"The line between insanity and mysticism is thin; the line between reality and unreality is thin. Liminality as a spiritual concept is all about the porousness of boundaries." - Esmé Weijun Wang, The Collected Schizophrenias Essays

o-o-o

Sunday, November 20th

"It was you. Jackie. You were the chick Hyde went out with last weekend."

Of everyone in the basement, I would have never expected my ex-boyfriend Michael Kelso to be the one to figure out what really happened on Veteran's Day.

And yet, he somehow had enough brain power to see through the haze of his drunken state at the barbecue to remember that he, in fact, had been standing right there in the Forman driveway with us when Steven finally - and very publicly - agreed to take me on a date.

The basement is dead silent for a moment. My reflex is to deny what Michael has said, but I can see in his face that he truly remembers, and my lying about it would suggest that there's something to hide.

Which there's not. Because there is nothing between me and Steven to hide.

Michael, who is kneeling in front of his box of junk rises sharply as a thought occurs to him. "Oh my God, did you two sleep together?"

"What? No!" I interject immediately at the same time that Steven stands up and punches Michael in the shoulder.

The rest of our friends who'd frozen suddenly re-animate. Eric flies off the couch, points an accusing finger at me and starts shouting at Steven. Donna shakes my shoulder and starts hounding me about why I didn't tell her anything. Michael is shouting at no one in particular. And Fez drops his pile of candy on the floor and gets down on all fours to start picking it up with a dumbfounded expression on his face.

"Everybody just shut up!" I shriek, and my shrill voice reaches through the cacophony. It takes a moment, but everybody calms down.

I stand up confidently to say my piece. I have to shut this down before it gets out of hand again. "Yes, Steven asked me on a date on Veteran's Day, but it ended up being nothing, okay? Any feelings I had for him fizzled out." I turn to glare at Michael. "And we did not sleep together."

Michael crosses his arms and pouts. "Well, did you kiss?"

I hesitate for a moment too long and the basement erupts into chaos again. I throw my hands up in the air, frustrated, and fall back onto the couch. I figure I'll let Steven settle them down this time, but when I glance at him, he's just standing there, arms limp at his sides, looking at me with an unreadable expression.

For some reason this pisses me off. It wasn't like I told Michael, he just figured it out himself. And now I was the only one bothering to do damage control, here. I purse my lips angrily as I meet his gaze and shrug my shoulders.

When the room quiets, I speak calmly. "We kissed, but we didn't feel anything. Right, Steven?"

Steven crosses his arms over his chest and nods. Now he looks as pissed as I feel.

"Wait a minute, Jackie." Eric's voice sounds panicked. I look over at him. "Did you say Hyde asked you out?"

The room quiets again as they wait for my response. But I'm so over it now. None of this was anyone's business, anyway. I turn to look again at Steven, clearly communicating that I was fielding this question over to him.

"What the hell, Hyde?" Eric squeaks, taking my silence as confirmation.

"Would you just relax, Forman?" Steven grimaces at Eric. "Okay, look, I…" He shakes his head. "It doesn't matter, okay? We agreed to forget about it, so - "

"It was to prove a point, wasn't it?" The realization hits me like a kick to the ribs. "That's why you took me on that date?" I say, breathless.

I can't believe I was so stupid. Of course Steven only agreed to go out with me so that he could prove to me that we were incompatible. Never mind that he was right, but the fact that he went into our date with this ulterior motive hurts more than everything else he has done since.

I dare to look over at Steven. He rubs his hands together nervously, his shoulders hunched up to his ears, and he averts his eyes. Clearly he hadn't expected me to figure it out. I feel embarrassment flush over my whole body.

"Right," I say slowly. "So, there you have it. You guys never had anything to worry about." The enthusiasm in my voice is so clearly forced it makes me cringe. "I think I should leave."

I want nothing more than to run out of this room. But I'm still Jackie Burkhart and no one ever ran me out of a room. So I take my time rising from the couch, flipping my hair over my shoulder, then take the stairs up to the kitchen.

When I get to the landing, I pause. I'd come over this morning because I'd wanted to talk to Donna about the school paper. But also because after spending all of last weekend and this weekend at home, and all week with the cheerleaders, I'd needed a change of scenery. And I'd started to miss the basement.

Now I didn't know where to go.

"Jackie?"

I turn to find Mrs. Forman hovering over a cookbook next to the stove.

"Mrs. Forman!" I smile and walk over to the motherly figure.

Maybe I could hang out with Mrs. Forman for a while. As long as she didn't ask me to cook anything. Plus, part of me was wondering if Steven would come after me to apologize.

