A/N: Everyone can blame Trinity3 of Gateworld for this. Her Random question: "Sam comes home dead tired. Jack is waiting for her, shall we say…expectantly, but recognizes that she's beat. Does he run a warm bath, get her something to eat and still try for the physical activity later on, or would he pass on that and just give her a foot massage?" This generated a Challenge: "After all there is no wrong answer here but sometimes we just want what we want right? How about you write one and I'll do an opposite other?"~Trinity3
This is my answer to her challenge. Awaiting your opposite other fic, Trin.
Deepest thanks to hedwig (Beta extraordinaire) for her insight and suggestions.
Que Sera, Sera
-"Che sera, sera / What will be, shall be" –Doctor Faustus, Christopher Marlowe
Jack fidgeted.
He had been thinking…about her.
All damn day.
Thinking about her blonde hair, about the texture of her bare skin, about the glazed look of pleasure in her sapphire eyes when she…
Geez!
He shook himself, halting the train of thought.
Get a grip, Jack.
He checked his watch for the tenth time and sighed, peering out through the storm door. She should be getting home within the next ten minutes or so; it was a nice change to have a predictable quitting time –he missed the off-world missions, but there was something to be said for 'normal' life. He grinned wryly at his own thought. Normal. In what universe did any of this qualify as normal? A husband lives in Washington, DC…his wife lives in Las Vegas, NV; it was some kind of cosmic joke –they had to be apart so that they could be together.
He fidgeted a few moments longer and finally opened the door and stepped out onto the porch of the small two-bedroom house, squinting in the late afternoon light. The sun was dipping rapidly behind the mountain peaks in the west; he leaned against the rough stucco of the porch pillar and stared down the subdivision road.
From the foot of the driveway, the landscape sloped away; the gray asphalt street curving gently past the ranks of stucco-walled, clay-tiled houses. Beyond dull beige sameness of the houses, the naked desert mesas rose up to meet the heavens; the Rocky Mountains loomed in stark backdrop, dividing tan desert from golden sunset sky.
The afternoon heat had dissipated very little, and though he had been outside of the air-conditioned house only a few minutes, he could already feel the sweat beading on the back of his neck; he was just glad that it was October instead of July –he could handle eighty degree weather better than the triple-digit summertime heat that was commonly associated with Sin City. It was nice, he mused: the weather he had left behind in DC was about fifty-two and rainy. That was a miserable combination.
They had lucked out and found the small rental house just outside of Las Vegas –the owner told them the market had been poor lately, so he had chosen to rent it out rather than sell.
A flash of silver caught his eye, and his heart skipped a beat as he watched her Volvo cruise up the street and pull into the driveway. She was nothing if not punctual.
Pushing open the car door, she unfolded herself gracefully from the driver's seat; her long, lean form silhouetted in the waning light as she stretched. He felt himself respond to the view -to the combination of his previous thoughts and the sight of her stretching out the kinks.
She started toward the house and he immediately noted the slump to her shoulders, her features clouded with weariness.
Uh-oh.
As she stepped up onto the porch, he held the front door open for her and greeted her with a cautious "Hey."
"Hey," she replied wearily.
"Long day." It wasn't a question. The evidence was written across her face.
"You have no idea."
He opened the door wider to let her pass, and followed her across the threshold, letting it swing shut behind them as he guided her to the living room.
"Sit."
She looked at him with a raised eyebrow.
He smiled gently, off-setting the command that had obviously been present in his tone.
Sinking down with a sigh, she leaned back and closed her eyes.
He hurried from the room.
Ah hell!
His plans were shot. He paused and mentally kicked himself for the selfishness of the thought.
He strode to the refrigerator, grabbed a diet Coke and traced the route back to the living room, pausing in the doorway to watch her. Her eyes were still closed and she hadn't moved, except to wrap her arms loosely around herself in that particular way that he always associated with her 'self-protection' mode: as though by doing it she could hold herself together. She looked like someone had sucked the life out of her.
He didn't regret their choices, not for a single minute; his transfer to the Pentagon and hers to Nellis had allowed them the opportunity of a lifetime. They had started the exploration of a relationship between them that had been brewing for…well, years; something previously out of reach and strictly against regulations. Once removed from each other's chain of command, they had found a lot of common ground to build their relationship, and things had progressed.
Then, for the second time in his life, and with the same thundering heart, he had proposed. She had simply looked at him as though he was out of his mind to think that the answer would be anything other than yes.
He took every excuse that he was handed to travel out to Nevada to spend time with his wife. This trip was an extended weekend trip; he hadn't seen her in several weeks, and the plan had been to shut out the rest of the world and just spend the weekend wrapped up in each other.
He hated to see her like this: she looked like she'd been through the wringer.
As he set the drink on the end table next to her, she opened her eyes and greeted him a wan smile. Lowering himself onto the couch, he tugged her over and tucked her in against his side. She wrapped an arm around him and gave a light squeeze.
"I love my job…don't get the wrong idea," she started.
