Mysterious Distance

Part 16

After they had put Gracie to bed, Jack and Sam sat in the living in comfortable silence. Jack was sitting in his recliner by the fire reading an old Nero Wolfe novel. Sam still couldn't get over him wearing glasses and kept glancing over at him as perused the paperwork she'd received from Daniel's attorney after his 'death'. She had been avoiding going through it but she had stuffed it into her bag before she'd left figuring she might get bored with fishing. She had worked her way through his will, everything of course went to her and Gracie, when she found a sealed envelope with her name on it. She opened it and found a note from Daniel. It was dated a couple of months after Grace's birth.

Sam,

If you're reading this, I'm probably dead. You know why I say probably. Let me start of by saying I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm a coward. I'm sorry I didn't have the guts to point this out to you on my own. Though by now you may already have figured it out, but I doubt it. You're good at being oblivious when you want to be. I'm sorry for helping you take the easy way out. I'm sorry for doing this to Jack. I'm sorry for taking you and Grace away from him. I guess ultimately I am a selfish bastard who was searching for some small semblance of happiness, but I do love you both very much. Not the way Jack loves you, but still I do love you. I'm sorry, Sam. I hope one day you, Jack, and Gracie will forgive me.

Love,

Daniel

There was a second sheet of paper behind the note, Sam, still stunned, tried to read it. It didn't make sense the first time she read it, so she read it again and again and again. It still didn't make sense. The sentences didn't make sense. Her eyes kept lighting on several words and phrases that in no way should go together, like 'Grace Catherine Jackson', 'paternity', 'Jonathan J. O'Neill', and '99.9 certainty'.

"Carter, you okay?"

Sam looked up at Jack who had pulled of his reading glasses and set his book aside. He looked concerned, but she didn't know how to answer him. She wasn't okay. Everything she had thought to be a fact in her life for the last six years was not. Her life had been false. Everything in Jack's life had been false. He wasn't 'Uncle Jack'. He was 'Daddy' and 'Daddy' was really 'Uncle Daniel'.

She realized Jack was now crouching before her his hands resting lightly on her knees. "Carter…Sam, what is it?"

She folded the papers quickly trying to fight the urge to push him out the way and throw Daniel's note and the test results in the fire. Jack had been wonderful to her these past weeks. In fact, he had been wonderful to her these past few years, never letting on that he was angry or resentful over her marriage to Daniel. She knew she had hurt him then. She was afraid to lose what she had from him now. Her father was running around with the Tok'ra. Teal'c was with his family and leading the Jaffa. Daniel was out glowing on some other plane of existence. Jack was all she really had left. He would hate her for this. She deserved to be hated for what she'd done to him.

She handed him the papers and closed her eyes against what she would surely see in his own eyes.

"Oh."

He didn't sound surprised. Her eyes snapped open. He didn't look surprised either. "You knew?"

"Yeah."

"Daniel told you?"

"No," he replied calmly. "I didn't even know he knew for sure."

"Then how?"

"She was born with O'Neill eyes. Brown eyes at birth run in my family."

"And you never said anything?" she felt irrationally angry.

"What would I have said?" he asked in disbelief. "'Sorry to screw up your happy little family, but guess what? The kid's mine.' No, I'm not that much of a bastard." He looked tired and sad. He'd been living with this a long time. "You're not stupid, Carter. You could have seen it if you wanted to. No one should have had to tell you."

"So what now?" she asked. It was a question she was afraid to ask and one that she needed desperately to know the answer to.

Jack stood and smiled bitterly. "Uncle Jack will always be there for Gracie…and her mother."

Sam watched him cross the living room and disappear into his room.

Sam lay in bed fitfully. She couldn't quite seem to wrap her mind around the idea that Jack O'Neill was the father of her daughter. And he was right; she must be completely stupid not to have seen it before. Gracie was very much like Jack and not only because of the way she imitated and idolized him. Her hands were constantly fiddling or moving. Her hair was nearly the same color as Jack's when she first met him, though the curl she inherited from her mother's side. And above all the same dark soulful brown eyes. They were not Jacob's eyes. She should have known by the eyes. She had always loved his eyes. And his hands. She had always like to watch his hands whether cleaning his weapon, gesturing madly, doodling, making those origami animals, throwing pots…

Today, for the first time in a very long time, she had had allowed herself to think of Jack as a man and not her daughter's safe, reliable 'Uncle Jack'. She realized that she still very much wanted that man and she was surprised to find how much she still loved that man. Even though he was the same man she had run away from for too many years. She was tired of running. It seemed that all her running had only brought her back to the same place- Jack O'Neill.

