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, the song "Glitch," and all the lyrics contained therein copyright to the author of this story (username: MistyMountainHop, maker of Those '70s Comics).

CHAPTER 63
GLITCH

May 15, 1995

St. Paul, Minnesota

Forman's Basement Sound
…

A curtain covered the the vocal booth window in Forman's Basement Sound. Hyde couldn't sing when people wandered into his peripheral vision, not when he knew it would be recorded. The studio's assistants might roam into the isolation room accidentally. Or Nate might do it purposely to screw with him, air-drumming while making ridiculous "rock star" faces.

Hyde needed to get this session over with. Ro sprang it on him as a surprise request: "A small, altered reprise of 'Magnetar,'" she'd said. "With you singing, it'll drive the point home."

A set of headphones was looped around his neck. The band liked to burn him from the control room while he warmed up his voice. Lee, Sherry, and Nate's muffled voices pricked his skin, but the details were lost. Hyde placed a hand on his diaphragm and inhaled. He was breathing from the right place.

"Good to go, Dave," he said into the mic. He'd put the headphones on his ears, but his hand slid lower to his stomach. It had felt strange inside since Friday, since his reconciliation with Ro.

"All right, Hyde. Get ready." Dave gave him a countdown, and the raw, furious guitars of "Glitch" blasted into his ears.

"Don't get too close. I'll rip you apart," he whisper-sang, in marked contrast to the music. "Don't get too close. What attracts you to me isn't art. Put away the star chart."

His voice rose in volume, and soon his vocal matched the rawness of the guitars. "There's money to be made. Crimes to be staged with lies and spies, and 'We sure hope he dies!' so we can print it on the front page."

Spit flew from his mouth and landed on the mic's pop guard. His hand pressed into his stomach to make sure it was still there, but he kept going. "This magnetism is a glitch! It might line your pockets, but it won't scratch your itch. My life's not full of spare parts. It's short, just like yours, and full of false starts. False stars.

"Fuck off. I won't suck you off!" he shouted with more of an emotive melody than he'd expected. "Not mythical, not criminal, not fictional—fuck your price for being visible."

Excess saliva had built up in his mouth. He turned from the mic and spat onto the floor. Different people and images were crashing through his mind, piling up, and he no longer knew who he was singing to.

"My life can't fit neatly between your pages. My starquakes warped your cages. Open the door to feed me—dickhead, I'm already free! Didn't realize it, but I'm free."

His voice dropped back to a whisper during the song's closing riff. "Don't get too close. I'll rip you apart..."

Silence filled his ears. No one was speaking in the control room. "Hey," he said into the mic, "you got all that, right?"

"Oh, we got it," Dave said. "Shit, where'd that come from?"

Ro's voice came through the headphones next. "When'd you change the lyrics?"

Hyde gave his stomach one last rub then moved onto his neck and shoulders. His muscles were tight and promising to give him a headache. "Spur of the moment."

"Can't wait to hear the playback" Sherry said. "Your voice did things I've never heard it do."

Probably because he'd quit smoking a few months ago. He'd never been the biggest fan of his own singing, but his vocals had a richer quality now. "Need a few before I do another take."

"Come into the control room," Dave said. "Let's listen to what we've got."

Hyde entered the control room to applause. Even Lee was clapping and said, "Didn't think you had it in you. That was badass."

Nate pulled out a chair and patted it for Hyde to sit. "Unless I'm going senile," Nate said, "you didn't trip over any of the lyrics. That was a real boogie beat. Alla breve. You're a fucking speed demon."

Ro hurried to Hyde's side before he sat down. Her fingers edged around the sweaty nape of his neck. She wanted a spot on his lap, and he gave it to her. They'd been closer than ever since Friday. She'd asked to hear more about his life before her and not the short, one-sentence editions. Her comfort with learning his past seemed to be growing. He'd waited for that to happen, fought for it, and yet ...

Dave signaled Frankie, the mixing engineer, to start playback. Frankie adjusted a few knobs on the soundboard, and the fury of "Glitch" burst through the speakers.

Hyde dropped his head to Ro's shoulder. The void in his stomach had increased, and he suppressed a groan. His voice on "Glitch" frothed with emotion, but he couldn't connect to it. His chest was a black hole of numbness.

"You all right, love?" Ro whispered into his ear.

He sat up straight in response. For a one-minute song, "Glitch" seemed endless. It gave him too much time to think. He should've been blissful about Ro's new openness. She hadn't shared any personal stories of her own yet, but he no longer underestimated her ability to change.

His stomach quaked with nausea, and his eyes squeezed shut. He was tired of bolting to the bathroom, but he patted Ro's thigh so she'd get off his lap. He excused himself as his own voice shouted at him. The studio's speakers were top-notch, providing plenty of volume without pops or crackles, and "Glitch" reached him through the bathroom door. .

The nausea eased after a few minutes, but his stomach would likely remain sensitive. The cause had to be anxiety, relaying messages from his skull he couldn't decipher. He walked back to the control room at a deliberately slow pace, and his memory conjured his night in Alkali, when the cosmos had revealed itself in thousands of stars. They'd whispered of endless possibilities, of open roads and an unwritten fate, but one-by-one they were going silent.

Ro snagged one of his belt loops when he returned. She pulled him close, locked her arms around his waist, and his stomach tensed in response. "Glitch" was on its second playback.

"Woo-ha!" Nate hollered with the song's last cymbal crash. "We've got to put that on the album."

Dave stroked his copper-red goatee, nodding. "It's powerful, but I think we should do another take with the original lyrics. It'll give us more options for the record's overall message and tone. You up for it, Hyde?"

"Sure," Hyde said. Just one more take; then he could sneak up to the guest room and sleep his stress away. Or curl into a sleepless grenade. His subconscious seemed to have removed the pin already.

He gave Ro a quick peck on the lips and stepped into the hallway, but Sara, one of the studio's assistants, stopped him halfway to the isolation room. "Steven," she said, "there's a call for you. It's W.B."

"Put it on line three. I'll take it upstairs."

He intended to maintain a steady but urgent pace, but nausea attacked his stomach again, and he high-tailed it to the isolation room. He sprinted up the stairs to the balcony, and his pulse throbbed in his ears when he closed himself in the guest room. His dad must've had news about the lawsuit against Come On Magazine. Hyde snatched up the phone receiver and said, "'Lo?"

"Steven," Dad said, "they agreed to settle."

"They—what?"

"Come On Magazine. They're settling."

Hyde sank to the bed, and the phone slipped from his hand. He caught it at his shoulder and forced it back to his ear. "Details."

"We had too many witnesses willing to testify on your behalf: the Formans, Donna, me—hell, all your friends and family, son. Those bastards didn't have a leg to stand on, and they knew it."

Dad's words absorbed into Hyde's stomach like a salve. The nausea abated, and his body reacted with exhaustion. He pressed the heels of his hands to his eyes and supported the phone with his shoulder. "So, what do we get?"

"A cover story retracting the exposé, which we'll get full approval of. A three-hundred thousand payout to the Formans—"

"Holy shit—"

His dad laughed. "That's peanuts. You and they could've gotten millions had this thing gone to trial. You don't have any friends who've been through this before, do you?"

Hyde didn't, but Dad had colleagues and friends high-up in the corporate food chain. He was used to that world. Hyde never would be, and it was one reason he'd let his dad take the lead on the suit.

"Three-hundred grand is more money than the Formans have ever seen at once," Hyde said. "Mrs. Forman's gonna think she won the lottery."

"Money can't always fix what was damaged. The most vital thing we won is that retraction, but the magazine's also compensating our lawyer fees and..."

"And what?"

"You got half a million."

Hyde clutched the back of his head and swallowed a curse. "Man, I told you I didn't want monetary compensation."

"Steven, we had to scare them. We asked for a whole lot more, and that money can do a lot of good."

"Right..." Hyde already knew where it could go. He and the band supported a lot of charitable causes.

"They got off easy," Dad said. "They truly did, but a trial could've dragged on for months. We needed this fixed now. You're the last person who'd ever act the way that filth claimed."

Hyde inhaled deeply through his nose and exhaled. His dad's faith in him had been a safe house the last sixteen years, one built on a lie of omission. But, despite his urge to confess, Hyde would never tell Dad the violence he'd once committed. First, do no harm, Jackie told him six months ago, and that was the philosophy he'd stick to.

"Some people'll always have doubts about me," he said. "Once crap like that gets out, there's no puttin' it back."

"But Donna herself publicly denied the allegations," Dad said, "and once Come On publishes its retraction, all the major news outlets will pick it up. The only people who'll still believe the lies are crazy nuts who also believe the moon landing happened on a movie set—"

"It did happen on a movie set," Hyde said, and a burst of laughter came through the receiver. He removed the phone from his ear. "Spielberg shot the whole thing—"

"Steven, even you aren't that paranoid—"

Hyde found the energy to smile. "Not anymore."

"That's a relief. Otherwise, I have the number of a very good psychologist."

"I might want that anyway," Hyde said, and a soft knock came from the guest room door. "Dad, I've got to go, but thank you—for everything, you know?"

"I know, son. Take care of yourself."

"Back atcha."

Hyde hung up the phone. He opened the door, and Ro entered. "What's going on?" she said.

"Come On agreed to settle."

Her eyes widened as the news soaked into her. She leapt at him, and he caught her in his arms. Her legs wrapped around his hips. Her arms looped around his neck, and she kissed him in between excited questions.

They lay down on the bed together after he filled her in. Her fingers traced slow patterns on his arms. He was so damn tired, and her soothing touch threatened to put him to sleep.

"Time to shove all this trouble behind us," she said.

He closed his eyes. "Yeah..." His stomach felt better than it had in days. When news of Come On's settlement hit, the other rags would probably back off. At least for a while.

Ro's fingers slipped into his short sleeve, and her nails scratched his skin lightly. If he didn't get off this bed, he'd snore himself to slumberland.

No more distractions, love," she said. "No more of this fame bullshit getting in the way. Now you can concentrate on the world's problems, not just yours."

Her voice enticed his eyelids to open. "Haven't quit thinkin' about that,' he said, "but part of why I give a toss comes from what happened to me. You can't tell me it's not the same for you."

She slid her hand down his arm and grasped his palm. The move should've tingled his skin, but his body didn't react. "Yes," she said. "It's the same for me."

"See? That's what I've been sayin'!" Triumph rang through his voice. "Your past is inseparably linked to your present, man, influencin' you."

She blew a raspberry at him. Droplets of spit landed on his nose, and he wiped them off on the pillow.

"That's not an argument," he said.

"Because I don't have one, you scunner. I can't argue your logic." She inched closer to him and leaned her forehead against his. "I don't like questioning my philosophy."

"Why?"

"Not safe," she whispered, and her vulnerability woke him up. Adrenaline sharpened his senses, quickening his thoughts. "You're drilling holes into my perspective," she continued in a whisper, so low he almost missed it, "but it feels like necessary surgery."

"Don't want to hurt you, Spark. Just need you to meet me halfway."

She hooked her leg over one of his, and her hips pressed against him. The contact should've made him hard, but he remained soft. "No one else could open me up like this," she said. "Or I've gone off my head from not fucking you for so long."

"I'll screw the sanity back into you."

He stroked the side of her face and tried to find his home in her hazel eyes. The world inside them was vibrant, with rolling hills of green and gold, but a fog of impermanence rose off the land. It coated his skin, saturated his lungs, and urged him along. He tried to stay, to lay down a new foundation, but it crumbled beneath his fingers. His building materials had changed. They weren't compatible with the environment, but shelter be damned. He'd sleep in the elements if he had to.

"When I'm sane enough myself," he said, "we'll fuck until our skin peels off."

"Romantic." She disentangled herself from him and got off the bed "Dave's waiting. You have that second take in you, or did the good news squelch your anger?"

"I'll give it a shot." He sat up and stretched, but he doubted the second take would be usable. He'd given all he had to the first. Generating the same kind of authentic fury was a reach, especially since he wasn't sure where it had come from.

May 27, 1995

Foster City, California

Jackie's House
...

In her home office, Jackie slipped the latest newspaper clipping about Dale Fischer into her evidence folder. She'd received one every mail-delivery day since the first. Each was a xerox copy, but the content was growing progressively more personal. It detailed parts of their history, black-and-white reminders she didn't need. She already owned one in full color.

The folder returned to the drawer of her roll-top desk, its hiding place. Inside was also a Ziploc bag, holding the remains of Anders's envelope. She should've tossed it or taped the check back together, but she was stuck in an indecisive limbo. Too curious to ignore the claim that the check "contained information" she needed to see. Too suspicious of Anders to trust that claim. So her office had become a vault, storing what she couldn't yet face.

She turned toward the bulletin board nailed to her wall. Pictures of her dad and friends smiled at her. They'd been her only company in the house these last few weeks, except for Patricia and Sheila's security team. Her self-inflicted isolation had grown pathological. Even her therapist was concerned.

Those articles about Dale, Sarah said, were retriggering Jackie's post-trauma defense mechanisms and fear. Despite all the intense healing work Jackie had done in therapy, this wasn't an abnormal or unexpected response. Sarah and her psychiatrist both recommended a higher dose of Valium, specifically standing instead of as needed, to help with the panic and anxiety. To keep her functioning on a daily basis. It was a temporary increase as she took the necessary steps to root out her harasser and reassert her safety.

For instance, she'd had her phone number changed. Only her therapist and most trusted friends had it. She'd called each of them once since her final lunch with the Blonde Brigade, but both Donna and Steven checked on her every few days. She made sure to talk up the positives—about her jewelry making, how the tabloid stories had stopped since Come On's lawsuit settlement. Paparazzi and journalists from more reputable magazines, however, still infested Foster City. The settlement had actually doubled their efforts to gain Jackie's statement.

She spoke to none of them. Shared nothing about Dale Fischer with her friends. Her dad had always told her to keep evidence, a paper trail, but she was too frightened to do anything with it. Too terrified to leave her house.

On the plus side, she'd become adept at using all sorts of pliers. Her portfolio of jewelry was filling up, and she'd begun to sketch her own designs in the notebook Steven gave her last Christmas.

A familiar, rhythmic knock vibrated her office door. She and Patricia had devised it to decrease Jackie's startle response. She unlocked and opened the door, and Patricia said, "You have have a visitor."

Anxiety swelled inside Jackie's chest. "Another reporter? It's after seven at night." So much for her break. She'd been hoping for a day off. "Please tell Sheila to do as she always does—"

"It's not a reporter," Patricia said. "He's on your whitelist. Sheila's waiting with him outside your front door. They're discussing music—"

"Music?" Jackie sped past Patricia and raced downstairs. Her anxiety exploded into excitement, but her mind tried to tamp it down. If Steven was here, it might not be for a good reason—if he was here at all. She had put his dad and sister on her whitelist, too.

Her legs pumped until her muscles burned. Her feet dug into the carpet, but the living room stretched into eternity. When she was close enough, she reached for the front door. Her sweaty fingertips slipped off the doorknob on the first attempt, but she grabbed hold of it and unlocked all her locks.

The orange light of sunset hit her face first. It reflected off the lagoon, off windows from houses on Dolphin and Shearwater Isles. She protected her eyes with her hand and spotted Sheila. She was smiling, a rare sight, as Steven spoke to her.

Steven. He was here. Steven had come to her home—a day before the first anniversary of their strange and startling reunion at Kimberly Kelso's funeral.

His hair was hidden in a Milwaukee Brewers cap. His duct-taped backpack was slung over one shoulder, and a small, rolling suitcase stood at his side. He was holding a guitar case, and a Marshall amplifier case sat at his feet.

Jackie gripped the edge of her door as her legs wobbled. Her knuckles stung with with her effort to remain standing. She couldn't speak, but Steven turned to her, and the joy on his face slapped her neurons dizzy.

"Hey," he said. "I was nowhere near your neighborhood. Thought I'd drop by for a visit."

"Visit. Me? You—" Talking was useless. She thrust herself into his arms, and warmth spread over her back as he returned the hug. She took in his smell. It was a mixture of Old Spice and a little sweat, and goosebumps rose on her skin. She prayed he didn't notice, but he was here. She wasn't imagining him. He'd surprised her exactly when she needed him most.