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The very first time Jughead Jones The Third sees Elizabeth ‘Betty’ Cooper, she wears flowers in her golden locks and some other painted on her pink dress, and it’s
a freaking cliché but she’s the most beautiful little girl he has ever seen, second only to his sweetheart of a sister, the dear Jellybean Jones.
She’s playing alone in a garden full of the same flowers she loves to have on her, while some other girls are laughing and screaming in a near distance.
One of them is standing while the others are sitting in a circle, and Jughead can’t seem to ignore the brightness of her red hair. Some parents are chatting with each other a little farther, others are minding their own business, but neither of them seems particularly concerned with their children. Maybe due to the smallness of the town, maybe due to certain failings.
This is actually one of his first times in Riverdale at all, to be truthful. It’s the first time his mother takes him around this gloomy and crepuscular compound of houses and buildings, the very one where she and his father grew up, too, and his eyes are tired from observing and examining every inch of it.
When his mother pushes him to approach the other children, there’s only one direction his feet could ever point him to.
« Hi. » He says in a soft, shy but nevertheless restrained voice, kneeling beside the blonde girl.
She doesn’t immediately turn to him, just keeps gently touching the grass that grazes her skin where her skirt doesn’t cover her, a distant smile on her bright pink lips.
When she does, a spark of surprise shines across her baby blue eyes, but her face is serious like the one of an adult.
« Who are you? » She inquiries, wondering who this little boy could be and why she has never seen him in Riverdale.
He pouts lightly, slipping his hands back and forth on his jeans. « Jughead. » He says.
« I’m Elizabeth. You can call me Betty. Can I call you Juggie? I think I want to call you Juggie. » Her initial insecurity is immediately replaced by a certain kind of fondness, in a way. She’s looking at him like maybe he could make her feel something new and adventurous.
It equally scares and excites him, and that’s a feeling he’ll still hold deeply and carefully in his heart many years from now.
« Everybody calls me Jughead. » It’s the only thing he says.
« I’m not everybody, Juggie. » The little girl tells him, leaning into him and taking his hand.
Jughead instantly freezes, his ice blue eyes wide open in fear and something else, but Betty only smiles at him.
Then, she gently drags his hand across the grass they’re sitting against.
He’s six and a half years old and this is the first time he lets a girl who’s not his sister touch him, and he hasn’t the slightest idea how this should make him feel.
It’s not entirely bad, though. It never feels wrong, at least, not only for a single moment.
« I really much like nature. And animals. And ribbons. Oh, and I like your funny hat. » She confesses, still admiring their joined little hands brushing the grass.
« I really much like food. » It’s his instantaneous response. « Burgers, especially. »
« I don’t know how to make burgers, Juggie. » Betty tells him with a remorseful and guilty expression on her face, looking up at him and chewing her little lips. «
But I do know how to make cookies. Do you want me to make you cookies? »
« Why would you do that? » He enquires, doubt and hesitation visibly clear in his voice and face.
« Because you’re my friend, silly Juggie. »
Jughead has no time to reply – wouldn’t know how exactly to reply, actually – when someone screams Betty’s name in the distance and, before he can look around, a little boy hurls on her and wraps both of his hands around her neck, hugging her.
The young Jones doesn’t know what to do except staring at their attached cheeks and their full-on smiles, waiting for both of them to recognize his presence and say something.
« Archie! » Screeches Betty, one of her hands on the other boy’s arm and the other reaching again for Juggie’s hand.
« I missed you so much, Betty. » Says the red-headed boy, whose two upper teeth are blatantly missing from his smile.
« But I saw you this morning, you pumpkin! » She giggles, sending a fond glance in Jughead’s direction afterwards. When Archie finally notices him, he immediately detaches himself from Betty to have a better look at him.
« Who’s this? » He asks, shifting his eyes between him and his best friend with curiosity and inquisitiveness. At that, the blonde little girl stands, moving so she’s sitting again, next to Juggie this time.
« He’s Jughead. And I’m the only one who can call him Juggie. He’s my new friend. I’m gonna make him cookies. »
And that’s, basically, how the Jughead Jones and Elizabeth Cooper story begins.
Pretty soon – and pretty unsurprisingly, too – Jughead realizes that Archie starts saying how cute the girls around them are, and Betty keeps going over and over again about how cute Archie is, but he doesn’t.
He doesn’t find anyone cute at all. Nor pretty. Nor attractive, or even enjoyable at all.
Sure, Archie Andrews is still his best friend, and that’s something he doubts will ever change.
He still thinks Betty Cooper is the most beautiful girl he’s ever seen, but that’s different. She’s different.
She’s the only exception to this strange and inexplicable distance that’s growing inside of him and keeping him away from everyone else.
