serpent ♔ juliet

In the five minute drive that it took to get to the Riverdale Cemetery, the sun had started to set when Betty parked the car. She watched over the small town as she waited for the dark to set in. It didn't feel right to confront her father's corpse during one of Riverdale's beautiful sunsets. He didn't deserve anything beautiful, even if he was dead. He earned the cold, dark night and his six-foot grave and the graffiti and trash around his headstone. Betty continued to sit in the driver's seat, just simmering in all of the anger she'd accumulated over the week. From Brett. From his weak attempts at intimidating her. Jughead not telling her things. Jughead writing about her father for his book. Yale not accepting her for who she was, her traumatic experiences and all.

When the town finally felt dead, Betty got out of the station wagon and grabbed her father's sledgehammer. She marched over to the far corner of the cemetery where the town had insisted she bury her father. Out of sight, out of mind, right? At the time, she had believed that her father deserved a proper funeral. Only ten people showed up, and she knew that they were only there for her. They weren't there to mourn her father; they had all come to comfort her. Most at school had turned a blind eye to her father's death, but those that didn't insist it was for the best that the Black Hood was dead, and others were glad he had kicked the bucket. Betty had once mourned the loss of her father, but now she was nothing but resentful of him. Betty saw the trail of trash coming from the single grave, no less than fifty feet away from the rest of Riverdale's dead citizens. Maybe when she was done, she'd find a dumpster full of horse sh*t and have it overturned on his grave. Perhaps she'd feel better then.

Betty let him know how much pain he was causing her, even while he was rotting in his grave. He had screwed with her past and present, but now he was messed with her future. She thought she could have been safe from him after he was gone, but she was angry that wasn't the case. She was disgusted, just standing in front of his headstone. Only then did she allow herself to get even slightly emotional. She usually just bottled it all up and waited to see Jughead so that she could let it all out in private with him while he held her close. She felt a few stray tears running from her eyes, and she didn't even try to stop them as she berated her father for everything he'd done.

Then she picked up her sledgehammer and swung it down forcefully, breaking off the corner. It felt good, even though the tears and anger. So she hit it again. And again, and again. She wanted to turn it into a pile of pebbles. Soon, she was screaming and growling her resentments as she swung and swung and swung, tears streaming down her face. Her mother showed up at some point, grabbing her and taking the sledgehammer from her hand.

Betty truly broke down then. Her body slacked as she collapsed into her mom's arms. Her body shook with sobs and embarrassing cries. Her mother said a few things to her, cupping her face in her hands to force her to look at her. Betty became even more emotional, as her mother was finally there when she needed her most. She held her tight, the hammer dropping to the ground at some point. Alice just stood there and comforted her for a few minutes before taking them back to the station wagon. Alice made Betty get in the passenger side and threw the hammer in the trunk before driving them home.