A/N: here we are again with more sad teenage boys, sorrynotsorry. i'm not sure what this is exactly, i wrote half of it at 2am and the rest at the seat of my pants without any real direction in mind. this is not proof-read, my apologies. maybe i'll come back and tweak some stuff some other time.
(i made up the title as i'm posting this, oops)
trigger warning: self-harm, some blood - please take care of yourself and don't be afraid to stop reading if you need to, i love you all and stay safe 3
Spoilers for Riverdale in general, but it's pretty vague.
Rated T for self-harm, some blood, language.
Lyrics from A Car, A Torch, A Death - Twenty One Pilots
000
and i begin to envy the headlights driving south
i want to crack the door so i can just fall out
but then I remember when you packed my car
you reached in the back and buckled up your heart
000
in hindsight, it doesn't make much sense.
at the time, it seemed the lesser of two evils. things were... tense between them, between all of them, but most of all between Archie and himself. actually, probably Veronica, seeing as her dad is the source of all the dry wood feeding the constant flickering heat of injustice in his gut these days. he can't seem to put it out, but when it comes to the Lodges, he doesn't really want to. but he was never that close with Veronica, as much as a small part of him hoped he would be. even if they were, it's hard to compare it to the sting of a friend he's known since memories even began to stick to his muddled mind drifting further and further away as if he prefers the company of criminals to that of his friends.
but he's sure as hell not trying to break into the Lodge's house.
so the Andrews' it is.
maybe it's a desperate move (definitely), but it was three in the morning when his half-baked mind cooked up the idea, and nearly four by the time he's brushing the potting soil off the Andrews' house key he'd retrieved from the flowerpot sitting nearby.
(he was six years old when Archie first showed it to him like a dirty little secret between the two of them – and it was; they had to wash mud out of their hair and clothes after a joking handful of the stuff was dumped down the back of Archie's shirt the moment he turned to unlock the front door as if showing off a trophy, and it quickly escalated to a full-out mud war. sadly, the plant didn't make it)
he shoves down the pang of guilt as the key slides in like butter and the doorknob clicks.
it's not really breaking in, to be fair. the Andrews once said this was Jughead's home as long as he wanted it to be, what's theirs was his and all that. he'd felt guilty then too. the guilt doesn't go away at the thought, in fact it sharpens, his actions feeling now more like a betrayal than simply a low blow.
he ignores it and steps over the creaky floorboard two steps past the bottom of the stairs.
(he'd always wake Fred stepping on it when he'd tiptoe downstairs for a midnight snack during sleepovers)
it's what he has to do, for the greater good. besides, it's not like Archie cares about their carefully constructed friendship anymore. Jughead might as well not exist to him – that is, until Hiram tells him to sit, boy, roll over, and sics his new dog on the Jones and all the Serpents and Southsiders at their backs for the nth time. people too poor or too undermined to do anything to stop the rich and powerful.
Archie's at the man's every beck and call now; there has to be something under this roof that could be of help.
he wonders how much Fred knows about this. whatever 'this' is. he doesn't even know much about 'this'.
(there was a time when Jughead knew Archie's favorite number and favorite color and favorite skittle flavor and favorite Legend of Zelda game and-)
they hadn't talked like that in years.
if only navigating Archie was as easy as navigating his house.
he makes his way to the sitting room and catches himself staring, body still as his gaze roams over the familiar setting until he pushes himself forward, only to quickly stop short; there wouldn't be much downstairs. anything useful would be in Archie's room, perhaps the garage.
(Archie used to hide all their 'secret book club adventures of beanie boy and red skull' [nerdy but almost clever, he had to admit] stuff at the bottom of the tool shelf in the corner, shoved behind the old rusted and now replaced tool box, for safety purposes, of course, it was indeed confidential information after all)
if he can avoid the obstacle of trying not to wake a sleeping Archie at four in the morning, he'll consider himself blessed by the breaking and entering gods.
he checks the garage first.
trying not to knock over all of the old band equipment may prove to be harder than he originally thought, but he manages with a panther-like agility (at least that's how a ten-year-old Archie put it that one time Jughead made it through a game of dodge-ball without getting hit a single time) and even checks inside the fucking drums for any clues or – he doesn't know, he'd take a bejeweled diary at this point, just anything that'd explain what's going on with the Lodges and Archie even a little.
but there's nothing. he can't say he isn't surprised.
