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They were back at the diner, this time with a better appetite, listening to Pop Tate confess that he was selling out.

"Did they make you an offer you couldn't refuse?" Jughead asked.

"Who's buying it? Do you even know?"

"It shames me to say. Chug-Mo."

"The liquor store chain?" Betty clarified. Because that was just what Riverdale needed.

Pop nodded.

Jughead looked up at him. "Hey, could I make a request of you, Pop? For a last supper?"

"Anything you want."

"Actually, it's not for me, it's for my dad. He's facing … twenty years of that weird meat loaf they serve prisoners. So barring an eleventh-hour miracle, I was kind of hoping for his last meal in Riverdale that you could make him his favorite?"

"Fried chicken, cornbread, onion rings, and … an orange freeze, if memory serves."

Betty smiled. Pop was an institution in Riverdale. The place would lose something without him caring for all of them.

"That's very Rain Man of you, Pop," Jughead observed.

It was nice to see a smile on his face. His father's imminent jail sentence was weighing heavily on him, and while he had found a comfortable niche at South Side High, it was still a lot … and he had never really recovered from everything that had happened to him the night of Homecoming. Not completely.

"I've been doing this a long time," Pop said. He sighed. "I thought I'd be doing it until the day I die."

Betty hated to hear them both sounding so down. They were large parts of the beating heart of Riverdale—as they slowed, so did the town. "This is … unacceptable," she said softly.

"What?"

"Just—everything." She looked up at Pop. "Have you officially sold the diner?"

"The contract's being drawn up."

"Do not sign it," she told him. She was fed up with … just, all of it. She didn't think she could help Jughead's dad, hard as she had tried, and she was losing hope that she could do anything to meaningfully improve Jughead's life overall, but she could darn well do something about Pop's, and that would help everyone. "Okay? Do not give up—either of you. I can fix this, all right? I—I will fix this." She got up and grabbed her jacket, gave Jughead a quick kiss on the cheek, and hurried out. One way or another, she was going to make sure Pop's got saved.

While waiting for Betty to work her magic, to wave her ponytail and save the world, Jughead found Veronica sitting alone in a classroom, scrolling sadly through her phone, the weight on her shoulders heavy enough that he could practically see it.

"I don't have red hair and broad shoulders, or a blonde ponytail, for that matter, but … do you want to talk?" he asked. He and Veronica had never spent much time together, but as she pointed out, they were dating each other's best friends, and they each had fathers who had screwed up badly.

Veronica looked up, taking his measure. "You were ready to walk away from your dad. And now you're crusading for his freedom. What changed?"

It was a good question, and one Jughead wasn't sure he had asked of himself yet. He mulled it over as she watched him and waited for his reply. "He did," he said finally, thinking back to the clean trailer and the clean shave and, more than anything, the sobriety. "Made an effort. Took another swing at being a good dad." He thought of his dad making himself out to be a monster, a murderer, trying to get Jughead to leave him behind once and for all, because he thought that was what was best for his son. He had tried, when it counted.

After thinking that over for a moment, Veronica asked, "Don't you think … some people can't change? Like, it's just … in their DNA to be bad?"

"I'm not going to presume to know what lies in your father's heart," he told her, "but Archie's dad almost died. And my dad is going away for twenty years. If there's even a 0.0001 percent chance that your dad is trying …"

"I get it." She nodded. "Thank you, Jughead."

A little application of extortion in the right place—Cheryl Blossom—and Betty thought she might have just found the solutions she needed.

She got the Vixens started cleaning the graffiti off Pop's, and encouraged Cheryl to come to court and make a victim's statement on FP's behalf. Cheryl was composed and quiet and convincingly sincere as she proclaimed the Blossom family's forgiveness and asked the court for leniency. Betty would have applauded if they hadn't been in court.

When the judge gently told her there weren't extenuating circumstances, Cheryl, in response to Betty's carefully raised eyebrow, even came up with a hasty lie, claiming that her father had threatened to hurt Jughead if FP didn't do what he was told. It was a good lie. Betty was impressed. Maybe next time she needed an accomplice for some reason, she'd have to consider Cheryl.

Seeing how tightly Jughead held on to his father, the shine of tears in his eyes when he turned back to her, Betty was satisfied. Whatever bridges she had burned, whatever currency she had blown, it had been worth it.

Later, she joined the Vixens to run Pop's for the night, happening to casually blast over social media that the Pussycats would be performing, which, as she had calculated, brought Josie down where Betty could talk her into it. Between them, they managed to get half the town to come out. Veronica's parents even made a donation in order to keep Pop's running.

It was a good day.

At least until Betty's mother stopped by on her way out in order to make sure Betty knew that seven drug deals had been brokered outside of Pop's that evening, that the Serpents now had a toe-hold on the North Side, and that Hiram Lodge, Veronica's father, never did anything for altruistic reasons. She marched out, leaving Betty to wonder what she had really accomplished today.

She said as much to Jughead as they walked home together.

He put his arm around her shoulders. "Hey. What you did for my dad today … that's the best thing anyone's ever done for me. And as for Pop's—can you imagine what life would be like here without him? What he would have done without that diner? Everything else—well, you can't change the whole world, Betty. All you can do is try to keep your part of it going. And you did that today." He squeezed her shoulders. "I'm really proud of you."

She couldn't remember when anyone had said that to her. Hearing it from him meant the world. "Thank you, Jug."