Stardust // Reggie Mantle (3)

Prologue- Summer

Summer is supposed to be a time to relax and chill, a break from school and all the responsibilities that come with it. Summer should be fun, but sometimes that is not how things end up.

Veronica Lodge spent her summer working a tiring job at Pop's. Betty Cooper spent hers working an internship to help a friend. Archie Andrews spent his worrying about his future as everyone around him tried to figure it out for him.

Caia Sinclair, however, spent her summer a very different way.

Some might say that finding out your mom is alive after five years of thinking she was dead was a good thing. Caia had always thought this too, until it actually happened to her.

Anna Sinclair had changed. A lot. In her appearances and attitude. Her once curly blonde hair had been been chemically straightened and dyed black. She was adorned with tatoos running up and down her arms and a hardened expression. She had become tougher, a severe change from her once sweet disposition.

Having a strange woman that she felt like she barely knew move back into her house was very hard for Caia. But it wasn't like she could say no. After all, it was her mom.

Confused as to how her mother was alive, Caia brought it up.

"Hey- uh," she cleared her throat. "Mom? How are you, like, alive?"

Anna stopped unpacking her shirts. She sighed and straightened up. She glanced over at Caia, who was standing in the doorway of the room. She made her way over to the girl.

"I know you might not understand this," she began cautiously. "But I had to. Your father was too controlling. I needed to get away."

Caia recoiled, furrowing her eyebrows. "What are you saying?" She questioned. "You faked your own death?"

"Well, I didn't exactly plan it that way. I did get in a crash, but it wasn't hardly as bad as it ended up seeming." Anna shrugged. "I guess I didn't really evaluate the consequences."

Caia was starting to get angry at the nonchalant way her mother was brushing off the issue that was a really big deal to her. "We had a funeral!" Caia yelled. "I thought you died! I thought I was never going to see you again!"

Anna's expression didn't change. "Well, I'm here now, aren't I?"

Caia scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Don't you get it at all? You abandoned me. Left me here, with him." She spat the last word, referring to her recently jailed father. She glared at her mother. "He hit me because of you."

"I don't think me leaving could have possibly caused whatever actions your father may have committed in my absence," Anna replied, not even reacting to the fact that her only daughter had been abused for almost five years of her short life. "You should be happy I'm back, not bitch about whatever happened when I was gone." With that, Anna pushed past her daughter, shoving her shoulder against Caia's as she passed.

This short conversation began to make Caia resent her mother. She scoffed in disbelief and turned around, retreating from her mother's room and into her own. She slammed the door, not wanting to interact anymore with her very insensitive mother.

*

The only suffice Caia had the entire summer was Reggie. Every minute she could, she escaped her house, now being taken over by her mother and her friends, to hang out with her boyfriend.

"She's that bad, huh?" Reggie questioned as he and Caia laid on the couch, the small girl wrapped in his arms.

Caia nodded. "When she was 'dead,' I always thought it would be the best thing ever if she came back. But now that it really happened, I kinda wish she would have stayed dead."

"Hey," Reggie exclaimed. "On the bright side, we've got two packs of gummy worms and a whole crap ton of movies to watch."

Caia smiled at the thought. "Well let's get started then."

*

When she wasn't at home or with Reggie, she was hanging out with Betty, Veronica, Jughead, and Archie at Sweetwater Swimming Hole trying to soak up the short time they had before Archie's final trial. After that- well, Caia didn't want to think about that.

She didn't talk about her mom at these times. She figured everyone else already had enough to worry about. Besides, compared to them, she had it good.

The only one who knew anything about her mom coming back was Jughead. Anna was a serpent and had started hanging out with the other serpents again. He tried to talk to her about it a few times, but Caia always shut him down. She didn't want to talk.

After all, the defense attorney at Archie's trials did enough of that for the both of them.

"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the evidence and testimony that was presented in this court tell a dark story. That Mr. Andrews has a history of violent behavior." The attorney was staring down at Archie as if she was sure she had the outcome of the trial in her bag. "That he started, not one, but two masked vigilante groups. That he assaulted an innocent boy that was helpless with two broken legs." Caia saw Betty roll her eyes at that and she agreed. Nick had been in no way innocent. For goodness sake, he had almost raped Cheryl Blossom!

"And he went wilding in the Southside of town and threatened to shoot a young man in the face."

Caia tried not to scream out in frustration. Nobody was bringing up the circumstances of these actions. The full stories would reveal Archie's true character. A good, kindhearted and well-meaning boy.

"And while partying with his friends in the town of shadow lake, Mr. Andrews ran into the woods and shot the victim Cassidy Bullock, point blank, in the head. Now Mr. Andrews claims that it was his girlfriend's father's doorman who shot Mr. Bullock. A shot Mr. Andrews claims to have heard but not seen. Who knows the truth of what happened that terrible night in the woods near Shadow Lake? I'll tell you who," the attorney whipped around from the jury and pointed at Archie. "That man. Archie Andrews may be a varsity athlete, and he may be a sensitive musician. But he is also a cold blooded killer." After glaring at Archie she finished her statement and returned to her seat.

Finally, Mary Andrews stood up to testify on Archie's behalf. "Ladies and gentlemen, we know for a fact that Archie Andrews constantly puts the needs of others ahead of his own." Finally, Caia relaxed. The real story would finally emerge.

"We know that he helped to solve the murder of Jason Blossom. We know that he offered both friends and enemies shelter when they had no where else to stay. We know that he punched through a river of ice to save the life of his classmate, Caia Sinclair." Caia shifted uncomfortably as she felt the eyes of the jury on her.

"Well, let me remind you that there were no witnesses to the actual killing. There was no murder weapon, there was no motive! And the end of the day, all the prosecution has is cloudy testimony from unreliable people." Mary accused. "Now it is my solemn duty as a mother to protect my son. But as an attourney, it's my duty to adhere to the facts, to the evidence. There is nothing here that proves that Archie Andrews is anything less than an innocent boy." She nodded to the jury. "Thank you."

Mary returned to her seat and the judge began to speak.

"Ladies and gentlemen, the charge is first degree murder. You may retire to begin your deliberations." The judge banged his gavel and the jury members got up and retreated into a back room.

Caia prayed to God that they would realize the right side of the story. Archie couldn't go to jail.

It just wouldn't be right.