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Jerk of Hearts, Queen of Spades	By : xyggimartak Category: Comics > Archie & Co. Views: 4306 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: All characters and related concepts copyright Archie Comic Publications, Inc. This is a not-for-profit work of fanfiction.

Chapter List
- 9
- 10
- 11
________________________________Chapter 10

"Sorry," Betty said meekly, sparing Midge a brief, worried glance. "But... the door, it was..."

Midge's face was a hurricane of differing, conflicting emotions. Mostly, she was staring straight at Reggie, but it was as if she couldn't see him. No one could speak; Betty's failed attempt had made it seem very unappealing.

"Good work," Miss Little said at last, low, feral. "Now it will be impossible. Guess we'll be packing soon enou-"

"I meant every single thing I said," Reggie reminded her. "And look, here's Betty now! Hey, Betty - I think Midge's mom has something to share with you!"

"That's not fair to anyone," his own mother admonished him. "You have to stop letting your temper rule your actions!"

"Yeah? Well, at least when I do I stand a chance of ruling them myself instead of being a- a whipped dog!"

Clearly, Betty wished she was elsewhere. "Look, I just- Midge said she was supposed to have the car to drive to work in a couple hours, but, uh... then she heard some message on her machine from the Mantles, and... maybe I should go, this seems-"

"No, no, no!" Reggie said jovially, strolling over and throwing an arm around each of their shoulders; he felt Midge twitch. "Stay! Both of you, stay! It might put a crimp in this private session of Chinese water torture we had been enjoying, but hey, we can reschedule!"

"I will not be blackmailed into changing my mind," the woman fired at him. "Do as you wish. We are leaving, and there isn't a thing you can do to stop it, so you'd just better get used to the idea."

"Betty," he said in a conversational tone. "Apparently, Miss Whatever-her-name-is-this-week thinks she has to move out of town to get her poor helpless daughter away from the likes of me. Do you like this plan?"

"No," she said slowly, brow knitting.

"If it became apparent she were... serious about ripping Midge out of Riverdale High this late into her education..."

Betty smiled nervously. "Well, gee. I guess I'd try to talk her out of it. And then I'd get the gang rounded up and we'd all organize some kind of... but you're not serious, are you? Midge is moving?!"

Mr. Mantle sighed tiredly, turning to his wife. "Big fun under the big top, eh, dear?"

"But you can't!" Betty exclaimed, stepping forward and away from Reggie. "Come on, her whole life is here now, she has a job, and friends, and- look, whatever Reggie did, I promise he's not as bad as he comes off!"

"I rest my case," Reggie told his prey, deciding to pretend he didn't hear that very spiny comment from the girl who claimed to be his friend.

"What a horrible little bastard you are," Midge's mother spat at him. "You really think I'll take this lying down?"

"I'm sorry, Miss Klump," Reggie's mother said pointedly, a false, plastic smile in place to hold back the outrage she was doubtless feeling. "But we don't abide such language in our home. I'm going to have to ask you to leave."

The outnumbered woman sighed bitterly, glaring around at the others gathered there. "Very well. I shall leave you all to tear me down behind my back. But rest assured, I will see to the well-being of my daughter, even if no one else will. Come along, Midge."

Nobody moved for a long moment. Finally, Betty piped up, "I, uh, can drive her back over later, I have my mother's van."

"It's allright, Mom," Midge said in such a deadly, frostbite-infused voice that it made things very plain that nothing was 'allright' from her point of view. "I'll catch a ride with Betty."

That, more than anything, more even than Reggie's declaration of devotion, shocked her into silence, a scandalized look across her feature. Then, without another word to anyone at all, she left the room and slammed the front door behind her. Once they heard the engine start in the driveway, his father said, "Dear God in Heaven."

"Why?" Midge whispered. "Why are you... having secret meetings here? Am I just not smart enough to decide things on my own?"

"Come here, dear," Mrs. Mantle said, her voice straining not to break as she embraced the girl from where she stood under Reggie's arm. "Oh, I'm so, so sorry..."

"Look," Betty said mildly, "I can, uh... yeah, I'm gonna go wait in the van for a while. Listen to the radio. Yeah..."

No one moved much as Betty retreated, clearly wishing to stay and find out what was going on but too afraid she'd be in the way. Again, they waited for the front door to click shut. Again, they began to breathe easier. Until Midge growled, "So how much do you all know now?"

"Enough, honey," his mother sighed into her hair. Reggie was almost shocked when Midge collapsed into his mother's arms, hiccuping and making odd, struggling-animal noises. But he stepped back and left them to it for a moment, and apparently his father had the same notion.

"Come on, son. Let's give 'em some space."

