Title: Turn the Other Way
Summary: It's all about magnets. And maybe a date?
Warnings/spoilers: None
A/N: Birthday fic for supplyship! Also, a BIG thank you to mrspollifax for the beta work

Carter opens the passenger door and climbs inside. She hands me a small wrapped package before twisting around to put her seatbelt on.

"What's this?" I ask, because with Carter, you just never know. She can make a bomb out of three paperclips, a shoestring, and some rubbing alcohol.

"It's for you," she says, "as a thank you for doing this."

I'm happily doing this for many reasons, none of which were the possibility that Carter would be giving me special gifts. All of my reasons are better and more basic than that. Take, for example, the way she looks tonight— no one can wear a red dress like Carter can wear a red dress. That alone was reason enough to agree to escort her tonight.

"You didn't have to get me anything, Carter." I pull at the corner of the paper a little. "However, you do realize you have to bring something for the bride and groom?"

"Yes, sir," she replies, but it's not the kind of sir she uses in the field. "I have been to a wedding before." She's teasing me now, and it makes something flip over in my stomach.

Right.

Time to unwrap the gift and focus elsewhere. I pull the paper off; the picture on the front of the box looks like it's some kind of kid's toy, a bunch of colored pieces that you can use to build things. "Magformers?"

This is strangely flashing me back to a time, years before, when Carter and I had a running joke going on Jonas. We'd convinced the happy little gullible alien that all the "As Seen on TV" stuff you could buy was actually Asgard tech we'd brought back to Earth. The charade resulted in all of us getting some pretty odd, but oddly useful, Christmas and birthday gifts for a while.

"Ah." I look up and she's smiling at me. I don't want to disappoint her by asking what the heck? so instead I say, "Thanks. It's great."

"Shall we go?"

I nod and start the engine.

I really didn't think about whether this would be complicated, going somewhere with Carter as my "date." With the two of us, things always got complicated on Earth but we were rarely complicated off-world, and I'm sure there's something deeply symbolic in that. I'll leave that alone for now. Lately, it's been… easy? That's not exactly the right word. But being around her feels more like it used to back when we were traveling the stars together, along with Daniel and Teal'c.

Of the four, Daniel is the only one still a part of SG-1. Teal'c is busy nation building, and Carter will certainly be up for another promotion soon, taking here god knows where next.. But tonight she's in town on downtime, and we're standing in a ballroom watching a bride and groom enter to a round of applause.

Six weeks ago, Carter called my Pentagon office saying that she wanted to take someone with her to this wedding. She wondered if I happened to be free? I said I was, and here we are. Simple.

Just two friends going to a wedding together, as friends do.

Really.

"She looks happy," Carter says with eyes on the bride, someone from Carter's academy days who now lives in Washington and is marrying a lawyer. Robert is his name, and I think hers is Linda? Or maybe Lisa? And one of Lisa's bridesmaids grabbed my ass when we all stood around outside the church after the ceremony earlier. That's about all I know of these folks, and frankly, it's more than enough.

We watch the bridal party take their seats; there's the usual round of toasts and speeches by the best man, the father of the bride, etc. They are short and accomplish the intended purpose, whether it be to make the crowd laugh, or to bring a tear to the bride's eye, or to embarrass the hell out of poor Robert.

Dinner begins and Carter's making small talk with the woman sitting to her left. There's a break in the conversation, long enough for me to get in, "Hey, Carter, can you pass the butter?"

"Sure, sir, here you go."

The woman looks at both of us like we're aliens. Trust me, it's not cliché, not if you can use that description accurately.

The woman asks, "You call your boyfriend 'sir'?" She's clearly unsure if she really wants to know more.

"Oh, no, no," Carter jumps in right away. "We're both military, and we used to work together. I suppose now it's just habit."

"Of course," the lady chuckles. "The possibility should have crossed my mind. My son is serving in Afghanistan right now with the Marines."

The talk turns to current events. I sit there wondering if Carter realizes that she was far more concerned with correcting the "sir" part and not the "boyfriend" part of the misunderstanding.

I return to the table, drinks in hand, to find that Carter has turned our chairs to face the DJ and the crowd. The rest of our former dinner companions are gone. I do not mind at all; the guy who had a thing for collecting peacock feathers was really starting to freak me out.

I had one of those moments earlier when I regret, just for split-second, saving Earth so many times from complete destruction. Sue me if my fantasy life includes a negotiation with the Goa'uld that goes something along the lines of: "You don't blow up the entire world, but in exchange, here are some targeted people we really wouldn't miss."

Peacock-feather-collector guy is so on that list.

I sit down and hand over a glass of wine to Carter. "Everyone abandoned us."

"Yeah." She points toward the crowded dance floor. "Who doesn't love the Macarena?"

"Me. And the entire population of P2X-992." Our chairs are sort of pushed together, enough that my only option with my left arm is to drape it across the back of her chair.

She smiles slightly. "I'd forgotten about Daniel trying to teach them to dance."

