Disclaimer: That '70s Show copyright The Carsey-Werner Company, LLC and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, LLC. The fictional band Degenerate Matter, their albums Vagabondage, Ultrarelativistic, WIMPs and MACHOs, Frozen Stars, and all the lyrics contained therein copyright to the author of this story (username: MistyMountainHop, maker of Those '70s Comics).

CHAPTER 55
ON BELAY

April 6, 1995

Paradise, Nevada

Las Vegas Strip
…

"I've never been to Vegas," Jackie said. She was staring out the tinted window of Hyde's rental car, and her palm pressed against the glass. "I was expecting more. It doesn't look all that spectacular to me."

"'Cause it's daytime. Its true colors come out at night."

"Kind of like some people," she said. "It's crazy your mom ended up here."

He squeezed the steering wheel, hard enough his knuckles went white. Ten minutes together, and she'd already pried open a wound. Unintentionally. Without any awareness of it, but he'd spent a skin-flaying day in Paradise without her, taking care of business she couldn't have helped with. It left him raw, but at least he didn't have the paparazzi to contend with.

So far, no one had tipped off the tabloids about his traveling plans. That was what he told her last night from the hotel, when he'd insisted on picking her up from the airport. She'd offered to take a taxi to their hotel, to avoid baiting the paparazzi, but she was showing up for him. He had to do the same for her.

"Speakin' of Edna's life here..." he said now and turned left onto Tropicana Avenue. They were surrounded by Nevada heat and gray pavement on all sides, but the bleakness didn't infiltrate him. The car's air conditioning was cranked up, and Jackie was by his side. Two solid barriers. "Met up with her best pal, a woman named Carlotta."

"She had a friend? That's surprising."

"Yeah, well, Edna's lawyer and Carlotta filled me in on a bunch of shit." He gave Jackie the condensed version, how Edna had been a croupier at the Tropicana with Carlotta for over a decade. That she'd married a high-stakes gambling addict, whom she'd kicked out for bloodletting their savings. He died two years ago—under mysterious circumstances—but they'd never divorced, and Carlotta helped Edna during her last, sickly months. "We arranged Edna's funeral together yesterday. I'm payin' for it—"

"You are?" The shock on her face was visible in the rearview mirror. "You should let her rot out in the sun. The Mojave Desert's around here somewhere. The vultures can have her."

He didn't entirely disagree, but she winced, shoulders hiking up to her ears. "I'm sorry." She cupped her forehead and shut her eyes. "Steven, I'm just … I remember all the things you told me about her. I know you're grieving, but it's hard to separate myself from what she did to you."

"Can't separate myself from it either," he said and offered a small smile. Her empathy was acting like a skin graft, soothing the burn out of yesterday's events. "Anger's one of the stages of grief, so I guess I've been grieving my whole life. But I'm not goin' to the funeral. That's for Carlotta and whoever else gave a crap about Edna. They knew her in a way I never could."

"That's really nice of you—and more than she deserves. People eulogizing such a..." She didn't finish her sentence, but the rest wasn't hard to imagine.

Hyde continued to drive down Tropicana Avenue. A variety of hotels and inns lined the street, but they could've all fit into Jackie and Hyde's destination: the Tropicana Las Vegas. He tensed upon seeing it again, his back and shoulders growing stiff. The building was a white giant with rows of dark windows. It loomed over the rental car, over his present.

"Are you sure this is safe?" she said.

"Us staying at the same hotel? I used fake names for both of us. And I'm in disguise." He tapped the bill of his Yankees cap. "No one's gonna be looking for me here anyway. Easier to stay anonymous in a big place."

"I mean staying where your mom worked … and where there's easy access to alcohol.

He drove toward the resort's parking lot, past the palm trees surrounding the main building. "Had to see where Edna lived the last part of her life, but I haven't gone near the bars or casino. Waited for you to do that."

She nodded but concern shone in her eyes, radiating at him from the rearview mirror. Long ago, the honesty of her feelings used to overwhelm him, but now it was his lifeline, tethering him to the present as he descended to hell.

Hyde and Jackie's ride to the Tropicana's Club Tower had become an exercise in self-control. Three passengers were in the elevator with them. Jackie had one hand clamped on her suitcase handle and one clamped over her mouth. Hyde was staring at her reflection in the mirrored ceiling. Looking at her directly would've finished him, but giggles occasionally squeezed between her fingers. The sound tickled his chest, and he sucked in a deep breath through his nose each time.

