Chapter One
The Mess Up
Fez sat on the couch of the basement, watching Hitchcock's finest thrillers. His friends were yet to show up. Hyde was getting busy in his room with a girl so Fez thought it best to just be silent until it was over. He played idly with ball-on-a-string and Snakes and Ladders with himself eventually. The night itself wasn't particularly spooky feeling. Fez was creeped that nobody else was in the basement yet. He tried to turn his ear and make himself busy the more he could hear from the back room. But he couldn't.
It finished just as Psycho started on TV. Fez sat patiently, ignoring the movement of Hyde behind him.
"Hey, man. When'd you get here?" He asked but Fez couldn't talk. Hyde just sat on his chair with his legs now crossed and on the table. "You're being weird. What's the matter?"
"I heard you and.. the lady. Did you, uh, have fun?" Fez showed a weak smile. Hyde ignored it for some time before pulling his chair around to the table and lighting the incense.
Fez was happy and relaxed, forgetting all about the girl in Hyde's room. Whether she was easy or not. An uggo or not. It was just melting away from him. But Hyde was paranoid. He stared at Fez, jumping when the girl excused herself from Hyde's bedroom and exiting from the basement.
"Oh, Hyde! She is nice! Who is she?!" Fez commented, nodding and smiling wildly.
"Fez, man, I said something that no man should ever, ever say, when he's having sex with a beautiful blonde like her. Alright. No man ever. Not even Kelso. Or You for that matter. Dude, it was horrible." Hyde was uncomfortable. He couldn't sit still on his chair and Fez leaned in closer with a look of curiosity.
"Tell. I am listening."
"Alright, man. You can't tell anybody! Not Kelso or Mrs Forman. Nobody. Got it?! Got it!" Hyde was getting twitchier and he rubbed his eyes behind his glasses. He was prepared and ready to fill Fez in when Eric and Donna came bounding into the basement from outside. They both looked excited and quickly joined the circle.
Hyde waited and waited for them both to get overly toasted before resuming his conversation with Fez. Donna chuckled, leaning in when Hyde did. Eric followed and their heads were very soon nearly touching.
"Take it away, Hyde. It will not leave the circle." Fez promised.
"Alright, so I was makin' it with Patti-"
"Walker? Or Sondherson?" Eric asked, ripping open a stray bag of peanuts from under the couch.
"Sondherson. Anyway, I was makin' it with her and y'know, Patti, y'know... sounds a lot like Jackie. Hang on! Funny story, true story actually-" Hyde got giddly and started to sweat, leaning back onto the chair again and tapping his feet out of frustration and anxiety. Donna sat, still leaning in to the circle but fell back quickly,
"Hyde!" She squealed, "What about it?" Donna asked with a blank look. Eric was silently in a fit of tears. He was almost off his space on the couch. He chewed widely on the peanuts and slipped off of the couch and onto the floor. There were tears. Fez just looked at Hyde and shook his head.
"You keep away from her. I need a chance." Fez warned. Eric was pausing to breathe, slowly stopping his laughter when Jackie and Kelso came downstairs, at each other's throats about Laurie and Kelso's relationship.
"What's going on?" Jackie asked and sat on the edge of the couch. Eric roared with laughter again and pointed at Hyde. He had paralysed himself with Hyde's sexual dilemma. Donna's eyes widened and she looked at Hyde.
"The worst thing..." Hyde directed at Fez and Donna, "It got better after I said it. It was better with her than Patti. That's messed up." Hyde shook his head, holding his head in his hands after a while. "I didn't want to... I didn't want to but I did."
"Did what, man?" Kelso asked and climbed over the couch to sit behind Eric.
"Nothing! Everybody... shut up! Shut up." He lifted his head to look everyone in the eye.
Except Jackie.
It was a few weeks later. A colder night. A sober night. It was almost midnight when Hyde was leaving the Hub and taking the long route back to the Forman's. There were dogs barking in houses and the sound of the busier streets a few miles out. Luckily for Hyde, the gang had forgotten about his mishap with Patti a few weeks before. The thoughts hadn't bothered him all that much. Just whenever Jackie was around. He was trapped in his own mind. Did he like her? Or was it a spur-the-moment kind of deal where he said the first name that came into his head? He wasn't sure. Jackie repulsed him to no end and he done everything in his power to make sure she felt the same. He couldn't risk anything like that. Yeah, Kelso was an ass, but he was Hyde's best friend. He couldn't betray him like that.
