Disclaimer: That '70s Show copyright The Carsey-Werner Company, LLC and Twentieth Century Fox Home Entertainment, LLC.

ONE DIFFERENCE:
HYDE CATCHES JACKIE

Part IV: The Worst Day of Her Life

Four days had passed since hell was unleashed. Everywhere was full of pain—the Formans' basement, the Pinciottis' house, Forman's face. Hyde tried to lay low, but he couldn't escape the flames. They were inside of him, licking at his guts and heating his mind with turmoil. He hadn't felt this shaky since his mom ran off with that trucker.

Donna was missing. Four days ago, Casey Kelso had dumped her. Not in private but in front of Donna's whole world. Her dad, Forman, and Forman's parents watched as Casey spat her out like chewing tobacco. Her friends, including Hyde, heard all of it from the Formans' kitchen. Afterward, she became a freakin' runaway, and now no one knew where she was.

The cops started investigating only yesterday, questioning all of her friends and family. Casey Kelso had left town again, but his timing sucked. Because of it, the cops' going theory was that he and Donna had put on a show for the folks and run off together. Possibly to elope, but Hyde didn't buy it. This was no conspiracy; the cops were full of paranoid bullshit.

The other Kelso—the one Hyde had been friends with for over ten years—had nothing useful to contribute. He'd spent the last few days crying in the basement, about his black eye, about Jackie dumping him. No one had the energy to kick him out, but he'd left on his own today, to Kenosha for his first modeling-tour gig.

But Kelso wasn't Hyde's main concern. Donna held that spot, followed closely by Jackie. He hadn't seen or heard from Jackie in days. Kelso's incomprehensible sniveling about their breakup had given Hyde only hints.

Details weren't necessary, though, to know the breakup wouldn't stick. Jackie would be miserable without Kelso this summer. He'd sleep with a bunch of model-groupies, but she wouldn't care. They'd be back together by the beginning of the school year.

Hyde mentally frogged himself. He really needed to get over her … or do her. Either one would've worked for him. He was reading his copy of Rolling Stone in the basement—no, the word "reading" wasn't accurate. More like staring. Anxiety filled the empty spaces of his chest, and every heartbeat amplified the feeling.

Sitting through dinner tonight had been a bitch. Mrs. Forman made far too much food, crowding the kitchen table with three separate entrées. Red insisted Hyde and Forman eat as much as they could, and Forman puked up a mix of chicken, steak, and veal afterward. Cooking was Mrs. Forman's coping mechanism, and yelling at people was Red's. Puking seemed to be Forman's.

Getting high was Hyde's.

But he refused to spark up with Donna missing. If she needed him, he had to be clear-headed—though anxiety trapped his thoughts like a car stuck in traffic. Maybe avoiding the circle hadn't been the best choice.

He stood up from his chair, but footsteps beat frantically on the basement's wooden stairs. "Midge," Forman said from above. "Midge just called Bob, and Bob just came over." Forman hit the basement's cement floor, crossed over to Hyde's chair, and grasped Hyde's shoulders. "Donna's safe, man. She's—she's in California."

Hyde let out a long breath. "Shit."

"Yeah, she took a bus to Milwaukee but got off in Utah." Forman let Hyde go and hopped onto the couch with an impressive leap. Hyde joined him there, using the old fashion method of walking. "She took a bus to Arizona," Forman continued as they both sat down, "to see the freakin' Grand Canyon before taking a bus to California. Can you believe that?"

Hyde laughed, expelling the last four days of tension from his body. "It's Donna, man. Sounds right up her alley." Tears gathered in his eyes, and he took off his shades to wipe them away. His laughter was a good cover. It hid the tears he was also crying in relief. Donna was family, man. Losing her would've blackened a chunk of his heart, but the flames of hell had been quenched.

"Man, it's a good thing Mom put these tissues down here for Kelso, huh?" Forman grabbed the box of Kleenex off the wooden spool table. He was weeping openly but not vocally. His face looked like it had its own personal rain cloud, and his nose honked into a tissue.

Hyde rubbed his eyes against his shoulder just as the basement door opened. Jackie burst inside and shouted, "Oh, my God—Eric! I'm glad you're here. I just—"

Forman put up his hand. "Away with you, woman. I have no interest in speaking about your blubbery ex-boyfriend."

"Michael is not fat, and that's not why I'm here. I—"

"I meant 'blubbery' as in Kelso is a cry-baby. He got snot on my shirt."

"Forman, would you shut it already?" Hyde slipped his shades back on but glowered through their dark lenses. Forman could be an insensitive ass sometimes, especially where Jackie was concerned. A frogging was in order, but it could wait. "Jackie," Hyde said, and his expression softened, "Donna's cool, man. She's in Cali with Midge."

