I'm very excited about this story as well, and I'll keep it short and sweet:
I hope you enjoy!
(and if you're just arriving, I'm almost afraid to tell you that there are eight prequels to this one... so, um, I hope you enjoy those as well! :-D)
-Button
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Not nearly far enough in the future...
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Brand caught just a flash of FP reaching to yank him down.
Too slow, old man.
Brand was already in motion; he slammed FP to the floor and started maneuvering him across the slick marble.
"Behind the desk. Get behind the desk. There's a door; we can get out without being seen. But we need to be behind the desk," Brand spoke directly into FP's ear as screams threatened to deafen everyone in the building.
FP must have heard and understood, because suddenly they were behind the desk and crouching in tandem.
The screams were falling silent, replaced by fearful gasps and panting, but thankfully no shots had been fired. Yet.
"Should we try to help-," FP started to say something stupid.
Saying anything at all in this moment was supremely stupid.
Brand grabbed FP and clamped a hand over his mouth. "Shhhh."
FP seemed to get it together then. His shoulders dropped and his breathing evened out.
Yeah. It was time to remain calm and to do their best to outrun the bear. Helping anyone else came second.
Even as he thought that, a lithe form flashed through Brand's peripheral vision.
He was dressed in black from head to toe, toting something that looked like a stupidly theatrical, over-the-top gun that nobody should be wielding outside of a comic book movie.
Brand felt every muscle in his body tense. He placed his mouth next to FP's ear again, wishing that the screaming was still providing cover for anything they needed to communicate. "Are you prepared to be taken hostage?"
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Shortly after the tour's abrupt end; present day.
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Brandon shoved a plate toward FP. "Eat. The family resemblance is getting more disturbing by the day."
The plate skidded across the kitchen island.
The island where yet more had gone terribly wrong.
Well, add it to the list of sins that they were being held to account for.
FP rubbed his eyes. This tallying of missteps and wrongs done had become overwhelming, and at this point the acts of self-flagellation were just making him numb.
There was no chance of further guilt inspiring new motivation or positive change.
There was, however, every chance of it inspiring him to throw that plate at Brandon's head.
Or turning on his heel, leaving his work and commitments behind, and finding a stiff drink.
FP felt his stomach tighten. Maybe it was with hunger. But at least it felt like something tangible, something real.
More self-flagellation, maybe. But what else could he do?
This was what Jughead wanted. And his reasons were sound.
FP stopped rubbing his eyes and regarded Brandon wearily.
"Wipe that look off your face, old man. Eat." Davies knocked one fist on the kitchen island for emphasis. "As long as we've got his dogs, you know as well as I do that this is not the whole story."
Brandon's expression hardened as he repeated his overused-to-the-point-of-being-pathetic theory: "He's there under duress and the minute we figure out the pressure points and release 'em, he's coming home. For good. No Rose, no Southside, no FBI. Just highschool. And his dogs, his camera, and his books."
It was the dream. A pipe dream. So far removed from the reality they'd experienced that FP wanted to roll his eyes.
Almost as much as he wanted to believe it, pick up a fork, and prepare himself for what Brandon kept assuring him was inevitable: a breaking point where Jug would tell them an impossibly compelling, understandable story explaining why he'd gone home with his mother and refused to return to the Northside.
At least custody was not an issue. When FP considered how much worry he'd wasted on that specter, it was almost amusing. In all that time he'd never once thought of the possibility that Jug would simply wake up one morning and recognize what had been done to him. What had been taken from him.
That no amount of 'making up for lost time' could ever actually give him that time back.
It had taken just the space of a week, too. One lousy week of disasters, and the grave mistakes of creating a cover story where FP and Brandon would revive their old vices for show.
Brandon had always said that a cover story really happened, even if it was fake. They had actually intimidated Jughead, bullied him, and pushed him around on the tour.
A teenager's brain, Davies had declared solemnly but far too late to be helpful, was always going to struggle to make meaning of his caregivers turning on him in that manner - and without a full debrief, it was quite likely to hit Jughead with all of the trauma of it having been real.
Dax had been conveniently willing to play hero, taking Jug under his wing - and then betraying him. It didn't help that Dax had done so without beating Jughead or putting him through months of terror and isolation, either. He was a stark reminder not only of what Brandon had done to Jughead, but also of how much worse Brandon had been at every step along the way.
