Chapter 8: Obvious Problems
When Sam woke up the next morning she felt great. She wasn't sure if it was because she'd gotten more than her usual four hors of sleep, or because she'd finally gotten the experience with Jonas off her chest, or both, but whatever it was it had done her good.
She ran an extra mile around her neighborhood and went through a round of pilates with gusto before starting her coffee maker and hopping in the shower. Fifteen minutes later she was dressed for work and sipping her cup of coffee, pondering her obvious problem. Since Colonel O'Neill had driven her home the previous evening, her car was still on base.
That in itself wasn't much of an issue, she hadn't had a good excuse to ride her motorcycle in a while. The real problem was that although he hadn't brought it up last night, Colonel O'Neill was sure to feel obligated to giver her a ride back, especially since he blamed himself for making her unable to drive in the first place. However, as a general rule, the Colonel reported in much later than she did, and the amount of work that was no doubt conquering all open space on her desk by now preempted her from taking advantage of the free ride anyway.
Deciding this, Sam picked up her phone and dialed her commanding officer's house, hoping that the ringing wouldn't wake him up, and that he would actually check his answering machine before he left.
About halfway through her simple message she realized how out of place it would sound to call him sir, but calling him Jack wasn't any better. In the end, she managed to compromise awkwardly and not actually call him anything.
Despite being shocked into submission the day before, the rumors seemed to have returned with a vengeance. Sam could feel the stares on her back and hear the whisper that chased her through the hallways. However, no one had yet confronted her about the situation: Sam assumed that was mostly because she and Colonel O'Neill hadn't arrived together. If there was living proof that whatever was going on between them had lasted more than a few hours the gossipers might not have been so timid.
Of course, there probably would be such proof as soon as the Colonel did report in, but they would have to deal with that later. Right then, her main priority was to knock the stack of work on her desk down to size, and she locked herself in her lab all morning with that intention.
Unfortunately, she found herself unable to work as efficiently as usual, as she was having trouble maintaining her concentration. She was plagued mostly by memories of the previous evening. It was just over there where she had cried into Jack's shoulder for nearly half an hour. She had been sitting in this very chair when she had told him all about her failed engagement to Jonas.
It was while Sam was on a similar tangent that the door to her lab opened noisily and the subject of her daydream walked in.
"Afternoon, Carter," Jack said.
"Afternoon, sir," Sam replied automatically, paying more attention to the fact that the morning had apparently evaporated out from under her than what she was actually saying.
"I thought we went over this yesterday," Jack said, crossing his arms. "You can call me Jack, I won't tell the Chief of Staff or the President or anybody."
"Sorry, old habit," Sam replied. "You can call me Sam, by the way."
"Did I not?" Jack asked.
Sam thought about if for a moment, then said, "I don't thinks so." She usually had a better memory than that, but she'd been distracted at the time.
"Oh, old habit," Jack shrugged. "Lunch?"
Sam looked ready to protest; citing the amounts of work she had yet to finish, but a second look at the stack revealed that what remained would take less than two hours. Apparently, the morning hadn't been as unproductive as she originally thought.
In any case, Jack beat her to the punch, saying, "I understand if you're uncomfortable with all this, it's got to be one of the strangest missions I've ever been on, but Hammond still thinks that if we just go with it these rumors will go away faster."
"I know," Sam replied. "It's not so much that I'm uncomfortable..." Yeah it was, just not for the reasons he was assuming. She sighed and said; "Do you think we could just avoid the commissary?"
"We could," Jack said, "but staying holed up in your lab all day won't get the job done either."
"Well, what if we ate off base?" Sam suggested. "Then people would see us leave and come back together, but we won't have to eat with everyone staring at us." This was actually starting to sound better and better. "I could give you a ride on my motorcycle," she added.
That was the cincher. Jack had to admit he'd been itching to ride her...bike. He shook his head quickly as thought that would help banish the thought quicker. "Let's go!"
Sam grabbed an extra helmet from a cupboard and passed it to him. Both the airmen were so excited that Jack didn't bother to ask her why she kept an extra helmet on base and they held hands without even thinking about it, something that did not go unnoticed by the curious inhabitants of the base.
A few minutes later, Jack and Sam were winding their way down the mountain. Jack sat in back and held on to Sam's shoulders tightly. He could understand why Sam enjoyed riding her motorcycle so much. It felt like piloting a fighter jet, except slower and windier.
Such was his trust in Sam's abilities that he didn't worry at all when he noticed she was going more than twice the posted speed limit, nor did he flinch when a car moving the opposite direction sped around a blind at the same time as they did, nearly clipping them.
Sam pulled into the first restaurant she found, a small café located a few miles after the road to the complex intersected with a larger road through the mountains.
