Disclaimer: Oh, believe me, if I owned anything about this show things would be MUCH different.
Warning: Mild language
AN: This is for the Fan Forum finale challenge. Contains/makes use of spoilers for up to the second to last episode. Will include the entire group, but will be primarily Jackie/Hyde related. :) Enjoy! I'll be posting part 2 hopefully tomorrow, and part 3 in the next couple days.
FRIENDS WILL BE FRIENDS
Part One
December 29, 1979
Donna Pinciotti's bedroom
Donna Pinciotti lay on her bed, her eyes focused on the ceiling above her, her face still flushing from the heat of too many emotions to count. She had just seen Eric again, the man she'd once thought she would be spending the rest of her life with. The boy she'd grown up with and loved nearly her entire life. And what had she done? After mumbling an awkward hello in response to his equally uncomfortable greeting, she'd turn and run from the Forman driveway and sought refuge in her bedroom.
Now she didn't have a clue as to what to do.
Her muddled thoughts were disturbed by the sound of her door being thrown open, and the unmistakable voice of her best friend.
"Donna, there you are! I have to talk to you!"
Donna sighed and sat up as Jackie Burkhardt plopped her small frame down on the end of the bed. She looked at the obviously flustered brunette. "Jackie, now is not a good time. I just saw Eric, and I'm not exactly up for listening to you ramble on and on about your new hot rollers."
Jackie frowned. "What, are you upset or something?"
Donna rolled her eyes. "Jackie, I just made a complete jackass of myself! Eric said hello and I just stuttered something stupid and ran away!"
Jackie shook her head. She didn't see what the problem was. "So what? Come on, Donna. You and Eric will sit down and talk, and you'll get back together, and all will be right with the world. This is NOT a big deal. Whereas what I have to say IS!"
Donna stared incredulously at Jackie. "How can you be so sure of that? Right now I can't even SPEAK to him, let alone get back together with him!"
And Jackie gladly took her turn at rolling her eyes. "Please! You and Eric are as predictable as the sun rising every morning. I guarantee that within three days, you'll be all sickeningly sweet and disgustingly all over one another again." She bounced up and down on the bed impatiently. "Now, please. We HAVE to talk about me!"
Donna sighed and gave in. She might as well. She knew she'd never win. Jackie always won. "Fine. What's wrong?" She didn't bother to hide the annoyance in her voice, not that Jackie noticed or cared.
Jackie sighed and shook her head. "It's just…Donna, kissing Fez is like kissing my brother," she blurted out. Her eyes widened. "I mean, he's a good kisser and all that, but it isn't like my first kiss with Steven, when I felt something but lied and said I didn't. I really didn't feel anything, Donna! And I told myself that I just had to get used to the whole idea of being with a foreigner, but…I still don't feel anything, and now I can say that I'm dating a foreigner without being embarrassed! So why don't I feel anything, Donna?"
Donna bit back her smile. The whole idea of Fez and Jackie dating seemed ridiculous to her from the get go, but she hadn't said anything because Jackie had been so convinced that it was right and that she wanted it. "Well, Jackie, maybe things just aren't working with the two of you as more than friends."
Jackie frowned and shook her head stubbornly. "Of course it's working! It has to work, Donna! Fez is the perfect boyfriend! I can prove it. I made a list!" But inside, in her deepest, most secret heart, she knew she was lying. She knew she had been completely wrong. Well intentioned, but wrong.
"Jackie, sometimes what looks good on paper isn't always good in reality," Donna said, getting off her bed and standing next to it. She watched her friend sigh and look down, as if she knew that Donna was right. "Look, maybe you should just end things with him, before things get too complicated."
Jackie traced her index finger over the pattern on Donna's bedspread. Donna was right, of course, and it irritated Jackie, but then again…she couldn't keep lying to herself. She just didn't feel that magic with Fez that she'd hoped she would, that insatiable passion and fire and energy. Really, she'd only felt that with one other person. And as much as she'd tried to convince herself that she didn't NEED that in her life to be happy, the truth was beginning to sink in that maybe she did. "I can't," she mused sadly, still eying the movements of her finger. "I don't want to hurt him. And I promised him that I wouldn't leave him."
Donna shrugged and walked over to her window. "Then I guess you'd better learn to like kissing him." She silently stared outside for a moment, then whipped around to face Jackie. "What in the HELL am I supposed to do about Eric?"
Jackie arched her eyebrows. "Well, the question is, what do you want to do about Eric? Do you want to make him pay for leaving you and then breaking up with you from Africa?"
Donna pondered that, and a sly grin crossed her lips. "That might be good. I mean, I can't just run back to him, right?"
