Happy Valentine's Day
by Laura Y
TITLE: Happy Valentine's Day
AUTHOR: Laura Y
EMAIL: mrdrdoc@hotmail.com
CATEGORY: Missing Scene/Epilogue[Revelations], Angst
PAIRING: Sam/Jack, Daniel/Janet
SPOILERS: Revelations, Meridian, 2001, Between Two Fires, Ascension, Rite of Passage, Divide and Conquer, The Curse, Small Victories, Past and Present, The First Commandment
SEASON / SEQUEL: 5
RATING: PG
CONTENT WARNINGS: None
SUMMARY: Sam and Janet have a girls night in after the events of Revelations.
STATUS: Complete
ARCHIVE: Heliopolis
DISCLAIMER: Stargate SG-1 and its characters are the property of Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. We have written this story for entertainment purposes only and no money whatsoever has exchanged hands. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations, and story are the property of the authors. Not to be archived without permission of the authors.
AUTHOR'S NOTES: This was supposed to be funny, but went off on its own at some point. As always, for the SWDC, especially Suz for taking my to SG4, my first ever con.
"So…how was dinner?" Janet handed her friend a glass of wine and sat on the couch.
"Dinner?" Sam smiled her thanks and curled her legs under her.
"Yeah, remember? I’ll tell you all about it tonight, Janet?"
"Oh. Fine."
"Fine."
"Yeah, it was good."
"So…you’re okay?"
"We’re okay." Sam lifted the glass to her lips and let out a soft sigh.
"I was worried." Janet took a drink, silently sighing as well.
"You and me both."
"You were worried?"
"We’ve never been like that before. I was so…angry."
"You’re allowed to be angry, Sam."
"Not like that. Not at him."
"Him."
"You know who I mean."
"Do *you* know who you mean?"
"Of course, I...What is this, a psych evaluation?"
"Sam."
"I’m sorry, Janet. And you’re right, I was mad at both of them. Daniel for dying, and…"
"I know. I just want to know if you’re going to avoid saying his name all night."
"We’re not going to be talking about him all night." At the raised eyebrow and implied ‘you’re kidding, right?’ she sighed again. "You’re getting worse than McKenzie."
"Hey, Girl’s Night Rule Number One – no mean name calling." Both women laughed, and the conversation turned to lighter topics.
"You know what tonight is, don’t you?"
"Of course. Why do you think Cassie isn’t here?"
"Oh my god, is she…"
"Sam, please, I don’t really need to be thinking about it any more than I already am."
"She’s with her boyfriend."
"Sam."
"She’s with Dominic!"
"Sam."
"Cassie’s with her boyfriend Dominic on Valentine’s Day!"
"Sam! Stop!" Janet tried to cover her ears, but almost ended up sloshing her wine all over the sofa and gave up, since Sam had collapsed laughing.
Between gasps of laughter, Sam managed to regain her composure.
"That’s what you get, Janet, being the mother of a teenager."
"Please allow me my one night of denial, Sam. She’s had the lectures. I gave her protection. She knows how to be safe."
"You *gave* her protection?"
"Hey, that’s what she gets, having a doctor for a mother."
"Good for you. I think that’s great."
"Has it occurred to you..."
"Oh yeah."
"You know what I was going to say?"
"Has it occurred to me how sad it is that we’re sitting at home drinking together on Valentine’s Day while your teenage daughter is off with her boyfriend?"
"Yep, that’s it."
"And probably getting some, too."
"Sam!"
"Sorry." Between more gasping laughter. "Sorry."
"I need more wine. If you’re going to continue to make rude comments you can’t have any." With that pronouncement Janet got up and went into the kitchen.
"Hey! I brought most of it!" Sam leaped to her feet and followed.
When both had full glasses and were settled on the couch again with snacks, they picked up the discussion.
"You know how few good relationships there are when you count up all the staff at the SGC?"
Sam eyed Janet sideways, never sure of where this conversation was going to lead.
"Well, it’s pretty damn hard to really pursue a relationship with someone when you have to edit the answer to ‘how was your day, honey?’"
"A couple of my nurses have great marriages, but hell, their husbands work on the base. My doctors are as single as I am. Though I think that Parsons and Fletch have something going on."
"Which one’s Fletch?"
"Lisa Fletcher? Average everything, but a fantastic MD."
"Oh yeah. Haven’t caught her yet," Sam grinned. "We haven’t been spending enough time…" Her voice caught and tears welled up in her eyes as she realized what she’d been about to say.
"Oh, Sam." Matching tears fell from the brown eyes looking into hers.
