A/N: Wow, it's been a while. This semester has been... not so pleasant to put it nicely. Let's just say that Organic Chemistry and I don't really mix. At all. But for whatever reason, this plot bunny decided to give me a good whack upside the head and said "WRITE ME!". So I did, because I've found that angry plot bunnies aren't the nicest creatures in this universe. Okay, my crazy note's done now. Fic time! (And just remember, I don't own anything. I just play. Other lucky people own Stargate.)

Not Exactly

Part I

Why did things always tend towards painfully complicated when her personal life was concerned? There had to be an answer out there somewhere; there was an answer to everything out there somewhere. So maybe if she just looked a little harder… but no. This was something that couldn't be explained by an equation. All the numbers and symbols in the world could never come together to form an explanation for why her personal life was just plain abysmal at times. And that, the fact that her beloved math and science couldn't provide a way out, was almost as depressing as her current state of affairs.

"Sam? Sam, where are you?" called a familiar voice from somewhere around her apartment's kitchenette. "I think I have everything packed. Maybe."

"Great, Cassie," she called back, trying to inject just a little enthusiasm in her voice. "We can start loading things up then." Sam forced herself up from her slouched position on her bed and out to where Cassie was waiting for her expectantly.

"I can't believe it's been an entire semester already. It's going to be weird going back. But fun!" she added when she caught the worried look in Sam's eyes. "It'll be great to get back to college life!" Her enthusiasm was apparently contagious because Sam could feel the corners of her mouth twitch into a smile even as the closest thing she'd ever had to a daughter prepared to move back to college. "And you know what? I think I might even be able to graduate with my class," Cassie continued as she and Sam carried the boxes down the stairs and out to the car. "I might have a few killer semesters ahead of me, but I think -"

Sam didn't think before the words came spilling out of her mouth. "Don't feel like you have to overexert yourself, Cass!"

Cassie nearly dropped the box she was carrying, that was how hard she started laughing. "Sam, you're probably the last person who should be giving me that advice!"

But that's what mothers are supposed to do, Sam thought, chewing her lip embarrassedly and pretending the reason her face was turning red was simply because the Nevada sun was particularly hot that day. Cassie didn't need to hear what she was thinking, though. The girl had been through a tough couple of months, the stress of too many advanced classes and life on her own combining with the fact that, even though it had been over a year, she was still struggling to deal with Janet Frasier's death. So that's where Sam had stepped in. She'd been the one Cassie had run to that day all those months ago, red eyes and tear-streaked face a marked contrast to the cheerful spring sunlight. She'd been the one who'd worked everything out with the college, the one who'd altered her work schedule and sleeping habits drastically in order to facilitate more time at home, the one who taught herself how to cook and bake so that there were more to evening meals than local takeout or buttered noodles.

It took three months of having Cassie live with her before Sam realized she was acting like the mother she never imagined she could be. And while a part of her was scared by that fact, a larger part of her never wanted it to end. So that's why they call it maternal instinct, she'd thought to herself that night as she put away the recently washed dishes. It never really goes away. She'd been so good at ignoring it all her life, at pushing it to the back of her mind so that she had a perfect excuse for not thinking about the dull ache she always felt whenever she saw other women with their children… and here it was, coming back to haunt her at the moment she was least prepared for it.

Sam never spoke of her revelation to Cassie. But as the weeks crept by and things seemed to be getting better and better with Cassie, a feeling of dread started to build in Sam. She was going to have let her go. It occurred to her that she was more than likely being too emotional about things, and that she should have known that Cassie wasn't just going to drop out of school; she had to go back sooner or later. However, that didn't stop her from occasionally giving into the urge to hug Cassie extra tight in the morning or from spending as much time as possible with her whenever she was on Earth and not buried under hundreds of feet of dry Nevada rock.

"Sam! Did you hear what I just said?" Cassie said, snapping her fingers in front of Sam's eyes to get her attention.

"Uh, no, sorry, I guess I just sort of zoned. What did you say?"

"I said do you think we can stop in Colorado Springs on our way to St. Louis?" she asked, giving Sam the young adult equivalent of puppy dog eyes. Sam pretended for a while to think about it, her brow wrinkling as if she were in a deep debate over the feasibility of the request. In reality, she'd already planned on stopping there for the night.

"I suppose so… oof!" Sam felt the air leave her lungs as she was engulfed by one of Cassie's giant hugs. She pushed down the hot, prickly feeling in her eyes. She would not cry, she would not cry, she would not cry…

An errant tear escaped, leaving a warm trail from the corner of her eye as it raced down to meet Cassie's hair. "I love you, Cass," she whispered.

