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Author's Note: This will be a series of one shot stories during which Sam and Jack get engaged. They will all be AU stories. Suggestions are always welcomed for future story topics and/or scenes you want to read!

YEAR ONE

It had started after the za'tarc incident.

Sam had come home from the SGC to find a package sitting on her doorstep. She recognized the handwriting on the outside, so she picked it up and took it inside. She sat down on the couch and opened it up.

The contents were a shock, to say the least. There was also a small nondescript box. Before she opened that though, Sam turned her attention to the manila envelope that contained a whole stack of papers.

On the top was a sticky note.

All these need are my signature. If you think we could ever be something more than Colonel and Major, I'm giving you the chance to 'take it out of the room'.

J.

Sam gasped as she leafed through the papers. It was the Colonel's application for retirement. He had just thrown the ball about any potential relationship into her court.

Realizing the box was still unopened; she picked it up and opened it. Inside was a neon green, light up yo-yo. She laughed. After the way her life had gone the past week, trust Jack O'Neill to make her laugh by giving her his favorite yo-yo. In reality, she knew he was giving her one of his prize possessions.

Now she just had to figure out what she was going to do about it.

Two days later, Colonel Jack O'Neill walked into his office. Sitting on his desk was a wrapped box, complete with a bow. Underneath was a folder. Being the child that he was, Jack tore into the present first. The box was full of bouncy balls, light-up bouncy balls, and a note.

Someday.

Sam

P.S. Not for use in my lab!

Jack sat there in a daze for a few minutes and then chuckled. She had just given him hope for the future and a new toy. What more could a guy ask for?

Jack opened the folder and flipped through the pages. These papers were her request for separation from the Air Force and employment by the SGC as a civilian.

'Huh,' Jack thought, 'suddenly, someday sounds too far away'.

YEAR TWO

A year later, Sam came home from the infirmary after recovering from her kidnapping by Conrad to find a package again.

This time, he had signed the retirement papers and included another note.

Never do that to me again Carter! That's an order!

Jack

P.S. The rest of the gift will arrive later!

Two hours later, the doorbell rang and there stood a delivery man with a few balloons attached to the cutest stuffed dog Sam had ever seen. Sam noticed the card attached to the dog and read it-

I hope you like your new guard dog!

Sam smiled, knowing exactly what she was going to get him.

This time, it was a week before Jack found Sam's counter present in his office.

It was the same papers as the previous year, though just like him, she had signed them this year. Inside the box though, was the absolutely ugliest stuffed cat Jack had ever seen.

Pinned to it was a note-

Sir, if I need a guard dog, you need a feline friend.

Sam

YEAR THREE

The next year, it was Sam who initiated the gifts. After Jack's return from dealing with Kanan and Baal, Sam dropped off a care package for him in the infirmary.

The papers are on your desk. Make sure that you don't tell Janet where this stuff came from! An SF will deliver the TV later.

Sam

Jack opened the box to find a bag of cheese curls and the newest season of the Simpsons on DVD.

"Sweet!" he exclaimed, wondering what he was going to get her in return.

Jack's experience with Baal had been trying to say the least and Sam had faced her own trials during that time. Couple that with loosing Daniel, and he knew that this was going to have to be a good gift.

Sam opened her locker to find that all her normal bath products had been replaced-by the stuff that she only used when she had a really, really bad day at work. And taped to the shelf was a note.

For the only woman who could ever put up with me. Papers will be delivered as usual.

Jack

Sam smiled. She was really getting to enjoy this tradition.

YEAR FOUR

Jack was scared. Sam was missing and he swore that if she made it back in one piece, he wasn't going to leave things up to her; he was just going to retire and be done with it. So when she came back safe and sound he went out and bought a ring intent on retiring and asking her.

But he just couldn't work up the nerve. So one night, he wrapped up the box and delivered it to her front porch, ringing the doorbell, and running to his truck, only she didn't come to the door to get.

Sam had slept later than she intended, probably an effect of the sleeping pills that Janet had her on while she recovered from her stint on the Prometheus. The drugs knocked her out, making her dead to the world, something that Sam hated.

So Sam was running late. She was supposed to meet Pete for breakfast. She rushed out the front door and almost tripped on the wrapped box. She tossed the box into the house. It never dawned on her that the box could be from Jack.

Jack just wanted to tuck his tail between his legs and turn in his retirement papers right then and there. Sam had found someone else at the same time he had given her a ring.

Only his pride kept him from doing that.

