Polly

I was sitting outside the gates at the Blossom mansion. Jason was supposed the be by the barn, waiting for me to flash my light three times in his direction. Our meetings had to be secret, a secret from my family, a secret from his.

His red hair became visible amidst all the fog that covered the streets of Riverdale. He smiled when he saw my face, so I flashed my pearly whites back at him. I still hadn't changed out of my River Vixens uniform because I couldn't walk through the front door of my own home without being interrogated by my mother. He kissed the top of my head and pulled me over to the end of the driveway. "Pops?" I nodded and got into the car.

Pop Tate was behind the counter serving food to a girl I had seen at school before. He looked up at Jason and smiled, "two chocolate milkshakes coming right up!" I smiled back at him as Jason threw the ten dollar bill in the 'tip' jar.

I sat in the booth in the back, the one that is the most hidden from the other people in the diner. Jason slid in next to me and put his hand on my leg. "How was practice?" He asked in all sincerity.

"It went well other than the fact that your sister wouldn't stop trying to ask me about you and me." Cheryl knew about Jason and me because of Jason. Jason told her the truth because she was the only one in their family who he truly cared about. The only one who wasn't a crazy. I on the other hand wasn't a Cheryl advocate. In the back of my mind, I feared what she would do knowing the information that she knew. Betty would tell me about how some things she would do during their 3rd-period science class together and I would stare at her eyes and shake my head. The way Betty described her didn't match with the descriptions Jason would tell. I was always stuck in that triangle wondering who I should trust.

"Look," he placed his hand on my upper thigh and smiled at me, "she just wants the best for me, she's just being protective."

"And am I the best thing for you?" He made an uneasy face that scared me. There was a pause, a long pause and I just sat there waiting for him to say something, but all he did was take a sip of his milkshake. "Jason!" I hit his hand off my leg and he just laughed. "Jason!"

"I'm just messing with you, of course you're the best thing for me." He ran his fingers through my blonde ponytail, which made me look a lot like Betty, too much like her. I hit his hand away and he shot me a creepy look. "Polly, what's the matter with you?"

"What's the matter with me?!" I was mad now. If I wasn't mad before, then I definitely was now. The next door neighbor boy who Betty was obsessed with, Archie Andrews, walked to the back of the room and waved to me. I waved to him back for the sake of Betty, but that smile was something that was harder to do than it needed to be. "Jason! Are actually serious?!"

"What? Polly, you're being ridiculous," he stood up from his spot at the booth and tried to walk over to me. I backed away from him, but he kept coming closer and closer.

"Oh, me ridiculous?! You are so stupid Jason, you and all your football friends. I know about that notebook and what you wrote in it. Why do you want to go and talk about all those girls behind their backs? So whatever, we had sex, but that doesn't mean anything. Do you think it's easy for me to constantly go behind both our family's backs? You realize you're the one who ruined my relationships with them? Did you? Did you know that you're the reason they won't say any more than three words to me? You just are so selfish Jason, you only care about you and your sister, f**k your sister for God's sake, she's just going to betray us like everyone else in our da**ed families." My head was spinning, I was rattling off a list of all the terrible things Jason has said to me in the past year we had been dating for. I was about to continue going but choked on my own saliva, making the whole fight a whole lot less dramatic. I didn't know what to do anymore, so I began to back away from his cold stare. A single tear fell from the corner of his eye and he sniffled his nose a little, tiny bit. It helped me to know that he too had emotions, not the emotions he should have, but deep down Jason Blossom had feelings.

"Polly, are you okay?" Pop asked me from his spot behind the counter. I kept backing up until I was walking out the door. I realized I didn't have a car and I couldn't call my mother because of the risk of her finding out about us. I wish Betty could just drive already. I heard the door of the diner close and saw a glimpse of red hair appear in the corner of my eye. I assumed it was just Jason, so I kept on walking.

"Hey, do you need a ride?" I looked behind me knowing that voice was not Jason's but a voice of a boy who had just recently gone through puberty. His hair was almost the same color of Jason's just a little bit darker. "Really it's no problem, we live right next to each other."

I forced myself to smile at him and nodded my head, "thanks." He called for his dad from the door and out came walking Fred Andrews. He shook my hand and asked me how my parents had been. "Good," I told him, which was an obvious lie. Archie laughed, knowing too that I had been lying.

The car ride was a little awkward. Fred had the radio up pretty loud and he and Archie were chatting away, inviting me into the conversation every here or there. I was too upset to say anything but, 'yea.'

