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“What were the chances of it happening?” Veronica asks no one in particular.
“Likelier than we thought,” Jughead says sourly, kicking up the dirt beneath his sneakers. “We both were too stubborn to see it.”
People at high school talk. The rumors are inevitable, unavoidable. And this type of drama is what teenagers thrive on. Childhood sweethearts, prom king and prom queen material, finally get together and leave their ex-partners in the dust. What took them so long? It becomes exceedingly difficult to avoid the topic.
Jughead detests it, but he can’t do anything about it. He’s helpless in that sense, and so is Veronica.
By the third time that they are seen together—no, in close proximity—people talk.
The most popular speculation so far claims that they are spending time with each other as an act of revenge against their former partners. When he overhears idle gossip during fifth-period AP Lit, he feels compelled to take matters into his own hands. He hunts down Veronica at her locker after class.
Despite the raucous commotion in the hallways, she senses him approaching. She turns, slams her locker shut, and faces him. She slips her phone into her bag, and he notices her somber expression, the way she slouches her shoulders to appear unseen.
“Have you heard?” he asks, his fingers lightly tapping the locker door next to her.
Veronica offers a sardonic smile. “Who hasn’t?”
“A proposal then,” he suggests. “To antagonize our worst critics.”
“I’m in.” She straightens her posture and extends her hand, a show of unity in a time of crisis.
He does not mention that she has agreed to a proposal that he has not yet presented. The equivalent of signing a contract before reading the terms and conditions. She dives in headfirst, not because she has nowhere else to go, but because, like him, she is tired of seeing decisions made for her.
Jughead reaches out to Veronica with more certainty than anything he has done in the past week. A Jones-Lodge alliance, forged from a joint betrayal. He clasps his hand with her hand. Palm against palm, warmth against warmth. He shakes her hand, in full view of curious onlookers, the people who will talk.
Veronica takes a swig of the lukewarm beer. She rises to her maximum height and places her gel-manicured hands on her hips. She sways in the wind, her heels providing little stability in the wet grass. “I think we should re-enact it.” Her tone is completely serious, devoid of humor.
Jughead stays planted in his spot. He doesn’t look at her. His eyes remain trained on the couple feeding breadcrumbs to the ducks in the distance. “We’ve already done that before.” He sounds bored.
He doesn’t accuse of her typical over-dramatics or staged antics, rather dismissing the notion like a failed attempt.
“That was performed in front of an audience, the very same offenders.”
He looks up at her, bringing up his hand to shield his eyes from the setting sun. “How would this be different?”
“Aren’t you the least bit curious how it happened?” she needles, sidestepping the question. The effect is immediate. His mouth turns sullen and resentful, thankfully not towards her. She is unnerved by her forwardness. She cannot be persuaded to conceal her anger. It is moving, in a twisted way, seeing her bitterness matched in the expression of her counterpart.
He bites. “Okay. You’ll be her, I’ll be him.”
Veronica is more than aware of his gaze on her as she fishes a hair tie out of her Celine purse and pulls up her hair in a high ponytail. The act makes her feel more exposed than if she were to undress herself. She can’t imagine doing it in front of anyone else. It’s a petty gesture. She continues to reveal her unsightly impulses and he sees it. He understands it more than anyone else.
He narrows his eyes but does not verbally object. “I don’t have red hair dye in my backpack, so forgive me.”
Veronica launches a beer bottle cap at him, barely missing his chin and grazing his shoulder. “Just take off your beanie.”
He snorts but complies, removing his beanie and folding it in half before carefully setting it down beside him. He runs a hand through his dark hair in an attempt to push errant strands out of his eyes.
The shock of dark hair is something Veronica is not used to. If she was a stranger, he would appear more approachable. Less bent on affecting a standoffish persona. But to her, he appears unapproachable. Not intimidating, but wholly unfamiliar, like she never put much thought into her relationship to him.
Veronica starts first.
They playact, careful to never let a touch materialize or allow an inadvertent smile to become sincere. After all, they could never stoop to level of their offenders. They were better than that.
Fresh off their anger, they make a mutual pact to indulge their vices and worst impulses. It becomes a game of chicken, each one daring the other to engage in questionable behavior, ranging from mild to highly problematic. They circle around each other, no clear winner or loser. Veronica loses track of the times she has initiated the game, and Jughead probably has too.
This night, Veronica can’t recall if Jughead provoked her into doing a distasteful deed or if she proposed it to one-up him and defend her pride. Veronica is struck by the callousness of their plan when she is halfway up the bleachers. She peeks inside the rucksack she is lugging up the steps, and yes, the stolen pottery pieces are still there. She imagines the feelings of devastation when the freshmen students discover their clay creations vanished from the art classroom and somehow manifested among the grass clippings of the football field.
