Fatherhood, Part Six {That ’70s Show}
Title: Fatherhood
Chapter Title: 1990
Words: 2, 472
Fandom: That ’70′s Show
Coupling: Jackie/Hyde
Rating: T/PG-13
Author’s Note: I’m really sorry about my lengthy delay in updates. Calculus made me its bitch for the last month and a half. But this chapter is much longer than previous chapters so I hope that makes up for the delay. Also, I’m marking this story complete. For now. There might be more updates later on, but I don’t want to get people’s hopes up.
“Jackie, turn that crap off,” he snaps at her before going back to counting the cash in hand. He’s perched on a stool behind the registrar trying to get through closing, and she’s interrupting his mental count playing the obnoxious sounds of ABBA over the store’s speakers.
“You are the dancing queen, young and sweet, only seventeen…”
“The baby likes it,” she retorts as she flicks through a collection of tapes. With a sigh, she walks (actually, more like waddles) over to the counter.
“Steven, aren’t you done yet?” She whines loudly causing him to lose count of the cash in his hand.
“No,” he tells her sharply. She crosses her arms over her expanded belly and glares at him. She doesn’t like his tone, doesn’t like how snappy he’s being with her.
“Just turn that crap off and sit over there,” he instructs, gesturing to the ratty blue couch sitting in the middle of the store. “I’ll be done in a minute.”
“Fine,” she snaps back. “But you have to take me to The Vineyard.”
“You said you wanted to go to The Hub.”
“That was twenty minutes ago,” she replies as though he’s not thinking clearly, as though it should be obvious that she would change her mind in twenty minutes.
“Yeah, no,” he replies. “You already used up your Vineyard quota for the year.”
“But Steven,” she whines while rubbing her back. She’s been having back pain since early this morning, and she wishes the baby would move out of her back and find somewhere else to kick. A month ago, when the baby was settled up high by her lungs, she could barely breathe. But this pain is quickly becoming worse than that experience. Read more…
Wall
I’ve hit a wall when it comes to Fatherhood. Started part six and part seven but nothing is coming out the way I want. So frustrating!
Fatherhood, Part Five {That ’70s Show}
Title: Fatherhood
Chapter Title: 1989/1990
Words: 1,603
Fandom: That ‘70’s Show
Coupling: Jackie/Hyde
Rating: T/PG-13
Author’s Note: For some reason, writing the group is really difficult for me so it took me a while to get this chapter out. Let me know your thoughts. They’re sustaining me through the horror that is calculus.
Five hours to go before the beginning of the next decade, and Steven Hyde did not expect to spend the last day of this decade working at Grooves. A decade ago, Hyde would have been just like his two employees – showing up at work with a hangover from celebrating the last day of 1989. But all of Jackie’s doctor appointments and the baby crap she just has to buy are getting expensive and Hyde’s hand is being forced. Hard to do inventory when your employees can’t even count to ten so he has to become less of a “cool” boss and create a rule of no drinking or smoking before noon.
The new rule is putting his employees on edge. It’s putting him on edge too.
No surprise that he walked into the basement with a glare fixed on his face. The slam of the basement door interrupts the debate Forman, Donna, Kelso, and Fez were having about whatever is on television. They all watch silently as Hyde walks across the room and glares at the man currently occupying his chair.
“Kelso,” Steven growls. “Move!”
“It’s a free country,” Kelso replies smugly and wiggles his body in a display of him marking his territory. His smug grin is wiped off his face, however, when Hyde’s fist connects with his shoulder.
“Ow!” Kelso cries out as he falls off the chair and onto the floor. “Hyde, what the hell, man?”
Without a word, he sits down on his chair and folds his arms across his chest. Kelso stalks off the freezer and grabs a popsicle with a huff.
“Alright, red!” He says excitedly, and Hyde just shakes his head in response. The slam of the door reverberates around the room and although nobody noticed the door opening in the first place, the slammer certainly has the group’s attention now.
He watches his wife from behind his sunglasses with amusement. She’s so angry that he’s surprised smoke isn’t coming out of her ears.
“Isn’t anybody going to ask me what’s wrong?” She demands of the group. They all look at one another to see who wants to actually ask this loaded question.
“She’s your best friend,” Eric whispers to his wife from his place on the couch in the parents’ basement next to her.
“She’s his wife,” Donna replies pointing to the guy occupying the chair next to her. Hyde doesn’t dare jump on that grenade.
