I'm Darkness || Archie Andrews and Jughead Jones [2]

A Healthy Drug

A HEALTHY DRUG

Eleanor is locked away in her room, and she's in this complete calm state where she can't really feel anything. It's like a numb sensation of some sort. But numb, somehow, it's worse. We cannot selectively numb emotions, when we numb the painful ones, we're also numbing the positive ones, and that makes it harder to come back from that safe place.

Only the pills on her third drawer – yes, it's pills again, always has been – are easier to swallow than the fact that her life is messed up. It's easier to lock herself away in her room than it is to face Archie, for example. God, things with Archie are so bad at the moment. But so are things with Veronica who is supposed to be her best friend. What happened to them?

So, here she is lying in bed hoping that the pills make her sleep before she falls apart.

Tonight Ellie sleeps tight, no nightmares. She sleeps through the night without waking up feeling like some giant rock is on top of her keeping her from coming up for air. She only wakes up with Betty knocking on her door worried sick about it being locked.

"I'm coming," Ellie drags herself to the door, and opens it. "I'm alive."

"You look terrible." Betty notices the pale face and the dark circles under her sister's eyes, and it's not lack of sleep. It can't be, because she's been sleeping for twelve hours now. "You ok?"

"I'm fine." She turns her back and walks up to her wardrobe, where she looks at clothes while trying to avoid whatever conversation they should be having.

"I know you, Ellie." Betty doesn't let it go, and steps inside. "You can't ignore Archie, you can't just give up. What I said about him and Veronica, I was just trying to hurt her, I didn't mean –."

"Betty, he gave up on us." Ellie faces her sister with a sigh. "My boyfriend stood there and chose Hiram Lodge over me. This isn't about Veronica, it's about Archie not standing up for me when I needed him to."

"Ok, well tell him that."

"I did, remember?" She pulls out a pair of mom jeans and an oversized sweater from her wardrobe, and then she walks to her bed where she places the pieces. She faces her sister again. "Look, I'm happy that you and Jughead manage to solve all of your problems but your boyfriend isn't the one kissing up to Hiram's ass, so."

Betty sits down on the large bed. "I'm sure there's an explanation to that."

"Yes, Archie's an idiot." Ellie shrugs.

"Can't really argue with that."

. . .

Eleanor is sitting down on FP's kitchen – on his chair – and she's trying to figure out the board Jughead placed on the wall. It's filled with all these documents and photographs, and articles from the newspaper. And she's trying, really hard, to figure it out.

Figure out what Hiram Lodge's plan is. The ultimate endgame.

"So I'm guessing you have a hand in this." FP's voice sounds behind her and she turns around with a greeting smile, before turning back to the board. "You two are too obsessed."

"Forgot that Hiram Lodge tried to start a riot to cast me out of the Serpents?" Ellie recalls with bitterness. The thought of how close he got to achieve it still brings her lots kinds of anger.

"Ellie, right now he was our savior."

She turns around in a sudden but very aggressive movement. "Are you kidding me? This has a cost, FP. And we gonna pay it, sooner or later."