stealing himself, fingers curling into momentary fists that buzz quietly at his sides, he returns to the creaky floorboards and warmth of the house versus the chill of the garage and stops at the foot of the stairs to simply watch. waiting.
working up the nerve is more like it.
he doesn't have a lot to worry about; Archie always slept like a fucking log with a concussion, almost to a worrying extent when Jughead would try to rouse him for pancakes in the morning ('your dad even said with chocolate chips this time!') after a long night of green and red turtle shells, whispered hollers of victory and petulant grumbles of defeat.
with that in mind, he pulls himself up the stairs two at a time, hands braced on the railing to bear most of his weight. the old stairs barely make a sound under the familiar tread of his feet.
Archie's door is open.
it washes like cement over him and stops him in place, heart thumping loud in the quiet of the early (early) morning. but it strikes him as odd more than anything. Archie never slept with his door open, some crap about privacy, he's sure (more likely the ventilation making his room too cold in the winter and too hot in the summer; Jughead had experienced both up close and personal himself).
but only the lamp is on (odd as well, but not alarmingly so; Archie often used to fall asleep doing homework and get drool all over his notes until they were basically undecipherable and had to go through the entire lesson again, all while Jughead snickered at the unflattering pictures he managed to snap on his phone), and after a moment of standing there, he determines there's not even the small sound of a snore to be heard; Archie must be dead asleep, then, if he's not even snoring.
good (is what he tells himself instead of acknowledging the tiny voice that wishes Archie was awake, to scowl and tell him off for sneaking in like a lunatic at this ungodly hour).
he tiptoes regardless, though he's lucky he won't have to go through the grueling process of opening Archie's excessively creaky door. Archie may be a deep sleeper, but that door could wake the fucking dead if it wanted to.
he realizes too late that none of that would matter anyway.
he makes it three feet from the doorway, three feet away from slipping past that god-awful door and rifling through his (ex)best friend's shit to find the oh so eluded evidence he was so sure was there, before he spots Archie sat cross-legged on his bed, peering at his own arm and very much awake.
he freezes like he's been shot, blood rushing in his ears, and he feels like he's been as such, something cold and sharp lodging somewhere between his ribs and clogging his lungs.
it takes less than a second to take it in. human brains are annoyingly efficient like that, soaking up details you didn't even mean to soak up, filing information, important and unimportant, into the expanses and crevices of your head, minute things, body language, action, inaction, meaning, whole scenes and images spliced together all within a single breath, less than a second.
the image is this:
Archie Andrews, bleeding.
Archie Andrews sat cross-legged on on his bed, peering at his own arm as it bleeds, small droplets snaking down his wrist toward his elbow, stark in the light (no matter how shitty Archie's lamp was) of the darkened place, nothing but slivers of red yet spotted, taken in, soaked up in less than a second.
and Archie Andrews holding the thing that caused the bleeding, is causing the bleeding, clutched between his fingers and dragging slow but not deep across the skin of his forearm, a pocket knife, expression pinched but invested as if solving a puzzle.
(though he can't see it from here, he knows that pocket knife has 'a. a.' etched into the handle in cursive, was there was Archie opened the package after tearing away at the obnoxious Captain America wrapping paper on his 11th birthday, when he showed it off to him and shed sticks of their bark just cause he thought it made him look like a badass even though Jughead himself already had one of his own with a 'j. j.' on the handle, carried in his pocket wherever he went [it was what made Archie want one of his own in the first place])
for a moment, his mind is nothing but blurred run-ons and sharp un-ending strokes of indistinguishable thought, loud and thick and running, bouncing around the inside of his skull, until he realizes he's not actually thinking anything at all.
there's just the open door, the blood, Archie Andrews, and the silence.
and him, standing in the open, too long, long enough (less than a second) for the thread of movement to catch the attention of dark eyes, for ruddy skin to wash pale, thick eyebrows to twitch in surprise and then draw together in stone, sharp, for a pocket knife to pause in its destruction as fingertips calloused by guitar strings start to tremble (less than a second).
he's stepping forward before his mind even registers the movement.
that god-awful door croaks as he brushes against it.
Archie Andrews, bleeding, bolts to his feet, arm tucked behind his back as if neither of them knew a dirty little secret.
"what the fuck?"
he can't tell who's said it, the phrase feeling appropriate for his own tongue to carry but also unfortunately befitting the stormy expression flashing across Archie's face.
