Everyone stepped past the hearth and into the fire, one by one.

First Polly.

Then her father.

Then her mother.

Then her.

Her brother was left staring at the flames, his smirk highlighted by the deep shadows the glow carved in his face.

/

Betty woke up to the radio playing softly. A commercial for Taco Bell. The wind against the roadster. Cheryl breathing slowly, eyes open and trained at the ceiling. Boys laughing outside.

"Oh my god!" Betty jackknifed up, almost hit her head on the roof.

Cheryl leapt in response. "What the hell?"

"Oh my god those boys, those boys definitely took the money."

"Let's find that devilish brood. Shit, we're stupid," Cheryl cursed. She was right, of course. In less than twelve hours they'd allowed their keys, cash, and card to be stolen. The only things they needed to survive.

Betty unbuckled her seatbelt, wondering why she'd felt the need to wear it while she slept, and looked up to find the boys walking toward them, massive slushies in hand.

"Dammit!" The biggest boy, Thad, shouted when he spotted the girls coming toward them. "What the hell do you want?"

"I think you know what the hell we want," Cheryl spat.

"Thad, let's just give it back," Jodes mumbled.

"Give it back? Hell, no." Thad turned to Cheryl and Betty. "We're gonna run away, too. Like you guys."

"Well, have fun without a car or a license," Cheryl snorted. "You're going to walk?"

"We're gonna hitchhike."

"You're going to get killed," Betty reasoned.

"Or raped," Cheryl added. "Or both. In either order."

"Not us!" Austin threw his empty slushie cup on the ground. "We're too smart for that. And, now, too rich."

"Smart rich people can still get murdered," Cheryl said pointedly. "But you're dumb and you're going to be poor after we take our money back and you will probably be dead before you even reach the highway."

"Like hell we would," Thad said. "We're going to Hawaii."

"How are you going to cross the ocean, genius?" Cheryl asked.

"That's what we were trying to figure out before you so-rudely interrupted."

"Are you gonna call the cops?" Jodes asked timidly, voice shaking.

"Jesus, Jodes, shut the hell up!" Thad shouted.

"Yeah, we're gonna call the cops," Betty bluffed. Her phone was still dead and the police probably wouldn't take kindly to two runaway minors.

"You can't do that; you said you were criminals!" Zach reminded them.

"Yup. Which is exactly why you'd better give us back our cash before we kill you." Cheryl sounded dead serious.

There was a shift in the boys' attitudes.

"You wouldn't do that," Thad said finally. "We're kids."

"Maybe so, but you're also thieves who are in a bad neighborhood in the dead of night."

Thad's eyes went from Cheryl to Betty, trying to tell if the redhead was serious or not. Betty knew that she should have called Cheryl's bluff, let the boys know that they weren't actually in grave danger, but she thought about the ocean, about her family stepping into the fire, about the stars overhead moving slowly across the night sky.

"Don't test us," Betty said gravely.

"For real?" Thad giggled nervously. "For serious, you'd do something like that?"

"Give them the money back, just give them the money back!" Jodes begged. He was clearly trying not to sob.

"Just give us back what's ours." Betty folded her arms, Cheryl put hers on her hips. Betty wondered if she felt bad.

Jodes was choking back snot and tears now, the other three boys frozen with fear. Hopefully, they were smart.

"Give it back, Thad," one of the other boys chimed in.

Stiff silence, the leader of the boys weighing his options, Cheryl and Betty trying to look as tough as possible, like they could possibly kill four middle-school-aged boys on their own.

Like drowning Chuck Clayton. Like making herself bleed.

"Fine," Thad relinquished the money with a roll of his eyes. "Fine, take it. Don't wanna run around with these dumbasses anyway. If they're scared of a coupla girls. Screw 'em."

"Yeah, thanks, tough guy." Cheryl snatched back the cash. She turned to Betty and said, "We have to go. Now."

Car, gas, car, highway.

"We gotta bolt," Cheryl said as she pulled onto the freeway. "Gotta spread across this country like wildfire."

"Wildfire?" Betty drew her eyebrows. "I thought it was wildflowers."

"Spread like wildflowers?" Cheryl laughed. "That doesn't make any sense, Betty."

