lol i forgot to post this
"just get in the bed."
it's four in the morning. it always is.
archie's eyes roll back into their sockets.
jughead can feel the cold in the middle of the room. in odd socks, boxers, and what might just be archie's t-shirt. because jughead knows he doesn't own any clothes this bright.
no doesn't reach his lips before archie is on his feet. moving, gracefully, like a swan skirting a lake. jughead is just another pebble at the bottom. the dirt that fell in, trapped under ice frozen over. he thinks thats what living with archie feels like. like it's not quite a place he's allowed to be.
but archie andrews is the word 'yes' to the ultimate degree.
and jughead's been having nightmares again. like a routine.
"come on." archie insists, pressed too close to him in the darkness.
jughead closes his eyes, and wishes he could sleep standing up and just fade away.
but then archie's arms are around him and he's fifty feet off the ground and everything is terrifying.
archie andrews with his arms around his waist gives every single one of jughead's nightmares a run for its money. yet, he stills. they still as one.
jughead lets himself be warm. lets archie move him like a doll.
he is only faint footsteps and shallow breaths as archie eases him down into bed with a hand on his back. he thinks of archie's hands with such urgency it would seem they were to be taken from him - a hole to be ripped in the fabric of their very being.
as his head hits the pillow, he realises he is not scared. at all.
this isn't fear. this is something more.
this is archie andrews on his side, in bed next to him, face the perfect picture of concern - just enough to send jughead to mush inside. this is archie andrews asking him;
"is this okay?"
jughead doesn't know what to say. so he doesn't say anything at all.
archie stares at the ceiling like he doesn't know what to do with himself.
for moments stacked high to the ceiling, they just be.
jughead thinks about his nightmares. about every dark shadow around every hidden corner. he thinks he's almost set traps for himself in his mind; to keep him from treading down certain pathways its seems. but he's hit this romance one head on.
and archie andrews is in bed next to him. but jughead doesn't want to move for the love of anything.
and love is a foreign dead thing, but one he'll hold in his hands to the very end of time. for jughead believes in love in the same way that he believes in hope; at first so very little at all, and then, with everything he has.
the clock turns five.
jughead doesn't know if archie's still awake; part of him doesn't even want him to be. yet still, he speaks aloud, as if they'll never run out of time.
"i think... cheryl blossom thinks we're dating."
archie jerks in the bed next to him.
it throws jug, honestly.
for his eyes narrow and widen again like shadows cast under the travelling sun. and they are nothing if impossible. for the ice thaws over and every locked doorway opens itself back up.
archie, timid, red-faced, smiles and says:
"aren't we?"
jughead.
doesn't.
breathe.
for it's like this knot in his stomach. this knife in his throat. twisting. twisting. twisting. tugging away with gnarled fingertips until theres nothing like. this incessant ache tearing apart his insides until he is all shadows and specs of dust. and never. never. never enough. for their first night is cast in burning lights to the back of his retinas to the end of time, for no matter what archie says. he will. never. be enough.
archie coughs.
jughead breathes.
he doesn't think he can tell archie's soft eyes that's exactly what he's been having nightmares about. for jughead knows little of hearts and breaking them, but if there was any way to do it, that would be the one.
but archie deserves better than that. archie deserves better than him.
archie deserves someone who will look at him in the middle of the night. someone with something to give him. something more to give than just take. take. take. take.
jughead shoots one last glance across the room. archie's covered the hole his fist made in the wall with a poster. something jug can't make out in the dark. he hasn't told fred. jughead knows that's because he'd have to tell fred why.
and archie's fine with words like dating and arms around his waist. as long as the lights are out. jughead wonders how many times archie's even said the word 'bisexual' out loud.
but archie deserves a boy who won't question him into oblivion. to tear away at every piece until there's nothing left.
so jughead gives up and goes to sleep.
-
kevin's boyfriend is nice. all blue eyes and smiles.
jughead stares and wonders if that's what love is supposed to look like.
because archie andrews is more like late night realisations, ever-growing black holes, and the fucking end of the world. but only in the darkest of holes can sunlight shine the brightest.
archie is quiet. for once. it's odd.
he's not overcompensating for something. he's not the centre of the room. it seems, for the first time, it's only jughead with eyes upon him.
jughead likes that. jughead hates that he likes that. but it feels right. a tightening in his chest nonetheless, but like a spring stretched to breaking point finally settling back into place.
and then those words chase him out of his own head.
'aren't we?'
and archie must feel the weight of jughead's eyes, for archie is watching him too.
there's this soft, mellow, kind of weight in his chest, like he wants to tear the world apart just to get closer to him.
but the journey is anything but straight lines; it's all jagged edges and misdirections, and jughead doesn't know what he wants from archie, nevermind what archie wants from him. so he does the only thing he can do: he shuts his head up the best he can, and smiles, and just lets himself be.
archie is slower, hesitant in his movements. with dark eyes that take a long sweeping motion from jughead's down to his lips. and jughead may not know a thing of love, but he certainly knows what that means.
he knows with a burning in his chest and the world turned up to full throttle.
but all he can think is - 'god, has archie ever been discreet?'
because he can't get his head around this knot in his chest; for it seems to tug upon the vein of 'i want to kiss you too', in the middle of pop's, in front of all of our friends, and kevin's new boyfriend with the nice blue eyes.
and like fuck, does he have the slightest clue what any of that means.
yet soon enough, betty slides her hand across the table and jerks his attention back to the rest of the world, and the boys are left blinking endlessly at their friends. they can pretend no one noticed a thing, it might make it easier, but it won't make it true.
