School the following week was torment. Sweet Pea had to act like Archie Andrews hadn't just tried to murder his little sister. He knew, deep down, that Archie panicked when he heard the motorcycles. However, that did not give him a get out of jail free card for throwing his sister into the pool. They hadn't even heard the splash or scream – if she had screamed – and Sweet Pea was kicking his own ass for wasting time checking upstairs and in different parts of the house for his sister. It was Jughead who glanced out of the back window and saw her flailing limbs. It was game over for Archie at that point.
Now they were back in school. Sweet Pea a senior and Betty a junior. It was too much to hope for them to share the same classes when Sweet Pea was a whole grade above her. But he went to the games she cheered at – mainly football – and she had been at Archie's game on Friday night. How the prick still got to play football after an attempted murder made Sweet Pea's blood boil, but he and the Serpents were working on it.
Jughead and FP had been adamant about not bringing the obsession to any more publicity than it already had. Archie's goons on the football team knew he liked Betty but didn't know how deep that obsession ran. So, Hal and Sweet Pea had decided to follow their leader's lead on this. Maybe FP had an answer that they hadn't yet thought of.
Whatever the case, Sweet Pea was going to annihilate Archie if he so much as breathed in her direction. The bell rang just then, dismissing them for morning break, and Sweet Pea made a beeline with Joaquin to the Blue and Gold. It was where they and all their friends met for the morning break. It used to be the quad but ever since Archie had taken to harassing Betty outside, they moved into the Blue and Gold which had a lock on the door from the inside.
Making their way down the hallways, Sweet Pea used his height advantage to look over the sea of students. Betty wasn't anywhere to be seen nor was a ginger judas. And that didn't sit right with Sweet Pea. He hurried down the hallways, elbowing some people out of his way in his rush. A guy shouted at him, and he flipped the bird, not so much as stopping to apologize. The tool would get over it.
Reaching the Blue and Gold, he threw the door open frantically, breathing a sigh of relief when he saw Betty and Jughead typing away at the computers. Betty looked up, laughing quietly the next minute. "I came in here last period, Sweets."
"I just didn't see Archie outside," he said, feeling his heartrate return to normal.
Jughead flickered his eyes to him and then back to the computer screen. "He's running suicides with the rest of the football team. Something about their grades being dismal."
Sweet Pea snickered quietly to himself. One of the best things about having Betty as his sister meant that his grades weren't bad. Betty tutored him in whichever subject was posing as a challenge for him.
Betty grinned smally and then looked at Joaquin. "How's Kev?"
"He's good," Joaquin replied, playing with the cigarette behind his ear. It wasn't allowed on school grounds, but he nor Sweet Pea had ever been one to follow the rules. At least Joaquin didn't smoke it. Well, at least while he was at school. There was a new cigarette there at the start of each morning. "He wants to go on date night this weekend, but he also wants to see you."
Betty smiled tenderly. "Take him on a date, Quin. I can see him around your schedule."
"You got it, doll," Joaquin replied with a warm smile. It wasn't often that the Serpents were soft for anyone, but if they were, it was always for Betty.
"I think we've reached a good stopping place," Jughead said, stretching his arms above his head. Betty hummed and together they shut down their computers. Betty turned to Sweet Pea.
"I have cheer practice tonight, but I'll catch a ride home with Ronnie," she said.
Sweet Pea frowned. "Can't Cheryl reschedule that?"
"No," she sighed. "We've got the game on Friday and the pep rally. We've got to be performance ready."
"Okay," Sweet Pea said. He knew better than to question Cheryl's practices, but he hated the fact that he and the other guys would be at a Serpent's meeting that night. He'd feel much more comfortable if they gave her a ride home.
Jughead spoke up just then. "Don't leave Cheryl or Ronnies' sides. Ride with one of them and carry your mace on you when you're walking to whichever one's car."
"I will," Betty assured him, nodding at Sweet Pea the next moment, and he felt some of his anxiety abating.
"Come on," he said. "Let's go to our lockers and grab our stuff for after break. I want to get some coffee from the lounge."
Their student lounge was one of the best rooms on campus and Sweet Pea loved spending time there. They walked to their lockers, which placed Jughead and Betty next to each other, and Sweet Pea across the hall, and they started working on their combinations. Betty gasped quietly the next minute, and Sweet Pea was at their sides in an instant. He looked down and spotted the decapitated baby doll with a locket around its stomach.
Growling, he nodded at Jughead, who walked Betty away from her locker, and he looked at the doll. There was a note on the back, and he flipped it over.
Riddle me this:
What has two legs but only one heart that beats endlessly for one soul?
One, two,
I'm coming for you.
He crushed the paper in his hand, seeing bloodshed.
Archie Andrews was a dead man walking.