AU: Sam's time missing onboard the Prometheus drives Jack to distraction, setting them on a course they have denied themselves for years. Set in Season 7 after 7.13 Grace, but before 7.16 Death Knell. The dates given are based on when the episodes were aired as this is the timeframe I have used in Lost and Found.
Prequel to Lost and Found. You should read this first or you will not understand some of the references in this story.
Chapter Summary: Jack wants to talk to Sam. Sam wonders if she should finally give up on Jack and call a guy called Pete.
Chapter 1: Taking Chances
Friday afternoon, 16th January 2004
Pacing in my living room, I cursed when the phone number I dialled went straight to voicemail without ringing. Desperately needing to talk to her, I dialled again to no avail. Four days. Four damn days that felt like months without her smile, her laugh and her bright blue eyes greeting me in the morning. Four days that grew to seven when she laid unconscious in the infirmary for three more days, then grew to eight when she pretended to sleep during my visits after I all but berated her for calling me by my name instead of my rank or honorific. Admittedly, I was shocked to hear my name. Shocked and elated, torn between duty, and leaping in the air to fist pump the cosmos, worried about appearances and not caring who saw the ecstatic gleam in my eyes. I dialled again, but her phone was still engaged. Damn. Damn. Damn!
"C'mon Sam, pick up!" I muttered desperately, holding the portable handset to my forehead. I had barely arrived home from the base, all but forcing myself to come here instead of driving straight to her place. I stopped my relentless wandering to breathe deep, mostly to talk myself out of getting in my truck and driving over there right damn well now. Every fibre of my being wanted to beg her to let me open the door to our room, kiss her senselessly and make love to her without worrying about ranks and titles, the military, the regulations, or our careers. Looking at the phone in my hand, I dialled again. My heart leapt when the familiar sound of ringing trilled down the line. Five. Six. Seven. Eight.
"Hi, this is Sam Carter, I can't…"
"Damn!" I cursed again, jamming my thumb on the hang up button and started pacing again. If I drove over there now, would she turf me out or take a chance on us? God, I wish I knew! It would make this so much easier. "Screw it!" I muttered, chucking the handset on my couch, something I would no doubt regret in about a week when it was out of batteries and my locator alarm to find it wouldn't work. Just as I opened my door, the thought crossed my mind that having my truck parked anywhere in the vicinity of my Major's house was a bad idea, and walking from the local shopping centre would take an extra 10 minutes that I didn't want to waste. My need for her was so great. This time had been the proverbial nail. I had come so close to losing her so many times – too many times – I couldn't do it anymore.
"Motorcycle." I said to myself as I closed my door and jog trotted up the corridor, around the corner and up to my room for my leather jacket and helmet. My jeans would suffice for leg protection in the unlikely event that I laid my bike down while on my way over, and it saved the time it would take removing my boots and putting them back on again. Not many people knew I owned a motorcycle, in fact, I think Sam was one of the only ones who had seen it – who had been interested in seeing it – and of course Siler who was a motorcycle enthusiast. It wasn't as special as her Indian or as sleek as her Ducati, but it was serviceable, practical, and suited my occasional riding habits. Since Sam was an enthusiast herself, it would not be considered strange for a motorcycle to be parked out the front of her house. My helmet would obscure my telling features making for a perfect identity cover.
Less than five minutes later, I pulled out of my driveway on the way to what I hoped was the rest of life, and not a monumental mistake that would see my heart crushed.
I called him Jack. Of all the prodigiously reckless things I could do to my career, falling for my Commanding Officer was probably the single fastest way to bring everything I worked so hard for down around my shoulders. After so many years of hiding it and denying it, I go and slip up by calling him Jack in the infirmary instead of Sir or Colonel. I thought I had still been hallucinating, but instead the grey walls were the infirmary at the SGC instead of the walls of my cabin on the Prometheus and he had been Jack O'Neill, the Colonel instead of Jack O'Neill, my hallucinatory lover. The kiss had been just the start. After fixing the ship and going to the infirmary, my hallucinations continued, and things heated up between us.
"Great job Sam!" I cursed myself. I had been sitting at my kitchen bench staring at my phone for what felt like ages. I could call him, but then what would I say? Somehow, I didn't think saying, 'Hi Sir, sorry about the insubordination yesterday, would you like to come over and break more regulations?' would be rated up there with my better decisions, even if I did want him more than the slowly melting bowl of ice cream in front of me, or all the blue jello in the commissary, or my career.
Dad wanted me to be happy. I was happy… with my work, but that was it. At the end of the day, I went home to my plants, my over full mail box and rotting food in my fridge. I didn't even have Schrodinger waiting for me anymore. There was no loving husband waiting by the door, no special person who I loved and loved me in return. Well, there was, except he wasn't at home or in the part of my life that I really wanted him in. He had told me to get a life, but I held on hoping that the war would end. Why didn't I change teams during the last deployment of SG teams? Why didn't I quit the Air Force or transfer? Why didn't I ask him to find a way? I closed my eyes and pushed the bowl of cream and chocolate sauce away.
