Falling Apart

Chapter 7

“Betts?” I hear Jughead whispering as he's stroking my hair by running his fingers through it, his palms touching the skin on my head. I mumble something to him, I'm not even sure what it is. He chuckles at me, “Come on, Betty, it's 10. We need to be out of here by 11,” he says. I groan and snuggle my face deeper into his chest.
We've been here for 3 nights now. Right now it's fourth day in here. And since I don't have the fever anymore and my cuts are started growing together again, healing, he's taking me back home, not that he wants to do it. I can see he doesn't.
“Five more minutes, that's all I'm giving you.”
“Juggie,” I whine. The nickname I came up with yesterday. He laughed at me, but told me I'm cute, the first time. The second time I called him ‘Juggie’, he grinned big and gave me a kiss on the top of my head.
After some minutes pass by, he pulls a little away from me, loosening his arms. I purse my lips in disappointment and open my eyes the light shining directly into my pupils. I groan and turn onto my stomach. I hear him chuckling.
“I’ll get you some clothes,” he says. I nod sadly and he gives me a smile, just as me. He gets up the bed and I look at how he walks to the corner of the room, where is the sports bag his dad dropped off on the first day. He pulls out a pair of gray sweatpants and a T-shirt.
He has a sad impression on his face as he slowly makes his way to the bed. He squats down in front of me and grins at my sleepy face, his only a few inches away. “These are big for you for sure. But better than the shorts.”
I give him a small smile, “Thank you. Not only for the clothes. For everything.”
He sighs and nods. “Any time.”

We arrive in front of my home. It's warm outside, but the fresh smell is still lingering in the air, because of the rain this morning. “Wow this place is bigger than I remembered,” Jug breathes out.
“Yeah, tell me about it,” I murmur. I turn to him as we're standing in front of the stairs. I swallow quickly. “I’d invite you inside, but I don't think my dad would like it.”
He smiles sadly, “It’s okay.” We stand there, just looking at each other, the sadness of saying goodbye floating in the air between us.
“I should go,” I breathe out. He doesn't answer anything, just keeps looking at me with these thick eyebrows of his furrowed, almost touching on his nose. I see the pain in his eyes. He knows it's not safe for me, but he doesn't know what else to do. And neither do I.
I give him a small smile, “Thank you.” I step away from him, towards the front door, but he grabs my hand immediately. I look behind me, turning my body only a little, most of the movement just produced by my head looking over my shoulder. He has tears in his eyes.
“Don’t go,” he breathes out and steps closer to me as I turn around completely now, to face him. “Don’t go. Please. I don't want you getting hurt.” His voice sounds broken as one tear slips out of his eye, rolling down his cheek.
“I don't have anywhere else to go,” I say quietly.
“Come with me,” he says desperately.
I shake my head a little, my eyebrows risen up. “I'm 15… They'll take me away and send someone and I'll be placed into some foster care.” He knows that it's true, I know he does. “Why are you even offering that?” I ask with a sigh. “You have your own life. You don't need to keep me alive every single secon-“
I get cut off by him cupping my face with both of his hands. “I’m not doing this because I want to help you. I'm selfish. I have my own reasons, Betty.”
I gulp down the tension and keep staring into his eyes as he does the same. And just with a few seconds, his eyes flick down to my lips and back to my eyes. Again. And again. I feel the desire. I want to kiss him. I want my lips against his. I need to kiss him.
But crap do I start panicking. My hands start shaking a little, all the scars and bruises start tingling with anticipation. I get so fucking nervous. But my eyes move onto his lips as well. I look at the soft way he holds them a little opened, the soft pink tone on them. And I know I’m ready for this. Ready for my first kiss. Ready for kissing him.
My eyes close completely, letting him make the next move and lean in. I feel his hot breath on my lips. It sends shivers down my spine and makes me want to crash them against his. The moment our lips meet, my body relaxes against his, our foreheads pressing together like our noses. Like the feeling of my skin against his face wouldn't be perfect enough, our lips are also pressed together. This is heaven. He tastes like… I don't know what it is, but it tastes amazing.
And with just another second, it's over. His head pulls back a little, only enough for our lips to part again. His forehead stays resting against mine, his hands on my neck now, cupping it. Our lips meet again, but not because it's another kiss. It's because I rest myself against him even more, and they just touch, brushing against each other.
Our eyes are closed, our hearts are beating in the exact same rhythm, our breathing is exactly the same, our lips are a little swollen from the way he just kissed me, our thoughts are in the same place. It's like we're the same person. And in some ways, we are. We're feeling exactly the same thing at the moment. The feeling I never thought I'll be able to experience with someone. Love.
My eyes open slowly and I see his doing the exact same thing on the exact same moment. We smile at each other, me blushing just a little bit. He wraps his arms around me and holds me tightly against him.
“You're a good kisser, baby,” he whispers and presses his lips onto my temple.
I blink slowly, smiling big. Did he just call me baby? “So are you Juggie.”
He pulls away just a little, looking down at me. I smile up at him, “I'll text you when I'm upstairs, okay?”
“Okay,” he sighs. “And if you haven't texted me in five minutes, I’m coming in.”
I roll my eyes at him, but since it makes him feel better, I tell him, “Let's make it ten.” I stand on my tiptoes, my head leaning up. He grins and leans down a little, our lips meeting just once more before I let go of him.
“And uh… Yeah, text me,” he says. I smile and nod, wondering what he wanted to say at first anyways.
“Bye,” I say quietly and go inside. It smells like puke. Don't tell me he hasn't cleaned that up. I peek into the living room. Him and two other men are drinking on the couch, laughing and eating. It's fucking 1pm. I decide to sneak past them and upstairs immediately. The puke is cleaned up, but he obviously hasn't opened the windows, it makes me sick.
“Elizabeth,” I hear his voice as I walk past the door. I freeze. “Come here.”
And suddenly I'm nervous again, my mind blank, my hands sweaty. I know that if I don't go in there immediately, I'll get beaten up later. I wouldn’t want that happen with me, especially with the new late edition of scars and bruises on my skin.
I slowly turn around and take a few steps, before I get into the living room. The moment I'm in that room, I feel sick. My dad smirks at me evilly, but I can't stop myself from walking to the window and opening it, along with the back door.
“What the fuck are you doing?” he asks.
“Hal,” the guy in a officer's outfit says with a sound of confusion. I look at them, backing against the wall slowly as my father clenches his wrists. “She’s your daughter.”
He gulps and puts a fake smile on his face, “Right. Honey, you want some lunch?” he asks with a surprisingly light tone.
I raise my eyebrows and my lips part a little as I start breathing better. As long as these guys are around, he's not hurting me. “Um, no thanks,” I say quietly, lowering my head.
“Where have you been?” he asks the moment my eyes slide over the two men. On the officer’s badge, there's his name. Sheriff Keller. My lips curl into a small smile. He's Kevin's dad. He has told me about his dad. He's a great guy. The other one I don't recognize though, but he is looking at my clothes with a weird look. My eyes grow wide, seeing his blue eyes looking at me and then a big smirk on his lips. He's Juggie's dad, with the same hair and eyes. They look kind of similar.
What surprises me the most, is the fact that they're holding beers, but none of them is actually drunk. At least not much, they don't smell like alcohol.
I just walk out of the room rapidly, ignoring their eyes on me, especially the one's who should be Jug's dad. I practically fly upstairs, taking two steps at once. The moment I get to my room and lock it, I relax. I make my way to the bed and see my phone on it. I haven't been using it for four days and it still has 20%. That's positive. I plug it into the charger and fall to lie down on my bed.
I pull the small piece of paper out of my pocket. Jug has written his number and a winking face on it. I smile shyly and open my phone. I have 20 missed calls from Nick, 10 from Dan, 12 from Jake and 4 from Matt. Wow, he must've called me every time he had connection. Also from Kevin and Veronica and a few from Archie. They're all worried.
I decide to text Jug at first. I save his number into my phone, addressing him as Juggie and a kissing emoji.
Everything’s okay. Your dad has the same eyes btw
He answers me with less than ten seconds.
My dad's here? Fuck
I giggle quietly and text back to him again.
He looked at your clothes on me with a huge smile, I think he liked the idea you spent half a week in a hotel with a girl he doesn't know
I basically hear him grinning at my sarcasm.
Ha-ha. I'll better get home, now that I'm not worrying anymore. Lock the door and please ignore both of our dads
I smile and nod mentally.
Okay
I open the chat with Nick, and start to read the messages, but get stopped by another text from Jug.
I'm taking you to Pop's tomorrow morning. Be ready at 10
10? Is he joking?
I'm on a summer vacation, idiot.

