The Lemon Parade Part 2
Title: The Lemon Parade Part 2
Author: ardvari
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Sam/Jack
Disclaimer: Not mine.
A/N: Part two, finally!
The Lemon Parade Part 2
It’s very late, or very early, by the time they get to the cabin. The rain has stopped but the clouds are thick and heavy and it’s almost pitch black outside. Jack leaves the headlights on so they can carry their stuff inside and won’t step into any puddles or slip in the mud. He takes Carter’s bag and hands her the keys, motioning for her to go ahead. He follows her, rocks back on his heels as she pushes the key into the lock and opens the door. It creaks and then the smell of years of wood smoke lingering in the beams surrounds them. She takes a deep breath, turns around, and smiles.
"I like it already," she says.
He drops their bags inside the door and while she flips on the lights in the living room and kitchen, he goes to turn the lights off on his truck. He doesn’t bother to lock it up here, it’s not like there’s anyone around. Before he goes back inside, he takes a deep breath. Five days with Carter. Just Carter. Sam. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. He swallows hard and walks inside, kicking off his shoes before he goes looking for her.
She’s in the living room, always the soldier, already lighting a fire. When she’s done she wipes her hands on her jeans, gets up and turns around. She smiles when she sees him, the fire behind her making her look ethereal, painting her in hues of orange and gold.
"Hungry?" he asks and she nods.
He sends her to root through one of his bags full of canned food while he has a chat with his generator. The thing is old but it still works, it just has to be reminded of what to do every once in a while. He’s fairly sure Carter will take a look at it sometime over the next two weeks. Carter is magnetically drawn to things that are old or don’t work, and Carter can fix anything.
After he’s cooked her dinner they both stand around the kitchen, looking for something to do. Dishes are done, the leftover tomato soup in the fridge. It’s past midnight and the clouds seem to break up above the cabin.
"Uhm, I’ll show you... the spare room," he says, slightly deflated all of a sudden.
She follows him out of the kitchen, leans against the spare room’s doorframe while he turns on the light on the nightstand, demonstrates how to close the curtains, and pulls back the bed’s cover. With her arms crossed over her chest she smirks at him.
"You brought me all the way up here so I could sleep in your spare room?" she asks softly.
He blinks at her a couple of times, then rubs his head and smirks.
"I was hoping you’d bring that up," he says sheepishly.
He opens the curtains again, folds the cover back over the pillows, and turns off the light. Together they trudge through the living room to the master bedroom. There’s another moment of awkwardness when they both head for the bathroom at the same time, but he waves her ahead and watches her blush when she passes him.
They’ve slept in the same tent a million times, they’ve huddled together to stay warm. They’ve never slept in the same bed and when they’re finally under the covers, he clears his throat and turns the light off. He listens to her breathing, the way it doesn’t slow or even out. She’s not sleeping and neither is he, his heart thumping away loudly in his chest.
She’s all the way over on her side of the bed and he’s all the way over on his side and between them the covers and sheets dip down into the no-mans-land they’re still terrified to cross.
They’ve spent years falling asleep against the sides of moist tent walls, more awake than asleep while they listened to the night life on another planet, waiting to be shot at. He knows she’s the lightest sleeper out of all of them, not counting Teal’c, and that she generally doesn’t need much sleep, unwilling to let her mind shut down.
"Good night," she whispers into the quiet room and he smirks, turns to face her.
"Good night," he whispers back, and reaches out to her, leaves his hand palm up in the space between them.
Her eyes have adjusted to the dark enough that she can see the outline of him, the bright spark of his eyes. He blinks at her and she turns over, faces him, and places her hand in his. He’s not going to kiss her, doesn’t want to because he’s fairly sure that eight years of unresolved sexual tension would render them unable to stop. There is a fairly good chance, he thinks, that they would screw up this attempt at a relationship right from the start. If their car trip up here had been any indication, they are treading on thin ice and while he doesn’t doubt his feelings or her feelings, he knows that the devil is in the details.
They do fall asleep eventually and when he wakes up halfway through the night, they have both slid into the center of the bed somehow. Sam is close enough that he can feel her breath on his shoulder, brushing warmly through the fabric of his near-threadbare t-shirt.
When he wakes up in the morning, the other side of the bed is empty. The sheets are rumpled and cool, and the door to the bathroom is open. The cabin is quiet and he wonders if she’s had second thoughts, if she took off sometime last night and he will find a note in the kitchen saying that she just can’t do this right now.
