The next few months were eventful for the basement gang. Eric broke away from the fold all the way to Africa, leaving a saddened Donna. Fez and Kelso joined forces to move into an apartment together and Jackie graduated from High School. The only thing which did not progress was Jackie and Hyde's relationship. While on the surface they were a portrait of young love at its hottest, beneath the surface were issues neither were brave enough to confront. Only one person sensed the rift between them, his uncanny radar for all things Jackie picking up on their tension.
Michael and Jackie's friendship was ripening to a stage neither had been able to achieve before. In the last two years Jackie had become less self-absorbed and so had more to give than in the years when she and Michael had been a couple. And Kelso – well, his growing intelligence was changing him on many levels.
It began with being able to follow the complicated plot twists when watching Colombo, now being able to make it through an entire episode without asking such questions as "Who's that guy? Why did he just kill the other guy?" He noticed his police work improving as he found he had the ability to actually listen and remember what was said to him without his attention wandering. The 'D's on his police academy tests turned into 'B's without any help from his magic marker, and shortly thereafter became 'A's. As his performance improved, his supervisor decided to place him in the field with an experienced officer, Sergeant Gregory Sattler.
At first Kelso wrote his new partner off as a dilhole, seeing as how he was in his 30s and was unimpressed by the type of humour that consisted of burns, practical jokes and put downs. But one week they had to stake out a suspect's apartment and in the desperation of boredom Kelso actually started to listen to Greg. He found out Greg came from a family of academics and had himself graduated with a suma cum laude in mathematics and business. However, shortly after graduating Greg's girlfriend was mugged and raped one night when he was not around to walk her home. Shortly thereafter he had joined the police force in the belief that a man of integrity and intelligence could do the most good in this field. However, he did not throw away all his college learning, using his knowledge to play the stock market and invest in property with great success. To fill in the dull stakeout hours, Greg showed Kelso a few simple stock market strategies based on the figures in the companies' financial statements. He was surprised when his young partner showed a surprising aptitude for matters mathematical, often beating Greg's calculator to the correct answer. Kelso's interest in the world of finance grew with his increasing ability to understand it, and by the end of that week he and Greg had devised an investment strategy to grow his small savings into a useful amount of capital using options trading.
All of these things were giant steps forward for Michael Kelso, but from his point of view the greatest change was his feelings for Jackie Burkhart. As he looked back on their relationship, he was amazed and furious with himself for his crass stupidity in throwing away the best thing that had ever happened to him for the momentary physical gratification that his random couplings provided. He suddenly saw the insanity of trying to juggle affairs with Jackie and Laurie simultaneously, he realised how stupid his anniversary gifts to her had been, he remembered all the times he had stood her up when he was watching cartoons because he was too dumb to consider how that would make her feel. And finally, the death blow to their love, his dash to California. Contemplating a lifetime of foolish behaviour, his actions towards Jackie made him wince the most. From that regret, a new emotion grew – anger. As Kelso realised how strongly pot had affected him, he began to see Steven Hyde as the author of his downfall. The fact that the stupidity Hyde had caused had led to Hyde stealing Jackie from him doubled his sense of grievance towards his one time best friend, cancelling out any sense of loyalty he owed Hyde.
Now, as Jackie and Kelso shared a lunch break together at the new Italian café that had just opened, they found themselves falling into an easy and comforting pattern. Their conversation rippled from the latest fall fashions to celebrity gossip and even ventured into current affairs; Kelso's friendship with Greg had motivated him to start reading the newspaper everyday and Jackie also found being up to date useful in the media profession. Their weekly lunch together had become a highlight in their schedules.
"…and did you see the new restaurant that just opened on Main Street? Tiffany's boyfriend took her there last week and she said it was so classy she almost died! The waiters all wear tuxedos, and they have a piano and string quartet and a dance floor so you can dance and eat at the same time!" Jackie sighed wistfully.
"Sounds like that could get messy," Kelso joked. "Hey, why don't you get Hyde to take you there? Valentine's Day is coming up."
"You know Steven's views on Valentines Day," Jackie replied lightly. "I couldn't ask him to go against his principles like that."
"I don't see what he has against having one day a year set aside to celebrate romance," Kelso continued, trying to provoke a reaction from Jackie. "But then, I guess he makes every day Valentines Day for you, right? Having him say "I love you" on February 14th would just be old news."
"Yeah, sure," Jackie replied unconvincingly. Suddenly, she dropped her head in her hands and moaned "Who am I kidding? A swat team holding him at gunpoint wouldn't get an "I love you" out of Steven. God knows I never have."
"What, he's never said it?" Kelso said in feigned surprise. He knew very well Hyde was the type of guy to have a problem with those words.
"Once he did – but he was trying to stop me breaking up with him at the time so that doesn't really count – does it?" Her voice rose hopefully.
"No, what a guy says when he is facing a break up is a complete suspension of reality."
"I just don't know what to do about our relationship," Jackie said, turning for support to her friend whom she had recently found to be a fount of good advice. "We just seem to be… stuck."
"Well, Jacks, I think what you need to do is ask yourself what you need to make you happy –happy for keeps, not some passing new-shade-of-lip-gloss happy."
Jackie worried her bottom lip as she thought over Michael's suggestion. "What do I want? I used to want so many things – to be a Dallas Cheerleader or a supermodel and have everybody love and admire me. But now… I just want to be with the man I love and know he loves me and wants to be with me forever. And I want him to be someone I can count on to be there for me when I need him. Plus it would also help if he was rich so we could buy a nice house like that one on Jamison Avenue – you know the one with the green shutters? And I want an Irish Setter dog and some kids – a boy and a girl. There – that's my happiness list. But I know it's not Steven's."
Kelso sipped his hot chocolate, satisfied with what he had accomplished. Silently he memorised Jackie's soul mate shopping list for future reference.