Stargate SG1 and its characters are property of Stargate (II) productions, Showtime/Viacom, MGM/UA, Double Secret Productions, and Gekko Productions. This story is for entertainment purposes only and no money was exchanged. No copyright infringement is intended. The original characters, situations and story are property of the author. This story may not be posted anywhere else without the consent of the author.

Notes: I've been writing fanfic for myself for years now; this is my first time posting anything on the Internet, so this story is unbeta'd. Any mistakes (and there are bound to be some) are mine and mine alone!

The character of Jane Evans is based on a very good friend of mine who died of leukemia when the two of us were ten years old. Even as a little kid, her attitudes were very similar to Jane's in the story, and I thought it would be fun to tie in the incredible personality that I remember with an obsession that started only shortly after she passed away. The title, 'Firefly' is from a Sister Hazel song of the same name and I thought it applied well to the OC in the story. :) I started this story looonnnng ago and only recently uncovered it and decided to correct and complete it. I hope you enjoy it!

From what I remember, I never had this much stuff.

I had this much stuff? I was a lot better off than I thought.

Not.

I rock back onto my ass, staring blankly into one of my two tattered old bags that contain the failure that has been my life to this point. There's a surprising amount of stuff packed into them--more trinkets than anything useful, of course, but certainly more than I remembered there being.

"Why Doctor Jackson, you've outdone yourself," I mutter dryly, reaching into the first bag to reluctantly remove the items.

I'm sitting on the floor of Jack's spare bedroom--my 'home' until the Air Force clears my long-overdue paycheck and I can get a place of my own. I've been here about two weeks; the days are so short compared to Abydos--I'd nearly forgotten that.
My throat tightens as I think about my home, the only place I've felt at home since I was eight years old. Jack decided that I should do something to take my mind off 'the big picture' and only yesterday remembered that he'd commandeered my meagre belongings after the original Abydos mission--according to him, I wouldn't want to lose my diplomas and other such 'ties to eternal geekdom'.

It was a nice thought.

Too bad geekdom, like that day two weeks ago in the Abydonian gateroom, is something I'd really rather forget.

I haphazardly rifle through my diplomas and certificates, tossing them aside with a grimace. I'm a little more careful with the few photographs I own, and a rueful smile crosses my face when I uncover the picture of myself at eighteen, atop a camel near the Great Pyramid--my first trip back to Egypt in nearly ten years. 'If only you knew what you'd get yourself into,' I tell the smiling image silently, and set the picture aside as a flat, square package wrapped in ripped-open brown paper catches my eye.

I pull the wrappings from the oak box, and chuckle as I open it and lay eyes on what I've carried around but never thought of for nearly three years.

It's a chessboard, its hand-carved pieces vaguely familiar but strange in my hand, all carved in the likeness of an Egyptian character--Tehuty, Ra, Horus, Anubis, Osiris--and the men in black and women in white, all in classic adoration poses, that are their pawns.

I reverently turn the polished board over in my hands, and another small laugh escapes me as I read the message there. It's written in black permanent marker in the flourish of a familiar hand--

"Hello, may I speak with Jane Evans, please?...Oh, I'm sorry; my name is Daniel Jackson."

=====
=====

[September, 1991 - Chicago]

"Doctor Jackson?"

I glance up from my book, peering over the rims of my glasses and between annoyingly errant locks of hair. The girl standing in my doorway is half-in, half-out, clutching the doorknob and doing an uncomfortable sort of floaty dance, shifting from foot to foot and looking about ready to bolt.

"Daniel," I reply absently, studying her. She's wearing a faded Chicago Blackhawks t-shirt, baggy jeans, and well-worn grey Nikes. Interestingly, she has an unlit cigarette tucked behind her right ear, giving her the appearance of someone much more at ease than she obviously is.

Freshman.

Blank stare. "Huh?"

"Daniel," I repeat with infinite patience. "You can call me...Daniel." I sigh inwardly at her deer in the headlights impersonation. Straight out of high school, apparently, she's one of the masses far more used to using salutations, titles, 'sir' or 'miss' rather than being on a first-name basis with teachers and instructors. "Can I help you?"

That jolts her into action. "Oh! Yes Doc...Daniel. My name's Jane Evans--I'm scheduled for your Egyptology class this semester, but I got a, uh...a little lost on my way this morning." She flashes a self-conscious little grin as she tucks an errant lock of auburn hair behind her ear. "I was hoping I might be able to get whatever was handed out this morning."