"But…?"
"But sometimes they're just…just such…"
"Scientists?...Geeks?"
The answering giggle was muffled against his shirt. "That's not funny, Jack." Her tone was serious, but he glimpsed a smile curling her lips.
He stifled the laugh bubbling up in his throat and pressed a kiss to her forehead, stroking her back lightly.
He could feel the warmth of her pressed full length against his side. Hip to hip, thigh to thigh, chest to…his mind drifted –thinking about what she felt like clutched against him in nothing at all. With effort, he dragged his mind back to the present moment. God this was hard! Something else was, too, and he was certain that if she pressed against him in just the right place, she was going to notice.
Stop it! He willed his body to comply. It would be impossible to convince her that he was being empathetic if she knew he was aroused. He shifted uncomfortably and untangled himself from her embrace. She shot him a questioning look.
"Dinner," he said in hasty explanation, hurrying from the room.
He used the mundane activity of preheating the oven and popping in frozen lasagna to regain control of his insubordinate body. He sighed and scrubbed a hand through his silvering hair in frustration.
"You ok?" she asked when he came back into the living room.
"Yeah." Lie through your teeth, Jack…you might actually get good at it.
When the food was ready, he brought both of their plates into the living room and flipped on the TV. He watched the game intermittently, more using it as a cover to surreptitiously steal glances at her rather than actually following it. She picked at her food. He was not surprised -this happened whenever she was under stress: she tended to focus on the problems and seek solutions, usually ignoring the needs of her body. Her brows were pulled together and a frown turned down the corners of her mouth.
"Carter…I can hear you thinking."
"I'm actually finding it hard to think right now, Sir…too tired."
He smiled. Sir. She didn't even realize what she'd said.
"Done?"
She nodded listlessly.
He lifted the plate from her hands and took the dishes into the kitchen, loading them into the dishwasher.
When he returned to his place beside her on the couch, he gently lifted her feet into his lap, tugging at the laces of her shoes until they loosened.
"Jack…you don't have to…"
"Shhh!"
He slipped the sneaker from one foot, then the other, the socks following quickly, and began rubbing her feet in slow, firm circles.
She leaned back into the couch and watched him with heavy-lidded eyes, a murmur or soft groan periodically escaping her lips.
Well…that didn't help! He could think of a LOT better reasons for his wife to utter those particularly stirring sounds.
He cast around in his mind for a subject…ANY subject…to keep him on task…to keep from simply working his way up her legs…
He was silent for a long moment, pitching around in his head for a topic as he focused on the feet in his hands. Carter had beautiful feet. The thought sounded ridiculous –how can feet be beautiful? But Carter's were: soft, pale skin; high arches; long, thin toes, and…he stopped, turning her feet in the lamplight. A soft sparkle skittered across the toenails.
"Uh…Carter?
Her eyes fluttered open, "Mmm?"
"Your toes just glittered."
A soft chuckle and a brief flash of white, even teeth made his heart stutter.
Guh.
There was just something so damn sexy about Carter's long, thin toes shining with glitter nail polish. He swallowed hard.
Subjects! Topics of conversation!
She had drifted once again, her face relaxed and her eyes closed, blissfully unaware that he had lost the power of speech. He continued to dutifully knead her feet as he racked his brain, which seemed to be caught in a time-dilation field.
"Can we call this one the Enterprise?" he finally managed to croak out of his arid throat.
"Mmmm?"
He could tell he had snatched her back from the edge of sleep.
He cleared his throat and tried again: "The new ship you're working on…the…uh…X-30…"
"X-304" she verified.
"Yeah, that. Can we call it…"
"The Enterprise? No."
"You didn't let me name the last one."
While she didn't grace his mock-petulance with a response, he could see the ghost of a smile playing at the corner of her lip, the dimple on her right cheek emerging.
He continued to rub the toes and arches, eliciting a quiet hiss of pleasure from her. His body and mind clamored riotously, reminding him of other things that she reserved that sound for.
Think spaceships…c'mon, Jack! Caressing naked feet captured his attention for several long minutes.
Naked feet.
Naked.
Oh…this was not helping…
He gently lowered her feet to the floor. As he brought his eyes back up, he was caught in the unfocused blue gaze peeking out beneath her long lashes.
He leaned back into his corner of the couch and pulled her to him, shifting them both until she was reclining with her cheek against his chest. She sighed and closed her eyes, her hand fisted in the soft cotton of his flannel shirt. He ran his hand through her hair in slow, repetitive motions as he turned his attention back to the game on the TV. He felt her movements still and her breathing even out under the circle of his arm. It felt perfect. Sam Carter…Sam O'Neill lying against him, secure in his arms, asleep.
His body still gave twinges to remind him that there had been other plans for tonight, but he quieted the grumbling ego…tomorrow was another day…and so was the next. He did, after all, have her to himself for the rest of the weekend.
~Fin~
A/N Edit: Find Trin's opposite other fic at this FFN story id:7709657 ('Three Months' by Trinity 1.0).