"what?" archie stammers, entirely disjointed.
jughead is momentarily consumed by the notion that he did that to him. and there's this clenching of a fist inside his chest, as if something, someone, is twisting their knuckles around his heart. it burns like hell, but there's this ice locked away inside of him that yearns to be melted away.
"i was just talking about..." kevin trails off, shaking his head. "doesn't matter. it was just-"
"no." it's veronica that cuts in. "it does matter."
"what is it?" archie does the talking for the both of them; jughead doesn't even mind anymore.
again, veronica is the one to speak. "these assholes from school were giving kevin and joaquin shit."
archie stares at them blankly.
"for being together." she rolls her eyes, glancing first to betty, and then to kevin and joaquin.
"it's really nothing." kevin assures them. "it wasn't like a thing. just one comment-"
"it's still homophobia." veronica is stern, passionate.
and jughead knows he was right.
he glances from veronica, to betty. and then from betty to veronica.
and then as the conversation stills, veronica turns to betty. and betty, betty turns to archie.
and it all hurts like the worst kind of ache, like a great fizzling vat of problems intent upon overflowing upon the four of them. but jughead doesn't say a thing, because he likes to think he has a shred of human decency within him, and secondly, he knows so very well how it all feels.
kevin draws out a sigh, long and arduous. but it's joaquin that's the one to speak. "here's the thing, though, veronica. straight people don't get to decide how we ought to feel about homophobia."
and through the silence, with coils drawn too tight, everything snaps at once.
jughead can smell the summer breeze and it's july all over again. and everything is archie, archie, archie, forever dial tones. until the end of the world, until he's spitting out blood into the yellow grass. they were getting away, but they were getting nowhere.
because veronica is fearless, and honest. in every way that jughead is nothing but a mark in the dirt, an echo in the corner of the room of an old house.
because she's got her hands flat upon the table and her voice peaked high and truly shameless. "for a start, how dare you assume i'm heterosexual? secondly, how dare you assume anyone's sexuality? and thirdly, i was just trying to stand up against what is wrong. and i don't see anything wrong with that."
the world ends for a moment. there in their booth.
jughead is utterly relieved, because for just a second, along with everything else, his feelings for archie don't even exist.
but then the lights come back, and veronica looks twice around the table before storming out. and that is that.
-
"veronica, huh?"
archie makes small talk on the walk home.
jughead doesn't think he can pretend to act surprised. he doesn't want to play along.
he's sick, and he's tired. he wants nothing if his head to stop.
forever, archie is relentless. "i mean, i didn't see that coming-"
"come on." jughead snaps, coming to a halt in the middle of the street. he narrows his eyes at archie, who is ridiculously clueless, it seems. "have you ever seen the way she looks at betty? it's-"
he wants to say, 'it's like the way you look at me'.
but the words freeze over in his throat.
and like a toll, archie's words from last night come back with malicious intent:
aren't we? aren't we, aren't we, aren't we? aren't we? aren't. we. aren't? we? aren't we. aren't we. aren't we aren't we aren't we- aren'twearen'taren'twearen'twe-
"aren't we what?"
it's a full sixty seconds before jughead realises that he's said it aloud.
practically screamed it from the top of his lungs. in the middle of the street, the leaves falling through the evening light.
archie swallows. he doesn't know quite where that came from. but he doesn't need to ask.
"i don't know."
he chokes.
he caves.
and jughead tears off home without him.
-
his eyes burn with a fire like he wants to scorch out a hole in the darkness and bring the two a.m. lull to a steady collapse.
for jughead has hardly slept at all.
and it's killing him.
archie watches. in the landing light.
silent, stupid. because it's killing him too.
but they stand as terrible, broken boys, who've always wondered what it must feel like to die.
until the floor almost gives beneath archie's feet.
until the world wraps around them and swallows them whole.
until archie joins jughead at the windowsill, and it's that very first night all over again. because jughead's no liar, and he could never resist that look in those eyes. he just wishes archie would know when to shut up, to think for once.
it seems tonight is not the night, now is not the time.
for archie is the drumming of his fingertips against the windowpane, and his words soft and slow, like the gentle caress of the moon against their silhouettes. jughead hates the way he does this to him: makes him feel so at home.
"so veronica likes betty?"
somehow, jughead imagines this hasn't been what's truly bothering him.
"she's never been very discreet." jughead tries his hand at aloof, distant; it doesn't work at all.
archie smiles.
"it's hard to be."
and jughead's face grows white. he feels something inside of him curling up and dying.
archie fidgets. like he doesn't know how to be still.
