We arrive without mishap and I spot a table towards the side of the room, near the windows with the words, 'Reserved for the Atlantis kindergarten'. I smile at that; Alex must have come up with that. Jason and Patrick go running towards the table nearly running into people and making them drop their trays. Maybe it's not too late to reconsider Elizabeth's proposal. Nah, we'd go stir crazy and besides they need to learn interact with each other in public places. I set Maria down in a chair and help the others get seated. I make sure that the siblings aren't sitting by each other and that there's an empty seat in the middle of the boys for me (I don't trust them). Once everyone's settled I say, "Stay here while I get lunch and behave." Implying that there would be dire consequences if they didn't and looking at the boys while I said it. They just nodded and I went off, looking back every few seconds to see if they were getting into trouble. But they weren't. Fortunately the line isn't too long and in no time it's my turn. "Hey Alex." I say, when I see her.

"Hey back doll." She says. "What'll it be?"

"Six PBJ's and a turkey sandwich."

She raises an eyebrow and says, "Hungry are we?"

I shake my head. "No, first day with the kids. You should've known since you put the sign out."

"No I didn't."

"Yes you did."

"No, I didn't."

"Yes you did." I say. Then I see the twinkle in her eyes and realize that she's pulling my leg. I grin and say, "Funny."

"Thank you." Turning around she shouts, "Mick! Where are those frelling sandwiches?"

"Keep your shorts on, they're coming." Comes the reply.

I mentally thank Alex for not swearing in front of the kids. I heard that when she first started here you could hear her cursing halfway down the hall, but apparently she's gotten better. I think. Last week there was a big row and all I heard was that it had something involving cookies and citrus.

Turning back around Alex says, "You coming to the game tonight?"

I shrug and say, "Maybe. I've got letters to write to family and Dave."

She nods her head in that all-knowing way of hers and casually says, "Heard that you 'ran' into Logan again this morning."

I feel my cheeks heat up and resist the urge to smack my head. Word sure gets around here fast. Before I can reply Mick comes out of the back with the sandwiches and hands them to me. I could kiss him right now, damn the talk. I take the tray and say, "Talk to you later, Alex." I then head over to pick up drinks for everyone and realize that I should have brought one of the boys to help me with all the stuff. Oh well, you know what they say about hindsight. I'm standing there trying to come up with a way to get the drinks without making another trip when I hear someone say, "Hungry?"

I turn to see that it's Logan. Argh, why do I keep running into him? Figuratively and literally. I'm about to crack some smart-ass remark when I see him smiling and realize that he's joking. "Haha, funny." I deadpan. "Actually I'm trying to get drinks for all of us, but I don't have the room. And I suck at balancing trays."

"Hmmm, that does sound like a problem. What do you need?" Logan asks me.

"Six milks and an iced tea. Why?" I ask as Logan stretches out a hand, grabs three milk cartons, and puts them on his tray. I see what he's up to and quickly rearrange the stuff on my tray (duh, why didn't I think of that before?) and manage to get two cartons and a Snapple. I love the fact that we get brand names in the Pegasus Galaxy. "Here, let me take those." I say.

But Logan shakes his head and says, "Nope, I'm going to follow you with these so you don't drop the tray."

I shrug and say, "Fine." We then head on over to the table and quickly distribute the sandwiches and drinks. I then sit down between Jason and Patrick and see that Logan hasn't left. "Something wrong?" I ask.

"Nope, I was just going to take you up on your offer of lunch." He says, snagging a chair from an unoccupied table and bringing it over.

"Uh, ok. Although the conversation might be limited to who's cooler; Superman or Batman." I say as he sits down.

"Superman!" Jason says.

"Unuh, Batman." Patrick says.

Great. Look what I started. I smile and just take a bite of my sandwich.

Logan laughs and says, "Why don't you tell me a bit about yourself, Max. I hardly know you other than you seem to be extremely clumsy and have one hell of a reflex."

I glare at him and now he's the one to blush.

"Sorry." He says.

"Just make sure it doesn't happen again and for your information I was just having a bad few days." I say.

"Mmmhmm." Logan says in a tone that tells me he's not entirely convinced.

I just roll my eyes and say, "Let's see…you want to know more about me? Well, I'm the oldest of three, I've been teaching for five years, I'm a big science fiction junky, and I love kids. What about you?" I say, raising an eyebrow. "Somehow I think that there must be more to Logan Cale than cybergentics and good looks."

