Betty Cooper.
If you were to look up the definition of perfection, you'd see a picture of her. Betty was pushed to be the best from a young age. When little Archie Andrews invited her to play in the mud, the Coopers frowned and dragged their daughter away. She was groomed to be the sweet girl nextdoor with the flawless grades and not a hair out of place. When she failed to make cheer captain, let alone getting on the team, she she as banned from even trying again. It was a small stain long forgotten on her perfect reputation. And accomplishment Polly made while she did not.
But that wasn't Betty. She didn't love pink nearly as much as her mother wanted her to. She did most of the things demanded of her out of fear. The one thing everyone knew about Betty that was absolutely true was that she lived to make her parents proud of her. That's why she took attention pills even though she did not have ADHD, and even though the side effects were brutal. It was not her choice.
Jughead was just starting to tease out the real Betty under all the forced layers upon layers of good girl. But something interesting happened along the way.
Now everyone knew her secret, she was also Dark Betty, an alter ego she found equally repulsive yet she did not understand how she kept sliding into it, wearing it like a suit of armour. Chuck laughed and claimed he knew her better than she knew herself, but that was a lie. Dark Betty was as much a persona as Light Betty. The real Betty was a chaotic mixture of the two; she was human. She liked breaking curfew and sneaking around both as detectives and lovers with her beanie crown wearing boyfriend. She liked being alone together in a booth at Pop's or even just at their lunch table at school, inadvertently blocking out their friends to be in their own little world.
So if Light Betty wasn't what Betty wanted, and neither was Dark Betty, why does she do the crazy thinks she does?
There's a stereotype about a Pastor's daughter. She's more rebellious than the other girls. She likes boys or maybe even girls more than the other girls do. Why do you think that is? Well you know what I think? It's reactionary. Being forced into an image, being forced to be something or someone you're not is hazardous to your health. Specifically, your mental health. Like some sort of reverse psychology coping mechanism to let off some steam. I have to be perfect so for these fives minutes, I'll be sin itself. After years and years of psychological warfare, something had to give, right? Betty, try harder in math. Betty, stop hanging out with Archie Andrews. Betty, we don't associate with kids from the south side. Betty, concentrate. Betty, get changed, you look like a goth in those black jeans. Betty, get into an Ivy League school. Betty, have a perfect GPA. Betty this, Betty that. And there was Polly this and Polly that. And truth be told, the pressure just about doubled when Polly was taken away while Betty was away on her summer internship. She was to make up for the supposed failures of her sister. How could this not cause a fissure in her carefully constructed mask? Her hair was down and messy.
Betty cared what people thought, maybe even a bit too much.
"You're not a monster, Betty. This may be a part of you, but it's not all of you. A part of you will always be the girl who does her best to please her parents, and maybe a part of you will always be a rebel without a cause, but underneath all that is still Betty, just Betty. You don't have to try so hard or run from it or even figure it out. You're so much more than any of these stupid labels. I'm more than a kid from the wrong side of town. We're complicated. Like stereotypes with wrenches thrown in the works. So just be you, be Betty, and don't worry so much what that should look like. If you learn to let go and just be yourself, everything will just fall into place." He rested his forehead against her. "And I'll be with you every step of the way, I promise. And Veronica, and Kevin, and Archie, and maybe even Ethel. I'm sure even Polly, when the time is right. Everything is going to work out. Maybe not perfectly and maybe not today but just hold on."
And she did. And she felt a weight leave her. She was fractured, not broken, and he was right. She wasn't alone and with all the special people in her life she knew she could get through this.
