A/N: These are coming out not as fast as normal because I've been super busy what with moving and all. But thanks for the patience and I hope that they're worth the wait.
Disclaimer: I don't own 70S SHOW nor any rock references I may make. Though I own Ash, and she's such a cutie!
Jackie knocked on Ash's door the next evening after she got home from work.
"Come in." She opened it, and was surprised to see Adrian there with her daughter. She was about to lecture about the door being closed, but noticed that they were only playing on Ash's Sega Genesis, not engaging in carnal desires.
"Hey Mom," Ash said. "How was work?"
"It was fine. How is your ankle?"
"It's not as ouchy."
"That's good. Hello, Adrian."
"Hello," he stated.
"Paul wanted to know if we wanted to do sushi on Wednesday," Jackie said. "Do we?"
"Well I can't because Maddie and Sam are coming over to watch horror movies," Ash said. "But you should go. Paul would be sad if you didn't go."
"It's true, he has no life outside of me," Jackie said. "Okay, maybe I'll go then. I could use some Paul time. And wait until he hears about how you hurt your ankle."
"Don't tell him!" Ash exclaimed.
"Well honey, he already knows it happened!" Jackie threw back. "Why can't he know how you managed to do it?"
"Because it's embarrassing!" Ash exclaimed. "He'll never let me hear the end of it if he knows I got it while running away from a ghost!"
"What you THOUGHT was a ghost," Adrian corrected.
"It was a ghost," Ash complained. "Why else would it be in a cemetery?"
"It could have just been a grieving woman," Adrian said. "Or a crazy person like the three of you." Ash hit his shoulder, and he rubbed it slowly.
"Well whatever you saw, Paul is going to hear about it," Jackie said. "I'll go call him." She left the room, and Ash and Adrian when back to their game.
"So did your Parent Trap work?" he asked.
"Stop calling it that."
"You're the one who was planning one, Leigh."
"Well not like that," she muttered. "And I don't know. Clearly they aren't together. I talked to Hyde briefly today, he gave me shit about my ankle but sounded kind of melancholy at the same time."
"Your Dad is kind of a downer."
"Wouldn't you be? I mean, if I wasn't willing to give you a change, you'd be devastated," she said, while the Sonic the Hedgehog in her control began to fight Dr. Robotnick as Adrian's Tails just sat back, watching.
"Well I suppose that's true," he said, snarkily. "When you were SO SO cruel to me in that writer's workshop, I cried myself to sleep every night asking the heavens 'Why oh why won't Ashleigh look in my direction?!'"
"You wanna stop with that and maybe help me fight Robotnick?" she asked, as Sonic lost all his rings from a hit. "FUCK! Like, NOW?!"
"Calm down, I gotcher back," he said, and Tails went into action. "Jesus, leave it to a man to do a woman's job." She hit him on the shoulder, and Tails lost all his rings as well. "Dammit! Well now we're equally screwed!"
"It's your fault."
"I'm sorry, HOW?"
"Sexist."
"I'm not-!"
"There, I beat him," Ash said. "Thanks for NOTHING."
"…. You're impossible."
"And you ADORE me."
"….. Shut up."
Jackie called Paul's house to find that he was not home. Which meant he must have been having a long night at the office. Poor guy, she thought, and dialed his office phone.
"Paul Hodge."
"Hello!"
"Oh hey Jackie."
"Well don't sound TOO excited," she muttered.
"Sorry, I'm swamped in a document that needs to be figured out by tomorrow at noon," he said. "So let's make this short. Are we on for sushi Wednesday?"
"We are, Ash cannot come," Jackie said. "She's having friends over."
"I thought she was in trouble."
"Let's not start accusing me of being too lax, she has a long list of chores to get done by the end of the week and her ankle is all wrapped up," Jackie said.
"Fair enough."
"Don't tell me how to raise my daughter."
"I'm not!"
"I'm watching you, mister," Jackie said.
