No Evil Angel
Chapter 1
He Speaks Holidays
At the beginning of winter, he takes her downtown to do a little shopping. She's more open to the idea then, especially since his mom, reluctantly, agreed to take them in for Thanksgiving.
"So, it's customary to bring a gift when someone is going to be feeding us?"
The winter coat she's wearing is mostly for show, but it's no where near as nice the one he bought for her in Ver Isca. When he told her to pick one out, she went with the first one she saw, she doesn't really like public places that much, or buying things that she needs, and he thinks it's because she's spending all of his money.
Knows that in a different lifetime, in a different world, she'd probably get a kick out of spending all of his money, but the joviality he saw when he went with her to the tailor in Ver Isca and they took her measurements, was long gone when she went over to the rack and picked up the first grey coat she saw.
Wishes there was a way she could get a job, even by doing something at home—at least when they were with the SGC, she was able to help out with translating, with ideas and the opinion of an outsider. She's come to him once or twice with ads from the paper, asking if she can apply, and he's running out of polite ways to tell her that he doesn't think she'd make a good waitress.
"Yes and no." Holds her hand to his arm tighter as they walk down the snow dusted streets. They had the first snowfall, just a sprinkle last night, and she woke up this morning exhilarated and wanting to go out for once.
"Cameron, all of your Tau'ri rules are so—"
"If we were going to anyone else's house on Thanksgiving, we'd bring a present." They stop outside of a store window, looking at how the table is decorated for the holidays.
"So, it's the festivities which call for the gift?"
"No, because if we were just going to go visit my mom, we'd still want to bring a gift."
She groans in frustration, covering her cool blushed cheeks with a big pair of mittens he had stashed away. Her long fingers don't even come close to meeting the rounded ends. "How about if we ever meet anyone new or go to another's house, I just bring a present?"
"Honey, why don't you just follow my lead on this one?"
"Because if I'm going to integrate with your society, I'm going to need to learn the social cues eventually, Cameron." Sounds annoyed, maybe she is because this is about the third time she's had to explain something like this to him. The red in her cheeks starts to grow as she becomes more frustrated because Tau'ri do have some really stupid customs to follow.
His gloved hand grasps hers and he smiles at her, reminding himself that he needs to slow down when explaining these things to her, that he needs to be more patient with her so she can learn and be more independent.
"Okay, look—" he points to the storefront window where a table is decorated with a red plaid tablecloth. There are six places set with three layers of dishes, a wine and water glass at, and about six different types of utensils that he couldn't even try to explain her, because he's typically just a fork and knife type guy "—that's how we usually set a table for Thanksgiving."
"There is a lot of accoutrements."
"Oh yeah, it gets really confusing."
When he laughs, she grins, and he doesn't know if this is her following his social cues, or if this is her letting go of what could have been an argument with him.
"See the thing in the middle of the table?" His finger taps against the window trying to point beyond the platter of food at the front, and before the turkey at the back. "That's called a cornucopia, it's filled with fruits and vegetables, we use it as a center piece."
"All right—" her eyes squint, her body shifting left and right to see "—what's a center piece?"
"It's something we put on display in the middle of the table while we eat. It changes depending on what holiday we're celebrating."
"Are there a lot of these holidays?"
"Three major ones, a few minor ones—"
"And everybody celebrates in the same way?"
"Well, no—"
She stops staring at the display and turns back to him, one of his old wool caps almost falling over her eyes, her hair frizzing out from underneath. "What do you mean?"
"Well, a lot of people celebrate holidays different—a lot of them have their own customs—hell, some people celebrate entirely different holidays and—"
She groans again, resting her head against his coat, and holding onto his arm.
He laughs again, his hand rubbing up and down her back. "Why don't we just handle this on a case-by-case basis?"
For the first time since they came back from Ver Isca, she pouts at him.
When they lived in the village, she would do it all the time to try and coerce him into doing something she wanted to do, that he was hesitant to. He never was upset—not really—not most of the time—he would just act that way, so he got to see that expression on her face.
Her pout is something so definitive of her, of who she used to be.
Who she could have been.
Playful, sly, flirty, someone so in control of themselves that it's no wonder people worshipped her as a God.
Now it also works to give her a nativity, an innocence he's never known in her because since their first meeting, she's had to outsmart everyone around her. She's had to know the topic before it was introduced and be able to debate whoever came up against her, be able to explain her side of the story, but without using words that would make her seem too intelligent.
Too much of a threat.
The thumb of his glove swipes over her fat bottom lip, and it tucks away as she grins at him, maybe thinking the same thing. Maybe remembering when things were simpler, and the only thing that mattered was that they were in love.
It's still the only thing that matters.
But they're both carrying so much, that sometimes their perspective skews and they forget they're on each other's side.
He leans in to kiss her on the snow powdered street, tucked into an alcove against the window to a store where he's going to show her how to buy a cornucopia center piece that has absolutely no value other than what they're told—has no value other than the memory of purchasing it together.
He never gets to kiss her though, because down the street, maybe five stores away, someone yells something, in a voice so raw, so shrill, that through the cracks of their cadence, he can hear their emotion. Remembers hearing men speak like that before, when he was on basic training, before he was an approved pilot, before the air force, when he was just some low-level private trying to negotiate peace in villages halfway around the world.
Being at an emotional flashpoint makes men insane.
He remembers, being told about Birdie's death, about her murder, about the treatment of his wife. The two people he would've gladly given up his life for without even a second thought, without a blink of his eyes.
Realizes too late.
Doesn't connect the dots on time, what this man intends to do. How he spits hateful comments about the military—about how they're still technically without the 'military' neighborhood near the mountain—about oppression and lies.
And then he clicks a trigger.
A/N: Story title borrowed from Shakespeare's Love's Labor's Lost. Chapter title borrowed from Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor