Chapter Text
March 1976.
Seven teenagers are sitting in the Formans’ basement. Hyde’s in his usual chair, Jackie next to him on a footstool, Buddy sitting on the couch armrest next to Fez, Eric and Donna trying to touch and not touch at the same time next to him on the couch and Kelso was on the lawn chair. Hyde’s mind is a mess. It has been six months since the two rich kids joined the group of misfits. He thinks that Buddy was actually a pretty cool guy. He’s fun to talk to and he seems like a really good guy. He does have a problem with the other one. Jacqueline Burkhart is not supposed to be here. She is the school princess. The rich popular cheerleader should not be hanging out with his friends and she should definitely NOT be having fun talking with Fez of all people.
He has no idea what they are talking about. Apparently Fez, Jackie and Buddy spoke French, and they use this “secret code” to talk about the stuff they assume the others aren’t interested in. And he shouldn’t care about talks of haircare and Vogue articles, and he honestly doesn’t, but he found himself entrapped by Jackie Burkhart. The girl who claimed to read only romance novels and Nancy Drew actually quoted Paradise Lost one time. Granted she did it when discussing the latest bit of celebrity gossip but it was a shock. She shouldn’t be smart, she had no busyness being caring, no one had a right to look that good in a pink fuzzy sweater, and he is not imagining picking her up, placing her on the deep freeze and having his wicked way with her.
She needs to be more self absorbed. Now, she makes plenty of annoying spoiled girl comments, but she is also the reason the jocks at school have stopped going after Fez.
Apparently Fez met her and Buddy when he was stuck in a locker, and she helped him out. The next day at lunch the jockstraps who put him in the locker actually approached him and apologized. They all thought it was some elaborate prank, until Jackie talked to Fez after school and told him not to worry about the bullying anymore. Buddy and her started sitting with them at lunch the next day. He really needs her out of his head.
She was always with Buddy and a girl like her would never go for a burnout. And a guy like him shouldn’t want to date. Period. It’s not his style. He’d fool around with girls but he never got serious. The closest he came to that was Crissy, and even that lasted a few days. He will keep saying he doesn’t want her until he believes it. He is also trying really hard not to think about their chess lessons.
Jackie is sitting with her friends and having fun. She really likes the basement. For a long time the only person she could actually talk to was buddy, and he’s great, but he isn’t exactly the most devoted reader of gossip columns. He prefers “serious” journalism and she’s OK with that. But having Fez around to talk beauty regiments and gossip with is a welcome change. Despite all the time they spend together she still hasn’t really figured the whole Buddy/Fez thing out. She thinks she’ll see a bit of a spark there when they banter a bit, but then Fez will start talking about finding a girl to lose his virginity with.
The even greater surprise is Steven Hyde. The burnout often captures her thoughts. She isn’t really sure why. It’s just that he seemed to genuinely care about the people in the basement, despite not wanting to show it in any way. He was the first person to reach out to Fez and offer him protection. Granted his methods of intimidation by implied violence weren’t as effective as her explicit threats of schoolwide embarrassment but he still did what he could. He was also extremely smart. He doesn’t really show it outright, but the guy never studies, never does homework, and yet he was never held back a grade. It actually brings her mood down a bit when she thinks that he isn’t doing as well as she thinks he should be, as well as she knows he can.
It’s really difficult not to let her mind drift to the time they spend alone. The first few times it happened on accident. The rest of the gang was doing their own thing. Donna and Eric probably pining somewhere, Fez stuffing himself full of candy, Buddy doing something for the paper, and Kelso being Kelso.
The first time they just sat in the basement watching some rerun, when she felt something poke her butt. She pulled out a chess piece, a pawn.
“Hyde why are there toys in the couch?”
“Oh wow you found it! Thanks man!”
“How did it end up here?”
“I was playing with Fez, but when he realized he would lose he flipped the board. He ran like hell when we couldn’t find the last piece.”
“Would you teach me?”
“You wanna play chess?”
“Sure!”
“OK. Come on young grasshopper.”
“Grasshopper?”
“You wanna learn or not?”
“Yes!” She clapped excitedly
And they started playing. And it kinda became their thing. When the others were out they would play chess. Two weeks into it she actually borrowed a few chess books at the library. She felt like a spy with her scarf over her head and her big shades, but she had a reputation to keep. Pretty soon they started to play even with the others around. After three months of studying she played and beat Fez for the first and last time.
