"Oh, Sam," Janet sighed as she put the lid back on the applesauce and turned off the burner. "When did this happen?"

"What makes you think something happened?"

"Something must have happened or we wouldn't be having this conversation." Janet gave up all pretense of cooking, and settled down on one of her kitchen chairs.

"Yesterday." Sam paused for a moment and twirled her hairbrush in her hand "We got put in time out for making a mess, and we started talking."

'Time out,' Janet wondered to herself. 'What exactly was going on there?' All she vocalized was a non-committal "Mmm-hm."

"I told him about last year, that I couldn't. . . that it was really tough."

"What did he say?"

"He said he was home now. But I'm not sure what he meant. Then he kissed me."

"Daniel kissed you?" 'It's about time,' Janet thought. Being the CMO of the base she was privy to many private scenes between the individuals who served there. It always amazed her how people who hid their feelings on a daily basis would loose that composure when the other was lying unconscious in her infirmary. SG-1 spent more then their fair share in the infirmary, either as visitors or residents. When they were there as a team, they would all keep the brave front, being 'strong' for their teammates. Individually they were complete different. Jack was the anxious father alternating between cajoling the patient, and worrying himself to death. Teal'c, normally stoic and of few words, would talk to them, his smooth voice switching between English and the Jaffa dialect as he shared stories and legends of his childhood. Sam had a suppressed mothering streak, which resulting in her alternately scolding the patient, and making sure they were as comfortable as possible. She never scolded Daniel.

"Yes," Sam breathed, and then laughed, "God, I sound like Cassie."

"So then what happened."

"Well, I didn't slap him." It was Janet's turn to laugh.

"That's a good sign, I assume."

"Apparently he took it as encouragement, at least that's what he said."

"He said that."

"Well what he actually asked was what if we were more then friends and we didn't know it?"

"Why would he ask you that?"

Sam wriggled a little on the bed, "It's a bit of a long story."

"This turkey needs another hour to cook."

"Back when we found him on Vis Uban he asked me if there was anything between us. I told him we were just really good friends."

"Again, why would he ask you that?"

"I don't know. He had no idea who we were."

"Maybe he knew who you were."

"He didn't even know my name. He kept calling Jack Jim."

"Sam, the heart very rarely relies on logic. If it did romance novels wouldn't be nearly as popular as they are. On some level he knew you. Some people believe that we go through life looking for our other half, our soulmate, as it were. You two were always close, right from the beginning."

"He said he was coming home. After I left the tent. He said it again yesterday."

"Maybe he means you."

"That doesn't make any sense." Sam frowned as she said it.

"Why not. Home doesn't have to be a physical place. Maybe its just the place you know you belong. Stop being so literal for a few minutes. Take a chance. You have to stop being afraid of falling in love."

Sam froze. "What did you say?"

"Take a chance? You have to stop being afraid of falling in love? Why?"

"My father said something very similar."

"Your father is a wise man."

"What am I going to do?"

"Take it a day at a time, see what happens. You know Daniel would never intentionally hurt you, or make you do anything you weren't comfortable with. You're safe with him."

Sam remembered how it felt to have Daniel's arms about her or just her hand in his, "He does make me feel safe."

"Does he make your toes tingle when he kisses you?"

"Yes, I feel warm all over."

"Especially in certain areas?" Janet asked wickedly.

"Janet!"

"I'll take that as a yes."

"You're terrible."

"And you're crazy if you don't go for it."

"Thanks, Janet"

"That's what friends are for, keep me posted, will you?"

"Sure thing, Janet."

"And I look good in green."

Sam made a face at the non-sequitar, "What?"

"When you're picking your wedding colors. Oh, and nothing too frilly either."

"Good bye, Janet."

A huge smile spread across Janet's face as she hung the phone back up in the cradle. She wondered what the odds on Sam and Daniel hooking up were at in the base pool. Grinning she scribbled herself a note to call Feretti tomorrow with a wager.

If Sam took a little longer than usual getting ready she chalked it up to being a holiday, and not that she wanted to look her best for a certain archaeologist. She was just heading into the kitchen to give Allison a hand with things when the doorbell rang.

