He smiled at me. A real smile. A smile that I rarely saw out in public. That I only saw late at night, when neither of us could sleep but we were okay with that because we got to enjoy the little bit of time we had together before the sun came up. I had learned to hate the sunrise this summer. It meant that Juggie was leaving. It meant coldness from the disappearance of his body in my bed. It meant i was alone again. No more beams of light from the flashlight on my bedside table swirling across the walls of my room. No more little jokes and muffled laughter. No more sweet short kisses (or loving long ones). It just meant no more Juggie.

The new girl, Veronica, had convinced Betty to try out for cheerleading, so later I got a text from her.

Betty💗: Veronica and I made the squad!!

Me: That's awesome!

Betty💗: Veronica says u should try out

Me: Ha fuck no, not happening

Betty💗: Y not? It could b good for u

Me: I can see the headlines now: Second death of a Riverdale High Student in 2 months- Girl killed in freak cheerleading accident

Betty💗: Come on u know nothing bad would happen

Me: I bet it'd b Cheryl's fault

Me: I bet she would do it on purpose

Betty💗: Y/N/N her brother just died, do u honestly think she would try to kill someone?

Me: WHo even knows anymore

Betty💗: K, I'm gonna go. C u tomorrow

Me: That's right, avoid all the crazy theories, that's how you'll find the killer

Betty💗: Bye Y/N/N

I shut off my phone and layed down on my bed. That was a weird conversation but it was not the weirdest one we had ever had. Not at all. I guess with me, every conversation gets weird. Later that night, I got another text from Betty, asking if I was going to the back to school dance. To which replied again with "Fuck no" but she wouldn't take it. She told me that I was coming and that she and Veronica would be around tomorrow to help pick out a dress. Great.

The next few days leading up to the dance passed by fairly quickly. I accepted that Veronica was probably going to be around a little while longer as she was still the new girl and didn't have any friends. Betty had told me that she was concerned that by the end of this month as least, Veronica will have moved on to some other group of (cheerleaders most likely) friends. I still decided that I couldn't be all weird and nervous around her because whether it be one month or three, Veronica was still going to be around for a while. I didn't see Jughead much and it bothered me. I knew he wasn't going to the dance so I figured if I could get out of the house this weekend, I would go see him at the drive-in.

Kevin was my date to the dance. We walked in, arm in arm, behind Archie, Betty and Veronica. My hair was down and around my face as usual, but Betty had helped me straighten it so that it didn't look like a total mess. Kevin knew that I was basically not going to let go of him the whole night unless he passed me onto to someone else. We met Veronica over at the snack table and I looked onto the dance floor to see Betty standing alone. Where was my idiot brother and why did he leave his date? Than I saw him. Sitting in a chair talking to Miss Grundy. I could feel my blood boil. How could he leave an amazing girl like Betty so that he could go talk to the teacher that he was screwing behind the scenes? I was so mad that I actually considered leaving the safety of Kevin's arm and walking into a crowd of people to drag Archie back onto the dance floor. I only calmed down when I saw him get back up to go dance with Betty.

Kevin pulled me onto the dance floor, despite my protests and my threats that I was going to kill him in his sleep if he didn't take me back to the food table. We got to the edge of the dance floor and I wrapped my arms around his neck and hugged him really close. He laughed at my actions.

"Y/N/N calm down. No one here is going to hurt you or embarrass you or even talk to you so just relax."

"You don't know that." I mumbled into his shoulder.

"Yes, I do. This is a dance, you're supposed to have fun and you can't have fun if you don't relax." I felt like he was going to say more, but he didn't continue so I looked up at him. He was looking towards the back of the gym as if he had seen something. When I looked back, I saw Moose looking directly at the two of us. I looked back up at Kevin and raised my eyebrow.

"I'll explain later. Mind if I leave you with Veronica for a minute?"

My eyes got wide. Leave me alone in a crowded gym with the new girl who I was still not even comfortable being around while with my friends? I don't think so. But I couldn't say anything because Kevin had already found her, practically picked me up and set me in front of her.

"Kevin!" I yelled at him, but he had already disappeared into the crowd. I looked back a t Veronica.

"Um... hi." I said.

"Hi, what was all that about?" she asked me, gesturing in the direction Kevin had left.

"I don't know, but it had something to do with Moose."

"Moose?"

"Moose... he's a football player."

"Moose is his name?"

"No, his name is... I don't remember, we've all just called him Moose for so long. It's strange, I have no idea where it came from. Then again this town seems to have a thing for nicknames."

"What do you mean? How many other people have nicknames?"

"Well I'm not really sure, I mean a lot of us go by nicknames, but there a couple weird ones. Archie goes by a nickname, so do Betty and Reggie and Josie and I mostly go by my nickname. Moose and Jughead just seem to have weird ones."

"I'm sorry, did you just say 'Jughead'." She smiled. I smiled too.

"Yeah... I guess it's just an old nickname from elementary school that stuck."

She laughed, "That's an unfortunate name to get stuck with."

"I guess it is. I never really thought about it. Jughead's just always been Jughead to me, that's just his name." I giggled a little bit.

"Do you want to dance?" she asked me.

"Um sure, but be warned, I'm an awful dancer."

We laughed and I put my arms around her neck as we began to move with the music.

"So, tell me more about Jughead. His name makes him sound like he'll be a very interesting person."

"Believe me, he is. He wears this grey beanie that looks like a crown and he never takes it off. He's a writer. He brings his laptop everywhere and right now, he's writing the story of Jason's death. He's a mystery that no one knows how to figure out because he won't open up to anyone. A lot of people think he's strange or creepy because he doesn't like to be social but honestly when you get to know him, he's amazing. He can make you feel so special because he's paying attention to you and only you and he doesn't do that for many people. And when he puts his laptop to the side just because you showed it can make you feel like the only person in the world and fuck that sounds cheesy but it's true." I wasn't talking to Veronica anymore. I was just talking about Juggie. She was just watching me as rambled on about a boy that she knew nothing about. I stopped when I realized what I had been doing and I looked with wide eyes at Veronica. She had a big smile on her face.

"I think someone has a crush." she teased. My face went red. "Or better yet, someone has a boyfriend. Is there something going on between you this mysterious Jughead?"

"Okay, so here's something you don't know about me just yet: I can't lie. I just can't. So I'm gonna tell you, but you have to promise that you won't tell Archie."

"Done."

"Okay... Jughead was Archie's best friend. They had a bit of a falling out during the summer, but to me, there's still hope. Anyway, Jughead started hanging out with me and yes, there is, since this summer, something going on between us. Please don't tell Archie."

"I won't. So is he your boyfriend?"

"I don't know. We're not really anything right now, I mean we just haven't put a label on it. I'm fine with it that way though."

"Good. As long as you're okay with it and it's not ruining anything then it's good. Y/N-"

"Call me Y/N/N." I smiled.

"Y/N/N, I think that we could be really good friends and that first day I met you, I'm sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable in any way-"

"On, no, don't worry about that, that was just me being me. I get nervous and freaked around new people, it wasn't your fault."

"Really?"

"No, not at all."

"Okay, good. I was so afraid that I made the wrong impression on you or something."

"No, I'm just a little strange. Well actually 'a little' is an understatement, but you'll get used to it."

At that moment we looked over to see Archie and Betty stop dancing. We exchanged a worried look. Than one of Cheryl's minions came over and invited us to an after party at Thorn Hill. I did not want to go, but then we were told that both Betty and Archie were going so Veronica dragged me outside and we started to make our way to the house that I never wanted to enter.