A/N: ok so i feel like the last two chapters focused more on Hyde, so this one is Jackie-centric. We find out how she's been feeling about things. Happy Friday!


Week Two

Day Six

"No."

"Why?"

"Because I said so."

The sound of semi-hushed voices starts to rouse Jackie from her deep sleep. She burrows further into the covers, trying to ignore the disruptive sounds. If she can block out those voices, maybe she'll be able to fall back asleep.

"Please?"

"Bets, trust me, okay? There are enough chocolate chips in there, you just can't see 'em all."

Jackie opens her eyes with a groan, giving up on sleep. She'd worked late the night before and pretty much fell asleep the moment her head hit the pillow. While she doesn't know what time it currently is, she can feel that however long she slept wasn't enough. Ever since Betsy came into her custody, she just hasn't been able to sleep in- or well. She'd hoped she'd be able to sleep in this morning, but alas. This is just what life with a kid is like, she supposes.

With another groan, Jackie forces herself to get out of bed and walk into the bathroom. She quickly splashes some cold water on her face and runs a brush through her hair before grabbing a silk robe and heading out of her room.

"Just eat it," Hyde is saying to Betsy, who's seated at the dining room table. He looks up to see Jackie walking into the room, and for a moment, he looks at her just like he used to: like he thinks she's the most beautiful girl in the world, like he's in awe of her radiance.

Her cheeks flush slightly, and to cover it up she quickly walks past him to give Betsy a good morning kiss.

"Oh, hey. You're up," Hyde says bluntly, seeming to shake himself from his daze. "Sorry if we woke you," he adds, sounding genuine. He's been kissing up to her lately, treating her with as much devotion as he does with Betsy. She more than appreciates it; it makes her feel powerful in a way. Steven Hyde, adhering to her every wish and command. Now that's living the life.

Jackie shrugs off his apology. "I probably would've woken up soon anyway," she lies.

Hyde frowns, appearing to know she needed the sleep.

"I just need some coffee," she says, making her way over to the coffee maker where there's already a fresh pot waiting. She's been relying on coffee a whole lot lately, it seems.

"I made breakfast if you want some," Hyde offers as he watches her sit down with her coffee mug. She notices he already set out a plate for her. "Waffles with chocolate chips," he states, though she already guessed as much based on the conversation she heard earlier. Betsy often requests waffles for breakfast and Hyde often complies.

"Need more chocolate chips," Betsy pouts, bringing her complaint from earlier back into the conversation.

Hyde closes his eyes in frustration and takes a deep breath. "Betsy, if you complain about the chocolate chips one more time, there won't be any chocolate chips at all from now on. Or waffles. That way you won't have anything to complain about."

"Noooo!" Betsy wails in classic toddler fashion. "I want chocolate chip waffles!"

"Then stop complaining and eat what I gave you," he says firmly, more than a little annoyed at this point. This stupid argument has been going on for far too long.

"No!" she crosses her tiny arms.

"See, now you're just being bratty. Jackie, what do you do when she gets like this?" he asks, exasperated. He looks over and sees Jackie dozing off, coffee mug in one hand and face resting against the other. "Jackie?"

She jolts back to alertness. "Sorry, what?"

Again, Hyde frowns at her in concern. "Man, you really are tired, huh?"

"Way to state the obvious," Jackie mutters into her mug as she takes a sip of the caffeinated brew.

He ignores the sarcasm. "I'm supposed to meet up with Angie this afternoon, but I can cancel if you're not up to watching Betsy. I'll just tell her we can do it another time."

"What? No, I'm fine. I just need to wake up, is all," Jackie insists. She knows how much Hyde's visits with his sister mean to him and she certainly doesn't want him to miss out just because she's a little tired. She also doesn't want any pity from him.

"Alright, if you're sure," Hyde agrees, eyeing her carefully.

"I'm sure," she reassures him.


Jackie's trying to get through the household chores while also keeping an eye on Betsy, and the afternoon seems to be dragging on. She just wants an itty bitty rest, is that too much to ask for? Apparently so, because right when she's in the middle of doing laundry there's a knock at the door. With a sigh, she stands up and heads over to the door. Peering through the peephole, she sees the person standing on the other side is none other than Carolyn Rockwell. She mentally curses. This is just what she needed today.

"Oh, hi, Carolyn," Jackie greets with the sweetness of artificial syrup. "It's so nice to see you."

