The question reverberated in Jughead's mind until he could bear it no longer.

Are you telling me... that this whole relationship with Betty... is a sham?

"No, dingus," he said after a too-long pause in their discussion. "I said I liked some of that relationship stuff. Weren't you listening?"

And Jughead really did mean it this time. The romantic bond he'd established with Betty, however accidental, meant so much more to him now than when it started. All it had taken was a conversation with this weirdo from a parallel universe for him to realize it.

"You can be aromantic and still be in a relationship," the other guy quipped.

Jughead simply gawked at him.

"Wha? Since when?"

"Since always."

The whole idea sounded ridiculous. He tried to imagine a 40-year-old Jughead trapped in a one-sided relationship with a wife or husband he barely cared about. If that's what the other Jughead was describing, then who in their right mind would want that? (Although by the standards of his parents' generation, it would be considered a successful and happy marriage.)

"But why would an aromantic guy want that?" he said, emphasizing the first syllable of aromantic.

"I dunno?" The other Jughead shrugged. "I try not to judge."

"But isn't that a contradiction in terms?"

"Ohhh!" he said. "Says the walking contradiction himself."

"What?"

"At first you're like, 'Betty means the whole world to me,' and then..." Jughead winced internally when he realized this was how he'd been sounding. "And then you're like, 'I never wanted this relationship, but I do it for Betty.' Seriously dude, which one is it? You flip-flop more often than a politician."

"Are you saying I'm confused? Well of course I'm confused! I'm a teenage boy," Jughead said, as if he could convince himself that confusion was something unique to teenagers, as if the adults in Riverdale weren't all equally clueless, as if the whole town was not stuck in its own slow struggle to figure out its identity.

"I never said you weren't. Doesn't mean you can't be aromantic."

"Aargh, stop saying that!"

The other Jughead took a long slow slurp of his slushy ice cube melt, before saying:

"Maybe you're somewhere in the middle. Not quite aro but not quite straight either, which would mean... the universe makes sense again. Hooray!"

If anything, it made a lot less sense to Jughead to be hearing this. But then again, no part of this evening had made much sense in the first place.

"Wait, is that a thing?"

"Sure is. It's called being gray-romantic. Or is that demi-aro? I forget which one is which."

"There's a difference?"

"Oh, you bet there's a difference!" said the other Jughead, before taking a big breath. "There are a lot of different identities and descriptions within the aromantic spectrum. For example, there's the one where attraction changes over time. And another one where you're kinda attracted to people but hate the idea of being in a relationship – so, basically the opposite to what you have now. And that's just scratching the surface. There's even one for when you're not sure what kind of orientation you have, which sounds right up your street, by the way."

"No way is that a thing."

"Why would it not be a thing? I mean, think of it this way. There's no one way to be aro and everyone is different. D'you know we have more words for specific types of aromanticism than the Eskimos have words for snow?"

"You're pulling my leg."

"It's true," he said, pulling a smartphone out of his pocket. "There's this one tumblr that makes flag gifs of them all. I'll show you if you don't—"

"Nono, I believe you!"

"You sure?"

"Yeah, I get it. This is great and all. Aromantics are wonderful and... diverse. But it's just... I don't get is why you guys want to make it a thing. I mean sure, people are complex, and so are relationships, but... why does that have to be a thing? Like, you wanna mark yourself out as an oppressed group of people? And all for what? So you can open yourself up to the kind of rejection and ridicule from others that—"

"Oh, shuddup!" said the other Jughead. "It has nothing to do with being oppressed. We're not an oppressed people. I for one don't have to deal with the same kind of crap the first four letters of LGBT do. Listen man, chances are that no one's gonna oppress you for being aromantic. I almost guarantee they won't oppress you for being ace. If any of your friends have a problem with this, then you need better friends. Seriously."

"I wasn't thinking about my friends per se..."

"Oh, you mean Betty? Because if you think that she would—"

"Leave me? That's a real concern, yes."

"She wouldn't," the other Jughead said. "Because trust me, the Betty I know would love and support her aromantic boyfriend... if indeed she had one."

