A/N: I didn't watch past episode 4 of Season 8 so some details might be off.

Well, first let it be known that I ship J/H. But having read so many stories here on Fanfiction, to help deal with the mental breakdown I had because S8 was such a mind-blowing disaster. Anyway. I started out with a J/E friendship and eventual J/H in mind. Butttt…. Eh. I started writing and things started to progress and well… Post-Africa Eric is Just. So. Intriguing.

And I couldn't help it. I thought they needed each other more. So this one is for all the J/E fans out there. I'm sorry Zennies!

If Eric is OOC, it's because it's post-S7, post-Africa and I think Eric after that is fair-game.

I

Point Place

January 1979

"Steven, I'm breaking up with you."

Though her words were thus, her eyes however were telling a different message. Please ask me to stay.

The first thing a person noticed about Jackie Burkhart had to be her eyes. If you asked her, she would dismiss them as an ordinary brown, but in truth it was a most intriguing shade of brown that reflected her every thought and emotion, and could count among its conquests, the melting of the iciest, most immoveable heart (though, said heart, on the other hand, would vehemently deny its own existence).

And at that moment, though her words were one thing, her eyes were telling Steven Hyde a whole different story. They told him that she loved him. They told him that she needed him. They told him that she ached for him. Please ask me to stay. They pleaded and they begged. Steven, please. Choose me.

He read all that with just one look into her mesmerizing eyes but he said the words anyway. It killed him to say them, but he did anyway.

"Whatever, Jackie."

He said them because of Chicago. Because he was mad. Because he was beyond hurt. Because he wanted to see her suffer as he had suffered when she broke him.

Her face crumpled and he welcomed the rush he felt. He was unfeeling, he was infallible, he was indestructible. And most importantly he had regained the upper hand.

Whatever, Jackie.

His words echoed in the hollow silence of the basement and she held on to whatever shred that was left of her pride and fought back tears. Lifting her chin she swept out of the basement with as much dignity as she could muster.

Ask me to stay Steven, please ask me to stay.

But once again, the words that she wanted so desperately to hear, never made it past his lips.

Back in the basement, without so much as a flicker of an eyelid, Hyde watched her go.

Inside though, he wrestled with a gamut of thoughts and emotions. He squelched them down ruthlessly, shielding himself once again with his unassailable fortress of Zen, until only one clear thought rose high above the rest:

She was gone, and he was safe.