Cingulomania

This is a work of fanfiction, no copyright infringement is intended. I do not own anything pertaining to the Riverdale/Archie Comics Universe.

Chapter 19

This chapter is dedicated to my brother in law, Mike Schwartz. You are loved, and missed beyond words. Give Dad, and my Mom, and my own brother Monét a huge hug for me. It's with great sorrow that say to you, Until we meet again. I love you man!

…~*~...

"These bags," She held the plastic sandwich bag between the thumb and forefinger of both hands. "they have to be wrapped tighter or the nugs will dry out too quickly. See? I've already found several bags that weren't properly sealed. Just because you have things to do after work, doesn't mean you get to slack off with the packaging. It's there for a reason." Betty's tightly clenched fist rested on her hip, which was slung out to the side, in her other hand she now held several rolled ziplock bags with bits of marijuana inside of them, the ends of the bags bulging with air pockets. She was not happy in the slightest.

"Sorry Betty, we were just in a rush, we had people callin' people textin'. It was go time. We'll pay more attention today." Fangs felt like a scolded child. He let his countenance fall and poked his lip out a little, he wanted to back out through the stairs behind them, and leave on his bike. Her death glare was brutal, eliciting extreme feelings of anxiety and shame.

"All I'm saying is, if we keep having to throw good nugs into the shake bins, Sweet Pea is going to have all of our asses. I do not want a repeat of last week. He stress ate at Pop's for two days." Tossing the baggies into the plastic bin labeled "Shake", she turned on her heel and went to her station at the back of the room. She was in charge of packing the sealed bags into the small cardboard boxes they'd be traveling in the next week. The orders from Everglades City were through the roof. Prices were right and the weed was more than they expected.

"Get back to it please, we need eight boxes by the time we leave. That's 100 bags each. Keep in mind, that's bank to keep us afloat for more than three months." Betty was already weighing sacks for the second time, then placing them into the box in front of her.

The sounds of plastic zipper locks, and shuffling filled the dimly lit room. Fangs turned the radio back on.

"Keep me clean,

Keep me warm,

Keep my soul away from harm,

Keep the night,

Keep the day,

Keep the in-between away..."

Fangs hummed to himself, making certain his weight was right and the bag was sealed tight with no air. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted Sweet Pea, arms folded in front of him, the sleepless nights displayed upon his young face. Ignoring his friend's distress, he got back to weighing and rolling, and zipping. The others around him did the same. They had more than just these boxes to fill. They had to bake, and cook, and embrue, it was exhausting.

Sweet Pea moved through the eight desks in the room, checking each person's work as he did so. Nodding at Fangs and Mathias before he came to stand behind Betty now, silently taking in the work her slender fingers were doing. Unraveling the ziplocks, placing the sack on the metal surface of the electric scale before her. Her fingers making quick work of winding the extra plastic around the contents of the bag, then placing it neatly into the open box on the table next to her. She was really good at this, better than she probably should be.

"Hold that second,

Hold the time,

Hold that picture in your mind,

Hold the smoke,

Hold the fire,

Hold all that you desire, hey!"

"You have them on lock baby girl." He whispered into her ear, bending down to be nearer to her. She shivered at the warmth of his breath washing over the side of her face and neck. "What would I do without you Betts?" His warm lips were on the shell of her ear, her eyes rolling back into her head. An explosion of heat washing over her, starting at her shoulders, melting over the rest of her body.

"You'd be broke, with dry weed and mediocre edibles to push to the gator wranglers." Biting her lip as she looked up at her love, a sweet blush flushed her cheeks, and he smiled at her.

"You're right baby girl. I'll let you whip them into shape, you have about three hours, then it's ink time. You didn't forget did you?" Licking his lips he brought his hands together chest height, and looked at her expectantly.

"I didn't forget, I can't wait. It's been too long already. I'll meet you upstairs after I get these boxes filled and packed." Offering him a sweet smile, she got back to work, weighing, rolling, then stacking.

"Show me trust,

Show me love,

Show me heaven up above,

Show your soul,

Show your mind,

Show it to me all the time, hey!

Hey!

Hey!"

With another look around the room and a wink at his best friend, Sweet Pea too the stairs two at a time. He had to get the larger boxes stacked into the cargo van. He wasn't worried about the weight and freshness when Betty was around, the older guys liked to fudge numbers and pocket sacks for themselves. Like they didn't give a shit about the club at all.

…~*~...

He knew they were selling to fuel their own habits or to make good on gambling debt and the like. It rubbed him raw that the jingle jangle was taking over the streets of Southside, his aunt had a run in with FP not too long ago, she offered to "help him out" for just one straw if the jangle. FP called Tanis and she swooped in like a hawk to snatch up her little sister and take her to the Whyte Wyrm's own version of rehab.

It made Sweet Pea sick to think of the overdoses and the massive population of people who were totally dependant on the shit, not just jingle jangle or coke. There was other stuff floating around town thanks to the goddamn Ghoulies. They'd had their fair share of run ins with those dumbasses, none of them ended well.

There was hope that when Malachi had taken over, there would be some semblance of civilization between the two crews, but there was no such luck there. Malachi acted like he hadn't prospected for the Serpents and was turned away when he tried to roll hardcore drugs through their little town and FP threw him out on his ass. The bad blood ran deep and now they were pushing the sickly sweet straws into the high schools and literally on the playgrounds. It was the stuff of all parents nightmares.