"I'll get it," she called pausing to look at her watch. "11:30," she mumbled, "That's more than a little early." She opened the door to reveal a thirty something man with dirty blonde hair in khakis and a polo. "Hello," she said putting on her best diplomatic smile.

"Hello, yourself," he said giving her a slow once over. His eyes stopped to admire the fit of her aqua colored blouse that was partially unbuttoned to show a modest hint of cleavage. From there his eyes traveled lower to linger over the hem line of the soft gray skirt she wore that stopped several inches above the knees. Sam blushed under such a blatant appraisal. "You must be Sam Carter, " he said extending his hand.

Tentatively Sam took his hand in return, "How did you know my name?"

"I am a detective," he said impishly, "May I?" He asked indicating that he'd like to come in.

"Of course," Sam said as she opened the door wider.

"Mark told me he had a gorgeous blonde for a sister, but I swore he was kidding. And here you are in the flesh."

"Should I know you?" Sam pulled out the stare she used on raw recruits.

"So sorry, Pete Shannahan. I'm a friend of your brothers." He shrugged out of his jacket and hung it on the coat rack.

"You already know who I am."

"But there is so much more I'd like to know." Sam tried her hardest not to roll her eyes at the blatant flirtation.

"There you are, Sam," Daniel called as he strolled out from the kitchen, drying his hand on a dish towel. Whether deliberate or not he completely ignored the fact that Pete was in the room, "You look great." He leaned over and kissed her quickly on the cheek, before wrapping his arm casually about her shoulders. A look of supreme confusion spread across Pete's face.

"Daniel," Sam said calling his attention to the other man in the room. She made, however no attempt to dislodge his arm. It felt right there. She took his hand in hers. "This is Pete, a friend of my brother's. Pete, Daniel Jackson."

"A pleasure," Pete said as he offered his hand to Daniel, the tone of his voice indicating it was anything but.

"Likewise," Daniel said his eyes narrowing just the slightest bit.

"Hey, Shandy!" Mark called from the kitchen, "I thought I heard your voice. "Could I offer you a drink? Allison has been cooking up a storm and the hors d'ouvers will be out shortly."

"Yeah, a beer would be great," Pete shouted back. A moment later Mark appeared beer in hand.

"I see you three have met," Mark observed as he saw the uneasy silence in the room.

"Yeah, we did."

"Well come on in and have a seat. Tell me how it's going in Denver." Mark steered his friend into the living room and out of the foyer.

"You forgot to mention the boyfriend when you were describing her, buddy, " Pete said in a stage whisper as he followed his friend. Mark had the good grace to look embarrassed as he mumbled something in reply.

"Well, that was fun," Daniel said, detaching his arm from Sam's shoulder.

"He was a little obvious, wasn't he," Sam laughed.

"Just slightly. I heard him in the kitchen."

She fluttered her eyelashes in imitation of a southern belle, "Will you always come running to my rescue, Dr. Jackson?"

Daniel took a step closer his expression deadly serious, "Only if you want me too, Dr. Carter." She stared up at him, and swallowed hard as she realized she could loose herself forever. Unbidden Janet's advice echoed in her mind, "You have to stop being afraid of falling in love." Life was too short. She learned that last Christmas didn't she.

"I want you," she whispered as she reached up to kiss him softly on the lips. "I mean. . ."

"I know what you mean," Daniel answered drawing her into his arms and nuzzling against her neck.

"I'm afraid."

"Of me?"

"Everyone I've ever allowed myself to care about ends up dead."

"Oh, Sam," Daniel tightened his grip around her. "You don't have to worry about that," he tilted her chin up so she was looking at him, "I've already died." Sam let out a choked laugh. "But I promise you this, if there is a way, I will always come home to you."

"Janet was right."

"Janet?"

Sam stared down at the floor, "I called her earlier to sort through a few things."

"What was she right about?"

"She said that home wasn't a physical place."

"Home is where the heart is, Sam." He opened his mouth to say something else, but his interrupted when his pants began to ring.