"what the hell are you doing in my house?" breaks him out of his stall, the words being spat like a slap across the face, like a key being buried in a casket instead of a flowerpot.
"what did you do?" he finds himself managing, though it's more of a choked breath, like the croak of that god-awful door on those god-awful hinges, like the floorboard two steps past the bottom of the stairs echoing dull in his ears that still have yet to unclog, blood rushing, blood on Archie's arm, Archie, bleeding-
"get out." and Archie's jaw is set and clenching, eyes framed with sleepless shadows bright with a fire but dull and still and cold, a numb chill creeping over Jughead's skin and setting hairs on end.
"Archie, your arm-" a step forward.
"i said get out."
"i saw what you-" and he's stepping forward, closer, again, before his mind even registers the movement.
"i mean it, Jug, get out." bright eyes simmer down and his throat bobs as he steps away from Jug as if he's not the one carrying a weapon. that makes Jughead stop, swallowing down his own instinctive protests in order to gather himself even as he notices his own hands shaking.
he can't see it from here, but he knows that pocket knife was only adding another chink to a chain, a rung to a ladder of cuts both fresh and scabbed over climbing the veins of Archie's arm, he'd seen it, them, stark in the light of Archie's shitty fucking lamp, he can't stop seeing it.
"if you really think i'm going to walk out of this room and pretend i didn't just fucking see you-"
"get. out."
it sounds like water sizzling over a fire and turning to steam, sprouting sweat on the back of Jughead's neck to trickle down his spine in a shiver.
"right now."
suddenly the knife clutched and shaking in the palm of Archie's hand feels like more of a threat to Jughead than to Archie's arm.
he holds his breath as if it weighs like bricks on his chest, crushing him and grinding his bones and nerves to dust, only for a moment but too long, long enough (less than a second) before he eases back some, shoulders sinking and back straightening.
he feels scared and brave at the same time.
(he's neither)
"or what?.. you gonna cut me too?"
he doesn't realize how imposing Archie's presence was, something dark and oozing and writhing like a looming storm over the both of them, until it vanishes behind eyes suddenly bright with fear, horror, like a bucket of cold water and Archie's shaking, shaking harder than Jughead and looking down at the knife in his grasp as if seeing it for the first time and dropping it with a clatter to the floor.
there's still blood on it.
a. a. winks at him before disappearing as that side of the handle lands face-down in the carpet.
"no," Archie finally says, the single syllable grating on his vocal cords as if he'd swallowed nails. "fuck, Jughead, no, never, i-i wouldn't-" a ladder of cuts slices back into view as Archie takes a step forward, seeming to forget his secret, their secret, hands twitching outward as if to slap a bandaid over something he'd done, reconstruct the broken glass he'd shattered to pieces between them, but stopping short as he comes up empty for a stick of glue.
just a pocket knife.
he feels sick as he watches the half-drying blood weep sluggishly down pale, smooth skin, unable to tear his gaze away even as he longs to never see it again, to have never seen it in the first place.
their secret.
"i know you wouldn't," he finds himself muttering, clear but quiet, and he's a few steps closer than he remembers himself being, head still filled with images of blood and blade, Archie, bleeding- "i'm sorry."
he's apologizing for saying what he did, for saying something he didn't mean and that wasn't fair, but he wants to apologize for so much more, to say whatever it takes to fix the precipice swallowing the space between them with hungry, insatiable jaws that are chewing Archie's arm raw and tearing Jughead's heart into a bloody heap.
he'd say anything to get that hurt, horrified, weathered expression off Archie's young face.
but instead it folds into something sadder, teeth flashing in a grimace like he's in pain, and all Jughead can see is lines weeping red and he wonders if he'll ever see anything other than the blood that keeps following Archie like a shadow.
(even on the playground, Archie was always picking fights too big for size of his knuckles)
lines of pain (sorrow, not pain, if he reads past the fog of red) smooth over in a blink, shutters closing, a shadow, falling over him like a cloud blotting out the sun, and the pain (sorrow) is replaced with... something almost worse; nothing, like he might as well not exist – that is, until Jughead takes yet another step forward even though he knows Archie is miles away and the expression blinks as he flinches away.
it's a mask, breaking at the seams.
"please get out."
Archie, begging, and Jughead sees the moment he notices it too, chest shuddering on his next breath, a wince.
a beat.
