Chapter Twenty - Sam

Joe was waiting for her in the Residence when Sam finally adjourned the meeting in the Oval Office. He kissed her cheek, but it felt almost mechanical. Like these kids who had shown up at the White House, claiming to be Sam's offspring, had driven a wedge between them.

"You want me to call down for dinner?"

She shook her head. "We had sandwiches in the meeting."

Joe frowned. "With that O'Neill guy?"

The idea that Joe would be jealous of the retired Air Force colonel made Sam laugh as she pulled away from him. "Trust me, you don't have anything to worry about."

She went into the closet and changed into her pajamas. "He actually suggested that the only reason you weren't on the ticket instead of me was because the other party had already announced they were going to put a woman at the front of their ticket."

When Joe didn't laugh, Sam got a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. She finished dressing, then stood in the doorway with her arms crossed. "That's a totally ridiculous idea, isn't it, Joe?"

Her husband looked down at his hands, like he was trying to gather the courage to tell her the truth. "It was my idea, actually. The party asked me if I would head the ticket, and I suggested—"

Sam gaped at him. "Your idea? Do you have any idea what that does to my political capital? No wonder it was like pulling teeth to get the Planetary Protection treaty on the books!"

Joe stood as he ran a hand through his hair. "I knew you were going to want to vote for the other candidate because she was a woman. I figured there were a lot of other voters like you. I thought we could still do a lot of good if I set aside my ego and encouraged you to run."

"So, this was never about thinking I could be a good president, was it? This was all about trying to shove your agenda through regardless." Sam rolled her eyes. "My dad was right about you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Sam grabbed one of the pillows and threw it at him. "It means a politician's a politician, no matter what they say."

Joe caught the pillow. "Sam, it doesn't matter what anyone thinks. You and I know how it's really running here."

Sam put her fists on her hips. "Like it didn't matter how anyone thought when you were thinking about running for president but put my name down? Like it didn't matter when you thought that I would be more likely to vote for a woman I didn't know over my own husband?"

"Sam..."

She stopped long enough to take a deep breath. "Look, I'm sure we'll get through this, but right now, I need to get some rest before I decide whether we're going ahead with this plan to try to fix the timeline."

Joe just stared at her. "You're not still on that, are you? What is so much more appealing about that timeline? You're the president of the United States in this timeline. That's impressive."

Sam stared at her husband. How was he the same man she'd married? "This isn't just about me, Joe. There's a whole universe out there that's been affected by this change."

Joe crossed his arms and studied her. "Do you honestly think you being military had that big an impact?"

Sam tried not to think about what would have had to change, not only for her to go military but also for her to name a son after her father. "I don't know, but I can't help but think that maybe we need to do this. For the greater good."

"Sam, what about us?"

She crossed her arms. "What about us?"

"Do you even know what I'm doing in that timeline?"

She looked down at the ground. She was married to O'Neill in the other timeline. She'd put that much together from what the kids had said. She hadn't even thought to ask about Joe. Had assumed that since they were shocked to meet her husband, they'd never met Joseph Faxon. "I don't know."

"And you don't think this is worth saving?"

Sam's head snapped up. He said that like she was the sole person responsible for their problems in the last couple days. "I might have felt differently before I found out that you made me some puppet president!"

"For the last time, you and I both know that's not how it works, Sam."

"Well, I had a seventy-year-old retired Air Force colonel who was questioning my ability to do my job because of that implication, Joe."

Joe scoffed as he almost moved toward the door. "If I never hear another thing about Jack O'Neill, it will be too soon."

Sam clenched her jaw as tears stung her eyes. "Joe, I just met the man today, and frankly, I didn't like him. That doesn't matter to you, though, because you're acting like I've had an affair. It was another timeline, Joe."

He leveled a serious gaze at her. "Another timeline you want to go back to."

The accusation in his voice stung, and Sam's lips trembled as she pointed out the door. "You need to go."

There was instant regret on Joe's face. "I shouldn't have said that, Sam. I'm—"

She pointed at the door again, more insistently this time. "I can't talk about this now. We'll talk tomorrow."

Joe hesitated a long moment before he sighed. "Should I make an appointment with your receptionist? Or are you going to come find me between meetings about the timeline?"