"Yeah it does," Betty argued. "Like, they pop up and grow everywhere. Spread like wildflowers."

"Like wildflowers."

/

The sun was coming up, the stars had faded long ago.

And then the sun began its rotation, the day began. Breakfast was old nutrition bars. The radio was consumed by exclusively commercials. For food, for fun, for roadside services. Existential hide-and-seek was played in the stead of music.

Betty hid on the old maple syrup sign.

Cheryl hid on Polly's farm.

Betty hid in the trunk.

Cheryl hid on Mr. Svenson's severed finger.

Betty hid in Josie's pussycat ears. Cheryl laughed really weirdly.

Lunch came from a drive-thru, hot and greasy. Betty was wondering how much sleep Cheryl was running on as the fourth semi-truck cut them off. Betty was considering drafting a will.

"Where are we?" Betty crumpled all of her garbage into the fast food bag, threw that into the back.

"We are almost in Montana. Making decent time, considering we lost a whole day yesterday."

"Gosh, what day is it?" Betty asked giddily.

"Uh… Tuesday?" Cheryl was mostly guessing, Betty trying to count off the days they'd been gone.

"Has it been that long? And also, has it only been three days?"

"Good lord, a song is playing!" Cheryl turned up the music, both the girls savoring the music as if they were desert explorers and it was fresh water.

/

"The claw machine calling my name," Betty mumbled.

They had stopped at a pancake house, its dim lights making them drowsy, both of them full of grilled cheese and sweet, fresh fruit, the sound of the road still humming in their ears. In the dark establishment, Betty couldn't take her eye off of the neon claw machine filled with cheap stuffed animals.

"Okay," Cheryl lazily popped a strawberry into her mouth. "Let me get quarters." She pushed herself out of the booth, up to the counter. "The trick is to use two people to get a grasp on both dimensions," she said when she returned, quarters weighing down her pockets.

"What do you mean?" Betty jumped up from the table and followed Cheryl to the big glass box full of prizes.

Cheryl took her hand and pressed four quarters, the price to play, into Betty's palms. "You stand at the front of the machine and operate the claw. And I stand off to the side and tell you if you should be going forward or backward. Back when Pop's had a claw machine, Jason and I cleaned house. Betty, go for that fox, it's sticking out the most," she pointed at an orange plush whose head was peeking out from a sea of its peers. "Let's go, we'll be great."

They were not. The first round, Cheryl cursed out the claw for being "illegitimately constructed, rigged, setting them up for failure on the first try."

The second attempt, Cheryl narrowed her eyes at Betty accusingly.

The third attempt, Betty told Cheryl that she'd told her to go too far backward.

The fourth attempt, both girls blamed the other without a shred of subtlety.

The fifth attempt and Betty pounded two fists against the glass and shouted "Jesus Christ!", as Cheryl demanded she try to be in charge of the claw.

Betty was determined to prove herself, though, and asked for one more try. On their sixth attempt, both were shouting at the machine to pick up the goddamn toy, keep it steady, hold it, hold it, hold it…

They erupted with cheer when Betty pounded the button to drop the fox into the slot.

"What should we name it?" Betty asked excitedly. She'd never won on a claw machine before, assumed winning one was like winning the lottery. The doll was almost two feet, a garish shade of orange, and clad in felt overalls, but it was a worthy prize nonetheless. "We should name her Vixen, because, like, the River Vixens!"

"What? No," Cheryl scoffed. "It would never be allowed on the team, it's dressed like a hobo. We should name it Jughead."

"Heck no!"

They were still arguing over the name of the toy when they checked into a hotel later.

"I'm just saying we shouldn't name it after anyone we know in real life," Betty said.

"I think Kevin would be honored. He'd appreciate the homage."

"Veto."

"Screw you." Cheryl looked out the window, seemed to be watching something. "Hey there's a movie house right across from us."

"Are they playing anything this late?"

"Yeah, it looks like they're playing some film called Glass Door at ten."

"Ten? That's late."

"What, can't stay up past your bedtime?"

"I can do whatever I want."

"Want to see a film?"

Betty and Cheryl and their clothes were clean, situated, ready for another day tomorrow, although it was only nine and that felt too early to go to bed, despite the seventeen long hours that had passed since they got a proper rest.

