Just as the soreness was leaving his body, his first therapy appointment came around. He met his therapist Sandy, an upbeat, redhead with a very quick wit. When he complained about the exercises she made him do he called her his physical terrorist and not to be out done she called him 'da general'. Jack welcomed the verbal sparring as a distraction to the pain.

Sam took him to his PT appointments, but was not allowed in the therapy sessions. She could tell how difficult they were on Jack by his attitude. Good days were bad, but bad days were hell.

Life became a repetition of pain and lashing out at people for Jack, and although he thought he was pushing them away he couldn't seem to stop himself from doing it.

Daniel and Teal'c had to leave to resume their lives but promised to keep in touch by phone and e-mail. Sam still had a lot of accumulated leave time so she was staying.

Jack didn't have the words to tell her how much it meant that she was still there with him through all the biting comments, snide remarks, and verbal tirades. He was fighting with depression every day and she had become his only anchor against it. It amazed him that she just seemed to go with the flow of his mood no matter what it might be.

After two weeks of therapy, including walking between parallel bars, he was taken out of the wheelchair and given a walker which he hated even worse.

"The chair at least had some dignity to it," he griped to Sandy one day, as she exercised his legs in range of motion movements.

"But a chair isn't going to make your legs stronger and we need to do that. Believe it or not, your muscles have atrophied slightly and are weak around those weak bones. Bad combo, see, if we get the muscles back up to par you can walk even sooner, and I know you want that."

She was right, Jack wanted to be back on his own two feet, he wanted to walk, hell, he wanted to run, to dance even. He and Sam were getting married, they hadn't set a date yet, but when it came he wanted to be able to dance with her at their wedding.

He began to push himself harder and harder in therapy and then at home too. Sandy warned him to slow down before he did more harm than good, but he didn't listen and charged ahead. He had made up his mind to be walking out of there in three months and to marry Sam.

Once he made those decisions his attitude changed. The verbal onslaught stopped and he became himself again. Everyone was right, he had been damn lucky to make it through that accident and still have the woman he loved and considered his best friend by his side.

"Have I told you lately how much I love you?" he said one night as they sat down to dinner

"You tell me all the time," she answered, cocking her head to one side with a little smile. "But I never get tired of hearing it."

"Well I do, and if you weren't engaged already I'd ask you to marry me," he said with a wink.

His therapy became easier as his legs grew stronger and stronger and in eight weeks he was walking much better. His confidence was growing as well and he realized there was something he had not done since the accident. He had not made love to Sam since the crash, and that realization came as a shock to him. Jack O'Neill possessed a high sex drive, and to lie in bed next to his fiance every night for two months and not touch her was strange.

"Sandy?" he said the very next morning as they were in the hydro therapy pool. "Do you think it would be ok for me to have sex?"

"I dunno, are you any good at it? It's ok if you are good at it," she smarted off to him.

Jack actually blushed slightly.

"That wasn't what I meant and you know it."

"I know, I just had to give you a hard time. I don't see why you can't, although I would suggest you are the one on the bottom, at least for now."

"I'll take that under advisement," Jack said.

He had taken a shower that night and got into bed and Sam was reading a book, with no warning he reached over and removed it from her hands.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm going to try making love to you, what did you think I was doing?"

"Jack, if you aren't ready it's ok to wait," she said.

"Oh I'm ready, are you?"

"I'm always ready for your touch," she smiled.

He discovered he had nothing to worry about.