A/N: Thank you again for reading and reviewing!!! You keep me going! Hope you'll enjoy this chapter also. Tell me what you think!Huge thanks as well to Haleakala, my amazing beta-reader!!! Wouldn't know what to do without you:-)
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4. Almost Perfect.
The sun was warming Elizabeth's face as she was sitting in one of the campus cafeterias, enjoying some free time between her courses. Elizabeth truly loved this time of the year; the early fall with all the beautiful colors and the chilly weather. At present her years in New York seemed to belong to another life. In Washington, with the work at the university and her friends (especially Sam and Daniel) life could be perfect. Except for a few things. Elizabeth's face fell as a thought she had tried to banish for good stubbornly resurfaced.
Elizabeth groaned, cursing the imminent wedding. She could effortlessly imagine all the people that would be there: Simon's family, of course, their very important High-Society-friends and countless other vultures. There was no way Elizabeth could go through that on her own. A lot of these people would know her and within seconds her former relationship to Simon would be the major topic along with the spectacular "Weir affair" her father had provoked.
Dad …, Elizabeth sighed, … had better not go there.
While Elizabeth was contemplating the dilemmas, that kept haunting her, Daniel Jackson approached unnoticed. "Hey! I hope work hasn't driven from your mind little things like, oh I dunno, sleep and eating?" He smiled at her.
Surprised, Elizabeth looked up and returned the smile, shrugging. "Got a little carried away."
Only then Elizabeth became aware that there was someone else standing behind Daniel. Curious, Elizabeth looked at the young woman who appeared to be in the middle or end of her twenties. For a split second she seemed familiar, but Elizabeth quickly concluded that she must've come across her on the campus once.
Daniel observed Elizabeth's glance and realized the two women didn't know each other yet. "Oh, sorry, where are my manners? Elizabeth, this is Josephine Sheppard. Finn, this is Dr. Elizabeth Weir."
"Nice to meet you. Daniel told me so much about you!" The girl, Josephine, gave a friendly smile as she shook Elizabeth's hand.
"Likewise." Elizabeth couldn't help but return her smile as well. "Sit with me?" She invited them.
"Love to, but first I need to … you know." Josephine jerked her head into the direction of the restroom, and hurried off that way.
Daniel, instead, took a seat and met Elizabeth's big, questioning eyes. "She's nice. Is she … are you … ?"
"What? Finn and I? Oh god, no! She's crazy!" He shook his head vehemently, and it was very clear to Elizabeth that he never spent a second thinking about her that way. "She works with me at the archeological department."
"Nothing better than crazy coworkers, huh?" Elizabeth smirked, her voice full of innuendo.
Whirling his hands around, Daniel seemed to search for a totally non-incriminating response. "She's amazing … as an assistant, I mean, she's doing a great job … " Only a second before getting seriously desperate, it dawned on Daniel that Elizabeth was just teasing him. "Oh, forget it!"
Elizabeth laughed; she and Sam always had great fun teasing the sometimes confused scientist. Daniel sensed a chance to use Elizabeth's good mood to dig up what was going on with her. "Umm, Liz, are you alright? You seemed to be in another world when we arrived."
"I only have two weeks left until I have to go to that damned wedding."
"Oh." Elizabeth had already complained a lot about this strange wedding and the lack of company she would suffer from. "Why don't you just excuse yourself? Like you were sick, busy or something?"
"Never!" Elizabeth answered instantly. Not that she hadn't yet considered this way out, but her pride and a bit of spite forbade it. "They'll think I'm running away from them, first New York with the UN and then this wedding. No, I'll never let them believe they have defeated me. "
Initially Daniel wanted to ask her if she thought she was at war, but then made up his mind. He surely didn't want to face the ensuing rant. On the other hand, maybe throughout the last months, after her father had left the UN in such a dramatic fashion, she had felt like she needed to fight a war. A war for and in her father's place. "I would've loved to go with you, you know, but unfortunately I'll be in Egypt."
"Lucky you."
---------------------------------------------------
Damn, damn, damn!She was cursed. She'd never learn to be on time, well, at least not today. The lecture, she wanted to hear, had begun ten minutes ago and where was she? Dashing haphazardly toward her destination. Damn!
She was caught up in thoughts of the excuses she would use this time as she rounded the corner to her class. Too caught up, unfortunately, to notice the woman walking towards her. Until it was too late.