Hyde kicked his heels along the concrete, aching to go home to bed after a long, hard day of 'divorcing' Jackie and Kelso. He needed to unwind. It was a stressful few hours they had had. He came to Jackie's house which was surprisingly bright. He room light was on. Hyde checked his watch. What the hell was she doing?
He walked around the back of the house, shimmying past the garden fence to look up at her larger window.
"Little Red Riding Bitch! What're you doing?!"
She was leaning out of the window with a cigarette half smoked. It was stubbed out quickly and she used her hands to flail away the smoke. "You're smoking?!"
"Hyde, shut up." Jackie seemed upset. "What do you want?"
"I seen you were awake and I came 'round here and there you are. Blazing. What's wrong?"
"Why do you care?"
"I care 'cause your mom's car's not home and neither is your dad's. You're smoking and your mailbox is full out front." Hyde said calmly and started to scale the wall by the back door to reach her window.
"You could use the front door."
"Nah! I'm better at breaking and entering." Hyde puffed and tumbled into her dim pink bedroom. He got to his feet and closed over the window, bringing the heavy crystal ashtray inside with him. Jackie sat on her bed and sighed. Hyde didn't know what to do. He stayed standing and put his hands in his jacket pocket. "So why the smokes? My stuff not good enough anymore?" He chuckled but Jackie didn't.
"I don't know. I guess... Today just proved that Michael and I are over."
Hyde scoffed, "I could've told you that. It was going to happen. You don't need to smoke to get over it."
"But it's not just Michael. My mom and dad are getting divorced. You're the first person I've told. I don't know how else to cope!" Jackie whined and started to heartily sob into her hands. Hyde swooped in by her side and comforted her with an arm around her back and his free hand on her knee. He hushed her and calmed her, reassuring her that it'll all be okay. "It's not okay! I don't want to stay with my dad because he's never home. He's always working. I don't want to stay with my mom either 'cause she's always got some guy with her and doesn't listen to me!" Jackie turned fully to Hyde and buried herself into his shoulder, crying. It broke Hyde's heart, despite the fact that he hated her. She had feelings and had a life and that life was just crumbling to nothing.
"Look, man. C'mon. I got a roach in my pocket. I was going to save it for when I went to bed. But, man, you need it more than me!" He chuckled sadly, smiling as he leaned on to the top of her head.
They sat side by side at the head of Jackie's bed, relaxed and almost falling asleep. Jackie perked up when it got close to one o'clock.
"Y'know, I just don't know what I'm gonna do. I'm gonna be an orphan." Jackie said quietly with a smile in her voice. Hyde just hunkered down and put his arm around her, relaxing to the repeating record on the player. It had played over twice already. Neither could move to change it.
"You won't be an orphan. You got Mrs Forman. She's, like, everybody's mom. Everybody's." Hyde said drowsily. He was far too relaxed for this environment. But it was already too late to climb back out the window and leave her to be alone. His boots were off and her candles were dying down.
"Y'know, sex with Michael isn't even that great. I think that's what broke it for me. Sex is meant to let you unwind and relax. I never got that with him."
"You don't say." Hyde was uninterested in their sex life and really anything to do with Jackie and sex. His eyes closed over but he was plagued with the memory of Patti and himself on Halloween. His eyes shot open.
"Yeah. He isn't strong or all that mighty. It's all very wah-wah. I'm anywhere else except there with him. Thinking about homework or John Travolta."
"Travolta? You really gotta get it good if that's what you start thinking about." Hyde laughed and pushed himself up slightly. It fell quiet between the pair and they looked at each other. They thought the same thing. They could just do it and be done with it. But it could get messy. It could definitely alter the loathing that they had for each other.
Jackie hmm'ed and sat up too, turning to face Hyde with her legs crossed.
"We shouldn't."
"No, man. Totally. Yeah."
"I don't need a rebound, alright!" Jackie chuckled and shoved his shoulder. Hyde shrugged,
"I'm good anyway." Hyde lied but thought nothing more of it. "Couldn't do that to Kelso, man."
Jackie dipped her head and nodded.
"Well..."She said quietly as the candle burned out into nothing leaving the pair in the dark. "It would be a once-in-a-lifetime thing... for you."
"Jackie. Totally no-strings, alright?"
"Yup."
