Title: 12 songs by Willie Nelson

Disclaimer:  No That 70's coup yet.  Still not mine

Summary: Jackie's summer alone turns into a summer on the phone with the man that she just can't seem to leave behind.

Credit: Thanks everybody for reviewing Chapter 7.  I wasn't sure if a Jackie-less chapter was the way to go.  But the song and story demanded it.  You can't have country music without drinking.  I'm going to sober our boy up though.  He needs to be a man.  Don't worry in my world he will be.  Not yet though. This chapter is all about Jackie. 

Song Cred: Song 8, This Face.

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"I do not believe that sheer suffering teaches. If suffering alone taught, all the world would be wise, since everyone suffers. To suffering must be added mourning, understanding, patience, love, openness and the willingness to remain vulnerable."
                                                                                           -- Anne Morrow Lindbergh

"Only quitters quit"

                                                                                          -- Red Eric's Burger Job

This face is all I have

Worn and lived in

Lines below my eyes,

They're like old friends

And this old heart's been beaten up

My ragged soul it's had things rough

This face is all I have

Worn and lived in

The fairest, they can fall

Bored in believing

Something to achieve

This peaceful feeling

After all these tears are only truth

Your silver spoons can't dig up my roots

This face is all I have

Worn and lived in

Worn and lived in

Through the tides of time

Worn and lived in

This face of mine

Worn and lived in

The reflection on the wall

Who needs to be the fairest of them all?

Two days later Jackie was sitting on a barstool outside the Loco Madre hotel sipping a virgin Pina Colada and feeling sorry for herself.  Her arms were peeling, her face freckled and she hadn't talked to Steven in 3 days.  She felt like crap.  And she didn't know what to do. 

She was mad at Steven yes –but that wasn't why she hadn't called.  Her mother had run off with some investment banker she had met at the pool –leaving Todd the computer salesman high and dry.  He had paid their last phone bill and promptly checked out of the hotel.  Her mother who thought she was on to bigger and better things was somewhere in Bora Bora by now.  When she sobered up enough to remember Jackie and her Universal hair dryer (all she had left behind) she was sure she would get a phone call.  It would be short and sweet.  It would probably be limited to detailed instructions on the proper care and packaging of Air mailed beauty products.  She made a mental note to throw the precious dryer into the ocean.  God could things get any worse?

She felt old.  She felt tired.  She wondered which girl on the chess team she had made fun of to get her in this bad karma nightmare.  How in the span of 3 months had her world been turned inside out?  Shouldn't it take longer to ruin 16 years of privilege?  She missed being the pretty princess with no worries.  She missed living a life that's biggest concern was fall fashion and being in love with a doofus.  The new life she was living blowed.  She was stranded on a tropical shore –no money – no mother.  She was in love with a man too smart for her own good.  Yeah –he would thank his lucky stars one day for having her out of his life.  She had about decided she was bad luck. 

"So what has put such a sad puss on that pretty face?" the old bartender asked. 

He was a sweet old man that had been really nice to Jackie since she had gotten here.  He saw a lot of her mom and her gentlemen friends. That was enough for him to take pity on her. 

"Oh Zeke.  I don't even know where to start." She said pitifully.

"Well the beginning is always a logical place."

"I don't know if I have the energy to go back that far." She said thinking about last summer.  Was that the beginning?  Or did it go back to Veteran's Day?  Or the prom? Maybe it started the first time she walked into the basement.  Back when she was determined to belong in that group of people she soooo didn't belong with.  Back then Steven had been the epitome of that group.  Calm and carefree, cool and nonconforming –things Jackie Burkhart would never be. 

"You are too young to be so tired." He smiled.  He reminded Jackie of a grandfather in a movie.  He was gray and round and he had gentle eyes.  She couldn't remember her own grandfathers but she was sure they would have cared more about her than her parents. 

"Where has your momma been keeping to lately?" he continued when she didn't respond. 

She tried to deflect her eyes and opened her mouth for a lie but he stopped her with a look before she could.  He had obviously spent too much time studying human nature behind a bar to not spot a bad lie from ten paces. 

"She left with some new guy". She answered instead.

"And left you here alone?"