"feelings are..." he stops like he wants to say something profound. "feelings."
jughead snorts, his lips teasing a smile. "very profound. feelings are feelings - archie andrews-"
but archie interjects. "look, jug, what i'm trying to say, is that... feelings are feelings, whether you like them or not."
"and what's that supposed to mean?" jughead curls up inside of his head, like he wishes to god he could stay there forever.
"i don't know." archie wrings out a sigh. but there's a look to his eye, like he might be getting there, eventually. "maybe that they've got nothing to do with what anybody else has to say about anything."
it's then that jughead is brave enough to break their facade.
"what cheryl blossom has to say about anything."
slow, tentative, archie nods.
and for minutes by the dozen, to mull over that very notion, is enough.
but by minute thirteen, jughead's heart is a spring within his chest; a spring about to snap.
and snap he does.
it's two thirty four in the morning, and jughead looks archie in those eyes of his and says, "i don't know if i can be your boyfriend."
and he knows that archie doesn't know what that means, because jughead doesn't himself. but archie bites his lip, and nods along like that's all he wanted to hear. and everything is fucked, fucked, fucked. but not quite so much as it seemed.
"okay." archie looks to jughead. and then to the stars. and then to jughead like he is the stars.
and it's all too much.
"but..." jughead pushes his knee down from his chest; it slides against archie's, enough to startle the both of them.
"yeah?" archie is all ears, buzzing against him. jughead swears he can feel it.
"i don't know if you can look at me like that and expect that i won't want to kiss you."
those are some veronica lodge nerves, if jughead says so himself.
archie doesn't breathe. jughead swears he can feel that too.
as archie sits frozen, jughead lives like he's got no time left to waste: shuffling along the windowsill until their knees are touching. and archie looks him up and down like he wants to eat him alive. and jughead kisses him like he might, just for a moment, let him.
everything is all too raw at first. with hands that go from hair to shoulders to waist to hips and back again. kissing like they might just run out of time.
but with steady gasps for breath, the world begins to hum, lulling in around them, for it seems that it's no longer the night sky, but archie, that jughead wants to leave a hole in.
foreheads together. eyes heavy. words strung into songs of eternity and childhood dreams. they sit and live like they, too, can be at ease.
archie still feels the tug of a weight in his chest, at the back of his heart: an ache upon his lips, space under his arms. there are jughead-shaped holes in every part of him. it feels like he's at war with himself, and somehow, still, he's losing.
but this time, it's jughead urging archie to sleep beside him, and both boys are left wondering whether it was the fire or the storm that broke the ice.
-
it's five in the morning.
archie wakes jughead up.
with their heads pushed together. millimetres apart.
voice soft, eyelids fluttering closed, he murmurs.
"'m gonna go for a run."
and it's like his eyes are screaming 'tell me what makes a boy a man'. like everything in archie's mind has gathered like space dust in orbit of this great heaving blackhole sleeping in bed next to him.
then those eyes soften. to the tune of 'let me be enough. please'.
but jughead's only half-awake. too much to notice. and archie pretends it's lethargy they share, for he wishes desperately for a world in wish it was all - 'too much to notice. too much to care'. but he can't fit into line anymore. he's all jagged edges and too many corners and too many scars.
and everything heaves itself into place eventually. as long dark eyelashes fluster and dance against jughead's cheeks, as they drift, incorporeal, specks of dust in the morning light.
"a run, jughead." archie's voice comes as a pull, a tug, that disrupts the delicate balance of early morning ethereality cast between the two. "i'm gonna go for one."
jughead is bleary-eyed, with hair in all directions. with this kind of look about him that gives archie a feeling he really doesn't know what to do with.
"it's like... three in the morning..." jughead's best efforts are a soft grovel.
archie can't stop himself from smiling. "five. it's like five in the morning."
"ugh." jughead pushes his face down into the pillow. forceful. deliberate.
archie likes him like this. he seems free. unafraid.
and he lies there for a while, stealing glimpses at the jughead hidden deep down and far away from the public gaze. for these moments, they are truly theirs.
until jughead does what jughead does, and breaks, lacing the silence with a smirk. and the cracks fall through. porcelain hearts sink away into styrofoam chests. it's a routine. something they like to think they have figured out.
"stop staring at me, you fuck." jughead draws the word. fuck. out through his teeth like its candy. sticky sweet. archie is entranced, thoughts swarming his head like wasps in search of something sweet.
"i'm not staring at you." archie laughs. it's an easy lie.
jughead throws himself onto his back, with eyes set to tear holes in the ceiling. for archie does indeed that those eyes could bring the whole world down with them.
a moment passes.
as moments do.
"go on your run then." jughead gestures vaguely into the air with stumbling, half-way comatose fingertips.
archie doesn't move. he's all eyes and searching for prophesied perfect words. it's as if, with time, the air will suffocate him.