"no."
they're speaking too soft, voices blending into the dead silence, night still young enough to shelter them from the rest of the world, a little corner of muddled air and shitty lighting that makes Jughead's eyes water from the strain (yes, that's what it is). Archie, speaking monotone, scarily dull, flat, like he's making sounds, not words, and Jughead, bottling up every ounce of willpower he has to refuse begging, his hands steadying for the first time since he stood three feet away from that god-awful door.
(he's so, so thankful that door was open)
Archie nods, but Jughead's not relieved. there's no compliance in the gesture, just resignation, defeat.
Archie, bleeding-
"can i see?" it's a stupid question because, yes, he can clearly see, and Archie seems to have forgotten, another flinch, another wince, but the intent is clear. will you let me take a look? will you let me? he doesn't hide his arm but he doesn't proffer it either, both of them just hanging limp at his sides as if he's a statue.
but statues are much stronger.
Archie simply swallows, audibly, like he might throw up, and when his skin ripples white to faint green, Jughead thinks he just might. but Archie doesn't step back when Jughead steps forward, fingers slowly, slowly, reaching out to circle a hand calloused by guitar strings that still tremble, careful, careful, like he's handling broken glass.
the blood is tacky under his fingertips.
and Archie's entire body stiffens, making to pull away but for some reason not completely. the tremble in his arm spreads to the rest of him, a poison, turning his skin sickly colors and making his eyes glassy. "you-" chapped lips stutter around the word. "you don't want to see... i'm fine."
two lies.
"i need to see, Arch." perhaps another lie, but it feels like the truth. "please."
his arm is pliant when Jughead tugs it up and twists it so the underside faces up, a ladder of cuts, chinks in a statue's armor, broken glass, Archie, bleeding, still bleeding, and they seem to mock him, thoughts of sneaking in like playing dress up as a spy in his own friend's, best friend's house rubbed in his face, salt on wounds, cracks grinning shades of red until he blinks it away, gaze jumping to the floor, the pocket knife there, then back again.
"c'mon," he says under his breath, tugging oh so gently toward the open door. surprisingly, Archie doesn't resist, face blank, empty, nothing, like he might as well not exist –
they move like ghosts to the bathroom down the hall. the creaky floorboards stay quiet for once, and Jughead's thankful; he doesn't know what would happen if Fred woke up. if Fred woke up to this.
everything stays quiet, as if the air itself senses the fragility of the situation, of Archie, bleeding, of Jughead, soft hand wrapped around a calloused one as he steers Archie to stand above the sink. it feels like a pin dropping as he turns to grab the first-aid kit he knows is in the cupboard at their knees, hinges quiet but the split of attention loud, shattering, facing away from Archie, bleeding, he's fucking bleeding, drops staining white counter red, red-
he sets the kit to his left before switching on the faucet.
with hands now steadier (they don't quite feel like his own), he eases Archie's arm under the flow of water, letting it run for what feels like hours until he finds it within himself to swipe the remaining red with the pads of his fingers.
Archie doesn't make a sound.
he snatches the towel hanging on the back of the door (ironically and somewhat helpfully, a red one; nobody will notice any stains) and dabs the moisture away as if any misstep will shatter it all, have Archie shoving him away, back across the hungry precipice between them, out of reach, out of the house, what was once both of their homes.
(now he's not so sure it's either of theirs)
he ushers Archie to sit on the closed lid of the toilet, unnerved by the lack of... anything at all, but he keeps moving, on autopilot, head floating somewhere above his shoulders as he slides the kit closer and opens it.
he's not sure what he's doing but he sees neosporin and bandaids (the big kind that Fred had to use on multiple occasion cause they were stupid kids who rode skateboards just to look cool even though they hadn't a clue how to use them and always wound up with skinned knees and palms stuck with gravel).
Archie, no longer bleeding, skin clean and still a bit damp. Jughead examines them closely as if they belong to someone else.
they're not too deep. (deep enough, they shouldn't even be there)
as long as they're kept clean, they should be fine. scar over. heal.
he feels sick.
he squeezes the ointment onto the bandaids themselves and lays them over the ugly marks, old and new, until most his forearm is a patchwork of flesh-colored squares darker than the rest of him. he wishes it were real, that it'd blend into the rest of his body like it belongs there, fresh, new, no blood, no nothing, like the arms of a six-year-old boy.
it takes more than it should for him to finally glance up, to tear his gaze from his handiwork to look Archie in the eye, eyes dull and still and lukewarm, framed with sleepless shadows emphasized by the too-bright lights of the bathroom.
he looks like he hadn't slept at all.