"Because you don't trust anyone else with his life, and he wouldn't let you quit for him." I answered two of my own questions. As for the last, I didn't know. Fear maybe? Fear of rejection, fear that he would find a way, fear that he wouldn't, and we would be exposed, fear that our connection was only skin deep and once we had scratched that itch, we would be unhappy with our decisions.
I knew my hallucinations were my own creations, my own words. Open to interpretation. I knew that if I truly wanted answers to my questions not conjured in my own brain that I could call him and ask or drive over and ask. It was just bringing myself to do that was hard. He had wanted it left in the room. Hadn't he? I didn't know for sure. He agreed and seemed OK about it at the time. Didn't he? Or was I so consumed by my own thoughts, that I missed something? He said he cared, but what did that really mean? Caring is caring. It's not as if 'caring more than one should' means love. More along the lines of he likes me, as a person, as a friend, as his Major. His Major. So then why did he revel in our midnight kisses under the dome? God, we had come so close. Another week in that place and we would have succumbed to our desire. Well, my desire. I didn't know if he wanted me that way.
In my last message to Samantha, I had laid all my cards on the table regarding Jack. She had told me to just go for it. She hated the regulations, even going so far as to remind me that if my Major General father was so willing to flout them to get me a place in NASA, why couldn't I do the same thing by grabbing my CO and having my way with him. I winced when I remembered her words on the short video she had sent me. She said it would be like coming home. Like walking out of a dark room into the bright sunshine. Like those first few minutes of wakefulness under your winter blankets on a cold sunny day that you didn't have to go to work. Utter bliss. The dreamy look on her face turned sad for a moment before she had smiled again. So, why wouldn't I do it? Why wouldn't I take the advice my best friend who was admittedly also myself. A woman who had loved and been loved by Jack. A woman who had married her Jack only to have lost him. A woman who was desperate enough for a piece of Jack to remain with her that she did more than kiss my Jack. In those first few months after the mirror, I had often wondered why he had returned her kiss. Seeing him kiss her made me so mad. Then one night, several months later, I saw her in the mirror heavily pregnant and I knew it was his. At first, I was angry at him for taking advantage of a grieving widow, until she confessed a few months later that it had been her. She sent a video introducing Grace with a note apologising and explaining why she did what she did and not to take it out on him. She knew I would because she was me. I guess it was jealousy because she had want I wanted more than anything.
Cursing myself for my whimsical thoughts, I mumbled, "Dammit Sam. You can't have him. Just move on."
Looking down at the yellow post-it note I had been fiddling with since I arrived home, I wondered if I should I call him? Mark's friend, Pete. I had lost count how many times Mark had given me his number. My other option was to hit a bar and screw the first tall, brown eyed, brown-grey haired man I could find. Unfortunately, one-night stands had never been my thing, which was why I had not been laid in seven goddamn years. God help Jack if he walked through my door right now. Picking up the handset, I managed the first five numbers before hanging up and running my hands through my hair. Staring at the phone, I picked it up again and dialled the numbers. It rang… and rang… and I lost my nerve and hung up.
Swallowing down my discomfort, I muttered, "third time lucky," to myself, picking up the phone and dialling again. This time I let it ring until the answering machine picked up. Listening to his voice message, I noted he sounded excited on the recording. When the machine beeped, I sat silent, then cringed and hung up again without leaving a message. What was stopping me from speaking?
"Shower." I mumbled with closed eyes. A steaming hot shower was what I needed to clear my head and settle my nerves. I would shower, then come back out here and call Pete. I would not hang up. I would either talk to him or leave a message. Unless Jack walked through the door, not that that was a likely scenario, but a girl could dream.
"You can do this Sam; you are an Air Force Major with a PHD in Astrophysics. You can call a guy." I told myself as I undressed and turned the taps onto the hottest setting I could take. Spending a blissful fifteen minutes in the shower giving myself a pep talk about how I blew up suns, killed false gods, raced spaceships, bent physics to my will and rewrote the parts that didn't do what I needed, and built naquadah generators. So, I could definitely call a guy I had never met and arrange a time to meet him for coffee. Yes, I could do this. Turning off the taps and wrapping a ridiculously small bath towel around myself, I chuckled. I really should go and buy those bath sheets that Daniel had been raving about. At least they would cover to just above my knees instead of just below my arse. Walking into my bedroom, the sound of my front door clicking shut and boots on my tiles had me reaching for my sidearm.
Whoever it was could only escape through my front door and I was relatively certain I could aim and fire faster than any would be burglar. Stepping around the corner out of my bedroom in nothing but my towel with my sidearm already aimed, I came face to face with… Oh my God!