She’s like this limb, this part of him he knows he could never shake off, no matter how hard he tries to resist it, no matter how fast he tries to run away from the something he feels when she smiles at him with that sweet and caring smile of hers.
There’s this warmth, this pull, this strange need that creeps onto him, and it starts from a tiny spark and it spreads, it takes and it takes and it just keeps taking even when there’s nothing left in him to take, just to give.
But he can’t, though, and probably never will.
Because it’s clear now, as clear as every sunrise the Riverdale’s sky projects over their heads every day, that she’s in love with their best friend. She’ll always be in love with him.
So, Jughead doesn’t bother asking himself and his body any more questions, and just buries this feeling deep down his stomach, teaching himself each and every day how to ignore it, how to numb himself enough to maintain a semblance of sanity.
It’s for their sake – everybody’s sake – is what he keeps telling himself at night, when his eyes are so tired but his brain can’t stop thinking of when did it all fall apart around them.
They are sixteen and reckless when, one very lonely night, they find themselves stealing Jughead’s dad old bottle of liquor.
This is not something the perfect, flawless and impeccable Elizabeth Cooper would normally do, but it’s neither like Jughead Jones to look at her with a longing he thought long and gone forgotten, so it’s a draw.
She’s got her golden hair down, nothing like the strict and firm ponytail her mother keeps demanding of her, and a tight, lavender sweater enveloping every single curve of her chest and hips, and for a moment there Jughead can’t be sure of when she became this appealing young woman, but especially when he started thinking of her that way.
He comes to the conclusion that his night they are just not who they are supposed to be, and maybe it’s okay. Maybe it’s fine.
They do everything in their will power to silence everything inside them that tells them they’re pretty dangerous together. They don’t listen to it, just hold hands like they’ve done since they were children and climb into the Jones old treehouse.
It’s not as big and large as their child eyes remembered it, but it’s quite suitable. It’s theirs.
That’s how, a few hours later, Betty ends with her head on Jughead’s lap, her first shots of alcol doing something vicious and, to say the least, confusing to her mind.
Now that they’re so close, the young Jones can’t, for the dear Lord up above, stop himself from taking delight from her scent, something both exquisite and vigorous upon her soft skin.
Without saying any word, Betty reaches for his hand and places it between her blonde waves, cracking her neck to give him access and urging him to touch her hair.
Just like so many other times before, Jughead is really, entirely not capable of saying no to her. He would never be.
They keep staying there for a long time, minutes and hours passing them by without going noticed, just laying in their childhood shelter, their bodies touching like
it’s the first time they ever become acquainted to each other.
When Betty moves her face so she’s snuggling against his stomach, Jughead holds his breath, not daring to look down at her.
« I think I’m unlovable, Juggie. » She whispers against the fabric of his hoodie, closed eyes and aching brows. « I think I’m broken inside and I will never be enough.
I will never be whole. There’s just something missing, you know? I can’t fill it. It’s just… there. And I can’t fill it. I’m afraid I never will. »
Before she’s done talking, even before she’s finished her sentences, Jughead is chocking on air, a hard pinch on his throat and eyes.
He’s not sure if it’s because he never ever wanted her to suffer like this – to suffer at all – or because this is exactly how he has felt his entire life. Either way, it’s a living hurt, pumping through his veins, reaching his heart and making it go crazy with heartbeats he can’t control.
It’s only after a couple of minutes that he looks at her, really looks at her, and sees silent tears streaming down her face, violently caressing her pink cheeks, dissipating between her natural red lips.
He wonders when she learnt to cry without making any sound.
He’s aching to reach down and brush them away, to tell her that it’s just the spirits in her stomach talking, that everything is going to be okay, they are going to be okay.
He’s aching to tell her that she’s the most whole person he’s ever met in his life, and the most loving, passionate and caring, too, and that she’s the exact opposite of unlovable.
In fact, she’s the only person he thinks he could ever truly love, and he wants her to know it.
He really wants it, he just doesn’t know how to do it.
So, he bends over her, surrounding her with his arms, placing his lips on her temple and his forehead on her shoulder, and hopes it’s enough.
Jughead doesn’t know how it happens, but it does.
Archie bails on him without much of a word, just disappearing a bit at a time: an “I have practice” once, an “I’m going out with Reggie, it’s for the team” the other, a “Lots of homework, ya know?” the next day and, just like that, they don’t see each other anymore.
And his mother is gone. And his dear Jellybean is gone, too. And he hates his father, hates his guts so much he can barely stand the sight of his pathetic and worthless face.
Before he knows it, he’s homeless. Still better than hanging around that loser of Forsythe Pendleton Jones, but just as much of a homeless, and he’s only seventeen.
