The Colour of Pain Chapter 5
**
Jack O'Neill grimaced as the nurse wiped the back of his hand with the antiseptic swab. She hadn't listened when he'd protested he'd cleaned it in the field. They never did. She'd had a very sadistic looking smile on her face when Doc Frasier had announced he'd need an anti-histamine jab, as it looked like he was having an allergic reaction. Ok, possibly his hand wasn't meant to be quite as big as it currently was and all right, he'd admit it was a little itchy but surely it'd be fine in a few days by itself? No-one had listened. They never did. And the nurse hadn't listened with a big, sadistic looking, smile on her face. As she left to prepare the shot, Jack noticed a familiar figure leaving one of the treatment rooms.
"Carter!"
When she looked up, Jack noticed she looked unhappy and tired, as usual, but she had put back some of the weight she'd lost during her long hospital stay. Most of the red tinge had disappeared from round her scar, but it was still obvious. They hardly spoke these days and it had been weeks since his last, painful, attempt at conversation with her. She was continually going out of her way to avoid him and he had to admit, it more than smarted.
It plain hurt.
As she walked towards him, he realised she was hardly limping at all. He knew she'd been getting intensive physiotherapy but he had no idea it had been going so well. But then, he now only ever saw her sitting behind her desk, in her lab. Busy. She'd talk to him later, experiments going, collating important data or some other such excuse. Still, he had to try if the opportunity presented itself, as now.
"You're looking good, Carter," he lied.
"You're looking pale, Sir," she replied honestly. Nodding towards his hand she asked, sounding concerned, "What happened?"
She was actually asking him a question? Not making excuses and running away like a frightened animal?
"Well, it was a… thing…" he told her, gesticulating with his other hand. "Bit like a giant, fat, cat, forget what they called it. Anyway, they said it was friendly…"
She couldn't help but smile a little at his tone and the accompanying frown and he noticed the slight twitch, as the corners of her mouth turned upwards, just a little.
Oh, great! Don't tell me I'll have to keep injuring myself to get her to talk to me!
"Glad you're amused, Major, but I may never play the piano again!"
The smile became a little bigger.
"And we're all mighty glad about it too, Colonel!" yelled someone from across the room, to an explosion of laughter from most of its inhabitants.
Carter's smile grew bigger again.
That smile. A genuine one, not one of her "I'm fine" fakes. Had it really been almost 10 months since he'd last seen it? How had he survived? He'd have to build on his success by being attacked by progressively smaller and cuter animals, obviously, and receiving progressively more serious injuries to make her laugh. There were worse reasons to die, he reflected.
"I have to go and check some experiments I have running, Sir. Good luck with the piano."
A joke! A bone fide joke! Hardly a rib cracker he'd admit, but it was a start. And she was still smiling a little. Jack was visiting the Tok'Ra in a few days and he wondered if any of them kept pets…
"Ready for your shot, Colonel?"
Watching his former 2IC leaving the infirmary, Colonel Jonathan "Jack" O'Neill, fully qualified and certified needle-phobe, hardly felt a thing.
**
End of Chapter 5.