On the way to the kitchen he’s already beating himself up, telling himself that all of this was a bad idea, that she has every reason to be gone, really. But there is no note, there’s a pot of fresh coffee and a mug, and the sliding glass doors that lead from the living room to the back porch and the pond is wide open.
He goes and puts on a sweater before he goes outside, walking barefoot across the dewy wooden boards of the deck, down into the grass. He can see her footprints, and then her. She’s sitting on the edge of the dock, wrapped in one of his fleece jackets and sipping her coffee absentmindedly. He’s fairly sure she hasn’t heard him yet so he shuffles his feet a little more until he can see her tense and listen, the good soldier, and then turn her head. She smiles at him but doesn’t bother to get up.
He sits down beside her, grimacing because his knees crack and there’s that dull, pulling pain behind his knee cap that spreads and then recedes.
"Hi," she says, her eyes traveling up his boxer-clad legs to his sweater and his hair sticking up in every direction.
She’s amused, he can tell.
"Morning," he says a little too gruffly, running a hand through his hair almost self-consciously before he takes the mug out of her hand and takes a sip of her coffee.
She turns back towards the pond, stretches her feet so her toes touch the pond’s surface. She traces lazy circles and figure eights that make the water ripple gently, and he watches her for a while, finishing her coffee and finally setting the mug down beside him. The dew is seeping in through his boxers, is no doubt seeping through the fleece that reaches down to her thighs and the shorts she’s wearing underneath.
The air is still cool from the rain, too cool for shorts, but she doesn’t seem to mind.
"I get why you love it so much up here," she says quietly.
He’s not going to remind her of how often exactly he’s asked her to come up here with him. He’s not going to remind her of how many times she refused, that she’d tried to refuse again. There has never been a doubt in his mind of whether or not she would love it; it had just been a matter of getting her to come with him in the first place.
"Worth it?" he asks softly, staring down at her hand curling around the edge of the dock.
She pushes her shoulders back and takes a deep breath.
"You know it is," she answers and smiles, and he isn’t sure anymore if they’re still talking about the cabin.
They’ve always been good at talking, but not really, about two things at the same time.
He puts his hand on top of hers and she stretches her fingers so his fall into the spaces between. Her smile brightens and her eyes come to rest on his. He’s always loved her eyes, their blue depths holding more mysteries to him than the event horizon of the Stargate ever could. He can see her eyes flickering to his lips, then back to his eyes. There’s tension in the air now, electricity. They’ve kissed before. They’ve kissed because they were infected by an alien virus, he’s kissed her in an alternate reality, and he’s kissed her while they were stuck in a time loop.
He carefully pulls her closer and it’s awkward because they’re both sitting on the dock and they have to twist a little, but then her hands are on his cheeks and she pulls his mouth down to hers, and nothing else matters. This kiss isn’t like any of the other kisses because this is genuinely them and there’s no alien virus, no alternate reality, nothing but them, pure and simple.
Her lips are soft and when he traces her bottom lip with his tongue she opens her mouth and he can taste coffee and sweet relief on her breath. Her hands fall from his cheeks to his neck and somehow she manages to turn herself around until she’s kneeling beside him. He pulls her into his lap and the entire thing is a little precarious but they make it work. They kiss until her hands start pulling on his clothes and his fingers sneak beneath her shirt and stretch along her back.
He rests his forehead against hers and she giggles because they should both be too old for this and yet here they are, dressed inappropriately for the weather on a dock in Minnesota kissing like teenagers.
"What?" he asks, his hand above her shirt now but beneath the fleece jacket, warm against her side.
"Nothing. Just... this. It’s really nice," she says.
He chuckles at that, pulls her body against his and wraps his arms around her. He kisses the side of her neck, letting his lips linger against her pulse.
"Breakfast?"
"Yes, please," she says, kissing him again before she climbs off of him, holding out her hand to pull him up.
She doesn’t let go of his hand on the way to the cabin and he’s quite happy with that. It’s still cool outside but he feels warm now because Sam’s beside him and occasionally their entwined hands brush against his thigh.
"Omelets?" he asks when they’re in the kitchen and he realizes that he’s brought beer and eggs and canned food with him and nothing else because he usually runs to the store first thing in the morning.
"With the secret ingredient?" she asks and he smirks.