Due to their chosen careers all members of the SGC were perpetually on call. Daniel rolled his eyes mumbling, "Can't Anubis wait," as he fished his phone out of his pocket. "It's Jack," he said, after checking the caller id. Sam made no move to disentangle herself as he answered the phone.

"Hey, Jack, Merry Christmas."

"Merry Christmas to you, too, Daniel. I tried your house."

"Yeah, well I'm not there, obviously. I left my contact info with Hammond. How's everything going?"

"Great. Brata'c and Ryac have discovered the joys of X-Box. I'm going to have to run out and buy additional controllers. Is that the doorbell?"

"Yeah, Sam's got it." Sam opened the door as more people arrived. Glancing at his watch he realized it was nearing noon.

There was a long pause, "Sam, as in Carter?"

"Yeah, Carter."

"Daniel, is there something going on that as your CO you need to inform me of?"

Daniel watched Sam as she greeted the new arrivals. Obviously she knew these guests as she started chatting animatedly with them. Jacob came out from the living room, apparently already familiar with the group as well. Catching Sam's attention Daniel pointed at his phone and then out towards the deck indicating that he was going out there to finish his conversation so as not to be rude. "Um, can I get back to you on that?" Daniel asked, pulling the door shut behind him.

"It's a yes no question, Daniel."

"Things are kind of ambiguous."

"Ambiguous?"

"Yeah," Daniel said slowly. "I'll have a better answer for you when we get back."

"Have you slept together?"

"Jack!"

"Daniel?"

"No." 'But she says she wants you,' the evil part of his brain reminded him.

"Has she told you she's in love with you?"

"What?"

"Oh, so you haven't figured that part out yet. Sorry."

"Why would you say that?"

"Oh, for Christ's sake, Daniel. I may act stupid, but even I know that you're crazy for each other."

"Right."

"Daniel, I only do the touchy feeling thing once a year, so listen up. When you died, it hurt all of us. Sam took it hard, Daniel, and I was of no use to her. I was hurting myself, and if I allowed myself to really talk with her about our 'feelings' that would have meant that I had to accept the fact that you were gone. I wasn't prepared to do that. I'm old and set in my ways. So I took it out on Jonas.

"Sam mourned you, Daniel. You don't do that for someone that's just a friend. Not like she did. I once 'entertained' the thought that I might have some inappropriate feelings for Carter, but after seeing that, I knew it would never work."

Daniel leaned heavily against the railing of the porch as he thought about what Jack had said. People had hinted that SG-1 'wasn't the same without him' or that the team 'took it hard' but no one had ever mentioned specifics. Especially not one of his teammates. Especially not Jack. It was the conversational pink elephant that they all had successfully avoided by some tacit agreement up until the last two days. Not that Daniel needed to hear how much he was or was not missed, but sometimes he felt that people tried so hard to avoid it that it was almost as if they were pretending it never happened. It had hurt, at first that everyone seemed to avoid talking with him about his 'sabbatical'. He had lost a year of his life, although to him it felt like only a few days. Then he started to realize that people didn't really know how to discuss it. They only barely understood the whole concept of being an ascended or an Ancient. Heck, he barely understood it, and it happened to him.

"I don't know what to say."

"Do you love her?"

"Yes."

"Then I'll talk to Hammond for you, when it becomes necessary."

"Don't you mean if, Jack."

"Now who's the genius here."

"Thanks, Jack."

"Hey, it's what friends do. Here, Teal'c wants to talk."

"Merry Christmas, Daniel Jackson,"

"Merry Christmas, Teal'c. So, have you caught anything?"

"We have not. The lake is frozen solid."

"Don't tell me you didn't realize it would be frozen? It is the middle of winter."

"O'Neill did not mention it, and I failed to remind him."

"Nobody had a saw, eh?"

"It went missing from the tool shed." 'I'm sure it did, all by itself, too,' Daniel thought. Teal'c could be quite devious. "So what are you doing instead."

"I am introducing Bratac and Ryac to Star Wars." Daniel tried very hard not to laugh as he pictured the three Jaffa warriors caught up in the epic battle of good versus evil. "Bratac is much taken with Obi-Wan Kenobi."

