At 7:15 am on the dot, Betty unlocked the door to the classroom that served as the Blue & Gold's offices.
It felt somewhat strange to be back at Riverdale High after nearly three months away, especially knowing this was her last-ever first day of school. But the jitters were mixed with excitement. Betty loved learning and the promise of a new year. The smell of autumn smoldering in the air, recycled books with musty, yellowed pages to flip through, fresh notebooks to fill with her neat cursive handwriting.
Betty pulled the sheet off the long wooden desk that ran like an aisle down the middle of the room. Atop it sat several old computers and three green bankers' lamps, the wood coated in a thin layer of dust. Betty brushed off the grime, making sure to also wipe down the shelves of the olive-painted bookcase built into the length of the wall.
She placed the smaller of her two black leather planners on the desk by the window that served as her editor-in-chief's perch, before wandering back toward the blackboard.
After writing a welcome message to the newspaper staff on what would soon become their investigations board, Betty surveyed the room. Her lips quirked up into a satisfied grin. It was good to be back.
There were still some 15 minutes left before the bell for homeroom was set to ring, so Betty decided to head over to the student lounge to meet up with her friends. That was their usual spot most mornings.
Her phone beeped as she exited into the hallway, and she pulled it from the back pocket of her jeans. There was a new message from Jughead. As strained as things had felt between them for the last two days, her heart couldn't help but pulse a little faster when she opened the text.
Jughead: Have a great first day, Betts. Is it okay if I come by tonight? ?
Betty's face melted into a smile. Sunday morning at Pop's had been awkward and tense, and they hadn't seen each other or talked much since, except for a few distracted texts here and there. It was her fault she knew, her mind in a spiral from her friends' pushy comments, Jughead's mounting aggravation at their pressuring, and her own fear over being spotted together and the beans being spilled to the entire school. That worry hadn't totally dissipated, but it had receded enough that she found herself missing Jughead terribly and aching to spend a few quiet hours together, just the two of them.
As she typed out a response returning Jughead's well-wishes and inviting him to come over for dinner after she finished her newspaper meeting, someone bumped into Betty's side. She stumbled forward, teetering for a moment before finding her footing.
"I'm sorry," she chirped automatically, adjusting the now loose straps of her floral backpack. She lifted her chin to come face-to-face with Ethel and Dilton. Doing her best to ignore Ethel's disagreeable pout, she greeted them as politely as she could muster. "Oh, hi, Dilton, Ethel."
"Hi B—" Dilton started to respond, before Ethel shushed him loudly and dragged him away.
Betty frowned, watching as they disappeared down the corridor. That was odd. A sinking feeling filled her stomach. She slipped the phone back into her pocket—her message to Jughead abandoned—and walked toward the student lounge.
She felt a million pairs of eyes on her as she darted across the hall. It was freaking her out. Is there something wrong with what I'm wearing? Betty ducked her head down to examine her clothes. But her straight-leg jeans and frilly, floral cap-sleeve button-down were pristine. No visible stains or tears anywhere. Her new white sneakers were spotless, as well. A laugh sounded and she glimpsed up, but none of the dozens of students loitering around the hallway's taupe-colored lockers would meet her gaze. Betty didn't understand. She shivered, pulling her pale pink cardigan tighter around her frame.
Reaching the double wooden doors that led to the student lounge, Betty exhaled a sigh of relief when she spotted Cheryl, Josie, and Midge splayed out on the well-worn red loveseat.
Betty stepped into the room. "Hey guys," she said with a smile. Her eyes fell to Midge's blue zip front denim miniskirt. "Cute skirt, Midge," she complimented.
Midge's lips quivered, but she said nothing, glimpsing toward Cheryl for instruction.
Betty glanced between Josie and Cheryl next, but both of them looked through her like she was invisible. "What's up?" she squeaked out. She tried her best to keep her voice bright, but her throat felt as tight as a fist.
"Let's go ladies." Cheryl sprang up from the couch as if Betty's presence had somehow contaminated the polyester cushions. "A whorish stench is stinking up the room."
Josie snorted and rose after her.