"Oh, sure." I paste a friendly smile on my face and wave her forward. "Come on in." I open up the syllabus and print it off for her along with the notes for today, and, after a pause, for Wednesday too. "Just in case you get 'lost' again," I reply to her questioning look. 'Don't bullshit me,' I tell her silently. She's one of a million students who skip out on this class day after day because it's too 'boring' for them. They can just blame themselves for choosing archaeology as a career.

Jane flushes in embarrassment, and I figure I'm right on the money. "Right. Thanks. Well, I'll see you on Wednesday then. Have a nice day."

I nod absently as she takes her leave, not giving it a second thought.

---

Two days later, the shy, uncertain creature that was Jane Evans has been swept away in the hailstorm of general knowledge that now graces the center seat of the front row of my lecture. When her head isn't bent over furiously-written notes, the intense hazel eyes are focussed on the whiteboard, myself, or the student who happens to be asking a question. It's actually a bit refreshing to know I may have misjudged one of my students; the rest of the class are having a hard time keeping their eyes open and their heads up.

Admittedly curious, I pull up Jane's high school transcript and her public school file after class and skim over it. Skipped third grade, graduated at 16, took a year off for undisclosed reasons, enrolled for her freshman year this year. Didn't particularly excel in any subject, but had half-decent marks.

Her schedule for this year confounds me--she's enrolled in a slew of unrelated courses, nothing that will put her ahead in pursuit of any single degree anytime soon. I figure she's just another kid with no idea what she's going to do, and decide to speak with her after class on Friday.

---

To my surprise, Jane only grins when I point out what I've noticed and explain that this isn't really the way to go to get a degree.

"Oh, I know," she says airily, "but I'm dabbling in a bit of everything this year, and when I find out what interests me most, I'll take more courses focussing on that--if I decide to come back next year." She gives me a curiously wary look, but smiles. "Thanks for taking an interest, though."

I shrug. "Professors may be aloof, but we all want our students to be as well off as they can be."

"Well," she says, standing and shouldering her backpack, "you are one of the good ones, then."

Something about the way she said that irks me, and I raise an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

She hesitates. "Uh...well, to be honest, a few of the older students I've spoken to said you're...um..."

"Whaaaat?" I drawl, eyes narrowed. Come on now, kid, you can't just run me through and leave me bleeding all over the good carpet.

"A bit of an asshole," she admits, the last word almost a whisper, and she cringes while quickly adding, "but you're not! I mean, taking an interest and that--with more profs like you and more parties like the one tonight, I'll be well on my way!"

I'm a little speechless over the 'asshole' revelation and still trying to work out the compliment from her last statement, but to my credit I manage a rather pathetic, "I see." I clear my throat, wanting to end this as quickly and painlessly as possible. "Well, that's all I had to say...have fun tonight, I suppose."

"You're not going to the party? It's frosh week!"

That freezes me, and I bite back a derisive snort. "No..."

"Man, how old are you? Fifty?"

"Twenty-six," I reply, immediately wondering why I did.

"Oh, thank God," she says sarcastically. "I was getting a bit worried there. Twenty-si--" she explodes, tossing her head back in disgust as I find myself taken aback at this abrupt turnaround in personality. "What are you, a hermit? For Pete's sake, live a little!"

Indignant replaces Stunned as my reigning emotion. "If it's any of your business, Doctor Jordan has some very important--"

"Booze? Women? Dare I venture, drugs? Beacuse if none of the above, you sure as hell aren't doing what a normal twenty-six year old guy does on a Friday night! Hiding behind some bookish front isn't exactly healthy, you know."

"Oh, and I suppose you have first-hand knowledge of what a 'normal twenty-six year old guy' does, do you?"

"Well, I mean..."

Sensing that I have her on the run, I narrow my eyes at her, ready to drive my point home, and indicate the cigarette behind her ear. I pull out the old pack of cigarettes Doctor Jordan has stashed in the desk drawer. "Got a light?" I challenge smugly, confident that I've called her bluff.

"Er..." A finger reaches up to fiddle the cigarette self-consciously. "I, uh--actually..."

I drop the pack of cigarettes back into the drawer and lean back, satisfied. "There; you see? There's more hidden behind the flamboyant party animal you appear to be; something you don't share--just like there's more to this bookworm 'hermit'. Are we hiding? Maybe, maybe not--I think we're people who only show what we're comfortable with other people seeing."