We got to their driveway and Archie hopped out the car, "I can walk you home." I looked over at Fred who was already walking into the pathway to their house. My house was only a few steps out of the driveway but I excepted his offer with a simple nod of my head.

We got into the front of my house without saying one word to each other until he broke the silence, "so are you okay?"

"Yea," I brushed the piece of hair behind my ear and gave him a fake smile, just like the one before.

"Really? Because you didn't seem fine at Pop's." I wanted to yell at him, but I realized he was just trying to help, so I let him see my real reaction. A frown and tears. I knew my mascara was going to be smeared all over my face and that my eyeshadow was a great big mess. He gathered me into his arms as I cried and cried and cried.

Finally, I stopped and Betty came walking down the driveway. "Polly," she said in her sympathetic but worried voice. "Arch, why are you here?" I could feel the tone of jealousy come from her voice, but I was too much of a mess to point it out. I felt her tiny little hands touch my right shoulder as I began to cry again. "Polly."

I knew why Jason wasn't responding, he wasn't sure if Betty knew about Jason and me together. "She knows Archie," that phrase made me cry even more, which I didn't know could be possible. I started to try and take deep breaths every here and there but none of it worked. I only calmed down when Archie moved his hands from the bottom of my back to the top of my head. He stroked through my ponytail, something my dad used to do before he got too caught up in work.

I could only half see Betty, but her eyes were open wide as Archie told her the whole story. I tried to not listen and I think Archie kept his hands closer to my ears to keep me from hearing what he was telling Betty. I did know when he stopped telling the story when Betty touched my back and motioned her hand for me to come into the house with her. "Polly, Mom and Dad aren't home." For once in my life I didn't want to go and fall into the comfort of my loving sister, I was perfectly fine standing here with Archie calmingly stroking my hair. I knew she would kill me if I did stay because she was obsessed with Archie and I would never ever want to make my sister mad. She was one of the only people who still liked me anymore.

She pushed open the front door and I walked in behind her, "you must be freezing." She walked into the living room and turned the heat up from the dial on the wall. The house made this loud noise which made it sound like an earthquake was passing through. "I'll go make you a hot chocolate." I shook my head and went to sit at the kitchen table. My phone buzzed but I ignored it, only because I didn't even want to see the word, Jason. I was still in my Vixens uniform and I needed to get it off as soon as I could. On it was the same yellow R that was on the top of Jason's varsity jacket.

I walked up into my room when Betty's back was turned to me. Pictures of Jason were spread across my pale purple walls, walls that coordinated with Polly's perfectly. I wanted to rip them all down, but I knew that I would regret that choice later down the road. As much as I say that I won't ever look at him again and not fall in love with those deep colored eyes that you couldn't tell were a brown or a deep green, I knew I couldn't. He was to manipulative. He knew my strengths and my weaknesses, which gave him the perfect information to plot a plan against me. I didn't want the label of Jason Blossom's girlfriend, but I knew it was a label that would stick with me even if he would die tomorrow.

I pulled open the drawer of my dresser and stared at the array of clothes. Every color of every t-shirt just staring back at me yelling, Pick me! Half of the shirts were Jason's, I wore them when I wanted to make the other girls at school jealous that he was mine and not there's. I went with the shirt Betty had bought me on her field trip to the zoo about two years ago. Recently, the Riverdale school district had cut all field trips because of low funding, so I kept this t-shirt just to remind me of the good old days. When I wore my hair in pigtails and put stole my mom's eyeshadow to smear all over my cheeks like highlighter.

The sweatpants I put on were a little small, which was expected because they too were a pair of Betty's, but at this moment I did not care one little bit. "Pol's you okay?" She yelled up the stairs. When Betty called me Pol's you knew something bad was going on. It was a comforting word for me, it hit my ears just right and a made me feel loved again for just a little moment.

"Yea, I'm coming down." I walked down the creaky staircase and walked back into my seat at the kitchen table. Betty had a nice and warm hot chocolate sat in front of my face. It was just the perfect temperature, not too cold, not too hot. "Thanks," I told her. I always hated making Betty clean up my messes for me. I was her older sister, I should be the one who should be helping her. I knew she was staying quiet because she was a little jealous that I was standing in the driveway holding Archie's body against mine. I wanted to say something, but I feel like I would just make everything worse, so I just sat there sipping my drink, thinking about all the things I should have told Jason. Stupid saliva.