Midge stood up as well. She blushed and looked down to the carpet, refusing to meet Betty's eyes as the three of them shuffled out of the room without acknowledging her.
Betty gulped down a deep breath of air. Her cheeks stung as if she'd been slapped. The other students in the room looked away, snickering, but no one spoke to her, not even when she searched their faces for some clue. A lump welled in her throat. Don't start to cry, she ordered herself. Not in front of them all. Swallowing, Betty rushed back toward the hallway, her stomach twisted in knots. In her scramble, she knocked into Kevin just outside the doors to the lounge, nearly losing her balance and toppling to the tiled concrete.
Kevin grabbed her by the shoulder to hold her upright before quickly letting go and jumping a few feet away.
"What is going on, Kev?" she hissed quietly, as yet another person sniggered in her direction. "Why is everyone acting so weird?"
"Rumors got out about you and Jughead." Kevin grimaced when he saw a group of sophomores gawking at her and murmuring in low voices. He pretzeled past Betty toward the vending machine. "Sorry."
Betty stood paralyzed, gaping at Kevin's retreating form as she tried to process. But lingering too long in one place only prompted more stares and hushed whispers. Her feet lifted and she hurried to her locker, doing her best to keep her gaze directed to the floor. Unfortunately, it was impossible to miss the creepy leer Reggie shot her, followed by a lewd gesture involving his fist and a hollowed-out cheek, or the sound of Moose chuckling to a fellow Bulldog about when her next shift at the Ho Zone was.
Betty's cheeks flushed darkly. Dating a guy from the Southside somehow meant she was now working at the town strip club? Betty harrumphed. What a ridiculous assertion.
Her footsteps slowed as she arrived at her locker. A not insignificant crowd was gathered outside it, tittering loudly. She couldn't see much beyond the sea of bodies, but Archie's flaming red hair against the row of metal was unmistakable.
"It's not coming off, Ronnie," he grunted, tossing what looked like a wet wad of bathroom paper towels to the ground.
"Scrub harder, Archiekins," Veronica demanded.
The crowd parted when they noticed Betty and suddenly her view of her locker was unobstructed. Written in menacing, bright red letters on it were the words "Serpent Slut."
Her body went rigid, then cold. She froze in place, her racing heartbeat ringing in her ears.
"I don't think it's paint, Ron," Archie murmured, his hazel eyes wide with panic.
A gasp escaped Betty's throat before she could stop it.
Veronica turned toward her at the sound. Her face dropped. "B, shit."
The frantic need to disappear seizing control of her body, Betty spun around and sprinted as fast as she could back to the Blue & Gold offices. She collapsed against the desk, one hand on her chest as she struggled to breathe. Why? Why? Why?
Betty startled at the soft tap of the door opening and closing gently behind her. When she looked up, Veronica loomed before her.
"B, are you okay?"
Betty's eyes screwed shut. She jerked her head back and forth, hoping this was all some sort of nightmare she might wake up from. But when she blinked open her eyes and saw Veronica's concerned expression, the morning's events came rushing back to her like a tidal wave.
"All this because I'm dating Jughead?" she managed to stutter out. It didn't make sense.
Veronica winced. "Well, not just."
Betty swallowed, trying to understand. Her nails dug into the scuffed wood of the desk to keep from nestling into her palms. "What do you mean?"
Veronica toyed with the velvet black ribbon at the collar of her scalloped halter neck dress, not quite meeting Betty's eyes. "The rumor is you were on your knees at Pop's pleasuring him behind the counter."
"I—what?"
"Ethel told Ginger Lopez that she saw you wiping saliva off your chin when she and Dilton arrived."
Betty gawped at Veronica. This had to be a joke. In what world would she do something like that so indiscreetly, in the middle of Jughead's shift at work no less? How could anyone believe that?
"We were just kissing a little when they came in…I wasn't…I wouldn't do that…" The words felt heavy on her tongue, like she couldn't steer them in the direction she meant to, let alone shape them into a satisfactory explanation.
"I know you wouldn't." Veronica's brown eyes were soft with understanding. "But this is the risk you take when…" She paused.
"When what?"