"Love you too, Sam," Cassie whispered back. "And thanks."

Part II

Jack looked down at the crisp, freshly printed schedule for that day. His secretary was almost as efficient at letting him know when and where he was needed as Walter had been, and that was, in Jack's eyes, an impressive feat. As usual, though, Jack decided to ignore the schedule and set it aside while he looked through the rest of the papers on his desk that morning. The budget packets literally caused a shiver of revulsion to pass through him and it took all his willpower not to drop them through the shredder and call it an accident. The rest of the reports directly beneath caused a similar, if less severe reaction. He was just about to give up all hope for the day when his fingers caught on the edge of a red-tabbed manila folder. Finally, something that didn't make him want to run screaming out of the building.

SGC mission reports were undoubtedly the most interesting things that crossed his desk, though he had to admit that as much as he loved getting them, he was always a little afraid of what he'd find buried in their pages. There was an ever present fear that in the next folder he would open would be news of the death of someone he'd been friends with. It had happened more than a few times, especially with those damn Ori worming their way into the galaxy. At one point, he'd thought that Daniel had been a goner, but in normal Daniel Jackson fashion he'd gotten himself out of it in some way or another.

Jack opened the folder before the anticipation killed him and noted absently that it was Mitchell's report that had ended up on top this time. His eyes scanned through the painfully precise account quickly, landing on words like 'bomb' and 'capture' and nearly causing his heart to stop beating a couple of times. Thankfully, though, as he went back and read through the report thoroughly, he saw that no one had been injured in the incident (except for Ba'al, but that didn't upset Jack in the least). Jack flipped through the rest of the pages in the file, identifying Daniel's report and Carter's as well by their writing style. Daniel's was, as always, much too wordy for Jack's taste, but Carter seemed to know exactly what he wanted to see in a report. Not too much, not too skimpy, highlighting just the right points to keep him both interested and informed. The thought that maybe he'd trained her too well during his stint as head of Stargate Command crossed his mind but he quickly pushed that aside. She probably would have written reports like that regardless of him becoming the head of the SGC or not. The writing style was distinctly Carter, after all; if he thought hard enough, he could picture her sitting up 'til two writing the damn thing, every so often re-tucking pieces of hair behind her ears even though they were far too short to stay there for very long…

Oh, he was really much too old to be acting like this! He hadn't even talked to the woman in question in… one month. Oh geez, had it really been one month? He really should call her, just to check in… see how she was doing… see how she was settling back in and everything…

"General O'Neill, sir, there's an Agent Barrett to see you," interrupted the voice of his secretary via the intercom. Jack, to his credit, didn't jump, though he did feel his heart skip a beat or two as he was jerked out of his reverie. Two-star generals don't get startled, and Jack wasn't about to break the image.

"Send him in," he barked back before his brain had fully processed who his visitor was. As his grey matter finally kicked in and did its job, though, it was all he could do to stifle a groan. Barrett. As in NID Barrett. Damn it all. And his day had been going so well!

"General O'Neill, it's good to see you," greeted the younger man with what Jack immediately recognized as false cheer. He was just saying that to be polite. Common courtesy dictated that Jack do the same.

Of course, he did nothing of the sort.

"Agent Barrett, what are you doing here?" Jack flipped furiously through the stacks of paper, trying to find his schedule for the day. He found it quickly and frowned as he studied it. "You're not on my schedule."

"Um, no. That would be because I didn't actually make an appointment. Your secretary said you had a few minutes before your meeting this morning and since I was in the neighborhood…" At this, Jack rolled his eyes. "I wanted to…"

"What, have a chat?" Jack filled in as the NID agent trailed off vaguely again. "In case you didn't get it the first hundred or so times, I'll reiterate it now. I'm not a fan of the NID, Barrett, and as far as I know we aren't really friends. Not enemies, but not buddies either. So excuse me if I'm still confused as to why exactly you're here."

"I ran into Sam recently," Barrett said, looking Jack directly in the eye. If Jack didn't know any better, he would have thought that he was being accused of something, but seeing as he hadn't even talked to Sam in at least a month he wasn't quite sure what Agent Barrett was getting at.

"So? How was she?"

"She seemed fine."

"Well… that's good. Still doesn't answer the question as to why you're here though."

"She was a little evasive," Barrett continued. Jack could tell he was going to get to a point eventually, but in the mean time he was completely lost. He had no idea whatsoever what the man was getting at.