“Oh, whatever,” Jackie snaps tired of waiting for someone to ask her. She stomps over to the edge of couch and glares at everyone in the room.
“Your baby,” Jackie huffs gesturing to her rounded belly, “won’t cooperate.” Read more…
Fatherhood, Part Four {That ’70s Show}
Title: Fatherhood
Chapter Title: 1989
Words: 1,211
Fandom: That ‘70’s Show
Coupling: Jackie/Hyde
Rating: T/PG-13
Author’s Note: Apologies for the delay. I was on the wrong end of a washed out road in Yellowstone National Park and had to take a four hour detour to get home. Thanks again for all the reviews and story alerts! I’ve been blown away by how much attention this story has been getting. Oh, and creative license on some of the legal mumbo jumbo, okay?
He knows the steps to this dance by heart.
After slipping out of his embrace, she will shut the door to the bathroom with a soft click. He’ll hear her rumbling through the cabinets to her stash in the back that she doesn’t think he knows about; hear water come out of the faucet as she tries to cover what she’s doing. The toilet will flush and then he’ll count to one hundred and twenty before he’ll hear the gasp of air, the sound of her body being racked with sobs. And then he’ll hear the slide of the shower curtain and her turning on the shower.
He will wait awhile longer before getting out of bed and shuffling to the bathroom. He’ll palm himself through his gray sweatpants while trying to open the bathroom door. It will be locked.
It is always locked during these mornings.
He’ll pick the lock with the bobby pin he keeps stashed above the door frame, open the door, and step into the bathroom. He will pull down his sweatpants and in one fluid motion will step out of them, kick them over to join her discarded pajamas. He will pull back the shower curtain and watch her try to turn into the stream so he will think the tears running down her face are just water droplets from the showerhead.
But he will know better.
There will be the tale tell shake of her shoulders as she tries to control herself. There will be his hands on her waist pulling her into him. There will be her head tucked under his chin. There will be the two of them standing there trying to wash away all of their disappointment.
It’s a dance they’ve been doing for the past three years. A dance they don’t talk about.
They don’t talk about how he wanted to punch the realtor for saying that the house’s spare bedroom could be a nursery. They don’t talk about the baby clothes she stashes in the closet of the spare bedroom. They don’t talk about the crack in her voice and the tears in her eyes when she overheard a sixteen-year-old girl buying music at Grooves bitch to her friends about her terrible pregnancy-induced heartburn.
They don’t talk about it with Donna or Eric or anybody else in their gang when they shoot them looks of pity as nine-year-old Betsy Kelso demands Jackie teach her how to put on makeup or two-year-old Luke Forman tries to climb into Hyde’s lap. They sure as hell don’t talk about the pamphlets Kitty Forman slips into Jackie’s purse or Hyde’s coat pocket every time they stop by her house. And they definitely do not talk about it during dinner at the Formans’ even when Kitty brings it up like she did two months ago. Read more…
Fatherhood, Part Three {That ’70s Show}
Title: Fatherhood
Chapter Title: 1986
Words: 1,696
Fandom: That ‘70’s Show
Coupling: Jackie/Hyde
Rating: T/PG-13
Author’s Note: Thanks again for the reviews! I was asked in a review if there is another story in this fandom with the same name. I never once looked and apparently there is. This happens a lot in the world of FanFiction (and even in the publishing world), and I’m honestly at a lost at what else to call this little fic.
Seven-year-old Betsy Kelso’s jaw drops in surprise as her opponent’s brightly colored, plastic gingerbread man game piece slides across the second bridge on the board game putting her closer to the end. Her aunt squeals in delight while her uncle shakes his head.
“But,” the little girl sputters.
“Betsy, let me tell you a little secret,” her uncle replies. “Your Aunt Jackie cheats.”
“I do not!” Jackie retorts from her spot on the couch.
“You see, Bets,” Hyde continues. “That’s the reason why none of us play board games with Aunt Jackie.”
“But you play other games with her, right, Uncle Hyde?” Betsy asks.
“Huh?” Hyde asks.
“Daddy says you and Aunt Jackie like to play games together in there,” she replies gesturing to the entrance of his old room. “He says I can’t play with you ‘cause your games are just for you and Aunt Jackie.”
A blush colors Jackie’s cheeks, and Hyde smirks before taking another swig of beer.
“Uncle Hyde, what games are you playin’?” Read more…
