III

June pushed on―sticky, like the last squeeze of honey from a bottle―and although Betty's time at work was spent staring at the same three walls (never at the fourth, where the door and hatch were), she still saw changes.

The changes in herself were the first she recognized, having always been highly attuned to her inner world and a master of self-analysis. Working for Penelope required her to learn to accept her own naked self as company, but more was bared to Betty than just skin. While she'd been with Jughead, they'd had only one night together before she'd come home in a happy, woolly haze to find her mother sopping up a stranger's blood from their dining room floor. Things hadn't so much fallen apart between her and Jughead after that as just gone back to how they'd been prior to their frantic but sweet scene on the couch. It turned out that was the end of their relationship, not a sustainable revival of it. A consequence she hadn't been in the right mindset to consider at the time―admittedly caught up in yet another, though softer, post-Jughead heartbreak―was a lost opportunity to become more comfortable with her own body.

What a massive difference there was between one night in a dimly lit trailer under the hands of someone who cared about her and shift after shift in a mix of crystal white LED glow and daylight under the eyes of stranger. Unlike Penelope's, Betty's task wasn't to actively please her patrons, but she figured that any obvious discomfort of hers would spread like a contagious cough back through that hatch, affecting the onlooker, so she learned to hide it. Then she found she didn't feel it very much anymore. Anyway, that was the easier change to identify.

Since Betty's work was so completely on her mind, from when she headed out the door of her house to the hour she left Penelope's later that day or evening, her outward observance had declined. By the time she noticed the changes outside of Thicket Hall―nothing inside changed, at least, not in the room where she spent her time―she had to wonder how she'd missed them. Coming up the driveway one day, Betty perceived that the gardens alongside it had been maintained, lending a less forbidding feeling to the approach to the house. It was cleaner, more vibrant, and gave the place the kind of expensive look that excessive care can provide (Betty was reminded of her mother's meticulously made-up face). Definitely a concerted effort by her employer, only Betty had never heard the telltale crunch and clunk of a fleet of landscaping company trucks, which was a familiar sound up and down her own street as neighbours' lawns were maintained throughout the summer. Since she'd taken to leaving the window of her room open on all but the most humid days, she was convinced that she would have heard the trucks had they come. Betty was also skeptical about how Penelope would've afforded the cost of hiring the work out on such a scale. So, what was the explanation? That Penelope was doing all that work herself, on top of her other… duties… seemed as likely as it was impossible. Had the woman freaked Betty out a little less, she might have asked her.

They did gain some ground together, once the charade of afternoon tea was done away with during their infrequent meetings. Penelope paid Betty regularly, which evolved into her paying regularly and bestowing the most moderate of compliments regarding Betty's punctuality, which evolved into her paying, complimenting, and trusting Betty enough to give her a key to Thicket Hall. Betty was cautious of appearing too grateful, but this would definitely make things easier. It was absolutely outlandish to her that she was probably being shown more trust at work than whichever of her classmates had been hired to serve cones at Riverdale's little (but popular) ice cream shop; she had worked there herself one summer and could still recall the sensation of having the owner's eagle eye on her while she weighed the servings to determine the price.

The question of the key resolved, Betty settled into a new tier… which quickly became boring. All the risk of the job was still present, but without a precise goal (like receiving a key) to work towards, Betty got restless. How was she supposed to sit still and read her Beat poets and just wait for the next envelope of cash? It had never been the money she cared about; it was her unfathomable 'darkness' that needed nurturing, not her bank account. Feeling like a repressed Victorian lady, she would scurry to her window and fling her arms out in distress, seeking open air. Sometimes, the feel of gravity pulling her hands down was her only reminder that there was still direction in her world when she was here, at the Hall.

The grounds were large enough to make Betty feel at sea when she looked out―literally as though she were occupying the cabin of a substantially-sized vessel. When no clients were expected, she took pleasure in laying her bare back on the window sill and staring up at the sky; had the house been closer to a lake, the sound of seagulls would've improved the fantasy, but Betty was good with her imagination. On days that the heat had zapped too much of her energy to divert any to worldbuilding, she found enough to observe on the property, roses mostly. If she'd always been positioned upside down, she would never have seen the boy.

