Sooner or Later

By

AstraPerAspera

The name on the return address on the manila bubble-pack envelope said "Carter", which in and of itself was enough to get Jack's heart beating a little faster—and not in a bad way. That was until he noticed the address itself, which was San Diego, not Colorado Springs. He frowned at it for a moment, trying to figure out why Mark Carter would be sending him anything when, for all the years he'd known about him, he'd only ever met the man once—at Jacob's funeral. Shrugging, he tore open the envelope—only to find a small note and yet another tightly wrapped envelope inside with his name scrawled on it in a completely different hand.

Huh.

Unfolding the note, he tried to make out what it said. No point in hunting for any glasses—he'd left his last pair at Sam's when he'd left The Springs yesterday, just after that whole hum-drum Ba'al thing. But…perched at the end of his outstretched arm, he could just make out what it said.

I was told to send you this when the time came. The man had many secrets. I guess this was just one more.

Best wishes,

Mark Carter

As far as explanations went, Jack had to admit, that was among the least helpful he'd ever seen. He turned the paper over, hoping for more, but there was nothing there. Which only left the envelope, small and compact and wrapped with what looked like layers of packing tape. He was going to need scissors.

Or a knife, since fifteen minutes of searching for scissors had been time not particularly well spent. Grabbing a steak knife from the kitchen drawer he sawed his way through the armor of transparent tape and finally pierced the paper of the envelope itself, slitting it up one side. Prying it further apart, he tipped it over his open palm and out dropped yet another mysteriously wrapped item. Tissue paper this time. And with it, another note. Now he was getting somewhere.

There was more light in the kitchen, so he didn't have to hold it out quite so far to read this one. He didn't recognize the handwriting at first, but he did the signature. And because of who it was from, he read it twice.

If you're reading this, Jack, the two of you have finally figured it out. Took you long enough.

Sam's mother would have wanted her to have this. I'll leave it to you to give it to her.

Take care of one another. And don't waste a single moment. It goes by all too fast.

Jacob

Setting the note down he carefully unwrapped the small parcel in his hand. He had a pretty good idea what it contained; and he was right.

"Nice call, Jacob," he said quietly to the empty house, turning the object over in his hand. "Thanks."

And carefully re-wrapping it in the tissue paper, he returned it to its envelope and went to put it away for safe-keeping.

o-o-o-o

He loved watching her sleep. He always had. Even years before when he shouldn't have been enjoying it quite so much, it was the only time he could look at her without fear of discovery and savor every curve and contour of her face. He'd committed it to memory a hundred times over, regretting only that in sleep he couldn't see those beautiful eyes.

But that had been long ago. A lifetime, it seemed. And from the first night he'd held her in his arms and watched her dream he knew without any doubt that he'd do whatever it took just for the privilege of watching her sleep like that every night for the rest of his life.

Except that it had been a little more complicated than that. Helluva thing when the price of being together was having to be apart.

Which made watching her sleep all the more meaningful on those rare nights they could be together.

And even rarer days. Like this. With the rain spattering outside of the cabin window making chalky gray puddles in the driveway and Sam curled up, asleep, at the end of the sofa, a half dozen tech manuals scattered within an arm's reach. Even with her reading glasses askew…wait, those were his glasses…there was a quality to her that made him lose almost all reasonable thought, especially when he realized that of all the sofas in all the cabins in all the galaxies, she'd chosen to fall asleep on his. Repeatedly. He'd long shed himself of the notion that he didn't deserve her, but there were days he still didn't quite get what it was she saw in him.

Not that he was complaining, or anything.

Nope. Not complaining at all.

Except maybe about the glasses. He'd spent the better part of an hour looking for them that morning after all. Toothpaste he didn't mind sharing. His razor, on occasion, he would pass her way. And he'd never once complained when she'd borrow his shirts to wear around the cabin—especially first thing in the morning. But a guy did have to draw the line at his reading glasses—no matter how geekily cute they made her look.

Besides. He needed them at the moment. But as he edged them carefully off of her face, her eyes opened and he found himself staring into those blue depths that were the only thing he liked looking at even more than her sleeping face. She smiled.

"Hey," she said, sleepily. "Those are mine."

"No…they're mine. And one of these days you'll admit you need them and you'll get your own."

"I fell asleep." She sat up, looking around at her scattered library.

"Yeah. Go figure. All that excitement. Who'd have guessed."

He loved the look she shot him—part practiced patience, part unabashed affection. Which was exactly why he said such things in the first place. He'd have thought she would've caught on by now. Maybe she had. But she always played along anyway.

"You are supposed to be on leave, you know. As in 'on vacation'… 'off duty'…'incommunicado'." He let his voice trail off teasingly. She didn't look one bit penitent. Not that he thought she would.