Papers flew everywhere in a confused flurry. "Oh, I'm so sorry!" she apologized quickly, helping the woman gather her scattered belongings. Handing the things back to the harried woman she looked in her face for the first time. To her surprise, she recognized Elizabeth Weir, with whom she and Dr. Jackson had shared almost every lunch the past week. "Elizabeth? Hi!"
"Josephine? How are you?" Elizabeth smiled genially.
"I'm fine, thanks." Suddenly remembering the lecture, Josephine raised her left arm to glance at her watch. Out of her eye, she saw something pink among the documents in Elizabeth's hands.
It can't be, can it? She stared rather blatantly at the documents in Elizabeth's hands, wondering ... The doctor followed her gaze, puzzled. "Umm, Josephine? Something I can do for you?"
"Told you … y'can call me … Finn," she answered absently, still curious to see if the pink slip of paper was what she thought it was. Another few seconds of staring later, Elizabeth seemed to have enough and inquired in a voice she usually used to discipline her students. "Finn! are you alright?"
Josephine's attention snapped back to Elizabeth. "Sorry, I was … umm, is that … umm, Madeleine Sheppard and …"
"What?" When Elizabeth still didn't understand what the other woman's problem seemed to be, Josephine pointed at the envelope in Elizabeth's hands.
Madeleine Sheppard? Was she talking about the wedding invitation? Slowly her strange behavior started to make sense for Elizabeth. "Madeleine Sheppard and Simon Wallace," Elizabeth finished for her.
"Join the club," Finn said, resigned.
"Really? How … ?" Elizabeth was confused for a moment, but then she recalled when Daniel had introduced Finn. Josephine Sheppard. "Sheppard, your name's Sheppard as well."
"Afraid you're right. Maddie's my cousin. And you're related to the groom?"
"No, no, he's … he's … an old friend."
"Oh, okay." Josephine didn't press any further. Instead, it struck her that Elizabeth could be her opportunity to solve the annoying wedding gift problem. Silently canceling her plans with the lecture, she decided to go for her chance. "Umm, Elizabeth, since you're friends with the groom, do you have any idea what would be a good present for them? Cousin Madeline and I are not … close, thank God we're not, since … well once you get to know her you'll know what I mean, but … umm, where was I?"
While Josephine was scratching the back of her head with her hand somewhat confusedly, Elizabeth inwardly agreed with Daniel about the state of her mind. Insane, indeed.
"Right, my brother and I are going to go gift shopping this afternoon, but we're still completely clueless. Can you help us?"
Three days until the wedding and they don't have a present or even an idea That's not much. Although, only three days until the wedding and I'm still dateless. "Don't get me wrong, I'd love to help you, but I'm not sure if I'm the right person … "
Pleadingly, Josephine cut her off. "Please, I'm really desperate. My family will go ballistic if my brother and I harm the illusion of the incredible happy and loving Sheppard-family, which means we have to show up like … " As if to support Daniel's assessment of her frame of mind, she was whirling her arms around wildly. " … and … and if we don't show up with an appropriate and stunning present that at least one of them likes Maddie will go squealing to Grandmother, who will then in return disinherit me! Please, you see how grave the situation is! Don't make me beg even more! We have only three days left!"
Although Elizabeth was tempted to decline on the spot, a little voice inside her head stopped her. Some "allies" in the lion's den wouldn't hurt and this could be the perfect chance to make some, and even crazy allies were better than no allies. "Okay then, why not. I was going to get an object of early African art for them, Simon likes this stuff." Elizabeth tried to sound casual, whereas actually, the love for African art was one of the few things she and Simon had shared. With such a present Elizabeth hoped to be able to make peace with him. Maybe giving away this idea would hinder her wish of tying up loose ends, but in the short run, "allies" seemed to be more important right now and Elizabeth didn't have other ideas for presents. "Do you know where to get such stuff?"
"Yeah, Dr. Jackson once told me about such a shop. It's not exactly close, but … umm why don't you just join us afterwards? If you have time, I mean. I can show you where the shop is and you can pick something suitable. My dear brother will pick me up at three. "
For the second time, Elizabeth wanted to refuse straight away, but decided against it. For once, in all probability she would hardly make it to the shop on her own since she could find neither the time nor the shop itself on her own. And secondly, to her own surprise, she found herself really looking forward to going shopping with friends, insane or not. "Thank you, that would be great."
"Alright, then. Meet you at three at the main entrance."