Jughead's Family Secret

Chapter 34

Ash excitedly ran to me. I was sitting on the couch, watching Gilligans Island. She sat down right beside me and cuddled up under my arm. I smiled. I hadn't seen her since I got in here, and I was so excited to see her. I felt bad, I wanted to be high energy, but I was exhausted and was fighting the urge to curl up in as much of a ball as I could and just lay there. She talked my ear off about how her school had been. Betty had sat on the couch right beside me as well, so I was cuddled in between my wife and my daughter. If almost felt like we were back home. Ash was the one that had kept the conversation going most of the time, it felt like I had missed a lot. She eventually ran out of things to talk about and grabbed her tablet and started playing games. Betty started talking to me then, until Veronica and Archie came in out of no where. Ash jumped up and went to hug them, but soon returned to my side. They had brought a bagful of Chinese food, which they placed on the coffee table. Arch started setting everything out, they had orange chicken, chow mein, teryaki, rice, fortune cookies, and paper plates. Everybody grabbed a plate, and found somewhere to sit. We all were laughing, and acting like everything was normal. Ash had apparently gotten tired, and was sound asleep in the crook of my arm. Archie and Veronica woke her up, left with her soon after that. "Betty, can you please make a diaper bag and run it up here?" "Of course Jug," I smiled. Betty helped me up and we went to my bed, we fell asleep shortly after.
Archie POV next morning: I walked my way through the hospital carrying some muffins for breakfast. I made it to Jug's room, and opened the door. He was siting on the couch looking like an absolute zombie. I drop the muffins on the coffee table, and sit down beside him. He doesn't respond to my presence, he just continues staring off into space, deep in thought. He zones back in, you can tell because his face becomes softer, then a single tears runs down Jug's face. "What's wrong Jug?" That seems to break him. "I want to go home," he says as he starts sobbing. I let his head fall into my lap as he cried about his isolation. He cried about how he wanted this to be over, how much he was hurting, how he was stressed, and I played with his hair until his crying stopped, and his breathing evened out.