Veronica spots his red hair, with his head in his hands. As she gets closer she can see his face, the paleness of his soft skin and how his eyes are swollen and bloodshot. Blood… the blood stains on his jeans, his jacket and his white t-shirt. She starts to feel uneasy, her heart starts beating faster and she's starting to feel scared too.
She tries to walk ever so gracefully over to him but her heels are making so much noise that Archie notices and looks up….
'Archie, Archie are you okay?" She touches his face, running her hands down his clothes. Her worried eyes are met with his…
"My dad, we were at Pop Tate's diner and a masked gunman tried to rob him and then he just shot my dad instead". Tears were streaming down face, his hand covered with blood wiping his tears. He struggled to stand, overwhelmed with emotions of worry, sadness and shock. Veronica hugged him as tightly as she could. Her hands soothed his back, caressing his cheeks, kissing him and whispering "he will make it, he will, he will come back to you, he loves you too much to leave you" and in that moment her eyes let her down, because she couldn't hold her tears any longer.
'Ronnie, are you sure your mum is okay with this?' Tonight his new girlfriend had insisted he stay with her.
'Archie, it's fine. It's not like we are….' She kinks her eyebrow referring to their actions last night before this mess occurred. 'Plus, you shouldn't be alone. So until your mum gets here, you'll just have to put up with me'. He smiles at his girl, she always manages to put a playful twist on her words, something that always stood out when they spoke. She always expressed her feelings through her facial expressions, her big brown eyes and her lips always a vibrate colour of berry tones.
'Let's get you undressed, showered and fed, use my bathroom, everything is in there' her hands directing him to go now. She collects his clothes from on top of her bed. She doesn't squirm at the blood. Archie is taking it all in, her maturity, her caring nature and here he was thinking a 'New Yorker' couldn't adapt to boring old Riverdale. He's so focussed on her that he doesn't move, she looks back at him as she is about to leave her bedroom.
Hermonie had gone to bed and both Archie and Veronica were sitting in front of the fire. Apartment living was very different to being in an actual home. There was no porch or a backyard. Everything was contemporary whereas his house, it just felt more comfortable.
'Ronnie' he whispered.
'hrmm?' her brown eyes staring right into his, her face without makeup still beautiful.
'I'm going to try and get some sleep' she pulls herself off him, wrapping her robe tighter around her body.
'Sure, go to bed, I'll come in when mum is fully asleep' her hand caresses his face, she wraps her arms around his neck.
As he walks into her room, he feels out of place. He misses his own bedroom, Jug sleeping on the ground and his dad. He just misses his dad more than anything.