Title: "Phone Bills"

Summary: Sam and Jack on opposite sides of the country.

Major Sam Carter glanced at her watch for the fifth time in the last twenty minutes. If they didn't take a break soon she would have to request one. Her ribs and shoulder, still bound and in a sling, were beginning to ache indicating the need for some ibuprofen. And she really wanted to call back to the base and talk to Jack before SG1 headed out on their scheduled mission. She tried to concentrate on Major Davis talking up at the head of the room. This meeting was important but she knew all of the prep material he was currently covering by heart as she had put most of it together.

She did a quick survey of the room. Besides Paul Davis she only knew two of the other attendees. Colonel Chekov and Dr. Svetlana Markov had been sent by the Russian government to represent their interests along with another scientist that was an expert on the Space Station design. The other dozen people in the room were all scientists from NASA, NORAD, and the AF Space Command, none of whom she personally knew. Although she recognized one of the science officers from NASA. She wondered if he remembered her, as he had been on the Endeavor almost five years ago the day it had come to rescue four mysteriously stranded (and totally unintentional) astronauts floating just outside of Earth's atmosphere in two highly unique gliders.

Finally, Davis called for a break, and Sam slipped out of the conference room before anyone could stop her to chat. Years at the Pentagon gave her the advantage of knowing where she wanted to go, and she headed for a ladies lounge that she knew had comfy chairs. With any luck she would be able to get a signal on her cell phone from there, as it was above ground. She really didn't want to hunt down a secure phone to use to call the SGC. After using the facilities and downing a couple of pills, she curled up in one of the chairs and dialed. A minute later she was connected to Jack's office.

"O'Neill."

"Will I seem totally pathetic if I admit I miss you?"

"I can't imagine you ever seeming pathetic. And I'm glad you called. We are due to head out in an hour."

"Yeah, I know. Just wanted to say bye, and I love you."

"I love you, too. And pathetic or not, I miss you like crazy. I couldn't sleep at home last night alone."

"I hope you took one of those famous O'Neill naps pretending to work on paperwork this morning."

There was silence on the other end of the phone for a second. "You are on a secure phone giving away all of my secrets like that aren't you?"

"Like everyone doesn't already know. Anyway, make sure you come back all in one piece, because I'm hoping to be healed up enough by Friday for a really great homecoming."

Jack chuckled at that. Her dislocated shoulder and cracked ribs had kept them from any strenuous romantic activities before she'd had to leave for DC.

"It's a date," he confirmed.

"When are you due back from the mission?"

"16:00 Wednesday, local time."

"Send me a text message when you get back. I'm supposed to be having drinks with some old friends that night."

"Have fun. How's the meeting going, by the way?"

"Boring so far, but we'll get to the good stuff soon enough."

"There's good stuff?"

"*Goodbye* Jack. I love you."

"Love you, too, angel."

She hung up the phone with a sigh. For a couple of minutes she sat playing with her rings deep in thought. She couldn't believe how much her life had changed for the better in just five months. She couldn't help but smile at the thought of what the next five months could bring. She really hoped it included a baby on the way. What with this project kicking off and her work on the X-303 she would have plenty to do if she was to be banned from gate travel for nine months. Suddenly she realized that she needed to get back to the conference, and she reluctantly shook off the daydreams. She hadn't been kidding Jack. Later that afternoon there were going to be a lot of very shocked and excited scientists in the room as she and Davis outlined the plan to set up a network of deep space satellites. Really deep space, as in orbiting planets outside of their solar system. Planets with Stargates.

Two days later, Sam was exhausted. The other scientists had been shocked by the news that not only was there a way to visit planets beyond using spaceships, but that there was intelligent life out there, some of which we needed to guard against. They were quite excited about the prospect of setting up a satellite system, but full of questions, all of which were Sam's responsibility to answer in detail. She had fallen into bed the last two nights and gone to sleep as soon as her head hit the pillow.