"Is it?" the older woman asks, arching an eyebrow.

Hell, no.

"Yep…" Jackie replies awkwardly. She hates this entire situation. Why did Carolyn have to come over when Hyde isn't here? She's not sure he would say something to ease the tension- in fact probably the opposite- but at least she wouldn't be alone. "Here, why don't we go sit in the living room?" she suggests. "Betsy's playing in there."

Carolyn eyes her warily but complies, following her into the living room and sitting on the couch. Betsy runs up to give her a brief hug.

"Do you want something to drink?" Jackie asks her after an awkward moment of silence.

"No, I'm fine. Thank you," she answers, pulling Betsy onto her lap while the toddler looks at a picture book. She glances around the room, seeming to silently judge the messy appearance. Betsy's toys are scattered on the floor and the half-folded laundry is spread about in piles. "Were you doing laundry?"

"Oh, yeah," Jackie nods. "I'm trying to catch up on chores today."

"Yes, I can see that," Carolyn comments and Jackie bites her lip to keep from snapping at the woman. "Where is Steven?"

"He's visiting with his sister," she responds.

Carolyn nods. "Well, speaking of Steven, he told me you're a model. How's that going?"

Jackie smiles excitedly, always happy to talk about herself and something successful in her life. "It's going great! My agent says if my work keeps doing so well, I might end up in Vogue!" she squeals with a dreamy sparkle in her eye.

"Hm. I told your boyfriend that I don't think it's an appropriate job for a young mother who should be at home with her child," Carolyn starts, and Jackie's smile drops at the words, "but he seemed to disagree. He says he's confident enough in your abilities to balance work and still be a good parent. Do you agree with that?"

"I-" Jackie starts to answer, her gaze flickering away. She's taken off guard by Carolyn's words. Hyde said that? He stood up to Carolyn like that for her, even when she wasn't around? Huh. "Uh, yes," she finally finds the words. "I do."

"He also said that you're very smart and responsible and can 'do anything you put your mind to'," Carolyn continues. "I must admit, from my first impression of your relationship- which, if you remember, wasn't a very good one- I thought it was rather flimsy. And mind you, I'm still not entirely convinced that it's not. But...well, after speaking with Steven, it seems that he really cares for you. He has a lot of faith in you; he admires you, even. It took me by surprise. I get the feeling that he believes in you much more than he believes in himself."

Jackie's at a loss for words. She's a bit surprised herself. So he really...said all that about her? And meant it? Maybe he is maturing and growing into a better person. Maybe it's always been in there and was just being smothered by his vices. And now that those vices are worked on, being fought back, the man Jackie always believed was in there is coming to the surface. For a brief moment, she wonders, just wonders, what it would be like to be with this improved version of Hyde.

No, no, no, no . It's too early for this; this wasn't supposed to happen this soon. Or ever. But it is, and those long-buried feelings are beginning to bubble back up. But she doesn't want them to. She'll just...have to stop them before they can grow any more, push them back, whatever it takes to nip 'em in the bud. Yeah.

"And how are you doing Betsy?" Carolyn asks the toddler since Jackie went silent.

"Good," she replies. "I fed the ducks yesterday."

"Oh you did, did you?" she humors the child.

"Yep. I drew a picture of it. You wanna see?" Betsy asks, scrambling off Carolyn's lap without waiting for an answer. She disappears into her room and re-emerges with a paper in hand. Bringing it to her grandmother, she begins to describe the artwork, pointing to a few scribbly smiley faces with sticks for limbs alongside an oval with what appears to be a beak. "That's Mommy, and that's Daddy, and that's me! We're feeding Sprinkles," she explains.

Jackie feels her throat tighten at the words. Betsy has only recently started to refer to both her and Hyde as Mom and Dad, and she still hasn't gotten used to it. It's surreal, and it feels like a splash of cold water every time she hears the word come out of her mouth. Furthermore, she doesn't know how Carolyn is going to react to hearing "replace" Brooke and Kelso like that. She sure hasn't gotten used to it herself, and she can imagine that for Carolyn it must reopen the wound of her daughter's death.

Carolyn purses her lips in a tight smile and blinks rapidly. "It's lovely, dear," she manages to answer, voice merely a pained whisper.