"A lot of similarities there."

"Indeed." A tapping on the glass of the doors caught Daniel's attention. Sam was on the other side waving for him to come into join them. Daniel said his farewells to Teal'c and pocketed the phone.

"Hey," Sam said slipping her arm through his, "I thought you'd like to meet everyone." In the next twenty minutes, Daniel was introduced to an assortment of friends, relatives, and colleagues of the Carter family. There was Allison's parents as well as her brother and his family. Then there was her grandmother, who was well into her eighties and hard of hearing. She managed to mishear almost everything said to her with hilarious results. Allison confided to them later that they were fairly sure she did most of it on purpose as she seemed to overhear all sorts of tidbits of gossip just fine. In the friend contingent there was Mark's other college roommate with his fiancée, in addition to Pete who they had met earlier, as well as Allison's best friend since grade school. As for colleagues, there were two grad students that worked with Mark who hadn't either the means or inclination to get to their families for the holidays as well as a co-worker of Allison's with a similar predicament.

The Carter family did love to entertain and did so maybe not with the best of style, but in good taste and good humor. It didn't matter that the china didn't match and that the tablecloth changed halfway down the improvised table. The food was plentiful and delicious, the conversation amusing, if not always witty, and the alcohol flowed freely, even if it wasn't of a snooty vintage. The half a dozen kids present, not including the baby that was napping upstairs had a blast at their own table, gravely presided over by Princess Emily in her velvet holiday dress. Austin dispensed with great dignity a sparkling fruit punch concoction to the younger set and made his own toast, to Santa Claus.

After dinner, the now mellow and slightly tipsy gathering splintered off into smaller groups. Mark's graduate students, after realizing that Daniel was 'that Dr. Jackson' kept him cornered for a good forty five minutes discussing the possibility that there was intelligent life in the universe. Sam had similarly been cornered by Allison's mother and grandmother who wanted to know who that nice young man she brought with her was and what they planned to name their first born child. Jacob hadn't been the slightest bit of help, egging them on and smilingly angelically at them the whole time. When Allison asked for a hand getting dessert together in the kitchen, Sam jumped at the opportunity to disentangle herself from the Inquisition.

When finished slicing up cake and pie and other assorted goodies Sam took her own slice of apple pie out on the deck to enjoy a few minutes of quiet. It was a little on the cool side now that the sun had gone down, but spending the last seven years in Colorado, it didn't feel nearly as cold as it would to the locals. She was finishing up the last crumbs of her pie when she heard the door slide open behind her. Involuntarily she groaned, wondering who was coming to torture her now.

"Mind if I join you?" Daniel asked from the doorway.

"No, not at all. I was afraid you were someone else." She put her plate down on one of the resin end tables that was out here. Glancing around for a place for the two of them to sit, she spotted a wooden swing sitting a little ways in the backyard. Motioning for him to follow she marched over to it and sat down, patting the seat beside her.

"Hopefully we can loose our respective fan clubs for a little while," Daniel laughed, seating himself next to her. "Mark's grad students are tenacious." He gave the swing a little push with his foot to start it rocking.

"A desirable quality in a researcher I'm sure." Sam swung her feet up off the ground and twisted herself so that her legs were across Daniel's lap, her feet dangling over the side. He squirmed a bit as she did so.

"There is that." Daniel said absently as he tried to decide what to do with his hands. Sam's skirt which had been above her knee to begin with had drifted considerably upward in her new position.

"How did you get away?"

"Apparently Santa came a second time. The guests started handing out presents to the kids and apparently the guys had theirs out in the car. No one noticed me slip out in the chaos." He finally decided to rest one hand on her knee, that seemed a neutral enough spot. The other hand dug in his pocket, "Besides it reminded me I had something for you."

"Something for me?" Sam said in surprise. "You already gave me a present back on base."

