Disclaimer: That '70s Show copyright The Carsey-Werner Company, LLC and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, LLC.

CHAPTER TEN
FOLLOWING THROUGH

Hyde should've been in his car, driving off to freedom. The final school bell had rung. The first week of his senior year was over, but he bolted to the third floor bathroom and locked himself in a stall. The minutes plodded by on his watch, slower than during any of his classes, but he had to wait. Otherwise, his path to the school parking lot might not be safe.

On Monday, girls stared at him in the halls, pointing and giggling. Tuesday, a few of them offered a shy, "Hi," before scurrying off. By Wednesday, the first chick asked to feel his beard. She was a junior, almost as tall as him, with legs he wouldn't mind wrapping around his hips. So he said sure.

More girls asked to do the same on Thursday, and he indulged them. But today, most didn't bother asking. They felt up his face in classrooms, the stairwells, wherever they could corner him. It seemed like a conspiracy. Like Jackie getting vengeance for last Saturday and his other supposed felonies. Siccing the female population of Point Place High on his beard would be a decent payback.

But that kind of retaliation wasn't her style.

She hadn't spoken to him since Monday, since she'd accused him of being a liar. She'd gone to Donna's a few evenings but never the Formans'. Even if she were to drop by the basement, words wouldn't fix shit. Her friendship with him was done. Irreparable.

He pressed the heels of his hands against his forehead. For twenty damn minutes he'd tolerated fart stench and listened to urinals flush. He had to get out of the bathroom.

He left the stall and opened the bathroom door a crack. The hallway outside was clear, so he darted to the stairwell. His backpack bounced against his back, and his boots squeaked as he rushed down the steps. The senior locker area was empty, but he peeked into the lobby. A few students roamed around, but none fit the type who'd been interested in him lately.

Crossing the lobby caused no problems. He pushed through the double doors to the parking lot, but his breath sped from his nose, and his heart slammed against his ribs. Racing down two flights of stairs, people molesting his beard, Jackie avoiding him—his body and mind needed a break.

The Camino had no cars parked on either side of it. That would let him make a quick getaway, and he pulled his keys from his jacket.

"Hey, there, foxy," a feminine voice said behind him. Fingers tapped his shoulder when he didn't turn around, and the muscles in his neck tensed. He prepared to rip a groping hand from his face, but no beard-fondling followed.

He glanced back at a short chick with a nice rack. Her blond hair was curled similarly to Jackie's, and she smiled at him.

He acknowledged her with a nod but returned his attention to the Camino. He needed to unlock the driver-side door and get the hell out of here.

"Steven," she said, and shivers pricked his spine. Jackie must've been gossiping about him. No other way for this girl to know who he was. He didn't socialize in school except with his friends. He'd never been part of any extracurricular group. "I hope you won't find this too forward, but—"

"Beard's retired," he said.

"Really? That's too bad because I heard you give great head."

His fist tightened on the Camino's door handle. She wanted more than he'd expected, and he turned toward her. "Where'd you hear that?"

"Kat Peterson." She cupped her left cheek and drummed her fingers below her eye. If that was her most seductive move, it needed work. "She told me in confidence, but she's at the U of C now, and I can't imagine she'd mind if I talked to you about it."

"Uh-huh." He released the door handle and clutched his belt buckle. Jackie still could've sent this chick to screw with him, but Kat was the gossip in this sitch. "So you wanna slum it, too?"

Her arm dropped to her side, and she inched closer to him. Her knee-length skirt rippled with the wind blowing through the parking lot. "You're living with a nice, middle-class family. I'd hardly call that slumming it."

A chill set into his skin, raising the hairs on the nape of his neck. Apparently, Kat had paid more attention to his life than she'd let on, gathered intel, and shared it with this girl. "Who the hell are you?"

"Oh, come on, Steven." She cocked out her hip and gazed at him as if the answer were obvious. "You've known me a long time."

"Think I'd remember you."

"God, you really don't recognize me, do you?" she said, sounding turned on. "Julia Falk, but I go by Julie. I'm assistant captain of the cheer squad."

The name sparked a synapse. Jackie had mentioned her over the summer, and Julie's face wasn't wholly unfamiliar. Maybe Jackie had brought her to the Formans' once or twice.

