Author's Note: So, I originally posted this a while back with all the lyrics in it since it's inspired by John K's ilym song, but apparently, I didn't read the rules correctly and that was a no-no. I was originally gonna scrap it, but I keep thinking about it every time this song plays (which if often since I love it so freaking much), and I finally decided to tweak it so it was legal.
Let me know what you think.
o0o
I Love You More
The party was in full swing.
Every major, big, and important moment/activity had been done: the first dance, cutting the cake, the toasts and speeches, the father-daughter dance, everything. Now it was just time to relax and enjoy watching their daughter celebrate her marriage to her new husband.
Vala Jackson sat on her husband's lap, feet resting on another chair, as she leaned back into him, taking in the scene of her children dancing on the dance floor with their significant others. She couldn't help but smile. "We did good," she commented to the man holding her, "didn't we, darling?"
Dr. Daniel Jackson leaned forward and pressed a kiss to his wife's shoulder. "We did," he agreed, "They're all grown up now and married to someone else now."
"And no longer our problem," she added saucily, holding out a hand for a high five, which he gave her without hesitation.
"Nope, they are now their problems," he stated, gesturing to their sons and daughter in law, "Though I could've done without two of our kids marrying one of our friend's/former teammate's child, but what can we do now."
"I agree," she said, "They were raised as cousins, so it's just weird. At least our youngest married someone from outside the SGC."
Their son, the oldest, had married Cameron and Carolyn Mitchell's oldest daughter three years ago and were about to give all of them their first grandchild in a few more months. Despite her jest, Vala and Carolyn hadn't actually minded the relationship between their children, but Daniel and Cam had taken a little longer to get used to them dating. Daniel had almost been a little offended at Cam's resistance to his son dating Cam's daughter…that is, until his first daughter, his second child, brought home Jack O'Neill's son, and he understood perfectly.
Vala and Sam loved the idea of their kids together, but Jack and Sam's son was a lot like his father. Thankfully, he had his mother's influence in his life, but Daniel still had been on the fence about the relationship. Don't get him wrong, he loved his nephew, but it was his first daughter and second to Sam, he knew Jack O'Neill better than anyone else and the thought of Jack's son dating his daughter put up a whole bunch of red flags. Unfortunately, his daughter was strong headed like her mother and didn't listen to a word of warning from him. They were married, closing in on two years, and Daniel had to admit he'd been wrong. Watching the two dance now, he wondered how he even doubted. The way that boy loved his daughter was beautiful to say the least.
Daniel half expected his youngest to end up being married to one of Jonas' sons, but when she brought home a nice boy she met at college, he sighed in relief. That's how you're supposed to meet people – the normal way, and not end up with someone you were raised as cousins with.
Despite his grumpiness, he loved each one of his children in laws – mainly because they made his own children happy beyond expectations and that's all he ever wanted.
Vala tapped his arms, breaking him from his thoughts, and got up from his lap. "Dance with me," she demanded, holding out a hand and wiggled her fingers.
Daniel groaned. "Vala, it's been one hell of a week preparing for this wedding," he grumbled.
She gave him a soft smile, one she knew he couldn't refuse, and tried again. "Dance with me, darling," she implored this time.
He relented, just like every time. She knew he couldn't resist her. He linked his hand with her and got up. "Nothing fancy," he ordered softly as he led her the two feet to the dance floor and took her into his arms.
She put her arms around his neck and swayed to the music. "No promises," she teased, "The song's about to end and the next might be a bit peppy."
"I'm out if it is," he told her seriously, but she knew he didn't mean it.
The next song started, and it appeared to be a slower song. It was about some guy mooning over his girl and how he missed her, even though she wasn't gone and something about calling her.
Daniel snorted as he heard the opening lyrics. "Was that ever us?"
Vala grinned. "No, not really," she replied, "Only when we were apart for a few days on some mission or something."
The song continued and the artist sang about writing a letter but couldn't fit all he wanted to say within the letter.
It was her turn to chuckle. "Definitely not us," she declared, "I don't think we've ever written to each other."
"Does that mean something's wrong with us?" he teased with a grin.
"Oh, definitely," she agreed in mock seriousness, "We've obviously done something wrong if our marriage is nothing like a love song."
A line about something not being a competition made Vala snort. "It's always a competition," she disagreed with a smirk.
The chorus hit with a rising crescendo. All their mocking and teasing came to a halt as they listened to the lyrics of the chorus.