“No,” I smirk at Jug as we're sitting on the same side of the neon colored booth, his arm on the back of the seat behind my head. The diner is empty mostly, but the people who are here aren't our age and they're not paying attention to us either. Pop looked surprised when he saw us together, but now he always smiles at us as he brings Jug another burger. Which has happened for the total of three times by now.
“And why not?” he asks with a little annoyed voice. I shrug and sip my milkshake. “Baby,” Jug whines.
I chuckle at his cute voice and steal a fry from him. “August 28.” I smirk at his narrowed eyes as he pulls out his phone and looks at the date. It's like 6th of July now or something. Then he smiles and puts it back into his jacket pocket. He's wearing a black leather jacket with ‘Southside Serpents' and a logo on its back. I love it.
“And yours?” I ask.
“November 7.”
“So you're what? Scorpio?”
He chuckles, “Probably. I don't really memorize these things.” I roll my eyes at him. His arm goes around my waist now and he pulls me closer to him, which means that I'm leaning against his side now. His other arm snakes around me as well and he intertwines his own fingers, holding me securely against him. I chuckle quietly.
“Do you want another milkshake?” he asks, looking into my eyes with an emotion I can't describe.
“I don't have that much money with me,” I say.
He rolls his eyes at me, “I’m gonna pay, dummy.”
I raise my eyebrows, “Seriously?”
He kisses my cheek and looks over my head towards the counter. “Pop, could we get another vanilla and a cheeseburger with a side of fries?”
“You’re gonna explode,” I murmur to him as he turns back to look at me.
“The fries are for you.”
“I'm full, but thanks,” I say.
He narrows his eyes a little and leans his face close to me. “No, you're gonna eat it.” His lips touch my nose. Butterflies.

“Betty,” Jug says nervously as we reach my street, our fingers intertwined together. “I was uh… thinking.”
“About what?” I smile.
He sighs nervously and looks back at me. I smile at him, making his face relax and smile back at me. “Maybe… You'd want to be my girlfriend?”
I freeze and stop. He stops as well and I hear him letting out a sigh before he turns at me. I love you. When he turns around, he looks sad, but then I jump into his arms, mine going around his neck. He chuckles quietly and presses his lips against my cheek. “Is that a yes?”
“It will always be a yes,” I say, hiding my face into his neck to breathe in his scent.