"Can do," he says, and she giggles again.
Author: ardvari
Rating: PG-13
Pairing: Sam/Jack
Disclaimer: Not mine.
A/N: Part two, finally!
The Lemon Parade Part 2
It’s very late, or very early, by the time they get to the cabin. The rain has stopped but the clouds are thick and heavy and it’s almost pitch black outside. Jack leaves the headlights on so they can carry their stuff inside and won’t step into any puddles or slip in the mud. He takes Carter’s bag and hands her the keys, motioning for her to go ahead. He follows her, rocks back on his heels as she pushes the key into the lock and opens the door. It creaks and then the smell of years of wood smoke lingering in the beams surrounds them. She takes a deep breath, turns around, and smiles.
"I like it already," she says.
He drops their bags inside the door and while she flips on the lights in the living room and kitchen, he goes to turn the lights off on his truck. He doesn’t bother to lock it up here, it’s not like there’s anyone around. Before he goes back inside, he takes a deep breath. Five days with Carter. Just Carter. Sam. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. He swallows hard and walks inside, kicking off his shoes before he goes looking for her.
She’s in the living room, always the soldier, already lighting a fire. When she’s done she wipes her hands on her jeans, gets up and turns around. She smiles when she sees him, the fire behind her making her look ethereal, painting her in hues of orange and gold.
"Hungry?" he asks and she nods.
He sends her to root through one of his bags full of canned food while he has a chat with his generator. The thing is old but it still works, it just has to be reminded of what to do every once in a while. He’s fairly sure Carter will take a look at it sometime over the next two weeks. Carter is magnetically drawn to things that are old or don’t work, and Carter can fix anything.
After he’s cooked her dinner they both stand around the kitchen, looking for something to do. Dishes are done, the leftover tomato soup in the fridge. It’s past midnight and the clouds seem to break up above the cabin.
"Uhm, I’ll show you... the spare room," he says, slightly deflated all of a sudden.
She follows him out of the kitchen, leans against the spare room’s doorframe while he turns on the light on the nightstand, demonstrates how to close the curtains, and pulls back the bed’s cover. With her arms crossed over her chest she smirks at him.
"You brought me all the way up here so I could sleep in your spare room?" she asks softly.
He blinks at her a couple of times, then rubs his head and smirks.
"I was hoping you’d bring that up," he says sheepishly.
He opens the curtains again, folds the cover back over the pillows, and turns off the light. Together they trudge through the living room to the master bedroom. There’s another moment of awkwardness when they both head for the bathroom at the same time, but he waves her ahead and watches her blush when she passes him.
They’ve slept in the same tent a million times, they’ve huddled together to stay warm. They’ve never slept in the same bed and when they’re finally under the covers, he clears his throat and turns the light off. He listens to her breathing, the way it doesn’t slow or even out. She’s not sleeping and neither is he, his heart thumping away loudly in his chest.
She’s all the way over on her side of the bed and he’s all the way over on his side and between them the covers and sheets dip down into the no-mans-land they’re still terrified to cross.
They’ve spent years falling asleep against the sides of moist tent walls, more awake than asleep while they listened to the night life on another planet, waiting to be shot at. He knows she’s the lightest sleeper out of all of them, not counting Teal’c, and that she generally doesn’t need much sleep, unwilling to let her mind shut down.
"Good night," she whispers into the quiet room and he smirks, turns to face her.
"Good night," he whispers back, and reaches out to her, leaves his hand palm up in the space between them.
Her eyes have adjusted to the dark enough that she can see the outline of him, the bright spark of his eyes. He blinks at her and she turns over, faces him, and places her hand in his. He’s not going to kiss her, doesn’t want to because he’s fairly sure that eight years of unresolved sexual tension would render them unable to stop. There is a fairly good chance, he thinks, that they would screw up this attempt at a relationship right from the start. If their car trip up here had been any indication, they are treading on thin ice and while he doesn’t doubt his feelings or her feelings, he knows that the devil is in the details.
They do fall asleep eventually and when he wakes up halfway through the night, they have both slid into the center of the bed somehow. Sam is close enough that he can feel her breath on his shoulder, brushing warmly through the fabric of his near-threadbare t-shirt.
When he wakes up in the morning, the other side of the bed is empty. The sheets are rumpled and cool, and the door to the bathroom is open. The cabin is quiet and he wonders if she’s had second thoughts, if she took off sometime last night and he will find a note in the kitchen saying that she just can’t do this right now.