Stacking three boxes across the inside of the van, then stacking them three tall seemed to be the way to go with packing. They guys had roughly five days before it was go time. Betty was taking things into her own hands, formulating schedules and getting the younger Serpents down in the grungy basement of the shop in Greendale to stack sacks as high as they could get them. She was a beast and it turned him on to watch her assert herself. It didn't hurt that she'd stroll in with her leather on and her hair down, jeans as tight as skin covering her curvy legs and ass. She'd recently been shown the ways of the midriff top by none other than Miss Toni Topaz. They went thrifting, and when Toni showed Betty how to deconstruct and reconstruct shirts, the blonde was addicted. There were little pieces of shirt everywhere she went. Betty was cutting and weaving and beading every last shirt she could get her hands on. It was very reminiscent of his Mom in pictures she had stashed away in the closet of her bedroom.

Nearing the end of space and time in the van, Sweet Pea placed one last box in his neat row of three on three, then shut the door. Inhaling deeply as he lit his smoke, closing the lid of the zippo harshly, he noticed that the music wafting up the stairs had stopped. He was liking the bluesy sounds that helped numb the monotonous repetition of stacking the bud filled boxes. The silence was replaced with the sounds of feet shuffling, and laughter, the click of a lock on the metal security door.

"Hey Sweet Pea, hows about a burger before we carve up Betty here?" Fangs had tugged at the cigarette he held behind his ear, placing it between his lips, uniting it's end with the flame of his own zippo. He shot Sweet Pea a silly wink while clapping the girl on her arm.

"I'm always down for food, especially Pop's, but watch it with the carving my girlfriend thing. It sound far worse than it should." Winking at his sweet smiling girl, the cigarette found itself back into his lips, smoke escaping through the sides of his parted lips.

"Someone else has to drive, Jug dropped me off." Wrapping her arms around Sweet Pea's muscled torso, she had to look directly up at him to catch his eyes.

Slipping his left arm around her shoulders, his heart skipped a beat. Just her touch had him breathing deeply. He couldn't touch her enough, couldn't love her enough. He wanted to feel her warmth seep in through his thin cotton t-shirt and into his soul. He'd give his left nut up for donation to just feel the heat roll off of her naked flesh into his for, well, forever.

"No worries there Betty, I'm sure we will manage. You're a natural on the back of Sweet Pea's bike anyhow. Okay, let's go before you two make me lose my appetite, you're sickly sweet and it makes me want to be sick." With a hearty deep drag from his cigarette, Fangs, nudged Sweet Pea and left through the man door opposite of the bay door they stood at.

"He's delightful lately, isn't he?" Sweet Pea smiled at Betty, turned her out of his embrace, then took her hand to lead her out of the shop.

"He really has been, especially after he had me watch Evil Dead 2. I promised him next movie night would be Army of Darkness." She was a little pleased with herself, having liked the first Evil Dead, she jumped head first into edibles and Evil Dead 2, it was becoming a thing with her and Fangs, which she was positive earned her a gold star in both boy's books.

"Here we go, you're gonna be talking about how Bruce Campbell is sneaky hot and stuff again. Then Kevin will interfere and say how old he is and it's gross that you think he's attractive. I can't live through that again." Sweet Pea, stubbed out his butt on the bottom of his boot, then flicked the mashed end out into the parking lot. Betty let Sweet Pea loose so she could walk to his bike while he shut the shop door and locked the three deadbolts it held.

"You know, I'm sure that if Kevin really seen past youthful beauty and really looked at Bruce Campbell, he'd see that the man is a genius and that's what makes him enticing to all demographics. Instead, we sit around debating whether or not he's hot still or just when he first helped to create Evil Dead. I mean my Grandpa, he's in his late 60's and the man is dignified, not so much as a single silver hair on his greaced head. He's funny, and smart and he keeps my Grandma safe and taken care of. She adores that man more than anyone really understands, but I see it. I see the love they have for each other, the determination they have to stick it out til the very end. It's hard to come by anymore. Everyone is fickle and petty and full of shit." Swinging his leg over the back of his bike, Betty let the shiver of excitement roll through her body. She could literally feel what Sweet Pea was saying. It was like he was talking about them, but he wasn't. Couldn't have been. He was talking about his Grandparents, some of the first Serpents ever.

Staying quiet, contemplating what Sweet Pea had said, she set herself behind him on the large Harley, encircling his torso with her arms and holding tight when he bike roared to life. He kicked off from the asphalt, sending them on their way through what was left of the daylight, toward her future.

…~*~...

A/N: Hello there my lovelies! It's been awhile. I had to really reach into myself this go around. My Brother In Law passed on from this life and into the next shortly after the last chapter was published. Needless to say, living over 600 miles away from most of our family, we had to put life on hold for a moment and head back north over I-25 to Denver and see the family. With that being said, musically I consoled myself with a very different set list of artists and genres which hindered the writing process. I was able to get to place where we can move forward from the drama of Miss Bennie-Jo and the bedresting queen Alice. Next week we will be heading back to our hometown of North Denver to celebrate life my beloved brother in law. (He was more than that, he was incredible, I can't put into words how this man changed lives and touched the people around him.) I will do my best to take this holiday week, and create a badass chapter. Thank you for hanging with me and loving this crazy little thing that started as a way to relieve my stress over the shotty writing on Riverdale. I will not abandon this story, I am getting my voice back. Also, the song is Keep Me by The Black Keys. Until next time. ~S.C.