"No, it’s OK. It’s just too early for the melancholy part of the drunk to start. We’re only on our second glass." With that she got up to fetch the bottle, and came back with two more under her arm. "Reinforcements," she declared, and Janet could see that she’d willed her tears away.
"You miss him." With those words, both were vividly reminded of the last time that Janet had made that statement.
Without any trepidation this time, Sam answered. "Yeah."
"Me too."
They sat in silence for a few minutes, both lost in thoughts of their lost friend. Janet looked up from her contemplation of her wine when Sam let out a small chuckle.
"Talk about someone with bad luck in love. You know, there was some talk about the two of you for a little while."
"Me and Daniel Jackson?" Janet’s smile didn’t quite reach her eyes.
"Was there…?" Her eyes wide, Sam leaned forward.
"No, Sam. You’d have been the first to know, believe me. I don’t know…it just never seemed the right time. And we’d become such good friends. But mostly, he never really got over his wife." Her sad smile showed that this was the biggest reason. It was hard to compete with the dead.
"Well, he covered that up pretty well," Sam smiled, trying to bring the mood back up.
"He certainly made some interesting choices, didn’t he?" Janet smiled, too.
"Interesting? That’s not the first word that came to my mind."
"You have to remember that for several of those choices he was in what psychologists like to call an ‘altered state of consciousness’." She paused. "That’s their fancy way of saying stoned." They looked at each other and both women dissolved into laughter again. "But not for all of them. What about…oh what was her name…Kira."
"Oh yeah, who turned out to be the Destroyer of Worlds. That was a good, rational choice." Sam downed the last of her wine and picked up the bottle, filling her glass and then emptying it into Janet’s.
Both women sat in companionable silence again, sipping their wine.
Janet spoke up suddenly. "He was so good with Cassie. I think he really regretted not having kids of his own. When she was sick…"
"He was checking up on you a lot. He said he’d be checking on Cassie, but more often than not, he’d head straight for wherever you were."
"I know. I didn’t notice at first, but pretty soon he was around more than you were. Well, around me, anyway." She smiled softly.
"That’s when we thought…"
"We, who?"
"Ah, no one.
"Sam! Who?"
"Well, there were a couple of people who noticed…" At Janet’s stern look she grinned. "OK, fine, maybe the Colonel and Teal’c and I talked about it." She smiled as Janet’s eyes widened.
"Teal’c?"
"Hey, you’d be surprised. Daniel’s one of his best friends…oh man." Sam’s eyes teared up again. "I really do miss him."
"I know." Janet stretched her foot out to touch Sam’s in silent sympathy. "Want to know something else funny?"
Sam sniffed and wiped her face. "Oh yeah."
"When I first started at the SGC there were lots of rumours about *you* and Daniel floating around." At Sam’s aghast look Janet almost spat out her mouthful of wine in laughter.
"*Me* and Daniel?"
"Don’t act so shocked. You’d have been perfect for each other. You were both brilliant, both driven, both attractive…"
"OK, aside from the fact that he was more like a brother to me than the one I’m biologically related to, there was the small matter of his missing wife who he was desperately in love with."
"Aside from all of that…" Janet realized that they were both well into their fourth glass of wine, and decided to throw caution to the winds. "More than all of that put together, those rumours died a quick and painless death once people saw you and Colonel O’Neill together."
Sam gave her friend a warning glance. "Let’s just not go there, OK?"
Janet figured that Sam must have been holding onto her faculties better since she was so much taller, and was probably used to drinking the guys under the table, but tonight she just didn’t feel like heeding the warning.
"Why not, Sam?"
"God, Janet, you know why."
"To hell with it. I declare tonight to be free of all ranks and regulations. This is neutral ground. This is Switzerland." She opened a new bottle and filled both of their glasses again. The melancholy segment appeared to have returned, and was here to stay. She decided to get to conversation going again.
"These last couple of weeks have been hard on you."
"No kidding."
"Not just because of Daniel."
Sam didn’t answer for so long that Janet thought she was going to ignore her. "…No."
"When you two are fighting…"
"We weren’t fighting. We can’t fight. Janet, that’s the worst part."
"You know that he won’t have you up on charges for…well, for just about anything." She smiled slightly, and was relieved to have Sam smile back, just a little.
"No, he won’t. But that doesn’t mean that I can yell at him whenever he pisses me off."
"You yelled at him?" Janet’s incredulous expression made Sam laugh out loud.
"No, but I really wanted to. You have no idea."
"Oh, you’d be surprised." Janet’s ironic tone made Sam look up at her and laugh again.
"Yeah, I guess that of everyone on base, maybe except General Hammond, you’re the one who’d want to yell at him the most." She felt the buzz of the wine and laughed even harder as she imagined her diminutive friend yelling at her wisecracking Colonel, knowing without a doubt who would win that face-off.
