Not sure how even this chapter is, so it would be great to know if you think it works. Just and FYI, we're still in rated T territory, so don't worry about covering your eyes too much, just a little (fully clothed) making out. Please excuse the typos-I'm rushing to get this out to you and will fix them tomorrow. xox
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CHAPTER 12
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Fez and Kelso are in the kitchen rummaging through the fridge for snacks.
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Hyde peeks his head in the door. "Hey man, can I talk to you for a second?" he asks the brown-skinned foreigner.
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Fez makes eye contact with Kelso for a minute and then follows Hyde back downstairs.
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As they reach the bottom, Hyde grabs two beers he's been cooling in the deep freeze and hands one to Fez.
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"She turned you down, right?" Fez asks.
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Hyde deflates. "She told you?"
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"No, but she's not stupid" he shrugs.
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"You've got to help me, man. If I don't get Jackie back I am fucked" he groans.
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"Why?" he wonders.
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He looks around to make sure they're alone. "What do you mean why? I, you know..."
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Fez shrugs.
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"You know...I - I love her, that's why" Hyde says indignantly in a low voice.
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"Why do you love her?" Fez asks.
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Hyde rubs his hands through his hair. He's sick to death of his buddy busting his balls, but he knows he's pretty much screwed without his advice. Fez knows Jackie better than any of them, and if he ever wants to have a shot at straightening his life out, he's just got to man up and listen to some hard advice.
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"Well, she's really hot, which you obviously know. She's a lot smarter than you'd think she'd be when you first see her, and she's tough." he concludes.
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"Okay, so 'really hot', 'smarter than she looks', and 'tough'. Good luck with that," Fez smacks him on the arm and stands up to leave.
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"Wait! I'm not good at this kind of thing. I need your help" he admits begrudgingly.
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"Why should I help you?" he challenges.
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"I need her" he says quietly. "She gets me."
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"What's in it for her?" he asks.
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"Me?" Hyde suggests weakly.
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Fez balks.
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At first, Hyde debates which way he's going to beat the crap out of his friend. Should he use his hands or his feet? Then however, he takes a minute to really think about what the little guy is saying to him. 'What's in it for her?' He couldn't really answer that. Jackie made it pretty damn clear that she didn't want to go back to what they once had, but she didn't say she wouldn't go back to something completely different, now did she?
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"I got you," Hyde nods approvingly. "Your point has been noted".
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"Focus on giving her what she wants and you're in like Fun Dip." he offers helpfully.
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"Thanks" he says as he straightens his glasses.
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Fez starts climbing the stairs, but stops for a moment and turns around. "I meant what I said earlier about you hurting her. Don't." he says menacingly as he finishes the walk to the top.
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"What does Jackie want?" Hyde wonders to himself. Well, he knows what she doesn't want, and that's him. What doesn't she like about him?
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Hyde walks to his room and pulls out the pad with the 20 Questions written on them and reviews her answers.
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She likes playful games, he smiles, thinking back to the blindfold payments and her punk-flavored striptease. He remembers the chair swapping incident earlier and knows she enjoys burning people. Loyalty and trust are important to her, he notes, having learned that lesson the hard way. She worships fashion, lives to dance, digs being serenaded to, and hates weird facial hair. Mainly though, she loves feeling loved - and he definitely loves her, so that's a start.
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For a complicated chick, she's pretty simple when you pull back the curtain. Her parents let her down and she wants somebody constant to make her feel secure and protected. He can do that. He didn't do it enough when they were together, but that's all going to change now that he's got a second change. Blowing it with her is not an option for him - not if he wants to be happy. Luckily for him, seeing her happy makes him feel happy. Two birds, one stone.
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From the time he first realized he liked her, he worried he wouldn't be able to make her happy. He feared that he wouldn't earn enough money and wasn't refined enough to make her life the way she always pictured it. The irony is that she didn't care about any of that. All she ever really wanted was somebody to hold her at night and be there when she woke up every day. That's how Kelso always got her back when he didn't deserve to, how he got away with murder - he made her feel cherished. How did he not see this before when it's so glaringly obvious?
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Okay, he's got a game plan. She wants love and romance, he's going to give it to her in spades. She's going to have so much love crammed into that little 95lb body that he's going to have to to hire somebody to follow them around and sweep up the extra stuff that falls out.
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He walk purposefully into his room and slams the door behind him in a fit of activity.