A minute earlier at the concierge desk, he'd checked Jackie into her room, giving her the name Toni Lyngstad. It was an amalgam, created from members of ABBA and Captain & Tennille. She'd tugged on the hem of his T-shirt after he said it, like she wasn't too happy.

"How are you enjoying your stay so far, Mr. Harley?" the concierge had said to him.

"Can't complain," Hyde said and guided Jackie toward the bank of elevators.

"Mr. Harley, huh?" she whispered. "What's the first name?"

He swallowed before answering. "Dave."

"Dave Harley?" Her face went blank. Blood rushed into her cheeks a moment later, and her lips broke into a smile. "Harley-Davidson. Oh, my God..."

"I had to think fast, man. I'd spotted a Harley in the parking lot. Vintage, too. '41 Knucklehead."

"Dave Harley!" she said and burst into laughter, but she shut up as soon as people joined them by the elevator bank.

Now, though, as the elevator doors opened at the fifth floor, she giggled again. He pretended to be annoyed, flaring his nostrils, but her laughter was grounding. A reminder of the light waiting for him on the other side of this trip.

One passenger left the elevator, but too many floors remained before Hyde and Jackie would be free. He stuck his hand into his jeans pocket. His room key was inside, and he rubbed his thumb against its ridges. That distracted him enough until the eleventh floor, when Jackie said, "Dave," with a deep voice.

The unexpectedness of it got him laughing. Their fellow passengers glanced at him, but he grasped Jackie's hand at the sixteenth floor. The elevator doors opened. He pulled her into the hallway, and her muffled giggles turned into cackling.

"You've never been quick on your feet for things like this," she said, tearing up. "Oh, God."

"I'm under freakin' stress," he said, but he was still laughing. "Give me a break."

"I'll try." She wiped her eyes and pointed to the carpet. "Look at that paisley pattern. It's—it's—" She frowned as stray laughs bubbled from her lips. "Straight out of the seventies, Dave Harley … Bob Marley." Her hold tightened on his hand as a fresh giggles assaulted her. "I can't stop—sorry—just get me to the room."

"This hotel must be pumpin' goofy gas through its vents."

He led her in a brisk pace down the hallway. It was long, but after two lefts, she finally calmed down. Their rooms, 1622 and 1624, were next to each other and connected by doors inside.

"Need time to settle in?" he said and took out the key to his room. "I'll leave my connecting door open. Just come in when you're ready."

She unlocked the door to her room. "You can come into mine. I'm about as settled as I'm going to get." She rolled her suitcase inside. He followed, but she paused at the dresser. Her gaze traveled from the king-sized bed, to the glass desk, to the white window shutters. "Steven, you must've booked the most expensive rooms in the hotel—" she sniffed the air— "and non-smoking, too."

"Wanted you to be comfortable." He placed the extra key to his room in her hand. "For easy access, in case you need me."

"Do you want my extra?"

"Would you feel safer or less safe if I had it?"

Her expression shifted then shifted again, like she were waging an internal battle.

"Less safe—" he said, and her gaze lowered to the carpet—"and don't feel guilty about it. I asked 'cause you should feel as safe as possible. … Both of us should." He crossed to her mini-fridge. It was near the dresser, and he opened the door. Cool air hit his legs. "See those small bottles of booze? Do me a favor and don't drink any. The smell's enough to—"

"Like you, I have no plans of drinking. Those candy bars, though..."

He hefted her suitcase onto the luggage rack against the wall. "I'll take the candy bars if you want. Don't worry about the bill. All this is on me."

"Thank you, but no. The maid will just replace them each day. I can control myself." She sat on the bed and bounced on it a little. "Not bad," she said, gesturing for him to come closer. He did, and she sniffed his T-shirt sleeve. "I wasn't imagining it. You don't smell like smoke at all, but you haven't been chewing gum, either. What's going on?"

He sat on the edge of the bed, making sure to give her personal space. "I quit."

"Quit-quit?"

"Yup. One of the hardest things I've had to do—again. Especially with all this crap going on, but it had to be done."

"Do you think..." She flicked a piece of lint off her khaki pants. He waited for her to ask her question, but she never did.

"Hey," he said, and her attention returned to him. "Don't be afraid of sayin' what's on your mind."