Actually, it was sound, not sight that informed her of his presence, though it wasn't him she heard. It was his music. She'd been lying across the bed, squirming to find a compromise between a position that kept her face hidden from the hatch and one that allowed her skin to touch some part of the bedsheet that was still cool. Then, it had started, partway into a song. Betty didn't know why that spot, or whether the person playing it had simply chosen that moment to crank the volume, but she did recognize the song.

"…stars were bright above.

I'll hope and I'll pray

To keep

Your precious love

Well before the light.

Hold me again

With all of your might

In the still of the night."

She pried herself up from the bed, knowing that song anywhere, thanks to her numerous viewings of Dirty Dancing―a summer tradition. It was unlikely to be Penelope's music; besides the fact that something so sweet and heartfelt was an obvious mismatch for her employer's creepy seductiveness, the tune was coming from outside, through the window. So, Betty crossed the floor to it. Even her feet were sweaty and her soles smacked the hardwood. She glanced out, peered around, and saw no one. She leaned a little farther. Finally, she looked down and to the left and spied her listening companion. He was doing something along the side of the house, a boombox that was undoubtedly older than she was sat crookedly on the grass just above the garden bed. Of course, Betty realized, the man was gardening. She gave the yard another scan and saw no one else. It was a big job for just one guy, but it did explain why she'd never heard a whole crew of landscapers piling out of a truck.

He straightened up from his work and Betty jolted back inside. However, aside from the books she brought, Betty hadn't had much entertainment during her time in the room, and curiosity compelled her to look again.

Folding her arms on the sill, Betty advanced more cautiously this time, chin first, gazing straight down at her dark-haired subject. She had no idea if this thrill of a secret onlooking was the same as what her own visitors felt, but it certainly raised her heartrate to be the watcher for once, rather than the watched. Maybe it wasn't fair though, surveying without his knowledge or permission. She considered this angle for a minute, trying to be objective and unbiased, like when she vetted article ideas for the Blue and Gold. It could've been her overwarm discomfort that encouraged her snap decision, or sheer nosiness, but Betty concluded that she didn't care about being biased. This man was an employee of Penelope Blossom. How innocent could he be? He was probably being paid under the table (as she was, though purposeful ignorance prevented her from seeing herself as a hypocrite), or owed Penelope for some questionable favour she'd done him. Or, he might even be a criminal. Everybody knew the Blossoms had those kinds of connections.

Betty was trying to solve the mystery when the man did something that completely threw her off: he rewound the dying song and, this time through, he danced to it. Nothing studied or complex, but he was definitely swaying… and singing! She distinctly heard a low voice following the lyrics and couldn't help smiling. Even more delightful, from the way he sounded and moved, he was young! Not the washed-up, middle-aged fraudster her criminal-catcher mind had been picturing. She knew what was coming when she saw the man―boy―turn his head in the direction of the stiff broom that had likely been used to sweep the brick path lining the side of the house, but she still laughed when he picked it up and made it his dancing partner.

Suddenly, he dropped it and raised his head. Betty didn't wait to see his face; she darted back inside, blood thumping in her ears.


She was up there! Sweet Pea heard her laugh―the girl with the arms―and almost fell backwards over the boombox as he craned his neck back to look. He hadn't even brought it to get her attention, just to keep himself from getting so bored that he would lay down in the dirt and wait for all the fucking weeds to grow back up around him. Aaand, she was gone again. Shit.

Sweet Pea bent to inspect the other source of his entertainment. He'd hit it with his foot, but it looked fine. Fucking sturdy. Fangs would've told him he sounded like a grandpa for saying it, yet it was a goddamn fact that they didn't make things like they used to. Still, he needed to be at least a little careful, because the boombox didn't belong to him, it belonged to the Wyrm. Toni had found it buried in the back room during a slow night tending bar and after it sat around for a week with no one giving it a second glance, Sweet Pea had borrowed (taken) it for his own personal use. Thanks to the equipment's advanced age, it only played cassette tapes and AM radio (the switch to change it to FM was permanently stuck―from years of sweat and slopped drinks, Sweet Pea guessed). The latter option was useless since Penelope Blossom's house wasn't central enough for a strong reception. The former had seemed equally hopeless until Sweet Pea did some independent digging around odd corners of the Wyrm and turned up a pathetic collection of tapes. Nothing older than 1988. The communal tapes of Serpent youths gone by.