Sam got home that evening and walked through the door, almost tripping on the box that she had casually tossed inside that same morning. But once again, she didn't have time to open it because she was going on a date with Pete. So she set it on the kitchen counter, intent on opening it when she got home.

That evening she got home from her date with Pete and actually remembered the box. She opened the box to find the last thing she ever expected.

She opened the velvet ring box to reveal a three stone engagement ring. The three stones were set in white gold. Sam didn't know a lot about jewelry, but even she knew that this ring must have cost Jack a small fortune.

And she absolutely loved this ring, almost as much as she loved the man who had given it to her.

Sam just didn't know what to do. As had become the norm, Jack had included his own retirement papers, but this time there was no note attached. She couldn't let him give up his career for her!

So Sam was forced to sit back and think. She didn't get much sleep that night, but she did get a lot of thinking done.

First thing she did the following morning was calling Pete and ending things. He didn't sound very happy about it, but Sam was sure things would never have gotten very serious. He was too curious for his own good and wasn't willing to take her word for things.

The next thing she did was update her own request for retirement and schedule an appointment to see General Hammond. She was taking things into her own hands.

The whole time she did this, she kept looking at the engagement ring. Finally, she stuck a small piece of paper in with the ring and closed the box, putting it back in the box. Carefully, she rewrapped the box, using leftover wrapping paper from Jack's birthday party.

That morning, the SFs at the security checkpoints thought it was kind of strange that Major Carter carried a big box wrapped in Simpsons' paper, but none of them said anything.

Sam left the box in her lab and went to see the General. It took a lot of talking on her part to convince him that this was what she wanted. Finally, he agreed, although he was very reluctant and made her promise that she would be the one to tell her father.

That night Sam went to bed, happier than she had been in a long time. She knew the next few days would make or break her relationship with Jack O'Neill.

Jack O'Neill was worried. It had been several days and Sam hadn't said a word about his silent marriage proposal. But right now they had more important things on their minds, like why Daniel was so tired.

And then he got to meet 'the guy' and Jack hated him. He was horrible and Jack couldn't figure out what Sam had ever seen in him.

Luckily, it seemed Sam had finally come to her senses because she made sure that Janet broke out the biggest needles to work on him and refused to vouch for him to get security clearance, especially when she learned that Pete had done a background check on her.

Jack got special pleasure in listening to her tear the man a new one, but eventually he had to go do paperwork in his own office.

He found a box sitting on his desk, wrapped in Simpsons' paper.

Do not open until 1700 hours was all the tag read.

Jack looked at the clock then back at the package and knew he wouldn't be getting any work done between now and then.

At one second past 1700 hours, Jack ripped open the box. Whatever he expected to be on the inside, he was sorely disappointed. There was the ring box he had given Sam along with a stack of papers.

Hoping that maybe she had taken the ring, Jack opened the velvet box to reveal the ring was still there. But there was a piece of paper. Jack quickly unfolded it.

All you have to do is ask.

Sam

P.S. You won't be needing those retirement papers.

Jack quickly looked at the papers in the box and noticed they were his own retirement papers. "All you have to do is ask," Jack whispered to himself as he grabbed the ring box and made his way out of the mountain.

Doctor Samantha Carter was sitting on her front porch, waiting when Jack's big black truck pulled up.

He got out and slowly walked up to the house. He dropped down beside Sam, fidgeting with the box in his hands. Not even sure how to begin, he repeated her words, "All I have to do is ask."

"Yep."

Jack looked at the woman sitting beside him. He could read her like a book. She was nervous, but was a good nervous. "You know that I'm totally going to screw this up right?" he asked.

Sam looked at him and smiled. "I have faith in you," she claimed.

Jack stood up and went down on one knee in front of her. "Samantha Carter, you are an amazing woman. When I heard you were dating someone else, I was jealous beyond belief and thought I had lost my one and only chance at ever being happy again. I can't imagine not having you in my life. Will you marry me?"

Sam smiled the smile she reserved just for him and held out her hand. "Yes," she said and let slip the ring on her finger.

Jack leaned in to kiss her, and when they broke apart, Sam started to laugh.

"What?" Jack asked.

"We have to be the strangest engaged couple in the universe. We get engaged, then we kiss, and then we date," Sam explained.

Jack chuckled. "Yeah well, I was never one for normal."

And he leaned in to kiss her again.

AN: Reviews are always welcomed. If you've read another one of my stories and are wondering when the next one will be coming, I'm working on them! I promise! In the meantime, I am currently co-writing a story with hannahj310 called "SG1 Highschool". Check it out!