Home Sweet Home
Jack opened the curtains a crack and looked out of the window.
"Sam! Come here honey," he said and she got out of bed and joined him.
"Snow!" she cried joyously.
"Yep. Looks like we'll be in for a bit of a fall."
"A roll around in it with my wonderful lover type fall?"
"You betchya," he grinned and kissed the top of her head.
"A snowball fight type fall?"
"Hey, you never mentioned anything about a snowball fight."
"Huh! Worried I might win?"
"As if!"
Jack could feel his excitement mounting, the prospect of rolling around in the snow with her, and having snowballs fights, delighting him. He was a big kid at heart and Sam wanted to be one as well, right alongside him. It was thrilling.
Although he knew that snow could get pretty bad around these parts, the possibility that he might get snowed in with Sam by his side appealed to him. He wondered what "wily" would say if he called to tell him he'd be late reporting for duty because of snow. Maybe not such a good thing. Where was Asgard "beam up" technology when you needed it most?
'We'll cross that bridge.' he thought.
The day they'd visited his mother had been their last in Chicago. The next morning they flew to Minneapolis Saint Paul and drove to the cabin, but not before Jack took advantage of one final thing he wanted to do while in Chicago. The couple went to the opera that last night.
If he was honest, he wasn't really in the mood after the visit to him mom, which had his head spinning every, which way. Sam had helped a lot. She supported him through his brief bleak depression and brought him out the other side as the much happier man she had helped make him.
He couldn't say that he hadn't thought about it over the last few days, but he no longer felt like bursting into tears like the schoolboy his mom seemed to have believed he still was. Hadn't she noticed the grey, for crying out loud? His mother was clearly slightly senile, and he was no longer the son she thought him to be. He'd be okay; Sam saw to it that he was.
So far, this vacation had served to cement their relationship into the thing of substance that he so longed for. He had always believed that this was something special, that the dream existed, but now he was sure. Sam had been nothing short of amazing, accepting and loving him for what and who he was, as well as supporting him. He loved that she was there for him and wanted her to be there forever.
Sam didn't actually mind opera but was not a big fan and had never been to a live performance before, so Jack was pleased that they managed to get tickets for a comedy as opposed to a tragedy. Mozart's "The Magic Flute" was entertaining and a good opera to cut your teeth on if you weren't sure. After the events of the day they needed the laugh, and he believed Sam would enjoy it. He was right, she tittered in all the right places and when they left she was grinning her ass off. Jack's mood, however, remained downbeat and Sam did not fail to notice.
Even the fireworks display they accidentally caught on their way back to the hotel did nothing to cheer him. Sam knew Jack loved fireworks and he seemed exuberant, but she could read between the lines. They watched the exotic display of color in wonder like a couple of kids, holding each other tight in the bitter cold of the Chicago night.
"Wonder what they're celebrating. It reminds me of when I was in England a long time ago," Jack stated. "Huh! I haven't thought about that for a while."
"You were in England? I never knew that," Sam replied wondering where this was leading them.
"They have this weird celebration over there in November called Bonfire Night. There are fireworks and bonfires everywhere. It's great but pretty odd. Why the hell would they want to celebrate the day bunch of terrorists tried to blow up their Houses of Parliament? It's beyond me."
"They celebrate a bunch of terrorists?" Sam queried, "Oh you mean Guy Fawkes Night. I've heard of that. Sure, a bunch of guys tried to blow up the King and they celebrate it every year. I guess I've never given it any thought. Trust you to think of them as terrorists. Maybe they were freedom fighters."
"Yeah, maybe," Jack snorted cynically, "I guess whether you're considered a terrorist or a freedom fighter depends on whose side you're on and who writes history. Never did understand that English thing. Love fireworks, but they're pretty dangerous in the wrong hands. Guy Fawkes. Sure. That's what all the penny for the guy stuff is about."
"Penny for the guy?"
"Kids making effigies of Guy Fawkes and then begging for money for them, just so they can go blow themselves up."
"Oh! You are such a cynic sometimes Jack."