Of all the things the other guy had said tonight, Jughead found this the hardest to believe. But he had already decided by now that this conversation was going nowhere.

"Actually," said Jughead. "She's probably wondering where I am right now. I mean, I did leave in kind of a hurry."

"Hey, maybe I could go to the party and pretend to be you."

"Or maybe you could not," said Jughead. "No offense, dude. But the only thing that could possibly be more awkward than tonight's conversation would be having to introduce you to my frien—"

Jughead stopped there, because at that moment he looked up from his table to see none other than Veronica Lodge walking in through the big glass door.

The other Jughead turned to follow his gaze. Jughead immediately realized his mistake, and averted his eyes, trying to look inconspicuous. He knew that Veronica could only be here for one reason if she wasn't still at the party with the others: she had come here looking for him.

In a bold defiance of common sense, the other Jughead waved her over with the words:

"We're over here!"

"Oh hey, Jug—" she began, taking a step towards the guy who'd called her over, until she took a few more steps and saw that the other guy was not only wearing his clothes, but that the other guy was also him. "—head?"

Veronica blinked back her disbelief as she drew up to the table, her eyes darting frantically between the two of them, until finally she said:

"Have I met your twin before?"

"We're not twins," the two Jugheads said in unison, and immediately glared at each other.

"Oh my God, that is cute," she said.

"Here we go..." said Jughead, rolling his eyes.

Veronica lowered her tone a bit.

"You guys can relax. I already used up my one twincest joke for this evening on Cheryl."

"Then allow me to introduce myself," said the other Jughead, offering up his hand to shake. "I'm your Jughead's double from a parallel universe. Pleased to meet you, Roni from this universe."

They shook hands.

"I didn't know there were more of me," she said. "So um, pleased to meet you... other Jughead. Did you just confirm the existence of parallel universes by the way?"

"He's been giving me an existential crisis for the last hour," Jughead chimed in. "And that's just the relationship talk."

"Oh, if I'm interrupting anything, I can just—"

"You're not," said the other Jughead. "We literally just finished talking about aromanticism when you came in."

Jughead tensed at this. He hoped the other guy wasn't about to give away his secret.

At the mention of aromanticism however, Veronica's face seemed to light up. Jughead wondered if this was one of her social justice matters that she liked to talk about online. It was a long shot, but if she did happen to know more about the subject than the guy sitting opposite, he wouldn't mind her knowing too.

"Actually Roni, I was wondering if I could ask you something," Jughead said, surprising himself by just how willing he was to talk about it.

"Go on..."

"So, suppose you started dating a guy who told you later on that he was aromantic. How would you react to that?"

"Hmm," she said. "Well, obviously I'd ask them first if they thought our relationship could still work out. I myself would still want to make it work out. But I wouldn't take it personally if it didn't, if that's what you're thinking. Why? Are you thinking you might be—"

"I don't know," said Jughead. "I both am and I am not."

"Right," said Veronica. "And you don't know if Betty will be okay with that?"

Jughead nodded.

"I understand. Completely. Really, if you want me to, I can talk to her myself. I know it shouldn't to come to that though."

"Um, sure but... how do I know if I'm aromantic or not? What if I'm just... straight but bad at relationships?"

"Jug, I wish I could tell you that, but I'm afraid it doesn't work that way." She took a deep breath. "No one can show you your orientation. You have to see it for yourself."

"Did you just quote The Matrix?" the other Jughead chimed in.

"Sure did," said Veronica.

"I think I like this universe's version of Roni."

Jughead the movie buff wanted to point out to both of them that the actual quote was 'No one can be told what the Matrix is,' but he managed to refrain. Instead he said:

"That's great and all, but how exactly am I supposed to... see it for myself?"

Veronica let out a sigh.

"I wish I could tell you it was easy. But honestly, understanding who you are and what makes you tick is hard work. I don't think it's something most people know how to do. And a lot of the time it's just a process of trial and error. But there are resources to help you online. Blogs and stuff. I don't know what'll work best for you. Maybe it's finding other people who share your experience with dating. Or you could look at a long list of terms and see which one fits you most. That actually helped me quite a lot with finding out I was bi."

