AUTHOR'S NOTE/SYNOPSIS:
Okay guy, let me explain this one. The problem with sitcoms is that they don't go too much into character development, and they try to play off serious moments with humor. I've decided to take some liberties of my own and fix the errors and mistakes that were made in the canon of That 70's Show, and give the characters and plot more depth. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love the show and what the canon brought but I thought that some things about it (especially Season 8 and all of those unnecessary contradictions throughout the whole series) were twisted due to the writing.
The first liberty that I've decided to take (which also happens to be the most prominent change) was with Jackie Burkhart's character. I felt like there was much more to her than the two dimensional character we saw on the TV screen. I grew up in a similar environment and lifestyle that she did, so I could relate to her more. However, you WILL still see the Jackie we all know and love throughout this story. :) I just couldn't bring myself to completely dismiss her. I've decided to switch things up a bit, and make Jackie's character be renamed Jaime. It just fits. This story is going to be told in first person perspective (Jaime's POV), as well. Since I really liked Jackie and Laurie's friendship in the canon, I've decided to make Jaime be Laurie's best friend. Laurie was also someone whose story I felt needed to be told, and I wanted to tell her story, but through her best friend's eyes. We never learned a lot about Laurie, and she's one of my all-time favorite characters, because she is so mysterious. So I'm giving her a back story so that my readers can learn more about her. I'm going to give more depth into her relationships with her family, and her friends.
Speaking of Laurie, her ORIGNIAL characterization and personality was that of a typical 60's "free spirit" type of young woman. The show never made it clear if Laurie ever had monogamous relationships, but I see her as having more morals and being more careful than what was depicted on the show. She's not the type of woman who seeks love through inappropriate sexual partners (IE. men who are married, have girlfriends, or are convicted felons), especially in a willful, malicious, and aggressive manner. All that changed post Seasons 1, and quite frankly it irritated me. So in this story, I'm sticking with her original character.
Other major changes to the plot and some of the characters include:
- Hyde is with Donna (Donna was based entirely off of a girl that one of the show's creator's Mark Brazil lived near in New York, and she was in fact with Hyde and never was with Eric).
- Hyde is Jaime's cousin. I'll get his later and explain it in more detail!
- After a experiencing a miscarriage after having Laurie and before having Eric, Kitty (whose real name is Katherine therefor making "Kitty" a nickname) was a nurse until she went back to school to become an OB/GYN, a career which she later fills in the mid-1970s.
- Eric was born a few weeks premature on May 29, 1960, therefor making him a Gemini.
- Hyde was adopted by the Forman's when his mother dropped him off at their doorstep and abandoned him when he was 14, so he and Eric are legally brothers. And NO, he wasn't required to obtain the Forman's surname just because he was adopted by them.
- Donna doesn't live right next door to Eric, but instead four blocks down from him.
The 1970's are my absolute favorite era. So I'm putting my whole heart into this story. Let me know what you think of it!
I really hope you like it. :)
Danielle F.
All chapter titles are song titles from the 60's and 70's. This one is "School's Out For Summer" by Alice Cooper. Don't forget to read and review please! :)
CHAPTER ONE:
SCHOOL'S OUT FOR SUMMER
ERIC FORMAN'S BASEMENT - POINT PLACE, WISCONSIN – AUGUST 27TH, 1976
I'm sitting on the beaten up couch in the basement of my best friend's house, next to my friends Michael Kelso, and Donna Pinciotti. Sitting on the white chair on the right hand side of the couch, is Steven Hyde. In the lawn chair on the left side of the couch is Fez, the foreign exchange student from somewhere in South America. There's a Muddy Water's album in the record player, playing the song "You Shook Me". In front of the TV sits Eric Forman. We're all sitting in what we called "The Circle", and passing around a joint. Michael's talking about how he swears Robert Plant says "Kelso" in "Whole Lotta Love".
"I'm telling you guys, it's clearly in there!" He gets up frantically and goes over to the record player next to the backdoor, turns off Muddy Waters, pulls out Led Zeppelin's album, and puts on the song "Whole Lotta Love". He listens attentively.
We all just rolled our eyes. This wasn't the first time he brought this up while in the circle.