I love you more than the bad days ahead
I love you more than the nights that we ended with slamming door
It triggered something in Daniel and his mind flashed back to the beginning of their relationship and the bad days they did encounter. After the Ori were defeated and Tomin had left, Vala's marriage to him officially over, they drifted together without knowing until it was too late and they were already in too deep. There were bad days that followed and nights that ended with slamming doors – figuratively and literally.
After they were done with the Ori, Ba'al had been their main focus and rounding up the rest of his clones. He remembered when they had caught the last one, he remembered the day the Tok'ra had removed the symbiote from the last clone. He had been annoyed with Vala for some reason – why? He couldn't remember, it had been too long, but he remembered the fight they had after she volunteered to stay and help the host through the transition.
He was at fault, that he could freely admit and see how wrong he had been, but at the time, they had only been married for barely a month and there she was, offering to stay and help another man without even asking his opinion. Vala had never needed his permission to do anything, but the fact she hadn't even consulted him had riled him up and it had been one of their worst fights in years, probably since before the Ori were defeated.
They left things badly. He had abruptly walked away from her and refused to turn back when she demanded it – he had regretted that decision ever since. She stayed for two weeks before he swallowed his pride and requested to go back to the planet. When he arrived, she was still mad at him and his anger was renewed when he saw how caring and attentive she was being to Ba'al's host. Pure and unadulterated jealousy had hit him so hard, he hadn't known what to do with himself or how to control it. He had never been the jealous type up until then and he had handled it badly.
There will be times when your heart will forget
So I'll say it over and over again.
Vala agreed to come home, mainly because she knew the SGC needed her to attend to her duties, but the tension had still been there, and they fought while at home for what seemed like forever, when in reality it was only a few days. They screamed and shouted at each other in ways that made him cringe now, and it may have gone on longer and could've possibly ruined their marriage had she not found the root of his problem and asked why he was so angry that she had stayed.
Confessing he was jealous, something he wasn't used to, was hard. Confessing he was being possessive and admitting he was unreasonable was just as hard…but it had brought understanding and ultimately, healing when he finally told her how he felt without hiding behind anything else. It wasn't just jealousy and possessiveness that caused him to lash out, it was hurt, and a little bit of worry. When they started dating, Daniel, for the longest time, had been worried that she couldn't ever truly be happy with him, that he couldn't be enough for her. He thought he had dealt with those worries and left them behind, but he realized then, he hadn't, despite the fact that they were married.
Vala somehow understood and even forgave him, promising him he would always be enough. "It's always been you," she had told him that fateful night, "and it will always be you."
As Daniel remembered those turbulent days, he pulled his wife of over twenty years closer. He felt her tighten her arms and knew she had been thinking of similar times.
The second verse began, and it was Vala whose mind flashed back when the lyrics mentioned how much the guy singing loved his girl more than the bad jokes that went too far. Vala chuckled lightly, knowing she had been guilty of that a time or two. In the beginning, she often took things too far, mainly her flirting, and not just with him.
While he had silently been thinking she could never truly be happy with him in the long run, she had thought the same. They were opposites in almost every way, and she had assumed at the time that he would eventually see it and find someone more like him. She didn't doubt him when he told her he loved her, only the depths of his claim. For the first few months of dating, she was constantly waiting for him to figure that out and leave her, so she kept a barrier between them that would prevent her from falling deeper.
She flirted with other guys, testing his reaction, and he never once got upset at her, which in turn upset her. How could he not be upset that his girlfriend was flirting outrageously with other men? Did he not care like he claimed to? When she could take no more, she confronted him, demanding to know why he didn't care.
Just like the song said, Daniel knew her and had just rolled his eyes at her attempts.
He simply told her that he knew she loved him, and the flirting was just part of her defensive mechanism coming into play. He also told her that it was just her. Vala Mal Doran flirted and everyone on base knew it was harmless, so no reason for him to be jealous. He wasn't really the sort to get jealous, other than that one time after Ba'al's extraction, but the situation had been different then.
I'm not sayin' that I'll soon be changing
Daniel never expected that of her, and she had never wanted him to change for her either. But that didn't mean she hadn't wanted to grow as a person and as the woman he loved. She wanted to be better and not just for him, but herself as well, and she was proud of the person she grew to be and of the person he became. They grew together, through the bad, the hard, and the good, and it made them who they are today.
The chorus began again and it got Vala thinking on all the hard days they had and the times things ended in slamming doors.
