As per your request M1CH3 :P

Enjoy

M.

Chapter 95

Sunday, January 27, 2013

Harper O'Neill was a woman on a mission. Jack knew this by looking at the glint in her eye. What the mission was? He had no clue. So, he let her walk inside his cabin and heard her blabbering about who knew what… He heard, but he wasn't listening. He wasn't in the mood.

Harper knew that'd be the case. She just needed to keep him distracted enough, so she could find what she was searching for. Knowing her brother as she did, she knew the thing she wanted (the thing she needed) was hiding in plain sight somewhere.

"Aha," he said as he plopped himself on the couch and watched amusedly how Harper perused his library as if she would find something new laying in there. He had placed nothing new since his 50th birthday.

Her truth was that she was tired of the game they were playing. They always let him do whatever the fuck he wanted with his life. Truthfully, she sick of watching him wallow, doing nothing about it. Especially after Shannon had mentioned the girl he hated was, in fact, his daughter. He was too blind or stubbornly closed off, hating her, to see it. If she was someone else. She wouldn't be able to understand why her usually blunt and direct brother was so fearful when it came to grabbing what made him happy. But she, like all the O'Neill's, knew too damn well why he was like that. Still, against her family's objections, she decided he was taking too damn long. He was sixty, for crying out loud! And not getting any younger… No matter how fit he still was. Above all, he deserved to be happy.

The entire family was aware he'd received a gift from Sam on his 50th birthday. The mailman was kind enough to let the whole town know that Jack had gotten some birthday gift from a fancy library in New York. Harper, being the romantic she was. Had an inkling there was more to it than just the book he'd carried when he said his goodbyes.

Her eyes widened when she saw it.

"Isn't Daniel Jackson the name of one of the guys you worked with? I think he came to town once or twice. You know, when you asked all of us not to mention being your family?" Harper said, picking up the book and leafing through.

"Yeah," Jack said. Unaware of how her eyes had widened when she found what she thought she was looking for. The book had opened in the middle where an envelope had been pushed deep enough so it wouldn't fall. She took it and slid it in the pocket of her overalls.

"So, is the same guy?" She asked. Closing the book loudly and turning it towards Jack, pointing to Daniel's picture.

"Yup."

"Huh, he looked hotter when he was here, but if you say it's the same guy."

"Harper? Whatcha doin' here?"

"Can't a sister pay a visit to her estranged brother?" She grinned. Then she huffed, "You want to be alone?"

"That's why I came here." She shrugged.

"Okay then. I'll go. But don't blame if someone else comes by…" She threw over her shoulders as she left herself out. She walked to her truck, turned the engine on, and grabbed the envelope. She checked it and smiled brightly. "You are up for a trip, Mrs. Harper."

Monday, January 28, 2013

The doorbell rang not too late that night, but Sam wasn't waiting for anyone. Sure as hell, there weren't any issues at the base since no one had called her. She was thankful for that since she'd just arrived home herself.

She'd ushered Jessica out of her house. Telling her she should enjoy those rare nights when she could get home early. The young woman had jumped at the chance.

"Maybe she forgot something in her rush to get out of here," Sam mumbled as she walked back to the front door. She peered outside and frowned.

"Whoa! No wonder people have a thing for people in uniform!" Harper said, looking at Sam. She'd a last hour meeting with the JCS. Instead of getting changed out of her uniform, she'd rushed out of the base wearing her dress blues. They needed a visit to the dry cleaner. So she'd just grabbed her bag and drove home. "Jack looks hot on those too. May I come in?" Harper grinned brightly, it reminded her of Parker's smile.

Sam shook her head. Harper O'Neill wasn't even on the shortlist of people she thought about when she heard the doorbell before.

"Wanna get changed? I can wait."

"Make yourself comfortable then," Sam said. She moved quickly until she realized it was her sister-in-law in her living room. The one that had openly embraced her the first time she met her. Then had thrown all those words back at her when they'd met in a different life.

"Mommy, you think we can have dinner soon. I'm starving." Parker said.

"Let's ask our guest."

"We have a guest?" Parker frowned in confusion. "Sorry, I was so focused on homework."

"Come," she said. Together they walked to the living room. "Harper, we were about to have dinner. Would you mind joining us?"

"We?" Harper asked. Hoping it would mean only the niece she didn't know and Sam. Turning around, she found a kid that could pass as one of her own and breathed again. "You must be Parker."

"Yeah. Parker McKenna Carter. So, food?" She grinned, making Sam shake her head in amusement.

"Sure. Food sounds awesome."