Julie slid her hand over his shoulder. Her thumb stroked his beard, but he didn't flinch. Her touch promised more, and she used her grip on him to pull herself closer. "I'll blow your brains out," she whispered in his ear, "if you go down on me."

"When?" His body was already responding to her, but she could still be playing him. He dragged his palm along her hip and down to her thigh. If this was a trap, his move would freeze her up.

"Soon as you drive me home," she said, and her teeth nipped his earlobe. "My parents won't be home for hours."

His ear tingled where she'd bit it. She was freakin' serious about this. "What about cheer practice?" he said.

"Not today."

"Cool."

He gestured to the other side of the Camino. She followed him there, and he opened the passenger-side door. She scooted inside, grabbed her knees, and leaned her head back against the seat. She had to be desperate. No other explanation for her interest in him.

"Football team's not doin' it for ya, huh?" he said once he was in the driver's seat.

She crossed her legs. "Let's just say their skills on the field don't always translate to other places."

"Got it."

"Just as long as you get me there. You'll be happy you did."

He chuckled and revved the Camino's engine. Not much made him happy these days, but at least he could have some fun.

Jackie met Mark on neutral ground: the chess tables in Mt. Humphrey Park. She'd found his phone number on Monday night. Called him on Tuesday and convinced him she wasn't normally a screaming lunatic. He seemed to believe her, offering sympathy for the Dating Game disaster, and he agreed to a date for Friday.

He smiled when she showed up. His hair was still as long as it had been last week, reaching his shoulders, and a breeze fluffed it out appealingly. The cheer squad would recognize him in the pictures—or mistake him for Leif Garret himself—if he allowed any to be taken.

"You're actually here," he said and patted the concrete chess table he'd chosen.

She sat across from him. "Of course I am. Why wouldn't I be?"

"Gorgeous girls don't usually ask me out unless they want something."

She clutched her purse on her lap. Her camera was inside.

"But what could you possibly want from me?" he said and pulled a velvet pouch from his backpack. "You're smart enough to do your own homework, and we don't even go to the same school."

"Mark..." she said, and he removed chess pieces from the pouch, "I do want something from you."

He'd begun to set up the chess board and didn't stop. "What?"

"You're a really handsome guy, right?"

"If you say so." His concentration remained on the chess board. Maybe he had low self-esteem or didn't care about his looks, but she'd meant what she said. He'd never be without at date at her school.

She rummaged in her purse. "And you're too nice for me to lie to. I'm in trouble, and I need your help."

He finally met her gaze. "What kind of trouble?"

"A deep and painful kind." A gust of wind swept through the park, and she shuddered with the trees. "Yes, I'm rich and beautiful and popular—"

"You're not making a great case here, Jackie."

"I fell in love with a boy who cheated on me," she said, and her voice strained with the confession. "I fell in love with another who doesn't see me. My best friend is at a different school this year, and I'm stuck with a bunch of shallow bitches who'll cast me out unless I..."

She showed him the camera. "I have to prove to them I have a boyfriend so they'll get off my back. If I don't, they'll kick me off the cheer squad."

"Oh, boy." Mark tapped the top of one his pawns. "Your situation kind of makes me feel lucky I'm mostly ignored."

"Ignored?" She glanced at the table next to them. An old white man was playing a chess match against a younger black man. "But you're more than handsome. You're pretty. You could be on the cover of Tiger Beat!"

Mark rubbed his cheek and laughed. "At my school, I'm considered a nerd. Most of my friends don't go to Ft. Anderson. I met them elsewhere. The girls I've dated, too … not from my school."

"How long have you known your classmates?" she said. Their chessboard was completely set up, and she moved her e-pawn forward.

He matched her move, pushing his own e-pawn up a space. "Since first grade."

"So they formed their opinions early." She brought her queen's knight to f3. "And they're too small-minded to change those opinions as people change. As you've grown and changed."

"You going for the Spanish opening?" Mark said, placing his king-side knight on c6. She slid her queen's bishop to b5, and he nodded. "So you are—and you're right. My classmates are stuck in 1966."

