December 31st, 1980 20:47
Jackie sat in her car, parked at the top of the hill where she and Steven had once gone long, long ago, on their very first real date. She looked around, glad that she was the only one here, as she had huge black streaks running down her face, and huge raccoon eyes from her mascara running.
"Stupid Donna, I can't believe she still thinks I love that loser," Jackie said in a quiet voice to herself. Who the hell am I kidding, she thought, I am still in love with him. She buried her head in her hands, and laid them on the steering wheel. The tears were slowing down, but she still could feel the utter despair that had lately come to settle deep within the pit of her stomach welling up again. She was so lost in thought that she didn't notice someone walking up to her window.
Tap, tap, tap! Jackie jerked her head up, completely confused as to what was going on. She looked over to her left, and saw that someone was standing right next to her window. She rolled her window down, only to be confronted with the face of the man that she had been thinking of.
"Jackie, we have to talk," he said, before he turned around and went back to his car. She huffed a little; how come it always had to be on his turf? She rolled the window back up, and got out of the car, making sure she had the keys in her hand. Once she was sure that she did, she locked it, and walked the 10 feet to Hyde's car, where he was sitting on the flatbed. She took her seat next to him, and put her hands in her lap. He had his arms crossed over his chest, just staring up at the stars. She turned towards him, and said,
"So, what did you want to talk about?" He didn't answer her, and she knew better than to try and pull an answer out of him. She sat for what seemed like an eternity, waiting for his response, but none was forthcoming. She grew more and more irritated with every second that passed, before she finally said, in an irritated voice,
"Ok, Steven, you drove all the way out here, knocked on my car window scaring the life out of me, saying that you want to talk, and now you have nothing to say? Talk, you big jerk!" Without even turning towards her, he said,
"Your mascara is running." Jackie felt tears welling up in her eyes again; that's what he wanted to talk about?! She could feel her blood begin to boil, before she turned to him, and said, in a voice that was brimming with tears and anger,
"Fuck you, Steven Hyde!" She jumped off the flatbed, and started walking back to her car, but not getting very far before he grabbed her arm.
"Let go of me, you ass!" she screamed at him, before placing a well-aimed kick on his shin, making him let her go. She ran towards her car, and he limped after her, yelling,
"Jackie, wait!" She reached her car, and with shaky hands tried to get the key into the lock, but dropped the keys instead. She muttered an expletive, and dropped to the ground, trying to get the keys before he got there. She didn't find them in time, as he picked her up from the ground, and pushed her against the car.
"God damn it, Jackie, I said wait!" he said, his face centimeters from hers.
"Why? So you can insult me some more?" She pushed his arms off her shoulders, and stood there, arms crossed over her chest. He ran a hand through his hair, before he said,
"I'm sorry about what I said. Lately I seem to just have a bad case of word vomit when it comes to you, but that's not what I wanted to talk to you about."
"So what exactly did you want to talk about?" He backed off a little, and turned around, before saying,
"I heard what you said to Donna." Jackie felt the blood drain from her face; he was listening?!
"Wh-what exactly did you hear?" she asked, her voice very soft. She uncrossed her arms, and waited for him to answer. He sighed, before he turned to face her, and said,
"Everything."
"Oh." She bit her lip; he had heard everything that she had told Donna, and now she didn't know what to say to him. She leaned back against her car, in complete shock.
"Look, Jackie, I'm really sorry about what happened between us. I really didn't want it to, I wanted it to work. It's just, you chose Kelso and I felt-"
"Wait, what? You think I chose Michael over you?" She looked up at the stars, a tear running down the side of her cheek. She knew he had thought something along those lines, but she didn't think his insecurity ran so deep as to abandon her before even hearing her side. She felt the anger bubble up again, and she let it loose on him.
"You stupid asshole!" she screamed at him. "You utter and complete MORON! You think that I chose Michael over you?! Are you really so blind?"
"What the FUCK are you talking about Jackie? I come to your hotel room, and Kelso shows up naked with only a towel on and a bucket of ice! What the hell was I supposed to think, he was there to take an ice bath?!" he screamed at her. She was really pushing him; how dare she call him a moron and blind?! What the hell was he so blind to?
"He was there to talk to me! Nothing else but to TALK! I purposely sent him away on some stupid errand, such as getting a bucket of ice, so that he would stop trying to have sex with me! I asked him to come so that I could talk some stuff out with him!"
