jug is, too, with work and whatever else he’s always typing away at on his laptop. And it’s not like Jughead’s made much of an effort to start up any conversation, either.
So, he tries his best to just not think about it—about Jug and about the gunshot they heard on the Fourth and about how he doesn’t know how to tell his dad he isn’t sure he wants to play football this year. Which isn’t hard, because he is busy.
And then Jason is dead and he and Geraldine heard a gunshot and the Lodges move to town, and suddenly he isn’t able to ignore any of it anymore.
vi.
The heavy dread that fills Archie’s lungs when he sees the sheriff walking Jughead down the hallway comes so suddenly and so completely that he barely manages to nod when Jug asks them to call his dad.
There’s been a mistake, he knows. Betty says “the sheriff must be desperate if he’s going after anyone who breathes wrong—I’ve been investigating, too.”
Yeah, Archie doesn’t say, but you aren’t writing a book.
The book isn’t all it’s about, he realizes somewhere between waiting in the hallway at the station and his dad showing up to get Jughead the hell out of there. It’s because all the stuff Mrs Cooper uses to say about the other side of town, and the way his dad said if someone is drowning you can’t always pull them up without them dragging you down, too, and the things Archie hears people say about his friend sometimes.
This town’s gone nuts, he thinks, if anyone could ever think Jughead killed someone. The same Jughead who would cross his knees in the back of Dad’s truck and try to predict everything that would happen as they watched an old movie at the drive in.
“You know I didn’t do it, right?” He asks, voice wavering. Archie puts his hand over Jug’s to stop him from picking at his nails; the interrogation room is cold.
“Of course, Jug,” he says, “Of course.”
The sheriff makes him leave soon after that, and Archie tries FP’s cell again and again until Dad shows up. He lies to the sheriff, which is surprising, and he has experience bailing people out from the old days, with FP. Archie doesn’t know how to feel about that.
He’s not sure how to feel about any of this, how to confront the fact that the sheriff, who’s supposed to protect everyone in the town, might be looking for a scapegoat in his friend.
Everything’s been all fucked up, since Jason died, all twisted up and wrong.
He marvels, later, down in the living room and waiting, at how easy things were when they were younger. How they carried this easy affection and friendship without all these new layers and baggage. Before they knew they would always be Different in many, tiny ways instead of together, living the same life. Or maybe Archie’s the only one who ever thought that--he thinks, for a while, about how he would feel if his best friend had a bigger house than him, and nicer things, and a nicer dad and didn’t have to worry about the same things he did, and how that would make him feel… separate. He wonders if he’s part of the reason Jug must feel that way. If he’s been careless, or acted like some of the other kids at school.
It makes something in his stomach turn, the idea of making Jughead feel like he was less-than. He’d never want to make him feel like that. He never wanted to make anyone feel like that, but especially not Jughead. He knows the sheriff must’ve driven that point home hard, hitting him where it hurts, and Archie hopes he knows that not everyone thinks of him that way.
He thinks about how small Jug had looked, head down as the sheriff walked him down the hallway and down to the station, as FP held his face in his hands and asked him if he believed that he would make things right. How Archie was so afraid Jug would decide to go back to the trailer instead of home with them. Because it wasn’t safe, it wasn’t a good place for him to be, maybe it never has been. And he should have noticed sooner but he did notice sooner, he’s been noticing since the first time his dad brought Jug and JB over late in the evening and said it was a sleepover even though it was a school night.
FP drops Jughead off later, luckily. Archie hears the truck pull up and goes to open the door. When he looks through the peephole, though, Jug is still in the car, talking to his dad, or maybe letting his dad talk. He gets out eventually, pausing halfway as if he’s waiting for something—whatever he’s waiting for, he doesn’t get it, and swings the truck doors shut and takes a minute to watch his dad drive away. Even from this far away angle, he can see the disappointed frown on his face. Archie feels bad, for a moment, like he’s seen something he wasn’t meant to.
He shakes it off, and opens the door. Jughead turns at the sound, and tries to give him a small smile as he walks up.
“Hey,” he says, casual as ever.
“Hey,” Archie answers, and then has the sudden urge to hug him—like he had back at the football game when he was apologizing, like Jug noticed and shut down—just to make sure he’s there and in one piece. The whole town isn’t here to watch this time, so Archie steps forwards and throws his arms around him before he can second guess it. “Are you good?”
Jug tenses under him for a moment, and then softens out, bringing his hands up to rest light against Archie’s back. “I’m fine. What’s a little getting arrested now ‘n then?”
“Jug,” he says, pulling back to look him in the eye.
Jug avoids his gaze. “I’m—I was—pretty freaked out, I guess. I thought I was… I thought they wouldn’t believe me. I don’t know if they believed me. That’s—scary.”
Archie, for some reason, thinks about the time Jug didn’t wanna go to the principal about Reggie breaking his hearing aid. How he said no one would believe him then, too.
“I believe you,” Archie says, unflinching under Jughead’s sudden, heavy gaze; there’s a vulnerability there that Archie hasn’t seen since long before their rocky summer. “I’ll always believe you—I know you didn’t do it.”
They stand there on Archie’s porch for a few long moments, just looking at each other. Jughead looks tired. Archie feels tired.
“Thanks, Arch,” Jug finally says in that way he always does, voice small. “Do you mind if we, like, go inside though? It’s kinda cold out here.”
The joke falls a little flat with the way his voice wavers just a bit, but it diffuses the tension in the air anyways.
Archie nods quickly, and steps aside to usher his friend inside. Jug looks faintly bemused as Archie shuts the door behind him and offers to carry his stuff up the stairs for him, so Archie counts that as a win.