"So I've heard." He teases. I smile and take a sip of my Snapple. "Let's see; I'm an only child, grew up in Seattle, and don't watch that much TV."

"That's it? No parents, quirky relatives, or strange friends?" I ask. I see the sparkle in his eyes dim when I mention parents.

"They died when I was young." He says somewhat subdued.

Crap, I really did it this time. Hold on a second and let me pull my foor out of my mouth. "Listen I'm sorry-" I start to say, but he interrupts me.

"That's ok, you didn't know." Flashing a smile he says, "Enough about me, why did you come to Atlantis to teach kindergarten? I'm sure that there were jobs where you lived."

"Oh there were, but I guess that I wanted something more unusual." I say. Logan just looks at me and I add, "Well that and Dr. Jackson is a friend of mine and submitted my name for the position."

"Ah, now the real reason comes out."

"Hey in my defense I all I said was that I'd like to try something new and exciting." I say. We chat for a bit more; who we know from Colorado Springs, music, books. I enjoy talking to Logan and the kids actually behave. Well aside from the fact that Jason wouldn't eat his sandwich until I had cut the crusts off, Patrick would only eat once I had cut it into pieces, Jamie and Kelly wanted chocolate milk, and Maria had never had a PBJ before, so she picked at it until I took a bite and showed her that it was actually quite good. After everyone's finished eating and all cleaned up we head back to the room where once all the kids are playing happily I start Stuart on tracing more letters. We do that for about a half-hour and then I have him working on the alphabet again for a bit. Around 1:30 I end class for the day and around that time Kelly, Jamie and Maria are looking a bit sleepy so I construct an area where they can konk out for a bit and I can still keep an eye on them. They sleep for a good hour and a half while the boys play quietly. When they get up, I get out 'Operation' and we play a few games. Then Kelly and Jamie want to play 'Candyland' again so I pull that out as well and leave them to play it. They play happily while I work on administrative stuff, the paper work never ceases even out here, and I only have to stop a few times to break up an argument and stop a flow of tears. By the time 5:30 rolls around, the kids are getting antsy. The door opens at 5:40 and in comes Elizabeth.

"Mommy!" Kelly says, jumping up and running towards Elizabeth. She envelops Elizabeth's legs in a big hug as Elizabeth laughs.

"I take it you're ready to leave." Elizabeth says, picking Kelly up.

Kelly nods and I smile, having made my way over to them.

"Patrick time to go. How were they?" Elizabeth asks me as we wait for Patrick to come over.

"As well as expected." I say.

"That's good." She says as the door opens and Carson comes walking in.

I smile and say, "Hello, Dr. Beckett."

"Hello lass." He says giving me a smile in return. "And please call me Carson."

"If you inisist." I say turning around so he doesn't see my face turn red (I still think he's dreamy even if he's married) "Stuart your dad's here."

Stuart looks up and his face breaks into a grin when he sees Carson.

"Ready to go?" Carson asks. Stuart nods and gets up, making his way towards us. As he does the door opens again and in comes John.

"Jason, Jamie your dad's here." I call out.

"Daddy!" Jamie yells, dropping the doll she's holding and running towards John. When she reaches him, John picks her up and tosses her above his head. Jamie giggles as he does this and when he brings her down she hugs him. "How was Jason?" he asks.

"He was fine." I say. Which is true, for the most part.

"Good. Ok, kiddo's ready for some dinner?" he asks.

"Yes!" they shout. They head out and I realize that it's just Maria and me. She's made her way to me and when I look down I see that her eyes are swimming with tears. I lower so I'm eye-level with her and say, "Don't worry your dad's gonna be here soon."

She just looks at me and doesn't say anything. I pick her up and take her over to the stack of books I have are. "How about we read a story until he comes?" I say.

" 'K." She says in a soft voice. I smile and can't help but think that I'm making progress.

"What'll it be?" I ask pulling out a few books. "How about 'Spilt Milk'?" Maria shakes her head no. " 'Babar the Elephant'?" Another no. I pull out one that I know she's gonna love. "Ok, what about 'The Stinky Cheese Man and other Fairly Stupid Tales'?" I get a giggle from that one and know that I've struck gold. I sit down in my chair with Maria in my lap and I begin to read, thinking that Marc'll get here before we're through. Wrong. I finish the book and he's still not here. I glance at my watch and see that its 6:10pm. Hmm, he should have been here by now. Slightly worried, I send Maria over to play with the dolls while I activate my headset and say, "Major Lorne, come in." There's a three second pause and then,

"Lorne here."