"For crying out loud, fireworks are high explosives. Pretty but lethal. Charlie loved 'em."
Jack looked wistful and Sam squeezed his arm. She wished he hadn't thought of that. Weren't his thoughts dark enough already? Sam would love to have asked him more about his son but it was one of those taboo subjects that you couldn't just bring up. Jack rarely mentioned him but he must think about him a lot. She figured if he ever wanted to talk about him he would.
"So tell me more about this trip to England," she encouraged, trying to lighten his mood, as well as change the subject away from thoughts of Charlie.
So Jack animatedly related some light-hearted stories about that visit, but Sam could still sense that he was deeply troubled and was concerned about his dark mood. She could feel it clinging to him despite the appearance of jollity.
"Jack, are you okay?" she asked when they reached their hotel room.
"Ummm. yes, no, I don't know. Jeez, I wish we hadn't gone to see mom. I don't want to spoil our vacation thinking about it."
"Jack, nothing is going to spoil this vacation. Darling."
She put her arms around him and hugged lovingly, and Jack gratefully warmed to the feel of her embrace, relaxing into her arms.
"Y-you've been great, Sam, amazing. over the last few days. For weeks actually," he laughed nervously. "Make that, like, forever?" he smiled crookedly and she smiled back.
"I'm here for you my love."
"Yeah, and that's just the best thing. the best, Sam. I'm beginning to wonder how I ever managed without you."
"You never knew what you were missing," she joked.
"You've got that right! Sam."
He wasn't sure how to express what he felt so, instead, he kissed her, tongue exploring her mouth eagerly, hands starting a frantic seduction. Afterwards, Jack wasn't sure what had happened, or how, but an abrupt change swept over him and suddenly he felt a desperate need for sexual gratification. For the first time since this relationship with Sam had started, it was a totally selfish one. He was mindless of her needs.
Jack was frenetic and feverish and this sexual act did not remotely resemble lovemaking; it was pure self-centred need - a violation. It wasn't exactly non-consensual sex, but it wasn't exactly consensual either. Afterwards, Sam ran into the bathroom, locking the door behind her, desperately in need of a shower. She sobbed silently to herself as she urgently tried to scrub him away. Meanwhile, Jack was coming to his senses and couldn't believe he had acted that way.
What have I done?' he questioned himself. 'what the hell was that?' He was cursing himself for his actions and, with a heavy heart. went to knock on the bathroom door.
"Sam? Sam, honey, god I'm so sorry. Sam please. Jeez, Sam I don't know what came over me. I've never. crap!"
When she failed to respond Jack's heart sank even further and, terrified of her reaction, he quickly put on his clothes and left their suite, not sure what to do or how to apologise. He found himself in the hotel bar drowning his sorrows but, after a couple of drinks, knew he needed to pull himself together and face it or they might never recover from this. The thought that they might not get past that awful moment of madness scared the hell out of him and he rapidly made his way back up to the suite. Once there he stood outside the door for a long time trying to pluck up the courage to go back in.
In the meantime Sam gingerly made her way out of the bathroom, wondering how to face Jack and how to react to his actions. She was shocked to find him gone and realised he was ashamed and probably just as scared to face her as she had been him. So he should be, but his disappearance worried her. She was confused and didn't know what to do now. Should she forgive him, try to understand? Should she be angry and unforgiving?
She had been so happy, thought they were happy together, and now? She didn't know what to think anymore. That man had not been the Jack she knew and loved but a totally different person and Sam was trying to digest and analyse it.
When Jack finally got the nerve to enter the room, Sam was sitting on the bed and looked up, meeting his eyes. The piercing blue depths stared into his soul and he cracked, sinking to the floor with his head in hands. Sam could hear sobbing, see shaking, and she was as stunned by that as she was by his earlier actions. He was distraught and her heart broke for him. Once again, this was so unlike Jack.
Jack could be dark, Sam knew that, but she was also sure that he would never hurt her in an intentional way. This was an aberration brought on by his emotional turmoil. He'd been much more affected by the memories provoked during this visit then he wanted to admit. Too many bad memories. Finally she reached an understanding with herself about the fundamental nature of Jack O'Neill and this wasn't it. He needed her more than ever right now and she wasn't going to let him down.