"Yes, well, she's Carter. Straight answers aren't the easiest things to get out of her at times." Unless she's ordered, Jack added with an internal smirk. It wasn't that he didn't love to listen to her babble on about this technology and that theory of the universe, but sometimes he'd just needed her to cut to the chase.

"Are you two seeing each other?"

At first, Jack was pretty sure he hadn't heard Agent Barrett correctly. There was no way that anyone could be asking him in all seriousness if he was seeing a woman who hadn't talked to in a month, let alone actually seen in over six months. But as Barrett continued to hold Jack's gaze, he quickly realized that the younger man was serious. A large part of him wanted to stand up and demand why the hell Barrett thought it appropriate to visit him in his place of work and ask him about his (sadly non-existent) personal life. The only thing that stopped him from doing this was the small part of him that was quietly overjoyed that Barrett saw Jack as serious competition.

So it was that after a long and increasingly awkward silence Jack finally answered. "No. We're not seeing each other." Not that the idea hasn't crossed my mind…

"Oh." Barrett sounded completely nonplussed. "Then… what was the 'not exactly' about?"

"What 'not exactly'?"

"I…" Agent Barrett trailed off awkwardly, finally realizing just how strange it was to be having such a conversation with a two-star general during working hours at the Pentagon. "I asked her if she was seeing someone and she said 'not exactly' and I just assumed that you two had some strange sort of thing going on, but she wouldn't say any more -"

"Whoa there, sparky," interrupted Jack before Barrett dug himself in too deep. "Now, I wasn't there, and frankly, I tend to think that private conversations, no matter how confusing they turn out to be, are meant to be private. So if Sam didn't feel like explaining her life to you, I'm sorry to be the one to tell you this but she's a fairly private person. In the future, please refrain from asking me about something I more than likely know nothing about. I get that enough from other people here." Jack paused to breathe. "Is that all?"

"Yes, I think that just about covers everything," Barrett answered, doing his utmost not to look completely embarrassed and failing utterly. Jack was tempted to keep him around and make him squirm a bit more, but he wasn't a sadist. Besides that, he had a meeting in ten minutes and he needed at least eight of those minutes to read up on what exactly he was supposed to already be briefed on. "You remember how to use the door, right? Good. I'll see you around, Malcolm."

Agent Barrett offered a tight smile in return as he exited Jack's office as fast as he could while still retaining a little dignity. Well, you certainly don't see that every day! Jack thought as he flipped through his stacks of reports looking for the budget papers. He hadn't shredded them, had he…?

Part III

It was still bugging him. It shouldn't have been bugging him, but after an insanely busy week behind his desk the phrase was still running through his head like an annoying advertising slogan. 'Not exactly'. What did that mean?! Did it have something to do with…? Could she possibly still…? Or had something else entirely happened in her life that he hadn't known about because he was trapped behind a desk all day and was too tired to do much besides catch the highlights of the game after work?

Somehow the days he spent in Washington had turned into weeks and the weeks into months before he realized they hadn't just talked since she'd transferred to Area 51. Enough was enough. He'd let another week slip by and he'd be damned before letting another one go without laying the issue to rest.

Not being one who enjoyed flying by the seat of his pants, Jack planned everything out. He called in to work the next morning, finally taking advantage to the numerous sick days he'd saved up and blocking off a good two week chunk in his schedule just to make sure that if he caught her in the middle of a mission his whole trip would not have been wasted. He got someone to water his plants (he wouldn't admit it, but they were strangely comforting to have around… whenever he saw them his mind would inevitably wander back to the time Carter had admitted she talked to her plants and that never failed to brighten his day) and made sure to stop his mail and newspaper from coming to his apartment so he wouldn't find his doorstep cluttered with paper by the time he came back. Jack even decided to fly commercially, just to keep the tone of his visit as unofficial as possible (though he severely questioned that decision later as he waited in line to get past security).

For the first time in a very long time, he was no longer anyone even remotely important; he was Jack O'Neill, an ordinary man who was taking time off work to visit friends. Jack found he rather missed being ordinary. There was something to be said for anonymity.

It was well after the normal dinner hour by the time Jack made it out of Colorado Springs Airport. Undaunted and determined to stop that damn phrase from playing through his mind like a broken record, he got in a rental car and started driving. He knew the way to Sam's house by heart, and he was secretly quite glad that nobody had been interested in buying it when she had put it up for sale before her transfer.

