Just Friends ▻ Jughead Jones

13

    It was afterschool time and the Riverdale Bulldogs were outside for practice.

"Bulldog twenty-five on two," Victoria announced to her team of Bulldogs as she knelt on one knee, "Bulldog twenty-five on two, ready?"

  "Break!" The team shouted out, clapping their hands together before they began their practice.

   Victoria stood up and sighed when she saw Archie staring down at his wrist, he had clearly written down the plays there and she already knew that it was going to be a bad practice for Archie.

"Red three two, red three two!" Coach Clayton shouted out to the players that were ready in their positions, "Ready? Hut! Hut!"

The player who had the ball was about to pass to Archie until he saw that he was on the wrong side, "Other side! Go left." He spoke up loudly Archie, who quickly obeyed.

Archie went to go catch the ball, only to be tackled to the ground by Victoria. While basically straddling her best friend, Victoria smirked as she looked down at him, "Better luck next time, Andrews." She told him before getting back up.

Numerous plays later and Victoria was still knocking Archie to ground over and over. It was kind of getting boring for her by then. When Archie was about to catch the bell once more, Victoria tackled him, "Well done, Munroe!" Coach Clayton shouted out, clapping his hands together.

Once getting off of Archie, Victoria grabbed him by the hand in attempt to help him up, "Ah!" Archie yelled out, causing Victoria to give him a face filled with concern.

Archie ended up getting up on his own and both he and Victoria took off their helmet, out of breath from the brutal practice.

"Dude, what the hell's wrong with your hand?" Victoria asked Archie concerned.

"It's fine," Archie assured her and Victoria shook her head.

"Archie, I'm not letting you play with a busted hand," She argued calmly.

"I said it's fine, Tori. Just give it up already!" Archie shouted at her, causing Victoria to roll her eyes at him.

"Fellas, are we going to chit-chat or we going to play?" Coach asked the two teenagers from a distance.

"Let's play," Archie told her before walking off.

"Fine, but it's your funeral, dumbass. Don't think I'm going to go easy on you now." Victoria replied before putting her helmet back on.

______

After practice ended, Victoria made her way back to the school in search of Archie. She found him in one of the hallways, sitting on a bench. He was in the middle of trying to bandage his hand up but was failing horribly at it.

Victoria walked over to him, causing Archie to instantly stare up at her, "Need some help?" She asked curiously and Archie smiled slightly, nodding his head in response.

She let out a small as she took a deep beside him and began to wrap his hand for him, "Look, I'm sorry for being so hard on you lately at practice. You're really good at football, Arch, but lately, you've been slacking. I would much rather have you as my co-captain instead of a boy who calls himself 'Mantle the Magnificent' in attempt to pick up girls."

Both Archie and Victoria began to laugh at her statement and stared at each other intently for a moment, "There. All done." She spoke up with a smile on his face. She placed a kiss to his arm before Archie began to ask his question.

"Hey, would you maybe wanna get--" He began to ask her, only to get cut off by approaching footsteps.

"Tori, can we talk?" Jughead asked curiously as he stood in front of his two friends.

Victoria stared up at him and slowly nodded his head, "Yeah, sure thing." She replied, even though she wasn't so sure, "Bye, Arch."

Victoria got up from her seat before following Jughead to an empty classroom, "So what do you want to talk about?" She asked curiously as she turned to face him.

"I have something to tell you," Jughead announced and Victoria gave him a confused look, "I..."

"You what, Jughead?" She asked confused.

"I like you, okay?" He confessed loudly, "All this time I've liked you and you haven't even realized. I told you that I liked Betty and tried to like her in hopes of getting over liking you, but I can't. Seeing you being all lovey dovey with Archie made me pissed and I tried to get just keep distance, but I can't do that anymore. If you don't like me like that, it's fine, but I need you in my life as either my best friend or maybe even more."

Victoria's eyes softened when she heard Jughead's words, "Jughead, are you kidding? I like you, too! I've been hinting at it forever, but you've been completely obvious it. At the Jubilee, that person that I said I liked that was in the room, it wasn't Archie, it was you. And at the Drive In, the only reason I said that was because I was jealous that you liked Betty. Jughead, you're my best friend and you're the only person who understands what it feels like being a Southside teen going to a Northside school." She explained to him.

It was silent between them, both of them unable to form words, "I can't believe I was so oblivious all this time." Jughead spoke up with a sigh.

"Same," Victoria agreed with the Jones boy.

"Wait," Jughead said, a frown appearing on his face, "So this means you don't like Archie?"

Victoria laughed as she shook her head, "No, of course not. Archie and I were just using each other as rebounds after getting our hearts crushed by the people we cared about." She answered, "I told like Archie more than a friend and he doesn't like me as more than a friend."

"Not that you know of," Jughead told her and Victoria rolled her eyes at him.

"Archie doesn't like me like that. I would know if he did," Victoria assured, "Can we stop talking about Archie please?"

Jughead slowly nodded his head as he walked closer to Victoria, cupping her face with his hands. He slowly leaned forward, both of them having their eyes closed as their brushed against each other.

Victoria couldn't take the wait and attached her lips to Jughead's. The two of them passionately kissed each other. They felt as if nothing could come between them.