The plot had unfolded bizarrely, confusingly, and been muddied by the band drama and the roadies' strike - and a murder-suicide that they now knew Jughead had witnessed, and that they suspected Gladys had somehow orchestrated.
They didn't know how much Jughead had seen. They didn't know how much Jughead knew. They were pretty sure that he was completely in the dark about his mother's ties to the tour activity in any capacity, let alone Gladys' proclivity for being at the center of the action for quite a rap sheet of criminal activity and violence - while always, always, maintaining plausible deniability.
But they could not be sure of even that much. Because when it had mattered most, both FP and Brandon had been too late.
Gladys had somehow shown up before them, saved the day, and she had claimed the prize: she'd taken their boy home with her.
And now, according to social media, they were putting up a Christmas tree. They were all smiles, and even though Jughead had prominent dark smudges under both eyes in the photo, that wasn't out of character for him at the best of times.
Which this was not.
Was Richard behind the camera? So far, FP hadn't heard so much as a whisper about his ex's new spouse, which seemed like an increasingly conspicuous omission with each passing day.
"How about this?" Brandon asked more caustically, apparently losing patience with FP. "You eat or I will go tell Sweet Pea there's food to be had in the kitchen. Then it'll all be over for breakfast."
Or lunch. FP had made a slow start on the day, figuring that if he made his afternoon meeting it would be enough to keep things going.
It was less than a week until Christmas. Nobody was doing much work anyway.
"Give it to him." FP was roused by the mention of their houseguests, a.k.a. their 'ankle monitor' and his retinue.
Tim had moved in with them, along with Sweet Pea and Finn, at SAC Wilson's request. Her very firm request.
'They aren't safe,' Wilson had said after the dust had settled and the pat murder-suicide had stopped looking quite so pat. There were crime scene details that Wilson had refused to share, but that made her very concerned about Jughead's wellbeing, too, which was frankly horrifying - and a maddening omission that was swiftly destroying what had previously been a strong working relationship between the SAC and FP.
'You are the only person the Southsiders really can't touch right now, for a lot of reasons,' Wilson had gone on to explain. And, sure, the recent chaos in the Southside had led to a renewal of efforts to get the Serpent King back. 'Only he could right the wrongs,' and so on.
But FP knew what Tim was really there for and he could see it in the man's oh-so-unbelievably-casual demeanor.
FP and Brandon had pulled one too many stunts, and everyone could tell that they were at a breaking point with the current situation.
They could not be trusted. They could not be left to their own devices.
They needed a guardian the same way Sweet Pea and Finn did.
And so there were five people living in the house. And three dogs.
"You can say his name." Brandon sounded weary now, as though he was just going through the motions and didn't really think he was ever going to get through to FP on this subject. "He's just a kid."
Well, wasn't that a cute way of putting it.
FP felt anger rise in him and he snapped a retort: "Jughead is a kid. Sweet Pea is a menace."
And when FP shoved his chair away from the kitchen island and turned to leave the house - go to his meeting - he felt nothing at all when he realized that Sweet Pea was standing right there, at the top of the staircase, his arms wrapped protectively around himself and his expression stricken.
FP left the house without hesitating, and without another word.
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Jughead smiled again, hoping the expression was not strained, as his mother looked up from where she was rolling out the sugar cookie dough she'd sliced out of the plastic sleeve.
She was making an effort. That was everything, Jughead reminded himself. She hasn't had intensive months to get used to parenting, the way his dad had. She was playing catch-up, and Jughead needed to be patient.
That was one of the reasons why he wasn't whipping up a batch of cookies from scratch, or even adding lemon zest to the prepackaged cookie dough.
Every time Jughead said or did anything like that, his mother got a look in her eye like he was insulting her. Putting on airs, maybe.
Probably.
After all, she'd taken one look at Jughead's backpack full of clothing and basics and said, tightly and full of judgment: "Nice bag."
There had been complete silence after that while Jughead gathered his things.
Or there would have been, if he hadn't been choking back sobs.
Gladys had watched him stumble around Ben's body, grabbing his belongings and trying to wipe at least some of the spray of blood off of himself.
Jughead wasn't sure if his mother had noticed what stopped him in his tracks: a crime scene style silhouette of his own body on the carpet, outlined in a hot, sticky wash of blood.