There was one thing Sam really liked about Jack's sisters. All three of them were chatty and could make conversation about anything at all. So, during those two days, she'd never been uncomfortable as she was jumping from subject to subject with them. Parker had inherited that skill. That was an O'Neill through and through. Since Sam was way shyer that people thought she was.

Before she noticed, dinner was done. Harper had offered to help her clean. Sam just knew there was no way to stop her sister-in-law from helping. So, the three of them had made a quick job of the kitchen. Soon, Parker was being ushered away to finish homework and then settle for the night.

"She's lovely. Fancy you picked McKenna as her name… Parker, daughter of the handsome one, huh?" Harper said wriggling her eyebrows. Sam blushed. "You did a great job raising her, Sam. Especially since she's so damn O'Neill. I know out of the experience just how handful we can be."

"She's not a handful. Just… Communicative."

"Yeah... Communicative. I like that word."

"Coffee?"

"Yes, please!" Sam disappeared to the kitchen again, but Harper just followed.

"What are you doing here, Harper?" Sam asked, turning around to face her.

"Meeting my niece and sister-in-law? One I haven't met and one I haven't seen in ages. Which brings me to the next question…"

Having an inkling of where it was going, Sam gulped.

"Delilah Benson. You know… Until recently I had forgotten the name. Then, I saw you on TV. Saying all those names and it hit me. I met one Mrs. Benson back in the day. J had made me believe that I had bad mouthed someone else. But it was you… Right?"

Sam took a deep breath and nodded once.

"Was I right?" Harper asked then.

"About?"

"You know… What I said to you?" Sam thought about it for a moment. She lowered a coffee mug in front of Harper and then grabbed one for herself. "You know, about not being you because you were so damn cold?" Sam took a deep breath. Nodding towards the living room, they walked in silence until they both were sitting comfortably. "So?"

"I'm not sure," Sam confessed.

"Hmm. What about this? Do you still feel this?" She said, passing her the envelope she had stolen from Jack's library. Sam frowned in confusion at first as she grabbed it. With an encouraging nod, she took the card out and she couldn't help the small smile it brought to her lips.

She remembered, albeit faintly, the image of the boy fishing at a pond. It was the 'Have a fishing birthday' what had caught her attention back then. Fishing, his keyword to remind her he was there waiting for her. Even if they hadn't even confessed their feelings before that stupid barrier.

She couldn't help but trace the golden raised lettering, in the same way, she'd done when she bought it. Unaware that Jack had done the same time and time again. She opened the card then and smiled sadly at it.

It's taken you 17.855 days to reach this very important day. I love you. I might not be there with you, but I'm celebrating your life. There's too much I want to say, but as usual, it's never the right time. One day, my love. One day I'll see you again. One day I'll hold you so tightly that every piece that was broken will be suddenly back in place. Just hold them all for me. I'll be there… One day.

Magnets, Jack. They can't keep us apart forever. I love you,

Always.

She read it and couldn't help the tear that fell from her eye. Until two days ago, he could still make her feel like she was complete. His hugs were slowly melding her back together, even if he didn't realize it. She sucked her lower lip for a second, then bit it harshly. When she remembered he had all but smashed the remainders just days ago.

Exchanging the card for the coffee mug she had laid on the table. She grimaced as nausea hit. She lowered the mug as fast as she could. Taking deep controlled breaths to avoid just puking up what she'd just eaten all over the carpet.

"Are you okay?" Harper asked, and it seemed a second before she was sitting beside her. "I'm sorry. I didn't know it would distress you so much."

Sam nodded once. Her world shifted, and she ran for the bathroom. The contents of her stomach were quickly gone. Her gut feeling going for the worse thing she can think of, as things are.

"You got to be kidding me," She said. As she splashed cold water on her face. Diving for her phone, she checked the stupid calendar. Yes, effectively she'd missed her last two periods. But she was so damn busy, sex-driven, and distracted that she hadn't noticed it.

"You are forty-four, Sam. It can just be menopause…" She pep talked herself, but at the same time, she wondered if God had a weird sense of humor. One that involved her being placed in situations that ended up being more than she could handle.

"Everything okay in there?" Harper's voice called out from the outside.

'No. Nothing is fucking okay here.' Sam thought. "Yes," she answered, nonetheless. She got out, the color had completely drained from her face.

"I'm sorry. I didn't think this through." Harper apologized. "J always said I'm a fucking ticking bomb. That I just explode in the worse possible way. At least, I now know I wasn't right," she smiled warmly. "You're still the same woman I met. Or that at least you still love him as much as you did."

