First Chapter of new story: Highway Run
Hyde gripped the steering wheel of the Camino so tight his knuckles were white with pain. He was still in shock that he was driving down the damn highway at 11:30 at night chasing after Jackie. As soon as he thought of chasing after, a spurt of rage ran through him. He was so mad at her. Why couldn’t she be patient one damn time in her life? Why couldn’t she wait for him to answer? Why couldn’t she stay the fuck put on her own damn deadline? He had gone to answer her stupid ultimatum, only to find her gone, only to find that she hadn’t bothered to wait for him, to find that at the core of it she didn't have faith in him anymore, and that made him sick. He knew what she was doing, she left before she could be left. He got it. It was a page out of his own damn playbook, but he was still furious. He was so damn mad. She made him insane. She always had, and he was fairly sure she always would, because he wasn’t driving down a dark highway for there not to be an always.
He pulled over, to the side of the road with blurry eyes. His blurry eyes weren’t the result of driving while tired. They were unfocused, because all he could see was Jackie. Jackie in her room shoving stuff into a suitcase. Jackie frantic with fear that he wasn’t coming. Jackie resolute in her impulsive choice. Impulsive…wasn’t that nature of who they were. Wasn’t that the foundation of their relationship? An impulse. A leap before you look. A gamble. A dare. A refusal to backdown. Hyde sighed. Every big moment with Jackie was a deliberate throw of the dice. He didn’t know what it was about Jackie that inspired him to act before thinking about it, but she drove him to a place where consequences weren’t even in the picture. It had burned them both, dancing in the dark without thinking about what might be waiting for them, but it also lent to some of their best moments. He couldn’t help but think about the first time they kissed after Kelso left. That moment was the definition of impulse, and he would never regret it. He let a small smile drift across his face, as he fell back to the day that changed it all.
Hyde was over it. He was over Forman. He couldn’t take him whining about Donna anymore. He was near hostile over the moping, and he was on the verge of strangling him every time he asked Hyde what he should do next. The cherry on top was bizarro Jackie. He expected her to be acting like Forman. He had braced himself for crying, shouting, and heartbroken attempts to get him to pay attention to her. What he wasn’t ready for was a Jackie who seemly didn’t give a damn. If anything, she was damn near ecstatic. It was freaking him out. It had been his unlucky task to break it to her that Kelso had ditched her. He had laid it out there without platitudes or useless comfort. He watched hurt roll across her face, tears well up in her big eyes, and for her body to start to shake. Then much to his surprise, she had closed her eyes, taken a deep breath, and whispered “okay.” She had turned around and walked home. She had gone AWOL for three days. He had been worried, but on day four she reappeared looking happier than she had in ages, with a box in her hands. She had dropped it on the table and asked sweetly,
“Can you give this crap back to Kelso?”
Hyde had been shocked by the choice of name. “Did you just say Kelso?” In the entirety of knowing Jackie, she had never called Kelso anything but Michael. Even when they were broken up, she still called him Michael.
Jackie had arched her eyebrow at him and repeated, “Can you do it or not?”
Still stunned, he muttered out sure.
Jackie had turned, walked away, and opened the basement door to leave. For some reason, he was worried if she left, she would never come back, and that scared the hell out of him for some reason. On pure impulse, he said,
“Hey Jackie, want to go to the hub later? I’ll kill Forman if I stay here.”
She had turned, smiled, and said “Sure.”
Hyde came back to the here and now. That one simple question, one that he hadn’t even thought about other than he didn’t want to see her go, and been the catalyst for the rest of the summer. From that day on, they had been inseparable. If Eric and Fez hadn’t had their heads up their asses, it would have been impossible to miss that they were always together. It hadn’t been all that terribly hard to hide their make out sessions. He smiled a bit wider, this time thinking about their first kiss.
“I can’t believe you got me to come out for fireworks. I hate the 4th of July,” he sighed heavily.
Jackie rolled her eyes, “If I waited for something you don’t hate, we would never leave the basement.”
He couldn’t help but laugh, “I guess that’s true.”
As the night settled down upon them, they fell silent as the watched the sky light up. As the heavens exploded into wisps of color, Hyde found himself watching Jackie. Her face lit up every time a new firework danced with the night sky. She was beautiful. There was no denying it, but this Jackie looked brand new to him. Her face was softer, sweeter, and happy. Her smile rivaled the fireworks with how bright they were. He found he was thrilled they had come, because watching Jackie enjoy the fireworks took his breath away. She was perfect like this. He wished he could bottle this version of her and carry it with him. Because it was impossible to not feel good faced with such innocent wonder. When the last boom faded, they headed back to the Camino. They had parked pretty far away, and Jackie was fading fast walking in her stupid wedge sandals. Before he could stop himself, he sighed,
“Come on Jackie, I will give you a piggyback.”
She gave him a tiny smile and whispered “Okay”
Jackie jumped up with little effort, and he found he could carry her easily. It was a long walk, and despite Jackie weighing nothing, when they finally got to the Camino, he was beat. She slid off of him. As she dropped down, she stumbled. Hyde turned around quickly to support her, and grabbed her close. Looking down at her and holding her so close, every bit of tired fled his body. All of a sudden a deep longing raced through his body, and he knew what that longing was asking. Without thinking, he dipped his lips to hers and softly kissed her. Within the space of a heartbeat, she kissed him back, and he knew in that moment he would never be the same. He kissed Jackie Burkhart.
Hyde snapped back as the memory was rushed away on a flood of why he was sitting on the side of the damn road. This time, instead of letting another memory rush to the surface, he yanked the Camino back onto the highway. He refused to let Jackie be a memory. He was going to kill her, but after that he just wanted to hold her, and hope to God it wasn’t too late.