He threatened her bishop with his a-pawn. It was exactly the move she'd hoped for, giving her the best chance of trapping his queen's knight.

"I understand how that is," she said. "People judge me, too, for how I used to be. Not for who I am now."

"Not all of them do, I think."

She withdrew her queen's bishop to a4, saving it from capture. "You didn't know me before."

"I'm not talking about me," he said and moved his b-pawn forward.

"Be careful, young lady," the black man said from the next table beside hers. "He's setting you up."

His opponent, the older white man, laughed once. "Noah's Ark."

"Jackie," Mark said, "meet Mr. Davis and Mr. Levine … who are about to destroy my defense."

She greeted Mr. Davis and Mr. Levine. The chess game was no longer important to her, but she listened as Mr. Davis explained the Noah's Ark Trap, where Mark would make her queen-side bishop useless. He and Mr. Levine gave her a few strategy tips, which she followed and thanked them for.

They let her and Mark play on their own afterward. Two-thirds into the match, though, Mark looked at the board and sighed. He seemed unhappy, but he had the obvious advantage.

"What is it?" she said.

"I'm about to destroy my defense."

She studied the board. "Even if you made a bad move, I'm not good enough at chess to beat you."

"I don't mean this game. Jackie..." A blast of cold air whipped Mark's hair into his eyes. The wind rattled the chess pieces and elicited a hoot from Mr. Davis and a curse from Mr. Levine. "Jackie," Mark said again when the wind calmed down, "I barely know you, but after what I've seen today—and after what Hyde told me—I wish you were actually here for me."

Her shoulders grew heavy. He deserved a girl like herself, but her heart already had too many tenants, freeloaders she was trying to evict. "Steven talked to you about me?"

"He had to, to get me to take part in that Dating Game thing. He was right about you: you're smart, insightful, and compassionate—"

She grasped the sides of the chess table and leaned over it. "He said those things? Steven Hyde said those things about me?"

"Some directly. Some indirectly, but that was the gist." He gestured for her to sit back. She did, but a few of the chess pieces had been pushed from their rightful squares. He returned them to where they belonged. "As pissed as you are by what he did, I think he respects the hell out of you. I genuinely believe he was trying to do something good."

Blood heated her neck. Steven could've lied to Mark, to convince him she was worthy enough to date. But he'd also chosen Mark as a potential boyfriend for her, an attractive, intelligent, and—so far—kind boy who came from money. If Steven didn't respect her, he wouldn't have picked someone like Mark.

"Maybe he was," she said and fiddled with her purse strap. Her heart was beating hard, and gravity abandoned her brain. Her consciousness floated into the sky, making her dizzy. Being friends with Steven was like playing chess, only she didn't understand his strategy or ultimate goal. No one had written a rule book about him, and he wouldn't explain himself.

"Jackie, are you okay?" Mark said. "You're all flushed."

She cupped her forehead and closed her eyes. "Fine. I'm fine. Just … I can't date anyone. Not now. I'm—"

"Letting me down easily. I get it."

"No. I mean, I would totally date you. I would, but I can be impulsive..." her hand glided over her heart, "where this is concerned. I can't afford to make another mistake. I have to be more careful," or she'd end up like her parents, in an imploding marriage. "I've been hurt, Mark. A lot, and I don't want to hurt you the same way."

He shrugged a shoulder, as if her explanation were enough. "So if I take those pictures with you, can I get a copy?"

"Why?"

"If I pass you off as my girlfriend at school, maybe it'll help my rep."

"Of course it will, but you won't say anything piggish about me, will you? Like I'm your whore or something."

"That's not me." He dragged a hand through his hair, pushing it from his face. "I'll say we started dating during the summer, and by October or November you and I will have broken up mutually—because the rivalry between our two schools is too much."

A thrill pinwheeled in her chest as her dizziness abated. "That's a great idea!" She bounced in her concrete chair but resisted the urge to clap. "People will think our relationship is like Maria and Tony's from West Side Story."

"Or Romeo and Juliet but without the death."

"So we'll both get something out of this."

He winked at her. "Here's hoping."

"Yeah..." she gestured to his eye, "don't do that in the pictures."