Today though, the others had split off into groups to try to work through some of the details that each area would need to deal with over the course of the project. Tomorrow they would come together to discuss any issues that they had come up with. That left Sam time today to do some refining of the basic plan based on the data she had gathered from the others over the last couple of days. And it would allow her to leave at a descent hour to meet her old friends from the Pentagon for drinks.

Once at the bar they had chosen, an old favorite hangout that hadn't changed too much in the six years since she had last been there, she sat with her friends and got caught up on their personal and professional lives. A couple had worked on the Stargate project with her during those years she had spent creating the dialing computer program, and trying random addresses. The others knew nothing of alien devices and far away planets. As much as she was enjoying seeing them, she couldn't help but glance at her watch from time to time. 18:30. The guys should be back by now. She checked her cell phone for messages.

"Waiting for a call from the mystery man, Sam?" Beth asked. She had been a neighbor of Sam's and a secretary at the Pentagon. While they had never interacted professionally, she and Sam had spent many a Saturday night lamenting their love lives over margaritas. Beth had been there through the whole Jonas debacle. Now she was happily married with two kids, and was glad to see that her old friend seemed to have found happiness too.

"Yeah, come on Sam. Spill. We want to know all about this guy that finally captured the elusive Sam Carter," one of her old lab tech's teased.

Just then her cell phone vibrated in her pocket and she pulled it out. There was one text message.

BACK SAFE AND SOUND. CALL ME LATER AT HOME. LOVE YOU

She had to smile. Cassie had taught him how to text message, but he still insisted on spelling out all the words. Luckily he was man of few words or his messages would cost a fortune. She breathed a sigh of relief, and turned her blinding smile on her friends. "His name is Jack," she began.

That night she had barely closed the door of the hotel room behind her before she had her phone out and was dialing home.

"Hi babe," Jack answered on the first ring and she grinned imagining him trying not to hover around the phone waiting for it to ring. They had it bad. After all the practice they'd had over the course of six years you would think they could go without seeing or talking to each other for a few days.

Over an hour later she hung up the phone. Wow! That was the longest conversation she'd ever had with the man. They hadn't really talked about anything earth shattering, but it had been nice. Maybe they should talk on the phone more often. At home discussions always seemed to dissolve into sex pretty quickly. Not that she was complaining. After five months she still didn't feel like she had made up for the last six years without sex. She figured they were about up to his first fishing invitation at this point. And she still hadn't been to that darn cabin. She could only imagine what that first trip would be like.

The next night it was late before she finally got back to the hotel to call home. With the time difference she wasn't too worried about waking him up though. Besides, he had sent her several text messages during the day. One was just him complaining about the lack of red Jell-O at lunch to which she had responded that blue was better anyway. In one he just asked what she was doing. He was obviously bored and without her in her lab to bug she would bet that he had been driving Jonas and Teal'c crazy all day. The last message had asked when she would be back at the hotel. Even as she reached for her phone it rang. She shook her head. He was as impatient as a five-year-old sometimes. The conversation began much like the night before, discussing their days. It was only a few minutes though before he turned the conversation around by pausing and asking in a soft voice, "So, what are you wearing?"

*Holy Hannah* Sam thought much later as she hung up the phone. Now even their phone conversations were dissolving into sex. She had never really understood the appeal of phone sex before, but she had to admit that the experience had been amazing. She pulled the sheets up over her naked body and fell into a sated sleep filled with very nice dreams of *fishing* with Jack up at his cabin.

The next day the conference was scheduled to conclude. Since the scientists for NORAD and the AFSPC were all stationed in Colorado along with Sam, the project would be based there at Space Command headquarters where they would get their own lab and conference room. As needed, personnel from the other areas could fly there to meet. However as the day wore on it became apparent that they were not going to be able to wrap up all of the details by the end of the day. Major Davis went off to rearrange transport for all of them for the next day, and Sam called the base and told her very disappointed husband that she wouldn't be home until late the next day. Luckily she called from the privacy of the ladies lounge as he proceeded to describe to her exactly what he had planned for her homecoming.

Sam just sat back in the chair with a grin. They were going to have one heck of a cell phone bill to deal with when she got back, but it was going to be worth every penny.

THE END

Continued in Just Another Sunday