Way #57 -- The Caffeine of Choice

Jack blinked at the pattern on his ceiling, which was full of squiggly lines under the white paint. Like a bunch of cow spots or something. Textured ceiling, for some reason. For acoustics or something? Jack smacked his lips, tasting the unmistakable bitterness at the back of his tongue-- stale beer, and salt. Mm. Not bad. He wriggled his toes and discovered they were in clean white socks. Not even the ones with holes in them. Good, he was in his civvies-- his good pair of jeans and a tee. He hated it when he fell asleep in his work clothes.

There was a muffled little snore next to his ear and Jack struggled to move. It was quite a feat of effort, however. He was stuck to the warm leather and tangled up somehow. He finally pulled himself to a half-upright posture and noted it was Daniel he was leaning against. The guy had his head pillowed on the puffy armrest of Jack's couch, sleeping blissfully, hair ruffled, looking like he had been given an über-dose of sleeping pills. Jack sniffed and noticed popcorn polka-dotting the couch and he plucked up the bits here and there, munching them down.

After scavenging for lost popcorn, eating it off the couch cushions and Daniel's lap, he took note of the many empty beer-bottles sitting on his coffee table and on the floor. Ah, that made sense. Daniel wasn't a heavy drinker, no wonder he was out cold. There were too many bottles for just the two of them, though, Carter and Teal'c must've been here at some point. Jack scratched his mussed hair, trying to remember the evening. Right, yes, big group get-together, his house, lots of sci-fi movies, beer, popcorn and chocolate. Boy. They sure did a good job trashing his living room. What time was it?

Jack climbed to his feet, taking care to unstick himself from the dozing Daniel as gently as possible. He padded off to his kitchen. The living room was dimly lit by only a small lamp in the corner-- the kitchen was totally dark. He flicked the lights on and glanced to the microwave clock--2:37Hmm. Pretty late. He looked around his kitchen suspiciously. Where the heck did Carter and Teal'c go? Jack peeked into his fridge-- a carton of oj, a bottle of ketchup, and a container of expired potato salad. He winced. Right, tomorrow was shopping day. Closing the fridge, he glanced across his kitchen counters and smiled, remembering he wasn't clean out of everything yet.

The smell of warm leather. Daniel sniffed. Mm-hm. Leather and salt and beer and a light muskiness that was familiar to him. Daniel's job was a unique one. It meant that he often spent his days sleeping over on vastly different worlds all over the galaxy. It had the tendency to disorient him when it came to remembering where exactly he was when he finally woke up. This couldn't have been off-world, though, because this wasn't his sleeping-bag, right? Not his familiar bed or the cold, stark SGC infirmary either. Daniel sighed and stretched out to his full length, sliding his body down to cover the entire length of the surface, enjoying the feel of each muscle reaching to full tension and then releasing. Blinking pale blue eyes open, he quickly recognized where he was-- Jack's living room, on his old brown leather couch. God, he fell asleep? They'd never let him hear the end of that. Daniel glanced around the dim room. Where did everyone go?

The gurgle of a coffee machine caught his attention and he perked up. Oh, yeah, Jack always kept the good stuff around at his place. He left the warm comfort of the couch to seek out the kitchen.

Jack was perched on a barstool in front of the counter. He gave Daniel a crooked smile when he entered.

"Hey, sleeping beauty."

Daniel smiled sheepishly.

"I heard the coffee machine."

Jack gestured for him to sit and Daniel pulled up the other barstool.

"Where did-- uh, Sam and Teal'c go?"

Jack shrugged. "Not sure, I figured they must've taken off."

"Ah."

Daniel rubbed the back of his slightly stiff neck, and glanced at the clock.

"Ooh. Sort of in the middle of the night, huh?"

"Mm."

"Guess we got pretty involved with those movies there for a while," Daniel commented with a smile, recalling their evening. The team had been in hysterics. Sam had cross-examined every single inaccuracy in the movies, and Teal'c's insights were always hilarious whether he intended them or otherwise. Jack mostly made smartass remarks and threw popcorn at his guests and the TV.

"To be honest, I don't even remember what the last one was about," Jack confided. Daniel chuckled.

"It was bad. That's all I remember. We weren't paying much attention."

