Taking my message from the veins | Jarchie ✓

Epilouge

(Thank you to all those who've read this fic. You're amazing! And for your patience with our sloooow updates!)

It's short because, well it's just a brief epilogue.

riverdalestorylover it's here!
********

The dust had settled.

Ample time had elapsed since Hiram's corpse had been removed from the channel of trees in the woods after those fateful moments that put him there.

Veronica was questioned relentlessly by cops.

Jughead had described his ordeal to police, notifying them that he has been kidnapped by Hiram Lodge, without every truly giving them the full story. He didn't tell them about his veins and the way they glistened around his boyfriend. He just told them, simply, that there was plenty of bad blood between them and Hiram holding him hostage was penance, punishment.

Eventually, it was concluded that Veronica had acted in self defence, acting on quick instinct when her friends life had been at risk. The police decided her comeuppance was living with what she had done for the rest of her days; killing her own father. Truthfully, to cops Hiram was no stranger, they knew of his criminal history, and there was a certain acceptance in knowing he was dead.

Archie and Jughead had a secret to keep, too. After their ordeal with Hiram's response to their illuminated veins phenomenon, they would never tell another soul beyond there friendship circle. Unless a genuine scientist came along, pursued by intrigue rather than gluttony for money, and pledged to help them understand it all, they may consider telling. Their friends had promised to also withhold their secret, they would never mention it to anyone. Archie believed their silence would be everlasting. Jughead had his concerns but over the past few months the strength of their friendship grew, even with Toni's recent introduction, and he also felt assured.

Changes are always afoot in Riverdale.

Toni and Cheryl were now dating, after endless amounts of flirting and wistful stares, Cheryl had brazenly asked Toni out on a date, taking her to Pop's. And the rest, as they say, was history.

Jughead was still being plagued by nightmares however, and Archie feared time will never heal those mental wounds. It wasn't every night. Sometimes Jug slept peacefully and in the throes of slumber he was free of his worries; it was those times that Archie liked to admire him briefly, entranced by the slight flutter of his lashes. And then there's nights were Jughead thrashes, entangled in the cover, clammy and crying out. He calls for Archie, shouts at Hiram. And Archie holds him tight, grazing his touch up his side as Jughead wakes, they don't always speak. Sometimes they stare into the darkness and ruminate.

Tonight, they talk.

"Even if it was a matter of seconds that I thought I lost you," Jughead mumbles into the dim, expression distant. "It felt like it went on for days... it made feel really lonely."

"I'm here," Archie reminds him, kissing his temple chastely. "I'm not going anywhere."

*******

It was Hiram's funeral.

Only six people had turned up.

Not even Hermione had came to say her goodbyes.

Archie held Jughead's hand as the clergyman uttered a prayer. It was a rudimentary service, even the bad guys were entitled to a burial. But it was without much emotion, there was no grief stricken widow, no heartfelt speeches.

It was a necessary evil, to bury Hiram.

As the coffin is lowered into the vacancy, Archie overhears Veronica mumble;

"Rot in Hell, daddy."

She is stoic, blank.

Archie worries about her, could never know how deep the pain of losing her dad ran because she was so good at concealing her emotions.

He checks up on her after, asking how she was feeling, they sit in the cemetery. The others had left.

"I can't wait to get on with my life Arch," She says, the glimmer of a smile on her cerise lips. She's donned black, even has a diaphanous black veil over the left hand side of her face. "I'm free of Hiram Lodge and you are too."

They had such a lucky escape, all of them.

Archie can love Jughead for the rest of eternity now.

And he would, that he was sure of.

*********

La fin!
That's it!

Thanks for sticking around to see it end!