My unexpected parry has her temporarily off-balance, but one corner of her mouth curves upward in a slight, thoughtful smile. "Maybe," she says, and turns and heads for the door. "See you Monday." And with that, she vanishes into the throng of students clamoring in the hall.

=====
=====

"Can I get you something, sir?"

"No thanks," I tell the flight attendant with a smile. "I'm fine."

I settle myself back into the seat of the plane and contemplate that first real conversation I had with Jane. Despite my expectancy that we'd never have a civil word outside the classroom again, Jane seemed to take our awkward conversation to heart, and the party thing became a bit of a Friday ritual. After each Friday class, she'd saunter up, grinning like the Cheshire Cat, and ask if I'd abe attending the latest bash. I'd simply laugh and shake my head, nad she's leave chocolate and various little jokeshop-type trinkets behind to 'spice up the hot weekend'. I never saw the cigarette behind her ear again, and we started grabbing coffee on our mutual off period Wednesday mornings, both pleased with the rare and somewhat unexpected friendship we had formed.

=====
=====

January, 1992

Jane comes back from Christmas break completely bald, and looking far more fragile than she ever has. She walks into my lecture a little late, bare head uncovered, eyes a little sunken, but exuding their usual warmth. She gamely banters with her fellow students and offers her usual witticisms during lecture, but it's a shock to the system how utterly tiny and fragile she looks.

As usual, she appears in my office door after class, and I present her with the Christmas gift I picked up for her after a sweatshirt emblazoned with 'Party Animal' and a tree ornamet of a blackboard and a little student-character writing

"I'm not all that great with gifts," I tell her self-consciously--there's not exactly a long list of people I've ever bought gifts for--but she smiles warmly.

"No, no, this is excellent! Thank you so much!"

I smile back as I hand her a mug of coffee from my coffeemaker. "Is it Wednesday already?" she quips.

"Coffee makes for conversation," I hint, and her smile falters just a bit. After a silence that seems about to give birth stretches for miles, I fold. "Are you okay?"

Jane realizes that I'm not in kidding mode her, and her smile comletely fades. After taking a particularly deep swig of coffee, she heaves a sigh that comes from her toes. "You might have heard from gossip that I have a pretty bad case of leukemia," she tells me without preamble, staring me dead in the eye. "It's true, and I had a pretty nasty chemo treatment after Christmas--hence this." She indicates her bare scalp where only a few short weeks ago the shoulder-length auburn hair rested.

I sit there, stunned into silence. I hadn't heard--I'm not exactly a gossip whore. Why do I suck at taking news like this? I flounder for something to say, finally coming up with "I'm s--"

"Don't!" A finger shoots up from my companion, and her gaze turns to ice. "I was hoping to get you into the social scene, but the pity party wasn't exactly what I had in mind."

"Yeah, but..." I can understand the annoyance at receiving nothing but pity from people--I got enough of that when my parents died--but I compare all the stuff I worry about, and draw away from people because of, with all that this kid must think about; her own death, not just the deaths of people she cares about. It blows my mind.

Jane smiles ruefully. "I haven't been given a deadline or anything," she assures me. "This is only my second round that just started, and the doctors are optimistic about the cancer going into remission."

I'm about to ask when she found out about it, but she sees the question in my eyes and responds to it. "That year I took off after high school? I was being a human pincushion. I was diagnosed a few months before registration started in July, and my parents and I decided it'd be easier to get all the tests and stuff out of the way before I tackled university."

Sitting here, I'm the emotional polar opposite of Jane. She sits there calmly, with none of the furtive, nervous glances I'm casting between my mug, her, the wall...

"Can I ask you something?" I blurt, surprising myself.

"Absolutely." She's crossed the room now, retrieving my chessboard.

"Well, with everything...what are you looking for in life now? I mean you must think a lot about--"

"About what the ending to this could be? I don't, actually. Well, not so much anymore," she amends with a wry grin, setting up the game and spinning the white side to herself. She meets my disbelieving gaze and chuckles. "It's true," she assures me. "At first...well, let's just say it wasn't pretty. But now, I try my best not to get lost in self-pity and just live. Day for day, just focussing on the moment. As for what I'm looking for..." she pauses, thinking about it while I make my first move of the game, never tearing my gaze from her. "I know I'm looking for something," she says finally. "Everyone is, I think. I guess I'll know what I'm looking for when I find it."