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Hyde walks into the kitchen carrying a wrapped present. He looks at Donna and Fez, who are both sitting at the kitchen table. "Who drew Jackie for the Secret Santa?"
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"Eric did. As you can imagine, he was thrilled" Donna smirks.
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"Where's the gift?" he asks curtly.
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Donna rummages through a shopping bag she's holding at her feet. "He doesn't even know what it is. Eric made me get her something because he doesn't understand what women like to receive as gifts" she grumbles as she hands him the present. "Did I just say that out loud?" her eyes widen.
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Hyde rips the card off of Jackie's present. He takes a sharpie marker out of his back pocket and writes directly on the paper in big letters:
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To: Dad
From: Eric
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Then he writes Jackie's name on his wrapped box and places it in Donna's shopping bag.
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"Where's your gift for Red?" she asks.
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"Yeah, um, I didn't exactly get around to buying one yet" he answers with only a hint of embarrassment.
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"You're making your best friend give his dad Jackie's gift?" she starts to chuckle.
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"Looks that way" he admits.
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Donna laughs hard. "Oh my God, Red is gonna be so pissed when he sees what Eric's giving him."
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"You know what you're giving Eric for Christmas, Hyde? The gift of ah BURN." Fez says.
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Just then, Jackie walks into the kitchen through the sliding glass door and freezes.
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Hyde grins smugly. "Hey Jackie".
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"Steven" she responds tersely with a head bob.
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"How was your afternoon?" he asks innocently.
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She shrugs. "Just like any other, I guess. Nothing interesting."
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"Really?" he pushes. He always did enjoy watching her squirm. "You didn't see those skyrockets in flight?"
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"What rockets?" Donna wonders, completely confused.
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"Nah-uh." she shakes her head no. "No."
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"Nothing you found particularly delightful this afternoon?" he smirks.
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"Nope. What exactly are you getting at, Steven?" she asks with hard eyes, calmly challenging him.
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"He's asking if you liked the 'afternoon delight' you two had earlier in the basement, woman! What are you stupid?" Fez screams, then starts to whistle the song. "Though I personally prefer an acoustic guitar version of 'Alison'. What about you, Hyde?"
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Donna stifles a laugh. Hyde scowls and flashes Fez his balled up his fist.
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Jackie glares at her foreign friend, then grabs her ex's arm and pulls him outside for privacy and slides the door shut.
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"What was that in there?" she demands to know.
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"Just reminding you of the good times." Hyde says nonchalantly.
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"Well, don't. It was a moment of weakness. The past is in the past, so we may as well just push ahead right?" she glowers.
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"That's what I'm trying to do, Jackie." he tells her sincerely. Something catches his eye and he glances upwards, then smiles broadly at her, thanking the universe for throwing him yet another bone.
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She follows his gaze and notices that Kitty has hung some mistletoe right above them.
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"Oh God. Is Mrs. Forman so desperate to get some that she has to hang these weeds everywhere?" she complains.
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"Can't buck tradition." he warns before pulling her in unexpectedly for a bracing kiss.
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Jackie fights it at first, then eventually gives in, letting his mouth take hers into it's heat. She allows his hands to roam all over her body, pulling her closer into his growing arousal as he glides his tongue and lips in and over hers in a soft tango.
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Jackie finds herself getting lightheaded and feebly pulls away. "Please stop." she begs him unconvincingly as he backs her up into the glass door and grinds himself into her, letting his mouth travel down the length of her neck.
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"You really want me to stop?" he asks, while nipping at her earlobe as he grabs her ass to bring her more tightly into his bulge.
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Two small palms smack the glass as the former cheerleader braces herself. "Oh my God." she moans breathlessly, unable to resist his love assault.
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From the other side of the glass Donna and Fez watch in shock. Donna has her hand over her mouth and tries unsuccessfully to avert her eyes.
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Fez is eating candy like he's watching a movie. "Yes, grind harder into her, you beautiful yet scruffy sonofabitch" he mumbles to himself.
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Kitty walks into the kitchen and busies herself loading up a serving tray with cookies from the cooling rack.
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Hyde runs his hand up his lover's skirt until he reaches her core. "Jackie, you are a bad girl. Where is your underwear?" he murmurs into her cleavage.
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"I think maybe still under your bed." she pants into his ear.
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"Do you want to come look for them with me?" he asks in a low growl that reverberates off of her hot skin.
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"Oh Steven, I-" she breathes, cut off unexpectedly by a loud noise.
