Once she let Jack in to her house, there was no way he was ever going to leave. He convinced her to eat. He started her out easy, with jello and beer, and worked it up to the first real meal she'd had in weeks.
Then he'd tucked her into bed, and went to sleep on her couch.
She woke up much later than she'd meant to. Close to ten o'clock the next day, she found him on the phone with her obsessively organized notebook of numbers and appointments before her, like he'd been since 7:00am. He'd already done a bunch of things she'd never even thought of. He'd ordered her father's death certificates, and arranged a Tok'ra ceremony (minus the throwing the body into the kwosh, he was very anti-kwosh) before the Earth one. He'd also made an appointment with the funeral director to plan the Earth funeral. He also planned a wake afterward at his own house.
He was about to start canceling the wedding plans, but that felt… weird.
He turns around, and there she is. Standing in the rumpled clothes from last night. Her eyes were red and large and puffy.
"Breakfast?" he asks.
"I think at this point we might as well call it lunch," she says.
"You wish is my command," he says, "Provided it can be made out of your meager supplies. This is something I don't miss about being on a front-line team. I can keep groceries around now."
"Toast," she says, pulling some out of the freezer and putting it in her toaster. He reaches into the fridge to grab her jelly, and into her drawer to grab a knife.
He doesn't search for peanut butter, because he knows she hates it. Pete usually forgot and smeared it all over her toast before she could protest. When he did remember, he would try to convince her that there was nothing worse than toast without peanut butter, which just goes to show you he didn't spend a whole lot of time with Goa'uld.
There is no fumbling, he knows where everything is. He's only been at her house a couple of times for team nights, but he didn't forget where she kept anything. Pete had spent the night dozens of times, and he always had to ask where she kept things.
"I made an appointment with the funeral director for two, will that work?" he asks.
"Yeah," she mutters, "You'll come?"
"You need to get this through your thick skull a-l-w-a-y-s," he says slowly.
She hugs him.
The toast pops up, and he covers it with jelly before putting it in front of her on the island. She really doesn't want to eat anything, but he's staring at her so he does.
"I'm going to go get ready for the day," she says after she's eaten the last bite.
"You want me to start on this?" Jack says, gesturing to the page of wedding stuff.
Just by looking at this he could have told her that something was wrong. Sara had a hell of a lot more than one notebook page of plans before their wedding.
"To be honest, Pete was doing most of the wedding planning. Mostly I just have to tell the people that are close to me that the wedding is off. And with my dad dead and Daniel missing, and you knowing…"
"I'll tell Teal'c and General Hammond. Since I've never had a conversation with your brother, you should probably handle that one."
"And Walter, he'll… spread it around the base discreetly," she says.
"Don't worry about it," Jack says softly, encouraging her.
"How could I let it get this far? I'm so stupid," she sobs.
"There are a lot of people who take it farther. Who take it all the way to the fifth anniversary," he says.
Her heart clenches. That's what he thought he was going to have to deal with - her being married to Pete forever.
"I'll never do this to you again," she promises, reaching toward him for a hug.
"It's ok, Carter."
"I'm going to get ready," she says, standing near him for just an extra second.
After she disappears into the bathroom, Jack picks up the phone.
"Colonel Carter, do you require my presents as you grieve?" Teal'c says.
"Ah, actually, it's Jack."
"You are contacting me using Colonel Carter's phone identification number."
"Yeah, I came over to check on her."
"Is it not early in the morning?"
Jack sighs, "Look, Sam wanted me to tell you that her wedding is off."
Teal'c might not actually grin that often, but Jack can FEEL the grin through the phone.
"I would like to offer my congratulations."
"You're supposed to do that when people get engaged, not when they get… unengaged," Jack stammers.
"I think this might be an exception to that social convention," Teal'c says.
"Well, I'd better go, there are more calls to make," Jack says.
"You will take care of Colonel Carter," Teal'c says firmly.
"Yeah, I'm helping as much as you can with grief."
"You will take care of Colonel Carter," Teal'c repeats.