"Jack!" she approached him, squatting in front of him but not touching.
"God, Sam, what have I done? I-I. don't know what happened. I don't know what to say to you. I'm so sorry."
"That's a start."
"But it's not enough is it? Maybe I'm too like my father after all. Crap!"
"I don't know what to say to you either Jack," she admitted, "please stop crying. I can't bear for you to." Ready for forgive and understand, she moved to kneel before him, taking him into her arms and holding him soothingly, letting him cry his heart out. "Get it all out, Jack. I'm here," she whispered.
"How can you bear to touch me? How can.?"
"I love you Jack."
"How can you do that? I'm a bastard. I don't deserve."
"You're reacting to all those repressed feelings about your mom and dad. It's all coming out now."
"Psych 101?" he said cynically, "S-Sam. that's no excuse f-for."
"Maybe not, but it's a reason," she said calmly and reassuringly, "Jack, you aren't your father; that isn't you."
"I. shit!"
"Shhh. you don't have to try and explain it. Maybe you can't."
"I can't just leave it Sam. I can't let this go, and neither can you. Life isn't like that. I don't want this to haunt us. I don't want to lose you. Christ! What do I do Sam? I don't know what to do."
Sam didn't respond at first as he shuddered in her arms, the sobbing, his fears and self-loathing tearing him apart from the inside out. Then she held him more tightly, and started whispering that she loved him and he wasn't going to lose her, over and over again. Eventually he calmed, his sobbing ceased, and she pulled back to look into his reddened eyes.
"How can you ever forgive me?" he asked.
"Forgive you? Jack. oh god, at first I was angry, hurt, confused, upset, shocked. One minute you were telling me how great I was and the next, well. You've never hurt me before and. I doubt you'll ever do it again, not after this. I trust you Jack. Totally and completely. When I came out of the bathroom and you weren't here I was worried. The state you were obviously in, what caused you to do that, I thought. I wasn't sure what you would do. I tried your cell and realised you'd left it here. Damn it, Jack, I was scared."
"Of me? I don't blame you for that."
"No! Not of you, for you."
"For me?"
Jack could hear the pathetic whine in his question and hated himself for it. He so had not wanted Sam to see him like this - ever! If he had realised this visit would throw him off like this he never would have brought her to Chicago. Jack had believed he could deal with it and obviously he couldn't. That surprised him. Everything would have been okay if they hadn't visited his mom.
"I thought you might do something stupid," Sam said.
"I was going to get very drunk, just like my dad." Sam detected the bitter tone in his statement and wondered what was going around in his head.
"But you didn't, you came back to me. You came back to tell me how sorry you were. You had a demon there for a while, Jack, and I know that demon lurks inside of you trying to get out sometimes, but you don't let it, not normally. Today wasn't normal though was it? Today you saw your mom and it brought everything back; it raised the demon."
She was so right and it helped to realise she understood it, even if he wasn't sure he did. His mom had been the final straw. Jack had so much wanted his mom to meet Sam, and vice versa. Sam had to know he still had family and there must have been something in his head about seeking his mother's approval.
He should have known better, she never had approved of him or anything he did, it seemed, although apparently she had liked Sam; it was her own son she didn't seem to like. That was still a bitter pill, even after all these years. Jack was trying to analyse why it mattered but knew if it hadn't he would never have brought Sam to Chicago to meet her. He just hadn't realised quite how much it mattered. It was his mother, for crying out loud, and he wanted her to love him like a mother should.
Sometimes he wondered whether his mother resented him for tying her to James O'Neill, although she claimed to love his dad. Jack had done the math and she had obviously been pregnant when they got married. How the hell that was his fault was anybody's guess but people's emotions aren't logical.
His mom had said she loved him, but he could scarcely believe that. Her memory was faulty and that was probably what she wanted to believe. At the time it certainly hadn't appeared that she'd cared much. He'd probably never forgive her. There were too many scars. His dad had merely been a bully, and the physical pain he meted out was as nothing compared to what his mother inflicted simply by doing nothing. What an irony. No wonder he was so screwed up sometimes.
