Stranded 12: Shadow of Doubt
by Bryn
The phone rang three times before the answering machine picked up. The silent room echoed the sound of a voice politely telling whoever was calling to please leave a message, followed by a single beep.
There was a pause, then a hesitant voice began. "Hi Janet, it's me. You must not be up yet. I guess it is pretty early… I just couldn't sleep. Not without you. So, um, when you get this, call me. I miss you." Another pause, and there was a soft click as Daniel hung up.
Janet glanced at the clock, noticing it was 6 am, then reached over and hit the delete button next to the blinking message light. She turned towards the kitchen with every intention of getting a glass of orange juice and diverting her attention from the voice that was ringing in her mind. She didn't even get halfway, though, before she had to make a mad dash for the bathroom.
By the time Cassie was getting up, half an hour later, Janet had made two more trips to the bathroom and finally managed to start breakfast.
"'Morning," Cassie called as she walked into the kitchen.
Janet looked up from the stove, where she was frying up eggs, and grinned at her daughter. "Good morning, Cass."
Cassandra sat down at the counter and stared at her mother curiously. "You're making breakfast?" she asked, not bothering to keep the evident disbelief from her voice.
"That is what normal people do."
"Yeah, normal people," Cassie agreed, "but not you. You usually grab a cup of coffee as you run out the door."
"Well I was awake and thought I might do something nice… but if you don't want any…" Janet held the plate of eggs, toast, and fruit just out of Cassandra's reach.
"No, no! I didn't say that!" Cassie grinned and snatched the plate from Janet's hand. Janet sat down next to her and they both dug into the out-of-the-ordinary breakfast. "Ya know, I feel bad leaving you alone today. I could stay home… help you get re-adjusted."
"Cassie, I've been away, not dead," Janet replied. "Believe it or not, I'll be able to manage on my own. Yesterday was a bit of a surprise and caught me off guard, but I assure you I'm back to normal now. And you're not missing school."
Cassie shrugged. It had been worth a try. "You sound like Teal'c."
Janet shoved a mouthful of eggs into her mouth and grinned at the teenager making a face at her. "That reminds me, I need the car today, so I'm going to drop you at school this morning. Do you want me to pick you up afterwards, or can you get a ride?"
Cassandra shook her head and kept eating. "I'll catch a ride. Where are you going?"
"I need to run a few errands and stop by the base."
"The base?" Cass looked up and scowled. "I thought you were on leave."
"I am, I just need to discuss a few things with the General and Dr. Warner," Janet explained, suddenly more interested getting up to put her plate in the dishwasher than looking her daughter in the eye.
"So you're not going back to work?"
"Not yet, I promise," Janet reassured her with a grin she hoped was convincing.
"Good." Cassie smiled back. "Tomorrow's Saturday, we can spend the day together."
"You actually want to spend time with your mother?" Janet asked with an exaggerated look of amazement.
"You've been away for almost a year, of course I do. Now stop complaining and enjoy it while it lasts!" Cassie shot back.
"I intend to," Janet said, smiling genuinely. "Go get your stuff, it's time to go."
~~~~~
Cassie was watching Janet wearily from across the room when the doorbell rang. Janet was vacuuming, therefore didn't notice, but Cassie had been desperately awaiting that noise all morning, so she bolted for the door in a heartbeat.
"Sam, thank God you're here!" Cassie exclaimed as she grabbed hold of her surrogate aunt's arm and dragged her into the house.
Sam followed along, bewildered. "Cassie, what's wrong? Your message said it was an emergency."
"It is!" Cassie replied, yanking Sam into the living room behind her and pointing at her mother. "Look at her! She's been like this for hours!"
Janet was cleaning. A lot. Absurd amounts. And it was kinda creepy.
"I could handle the tidying up, doing laundry, the dishes, that sort of thing," Cassie continued. "But she just finished scrubbing the bathtub with a toothbrush!"
Sam looked at her skeptically. "Ok, now you're exaggerating."
"I swear, I'm not."
Sam looked back and forth between Janet and Cassie for a few more minutes, then decided she might as well dive in. Stepping forward, she tried to get Janet's attention. It finally took standing directly in front of her and yelling her name, but then Janet looked up and turned off the vacuum.
"Sam? Hi, what are you doing here?"
"Cassie called me," Sam explained. Pointing at the vacuum, she asked, "Janet, what are you doing?"
She had the decency to look self-conscious before answering. "I think I'm nesting."