The best bet had been Springsteen, until the crispy old tape snapped as Sweet Pea was rewinding it. Nearly every other choice was unthinkable, so he'd settled on the soundtrack to Dirty Dancing. He wasn't stupid enough to tell anyone, but he'd always sort of idolized Patrick Swayze's character in that movie. The guy was cool, he had skills, and he beat the shit out of some rich sleaze. What was there not to admire? And maybe Sweet Pea was no Johnny Castle, but it didn't hurt him when his observer laughed, catching him dancing.

After he assured the safety of the boombox as thoroughly as if it were a fellow Serpent, Sweet Pea stopped the track with a heavy click. His eyes returned to the still-open window. The only open window, which was how he'd figured that playing music wouldn't bug the Blossom. And it hadn't. Instead, it had attracted a butterfly. He stood―hand cupped above his eyes, feet itching in the thick socks protecting them from the rub of his work boots―and puzzled over whether trying to meet the girl (she was young, from her laugh) would go against his better judgement.

Then, Sweet Pea recalled that he had no better judgement.

He raced to the back door of the Hall, the sweat on his spine running about as fast as he was. Outside the door, he kicked free of his boots; leaving dirt and dried grass clumps through the house would only make things worse for Sweet Pea if he got caught. Not that he had any intention of being caught. His socks were torn off as well, first of all, because they stunk, and second of all, because it was too fucking easy to imagine himself slipping on the staircase and going home with a broken arm or a dent in his head. Plus, knowing Penelope Blossom the little that he did, Sweet Pea bet that she'd probably finish him off if she found him unconscious.

So he took his passage through the house slow―slow-ish―feet sticking to expensive floors like a tree frog might've stuck to the trees the wood came from. On the landing, he oriented himself, eyes falling on the line of closed doors that would have a window on the correct side of the house. One of these things is not like the others, he thought, staring at some kind of metal plate in one of the doors. He approached that one, thinking it was worth a look, and pressed his damp hand flat to the plate, the heat of his palm making a cloudy outline. With a little pressure, and more of the tree frog grip, it slid sideways and then he was looking into the room at…

"Holy shit," he breathed.

A girl… a naked girl… the girl… shifted hastily to pose herself on the bed while Sweet Pea felt like his eyes were growing larger and larger. It took smacking his forehead on the door to realize he'd leaned in, wanting to see more. To see everything. God, she was so blonde and her skin looked so soft and―what was she doing here? What in the ever-loving sonofafuck was she doing here? Like… this? He shook his head. It didn't matter. The way she sat, the way her shoulders moved a little every time she breathed… there was nothing disgusting about what she was doing, and definitely not about her. She looked like an angel. The only girl Sweet Pea knew of with hair like that was Jughead's ex. He rolled his eyes solely for his own benefit, writing the Cooper girl off immediately. Yeah, she'd danced around the pole at the Wyrm one time, but that had been months ago and, as far as he'd been able to tell, not an experience a babe would want to build a career out of.

"Hey," he called to her just above a whisper. The girl started to turn her head, but then her back tensed and she froze. So she wasn't supposed to talk. Well, alright. He'd accept that for the moment.

Wiping the sweat out of his eyes, Sweet Pea looked her over again, believing there would be nothing more satisfying in the entire world than being able to touch that skin and run his fingers (once he'd scrubbed his hands clean) through that hair. Run them all over her. He'd never seen anybody look so elegant just sitting still.

A noise from down the hall made him clang the little metal window shut, but he'd be back. Now that he'd seen her, there was no other choice.


To be continued...

Author's Note:

Psst! I'm on Tumblr as forasecondtherewedwon! I've been doing a ton of drabble requests lately, several Sweet Pea/Betty drabbles included!