"Doesn't that demon scare you?" he asked, trying to shunt his unhappy thoughts into a dark corner of his mind.
"Yes, of course it does, but I know you better than that; I know you are better than that. Like I said, I trust you Jack. If the demon comes again, I'll fight it with you, I promise. I should have fought it this time, but I didn't. I let it take you, and me, but next time I'm not going to let it take either of us. I won't give up on you - not that easily.
"Jack, you are a good man. You care. Sometimes you seem not to, but you have to appear dispassionate because you can't afford to do anything else. But I know you care very deeply about things. However painful your past is, it is part of what made you what you are and there is nothing wrong with that man, and a good deal of right. Your natural inclination is to protect. Maybe this is where that comes from. I just wish you hadn't needed to suffer all that pain to make you the person you are. But you got lots of love too, and you have it now - never forget that."
Jack wasn't sure how to react to that declaration of faith in him. Could he have that sort of faith in himself? If Sam could, then why shouldn't he believe? He thought the incident would tear them apart but now realised that it had bound them even closer together.
"Sam, you really are something, you know that? A very special woman. I love you so much and I never wanted to hurt you. If I lost you I think I'd lose myself. You've become part of me. That scares me half to death but it also gives me life. How dumb is that?"
"Not so dumb. Pretty deep, actually."
"I am such a lucky guy, to have found you, to have kept you, to have someone like you love me. so lucky. So happy."
"Happy? Not right now you aren't, but I'd very much like you to be happy, Jack."
"What about you? I know I've screwed up. How much does it change things between us?"
Sam could sense his fear even though his face had become a mask by now. She realised he was trying to exert control over himself, trying not to be weak, or to appear it to her. Sam didn't think that Jack was in the least bit weak. He was human, that's all, and fortunate to have come through his life as a sane man. By all rights he should be a psychopath or manic depressive or something. Instead he was merely human.
It saddened her that he hadn't known his mother's love and it made her happy that he had moved to Minnesota and gained that love from his grandmother. He had needed it. Jack was right to wonder what might have happened to him if he hadn't moved there. The notion made Sam shudder.
Maybe Jack wasn't psychotic as a result of his childhood but he had obviously been deeply affected and still bore the scars.
"It changes them," she replied quickly, eager to reassure him, "but I think it changes them in a positive way, don't you?"
That was true. She had learned so much, good and bad, about Jack on this vacation. It made her feel closer to him and she believed it made him feel the same way. He had trusted her enough to confide something he probably wouldn't admit to many people - loved her enough. That was something very positive as far as Sam was concerned, despite the demon that lurked within the man she loved. That had always been there and, although they hadn't always agreed about everything over the years, she knew him as a fundamentally good and honorable man. That was important.
"Yeah, I guess I do," Jack agreed with relief at this reaction from Sam, and her reassuring words. "Jeez, isn't life ironic sometimes?"
"Pretty much all the time, actually."
"That sounds like something I'd say."
"Yeah, it does doesn't it? That isn't necessarily such a bad thing," she smiled so lovingly that Jack's heart leapt at the sight of it. This truly was the real thing. If he needed it, this was his final proof.
"I've never done anything like that before, not to someone I love," he confessed.
"I'm not sure, but I think there might be a compliment hidden in there somewhere. Another irony." She thought for a brief time and then asked a question she suddenly needed an answer for, "Never with Sarah?"
"No, never. Sheesh, I'm not sure how that sounds. What I mean is. Sam, what I feel about you is so different to how I felt about her. I loved her, of course I did, very much, but. this is more than that. Damn, I wish I could explain it. I wish I understood it, maybe then I could explain it."
"You don't have to."
"I have to try." He paused momentarily trying to give words to his thoughts. "I guess maybe this relationship developed so differently. We've done so much together, Sam, been through so much. I just think that inevitably it's different because it comes from something so different. W-we formed such a deep bond over the years, know so many of each other's secrets. You know Jack O'Neill in a way she never did and never could because I could never tell her, or show her. You I can tell and show because you already know so much, and understand so much. How could she have ever understood, Sam, when she hadn't the kinds of experiences we've had? Does any of this make any sense to you?"