She planted her hands on the comforter. Her biceps flexed, as if she were pushing against the bed. "First, do no harm, Steven."

"You won't hurt me long as you're you. I'm counting on you being you."

"Okay..." She sucked her top lip into her mouth then released it. "Do you think not smoking has increased your craving to drink?"

"Probably. Body wants an escape route from my mind. Always has."

"Funny. My mind's always trying to escape my body." She scooted closer to him on the bed, and she leaned her head on his shoulder. "Don't be afraid of being you either. I'm not going anywhere."

He pressed a kiss to the top of her head, but he realized what he'd done only when his lips pulled away. "Too far—"

"No," she said before he could apologize. "I'm grateful for you, too."

Hyde and Jackie ate a late lunch at one of the Tropicana's cafés. The décor was beach-inspired, with bamboo tables and chairs. The walls were covered in abstract paintings, depicting sunset ocean scenes. Hyde's hamburger wasn't seasoned, but in his experience, American restaurants rarely seasoned meat properly, if at all.

"My mom must be a basket case right now," Jackie said and swallowed a bite of her chicken salad.

"You didn't talk to her after the 'exposé' came out?" he said, glad for the change in topic. He needed a break from focusing on himself.

"I unplugged my phone that morning. Then I flew off to Brooke's. For all I know, my mom thinks I gave Come On a copy of my birth certificate." She plunged her fork into her salad. "If she's gone really nuts, if she tries to get 'revenge' on me for the truth coming out, I'll have to cut her off."

"Don't know why you went along with her I'm-your-sister act in the first place."

"It was the only way she'd take me in after my dad died. If she hadn't, I might've died with him. Outside of Wisconsin, the world didn't know she had a child. She was scared, and the way I looked back then—" she twirled her fork in the air—"didn't fit her standards. She was ashamed of me."

Hyde crammed a few salty fries into his mouth and chewed them to mush. "She should be ashamed of her goddamn self," he said once he swallowed. "All the dirt she scraped off her life buried you."

"When you're that terrified, Steven, you can't see anybody but yourself. Even your own child." She dropped her fork into the salad bowl and pushed the bowl aside. "That doesn't make it right. It doesn't excuse her behavior by any means. She's still a vile person, but all her narcissism doesn't take away from the fact that she's my mom."

"In name only."

"Not entirely. She could've abandoned me again, but she saved my life, got me a new life. Problem was, it had to be on her terms."

"Digging for pearls in a pile of shit." His teeth tore into his hamburger, but whatever anger he felt was tempered by Jackie's openness. "I get it, though. Most people are saddled at birth with the only folks they'll ever have. I was lucky. Mine ran off, and I ended up with a better set."

"The Formans ... W.B."

"Like getting a royal flush in poker. Best two things Edna ever did was leave with that trucker and write my real dad's name on my birth certificate. She could've stayed or written Bud's name down, and I would've been stuck with a bad hand." He ate the last bite of his hamburger. His stomach protested, but eating helped ease the tension growing in the rest of his body. "Like you were."

"I had my dad," she said, "though not nearly long enough. He really loved me, just like W.B. and the Formans love you. And if we'd had a little more time, he and I might've figured out a better way to cope with our lives so his wouldn't have been cut short."

Her shoulders sagged, and she glanced away. "Damn. I didn't mean to make it about me." The lights of the café shone onto her cheek. Her skin was smooth and without a thick cover of makeup, but he missed her eyes.

"There's a difference between commandeering the conversation and tryin' to connect." He touched her wrist, and she looked at him again. "What you've been telling me, it helps. Lets me know I'm not alone in this."

"You're not." She turned her hand palm-side up and hooked onto his fingers with hers. "I guess whenever I talk about myself, no matter the context, it feels selfish now."

He tugged on her fingers playfully. "Who taught you that bullshit?"

"And we're back to my mom," she said. "Maybe we should fly to Wisconsin after this trip, stay with the Formans a little while. Remember what good mothers are like."

"Maybe." He let go of her hand when their waitress came to their table. He paid for their bill in cash. The waitress left with a thirty-percent tip, and he said to Jackie, "This is the point of no return. If you've got any second thoughts, tell me now."

"No second thoughts." She stood up and grabbed her purse from the side of her chair. "I'm ready."

"Then so am I." No matter how deep into hell he had to go.