So, Jughead finds himself in his old treehouse, that same wild, forgotten and damaged old tree house where he once thought, just for a second, that he could be normal, and just be in love with a girl – not with some girl, though. One girl, just one. –
Wild, forgotten and damaged, just like him.
He is fully aware that this can’t be a long-term solution, that he has to find another steady place to live, and he has to find it now, when it’s still not so cold but, tonight, this is going to have to work.
He tries to sleep, really tries to – can’t find somewhere to rest your head on when you can’t keep your head straight – but he can’t.
It figures.
He wishes he could talk to his best friend, the only friend he has left, really. He wishes they could still be there, just like a year ago, laying to each other’s side, dreaming of what they would do once they left that God-forsaken town, who they would be, what they would look like.
Maybe he just wishes to hear her voice.
But he can’t do this, either.
Betty’s on her summer internship and he doesn’t have her number. They’ve known each other for their whole lives, but he doesn’t have her fucking number, and she’s slowly fading away from his mind.
Jughead can feel his heart getting harder by the second, can feel himself detaching from everyone he’s ever met. There’s something inside of him – something so much similar to self-preservation – that screams at him to be numb, to be indifferent, to stop caring so much about the goddamn selfish people in his life.
He knows this is just the easy way out, and that everything he is going to bury right now will just forcefully and painfully catch up with him later, but he has to.
That’s the only way he’s going to survive all of this.
At the end of that same summer, Jason Blossom dead body is not the only thing that returns to the surface.
When Jughead sees Betty for the first time since months, walking on the Riverdale High Shool corridors with Kevin Keller and a raven-haired uptown kind of haughty girl on each of her sides, something’s changed.
It’s not her clothes – still as pink as the first day he met her, with her domed tulle skirt and her little floral camisole – as much as it’s her lost and distant baby blue eyes.
It’s a look Jughead has seen on her face so many times before, the last of them being the one when they got drunk on his father’s second-hand booze and she confessed to him how she felt in her own skin, which was the same way he’s ever felt in his own skin, too.
It’s not blatant and obvious, and very likely no-one has noticed it; it’s just something hidden somewhere deep behind her eyes, a flame, a single flicker of fire she’s trying so hard to camouflage.
But he sees it. He sees her, just like he has always done.
Being aware of all of this and doing something about it, however, are two very distinct things, and the young Jones disappears between the crowd of hormonal students before she can spot him.
Just like Jughead sorrowfully expected his whole life, waiting for the moment to collect the shattered pieces, Betty Cooper’s heart breaks in a warm autumn night without making any much of a sound.
Archie comes searching for her at Pop’s with a loose and messy tie around his neck, something extremely sorry painted on his tired face, and, before he speaks, Jughead knows what’s going on; he feels it. And it’s unavoidable.
This doesn’t stop him from helping his once irreplaceable best friend, because no matter how much he tries not to, tries to forget who he is always been, he’ll always want Betty to have something honest; something real.
So, he watches through the neon lights and the misty windows as Archie runs towards Betty’s house, just like he used to do when they were children, and hopes that this stubborn, blinded red-headed boy, who could never fully see how granted he always took her, will finally realize how precious and rare her heart is.
Because Jughead as sure as hell does.
It’s natural and inevitable, a quiet agreement between their eyes, how they start orbiting around each other again.
First, he simply looks at her in the corridors, hiding himself between half open lockers and crowds of students, and then, before he can wholly wrap his head around it, they lead the Blue and Gold together.
Betty’s immediately and irrevocably everywhere Jughead turns, silently observing him in class, investigating with him about Jason Blossom’s death, daily sitting beside him at Pop’s – sometimes in front of Veronica and Kevin, sometimes just the two of them –, sweetly asking if everything’s okay and if he wants another burger, on her treat, of course. And suddenly he’s smiling every day, sometimes utterly incapable of finding within himself the will to stop.
It’s so easy for him to fall back into old habits, and it’s not just about eating so much more than his body naturally requires.
He needs her. It’s as simple as that. He becomes hugely aware of this on a normal, peaceful and mild midnight like all the others, when he’s walking her back to her house from a very busy night working at their school newspaper.
Jughead’s black jeans jacket is loosely wrapped around her shoulders, they’re silently walking under the low and suffused lights of the street lamps, and her perfume is gently wafting around them, dancing under his nose, daring him to do something. And he needs her.
« I’m sorry, Betts. » He blurs out of the blue, not risking to look at her, just keeping his eyes fixed on the road in front of them.
His voice is feeble and soft, a little guilty, maybe, and it’s so different from the snarky, laid-back, sarcastic sort of asshole sham he shows off in school. It’s just really him. The real Jughead.