"I'm sure she didn't mean to..." she started but didn't have the heart to finish.  She was done lying to herself or others about her mother's motivation.  "She hasn't realized she left me yet.  I am not exactly priority one with her these days." 

"Well that is sad child.  But don't you be blamin yourself.  Some people just weren't meant to be mothers."

"Then why do they have children?"  Jackie asked not really expecting an answer.  Really there was a limit to the wise man's knowledge.

"Love.  Love will trick you child. Make you think you are capable of anything. Make you think you are more than you really are. Make you forget too."

"Love sucks." She laid her head on the bar. "I quit."

"No child you can't quit.  Love is all there is.  And it may trick but it will always do more good than harm.  You know anything about it?"

He could tell but she lied anyway.  "No."

"Your eyes tell a different tale".

She sighed.  "Fine.  Yeah, I'm in love.  Well - I love someone.  Fat lotta good it does me."

He laughed, actually laughed at her.  "What good have you done it?  Who is this boy?  That is good enough for my pixie girl?"

She smiled thinking of the proper words to describe Steven to a perfect stranger.  Someone he would never meet or know, they were easy to find.  "Well his name is Steven.  And he is one of those cool guys that act like nothing and no one can affect him.  He is all sarcastic and sneaky.  He has these conspiracy theories about everything –I mean don't even get him started on the government.  And he will act so mean –but no one thinks he is – because he can always be counted on.  You know?  Like you know that if you ever need anything –he would do whatever he could."

The old man just listened –so she kept going.

"And he is so funny.  And a good kisser.  And when he doesn't have those stupid sunglasses on his eyes are so expressive.  And his voice – his voice – I could just talk to him for hours.  Not that he talks much but…" she sighed.  She missed him so much.  But she had fought with him and not called and now….

"What?  Something stopped you.  What thought took all those daydreams outta your head?"

She had tears in her eyes when she spoke "I'm stuck here.  And I miss him.  And we had this fight the other night on the phone.  And now I can't call him to try to fix it.  Not that it was my fault or that I'm not mad at him.  I am.  I just want to talk to him anyway."

"You love him." He stated simply. 

"I do." She concurred.

"And love it is tricky.  It make you fight.  But it also make you make up."

"Why does it have to do both?" she asked sounding even to herself like a little girl again.  God –he was right.  Love made her feel infinitely old –but at the same time like the child this man saw her as. 

"Because it can- little one.  But like I said- it will balance out and then it will go further.  More good.  This boy he love you back?"

She looked doubtful.

"Course he do."

"How do you know?" she expected a comment about her beauty or personality.  But not his enigmatic smile.

"How don't you know?"

She looked confused.

"You sat right there and sung his praises.  You think he ain't singing yours?  Why you here anyway?  Not cause you missed your momma."

"He cheated on me." She said sadly

"Why?"

"Does it matter?" she raised her eyebrow shocked at the question.

"It always matters.  It might not explain or make it better but it matters.  If he did it because he don't care?

"No" she answered hesitantly.

"Because you don't?"

"NO!" adamantly.

"Because he scared?" he said as if he already knew the answer.  Like they were just some soap opera couple he'd been watching on t.v. –easy to figure out and fix. 

"Yeah –he scared all right.  Cause maybe this cool boy, with his conspiracies ain't used to needin' a fiery girl like you." 

The look on her face must have conveyed more shock.  Maybe they were that easy to figure out. "Maybe."

He laughed again.  "Ain't no maybes child.  He done wrong for sure.  But you are ready to forgive."

She laughed despite herself.  Was this his wisdom?  Something she already knew? She didn't need someday to tell her the way things were, she needed helping fixing the situation. "Yeah I know that.  But I'm kind of still stuck here.  I can't afford a phone call let alone a plane ticket.  What good is forgiveness?  When I'm here and he is there? "

He turned around at her words of exasperation.  Great- now she had pissed off her only ally.  Friendless and forgotten sounded like a great country song.  But when he turned around she felt like singing a hymn not a ballad.  Her spirits soared.   

He placed the bar phone in front of her.  "Well forgiveness child – it is as good as love."

A/N:  Only 4 more to go.