"Do you have plans for Thanksgiving this week?" Mrs. Forman asks me, glancing up from her cookbook.

I shrug. My parents would probably do what they always did: cater a huge Thanksgiving dinner and invite all the people from work they hoped to schmooze for raises, promotions, funding, and who knows what else. The food was always good, but it was otherwise a boring night, at least for me.

"Well," Mrs. Forman says, clapping her hands together excitedly. "If you have a chance, you should stop by here. I'm doing something different for Thanksgiving this year."

"What's that?" I ask.

"Well, none of my family or Red's is able to come down this year. So I told Red, Laurie, and Eric to invite their friends over for dinner instead. Normally we just have friends over for dessert, but I want everyone here for dinner this year, too! I'm having some of my nurse friends from work, I don't know that Red is going to invite anyone other than Bob…" she says with a frown. "But Laurie is bringing some friends, and of course I want all of Eric's friends here as well. I'm calling it Friends-giving!" Mrs. Forman says, with her signature laugh.

Mrs. Forman's Friends-giving already sounds so much more fun and exciting than Thanksgiving dinner at my house. But when I glance at the basement stairs to find that Steven never followed me up to apologize, I know that it would be a horrible idea for me to come.

I look back at Kitty and force a smile. She looks at me expectantly, and I don't have the heart to tell her no. "Sounds like a lot of fun, Mrs. Forman. I'll drop by if I can," I say instead.

Kitty offers me a piece of her apple pie that she baked as practice for Friends-giving, explaining that it was a new recipe, and she'd wanted to make sure it was perfect. Between the sweet desert and Mrs. Forman's warm chatter, I am feeling better, just a little, when I decide I should go home.

"I'll see you later, Mrs. Forman," I say. She squeezes my shoulder affectionately.

I spare one last glance at the basement stairs before stepping out the sliding glass door. Nothing.

o-o-o

I hear my phone ringing before I reach my bedroom door. I have to fling myself across my bed to pick up the receiver in time.

"You've reached Jackie!" I say cheerfully. Nothing made me feel better than gossiping on the phone.

"You can't just drop a bomb like that and then disappear!" Donna's accusing voice answers back.

I roll my eyes. This was not the kind of gossip I had in mind.

"Did you time how long it would take me to get home so you could call me?" I ask, ignoring what Donna had to say all together.

"Yes, I did," Donna says frankly. "And I'm not proud of it. But why didn't you tell me about you and Hyde?" Donna's voice softens at the end.

I sigh. "Because there is no me and Hyde," I explain. "The date was nothing. We have moved on."

There's a long pause. "Are you sure?"

"What do you mean, 'are you sure'?" I say defensively. "Of course I'm sure."

"I don't know, it kinda sounds to me like you might still like Hyde."

"Well, you're wrong. The date was a disaster."

Even as I'm saying these words, I know they are a lie. It had been the best date of my life. It was the kiss, or well, the whirlwind of unfamiliar emotions that threw me way outside of my comfort zone afterwards, that had ruined everything. I roll onto my back and clutch a pillow to my chest.

"Okay, but can feelings just go away that fast?" Donna pushes, not unkindly.

I think of the way my head spun when Steven and I had kissed. I still couldn't pinpoint what it meant, but it had been new and unfamiliar. It had been nothing like kissing Michael, the only boy I'd ever loved. Which meant that it had been nothing, right? The further away I got from that night, the harder it was to keep my feelings straight.

I don't say any of this to Donna, though. Fortunately, she changes the subject.

"Can I ask you something?" Donna says hesitantly.

"Why not?" I exhale. At least she was kind enough to ask.

"Do you really think Hyde only asked you out to prove a point?"

"Yes," I say firmly. I'd pondered it the whole drive home. "Look, did that hurt? Yes. Was it humiliating? Also yes. But he was right. Steven had to take me on that date to make me realize that there are some boundaries you just don't cross."

"What are you saying?" Donna hedges.

"I'm saying that…he and I were never meant to be anything more than two people who barely tolerate each other. And I think to get back to that place, I need to get out of the basement for a while."

"Wow, Jackie. You sound really serious about this."

I shrug, then remember that I'm on the phone. "Yeah."

There's another long pause. "Well, for what its worth, Jackie…there was a time when we couldn't wait for you and Kelso to break up and for you to stop hanging around in the basement with us. But I mean, you're kind of like one of us now."

I feel my eyes start to sting. If my relationship with Michael had given me anything, it was Donna's friendship. "I'll still see you around school, I promise."