"I've got to get up to speed, Jack. This happened so quickly—they haven't given me a lot of time to prepare." She'd picked up two of the books and was hefting one in each hand. He reached over and took them from her.

"You promised," he reminded her, enjoying the puzzled look that crossed her face. "No more than three hours a day. It's been five today already."

She shook her head and reached for the books. He held them just out of reach.

"Time I spend sleeping doesn't count," she countered, reaching around to grab one, but missing.

"Any time a book is open, it counts," replied Jack, twisting away so she still couldn't reach it. "It's not my fault if your eyes are closed."

"I beg to differ," Sam retorted, her flushed pink face betraying the memory as she made another attempt at the books and failed. A smug chuckle escaped him. Yeah. Maybe she had him on that one.

Finally she fell back against the sofa in exaggerated exasperation, crossing her arms, refusing to play any more.

"Jack…please give me the books. And don't lose my place."

A self-satisfied grin split his face. Finally. The opening he'd been looking for.

"I would never do that," he replied, in mock indignation. "Anyway…I already marked your place. See?"

He handed her one of the books and sat back, waiting. It wouldn't take her long, he was sure.

She eyed the book as soon as it came into her hands. Yep. She'd spotted it. Like there was ever any doubt.

It had been a while since he'd actually experienced nerves, he realized. Oh now and then he'd get an occasional twinge…like when they'd been at that damned Tok'ra ceremony a week or so ago. For all the world he'd felt like something there was going to go awry. A false alarm, as it turned out. Just some crazy cloned snake sputtering a bunch of nonsense.

But this was nothing like that. This was a good feeling. Unsettling, yes. But good. Almost like Christmas when he was a kid. Only better. Because he already knew what was in the package. Or in this case, the tissue paper, carefully tucked inside the book, waiting for her to discover it.

Which she finally did, glancing up at him with a puzzled look on her face. He gave a half shrug and shifted again, nervously. What if this wasn't expected? What if he'd made the wrong call here? What if Jacob had? Still…he felt he knew her well enough to know that something like this would mean a great deal to her. Unless, of course, it completely back-fired. In which case there might be a whole lot of emotional pieces he was going to have to pick up.

Yeah. Not so good at that.

For just a moment he found himself wishing he'd given it more thought, but it was too late. She was carefully unfolding the tissue.

"I know we've still got some time before we're going to need it," he qualified. She was still unwrapping. He realized he'd been holding his breath and let it out with a huge sigh. She glanced up at him again, eyes bright with curiosity. His fear of disappointing her grew. "But I just thought…well…you know…."

The last bit of tissue opened up and he saw her breath hitch as her brain registered what it was. At least what it was in concept. He didn't think she'd quite latched on to its significance…yet.

That happened a heartbeat later when she picked up the gold band and held it in her hand. He could see the sudden moisture in her eyes as she recognized the ring. Eyes glistening, she seemed mesmerized by it for a moment, until finally she grasped it tightly in her hand and put her lips to her fist, closing her eyes. Tears trickled out the side of each eye and Jack reached over instinctively to wipe them away with his thumbs. Her eyes flew open at his touch.

"Where did you get this?" Her voice was a barely controlled whisper as she looked up at him. "How?"

It was his turn to look away, to find something about his hands worth studying for a moment. Her feelings were so raw and open on her face he could barely stand the thought that he'd caused her that kind of pain. Perhaps this had been a very bad idea after all.

He couldn't help but wince when he finally dared look back up at her. The tears he'd wiped away had been followed by even more, and there were two moist trails streaking each lovely cheek.

Time to tell her.

"Jacob, actually. He wanted you to have it—said your mother would have wanted you to have it." He stumbled through the words, not knowing what else to do with them.

Sam's eyebrows shot up at his words and her chin jutting forward in disbelief, even as more tears escaped down her face. Okay. He officially felt like crap now. He wished he could rewind the past five minutes and do it all differently. He'd have kept the ring in his pocket. Taken her to the jewelry store. Let her pick something out that didn't have a suitcase full of memories already anchored to it. Something her own.

He shifted uncomfortably on the sofa next to her. Maybe it wasn't too late. He could still get her something different. Something that didn't make her shoulders shake with silent sobs like they were doing now.

He pulled her to him and held her. Her arms went around his neck and she buried her face against his chest, letting the tears come until the whole front of his shirt was wet. But he didn't mind. Gathering her into an embrace he pressed his face against the soft tendrils of her long hair and murmured soothing words into her ear, rocking her gently back and forth. He didn't like to think ill of the dead, but he wished to hell Jacob Carter had kept that ring to himself. And he wished to hell he had too.

