**********
Daniel refused to let Jack throw him a birthday party. No amount of cajoling on Jack’s part changed Daniel’s mind. The answer was always, "No, Jack. No party." That left Jack just one option. He planned one in secret.
***
When Jack dragged Daniel away from his work on a particularly elusive translation, Daniel complained - loudly - that he didn’t need a lunch break. Jack ignored the protest, and Daniel grumbled all the way to the commissary about over-bearing COs. His grousing was gaining steam just as Jack pushed open the commissary doors and gently shoved him through. Daniel’s "hey, don’t push," died on his lips as shouts of "Surprise!" assaulted him. He stopped so unexpectedly, Jack had to alter his own course abruptly to avoid running into him. Daniel stared at the crowd of smiling, laughing faces. Balloons adorned every commissary table and ‘Happy Birthday’ had been painted on a sheet and hung on the back wall. An array of gift-wrapped packages covered what was usually the mess hall dessert table. Speechless, Daniel turned slowly to Jack. "Judas," was all he had time to say before he was surrounded by well-wishers drawing him into the room. Jack grinned like the cat who ate the canary as the crowd swept Daniel off to the punch bowl.
Nothing like a good surprise party, Jack thought, surveying the room later. Ferretti had them all in stitches for awhile with embellished accounts of his ’gate escapades. And to Jack’s utter disbelief, Sam actually succeeded in getting a room full of Air Force personnel to play party games. After his initial dismay over the celebration, even Daniel joined in. Now, Jack figured it was time for cake and presents. The sooner, the better, given that SGC parties were all too frequently interrupted by some off-world crisis. He looked around for the guest of honor and spotted him in the midst of a rowdy game of musical chairs. As Jack watched the mad scramble for chairs, Daniel slipped away from the game unnoticed and made his way to the door.
Damn. Now what? Daniel had been enjoying himself. Jack was sure of that. What sent him running for cover? And how did he think they were going to do cake and presents without him? It was his party. Jack trailed him out of the room. When Daniel turned toward the elevator instead of his office, Jack guessed he was headed for the surface. It wasn’t like Daniel to leave the base in the middle of the day, which meant he was probably going up the mountain. Jack let him have the elevator to himself and followed up in the next one. He found Daniel several hundred yards up the mountain trail. Apparently the birthday boy wasn’t in full flight mode; that would have taken him all the way to the top. Instead, he was sitting along the trail with his back against a tree. He didn’t seem the least bit surprised at Jack’s approach, but he didn’t say anything when Jack sat down, stretching his legs out in front of him and leaning back on the palms of his hands.
"You were having a good time," Jack finally said. Daniel acknowledged the statement with a small nod. "So, what’s with the no party rule?"
While Daniel picked at the twigs on the ground, Jack waited him out.
"My first seven birthdays were celebrated on digs. No kid parties. Just me, my parents, maybe a cake and some family friends. It was always a special day. My day. We’d do whatever I wanted. We usually rode camels and climbed pyramids. My dad hated riding camels. The one necessary evil in his work. ‘Camels are evil, Danny,’ he’d say. But we rode camels on my birthday."
Jack smiled at the image, but Daniel didn’t notice. He was tracing pyramid patterns in the dirt.
"I suppose I knew what birthday parties were, but I’d never been to one - never had one. It didn’t really matter. I had my parents and we were riding camels. Then, after – I was in school in the States. The other kids talked about birthday parties. They sounded like fun - cake, games, hats, candles. So for my next birthday, I asked my foster parents if I could have a birthday party. The Mahoneys were nice people. They cared enough to give a foster kid a decent home. But they didn’t have a lot of interest in providing the other stuff - trips to the zoo, or new bikes, or –"
"Birthday parties," Jack guessed.
"Birthday parties," Daniel confirmed. "I begged Mrs Mahoney for weeks. She said I was too old. She didn’t have time. The noise would bother Mr. Mahoney on his only day off. It was a lot of time, expense and effort for paper hats and balloons that would get thrown away. But I just kept asking. Finally, she said yes. She told me I could invite five friends . . ."
"Five friends, Daniel, and we’ll have a party."
"With cake?"
"Yes, with cake."
"And candles? And games? Can we play pin the tail on the donkey?"
"Yes, Daniel. We’ll put some candles on the cake . . ."
"Nine."
"Nine candles. We’ll have ice cream and party hats and noise makers, and you can play pin the tail on the donkey. But not too long, and not too noisy. And you’ll have to clean up afterwards."
"I was so excited they couldn’t shut me up."
"Now there’s a surprise," Jack interrupted. Daniel smiled a bit.