Which is, of course, the reason why Betty immediately turns to him, inspecting his face for something that could tell her what happened.
He’s unreadable, though, and his profile in the dark penumbra is rigid, like his own body is keeping him from saying more.
« What do you have to apologize for, Juggie? » She asks, glaring gently at him with a fond smile on her pink lips.
He abruptly ceases to walk, staring ahead of him with a focused expression on his features, then turns to face her.
« Everything, actually. » He realizes, arching an eyebrow and pursing his lips. « I’m sorry for the way everything went down last summer. For what happened with you and Archie. For what he did to you, because he could never notice how lucky he was to... »
When he stops talking, suddenly hesitant and reluctant, Betty takes a step forward, then another, staring at him with an expectant look on her baby blue eyes.
He’s never particularly appreciated someone invading his own personal space, never been a fan of close physical proximity, but, then again, it’s Betts. She’s still the first little girl he let touch him when he was just a six and a half grumpy boy. He wants her to be close. Can’t not have her close, really.
« How lucky he was to what, Juggie? » She whispers, promptly encouraging him to finish his sentence.
There’s suddenly something dangerous in her eyes, a not so innocent rush as everybody thinks, like she’s onto him, like she figured it out. Figured everything out.
Jughead knows it –can feel her gaze creeping between his bones – but he can’t say anything.
He isn’t capable of doing anything except keep staring into her eyes, trying to decipher the mysterious enigma that is Elizabeth Cooper’s heart.
And Jughead’s never been one to back down from a challenge, but it’s pretty clear how risky and threatening for his façade this is, and how much worse it could be, so he just shakes his head, unable to restrain himself from a quick peer at her oh-so-close and tempting mouth.
« We should go. » He says instead, resuming to walk on the silent yet observant streets around them. « I’m still far too young to have my head taken by Alice Cooper. »
When they finally arrive at the Coopers’ house, he’s not quite sure he wants to part from her.
Besides, his jacket around her shoulders is sort of a marvelous and breath-taking sight, yet a singularly natural one: the contrast between the light colors of her dress and the harsh blackness of his old denim jacket against her porcelain skin is undoubtedly something.
If he were a religious guy, he’d say it’s almost a God-given gift, seeing her like this. Like she belongs in his clothes, with a clean smile on her full lips and an halo of lightheartedness around her form.
They stand still for a few moments, enjoying the silence of the starry night above them and the lack of the people’s constant and loud cackle around them. It almost feels like the universe belongs only to them.
It’s a nice feeling.
Not nicer, however, than the unexpected brush of Betty’s hand on his cheek, stroking with extreme care the dark circles under his eyes, demanding back his full-on attention.
« You’ve always had one hell of a tired set of eyes, Juggie. » She swears lightly, but it still feels like roses are gently coming out of her mouth, like her words are dripping with a honey he’s not sure he deserves.
« But how I’ve always liked them. »
After that night, Jughead’s body develops an acute awareness of every time Betty’s close to him: it can be an accidental brush of hands, or a casual graze between their hips when she’s exiting a room, or even the mere nudge of her shoulder on his.
But he feels it. His body feels it, raw and sweet as cherry wine in all the right places, those same places he never thought he would pay attention to. And it’s excruciating and delicious all at once, without even caring about any principle of non-contradiction ever existed.
Then, he starts noticing all these apparently useless things, little facts he’s never been interested in remarking in any other situation: for starters, the way her lips close around her pen cap every time she’s struggling to find the right words, or the way her hand sneaks on her neck and just touches it absentmindedly, playing with the shivers that every once in a while run down her skin when the Gold and Blue radiator stops working, which happens an indecorous number of times, if you
ask him.
He knows that he’s always wanted Betty. He just never asked himself how he wanted her, though. He never enquired about the extent or the bounds of this yearning.
The worst part is: he can’t do anything about it. Doesn’t know what to do about it, really. And he hasn’t the slightest idea how to stop himself; how to stop his body. He’s not even sure he wants to stop at all.
The most grown-up and constructive solution Jughead Jones can come up with this extremely precocious existential crisis – he point-blank refuses to call it by its real name, which is an annoying, inconvenient, infuriating, apparently inexplicable crush on his best friend – is quitting the Blue and Gold. Without notice. Without any kind of explanation.
He just stops showing up.
He’s not exactly sure how this can work out, and the reason is pretty obvious: it’s Riverdale.
The same Riverdale with one high school, one library, one worth-the-time diner (his favorite, nonetheless), basically one everything, and there’s not even the faintest chance of avoiding someone.
