one-shots || bughead + sprousehart

"I can't sleep with you staring at me." - bughead

if Jughead's disappearance had a different reason & if Betty reacted to it properly

sexy times ahead (not very graphic)

The church was empty when she came in. She crossed her fingers over her chest as she walked inside and sat down on a pew.

She prayed for his safe return, for his head to pop in her classroom in the mornings to say a quick hello. She prayed silently, because he had been gone for two weeks now and—

"This is God. What is it now?" The voice frightened her and she gasped loudly. As she turned around to find the source, of course he emerged from the pew behind her, grinning from ear to ear.

"You scared the life out of me." She huffed, turning back to face the front of the church.

"I crawled all the way on my hands and knees from that door. But it was worth it." He chuckled, leaning on the backrest of her pew.

"What are you doing here?" She questioned, somewhat stunned and exasperated by his sudden appearance.

"It's good to see you. How've you been?"

"Worried sick is how I've been. And then you pop in here like some sort of a lunatic playing games, asking how I've been." She was frowning now, suddenly angry with him.

"Just—"

"Shame on you." She scolded, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Stay calm, okay? It's important that no one sees us together." He seemed serious and Betty didn't know how to take that in.

"Why not?" She was genuinely confused, but also genuinely not surprised by that.

"I'm faking my disappearance. It's the only way to find whoever is behind the killings of these girls."

"You son of a bitch." She whispered quietly, "you son of a bitch." She was louder now, putting emphasis on each separate word.

"Okay, we are in a church." He mocked, eyes widening.

"Wait, how does faking a disappearance, if that's what you're really doing, because it looks pretty real to me, how does that trap this murderer?" She was squinting her eyes at him, frustrated.

He had seriously lost his mind.

"All of these clues we have gathered up so far, they're all a bunch of useless theories based off of unreliable sources and characters like a moth man. It's like you said, there has to be an actual person behind all this who is torturing and murdering all these girls. He cannot do that alone, he needs allies, so I'll become one for him."

"So, I disappear, basically hand myself to him. I need his trust, his attention, so instead of telling everyone I'm crossing to the 'dark side', I simply just leave."

"Brilliant, you did that part great, now what?" She was still annoyed, not at all convinced by what he cooked up.

"Surprisingly, he reached out. Sent me a message. Now I'm going to take him up on the offer. I'm in a lot of real trouble. I do need a new life, so to speak." He raised his eyebrow, grinning slightly but Betty couldn't see what was so laughable.

"Yes, you do." She muttered angrily.

"That's what makes the gag work."

"Or it won't."

"Fooled you, I can fool him."

"Well, you fooled me all right. Well done." Guilt flooded him and he nervously started playing with his fingers.