"I'm sorry, Sam. I never would have given it to you if I'd known it'd make you unhappy," he apologized softly. He felt her take a shuddering breath before she pulled back, out of his tight embrace.

"No…it's okay…I'm okay…really," she smiled at him, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. "It just caught me off guard, is all. Mom's ring…. I never expected that in a million years. How…?"

"Long story," he interrupted her, deciding it probably wasn't a good time to bring up the note that had accompanied the ring. She nodded, accepting his deferral of the topic until later.

"You're sure you're okay with this?" he asked one more time, just to be sure. Sam nodded vigorously.

"I am…are you? It's my mother's ring, after all."

He flashed back momentarily to the cargo hold of a tel'tak and Sam struggling to get past her own memories to find Jolinar's. Like he would ever deny her whatever piece of her mother she could still find to hold on to.

"Hey. Whatever makes you happy," he told her, pulling her toward him again and wrapping her in his arms, hoping she'd undertand all the things he still couldn't say, even after all these years.

It seemed she did. "Ummmm," she sighed, settling against him. No tears this time. Even better. "This definitely makes me happy."

He buried his face in her hair and breathed deeply. Moments like this had been too damn few. Which was why he'd insisted they come up here, her homework notwithstanding. The rain outside and the dim lamps keeping the gloom at bay made for the perfect sanctuary. No more Ori. No more goa'uld. No more unfathomable distances to separate them. Just a nice cabin in a nice woods and the two of them without any pesky interruptions for the next six days.

Nice.

"If you're happy, then I'm happy," he told her finally, realizing he'd let his mind wander. Not that that probably surprised her. She glanced up at him and smiled that full-out, straight into his heart, see-it-in-her-eyes smile. Oh yeah. Just try to let a guy have a half-way coherent thought when that was aimed his way.

"Here," she said, offering him back the gold band. "Supposedly it's bad luck to put the ring on before the wedding, so I'll let you hang onto it until we need it."

"Which will be sooner, rather than later, right? We agreed," he reminded her. Part of him knew there was no rush—things were fine as they were. Except—she still felt, somehow…allusive. As though she might drift through his fingers like so much smoke. Making it official would make it…well, official. And he wanted it somewhere, on somebody's record book, that it was.

"Yes, we did," she replied, placing the ring into his outstretched hand and folding his fingers over it. "I just think we should wait until…."

He couldn't contain the groan. "Oh for heaven's sake, Sam…."

She placed two fingers against his lips before he could say anything more.

"I think we should wait until," she repeated. "Teal'c gets back from visiting his grandson on Chu'lak. He would never forgive us if we did this without him."

He grunted, relaxing again, unable to keep himself from holding her tighter. Still, he just couldn't quite let it go.

"Do you have any idea how long those Jaffa rituals can go on?" he asked in mock irritation. "You'll make Brigadier before the kid's even got a name."

She settled deeper against his chest and smothered a chuckle. He allowed himself a grin she couldn't see and tried desperately not to play with her hair, failing miserably. How he'd ever liked it short, he had no idea.

"Teal'c said he'd be back Wednesday; so does Friday work for you?" her voice drifted up and into his musings on her hair.

Damn, she was good. He hadn't seen that one coming.

"I'll clear my calendar," he replied as nonchalantly as he could manage, glad she couldn't tell how much his heart was now racing. Or maybe she could. She did have a self-satisfied glow about her.

"Not much time for a honeymoon," he pointed out, after a few moments of silence. They hadn't actually discussed it, but he'd always assumed they'd go…somewhere.

"That's true," she replied, trailing a finger across his shirt. "But then, no one says the honeymoon has to wait until after the ceremony."

Damn. She was very good.

"What about these?" He picked up the nearest tech manual with two fingers, dangling it as if reeked to high heaven.

She broke from his embrace and gathered up the books into one armload. Striding to the cedar chest beneath the far window, she lifted the lid and unceremoniously dumped them on top of the blankets inside. He could hear the lock click as she turned the key and, grasping it in her hand, she sauntered…actually sauntered…back over to the sofa and resumed her previous position, offering him the key.

"I'll need it back Sunday," she told him, as he took it from her, feeling like that ridiculous Cheshire cat. He slipped it into his shirt pocket to hide later. And damned if he wouldn't hide it too. Just to be sure. In the meantime, she'd returned to slowly driving him to distraction with her wandering fingers.

He had to clear his throat to get the words to come out before any more of his higher brain function shut down.

"Shouldn't we…uh…tell someone? Daniel…maybe…Cassie…?"

Her lips were on his and whomever else he thought they ought to tell slipped from his thoughts.

They had 'til Friday anyway.

It could wait.