"The blog with the flag gifs doesn't seem like such a bad idea now, eh?" said the other guy.

Jughead let out an even bigger sigh.

"Great, so an internet gif image is going to show me my true self."

"It's pronounced 'gif'."

"Anyway, you'd be surprised," said Veronica. "You can discover yourself in the strangest of places. I know it sounds silly, but, you know, part of the reason I know I'm bisexual is because of the bi character in The 100."

"You mean Lexa?" the other Jughead asked, nodding sagely.

"No, that was Clarke. Lexa was the one who..."

"Oh right."

"I mean, I still can't believe the writers would just—"

"Hey, no spoilers!" Jughead cut in. Then when the other two stared back at him, he qualified it with: "What? I'm still halfway through season 1."

"Don't worry too much," said Veronica. "The 3rd season is not worth watching."

"Y'see, that in itself is a spoiler. Simply by telling me that the—"

"Oh, shuddup," said the other Jughead, relieved to finally have the excuse to say it back to him.

"Anyway, didn't mean to take us on that diversion," Veronica said, pulling back the conversation. "The whole point is that you don't have to identify as something you don't feel comfortable with. Also, whatever word or phrase clicks with you, doesn't necessarily have to be the way you describe yourself to other people."

"You're telling me I can lie about it?"

"Well, not exactly."

"I gotta be honest with Betty though."

"Look, either way," said other Jughead. "I don't know your Betty, but if you seriously told her you are questioning these things, I think she'd listen. Sure, she might be a bit surprised at first, but the Betty I know would be fine with me being ace, aro, really anything other than straight."

Jughead looked at him like he was simple.

"You're not dating her. That's different."

"No, but I still think you should tell her."

"Why?"

"Because – and listen, this is something I know very little about – but you're supposed to talk about these things with your... significant other, not keep it to yourself and resent them for it because they don't understand."

"Talking to her could mean the end of our relationship. Weren't you listening?"

"Jughead's right," said Veronica.

"Which one?" they said in unison.

"The Jughead sitting to my left. The one from this universe, I mean." Then, to Jughead, she said: "You shouldn't be pressured into talking about these things when you're not ready."

"So if I never am ready... then I never have to tell her. Perfect!"

"All I can say is, when you do tell her, it's probably not as bad as you think it will be."

"Great," said Jughead. "Now can we please talk about something else?"

"Like what?" said the other Jughead. "I don't know about you, but I could do with some milkshakes."

"Well there's actually one thing I wanna ask you," said Veronica, looking at the letter on the other Jughead's shirt.

"Go on..." he said.

"What does the S stand for?"


AN:If you were wondering if that blog really exists, I think the closest thing you're likely to find is pride-color-schemes, which has a mind-boggling database of hundreds of identities, most of which you've never even seen before. The flags on it aren't gifs though. :(

You may also be wondering why this fic focuses so much on the aromantic aspect when seemingly everyone else has been talking about Jughead as asexual. They're both important of course, and while Jughead in the comics is both aro and ace, I feel that few people (outside of a noisy minority) were ever talking about him being aromantic. Fewer people in general seem to talk about aromantic as an thing you can be. And I think there's still a tendency to assume that sexual orientation is the only orientation that matters, and that romance (or rather the lack of it) plays second fiddle.

But to me, the story in Archie Comics (and to a lesser extent, the Riverdale TV show) has always been a story about romantic relationships between teenagers. Sex rarely comes into it, if at all.

Now, it is entirely possible (or dare I say it, important) that Juggie and Betty follow up the conversation they have in the next few chapters by starting another one about what they're comfortable with doing in the bedroom together. But I don't feel that would be a part of this story, nor that I am necessarily qualified to write it. I also don't want to change the age rating of this story for that, as I'd rather keep it accessible to the entire age range of Archie Comics' audience. Remember that for many people, Jughead is the first aromantic character they come across.