Beloved in the river

"💓💧👅" the mini series 3(last part)

"Is this some sort of regularly performed rite where you interrogate your daughter to make sure she isn't failing anything?" Jughead interjected.

The silence was as dead as the ground-up cow meat in his esophagus.

Alice rounded on him slowly. "Yes," she said sweetly. "Is that a problem?"

🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺

Dinner was delicious. Crisp lettuce and pickles cut through the richness of the beef and contrasted with the gooey softness of the onion rings. There was a hint of ketchup, which gave the burger just the tiny bit of depth it needed. The flavors—supreme. Divine. Glorious. Jughead took another bite.

"Howsch 'Nglesh?" Hal Cooper asked through a mouthful of food. Alice swatted at him, and he chewed and swallowed with difficulty before repeating his question: "Sorry. How's English?"

"Good," Betty replied easily. "The essay's due tomorrow, but I just have a few quick edits to make." She took a small bite of her burger and chewed slowly. (Jughead knew people who savored food when he saw them, and yes, Betty was one of those people.)

Jughead, who (in his defense) had been busy investigating for the Blue and Gold and expanding his already lengthy novel, had far more than a few quick edits left of his essay, but he had just enough social skills to know that now was not the time to announce that particular fact.

"What about math?" Alice asked.

Betty chewed. Swallowed. "Good."

"What about—"

"Is this some sort of regularly performed rite where you interrogate your daughter to make sure she isn't failing anything?" Jughead interjected.

The silence was as dead as the ground-up cow meat in his esophagus.

Alice rounded on him slowly. "Yes," she said sweetly. "Is that a problem?"

Jughead glared at the table and decided he didn't have that much of a death wish. "No." He nudged a few fries around with his fork to isolate them from the others, impaled them, popped them into his mouth, and chewed.

Hal broke the silence first. "Science?"

"Good." Betty stared at her plate. Curse the Cooper family, Jughead thought for the second time that day.

Feeling eyes burning into his head, he tore his eyes away from Betty to glare pointedly at a disapproving Alice Cooper, who had apparently noticed just how much food was in his mouth. Without swallowing, he took another slow bite. The message was clear, he hoped; at least, it should have been clear. You don't control me. Delicious. Jughead swallowed.

"Hist—" Alice began, and Betty opened her mouth to say 'good', and Jughead couldn't take this anymore.

"Where did you say Polly was again?" he said loudly.

Alice Cooper choked on her bite of burger. Hal Cooper sputtered. Betty looked up from her plate. She was trying—and failing—to not smile.

The painful death he had in store would be worth it, Jughead thought suddenly, if Betty would keep smiling at him like that.

"She's at a group home," Alice said briskly, prodding a fry, because when—despite the best efforts of her parents—Betty was finally smiling, of course Alice Cooper had to speak. "For her own good." She shot Jughead a tight-lipped smile.

"Speaking of which, Mom," Betty cut in, "I can go see her soon, right?"

Well played, Jughead thought. It was a trick she'd told him about a few days ago—asking her mother for something when they had a guest over, so that if she refused, she'd look like a bad parent. 'Works every time,' she'd told him, beaming.

The problem was, a charity case wasn't nearly the same sort of guest as the typical judgemental neighbor.

Mrs. Cooper exhaled noisily and stared her daughter down. "Betty, your sister is not well."

How Betty managed to look almost apologetic while she was clearly seething inside, Jughead would never know. Maybe he'd ask her to teach him one day. "I know! You tell me that every time, but—Mom, she's my sister." Jellybean. "I don't care if she hates me, or can't remember me, or wants to kill me, or whatever, she's my sister, and I'm her sister, and I want to be there for her, and you aren't letting me—"

Alice's eyes narrowed. "Your sister made a mistake, and I don't want you around her—"

Betty scoffed. "What, so Jason was a disease that she caught—some sort of Stupid Rich Guy disease—and now she's contagious?"

"I told you, she's not well!" Alice leapt up from her chair.

So did Betty. "She's my sister! I want to see her!"

"You can, when she's better!" Alice snapped.

Betty crossed her arms and glared with eyes full of vicious skepticism. "Oh, and when will that be—?"

"SOON!" Alice Cooper bellowed. The room erupted in sound.

"Alice!" Hal yelled, shocked, and reached for her arm, but—

"Leave me alone!" Alice shouted, wrenching it away. "I'm her mother, I can—"

"The neighbors," he hissed, "not so loud, Alice—"

"DAMN THE NEIGHBORS—"

"Let's get out of here," Jughead muttered to Betty. "That was amazing."

Betty nodded, tension written in every muscle, and Jughead tried not to notice the way she gripped his hand like a vice as they made a hasty getaway.

I'm sorry about Polly, he wanted to say, but didn't.

-

It was a dark and stormy night.

Jughead kicked back and got out his laptop to work on the essay. He ended up just staring at the last half-finished paragraph, though. It was a dark and stormy night, he typed, then deleted it.

How had Betty managed to finish her essay alre—

Creakk.

Jughead shut his laptop instantly. His eyes snapped up—

--to see the shadowy form of Betty Cooper creeping towards him.

"Psst! Juggy? Juggy!"

He squinted through the darkness. "Betty? What the heck are you doing here?"

She was closer now, and he could just make out the exhilarated terror on her face as she whispered, "I lied—I haven't finished the essay yet—"

"WHA—"

"Shh!" The bed creaked softly as she sat down. "Please—can I look at yours?"

Jughead took a moment to forever preserve in his memory the day that Betty Cooper asked him to help her cheat on a homework assignment. Then he remembered—

"I haven't finished it either!"

Betty's jaw dropped. "Seriously?"

Jughead raised an eyebrow, and Betty visibly suppressed a giggle. "Good," she whispered, grinning.

"Good?" Jughead echoed incredulously.

Betty nodded, and somehow even in the near-darkness he could tell that her eyes were gleaming. "Great. Work together?"

Jughead nodded wordlessly and opened his laptop back up. Beside him, Betty opened hers. "Let's switch," she breathed. "You finish mine, I'll finish yours. I did it with Polly all the time."

It was one of those rare moments when Jughead actually had to try not to laugh. "Wait. You traded homework with your older sister?"

Betty let out a half-stifled laugh. "I got the better end of the deal," she whispered. "Hey—you should probably say 'Twain shows that Huck' instead of just 'Huck,' he likes the author to be in the driver's seat..."

And that, dear reader, was why Jughead found himself in bed with Betty Cooper on a Sunday night.

(Needless to say, they both got A's.)