Work Text:
Jackie left for Chicago.
She had to. She couldn’t stay in Point Place any longer with people who didn’t really seem to care about her, often letting her be the butt of several jokes. Chicago wasn’t the glitz and glam she had envisioned for herself, pretty castles and diamond rings often appearing in her fantasies, but no one would know who she was and what she was running from, and that was enough for her.
She left in the early hours of the day, packing three suitcases and buying a bus ticket. It was compromising on what she was brought up to believe, but if she was going to go she was going to do this right. Jackie Burkhart was most things, sure, but not a quitter.
The bus ride was long and the seats hurt her back, cramped in the tiny shuttle like tinned fish. Ew. Checking to see if she smelled like fish too (oh god, another low for Jackie Burkhart– she could not take another hit to her ego), she climbed as gracefully as she could off the bus, tipping the driver (not thinking about where she picked up that habit, thank you) and stretching her arms. Chicago was cold and foggy, bleak grey skies bleeding into concrete buildings, but better than the alternative.
The job she was offered gave her enough money to rent out a studio apartment. Not nearly enough space as she was used to, but comfortable and something she didn’t have to share. She had also enrolled in some classes at the nearby college, able to work part time while completing a degree in journalism. That, at least, would set her up for a promotion as soon as she graduated. Her landlord was a balding man with sweat stains on his cheap polyester shirt, wiping his forehead furiously as he walked her through the apartment. Not a great impression on what the people in Chicago are like, but she schooled her face into a pageant winning smile and nodded along.
Jackie’s job was more of an office clerk type of role, highlighting inconsistencies and fact checking information before the articles got sent to head office. She was paired with a woman prematurely going grey, thin lines around her lips from frowning so often. Heather, she learned, was a rather straightforward woman, no frills or compliments to pad out her sentences. That was okay, Jackie decided. She had a special talent for winning over people.
She took a minor in PR, hoping to god that if the journalism job didn’t work out that she could at least manage someone, maybe even a Hollywood star.
‘Don’t get your hopes up, doll, Hollywood just feeds into the capitalist dream’ a voice in her head pipes up, sounding too familiar for her liking. She neatly packs up that train of thought and files it under something that she can address later, when things made sense.
("You had to leave him”, she tells herself late at night, speaking into an empty void in the shape of a person. “He wasn’t the man you fell in love with anymore.”)
For all her complaining about hard work, Jackie did know that if she wasn’t able to be successful here, she would have to return to Point Place, tail between her legs as she tried yet again to fit herself into a group that didn’t make space for her. So she threw herself into her work, started to drink coffee to stave off sleep, completing extra credit work at college and making new friends. She liked the people in Chicago, even if they didn’t dress nicely. They were honest about how they felt about her, and she liked that. Better than her friend groups before.
She tried to date, she really did. A clean, honest guy this time. But she always felt her eyes moving to the scruffier ones, the ones that looked like they would hate her in and out of the relationship. So eventually for her own sake she stopped, focused on her friends and her work.
(She sometimes awoke with tears running down her face, mourning for a relationship that never was but could have been, something that lodged itself deep in her ribcage all those summers ago and refused to move on.)
Time seemed to fly by as Jackie settled into Chicago. The guilt she felt was slowly slipping away from her, lightly holding her hand instead of yanking her backwards towards her past. She was promoted (a glowing recommendation from Heather, she heard), now a junior weather girl, on air at the late night news. Better than nothing, she supposed. A new girl was tasked with filling her old job, a girl named Samantha from Vegas. She held that same frightened look in her eyes that Jackie did a year ago whenever someone asked about her past, so Jackie made a new friend.
Sam needed a new place, her old one being found by people from her past, banging on her doors at all hours of the night. It was only by pure coincidence that Jackie was also looking to upgrade but would need a roommate that she extended the offer to Sam. Not because she was going soft. Never.
She sometimes saw people from her past wandering the streets, Michael and Brooke with their baby, Donna on vacation and Eric and Fez tagging along. She would often turn and head in the other direction, not yet willing to confront what she left behind.
(She almost cried when she saw him again, the face of the boy she fell in love with mixed with the mind of a man who wouldn’t break his stupid ‘zen’ for her. A new Grooves was opening, a fresh start for him that could only break Jackie’s heart again. )
Letters addressed to Jackie Beulah Burkhart were appearing at the studio, insomniacs paying their respects to her upbeat energy. She took them home and hid them well, knowing exactly what they would say without having to open them.
She wasn’t stupid, she knew that her being on TV meant that it was only a short amount of time before the others knew where she went and what she got up to, especially when the senior weather girl in the prime time slot got pregnant and went on maternity leave, promoting Jackie temporarily to her place. Still, she found herself hoping that the peace would last a week longer, finding new excuses as to why now was not the ideal time.
It wasn’t surprising that he found her, waiting outside the studio with those stupid sunglasses on, the most stubborn boy in the world. It was surprising when he held out his hand for her and suggested they go on a walk, voice the same heavy sound of home. It wasn’t peaceful, air buzzing with an energy that either meant happily ever after or complete destruction of Jackie Burkhart. It was a while before either of them said anything, standing awkwardly side by side in bodies that didn’t fit together anymore, like magnets repelling instead of attracting.
“Can I ask why you left without saying goodbye?”
Another surprise. Steven initiated the conversation, asking a question while taking off his sunglasses, eyes still the same shade of blue that she dreamed of.
“You didn't trust me enough. Not enough to believe me about Michael, and not enough to let go of your zen. And, to some extent, I didn’t trust you. I didn’t trust that you’d stick around for the long run, that you wouldn’t get bored and leave me alone again. I thought marriage would fix that, but look at how my pushing turned out.”
He was silent, no doubt thinking about how hot Jackie was now that she was super introspective and insightful. Pretty and smart, the whole package– but not quite enough for anyone, falling short on standards she couldn’t see.
He looked at her, expression a little less pained, a little more hopeful now.
“Can we go from the start again so I can earn your trust?”
Words said plain and simply, like they didn’t just open a part of Jackie that she tried so hard to stitch up, not with pain, but with hope.
“What were you thinking?” Is all she can breathe out, something surging and beating again in her chest, hopeful and alive.
He adjusts so he’s facing her, hand extended towards her in greeting.
“Hi, I’m Steven Hyde, what’s your name?”