"you're not going to leave, are you...?" jughead rolls back onto his side, facing archie, he toys with the idea of disappointment. it's a facade that scarcely tugs at their feet.
archie smiles. close his eyes.
when he breathes, the air tastes like summer.
like here they are, all over again.
but when he opens them, there's a cold sensation at his neck. for jughead, through and through is the fire that burns cold. the brushing of his fingertips is no different.
but jughead can feel the tightening in the muscles of archie's neck as his throat seals up: scarcely able to breathe at all. and tears his fingers away. careful, scared, tentative, moving like there are shards of glass sleeping in the sheets within them.
"i'm not going to leave." archie says, and leaves jughead to imagine just what he might really mean.
"so is this what we're doing?" jughead's lips bade grace to a smile. "talking about our feelings? and not just suppressing all hints of homosexuality with excessively masculine activity?" he laughs. it's a dig. it's water flowing free. it's jughead's fingers daring to trace his jawline up towards his cheek.
"when have i ever-" archie plays along. pretends to be offended.
for he'd give the world to ensure jughead never moved his fingers away.
"every morning." jughead informs him, eyes heavy, incarcerating. "you wake up and remember you're attracted to me, so you go and sweat it off, go and do some sports. be archie andrews, on the football team. not archie andrews, who won't get out of bed because he can't stop staring at me."
archie thinks for a minute. it's simultaneously entirely too long and nowhere near long enough.
"what if archie andrews, on the football team, is the very same archie andrews that maybe doesn't want to get out of bed because he's staring at you?"
and jughead breathes, like he doesn't quite know what air is. like they only have one set of lungs between the two of them. like archie's words double themselves up on his tongue. and everything is air and rush. and the unspoken. and the unreasonable. and this.
because this full body tingles. centered in his chest. a feeling he can't quite explain; one he's too scared to even try.
"then i ask him..." jughead's voice is soft, fleeting, fading in and out of the air like the gentle lapping of the tide at the beach. "why does he act like there is? why can't-" jughead's voice cracks. "why can't he even be the same around betty, veronica, kevin, around-"
"what do you mean?" archie's eyes and strung out. pleading. they're falling through space.
"you'd never be my boyfriend." the words fall out of jughead's lips before he can stop them. they seem to fall with a physical weight, sinking through the sheets. "if i let you. i'd be your boyfriend. but you'd never be my boyfriend, you-"
"jughead-" his head is a daze. like all he knew had fallen away with the rising of the sun.
"you'd never do what veronica did. you'd never talk about it. talk about us. because you can fuck off and sweat out every damn feeling you want, but you can't do that to me." jughead's voice is loud. louder than he would believe. he's unafraid. archie is falling back to earth.
"not again." he utters, a reprise, but it takes the form of a curse.
archie sees white.
his eyes screw themselves shut. as this bed is a tomb sealing him in. he isn't sure he knows jughead would dig him out again, because that boy, as beautiful and enigmatic as he is, sometimes he looks at him with all the will in the world to seal him firmly beneath the earth.
and archie doesn't know what to do about that.
because he can't promise that he would. "jug..." it's a gasp, a painful last hope. until they depart, and drift away again.
"what is it, honestly?" jughead starts to demand. to take what he deserves, because finally he's began to tire of giving. "look, no one hates veronica - there's no extravagant show about it, it's just... it's just a thing. and kevin, no one cares, archie, no one cares."
and his voice comes, like a pleading, like a sigh.
"but i do."
and his chest falls from such a height that jughead fears he lost more than three words in that very utterance.
"why?" jughead sits up. finally. he's awake. he's alive, with one hand pressed into the pillow, and the other still lingering half-way to archie's face.
archie doesn't move. at all.
"i think i'm scared. it's all... it scares me." archie's face dances back and forth through a cycle of expressions, like he doesn't know what he ought to say and who he ought to be.
but it's enough. for suddenly jughead knows all that he means.
but he doesn't quite get time to respond, for maybe archie isn't quite so afraid anymore.
he fixes dark eyes somewhere off into the middle-distance, settling in the early morning light, as he chips away at all that surrounds his chest in walls built foreboding and tall.
"when i was fourteen." his voice is soft, slow, swooping, spiralling. "i think that was when i started to notice. because you can't not notice. it's not like... i woke up one morning and i was bisexual." he pauses, clears his throat, as if the word feels dirty upon his lips.
"bisexual." jughead repeats it back at him, because he thinks archie needs to hear it aloud.
"bisexual." archie nods, like he knows all that jughead means. "i started realising i looked at boys differently. well not differently. i looked at boys the way i always did. i just started realising that i looked at boys a lot like i looked at girls. that i looked at boys in a way that i wasn't supposed to."
jughead wishes he had the answers. to lift a weight from a burdened chest to form a crown upon a heavy head. but all he has is the morning light, and his heart slipping out of his chest and onto his sleeve.
"i know now, of course, that it's fine, and i can look at boys however i want to, but-... there's still traces of those ideas, that always catch me." archie sighs, and it's like letting go. "i wish i could be enough for you, jughead, i really do."
and those words twist like a knife in his chest, for they are in essence his own, and it all makes his head spin like he knows little of who he is anymore.