Sam and Cassie shared a puzzled look. "What, you're a bird now?"
"No… I'm pregnant."
Sam blinked. Cassie fell off the couch. Somehow the both managed to simultaneously exclaim, "What?!"
Janet sighed. "Maybe you two should sit down, there's a lot I need to tell you." She started with the short version, but every other sentence or so they interrupted her with questions, so eventually the entire story came out it every excruciatingly vivid detail.
"Well, this does explain the twenty messages from Daniel on the answering machine," Cassie commented.
"Ok, so there's one thing I'm still confused about," Sam said finally.
"What's that?"
"You've barely spoken to Daniel since you got back."
"And you're avoiding his calls," Cass added.
Janet bit her lip and looked at the ground.
"Janet, there's something you haven't told us, isn't there?"
"He doesn't know," Janet mumbled.
"Doesn't know what?"
"About the baby."
Now Sam nearly fell off the couch. "*What*?"
"Mom, how could you not tell him?"
"I meant to, but I was trying to find the words when 'Beam me up, Thor' decided to show up! And then when we got back…"
"What about when you got back?"
Janet shook her head defensively. "Everything's different now."
"The only difference I see is that you're home now," Cassie said bluntly.
Janet stood up from the couch where they'd parked themselves and tried to escape their interrogation, but it didn't work. Sam and Cassie followed along, right on her heels, not about to give up. "There is a difference. Here is not the same as that planet was. Life for us is different. *We're* different."
"You still love him and obviously, from the number of frantic calls he's left, he still loves you, so I really don't see the difference," said Cassie.
"Cassie's got a point, Janet, I think you're overreacting."
"No, I'm not!" Janet exclaimed. Closing her eyes and taking a deep breath, she started again in a more rational tone. "Being back here, with all of you, has made me happier than anything, and I wouldn't trade that for all the world, but back there on that planet, when it was just Daniel and me, it was different. We were a family. We were complete in each other, because we didn't have any other choice. All we needed was each other, because that's all we had."
"You want us to go away?" Cassie asked, confused and a little frightened by the idea.
"No, of course not!" Janet pulled Cassie into a tight hug and kissed her forehead. "That's not what I want at all. I couldn't bear the thought of losing you again. It's just that what we had there can't exist here. "
"Then make something new," Cassie countered.
"It's not that simple," Janet argued.
"Yes it is, Janet," Sam replied. "It's exactly that simple."
"How?"
"Mom, you're making everything too hard," Cassie grumbled. "All you have to do is ask yourself what you want."
"I want my friends close by, I want my job, and I want a family, a normal one."
"You want to marry Daniel, don't you?"
Janet nodded slowly, not meeting her friend's or her daughter's eyes. "On the planet it's like we were, and now that we're back… we're back to being nothing."
"Then why don't you just get married?" Sam persisted.
"He's never brought it up, in fact he's avoided it at all costs. Once, when the subject came up in Vdorish and one of our friends asked me what my wedding was, like Daniel nearly fell out of his chair trying to change the conversation before I could answer. Obviously it's not something he wants to deal with."
"So you're running away from him?"
"Just for a little while. I just need some time to figure out how to break it to him that regardless of his doubts or hesitancies, we are going to be a family. I don't know how I'm going to bring myself to force this on him. It doesn't seem fair. He's home now, and should be free to do whatever he wants. He shouldn't be forced into a marriage he's not ready for."
"Have you even bothered to ask Daniel what he wants?" Cassie asked. "From what I've heard on the answering machine, he doesn't what to be free, he wants you."
As if on cue, the telephone rang. All three heads snapped towards the source of the sound, and for an instance no one moved. Then Cassie took a step toward the receiver but Janet's hand caught her arm and halted her.
"No, let the machine get it." Janet's voice was low and her eyes were still focused on the phone, like it was hypnotizing her.
"It could be for me," Cassie protested.
"It's not," Janet stated, shaking her head slowly. "It's Daniel."
"How do you know?" Sam asked as she traded a bewildered look with Cassie.
Janet didn't notice, or if she did, she didn't care. "I just know," she whispered.
Sure enough, a few moments later the answering machine picked up and Daniel's voice came through loud and clear. "Janet? Janet, if you're there pick up. Please. I'm worried, this is scaring me. Janet, talk to me or I'm coming over to find out what's wrong." There was a hopeful pause, then a hoarse whisper, "I'm coming."
Part 13
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