jack_built fic: Debra Winger Moment (Sam/Jack, PG)
For this to make absolute sense, you'll probably need to read these previous
jack_builtstories:
peri81 's Not Quite Pantsless, my Poor Unfortunate Souls, and
holdouttrout 's The Earthquake.
---
She'd already known that this party was going to be a nightmare, but that was before it had been relocated, following earthquake damage, to Jack's apartment, and she realized that neither of them would be able to escape. She was going to have to spend the entire evening in his company.
Which wouldn't be a problem if she hadn't been dressed as the Little freakin' Mermaid.
What's more, she'd have to enjoy the entire party from the comfort of his couch, tails and sprained ankles effectively conspiring to immobilize her. She'd thought she'd found a good excuse not to wear the damn thing, in fact, but Vala had insisted - and so, surprisingly, had Janet.
"Oh no you don't. I want to see where this goes."
So now she was being Janet-handled into her costume, in the spare bedroom of Jack's apartment. She shifted uncomfortably, finding the restriction of her feet psychologically irksome. "I'm not going out there," she insisted.
Janet ignored her, as she had done the last dozen times, and gave the wig a tweak. "Perfect," she pronounced, and stepped back, hands on hips. Sam began to feel like the prize catch in a fishing competition as Janet surveyed her. "You look great, Sam."
"I'm not going out there." Sam tugged at the fake purple seashells on see-through bra straps that comprised the entire top half of her costume, trying futilely to make them cover a larger area. "I am NOT going out there!"
"Oh, don't be such a baby," said Janet, in a tone usually reserved for Cassie. "Everyone else will be in costume. I'm sure Vala will be wearing something far worse."
Sam pointed. "Far worse!" she repeated, triumphantly. But Janet wasn't so easily vanquished.
"Even Mr. O'Neill will be in costume," she said, trying another tack. It distracted Sam, at least briefly.
"Do you know what he's wearing? He won't tell me."
Janet shrugged. "Cam said John was lending him something." She frowned. "Or did John say Cam was lending him something...?"
Sam tried, but she couldn't imagine what Cam or John would be lending Jack. Frankly, she was surprised he wasn't just wearing his hockey gear and claiming to be Wayne Gretzky. She'd watched more hockey in the past few days than she had in her entire life previously. It had become a strangely soothing background noise to her studying.
It had been a weird week. Half the time she'd felt extremely awkward about suddenly taking over half his apartment when they weren't even dating. (Officially, chipped in a tiny internal voice.) Rodney had ungraciously agreed to bring some of her work back from the college, and she was guiltily aware of just how much space it took up. Jack was absent a lot for someone who lived in the same place as they worked, and she had no idea if this was a good thing (in that he would be less bothered by her experiments), or a bad thing (in that he was being driven out of his own apartment). Although, of course, on top of the usual running of the building, they'd just had an earthquake, so he was very busy making repairs with his handyman, Dan Siler. Of course he wouldn't be around. It felt weird, all the same.
But the other half of the time had been... strangely comfortable. A few times, he'd slapped some food down in front of her, when she'd been so absorbed in her studies that she'd not noticed the time. When she thanked him, he gave a wave and a dismissive noise. She wasn't sure what exactly to make of that, except that a little voice inside went "squee!", very quietly, when she looked at the sandwich he'd made for her. They'd chatted, nothing consequential, and he'd been completely neutral about helping her to get around, accepting it when she said she could do something herself. Just yesterday, whilst explaining what a delayed penalty was, he'd casually mentioned his own knee injuries, and it had occurred to her that he probably understood her need for independence all too well.
To the very vocal annoyance of her friends, though, nothing else had happened. And the next person who asked was going to be on the receiving end of Sam's nastiest look. Else would require a more relaxed situation, where she wasn't already living with him. Else needed them both to feel less obligated towards each other. Else would have to wait. Although if the look he'd given her yesterday - when she'd yelled "Icing!" at his TV - was anything to go by, perhaps else wasn't entirely beyond the realms of possibility. If this party was -
She jumped a foot in the air when there was a sharp knock on the bedroom door, and Jack's voice came through the wood. "Sam? You need any help in there?"
Sam glared at Janet, willing her to stay put. "I'm fine!" she called back, but Janet began to move towards the door. "Janet! Don't you dare!" she hissed.
"You need help," argued Janet, unmoved. She paused with her hand on the doorknob, and nodded at the tail. "You can't walk in that tail, and you will NOT hop on that ankle. Anyway, he'll see you eventually." She turned the doorknob and opened the door as she spoke. "Think of this as a chance to - holy Christmas come early!"
Janet stared at Jack.
Sam stared at Jack.
From the door, Jack stared at Sam.
Janet was the first to recover. "You..." She cleared her throat and started again. "You look nice. Cam loaned you that?"
"Sheppard," said Jack dreamily, still staring at Sam. There was a pause.
"Dress Blues, huh?" said Janet, valiantly carrying the conversation. "I didn't know John owned a set of them." Jack's only response was an automatic hmm. "Anyway, you're just in time. Sam needs you to carry her out there."
That got his attention, at last. "What?"
Sam made an inarticulate noise of protest.
"Well you don't think she's going to be able to walk, do you?"
Jack stared wide-eyed at Janet, and then at Sam, and then, well, at the rest of Sam.
Sam finally got her tongue back under control. "Janet, I don't need to be carried!" she objected. "I'm not an invalid. Well, I am, but - but I just need help to - to hop out there."
At that, Jack visibly shook himself out of it, and he stepped forwards quickly. "Don't be stupid," he said, brusquely. And he swept her up in his arms.
Sam couldn't seem to stop herself staring at him as he carried her out of the room - but that was okay, because he couldn't seem to stop staring at her, either. And it occurred to her, right then, that this was it: she was having her Debra Winger Moment. It just figured that, for the most romantic movie-cliché moment of her life, she'd be dressed like half a fish.
She realized she was grinning like an idiot only when he set her down and let his arm get conveniently stuck behind her back. She leaned back a little, trapping it firmly and drawing him closer.
"What're you smiling at?" he asked, smiling pretty goofily himself, and leaning.
She shrugged. "Just thinking what we look like."
His eyes headed downwards, of course, and when he dragged them back up to meet her knowing look, he gave a cocky waggle of his eyebrows, and brought his free hand up to stroke back a strand of blonde hair that had escaped the wig. "Daryl Hannah," he said, and smirked at her immediate look of outrage.
Sam grabbed his collar, yanking him even closer. He went willingly.
"Richard Gere," she said - and smothered his protest with her lips.
---
Finished for now. But I have more thoughts about the party! Particularly about McKay.
That Debra Winger Moment
x-posted for my archiving.