"you are enough." it's a bloody, broken promise, strewn through cracked lips. for in his mind's eye, they are dancing around the room.
jughead thinks. like it's something he's paid to do. but he makes quite the mess of it, as he tends to do.
"it's... this. my head... it isn't you- it's..." jughead is a mess of garbled promises and frozen words, but he's too scared to stop, to thaw. "i don't know how i feel about you, archie."
he thinks that might have been the biggest truth he's told in all of his time.
"oh?"
"not like-" jughead stops. thinks. and stares up at the ceiling.
archie waits.
jughead sighs.
and archie waits some more.
"i want something with you." he strives for the best sense he can make, but he's suffering from a distant feeling of lacking: that there'll never be enough for the two of them and all they share. "i just don't know what that something is. asexuality... it's confusing. i don't know how feelings really work in general, nevermind my own."
jughead laughs.
and archie smiles.
they come down gently, like two boats to shore.
and despite himself, jughead has to admit, "okay you're right, running definitely sounds easier, doesn't it?"
archie shakes his head; jughead reaches a hand back up to his cheek.
"there's only so far you can run."
jughead quirks an eyebrow.
"i think with talking, my feelings never stop- i could sit and talk for hours, and it could still feel like healing. but with running, there's a point where you double over and spew your guts."
"jesus." jughead laughs, eyes widening. "what did you do without me all summer?"
archie laughs right back at him. but shakes his head to the tune of 'honestly, i don't know'.
-
there's someone in his booth.
it feels like falling from a height. it feels like falling out of tune with his own song. like falling out of step with his own feet.
he stops dead on the floor. he doesn't realise until he feels archie's hand on his back.
warm.
archie follows his gaze, making sense of all he can.
because pop's is coming close to empty at eight in the morning, but there's still someone in his booth. and she's-
jughead breathes.
she's veronica.
archie watches jughead's twisted display of emotion, as if from afar. and files it away in the pile of things they might one day dare to talk about. but not quite yet.
because he sees her too.
veronica smiles an easy smile and beckons them over. archie motions, and jughead moves in his stride.
she's got a banana milkshake. it's the first thing jughead notices as he approaches the table. he might have rolled his eyes at himself. but he's hungry, and he's drawn out thin like a piece of string, between going up to order, and archie's hand, still on his back, drawing him into the booth with veronica.
"hello boys." she twirls the world around her lips like she's making a show.
"hey." archie smiles. it's an archie andrews smile.
jughead shifts his eyes through the diner and starts thinking solely about that burger.
archie's smile twists upwards into a laugh.
jughead makes a poor job of it. because suddenly everything is to the tune of archie, archie, archie, archie, archie, and he's breathing like he's running out of luck.
but then veronica does such a job of being exquisitely candid that jughead doesn't have to think anymore. and part of jughead begins to wish he had kept some of his observations to himself.
"how do i talk to betty?"
she smiles, and turns from archie to jughead, and back again.
"with words." jughead gestures, vaguely. it's cheap, unhelpful humour, but it puts a smile on archie's face and that's enough.
for that smile, and that look in his eyes speaks of five a.m. light and enough promises to fill their every hole.
"very funny." veronica shakes her head, rolling her eyes with a fond sense of irritancy.
archie stops.
"you mean like... talk to betty- you-" he glances at veronica with eyes wide.
he's slow on the uptake.
preoccupied elsewhere.
"jesus, archie, i thought-" he stops himself, sighs. "i had mentioned... this." he sneaks a glance at veronica, tentative, halfway fearful. she says nothing at all.
"just talk to her, i mean- i don't really know." archie admits, cheeks flushed red. he tries to hide his face away, but jughead can read a whole world off his lips.
"come on." veronica places her palms against the table. "i got up specially for this. you know, you're boys, you know how to talk to girls, more than i do at least."
jughead gives a snort and decides that definitely isn't true.
archie's watching him. veronica too.
but he's got nothing more to say.
veronica continues, but archie doesn't turn away.
and suddenly, as the sun ascend through blue skies, he thinks might understand. that with this game they're playing, they might just be on the same page.
"seriously, i-" veronica gives a sigh. "i'm clueless." she admits.
"she's betty." archie says it, like it isn't obvious. "you know how to talk to betty, don't you?"
"but-..." veronica stops and sighs. "there's a point where she stops being betty and starts being 'betty cooper - unfairly, and unreasonably attractive, source of all my problems, and light of my life'." veronica twists her lips into a smile. "you know?"
jughead toys with the corners of a smirk. "maybe you're overreacting? possibly. perhaps? she's still just betty."
he doesn't get it.
but in the loom of silence, suddenly, archie does.
-
archie thinks it's rich.
that there's jughead with dark curls fanned out across his pillow, and looking at him like a marble statue in the early morning light.
and then there's jughead taking up the whole sofa with legs too long for his body, making a mess of his seventh slice of pizza.
he's absent from the room; at least his head is.
his head back in pop's the other morning, spun back and forth: hooked on the few words jughead and veronica actually returned.
it's the very same jughead jones.
just as he's always been.
and still archie's head is a mess of traps and pitfalls.
he doesn't know where he's stepping anymore.
archie thinks it's rich when jughead dares to tell him that there's archie in his room, and archie out on the football field.
archie thinks it's rich, but sometimes he thinks he might be right.
