"So you're not mad?"

"Why would I be mad, Sammy?" Lynn asked her.

"I… ok, I thought you might be a little tiny bit put out about it that's all."

Lynn shrugged. "You don't need to schedule your life around mine Sammy."

Sammy bit her lip as they walked home from school together. The early autumn air wasn't crisp yet but the smell of ripe apples wafted from neighborhood trees.

"Look, I appreciate what you were doing but I've been figuring out how to get around my psycho mom all my life. This is the first time anyone has even tried to actively help by helping me personally deal with her rather than trying to convince her she was acting crazy. You guys are the first ones to get that she isn't going to change and I appreciate it, I really do. But I can figure out how to spend time with Brian on my own if you guys don't have time. Honest."

"You're not actually making me feel better." Sammy admitted.

"I wasn't trying to." Lynn agreed because she thought being honest was more important than coddling her friend's feelings. She lied enough to her mom for survival. She didn't want to lie to her friends too, even if the truth was brutal and ugly.

"Do you like babysitting Gracie?"

Lynn snorted at the abrupt change of subject. Except it wasn't. Sammy was clearly still trying to solve problems. "I love babysitting Gracie." She said agreeably knowing where this was going.

"Ok, You know Aunt Sam's crazy schedule. I'll have Uncle Wil pick you up and drop you off because you'd be taking my workload according to us on the days I can't watch her because of practice. I don't think Aunt Sam would mind if someone came to check on you either." She said with a small grin.

Lynn rolled her eyes. "Have you always been this devious?"

"I plead the fifth." She said with a bigger grin.

"Somehow I have a feeling Jon has something to do with this sneaky side of you." Lynn told her best friend pointedly.

"It was more Uncle Jack if you want to get technical but yah."

"Am I off base here or is he actually just a big kid?"

"Jon?"

"Uncle Jack, you turd."

"Oh yah, he's always been like that. He's good at faking being all serious and scary for work but he's kind of pretending he's an adult really." Sammy admitted.

"We all pretend something." Lynn said softly.

Sammy nodded in agreement. Aunt Sam pretended to have confidence for years. She should know. A small smile played about her mouth. Like Jon, it had taken her a while to actively think of herself as a separate person. Jack pretended he was an adult. Daniel pretended he wasn't sad. Teal'c pretended he didn't think literally everything humans did was hilarious. Jon pretended he wasn't lonely. Zulfi pretended he wasn't insecure. The list went on and on. She pretended she knew what she wanted to do with her life. So far she hadn't even talked to Jon about that but she realized Mary at least suspected by some of her comments lately.

"Do you know what you want to do when you grow up?"

"Anything that involves not living with my mother." Lynn said succinctly.

Sammy laughed. "Ok, I'll give you that one. I mean like a job and I don't mean crap we do to get through school. Real life stuff."

"I don't know. I used to want to be a grade-school teacher but they don't make much money these days and it's a lot of hard work." She thought for a while as she walked. "I guess I should figure out something I can do with art even though my mom says there's no money in the field."

Sammy shook her head. "There's lots of good paying jobs in art. Engineering, video games, scientific development, illustration."

Lynn shrugged. "I suppose."

"If you don't like having what you make dictated you should go into psychiatry."

"I need a psychiatrist." Lynn said dryly.

"True." Sammy chuckled. "But so do I and Jon definitely needs one. Look there, you have two guaranteed patients right at your fingertips." She nudged Lynn with her shoulder.

Lynn chuckled. "Ok, I'll bite, why do you think I'd be good at psychiatry?"

"I don't know if it's because you've spent your whole life trying to understand what's going on in your mom's head or what, but you really just seem to get people. You notice things about them right away like that Jay is gay and that Jon is in love with me and Uncle Jack isn't as much of a grown up as he pretends to be."

"But that's all really obvious stuff."

"Not to most people it's not, Lynn. Jon didn't notice why Jay was being a jerk until Uncle Jack pointed it out to him and they are friends now but they didn't start out that way. And ok everyone noticed Jon was in love with me, that one was pretty obvious but how many people would see Uncle Jack with all those decorations on his uniform and notice the amused glint in his eye at getting one up on your mom? No one but you that's who." Sammy thought for a moment. "And if regular people bore you, why not criminal psychology? You could help put creeps like Conner in jail."

"Where he belongs." Lynn said with a firm frown.

"For life." Sammy agreed.

"I guess I could talk to Miss Stephanie about taking the honors psych course next year, see if I like it." She said thoughtfully. "But I'm guessing even though you got off track this was supposed to be about how you don't know what to do with yourself."

"There you go figuring people out again." Sammy said with a rueful smile.

"I bet you feel like you have some pretty big shoes to step into with your aunt and uncle."

"Oh yah, and grandpa too." She said of her dad. "He was a general."

"Was?"

"He died a couple years ago." Sammy explained.

"That's how you ended up in foster care, isn't it?" Lynn asked her gently.

Sammy smile was rueful and ironic. Lynn had no idea how close to the truth that statement was. She supposed some of the truth was warranted here. "I lost my mom a long time ago. Grandpa's cancer came back and well…" She shrugged and surprised herself by sniffling back a couple tears she thought she'd shed ages ago.

"I'm so sorry, Sammy. You must miss him so much." She hugged Sam spontaneously. It had been the first time Sammy had ever really spoken of her life before coming to Colorado. Jon seemed to know but he wasn't exactly an open book about the subject.

"I do. Don't get me wrong, Uncle Wil and Aunt Mary have been great."

"I know. But they aren't your grandpa."

"In some ways, they are a little better." Sammy admitted.

"Like a cool aunt and uncle that kind of get you more than your parents do, huh?"

She chuckled. "Yah, kind of like that."

"Don't sweat not knowing what you want to do yet. I think Jon is the only one who does and I think it's to make his uncle proud of him more than anything else."

"You do?"

"Yah even Zulfi is only becoming a doctor because his dad is making him." Lynn said chuckling. They were at her door. "See you tomorrow, bestie." Lynn said, her code for 'be online after dinner and I'll try to get on when my psycho mom isn't looking'.

"See you tomorrow. Hey how about we get together and compare notes on that rest of our lives stuff some time?"

"Cool." Lynn wrinkled her nose at the waft of cigarette smoke smell as she opened her front door.

Sammy winked. It was only a couple more years and they both knew it.