“Why did you stop?” Jughead asks, coming to an abrupt halt right behind her.
“I—I don’t know. It doesn’t feel right.”
“Tough luck. I’ve been feeling like that since we found out.”
“You must feel a little guilty about this.”
He shrugs. “If you want...” he trails off and she can hear it in his tone: Concede. “We can sneak back into the art classroom and painstakingly return these heirlooms to the cubbyholes of their rightful owners.”
Veronica entertains the notion briefly, then grimaces. “Do you remember what belonged to who?”
“Whom,” he corrects with a smug grin.
Veronica rolls her eyes. She crosses her arms and waits for him to lose the holier-than-thou attitude.
He gets the hint. “And, sadly, I do not. I was too busy making sure we didn’t get caught breaking and entering.”
“Then, there is no turning back,” Veronica declares. She turns to resume her trek to the top of the bleachers. Jughead follows wordlessly.
When they reach the top, Veronica can see the only source of illumination in the night is the cool white lights of the stadium, which cast the school grounds in an eerie light, like a liminal space. The phenomenon is only disrupted by the presence of Jughead at her side. He breaks it up, an unexpected respite from the chilly feeling creeping up her spine. She cannot imagine committing this after-school crime with one of her friends, let alone Jughead Jones.
“I’ll go first if you’re not up to it,” he offers, taking his hands out of his pockets. She hands him the rucksack. He closes his eyes and sticks his hand into the rucksack to pull out the object at random. After he produces a handmade ceramic mug, he squints at the handle.
“What?” Veronica prompts.
“There’s an inscription on the handle. I think it reads to my best friend Julia. Okay, now I definitely feel a little guilty about this.”
Seized by something that feels like a combination of impulsiveness and recklessness, Veronica wrenches the mug out of his grasp and hurls it over the side of the bleachers in one fell swoop. The mug shatters in the grass with a cathartic crack. A breathless laugh escapes Veronica’s lips. She does an impromptu touchdown dance. It was worth it, only if to see Jughead’s shocked face for a fleeting moment. She suddenly understands why people like to let out their pent-up anger by breaking things.
Veronica looks to him for his response. He seems more surprised she was able to throw the mug that far.
“Veronica,” Jughead says at last. “You’re a bad person.”
“I definitely am. Now, it’s your turn,” she says, jubilant. “Or, are you a chicken?”
Veronica is walking to art building when she hears footsteps behind her. It’s Kevin, making his way to her from across the quad. She slows her pace to let him match her stride.
“Veronica,” he says, out of breath. “I’m so glad I caught you.”
“Hey,” she says. “What’s up with you?”
“Me? Oh, nothing.” He looks slightly apprehensive about what he is about to say next.
Veronica’s stomach sinks. She knows what this is, a welfare check. She should have expected it, but she tries to remind herself that Kevin has good intentions. She swings her tote bag from her right shoulder to her left shoulder. She adopts the most blasé tone she can muster.
“Cool, me too,” she says, hoping he catch her drift and retreat.
“So, I’ve been seeing that you’ve been hanging out with Jughead a lot lately,” he says slowly. Very unlike Kevin to be so less than straightforward, but he knows that he is treading murky waters.
He continues. “I’m very grateful you two have suddenly found common grounds, albeit unfortunate circumstances. But I just wanted to make sure you two aren’t plotting some revenge plot. I know—”
“I assure you it’s nothing nefarious,” Veronica interrupts. She hates that comes out meaner than she intended. She shields her eyes from the sun’s glare with her hand and hopes Kevin won’t see the irritation plain on her face. She hates that she gets the title of woman scorned. Everyone at school expects her to stoop down to their level. She is better than them.
Kevin has the grace to look sheepish. “I’m sorry I jumped to conclusions. I couldn’t think of any other reason why you two were spending so much time together.”
Veronica chews her lip and focuses on the concrete beneath her feet. She doesn’t know the answer to that either. It worries her.
“After everything, I can never trust someone else again,” he says.
“That’s not true,” she says emphatically, even though she feels the exact same.
“Excuse my hyperbole,” he deadpans. “I meant to say, ‘After everything, I don’t think I can trust someone else for a long period of time.’”
“I know what you mean. I was just trying to make you feel better.”
He lets out a long sigh. “I know. I’m sorry. What makes you feel better?”
“Right now?”
He nods.
She exhales with a wry laugh. “Absolutely nothing.”
“Nothing?”
“Well, if I had to give something, then there is some sick satisfaction in knowing that they will never know what we divulged to each another. Talking, letting out our grievances together. If they did find out, they would definitely be unhappy about it. I can’t complain either way. Very Sophie’s choice, don’t you think?”