-
it's not until they share the same space that the world spins again.
fred had turned in a good twenty minutes ago. it was a twenty minutes jughead spent debating the logistics of any conceivable relationship between him and archie; in turn the logistics of hiding it, and the logistics of not.
but jughead's tired of thoughts.
and archie smiles just the way he likes. like he's playing his every card perfectly.
and jughead lets archie pull him to his feet, and drag him into the kitchen: hands held, feet stepping on feet. he's laughing against the fridge; archie's a vision in the evening light: he's got a beer in his hand, and this look in those eyes like he's got plans.
it entertains him.
jughead thinks that's the word for it.
as he laughs. all blood and teeth. and lets his heart descend through his chest.
because they play games like this all the time. the rules are different now. but that's the fun of it; jughead dares to think.
and archie andrews places a beer into his hand. jughead dares to take it.
he falls face first into the world they're living in; a world in which archie's fingertips don't pull away. they ghost and linger, as jughead tilts the can up to his lips. he watches, like he's only ever been a pair of eyes, and archie lays out his every vice like breathing in, and fingertips, cold, touch jughead's neck.
it's the same spot jughead placed his own upon him.
it's no coincidence. archie's playing it safe. and jughead's sick of it.
he downs as much of the beer as he can stomach, before sending the can crashing against the countertop with considerable force. still, archie's eyes don't leave his own.
jughead shoots a look up at the ceiling; at something like whatever higher being might be watching them now. but all his prayers have already been said; maybe even answered too.
archie opens his mouth. jughead knows that's bad news.
archie andrews. jughead isn't sure if he says it aloud.
the only thing either boy is sure of in the evening night is suddenly the way their foreheads crash together, and their lips meet somewhere in the middle.
it's not a kiss. it's a fucking cry for help.
all blood, and teeth, and tears.
because archie feels jughead falling through the cracks in his fingertips.
jughead is all closed eyes, and heavy lips, and putting everything he has into his mouth, like archie might take it all away, like he hasn't got the strength in his body to keep his feet on the floor.
archie's tentative: wary. he can feel jughead slipping. and he's doing that caring thing.
so jughead kisses him harder. maybe it's something one of them needs.
maybe this is what want feels like.
all blood, and curses, and teeth.
until jughead really is falling; legs turning to jelly against the kitchen floor. until archie's arms are underneath him and there's a hazy sequence of moments that make no sense at all that lead him down a rabbithole to a world in which he can breathe again.
it's.
it's a sobering situation.
jughead was never very drunk in the first place. he's putting it on. they both know it. but they both need an excuse.
it's a situation to sober them both regardless.
because it's like waking up with a few feet of snow; in a world that feels nothing like your own.
true, jughead was falling. true, archie caught him.
but then the world keeps turning, and jughead's feet aren't on the ground anymore. because they're wrapped around archie's fucking waist. and archie's got strong hands holding him up at the hips. and jughead's pressing himself back into the fridge like he wants to crash back through it.
and it's all heavy panicked stares.
this is fight or flight territory for two sexually confused teenaged boys. and jughead concurs that he's done his time punching walls.
except neither of them can move.
because they're stuck.
stuck in that moment.
as jughead and archie.
and jughead spares a thought for the moment, and god what would happen if fred walked in? because there's that too.
the logistics of actually being with archie, and-
jughead hates feelings.
but he's fucking high on them.
and dares enough to kiss archie again.
they do it right this time. like there's oxygen in the room, like they aren't constantly running.
jughead kisses archie gently, and with his legs wrapped around his waist, he can feel the shiver it sends down his spine.
it's only as archie pulls away that the boys remember how to breathe. because the air is thick, like they're laying cracks through the ice, and it's finally giving in.
"i'm..." jughead doesn't know what to say. at all.
he just knows he should say something.
archie waits on him. like he genuinely cares. and he does. jughead hates him for it.
"you can probably put me down now." jughead stammers in the end; his cheeks are red, but he reckons they might be past that point.
archie flushes too, stammering and twitching, before pulling away and letting jughead to the floor. he looks jughead up and down. just the once.
and then he's gone. across the room. pacing back and forth like he's trying to run away from this too.
jughead really thinks he should say something.
but all he can think of is the weightlessness in his chest, and the way it's slowly ripping him apart.
he talks in the end. to stop archie from pacing, before he drives tracks into the kitchen floor, and fred kills them both.
"i don't know why i did that."
he's honest, if nothing else.
but it's enough, because archie is all push and shove, and hands flat against the counter island. and jughead wonders just how long he's spent staring into those eyes.
it's getting ridiculous now.
"i..." archie breathes. like he's forgotten how. "it's okay. whatever it is. it's okay."
"i..." jughead pauses. "kissing... doesn't make sense to me, as a concept. it's... like... fascinating. i just... never saw the appeal in shoving your tongue down somebody else's throat- i mean... that's kind of disgusting, i mean- personal space, and hygiene, and god-"
jughead knows he's waffling: taking all he can and running with it.
archie shakes his head and smiles.