"I know." Jackie sat down on the lawn chair, Fez's usual spot. "I just got off the phone with her."

Forman eyes widened. "Donna?"

"Yeah, you know, the flannel-wrapped lumberjack you're in love with?" She pulled a folded-up piece of paper from her jeans pocket. "Anyway, she said she's sorry, and she wanted me to give you this. … Though I don't know why I should after how you just treated me." She shoved the paper back into her pocket.

Forman clasped his hands together in beseechment. "Jackie, I am so, so sorry. Please give me the paper?"

Jackie glanced at Hyde. "Should I believe him?"

Hyde shook his head. "I wouldn't."

"Hyde!" Forman punched him in the arm, but it barely stung.

"You were a dick to her, Forman."

"Fine." Forman sighed. "Jackie, if you give me that paper, you can hang out in the basement all summer, and I won't kick you out."

"You call that a bribe?" She brushed her brown hair off her shoulder. "Permission to hang out in your stinky basement?"

"What do you want?" Forman said.

"A key to your stinky basement."

Forman looked at Hyde, but Hyde shrugged. Their last vote on giving Jackie a key had resulted in a hell no—the same result as all their votes on the subject. But with Kelso out of the picture this summer, Jackie having a key could make things interesting.

"You shrugged," Forman said, "which I'm taking as a blessing." He returned his attention to Jackie, "Okay, you give me that paper, and I'll get you a copy of the basement key."

"You give me a copy of the basement key," she said, "and I'll give you the paper."

"Forman," Hyde said, "you know that paper could be blank, right? Or full of burns."

"I'm willing to take that chance." Forman jumped to his feet. "Back in a minute."

He ran upstairs, presumably to give Jackie his own copy of the key. Jackie, meanwhile, got off the lawn chair and moved to the couch. She sat in Forman's vacated spot, close to Hyde. The body heat emanating off her legs warmed his knees.

"So..." his hand itched to slide over her thigh and stay there, "what's on the paper?"

"Donna's phone number in California and address."

"You should take that notepad off the shelf there," he nodded toward the alcove under the stairs, "and scribble some bullshit on it. Just to mess with him."

"Ordinarily, I would take that advice..." she said, "because Eric's been a total jerk to me and a dumbass. But someone in this town should have true love, even if it's not me." She glanced up the stairs. "Donna and Eric have a chance to make it work. Who am I to stand in their way?"

"Huh." Her attitude surprised him but not unhappily. Ever since he'd caught her kissing her boss, she'd begun to change. She'd become less annoying, less pushy, less … selfish. He cocked an eyebrow at his own thoughts. Had she listened to him in the El Camino that day? Maybe she was more open to his perspective than he'd believed.

"What?" she said.

"What what?"

"Your eyebrow," she pointed above his eye, "it's doing that thing."

"Oh, uh..." he relaxed his face, "just rememberin' something Fez said about a dead fish. You got any plans for the summer?"

"Not really." Her hands absently patted a rhythm on her legs. "Daddy won't give me money again until he sees that Michael and I are broken up for good. So I have to keep working at the stupid Cheese Palace. How about you?"

"Plans are to sleep more." Especially now that he knew Donna was safe.

"How ambitious," Jackie said dryly.

He leaned back on the couch, "What can I say?" and a smirk crept over his lips. "I'm a dreamer."

"Sleep more ... dreamer?" She sounded irritated, but a giggle invaded her voice. "Steven."

He said nothing, but his skin prickled at the way she said his name. It was electricity on her tongue, but instead of jangling his nerves, she'd amped them up.

A few moments later, Forman returned. He pushed his copy of the basement key into Jackie's palm. "Paper, please," he said. She gave it to him, and he unfolded it. "Donna's phone number and address? All right!"

"Yeah," Hyde said, "Red'll be real happy with you racking up a long-distance phone bill."

"I've got money saved up. I'll pay for it." Forman rushed back toward the stairs. "I have a phone call to make!"

He disappeared again, and Jackie clutched the basement key. Her thumb rubbed over the end of it, and she gazed at Hyde in a way she hadn't in a long time. Her attention made him uncomfortable but not like it used to. This discomfort was entirely devoid of revulsion. It made him hungry to touch her, and he picked up his Rolling Stone Magazine from the spool table.

"Steven..."

"Yeah?"

"Thank you for not judging me about all my Michael stuff. Or if you were judging me, thank you for not saying it out loud."

"No problem." He opened his Rolling Stone and held it in front of his face. He pretended to read it."Steven?" she said again.

"What?"

"Do you remember what you said when you drove me home? The night I kissed Todd?"

He kept his focus on the magazine. "Yup."

"How much of it."

"All of it."

Her palm glided over his knee. "I want to take you up on your offer."