He laughs for the first time in days. “Yeah, cheers to that.”
On a slow Friday night, Jughead proposes they go see a re-run of Casablanca at an independent theater far outside of town, where no one would see them. Veronica accepts.
Watching Casablanca makes Veronica cry, even though it never did before.
If she had to guess, it probably happened right as a teary Ilsa made her final plea to Rick. But what about us?
At first, she doesn’t register the dampness on her cheeks. She cries without fanfare, the onset of the sensation vague and cloudy. When she inhales, her breath catches. Noticeable enough to attract the attention of her fellow moviegoer, sitting two seats apart from her. She stares straight ahead, keeps her chin tilted up, and thinks of all times that Old Hollywood actresses cried on camera, prettily and gracefully, inviting the masses into full view of their emotions.
The sadness rests like a weight on her chest. Its looming presence has haunted her for days, and now in her moment of weakness, she is vulnerable to its influence.
He does not say anything and Veronica is eternally grateful for it. She hopes that he has not noticed, too preoccupied with his own shortcomings. She is proven wrong, however, when he reaches across the empty seat to hold her sleeved wrist. He is deliberate in the placement of his hand, never drawing too close to her skin, circling within the safety of the cotton fabric.
He speaks in his silent touch. It burns.
Veronica cannot fathom what would have happened if they made actual contact, skin on skin, warmth on warmth.
She looks haughty and jaded when she cries, he thinks. Untouchable. Every part the ice princess. From her regal posture to her arms clutching the armrests of the theater seat like a gilded throne.
He feels he should refrain from snarky jabs. The crying is unrelated to the film being projected across the screen, although its onset may be attributed to Ingrid Bergman’s moving performance.
He is struck with the inexplicable urge to close the distance between them, reaching out to encircle her wrist. He makes sure that his hand only comes into contact with the sleeve of her dress. She does not flinch, as if she had anticipated his action beforehand. She lets him reach out.
As the film cuts to black, he doesn’t suggest that they leave immediately. People trickle out of the theater one by one, leaving the auditorium vacant, save for the two of them.
He is thankful for the cotton between them, for the empty seat dividing them, for the unspoken code that keeps them in each other’s orbit, but never close enough for them crash and burn.
Burn.
He wonders why he feels that he is being burned by the absence of touch.
After seventh period, Veronica finds Jughead lounging in one of the library chairs. Headphones in, book splayed across his legs. She draws closer and drops a package onto the table.
“What’s this?” he asks, pulling down his headphones. His brow furrow. He peels back the layers of the plastic bag to reveal a pack of malted milk balls. He picks it up, shakes it, and hears the rattling of the candy pieces—not empty, not a prank.
He looks up at her with an amused expression. “Why the act of kindness?”
Veronica is temporarily unable to produce an answer, overwhelmed with such giddiness during the gift bestowing that she neglected to bring a cover story. She opens her mouth, then closes it. She can’t seem to bring herself to say the truth. The truth is that she stumbled across it at the fifth grocery store she visited, so she settles for something adjacent.
“Payment. For lunch that other day.”
“Oh, right,” he says with a doubtful nod. “Thank you, Veronica.”
Veronica smiles and turns to leave.
“So, how many stores did you have to hit up before finding this brand?” he asks. His eyes alight with a mischievous gleam.
The question catches Veronica off guard. She thinks he is genuinely curious about the answer, but at the same time, she knows he is luring her into a trap of her own making.
“Just one. I found it on a whim when I was grocery shopping for my paella dinner this Sunday.”
“Lucky,” he muses.
“Exactly. It was very convenient for me.”
“And for me. I’m lucky that you thought of me when you did.”
He says that last sentence so earnestly that it unsettles Veronica in its irresponsible intensity. He continues to watch her, beckoning her to give up the gambit because they are on level playing fields now. They are even.
Veronica wants to appear indignant. He acts so recklessly with his words, endangering the already precarious circumstances. Entreating her to lose first. She does not want to surrender how she actually feels, seen and acknowledged, over a harmless one-time favor.
To her relief and disappointment, the bell rings.
They part ways.
When he watches her from afar at school, he forgets that she is the same person who listened to his dissertations about Lynchian surrealism, simultaneously indulged and scolded his worst tendencies to wallow in bitterness, or procured a rare brand of malted milk balls when he half-jokingly mentioned that he would travel to hell and back to get his hands on it. That person is Veronica, and he can’t always wrap his mind around it. This person is Veronica. Veronica is this person. She is the person he can confide in, following the aftermath of their shared anger, and their much less publicized shared sadness.
He observes her remarkable pull on the people around her. She could be talking about the latest episode of a mind numbing reality dating show and people would still listen because her enthusiasm is contagious. She is the clearest thing he can see in a crowded room.
He can’t believe he is lucky enough to know her.
And just like that, he is forced to admit that he has somehow come to care for Veronica Lodge. It doesn’t matter how, or when, because he refuses to break their unspoken code or cheapen their mutual alliance.
On some nights, they fight over the phone. It’s never about anything serious. Always one party taking unnecessary offense at the other’s perceived lack of cinematic or literary taste. Veronica swears Jughead will be thoroughly annoyed with her the next day from the way he coolly bids her good night. She reasons she feels tense after these arguments because she doesn’t know his limit, how much he can actually take offense. She refuses to believe it’s because she will feel immeasurably sad if he no longer tolerated her presence.
At school the next day, they wave at each other in the parking lot. She forgets to apologize for being so passionate in their disagreement last night. He does too.
Sometimes, when they’re sitting across each other at the cafeteria table, Veronica will catch herself looking at him. The action is innocent, but her thoughts are less so. Rather, she catches herself thinking about looking at him for longer than is socially acceptable. He never notices, or if he does, he pretends to be fully absorbed by the printed words on the page of his novel.
Veronica wants to ask him if he plans on watching the true crime documentary on TV tonight, but she stops herself short. She is struck with the notion that she has found herself consistently seeking out his presence at school and outside of school. They tiptoe over the line all the time, calling themselves nothing more than friends. When they have late night phone calls and he jokes with her, saying of course, you would do that, I know you, she is lured into thinking they are friends, formed out of normal circumstances. She used to be a person who knew exactly what she wanted, but lately, that sentiment rings false.
The realization that she is this new person shakes her.
As if reading her mind, Jughead looks up from his paperback to meet Veronica’s eyes. “Something bothering you?”
“Do you want to get to Pop’s for chocolate milkshakes after school?”
His look of concern dissolves. “Yeah, of course.”
More often than he likes to admit, Jughead lies in bed, mentally revisiting his relationship with Veronica prior to everything that transpired. He falls upon their pseudo-revenge kiss in the pool at the cabin. Even back then they were playing chicken. Using each other to get even. He shuts his eyes, trying to conjure up his emotions at the instant moment. A jumbled mess of bizarre nerves and spiteful self-satisfaction. He recalls how Veronica acted, how she looked. Playful, self-assured.
He thinks about it more often than not, because he wants to know what it would be like to kiss her now that he knows her.
When summer starts, they don’t see each other for over two weeks. Both are preoccupied with their own affairs and finalizing their plans before college. The third week into summer, Jughead caves. He calls her first.
“Will you entertain me in a pointless exercise? One catch. We can never speak of it after it happens.”
“Sure.”
“I want to present you a scenario, in which I would act like a presumptuous jerk. You have to respond, honestly, how you would react. Even if you think you might hurt my feelings.”
“What would you do?” she asks. He has to strain to hear her voice, barely above a whisper. He can imagine her now. Sitting in her bed, her knuckles whites from gripping the phone handset too tightly.
He takes a deep breath, exhales in one motion. He is too aware of the stakes, evidenced by his pounding heartbeat and the thrumming sound in his ears. “I would tell you... I came to the conclusion that I have feelings for you, the very kind that threatens our very fragile alliance. I would say it wasn’t a sudden realization, but rather, a period of knowing that it has transpired over some time. I would explain it happened so gradually that I never saw it coming. I would tell you how I want to be with you, even after everything.”
Veronica is quiet on the other end of the line.
“What would you do?” he asks in return, holding his breath.
“I would never speak to you again.” She sounds so pained, like he had to drag the words out of her as she resisted with every bone and muscle in her body.
“Good,” he says finally, exhaling slowly.
“Did it work?”
“Yes, I think you chased away what I needed to get out of my system.”
“I’m glad,” she says.
“Me too.”
“I want to tell you something.”
“You shouldn’t have to,” he says, when he wants to say you should. After all, he is the one that yielded first. He lost first.
“Thank you for being here,” he continues, hoping to settle things for good and signal the end of the theoretical exercise. He is throwing a game that he never should have even participated in.
“It’s not a problem,” she lies.
After Veronica hangs up, she curls up in a fetal position on her bed. She tries not to dwell on the larger implications of their conversation, but she keeps circling back to the same points. She closes her eyes and blots her tears with the back of her hand.
She wishes she can tell him that whatever he said has produced the opposite of the intended effect.
She wonders why she seems to have caught it. It’s stuck in her system. She sits up and glances around her bedroom. Her gaze is drawn to the box on her desk, a pack of malted milk balls, an extra one she bought for herself. A kindness disguised as a favor.
She thinks she caught it earlier than she would like to admit.
There is quiet consolation in knowing that they were both too stubborn to see it.