"Kelso, you idiot, he doesn't say your name anywhere in that song!" Hyde is looking him with what we can tell is a look of sheer annoyance.
"It's in there, Hyde! I swear!"
"Oh yeah, Kelso, we believe you." Donna said this sarcastically.
It was August of 1976, and the gang was about to start their junior year at Point Place High, on September 7th, the Tuesday after Labor Day. I was about to start my third semester at UW-Madison the same day. I graduated from Beverly Hills High School after skipping a grade in the fifth grade, and then skipping another grade in the tenth grade. I met Laurie, Eric's older sister, in junior high when I moved to Wisconsin for a couple of years before moving back to California.
Laurie was someone who I instantaneously clicked with, and vise versa. We met at McKinley Junior High (Point Place didn't have a junior high school, so we had to go into the next town's junior high school). I was the rebellious straight-A student daughter of a father who was in the Marines ever since I was young and was just recently in Vietnam, and a hardworking but free-spirited lawyer of a mother. We were insanely rich in Beverly Hills, California, almost being neighbors with Elvis Presley. Laurie was the deviant oldest child of Red Forman, an ex-Navy Seabee, and Katherine "Kitty" Forman, a UW-Madison Medical School graduate. Kitty was nurse when I met her in 1971, but now she was a OB/GYN, one of the leading female OB/GYNs in the state of Wisconsin, which was rare for this era. She worked at United Hospital System in Kenosha.
"Guys, let's talk about that concert next week." Hyde puts his hands on his knees. "But first, we need more refreshments." He smiles and gets another film container, containing weed.
"Jaime, are Paul, Adam, and Amanda still thinking of going with us?", Kelso asks me, having sat back down in his original seat, defeated.
Paul, Adam, and Amanda were my friends from college. They were all at least a couple of years older than me, but despite that fact, we all got a long pretty well. I had met Paul when I was visiting my mom's office in Chicago last year. Amanda was a classmate of mine at Madison, and Adam I had met through work. I introduced them to Hyde, Eric, and Kelso when I invited them to a concert in Chicago. Laurie was out with Randy, her boyfriend at the time, so she didn't come along.
"Who are they?", Donna asks me. I hadn't yet introduced them to her, or Fez.
"Oh man, Donna, you'll love them. They're Jaime's friends. They're really laid back and Paul's a bouncer in Chicago,and Amanda works in Chicago as a secretary. Adam...", Eric trails off, not exactly remembering where Adam worked.
"Adam is the owner of Grooves Records & Comics in Chicago," I say, reminding him.
"Hey!" Kelso snaps his fingers together. This has got to be another one of his stupid but highly enjoyable ideas. "You know what would be great? If I can get just one date with Amanda. She's really pretty."
Eric, Hyde, Donna, and I all laughed at him. In your dreams, Kelso.
We heard footsteps from around the side of the house. The same side of the house the you walk into when you walk across the driveway and into the gate the leads to the Forman's big side yard. The Forman's house was on a rounded corner of Marie Drive, at 416, in Point Place. We all froze sans Hyde, who runs to throw the baggie and canisters in his room, and Eric and Fez who start spraying the basement with air freshener. I reach into the pocket of my jeans and pull out a lighter, and grab an incense and light it, and place it back in the cup on the table. Donna does the same. The steps came closer and were shallow and too big to be a girls, but I was wrong when the door opened and teenage girl appeared.
It was Eric's girlfriend, Cassandra. Laurie, Hyde, Donna, Kelso, Red and Kitty have told me quite a bit about her, so I knew who she was. Her long brown pin straight hair clung to her head and fell loosely on her shoulders. She was much taller than me, standing at 6'1. Donna, for being as athletic as she was, was even thinner than Cassandra. Cassandra was your typical girl from the 70s who loved The Brady Bunch and listened to disco. I could read it from her super thin lips and the look of disgust in her brown eyes as soon as she walked into the basement.
"Eric," she said as she walked over over to him and brushed her hands over her ruffled shirt and her red bell bottoms, "How come you didn't call me? I thought we were supposed to study together..." She looks around at us, and her eyes stop for a second longer at me. She turns back to Eric. "Or are you busy being a piece of shit? I swear to God, Forman, if I ever see you with these dirt bags again, I will make sure that you get and them get arrested for this shit that you're doing! You're wasting time with these people who don't care about you, Eric. And you could be spending that time with me. I love you, Eric."