They found a table and ordered their food, then remained in an uncomfortable silence, each waiting for the other to speak. Jack broke first.
"So, you know where we're heading next?"
Sam glanced around quickly, looking for potential eavesdroppers, then jumped into the question with a fetish. Jack took in the details of the mission, although he paid more attention to Sam's ability to make it sound like they were going somewhere in Asia instead of another planet.
It did worry him a little that Sam seemed so enthusiastic about a way to avoid the reason why they were sitting in a cheap café acting like lovers after a fight instead of the commissary as friends. Was 'this never has to leave this room' code for 'I'm moving on'? Probably. But then what about last night? She'd seemed so willing to embrace their mission. Had that simply been the product of her skewered emotions?
Damnit Sam, Daniel's supposed to be the enigma of the team.
Sam seemed to have run out of mission specs to talk about, and was now rambling hopelessly. Jack cut her off by reaching across the table for her hand.
"Sam, I think we need to talk about this."
She looked up desperately and caught his eye, and then he saw it, that look of hers that said, 'Please stop, before we're both destroyed.' When he last saw that look they had been on opposite sides of a force shield on a ship that was about to explode. Good times. But there was nothing even remotely like that happening.
Then for a moment he understood. She was scared. Come to think of it, he couldn't blame her, from what he'd gathered, her record in such matters was far from stellar.
Well, he hadn't backed off on that ship, and things worked out all right.
Jack began to steel himself up to speak again, but Sam beat him to it.
"I don't know if I can do this."
Ordinarily, Jack might have been tempted to make some crack about her getting cold feet, but under the circumstances the thought didn't eve cross his mind, instead he said, "I know, I feel the same way."
"It's not that I don't..." Sam trailed off miserably.
"It's okay," Jack assured her. "You're scared, I am too."
Sam looked started at the accuracy of his perception and his own blatant confession, then sighted, "Yeah, I guess I am. So what do we do?"
"Um...well," Jack stammered. "We could just...I mean...If your okay with it...since...Hammond...you know...suspended the regulations...if you want to..."
Sam picked up where Jack left off, but didn't have much more luck putting a sentence together. "All right...but what about...you know...since hopefully these rumors won't...I mean, Hammond won't let this go on forever...and then what?"
They both smiled awkwardly and their failed attempts to speak. Sam was typically relatively eloquent, and although Jack had never been accused of possessing such a sill, he usually said what was on his mind without censor anyway.
Instead of trying to communicate in words again, Jack simply squeezed Sam's hand and she understood. They would figure it out when they got there. She squeezed his hand back in response.
Jack broke into a huge lopsided smile and pulled her into a tender kiss over the table. They broke off a moment later when the waiter arrived with the check. Jack insisted on paying for both of them.
On the ride back up to the mountain, Jack held on to Sam tightly around the middle, even thought he wasn't any more worried about them crashing than he had been on the way down.
When they arrived at the base, Sam discovered she was no longer embarrassed about making their relationship public.
A few more observant people must have noticed a change in the dynamic of Jack and Sam's relationship, because the amount of rumors about them increased once again over the next few days, prompting Daniel to ask them straight out what was going on. However, as General Hammond predicted, a couple days later they slowly but surely began to dissipate.
Jack had been spending most of his time in Sam's lab, to the point that she had to hook up another computer to make sure he got some work done.
He was staring blankly at his computer screen and Sam was nearby at her own computer, typing furiously. Jack sighed, he'd been trying to stall while still looking like he was working, but minesweeper was only entertaining for so long.
In the hallway, two airmen could be talking loudly as they approached the open door to Sam's lab.
Smiling gleefully at the excuse, Jack got up and walked over to Sam, glancing only briefly at the equations and text on her computer then began messaging his shoulders. Sam tilted her head appreciatively but didn't stop typing, although her accuracy on the keyboard dropped by about half.
The two airmen passed the open door and continued down the hallway, neither one able to resist looking inside curiously as they walked by. A few moments later they passed out of earshot, but Jack didn't stop.
He hadn't seen this many knots in one place since rope tying in basic training. He wanted to make her stop working, to find some way to release all the stress and tension from her body. He wanted to kiss her so much he could hardly stand it.
Suddenly, Sam stopped typing and reached a hand up to grab one of Jack's. Apparently she couldn't stand it either.
They crushed their lips together in a passionate kiss. Jack tipped Sam onto her desk, then climbing up on top of her, kissed her arms and neck and mouth, and she kissed him right back.
For a moment they didn't care about base protocol or etiquette, or how much trouble they might be in if they were caught despite the lack of regulations. They were almost oblivious to the world around them. Almost.
"Stand to, airmen."
Oh, shit.