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The mood is suddenly broken by the sound of somebody loudly banging on the glass door.
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Donna signals wildly for them to cut it out before Kitty catches an eyeful of their antics.
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Hyde removes his hand from under her skirt reluctantly and takes one last nip at Jackie's bottom lip before taking off. "You know where to find me if you're interested" he grunts as he heads down the outdoor stairs into the basement.
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Jackie takes a deep cleansing breath and still feels quite dirty. Tingly and hot everywhere, she wonders how she'll keep up her resolve until the snow melts. Half of her wants to tear off her clothes and go streaking into that basement for another round of backbreaking sex, but the rest of her knows he's just a drug. And like any dangerous habit that you have trouble resisting, you need to just quit the addiction cold turkey. The thing is, she's been eating nothing but cold turkey for over a year now and she's just as hungry for him as she was when they first parted.
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Everybody is dressed nicely and sits around the living room waiting for Kitty to start the activity.
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There is a giant plate of cookies in the middle of the table that Kelso and Fez eye greedily.
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"Don't even think about it, Tonto" Red warns him from behind the newspaper he's reading. "Kitty wants everybody to wait until after the gifts are opened."
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"Holy cow! Is that a reindeer?" Fez yells lamely while pointing towards the kitchen.
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Most people look in the direction of his finger while Kelso grabs three cookies from the plate and puts them under his shirt.
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The guys meet back over near Brooke and Betsy and Kelso divvy's up the booty—one for Fez, one for Betsy and one for him.
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Brooke clears her throat to signal her disapproval.
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"Sorry babe, I was only able to grab three" he says as he bites into his cookie. "What? You know I'm not lucky!"
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His lady puts her hands on her hips and narrows her eyes. "I am starving, Michael Kelso. If you want to ever get 'lucky' again, you're going to hand over that snickerdoodle," she threatens.
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He looks longingly at the cookie then at Brooke and reluctantly hands it to her. "Damn, Brooke!"
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Brooke smiles and eats the cookie while snuggling against her man.
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Donna brings the last remaining presents in from the kitchen and arranges them on the table. Eric walks over to help her set them up and takes a look at Jackie's gift from Hyde.
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"So he just backed her up against the glass door and was doing her out in the open?" he asks incredulously.
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"Pretty much. I thought Fez was going to start throwing dollar bills at them soon," she says.
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"I miss everything!" he throws his arms up in the air with frustration.
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"Something tells me we're going to get an encore tonight. Just a feeling" she whispers into his ear as Hyde walks in.
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Kelso sidles over to Hyde and plants himself next to his scruffy friend. "Do the words 'grand gesture' ring any bells?"
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Hyde grimaces at his buddy's stupidity. "Do they ring any for you?" he asks, not believing for a minute that he knows what this means.
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He hitches up the waist of his pants. "No they do not. However, Brooke told me to tell you that that's what you need to do to get Jackie back," he suggests before clapping Hyde on the back once and returning to his girlfriend's side.
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Jackie walks in through the kitchen and immediately locks eyes with her ex, then drops her gaze and seats herself in the far off corner next to Betsy, pulling the affectionate toddler onto her lap.
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Kitty walks into the center of the room and clears her throat. "Ahem!" she says, trying to get the room's attention. "Red and I feel so happy to have so many of you back at home for Christmas this year. As all of our babies get older, we've been seeing less and less of you, so having everybody here under one room is truly a blessing," she titters, trying not to get emotional.
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"As you know" she continues, "We all drew names for our Secret Santa gifts, so I'd like you all to come up here and look for your name to claim your gift. Hopefully, since we only each had to buy one gift, people went big and nobody cheaped out like last year by buying people socks" she laughs uncomfortably while looking in Kelso's direction. "Merry Christmas!" she gestures towards the table for people to start.
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Everybody charges towards the table and sorts out their gifts haphazardly. Once every one has their rightful present, people retake their seats to open their gifts.
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Hyde shakes his present before peeling back the paper. There is no card attached, so he just dives in. Under the festive paper and expert wrapping is a familiar-looking, beige and white shoe box. As he pulls off the top, a perfect pair of tan boots is revealed to him. The exact model Jackie bought him years ago when he took her to the mall to get over her breakup with Kelso. He smiles widely, knowing this gift could only be from his ex. He glances up at her and nods a 'thank you'.
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Having eagerly awaited his response, she shoots him a coy smile.