She wraps her arms around his neck and gives him a quick kiss, and walked out the door after giving us all a dirty look.
Fez takes a sharp break in, as does Hyde. Kelso slaps his hand on Eric back and asks him when he's breaking up with her.
Eric slumps down beside me on the couch and places his head in hands and mumbles, "How the fuck do I get rid of her, guys?" He lifts his head up and looks around at us. "Guys...help me out here! I mean, she was just fine before we had sex, and then afterwards she just went crazy and turned into that." He motions his thumb towards the door.
I had to be rude. I place an arm around Eric's shoulders and say, "You should look her in the eyes and tell her to stop reading her Seventeen magazines, and stop living in her fantasy world. And then tell her to fuck off."
Hyde and Donna agreed. The two of them had recently started seeing each other. Fez looks around for a bit.
"Do you think we should bring her to the concert still?"
Kelso walks over to Fez and slaps him upside the head.
"What are you, crazy? I know you're not from America, and I don't know how you treat crazies in your country, Fez, but here in America we don't bring girls like her to concerts! Or anywhere for the matter. She's a psycho bitch, and Eric needs to get rid of her. Hell, we all know that I'm every woman's dream with my good looks and all, but even I wouldn't want to touch that with a ten foot pole. She makes me want to run for the hills."
Eric looks up at Kelso. "I don't think you're the kind of guy to take advice from on this matter, Kels. Remember Janet?"
"Oh man, I forgot about her. Yeah she was crazy. But hey man, you're a Gemini, and they're known for giving people the silent treatment."
Eric ignores Kelso and slaps his knee, and stands up as to make an announcement.
"I know you all are going to hate me for this, but we're bringing her to the concert next week. If something bad happens, then so be it. But I'm getting rid of her."
We all a feeling something would go down at the concert.
Eric had the gotten the easy way out. When the night of the concert rolled around, during the second half of The Runaways, Cassie had told us that she was going to the restroom, to everyone's delight. My friends hated her; they, like me, could read her very well, and loathed how she treated them and Eric. Eric, although silent, was still trying to find a way to break up with Cassandra. Amanda and I told him ,"Just break up with her. Tell her you don't want anything but out. If she begs and and gives empty promises, stand your ground. With how shitty she treats you, it shouldn't be hard. Remember, you're drawing the line. Grow a spine, man." Twenty minutes went by, and we still didn't see Cassandra. After a moment's silence to gather his thoughts and words, Eric told the group that he'd be back.
None of us were prepared to see Eric completely livid when he returned to the group half an hour later. He launched into what happened between him and Cassandra while he was away: On his way to where the restrooms were, he saw Cassandra. Time froze when he watched her come from the bathroom with some unknown man who was more rugged and more muscular than he was. He knew that Cassandra had cheated on him behind that closed door, any fucking idiot would have been able to connect the dots. Eric had injudiciously confronted her and broke up with her when the two of them emerged, disheveled. Upon seeing Eric, Cassandra had denied everything and called Eric crazy and to not worry. The guy that Cassandra had cheated on Eric with had joined in and swiftly punched him in the face when Eric had called her a psycho bitch for trying to gaslight him. While Eric was on the ground from the blow, the two had walked away. I felt bad for Eric, I really did. He didn't know what to do with her, or what to do at that time, as he had told us in the basement a week ago.
Paul had lifted his spirits when he had invited all of us over to his house in Loop, assuring him that "We'll go over to my place and party all night, and Jaime and the rest of us can cover for you if your parents get worried or pissed. Seriously. Get over her. Like Kelso said, she just a stupid bitch. You'll find someone a lot better."
FRIDAY, MAY 13th, 1977 - UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN-MADSION - 12:15 PM
Today is my last day of finals at U.W. It's been a week since my last class held it's last lecture before exams started the next week and I'm sitting at my desk in my European History 124 class, writing my essay which was at minimum supposed to be 30 pages long, hand written. I was also thinking back on that particular night because that night was the last time we all had hung out together, and tonight was the first time in months that we were all going to hang out again, since we weren't busy with school and work. I still hung out with the gang with Laurie, because I only lived forty minutes away from Eric's house whenever I would stay at my house in Racine over the weekends (which Laurie preferred). Ergo, we were going to hang out more. I still didn't introduce them to Donna or Fez.
