The little TV with its snowy black and white picture flickered in the background, the volume turned down as Daniel Jackson sat on his battered couch and stared at it. It wasn't like he needed the sound. After all, didn't everyone know George Bailey's lines by heart? He absently picked at his lukewarm TV dinner. The traditional after Christmas meal...turkey and dressing. He snorted softly at the liberal use of the words. Cardboard and paste was more like it!

Pushing the uneaten meal aside, he reached for his scribbled stack of notes and scanned them. Somewhere, there had to be a link between the Egyptian and Mayan cultures. It was there, he just had to find it. He sighed. Daniel had studied and researched until his grants were just about expired. He only had a few months funding left and then he would have to plan his seminar and broach his theories to academia. Someone had to believe him!

He glanced at his watch. It was after midnight. New Year's Day. Yeah, just another day, another twenty four hours. The handful of people he knew, just colleagues actually, had not even bothered to invite him to their gala gatherings. No never mind. He considered parties a waste of time. All people wanted to do was drink, or one up the next guy, or brown nose the boss and he wasn't into those games.

If he had friends, he might have considered joining them for a New Year's toast, but his research consumed his time and he hadn't bothered to polish his people skills, preferring to devote his time to his passion. But maybe someday....

He pushed his glasses up into his hair and rubbed his strained eyes. As his eyes focused, they settled on the tiny Charlie Brown tree he had scrounged from a dumpster where some store owner had tossed it after the employee Christmas party. It had several unbroken glass ornaments, a single strand of multicolored lights (only half of which worked) and a silver star with one arm broken off. Sad though it was, it was a tree. The total lack of presents under it on Christmas morning had made the tiny tree even more forlorn. It was the only sign of the holidays in the dingy little apartment, crowded up against boxes of research and ancient artifacts.

His gaze drifted from the tree to the flickering images on the TV, a sad smile settling on his lips as he pushed his glasses back into place. Tilting his head to one side, he spoke softly to the unhearing images, "Ya know George, if you're the richest man in town, I'm the poorest," he admitted, a sudden lonely quaver in his voice. "Maybe someday..." He trailed off with a mocking little laugh. "Yeah someday, there'll be friends, a job, a place to belong and people who care..." He laughed again, but the mocking tone was missing, "And someday..." An unaccustomed sadness settled on his handsome face. "Someday there'll be people I want to spend time with...who'll want to spend time with me...too...Someday." He whispered as the movie ended and the screen went black. Daniel stared at it unseeing, as moisture gathered in his eyes, but not from the movie's ending. "Someday," he whispered again, his voice choking, "someone will care."

He shook himself. Just because it was the holidays was no time to get morbidly maudlin. Turning back to his notes, he reached for a pen and began reading. Yet, as he tried to focus his attention on the words, the lonely lost expression remained on his face. "Someday," he whispered under his breath. Someday he would make up for the losses. Daniel had never made friends in the foster homes as a child and as an adult he had remained distant from other people, lost in his studies, afraid to get close...afraid of being hurt like so many times before.

For some reason, perhaps the season, this night, his notes were more of a distraction than a comfort and he felt an unaccustomed, overwhelming longing to have someone around. Tossing the papers aside he climbed to his feet and grabbing his coat and his keys, Daniel headed downstairs.

His breath caught as he stepped out into the night. Snow was softly falling, huge feathery flakes which drifted lazily to the ground and clung to his hair and clothes. Looking up, he saw the falling flakes highlighted and haloed in the lights which lined the street.

Daniel sat down on the stoop and looked up the holiday emptied street. All his life, loneliness had followed him like some little yapping dog at his heels, worrying at him, too incessantly annoying to be ignored. He stared at the pristine, quiet beauty of the fresh snowfall and tears gathered in his eyes once more.

There was no one to share it with. No family, no friends, no one. He sniffled and rubbed at his nose as his lower lip quivered. At least 1997 was a new year...and who knew. Maybe 'someday' would happen this year. Squaring his shoulders, he pushed to his feet and jamming his hands in his coat pockets, wandered up the empty street alone.