She crawled out of bed. She checked first on Gracie. Her daughter was still sleeping peacefully clinging to her Jaffa teddy. Sam stopped in front of Jack's door and took a deep breath before quietly opening it to find the room empty. She searched the rest of the cabin but he wasn't there. She stepped out on the back deck expecting to see him studying the stars with his telescope, but he wasn't doing that either.

The breeze carried a swell of strings and the melancholy voice of a man she had learned to identify as Caruso. She walked around the cabin to see the light shining through the windows and open door of Jack's studio. She stood just outside, building up the courage that had fled now that she was here.

THWAP

THWAP

THWAP

Curiosity got the better of her at the sound. She looked through the door to see Jack's back to her working over a low canvas covered table with a half empty bottle of Jack Daniel's and a stoneware mug resting on it.

THWAP

The mug bounced but didn't spill.

THWAP

THWAP

Jack tossed the huge ball of clay in his hand down extra hard and it flattened. He pounded on it with his fists. Then he wiped his clay-covered hands on his black t-shirt before taking a drink out of his mug.

Caruso's voice trailed off and Sam held her breath afraid he would hear her. She heard the CD player shift to a new CD and Bob Dylan's gravely voice began.

"'There must be some way out of here,' said the joker to the thief."

"Are you just going to stand there and stare at me all night, Carter?" Jack asked, not even bothering to turn around. He set his drink down and began pulling the clay up off the canvas, forming in into a rough sphere.

Sam stepped over the threshold and over to him.

THWAP

She winced at the loud sound as it momentarily overpowering Dylan.

THWAP

"What are you doing?" That wasn't the question she wanted to ask, but it was the only one she felt confident enough to ask.

"Making sure there are no air bubbles. Air bubbles in the clay can cause it to explode when it's fired," he explained tonelessly.

THWAP

"Oh, so you're not pretending that that's my head?"

"I would never hurt you." He turned to her then and she was taken aback by the anguish she saw in his eyes. "Is that it? Is that how you've seen me all these years, why you ran away, because you thought I was a man like that? I do have blood on my hands. Bucketfuls. But I would never hurt you," he repeated. "I'm not Jonas Hanson."

"I know," she said quietly, unable meet his eyes any longer. She had meant that comment as a joke. She didn't know what to say now. She had never seen him so openly pained. She did know how to deal with a hurt Jack O'Neill. A man that had been hurt by her.

"'So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late.'"

'Good point, Bob,' she thought.

THWAP

"Jack…"

THWAP

"Jack, I'm sorry."

THWAP

"Jack," she touched her shoulder and he cringed away from her.

"Don't," he grunted.

THWAP

"Jack, please listen to me."

THWAP

Jack turned to her angrily, "Why should I? How many times over the years was I willing to listen? Willing to talk? Willing to do anything you wanted me to do? How many times did you shut me out?"

"Damn it, Jack! You've done the same thing to me!" She shot back suddenly angered by his accusations, even if they were true.

"When?"

"When I went to see you after the second Ancient download and when we were on the ship after that. "

"Oh, for cryin' out load, Carter! I was dying. My mind was swimming with all kinds of crazy shit. I'm lucky I could form a coherent sentence. Besides you were with that idiot Pete. It wasn't my place to say anything."

"I would have given him up for you. It's you I really wanted anyway."

"You had a hell of a way of showing it! You got engaged," he bitterly pointed out.

"I wouldn't have if you had said something."

"Why would I have? You shut me out. A guy gets a little tired of that after a while."

He was right. She knew it. Denying it would do no good. "I'm sorry, Jack. I'm so sorry."

"Why? Why are you sorry? Because you're alone now? Because you don't have Daniel to cuddle up to at night?"

"How can you say that?"