They both headed toward the kitchen and the back porch it promised. As he moved off, however, a hand shot out and caught his - Midge's. "Yeah?"

But she said nothing. Just squeezed, very hard, very urgently - and then let go.

Once outside, his father took a cautious look around, reached under a potted plant - and produced a pack of cigarettes. "Dad!" Reggie exclaimed. "I thought you gave that up years ago!"

"Oh, I did," the man said as he pulled one out and grabbed the stick lighter he usually only needed to light the charcoal in the family grill. A few puffs later and the cigarette was burning merrily. "And I haven't needed one of these since last Christmas, when your cousins somehow tore down your old tree fort, and I got into it with your Uncle Merle."

"You shouldn't do that to yourself." It felt odd to have to give advice like this to his own father. "It's... well, you already know all this stuff."

"Which is why I haven't had one in months," he affirmed. "But every now and again, my stress level goes through the roof, and these are the only things that bring it down - unless I want to become a Zoloft-zombie. And I can tell when my son is trying to side-step the issue."

"Dad," he began, before he realized he wasn't sure how to follow that up. "Okay. Okay, what do you want from me? Because I think we covered a heckuva lot in there just now."

The man chuckled, tiny whisps of smoke clinging to his thin moustache. "Reg... the fact that the girl in there has some gender issues, is really a non-issue with me. I won't lie - it threw me for a loop, finding out she's been keeping such a whopper under her hat. But as far as her walking the fence between male and female, that's all on you to decide if you can handle it. Not me." The man's features began to look more drawn as he puffed again. "And, well, as uncomfortable as it was to be party to the intervention, at least when she held up the condom wrapper it proved you were being safe. Personally, I still believe that you are far too young to be having sex at all."

"Do we have to talk about that part?"

"Yes, Reggie." The man glared evenly at him. "This is quite a bit of activity you've been sneaking under everybody's noses, you grasp that, don't you? If you expected warm hugs and congrats, your expectations need a hefty dose of reality."

"It's not, really," he sighed, leaning against the railing of their deck. "A lot of... I know this makes it look like we've been going at it like rabbits, but I swear, dad, just once! We haven't even really been going out for a week, and to be honest, I don't know how we ended up in bed together so fast, I just- this... Dad, I'm not some kind of sex maniac!"

The man laughed, half-choking on his smoke. "Son, I don't even wanna know how you came to know a term like that. When did I accuse you of being a maniac? I'm more concerned about your dishonesty."

"Fine, then. Next time we do it, I'll leave you a memo." What could he say to make him understand. "She swore me to secrecy, Dad. That's a promise I couldn't break, not for you, not for anybody."

"I understand. But your mother and I are in charge of you; everything you do under our roof is our responsibility. It doesn't matter who swore you to what." He stubbed out the end of the smoke, looked longingly at the pack, and then made himself squirrel it away instead of starting another one. "Restraint. Show some next time."

Reggie's eyebrow cocked slightly as he leaned against the outside of their house. "You saying we can't do it again until I move out?"

"You might not get a chance," he said very seriously. "That old bag-" Reggie snickered "-may really get what she wants and move the two of them out of this town. And she's got every right, because she has legal guardianship."

"But she doesn't seem to get-"

"What YOU don't seem to get is that she's a mother, put in a very tight spot by a son who mutated into a daughter. As she said, there are a towering stack of legal and social ramifications. Maybe she's handling THIS situation with less than finesse, but from what I can tell she's done a commendable job of stewarding that girl in there's needs. So you might think about that before you start firing off with that mouth of yours."

Reggie nodded, then walked over to his father and clapped him on the upper arm. "Hey... Dad, at least... thanks for not calling her an 'it' or anything."

The man shrugged. "I call myself a Democrat, and therefore I am. Why would I try to contradict anybody else's right to their own identity?"

Reggie had that ominous feeling that an awkward father-son hug was coming on, but luckily the back door slid open at that moment, and the two women joined the two men on the deck. "Well," his mother began with a heavy sigh, "I think one of us should go tell Betty she can come back in pretty soon; I glanced out the peephole and she looks pretty miserable out there."

"Betty can keep," his father said. "She's a smart girl, she knows when things aren't meant for her ears."

"I'm... really overwhelmed," Midge said quietly, staring at her shoes as she spoke, fighting back more tears. "You guys have been... I didn't think you'd understand..."

His mother laughed. "We may be old fogeys, but we've been around the block once or twice. It's a big world with all kinds of people - even ones as twisted as your mother. Horrible little bastard, indeed - I ought to snatch her bald!"

"So you're really okay? With me and Midge?" Reggie asked hesitantly. "It's kind of, y'know, atypical..."

"Mmm," his father said with a wry smile. "Vicky, why don't you tell them about that kegger you went to back at Vassar? What was her name?"