I snort. "I'm not looking," I contradict her. "I have nothing to look for."

Jane studies me wordlessly as she takes one of my pawns, a closed smile on her face--as if she knows something I don't. It irritates me a bit. "You will," she says simply. "At some point, you will have something to search for--life is pointless if you don't. Maybe it'll be somehing as deep as a way to free your soul, maybe something as simple as finding a home--you might not find it 'til you die, but I know that one way of the other, we all stumble across our own answers. Hell, you're the searching type," she tells me with a cheeky grin.

"'Searching type'?" I echo dubiously. "What, exactly, qualifies someone as the 'searching type'?"

Jane groans as she loses a knight, then shrugs. "You're an archaeologist; a glorified wanderer--the perfect occupation, or scapegoat, if you will. You never really stay in one place for long; just long enough to, either figuratively or literally, realize that what you're looking for isn't there."

"Hey, I'll be here for a while," I protest cynically. "I make 'good' money here." I keep arguing, but she's got me thinking now, the bugger. What a cleverly subtle topic-jumper I've got in front of me; she's completely turned the conversation away from the depressing original subject. "Checkmate," I add victoriously.

"Ack," she mutters as I smite her king with a flourish. "You just wait," she warns in response to my protest. "One of these days you'll find something you want to do and take off..." she glances at her watch, "like I have to, or I'll be late for Psych." Jane stands with a smile, and I do too, impulsively giving her a quick hug.

"If you ever need to talk..." I trail off as I release her.

"I know exactly where to find you," she promises, picking up her Christmas gift. "Thanks, Daniel. For the chat and the coffee. Wednesday?"

"Wednesday," I confirm.

=====

April, 1992

"Ahh...last Wednesday of regular classes." Jane sighs contentedly as we slide into seats at a table in the corner of the large cafeteria with our coffee. "Never thought I'd see the day."

"Have you decided whether or not you're coming back next year?" I ask as she slumps bonelessly in her seat, picking the chocolate chips that are closest to the surface of her muffin and popping them in her mouth.

"Dunno," she says inarticulately, savoring the chocolate. "I've really started getting into my botany class, so maybe i'll come back and finish out a BSc in biology."

"Archaeology too boring for you?" I tease, and Jane lazily throws a chocolate chip at me.

"No, just you," she retorts with a grin, then sobers. "Nah, I think I'd really enjoy doing something with plants...some kind of archaeo-botanist or something."

"Or a professor," I say as a memory hits me. "Show students that we're not all assholes."

Jane nearly spits coffee all over the table, managing to swallow and cough violently. "Oh Jesus," she moans between hacks. I stand, alarmed, but she waves me off. "I was hoping you'd forgotten about that."

I laugh--it did bother me a bit when I discovered what a few of the students thought about me, but I realized that I hadn't been giving them much reason to think otherwise. While I've been here, I haven't been the most cheerful guy around--teaching wasn't exactly my first career choice. I tell Jane this, but she's still muttering apologies into her mug for being so thick-headed.

"Hey, I was a little self-righteous, there," I say, instinctively shouldering some blame, "what with all that cigarette stuff."

"Oh yeah!" she exclaims, merry gaze whipping up to meet mine. "I forgot that you can be a bastard too!"

"Mind if I ask...what was the story with that, anyway?" I want to know.

Jane's laughter has died, but there's still that wry smile on her face. "Let me ask you something," she says. "How do you remember high school? What's your strongest memory there?"

I blink placidly at her. Where to start? Swirlies, taunts, elbow jabs...

Jane cuts into my rambling mind. "I thought so," she murmurs. "And uh, how'd you feel? Insignificant? Isolated?" A wry chuckle. "Well, you can chalk the cigarette bit up to all that and normal teenage angst." At my questioning look, she puts down her coffee and leans forward, crossing her arms on the table. "See, in high school, I wasn't really what you'd call 'popular'. I wasn't a bullied wallflower or anything, and I had my own little circle of friends...I was just awkward. Shy, kinda kept to myself, quiet. I wasn't interested in dating or drinking or smoking or getting high--and, you know, most of my friends were experimenting. They'd go to dances and stuff on Fridays, and the only time I've danced in public was at my prom, and my 'date' had to show me what to do in a slow dance!"

I chuckle. "Really? Who was your 'date'?" I lilt the last word like a ten-year old, but who cares.