But he does. He succeeds, for a while. After all, he did spend his whole life learning how to disappear among people, teaching himself how to be invisible, and it’s suddenly a life-or-death situation, trying to mingle with the horde of rabid Bulldogs football team, geeks pretenders and the acting-oh-so-fabulous River Vixens, with their tight uniforms and their maddening shorts.
The latter being the worst part, since Betty is inexplicably and against every scientific law ever one of them.
His school time is abruptly torn between diverting any chance of running into her and attending every class without giving her the slightest opening to really talk to him, and he can’t help but wonder exactly when things became so complicated.
Of course, it’s beyond the bounds of possibility to completely avoid Elizabeth Cooper’s eyes, even if it’s in the middle of ten thousands of people, especially when they are desperately trying to reach him, but never really succeeding.
He sees them – pleading, aching and disoriented, but still so damn blue – but she’s never fast enough and he’s always one step ahead, taking shortcuts between classes or walking secondary roads in order to elude any impromptu encounter.
Jughead’s living on a constant edge, always looking around and back on his shoulder, and it’s acutely agonizing, and it’s a lie, and it’s a dull ache constantly weighting on his tired heart.
Therefore, he decides to withdraw for a couple of days from this stupid and futile dance they’re doing, to have the time to really ask himself what the fuck is going on inside of him, why he just couldn’t be her friend, and stay with her, and be at her side.
It’s at the same time the most crybaby emo teenager situation and significant, momentous, wholehearted bond he’s ever had with himself, and it’s painfully confusing, not to mention the emotional consequences of this thing he feels within his own chest, this stir and pull inside his heart that’s driving him crazy.
He doesn’t know how to listen to himself, doesn’t even believe to have the faintest idea on what this cry inside of him could possibly mean, and he misses her – misses them, actually – in a way that’s new, and unknown, and fucking scary.
Which is part of the problem, isn’t it?
How did Elizabeth Cooper, irrevocable part of his earliest memories, intelligent and caring partner, the little girl who turned into a strong, brave and selfless young woman in front of his eyes, make this new, astounding seed of hope bloom inside of his chest? Why now?
That’s precisely what Jughead’s asking to himself with a pouting and frowning expression painted on his face like a mosaic of uncertainty while he’s climbing into that same old treehouse which he never grows tired of, the silent night around him being his only devoted companion.
Before he can fully realize or focus on what’s going on around him, the young Jones is taken back with the sight of nothing less than his said blonde, stubborn and definitely exasperated best friend.
Betty’s sitting on the wood floor, her back resting against the old rusty wall in the very same spot where he was sitting with her head on his lap a year ago, and her clearly tired and despondent face is tenderly illuminated by the cascade of little warm lights they put in there months ago.
She doesn’t immediately turns to him, but Jughead knows that she’s fully aware of his presence.
He also knows that he can’t run away anymore, not now, not with the way her body is telling him that she’s not okay, and it’s without any doubt nothing but his fault.
« Apparently, the only way I can talk to you is ambushing you. » She whispers at one point, but doesn’t let herself look at him.
Jughead’s eyes widen a little, just enough to crackle down the damned façade he’s dragging around like a chain around his neck, and he sits on the other side of their old playhouse.
« How did you know I’d be coming here? »
« I know you, Jughead. Even if you don’t believe it. Or care, for that matter. » Her voice is flat, but it doesn’t cover the anger and the disappointment that radiate from her silhouette.
He just wishes she could look at him – look at him and know, just know. But how can he expect her to understand him, if he isn’t capable of understanding himself?
She’s just human, like the rest of them. Elizabeth Cooper is not perfect, despite every of her movements, gestures and words is performed to make everyone else believe otherwise. And she’s trying. She’s trying so hard.
« Besides », she adds after a while, still looking down at her quivering hands, « I’ve been coming here for the last five nights. I had to find you, sooner or later. It was inevitable. »
And she’s right: it’s inevitable. Them, these words, these feelings hanging heavy in their chests. All of this, since the very first moment a little boy knelt beside a little girl and she took his hand.
She had to find him. She found him.
« I do care, Betts. » He sighs, an arm draped around his left knee and a painful yearning stretching inside of him.
The moment she finally gazes at him, there are tears shining through her eyes, dangling from her eyelashes, and Jughead hates himself.
« Was it something I did? Or said? » She asks him, and of course. Of course Elizabeth Cooper would think this is her fault.
When you spend your entire existence being told that you have to be flawless, and you have to always say yes, and you must be quiet, and compliant, and available, and you ought to keep your head down and your stare low, you start thinking everything depends on you.
You start picturing yourself as some invincible, tireless, unstoppable Atlas, and when something doesn’t follow the path you thought it was supposed to take, when life happens, you convince yourself that it’s you. It’s your fault.