"I asked for chocolate cake with chocolate icing. We went to the grocery store, and Mrs. Mahoney got a bakery cake just like I wanted with ‘Happy Birthday Daniel’ in bright green letters. She let me go down that aisle with all the baking food - with the spices, muffin mixes and chocolate chips and stuff. At the end was a section where they had those little packs of candles and party hats and things. I picked out what I wanted and we took it all home. We sent the invitations. The day of the party, I woke up early and, well, I guess I –"
"Bounced around the house?"
"Yeah. Mrs. Mahoney blew up balloons and strung crepe paper all over the living room. There was a present on the kitchen table wrapped up in plain tissue paper, tied with a blue ribbon. I could hardly keep my hands off it. I couldn’t wait. I kept running back and forth between the front door and the living room window."
Daniel stopped. Jack waited a moment, but he didn’t continue. His fingers wiped away the dirt pyramids and then stilled.
"What happened?" Jack asked gently.
"They didn’t come." Daniel’s voice was a whisper and suddenly filled with child-like hurt. "I kept asking Mrs. Mahoney when they were going to come. She kept saying ‘I’m sure they’ll be here soon.’ After a while I stopped asking. I sat on the couch in the living room staring at the paper donkey on the wall. I waited the whole two hours the party was supposed to last."
Daniel stared at the donkey, a paper noise maker twisting in his hands. The chimes on the mantle clock sounded . . . One . . . two . . .three . . .four . . . The party was over. Mrs Mahoney’s heels clicked on the entryway floor as she crossed from the kitchen to the living room. Standing in the entrance she surveyed the decorations strewn across the room.
"Time to clean up, Daniel. Put all the streamers and balloons in here," she instructed, laying a plastic trash bag across the arm of the couch where he sat. "Pop the balloons first. And be careful not to pull the paint off the wall with the tape. Stack up the hats and the things in the kitchen."
When she had clicked back into the kitchen, Daniel stood up and began taking down balloons. The house was still, as it had been for the last two hours. The silence had hold of him. It wouldn’t let him breathe. He knew if he made a sound the world would shatter apart. He was afraid to pop the balloons. Very carefully, just the way Daddy had shown him once, he used the scissors to cut a little hole near the knots. The air quietly fizzed out; the balloons drooped and then died. He threw them in the trash bag. He climbed on a chair to reach where the streamers were taped high on the wall. Biting his lower lip with the effort, he cautiously pulled the tape from the wall and dropped the streamers to the floor. They went in the trash with the balloons. He took down the donkey and folded it along the creases. He carefully placed all the little cut-out tails inside one of the folds to save them. Then he stacked the party hats and the noise makers on top of it and carried it all across the entry to the kitchen. Mrs. Mahoney heard him coming and turned to look.
"Put the hats and noise makers on the counter, Daniel. Throw the game away." He heard her mutter "what a waste" as he silently obeyed her. The donkey and its tails slipped down among the soggy bread crusts thrown away at lunch. He noticed that the present was no longer on the kitchen table and turned to ask Mrs. Mahoney what had happened to it. She was standing at the opposite counter, scraping the green writing off the birthday cake. She scraped it all off until it looked like any other cake.
He didn’t ask about the present.
"We had that cake for dessert. But nobody said anything. It was just another chocolate cake for dessert after tuna casserole and beans. She promised for the party I could have the corner piece with all the extra frosting, but at supper I got a lop-sided piece where the bakery missed putting icing on the side. There weren’t any candles. No one sang ‘Happy Birthday.’ Mrs. Mahoney set the piece of cake down in front of me and then she just sat down and asked Mr. Mahoney if he had rested well during his nap. I ached inside. I didn’t know what I’d done wrong. I just knew I was supposed to keep quiet and eat that piece of cake. Except my mouth was so dry I couldn’t swallow. Then all of a sudden, I couldn’t breathe. I dropped my fork. I remember watching it clatter on the plate and then bounce off the table onto the floor before I ran. Mr. Mahoney shouted ‘you pick that fork up off the floor, Daniel!’ But I was already half-way up the stairs. I ran into my room, curled up in a corner and cried so hard I threw up. They never came to find me."
Jack wondered if Daniel realized he had curled up in a ball while telling the story. His arms were wrapped tight around knees pulled up to his chin. God, how deep was the hurt when the humiliation of a nine year old could evoke tears of shame nearly thirty years later? If that had happened to Charlie, if his friends hadn’t shown up, he would have been heart-broken. Jack would have been heart-broken with him. Well, Jack probably would have rampaged through the neighborhood banging in the heads of those hateful little kids who hadn’t shown up. But after that, he would have been heartbroken for his son. And then, he and Sara would have played fifty rounds of pin the tail on the donkey with Charlie. They would have let Charlie eat the whole birthday cake himself. They would have wrapped up ridiculous things like key rings and alarm clocks just so he’d have presents to open. They would have celebrated in style and made sure Charlie knew that he was loved and wanted. Daniel got tuna casserole and chalky cake, and had cried himself sick.