Sam wrapped her arms around herself, trying to protect herself from his icy demeanor. It hadn't happened often, but there had been these subtle jabs over the years. They'd seemed so out of character at the time, but now, she could see them for what they were. Joe's simmering resentment that the best chance for his plans had rested in his wife's becoming president. Maybe he thought he was okay with her being powerful, but she wasn't nearly so sure anymore. "That's not fair."

"Good night, Madam President."

She flinched as Joe slammed the door behind him.

It was nearly one the next morning before she arrived at the Arlington house, the presidential motorcade in full force.

She should have called before coming over, but the urge to come had been so overwhelming and she didn't want to lock herself into something without knowing for sure that the feeling wouldn't pass.

The secret service knocked on the door. Spoke to the figure on the other side of the door.

Sam's stomach twisted in knots before the agent at the front of the limousine came and opened the door for her. "Madam President, they're ready for you."

Sam closed her eyes and sucked in a breath to strengthen herself. She forced a smile to her lips as she stepped out of the limo and faced the man on the front porch.

"Hi, Dad."

"Visit from the president of the United States at one in the morning. Things have changed since my day."

Sam rolled her eyes as her dad offered her a cup of decaf coffee. "Nice to see you, too, Dad."

"Joe didn't come with you?"

Sam stiffened and set her cup to the side. "No, Dad. Believe it or not, we don't do everything together."

Her dad studied her over his cup of coffee. "So, that's why you're here. Marriage trouble."

Sam didn't even try to disguise the sarcasm in her voice. "Yeah, Dad, I came home for advice. Because you were so good at marriage."

Her dad didn't react, just took another sip of coffee. "Is there a reason you came all this way in the middle of the night, Sam?"

Sam looked at the walls, at the memories lining them in the form of photographs and memorabilia. "I had a chance to reexamine some things recently. Assumptions about my life that may have been inaccurate."

"Like?"

Sam twisted her wedding bands around her finger. "Just about everything, actually. Whether I was right to go into political science. Whether I should have gone military. Whether Joe was the right guy..."

"A little late for second thoughts, don't you think?"

Sam threw her dad a look. "Can we just set aside all the stuff from the last thirty years, and have a civil conversation? For once?"

Her dad seemed to catch a glimpse into how distraught she was because he sat up a little straighter. "What's going on, Sammy?"

It had been decades since he'd used the moniker, but it brought her back in some way to a simpler time. A happier time.

"I can't tell you."

He raised an eyebrow. "Classified?"

She nodded. "But it made me wonder what things would have been like if I'd made different choices. If maybe circumstances had been different."

"Like?"

She shrugged as she thought about the blond man the DNA confirmed was her son. She'd never even met the kid's father, let alone had a baby with him, but there were things about Jacob O'Neill which had unsettled her. Starting with his name.

She took the coffee mug back into her hands and sipped at the bitter liquid for strength. "Before I got married, I always thought that when I had kids, I'd be so sure of what to name them. I met a young man who was named for his grandfather. I wondered for a second if it would have been easier to fix things between you and me if I'd had kids, or if they would have just complicated an already difficult situation."

Jacob Carter set his coffee mug on a coaster on the end table by his armchair. "There are a lot of mistakes your parents make that you can at least understand better when you've been a parent. That being said, juggling your relationship with your parents and your children's relationship with their grandparents can be a delicate balance."

Sam let her hands rest in her lap.

Her dad leaned a little closer to her as he studied her. "What's this all about, Sam? Are you okay?"

She couldn't explain everything that was going on with the time travelers, but she could at least tell him what had finally broken her tonight. "Joe told me that I was only approached to be on the presidential ticket because the party wanted a woman to represent them. That it was his idea to step back from the nomination so I could get it."

"And you believe him?"

Sam's head snapped up. "What?"

Her dad looked at her like it was the most natural thing in the world to wonder if Joe had been lying to her. "Do you believe that he really gave you the nomination?"

"He wouldn't lie to me about something like that."

"I hate to break it to you, Sammy, but he's already lied to you."

She frowned at him. "Explain."

"If he made this deal like he claims, then, he kept it from you for over three years. What's to say there was no deal, and he's lying now?"

Sam sat back on the couch as her mind processed the new supposition. "I know it sounds strange, but I feel like he's finally telling me the truth. There have been a few things over the last couple years that seemed to create friction between us, but I could never figure out what they were. This missing piece of information makes a lot of things make sense."

