You shouldn't be so quick to call Chuck Clayton your friend.
What had he meant by that?
As curious as she had been, and admittedly still was, the last thing she needed was Archie getting into a fight, especially not with Jughead.
Betty sighed, pressing a hand to her aching temple.
Apparently, it took seven-to-ten days for a concussion to heal, and she was only on day three. She was allowed to do light physical activity, meaning Cheryl had had her sitting on the bench for most of their earlier practice.
She shouldn't have been straining herself at the Blue and Gold, but with the entire former staff having graduated the year before, Betty had been left in charge of writing every hard-hitting article. That was, until she found some help, but none of her friends were really the journalism type.
Just as she let out a groan, the alarm on her phone went off, alerting her that it was time to change her bandage yet again.
She pulled the dyed gauze Cheryl had given her from her purse, choosing yellow to go with the white and gold t-shirt she was still wearing, and moved over to the mirror someone had hung on the wall long before she had begun attending Riverdale High.
It was her first time removing the bandage by herself; Archie had helped a few times, her mother doing the rest.
With a shaking hand, she reached up, and began to peal the adhesive from her forehead.
The first thing she saw was red.
She had also been warned that it was not uncommon for lacerations to bleed even after stitches had been applied, but she had not been made aware of how much blood could seep through.
Don't look. She willed herself. Don't look.
It was too late.
Betty caught sight of her reflection in the mirror, and her knees buckled. She would have gone crashing forward towards the unused computers, ancient but still functional, had it not been for two hands encircling her arms, yanking her away at the last second.
Her back connected with something hard and muscular.
Her savior held her by the elbows, keeping her steady as they staggered towards the desk she had previously been occupying.
"Betty." An all too familiar voice muttered.
Slowly, Jughead turned her to face him.
She felt faint, for more reasons than one, and she was grateful that he had yet to release her.
He studied her for a moment, then, the smirk he had always been famous for, still more smug than she was used to, spread across his face.
"I forgot how squeamish you are." He mused.
Betty glared at him, and he chuckled, lowering her back into her chair. He reached for the box of Kleenexes she always kept nearby, pulled out a handful, and perched on top of the desk, pressing the wad to her stitches.
They didn't speak as he set to work.
When the bleeding stopped, he threw the tissues into the trash can furthest away from her, and retrieved the bandage, expertly applying the gauze to her cut with quick, but gentle fingertips. Finished, he leaned away from her slightly to admire his handiwork.
Betty finally found the courage to speak. "T-Thank you."
Jughead shrugged, making no moves to get up from the desk. They stared at one another for a few moments, both unsure of what to say.
She couldn't help but ask, though the words that left her mouth did not form the same sentence that had been playing on a loop in her mind since the entire day.
"What are you doing here so late?" She demanded.
He chuckled, the sound darker than she remembered, a far cry from the carefree laugh he'd had when they were kids. "I could ask you the same thing."
The game of back and forth was nothing new; Jughead hardly if ever gave the first answer, he was good at throwing rhetorical questions back at her in response, he always had been.
"I asked you first."
"So?"
She frowned. "So, what are you doing here?"
"What are you doing here?"
"You're looking at the new editor of the Blue and Gold." Betty admitted, growing tired of his old antics.
Jughead tilted his head at her. "Still want to be a writer, Betts?"
The nickname made her want to smile. Almost.
"Your turn." She reminded him. "Why are you here so late?"
He shrugged again. "I guess Weatherbee isn't a big fan of cigarettes on campus."
Betty's eyes narrowed. "Really. Jughead? Smoking?"
He arched an eye brow in her direction, but there was no playful expression on his face. "What are you, my mother?"
"You know what?" She threw her hands upward in surrender, unsure of why she was scolding him in the first place. "Never mind. Do whatever you want."
"I already do." Jughead smirked at her. "But thanks for your permission, Betts, I really appreciate it."
His sarcasm hurt in a way it never had before.
"Whatever." She said again, reaching for the last article the previous Blue and Gold editor had written. She had been re-reading it for inspiration. "I have to get back to work."
She didn't look up to see if he'd left, her eyes already scanning the page.
"How's your head?"
Betty threw the article back down onto her desk, her eyes boring into his own. "You were there."
"I never said I wasn't." Jughead replied simply.
"Archie thinks I'm insane." She told him.
"No offense, Cooper, but I don't really give a shit about what Archie thinks. That's what happens when you stop being friends with someone."
She wasn't sure if the anger in his words was aimed at just Archie, or the both of them, but it stung just the same.
A moment of awkward silence passed between them.
"Are you okay?" He muttered.
Betty nodded, her pony tail swinging as her head bobbed up and down. "It's just a concussion and some stitches."
"Betts, the right side of your face looks like you were mauled by a bear."
"Thanks a lot."
He let his shoulders drop. "When have I not been honest with you?"