Veronica folded her arms over her chest. "Come on, B, you had to at least have been somewhat prepared for something like this to happen."
Betty's cheeks flushed, her eyes bugging even further out of her head. "To be slut-shamed by the entire school for something I didn't even do?"
A grimace formed on Veronica's lips. "Okay, maybe not that. But some backlash."
Betty tugged at her ponytail, her mind racing, trying to make sense of the disparate threads of information. "It's been two days since Ethel saw us." She squared her gaze at Veronica. "This rumor has been spreading since then?"
Veronica nodded. "It's been making the rounds all weekend."
"And you didn't think to warn me, V?"
Veronica blanched guiltily, but her voice took on a defensive edge. "Because you've been so honest with me, B?"
A chill ran down Betty's spine. "What's that supposed to mean?"
Veronica pursed her plum-painted lips together and appraised her. "Tell me the truth." Her gaze on Betty was intent. "Have you had sex with him?"
Betty gnawed at her bottom lip, but she couldn't lie. "Yes," she whispered.
Veronica's eyes narrowed, but she didn't look angry at the revelation so much as wounded. It took her a few moments to collect herself, but when she did, her voice was laced with hurt. "How could you not tell me you lost your virginity to him, B?" Veronica's jaw trembled. "We're supposed to be best friends."
A hot rush of shame flared on Betty's cheeks. "I'm sorry, V." She bit deeper into her lip. "It's just, I know how much you guys don't seem to like Jughead and I—"
"I'd still want to know, Betty," Veronica cut her off with an exasperated sigh.
Her full name on Veronica's tongue felt like a punch to the gut. Betty flinched, her gaze falling to examine the shiny brown concrete floor. "I'm sorry," she repeated, helplessly.
Veronica shook her head. "Have you ever asked yourself why if you're so into this guy, you always seem to be sneaking around and lying about being with him?"
Tears welled in Betty's wide green eyes. Her fingernails curled into her palms. She had no answer.
"Whatever," Veronica scoffed. "Forget it." She turned on her black ballerina heels and stalked out of the room.
Betty shuddered at the harsh bang of the door. The tears pricking her eyes fell before she could stop them, and she dug her nails into her skin as sharply as possible, until she felt the sweet relief of blood trickling over her palms. Betty whimpered as the pain overtook her, crumpling against the desk with a sob.
Betty blew the loose strands of hair out of her face, staring down at the prompt for her AP History midterm essay due in late October. With nothing better to do, she'd decided to get a head start.
On a normal Friday night after the Bulldogs' first football scrimmage of the year, she'd be out with her friends at Reggie's annual back-to-school party. Not sitting at the desk in her bedroom, and definitely not still dressed in the yellow-and-white raglan t-shirt and navy blue athletic shorts that comprised her Vixen workout outfit, her hair yanked out of its typical ponytail and falling limply around her shoulders.
But nothing was normal right now.
It wasn't that she'd been disinvited from the party so much as that her presence was clearly unwelcome. The bullying and stares she'd experienced the first day of school had continued apace all week. The rest of the River Vixens were barely speaking to her, giving her the freeze when she sat at their regular lunch table in the cafeteria and making snide comments under their breaths at practice. Betty's shoulders shivered against the back of her white wicker desk chair, the whispered giggles of "whore" and Cheryl's accusation that her slumming it with a "Southside guttersnipe" was ruining the routine still echoing in her ears hours later. The only reason she'd been able to bear it was Veronica's half-hearted attempts to tone the other girls down.
A soft tap at her window startled her from her thoughts. Betty whirled around to see Jughead, his fingers pressed flat against the glass. Vomit lodged in her throat. She'd been sending monosyllabic answers to his texts all week, too distraught and overwhelmed to indulge in his requests to see her. But it seemed Jughead wasn't planning to wait around any longer.
Her knees wobbling, she rose from her desk to pull open the window pane.
"Hey there, Juliet. Nurse off duty?"
His boyish smile was so adorable, it made Betty's heart hurt. So did the sweet literary reference. It was like a dagger cutting patterns into her skin.
Betty's body shook with a burst of suppressed anger, but Jughead climbed past her into the room before she could say anything to stop him.