"Yes. Surprisingly, it does. That makes me the lucky one."
"Ya think?"
"Yes, I do think."
After that they held each other silently for a while, contemplating what this evening, the whole day, had taught them about each other and their deep and abiding feelings.
"Jack," Sam said after a reflecting on their conversation, "what did you mean when you said you'd never done that to someone you love? Have you ever done it to someone you didn't love?"
Jack's heart leaped into his throat and he cursed himself for not having chosen his earlier words more carefully. He pushed himself away from her, looking at her briefly before finding that he couldn't meet her eyes because of his shame.
"You have haven't you?" Sam added, knowing it was true from his reaction. Jack had forced sex on a woman? It was almost too incredible to contemplate. "Jack, answer me!" she demanded, her voice raised. He could hear the horror in her tone and quailed because he knew he couldn't lie to her about this. She already knew.
"Yes," he replied, his voice a choked, low whisper.
"Oh my God, Jack! Yes? That doesn't tell me. you need to."
"Tell you something that will stop you from being disgusted with me?" he interrupted.
"Yes," she admitted.
Sam wasn't happy about doubting him but how could she not after that confession. On the face if it, this was unthinkable, and untenable, but she trusted Jack at a fundamental level. Sam was conflicted for the second time that night but, given Jack's life, his background and childhood, she was not surprised that he had hidden demons. You couldn't live through all of that without them.
"What if I can't do that?"
"I don't know."
Crap! Why did life get so good and then turn around and bite you in the ass? Jack considered what he could say, how he could explain.
"It was a very long time ago and you have to believe that I'm not proud of it. I hate myself for it, Sam."
"So you should."
"It was my first time out fighting the enemy, or the people we were told were the enemy. I was still just a kid really; wet behind the ears. My unit attacked a village. We killed a lot of people that day. It was a bloodbath and it was my first experience of it. It made me sick, elated, a whole mixture of stuff." he tailed off as if drifting into another world.
"Go on," Sam urged, "Tell me the rest."
"One of the women in the village, a girl really, my CO took a fancy to her. He raped her. I didn't know what to do, how to react. The other guys, they egged him on, cheered, clapped, the whole thing. It seemed they felt like they had earned the right to act as they pleased. I just kept quiet and held back. After he'd done he suggested we take turns, in order of seniority. I was the lowest of the low so my turn was last."
Sam had almost stopped breathing, desperately wanting to find something good in this sorry tale; something that confirmed Jack was the man she believed him to be. She had faith that it was coming and waited.
"The other guys seemed to revel in it, drink it in like a drug. It made me sick to the stomach but at the same time I wanted to be one of them, one of the guys, and there was a part of me who wanted to join in. The demon in me wanted it. Jeez, I'd like to believe I was too young to know any better, but I did know better.
"In the end I figured it was like a rite of passage, my way in to become one of them. So I did it too. Afterwards they all clapped me on the back and said some great ego boosting things, but I looked into her eyes, Sam, and saw her terror and loathing. It was a long time before I could look into my own eyes again after that, without seeing hers reflected there. A long time."
Jack stopped talking. He was unmoving, staring at a spot on the carpet, unable to bear to meet Sam's eyes. When he didn't offer her anything that would confirm her faith, she refused to believe this was all there was to it, that it was so irredeemable, and pressed him to reveal what had happened afterwards. Jack shuddered and drew in a breath, reluctant to go on but unable to refuse her need for more information. His story couldn't stop there because it hadn't stopped there.
"My CO, he shot her in the head," he revealed and could hear Sam gasp with horror. "I had admired him once, and all of them. I thought they were heroes. But I hated him after that, hated all of them. I didn't want to be a member of that unit anymore. In the end, although I knew it would get me into trouble, I reported it, the whole thing, including my part in it. Nothing happened, it was hushed up, swept under the carpet. No one seemed to care. Nothing happened to them, that is, but they didn't take too kindly to the fact I'd reported it.
