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you realise how real this thing with jackie is when forman tells you to choose jackie or kelso to protect and it’s too difficult to decide on the spot. if you had been given this choice last summer, a girl or one of your best friends, the choice would have been easy, but now you have jackie and everything's different.
you choose jackie and forman and donna throw a fit hard enough to make you feel like maybe they're right and maybe you should talk to kelso about all of this.
"michael didn't care about me," jackie says when you broach the subject, breathing heavy between kisses. "he left me behind for those california sluts so, steven, you don't owe him anything."
"he's my best friend," you argue even though all you want is to take jackie down to your room in the basement and to make out for the rest of the afternoon. it’s hot out, school’s starting again, and you don’t want to spend the last couple of days of freedom thinking about kelso and how he might feel about the girl you’re seeing.
instead of replying, jackie kisses you long and slow, her hand sliding down to the zip of your jeans, and you feel like she’s won this round anyway when you fall apart in her hand and forget about everything forman and donna said about this relationship being a fucked-up mess.
.
kelso finds out because you can’t keep your hands off of jackie for longer than half an hour and yeah, maybe it’s lame that you’re this dependent on a chick but none of the other girls you’ve been with have kissed like jackie, teasing and eager all at once, and so you think you’re excused from this stupid mistake that leads to kelso hating you.
“i really like her, man,” you tell him when he yells about codes and friendship and everything you promised when you were young.
“i can’t believe you would do this to me, hyde,” he shouts in front of forman and donna and fez, forgetting the way he would treat jackie like a joke and an object, blowing hot and cold from one week to the next. sure, you’ve never treated a girl right but you’ve never claimed to love any of them the way kelso did. it makes him look stupid, even if he is in the right.
but you stand up and you give him a free shot, standing with your legs apart, braced for a punch right in the face.
it ends when kelso can’t hit you, friendship still trumping everything else, and then the ending is official when donna makes you shake hands. “i’m sorry, kelso,” you say, and he shrugs and doesn’t say anything when jackie comes in and sits beside you on the couch, like everything’s okay now.
it might be.
.
“thank you for talking to michael, steven,” jackie whispers into the crook of your neck later that night. you’re stretched out in the back seat of your car, jackie straddling your hips, your head still buzzing from smoking a while ago, and you feel now that you made the right choice going with jackie, screw what kelso has to say about it.
“he’ll get used to it,” you tell her, because you’ve known this group for as long as you can remember and you know that kelso will find another girl soon and he’ll forget all about this and leave them alone. “and if he doesn’t i’ll kick his ass.”
her hand finds your bicep, squeezes. “i always thought michael had muscles but woah, you’re full of surprises, steven,” and that’s nothing but an ego boost so you kiss her with her hands clutching your arms and her hair caught in your hands. you’re going to need to go back home soon, a foot in your ass is not what you need for breaking curfew, but you pull jackie closer and you kiss her and kiss her until she’s wriggling in your lap and if you don’t leave now you’ll never leave.
“i’ll see you tomorrow, steven,” she calls from her front door.
“yeah, see you tomorrow, jackie,” and if it feels like a relationship, well, that’s okay.
.
“if she had to be with anyone who wasn’t me i’m glad it’s you, i guess,” kelso says as they’re lighting up in the circle. “but don’t mess her around.” he waves his finger around vaguely, the stuff always hitting him quicker than anyone else, and it looses some of its meaning but you get the blessing you were always kinda looking for. “under all the obsessive love she has for me she’s a nice girl -- she should be treated right.”
“oh yeah, like you ever did that,” forman laughs in one of his surprising defences of jackie. “poor girl doesn’t know how to pick ‘em.”
“i could say the same for donna,” you reply, kicking at forman’s foot, smirking when he yelps. “and thanks, man,” you tell kelso, letting him go just this once for the dig. “i appreciate it.”
“jackie is sure making her way around the group. soon it will be my turn with her,” fez leers then, grabbing a handful of candy from his stash below his chair. “and then she’ll see what a real man -- ow, hyde, stop punching me!”
.
“why does fez have two black eyes?” donna asks, flopping onto the couch beside forman.
“hyde totally kicked the shit out of him,” kelso crows, firmly in your corner. jackie twists in your lap to look at you, eyebrow raised in question.
donna laughs. “what’d he do this time?”
“he said mean things about hyde’s girlfriend,” forman says, hamming it up and fluttering his eyelashes so much you think you’ll go for him next. later, though, when jackie isn’t perched in your lap, leaning against your shoulder in a way that feels so easy you’ll be spouting fucking poetry about it next.
at forman’s comment she sits up straight, her mouth falling open as she stares at you. “you did, steven? oh, that’s so sweet.”
“it wasn’t sweet,” you say gruffly. “just said some things and i punched him a couple times. no big deal.”
“that’s very romantic of you, hyde,” donna butts in, laughing still. “you must be in love.”
jackie catches your eye then, silent for once, and when she moves her head jerkily in something like a nod your hand tightens at her waist and you think that fuck if you’re not there yet you’re definitely moving in that direction.
“it’s okay, steven,” she says so quietly in your ear that everyone else dismisses it for dirty talk and leaves them to it. “we’re doing okay.”
she still bugs the shit out of you some days and others you’ll say something out of line that sets her off but you knew this was a kinda fucked-up situation going into it and you’re still here for that.
jackie presses a kiss onto your cheek, giggling when you respond by nudging her until she’s standing and then leading her into your room. the basement clears quickly, forman pretending to retch and fez whining about friendships being torn apart, and jackie falls back onto your bed, pulling you down with her, like this is where you were always going to end up.