[Moments of Adoration]

Shaz said I had to do something really shippy... Many thanks to Michelle and Cal.

Skaara: "Will you be coming alone?"
Jack: "I assume Carter's invited too?"
Skaara: "Of course! Will you be coming together?"
Jack: "Together? As in... ?"
Sam: "As in two friends, going to a wedding..."
Jack: "Oh. Sure... Jonas!"

The sharp horn blast yanked Jack awake, his left knee slamming into the passenger side dash. "What the hell?"

"Sorry sir. Traffic's gotten a little crazy." Scrubbing at his eyes with the heel of one hand and rubbing his now-throbbing knee with the other, Jack glanced to his left. Sam was frowning at the snarl of traffic, fingers drumming an irritated staccato on the steering wheel. She'd been in a mood when they'd left the Pentagon, and it apparently hadn't gotten much better.

"How long was I out?"

"About an hour."

Damn. He must have crashed as soon as they'd gotten on the road. Their flight had been at an ugodly early hour, but he'd only had two meetings, both of which had been relatively painless, as much as meeting with the Joint Chiefs could be. Carter, on the other hand, had been in one meeting after another for almost nine hours straight.

Why the hell had he let her drive?

"Carter, pull over. My turn."

"I'm fine, sir. Just go back to sleep."

Smothering a traitorous yawn, he mumbled, "I'm not tired."

"Of course, sir." He noticed she wasn't frowning anymore. Much better. Even if it meant she was laughing at him.

"Just pull off at the next exit so we can switch."

"Colonel, really. I'm all right. It's only another hour or so. We'll waste half that just trying to get off the highway in this mess."

Details, details. "Carter..."

Jack saw her take a tiny breath. The "Sir, if you don't knock it the hell off, I'm going to do something unpleasant" breath. "Would you check the map and see if you can find us a way around this?" Sam asked instead.

She handed him a pale yellow envelope, her name and address handwritten on it. Unsurprisingly, she had neatly slit open both the outer and inner envelopes of the invitation, and even returned the contents in their original order, little pieces of tissue paper and all. Jack had one too, though he'd thrown away both envelopes, and then lost most of the inserts except the invitation and the reply card (which she'd reminded him about no less than three times). And he wasn't really sure where the invitation was anymore. Somewhere in the bottom of his suitcase, maybe.

"I can't believe it took almost seven years for them to do this." He ran a finger down the heavy parchment paper. Catherine Langford and Ernest Littlefield request the honor of your presence...

"It makes sense."

"It does?" He unfolded the little map that had been tucked in with the invitation. One of those damn web generated things. Useless. You couldn't find the Grand Canyon on one.

"Sure. They were separated for fifty years." Sam shook her head. "I mean, you just don't get past that in a couple of months and jump into something like that, no matter how much you might remember caring for someone."

"But seven years..." Jack stopped, something clicking over in his head. Seven years. Closing the glove box, he sat back. Seven years.

Seven years of bad luck. Seven year itch.

Seven years since he'd met Samantha Carter.

While his brain started assembling and correlating certain implications, his mouth heedlessly charged ahead.

"Do we know each other?"

Oops.

Jack saw Sam glance at him for just a second before turning her attention back to the road. "You mean Major Carter and Colonel O'Neill."

She was giving him an out. Saving his ass yet again. All he had to do was say yes and he could step back from the line that they just did not-

"No."

"Ah."

Trying very hard not to actually think about what he was doing, he waved the invitation at her. "Do we know each other... like this?"

Sam was quiet as she navigated through a clump of fast moving traffic, and for a long, stomach-twisting moment Jack thought she wasn't going to answer him. Crap. They'd spent so much time and energy not-

"What's my favorite ice cream?"

"Anything with chocolate." Jack replied immediately. Then, "Except Moose Tracks, because you don't like the peanut butter things in it. Which is weird," he added a second later, "because you love those Reese's cups. Only the little ones though."

"Higher chocolate to peanut butter ratio in the small ones," she explained with a perfectly straight face. "Chinese?"

"Spring rolls, not egg rolls. Almond chicken, gravy on the side. Otherwise you complain that gets all soggy." Jack paused. "You know, you're really a picky eater, Carter."

"Hush." He risked a glance. She was smiling. She was smiling. "Favorite band."

"That you'll admit to?" He saw her roll her eyes and he grinned, something loosening in his chest. "Hey, I saw all those Boston albums tucked away on your bookshelf."

"Those are Mark's!"

"Uh huh. Suuurrre." He couldn't help but laugh at the mix of righteous indignation and pure delight in her voice. "No problem, Carter. We all have our shameful little secrets."

"Like learning ancient Greek?"

It was official. The damn woman did know everything. "How the hell did you know? Did you see me take that book out of Daniel's office?"

"Uh, no. But I'm sure Daniel would love to know you've been stealing his stuff." There was a pause, and her smile grew wider. "I saw you reading that tablet on P6C 862. You were sounding out the words."

Oh, dear God. He could actually feel a slow flush rising in his face. That meant she'd been... "You haven't told Daniel, have you?" ... watching him.

Carter watching him.

"No... not yet."

He liked that.

"Carter..."

Really liked-

"You were cute. Adorable, actually."

Whoa. Did she just... "Really?"

"Very."

Holy...

"Uh, Carter, are you sure that's the sort of thing you want to say to your CO?"

"I wasn't saying it to my CO."

... shit.

There'd been a line back there somewhere. He was sure of it.

"Does that answer your question?"

Question? "Uh..."

"About us knowing each other."

Right. That question. "Yeah, it does."

"Are you... okay with the answer?"

Hearing that sudden, tiny hint of apprehension in her voice, Jack let his hand fall on the seat between them, palm up. A moment later he felt her fingers close around his.

Carter's hand. He was holding Carter's hand.

Breathe, Jack. Remember to breathe.

"Oh hell yeah."

As one of those beautiful, blinding smiles lit her face, Jack carefully tightened his grip on her hand. Lightning didn't strike, the world didn't end, Hammond didn't appear in a puff of oily green smoke, courts martial in hand.

And she hadn't called him "sir" or "Colonel" once in the last five minutes.

For now, for them, it just didn't get much better than this.

"Wake me when we get there, Carter." Grinning like a madman, Jack slouched back into his seat and closed his eyes.

Her fingers were still twined around his.

"Thought you wanted to drive?"

"Nah. This is just fine."