princess || s.p

-3-

Rounding the corner of the trailers, Aria frowned at the sight of Archie and Jughead stood in the middle of a heated argument, folding her arms and approaching them. Archie had told her he was only here to give Jughead something from Betty before he took the girl to Pop's for lunch, and she had already been waiting in the car for at least 5 minutes - which felt like an eternity to the impatient girl.

"What's going on here?" She asked, approaching the two of them in confusion. "Is everything okay?"

"Everything's fine, just- you two need to leave. Right now." Jughead rushed, pushing Archie back by his shoulders.

"What? Why do we-"

"What the hell do we have here?" Aria was interrupted by the sound of an irritatingly familiar voice, closing her eyes momentarily and cursing under her breath.

"They were just leaving, alright?" Jughead shook his head, rushing over to Sweet Pea, preventing him from getting any closer to the other two.

"Wait, you're friends with these thugs?" Archie frowned, stepping towards Jughead in confusion.

"Archie, don't call them that." Aria muttered, sighing and averting her gaze from Sweet Pea, who she knew was watching her every move.

"You know them too?" Archie frowned and affixed his gaze on the girl, confused. "Aria, why?"

"Can we not do this right now, Arch?" She sighed and pushed a hand through her hair.

"Archie, it's not what you think." Jughead shook his head and turned to face the redhead, who was looking between his two friends in utter confusion.

"Are you joining the Serpents?" Archie asked. Aria frowned at his question and looked up at Jughead, shooting him a meaningful glare that just told him to lie his way out of it, although the boy just shrugged helplessly in response.

"If he survives." Sweet Pea interjected, still glaring at Archie. "And go ahead, and call us thugs, one more time." He stepped towards the boy threateningly, but was pushed back by Jughead.

"Jughead, these are the guys who attacked me. Who attacked Reggie, and Veronica, and Dilton, your friends." Archie shook his head in disbelief.

"Please, Archie, are we not done with the whole 'attacking' thing, it takes two to fight." Aria rolled her eyes, inspecting her nails, clearly unbothered by the situation at hand.

"You're not going to stand up for your boyfriend?" Archie frowned at her, immediately she felt both he and Sweet Pea's gaze burning into her for a reaction.

"Ex-boyfriend, Arch, we've been over this." She sighed and looked up at him. She had briefly dated Reggie Mantle, their relationship lasting a grand total of two weeks, yet Archie still couldn't seem to understand that they broke up almost a week ago.

"Whatever, look, Jug, you shouldn't do this." Archie shook his head and turned his attention back to the situation at hand, fixing his gaze on Jughead instead.

"Is that why you're here? To warn me?" Jughead frowned.

"No. I came here to tell you to stay away from Betty. She doesn't want to see you anymore." He shook his head and glanced the boy up and down.

"Okay, what the hell have I missed?" Aria looked between Archie and Jughead, bewildered. The last time she had spoken to Betty - yesterday afternoon - the blonde had been annoyingly gushing about how she wanted to 'fight through the struggle of their relationship', surely nothing could have changed since then?

"Aria, don't." Archie muttered quietly, his tone serious.

"Screw you. I just saw Betty yesterday, she- she was fine." Jughead frowned in disbelief.