"RICK," she said warningly, "that is not important right now. And it was one time, and there were a great deal of, ahem, 'controlled substances' involved!"

"The point is," he went on, still with that malevolent gleam in his eye, "that we are not intolerant people, because they're the biggest hypocrites of them all. So you are free to think of our house as another safe haven for you."

"Thank you," Midge breathed as Reggie tried with great effort to pretend he hadn't understood what his parents were talking about. "B-but, just don't- when you look at me... I am going to get the surgery, okay? I'm not some crossdresser, this isn't a phase."

"I know the difference, honey," his mother said warmly. "But whatever you are, you're a friend of Reggie's first; the details are secondary to us."

Reggie's father stepped forward. "Let's go in and make her a cup of hot tea. That's supposed to be good for you in these kind of situations, right?"

He and Midge were alone now, and he wasn't sure if that was a good thing; so much had happened in such a short period. How much had they heard - if anything? He wasn't sure how insulated the outer walls of their house were.

"So," she began. "You wanna tell me why the whole fam-damnly are discussing me behind my back?"

"Hey, I walked in on it," Reggie said immediately. "But I get the feeling they were waiting. Classic sniper move."

Suddenly, they heard a raise in voice from inside the house; Reggie was positive he heard his mother shouting "NICOTINE IS NOT THE ANSWER!", but it was too muffled through the sliding glass for him to be sure.

"I told you," she croaked, folding her arms. "I told you it was going to hit the fan. And you wanted to linger in Blissful Couple Amusement Park, like nothing could touch us."

"This is all unimportant crap!" Frowning, he put both hands on her shoulders, but she backed up a step and he did not follow. "Hey, I- you know we're going to win this one, right? There's nothing she can do that will really keep us apart!"

"Oh, you mean like moving away? Because I don't care how Betty reacts, she'll do it, you don't know how pigheaded she can be."

"And I'm not pigheaded? I have an ox brain and you know it!"

She sniffled, looking up and off across their backyard, lip quivering as she sucked in a few breaths to calm herself and only succeeded in making herself cry harder. "Reggie... why did you have to say what you said?"

He blinked. "Why, what did I-"

"You should have said it to ME. But you told our parents first, that's... that's really strange. That has to be some kind of, of dating snafu for the record books, right? I'm calling Guinness."

Now he knew what she meant; it was near enough to unmistakable. "Yeah, maybe. But... it kind of snuck up on me."

"Try again." Her voice was almost a squeak. "I... wanna hear it from you, to me. I need that."

Reggie walked across the deck, backing her into the corner. Then he took her hand, using his other to tilt her chin up and look into her eyes. Another tear rolled down her cheek, and he kissed it away, then grinned at her. "Hey. I love you."

"Ah!"

That was the best she could articulate before she pounced on him, so frenzied and unabashed that Reggie staggered back a step or two. Once he'd regained his footing, he returned her kiss with equal passions, picking her up from the ground slightly and feeling her cling to him as he devoured her lips, breathing heavily into her. All the world was Midge, complete and flawless. Then, they lost their balance... and fell back into the swimming pool.

"AUGH!" she screamed, drenched and floundering. "What... holy geez, how did THAT happen?!"

"Whoo!" Reggie hollered. "That's mighty refreshing on a scorcher like today! Where's my water wings?"

"Come here, you goofball!"

And there they were, whirling around in the waters in full clothing, arms around each other when Midge laughed, "I love you, too, Reggie! And... that is a sentence I bet you never thought you'd hear with no hint of sarcasm!"

"Thanks a lot, doll!" he growled playfully, tickling her sides under the water with his fingertips. "You like to take a little ribbing, too?"

"AHAHAHA!" she cried gaily, shinnying in ways he hadn't expected to be physically possible. "Stop it stop it stop iiiitahahaa!"

"Am I invited to this party?"

They both looked up to see Betty, wide grin in place, standing on the edge of the pool with her hands on her hips. "Oh, uh- hey, Bets, what's shakin'?"

"You two look a lot better than you did when I went out to the van! Is... everything okay now?"

He only really had to consider his answer for half a second. "No," Reggie laughed. "But it's getting better all the time."

Then Midge waded over to the deck and jerked Betty's ankles out from under her, tumping her into the waters with them. The neighbors eventually complained about the noise, but they were already climbing onto the deck when his father came out to yell at them. The sight they presented was too ridiculous for him to stay angry.

________________________________

"So... this isn't something Reggie cooked up to make me this week's patsy."

Midge shook her head, clutching at her knees. "All true. Too true. But if you wake up tomorrow and find out we've been living in a very long nightmare, call me and let me know I can wake up."

