Title: When You Know
Author: helsinkibaby
Fandom: Stargate SG1
Pairing: Sam Carter/Daniel Jackson
Rating: G
Word Count:
Summary: "When did you know? About us?"
Spoilers: post ep to season seven's Resurrection
Notes: For day 10 of August Rush, a picture of Daniel from the pilot. Also takes place immediately after Ressurection from season seven, in an alternate universe where THAT picture ( all Sam/Dan shippers know the one!) really did happen...
"When did you know?"
Daniel had been starting to doze, ready to fall into a satisfied sleep, when Sam's question disturbed him. He blinked, both to wake himself up and to give him time to ponder the question. "Know? Know what?"
Sam gave him a smile that managed at once to be shy and embarrassed, expressions that as far as Daniel was concerned had no place on her face after what they'd just been doing. "Us." She waved her hand between them in illustration, dislodging the sheets as she did and displaying a tantalising amount of flesh to his gaze. When she saw his eyes drifting lower, she pulled it up, giving him a faintly exasperated look in response. "This, I mean." She bit her lip, suddenly nervous. "When did you know?"
Daniel blinked again, and parried with, "When did you know?"
Sam's jaw dropped and she shook her head. "I asked you first," she reminded him, but he was ready for that.
"So you answer first."
A staring contest ensued and wonder of wonders, this time it was Sam who blinked. "Honestly? About two seconds before I kissed you today." He smiled at the memory, but Sam's eyes grew troubled and she actually shuddered. "I walked into that room and saw you lying there... knowing what Anna was capable of... and I thought you were dead. Again." The last, he thought, was a stab at humour, but it didn't look like she found it funny. "That's when I knew... I never wanted to go through that again."
She looked so troubled that the only thing Daniel could think of to do was to lean forward and kiss her again. She responded enthusiastically, all but melting into the kiss and when she pulled back, her eyes were clear and the flush on her cheeks had little to do with embarrassment. He thought he might have even managed to distract her from her initial question - he should have known better. "You never answered me."
Daniel smiled as he ran a hand through her hair and down her back. "You noticed that, huh?"
"Yep."
He drew in a deep breath, let it out slowly. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you."
Sam lifted one eyebrow, her smile now a grin. "Oh, now you have to tell me."
Daniel closed his eyes for a moment, let himself remember. "The first time I met you," he told her, still with his eyes closed, and when he opened them again, he saw the scepticism he'd been expecting. "OK, maybe not the first very first second," he allowed. "But on Abydos, when I showed you the cartouche... you were so amazed, you'd pretty much forgotten that anyone else was even there..." He can almost smell the desert, feel the scratch of the robes he'd been wearing. "And when I put forward the theory of stellar drift, you said-"
"I knew I'd like you."
It was said with the same expression and inflection as the first time she'd said it and memory and moment combined made it impossible for Daniel to do anything but lean in and kiss her.
On pulling back, he continued. "I said, 'You mean I'm right?' and you smiled at me before translating what we'd figured out for Jack... but that moment... I felt it then. And I remember thinking, I feel like I've just met my wife. Except I was already married." The thought of Sha're had him looking down and Sam took his hand in hers, squeezed his fingers gently. He met her eyes and smiled. "I put it out of my mind, because I was married, because of what happened next... and then I spent five years managing to forget about it. But when I came back... before I knew who I was, who you were... I felt it again."
Sam looks like she's just discovered the answer to a mystery. "Is that why you asked me if there was ever anything between us?"
"I couldn't understand how there could be any other reason for what I was feeling." Daniel shrugged. "Turns out there wasn't."
"Yeah," Sam said, her hand moving up his arm, cupping the back of his neck, just like she'd done earlier in the way when she'd kissed him for the first time.
Just like earlier, he kissed her back.
He wasn't dozing any more but that was fine with him.