"but there was something... just and poetic in you shoving your tongue down my throat?" he tries to phrase it like he's bothered. both of them know he isn't.
"no. i don't know. maybe." jughead rubs his eyes. "i'm just. i don't know what this feeling is. i don't know what it is with you, archie. but it's... it's like nothing else. and sometimes i think it's driving me mad."
archie smiles. soft. sympathetic. no. empathetic.
empathetic, archie dares to cross the room.
just pathetic, jughead reaches out for him.
this time they hug. like things are supposed to be.
but everything's running away from now; jughead thinks this is growing up. and he doesn't think he likes it.
but he likes the warmth of archie's chest, and his hands against his back. and maybe they might make sense of this, with time.
"bed?" archie asks, what essentially, isn't a question.
jughead mumbles, what essentially, isn't a response.
he closes his eyes and turns off his head.
he turns it on again to the light on archie's nightstand; to the soft sounds of archie moving about the room. he's doing something. he's living. he's living, maybe even for the both of them sometimes.
"archie." jughead's voice is soft, like a bleat, like a moan.
he closes his eyes.
when he opens them again he feels the warmth of archie's arms.
"is this okay?" archie's got this all too concerned look in his eyes, like he's forever scared jughead might break into a million pieces. to his credit, jughead did collapse into his arms just half an hour ago. still it irks him.
"you don't have to ask." jughead drums the words out of his throat. "you... i... stop being so careful, archie. i... let me tell you when to stop."
archie's silent. almost for too long.
"if you're sure?" he's frozen: suspended in the night air.
"i'm sure." jughead's belligerent.
but there's this look in archie's eyes like they both know jughead's never been sure of anything. he doesn't say a word. jughead doesn't know if he wants him to.
and then that hand of archie's, it snakes around jughead's waist.
that weightlessness comes back all at once, and even lying in bed, jughead's tripping on both of their feet.
-
archie's got his head pressed into the palm of his hand, eyes glazed, fixated off on some very specific point of nothingness somewhere through the window.
he's vaguely aware of a teacher's voice in the background. the soft murmur of chatter amidst students. classroom sounds. normal people things.
but he's not listening.
no one is watching archie andrews today. he's not present in brilliant shades of red and gold. he's a flickering shadow in the background: another voice amongst the rest, another face in the crowd. he almost likes it.
until he doesn't.
until it all comes snapping back against him like the pull of elastic. with the pull of fingertips around his wrist. because somewhere amidst all that he's let be, there's someone who's not content to let archie andrews simmer into the background. not today.
someone had been watching him after all.
they're in the far corner of the room.
archie andrews and cheryl blossom.
out of the way, out of earshot. it's something archie finds himself soon thankful for; cheryl blossom has never been one for the finer intricacies of people's feelings. she's bold and she's sharp, and she hits him right where it hurts, all just to spark some life out of him. like this is all idle classroom fun.
"boyfriend trouble?" she twists the word 'boyfriend' around her lips like its a taunt.
and at first, archie thinks it is. but upon his second, maybe third take, he reminds himself that cheryl doesn't care, at least not like that. she only wants to get a reaction.
the word's not a taunt to her, but maybe it is to him. and archie doesn't know how to wind his brain around that one.
he stares at her blankly for a few moments before burying his head in his hands.
she is, after all, half-way right. except jughead jones isn't his boyfriend. and at some point that sort of became the problem.
"or do we need to keep all public conversations strictly heterosexual?" cheryl laughs, eyeing archie with a certain effervescent curiosity for just a moment more, before something outside piques her interest.
"no." something inside archie snaps.
maybe it's jughead's words, echoing throughout his head like there's some sense of spite in them. or maybe it's jughead's lips. and the way kissing him had felt so much like letting go and giving in.
"no. we don't." he says, like it's everything in the world.
and maybe, just for that moment, it is.
at the very least, he certainly has cheryl's interest again.
"and i thought you were going for the whole manly repression thing?" she's surprised even, intriguied.
"you thought wrong." archie draws out a sigh. he doesn't know what to think about that. what to think about cheryl at all.
but she's here and she knows, and maybe he needs an ear to burden his every thought with after all.
"then what is the problem?" there's that dazzled look in her eyes that almost seems to tease it out of him.
"jughead." his name draws cracks into archie's lips. he closes his eyes, and for a moment, they're hazy shapes in the kitchen light. and he thinks about jughead, in whatever class he has now - he thinks it might be history, with betty, and dares to wonder what might be going through his mind.
"mmm?" cheryl nods; there's an odd sense of softness to her eyes, and just for a moment, archie manages to convince himself that this is more than a distraction for her.
"we're a bit... all over the place." there's a distinct lack of a better way to put it. "i think he's hurting himself inside, trying to answer all of these questions that no one ever needs to ask of him- i-..." archie slows down.
cheryl nods. patient, silent, sympathetic. it's entirely un-cheryl. it throws archie, entirely.