For the fifth time, Reggie silently wished Midge hadn't freaked out and slammed the door when Betty tried to walk in on her after she'd showered. There was nothing weird about two girls seeing each other naked - not usually, right? Sure, Midge could have made up an excuse, but being who she was, she had come clean. Now, they were all seated in the living room, Reggie's parents drifitng in and out of the room and mostly leaving them to their difficult revelation.

"Okay." Betty scratched the back of her head. "Yeah. Well, I know I saw... it, but this still feels wacky."

"We know you won't tell," Reggie said confidently, but kindly. "But... sorry you gotta have a secret like this to keep. I've only been sitting on it for a week and already it feels like I keep screwing myself."

"Sitting on it and screwing yourself, huh?" she giggled feebly. "Bet that's an eye-opener."

Midge half-smiled. "Look at you. Taking over Reggie's hobbies now?"

"I'm really sorry, you guys," she sighed deeply, hugging her sweatpant-clad legs to herself. Luckily, his mother was a trim woman, so her clothes mostly fit and didn't fall off the girls' petite figures. "It's like some horrible domino effect. First, you're screwing around, and then you're like, IN LOVE - the real thing, not just some summer romance! And now... now you're gay?"

"Uhhh..." Reggie glanced at Midge, who looked depressed again. "That's not... you got some wires crossed in translation, I think."

"Right, no, you're right," she told herself sternly. "I didn't mean that. But... she does have a... so you're having gay sex."

Midge folded her arms. "We are, if that gives you a clearer mental picture."

If Reggie had thought Betty was overheating in his car earlier, that was nothing compared to now. "Whew! Uhhh... so Reggie, I... have you ever let her... I mean, what an eye-opener!"

"No!" he said immediately. "No way, José! I am the pitcher and she is the catcher, end of story!"

"Yes, we are in total agreement - no part of me wants to violate my boyfriend, okay? Ever!"

Betty pulled a glowing smile out of nowhere. "Aww, you just called him your boyfriend, omiGOD that's so awesome!"

Somehow, this only farthered the indignation in Midge's features. She was contemplating thwacking the blonde and Reggie knew it, so he hastily said, "The point is, we are straight, because... because Midge is a girl."

"But she's got a... okay, I get it," Betty said in a would-be serious tone if she weren't still inches from a psychotic break. "I mean, you're the 'girl' in the relationship, but you don't have to be ashamed. This isn't biblical times, two guys can hook up and it's normal, nobody should-"

"Midge is a woman," Reggie repeated himself clearly. "For real, not dress-up, not Halloween. She's going to get an operation and make it official when she's got a higher balance at the bank - but even now, she's still a lady if she says so. And she does."

Betty ran a hand down the side of her face, fighting for breath. "I know. You're right, she is if she says she is, but... God... I'm not going to be able to stop seeing that in my mind..."

"This is really important, Betty," Midge spoke up at last, getting down from her seat and kneeling at the other girl's feet, hands on her hands. "You have to promise, absolutely promise, to keep this top secret. Like CIA-level. I... I need this from you, okay?"

"We both do," Reggie put in, and Midge spared him a brief smile.

"Obviously," she whispered nervously. "I... I really hope I don't slip up about it, I'll try, but... sorry, I just don't know how I'm going to be able to look at you guys and not think about... and not see... I mean, wasn't it enough that I had to watch you making out?"

"You WHAT?" Midge exclaimed.

"Been there, covered that," Reggie said quickly. "Right, so... Bets, trust me, it took me a week to get over it, so I don't expect any less from you. Go home, sleep it off or whatever. Just don't forget to drop Midge off at her house - or I could do it."

"No, Betty should do it," Midge gusted as she stood. "If you pull up at my house, Mom'll probably call the cops."

"Sorry," Betty sniffled again as she also rose, grabbing for her mostly-dry wad of clothes. "I'm not trying to sound like such a prude, but I've never, ever had to deal with anything like this before!"

"Yeah, uncharted territory, we get it," Reggie assured her. "Drive safe."

As Betty meandered toward the family minivan, Reggie held Midge back and whispered, "Hey, lover. See you tomorrow."

"Reggie!" she cried, throwing herself into his arms and squeezing him around the middle. "Can't you just keep me here? Wrap me up in a blanket of love and keep me forever?"

"Nah," he said simply, kissing the top of her head. "Go to work, get more money for your- OUR operation," he amended, which only made her smile brighter. "'Kay?"

"'Kay." A brief kiss, then she was gone and he was closing the door, sighing with relief. Yes, he had been happy to be with his girl. But today, it had brought more pain than pleasure, and he wanted nothing more than to end this day and hope for a less stressful tomorrow.

________________________________To Be Continued...
-
- 9
- 10
- 11
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Jerk of Hearts, Queen of Spades