Riverdale - Beneath The Town (English Version)

Chapter 1: The River's Edge

Our story is about a town. A small town. And the people who live in the town. From a distance, it presents itself like so many other small towns all over the world. Safe. Decent. Innocent. But at a certain point you look closely enough - and you start to see the shadows beneath the town. And sometimes... the shadows take over. And you live in this place you don't recognize anymore. And you feel a lot of things, but sure is none of them.

The name of this town is Riverdale.

And our story begins, I guess, with what the Blossom twins did this summer. On July 4th, at dawn, Jason and Cheryl Blossom went out to the Sweetwater River for an early morning boat ride. The next thing we know happened for sure is that Dilton Doiley, who was leading Riverdale's Boy Scout Troop on a bird - watching expedition, came upon Cheryl by the river's edge. Riverdale's Police dragged Sweetwater River for Jason's body, but never found it.

Needless to say, there were no fireworks in Riverdale that night. So a week later, the Blossom family buried an empty casket and Jason's death was ruled an accident as the story that Cheryl told made the rounds.

That Cheryl dropped a glove in the water, and Jason reached down to get it, and accidentally tipped the boat, panicked, and drowned, which is super weird because Jason was captain of almost every sports team at Riverdale High, including Water Polo. Not that anyone had checked these facts too closely or asked too many questions. The Blossoms had wrapped their tendrils around the entire city - nobody wanted to make enemies of.

As for us, we were still talking about the July 4th tragedy on the last day of summer vacation, when a new mystery rolled into town.

On the last day of the holidays, Kevin and I were with Betty, watching her get ready for her meeting with her best friend and secret crush Archie Andrews. "Are you excited? Nervous?", Kevin wanted to know with a slight grin and looked from his mobile phone at our friend Betty, who was tying her light blonde hair into a ponytail. "Both. I haven't seen him all summer", she replied and turned to her bed where Kevin and I had made ourselves comfortable, nervously smiling. "Which is why nerves are acceptable, but we agreed, Betty", Kevin reminded her and I nodded in agreement. "Archie would be silly if he turned you down", I agreed with him and Betty turned back to her mirror, smiling. "It's time. Hey, you like him and he likes you", Kevin kept talking and Betty looked at us again while powdering her cheeks. "Well then why, Kevin, hasn't he ever said or done anything?", she wanted to know in return and Kevin hesitated a moment before he replied that Archie was a great guy. "And like most millennial straight guys, he needs to be told what he wants, so tell him", he finally ended and stood up. "Well, we'll see. I mean, it depends", Betty just said and Kevin looked out the window. "For sure you won't regret it, Betty." I wanted to encourage her and before she could say anything, Kevin drew the curtains a little further. "Oh, my God", he just said, and Betty and I followed his gaze. Betty's best friend lived right across from her and hadn't drawn the curtains at his window. There was a light on in his room and we could see him changing his shirt. "Game - changer. Archie got hot! He's got abs now", Kevin noted with a fascinated look, and now Betty and I were pressing our noses to the glass, too. "Six more reasons to take that ginger bull by the horns tonight", Kevin continued, but we were still too busy stalking Archie Andrews, who was staring at his mobile phone screen and luckily didn't notice us. Archie had always been handsome, since I moved to Riverdale with my dad four years ago. Over the summer holidays, Archie had helped his dad with construction and before the holidays he hadn't had all these muscles. But even though he was so good-looking, he just wasn't my type at all, not to mention the fact that I would never get involved with a guy that my best friend was into anyway. Betty continued to get ready and Kevin and I went out of the house with her, wished her good luck and then ran over to Kevin's place to have a nice movie night.