Disclaimer - MGM/Gekko/Double Secret own them.
Next in the 'Remedied' series, following several weeks after Silently. Feedback would be loved.
I want to thank all of you who contacted me after I posted the last part - I can't tell you how much it means.
*
If being defined as the baby while she was pregnant had been irritating, it was nothing compared to those four. Goddamned. Words.
"How are you doing?"
Everyone was very careful not to use the 'feeling' word, as if worried Sam might actually tell them exactly how she *was* feeling. And Heaven forbid they should have to listen to that - or that she should actually want to tell them.
The latest enquiry had come from Janet, standing next to the bed she was sitting on the edge of in the infirmary.
Sam gave the response she always gave:
"I'm fine, ________." (fill in blank)
Of course, just like everyone else, Janet wasn't buying it. "You say that every time I ask," She commented, pretending to write something on her clipboard.
"Maybe because it's the truth," Sam rebutted, so *not* in the mood.
Janet's gaze lifted, holding hers. "Physically, you're fine."
Oh, the magic word. 'Physically'. "But you're still not going to clear me for off-world duty." It wasn't a question. It didn't need to be.
Sighing, Janet threw her clipboard onto the bed. "Are you still having trouble sleeping?"
"What does that have to do with anything?"
"Sam, you're tired and understandably have a lot on your mind. Those kind of distractions could easily make you-"
"A hindrance?"
"Miss something," Janet clarified. "And I know that, more than anything, you don't want anything to happen to your team-mates."
Actually, more than anything... "I just want to work again."
"You *are* working again. As I understand it, you're spending at least twelve hours a day every day in your lab, against my recommendations - which, by the way, are dangerously close to becoming orders."
Perfect. Wonderful. "It's not the same."
"Sweetheart," Janet touched her shoulder. "You should talk to someone. If not a friend or Dr McKenzie, there are a lot of support groups-"
Pulling away from her hand, Sam hopped off the bed and backed away. "Janet, I know you're trying to help but please, just *don't*."
Janet's arm, which had still been lifting into the air, slowly lowered. She didn't try to stop her from going, but she did say one thing. "You spend most of your time here; that's not exactly new, Sam. But do you even see him anymore?"
She saw him.
She saw him every time in exactly the same place.
*
The laundry hadn't been done again.
A few steps into the house and she saw it: the pile of clothes she'd placed on the sofa in the dim hope that he'd get the hint. She shouldn't have been surprised - he barely left the bedroom anymore - but that didn't stop the clutch of disappointment or the ridiculous build up of tears in her eyes.
Shrugging off her coat and letting both that and her house keys fall to the floor, she stampeded towards the bedroom. Reaching the door she grabbed the handle and swung it open.
He was how he always was. Lying on the bed, in his boxer shorts, with the curtains still drawn. Just how he'd been since she'd left that morning.
"Thank you," She began, flicking on the light and liking too much the way he winced and covered his eyes. "For doing the laundry. After being at work for twelve hours," She moved into the room, opening the curtains - not caring that the act lost some of its impact given the distinct lack of sunlight outside. "It's greatly appreciated."
Refusing to look at him again, she walked out of the room...hesitating in the doorway. He had no idea just how much his behaviour was grating.
So she said the truth just before slamming the door behind her:
"I'm beginning to understand why Sara left you."
She regretted it when she booted up her computer (she'd moved it over from her house months ago). She regretted it when she angrily shoved the laundry into the washing machine, when she made - and drank - a mug off coffee just because she could.
But dammit, he *was* being an ass, and she *could* understand the frustration his wife must have felt.
It was an exhausting battle to get through every day now, and yet every night, she still came back here. And she wasn't kidding herself - to him.
Pissed at him, herself, and the baby she was never going to have, she thumped down onto the computer chair and logged onto the Internet.
She had to acknowledge that yes, she was probably using it as an escape, but what was wrong with that? There were worse ones. And she liked the people she interacted with. They didn't know anything about her life aside from the fact that they had similar interests, and they could quite happily talk about that.
No baby. No pregnancy. No death of a child taking over her life.
She found surfing for information or new web sites kind of...soothing.
But as she typed an URL into the browser, she paused, her fingers hovering over the keys. As it usually did, the browser automatically tried to finish the address for her, and one of the options it was offering...
She hadn't been to before.
Intrigued, she went to that address.
Her eyes widened. She definitely hadn't been there before. That meant...
"I should have done the laundry."
Turning in the chair, she swivelled until she saw him standing by the end of the sofa, still in his boxer shorts. He really did look quite terrible; drawn, stubble peppered around the bottom half of his face.
It was his way of apologising. "I should have done a lot of things."
Standing up, she clasped her hands together. "What have you been looking at on the computer?" What had he been doing? Reading information during the day, and then going back to bed when he knew she'd be back?
He didn't deny it outright. "Just...stuff. I was just trying to...understand."
"Understand?" She probably should have been grateful that he was trying to learn about it, but all she could feel was the anger at the fact that once a gain, *he hadn't talked to her*.
"How it happened. Why it happened. I know I can never begin to comprehend what you went through-"
"No," She interrupted, stepping towards him. "You can't. You weren't there. I was *bleeding*, and you weren't there!" It wasn't in the least bit rational, but the words were spewing forth anyway. "When it happened, the horror when I first realised that *something was wrong with our baby*, the humiliation when Teal'c carried me all the way to the infirmary. The pitying looks from everyone who knew what must have been happening, the utter helplessness as I pleaded - *begged* - that they let me die if it would just save my baby! You were there for *none* of it!"
She was scant inches from him now, tears having long since begun to mingle with her words.
He still hadn't said anything, unmoving except for the subtle clenching and unclenching of his jaw.
Sam lifted a hand to push away and walk past him...
Except he grabbed it.
"Let go," She ordered.
A brief, ridiculous tussle ensued, which only ended when one or both of them lost their balance, and they collapsed down on the sofa.
Sam coughed, landing underneath him. His head, at least, had gone over the top of her right shoulder and smooshed into the sofa.
She froze for a moment - both shocked, and feeling the absurd compulsion to laugh.
And then it passed.
"You were so good that first day, but then...you went away," She whispered, staring at the ceiling because she couldn't stare at him. "For the first time in my life I actually *needed* someone, and you went away."
He shifted, just enough to lift his head - though he didn't look at her. "You were working every hour under the sun...I...I didn't *know*. You never said *anything*."
"Neither did you," She sniffed, realising that - not for the first time - they really needed to work on that communication thing. Taking a breath and knowing something was needed, she uttered the scariest phrase of her life:
"I can't do this alone, Jack."
He moved further, his face burying into her neck. "We'll try again."
Her eyes were a sticky, gunky mess. She was sick of crying, but it never seemed to stop. "Another baby isn't going to solve this. It isn't going to make it go away." She knew, instinctively, that this particular pain would never leave her. Not completely.
This time, he did look at her, holding her chin with his right hand. "I know. And it shouldn't go away, but...I want a kid. With you. It doesn't have to be right now, but...only with you."
Her heart, which had already taken a serious battering over the last few weeks, contracted again. "Then you gotta stop hiding,"
Jack glanced away, paused, then said it. "Just me?"
He had a perfectly valid point, but that didn't stop the feeling that she was still out there, disconnected, floating silently away. "I don't know any other way," She whispered.
The tears came again and as he sat up and pulled her into his arms, he said the four words that, while not making everything all right, while not healing the pain, while not ensuring that she'd always have a happy every after...they showed her that she did, at least, have him.
"I love you, Sam."
~FINIS