Jack didn’t speak. Didn’t move. Daniel looked ready to bolt - as if he’d just realized how much of himself and his own pain he had revealed. He chanced a look at Jack, gauging his reaction. Jack knew Daniel couldn’t help but see the compassion he felt, just as he knew Daniel didn’t know how to receive it. Daniel tensed, an almost imperceptible movement, preparatory to flight. Impulsively, Jack reached for his arm, grasping it securely.
"Stay."
Amazingly, Daniel relaxed slightly.
"Stay," Jack repeated softly, and Daniel nodded.
Neither of them spoke. Gradually, Daniel unwound his body, pushing his knees away from his chest a few inches and relaxing his arms so that his wrists rested across his knees. He leaned his head back against the tree trunk.
"I never knew I was different, Jack. When my parents were alive. I had no idea that other kids didn’t travel around the world with their parents. I thought school was something you only did for a few weeks in the winter when your parents weren’t on a dig. I figured everybody knew the stuff I knew about mummies and pyramids and the pharaohs of Egypt . . . I didn’t understand why kids didn’t like me. I’m not sure I knew they didn’t like me until that day. Even then, all I knew was that they hadn’t come to my party and I didn’t know why. It hurt."
"I’ll bet it did."
"I never asked for another party. I don’t really remember ever celebrating my birthday after that. I still have the last birthday card my parents gave me. I get it out and read it every year. Promise I’ll make them proud. Have a cup of really good coffee. That’s pretty much it for birthdays."
There was a loss in Daniel’s voice that Jack found unbearable. It went beyond even the pain his own voice carried when he spoke about Charlie. Just hearing it made Jack ache.
"You miss them don’t you, Daniel? Your parents?"
"Of course," Daniel replied.
"No, I mean really miss them. Wake up in the morning and wonder why you can’t hear them fixing breakfast in the kitchen. Discover something amazing and almost call out ‘Dad!’ to tell him about it. See a necklace that reminds you of your mother and have your credit card in hand before you realize you can’t give it to her. That kind of missing them."
Daniel’s eyes widened. A small gasp escaped his throat as he tried to breathe and speak at once. He swallowed hard, and finally whispered, "yes" in a small voice Jack could barely hear.
Jack nodded and gently squeezed Daniel’s arm. There had always been an intangible piece of Daniel that seemed connected to something unseen. It was as though he was tethered to something good - something that gave him reason to hope when anyone else would have given up. Climbing pyramids and riding camels.
"I’m so sorry, Daniel. I’d give anything to give them back to you."
Daniel dropped his head, unable to bear the intensity of Jack’s compassion any longer.
"It was a long time ago . . . I . . . I had to . . ."
"I know. You have to go on. You grow up and go on with life. Nobody’s better at that than you, Daniel – "
"Lot’s of practice," he interrupted softly without looking up.
Jack nodded. "– but I still wish I could give you that one thing."
Daniel finally looked at him again. "I know, Jack. Thanks."
"Daniel?"
"Yeah?"
"I’m sorry about the party. Sorry it upset you."
"You didn’t know."
"Doesn’t matter. You asked me not to. That should have been enough."
"Don’t worry about it. It was a great party. I was having fun. Guess I was just – wishing for camels."
"Yeah," Jack agreed quietly. "Sort of got to climb your pyramid, though." He held his breath, not sure whether it was the right thing to say. He was rewarded with a hint of a smile.
"Well, it’s not exactly Giza," Daniel remarked, picking up a handful of dirt and letting it fall through his fingers, "but I guess I sort of did. We should probably go back down though, don’t you think? There’s probably a cake or something?" He actually sounded kind of hopeful about the prospect.
"Chocolate. And presents," Jack added getting to his feet and offering Daniel a hand up. "Daniel, you know all those people down there?"
"Yeah?"
"I only invited about twenty of them. The other twenty or thirty came and asked me if they could come."
"Asked?"
"Asked. As in, thirty people whose names I don’t even know, wanted to come to your birthday party."
Daniel smiled.
"Happy Birthday, Daniel."
{End}
© May 5, 2001 The characters mentioned in this story are the property of Showtime and Gekko Film Corp. The Stargate, SG-I, the Goa'uld and all other characters who have appeared in the series STARGATE SG-1 together with the names, titles and backstory are the sole copyright property of MGM-UA Worldwide Television, Gekko Film Corp, Glassner/Wright Double Secret Productions and Stargate SG-I Prod. Ltd. Partnership. This fanfic is not intended as an infringement upon those rights and solely meant for entertainment. All other characters, the story idea and the story itself are the sole property of the author.