Author's Note:

You like me, you really like me! (Or at least my versions of Sweet Pea and Betty...) Thank you for the new reviews, favourites, and follows! A little bit of a different format for this chapter: a Sweet Pea section, then Betty, then back to Sweet Pea. Basically, a Sweet Pea sandwich. Too creepy? This is also a more thoughtful/emotional chapter rather than a super dialogue-heavy one, since suddenly attending the same school would (I think) be a big change for our protagonists. Betty in particular struggles to adapt. Sweet Pea bides his time. The author waits in the wings, scribbling flirtatious dialogue for chapter 8, coming this Friday...

Enjoy!

XO ForASecondThereWe'dWon


VII

It was a brave new world, like the book he'd just been assigned in his English class. As far as Sweet Pea was concerned, this Aldous Huxley guy knew what was up, just from the title alone. When they gave you a book at Riverdale High, no matter the class, there were enough copies for everyone and nobody's looked like it'd had a past life as a coaster at the Whyte Wyrm. Even stranger, they were actually expected to read them―Sweet Pea almost felt like swinging by some of his old teachers' houses and blowing their minds with this information. Everything was squeaky clean here: floors, trophy classes, the faces of the preppiest bunch of snobs he'd ever seen; the relocated Serpents were like a stray, clumpy dust bunny that none of the janitors could manage to sweep away. Sweet Pea found he didn't mind being dust. It wasn't like at Southside, where you'd break a guy's nose for looking at you wrong. The Bulldogs in particular kept pulling shit like banging the Serpents' shoulders when they passed in the hall, but after the first week or so, Sweet Pea and the others basically accepted it. It wasn't so hard, really, because they knew no one was trying too diligently to pacify the spoiled brats and as long as the Serpents didn't react, they were untouchable. Sweet Pea had actually taken to smiling at anyone who targeted him. It seemed to piss people like Reggie off even more after they'd given Sweet Pea a shove and found he wasn't easily moved against his will.

Between taking crap and groaning over homework assignments, there was the best thing, which was Betty. Sweet Pea couldn't keep any sort of distance from her since just being in the same building as she was felt like living life in a parallel universe. Like, a better one, where they could've grown up together with him being the boy-next-door instead of Andrews. Those were the kind of thoughts he never confided to anyone. Walking down the hall towards Betty's locker felt like walking on the surface of the moon; his feet didn't hit the ground so hard anymore and sometimes, when she turned around, saw him coming, and smiled, it was even tough to breathe. Something was off with her, but Sweet Pea figured she was just adjusting too and was willing to wait it out. There were days, more and more frequently, when she got that look in her eye that, based on past occurrences, meant good news for him, but so far he was still waiting to get dragged into an empty classroom to make out, or show up to find her dressed like that chick from Grease.

In between those days, Sweet Pea stuck with his own kind. Mainly, that meant getting teased by them for the way he was chasing Betty Cooper. Jughead always tuned out with a scowl, but even Toni had gotten into discussing Sweet Pea's love life with her puppy in earshot. Some of the guys were the type to get embarrassed about that stuff, but Sweet Pea was proud as hell. He knew they were jealous. While they'd been at Southside High, he'd hid his interest in Betty. Now, Jughead knew and Sweet Pea was guessing Betty's friends did too, judging by the curious looks he got from the Sheriff's kid whenever he swung by to talk to Fangs. He wished Betty would sit with them sometimes, but they weren't at that point yet. She wasn't even his girlfriend yet. That was a problem Sweet Pea was putting some serious thought into, and slowly striping the couch in the lounge of its loose threads while in the depths of his contemplation. Any day, though, he'd think. Any day.


It was Veronica who pushed them together, in a way. Betty wanted to cling to her friend―suddenly a bundle of nerves at the thought of encountering Sweet Pea alone in hallways and classroom lately used for daydreaming about him―but Veronica was too busy to babysit. She was planning a dance, the latest scheme in her benevolent strategizing to bring the North and South together under the single roof of Riverdale High. Predictably, Cheryl was making every effort to thwart Veronica, not that it was doing much good. V had the administration's approval and her own conviction on her side. In between classes, she toyed with ideas about theme, decorations, details, and more with martial seriousness, turning the inside of her locker door into a tiny magnetic war room. Betty thought that planning a dance would be a perfect fit for her anxious desire to avoid Sweet Pea… except that Veronica wouldn't let her help. For whatever reason, she had taken dictatorial control of the project, though she kept Betty separate from it with kind words. Betty didn't need kind words, she needed an escape route from her own feelings!

Shockingly to Betty, Sweet Pea accosted her at every opportunity, and it wasn't only the fading bruise on his cheek that startled her. Something had changed, and she didn't know if it was his relationship with Jughead (they were rarely seen together unless the entire Serpent group was present) or just an instinct not to be humbled in a new environment, but he was bolder. It didn't matter what time she went to switch her books or stow her sweater, he would be there, his shoulder leaning against the bank of lockers and his eyes on her, as intense as ever; the look Sweet Pea gave Betty made her shiver and she had to keep fighting that in case he tried to give her his jacket again. She just didn't know what to do with so much attention, the sincerity and constancy of it. It wasn't that she didn't want to welcome their new students with open arms, or that being seen with this one in particular was in any way embarrassing or wrong, it was more that Betty couldn't figure out the boundaries. She and Jughead (in public, and often in private as well) had been a shy couple. Betty had thought that was just who she was. Now, she had experiences stripping and making out on somebody's lap in a car to argue the opposite side. It was possible, she was realizing, that the limits she'd thought she had didn't actually exist. She hadn't been trying to dodge Sweet Pea because she wasn't interested. The thing was, she might've been too interested.