"Really? And what 'stuff' would this be, Jackie? Who to nail next after me?" Jackie gave a little scream of frustration, and pulled at her hair. Her tears were starting to fall thick and fast, and they made him deeply uncomfortable. He hated when she cried, it brought out all his protective instincts. And right now, all he wanted to do was be angry with her; he didn't want to comfort her. She had brought up all this stuff when he had overheard her screaming at Donna; hell, he thought that the neighbors down the street heard most of the stuff that Jackie had said. Right now, he wanted to hear what she had to say next.
"No! It was more along the lines of talking to him to help me decide whether I should go to Chicago or not! He told me that if I really loved you, if I really wanted to be with you forever, then I shouldn't make the mistake of leaving you. That I really should not take the job, go back to Point Place and just be with you," she said, the last sentence said so quietly he barely heard it.
"And I was going to, as soon as he got back. I was going to have him drive me back to Point Place so that I could just throw myself into your arms and beg your forgiveness for trying to pressure you into something you weren't ready for. You beat me to the punch, though," she said, wiping away a tear. He sighed again; once again, he had jumped to conclusions. Surprise surprise, as Jackie would say.
"Jackie, look, it's just the way that everything looked, I jumped to conclusions."
"Yeah, I know that," she snorted.
"I didn't want everything to end the way that it did." He leaned against the car next to her, and crossed his arms again. "I came to Chicago to actually give you an answer, and my answer was yes." Her head whipped across to look at him so fast he thought she might end up with whiplash. He could feel her eyes searing the side of his head, but he wanted to continue. He needed to finish saying what he came to say.
"I'm so sorry, Jackie. I really am, because as much as you think that I didn't want to commit to you, I was beyond ready. Not for marriage just then, but I was ready to give you a sign that I wanted you for the rest of my life. But I really wasn't ready for marriage, not yet."
"What?!" she screeched, and he winced slightly. He had forgotten how ear-piercing her voice could be, while she steamed inside. He wasn't ready for marriage to her, but he sure as hell had been ready to marry that stupid slut stripper.
"You weren't ready to marry me, but you sure were ready to marry Sam, weren't you?" she said in a scathing voice. "Whatever, Steven," she said, before she started to walk away from him.
"Come on, Jackie, don't be like that!" She turned around, and said angrily,
"Don't bother, Steven, I get it now. Here I thought that maybe, just maybe, you had come here to tell me that you were sorry for everything and that you loved me and that you wanted to start over, but ha ha, the joke's on me, again!" She turned back around, and started walking faster away from him. He stood there for a second, before he made his decision. He ran after her, and when he caught up to her, spun her around.
"Get your hands off me, Steven! Leave me alone!" She struggled against him, beating her fists against his chest, but he held her fast around the waist. Then, he did something that was totally unexpected; he kissed her. Her eyes opened wide when he placed his lips on hers, but her eyes slowed closed as he deepened the kiss, and she encircled his neck with her arms. He put his hands on her hips, running them up onto her stomach, moving her shirt up with them. He had to feel her skin just one more time; it had been so long since he had touched her. He could feel her heart beating faster, and he was no better, his heart racing to pump blood to his fingertips, to his lips, to be able to feel her better. He couldn't see or hear or feel anything but her, and he didn't want it any other way.
She was dying; that was the only explanation she could find for Steven Hyde kissing her after almost a year and a half. She was dying, and she was going to heaven, with Steven paving her way. Her heart beat so fast that she thought it would explode out of her chest, and she felt the heat radiating from his neck, where her fingers were lightly massaging him, pushing him further into her mouth, bruising her lips with his. She never wanted it to stop; she wanted to freeze this moment in time and keep it like this forever. She belonged to him, just as much as he belonged to her, and she didn't want it any other way.
Eventually, the lack of oxygen made them pull apart, though they kept their faces mere millimeters away. He looked into her eyes, her brilliant mismatched eyes, and he felt himself being pulled in again. Her eyes, her beautiful eyes, were so wide, and sparkled with such love and passion, that he found himself wishing for more. He brought his left hand up to her face, cupping it, and wiped away a tear with his thumb.
"When are you going to understand, Jackie, that it will never be over between you and me?" he said, as she looked up at him. She reached her hands up to his glasses, and slowly pushed them up onto his forehead. She looked into his crystal blue eyes, and said,
"Hey there, where ya been for so long?" He smiled at her, before he moved in for another kiss. And he would be damned if anybody tried to break them up again.
A/N: And that would be that installment! Don't worry folks, there is still more to come! The story is far from finished yet, as you will see in the next installment. Stay tuned, and review, review, review!