* JELLYBEAN JONES

      technically speaking she wasn’t officially patched in, and yet that hadn’t stopped jellybean from hand sewing on a patch to the back of the old beat up jeans jacket jughead had given her, okay maybe not given so much as she liberated, but either way there she stood in her oversized jeans jacket, proudly displaying the serpent emblem, a grey beanie and some right pink doc martin that were a size and a half too big for her, but they were $12 in goodwill, beggars can’t be choosers, right?

    a heavy sigh on her lips, hands firmly on her hips, staring down at her brother (or up, she was will shorted by a solid 6 inches) apparently the whole club had gone to shit by the sounds of it. jellybean knew things had gotten messy, but this? 

         “ so lemme get this straight, you kicked out fangs for dealin’, and now he’s working some bullshit undercover ‘ross kemp on gangs’ operation that’s probably gonna get him killed, meanwhile topaz shacked up with a blossom -- gross but okay -- and after a little cat buglaring and de-facing hiram fuck-face lodge’s portrait you kicked them BOTH out? -- after you decided that you were going clean --do i need to alexa ‘democracy’ for you?  ‘cause last i checked that’s what this club was. but then what do i know, right? not like i’m a real serpent~” 

        she’d missed her brother, even if right in this moment it didn’t look that way. he was in over his head, maybe they all were, but that should bring them together not fragment them even more. “ so what now? -- what’s you big plan to save the serpents? ” swallowing thick, she was pissed, at all of them, she knew they were ALL better than this, but she hadn’t been here, she hadn’t lived through the riot, through each and every hit that Hiram Lodge made at her friends and her family, she should have been. jug never should have been left with this weight on his shoulders, and the guilt from choices beyond her control that left him alone like that ate at her. 

                   she’d been pacing; back and forth, back and forth -- she did that when she had something she wanted to say, but never sure how to get it out. her tendency to waffle, especially when nervous never did her any favours. and she’d been thinking it since her dad left, foolish childish notion, right? or so she told herself.  she was still mad at him, bitter in her resentment for his lack of calls or visits over the last eighteen months, how was it her mom seemed to let him off to scott free? should she? 

                bursting into the garage like a hurricane, she stops dead still, her mom still under the hood of the 58′ chevy she’d been working on all morning. hands on her hips, frown etched on her features, “ do you want him back? --- dad i mean. ‘cause you didn’t exactly seem that mad at him, are you? -- you should be. how can’t you be? ” it hurt, that sharp reminder that she hadn’t seen his face in almost two years, the last hug she had from him, the stench of whiskey sour on his lips, that smell of stale beer thick in the air. she made excuses for him once too, but he never came for her, and that broke her heart, how COULDN’T that break her moms too?

       “ feels like he just forgot ‘bout us -- ‘bout me...” swallowing thick, now he was gone again, and that emptiness louder than ever. 

YO !  TO ALL THE PERSONAL BLOGS THAT’VE STARTER FOLLOWING ME IN THE LAST TWO WEEKS... 

WHEN RAS MAKES EVERYTHING YOU’VE BEEN WRITING FOR A 18 MONTHS CANON AND YOU JUST NEED A MOMENT~

              Not exactly how she’d expected her night to go, as she stands there in the middle of the living room, her mom’s voice raised, and Jellybean rolls her eyes,  “ oh my god -- mom! stop -- it’s not like i’m pregnant -- ” maybe not the kind of image Gladys needs to fuel this fire. Caught in a rather unforgiving position on the sofa, straddling Sweet Pea, shirt pulled all the way up, flesh exposed when Gladys had walked in. Fuck, fuck fuck. she wasn’t suppose to be home until 11PM. She was NEVER  early from work, but of course tonight, the one night she’d convinced her boyfriend to come around -- of course this would happen to Jellybean, wouldn’t it?

        “ we weren’t fucking! i don’t see what the big deal is -- and you wonder why i never tell you anything~ ” turning it back around on her mother, standing her ground, hands running through her hair, Sweet Pea already escaped, far gone -- Jellybean left wondering if he would even text her back after this. 

          “  you realise than i am sixteen not six, right?~ ” she deadpan, a deep breath huffed out, anger rising in the bit of her stomach, tears welling up in her eyes, goddamn being a angry crier. 

&& christmas at the jones’ ! ( a drabble no one asked for )

it’s still dark, jughead’s asleep no more than 5 feet away, a christmas eve tradition that she’s not willing to let go of even if she turns FOURTEEN next year. only another year left in junior high, and that thought terrifies her -- but she won’t tell you that.EVER. she loves christmas, and jughead screws up his nose every time she says it. to him it’s another holiday filled with disappointment; to her it’s the only glimmer of MAGIC she still believes in. not the bullshit they feed you as a kid; santa clause, who never quite seemed to be as good to her as he was to the other kids in her class. the ones he brought bike’s and games consoles too, the ones she wondered at EIGHT years old when ALL she wanted was a nintendo DS -- why were they better than her? what did they do right that she did wrong? Jellybean grew up with a very SKEWED idea of what santa was.  But, thankful at NINE when jughead gently told her he wasn’t real -- that it was their parents, and she got it. 

she remembers her favourite christma. she was SIX -- jug was EIGHT. daddy came home on christmas ever with a pile of VHS tapes,scattered them on the living room floor, her eyes light up, her favourite LABYRINTH and so would begin her David Bowie obsession that her brother would tease her for years to come. she loved that movie, still does. the way sarah was dragged into this  realm of magic and mystery. jughead hated it -- terrified him to think of HER  as the stolen baby toby, ‘you're silly, Juggie i’m not a baby, i’m SIX!’ she proclaimed and that was that. Now a christmas eve tradition, all four of them huddled up on the little beat up couch to watch it.  jellybean curled up on her daddy’s lap, a miracle each year if she even made it to the end of the movie. 

‘jug --- jug... you awake?’ she’s got that child like grin painted across her lips, looks at the digital clock on the night stand, 05:38AM. her brother ain’t a morning person but all bets are off it’s CHRISTMAS ! and little does she know it but the last they’ll spend as a family -- at least for a while. he turns in bed, sleep filled eyes and a scowl painted on his lips, until he sees her face, hard to stay mad at her when she looks like a over excited puppy.  ‘jels it’s not even SIX -- mom and dad will kill you if you wake them now. do i need to remind you of christmas 2010?  y’know the year you decided to wake the whole house up at 4AM with a whistle.' That gets a laugh out her, giggling as she pulls herself up in bed, ‘ no whistles, promise, but c’mon stop being the grinch who stole christmas, emo’s can have fun too y’know.’ she teases.  moving without invite over to his bed -- the blow up mattress on her floor, because oh no, he wasn’t allowed to sleep in his OWN room on christmas eve, Jellybean would never allow it.

‘fine -- we won’t wake mom and dad but watch a movie with me?’ as if their was any answer besides YES to that question, knowing she had her brother wrapped around her little finger ALMOST as much as her she had her daddy -- eyelids flutter, ‘pleeease -- i’ll make it worth your while -- milkshakes on ME when we go to pops tomorrow’ a little pout and head tilt to seal the deal, as jug reluctantly agrees, her brothers ONE WEAKNESS -- food. 

two hours later and they’re both fast asleep on the floor, under a pile of blankets, the credits to nightmare before christmas rolling, Gladys and FP’s head peeking around the door, a little after 07.30AM, smirking at their two little tearaways, turning to FP she sighs soft, a hint of a smile curving, as she shakes her head, ‘every damn year...’ 

it’s late, after 9, her and her mom cuddle up on the couch, labyrinth playing in background -- some traditions die hard.  the tree lights twinkle, but it doesn’t feel like christmas, not this year, not last either. it was her FAVOURITE holiday, and now it’s worst. cell phone out and she flicks open whatsapp taps on juggies picture, snapping a picture of the TV before she types:

                                          ‘maybe i am toby after all...’

IT’S MY FUCKING MOM AND DAD !!!