Jackie shook her head. "Of course not! Making men pay is giving them what they deserve, Donna. So really, it's necessary." She smiled and stood up, moving towards her best friend. "Now, I suggest you put Randy to use, since Eric already knows about him. Make it clear to Eric that you've moved on with someone better. The perfect boyfriend. And watch him squirm." She giggled and clapped her hands together. "It'll be fun!"
Donna raised an eyebrow. This plan sounded suspiciously like what Jackie herself was doing. Getting herself a "perfect" boyfriend. "So, is that what you're doing with Fez? Trying to make…well, let's just say….Hyde think you've moved on? With someone better?"
Jackie's heart skipped a beat, and her face felt hot, but she managed to scoff at Donna's suggestion. "What? Please! I'm completely over Steven! I don't care what he thinks!"
She looked away. The truth was much different, and she'd only realized it last night after a few hours of tossing and turning in bed while comparing Fez to Steven. While discovering that her feelings for Fez were miniscule compared to even just the shattered remains of her feelings for Steven.
"Besides, even if it was what I was doing, it wouldn't matter. Steven obviously hates me and doesn't even care that I…" She trailed off, furious with herself for speaking. "Look, this isn't about me, okay? We have to plan an attack, to make Eric pay. So focus, Donna!"
Donna smiled faintly. Jackie made it sound so easy. Somehow, though, she knew it would be anything but.
Eric Forman's basement
Eric Forman leaned back against the couch cushions and sighed in contentment. "Ahhh, it's good to be back," he said. "Home sweet home." He grinned around at his friends and savored the familiarity of the basement.
"Well, don't make yourself too comfortable, Eric," Michael Kelso, sitting on the couch to Eric's left, said. "You gotta come to Chicago next month for me and Brooke's wedding."
Eric shook his head. "Can't believe you're getting married, Kelso," he mused. His expression darkened. "God, hopefully by then Donna will be able to look at me without running away."
Hyde sat on his normal chair. "Can you blame her? You broke up with her in a fricking letter. I'm surprised she hasn't kicked your ass." He thought for a moment. "Maybe she's just waiting for the right time, like in front of all your family and friends." He grinned widely. "Glad you're home, man."
Eric rolled his eyes. "Shut up, Hyde. This is serious. I made the biggest mistake of my life with that letter. And I have no idea how I'm going to fix it." He stared off into space. "I just know that I have to. God, I love her so much."
Fez sat on the lawn chair and pouted. "Oh, please, Eric." He pointed at the television set. "You and Donna will be back together before the next commercial break. Now can we please talk about something else? Like me?" His frown deepened, and he slumped back in the chair. "I have a problem."
Eric sighed. "Fez, if it involves candy or your horniness, I don't want to hear it."
Fez glared at Eric. "It doesn't." He sighed heavily. "It's just…being with Jackie is not what I dreamed it would be."
Hyde scoffed and ignored the slight tearing feeling in the pit of his stomach. It was nothing. Maybe just a little indigestion from lunch or something. It was NOT regret or irritation or anger or hurt at the reminder that Jackie was with Fez. He didn't give a damn that she was with someone else. "Hey, man, don't expect sympathy from me. I tried to warn you."
Kelso chuckled. "Yeah, she hasn't been the same since Hyde and I screwed her up. Man, we tore her apart! Fez, I feel kind of bad. All that's left for you is the bitchy ruins."
Fez shook his head. "No. It is not that. It is just…when I kiss her it's almost like kissing an ugly sister." He looked at Kelso and made a face. "Or Kelso."
Hyde heard the laughter around him, and some flustered protests from Kelso, but his attention drifted off. He stared at the floor in front of the television set. Kissing Jackie had never been a problem for him. She was talented, that was for sure. And she had this way of breathing into a kiss that made kissing so much more than just physically erotic. She put her heart into kisses, and god, he never felt so...safe or satisfied or…cared about as when she kissed him. And that sweet, misty, adoring look she got on her face when a kiss finally broke…
"Hyde! I asked you a question, you son of a bitch!"
He shook his head and looked at Fez. "What?" he snapped defensively.
"Did you have that problem with kissing Jackie?"
Hyde crossed his arms over his chest. "I felt nothing when I kissed her."
Eric raised an eyebrow and looked at him in disbelief. "Oh, is that why you were always making out with her, anywhere and everywhere?"
Hyde furrowed his brow. "It was just something to do. I was bored."
Eric shook his head. "For the better part of two years?"
Hyde ignored Eric and stared at the television. This wasn't a topic he wanted to discuss. Ever. He didn't even want to think about it.
Unfortunately, now he couldn't stop thinking about her. And not only about kissing her. Just about her, and everything she was. Her smile. Her laugh. Her passion. The way her eyes sparkled when she was excited about something. The way she used to gasp when she was excited about something. How she was always excited about something.