"Is he pulling the strings behind your presidency?"

She stood and walked over to the bookcase where she reverently caressed a photo of her mother. Trying to be patient with her father the way her mother would have wanted, she looked over her shoulder at him. "I'm going to pretend you didn't just ask that question."

Her dad sighed as he stood and walked over to where she was. Though she couldn't see, she suspected his vision was on the photo of her mom, too.

Sam's heart ached as she took in the view of her mother laughing in the swimming suit on the beach with a two-year-old Sam in her arms.

"Everything kind of fell apart after she died, didn't it?"

Sam swallowed down a lump in her throat. "Yeah."

Her dad put a hand on her shoulder, the closest thing to a hug they'd exchanged in years. "That's probably my fault. I was so consumed with grief—"

Sam tried to wipe away the single tear which had formed in the corner of her eye. "It felt so unfair. All that time I'd been worrying about you when I should have—"

Jacob's grip tightened on her shoulders as she tried to keep the tears at bay. When she couldn't stifle them any further, she turned toward him. She covered her face in her hands as her dad wrapped his arms hesitantly around her.

The hug felt unnatural, almost stiff before she relented and relaxed into it as if she were a child again. When she had calmed down, she pulled back and wiped at her nose with the back of her hand. "Let's say for the sake of argument that you had the chance to go back to a specific time in history and change things that went horribly wrong. Would you?"

There was a long moment when Sam didn't think her father even breathed before he bobbed his head. "Maybe it's wrong, Sammy, but yeah. I think I would."

She thought back to the two people who claimed to be her children. To the son another version of her had named after the father whom she'd once blamed for her mother's death. She leaned in and kissed his cheek. "Thanks, Dad."

"Did it help?"

She nodded. "More than I thought it would."

"Good."

She grabbed her jacket from the couch as she tried to pretend like she hadn't been crying. "Uh, if you have a chance to come for a visit tomorrow, I think there are some people I'd like to introduce you to."

"The kid who was named for his grandfather?"

Sam nodded. "And his sister."

"I'll see what I can do." Her dad walked her to the door. "What about Joe?"

Sam shook her head. "I wish I knew what to do."

Her dad helped her into her coat. "Trust yourself, Sammy. You're the one people voted for. You'll do what's right."

She righted her long hair, which had been pinned under the collar of the coat, as she turned back to him. "Do you really think so?"

"I don't know what's going on with you, Sam, but I just want you to know that even though we've been angry with each other for a while, I was always proud of you. Always sure you could do anything you set your mind to."

She blinked away a second batch of tears as she ducked in for a second hug. "Thanks."

Her dad's expression was oddly serious. "I know you don't like it when I talk about my career, but Sam, if I had the problem you're facing—"

She raised an eyebrow in interest. "Yeah?"

"I'd remind everyone who's boss."

She managed a thin smile as she reached for the door handle. "Thanks, Dad. I'll keep that in mind."

Reluctant to face her husband again after their argument, Sam walked into the Oval Office and took a look around at her surroundings. Just yesterday, she'd been marveling over getting a job that no other woman had held before her. There'd been a measure of pride in that as well as heavy responsibility not to ruin things for the women behind her who would one day wish to hold the office.

She walked toward the desk, running her fingers over the smooth wood.

Only then did she see the folded paper in the center of her desk.

She stiffened. No one was supposed to be in here without her. Not even Joe. If this was some backward attempt at an apology, she wasn't sure it wouldn't backfire.

She glanced down to the signature at the bottom of the note. A hurried scrawl. Jack O'Neill.

Then, she remembered walking the entourage out of the office after their dinner meeting. How he'd left his cap in the office and asked for permission to drop back in.

She sank into the desk chair as her eyes flickered up to the beginning of the short message.

There's no reason you should care what I think, but I thought I'd apologize anyhow. I shouldn't have suggested that you weren't the best candidate for the job. Frankly, I wouldn't have voted for your husband. But after the last couple days, come reelection time, I think I might just vote for you. That is, if we're both still around then.

Her throat thickened.

How was it that a complete stranger—a man who she'd married in another life—would have more faith in her than her own husband?

She closed the paper and slipped it into the top drawer.

She shoved the thoughts of the colonel out of her mind. He was off-limits. She was married.

Now, to finalize a plan for how she was going to remind them all that she was the one running the show.