After the Goa'uld and the Ori, Vala had never anticipated on having the types of bad days they had. She always thought those days would come in the form of a bad guy dead set on galactic domination and not through rogue Asgard kidnapping her husband from Atlantis while he was on a research mission in Atlantis or that it would entail her husband almost dying in another galaxy...and never did she think it would come through the heartache of miscarrying their first child in her second trimester…
She wasn't naïve, she knew there would be hard times, but she hadn't anticipated just how hard those times would be. She knew things wouldn't be perfect, she knew they would fight and it would end badly at times, she just never expected it to be as bad as it was in the beginning. After Ba'al's extraction, they had learned from their mistakes and done better, but there were still times when things went too far.
There will be times when your heart will forget
The lyrics in this portion of the song hit her hard. There were times she doubted, but he never once shied away from telling her and assuring her that he wasn't going anywhere. There had been one time where it had gotten especially bad.
After she had lost their first child, their little boy, she pushed him away in an effort to protect herself. During that dark time, she hadn't been thinking clearly and had been sure that Daniel would leave her. So, she decided to check out first.
But he hadn't let her. He pushed back and refused to relent, and it pissed her off. She did almost everything in her power to keep him at arm's length, but he deflected her attempts every time. He never gave up on her, despite her efforts, but that didn't mean he was passive. No, he fought back. He fought for her – for them.
The day that was the turning point was the day his patience reached its end and yelled at her, demanding to know why she was pushing him away, and in a desperate act to get it over with, she yelled for him to just leave her already.
She would never forget the look on his face, how stricken and crushed he looked at her words. He asked her if she wanted him to leave, his voice filled with so much pain as he did, and that was the moment the mental cloud over her had begun to dissipate and she could finally see what she was doing to him…to them. She had meekly told him that she wouldn't blame him – she had lost their baby after all, and she didn't blame him if he didn't love her anymore.
She would never forget the look on his face.
"Vala, I will always love you," he had told her vehemently, "and nothing will ever change that!"
It had been a dark time and it took a while for her to come through it, but she had with Daniel's help, and she loved him more for it.
Vala clung harder to him, burying her in his shoulder as the music played.
Daniel saw the expression on her face changed before she pulled him closer and knew she had been thinking about their little boy. She didn't think about him often and honestly, neither did he. After all this time, it was still painful, but they never forgot, and they would never let him be forgotten. He learned his head against the side of her as they listened to the rest of the song and the words resonated with both of them.
I'll love you more as the years pass us by
If you ever doubt it, just look in my eyes
And you'll know for sure
Their eyes connected as the lyrics hit their ears and they both heard the truth of those words as they were sung. Things started out rough for them but as time passed by, they got better at it, and they created a beautiful life together. There were things they wished they could've done differently, but ultimately, wouldn't change anything. Who knows what would've happened if they had done it differently? The good outweighed the bad.
The chorus repeated once last time.
Every obstacle they faced, they overcame it together. Every fight they had always brought them closer in the end. They fought like hell to get to where they were today and every single thing they were up against was more than worth it.
There were times when they both got too wrapped up in whatever shit was happening and they questioned things, but the other was always there to remind them what they were fighting for. Their lives hadn't been easy, before and after meeting, but every single hardship made them appreciate each other more and they always came through whatever trial had been put in their path and they came through it together, loving each other a little more each time.
As the song came to a close, both of them had shiny eyes.
"We did it," Vala whispered to him.
"Yeah, we did," he muttered into her ear, clearing his throat when his voice cracked, "I love you.".
"I love you, too," she whispered back.
Neither one made a move to get off the dance floor, still swaying back and forth as the next song came on.
"It's true, you know," he mumbled, and her eyes flickered to him with a questioning look, "I love you more with each passing day. After everything we've been through, I love you more than I did the day I first realized it, than I did on our wedding day, and on each day our children were born."
Vala blinked rapidly and sniffed. "I do too," she told him, "Everything we've experienced…could've so easily broken us or tore us apart, but it didn't, and nothing ever will. I just wish I had known that during each of those moments."
"I know," he agreed, "but it wouldn't have made who we are today."
"True," she concurred, "I love our life and it's not even close to being over."
Daniel chuckled and shook his head. "Who knew a simple song could bring up so much?"
She shrugged. "I don't know," she replied, "but a lot of it feels like it was written for us."
He hummed. "I'm sure a lot of songs would do that if you took the time to really listen."
"I suppose you're right," she conceded softly.
Vala slowly pulled back and made a move to direct them off the dance floor, but Daniel caught her arm, stopping her in place, and she sent him an inquisitive look.
He smiled at her. "I love you, Vala Jackson," he murmured lovingly.
She smiled back. "I love you, Daniel Jackson," she responded in kind, slowly wrapping herself in his arms, "Always."
"Always."
The End.