"you tired?" he whispers, but it comes out grainy from disuse and he wonders how long it took him to clean and dress the marks, how long he's been sitting and staring, too afraid to say anything if it means shattering it all, sending a broken statue crumbling.
Archie just blinks at his arm. shrugs, though it's microscopic and only with one shoulder. could be mistaken for a muscle spasm if Jughead didn't know better.
(maybe reading Archie is still as easy as reading his house)
he thinks of what Fred told him, not much but he remembers; Archie, upright and poised with a baseball bat late into the night, eyes glued on the front door, ready, waiting... scared. he thinks none of them have been paying enough attention to the shell of a boy who'd watched his father get shot, unable to do anything about it and the man who'd shot him, fading away to nothing but a statue made of desperation and fear and a fierce need to protect the person most important to him.
(maybe he's just been reading the wrong pages, stepping over the wrong floorboards)
i'm sorry, he thinks.
"come on." he tugs the statue to its feet, like they were six-year-old boys and the creepy lighting of the bathroom was too eerie to play bloody mary in and 'come on, Jughead, let's just go back to sleep', hesitant fingers shuffling from elbow to wrist, other hand awkwardly coming to rest at the middle of Archie's back.
he lets go only to pick up the pocket knife and shove it into his pocket, blood and all.
he doesn't want to ever see it again.
Archie just breathes, shallow and slow, still where Jug left him perched on the edge of his mattress, and a needle of worry drives further in Jughead's bones.
the room is cold. (likely the ventilation making his room too-) but he notices the window cracked open for the first time and hurries over to slide it shut, blowing out a visible breath and trying not to shiver as the remnants of a still-thawing spring breeze cuts off before it can burrow beneath his skin.
it's wrong.
everything's wrong.
it's supposed to be warm.
it's not supposed to be this quiet; still air should be vibrating under the strums of calloused fingers playing guitar, maybe late night and early morning practice, quiet enough as to not wake his dad, humming to himself and cracking smiles when he hits the right cord every time and something familiar starts to take a mind of its own, a peek at the cadence of Archie Andrew's heartbeat blending with each pluck and pull of the strings.
it's supposed to be different.
"are you mad?"
he blinks. registers the words at the same time as the voice and turns to face it, eyebrows furrowed.
mad?
"why would i be mad?" is all he can think to say, voice steadier than he expects it to be.
(he feels everything but steady)
another shrug, this one bigger than the last, Archie's eyes still tracing the bandaids on his arm.
Jughead doesn't think he's looked at him since – 'you gonna cut me too?'
he shoves down the pang of guilt as he comes to take a seat to Archie's right. their knees brush.
"i'm not mad." he thinks of his own blood, hot and boiling, 'get out', bright with a fire but dulled by worry and cold with a bone-deep fear he doesn't think he's ever felt before.
he used to wonder sometimes if his father drank himself into a stupor every night because some part of him wanted to die. sometimes he'd say things, words slurred together but self-loathing crystal clear. he would waste away like he wanted to, shrivel up and wither, like a dying man who'd locked himself in a room to starve even as his own family screamed and begged on the other side of the door.
but every time his dad was sober, he'd promise to make it right. most of the time lying through his teeth, knowing full well he'd be back where he started the same night, but in recent days actually proving true. but even at his darkest, he'd tried, wanted desperately to make it right, to stop hurting himself and his family.
Jughead had never had to worry about coming home to a gun fired by drunken hands, a body now housing a bullet instead of a brain.
he wonders what it's like to have a gun aimed you and your father.
"i'm scared," is what he whispers like a dirty little secret between the two of them, unsure of how long they've both been sitting there, simply breathing.
Archie flinches like he's been hit.
Jughead looks up to guilty eyes darting to somewhere on the floor.
"not of you, dumbass," he scrambles to say, words dropping so familiar from his lips, like the past several months haven't happened at all, like the past year hadn't happened. he wishes it hadn't. for both their sakes. but it did, and there's nothing familiar about this, and yet – and yet Archie seems to relax, blinking slow and hunching a little into himself instead of sitting so rigid, like he's prepared to bolt, leave, disappear straight into the ground. bury himself. "i'm just... sorry."
"don't do that."
it's Archie who sounds mad now, voice sharp, frustrated, but softened at the edges, like he'd meant for it to cut but managed to stop himself before it could leave a mark.
