Relationship: Archie Andrews & Fred Andrews (Familial)

Rating: General / Teen (For reference to abuse in Juvie)

Summary:  “What’s gotten into you lately?” “When I said I fought to survive – I meant it literally.” ~Or~ A moment between Archie and Fred. It occurred to me that no one actually tells Fred that his son was forced into an illegal and violent fighting ring, nor does anyone address the fact that Archie’s outbursts of anger and violence are likely because his coping mechanism had been fighting for his life bare knuckles and bloody, and now he’s expected to cope by just…Readjusting to school life and idle chit-chat??? Yeah, no. My trauma is sooooo mild compared to Archie, and I know that is NOT how that works. So essentially – Archie blows up, again, Fred gets onto him, Archie tells him how he coped, how he can’t cope anymore, and Fred is the most amazing father in Riverdale (I mean he’s Sheriff Stilinski level people).

Tags: Family, Past Child Abuse, Implied Jughead/Archie(/Betty), mild language, an unhealthy coping mechanism, dealing with trauma, Hurt/Comfort, Good Dad Fred Andrews, Angry Archie Andrews, Hurt Archie Andrews, good parenting for once on this show, mid-season 3, after Juvie and Canada.

Ao3 Link: Here

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Archie wouldn’t say he was proud of the fact that he lost it again, he wouldn’t say he was happy about it either, but then again, he couldn’t say he really had any control over it. He’d never accepted the nonsense excuses offered for Reggie and Chuck and the other teen boys who frequently got into altercations, never believed for a moment that they were incapable of controlling themselves, that anger and violence were to be expected just because they were teenage boys. But he was starting to wonder about Reggie, about his home life and what effect it had on him. The boy was an asshole, no doubt about that, and he wasn’t shy of acting up and boasting loudly, but Archie had a new appreciation, and dislike, for how ugly things inflicted by other people could fester under the surface and bubble up into an uncontrollable eruption. And Reggie, unlike all the others save perhaps Sweet Pea, had more than a few bruises and cutting wounds that suggested some well of poison in their lives.

He hadn’t started swinging this time, that at least he could say, but it didn’t make that much of a difference to the observer, to all those now looking in at the all-American-Golden-Boy that had been Archie Andrews. Some jerk twice his age had thought it was a good idea to step out of the circle of his family and the cushion of the masquerade of suburban life to get in Archie’s face. He thought it was a good idea to stand in the young man’s space and spit degrading filth in his face, to blame him for all the things that went wrong in the last year, to curse at him for ‘attacking and degrading a fine upstanding businessman like Hiram Lodge’, to spit a dozen insults and cutting words from a mouth that had no idea what his last two years had been like. He’d ignored it, tried to at least, turned his back and tried to walk away in silence while his father had attempted to break off the tirade calmly, peacefully.

He’d failed when words about Betty Cooper’s poison influence and Jughead Jones’ inbred filth and Archie’s “perverted obsession” with Hiram Lodge hit his back. He’d felt it turn inside of him, the poison darkness that lay dormant and twisting deep within his core, felt it turn from inky numbing coldness into deep burning anger that reached up to curl around his ribs, filling his chest with the heavy weight of a shifting sea formed from heated venom. He’d felt it reach into his mind, felt it build until it choked off his throat with sickening anger, anger born of pain and survival instincts, sharpened and called on repeatedly and frequently until they couldn’t be shut off, catching him in their stranglehold. He felt it all, the weight of the past years, everything since Geraldine Grundy’s abuses to Veronica’s manipulation to Hiram Lodge’s sick games, felt it fill him until it made him sick, until it left him with nothing but anger, and sickness, and rage, and an instinct to fight, to survive. He felt it build, curl his lips into a snarl, bare his teeth in defiance, turn his body without his conscious thought to face the arrogant ass, sound his voice into a growl behind clenched teeth, raise his arms to shove him backwards. He’d made contact, released primal sounds of aggression, acted in violence before he was able to control the impulse. His father was between them, pushing Archie away from the now blustering and red-faced man, and Archie was backing away, teeth still bared, moving away from them both.