Fez sighed. "Anyway, it's just weird. It's not at all romantic. I do not hear any violins when she walks in a room. I don't feel like Romeo when I'm with her. I feel more like…Laverne. And she's Shirley."
Kelso shrugged. "So break up with her, Fez."
Fez shook his head. "I cannot. I do not want to hurt her."
Hyde couldn't help but chuckle as he stood up. "Why not? She should be used to it by now." He heard Fez saying something as he walked towards his room, but didn't quite understand, and didn't at all care to. He closed the door behind him and sat down on his bed. His eyes fell shut.
Jackie. Her face filled his head, beautiful as always, but the look he was faced with made him insides curl with ache. It was the look on her face when he'd told her about the nursed he'd cheated on her with. The look on her face when he'd said that damned "I don't know". The look on her face when she realized he'd married another woman.
The look on her face each and every time he'd hurt her.
He squeezed his eyes closed and shook his head. Damn, why did he feel bad? It was Jackie! She was nothing more than a shallow, superficial bitch!
He lay back on the bed with a groan.
Right. He'd tried to talk himself into thinking that, and had come awfully close a few times. His head found it easy to believe it.
His heart, damned it all that he even had one, was another story.
That evening, The Hub
"And Randy doesn't have any problems with bugs or small rodents. He's not afraid when we watch The Wizard of Oz. He doesn't spend hours talking about Star Wars or building things from Star Wars out of Legos. He actually goes out and experiences things. REAL things."
Eric Forman did his best to smile at his ex-girlfriend as she extolled the virtues of her new flame, pointedly comparing Randy favorably to him. "That's great, Donna," he forced himself to say even as bile built up in his throat. God, he'd spent all afternoon hoping she'd eventually figure out a way to talk to him, and boy howdy, she had. She must have had a dose of Carnation Instant Bitch since they'd last seen each other. A heavy dose. "Randy sounds like a real Prince Charming." More like Prince Loser, he thought bitterly.
Donna stared at Eric, her heart pounding wildly in her chest. He'd filled out some in Africa, his shoulders seemed…well, like shoulders. He had a little more weight to him, a little more depth to his features. And an air of confidence that hadn't ever been there before. He looked incredible, and all of her, body, mind, soul, was reacting to it. It infuriated her. What infuriated her even more was that Jackie's plan wasn't working. Eric seemed unaffected by her glowing description of Randy. She stood up. She couldn't deal with this. "Yeah, well, he is," she snapped. "And if you'll excuse me, I think I'll go find him."
Eric glared at Donna as she stalked off. "God, I can't believe her," he muttered. "When did she become such a bitch?" He turned his angry and confused expression to Hyde, who sat next to him at the table. "Or was she always a bitch and I was just to blinded by love to see it?"
Hyde rolled his eyes. "Look, man, she's just saying all that crap about Randy to get to you," he said. He looked away. "I bet she talked to Jackie. Donna sounds bitchy because she's been influenced by the queen of all bitches."
Eric raised his eyebrow, curious at the hateful way Hyde spoke of Jackie, but ignored it for the moment. He was more concerned on getting a handle on how Donna was acting. "So…you think that she's just making up all that Prince Charming crap?"
Hyde nodded and took a swig of his soda. "Yep. She's lying through her teeth. She and Randy broke up awhile ago." He looked at Forman and pointed the end of the bottle he held at him. "So go after her, man. If you want her."
Eric smiled. "Oh, I do," he said. He paused and studied his best friend's surprisingly sunglasses-free face. Expressionless as always, but his eyes were shifting around the room, almost anxiously. "So, uh, Fez and Jackie. What are you going to do if they break up?"
Hyde narrowed his eyes and looked at Forman. "Nothing, man. I don't give a crap if they break up or not." The sudden thumping of his heart against his chest wall startled him. And irritated him. He didn't want to react to her, especially just the THOUGHT of her. "Look, even if there WAS ever anything between us, its gone now. Dead."
I killed it when I stayed married to Sam. No. NO! SHE killed it when she had Kelso in that damned hotel room in nothing but a towel!
Eric shook his head. "I don't know, man. I saw you staring at her this afternoon in the basement." He smirked. "And just for the record, she was looking back."
Hyde shook his head and looked away from Forman. Damn it, why had he left his sunglasses at home? And why had his spine tingled when Forman said Jackie had looked at him? God, no! "Whatever, man," he mumbled, praying that Forman would drop the subject.
He didn't want to talk about Jackie. He didn't want to hear about Jackie. He didn't want to even THINK about Jackie.
Jackie.
God.
What IF Fez and Jackie broke up?