"Marc? It's Max." I say, the worry still there.

"What's up?"

"I hate to bother you, but I was wondering if everything's alright."

"Everything's fine, why?"

"You haven't picked up Maria yet."

"Oh, crap." I hear him say as realization hits. "I'll be there as soon as I can."

"Why don't I take Maria to the cafeteria and you can pick her up there?" I say, looking out of the window. The sun is starting to set and turning the sky brilliant colors. It reminds me of the summer I spent on South Padre Island, the sunsets there were incredible.

"Alright. I'll meet you there."

I walk over to Maria and she looks up at me with question in her eyes. "Daddy come?" she asks softly.

I smile, get down on my knees and say, "Not yet. Why don't we get some dinner in the cafeteria and he'll meet us there, ok?" She nods; we both get up and head on over to the cafeteria.

I set Maria down but hold onto her hand while we stand in line. Today's Wednesday so it's spaghetti night. I pick up two trays for myself and Maria and after getting drinks we head over to a table. I had just set down the trays down and was helping Maria up when someone shouts, "Hey Max!" I look around and see that it's Lydia. I wave back and she makes her way over with another women; brown hair, glasses almost stereotypical scientist look. Lydia plunks her tray down and says, "Hey there, missed you at breakfast."

"I know, I woke up late and didn't have time to stop by." I say, holding out a hand to Lydia's companion I say, "Max Wainwright."

She shakes my hand and says, "Crysta Santella. Did you really knee Logan in the-"

"Crysta!" Lydia says, cutting her off before she can finish the sentence.

Crysta looks sheepish. "Sorry, it's just that people in the bio department couldn't stop talking about it and Logan's closed mouth about the entire thing."

I shrug as we all sit down. "So you work with Logan?" I ask, cutting up Maria's spaghetti and making sure that she's got something over her shirt so she doesn't get sauce all over it.

"Yup, although I'm more actual biology and he's part of the bio tech. group." Crysta says.

"Enough talk about work, please." Lydia says, rolling her eyes.

"Bad day?" I ask, raising an eyebrow.

"Any day in which I have to interact with McKay is a bad day." Lydia replies. "So when are we going to have a movie night? It's been awhile since the last one."

Crysta shrugs her shoulders and says, "I don't know maybe when everyone can get together. Working on the-"

"What DVD's did you bring Max?" Lydia says cutting off Crysta before she finishes the sentence.

I notice it and wonder what Crysta was going to say. Must be something they don't want people to know about. But that doesn't stop me wondering what it is. "Let me see," I say mentally going through my DVD index. "Serenity, Lone Gunman, Firefly, Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, Doctor Who, Torchwood, Dark Angel, Monty Python and the Holy Grail, Casablanca, Queen of the Damned, Van Helsing, Chronicles of Riddick, Princess Bride. I think that's it."

"Which Doctor?" Crysta asks.

"The Ninth and Tenth."

"Which season of DA?" Lydia asks.

"Both."

"Cool. I haven't seen them in forever, but I vote for Hitchhiker's. Go for something new. What about you Crysta?"

"I haven't seen the Tenth Doctor but I'll go for Hitchhiker's as well."

"Good, it's settled then. We'll watch Hitchhiker's."

"Ok, but when?" I ask, tearing off a piece of my garlic bread.

"When what?" a voice says behind me. Maria, who had been content to play with her spaghetti and then eat it, looked up at the arrival of a new voice and broke into a grin.

"Daddy!" she said, standing and lunging towards him, arms outstretched.

"Hey kiddo-Whoa there." Marc says, grabbing Maria but holding her in outstretched arms since her hands were covered with spaghetti sauce. The three of us laugh at the sight and Marc sets Maria down and says, "Mind if I join you ladies?"

"Sure." I say, raising an eyebrow at Crysta and Lydia. They grin and nod their heads in agreement.

"Great, just let me grab a tray." He says. We watch him walk away and I can't help but check him out. Forget the fact that he's a single dad, he's hot.

"He's cute." I hear Crysta say.

"Yup." I say, turning around. "So why is he single with a kid?"

"You mean you don't know?" Lydia says.

"Nope. I didn't get files or anything like that, just names."

"The cliff notes version is basically he and McKay went offworld to a place where if you had brown hair and eyes you were considered the 'enemy' and they got thrown into prison where they found Maria. Marc fell for Maria, named her after a sister, and when they escaped they took her with them. The rest I think you know." Lydia says.