Glancing up every now and then to look up at the clock that's hanging over the door, I can't wait until class gets out in forty minutes. A cough, and then a sniff can be heard across the room from any of my classmates as they eagerly await the finish of their last essay until the fall semester. I've already had three other finals today for my other classes, the other three were last week. Thank god I only have three more paragraphs until I'm done with this stupid class. But I''m even more excited for the party that's going to be going down at Richard's house. He's a football player who got into college on a full-ride scholarship, so the whole team is going to be there. He was also Laurie's new boyfriend. There were going to be endless amounts of beer and hard alcohol too. All of our college friends, and of course I had to invite the gang to their first real college party. The badger mascot is definitely going to be there as well. Even the fraternity boys were going to be there. Just your typical college rager. Paul, Adam, and a few of the other guys could really settle the crowd down if it got too rowdy, so there was no worry for that.
I quickly scribble down my last sentences and get up out of my desk to make my way towards my professor's desk where there's a box to put our essays in. As I set my thirty-six pages down inside the box, enclosed in a three-ring binder, he looks up at me and tells me that he really enjoyed me being in his class this semester. I am really creeped out by this, because all semester long, he was eyeing me and always asking me to volunteer and call on me mostly when my hand wasn't even up to answer a question during a lecture. At one point he even handed a paper of mine back with his phone number on it. I give him a fake smile and vow to never register for one of his classes ever again. I walk back to my desk and pick up my ruck sack and purse from the floor and head out into the hallway where a few people are sitting on the floor are quietly talking. There's a few papers strewn across the floor.
Once I get down the stairs, I see Laurie waiting for me on the bench. She's wearing a cognac leather jacket with a green shirt underneath and dark blue flares with light brown wedges. Her blonde hair was feathered out, officially somewhat making her the doppelganger of Farrah Fawcet, a hairstyle that every woman pretty much died for. Her eyes look tired.
"Hey, how were your finals?", I asked, adjusting my ruck sack on my shoulder and running my fingers through my long blonde hair. I loved to dye my hair and try different things...although I would never go red, too light of blonde or all over black. Those two shades wouldn't fit my skin tone. But this time, I felt like going to my natural color.
"Not that great, I feel. I'm already flunking out of all of my classes pretty much, except for psychology and philosophy, you know the ones with the cool professors?"
I loved Laurie (whose real name is Lauren Anne Forman, but nobody ever called her by real name, so they always penned her by her nickname), she was like an older sister that I never had. We have the same mind basically. We were both rebellious at heart, we both rebelled against our parents (It was super easy for me to "rebel" against my parents. I came from a very liberal Californian family, I went to a very liberal high school in Beverly Hills, my parents were carefree about what I did because they expected me to do well, but when the time was right, they could be downright strict, even when I was emancipated when I was 14.), we were both somewhat mean to our younger siblings, we both loved to party, we both loved horror movies, and I can tolerate and respect her style, even though it wasn't to my liking. I just didn't agree with how she didn't really care about her education, and just basically wasted Red and Kitty's money for materialistic and superficial things. I liked makeup and clothes as well, however I was smart with my money, and I never had to borrow or beg money from others.
I pull my compact mirror out of my purse, and looked at myself in it.
"Yeah, I know of them. What about them?"
"Those were the only two finals that I feel really confident that I did well on." She flashes her famous smile.
I sigh. "Come on, we have to get ready for tonight, and I don't want to spend another minute here until the Fall."
We walked out of the Business building where history classes were held, and out into the Wisconsin sunlight. There were a bunch of students outside; some where participating in a drum circle, some were making out under the tree, some were reading, etc. Laurie and I walked across the lawn past the building towards the parking lot where my friend's car was parked. We had to go over to my house and start packing and getting ready for the party because I was going to be staying with her at her house in Point Place for the summer, which was about 2 hours from my grandparent's house in Madison.