"Yeah, well I had something else for you. I just didn't want to give it to you in front of. . . everyone." Sam heard the more correct translation of 'in front of the guys' in the tone of his voice. She bit her lip to keep from laughing. It had never occurred to her that Daniel would be like that. "They might get the wrong idea." 'Though I'm not quite so sure its the wrong idea anymore,' he thought. Daniel placed a small jewelery sized box on her stomach. "When I bought Cassie's earrings I saw that and thought of you. Open it and I'll explain."

Sam methodically unwrapped the gift to reveal a blue velvet box underneath. Inside the box was an aquamarine necklace, the gem a most unusually deep blue green in hue. It was bezel set inside a circle of pure silver. Sam held it up to the moonlight to get a better look at the stone. The center of it caught what little light there was and reflected it back in brilliant sparkles of light. Her breath caught as she looked at it, for it reminded her of something much larger.

"It's the Stargate." Daniel's smile was all the confirmation that she had figured out the reason. "The way the light plays across the surface its like the ripples in the event horizon."

"I'll never forget the first time I saw the Stargate open, its one of the defining moments in my life."

"Mine too," Sam answered still mesmerized by the stone, "The Colonel had to push me through it, I was too caught up in watching the fluctuations in the event horizon. It amazed me."

"It amazed me, too. It confirmed all my theories and was the beginning of a an incredible journey. I lost sight of that you know." Daniel watched her playing with the necklace in the moonlight.

"What do you mean?"

"After Share, Shifu, Reese, somewhere along the way it stopped being the adventure of a lifetime and became a job. I started to forget what was important: I lost my soul. That's why I had to do it. We can't let go of that initial sense of wonder. It's the reason we signed up for this."

Sam stopped playing with the necklace and trapped it in the palm of her hand, "We've had this conversation before."

"We have?"

"On the Prometheus, only you were a figment of my imagination."

"I thought I told you the cloud was intelligent," Daniel said slowly.

"Among other things. You also said that I should seize the moment, to remember why we all went out there," she gestured to the night sky, "in the first place."

"I guess your subconscious knows me pretty well then."

Sam pulled her legs out of Daniel's lap and sat up turning her back to him. Carefully she handed him the necklace, "Put it on me, please?" She reached one hand behind her neck and piled her hair atop her head. Daniel took a deep breath to steady his hands as he fiddled with the tiny clasp on the necklace. These things were always tough to maneuver in the best of conditions but the mitigating factors of dim lighting, the rocking of the swing, and the effect Sam's proximity was having on him were making it near impossible. Finally after a few tense moment, the ends popped together and he planted a soft kiss on her neck where the ends of the necklace fell.

"I didn't say thank you, did I?" Sam said turning slightly so she could see him. She was holding the pendant tightly in one hand, "It's beautiful, as is the sentiment."

"You're beautiful." Daniel returned, gently stroking the side of her face.

Who moved first was entirely irrelevant, but in seconds the two were locked in a kiss so passionate it made the one they had shared yesterday evening see chaste. Sam slid into Daniel's lap, her hands tugging at his shirt tails. His hands found her rear an he pulled her close to him, so that she was nearly straddling him, making her readily aware of his level of enjoyment. The two continued unabashedly exploring each other, hands slipping under clothing, mouths tasting necks as well as lips, until Sam went for the buttons on Daniel's pants. With a strangled moan Daniel grabbed her wrists loosely in his hands. "We have to stop," he gasped his eyes hazy with passion.

"Why?" Sam asked, her breath coming in equally short breaths.

"Because," Daniel said reluctantly as he firmly slid her blouse back onto her shoulders, and refastened the buttons. "When we make love for the first time, it's not going to be in the middle of a party in the backyard of your brother's house."

"When?" Sam blinked, trying to follow the thread of the conversation.

"I love you, Sam," he said running his fingers through her hair. "Took me a while but I know that now." He thought back to Jack's conversation earlier that day, "I can only hope you feel the same way." Sam kissed him again in response. Tender this time it was lacking in carnal passion but instead full of tenderness and promise.

"I take that as a yes," Daniel finally said after he caught his breath.

Sam smiled, and if it was possible manage to look shy even when completely rumpled by their passionate embraces. "Yes, I've fallen hopelessly in love with my best friend."