"What are you doing here?" she finally asked as he brushed a few specks of dirt off his jeans.
"I can't want to spend time with my girl?" Jughead offered her a lopsided grin. "You've been like a ghost this week. Maybe I should have made a Hamlet reference instead?"
Betty's lips inadvertently ticked up, but in an instant she tamped them back down into a frown. "Why didn't you text to say you were coming?"
Jughead laughed. "Should I climb down to text you and then climb back up?"
"Don't be ridiculous, Jughead," she scolded.
"I'll go if you're busy. I just missed you." Jughead took a step toward her. "It's been a really shitty week and I wanted to see you." His hand lifted up to her cheek to pull her in for a kiss, but Betty flinched and stepped backwards, her shoulder knocking against the bedpost.
Jughead stared at her, a little shocked. Hurt flashed in his eyes. "Is something the matter?"
Betty swallowed the impulse to bury her face in his soft cotton t-shirt and ask him why his week had been so bad. Her throat felt dry, tight and strangled. Her next words came out as a snarl.
"You shouldn't barge in here like this." Her fingers toyed with the hem of her shirt, twisting it into a knot. "What if I was out or someone was here?"
Jughead's jaw tensed. "I'm sorry." There was an unapologetic forcefulness to his voice, like the sharp edge of a knife. "I didn't think it was that big of a deal."
Betty chewed at her bottom lip, turning away so he wouldn't see the tears springing to her eyes. Her fingers unconsciously clenched into her palms.
Jughead's eyes constricted, noticing her balled-up fists. "What are you doing?"
"Nothing."
She tried to step away from him, but Jughead boxed her into the wall and pried open her hands. His lips pursed open when he saw the crescent moon-shaped lacerations. The fresh ones, obviously, but half a dozen older, faded scars, too. He stared at them before forcing her to meet his gaze. Betty flushed as he studied her intently. Those marks were ugly. She was ugly. But no matter how shattered inside she knew she was, she had never wanted him to think that about her. Her head ducked down in shame.
"Betty?" he questioned. His eyes were wide with concern now.
"It's nothing. It's not important."
Jughead swallowed, his thumb tracing over her knuckles. "Do you do that a lot?"
"Sometimes." She looked away, adding in a hushed murmur. "When I'm anxious."
"Did something happen?"
"No," she lied.
Jughead's voice dropped to a harsh whisper. "Well clearly something did if it's enough for you to be hurting yourself."
Betty shrank away from him. But his blue eyes were as dark as the night sky, demanding an answer.
"People at school found out about us," she eventually relayed.
"Okay?" he prompted.
"They didn't take it well."
Jughead stared at her impatiently, punctuating each word. "What happened?"
It took her a few moments to speak, her phrases halting. But she told him as much as she could without bursting into sobs—the bullying, the name-calling, the graffiti on her locker that the school administrators had made her stay after class on Tuesday to help the janitor clean off.
Jughead's nostrils flared when she stuttered out the words "Serpent slut." Betty's eyes immediately locked shut, steadying herself. She couldn't remember ever seeing him so pissed, not even in the immediate aftermath of Chuck suckerpunching him at Cheryl's party.
"They painted that on your locker?" he repeated after her. He looked like he wanted to bash a hole through her pink and cream floral wallpaper.
Betty hesitated. "It wasn't paint." She took a deep breath, before adding quietly, "Mr. Svenson said he thought it was pig's blood."
Jughead jerked his chin in disbelief. "Wow." He chuckled without humor. "I'm shocked a Northsider has even seen Carrie to take inspiration from it."
Betty made a face and perched on the edge of her bed, her arms folded protectively around herself. She wasn't at all in the mood for Jughead's usual reflex of responding to any given situation with sarcasm or film references.
Jughead took a seat beside her. "I'm sorry." He pulled off his beanie and ran his fingers through his hair. "I just—that's fucked up. Shit, Betty. Why didn't you tell me sooner?"
She shrugged, choking on the lump in her throat and unable to answer.
Jughead tentatively slid his arm around her, holding her close. Betty let herself ease into his embrace, burrowing her face into his neck and inhaling his cool pine scent to keep from crying.
