Jack really could not believe that it had been a whole year, that his daughter was a year old. Maybe it was because he had not learnt that he even had a daughter until she was almost seven months old and so had only been a father for five months. So much had happened in the past five months though, that sometimes it did feel like a whole year. It was more than he could ask for to be watching his year old daughter opening presents, playing with her new toys and being the center of everyone's attention. Uncle Daniel, Auntie Janet, Uncle Teal'c, Grampa George and a few of Sam's scientist friends were present along with the mothers and children from groups that Sam attended, and Sasha was due back later. The only person really missing was Jacob, which Jack was actually kind of pleased about. Aside from his shared time with the elder Carter on the Alpha Site, neither Sam nor Jack had seen Daniella's grand-father since the discovery that Jack was her father. Sam had tried to speak with her dad, inviting him to the party. The Tok'ra had informed her that Jacob/Selmak were indisposed of on a mission and they would not be able to get the message through to him. Sam had mentioned it to Jack a few days before the party and he been relieved. He had no idea how they were ever going to break the news to Jacob and Jack thought that a children's party was hardly the right situation. It was not as if he could discuss this with Sam anyway as she was still ignoring him and blanking him most of the time.
When they were at work, on the base, Sam treated Jack no different, but as soon as they stepped off of the base, a frosty, hostile atmosphere filled the air. It had been almost a week since Jack had been released with all charges dropped after the assassination attempt on Senator Kinsey. It had also been almost a week since Sam had discovered that Jack had not informed Laira of Daniella. Jack knew that he should have been honest with Sam, telling her and explaining to her why Laira was kept in the dark and that it had nothing to do with Daniella. After his torture at the hands of the human form Replicators, Jack had decided that he needed to see his son again and that something needed to be done to form a proper bond. Jack wanted to know his son and to do that, it would be easier to have JJ visit him rather than the other way around. As for him not telling Laira the developments in his life, it was partly because he wanted to spend as little time with the woman as possible and because she would make his life more difficult and cause more problems in him seeing his son. Jack had not been able to explain any of this to Sam because she refused to hear it. They had discussed the birthday party and anything else related directly to their daughter whilst not at work, but that was it. There was a definite frosty barrier between them both which Jack had no doubt that his daughter could feel, that everyone could feel it in fact. If it were not for the fact that they were not romantically involved and already in separate bedrooms, Jack had no doubt that given Sam's mood, he would be on the couch or in the spare room.
"I think it might be time for the cake!" Sam declared with a large smile on her face and left the room. Hating the fact that Sam was unhappy most of the time now, Jack could not resist following her into the kitchen.
"The day's going well, isn't it?" he asked from a few feet away from her as she lit the candle.
She turned to him and smiled, nodding, but he could still see a distance in her eyes. "Daniella seems to be loving all of the attention."
"I know this isn't the right time, but I feel like there's a cloud hanging over what should be an amazing day."
"And whose fault is that, Jack?" she asked, her eyes on the flickering candle flame.
"If you would only let me explain."
"Will you just quit it?" she snapped, trying to keep her voice quiet. She did not try and control her tone, however. "This is so messed up. So completely messed up." She turned to face him, anger and frustration blazing on her face. "Honestly, if this was a normal relationship, I could actually avoid you, but because of our screwed up family life, I can't."
"Screwed up? What's so screwed up about it?" He understood that it was different, perhaps unique, but not that it was detrimental to anyone.
"Don't you think at some point, as Daniella gets older, she's going to start getting confused as to why mommy and daddy have separate bedrooms, or that they're like everyone else's mommy and daddy. Hell, Jack, however often I'm confused. What happens if either of us meets someone?"
Having no idea from where everything Sam was thinking and saying came, Jack had no idea how long these things had been troubling her. The fact that it was things that he had never even considered made him even less able to know how to respond to her. Instead, Jack said the first thing that came to mind. "Have you met someone?"
Growling in annoyance, Sam picked up the purple cake in the shape of Barney the Dinosaur, and walked past Jack. She paused just passed him and said, "We're having a family photo. The three of us and the cake." Spinning on his heel and plastering a smile on his face, Jack followed her, playing the dutiful father role.
SG – SG – SG
Sighing with a new found level of contentment and peace, Sam opened the door to her house and went in. After Daniella's party on the Friday afternoon, Sam had escaped for the Saturday and night with Janet and Cassie by venturing out to a spa. All three of them had needed the time away although it had taken a few hours and being wrestled to the floor, before Cassie had relinquished her cell phone. After that, the three women had enjoyed suanas, hot tubs and a variety of different treatments. Unfortunately, it was now Sunday afternoon and Sam had to return to her life and work. Part of her felt awful that she and Jack had been arguing so badly during their daughter's birthday party, but it did not make her want to simply forget what he had done. As she closed the door behind her, Sam felt a lot of the stress related to Jack and their relationship fall back onto her, undoing the hours of work at the spa. What had started as anger over being lied to and having her daughter be covered up, had evolved into Sam questioning how long they could continue as they were. Despite Jack's question of whether she had met someone, Sam had not met anyone and was not planning on it. For all intents and purposes she was a sinlge mother of a year old child, that was hardly the perfect time to be out on the hunt for a new romance. It did not change the fact that at some point either of them could meet someone and that it could end up more devasting for her. If Jack were to start a relationship and it became serious, would he ask Sam and Daniella to leave so that he could move in his new partner? Would the new girlfriend be okay with his closeness to Sam? Would any potential new boyfriend be okay with Sam living and working with Jack? None of these questions had occurred to her when Jack had insisted they all move in together.
Sam had also come to the realisation that she was spending more and more time confused as to the lines between her and Jack, what their relationship was and how she should be feeling. If she was confused then it was only fair to say that as Daniella grew up, she would become confused and that was not what Sam wanted. Their living together as a family was supposed to have made things easier and allowed them all to be a family, not confuse each of them on a recurrent basis. As Sam made her way further into her own house, the many questions she worried over refilling her mind and pushing out the peace, she could not help but hope that Jack was at work, on a mission or simply out and that she could have one more evening of being alone with her thoughts.
As if on cue as Sam passed by the telephone, it rang and she immediately picked it up. "Hello?"
"Sam, it's me." She could recognise Daniel's voice anywhere.
"Hey, Daniel, I just got in. What's up?"
"There's been a bit of an incident here. At work."
Panic filled her body, turning her blood ice cold. "Incident? What kind of incident?" A quiet voice in the back of her mind reassured her that he had said at work, Daniella should be upstairs playing with her toys. Despite the panic, there was an element of relief.
"Jack's missing. Something happened yesterday morning. I think you should get over here."
Sam was vaguely aware of mumbling an affirmation before she hung up the phone and headed back to the front door, pausing briefly to check that her daughter and Sasha were in fact in the house and fine. She quickly informed Sasha that she had to pop out again, but she would be in touch and then she headed straight for the base, desperate for more information.
Author's Notes: It's Daniella's first birthday and time for some nice family fun time together. If Sam had forgiven Jack and was talking to him that is.
End Notes: This was only a short one, because it's a filler between the two episodes as the Sam/Jack arc runs straight across. I thought it would be nice to show Daniella's birthday, but given the tension between her parents and the issues Sam's been starting to have, it couldn't be too much of a family affair. I've got plans for the next two episodes and, hopefully, I'll have some more scenes involving the background characters.
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 ]