"So I was thinking that we could just make it easy and order pizza for dinner tonight," Hyde is saying to Jackie that evening. She doesn't answer, however, lost in thought while they wash the dishes together. She's thinking about Carolyn's visit earlier and about what she said about Hyde. But mostly, she's thinking about her own feelings towards it all, those surprising, unwanted feelings. Her feelings towards Hyde have shifted a little, or maybe she's just become aware that they've shifted, but she's conflicted about it, angry even. She'd told herself and him she wouldn't take him back so easily. And yet here she is, starting to think about him as she did two years ago. She feels ashamed of herself.

"Jackie? Are you listening?" Hyde asks, stopping in the middle of washing out a pot.

Her attention snaps to him. "What? Sorry, I'm just thinking. Carolyn stopped by earlier."

"Shit," Hyde swears. "How'd it go?"

"Fine," Jackie answers curtly.

"Fine? Are you sure about that?" Hyde presses, knowing her inattention means she should have more to say than that.

"Yes, Steven. I just...realize I have a lot to think about," she explains cryptically as she finishes drying a plate and places it in the cupboard. She then picks up a glass cup and begins to dry it. By 'think' she mainly means 'try to shake these remerging feelings off and convince herself nothing has changed'. Of course, that's easier said than done.

"What does that mean?" he questions, raising an eyebrow.

"Can you stop interrogating me?!" she snaps, slamming down the glass she's holding onto the counter and causing it to shatter. She stares at the mess in shock for a moment before glaring at Hyde. "Dammit, look what you made me do."

"Jackie, you're bleeding," Hyde notices, reaching for her injured hand in concern.

She pulls it away. "I'm fine, just clean this glass up before Betsy gets hurt."

"But-" he starts to protest.

"Please, Steven," she pleads, exasperated but no longer harsh. He simply nods silently and starts to do as she says. She takes the opportunity to go into the bathroom and tend to her hand.

Once she's alone in the bathroom, Jackie blinks back tears as she inspects her cut. No, the pain of her injury isn't the cause of her damp eyes, it's what's going on in her head and heart. She's overwhelmed to the point that she lashed out at Hyde. If she's honest, she thinks he should've lashed out, too. No, she wanted him to lash out. If he had, then maybe she would've been able to convince herself that he hasn't changed and can't change. But that didn't happen, and now she not only has wounded emotions, but she also has a wounded hand.

Shaking her head to clear her thoughts, Jackie pulls out the medical kit she keeps under the bathroom sink. She opens it up and looks through it, but she's not sure what exactly she's looking for. She's not good at this kind of thing, but she can tell the cut on her hand isn't large or deep enough to need stitches, but it's too large for a bandaid. Not to mention the fact that the position of it on her hand will make it difficult to keep a regular bandage on. She sighs. Today is going just great.

There's a knock at the door and Jackie already knows who it is before he pushes the half-closed door the rest of the way open. "Hey."

She doesn't meet his eyes. "Did you clean all the glass?"

"Yeah, don't worry," he assures.

She keeps her eyes on her hand, even though she's not doing anything with it at the moment. "Are you sure, 'cause you know even if there's only a tiny piece Betsy could-"

"Jackie," Hyde sighs, knowing she's trying to keep the attention off of herself, "do you think you could stop worrying about Betsy for just five minutes? You're literally bleeding right now." He eyes her hand, which is dripping blood into the sink bowl.

Finally, she looks up at him. She doesn't say anything, just holds his gaze. She doesn't know what to say when there are so many things going through her mind.

"Here," he says, squeezing himself into the tiny bathroom beside her. He digs around in the medical kit until he finds the proper supplies he's looking for. "I might not know how to care for a sick toddler, but I sure as hell know how to treat nasty cuts and bruises. Had to teach myself how, otherwise I probably would've bled to death at some point."

She's quiet as he gently takes her injured hand in his and begins to clean the cut. She watches his movements closely, noticing how gentle but precise he's being. It's comforting and almost relaxing in a strange way.

"There was this one time my mom was really drunk and she shoved me down in the kitchen," Hyde says, starting to tell a story while he continues to work on her hand. "I hit my forehead on the edge of the counter and split it open. I thought I could take care of it myself, but I didn't know head injuries bleed that much. Forman thought I was gonna die and cried until I finally went to his mom." He rolls his eyes. "She had to put a couple of stitches in it. Other than that one time though, I've managed to patch myself up just fine."

This isn't the first story like that Hyde has told her, but Jackie never gets used to it. She doesn't understand how casual it is to him- or at least how casual he pretends to be about it. She hates it. Most of their friends have shitty parents, but Hyde had it the worst. There's no doubt about it.

