Chapter 3

-How do you start to change your entire identity? Can you ever really do it? They say no matter how hard you try disguise is still at best, a self-portrait, giving light to what was already within.-

Betty walked up to the front door of the White Snake bar, and courage she had poured into her as she was putting on her "costume" slid right back out again. She suddenly felt foolish, and alone, and very, very scared. Taking a deep breath she pushed the door open. Part of her was expecting a movie scene, silence and glass breaking as she walked through the door. That's not what happened. People just kept on with what they were doing, playing pool, drinking, talking. There was nothing scary or odd about this place that had been so demonized to her growing up.

With renewed vigor, she tried to find the bearded Serpent that gave the jacket she was now wearing to her boyfriend. When she walked up the stairs in the back of the shady bar she spotted the man. He was sitting on a beat up couch leaning in a buxom brunette's chest. Betty walked right up to him and stopped.

"Hey cutie. Mighty fine jacket you stole. How can I help you?"

Betty had no words. She wasn't tough, she couldn't even counter this guy's low-level sexism. Who was she even kidding?

"She's here for me, babe" the older woman that had been a pillow up until this point broke the screaming silence.

"Wha-" Betty started.

"Yeah, this is Kitty's kitten, don't you recognize her? Looks just like her mama." The woman stood up and lightly pulled Betty toward a back room. When they got there the other woman pushed her into a low chair and then sat across from her.

"So kitten, why are you really here?"

"Who are you?"

"If I weren't so unsurprised, I'd be hurt" she lay back in her chair and gave a deep laugh. "So you're mama's never mentioned me? I'm her best friend! The name's Betsy Bell, dear, but you can call me Birdie. Now which one of Kitty's little ones are you, Thing 1 or Thing 2?"

"My mom's not named Kitty, I think you have the wrong person." Betty started to stand up but the other woman pinned her back in a seat with a glare that was oddly reminiscent of her mother.

"I know just who you are, I just don't know which one of them you are."

"That doesn't make any sense."

"Doesn't need to make sense, you sound just like her! You don't have to be so perfect all the time, no one cares Alice!"

Betty sat back down with a start as the other woman lost her temper. "So you definitely know my mother," Betty said with a look of dark amusement.

Birdie's laughter crowed out again at Betty's words.

"I guess I need to start at the beginning with you little Kitty, but you need to answer one question for me, are you Polly or the baby?"

"I guess I'm the baby? My name is Betty… well, Elizabeth technically. Also, I didn't steal this jacket, I just… borrowed it… from my boyfriend."

"hmm… interesting… and I'll get back to the boyfriend part in a moment, but for now, a history lesson."

The next hour gave Elizabeth Cooper more insight into the past of a woman she thought she knew. Leading to more questions that she never thought she would receive answers for.

-That night Betty learned that her mother had grown up on the Southside, all but sisters with another young girl that lived just down the street. They turned the tough neighborhood into their very own playground. Many of the boys who were now leaders of the Serpents had been putty in the hands of these girls. F.P. Jones apparently among them. They were Kitty and Birdie. The nickname for Alice stemming from Allie, to Allie Cat, and finally settling on Kitty. Birdie was a lot simpler, she used to whistle loudly while walking through the neighborhood. Just when the girls were about to start high school Alice's father received a huge promotion and moved his family to the much more family friendly part of Riverdale, causing his daughter to switch schools. She created a whole new persona when she started at her new school, using all of her street smarts to become the perfect suburban teen, homecoming queen, and more. Leaving her friends on the Southside in the dust… including Betsy "Birdie" Bell.-

"So you're with the Jones boy then?" Birdie asked.

"Yeah, Jughead… I was worried when the Serpents offered to take care of him. So I wanted to know… see for myself what that would mean. I just want him to be safe" she said, dipping her head down.

"You're a good girl, Kitten. And he must be quite something to have such devotion from you. He better be worth it baby doll. His father was a mess, but a good man deep down. If you keep hanging around here you have my promise of safety along with your boy's. Also, it'll drive Alice nuts if she ever finds out… I'll walk you out."

Betty and Birdie walked back through the Serpent's play room, down the stairs to the main bar area, and finally out the door. Betty felt safe yet brash standing next to this woman that so many of the tough looking bikers seemed to hold deference to.

"Sweet thing, one last thing you should probably know…"

Betty held her breath for another potential bombshell. She still hadn't even begun to process her mother's past.

"If you come back here… maybe you should try just dressing like yourself, you look like you're trying to be a hooker, but don't know what a corner is."

The blonde looked down at her clothes and blushed. Skintight leather and lace barely hiding anything, except for Jughead's jacket which she was swimming in.

"Be you, be comfortable, this is the home of misfit toys, not some den of hedonism… Ok, maybe a little hedonism, but only on a Friday night", she added with a cheeky wink.

Betty was taking her first steps to the bus stop when she saw Jughead…