(if only he'd given his arm the same courtesy)
"this is on me, nobody else. i'm sorry you had to see."
"sorry i had to see?" now Jughead is mad, fire simmering like a burner switched on low and left to brew. "you think that's the problem here? not you, slicing yourself open like fucking-sushi – are you even hearing yourself? look at yourself!"
the words are meant for Archie but he finds himself doing the same, taking in the way Archie's entire frame seems to shudder on each exhale like he can't stifle it, spasms, nerves sliding together, his skin still sick and pasty, eyes round and intense, drilling holes in the corners of the room just so he doesn't have to look at the only other person there, breaths still slow and shallow and hesitant and quiet, everything's still too quiet.
he itches for a sound. for Archie and the ever-present storm in his eyes, bright with a fire but at least it's something, not this. not this nothing, a smoldering wick. it's too dull, too cold, softened at the edges like he wants to be able to push that much harder to break through the skin.
(his own skin, fuck-)
"i'm sorry," drops soundlessly to his left, a drop in the bucket, quiet and small and not enough when Jughead wants a waterfall, river rapids, a dam breaking, something loud and alive and not so fucking quiet.
(Archie was never quiet; maybe he kept to himself sometimes but he was always alive with something)
"don't apologize just cause you got caught, Arch. don't apologize to me, apologize to yourself."
the following silence is loud and clear, as easy to read as the creaky floorboards; Archie's not sorry at all.
"why?"
...his first question had been 'what'.
what was happening three feet from the doorway, what was he seeing through the lamp's shitty lighting, what was Archie doing to himself, 'what did you do?', but now it's just why.
why was he carving himself up like a sculpture – Jughead didn't know why.
"why not?" a shrug – Archie shrugs.
like they're talking about the fucking weather.
and Jughead's just so fucking mad (sad, stricken, guiltylosthurtithurts-)
"because it's-it's fucked up, that's why. it's wrong, you're hurting yourself, why the fuck would you do that?" and Archie sighs, like a lesser form of eyeroll as he scoots back onto his bed and lies down to stare at the ceiling with those shadowed eyes, dull and still and cold, and Jughead bites down the urge to pull a blanket over them both since Archie's too fucking stupid to take care of himself anymore.
it hurts.
"why wouldn't i, Jug?"
he sounds too composed in contrast to the coil of fury and confusion writhing in Jughead's gut, while Archie just fucking lies there. like nothing's wrong, like he hadn't just been making himself bleed all over the place, like it was just another night, another sleepover.
"what's that supposed to mean?" he tries to keep the bitter out of his voice. (he's not sure if he succeeded)
"it means i'm not... i can't-do anything, i can't even-" the words clamp down like they're fighting each other, tripping over syllables and scrambling together on Archie's tongue. "it means i want to." Jughead has no idea what he's trying to say.
(except he does and he hates it, it hurts and it's still so fucking quiet)
he wishes the floorboards in the hallway had creaked and Fred was here, next to Archie instead of him, he'd know what to do, what to say.
Jughead doesn't know what to say.
he almost asks why again, why would you want to hurt yourself? but he's still thinking of 'i can't do anything' and Archie watching his music career dance out of reach, watching his mom signs some papers and disappear, watching the music teacher he'd shared his heart with being forced to leave, watching both of his childhood friends' families fall apart, watching his dad struggle to pay the bills, his dad getting shot, people getting killed, watching, just watching, helpless, and he thinks maybe Archie never stopped being easy to read. Jughead just stopped reading.
(suddenly Archie's alliance with Hiram doesn't seem that unreasonable)
he thinks of how Archie told him to get out and he refused, how he backed him into a corner, unable to escape, to say no to Jughead's no, and the fire in his chest goes out just like that, doused cold with the aftertaste of guilt and apologies climbing up his throat like smoke out a chimney.
except Archie's eyes are half-mast and blinking lower, the lines of his face smoothing out in half-sleep.
(he looks young)
Jughead's never been good at saying no to Archie. tonight feels too surreal in too many ways.
"go to sleep, Arch," he says, and the words come out softer than intended but maybe it's better that way. but Archie twitches like he's only just noticed he'd been falling asleep and immediately jackknifes back up, gaze jumping to the door, wide. scared.
"i'm good."
one lie.
Jughead glances at the door, still open.