Julie's rug cushioned Hyde's knees, and his hands skimmed her bare stomach. She was lying on her bed, naked and fully informed of his one-week-only policy. If she liked what he did, she'd get seven days of it, tops. Fooling around wouldn't put them in a relationship.

She said she understood, but Led Zeppelin III played on her stereo. She'd evidently watched him their first week of school, noticing what he wore and assuming what music he liked because of it. Her attention to detail was unsettling. It made him feel more like prey than a casual fuck, but no reason a chick wouldn't pursue an orgasm same as a guy. Especially if she hadn't had one in a while.

He brought her legs over his shoulders and pulled her as close to his mouth as possible. She gasped at the first contact of his tongue, giggled as he found his rhythm, and said, "Your beard really does tickle!"

Laughter seeped from him quietly, pushing his stomach against her bed, but his amusement was sour. Had Jackie said those words to him, he would've kissed her inner thigh before continuing. But with Julie, he focused more intensely on getting her off. He hadn't been with a girl in months, saving himself for someone he couldn't have. That needed to end. He had to get back to his life, the one he'd lived before his summer of Jackie.

"Oh, God..." Julie's giggling stopped, and he grasped her hips tightly. She was squirming too much.

He pulled in a breath through his nose. His throat was becoming sore, and his fingers dug into Julie's skin. She yelped in pain, and his grip loosened. He hadn't meant to hurt her, but that seemed to be his latest bad habit: hurting people unintentionally.

"Sorry," he muttered.

He slowed down to give her a break. Her body relaxed, and a soft, sighing moan left her lips. Normally that kind of sound would get him off, but Julie's voice barely revved his blood. Whatever excitement she'd caused in the parking lot had worn off.

Jackie was in his skull. Her legs, her voice, her taste—he craved them. His touch didn't belong to her, but being with someone else felt like cheating.

"Don't stop," Julie said. "Please—"

He'd withdrawn from her thighs without realizing. He returned and gave her more than before, and her legs squeezed his head like a C-clamp. She groaned in that euphoric way girls did when they were close to the edge, but he slowed his movements again.

His jaw was tensing up, and not for the obvious reasons. The possibility remained that Jackie had fallen for him. Their encounter on Monday more than hinted at it. If she were truly over Kelso, then being with Julie was a big fucking mistake.

Nausea rolled through his stomach. Making someone come who wasn't Jackie … he couldn't do it, and he removed himself from Julie and her bed.

"What are you doing?" she said. "I'm done done yet."

His face smelled like her. Another disadvantage of having a beard, and he yanked a bunch of tissues from the box on her nightstand. " Sorry," he said and wiped his mouth and beard dry. "This just ain't gonna work."

She propped herself on her elbows, giving him a nice view of her breasts. They were a good-looking pair, but he had no desire to touch them again."You can't be serious."

"Wish I weren't."

"Did someone tell you I don't reciprocate? Because that's a lie."

He dumped the tissues into her waste basket. Leaving her in this state was an asshole move. Her skin was flushed and sweaty, and her eyes begged him to finish. But he couldn't do that for her or for any chick, not until he knew how Jackie felt about him.

Julie got off the bed. She marched up to him naked, and her gaze revealed such contempt that his dick shriveled a little. "Don't think you're getting away with this!" she said. "When I'm through, you'll have to go out of state to get a girl to touch you!"

"Do what you gotta do." He turned his back on her and opened her bedroom door, but she tugged on his belt loop.

"Please," she said quietly. "I'll blow you first. Even though you're being a huge jerk right now, you're worth the wait. And I have waited. You have no idea how long..." She tugged on his belt loop again. "Just—I really want you to stay."

He heaved a breath. His lungs and heart felt crowded, like someone had poured mud into his chest cavity. Julie's attitude had done a one-eighty. She was sacrificing her pride for a damn orgasm, but he wanted another girl. If he didn't leave now, he wouldn't deserve her.

"Gotta go," he said.

"I'm gonna tell everyone what you did!" Julie shouted as he went into the hallway. "Or what you didn't do!"

That was fine by him. By telling Jackie and the cheer squad he hadn't finished, she'd undo some of the damage he'd caused by starting.