Jane grins. "His name's Terry. We've been best friends since we were little kids." She laughs at a memory. "I used to boss him around so badly; I was horrible. He's a few months younger than me, so I was kinda...older and wiser."

I grin at her wickedly. "I cannot imagine you as the bossy type," I say dryly, receiving another chocolate chip missile in the forehead.

"Yeah, she says lightly, "I didn't think he'd go with me since he has a girlfriend, but he really got into it; made the night a lot of fun. But anyway," she mutters, getting on with her point, "I guess all through high school I felt a bit detached--it seemed like all my friends were growing up and I was standing still. Add that to diminished self-confidence brought out by this leukemia thing, and I had an urge to try and exude as much...maturity as I possibly could. Looked pretty stupid, I know--you made me see that."

My gaze rockets up from where it's staring into my coffee. "W-w-wait a minute; I didn't--"

Jane waves off my protest. "No, I know; not in so many words, but when you asked me 'for a light', I knew that if a professor I'd just met could see through it, anyone could--besides, it wasn't really helping the maturity factor much, anyway. Then you said something about there being more to both of us than meets the eye, and I knew you were right. By the way," she adds, "I never apologized to you for coming off as such a...bitch that day."

"Hey, don't sweat it," I tell her with a chuckle. "I thought you were charming."

That earns me an unladylike snort. "Yeah right--I practically wrote you off as some total wallflower hermit!"

"You weren't too far off!" I inject lightly.

"Please! You're anything but!" she insists. "You just have to figure out what you want from life and get down to finding it. And find yourself something fun to distract yourself from the unpleasant stuff, like I did!"

I raise my eyebrows. "And what'd you find?"

Triumphantly, she smiles even more broadly and pounds a fist gently on the tabletop. "Hockey."

I twist my mouth into a grimace. "Eh, I'm not exactly a sports fan," I remind her.

"Hey, it's just an example," she says, energised simply by the mention of her sport. "My point is, that the only time I felt included, unequivocally happy, and comfortable in my own skin during high school, really felt like I had some kind of grace, was when I was playing hockey. I've wasted away a bit," she adds with a chuckle, "but I was always a bit bigger than other girls, tall and heavy enough to make me self-conscious. On the ice, though, everyone has al that gear on; we're all huge. In hockey the best aren't always the smallest, the quickest, and God knows they're not always the best-looking! It's one of the few things out there that, at the heart, is based on skill alone. Whoever can take that skill and configure it to a winning combination gets the spotlight. No amount of gawdy makeup or perfume can do that. That's why hockey's perfect to me. I sure as hell wasn't the fastest out there, but I knew where to be and where to put the puck. There was nothing better," she says softly, her eyes taking on a faraway quality, "and I can't even do it anymore." Her eyes clear again so quickly that I'm uncertain the glimpse of naked sorrow even existed. "That's the worst part of this," she informs me. "It tries to take away everything that makes you you."

"Why can't you do it anymore?" I find myself asking. Sure, she's sick, but she's not exactly breakable. So sue me--I've never exactly sat through a hockey game before.

"I bruise really easily now," Jane explains. "Even my gear would bruise me when I tightened it--like my shin pads. The straps go around my legs right above my ankles and below my knees. First time I bruised, I had the straps' imprints on my legs for nearly a week. Scared the shit out of me and my parents, I was diagnosed a couple weeks later, and...early retirement." Her tone is forcibly light, and I can tell how much it hurts. "My parents tossed every last bit of gear I had over to the Salvation Army."

"Why do you keep trying to hide any negative feelings?" I ask quietly, my coffee cold and long forgotten. We've never gotten quite so personal in our talks before, and I'm riveted. "How do you keep doing it?"

