Author's Note:
This is my submission for the hard level of Amber's Monthly Oneshot Competition―August Challenge. Her criteria: "write about your OTP having a fight. Must include the genre angst and include the following prompts: chocolate, nervous, 'And yet you keep talking.'" This is my first-ever competition entry, first Archie & Val fic, and first T-rated story for Riverdale, so fingers crossed!
XO ForASecondThereWe'dWon
Val had wandered away from the party. She was wishing she'd had more to drink, including what she'd wasted flinging at Archie, because the concrete curb she was sitting on was cold under her butt and the inner warmth of alcohol would've been nice. She tunneled her hands into her coat and clicked the heels of her boots up and down on the pavement. Inside the Andrews place and out on the lawn, the party raged on, though a few doors down, where Val had escaped to, the street was really quiet.
She hadn't brought her earphones, but the silence interrupted by rising and falling voices wasn't a bad soundtrack. It reminded her of going to bed early as a kid and hearing her parents watching TV downstairs. Val closed her eyes and let it all―the noise and the quiet, the cold and the calm―pour over her. She felt her phone in her pocket under her stiff fingers (she could already tell she was going to have to do extra scales in the morning to warm up before she played) and she just left it alone, a small creature in its den, not yet ready for spring. There was no one she wanted to call. Well, there was no one she wanted to call that she would let herself call.
Although it was definitely chilly, Val eased back, flattening herself on the stranger's lawn with her feet hanging off the curb. She breathed deeply. Just a few minutes more and she'd go back to the party, and this time, she'd be able to handle it. Of course, Archie was still going to be there, but she'd known he would be before she agreed to be picked up by her friends and brought along. The meditative exhalations she was trying for turned into a groan. He did look annoyingly cute tonight.
She opened her eyes and glared up into the sky. The stars did not deserve the look she was sending their way, but Val was willing the universe to take her angst, to ball it up and pitch it right back to her. This was her own stupid fault for falling for the guy that everybody adored. A guy like that was spread too thin. It was even more pathetic when she considered it that way; she'd probably been sucked in by him only using like 5% of his energy on her. Archie's irritatingly honest, enthusiastically passionate energy. She felt tricked, like he'd used his supernatural charisma for evil instead of good, and what was the result? Her, lying on icy, damp grass in her nice clothes after being the asocial weirdo who dumps a drink on the town golden boy. Somehow, she'd become Jughead Jones.
Val exhaled shakily, trying to let her almost-peace of a few minutes ago back in so that she could get up and just tell Melody she wanted to go home. No more cold ground, no more drinking, no more Archie Andrews.
She heaved herself up and almost screamed.
"God, Archie! What are you doing?"
He was standing mere feet from the curb, his hands shoved into his jeans pockets. The posture made him seem nervous.
"I was looking for you," he said a little sheepishly.
"Apparently, since there's nobody else out here."
Val set her jaw and pushed herself up to standing. There was no way she was getting cornered twice in one night. She took a few steps towards the party, then stopped. Archie was still standing there.
"Why didn't I see you coming?" Val asked, glancing between his house and her little time-out spot on the neighbour's lawn.
"Like, metaphorically?" Archie's eyebrows rose in confusion. Val rolled her eyes.
"No, not metaphorically." She crossed her arms. "Do you have to be the artsy hot guy all the time?"
"Um, I think I'll just answer the first question. I was walking on the other side of the street." Archie jabbed his thumb back over his shoulder.
"To sneak up on me?" She narrowed her eyes.
"To let myself chicken out if I decided I couldn't face you. Again."
Val shook her head. He was making her sound like the difficult one. Did he really expect her to believe he didn't have the confidence to talk to her? Maybe it was reverse psychology to make her feel like she was the one in control so that he could insinuate the idea of them getting back together into her mind and make her think it had been her who'd thought of it.
"Well, since you somehow ended up over here, contrary to what we both seem to want, I'll save you any future creepy stalking endeavors. I don't want you to face me." Val widened her eyes at Archie as she spoke, trying to convey how much of an idiot she thought he was. "I don't want you to talk to me, make sad faces at me with that longing look in your eyes." She realized she was getting worked up enough to start ticking these demands off on her fingers so she folded her hands into fists. "Goodnight, Archie."
"Valerie, wait!"
Val turned slowly on her heel, having taken a few more steps away from him.
"You're talking to me."
"I am. You had your chance so I want mine."
He was giving her those open, earnest eyes that she found so frustratingly irresistible. She stared at him, weakness making her speechless, and he found his opportunity.
"First of all, I've changed my mind. I would like to address your 'artsy hot guy' comment. I don't want to be the guy you hate, and I definitely don't want to be some stereotype of a guy you hate. You're making me worse in your mind, which is not fair."
"Worse?" Val laughed bitterly, rocking her head back so she didn't have to look at him for a few seconds. "You are worse. You lured me in with your guitar playing and your whole wanting to be a songwriter thing. You tried to join the band I love. You got me to quit the band I love. I tried to help you get better and you just used everything I gave you and gave ME nothing!"
Val had escalated to waving her hands and pointing at him for emphasis and she would've been embarrassed about it if Archie hadn't started gesturing right back.
"I never made you do anything. I wasn't trying to give you nothing back. I thought music was this big, important thing we shared and that just being with you to talk about it and play was us having a reciprocated relationship!" He stepped closer to her and lowered his voice. "And I didn't lure you in any more than you lured me. You're beautiful and smart and talented and I would've wanted to be around you even if I knew nothing about music and never planned to learn! You say I used you, but I was so intimidated by you."
"And yet you keep talking." Val raised her eyebrow, but even to her, the words came out bare of the harsh edge she'd been using. Archie's mouth rose in the most tenuous smile.
"I may have to if you aren't convinced yet that I'm not some sleazy songwriter with his head up his ass and 'Wonderwall' in his back pocket."
Val's eyelashes flickered as she rolled her eyes.
"Please. I've heard you describe the colour of your guitar strap as 'chocolate.'"
Archie chuckled through closed lips.
"If I agree that was an incredibly pretentious thing to say, will you promise never to bring it up again?"
Val pursed her lips, biting the inside of her mouth. When had 'again' become such a loaded word? 'Again' meant more talking. 'Promise' meant trust, longevity, expectations.
"I'll think about it." She offered him an upward turn in the corner of her lips. "Do you want to walk back to the party with me? It's cold out here."
Archie's smile grew in a way Val thought hers wasn't quite ready to.
"Oh, you're cold? Somebody threw their drink all over me."
They fell into step together.
"It's your house, Archie. Why didn't you just go change?"
"I had to go see about a girl."
He was looking up at her from under his eyelashes and Val's heart gave a little tug.
"I know you ripped that off from Good Will Hunting. You better not write songs that way."
"I don't know what I'll do. I'm totally helpless without your guidance."
She fought her growing smile.
"Suck up."
Archie shrugged. They were almost back.