"i want to be his boyfriend." archie doesn't quite realise what he's said, until there's this scarlet red cheryl blossom smirk teasing its way up at him. "that's... yeah." he stumbles.
"i want... we have this thing. it's messy, all over the place. but i want it to be... a thing. you know, a proper, dignified, sort of-"
"relationship." cheryl cuts to the chase for him.
flushed, nonetheless, archie nods.
"i just... jughead isn't a relationship kind of guy. and that's what he's... trying to figure out, whether he's..." archie stops himself: there's a difference between spilling his heart to cheryl blossom in a moment of weakness, and spilling jughead's.
"surely the best way to figure out whether you like something is to try it."
archie laughs, because it's simply ridiculous. ridiculously simple.
but cheryl's serious. "i mean, how did you figure out whether you liked boys?"
"it just..." archie gestures vaguely with his hands. "i guess, yeah. i was certain when i... yeah..."
cheryl's smiling at him. like she knows more of him than he could ever comprehend.
and just for a moment, maybe archie's okay with that.
-
honesty is weird.
especially as they're playing this all by ear.
because archie gets in from football practice, smelling of dirt and sweat, with hair plastered to his forehead. and jughead drops his slice of pizza and slides off the kitchen counter, meeting archie by the backdoor, and kissing him.
"you're disgusting." jughead laughs, pulling away. nevertheless, he brushes archie's hair from his face.
"i never asked you to kiss me." archie laughs right back at him. yet, suddenly he's catching his breath; it's nothing like out on the field. it's the two of them, at a standstill, but it's exhilarating.
"you invited me to." jughead's flushing, just that little bit, trying to cover his tracks.
"i'm covered in mud." archie shakes his head in disbelief.
"you have lips." jughead says, like that's some sort of compliment and explanation all at once.
archie simply nods in agreement, kissing jughead quickly on his way upstairs.
it's barely a peck on the cheek. but it has his heart pounding in his ears.
jughead's laughing, howling after him, and for a moment, archie fears he could feel his heartbeat. and maybe he couldn't, but it's not the reason why.
"you're disgusting." he calls back after him, like he's only just realised.
-
"i don't really think you're disgusting."
it's four in the morning. it always is.
jughead wakes archie up, with the tapping of his fingers against his cheeks.
it's both wonderful and horrifying.
"what?" archie murmurs; his brain is anything but awake.
"i don't really think you're disgusting." jughead repeats. it's been bothering him.
archie nods like he understands, and closes his eyes to go back to sleep.
but jughead already knows that he's not going to let him.
"i'm worried you think i don't like you. because i don't like you like..." he stops, breathes, and stares up at the ceiling, and wishes for the thousandth time, that the answers were carved into archie's bedroom walls.
"because there's sort of like everything i thought i knew about myself, and then there's you."
archie laughs. he knows the feeling.
but jughead takes in the wrong way. four a.m., clouds heavy on his brain.
"it's not a fucking joke, archie, it's-"
archie reaches his hand into jughead's. he stills completely. the ocean freezes over. archie dreads that he's misstepped, terribly, but it's barely a moment, before they breathe easy again.
and archie says, "i had that too. with you. and being bisexual."
"hmm?" jughead settles, and nods like he's intrigued.
"i mean i knew, but i didn't really know. until i kissed you. like... like... you can read every car manual in the world, but you're not really a mechanic until you've fixed a damn car."
jughead laughs, soft and slow. "except there aren't any instruction manuals on the depth of the asexual spectrum and just where i might lie on it."
archie sighs. "yeah."
"yeah." jughead moves into archie's side. "that's what keeps me up at night."
"yeah?" archie, slow, tentative, moves a nod to jughead's hair.
jughead makes a huffing sound, and closes his eyes.
it's endearing. it's a nice moment.
until something backfires in archie's head, and there's this chain of disasterous headfuck dominoes that leave him in the warpath of one hell of a case of word vomit.
"but maybe being a mechanic is more about fixing the fucking cars instead of reading every little detail into it?"
jughead pretends he doesn't know what archie's getting at.
"but without the manuals, you don't know what you're doing-"
"but there are no manuals." archie raises his voice, louder than he ought to. "you said- you- fuck... i'm sorry... i..."
and jughead rolls over onto his back.
he laughs.
"so what? you want me to have sex with you or something?"
archie jerks against the pillow.
"no."
jugheads laughing, even more this time.
"no, i-" he sighs, desperately trying to recuperate. "i mean i-... look, that's not what i'm getting at, that's what i mean."
jughead draws out a sigh. maybe there's even a damned masochistic part of him that's disappointed. "then what? archie, what do you mean?"
"i want to date you."
he says it before he can stop himself.
but the sun can rise and bring common sense with it.
and in the silence, he curses cheryl blossom for putting stupid fucking ideas in his head.
and in the come down, he curses himself for not knowing when to stop.
but jughead,
jughead rolls back to face him.
pale face, illuminated in the first dregs of morning light.
and says,
"okay."
like it's simple, like it's easy. like it's been just like that all along.
for all their questions, as urgent as they may seem, will still have answers to find in the morning light.