"It's easy now. Don't get me wrong--I wasn't Johnny Optimist for a long time after being diagnosed. Not being able to play hockey was only one item in a long list of things that made me start considering what the point of life was." At my horrified expression, she hastens to explain. "No, no, I never got as far as suicidal - I'm too damn stubborn to lose that early in the game; you should know that about me by now! But," she says, growing serious again, "I was depressed--chemo...it takes a lot out of you; there's no way you haven't noticed that." I nod, once again finding my gaze drawn to her tired eyes and gaunt features. Her hair is just starting to grow back since her last chemo treatment in the beginning of March, and she's quite pleased with it. "I felt like a prisoner," Jane continues. "I was tired all the time; couldn't be up and around very long. It was bad. Then one day I just decided I didn't want it to beat me at all--lying down or otherwise. That's it. No near-death or run-in with a ghost of Christmas Past...I just started pushing myself harder, doing normal stuff; making time for chemo, not making time for me around chemo. I wanted to live, not just survive. That's why I don't let myself get caught up in the negative. A couple people have told me I seem insincerely pleasant, but stuff that used to bother me still bothers me--I just deal with it on my own, when I have time to. I won't let it interfere in my school and stuff." She eases the tension with a slight grin and asks with a Southern drawl, "What about you? How'd a nice fella like you wind up in a place like this?"

I smile tightly. "I don't know...I've always had an interest in archaeology, thanks to my parents. I didn't plan on teaching, though--until I met Doctor Jordan and he offered me a kind of apprenticeship after I had him as a professor here. Teaching a class was included in the offer.
"Archaeology, though--there was never a second thought about whether I'd get into it as a career; Egypt was always in my life in some form. When my parents died shortly after coming to the States, it was like archaeology--Egyptology--was the closest thing to home, and I immersed myself in it. Eventually I stopped trying to be 'normal'--stopped trying to be like every other kid, stopped trying to fit in...I kind of forsook childhood all together and did my own thing."

"How, uh...how old were you when..." Jane trails off, as if uncertain she should go there.

I nod slightly. "Eight."

"Jesus," she mutters. "That's terrible."

"Yeah; it was a, uh, a freak accident." I force a little smile and leave it at that, and Jane gives a little half-smile of understanding.

"Well, it's never too late to start playing again," she says lightly. "Remember that--don't give up fun just because you're an adult or because you think you should. Let loose. It feels good, believe me."

I can't help but grin at her. "I'll remember that."

=====
=====

I did remember, and a few weeks later I got a chance to prove it. I received a research grant, and I was heading back home to Egypt. The only thing I dreaded about it was telling Jane I was leaving.

=====
=====

"What do you think you're doing?" Jane asks, laughing, when I stop at the arena, reach in the back seat of the dilapidated rental I'm driving, and thrust a pair of hockey skates and a hockey stick in her lap.

I shrug one shoulder mischievously, wordlessly getting out and heading into the rink. "It's never too late to play," I remind her over my shoulder.

"Do you even know how to skate, poindexter?" she teases as we both lace up our skates. "You haven't been gathering dust locked in classrooms the past twenty years or so?"

I snort in mock disgust. "Just wait until I kick your ass," I threaten, and nod toward the ice. "Let's see what you've got."

I watch her lap the ice slowly, working kinks out of legs and shoulders unused to the motions. Then, in the blink of an eye, she's turning, flowing as if in a dance from the heels to the toes of her blades, circling the center circle backwards, then exploding forward to trace every corner faceoff circle in figure-eight patterns between adjacent corners, cutting backwards across the hashmarks, stopping on a dime and surging forward.

She finally comes to a stop in front of the visitor's bench where I'm standing, her eyes alight with joy, thin face flushed, panting. "You comin'?" she asks breathlessly.

I chuckle. "I may have overstated my skating ability just a bit," I admit. 'Face it,' I tell myself, 'you haven't been on skates since you were twelve, and that didn't go so well.'

"Who cares?" she demands. "It's for fun--come on!"

=====
=====

We spent the next two hours just laughing. I was less than stellar on the ice, but we had a ball - I couldn't remember the last time I'd been inclined to laugh even half as hard as I did that day. When we were finally kicked out by the maintenance crew, we headed to the Starbucks drive-thru for a coffee, and I remembered why I'd brought her out there--I'd told her it was a celebration of the end of exams, but I had the distinct feeling Jane wasn't buying that.

=====
=====

"I'm, uh...I'm leaving," I blurt without warning as we sit in the parking lot of Starbucks with our coffee.

I could see Jane freeze out of the corner of my eye. "What?"

"I got a research grant," I say as lightly as I can, but with a note of pleading in my tone; pleading for her to understand, keeping my gaze directed straight ahead. "I'm heading back to Egypt for a year."

"Wow."

I finally glance at her. "'Wow'?"

I watch as she musters up her resolve and smiles. "Yeah, wow! That's great; congratulations!"

I sigh. "Look. Will you please be honest with me about how you feel about this? I know you deal with this kind of thing on your own, but I'd sort of like to know that I'm not going off as some...grudge."