Sam shook her head and blushed. It's the eyes, she thought. There's something in the damn O'Neill eyes that she's a sucker for. "More than before, even…" she confessed. "It's just devastating that we can't seem to work. As if we aren't supposed to be together, no matter how much we want to."

"Why would you say that? I mean, I know J's back at the cabin mourning for you. When he could just be here and fix whatever mess could've been created by eleven years of unknown variables. If what you had isn't salvageable… Then there's no hope for anyone."

"I can't…" Sam gasped. "I can't be responsible for all the love in the world, Harper. Not when I struggle with my own."

"I'm not saying you're responsible. I just saying that yours is epic. It was amazing to see it in action. This," she said, touching the forgotten envelope. "The book, the dinner you made happen for him…. I know there's something he listens to too. Returning…. Everything is just proof of how much you're willing to do for him."

"And it was all for naught, I'm not worthy of it at all," Sam mumbled, not quite knowing why she was telling Harper these things.

"He's an ass," she blurted. "Yet, he's the best man you can find… I'll tell you something most people don't know. He's fucking terrified of having you back. Not for any of the reasons you might believe… The idea that you could make him that happy again petrifies him. Because every fucking time he was happy… Something equally wrong or worse happened to him."

Sam frowned.

"He married Sarah, right? We were still at the party. When he received his orders and got deployed. Sarah got pregnant after a lot of trying. He went MIA. They never recovered after that, though. Charlie helped… but he wasn't the same. He was afraid that if he gave up, something bad would happen. But Charlie was such a lovely kid… It truly was impossible for him not to cave in."

"Then Charlie…" Sam said. Harper nodded.

"Yeah. He was happy with you… and you've ended up going missing for all this time. Don't get me wrong, he's one of the strongest, most resilient men in this world. But that doesn't mean he isn't fucking terrified of getting you back. Maybe it's subconscious. Maybe he's just self-sabotaging himself. Thinking that by being miserable at least you have a chance of being happy. But you aren't, right?"

"No…"

"I'm here because I care, Sam. We loved you the moment we met you. Because he couldn't stop talking about you since he met you. We knew more about you than we knew about him. You're part of our family, whether you still like it or not. We want you back... and Parker. We want her to know us. We want her to know what it's like to have enough cousins that it can drive you insane. We want her to know the overwhelming love that somehow translates into very loud family meetings. We want you with him… Because you all deserve to be happy."

Harper stood up and Sam walked her to the door. The next thing she knew was that she was being embraced. It wasn't Jack's, but it made some parts of Sam's battered heart beat again. It gave her hope.

"You should come by the town, bring her. If you don't want to stay with him. There's an inn, and there's plenty of space in every house. It'll be good for you and for her to be surrounded by people who love you unconditionally. I'm sure she knows you love her like that, but I'm not sure you've experienced that since you left."

"I'll think about it."

"Don't think too much." She smiled. "Go kiss him senseless. I'm sure things will start to fall in place soon after that."

Sam laughed at it. Harper didn't know they'd tried that. She didn't know they'd been trying to solve their issues and fix their wounds by not speaking at all. Whatever happened. The only certain thing now was that she needed a medical appointment ASAP.

Shaking her head, she walked to her room and brushed her teeth. To try to get rid of the bitter taste of the bile before walking to Parker's room.

"Hey, mom. Ready for reading time?" Parker smiled, patting her bed.

"Yes. Let's do this." Sam smiled. She made herself comfortable on Parker's bed and they read as she caressed her daughter's hair.

"Mom," Parker said as they reached their last page for the night.

"Yes?"

"Who's Harper?" Sam took a deep breath.

"Ah, she's General O'Neill's sister," she answered with the truth while sitting on the bed.

"Really? Another one?" P said surprised. "And you know her too?"

"Yes."

"Okay. I liked her."

"Yeah, I like her too," Sam said, standing up and placing a kiss on her forehead.

"Mommy?" Parker asked again, making Sam chuckle.

"Yes, P?"

Parker doubted. Then sighed, she knew if her mom didn't like the question. She would simply avoid answering it. "When will my daddy show up? We've been ourselves for a long while now. Aren't these our forever names?"

What could she answer to that? 'I'm sorry, P. Your dad didn't know you were born. It's kinda half my fault because he didn't realize that you belonged to him. He didn't ask, and I didn't tell. Oops?'

She'd just learned that Jack had never realized Parker was his daughter. But he hadn't exactly come searching for them after he knew. Heck, Harper had just told her that he was back at the cabin. She took a deep breath and bite her lips to contain the tears that were threatening to fall.

"I don't know, P. I really don't know." She answered instead.