It's Nice To Have A Friend

27) Fireworks

Poppy was cleaning the counter at Pop's chocklitte shop, which was unusually abandoned that night. She figured that if she hurried up she could relax a little more tonight and celebrate this year's 4th of July fully with her friends.

The bell above the door rang, and before she could even curse under her breath that there had come another customer, she noticed that it was Fred.

"Hey, what are you doing here? I'm just about to close up." She smiled at him and threw her cloth aside.

"I know, but I heard FP call about bringing us some food. Since we're pretty big eaters I thought I'd better stop by and come get it. That way you don't have to carry it all alone." He told her, while sitting down at one of the stools at the counter.

"That's very sweet of you, Fred." Poppy gave him a warm smile. She didn't have that many thoughtful friends before, so while the bar was low, she did truly think Fred was different.

"It's no biggie." Fred smiled innocently. It was the least he could do after she had worked so hard all day.

"So, Pop lets you close all by yourself already, huh?" He asked, noticing that she was there alone.

"Actually, it doesn't happen often that the diner is closing. It's only because of the 4th of July. I noticed he wanted to go home to his family and promised to take care of the rest." Poppy said, while turning around to make sure the coffee and ice cream machines were properly shut off and cleaned.

"Who's the sweet one now?" Fred smirked, believing did she did a very nice thing for her boss. Poppy was about to make a playful comment back, until suddenly the lights went out.

"What was that?" She asked, clearly startled by the sudden dark that surrounded them.

"I think the fuses blew up." Fred had seen this before and he figured that it would be fixed in a second. He walked over to the back to check it, but couldn't find anything out of the ordinary.

"They seem fine." He called, while closing the cabinet again to walk back to Poppy at the front.

"Turn on the radio." He gestured for the wireless radio, which was a blessing considering everything else was quite modern in the diner, despite the retro look.

Poppy pulled out the antenna and they both leaned closer to listen carefully, barely registering how close they were in each other's auras. They had tuned in just in time, because the eight o' clock news shared that there was a black-out that covered all of the Sweetwater Triangle, including Riverdale.

"A blackout? Shit." Fred sighed. This would be a bummer for all the families celebrating the holiday.

"The door's closed." Poppy yanked on the main entrance, which had fallen into the lock that wouldn't open without the code that needed to be put in the little display on the right— which was shut off.

"Fuck this modern technology, now we're stuck here." She sighed deeply and tried to close her eyes for a second to think about a solution.

"How about the back door?" Fred proposed.

"Same thing. Alice said they recently changed it, including an extra alarm." Poppy said defeatedly.

If only they had stuck with old-fashioned keys. However, in a town like Riverdale you needed to be safe, and so Pop had invested in these new locks.

"Then we gotta wait till it's over, I guess." Fred said, not seeing another option. It couldn't last long, could it?

"I'll call FP." Poppy took her phone out of her pocket to dial the number of her brother, telling him that they didn't have to count on her bringing food tonight.