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As Jackie examines the package in front of her, she notices her name written in familiar handwriting. She peels back the sloppy wrapping to reveal an exact copy of the shoe box containing boots that she gave Hyde. Her brow creases as she tries to figure out what this strange gift means. Her delicate fingers slip under the lip of the box lid and lift it off. Inside, she's faced with the last four years of her life distilled into one worn out shoe box. This is Hyde's 'Jackie Box'. He has a Jackie box! Who knew he cared enough to keep all of this?
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The first thing she notices is the troll doll she gave Hyde for luck on his first day of work. She then spies one of Bob's stars & stripes napkins he saved from the Veteran's Day BBQ. His dried boutonniere from prom is also inside, as is a picture of the two of them taken that night by the school photographer. Her old cheer uniform that mysteriously went missing is there, as well as the pair of underwear she left on his floor earlier in the day. She even sees a ticket stub from their afternoon at Funland together and the dried flower she wore in her hair to the Valentine's day dance.
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Towards the bottom of the box she comes upon the Dear John letter she left for him when she went to Chicago. She runs her fingers over the envelope regretfully, cursing the moment she ever thought of picking up the pen.
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In the corner, sitting all alone is a small, black velvet box. She knows immediately what this is and a lump forms in the base of her stomach. He was telling the truth. He did buy a ring for her. While she was crying her eyes out, missing him in a hotel room, he was picking out a ring to propose to her with. Her hand shaking, she reaches out and brings the cube closer to her, letting it sit closed on the palm of her hand.
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"Aren't you going to open it?" Hyde asks, standing above her.
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Her eyes shift away from him as she feels too much shame to look. "No" she says, shaking her head.
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Hyde crouches down next to her and opens the box, revealing a glittering diamond pave band with nice sized stone set in the center. She had thought about the kind of ring she always wanted and this was nothing like it—it was so much better. He always had a way of upending her ideas of she wanted and giving her something even better, even when she thought she was so sure.
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"It's beautiful" Jackie utters as she runs her finger down the band and gently caresses the tiny pave stones set within. A tear runs down her face, but she's too distracted to wipe it away. She finally turns to him and several more tears start to fall. "You—you kept all of this? You kept it the whole time? Even when...even when she was living here?" she asks, still unable to say Sam's name without considerable pain.
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He nods quietly as he wipes her tears away with his thumb.
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Jackie shakes her head in confusion. "Why?"
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He takes a deep breath, settles down next to her and takes her hand. "I guess I always hoped we weren't over. Even when it seemed like the end of the road for us, I knew deep down I still loved you, and as long as I did I just couldn't give up," he confides.
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She silently contemplates everything in front of her and what he's just said. "You really did love me," she says with disbelief.
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"No, I really do love you. I never stopped" he admits.
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"I wish I knew then" she tells him sadly as her voice catches.
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"I wish I had told you" he says remorsefully.
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She looks him directly in the eyes for the first time and hands him the ring. "I can't keep this."
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His crystal blue eyes sting with hurt. "I bought it for you."
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"You bought it under different circumstances" she insists, trying to push it into his hand.
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"Those circumstances haven't changed, Jackie. I love you. I want to be with you. That's what that ring means and I'm not taking it back as long as I still feel this way" he whispers, realizing they are starting to draw attention to themselves.
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Jackie coughs, trying to hold back the volcano of tears she can feel threatening to erupt all over her face. "I'm sorry" she gasps as she runs out of the room, leaving the box and all of it's contents in Hyde's care.
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Through the corner of his eye, Hyde notices Fez staring at him. He sadly shrugs before collecting everything into the box and heading downstairs to the basement.
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"Hey dumbass!" Red yells at Eric. "What the heck is this?" he asks, holding up a pair of tiny, pink, fluffy marabou slippers.
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"You always did look great in pink, dad" Eric blurts out nervously as his eyes dart around the room in search of Donna. "Um, Merry Christmas?" he declares, petrified of what's to come.
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"Merry Christmas? It is now. Brace yourself, Eric, because you're about to have the pinkest, fuzziest foot up your ass!" He screams before catching Kitty's admonishing look. His whole body seems to say 'damn' and deflate as he realizes that if he kicks his son's ass his wife might literally divorce him. "But seeing as it's Christmas and all, I guess I'll just give you a pass this time," he sighs.
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"It's a Christmas miracle!" Eric screams as he embraces his girlfriend with glee.
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A/N – Review please!