She meant she wanted to have sex. With him. He flipped the page of the magazine. "No, you don't."

"I want to get over him, Steven."

Jackie's hand was slipping up his thigh, and his jeans grew tight. Not good. He put the magazine down over his crotch, and her hand stopped its tempting crawl up his leg.

"Only way to get over him," he said, "is to get over him."

"That doesn't make any sense."

He turned toward her purposefully, and she withdrew her touch. "You already tried puttin' your left foot in a pool of water while keeping your right foot in the mud," he said. "You gotta get both your feet on the dry ground first. Then you can think about jumping in another puddle"

"I see." She became silent. So silent, in fact, that if he weren't looking at her, he would think she'd evaporated. But she was sitting before him, probably tangled up in a mess of thoughts. "If I insisted," she said quietly, "would you...?"

He stuck a thumb beneath the magazine and fiddled with the pages. "If you insisted."

"It wouldn't be disgusting for you?"

"Would it be disgusting for you?"

Her gaze intensified on his face. "No."

More silence followed, but now he was tangled up in his own thoughts. "That's not why he cheated on you," he said after a while. "I told you before, you're totally hot."

"Minus my personality."

His breath caught. Shit. She was truly more perceptive than he gave her credit for. "Your personality ain't that bad."

Her expression brightened. "Really?"

"Yup. And without Kelso around, it'll probably get tolerable. Maybe even pleasant."

"Aww … thank you, Steven!" She smiled warmly, and her cheerfulness lit up the basement. "In lieu of us sleeping together—"

"'In lieu'?"

"Shush," she said, sounding and looking damn cute. Her hair wasn't curled to perfection; static electricity had caused flyaways. Her blouse and jeans showed off her body while leaving enough to the imagination. But her face struck him most of all. Her makeup didn't distract from the spark in her eye. "In lieu of us sleeping together," she repeated, "maybe I could hang out here with you sometimes … while my personality becomes more pleasant."

He kept himself from chuckling. She really was freakin' cute. He rolled up the Rolling Stone and hit it against his palm. "That's cool."

"I don't know how you mean that, but I'll take it." She got off the couch and turned on the television. "Happy Days or Three's Company?"

"Which do you think?"

She turned the station to Three's Company, and he nodded approvingly. She was coming along nicely already.

The first weeks of summer went by slowly but not miserably. With Donna and Michael gone, Fez had become Jackie's best girlfriend. They often went to the pool together, and she helped Fez hit on desperate girls with low self-esteem. In return, Fez complimented Jackie frequently. He also brought her sodas with tiny umbrellas in them. But her least miserable time was spent in the basement, alone with Steven.

She hung out with him there almost every day, and as the weeks wore on, he'd let his beard grow out. It was scruffy and sexy at the same time, and sometimes she imagined scratching her fingertips through it. He'd also migrated from his chair to the couch. Neither of them mentioned their proximity to each other. But sometimes his arm would snake across the couch's top edge, and his fingertips came close to touching her shoulder.

They usually watched a lot of television—game shows like Let's Make a Deal and The Price Is Right or heavier fare like Donahue. But no matter what was on, it led to interesting discussions or laughter. Her thoughts rarely went to Michael , she thought increasingly about Steven, especially how he didn't seem to be dating anyone.

During school, she was used to seeing him with different girls every week. Sometimes within the same week. He'd feel them up by the lockers or in the stairwells, but so far this summer, he'd been with Jackie. Just Jackie. And she liked it that way.

The Price Is Right was playing on the television now. She and Steven were sitting on the couch, only inches apart. Normally, The Price Is Right passed by quickly, but they'd both grown sick of its contestant selections. Contestants Row always seemed full of senior citizens.

"What does a ninety-year-old need with a Camaro?" Steven said. "I need a Camaro. Hell, I'd take the hot tub."

"She can't even reach the wheel!" Jackie waved scornfully at the television. "If I were on this show, I'd climb on that thing and make it land on the dollar." Her outburst seemed perfectly reasonable to her, but it elicited a weird response from Steven. He glanced at her sideways. "What?" she said.

"I woulda climbed all over you if you'd insisted."

She swatted at his chest, "Shut up," but she was also laughing. She liked that they could joke about these things now. They'd formed an easy rapport. His sense of humor was sarcastic and sometimes silly—and could cut a person to shreds if he was angry. But mostly, he seemed comfortable with her, and she'd found a comfort in him … one she hadn't known was possible.

Put simply, being with him wasn't work. In comparison, she realized just how much work being with Michael had become. Or, perhaps, it always had been. Steven questioned her a lot, but his questions made her think and re-evaluate her perspective. And she questioned him right back, challenging him, but it didn't feel like work. It felt right.

Then again, they had been watching a lot of Donahue this summer.

