AN: I just hope you like this better than the uploader did…
As soon as the words left his mouth, the subtle shift in her stance and the look in her eye was enough to make him regret it.
Although why, he had no idea – f'cryin' out loud, what about that was so terrible?
She was overreacting. And being unreasonable. And a lot of other polysyllabic words that he wasn't going to think of right now.
Was this it? Was he just going to roll over and play good puppy for the rest of this? Apologise when he'd done nothing wrong.
God, the last time she'd given anyone that look, she'd shot them the next second.
What had he done? Eaten a baby?
"F'cryin out loud," he growled, turning away from her and scrubbing his hand through his hair. Regarding the wall for a second, his mind raced.
He could deny everything. Whatever it was, he hadn't done it. Wasn't his fault, wasn't his problem.
For a fleeting second he considered running off back to Washington, leaving this mess that somehow they'd created together and slamming the door on it. She'd been mad all weekend, even if she wasn't saying.
If this was making her this unhappy, was it worth the stress it was putting on both of them? It was barely worth her time, anyway. He was barely worth it.
She was doing this – she was screwing them up royally, and he had no idea why. She seemed to be doing her best to piss him off and god help him, it was working. He was mad at her, he was mad at himself, and he was mad at the pair of them together.
Nearly a damn decade, and this was the best they could come up with? A petty fight over… over nothing?
"Carter, what the hell is up with you?" he demanded, spinning round to look her in the eye - frustrated beyond his already short breaking point. If he was going down, he was going down so damn hard that they wouldn't know what hit him. Never let it be said that O'Neill backed down from a fight.
Well, it was said often about the personal stuff, but he'd conveniently ignore that.
He searched her face, trying to find something, a clue, a hint, an anything that would tell him what the hell was going on with her. This wasn't Carter. Not the Carter he knew.
Not the Carter he loved, his subconscious supplied unhelpfully.
She was looking at him with pure ire in her eyes now, the fire that he so admired turned on him, and not in a good way. There was something else, though, something that she wasn't telling him. Something big, because she didn't sweat over the little things.
And he dreaded finding out what it was - when you'd been through everything she'd been through and done everything she'd done, there was a lot more in 'little things' than most people had.
And she wouldn't tell him. Good Carter's were good soldiers – they deal. They didn't ask for help, they didn't even like taking help when it was offered. It was irritating the hell out of him at that very second.
It didn't help that a good Carter and a good O'Neill were perfect blueprints of each other.
He balled his hands into fists, shoving them in his pocket to resist the urge to either try to shake some sense into her, or just to hold her.
How was he supposed to play the hero and save the day if she didn't tell him how to fix it?
F'cryin' out loud, how was he supposed to know what was wrong unless she told him? He wasn't a miracle worker, he wasn't her – he just did the grunt work.
He was watching her warily now, looking for the signs like he had in the field, looking for the slight shift of weight before that mood, or the glance to the left before that action. He'd used it to co-ordinate with her, once. It just seemed wrong that he was using it against her.
There was still no response.
"Look," he came out with, after the silent accusation had become too much to deal with. "Maybe I'll head back to DC; I'll catch you later, maybe."
He glanced at her once more, and then turned to go. That last word hadn't meant to come out with the finality it had done, but there was nothing he could do about that. What's done was done, and he was starting to wonder if they were… done.