"Obviously."

They both sat there for a while in companionable silence, watching the coffee machine gurgle away and slowly fill the pot up. Daniel found he was really enjoying it, just sitting there in Jack's dim kitchen, legs swinging freely in the air while perched on the barstool, watching the coffee machine with him at around three in the morning. It was peaceful, sort of meditative. His life usually wasn't so calm.

"We should do this more often," Daniel mused out loud. Jack smirked at him.

"Drink coffee?" Daniel exhaled a laugh.

"I mean all of this. Doing stuff away from work. It's nice."

"Yeah," Jack agreed, watching the pot nearly done.

"Work does get pretty hectic. Even if we do see each other there all the time, it feels like I never really . . . see anybody. You know what I mean?"

Daniel nodded. "Yeah, I do."

Jack clicked the machine off and reached for the mugs in his cupboard. He was suddenly grinning.

"What?" Daniel queried, trying to figure out what was so amusing.

"You'll like this. I got this one just for you," he said, eager anticipation in his tone. He filled the mugs up and then presented one to Daniel, turning it around so he could see the words printed on the side: Kiss the Geek.

Daniel laughed and accepted the mug.

"You shouldn't have," he commented sarcastically, but was actually kind of pleased with the simple gesture.

"S'no problem," Jack returned, smiling into his own coffee cup. He nodded towards the living room.

"Y'wanna go back in there and see what's on TV at 3 in the morning?"

"Sure."

They returned to the scene of the crime, Daniel whistling when he took a good look around for the first time.

"We really trashed the place."

"I know. And those two traitors didn't even stick around to clean up," Jack commented wryly.

Daniel was shuffling the beer bottles into one pile on the coffee table, making room for his mug.

"See if you can find the remote. It's probably under . . ." Jack trailed off when something caught his eye and he wandered over to the TV. Daniel was one step ahead of him and already digging up the couch cushions.

Jack pulled off the Polaroid taped to the TV and looked at it curiously. It was a shot of him and Daniel on the couch, both dead asleep. Jack's face was propped on Daniel's shoulder (his mouth hanging open slightly, no doubt drooling on the poor guy) and Daniel's head had dropped in the same direction, so that they were leaning against each other's foreheads. Popcorn decorated them like glitter. On the blank space beneath the image was a message in black permanent marker--

SWEET DREAMS, GUYS.

HAD TO RUN. THANKS FOR THE POPCORN.

--C & T

Jack shook his head amusedly and cursed the day he had decided to buy a Polaroid camera. It figures Carter would be the one to know where he kept it.

"Got it," Daniel reported cheerfully, and snapped the TV on. Jack came over and tossed himself back on the couch.

"What's that?"

He handed the Polaroid over.

"I gotta remember to keep my electronics away from Carter next time," Jack commented, stealing the remote and flipping through stations. Daniel was still studying the picture.

"I, uh, I don't even remember this."

"That's because you had three beers and were dead asleep," Jack said in a talk-to-children tone, patting Daniel's head. He wrinkled his nose at him.

"As were you."

Jack held a finger up,

"Ah, but not quite. I'm reasonably certain I had quite a few more beers than three, and then was dead asleep."

Daniel smirked and tossed the picture onto the coffee table. They explored the fascinating world of three-o-clock AM TV programming for a while. At some point Daniel murmured into his mug that he should probably find his shoes and brace himself for the drive home before he started falling asleep again. Jack told him that was ridiculous, it was almost 4:00 as it was already, he might as well stay over for the night. He could take the bed.

"But where will you sleep?"

Jack patted his couch lovingly.

"Right here."

"Jack, I'm not kicking you out of your bed."

"I know. You aren't. I haven't gone to bed yet, so technically. . ."

"You know what I mean."

"Trust me, Danny, I've slept on worse. For the longest time, this was my bed."

Daniel blinked at him and Jack shrugged.

"Didn't have a lot of stuff right after the divorce. Didn't feel real motivated to get any, either."

It was more around 5:00 when they finally shut the TV off and Daniel stumbled off in the direction of the bedroom. Jack told him where he kept his clean sheets and stuff, but Daniel was too tired to bother, and just collapsed on Jack's messy bed and slipped into sleep.