"Fine."

The movie house was small and quiet. Jughead would have like it, would have spent an hour obsessing over the vintage movie posters that adorned the walls. The lights were golden, the velvet red. Tickets to see Glass Door were $15, which Cheryl coughed up without complaint.

When the lights went down in the theatre, Betty sunk into her seat. It was more comfortable than the seat of the roadster, softer and a nice change from the same seat she'd been in for so many hours…

For so many days.

Again, Betty was struck by how monumentally stupid the past couple of days had been.

The movie flickered to life.

Glass Door was about a werewolf who went to high school. The high school had glass doors. The werewolf was pretty and nice behind those glass doors, and by night, she was hairy and covered in blood.

She killed people.

But she was also quite close to being popular.

Betty chewed on the stereotype of nice girl being unpopular, despite also being tremendously beautiful, and wondered if it was applicable to her life. The trademark Alpha Bitch didn't hate her, exactly; they were sitting side-by-side in a Montana movie house together. The other trademark popular girl was her best friend in the whole world.

So Betty decided the bitch clique was mostly movie trope.

Still, the movie played with it nicely.

By the end, Alpha Bitch was pretty tight with the werewolf, but the werewolf still had that miniscule issue of running off and murdering woodland creatures by night. Apparently, it was quite tiring because the morning after the dreaded full moon, werewolf and Alpha Bitch were sitting on the docks overlooking a nice lake.

Werewolf goes for a swim.

Werewolf is exhausted.

Werewolf starts to drown.

From the shore, Alpha Bitch thinks werewolf is waving at her, not signaling for help.

Werewolf drowns.

Betty cried. Cheryl didn't.

It was raining when they stepped out of the theatre, the streetlights turning to gold on the silver sidewalks.

"They relied too heavily on allegory. They didn't even the characters names and it didn't come off naturally," Cheryl said. "Also: too much color symbolism."

"Are you kidding?" Betty snorted. "I have literally never seen you wearing anything but red or black."

"Um, white?"

"Okay, I've only ever seen you wear like three colors. So, you have no room to comment on anyone else's overuse of color symbolism. And I liked the movie."

"I liked the part where the werewolf drowned."

"Of course you did."

"No, really. It was excellent. The other girl thought she was messing around and she was actually dying."

"I know."

"Excellent."

They walked in silence back to the hotel.

"In honor of that oversaturated film, I say we name the fox doll Fox Doll."

"What?"

"It doesn't have a name because it can represent anyone. Or at least anyone who identifies with fox dolls. Its name is Fox Doll."

"I hope Fox Doll doesn't drown."

"Fox Doll will be sitting on the pier waving at us as we slowly sink under the water."

/

Fox Doll watched calmly from the backseat as the roadster charged across the highway, Cheryl and Betty back to singing whatever the staticky radio allowed as America flew by.

They were close now, in Idaho, but too far north, rapidly making their way southwest.

"Betty!"

"Cheryl!"

"Want to stop for dinner?"

"Always."

"Sweet."

The restaurant where they stopped was a quaint pizza place that had red walls and red booths and red carpeting.

"It's so no one can see where they spilled the marinara sauce," Betty jested.

"It's so no one can see where they spilled the blood! This place is a mafia front," Cheryl joked back.

There was a rack of free newspapers by the entrance, and by force of habit, Betty grabbed one, fleetingly expecting it to be a copy of the Riverdale Register. Instead, the header read "Falls Post".

"Stocks are down," Betty announced.

"What?"

"Stocks are down!"

"What stocks?"

"I don't know. The paper just says that stocks are down."

"It doesn't say which ones?"

"I mean it does, but there's a lot of them and it doesn't say that any are up. Hence, stocks are down."

"Stocks are down. Do you know what you want to order?"

"Nope."

"Well figure it out before you fix the stock market; I'm starving, Cooper."

"Noted. Want to split?"

"I'm down. Toppings?"

Betty flipped to the third page and her blood went cold.

"Betty? Toppings?" Cheryl tried again.

"Cheryl, look!" Betty flipped the newspaper at her friend. Side-by-side pictures of the two from this year's picture day. Riverdale Teens Missing: Reward.

"Don't freak out," Cheryl glanced back down at her menu. "It's a sidenote article in a miniscule town paper. No one's going to care."

"No one's going to care?" Betty tore the menu from Cheryl's perfectly-manicured hands. "What about our parents who think we're missing and who are offering a reward?"

"They don't care about us," Cheryl said with surprising ferocity. "Don't think about it, Betty."

"My mother hasn't even texted me since Saturday. Why wouldn't she? Why wouldn't she call or… Why wouldn't she? Why would she assume we're missing? Why would she offer a reward instead of just—"

"Are you, like, hyperventilating?" Cheryl cut her off. "Because I'd offer you some water but they haven't even gotten us water yet. The service here is subpar."

"Cheryl, I need to call my mom."

There was a flash of anger in Cheryl's eyes. "Betty, it's not a big deal."

"It's a huge deal, Cheryl." Betty stood up. "I need to call my mom. I will be back, I will be back soon, can I get some money for a phone charger?"

Cheryl sat for a moment, openmouthed. "I… Betty at least eat dinner first, we'll buy a charger after."

Betty sat and was struck by a sickening wave of guilt, wondering whether her mother had gone to the police (the police they'd been trying so hard to avoid lately) and whether she thought Betty was hurt and if her mother was safe alone in the house with Chic and what the house was like at that very moment…

/

"There's a hotel—"

"No." Betty pointed to a corner store across the street. "We're going there first. I need to call my mom."

"Jesus, Betty, are you six years old?"

"Cheryl," Betty pleaded. She was cold and queasy and felt like crying. "Please."

More hesitation. Then: "Fine." Cheryl handed Betty a twenty and Betty bolted across the street.

Later, in the hotel room, Betty collapsed onto the bed and waited anxiously after plugging the phone in. She ground her teeth as it signaled it needed more time to charge, dug her nails into her palms when it finally lit to life.

Texting, Mom, Contact Info—

Unblock caller?

"Unblock caller?" Betty repeated aloud.

"What?"

"I… I had my mom blocked."

"Weird."

"'Weird'?" Betty pounded the unblock button and stood up. "Did you do that?"

"Why on earth would I do that?"

"Did you block my mom?" Betty looked through her other contacts. Veronica, Archie, Jughead, Kevin. All of them had been silenced. "Christ, did you block everyone?"

Cheryl wasn't saying anything, which Betty took as an admission of guilt, anger welling up inside of her, hot and quivering. She didn't wait for Cheryl to respond. Her phone had 20% battery and Betty just wanted to contact her friends, her family. Their texts and missed calls were rushing in now at an overwhelming speed.

Betty pushed past Cheryl and made her way down to the street corner below.

Logically, she knew she should call her mother first, but she was afraid to face all that blood, so she drew a breath and gave herself one sweet moment before pressing call.

"Betty? Oh my God, Elizabeth Cooper, where the fresh hell have you been?"

"Mom, I am so sorry. I've been on the road with Cheryl and… my phone hasn't had any battery until now." She has no idea why she's protecting Cheryl, maybe a dead phone is just easier to explain.

"Betty, you are coming home right this instant. I don't even know where to start—"

Over the sound of her mother fuming, the rush and the swell from the highway found Betty's ears through the black night sky.

The sound of moving, of going somewhere.

"I can't come home just yet," Betty said sternly. "I just need you to know that I'm alive and I'm safe and I'm fine."

"You're not coming home?" Her mother's heartbreak was audible; Betty felt cruel. She could picture her mother's face, crestfallen, and upstairs her empty, unmade bed.

"I'll be home by the end of break," Betty promised. "And I'll be safe and I'll go back to school and come home and everything will go back to normal. But for now… I just can't, Mom, I just can't…"

As her mother cooed comforting words and desperate promises into the phone, Betty pictured her feet sprouting roots, long and slender. Roots that cracked through the sidewalk and into the dirt below, all of them folding in on each other.

A text from Jughead pulled her out of her thoughts. It said, simply: Betty, please..

Her heart sang. "Mom, I have to go. I love you. I'll stay safe, I promise and I'll be back soon. Goodbye."

Click.

/

A/N: WHO ELSE IS EXCITED FOR NEW EPISODE AND HOPEFULLY CHONI TO NITE!?