"So he's single?" I ask. Single fathers are quite sexy. It's true, they're right up there with foreign guys and movie stars.

Lydia nods her head and says, "And I thought that you were taken."

"It's possible for men and women can just be friends you know."

"Uhuh." Lydia says, giving Crysta look that says she isn't entirely convinced.

I open my mouth to utter some witty retort but Marc chooses that moment to sit down next to Maria and me so I close my mouth.

"So what were you talking about when I arrived?" Marc asks me.

"We were going to decide when to watch 'Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy'" Lydia says.

"Show or movie?" He asks, while wiping off Maria's marinara covered face.

"Movie. Didn't know you were into that kind of thing." I say.

He shrugs and says, "A bit, I liked the show better than the movie."

"So when do you think we should do it?" Lydia asks, getting up back to the question at hand.

"How about on a Thursday? That way we can not worry about having a hangover ruin our weekend." I suggest. "Well at least some of you can drink."

"Why not you?" Marc asks.

"Because I teach and look after the kids and I prefer to do it without feeling like a jackhammer is pounding away in my brain." I say. Well that and other things which I won't get into.

"So who are we gonna have besides the three of us?" Lydia asks. I look at her with bug eyes and jerk my head in Marc's direction. Fortunately he was busy with Maria so he didn't notice. "You could join us as well, Major." She adds after getting the not-so-subtle hint.

"Thanks I'd love to." He says. "What about Alex? I know she loved the movie as well."

"Ok, who else?" I say.

"I could tell Asha, Logan, and Andera about it, they might like it." Crysta says.

I nod my head and ask, "Anyone else who'd like the movie?"

"I guess Radek and Carson would get a kick out of it." Lydia says.

"Stackhouse and Laura might like it as well." Marc adds.

I nod my head and say, "How does next Thursday sound? That way it's not last minute and it'll give people time to come up with something to bring." I say. Everyone else agrees and we set the date. We chat about this and that for a bit and all too soon Lydia and Crysta leave, citing some projects that need to be checked on.

"Thanks for looking after Maria longer than the others." Marc says when it's just the two of us. "I'm usually good about those kinds of things; it's just that I got…held up with something."

The way that Lydia cut off Crysta earlier, the vagueness of the projects, and now Marc's hesitation makes me wonder what's really going on. But I push it to the back of my mind and focus on the cute single father who's sitting next to me. "No problem. She's adorable." I say, flashing him a smile. "So tell me about yourself, you seem to know what you're doing with Maria and from what I've hear you've only been together a number of months. Makes a girl wonder what it was like for you growing up."

"Well, for starters, I have five sisters and four brothers with me being the oldest. Momma needed someone to help with the others so I learned pretty quickly."

"Nine siblings? Wow, that's quite a handful." I say, astonished. And I thought my family was big. Well, not anymore. "Where'd you grow up?"

"All over. Dad was career military so we were always bouncing around from one base to another. How about you?" He asks, taking Maria into his lap.

"Chicago, although we moved to Colorado Spring before my freshman year of high school." We chat about this and that until Maria starts to fall asleep. We stand and I tell him that if he ever needs an extra hand with Maria he should give me a call. He promises that he would should the need arise and we go our separate ways. I head back to my room and spend the rest of the evening taking it easy; listening to some classical music and typing a letter to Dave. But the entire time I can't stop thinking about Logan. I sigh and wonder why I'm acting like this. I'm with Dave and it's not fair to him for me to be acting like this. I finish the letter and quickly fall asleep. I guess that I was more exhausted than I thought because the next thing I know my alarm is buzzing and it's time for day two of school to start.

A/N: And so ends Max's first day teaching. I still live in Chicago (suburb of the city to be exact) and do own most of the DVD's mentioned in this chapter (all but the first season of Dark Angel, Dr. Who, Lone Gunman, Torchwood, Casablanca, and Queen of the Damned.) and have seen all of them except for Torchwood. I think that I've actually come up with a plot for the story -gasp!- who would've thought? There's actually a point to this story! Wow, I think that I've just surprised myself here. (j/k) Maria and Alex belong to Reefgirl, Lydia belongs to BiteMeTechie, and Logan belongs to James Cameron. Everything else (besides Max) isn't mine. Who do you think who's better; Batman or Superman? go debate it amongst yourselves. Review after you finish this sentence (which is now).