"They beat the crap out of me and I ended up in a hospital for a long time. At least it got me off that unit. Someone must have liked me because I got out and because of that I ended up in Special Ops. You know the rest, or a lot of it."
Sam realised that he had finished the tale. That he'd reported it redeemed him to a point, but not totally, and she knew that he would feel the same way. It had happened, he had let it, and participated in it, and it would always haunt him.
"So, I guess now you really do know what I'm like, Sam. I told you I can be a screw up. I've done some pretty despicable things and I can't blame you if you despise me for them. That was probably the worst. I never wanted you to know."
"I can see why."
She was silent for a while and Jack wondered what she was thinking. If he made a move to touch her would she shy away from him? That notion made him feel sicker in the stomach than his memory of what had happened.
"So is that it, for us?" he plucked up courage to ask, "Is that the end of it?"
"No."
"No?" his heart quickened with hope, "Sam."
"Got anymore surprises for me Jack?" she interrupted.
"I-I don't think so. No more bombshells."
"Then no, it's not the end of it. I don't despise you. You got caught up in something beyond your control, but you did something about it despite the fact that it could have ruined your career before it even started, and that you must have known they'd come after you if they got the chance. That was very brave Jack. I can't say I like that you did it in the first place but you redeemed yourself, didn't you?"
"Did I? I tried, but I never really redeemed myself."
"You did, many times over."
"Sometimes I think I'll never get rid of the stench of that day. I raped a young girl, watched her get raped and killed."
"But you aren't a rapist, Jack, despite that. I told you, I know better."
"You think that even after what just happened?"
"Yes I do."
"Jeez, I don't deserve you."
"Yes you do."
Jack tentatively reached out to touch her and when she didn't cringe away his breathing and heart rate normalised again and he placed an arm around her shoulder. When she lay her head in his chest, he knew that everything was going to be alright between them. She meant what she said and he was grateful.
She still loved him, in spite of everything she had learned. That was an astonishing and gratifying thing and Jack wondered how many women would do the same. Not many, but no woman knew him better than Sam did. And now she knew it all, almost all - enough to see into his soul and to know her heart.
Eventually, Sam coaxed Jack to bed and sleep and in the morning asked him to make love to her before they got ready for their flight to Minnesota. At first he seemed almost as nervous as the first time they had made love but, in the end, he was even more loving and thoughtful than ever in his lovemaking. They had turned a corner in their relationship and there was no going back for either of them.
By the time they checked out of the hotel both of them were happier again and neither were haunted by the events of the night before, recognising that it had ended up as a positive thing that had given their relationship more than it had taken away.
Now, they'd had a blissful two days in Minnesota and here was the snow she seemed to yearn for. That made him happy, despite the potential inconvenience. They had plentiful supplies of food, drink and fuel, so would be okay for a good few days.
"Could be hell, but at least it isn't blizzard conditions. Let's hope it doesn't come to that," Jack said, interrupting his own thoughts. No way was he going to do anything else that might mar this longed for vacation and time with Sam.
"It'll be fun."
"You've never been in Minnesota on real bad days and weeks like I have.
"True."
"We'll be okay. I've made sure of that."
"I'm sure you've thought of everything, Jack, you normally do."
They both turned towards the kitchen to make coffee and breakfast and sat in silent contemplation for a while. Over the past few days, Jack had recounted many tales of his youth in this place, and of his grandparents and the friends he'd made once he moved there. Most of these memories were so much happier than what she had learned of his life in Chicago and Sam was thankful that his whole childhood had not been a living hell.
"This is my true home and I love it here," he declared at one point and, given everything she knew, Sam understood why.
While the weather was still fairly clement they walked in the woods surrounding his cabin and she was regaled with stories like the first time he'd ever climbed a tree, pointing out the very tree; the day he'd got very, very lost, and scared; skinny dipping; and even about losing his virginity, which had been on the dock while his grandparents weren't around.
"I so much want to make love to you on that dock one day, Sam. Pity it isn't warmer," he'd said.
"We could try sleeping bags," she suggested saucily.