A new song begins. Some guy is drunk enough for him to forget the last several decades, and he starts to spin around on his ass in the middle of the floor. "I'm giving him a 3 for execution but a 10 for effort."

"He's having a good time." Carter admonishes me.

"Over there." I point to a woman. "She's got to be the wife, and judging by her look right now, he's in the dog house for at least a week."

"Stop that." But she's chuckling at me. "That's Lisa's cousin and she's married to—" The guy turns over and starts doing the worm, giving us a better view of his face. "Uh oh."

"She's married to breakdance-guy?" I finish for her.

I love Carter's laugh. Not only is it one of those great laughs that's contagious, but she holds back most of the time. So when I hear it, it makes me feel like she's granting me something precious and rare.

The guy finally gets up and bows to a smattering of applause. I take a mental note of who else to add to my list.

Soon the music switches to a slow song, and I clear my throat. "Want to show them how it's really done, Carter?"

She raises a brow at me. "You dance, sir?"

"If I'm not on P2X-992, I do."

I stand and make a deal out of offering her my hand. She takes it, and we make our way onto the dance floor.

This is the part when it should get weird. Where it would have gotten weird only 2 or 3 months ago, but instead, Carter's in my arms and it feels natural and easy and comfortable. I'm not sure what to do with that?

We sway together for a while, she's leading, not me. It's better that way. Besides, I trust that she's not going to tell anyone our little secret.

Finally, I say to her, "Thanks for inviting me tonight."

Carter looks up into my eyes. "Thanks for saying yes."

The song ends and another slow one starts. Which is a good thing, because I wasn't going to let go yet, and we'd look weird slow dancing to something like Baby got Back.

Carter puts her head on my shoulder and I'm pretty sure I stopped breathing for a second. She asks, "Can I propose a New Year's resolution?"

"In March?"

I feel her smile; her lips are that close to my neck. "Close enough."

"Propose away."

"More 'yes' and less 'no' this year?" She sounds… tentative. And I wonder if putting her head on my shoulder was a tactical maneuver? She's unsure what expression I might have on my face right now and she's a little afraid of certain possibilities, so she doesn't want to look.

God, this woman has no idea.

"Carter, the answer was never no." I breathe out. Even at its worst over the years, the answer was at least "maybe."

So, I think I got ahead of myself with the whole "this is easy and not at all weird" thing. Because I'm navigating Washington DC traffic to take her back to the hotel where she's staying, and neither of us is saying much. The silence is not a comfortable one.

I don't know what Carter's thinking about, but I'm wondering what it all means. What does two transfers, three months, about a dozen phone calls, one hurried lunch in the Pentagon cafeteria, and tonight all add up to?

I'd like it to equal a goodnight kiss.

Then I curse myself for even thinking that way.

This is Carter, and I can't just presume. I can't casually lean in and… yeah. I don't even know anymore, my stomach is all in knots, and maybe this was a bad idea from the start.

We pull up under the awning, the bellmen and valets hovering nearby. Carter turns and gives me a smile. "It was fun," she says in a neutral tone.

"Yeah."

There's a beat.

And then I know I missed it.

"Goodnight, sir," she says while opening the door and sliding out.

I sit there for a moment, running it over in my head again, trying to find the thing I missed. A clue. A sense of where she's at in all of this. My eyes land on the gift she gave me earlier, now sitting on the floor on the passenger side.

"Wait! Carter." But she's disappeared inside, so I toss my keys to the valet and dash after her.

Glancing around the lobby, I catch a glimpse of her. "Carter!" She turns as I gain on her. "I finally figured it out." Because of the way the little pieces were held together. "Magnets."

She smiles at me, this time a full, honest, genuine one. "It was always your favorite answer."

"Yeah." We stand there sort of goofily looking at each other, and all I want is to touch her.

Carter glances down at her shoes and then back up at me. "You probably don't remember, but you once told me why. You were pretty out of it, on some medication and in the infirmary and it was late at night.

"You told me that it was your favorite answer because when two magnets face each other a certain way, they push each other apart. All you have to do, all it takes is for one of them to turn around, to look at the other on in a new way and suddenly…"

"They attract one another," I finish for her, when it seems she can't go on.

Her eyes are bright, and she might be on the verge of tears. But she nods and says, "Yes. Yes they do."

I'm not missing my chance this time; I kiss her. I'm tentative at first, but when her arms come around and her tongue slides along my lower lip requesting entrance, the kiss deepens. She hugs me tight against her body, her hands sprawled on my back. I can't get enough of touching her, my fingers in her hair, at her hips, along her spine.

Suddenly, Carter pulls back.

"What?"

"We're, um…" Carter looks around us. People in the lobby are either making a show of not noticing us or are unapologetically staring. One little boy takes a picture of us with his cell phone.

Right.

Her hand touches my cheek, to redirect my focus back to her. "You want to come up? Maybe you can explain more physics to me."

"Oh, you mock. But the things I know, Carter, the things I know…"

She bites her lip, trying not to laugh. "Sure."

Carter takes my hand to lead me toward the elevators. It's funny, but the thought that pops to mind is that my life has just been saved, once again, by magnets.