On the way to the kitchen he’s already beating himself up, telling himself that all of this was a bad idea, that she has every reason to be gone, really. But there is no note, there’s a pot of fresh coffee and a mug, and the sliding glass doors that lead from the living room to the back porch and the pond is wide open.
He goes and puts on a sweater before he goes outside, walking barefoot across the dewy wooden boards of the deck, down into the grass. He can see her footprints, and then her. She’s sitting on the edge of the dock, wrapped in one of his fleece jackets and sipping her coffee absentmindedly. He’s fairly sure she hasn’t heard him yet so he shuffles his feet a little more until he can see her tense and listen, the good soldier, and then turn her head. She smiles at him but doesn’t bother to get up.
He sits down beside her, grimacing because his knees crack and there’s that dull, pulling pain behind his knee cap that spreads and then recedes.
"Hi," she says, her eyes traveling up his boxer-clad legs to his sweater and his hair sticking up in every direction.
She’s amused, he can tell.
"Morning," he says a little too gruffly, running a hand through his hair almost self-consciously before he takes the mug out of her hand and takes a sip of her coffee.
She turns back towards the pond, stretches her feet so her toes touch the pond’s surface. She traces lazy circles and figure eights that make the water ripple gently, and he watches her for a while, finishing her coffee and finally setting the mug down beside him. The dew is seeping in through his boxers, is no doubt seeping through the fleece that reaches down to her thighs and the shorts she’s wearing underneath.
The air is still cool from the rain, too cool for shorts, but she doesn’t seem to mind.
"I get why you love it so much up here," she says quietly.
He’s not going to remind her of how often exactly he’s asked her to come up here with him. He’s not going to remind her of how many times she refused, that she’d tried to refuse again. There has never been a doubt in his mind of whether or not she would love it; it had just been a matter of getting her to come with him in the first place.
"Worth it?" he asks softly, staring down at her hand curling around the edge of the dock.
She pushes her shoulders back and takes a deep breath.
"You know it is," she answers and smiles, and he isn’t sure anymore if they’re still talking about the cabin.
They’ve always been good at talking, but not really, about two things at the same time.
He puts his hand on top of hers and she stretches her fingers so his fall into the spaces between. Her smile brightens and her eyes come to rest on his. He’s always loved her eyes, their blue depths holding more mysteries to him than the event horizon of the Stargate ever could. He can see her eyes flickering to his lips, then back to his eyes. There’s tension in the air now, electricity. They’ve kissed before. They’ve kissed because they were infected by an alien virus, he’s kissed her in an alternate reality, and he’s kissed her while they were stuck in a time loop.
He carefully pulls her closer and it’s awkward because they’re both sitting on the dock and they have to twist a little, but then her hands are on his cheeks and she pulls his mouth down to hers, and nothing else matters. This kiss isn’t like any of the other kisses because this is genuinely them and there’s no alien virus, no alternate reality, nothing but them, pure and simple.
Her lips are soft and when he traces her bottom lip with his tongue she opens her mouth and he can taste coffee and sweet relief on her breath. Her hands fall from his cheeks to his neck and somehow she manages to turn herself around until she’s kneeling beside him. He pulls her into his lap and the entire thing is a little precarious but they make it work. They kiss until her hands start pulling on his clothes and his fingers sneak beneath her shirt and stretch along her back.
He rests his forehead against hers and she giggles because they should both be too old for this and yet here they are, dressed inappropriately for the weather on a dock in Minnesota kissing like teenagers.
"What?" he asks, his hand above her shirt now but beneath the fleece jacket, warm against her side.
"Nothing. Just... this. It’s really nice," she says.
He chuckles at that, pulls her body against his and wraps his arms around her. He kisses the side of her neck, letting his lips linger against her pulse.
"Breakfast?"
"Yes, please," she says, kissing him again before she climbs off of him, holding out her hand to pull him up.
She doesn’t let go of his hand on the way to the cabin and he’s quite happy with that. It’s still cool outside but he feels warm now because Sam’s beside him and occasionally their entwined hands brush against his thigh.
"Omelets?" he asks when they’re in the kitchen and he realizes that he’s brought beer and eggs and canned food with him and nothing else because he usually runs to the store first thing in the morning.
"With the secret ingredient?" she asks and he smirks.
"Can do," he says, and she giggles again.