mentally ill ™

come what may (i'll still stay)

the sequel to if it feels like a home

Back in New York City after the whirlwind Cape Cod weekend that resulted in their reunion, Betty and Jughead learn how to be a couple again.

chapter one: august

Seven years. It’s how long they’d been apart. Within weeks, a number that had once signified what felt like a vast eternity started to instead feel...arbitrary, laughable. A once-insurmountable barrier that they had managed to overcome and now laugh in the face of.

The end of July was a haze of sticky, addicting reunion sex and Betty dragging Jughead to places in New York he’d never been, his head ducked under the covers to hide from Betty’s squeals after admitting he had yet to visit. It quickly gave way to August, heat rising off the dirty concrete sidewalks in practically-visible waves, mornings spent wiping sweat off brows and leaning down the subway platform in the hopes of glimpsing the bright lights of the A train, perpetually running late for work as a combination of MTA delays and because too often they stayed wrapped up in bed with each other ten minutes too long.

varchie appreciation month: