SUMMARY:

Here are three things Betty knows about Jughead; he usually goes to bed around 4 A.M., he most certainly knows how to dismember a body (for story-writing purposes), and he gives the most frustratingly amazing gifts.

Here are three things Betty knows about herself; she enjoys house-cleaning, she's stubborn as a mule, and she maybesortakinda has a crush on her roommate.

XxX

When Betty accidentally gives her roommate Jughead a book of 'Sexy Coupons' instead of 'Chore Coupons' for his birthday, her pride would never allow her to admit her mistake. So she sorta just...goes with it. The rest, she argues, can be figured out later.

Welcome to this new book! I saw this prompt for a Bellarke story, but for some reason, this just really itched at my brain and begged to be written for Bughead. I hope you all enjoy it!

What does one get a moody, night-owl roommate with a penchant for gorey murder books and burgers by the pound? Apparently, nothing. Though, not for lack of trying.

Betty had been at the mall for three hours and her wallet was no lighter than the moment she had walked through the door. She had wandered the aisles of every store her, she was pretty sure, and somehow nothing had jumped out at her. It was absolutely ridiculous; she should be able to find something to buy for Jughead's upcoming birthday!

"Woah, you okay there?" Veronica asked, watching as Betty violently speared her noodles with her plastic mall folk.

"Nothing. Not one thing!" Betty said, waving her free hand, "Not one thing in this entire story that I feel is worth getting for Jughead's birthday!"

Veronica laughed, "You're being dramatic, and this is me saying it. I'm the most extra person we know," She said with a raised eyebrow. As it was, Veronica was dressed like she was attending an Oscars afterparty and not a mall day with her best friend, "Just give him a Barnes and Noble gift card and call it a day," She added with a nonchalant shrug.

"Are you joking?" Betty asked, "I can't just get Jughead that!"

"Uhm, why not?"

"Because we're in a gift-giving war, obviously!"

Veronica looked at Betty like she was crazy. Betty swore to God she wasn't.

She'd known Jughead Jones for only about two years. Her, Veronica, Archie, and Jughead had all been put into a little group for their college Freshman orientation experience. The four of them were about as different as different people could be; Betty The Overachiever, Veronica the Rich Kid, Archie The Jock, and Jughead the Moody Writer, but somehow something had clicked. All through Freshman year, they'd all been practically inseparable, particularly with the formation of Betty and Veronica as best friends and Archie and Jughead as close as brothers. They'd hung out in Veronica's dorm (she'd gotten the best one) or come to Archie's football games. They watched Jughead's favorite weird movies or helped Betty collect quotes for her journalism classes. They were rarely seen without one of each other in some collection of pairs or groups, so Betty knew Jughead fairly well.

At the time to move out of the dorms, Veronica got an expensive New York lofted apartment that Betty couldn't have ever afforded in her wildest dreams. Veronica had offered to let Betty live there free of cost, but Betty had far more pride than to let that happen.

So, she'd gone apartment searching. She'd found a two-bedroom that she knew if she split with someone else, it would be manageable. She'd started half-heartedly looking at the other girls in her class for possible choices, but hadn't felt right about any of them.

When Jughead mentioned that Archie was living in a big apartment with all the football players and was too looking for accommodations, it had seemed logical to invite him as her other roommate. They were fantastic friends and both in the English Program at NYU; Betty for Journalism and Jughead for Literature. Betty knew they would end up sharing a few classes and that their start times would be similar, so in all, it seemed like a completely logical conclusion.

So far, it had been the perfect solution.

Jughead wasn't a bad roommate, but living with another person was always a little stressful. Betty was sure there were quirks about her that bothered the hell out of him, and her list was fairly short when it came to complaints. He was often up at 3 am and sometimes woke her, he had a bad habit of leaving his laptop and handwritten notes on the kitchen table, and the worst was that he was really shit when it came to cleaning. Betty, the anal-retentive person she was, had made up this really nicely color-coded 'Chore List'...which he completely disregarded. Not to be rude, she had discovered, but he was usually so into his writing or reading that something like chores just...fell by the wayside. If she physically took his laptop away and told him to go scrub the sink or unload the dishes, he'd sheepishly do so, but to ask Jughead to do anything by his own accord was basically out of the question.

These, in its entirety, were her issues with her roommate.

That, and the infuriating fact that Jughead Jones was a god when it came to giving birthday and Christmas gifts.

"Erm, a war?" Veronica asked, leaning back in her chair.

"Yes, a war!" Betty repeated, "He is far too good at giving people presents! I have to at least match this year's birthday gift or-,"

"Or what?" Veronica said, who often gave good and expensive gifts, but rarely thoughtful ones, "I fail to see the urgency."

"It's the principle of the matter," Betty informed her. Whether or not Jughead knew it, he'd challenged Betty to a competition. Betty might be kind and friendly and almost willing to give you the clothes off her back if she thought it would help, but she most certainly was not a loser or someone that walked away from any sort of game. It was her ruthless and competitive nature that led her to be a good journalist, so she wasn't about to go around changing her personality.