He wasn’t proud of it, hell he hated how easily it happened, hated the constant anger and defensiveness that burrowed in his core, racing through his veins at any altercation. But he had a new appreciation for how other people’s violence could turn from pain into anger, and it made him wonder about Reggie, about Sweet Pea, made him worry for himself, for them both. He wasn’t proud, was truthfully unsettled by the lingering otherness under his skin, at least when he could muster more than numb apathy, but at least he hadn’t started swinging. This time. That was an improvement, even if no one else besides King and Queen could see it, but they weren’t here now. They weren't here to curl around him with unconditional acceptance and care. They weren't here to calm him down in the etherial way only they could. They weren't here to talk sense into him and tell him it would be okay. Their presence wasn't here, and it left Archie feeling ragged and vulnerable. No, now he had only an irate and confused father following him into their home, a few steps behind as they entered their dwelling and started through the kitchen. Archie didn’t know what his destination was, he just wanted to be away from here, away from everything…

“What’s gotten into you, Archie?” He wasn’t used to hearing frustration, much less disappointment, in his father’s tone…he had a sickening feeling he should get used to it. He paused by the kitchen island but didn’t turn around, heard his father come to a stop a few paces behind him, listened with a vacant stare as the questions continued behind him, the elder’s tone pitching closer and closer towards rare anger. “I know the last year hasn’t been easy, I know that, but you can’t keep blowing up at people Son!”

He could feel the itching urge under his skin, nestled into suddenly aching joints, to tap his forefinger and middle finger against the cold marble of the island countertop in a slow, heartbeat-like rhythm. He’d learned long ago, in the dark and cold of iron bars and blood-stained tiles, to quell such ticks, to keep still, to give nothing away. The itch became a painful need, but he stood still, fingers unmoving where they sat, stare beginning to transition from vacant to unfocussed, no longer able to make out the clear lines of the laundry room’s paneled door.

A harsh sigh hissed from between his father’s teeth, and Archie was relatively certain that old and calloused hands were running harshly through thinning red hair, pulling at the roots in frustration. An almost useless attempt at rediverting turbulent emotions away from his son. “Damn it, Archie, I don’t compare people, but I’m at a loss here and I have no clue what else to do. FP got manipulated by a man in power, same as you, got put in a damn jail cell for months, same as you, and he didn’t come out swinging and blowing up into fits of rage! You’ve never been an angry kid- What the hell happened?”

His father rarely cursed, that alone was enough to tell Archie how close to the end of his tether the man was. ‘What happened?’ Surely, he didn’t need him to go through it? FP had gone through a sharp, cut and dry withdrawal from alcoholism, but even then, he’d mostly just sat in a cell. His father couldn’t think that that was the same as… They wouldn’t. Would they? Surely one of them, Jughead, Veronica, FP, Betty, surely at least one of them would have told him. Right? He sighed heavily, the sound suppressed within a still chest and clenched teeth. They would. With all the shit going on, no one had told his father, had they?

“They didn’t tell you, did they? I thought at least one of them would have, at some point.” His voice came out steadily, rough and low like his vocal cords had been redecorated by sandpaper, weary with the weight of too much since the summer that his hometown had turned to hell. He turned towards his father slowly, acutely aware of every ache in his protesting body, the pain of where he was worn down, the phantom pain of injuries that had healed, the jarring pull of all the ones that hadn’t healed correctly, the grating where the pieces no longer fit together properly after one too many traumas. He faced his father and wished to gods he wasn’t sure he believed in anymore that the thousand-yard-stare that he couldn’t shake wasn’t reflecting the weight of everything that had happened, that the closed shutters didn’t reveal the numb apathy, hell-born weariness, and the anger that didn’t have anywhere to go. Wished, for the sake of his father, that all his traumas weren’t revealed in the depths of guarded eyes that no longer shined with childhood joy.

His father wasn’t afraid of him, would never, ever recoil from his son in any form of fear…but recoil he did, uncertainty and wariness clear in the sorrow etched into every line of his face when he met young whiskey eyes turned to rust. His voice, too, was guarded, hesitant and suddenly quiet, as he asked the question he knew he didn’t want the answer to. “Tell me what?”

Archie from two years ago would have moved around, would have changed expression, shifted tone in discomfort and an attempt to either avoid this or lighten the impact. Here and now, he didn’t move, not a muscle shifted in body nor expression. Monotone and rough, he wasn’t sure if his tone failed to reveal his emotions…or if his chest truly was as hollow as it felt. “About Leopold and Loeb. They didn’t tell you.” It wasn’t a question. The confusion tinged in the beginnings of alarm on his father’s face told him the answer. He sighed then, quietly but not softly, and shifted ever so slightly towards his father, resting his weight back on one leg.

“When I told you I fought to survive – I meant it.”

His father’s face contorted into confusion, brow furrowing and lips parting to ask him what he meant, but Archie wasn’t in the mood to play twenty-questions. He didn’t have the wherewithal to make this gentle either, but he didn’t want to draw it out, so straightforward it was.

“Hiram didn’t get me sentenced to his prison, to the warden in his pocket, to gloat from a distance. He did that up close.” He sighed heavily and shifted his weight, the first signs of animation he’d shown since he’d stopped moving “They made us fight.” Well that wasn’t going to cut it, he’d have to say it all now. “In Leopold and Loeb. They backed us into corners to see who defended the others, who fought against the dozen guards given free rein to abuse them, who’d lay down and take it and who’d stand up and defend themselves. Not sure it mattered in the end, they took whomever amused them.”

His father had a queasy look beginning to color his face, and Archie realized all of the sudden how that sentence sounded, what horrors it might lead an uninformed mind to conclude. He almost snorted in laughter when he caught it. That type of shit hadn’t happened since Geraldine Grundy. His words weren’t hurried, each of them slow and steady and marching after the previous ones with unshifting uniformity. All the same, he didn’t have use for dramatic pauses, any more than tonal shifts it seemed.

“Loeb and a handful of other juvie prisons took handfuls of kids and threw us by pairs in an old underground swimming pool, square mat that made no difference tossed over the drain in the center.” His father still looked apprehensive, but it was tinged by confusion rather than disgusted horror now. God, Archie wished he wasn’t about to change that. But he could no more avoid these words than he could bring himself to put any more than cold apathy in his tone.

“They made us fight. Six rounds at least, bare knuckles. Bloody or it didn’t count.” Each word like a bullet, spat out without cushion or coddling. Truth laid bare, chips to fall where they may. Not for lack of care or empathy or sorrow for the pain this would cause his father, but an inability for those things to overrule the apathy that had become his 'normal'. “I always made sure I was the one who bled. Half those guys were put there to be beaten into the tile, and I could take most of them down in a few hits, but that ‘didn’t count’.” He made an aborted half-shrug. “You got knocked down, there was a fair chance you’d be dead when they took you out of the ring. Made losing a bad option. The ‘repercussions’ for ‘disappointing’ the warden that got put on everyone else was a pretty strong motivation too. You won, one of three things happened: You died. You got beaten to a pulp. The others got beaten in your place. I kept winning, I kept getting put in the pit.”

His father was leaning against the wall now, a sick look warring for dominance with shock and horror on his features as he stared at his son like he was just now seeing him for the first time. Two years ago Archie would have moved to him, put a hand on his arm to support him, asked him ‘Dad, are you ok?’ with fluctuating tones that revealed a dozen emotions. Now? He stood broken and still as a crumbling statue, staring ahead with vacant eyes at where his father stood, unable to muster the energy to change his monotone. It wasn’t that he didn’t care. He just didn’t know how to be anything other than numb, unless he was angry, anymore.

“It was hell. But part of me wishes I was still there.” Fred Andrews blanched, whole body recoiling in shock at those words, and a small twinge of remorse – likely far bigger than he was capable of feeling – lanced through Archie’s chest. He took a deep breath and steadied himself, made a point to shift his weight back enough so at least some of it was resting on the arm still atop the counter. Attempted to look less like the veteran soldier come home from hell. He met his father’s eyes and offered a silent apology as the first tendrils of frustration and anger began to leak into his tone.

“I trained, I bled, I fought, I survived.” He breathed, calm and deep, control his survival had demanded he learn in every muscle movement. “I don’t know how to cope out here.”

