I rarely ship but when I do I fall hard

but it was, wasn’t it? that was archie on the couch next to her, the couch where they kissed for the first—second—time, the one where she looked into his eyes and promised she’d always, always be in his corner. that was archie, on the same couch he was sitting on when she left, and when that door opened, she hoped, she thought—that maybe, she hadn’t.

but it was his heaven. betty walked in. veronica was only down his road.

he was happy, there. he was. wasn’t him? she should let him be. archie and betty, happy in their little yellow house with their little kids who looked exactly like little them. happiness is all she ever wanted of him. right?

-

when her doorbell rings the next day. betty is outside, with yellow roses in her arms. the bouquet gets smushed between them when she hugs her tightly.

“v! we’ve decided to come have breakfast with you,” betty says, handing her the flower bouquet. veronica looks over betty’s shoulder and realizes there is archie, standing tall and carrying a signature cooper picnic basket.

she wants them to leave, she wants them to stop trying to insert her in their picket fence romance. the kiss was fun, but it was more than enough, and now things are different—she died for him, her soul literally left her body to follow him down an unknown darkness.

“good morning, ronnie,” he says, quieter and shier than she thought he’d be, and bottom line is that archie is there, alive, breathing, smiling softly at her, his heart beating and the blood pumping in his veins that her powers allow her to sense and hell, she can’t find it in herself to tell them not to stay.

“come in. i'll make us some mimosas that will rise us from the dead.”

betty beams, and archie chuckles. veronica lets them walk into her house. she can feel his scent when he passes her by.

truth is, he's alive. he’s breathing. there’s blood in his veins. nothing else matters.

-

archie offers to wash the breakfast dishes. he’s done that before, in those few blessed and frozen weeks they spent together before it all came crashing down.

veronica mentions the dishwasher.

it's supposed to be nothing. it's just out of habit—she’d always mention the dishwasher, before, and he'd say, i’ll do these in a minute, and she’d reply from the other side of the counter with, you know there’s a dishwasher, right? it cost me three thousand dollars. it even sings for you when it finishes, and he’d laugh, and he’d kiss her smile, and he’d blush while saying sounds exactly like me, and she’d moan when he’d haul her up the counter, and—

this time, now, there’s a blush across his cheekbones that betray their shared memories. it’s supposed to be nothing, but it’s everything.

betty probably notices the flush on his cheeks, and the look on veronica’s too. she’s tipsy on the mimosas and she makes a face, jokes, “oh, you two are nasty. spare me the details.”

archie looks caught, leans in to kiss his girlfriend, and it scares veronica, how quickly she’d forget that betty is sitting right there with them. how quickly she’d forget everything.

-

fate catches them alone in another kitchen—his, this time. everyone is gathered in the living room and veronica offers to brew them coffee just so she has anything to do with her hands and distract herself from the fact that the last time she was even in that house, it was when archie told her all he ever wanted was betty.

she can see traces of her best friend all over the house, too, like the detective romance paperback she’s reading on top of the coffee table, or the vanilla cream she likes with her coffee since forever in the fridge. she wonders if one would’ve noticed the traces she left in that house. she wonders if archie even missed them when they were gone.

when she opens the drawer that used to have cutlery, she’s presented with some other kitchen nonsense—dish towels and place mats. everything is the same, but everything is so different. she suddenly wants to cry, but she swallows it—wouldn’t want her tears to harm anyone around her.

“veronica?” he pulls her from her thoughts. she turns around to look at him, and it’s the weirdest sense of dèja-vu. “do you need any help finding anything?”

“just, uh,” she takes a deep breath, hoping he didn’t notice the sharp pain in her chest, “just the spoons.”

“oh, betty changed them to this drawer,” he says, showing her another drawer, and handing her a spoon.

“makes sense,” she says. the drawer does make a lot more sense in the kitchen scheme, right under the kitchen counter where they often prep the meals. veronica briefly looks at him, trying not to betray her own eyes. he's thinner, and his hair is way too long, and she misses him so violently she almost can’t deal. if she had known. if only she had known.

“i never thanked you, you know,” archie says, in that quiet, shy way he’s been reserving to her lately. “for…going after me.”

“there’s no need for that.” veronica shakes her head. “i mean, it wasn’t enough to bring you back, anyway. i just—”

“it was, though,” he says. there’s as much space between them as there was the last time they had a conversation in this kitchen. “i was coming on my own before cheryl pulled us back. i believed you. i was just surprised when you told me all of that.”

“oh,” veronica says. she tucks a piece of hair behind her ear, feeling suddenly so small. “i mean, i guess it’s not every day your ex-girlfriend shows up in your sweethere after to make you leave your wife and kids and come back to fight a war you thought you had already won,” she lets out a nervous laugh.

“i guess,” archie shrugs his shoulder. “but you still did it. so, thank you.”

“you’re welcome,” she tries a small smile.

“and i thought you should know, i would’ve done the same for you.”

veronica takes in a deep breath. she wonders if there’s a scenario where she tells him, right there and now, that she still loves him, that she’ll always love him, that she has always loved him. if there’s a scenario where she says fuck betty and fuck this universe, and just lets him know, just let him understand that she walked away but she was wrong, she was so wrong. that the life he saw with betty is the kind of life she wanted with him, just in a different background, in a different town. she wonders if there’s a scenario where this all matters. Where she kisses him without warning and asks, did you really forget me?

it's up for grabs.

“i know.”

-

she doesn’t grab it.