At his birthday last year, she had only just met Jughead, so she'd gotten him and Archie tickets to see a band playing on Halloween. And then, at Christmas, she'd gotten him something pragmatic; a new laptop charger cord. Chargers were expensive and the one Jughead used on his hand-me-down laptop was fraying everywhere, held together by a prayer and lots of electrical tape. It had seemed like a great gift, until they'd exchanged and she'd opened hers. Jughead had gotten her tickets to see her sister, niece and nephew back home. She had felt so stupid for just giving him a charger, no matter how much he claimed he loved it, because he'd come out of the gate with that sort of gift.

She tried to classify it as a one-time lucky thing. On occasion, people gave one really good gift, and to have it be the first one made sense. She had been expecting almost nothing, so that sort of gift had been unexpected and therefore more significant, so she told herself.

But then Jughead had to go and give everyone gifts on freaking Valentine's Day . Platonic gifts, he'd said. Who did that? And it wasn't just candy picked up at the drugstore, it was personalized poems to all of them, because he claimed this was the one day he was going to get sappy. And then on National Best Friend's Day- June 8th- he got them all another very personal, infuriatingly good gift.

Betty had almost been hoping she'd just get a bath bomb or something from him on her own birthday, which fell in early August. She told herself that if Jughead got her one more out-of-this-world gift, then it would be so on. And then she'd have to rise to the occasion, obviously.

And...sigh, he did.

A signed copy of Beloved .

That fucking asshole. That thoughtful, irritating, quiet little ass had gone and gotten her what she now regarded as the most important item in her collection of things she owned.

So yeah, it was so on, and she had to one-up him in the gift department.

"Well, you'd better think quick," Veronica checked her phone, "Aren't we supposed to be at Jughead's birthday party in like half an hour?"

"Yes!" Betty wailed in despair, "Dammit; Jughead like five million, Betty zero."

Veronica patted her hand comfortingly, though it was clear she thought Betty was really being strange, "C'mon, let's just wander through Barnes and Noble more time. Maybe a book or something will just...pop out at you?"

Begrudgingly, Betty agreed.

She tried to wander, but the impending sense of time weighed upon her like she was being crushed in a time glass.

Do you know what would be worse than showing up with a 'meh' present to Jughead's birthday? Showing up without one.

Near the end of the store, Betty spied a little calendar. The sort where it gave you a new word and definition every day. Although perhaps before she wouldn't have even looked twice at it, she picked it up for lack of something else.

Jughead would enjoy it, she figured, since he was really weird about modern-day things. Yeah, he could just download a dictionary on his phone, but he insisted on having this huge tome on his bookshelf. So, he'd probably get a kick out of this. It wasn't fantastic, but now at least she wasn't going empty-handed.

She vaguely wondered if she could spin it that his gift was coming? Although, that would only add more pressure to make it a fantastic, completely awe-inspiring gift. No, no, better to just take this now and hand it off to him, knowing in her heart that she was losing this battle.

"Damn you, Jug," She hissed as she made her way to the register. Veronica popped into the Starbucks to grab drinks for their subway ride back to campus, leaving Betty waiting to pay for her meager, singular gift.

There was a total of one woman in front of Betty and she seemed very confused. Betty couldn't glean if she was trying to return what looked to be a case of fifty copies of Heart of Darkness or if she wanted to buy fifty copies, but either way, it was taking forever.

Bored, Betty turned to a little wheeled display to her right, which had little a cute little stack of coupon books. She pressed the calendar under her arm as she flipped through it.

Good for one day where I unload the dishwasher.

Good for one vacuuming.

Good for one load of your laundry.

Betty snorted; it was coupons for chores.

"Next?"

Betty put the coupon book back. She bit her nail as the woman rung up the one item, looking lonely and empty in that big forest-green bag.

"Will that be all today?"

If they were just going by money value, that Toni Morrison book had probably cost a ton. She didn't like putting price tags on gift worth, but this calendar was like fifteen bucks max and just looked so pitiful by itself.

She glanced back at the display, thinking about it.

It might be funny to get Jughead that. At the very least, he'd smile. And, if he was ever knee-deep in writing and she came bothering him about leaving his clothes strewn across the living room or his dishes in the sink, he could just tear out one of those and go back to whatever he was doing.

"Betty, we gotta go if we want to catch the next subway!" Veronica called her from near the entrance, "You almost ready?"

"One sec!" Betty smiled, darting back and grabbing at the book from the stand as she turned to Veronica. She grabbed the black cover out of the corner of her eye, since black was his favorite color like the undercover moody goth he was, and threw it on the counter.

"Gift wrap these items, ma'am?"

Betty feeling slightly better about her gifts now, smiled as she dug her for wallet, "Yes, please!"