(vii. this one is a secret.
Archie first got into the habit of writing things down physically, like on paper and in notebooks, because even back before he got his laptop, Jug used to scribble all over everything—index cards and the margins of his school notes and sometimes the back of his hand to ‘save the idea for later,’ he would say, until Archie saved up and got him a nice, fancier notebook he found online.
Jug had gotten all hesitant, the way he always did when he got gifts that couldn’t be immediately eaten, and Archie almost thought he wouldn’t accept it. But he had, after a few minutes of holding it in his hands all careful, like it was something that needed careful handling and not a twenty dollar bullet journal Archie ordered on Amazon, and said “thanks, Arch,” all soft and pleased.
Archie bought one of those for himself, this last summer, when he started getting into music and needed somewhere to put all his thoughts. Jughead tends to use his laptop now, but Archie likes the process of making a song come together on paper.
He’s trying something new today, the window in his room propped open. He’s jotting down whatever comes to mind—something about the summer, and the heat and way the days seem to stretch out forever, and about sleeping outside in the cold and eyelashes casting long shadows and long sleeves bunched up right below elbows. Archie stops, and stares down at the page.
They’re good lyrics. There’s something nostalgic in them that makes them stand out. But the idea of putting them into a song, putting them to music and singing them for other people makes him... uneasy.
He tears the page out of his notebook and shoves it into the drawer of his desk, folded up into a tight square, with the rest of the lyrics--the ones about dark hair and the movies and long fingers against a keyboard--that he can't bear to put to music, either.)
viii.
Fall fades slowly into winter. Things, slowly, seem to get better. Archie goes to therapy once a week to deal with the whole G-word problem. FP keeps showing up to work, and Dad seems a little happier for it. Jughead unpacks his things and takes up half of Archie’s closet space, and their things start to blend together until Archie comes to expect to see Jug’s laptop charging in the corner and whatever stashed bag of chips or chex mix he has in the bottom drawer of the nightstand.
They fall into a routine, and things settle slowly back into place—or at least, find a new way to fit together. Not quite the way they used to fit, but still good. Still good.
It’s cold enough that Jughead refuses to let Archie keep the window propped open, and Archie agrees without much argument. They’re up late one night, like they have been most nights recently, talking and talking because they have months and months spent apart to catch up on and now they have the time. Archie’s blanket is pulled up under his chin and Jug still has his arm out because he still uses his hands when he talks. Archie watches him shiver as he does; it really is cold tonight. He would turn up the heater a little more, but Dad has forbidden him from touching it after he accidentally set it to, like, eighty five degrees when he was ten, and he doesn’t wanna wake his dad up for it either.
“Hey,” he says softly, interrupting the long, opinionated speech about some new horror movie Jughead’s been waiting to give since he saw it, “Are you cold?”
It’s a dumb question, but Jug still shrugs like he isn’t. “I’m fine,” he says, “The janitor's closet was colder.”
He says it like it’s a joke, but it makes Archie frown.
“Come on,” he says, scooting back towards the wall.
Jughead blinks up at him from the floor, eyes wide in the light pouring in from the streetlamp outside, “Huh?”
“Come up here,” Archie says again, before he can lose his nerve about it, “It’s a big bed. And my blanket’s warmer.”
“So you gave me a thin one on purpose, huh,” Jug says, mock-disappointed, but he gives in and climbs up into Archie’s bed.
Archie scoots further against the wall, leaving enough space for the two of them to lie without touching--kind of a feat for two teenage-sized boys in one bed. He remembers they used to have all their sleepovers like this, back when they were younger--bar the ones in the old treehouse.
“Shit,” Jughead breathes, and he turns to lay on his side, hands pressed together under his cheek; Archie thinks about the night Jug told him he was moving, and moves to mirror him again, “We haven’t done this since we were little. I forgot how much of a fuckin’ space heater you are.”
Archie huffs a laugh, so he doesn’t break the quiet, soft sort of tension they have in the air. “It’s not my fault your hands are always cold. You used to stick them up my shirt.”
“Yeah, to warm them up,” Jug shoots back, mouth curled in a small smile, “Isn’t that what heaters are for?”
“So you’re saying you only liked me for my body?”
“Exactly,” so matter of fact it makes Archie smile, too, despite the shit show the town has gone to and how heavy it rests on all of them, even at night.
Later, once Jughead’s aid is laid out safely on the bedside table, Archie is, once again, not the first one to fall asleep. He’s been finding himself lying awake later and later while Jug sleeps like a rock on the spare mattress, that kind of bone-deep exhaustion that probably comes with being homeless and alone for however many months he was.
Just like that night in the treehouse, Archie finds himself watching his friend. He’s closer than he was back then, and they’re both so much older. The streetlamp outside shines steadily, and Jug’s eyelashes still cast long shadows on his cheeks. His long sleeves still bunch up below the bend of his elbows, and his breathing sounds the same.
Archie thinks that, in a more fucked up way than his younger self probably hoped, his “Jughead living with him in a permanent sleepover” wish came true. He’s struck by the fact that this isn’t the last time this will happen, not like it was back then--Jug won’t be moving to the Southside and leaving his treehouse behind this time, because, at least for now, he’s here to stay.
He doesn’t have to work on committing everything to detail, this time, but he does it anyway, because these are the moments he finds himself writing lyrics about, almost on accident, like they’re waiting there in his mind and pushing to be let out again.
And when they wake up in the morning, Archie’s arm thrown over Jug’s waist and their legs tangled together and a little overheated under the thick blanket, Archie memorizes that, too.
He’s never been good at remembering things like history dates and Spanish tenses and how to spell long words, but he thinks he’ll remember this for a long time.