Nowadays Hyde still beats her nine times out of ten but she does beat him sometimes, and while he claims that he’s letting her win, she is pretty sure that the mistakes he makes aren’t on purpose.
She needs to get Steven Hyde out of her head. So she turns back to Fez and gets back to their secret conversation.
Later Kelso and Fez went cruising for chicks, Buddy went home to finish some homework, and Donna and Eric went outside to play some hoops, Which means chess.
Hyde is sitting in his chair and watching her with his head tilted to the board, eyes hidden behind his sunglasses.
“You know Steven if this was a tournament game you’d be out of time by now.”
She started calling him that after she beat Fez. She just jumped up, hugged him and screamed “Oh my God! Steven look! I did it! Checkmate!” Fez naturally flipped the board, though Hyde did appreciate Jackie bending over in front of the couch to reach for a pawn.
“Relax grasshopper. We’ve got time.”
“I’m going to beat you and you know it. Just topple your king.”
“Whatever” he turns to zen and topples his king.
“Yay!” she claps and bounces excitedly, then stops.
“How do you do that?” She asks, her head cocked slightly to the right.
“What?”
“How do you manage to stay cool like that? If I lost like that and you gloated I would have been upset.”
“You just need to be zen grasshopper.”
“Steven you can’t just make up words.”
“No, it means cool, aloof, zen.”
“Will you teach me?”
“I don’t know…”
“Oh come on, you already taught me chess!”
He still seems hesitant. She pouts.
Jackie pouts, and Hyde is done for.
“Alright grasshopper, I’ll teach you, but you must not question anything I say. Now your first lesson is to polish this boot.”
“Are you sure?” She seems unconvinced.
“Did you say something?”
She starts on the boot, though she still casts a doubtful glance at him every once in a while.
Half an hour later, she’s on the deep freeze, and he is standing in front of her.
“What-ever”
“No Jacks, there’s no pause there, it’s just whatever”
She feels a bit giddy about the new nickname, though she tries to hide it.
“I don’t get it”
“OK.” They switch positions, and wow, he can see a bit down her shirt. Before she notices him perving he continues: “OK try to be mean to me”
She looks dumbfounded for a second, but concedes: “Steven you’re stupid.”
“Whatever.”
“Oh my God! That’s so cool! I’m so sorry I doubted you Steven.’
“Whatever.”
“OK, can I try now?”
“Sure, go ahead.”
“Whatever.” She draws it out a bit.
“That was great!” and he was staring at her eyes.
“I just noticed, your eyes are slightly different colors.”
“Oh…” She seems to shrink in on herself.
“No they look nice.”
She smiled radiantly: “Thank you, Steven!”
Her smile looks nice too.
“OK. Now you also need to know how to be ambiguous.”
“OK. I can do that.” She seems a bit hesitant.
“Great say it with me ambiguous.” He says, drawing out the syllables of the last word.
“Ambiguous.” they spoke together, in the same drawn out fashion.
“Ask me to do something.”
“Steven would you like to grab something to eat together sometime.” She asks quickly.
“That’s cool.”
She seems to deflate for a bit, then perks up almost instantly.
“Oh my God! I totally didn’t know if you meant yes or no!” She is practically bouncing.
She’s cute.
His thoughts are interrupted by Donna and Forman coming into the basement.
“Hey Jackie, what are you doing tomorrow?”
“Whatever.”
Donna seems a bit put off by the answer.
“Well would you like to go see this French movie with me in Kenosha this Saturday? This dillhole doesn’t want to go.”
“That’s cool.” Jackie seems completely zen. When she notices Donna’s confusion she almost burst into a blaze of excitement.
“Steven I did it! Thank you so much!” She kissed his cheek.
“I’d love to go Donna. We can ask Buddy as well, if you want. Let’s go talk details.”
They were in the driveway when the kiss caught up to Jackie. “Oh my God! I just kissed him on the cheek!”
Donna has a gentle smile on her face as she hugs the younger girl.
At the same time Hyde is frozen in the basement.
“Hyde man you there?”
“Huh? Yeah man what’s up?”
“What’s up with you and the she-devil? First chess and now whatever that was.”
Hyde rolls his eyes. “Calm down Erica. She’s a cool chick.”
“Oh dear God you like her!” Eric seemed honestly disturbed.
“Whatever man.”