Someone taking up a much smaller segment of her mind was Jughead. Betty could have sworn she was almost seeing less of him now than she had when he'd been attending Southside High. When she did spot him and start pep-talking herself up to a friendly greeting, he invariably either appeared lost in brow-furrowing concentration or hastily exited whatever room or hallway she'd just joined him in. Betty got the picture: she was involved in a bizarre warping of hide-and-seek wherein Sweet Pea sought her and she sought Jughead, though the motivations of the players differed. And it seemed like, whatever game they were playing, Sweet Pea was winning. He took what he could get. Talks at her locker where he said more with his stare than his words. Private smiles sent across classrooms that seemed so obviously to stand in for 'do you like me? Check yes or no' notes. Without a doubt, Betty was beginning to let her guard down, but what was left to stand between their suppressed flirtations and total surrender that might see them hot and heavy on a couch à la Veronica and Archie the week before? After a face-reddening encounter, during which Betty stepped back from her locker and ended up right against Sweet Pea, who'd come to see her, she begged Veronica to let her help with the dance during her free period. Finally, more out of harried distraction than pity, Veronica said yes.

For once able to focus on something besides the memory of Sweet Pea's low voice, Betty carried a box of decorations to the gym on the day before the dance, her heeled boots clicking down empty hallways. Not one of her three closest friends had the same empty slot in their timetable, so Betty typically spent that time alone in the library or student lounge. Walking the nearly-silent halls was a nice change and should have provided a good opportunity to run through any other ways she might be able to help Veronica before the dance. She was definitely trying to concentrate on that and not on Sweet Pea's schedule, which she was familiar with because he was always letting her know which class he was off to. If she'd allowed herself to focus on that, Betty would've needed to admit that she might have had an ulterior motive for completing this particular task at this particular time. Instead, even as she approached the gym doors, she attempted to hear only her own tapping footsteps and ignore the squeaking of running shoes coming from inside.

She stared down into the contents of the box without seeing them as she pushed the door open and entered, interrupting a gym class. Betty looked up, heart beating hard. A boy's gym class. Sweet Pea's gym class. Like she'd known it would be. They were playing basketball. Shirts vs. skins. For a second, Betty was almost relieved that, now, she'd be able to stop imagining Sweet Pea with his shirt off, because there he was, before her very eyes. The heavy door thumped shut behind her and his gaze met hers without hesitation―even as he continued to dribble the ball outside of his opponent's reach and his teammates called for a pass. Gripping hard at the box in her hands, Betty felt much more than friendly interest. It took a few seconds of checking him out (with the recognition and acceptance of the fact that he knew she was checking him out), his shoulders, his chest, his hips, before Betty could make herself move, circling the gym's perimeter with the crystalline certainty that Sweet Pea was still looking at her. She wasn't able to glance at him again. After she left the gym, having immediately forgotten about the box and wherever she'd deposited it inside, she stopped, took a deep breath, and acknowledged that something had just changed.


"Sweet Pea!" Fangs yelled after him.

"Sub me out!" he replied, absentmindedly waving a hand back towards his friend.

"Where are you going?" Fangs persisted, half-turning his attention back to the game that was still in play around him.

"Uh, water," Sweet Pea explained, though his bottle stood just outside the court lines, same as everybody else's.

Since he'd convinced the North- and Southsiders to channel their aggression for each other into team sports instead of scuffling fights, their gym teacher had quit caring about whatever else they did. Sweet Pea hadn't tested the limits of that apparent free pass yet, but no one tried to stop him as he banged out the door of the gym. Blonde hair flashed in front of him. He hadn't expected Betty to still be here.

Warm from playing and jumpy with adrenaline, Sweet Pea immediately wrapped his arms around Betty and kissed her. She breathed in sharply and pulled him closer, right when he was wondering if he should let go. Her hands ran up his arms and he smiled against her mouth. He guided her in a careful half-circle so that he didn't have to stop kissing her for even a second and shuffled her back until she was pressed to the wall, their feet alternating in a line on the shiny linoleum. The consensus between his brain and other interested areas was, Finally. As if he couldn't help it, Sweet Pea kept gathering her forward in his arms until he could hold her body tightly to his. Betty's hands were more cautious, light like paper. She knew what she was doing with her mouth though.

Minutes passed and nobody came to get him, but not screwing up at this school meant getting more time with Betty, so Sweet Pea eventually made himself back away from her, eyes on her darkened lips.

"Are you going to the dance?" was the first thing he came up with, recognizing that he should actually speak when what he wanted to do was continue kissing her.

"I'm―I'm helping organize it," she stumbled out, pushing away from the wall and skirting around him with a giddy-looking smile.

"So… yes?" He watched her, turning as she orbited around him. She laughed.

"Yes," Betty clarified. "I love to dance," she added. Sweet Pea raised an eyebrow and watched her face go red. Didn't take much to prompt that memory, it seemed. "Are… are you―"

The door flew open and a hand grabbed his shoulder.

"Get back in here! We can't lose to them!" Fangs said, then noticed Betty standing a few feet away and grinned back and forth between them, while Sweet Pea clenched his jaw, signalling that Fangs had better keep his mouth shut. His buddy retreated, holding up his palms for pardon. When he was gone, Sweet Pea turned to Betty.

"They can't do shit without me." He shrugged. Arrogant, he knew, but he was working to get out from under the idea that she was too good for him. Better to play it too far in the other direction, he thought.

"Well," she said, still looking flustered, "you better get in there. Go, um," her gaze dropped to the naked top half of his body, "skins."

The girl was making him feel as anxious as she looked, so when she started to walk away, Sweet Pea jogged after her and kissed her again, holding her face between his hands.

"I'm going," he assured her. "To your dance." Betty beamed.

"You better be." She poked his chest, glancing from her finger up to his eyes.

"Oh," Sweet Pea joked, "there you are."


To be continued...