"When it's so cosy in here? You're kidding, right?"
"Then we'll come back in the spring."
"Yeah, I'd like to do that - a lot."
"Me too."
They grinned inanely at each other for a while and Jack came close to asking her to marry him right then and there, resisting the temptation with difficulty. He had doubts, not about his own feelings, not even about Sam's, but mainly about timing, as well as exactly how to pop the all important question. If he was going to ask when, where and how would be the right time?
Now, he wondered if he was making excuses to put it off and realised the thought of asking her terrified him. Just because she loved him didn't mean she would say yes or that she was ready for that type of commitment, despite everything.
"What's wrong Jack?" Sam asked, noticing his far away look.
"Nothing. Just thinking."
"Care to share?"
He couldn't tell her what he'd been thinking but neither did he want to lie. That so was not the basis of a good relationship. Instead, he prevaricated by kissing her.
"Wanna go back to bed?" she asked with a saucy look.
He had managed to divert her, and what a diversion it turned out to be!
"Why bother with a bed?" he asked, lifting her up so her thighs stretched around his and sitting her on the edge of the table. It was the perfect height for what he had in mind.
"Is this okay for you?" he asked nervously.
"Does it seem as if it isn't?" she countered.
"No, but."
"After what happened in Chicago, it worries you?"
"Yes."
"If you needed to worry I'd tell you. I promised remember? You don't have to treat me like a delicate flower, Jack. This isn't the demon, this is you. Think I can't tell the difference?"
So Jack made love to her on the kitchen table. There was nothing violent or dark about it. This might be lust, but it was totally unlike the self absorbed act in their hotel room a few days before.
"That was good, great, amazing. What a ride!" he exclaimed, an expression of great joy and satisfaction on his face and then he enfolded her in his arms, picking her up and taking her to the couch and snuggling up alongside her, wrapping them both in a blanket.
"It was. incredible Jack. God, I'm so lucky!"
"Lucky?"
"To have you - and great sex, I might add," she grinned.
"Ya think?" Jack smiled with pleasure at her words. "You know I do," she responded, curling up closer to him. "Cuddle me Mr Scarecrow."
"That will give me considerable pleasure, Dorothy."
After that they were silent for a long time, both thinking how comfortable they felt in each other's arms. No matter where they were it seemed that when together they were at home and both of them loved that - they loved that a lot.
***************
End
Story Notes: Content Warnings: Some use of mild language and references to sex, non consensual sex, rape and domestic abuse.
Spoilers: Minor for Solitudes and general S9.
An Adult only version of this fic can be found on my website here: http://www.ficwithfins.com/AA3_1/archive/2/neveralone8.html
Sequel/Series Info: part 12 of the Never Alone Series. Sequel to: Never Alone: Sweet Home Chicago.
Author's Note: This weeks challenge on the As The Stargate Turns Group was to write a fic including the line "what a ride!" and/or the words 'Bonfire Night' - a quaint English custom, for those of you who don't know, which takes place each year on November 5th the day on which this challenge was issued.
Archive SJD, yes Copyright © 2005 Su Freund
Email: su_freund@ficwithfins.com
Website: http://www.ficwithfins.com/
Spoilers: Minor for Solitudes and general S9.
An Adult only version of this fic can be found on my website here: http://www.ficwithfins.com/AA3_1/archive/2/neveralone8.html
Sequel/Series Info: part 12 of the Never Alone Series. Sequel to: Never Alone: Sweet Home Chicago.
Author's Note: This weeks challenge on the As The Stargate Turns Group was to write a fic including the line "what a ride!" and/or the words 'Bonfire Night' - a quaint English custom, for those of you who don't know, which takes place each year on November 5th the day on which this challenge was issued.
Archive SJD, yes Copyright © 2005 Su Freund
Email: su_freund@ficwithfins.com
Website: http://www.ficwithfins.com/
DISCLAIMER: All publicly recognisable characters, settings, etc, are the property of their respective owners. Any original characters and plots are the property of the author. No money is being made from this work. No copyright infringement is intended. ... [ read more ]