"i'll watch," he resolves before he can stop himself. (he wants Archie to look as young as he is) Archie just looks at him, for what feels like the first time since – 'you gonna cut me too?', watching with something unreadable framing his features, something open, for what feels like the first time since Jughead last saw Archie before he got a call telling him Fred Andrews was in the hospital.
"you don't-"
"i'll wake you if i see anything, alright?" an innocent proposition, but he sees in the softening of Archie's eyes that he knows it for what it is, an olive branch, a (ex)best friend grinning at the shiner he got from standing up to bullies on the playground, patting him on the shoulder and backing his story of damsels in distress he later spins to his dad in order explain it away. "promise."
Archie nods instead of saying 'okay', yet it's all Jughead needs to feel the quiet lift, if only a little. like soundproof headphones being snatched from his head as Archie scowls at him, 'were you even listening to a word i said?'.
and that's enough to have the grogginess returning to the bags under dark eyes, Archie shuffling around in bed until he's burrowed under the covers and burrowing deeper, adjusting his pillow until he's nearly spooning it, face pressed into the soft material and clutching it close. (when they were little, he hadn't been able to fall asleep at all without something to hug, that something sometimes being a certain Jughead Jones during their sleepovers until he'd had enough and moved to sleeping bags on the floor [except he felt guilty and decided put up with spaghetti arms in his sleep until Archie grew out of it])
seeing it now makes something in his chest loosen.
he gets up and tiptoes to the closet in the hall to retrieve the spare pillow he knows is there, grabbing two of them just because and hurrying back.
and Archie's staring at the door like someone'd hit Sadie with a truck and drove off without a backwards glance.
the expression schools a moment after Jughead reappears, cheeks flushing as he glances around at his upright position and discarded pillow. he keeps his head down as he slowly lies back and pulls his pillow back to his chest.
"just grabbing some pillows, bud," he tries, wishing he hadn't left, even if it'd only been for a few seconds.
nothing, but it doesn't feel stiff so Jughead scampers back to the bed and sits with his back to the wall, almost uncomfortably close to Archie if the guy wasn't already half-asleep. but his eyes are still open, glazed over and staring at something on the ceiling.
it's quiet.
but not like before; now at least there's something, warmer and whispering, settling in the space between them like an extra layer of clothing, itchy and old but familiar.
he feels safer than he had when he first stepped through the door.
one pillow at his back and one in his lap, he mirrors Archie in a way and hugs his own pillow against his chest to nestle his chin on, keeping his gaze dutifully trained on the door, only occasionally sneaking glances down at the too-still figure next to him.
until he stirs, just barely, blinking at Jughead before he can look away.
"are you okay?" he says, and it's... like a punch to the gut, the utter sincerity of the question, however simple and muttered it is. Archie, still thinking of others, even when Jughead had come to associate the world 'selfish' with him in recent days. maybe not selfish, but certainly small-minded, hyper-focused.
and maybe Archie was, but Jughead would sooner keel over before he'd say Archie Andrews didn't care about everyone else more than he did himself.
"i should be asking you that," he manages with a ghost of a wry smile, but it tastes sour. he lets it slip away as easily as it came.
Archie shrugs (again). "you already know the answer to that question."
fair enough.
though, Archie himself had said 'i'm fine' one too many times in the past year.
though, Jughead probably should've known they were lies each and every time.
(he did)
"i could say the same to you, Red."
"...fair enough." and he lets another smile flit over his face at the similarity of his thoughts and Archie's mumbled concession. it feels good. familiar. like home, like it should feel. he clings to the small and however brief sense of normalcy.
"just... you can tell me when you're not okay, and when you're even more not okay than usual. you know that, right?" there's still a bite to his voice, but not directed at Archie. just there, anxiety and frustration and confusion and a desperate need to never see Archie bleeding ever again, especially at his own hand. not if Jughead can help it, neither of them will have to see that again.
he just doesn't know if he can help it.
Archie shrugs.
it hurts.
he's not kidding himself. it hurts and he wonders how they got like this. it's somehow even worse than it'd been after the summer. at the time, he thought that was as bad as he and Archie, the terrible two, beanie boy and red skull, would ever get. he thought wrong, apparently.
but he wants to fix it.
"come on, Arch. i don't care how bad it gets between us, ever; i'll always be here when it counts. whenever you need me... always."
he waits for what feels like too long before he sighs and traces the doorframe with his eyes, clinging to his pillow that much tighter (though nobody else needs to know that).