« It’s not. » It’s all he’s capable of saying. And, once again, Betty manages to make the eloquent, silver-tongued, methodical writer speechless.
« Then what, Juggie? » She urges with a bittersweet anticipation dripping from her words, pushing herself up and kneeling in front of him. « What’s wrong? You can tell me. I want to know, I can help you. Please. »
Jughead knows this is his opportunity. It’s a deep and rooted awareness inside of his mind, and it’s supposed to be easy.
It should be easy. He should immediately tell her that she’s now the only thing he can write, think, dream and care about, and that he wants to make her happy.
He wants to fill her with a ridiculous and boundless amount of happiness, and just be happy with her, for her, like they’ve never been, like they never thought they could possibly be, and do it together, and keep doing it together.
But he can’t.
All these dreamy words and magnificent intentions get violently stuck in his throat and they take his breath away, and with it the only chance of being honest with her.
This is equally the best and the most puzzling, challenging thing that’s ever happened to him, and Jughead can’t afford to lose her; he doesn’t know if he could survive it.
That’s why he can’t tell her how he really feels. So, he shakes his head and looks away, putting an insurmountable distance between them.
Which is, of course, precisely how Jughead Jones loses Betty Cooper.
This time, he doesn’t have to hide.
There’s no need for Jughead to find creative and wasteful ways of avoiding Betty, he’s not obliged to look both ways before entering Pop’s, or attending a class, or simply walking down the Riverdale high school lane.
Betty’s not trying to run after him anymore.
He sees her, and she sees him, and they both haven’t the least idea why this – whatever they started creating and becoming together – had to end.
So, the most righteous and proper thing to do is going on with their lives: Jughead carries on writing his own In Cold Blood – or at least he tries to – wandering around Riverdale with his big headphones on, always putting a safe distance between him and everyone and everything else, sitting alone at Pop’s through the depth of night after night, sleeping every once in a while in his now lonely and empty treehouse.
Betty, by her part, works herself tired every day, writing – alone – for the Blue and Gold, having lunch with Archie, Ronnie and Kevin, practicing with the River Vixens, attending every stupid football game, fixing cars and doing homework ‘till she drops dead on her bed without even having the time to feel the absence of her best friend’s voice.
They cope with it in different ways: one isolating himself from each and every one of his acquaintances, falling back into that same, old apathy he felt rise inside of him years ago; the other surrounding herself with people to avoid her loneliness, making everything in her power to exhaust herself in order to prevent her mind from thinking about the piercing loss in her chest.
Neither of them is okay, though.
It happens on the rainiest and blackest night Riverdale has seen in a long time.
Jughead’s having trouble sleeping – like he always does, but really enjoys ignoring – in the old mattress in the back of Pop’s store, and the lighting and thunders outside the windows aren’t really helping him out, when he decides to stop laying and brooding purposelessly.
Weather like this always brings him memories of the time when him and his dear Jellybean would crawl under their colorful sheets and hold dearly onto each other to stop being afraid, and these days nostalgia seems already one step away from eating at him for Jughead to not afford to remember.
So, the young Jones can’t help but grip his bag, still full of his limited belongings, and dig around it for a while, trying to grab a hold on one of the only picture he still has of his little sister.
Rather than that, he comes across an old washed-up sheet of paper, distinctly consumed by many times of being folded and refolded again.
He doesn’t recognize it immediately, but he guesses it’s one of the first adventure stories he loved to write when he was younger.
Instead, an unexpected astonishment and a sharp sadness commit to paint themselves on his face when he realizes what this is about. It’s not some tale of brave pirates and lost islands, not at all.
It’s a letter.
His old eight years old hand-writing is blurry and faded, but Jughead immediately knows what it says, feels it burning in his brain, forever marked in the deep roots of his memories. And it hurts.
It takes approximately ten seconds for him to look around the pitch-black room, exploiting the light of the lighting outside to spot his combat boots and his old jacket, wear them with the most eagerly rush he’s ever felt in his body and go out without even caring about having an umbrella.
The rain is directly cold and freezing against his skin, soaking wet his beanie and sneaking into his back, but he doesn’t care. He’s not the writer anymore, not now; he’s the hero of the story, the one who finally has the chance to prove to himself and to anyone else that he’s not a pathetic nobody, he’s not a failure, and he doesn’t have to lose. He just has to be brave.
And, then again, it’s a fucking cliché, but he starts running, and he doesn’t even think for a second about what’s going to happen – both to his body, since he’s going to catch a damn pneumonia, and to his heart, once he’ll reach his destination – because he’s finally free for the first time in his entire life.