Jack can't remember ever being intimidated by a 'don't hurt her or die' speech, but if anyone can intimidate him, it's certainly going to be Teal'c.
His next call is Walter. "Holding down the fort all right?"
"Sir, you do actually know that I am not in charge of this place when you are gone, right? I am missing quite a few ranks for that job."
"I know that you aren't officially in charge of the place. But you do know that you are really in charge even when I am there."
"Everything is fine here, sir. How is Colonel Carter?"
"What makes you think I would know?"
"You called me from her phone, sir."
"When is the last time you missed something?" Jack asks.
"The time they stole the 'Gate from under my nose, sir."
"Ah, Walter, that was years ago, don't be so hard on myself."
"So, Colonel Carter?"
"She is doing all right. She… called off her wedding."
Silence.
"She wants everyone to know quietly, I was hoping that you could take care of this."
"Understood, Sir."
"And I was hoping that's as far as the rumor would go. That the, uh… reason she called it off wouldn't make it into the rumor mill,"
"Of course, sir," Walter says, sounding offended.
"Thank you, Walter."
"Sir, may I just say it is about time," Walter says.
"Thank you, Walter, I quite agree."
-0-0-0-
With every crisp crease of the flag, and every note of taps, Sam is unraveling.
With every squeeze of the shoulder with his big callused hand, with the lean of his head, Sam is being woven back together.
She stands to receive the flag into her hands.
The eulogies begin. Hammond is up first. He tells a story about her dad when they were cadets. Then he says something cryptic about Jacob serving the world. It's something that the SGC contingent in the room understands, but which no one else does.
Now it's her turn. She gets up to speak, but nothing comes out of her mouth. She feels like she is choking to death. Jack gets up and rushes to her side.
She was hoping that just his presence would fix it, but it didn't.
"Jacob was a good man," Jack says, tilting the microphone away from her, "A really good man. You could put him in an absolute snake den, and he would stay a good man." Most of the SGC contingent manage to stifle their laughter.
"He was courageous, and kind, and wise. And in the end he gave up his life for others. But that's not even my favorite part about Jacob Carter. He was a damn good father."
Sam nods her head through the tears streaming down his face. He puts an arm around her, and ushers her back to their seat.
-0-0-0-
"Sir," she says softly, "I think we need to talk about…"
For the first second he thought she wanted to have the "us" talk at work. Then he realized that it was about Daniel.
"He's not dead," he says. She's had enough death to worry about lately.
"Sir," she protests.
"I'm not having a funeral for him when he's not dead."
She nods her head, but he knows she doesn't believe him. Maybe they should just have the funeral. Maybe she needed closure. But he was really quite sure that Daniel wasn't dead.
-0-0-0-
Sam's so excited. Daniel is actually alive! The flag wrapped around his body, while not being an American flag, reminded her of the triangle she'd received at her father's funeral.
She likes flags around live friends better than flags covering caskets of dead family.
"So you have your typical 'back from the dead' week-long leave," Jack tells Daniel.
"Great! You know… You invited me up to the cabin a whole bunch of times. I was wondering if we could go fishing over this leave," Daniel says.
"You want to go fishing?" Jack asks in surprise. Daniel also detects a hint of disappointment, and he isn't sure why. He's trying not to be offended by it.
"I would also like to accompany you," Teal'c says.
"But you hate fishing," Jack reminds him.
"Yes, but I feel as though our team should bond. Colonel Carter, will you be accompanying us as well?" Teal'c asks.
"Uh… yeah," Sam replies. Jack looks over at her, trying to figure out why she isn't as disappointed as he is. Then she realizes that she's just so happy that Daniel's alive. She wants to spend time with her team. And he isn't going to begrudge her that. It's not like he really thought they would be going "fishing" this early anyway.
"Look, if you don't want us to come," Daniel says, confused by the delay.
"No, not at all, we're all going to go fishing," Jack says.
Sam snorts.
He glares at her.
She keeps a comment about a fishing pole under wraps.