"...yeah. yeah, me too. but with you. i'll always be here."
he swallows the lump in his throat and tries not to think of a ladder of cuts both fresh and scabbed over climbing the veins of Archie's arm.
"that a promise?"
he hopes Archie knows what he means.
(he does)
something hot and aching seizes his chest at the following silence. he's concerned to say the least, he's scared, scared for his best friend like he's never been and he doesn't know what to do.
"promise me," he starts, but quickly backtracks at the demand beneath the curt words. "you don't have to. i just-i hope you can. i want you around as long as i'm around. you and me, remember?" (pinky promises in tree houses and under old bleachers, impish grins and stupid pranks and hours of wasted time on video games and bikes instead of homework and school projects, tears shared like dirty little secrets when they knew the other was looking even if they pretended they weren't, a mutual understanding between broken boys too young to understand anything but each other, 'you and me', just them when it felt like there wasn't anyone else)
a smile that suddenly feels a long time coming, although small and thin, it tugs at Archie's face like a nagging child tugging at his father's sleeve for 'just one more cookie, pleeeaase', and there's a small blossom of relief forming between the upturning at the corner of his own lips.
"you and me, huh?" Archie pauses, as if chewing on the words before his smile turns a shade of blue. "we haven't been you and me for a while, Jug."
that hurts too. perhaps more than anything else.
(anything else but Archie, bleeding-)
"no, we never stopped. i don't care how bad it gets or what fucking messes we get ourselves into, if i'm pissed at your or if you're pissed at me, we're always here when it counts. whenever we need each other. that's us, okay, that's how we work."
(he'll make it work)
he's still watching the door for one reason or another, but he can feel Archie's eyes on him, a soft buzz all over his face that he itches to swat at. but he doesn't. instead he casts a reluctant look at it, at Archie, blinking up at him with an almost meek expression, hesitant but compliant. like he wants to believe it. he should believe it. Jughead doesn't know when he started believing anything else.
"okay." he's nodding, slow and thoughtful, but... sure. at least more than before. "you and me."
Jughead's apprehension crumbles like a house of cards, unabashed relief washing over him in waves. they're okay, Archie's okay, he will be okay; Jughead would make sure of it. that's what they do. should have been doing, should have never stopped doing instead of running around waving their political banners and playing war with each other, all of them. they need to make sure they're all okay.
(he knows none of them are, but that doesn't mean they can't be)
petty squabbles come second.
(they aren't petty, but they seem so in comparison to walking in on Archie Andrews sat cross-legged on on his bed, peering at his own arm as it bleeds, after having made it bleed with his very own pocket knife he got when he turned eleven, wrapped in stupid Captain America wrapping paper)
"promise."
and that's all Jughead can ask for.
it's not like they haven't broken promises before, but it's enough, more than enough for them, right here, right now. he won't ask for more than that.
"thank you."
he can't tell who's said it, the phrase feeling appropriate for his own tongue to carry but also very befitting of the feather-light expression tugging sleep over Archie's face. his eyelids sink lower, lower, low, until they're closed, breath sliding easily in and out of his lungs as he drifts away, but not out of reach.
Jughead extends a tentative hand over to Archie's sleeping form (he's curled up like a fucking cat on a windowsill, but Archie would always sleep like that, like a rollie pollie after you've poked it, after staying up too late, and he'd end up falling asleep mid-sentence talking about the Star Wars soundtrack) and placing it on his shoulder, giving a small squeeze after he knows he hasn't woken him up.
the sun is turning everything outside the window a cool shade of periwinkle by the time he too falls asleep, hand still clutching Archie's shoulder just to feel every inhale and exhale like he'll disappear any second, and he dreams of mud wars and skinned knees and shitty lighting and Archie Andrews when he'd still smile with his teeth.
000
the air begins to feel a little thin
as we're waiting for the morning to begin
but for now you told me to hold this jar
and when i looked inside, i saw
it held your heart
000
A/N: i'm not entirely happy with this, it's messy and they didn't get to talk about and address things i wanted them to talk about and address, but i didn't want to break the flow and direction this thing just sorta headed in, so i let it be. but i'm not unhappy with it either. i hope you're all okay, remember to love yourselves if you can, and at least treat yourself with the same kindness you show others if you can't, know i'm always here if you need someone to talk to and that i love you all, even if you're just here to read my stories. stay safe. 3
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