He’s free and alive even if he’s tripping and slipping on the icy and empty streets of his hometown, and his clothes are uncomfortably clinging to his shivery body, and the invisible moon and stars are unwilling spectators of the most foolish and extraordinary thing he’s ever done.
Fortunately, his destination starts being visible pretty soon after that, instilling inside of Jughead’s chest a stirring, spine-chilling and intoxicating feeling he shortly became addicted to.
He immediately takes shelter under the Coopers’ porch, realizing only after a couple of minutes that he doesn’t have his phone on him, which leads him on turning more and more into an old mid-nineties heroic teenager boy.
But Jughead did not just run across half of Riverdale into the pouring rain to give up now, so he arms himself of some gravel from the drive and jumps again under the storm, running exactly below Betty’s window.
Squinting his eyes in order to have an at least decent visibility, the young Jones throws three pebbles in a row against the glass, hoping that his best friend still has a tremendously light sleep.
And she has, because only after a few seconds the contrast of the golden halo of her hair against the opaque mist of the rain above them is enough for Jughead to sigh in contempt.
« What the heck are you doing here, Juggie? » She unwelcomely scream-whispers, looking down at his wet and dripping silhouette, trying at the same time to shelter herself from the raging storm.
« I need to talk to you! » He shouts in response, careless of what Alice Cooper would do to him if she discovered what’s happening.
« Go under the porch! » Betty immediately replies, a shade of worry and nervousness caught under the apparent discomfort in her voice. « You’re going to die from hypothermia, you… jerk! »
« Will you come down? »
« I will, but please stop standing under the rain. »
That’s enough for Jughead to bow his head for a second, trying to hide his grin and letting raindrops stumble on his cheekbones and lips; then, with agitated and snappy movements, he goes back to the Coopers’ front door.
He’s shifting his weight on each of his feet, unable of standing still, when his best friend’s outline comes out of the penumbra and closes the door behind her.
Jughead immediately reaches for his beanie – still inexplicably on his head – and pulls it off, squeezing out the water inside it. Betty’s wearing her turquoise pajamas, the one with little pink rabbits painted on it, her tired face is softly surrounded by her disordered golden locks, and she’s still the most beautiful girl he
has ever seen.
« You’re lucky my parents are away for the weekend, or catching a silly cold would have been the last of your problems. And I mean the last ever. » Betty’s voice is nothing but a murmur while she talks to him without looking into his eyes, approaching the raven-haired boy to wrap an old and thick blanket around his shoulders to try to keep him warm.
Jughead doesn’t move, doesn’t even breath, too focused on her overwhelming gesture of kindness to even register the full meaning of her words. He just lets her touch him – and it should be tiring, by now, admitting how easily he does it – and inebriate him with an intimate proximity he’s not scared of anymore.
« You’re soaking wet, for heaven’s sake. What were you thinking? » Betty scolds him, taking a step back and combing her left hand through her hair.
« I have to give you something. » It’s the only response her best friend gives her, doing the same to his own hair in order to dampen them a bit more.
Then, immediately after that, he reaches towards the inside pocket of his old denim jacket – the very same one she wore months ago, leaving her scent lingering both from the collar and the cuffs – pulling out the wrinkled piece of paper he held on dearly for half of his life.
Betty can’t help but wrap her hands around her torso, shielding herself physically and metaphorically at once, the moment she sees it.
They stand there, still and quiet, for a few seconds, the only sound around them being the roaring of the storm and the thunders above their heads; Jughead’s staring at her face while Betty’s staring at his dripping clothes, the mere light of the lampions and the lighting crossing their pensive features, and it all feels so unsteady. He doesn’t want to feel like that anymore.
He can’t, so he extends his arm to offer her the letter, studying her expression to grasp every nuance on it. He doesn’t wait, though, so, as soon as she takes it, he straightens and tilts his chin.
« Dear Betts », Jughead’s voice is just a tender, soft whisper dancing to her ears, while her eyes are fixed on the paper, « I don’t like people. I just like you. In fact, I think I like you so much that I’ll fall in love with you, one day. But not now, ‘cause I’m just a child, and so are you. But you are gentle and you smell nice, and I know it wouldn’t be so ugly. So, maybe, if you’ll want, we’ll love each other like our parents do, when we are old enough to. Yours, Juggie. »
When he stops reciting by heart the words of his eight years old self, he immediately notices heavy tears streaming down Betty’s pink cheeks, so much similar to the ones she spilled on her face with her head on his thighs a long time ago.
« I was right, Betts. It’s true. It’s all crystal clear, now. » He adds after a while, making a step toward her, and these simple words are more than Jughead, Betty or everyone else would have expected from someone like him, but he’s done.