"As scary as that is, I need to let you go and get back to work," Paul said.
"Why don't you go work at home?"
"Home is too distracting," he said. "I need to go!"
"Okay okay okay! Bye!"
"Bye."
Paul hung up, and went back to his document. He was beginning to swear a little under his breath, when there was a knocking on his door. This was perplexing, because he wasn't expecting anyone and usually security weeded out the undesirables. But then of course, it wasn't exactly the most locked down building, as it was on a quiet street in Saint Paul.
"Come in?" he said, and Steven Hyde walked in. "Oh! Hyde. Um…. How can I-?"
"Look Hodge, I don't like you and you don't like me, so-."
"What? I like you fine!"
"Oh. Well, I guess-."
"Why don't you like me?!"
"I… It was just a phrase, I have no opinion of you," Hyde said, beginning to feel stupid.
"Well why would you say something like that?" Paul asked.
"I don't know! I'm sorry, I'm under a lot of stress right now, and I came to you for advice. You're a lawyer, after all," he said.
"Well the advice I give is usually legal advice," Paul said. "And to corporations…"
"Yeah, I know, but-."
"If you want some HUMAN advice maybe you should go see a psychologist."
"Hey, I'm not crazy and I don't need a shrink!"
"Not everyone in therapy is crazy!" Paul exclaimed. They couldn't quite manage to get off on the right foot. "I'll have you know that your daughter goes to a therapist from time to time, is SHE crazy?"
"I don't know!" Hyde exclaimed. "I barely know her!"
"Well it's only been, what, two weeks?" Paul asked. "So you aren't expected to."
"Why does Ash see a therapist? Why didn't I know this?" Hyde asked.
"She just sees one because of anxiety issues," Paul said. "She's not a psycho killer or anything, if that's what you're worried about."
"Well obviously she's not!" Hyde said, and began to pace the room. "This is awful. You know more about my kid than I do."
"I HAVE known her longer," Paul said. "No reason to get all…. What would you call this state of mind, might I ask?"
"Agitation."
"And why are you agitated?" Paul asked, setting his highlighter down. He wasn't going to get to his document until he got rid of Hyde, and the only way to do that was to talk him down from his emotional precipice.
"… I am just a big chicken," Hyde said, sitting in the chair across from Paul. "Jackie doesn't want me in her life because I hurt her so much, and I am really REALLY sorry for it, but I have this knack of never saying the right thing. Especially when it comes to her. So when I'm about to tell her everything, I just kind of… choke and stop and say something else. Though the other night I thought I said a good deal-."
"You did," Paul assured him.
"Oh what, she told you?" Hyde asked, embarrassed.
"Oh Christ, now isn't the time to get demure," Paul muttered. "Yes, she told me because I'm her brother!"
"You aren't her brother!"
"Well I'm the closest thing she has to a brother, and I'm her closest friend in the tri metro area! So of COURSE she's going to tell me these things!" Paul snapped.
"Okay okay, sorry," Hyde said.
"Look, what all do you want to tell her?"
"Why, are you going to tell her for me?"
"GOD no!"
"Then why are you asking?" Hyde demanded.
"I'm trying to help you," Paul stated. "For Jackie and Ash's sake. Look, I'm pretty convinced that Jackie still cares about you very deeply, but she is DAMAGED, Hyde. She's damaged. And you can't throw damaged things around willy nilly, you know?"
"Did you just say willy nilly?"
"ANYWAY, what I'm saying is that you have to be very careful with what you say to her, which is probably why you don't say much at all," Paul said. "You're no idiot, so you just keep your mouth shut in fear of setting her off. Even more so now because of the things you've said in the past and how she's reacted to them."
"…. What the hell?" Hyde asked. "THIS is legal advice?"
"No, this is human advice, I was a psych major in college."
"And you went into law?"
"Eh."
"…. Okay, anyway, so what should I do?" Hyde asked. "I can't say what I feel because I suck that way."
"Or perhaps it's because your parents never listened to you so-."