When Donna and I hang up, I lay on my back and stare at my ceiling for a long time, thinking about what she said. I distinctly remember those first few months when I started dating Michael and the rest of the gang made it clear I wasn't welcome. Especially Steven.

So why was it that I still hung around after Michael and I broke up? Why did it take a fallout with Steven, the boy who'd never wanted me around to begin with, to break my heart bad enough to drive me out?

How had Steven broken my heart worse than Michael had?

o-o-o

Wednesday, November 23rd

True to my word, I stay clear of the basement all week, which is easier than I expected because I have cheerleading practice both Monday and Tuesday after school. Thanksgiving was this week, so Wednesday was our last day of school before the holiday.

Despite my promise to Donna, I don't see much of her during the week. We'll chat for a minute or two at the end of lunch, but I've actually seen more of Michael than I have Donna, unfortunately.

"Jackie, fancy meeting you here," Michael says, sauntering up to me Wednesday morning.

"Well, it's not that surprising," I say, rolling my eyes. "My homeroom is right there," I point, "and you know that. Which is why you have shown up at this exact time the last three days."

"So?" Michael says, frowning. "It can still be fancy!"

"What do you want, Michael?" I ask impatiently. Ever since he'd remembered that I had gone out with Steven, he'd been acting incredibly insecure and vaguely territorial, which made me angry, but mostly it just exhausted me.

"I just wanted to invite you to come to Mrs. Forman's Friends-giving with me tomorrow," Michael says, and throws an arm over my shoulder.

I immediately step out of his embrace. "I was already invited."

"Dammit!" Michael stomps his foot like a four year-old having a tantrum. "How did Hyde beat me here? I left extra early this morning."

It takes me a second to follow. Did Michael seriously think Steven had asked me? How dumb was he?

"What? No," I say. "Mrs. Forman invited me. And I'm not going."

"Not even for me?" Michael pouts.

"No, Michael. We're broken up, remember?"

"So that's a no?"

"Goodbye, Michael," I say, shaking my head. Before he can say anything else, I dart into my homeroom.

I should know that won't be the end of the conversation, because when I meet Donna after lunch on the way to sixth period, word has spread. Clearly Michael can't keep his mouth shut.

"You're not coming to Thanksgiving?" Donna asks, blocking my path.

I stop walking and sigh. "Donna, I told you I needed to get away from that place," I say quietly.

"I know, but…" Donna pauses. She looks me up and down, her expression shifting. "It was just one failed date with Hyde. I mean, even after Kelso cheated on you, you still hung around."

I shrug and cross my arms uncomfortably. Her words are eerily close to the mental war I'd been waging since our phone call this past weekend.

A small smile creeps onto Donna's lips. "Oh my God, you still like Hyde."

"Donna - "

"I mean, its the only explanation. If you were 'over him' then you'd have no problem coming to the basement."

"No," I say, and point my finger at her scoldingly. "Donna, you've got it all wrong. That date was a mistake. It messed everything up. I mean, I'm Jackie Burkhart! I don't date guys like Steven. It was a mistake. Steven was a mistake."

"Jackie…"

I can tell my voice is reaching a hysterical pitch, so I decide it's time for my exit. "I gotta get to class."

I do a 180 and turn the corner down the adjacent hallway where I immediately slam into none other than Steven Hyde. I take a forceful step back.

"Hey," he says, like he's not surprised to see me here.

"Excuse me." I try to step around him.

He puts an arm up to block me. "Actually, I think you've made another mistake." His voice is like ice. "Isn't your sixth period the other way?"

It was, but once again, I'd been eager to escape an uncomfortable situation and had taken the quickest exit.

I also know from Steven's particular choice of words that he'd heard everything I'd just said to Donna. For half a second, I feel guilty. But that fades pretty quickly when I remember how he'd only taken me on that date to show that he'd been right about us not being compatible all along.

I match his icy, unkind tone. "You know what, my class is that way. My mistake. Just another thing you're right about, huh?"

I meet Steven's gaze. He has his shades on, but we are standing close enough that I can see the slight shift in his eyes at my words. Good.

Having gotten the last word, I saunter off, feeling smug. I carry that feeling with me for the rest of the week, even when I spend Thanksgiving alone.

Author's Note: I know in recent years, Friendsgiving has become a very popular piece of American culture that did not exist in the 1970s. But I just got a kick out of the idea of making Kitty invent Friendsgiving decades before it became a 'thing', especially with how much she loves putting together a spectacular Thanksgiving dinner.

Chapter 6: Comfort & Quiet will be posted Friday, March 1, 2024.