"Hey, I know it sucks right now, but it'll pass." His hand lifted to stroke her hair as she shuddered against him. "It's just stupid gossip. They'll get tired of it and move on."
Betty's head rose up slowly, her lips twitching as their eyes met. "What if they don't?"
Jughead's grip on her shoulder tightened. "Then fuck them. This is between you and me Betty, not the rest of the fucking world. Who cares what they think?"
"I do," she admitted in a small voice.
She searched his eyes as they narrowed into slits. A sudden but perceptible change seemed to come over him, like a barricade coming up, almost as if he were steeling himself from her. It frightened Betty.
Jughead broke his hold on her and sprang up from the bed. "What exactly are you saying?"
She swallowed, unsure of how to verbalize it. "Maybe we should…I don't know…maybe if we just cool it for a little while."
"Cool it," he repeated. His voice was an icicle, enough to make Betty shiver.
"Just not be so intense," she murmured.
"Intense?" Jughead barked out a laugh. "What's intense? Being together?"
"I'm not saying we should take a break." Betty fingered a daisy on her floral-patterned quilt in frustration. The words weren't coming out like she wanted. "We can still date, but—"
"But I can't be your official boyfriend, is that it?" he cut in angrily over her. "Because dating a Southside guy exclusively would taint your perfect little image?"
"No, that's not what I said." Betty sat up abruptly, her eyes flaming. "Don't twist my words around."
"Tell me how you envision it, then." Jughead began to pace in circles on the carpet. "We don't hang out in public at all, but you can still call me for a quick fuck behind the bleachers whenever you're horny?" His eyes blazed into hers. "Hey, he's Southside scum, but at least he gets you off, right?"
Her face reddened at his crassness, her mind searching frantically for what to say to mitigate his fury.
"It's me, Jug, okay? You didn't do anything wrong. It's just been so awful at school." Betty glanced up at him with pleading eyes. "You don't understand the pressure I'm under."
But Jughead wasn't moved. He snickered, the noise completely devoid of mirth. "Oh, I get it." His lips quirked up, smirking nastily at her. "You just care more about being homecoming queen than being with me."
"Jug, that's not—"
"It is," he steamrolled over her. "Which is fucking pathetic." He jabbed the beanie back onto his head and stalked toward the window. His neck twisted back long enough to glower at her. "You're pathetic."
A lump swelled in her throat, desperation latching hold of her. "Juggie, please just listen—"
He turned toward her with a sneer. "I should have known better than to take up with some conceited Northside princess. You're all the same."
Betty's entire body trembled, frozen at his outburst. She didn't recognize this version of him. The boy standing across from her was cold and cruel, not the soft and understanding Jughead she thought she knew. But they were a matching set. Because all the ugliest parts of herself were on display now, too, making it that much harder not to believe she was deserving of his rough treatment. She had acted objectively terribly. She hadn't listened to any of her friends' warnings and she'd hid the truth from Jughead for so long and now everything was completely fucked up and she didn't know what was right or what was left. Betty's head was spinning in circles. She felt nauseous. She could barely meet his eye or even look at him.
When she glanced up from the carpet, she saw Jughead idling by the window. He was staring at her, rapt, as if still expecting some sort of denial to his spiteful accusation. Even worse, though, was the brokenness buried underneath the raging storm in his blue eyes. It was begging her to fix this, to fight with him to stay. It had been there all night, Betty realized. But she couldn't bring herself to reach out to that part of him. She didn't know if there even existed a band-aid to make everything better. Nothing felt right.
"I'm sorry, Jughead," was all she could think to say. It was poor consolation.
Jughead shook his head. "Fuck you, Betty."
Water welled in her eyes as he stormed out her window. For a minute, she almost believed he'd regret it and climb back in, but when she heard the roar of his motorcycle engine coming to life, she knew it was over. The teardrops streamed down her cheeks, hard and fast and unrelenting.
She had no idea what to do now except call Veronica.
It took several rings, but finally she answered. "B?"
"I know you're mad at me," Betty hiccuped through her tears, "but I need you. Please come here."