"Whoa whoa whoa, let's not get carried away with this psych stuff."
"Dang, I should have gone to grad school for my PhD!" Paul said, impressed with himself. "So here's what I propose you do. Write a letter."
"A letter?"
"Yeah. A letter. It will get out everything you've wanted to say, and then you can give it to her," Paul said. "It's kind of Victorian England, but at least with a letter you'll figure out what you want to say in advance." Hyde nodded, pensively.
"Well, that's a good point," he said, and grabbed Paul's stationary.
"Hey! That's mine!"
"It won't take long," Hyde said.
"Uh, yes it will!"
"Okay so it will," Hyde muttered. "I won't bother you, I'll just be here writing."
"Why can't you write at YOUR house?" Paul asked.
"Because I need to get it out now!" Hyde threw back.
"Well fine, but let me work on this document," Paul said.
"Deal."
Ash and Adrian and finished the game, and were now just sitting in her room.
"So what do we do now?" she asked. "We won the game."
"…. Want to play another one?"
"Okay!" she said.
"What's on the computer in the study down the hall?"
"Oregon Trail."
"Oh SHIT I'm THERE!" Adrian said, and leapt up, rushing for the study. Ash smirked, and grabbed her crutches. She began to make her way over to the study as well, and saw the picture of her and her parents that she'd tacked to the board above her desk.
"Adrian!" she called, hopping after him. "Can we work on another Parent Trap?"
"No, we're going to work on getting to Oregon," Adrian said, booting up the game.
"But Adrian, I have another plan!"
"And what does it involve? Twisting your other ankle?"
"No! Let's say that I 'run away'-."
"Stop right there," Adrian said. "You aren't Lucy Ricardo and I'm not Ricky, so no more of these stupid schemes that backfire in your face."
"The Cemetery wasn't a plan!"
"If your parents only come together out of concern for you, you'll have to be constantly in trouble," Adrian said, entering their names in the game. "And while I bet you THINK you can do it forever, you can't. I named our wagon team The Poes. Pretty cool, huh?"
"Adrian, but if this gets them closer, maybe-."
"Let them do it on their own or so help me God your wagon name is going to be Hortense," Adrian stated, pointing at her. She pursed her lips, and he smiled. "Seriously though. They need to figure it out on their own. This isn't a Disney Movie and you aren't Hayley Mills. Though if there were TWO of you, think of the possibilities!"
"I'm going to pretend you didn't just make a pervy joke," she said, and pulled up a second chair. "You better get us to Oregon in one piece mister Poe."
"I'll try, Mrs. Poe."
"If any of our children die from snakebite or cholera I'm going to divorce you."
It was ten thirty and Paul was almost done with the document. His floor was littered with paper that had been scribbled on and crumpled up, and he was trying not to kick Hyde out.
"This isn't working," Hyde said, ripping another piece of paper off the pad.
"Please use the recycling bin this time," Paul said, kicking it towards him. "And maybe try a pencil."
"Everything I say comes out feeling phony."
"I'm sure it's fine," Paul said.
"Look, I'm not good with words, I never have been, and I never will be," Hyde said. "I'm not a lawyer."
"Heh, we ARE great with words."
"Well thanks for trying, but I think I'm gonna head out," Hyde said. "I've taken up enough of your time tonight."
"As true as that may be, are you sure you don't want to try again?" Paul asked, and Hyde threw the paper in the recycling.
"Nope." He began picking up the crumpled paper and putting it in the recycling too. Paul watched him, and secretly fished out the last draft that Hyde had written. "Thanks for trying though."
"Oh certainly," Paul said, shoving the draft in his desk. "If you ever decide to try again, you know where to find me."
"Yeah, I suppose I do," Hyde said. "…. Later."
"Bye." Hyde left, and Paul pulled out the last draft and read it through.
"Paul, you shouldn't be reading this, it's private," he muttered as he read it. "Then again, you're going to be the bestest big brother EVER."