( Closed starter for @rougetous )
║👑╠ It was late. He knew this, not because of the clock on his laptop which shone it’s stark, unnatural glow through the darkness of his bedroom, but because of the sound of the late night syndicated nonsense on TV downstairs — or more overly, the sound of his foster father snoring along. Jughead liked to think it was an editorial comment, but it was more likely the sleep apnea taking its toll.
It was practically like clockwork — at 8:30, Mrs. Foster Parent would fix herself a cup of tea and retire to her room with a tabloid of her choosing, undoubtedly some bit of juicy gossip that gave honest journalism a bad name. Women her age ate those things up these days like any good piece of trash fiction, except the starring roles in these pieces were real, tangible. The kind of lives you could live vicariously through — or at the very least could make you feel better about yourself for not being in their situation.
Mr. Foster Parent, however, would retire to the living room promptly after dinner with his dessert in tow to hunker down in his recliner and watch his shows (and subsequently fall asleep doing so). Which left them here, somewhere around 11:30 if he had to guess, green eyes focused and zoning out on the screen in front of him as fingertips floated over the keys in quiet prose — something to calm his thoughts enough to sleep. But just as he felt the blissful void of coherent thought start to take him, there was a sharp tap at his window. He would pause, gaze drifting up from his screen to listen, though nothing came of it, and he cast it off as a fluke. But moments later it happened again. Tap. Jughead’s brows knit on his forehead as he glanced back over his shoulder at the window beside his bed, staring at it a moment before leaning over and drawing back the curtain to peer out into the dark.
There was not much to be made out in the mist that had settled over the back yard save for a figure just on the edge of the floodlights, obscure save for one unmistakable detail…
… Blossom red.
Carefully, quietly he would unlatch the window and push it up, leaning his head out to peer down at her with a puff of steam collecting in the cool night air around lips parted from confusion. “Cheryl?” ╣👑║