"Holy shit," Steven said and pulled off his sunglasses.. He leaned forward on the couch, toward the television. "The old broad did it. She spun another freakin' dollar."

Jackie slapped the couch cushions. "The gray-haired bitch! That ten-thousand dollars should be mine."

He glared at her, allowing her a rare look at his naked eyes. They were a beautiful winter-sky blue, but more appealing was the emotion they held. He was well-practiced at being aloof, but his heart remained in his eyes. Even so, she was untrained at interpreting it.

"What?" she said. "Why are you staring at me?"

"The dough should be yours?" he said. "How does that figure? You're not even on the show."

"I'm beautiful and young, and she's old and wrinkled."

He laughed, but it was an annoyed, warning laugh. "Okay, I think we better quit it with the ageism."

"You can do what you want." She crossed her arms over her chest. "I want my money."

"Then you'll have to go to California like Donna and get on the show."

"I think it's shot in New York."

"Then we got a little road trip to go on."

"Right," she said. "You and me trapped in your grimy El Camino for days. I don't think so."

"Who said you were comin' along?"

"Uh … hello?" She was staring at him now. "That's the whole point, Steven. Going to New York so I can get on The Price Is Right. To get what's rightfully mine? Besides, you said we have a road trip to go on, not just you."

"Damn it." He rubbed the back of his neck and looked away. "Been watching too much TV. It's rotting my brain."

"What else is there to do?" she said. "There's the pool and there's television. And there's work."

"There's also the circle," he said, "but the last time we watched this show high, I couldn't stop seein' price tags on everything in the basement."

She giggled and covered her mouth. "That's because I kept pricing things."

"Oh, yeah." He grinned then returned his gaze to the television, but she couldn't stop staring at him. His black T-shirt showed off the contours of his chest, and his beard made him appear so rugged and manly.

She forced her attention back to The Price Is Right. Thinking about his rugged manliness wouldn't ease her frustration,but her position on the couch had become uncomfortable. She needed to stretch, to take up more room. Her right hand drifted to the small area of couch between her butt and Steven's—and the back of her knuckles crashed into the back of his.

"Ow," she and Steven both said. The backs of their fingers were touching, and she didn't know who made the first move, but their fingers laced together.

They sat there like that, silently, through the Showcase Showdown. The ninety-year-old woman won her prize package, which included another car and a vacation to Tahiti.

Jackie tightened her grip on Steven's hand. "Ugh. This is the worst day of my life," she said, and he gave her a look so piercing that hot chills rippled in her stomach.

Oh, God, she wanted him. Not to console her about Michael or as a consolation prize. Just for him ... because he was the prize. She should have realized it earlier, during their Veteran's Day date and all the days after. But she understood it now, and—regardless of the consequences—she had to let him know.

Jackie had finally given Hyde the signal he'd been waiting for, even if she didn't know it. Her claim of this being the worst day of her life meant she'd either gone bat-crap insane … or had truly gotten over Kelso. Because if an old lady winning a game show had become equal to Kelso's cheating, hypocrisy, and absence in Jackie's life, then Kelso couldn't be that important to her anymore.

Hyde kept his breathing steady, but his pulse was juiced. He could safely inject himself with a full dose of Jackie-freakin'-Burkhart now—and it was a damn relief. He'd sure as hell failed at flushing her out.

Their fingers were still hooked together, but their hands withdrew from each other mutually. He couldn't stop gazing into her eyes, and her eyebrows rose in question. He licked his lips, and hers pursed slightly. Then their mouths joined together in a kiss he'd been waiting almost a year for.

They didn't hesitate to go deep. Their tongues made full contact, as if continuing where their Veteran's Day date left off. Her lips were hot and moist, and they moved powerfully against his, but his brain could take only so much. It had to assess what they were doing. He pulled away from her just as she pulled from him. Maybe she needed time to assess, too.

He faced forward on the couch, but his senses didn't register the television. They were jammed up with Jackie. He wanted her, man. Not just her body but her. She was capable of so damn much without Kelso dragging her down, and Hyde could no longer deny she stimulated every part of him. His mind, his sense of humor, even that organ he thought didn't exist … his heart.

She stimulated his body, too. Holy hell, did she get him worked up, just by sitting near him. He turned back toward her, hoping he wouldn't get the brush off. But she was facing him, too, with her lips slightly parted, inviting him back in.

He cupped the back of her head, and she grasped his wrist as their mouths met again. Her fingertips slipped toward his elbow, and their breaths mingled as they kissed more deeply, intimately, and fevered than they ever had before.

He had no plans on stopping, and he didn't just mean their first long make-out. He'd boarded the Jackie Express, and wherever they were headed—fast or slow, underground or up the side of a mountain—he'd ride this train until it ran off the rails.