"Easily. You were fucking my best friend for years and turned up married to him the day Hammond had my resignation letter on his desk. That's how!"

"You resigned?" she gasped in disbelief.

"I sent the letter to Hammond the day after you ran off to San Diego."

"I didn't know."

"You were too busy running away," he turned his back to her and picked up his ball of clay again.

THWAP

"I thought you would hate me," she said softly, almost afraid to give the thought voice, as if that would make it true. "For being so weak and behaving like cheap whore."

"If I was going to hate you, I would have left you in that bar the moment I saw you making out with that brute," he responded, his voice gruff. "Besides it's not like I haven't had nights like that myself. It just hurt me to see you like that. I loved you, Sam."

"Do you still?" She had to know.

"Don't ask me that." He leaned over the table his arms braced stiffly, his head bowed, and his back tense. "Please don't. I told you I would always be here for you and Grace, but… just don't. Leave it alone."

"I can't."

"Why? You've done well enough of that all these years."

'Why wait any longer for the world to begin
You can have your cake and eat it too'

In the silence between them she realized Bob had a point. "Because I still love you."

"And the Oscar goes to Samantha Carter-Jackson. Bravo."

"Don't be an ass, Jack."

Jack turned around and leaned against the table, his arms crossed over his chest and a mocking smile. "I'm sorry. Just when did you reach this startling conclusion?"

'Why wait any longer for the one you love
When he's standing in front of you'

Bob was mockingher. She reached out and slapped Jack.

"That was cliché," Jack rubbed his cheek but the mocking smirk was still on his face. "Why should I believe you? You're good at lying to yourself. How hard could it be to lie to me?"

That was it. That was all she could take. She hated herself for the tears falling from her eyes, but she couldn't stop them. She hated being weak. "You're right and you know what? You shouldn't have to deal with me anymore. I've caused you enough pain. I'll go. I'll leave the SGC. You won't have to have anything to do with me."

"Carter-" She saw the panic in his and knew why it was there.

"No, Jack," she hook her head and began backing away. "I won't take her away from you. I'll give you custody of Grace. It looks like I haven't been much of mother anyway," she gave a little hysterical laugh. "I couldn't take your daughter away from you. I couldn't do that. I already did it once. She'll be happier with you anyway, Jack. She loves you so much. And I-" Sam had been moving steadily away from him and she found herself backed up against his work table. She swiped at her eyes and turned to run out the workshop, but found him blocking her path of escape. "Don't make this harder, Jack. You can tell her I died or whatever… I'll leave. You won't have to see me again. I know you'll take care of her."

"Sam…"

She found herself engulfed his arms, crushed tightly against his chest with his face hidden in the juncture of her neck and shoulder. She cried harder. She had missed his arms around her, though their embraces had been few and far between. They made her feel strong, like she was capable of doing anything with him at her side. This was the last time. She was giving up everything she held dear to him in the hope that it would go some small way to repairing the wounds to his soul she had inflicted. She couldn't imagine living without her daughter, but she had to do it for him.

Jack lifted his head and she felt her warm breath on her ear as he spoke gruffly into it, "You are not doing that. Do you hear me? You're not giving up your daughter. She needs you."

"I want you to be happy, Jack," she moaned into his chest. "I'll do anything."

"It's not your fault, Carter. We've both done some stupid stuff to each other. It's not all your fault. I'm sorry. You're right. I was an ass. I've been an ass for a very long time. I don't want you to go away."

"What do you want?"

Jack took a deep shuddering breath, "I want both you and Gracie with me always."

"I want that, too."

"But God help me, Sam. I don't know if I could stand losing you again."

"You won't, Jack. I swear. I love you. I'm sorry."

Jack pulled away from her and lifted his hands to gently wipe away the tears from her eyes. "No more tears. Not for us. We're going to be happy from now. If I have to move heaven and earth, we're going to be happy. It's our time."

He pulled her too him again and wrapped his arms around her tightly, pressing his lips to her neck. "I still love you, too, Carter."

For the first time in a very long time for them both everything seemed right in the universe.

THE END

A/N- I'm still not satisfied with the ending, but then again I never am. But it's done. FINALLY.