He’s done forcing himself not to feel; he’s done wanting her so much that it makes him believe he’s going to choke on it, but doing nothing about it; he’s done pretending to be okay with his loneliness; he’s done being afraid of rejection and abandonment, despite this is all that people in his life have taught him.
Everyone, except one. His only exception: Elizabeth Cooper.
However, his step forward matches hers backward, and there’s still so much unconquerable distance between them, one that resembles continents and oceans, and he finally wants to overcome it, to get around it, but her face is hardening by the second, and Jughead’s never been more afraid.
« Say something. » It’s the only thing he can state right now, given the broken heart that is shining through her wet, teary eyes.
« I am… » She starts, raising her voce to overcome the sound of the rain around them, « so sick of people I love leaving me. I’m trying so hard, always so, so strenuously, to be perfect, every single day of my life. » There’s suddenly a fierceness on the way her shoulders open and straighten, a path of fire spreading from her eyes to her words, to the way her body lightens up and protects her, until there isn’t.
She’s crying again, saying with a whisper: « But it’s not enough. It’s never gonna be enough. » And she’s sobbing now, full shivers going down her nape and spine, drenching her chest with a throbbing ache. « And I’m so tired. »
Which is sufficient for the raven-haired boy to come closer, dragging his combat boots on the wooden floor of the patio to lessen the distance between their bodies.
« I know you’re tired. I’m sorry. I’m so disgustingly sorry about what I did. You don’t have to be- »
« You were right, you know? » She says, taking back control of her reactions and drying her face with the sleeve of her pajamas. This oddly alarms him more than before, because there’s a rigor and a new harshness in her voice, one Jughead knows very well: it’s the same he felt so many times in his own chest.
« It would never work out between the two of us. »
That, he can’t stand. He can’t watch her give up on them, not so easily. Not now.
So, he urges forward, taking her face in both of his cold hands, leaning slightly on his knees to get a full and plain sight of her blue eyes; he knows his are wide open and shell-shocked for what she has just said, but he doesn’t care.
« No, no, no. Listen to me, Betts, okay? » He spells eagerly painting, frantically, yet internally grateful that she’s not resisting his grip. « I did it all wrong. It was me. And I know I didn’t say it to you then, but I’m going to say it to you now: you’re not unlovable, Elizabeth. You are not. And you’re the most whole, devoted and brilliant person I have ever met. You made me whole. »
It’s so simple. It’s so simple that the words are wrestling with one another and racing against each other to leave his mouth, so madly and wildly impatient to come out, because Jughead is craving to tell her everything, to let her know that she’s not what she thought of herself this entire time, and that he has always seen her.
She’s a world.
But that’s still not enough, because Betty grips his hands on her face with her own, but turns her head to stop looking at him.
« I don’t believe you. » She sobs with shaking voice, and if he sees one more tear rolling down her cheeks, he’s going to lose his fucking mind. When she spins again to stare at him, she lifts her voice: « You’re a cowar- »
Before he knows it – let alone her – Jughead is closing his eyes and crushing his mouth on hers, unapologetically bumping their foreheads together and tilting his head to the side in order to have better access, because he’s desperate to embed his lips in hers, because he needs her taste, and craves any cure that could fix him, and them, and she’s the only one who can give it to him.
Betty doesn’t move for a couple of seconds, staring with wide and yawning eyes at her best friend, but they both know this isn’t how it’s all supposed to end.
That’s precisely why the blonde sighs against his mouth, totally incapable of tearing herself away from him, and wraps both of her hands around his soaking wet and clothed shoulders, still covered by the blanket she put there before, dragging him down to her, where she can finally have him close.
Their mouths keep moving together – more like colliding and biting – opening to each other with a loving vigor and eagerness, when their faces start to get wet; they don’t know if it’s because of the tears leaving Betty’s baby blue eyes or if it’s for Jughead’s soaked hair dripping raindrops on their cheeks, but it doesn’t matter. It’s all going to be alright.
After a few moments of just kissing and tasting each other, the young Cooper slides her hands first beneath the blanket, then under his jacket, letting both of them drop to their feet, finding herself two less piece of clothing closer to his skin.
« I still want to talk more about all of that’s happened. So, this doesn’t mean I suddenly forgot this last, horrible months. Or that I’m propositioning. » She moans, breathing inside of his mouth, diving into its warmth. « But you have to come inside and take off your clothes now, if you don’t want to die of pneumonia. »
Jughead can’t help but smile against her lips, slamming shut his eyes for a moment, and, for once in his life, he doesn’t feel the need to say anything at all.
And that’s how the Jughead Jones and Elizabeth Cooper story really begins.