"But hey, it taught me some badass survival skills, so I think of it as a plus," he continues, moving on to disinfecting the wound.

It stings a little, but Jackie doesn't let it show. Instead, she lets out some pent-up pain another way. "You shouldn't have had to learn those skills. At least not that way."

Hyde shrugs and this time he's the one to keep his eyes focused on her hand. "There are things both of us shouldn't have had to deal with, but they also made us who we are."

She scoffs at his Zen. There are some things he shouldn't even try to be Zen about. "Oh, yeah, because we both turned out great."

"Maybe not so much for me," he says, beginning to carefully wrap her hand in gauze and Jackie watches carefully. "But I'd say you did. I mean, look at you; at 20 years old you have your dream job, your own apartment, and you're raising a child. That's sort of impressive." He meets her eyes and smiles down at her, and suddenly Carolyn's words from earlier come back to Jackie full force.

"He has a lot of faith in you; he admires you, even."

"I get the feeling that he believes in you much more than he believes in himself."

"Uh, Jackie?" Hyde asks, noticing she hasn't responded. "This is the part where you say 'of course it's impressive, I'm Jackie Burkhart' or something else egotistical. And then I regret giving you a compliment in the first place," he jokes.

"Huh? Oh, yeah. Sorry, I'm just...thinking," she says lamely.

"Yeah," he says, looking at her in a weirdly amused way. "You've been saying that a lot today. And I think I know what's going on with you," he reveals, holding her gaze seriously.

Jackie's heart starts beating rapidly and she's suddenly very much aware of their close proximity. So he knows. Is he going to try to kiss her, right here and now? More importantly, would she stop him? She should. But would she? Oh, God. Why is she even thinking about that? Jeez.

"You do?" she asks, voice coming out almost squeaky.

"Sure," Hyde shrugs, "you're totally stressed out about Betsy and Carolyn and everything else going on. You're burnt out- and not the good kind of burnt out."

Oh. Phew.

"Oh. Uh, yeah. That's it," she says, and it's not a total lie. In fact, it's more than true. It just wasn't what she thought he was going to say.

"Well, I've just been thinking about it," Hyde continues with a sheepish shrug, "ya know, how hard you've been working and how stressed out you are. And you should take a little break. You deserve it."

"A break, huh?" she asks. If this bathroom wasn't so small and Hyde wasn't standing so close to her, she would've placed her non-injured hand on her hip. What the hell is he getting at?

"Just for like, a day or two," he quickly adds. "Just so you can get out of here and take some time for yourself. Betsy and I will be fine."

"Steven, I'm fine," she insists, not wanting to appear weak to him. Those days are over, reformed Hyde or not.

"How about you think of it as a trial run for me," he tries a different approach. "to make sure I haven't been slacking off now that we're living together. Make sure I can be independent with Betsy, don't burn the apartment down, that sort of thing."

Jackie knows just what he's doing, trying to make it sound like it's not out of pity or anything like that. And she has to admit, it works. She fights a smile, appreciative of how well he knows her. "Well...I work tomorrow, but I'm off the day after, so I guess I can go out and do something that day. It would be kind of nice."

It really does sound nice, she supposes. Maybe this is what she needs, to step away for a bit and collect her thoughts.

"Cool," he says casually. He then finishes wrapping her hand, pinning the end of the gauze with a little metal clasp. "Okay, I think you're good. Just try not to get the gauze wet," he advises, putting away the medical kit. He starts to leave the room.

"Steven?" Jackie stops him, reaching out and grabbing his hand with her good one.

"Yeah?" he asks, turning back to her. His eyes shine with concern.

Oh, God. Where are these stupid butterflies in her stomach coming from? "Thank you," she manages to say.

"Anything for you, Doll," he says with a small smile before walking away.

With those familiar words, Jackie is left staring after him, missing the warmth of his gentle hand holding hers.


Later that night as she lies in bed, Jackie's trying hard to put her exhausted body to sleep, but her mind keeps circling around. She can't help but think about her former lover sleeping on the couch in just the next room over. She wonders if he's warm enough with the blanket she gave him or comfortable enough with the decorative cushion as a pillow. She wonders why she cares so much, or why she even cares at all. But mostly, she wonders if he thinks of her as he drifts off to sleep, the way she's thinking of him.