Richard had been the one who had burst into the hotel room and pulled Ben - Ben's body - off of Jughead. Richard had ordered the teen to gather his things. Then he had almost-silently whispered something about Jughead's mother and her well-being.
It was Richard who had stepped in once more when Jughead's choked sobs had stopped abruptly. It had been involuntary: he'd realized that he was looking at the blood equivalent of a snow angel; he'd had a fleeting ghost of a thought that he was way beyond being 'red-handed.' And then his body had simply refused to move.
"Your mother misses you. Go with her to the car, and don't stop for anything." Richard had issued the orders while he'd stripped off a trenchcoat and thrown it at Jughead so hard that the impact made a loud smacking sound. "Take off your shirt first or you'll be paying to replace that."
Jughead had been jolted back into action by the heavy coat slamming into his midsection. The blood was thankfully almost all on his back, so the coat wasn't destroyed. At least, not yet.
It has not survived the trip back to Riverdale and the Southside, where his mother and Richard apparently had a new place. Or another place, maybe.
Ben had bled a lot. When Jughead had gone to take off the trenchcoat, its lining peeled with it a dried sheen of blood that he had not realized still covered most of his back and shoulders.
Jughead had rummaged in his bag and then handed Ben what he hoped was an appropriate amount of cash from the wallet that he still possessed - and the supplies Brand and his dad had given him when he'd needed to disappear into the night from their home in Riverdale.
Richard hadn't complained about the amount, at least, so that was good.
Gladys hadn't commented, either, though she had watched intently as Jughead folded the remaining money and replaced it in the wallet that Brand had bought him.
All of that might be as simple as Jughead looking like he had a little more money. That couldn't be comfortable for his mother, who knew that he'd gone hungry sometimes - both before and after she'd left his dad.
Maybe she wondered if Jughead was involved in illegal activities that gave him so much cash. That would explain her stare, and also the worried frown she gave him.
It would also explain the once over when Jughead had gotten dressed the next morning in clothing that, he was now very aware, Brand had purchased for him.
At least the last article he'd written and sent to the magazine had been amazing, and Jughead had gotten to thank his mother profusely for setting up the whole opportunity with the publication and the tour. That seemed to help smooth over some of the awkwardness.
But Richard was bad news, Jughead was increasingly sure of it. His comments about Gladys needing Jughead, and his veiled prognostications about what could happen if Jughead abandoned her again might be sincerely protective... but they could also be read as threats.
Jughead could not ignore them. He was not completely certain, but the man might have shoved him down the steps and caused the injury that - finally - led to a diagnosis of his thyroid issue.
He might be dangerous to Gladys too, vows or no vows.
Jughead needed to find out for sure, and until he was completely certain, he could not leave.
Or upset Richard.
Or upset his mother.
It was imperative.
And after everything his dad had done to reconnect with Jughead, and after everything Brand had done to redeem their relationship's beginning, and after the scores of investments that so many had made in Jughead (Archie, Betty, Agent Quinn, Mr. Andrews, Sheriff Keller, to name only a few), Jughead owed it to his mother and to all of them: he needed to pay it forward.
If it was humanly possible, he needed to make things right for his mother.
It would help if he didn't suck quite so badly at it.
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Archie grinned as his dad threw the tennis ball again for Vegas. "Looking good."
"Thanks!" Fred flexed his biceps with a teasing smile. "I'll be competitive with you in no time."
"Yeah-huh," Archie replied dryly, still grinning. "I do think your knee is healing up great, though. I didn't expect you to be back out here this quickly."
"Motivational posters have got nothing on the experience of getting a phone call from Brand Davies," Fred replied, his dry tone an echo of his son's. "At least three lives flashed before my eyes: yours, mine, and-,"
"Yeah. I know," Archie said quickly before his father could name Jughead and, no doubt, get that look in his eye again. Like, Archie got it already: people were concerned that Jughead was with his mother.
They were kind of missing the forest for the trees, though. Jughead wasn't missing or in danger. He was all over his mom's Facebook page, celebrating Christmas like they were starring in a Hallmark movie. If one were set in the Southside, anyway.
And okay, Gladys was super tough and Archie wasn't an idiot: the adults didn't trust Richard as far as they could throw him. But expecting Jughead to graciously extend just a tiny bit of shared custody to his mother over a major holiday was no reason to mope. Or go on a hunger strike. Or declare DEFCON 1.