"'Honest with you'?" she echoes.

"Yeah--you're always hiding behind the front of--"

"Hiding?! I'm hiding?"

I'm a bit confused by her tone, but nod warily. "I think so."

Jane turns in her seat to face me, scowling--and I realize that this is the first time I've ever seen an expression like that on her face. "No, no; I'm not hiding--you want the truth? I'm pissed. Not pissed that you're leaving, though that sucks ass, but that I was right about you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"You run. Whenever you get close to something you could lose, you run. You're so relieved you got this because who knows how much longer you'll have this...thing here? You're running to bury yourself in work, just like when your--"

I think both our faces drain of color at the same time. Jane visibly slumps and I wordlessly put the car in gear and head back to her house.

When Jane climbs out of the car, she pauses as though she wants to say something; she decides against it and shuts the passenger door.

"I'm leaving from the university at 10:30 Saturday morning," I tel her through the open window tonelessly, and drive away before she gets the chance to respond.

=====
=====

I sigh and fidget against the numbness growing in my rear. I hadn't expected to see Jane after that disaster, and that our last conversation would have been something we'd both have rather forgotten. So I got a big surprise that Saturday when I was about to leave.

=====
=====

"Daniel!"

I feel my heart swell, and tell the cab driver to hold up for a minute before turning to face Jane, who has stopped a few paces away. "Hi."

"I'm sorry," she blurts on the heels of my wary greeting. "I"m sorry about what I said the other day--I was way out of line. I know you're not running or anything, I know you can't stick around forever...I was just...I don't know, surprised I guess."

I nod slightly. "Yeah, it was out of line," I agree quietly, "but I guess I should have expected something like that for dropping the bomb like that. Apology accepted."

She smiles gratefully and edges closer, presenting me with a square package neatly wrapped in brown paper. "Here," she says. "I was planning on giving you this for Christmas, but now's as good a time as any. I never did get you into the good times scene," she cheekily teases as I unwrap the oak outer case and lift the lid, "but maybe this is a bit of a start."

My breath catches and I feel the burn of tears in my eyes as I reverently examine the pieces of the beautifully-sculpted game.

Jane picks the white queen, carved to resemble Isis. "So you'll know that, when you lose, it'll be me kicking your ass," she says with the ghost of a grin.

"Come on, buddy! I don't have all day here!"

"Sorry," I mutter to the cabbie, and step into Jane, hugging her hard and having it returned full-force. "Thanks--it's beautiful," I say, swallowing the lump in my throat. "I'm going to miss you." Even as the words leave my mouth, I realize how true they are--I haven't had this friendship deal for a long time.

"So keep in touch," she warns lightly, voice muffled by my coat. "I'll be here." She gives a great sniff as she pulls away, and I surreptitiously swipe at my own eyes. "And good luck," she says seriously. "If anyone deserves to find their answer, it's you."

I gingerly tuck the chessboard into one of my bags and cup her face in both hands, memorizing her features, which seem even more ravaged by sickness than they have since I met her. "So you do," I assure her quietly. "And I know you'll find it. Take care of yourself, you hear me?"

Jane nods as I slip into the back seat beside my bags, and doesn't say goodbye, doesn't even wave as the cab pulls away--she just stands there and watches it drive away. But that's just who Jane is, and there's no doubt in my mind that at least one of us will find what we're looking for.

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So here I am, two days after finding the chessboard--standing once again in Chicago, in a quiet corner of a large graveyard, at a headstone adorned with flowers and angel trinkets. There's a color photo of the grave's occupant on the stone with a simple inscription beneath it.

I don't know how long I crouch there before I feel the presence of my companion behind me.

"Hey." A hand on my shoulder, a familiar, warm voice. "You okay?"

I stand up and face Jack O'Neill--a friend; I know this from the simple fact that he's here. From what I've seen of the man so far, it seems unlikely my promise to have fun once in a while will be difficult to keep; this complex individual has 'play' down to an art.

"Yeah," I say with a slight smile. "In fact, I think we both are." I cast a final glance at my friend's resting place, and know that her soul has found its freedom, probably skating circles around all the others up there, as it should.

A comfortable warmth settles over my shoulders, and another, just as substantial, settles over my heart as I step out of the graveyard and into a life full of the unknown--and for the first time, I know I'm not stepping into it alone.

The End

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