Tomorrow did not suck less.

Tomorrow consisted of a morning full of especially long briefings, an afternoon of breaking pencil tips on the budget with the accountant whose name he really ought to learn after all the time they'd spent together that week, and three SG-teams, including SG-1, getting delayed off-world for nearly three hours by what turned out to be nothing more than an overheated something or other in the mainframe of their dialing computer. Because SG-1 was off carrying the metaphorical flag to the monthly SGC check-in with the Land of Light, he had to deal with a whole boatload of technology geeks trying to fix the problem without his personal technology geek there to translate for him.

Worst of all for the general progression of his day, Carter was in a bad mood.

A real bad mood, too. Not the entertaining kind.

Apparently, she was taking the extra 36 seconds added onto her pop-tart toasting time personally, as if the appliance was mocking her. As a rule, Carter stood nothing worse than being mocked. The delay had somehow snowballed enough to make her ten minutes late to their morning briefing, and by the time he met up with her for lunch before her scheduled 1300 departure, something critically polysyllabic had broken in her lab, her computer had eaten her latest three mission reports, and the cafeteria was serving goulash. Ordinarily, she was actually one of the few people on base who could stand the institutional goulash, but today she hated it and he had enough of an instinct for self-preservation to know that this was not the time to remind her of her customary likes and dislikes.

The dark cloud that apparently followed her all the way to P3X-797 -- he actually had to remember planetary designations now -- was doomy enough that both Daniel and Teal'c approached him after returning to Earth to ask, in their own respective ways, if everything was all right at home.

Daniel and Teal'c might like him a whole lot, but he was under absolutely no illusions -- if he ever did wrong by Sam Carter, former brothers-in-arms or otherwise, those two would band together and kill him.

"Everything's fine," Jack answered, waving a hand as if to somehow explain her mood without actually saying she's just crazy aloud. Daniel would probably take her side. He was crazy, too.

She hadn't managed to shake it off by the time he finally escaped the fiscal clutches of his overdue budget report at 2230. At this point, he didn't care if he'd just agreed to serve nothing but goulash and jell-o in the cafeteria until the end of time so long as it was done. He went down to Sam's lab, fully intending to fetch her and whisk her off to late night diner food, possibly followed by renting a movie stupid enough to put this whole unfortunate day out of his mind and break her out of her funk enough to get some of the sympathy and the sex that he had missed out on the night before. Instead, in between angry keystrokes, she informed him that this was day number seven and that he should go back to his place without her.

"You're going home?" This was so officially not part of the plan. "Please tell me this isn't about the toaster."

"It's not about the toaster." She banged a few more computer keys and then reconsidered. "It started with the toaster. But my plants need watering, and I have a lot of work still to finish up here, and it's been a really long day, and I really just want to go to bed, and..." She took a breath and offered him what passed as a weary smile, even though she was still glaring. "I'm not going to be a lot of fun to be around. It's probably better if I just go home."

Her bad mood was back to endearing, and suddenly, in spite of his own crappy day, he couldn't think of anything he wanted to do more than rub her feet until she fell asleep. "Not a good enough reason," he declared.

"Jack..."

"I'll water your plants on my way home."

"My house isn't exactly on your way." Sam was shaking her head, but that didn't sound like an outright dismissal of his idea.

"If I water your plants and pick up take-out while you finish up here, will you come over?" She didn't even have to do anything; he was whipping himself.

The beginnings of a real smile. "You know I'm just going to fall asleep."

"I know." He really did, and having her there, even cranky and tired and with legs tightly shut, still seemed like a better deal than spending the night alone.

He had it bad.

Not that that was news, but sometimes he was less obvious about it than others.

He knew he'd won when she asked, "Chinese?"

He waved at her phone. "You dial, I'll drive. And you'd better be home before it gets cold."

She didn't argue, but she made no promises, either, only gave a noncommittal nod. She reached for his hand before he could take off on his errands. "Thanks. For this."

She looked genuinely grateful, and he wondered again about her lingering insecurities, if she might ever have seriously thought that her neurotic appliance repair or subsequent sulk might be the imperfect straw that broke his interest in her and would keep him from wanting her in his bed every night. He really would have say something about that to her at some point.

For now, he only said, "Things will be better tomorrow."

Her eyes narrowed playfully. He wanted to take the credit for her getting over most of her mood, but really, it wasn't in her nature to remain unpleasant for long. "When did you become an optimist?"

Oh, it had nothing to do with optimism, and everything to do with his new, improved plan for the evening.

He was a man on a mission.

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