So his father, Jughead's dad, and Brand, respectively, really needed to calm down.
And maybe try being festive or something with the family and friends who weren't currently catching up with an estranged parent?
Not to put too fine a point on it or anything.
"Have you spoken with your mother?" Fred asked, not even attempting to be casual.
It was both awesome and annoying that they were back on good terms now, talking about basically everything and reading each other's thoughts.
"So. Veronica wants to come over and decorate the tree with us. She says it's romantic." Archie gave his dad an emphatically casual look of his own to signal that he was fully aware that he was changing the subject - and wanted his father to respect that.
"It would probably be a lot more romantic without me looking over your shoulders." Fred smiled in puzzlement, but at least he was playing along for the moment. "You're sure that's what you want?"
"Ask her. She said with Alice and her mom it was all about 'aesthetics' and 'balance' and crap. Ronnie wants a, uh-," Archie fumbled for his phone and located the text message. "Here it is. 'A casual tree trimming experience, with family and sweaters and eggnog.' Oh, and she mentioned Bing Crosby."
"I hear he's expensive to get," Fred deadpanned.
Archie grinned again. "Five bucks says she won't touch any eggnog either. I think she just wants a fire in the fireplace and the experience of putting ornaments on a tree without someone rearranging them afterwards."
"Well. That can be arranged." Fred smirked over his own pun. He inhaled as if to say something else, but then hesitated long enough that it was clear that whatever he had in mind, Archie wasn't going to like it.
Which sort of narrowed it down to one possibility.
"Dad?" Archie headed him off, feeling his stomach clench but knowing this was probably as good a moment as he was going to get for biting the bullet.
"Yeah?" Fred looked nervous.
Somehow that nervous expression made Archie feel more sure of himself - more generous - and more motivated to give his dad the 'Bing Crosby' equivalent to Veronica's request.
"Do you want to invite Mom? Do the whole thing up right, like old times? With her decorating sugar cookies and everything?"
Archie watched his father's expression clear completely, for what might have been the first time since Archie had declared his intention to go on tour.
So it was totally worth it, even if his mother was probably going to be awkward and intrusive and overly mothering in ways she had not yet begun to earn. Just like she'd been on tour.
"Are you sure you want that?" Fred asked the question again, with a nearly identical puzzled expression. "It's been just us for a while. So maybe our tradition is more of-,"
"Let's face it: neither of us can make a decent sugar cookie, Dad. They might as well be play dough." Archie held his dad's gaze until Fred's shoulders relaxed.
"All right, then. I will call her tonight." Archie's dad smiled and could not hide his excitement. "Let's work out the whole schedule if we can. Is there a particular night that Veronica had in mind?"
Archie consulted the text messages and they began to strategize.
And, mercifully, Fred's expression stayed cloud-free.
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Betty grimaced.
"Elizabeth! The photographer said that she thinks the red one is better. But I thought the green-,"
"Your eyes look amazing in the green," Betty shouted back the answer that she knew her mother wanted to hear - and which she had heard from Betty at least five times in the last hour - from where she was elbow deep in her closet, searching for a dress that she was starting to believe she had dreamed up.
If Betty was remembering correctly, she had bought it the previous year, after finding it buried in a heap of clearance items when the seasons changed. It was black velvet for the bodice and full skirt, with a lighter fabric over her shoulders that rested like mist. It had subtle rhinestones that occasionally caught the light, like a midnight sky that just a few faraway stars shone through. It draped elegantly and made her feel wintry and ethereal.
That was too much detail for her to have imagined it.
What Betty really remembered, though, was her vision for the dress: a starlit sleigh ride through snow, her cheek resting on a strong shoulder, and a protective arm keeping the chill at bay - particularly since that shoulder fabric wasn't going to do much to keep her warm.
It had been a total fantasy the previous year. She had been single and pining for her best (platonic) friend.
Unfortunately, it was a total fantasy this year as well. Riverdale did not boast any sleighs - or even many horses. And her boyfriend was very real and very attentive, but also very text-based.
All sorts of text, to be sure.
Betty needed to get a shoebox to hold the handwritten letters she was quickly accumulating. She had begun limiting her texts to Jughead as well, since his replies were almost instantaneous and staggeringly expansive. Betty hated to interrupt the quality time he was spending with his mother, and Jughead was so attentive that any message from Betty seemed like it had to be derailing whatever was going on on his end.
Which, Betty had to admit, was kind of amazing.
So she could be generous, leaving Jughead and his mother alone for long stretches; then she could savor the moments when she sat down to compose a text, knowing that in seconds Jughead would also be on his phone and completely present in conversation.
Well, as 'completely present' as was possible over text messaging.
So, for now, Betty focused on preparing for the photos that would mean so much to her mother - in large part because they contained so little truth. The photos seemed as though they would be the only marker of a happy Christmas that they would have this year.
And so, she supposed, it was important to Betty, too. That was why at some bone-deep level it was necessary that she find that dress. This was her only shot at living her fantasy in at least one way, if only for a single moment in time.
It helped that a picture was forever.
"Elizabeth, I'm on hold. Can you please-," Alice's voice cut off as she was presumably connected with whomever she was trying to call.
Betty frowned, wondering what could have prompted her mother to interrupt their preparations so shortly before the photographer was set to arrive.
When she turned back to her closet, she almost didn't notice when a garment slithered to the floor from where it had been trapped behind a tangled of hangers.
But Betty did see it, and so she was scrambling to try on the dress - hoping against hope that it lived up to her memory of it - and wondering how she would convince her mother that black was not just appropriate, but festive, when her mother began to yell.
Alice did not stop yelling, either.
Not until Betty was standing in front of her, stricken, and whoever had been on the other end of the phone call had long since hung up.
And then Alice began to cry.
"Your father... Our entire future... This house, your home..."
Betty was frozen in place. She wanted to hug her mother and assure her that none of it mattered. They had each other. They would be fine, they would be strong, and maybe they would even be stronger as a result of whatever had happened. Whatever her father had done.
But instead Betty thought of Jughead, and those thoughts made her unable to summon a response for her mother.
She thought of how he had gone hungry. How he had been without a home. How Jughead had been effectively orphaned by FP's murder trial, and how Brand had been a real-life Christmas miracle - simultaneously proving that miracles could happen, and that 'fixing everything' might come at a steep price and be accompanied by immense suffering.
Besides, how could they expect another miracle after everything that has happened?
So, instead of channeling one of the plucky heroines from the books that she loved, Betty instead felt frozen in terror as her mother sobbed and recounted a litany of pleasures that they'd come to expect - and the futures that they had anticipated.
"Well. All of that's over now. And college?" Alice barked out a bitter laugh. "He had better believe he's paying for that. Otherwise, I don't see how it's ever going to happen."
Betty thought of the picture perfect stream of images that Gladys had posted this week.
The raw envy in her gut was horrifying - and so, so wrong -, but in her shocked state she was powerless to resist it.
"Well, the photos are paid for, so we might as well get them taken." Betty's mother suddenly grimaced. Or maybe she grinned; Betty could not tell. Either way, Alice was fierce in her anger. "And then... I suppose I have some decisions to make."
That should have been reassuring. Betty's mother was taking control of the situation. She was a hard worker and fully capable of working out her own miracles in Riverdale - maybe even more capable than Brand.
But it was not reassuring. Nothing about Alice's expression was hopeful. Instead, she looked like she'd lost everything and was cornered - and ready to lash out. Maybe even burn it all down.
Betty had never seen this expression on her mother's face.
Most troubling of all, the transformation seemed like the return to an old way of being for her mother. It was too smooth and her mother seemed to accept it too willingly for it to be brand new. In fact, Betty realized abruptly, something about the whole thing reminded her eerily of Jughead's transformation into his alter ego, Jonas Davies.
For Jughead, it was so smooth. There was the ease of muscle memory. There was an angry strength. There was a powerful confidence that seemed to willfully ignore danger, as if having survived before meant he was sure to survive again.
Maybe that was what Betty was seeing. Maybe all of that was true of Alice as well.
And if that was true, maybe they had the most terrifying element in common as well:
The act of transformation meant effectively erasing their relationship with Betty.
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Yep - it's official - I'm taking on another story! The tour kicked up ju-ust a few issues for Jug, and what better place to explore them than from a slight distance? I'll be trying to keep to my now-typical posting schedule, and I'll love hearing what you think as this story takes shape. Happy New Year to all!
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