Anger began to swirl in his gut, began to rise up and swell in his hollow chest, and he grit his teeth to bite it down. “Silence was familiar, but it’s oppressive now. Music reminds me of other...unpleasant, things. Running doesn’t help. Punching a bag doesn’t help. Swinging a sledgehammer doesn’t help.” His teeth ground together, his jaws straining as they grit together, the anger he’d been biting down beginning to rear its head, tendrils of it reaching up to light fires in his eyes. “I can’t feel a damn thing anymore other than numbness and a rage that’s settled itself in my bones, anger that flares up when I can’t get this damn restlessness out of my body. It hurts so fucking bad, builds and builds in my bones until it aches, until I want to snap my own bones to get rid of it. But it won’t come out, nothing gets it out of me.” He barked a short, humorless laugh. “Hell, boxing with Sheriff Keller doesn’t even help. It’s controlled, slow, gloved, has too many rules, isn't real, and he wants me to start at the beginning – He’s not wrong, but that type of fighting, it’s the wrong fighting.”

He breathed out fire between clenched teeth, felt the weight of this thing under his skin run through him, forcing him to move for the first time since they got home, sending shockwaves through his body that make him tremble.

“I know I keep blowing up, stupid shit and stupid people making me angry – And there’s no excuse for it, I know that, I’m trying, fuck I’m trying, to control it. But I don’t know how to control this, fuck, this thing that’s gotten shoved between my bones. I’m not allowed what I need, fights like those are illegal for a reason, and damn it, I can’t cope out here! ” His voice had taken a higher pitch toward the end, distress and frustration ringing through clearly as he tried not to fall apart, the ugly truth of the patchwork of his psyche and trauma laid bare.

He was actively trembling now, teeth gritted and bared to the cold night air, tears that stubbornly refused to fall blurring his vision.

Fred hadn’t said anything else, the aggression gone from his form, chased away by horror and sickness, sorrow and rage. Those, too, were fading, becoming a muted background in the shifting earth of the elder's eyes. He straightened from where he’d been leaned against the wall, and somewhere in the distant recesses of his mind Archie marveled at how fathers could do that. How they could look like they had borne the weight of the world and broken under a trial that bent even a titan of old, could move like every fiber of their being was shredded, worn away by life and cruelty alike, and yet still appear as if steel was rigged around their bones, as if they could take the weight of the world and all the cosmos as well with ease, by the force of their will alone. Any frustration or ire he'd felt was gone, locked away behind the unfailing determination and love and care of a father.

He stepped up to his son with slow, measured and sure steps, stood before him and reached out to grasp his hands, used them to pull at him gently, not enough to move him but to ground him while his father looked up at him with earthen eyes turned warm with care, underlined by soft steel manifesting a survivor’s will. “Son…” God, he hadn’t heard a tone like that since he’d been small, ten or so, and had needed his recently separated father to reassure the fears that had manifest into nightmares. He wished he was ten again, back when fondness and patience and the never-ending warmth of his father’s voice telling him he was okay was enough, when the strength shifting beneath it, promising to cradle him and protect him from anything, real or fictitious, had been enough to settle any restlessness in his chest. Calloused hands that had long ago given up music in trade for unforgiving work for the sake of taking care of his family released his own, reached up carefully and gently to cup his jaw. Cradled his face between them, grounded him and urged him to meet older eyes that had seen him grow, had seen too much before him, too much now; eyes that promised the same shield of love and safety that had been promised to a ten-year-old with nightmares that paled in comparison to a now-seventeen-year-old’s reality.

“It’s going to be okay, Archie.” Rough thumbs larger than his own, that could more easily wrap around the neck and strings of a guitar, glanced over his cheeks in a reassuring pattern. He settled, teeth still gritted, eyes still tear-filled, and breaths still hissing out in quiet pain and anger. He settled enough to meet his father’s eyes, enough to lean into the offered embrace. Enough to ground himself in his father’s presence and hear the words uttered in quiet conviction in the space between them. “You’re not alone anymore Arch, we’ll get through this, I promise. It’s going to be okay Son.”