He pulled up on the side of the road in front of her house, taking the fact that the porch lights were on to be a sign she was home. When he rang the doorbell, Jack heard quick footsteps approach the door. He couldn't help but smile a bit when Sam opened the door.

"Sir?! What… what are you doing here?"

It was then that Jack realized he'd forgotten to call her and tell her he was planning on going to show up on her doorstep.

"I knew I forgot to do something," he muttered.

Part IV

Sam's eyes kept darting over to the spot at her kitchen table where Jack O'Neill currently sat. The whole situation seemed a bit surreal for her; she hadn't heard one peep from the man in months, and suddenly here he was in her kitchen, sipping a rather large mug of coffee and looking perfectly nervous if the fast tapping of his fingers and the way he kept glancing around the place as if looking for hidden cameras were any indication. Sam had to admit, she was feeling a bit on edge herself.

"Sir, you never did answer my question," she reminded him eventually, putting away half a week's worth of clean dishes in the process. She felt rather than saw Jack's gaze turn and focus solely on her, and she did her utmost to keep the greater part of her focus on her dishes rather than her guest. At least this way it was almost possible to hide the fact that her cheeks were flushing.

"What question?" he finally replied. Sam rolled her eyes. Even after all those months apart, she could still easily recognize when Jack O'Neill was being deliberately obtuse.

"What are you doing here, sir?" Sam reiterated. "Don't you have a job to do on the other side of the country?"

"Well, there's that… but Carter, in Washington they have these wonderful things called 'sick days' and it seems I've saved up enough in my short time there to get away with taking a two week vacation. Do you know what the best part of these 'sick days' is? You don't actually have to have an arrow sticking out of your knee or an alien virus running through your system in order to qualify to use them! You should really look into them -"

"Jack, please, just tell me what you're doing here," Sam interrupted, her voice not much louder than a whisper. Jack heard her though, quite easily. There was an intensity in her tone that made her words impossible to miss.

He sighed. "I had a strange run in with Agent Barrett last week -"

"Jack, I'm serious -"

"No, wait! I promise this has a point." At this, Sam closed her mouth and took a seat opposite him at the table. Her eyes were drawn to his hands as his fingers fiddled with handle of the mug. It was strange how fascinating they were; it was even stranger how much she enjoyed watching them. "So, as I was saying, Agent Barrett came to see me last week at work. Mentioned something about working with you on the Ba'al thing." Sam didn't want to interrupt, so she just nodded, encouraging him to continue. "He said some things that got me thinking." Jack paused, not quite sure if there was a delicate way to word his next question. He quickly realized that there simply wasn't a delicate way to phrase it and decided that being blunt would be the next best thing.

"What did you mean when you said 'not exactly'?"

There were very few times when Sam could remember being completely at a loss for words. Seeing the stargate operate for the first time had induced such speechlessness, as had finally figuring out the formula she used for her senior thesis. It had never been a man who had done that to her, though; it had always been science.

"I don't know what you mean," she finally managed. She tried to think back to her conversation with Malcolm Barrett in the back of the stake out van, but her mind drew a big fat blank instead.

"Agent Barrett said that when he asked if you were seeing someone, you said 'not exactly'. Now, I know it wasn't his place to tell me and it more than likely isn't my place to ask, but what did you mean, Carter? I mean, I know we had -"

"It wasn't that," she cut him off. She caught the brief flicker of disappointment that flashed across his face before he schooled his features back to neutral. "It was… well, while I was at Area 51 I was also taking care of Cassie."

Whatever he'd been expecting, Sam could tell that Jack had not been expecting that. She had a sneaking suspicion that he'd been dreading the idea that she'd found another guy in Nevada, but that would have been as far from the truth as anything. "Cassie? Our Cassie? What was wrong with Cassie?" Sam could hear the unasked question that followed, 'And why didn't I know anything about this?'

"Yes, Cassandra Frasier. She had a bit of a breakdown at the end of last semester and showed up at my door one morning." Sam paused, watching Jack's neutral expression melt into concern for the girl who was as much his adopted daughter as she was everyone else's. She felt a pang of regret that she didn't bother to call him to even inform him about what had happened with Cassie. "Turns out she'd had a rough semester and on top of that was still dealing with Janet's death. She took a semester off and lived with me in Nevada for those months. That's why I told Malcolm 'not exactly'. Even if Prince Charming himself had rode in during that time, between Cassie and work I wouldn't have been able to give him the time of day!"

"Carter, you could kick Prince Charming's ass from here to Dakara," Jack deadpanned. As always, Sam lost the battle to stop herself from smiling at his comments before it had even begun. "I'm sorry I wasn't around to help with Cassie, though. You know, you should have called me."

"I wanted to, at first," Sam explained. "But… Jack, it wouldn't have been fair on you to pull you across the country when you were just starting a new job."

"That's probably the weakest excuse I've ever heard come out of your mouth, Carter." Jack fixed his gaze on Sam, making sure to catch her eye so she couldn't look away. After a silent battle of wills, it was clear that Jack won out when Sam heaved a heavy sigh.

"I know," she conceded quietly. "The thing is… I enjoyed being a mother for Cassie. I never thought I would like it, but I did. I loved it. It was… even though it was only for a few months, it was… it was still really hard to let go."

"Yes, but you didn't have to deal with dirty diapers or teething," Jack quipped softly, trying to lighten the conversation, if only marginally. "From my experience, those things tend to put a damper on the parenting enthusiasm streak."

Sam smiled through the fuzzy mist that was rapidly obscuring her vision. Suddenly she found she couldn't quite manage to make eye contact with him. "Jack…"

"I know, I know," he backpedaled, seeing the tell-tale signs of emotion starting to show. "Sam, I'm sorry I wasn't there."

"I didn't tell you. Hell, I didn't tell anyone! I don't know why, but I didn't so it would have been absolutely impossible for you to have been there!"

"No, not then, not when Cassie went back to school. I'm sorry I wasn't there for you after. I should have called." He shrugged, fidgeting awkwardly and suddenly finding the grain of the wood of the table terribly fascinating. "I should have kept in touch," he admitted, so quietly Sam had to strain to hear him. "I made a promise and so far I'm doing a terrible job keeping it."

"If you recall, I haven't been a chatterbox myself," Sam said lowly, suddenly finding the surface of the kitchen table fascinating as well. "You can't take all the blame."

"But I was the one who said -"

"And I was the one who agreed with you. You're not the only one to blame, Jack."

A heavy silence fell on the room as the two officers continued to sit across from each other, each off in their own world, almost oblivious to the presence of the other. Not entirely, though. Sam knew it would have been impossible for her to completely forget the fact that Jack O'Neill was sitting across from her and she suspected he was in a similar situation.

They'd made a promise all those months ago, sitting on that little pier on a nameless lake in Minnesota. Neither of them could be absolutely sure it would last them until whenever it was Fate decided to cut them some slack, but for the present it was the best either of them could do. And then they'd gone their separate ways. After the fourth week of no calls and sporadic emails, Sam was tempted to just chuck it and try and live out the rest of her life like a normal woman, or at least as close to normal as she ever got. It wasn't until Cassie had shown up that she stopped kidding herself (once again). She would do anything to be able to have the chance to be a mother again, but this time around there was only one person she wanted at her side when that happened.

"Next time, I want you to be there, Jack," Sam finally said, breaking the silence. She caught Jack's eyes as his head snapped up, his gaze and body language strangely intense, despite the relaxed settings.

Jack swallowed. "What makes you think there'll be a next time?"

"Because there will be. There has to be."

Sam held his gaze, saying more things silently than she could ever say out loud. And he heard them, as clearly as if she'd just yelled screamed them at the top of her lungs.

"Yes, there will be."

Part V

They didn't say anything at the airport. Though, really, there wasn't much more that needed to or even could be said. To the people who jostled by them, they were just two old friends walking together; there was nothing about them that stood out about them except for the quiet peace that seemed to surround them.

His hand brushed hers accidentally on purpose, and a few moments later hers did the same. Their fingers wove between each other loosely, curling slightly so as to hold their hands in place against the constant bumps from rude and rushed passersby.

"I'll call you when I land," he said, leaning in just a little closer so he didn't have to raise his voice over the din of the other crowds of people. She turned to look at him, one corner of her mouth curving up into a slightly embarrassed smirk.

"When you get back to your apartment is fine, you know."

"I know, but I have a few months of missed calls to make up for so I figure I best get started while the day's still young." He was closer still now, but she did nothing to pull away. As Jack had told her a few weeks ago, there was something incredibly appealing about anonymity.

"I'll try and visit soon, but I don't know -"

"Don't worry. I'll be there whenever you come."

"Promise?" she whispered so that he almost didn't catch that she'd said something. He leaned in closer, dropping his carry-on between them and pulling her into a tight hug. He thought he felt something warm against his neck, and when he pulled back enough to see her face, he could see the trail of a tear traced out on her cheek.

"Always, Sam. I promise."