When you wouldn't say who you were supposedly protecting me from? She thought.
"What happened?" She demanded instead.
Jughead shot her a strange look. "I was going to ask you the same thing."
"You found me?"
"Yeah."
"Where?" Betty questioned.
"I don't know." He shrugged. "In the woods, I couldn't give you exact coordinates, Betty, it was pretty dark."
"Why were you there?" She inquired.
"Why were you?" Jughead challenged. "All of you, I mean, you, Kev, Archie, Veronica, everyone."
"How did you..." Betty began, shaking her head. "Never mind."
She was done interrogating him, at least for the moment, but as she reached for the article, Jughead caught hold of her wrist, halting her.
"Why were you there, Betty?"
Betty wanted nothing more than to yank her arm back and throw him out of the Blue and Gold office, though the tone of voice he'd used had her automatically ready to give him the answers he wanted. Why he wanted them was only known to himself.
"We were camping."
"Why would you-"
"It was for Jason." Betty admitted, ducking her head to avoid his intense gaze.
Jughead seemed surprised. "You went camping in the same place your friend was found murdered?"
Betty winced, and out of habit, Jughead unconsciously squeezed her arm. When he realized what he had done, he let go of her all together, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans.
Suddenly, the only thing she could see was Jason's dead body, a gun shot to the head, just like the papers had said.
"Betty?"
Tears didn't burn her eyes, she still hadn't cried over the great loss she had apparently suffered, but the familiar feeling of numbness began to seep through her body.
"Shit, Betty." Jughead mumbled. "I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that."
She shook her head, trying to push the image of Jason away. "Why were you there?"
"I'm always there." He told her, for once not playing a million and one guessing games. "It's technically on the Southside."
There it was, another reminder of just how different their lives had become.
Another awkward-filled silence fell between them.
"You really scared me, you know."
Betty finally dared to look at him. She had always been able to tell when he was lying, and he was being one hundred percent honest.
Come on, Cooper. He had said. Wake up.
Open your eyes.
Talk to me.
Another memory hit her. Hard.
It was that girl he hung around with, Toni, Betty thought her name was, it had been her voice, and Jughead's laughter that had first pulled her from the brink of unconsciousness.
Is it another body?
Another body?"
"Jughead?"
"Yeah?"
"What was Toni talking about?" Betty asked.
Jughead raised an eye brow. "What are you talking about, Cooper?"
"When you found me." She said, reaching up to pick at the bandage. It itched like crazy. "Your friend, Toni, she said something about a body?"
He caught hold of her hand before she could peel away the gauze and nearly pass out again, a faraway look crossing his face.
She knew he was about to lie to her.
"A body?" Jughead echoed warily. "Um... I don't remember her saying anything about a body."
"Jughead-"
"You were out of it, Betty." He snapped, his grip on her hand tightening. "You hit your head in some mysterious incident, you lost a lot of-"
"I fell."
He stared at her. "You sure about that?"
Betty's eyes narrowed. "Why would you ask me that?"
"Never mind."
"No, Juggie." She tried to pull away from him, and he let her. "Why did you ask me that? Do you know something I don't?"
Jughead scoffed.
"Jug-"
"Betty." He pronounced carefully, and she could sense how angry he was. "Just drop it."
But she couldn't. Not yet.
Oh no, she was just getting started.
"Why did you leave me, Juggie?"
Jughead stared down at her. "What?"
"Archie said I was alone when he found me." Betty said. Her cheek tingled as she recalled the pattern he had traced across it with his finger. "Where did you go?"
"I saw your friends coming, and I knew you would be safe with them." He responded, his tone strangely strained. "I wasn't far away though."
It was Betty's turn to raise an eye brow. "You were watching us?"
Jughead rolled his eyes. "It wasn't like that, Cooper, I just wanted to make sure you were okay."
Her heart soared for a moment.
Jughead slid off the desk, picking his bag up from off the ground.
"I've gotta go." He said, starting towards the door. "Look, Betty, do you think you can do me a favor?"
"What?"
"Don't change the bandage until you get home." Jughead told her. "Because I won't be here to save you if you try that again."
For a second, but only a second, she forgot herself. She forgot about Cheryl and Reggie, and Chuck and the rest of them, she forgot about being a Vixen, she even forgot about the Blue and Gold. For a second, she and Jughead were still part of the same world, they were still best friends, playing games of tag in the park after school, proofreading one another's papers before they turned them in, and catching a classic movie every Saturday night at the Bijou.
She stuck her tongue out him, the most childish move she could muster, and Jughead smirked back at her, no smugness behind the expression.
But all too soon, reality came crashing down around them, and he turned to leave.
"Jug." She called.
"Yeah?" He answered, not looking at her.
"Thank you." Betty muttered.
He nodded, just barely, and walked out of the Blue and Gold without another word.