"What?"
"Noth…nothing! Sorry. Just imagining you…yelling…and Colonel…" Soon both of them were laughing so hard that they had tears streaming down their cheeks.
When they’d both managed to get themselves under control, and a cloth had been fetched from the kitchen to wipe up the spilled wine, they settled back again.
"Wow, did I ever need that."
"Me too.
"It’s been a while since any of us laughed like that."
"It’s been a while since anyone on base has laughed like that."
"I know."
"So…what happened at dinner?" Janet grinned mischievously.
"Nothing." At her friend’s stern look, Sam repeated, "Nothing. Seriously. You know I’d tell you. We talked about Daniel. The stupid things he did. The good things he did. How much we’re going to miss him. The possibility of a replacement, and the chance of us staying a three man team. Afterwards we went back to the base and Teal’c performed a special ceremony for him. That’s it."
"Colonel O’Neill have any plans for tonight?" Janet watched Sam almost choke on her drink. Nothing like hitting them out of left field. Or was that into left field?
"What?"
"Oh, you heard me."
"I thought that we weren’t going there?"
"We decided to go there."
"We did?"
"Yup."
"Oh. I think we’ve had too much wine."
"Yup. Another glass?" Picking up the nearly empty bottle, the doctor tilted it at her friend.
"Sure."
"So, did he?"
"We didn’t talk about it."
"Why not?"
Sam let out a burst of laughter.
"What?"
"I was going to say ‘because we know better’."
"What’s so funny about that?"
"Geez Janet, you were there. There are certain things that we just don’t talk about. Valentine’s Day. Fishing."
"Fishing?"
"You know he hasn’t invited me fishing in more than a year?"
"Is that bad?"
"Yes! No. Yes. I don’t know. He used to ask all the time. He even got Teal’c to go."
"Oh yeah, I heard about that. That was right about when we were getting our asses kicked in Egypt, right?
"Yeah, right about then."
"That was the last time?"
"Uh huh. And before that, it was when we were in the middle of the mess with the Replicators."
"Oh. That’s a while."
"Yeah."
They were silent for a moment.
"Talk about someone with a cursed love life, I ought to share that prize title with Daniel."
"Come on Sam, it isn’t that bad."
"Give me a break, Janet! Look at my track record. The last ‘date’ I had, and I use the term loosely, since it was in the mess, was with a politician who I abandoned on an alien planet to die. Before that was the alien who was living with me, dead in a manner of speaking, and before him was Martouf. And let’s not forget Narim, probably dead. Jonas went nuts…and died. Face it Janet, I’m like the kiss of death."
Janet winced, when she put it that way…"Not quite, Sam."
"What. Did I miss one?"
"A big one. The biggest."
"No fair."
"I was there, remember?"
"And we *definitely* don’t talk about that."
"You can’t say he doesn’t count."
"He doesn’t."
"He has to."
"He can’t."
"Sam. I may not be in possession of all of my faculties right now, or even most of them, but I’ve got a couple left."
"Janet."
"Sam. Five years. He’s not dead."
"Not permanently, anyhow."
Janet shot her a dirty look. "Not dead. Still with you. Still at your side. Not that he’d be anywhere else." She looked at her friend. "Not that you’d be anywhere else."
"No. That’s the hell of it. It’s so important to us to stay together, that we’ve given up our chance to ever be together."
Janet stared at her in shock.
"What, you thought I couldn’t even say that? You think that we don’t know?" The matter of fact tone of Sam’s voice made Janet’s heart ache. "I couldn’t have, actually. Not before. Daniel has left one last legacy, then. Sorry to dump it on you."
"Oh Sam, don’t ever be sorry." She reached over and hugged Sam tightly, knowing what she needed. "Besides, as trite as it sounds, your time will come." She was rewarded with a small laugh.
"It will, will it?"
"I have it on good authority."
"Whose is that?"
"Why, the one person who knows everything, of course, my teenager." Another laugh. "She said, and I quote ‘Come on mom, if Cher can find a new boy, you can. You’re nowhere near as…’"
"As what?"
"Well, they do have some brains at that age. That’s where she stopped."
"Smart girl."
"That’s my kid. Want another glass?"
"What the hell. Here we sit, two single, brilliant…"
"Gorgeous"
"…Gorgeous women, in our mid…"
"Ahem!"
"…Prime of our lives. By ourselves on the most romantic day of the year."
"We’re not by ourselves. We’re with each other." Feeling that was an important distinction, Janet gestured at both of them.
"Good point." She paused and smiled sadly. "I wish I wasn’t here though."
"I know, Sam." Janet sighed with her friend. "I wish you weren’t either."
The End
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