Thanksgiving.

It sneaks up on them; they're working to deadline now. Cam's up to his eyeballs in load test simulations and JD's crunching his way through bugfix after bugfix and they're both dreading the mid-December user acceptance test and code review they've got scheduled with the Navy geeks. It isn't until Momma asks Cam on their weekly call whether he'll need one bedroom or two that Cam realizes they're flying out on Wednesday. "One," he says, without really thinking about it, and Momma takes it in stride, because she believes all her children and nieces and nephews and assorted other kin can tend their own business about who they're sleeping with, and she says she knows full well that people will get up to whatever they'll get up to, whether under her roof or not. And Cam hangs up the phone and puts his head in his hands, because he knew this was coming -- booked plane tickets himself, even -- but knowing something's coming and being ready to face it are two different things.

There's really no way to prepare someone for a holiday with the Mitchell family, Cam knows, except to throw them straight into the middle of the ocean and hope they learn to swim before they drown. He used to enjoy watching it. Standard operating procedure is to issue one warning and then it's sink-or-swim time, and every year at least one of the cousins or nieces or nephews can be seen patiently trying to lure an overwhelmed significant other out of the hiding spot and back into the fray. It's a fun game; it's a family tradition.

Somehow he doesn't think it's going to be as much fun this year.

"It's not that I'm ashamed," he says to JD, in the middle of the night, in the darkness of their bedroom. "It's that --"

"I know," JD says against Cam's hair, and tightens his hold. "I know."

They talk, now, in fits and starts, offering up little scraps of past lives as context and clarification. He's pretty sure he knows more about JD, about Jack O'Neill, than any other person in this galaxy. Pretty sure, because Daniel Jackson is on Atlantis and doesn't look like he's ever coming back. But talking doesn't come naturally to JD -- "never will," he'd said once; "too many years of the other way around" -- and even though (Cam knows, because JD told him) his first resolution for his new life had been to throw out his old ways of doing a lot of things, anything resembling JD facing his emotions takes place with the lights out.

It's not natural for Cam; he comes from a kin-group who wear their hearts on their sleeves. But it's a small enough concession to make. Their life together is slowly evolving into a series of working compromises, and they may get them wrong more often than not, but they're learning.

JD has his arm draped over Cam's side, spooned up behind him, holding on so fiercely Cam thinks he might be leaving bruises. Cam puts his hand over JD's hand on his chest and squeezes. "I want you to know," he says. "I need you to know. I don't care if they don't get it."

"You let me handle it," JD says. And Cam's used to hearing command-voice, control-voice, out of JD by now. He's used to looking past the packaging and seeing the person behind it. But it's still a shock when -- every now and then -- JD says or does something that reminds Cam, once again, that the man he's sharing his bed and his life with has been a leader of men for almost the entire length of time Cam's been alive.

They're on the crack-of-dawn flight out of Denver on Wednesday morning, which puts them into Charlotte before noon, even with timezones. JD drives the rental car. Cam can drive a non-refitted car -- if it's an automatic, if it's not a bad day, if he has to -- but JD won't hear of it. JD can drive Cam's car with its hand controls for gas and brake as easily as he can drive anything with an engine, but he lets Cam take the wheel if they're out and about in Colorado Springs. Cam appreciates that fact enough that he doesn't protest when JD puts his foot down at the rental counter, even if the surcharge for an underage driver is nearly as much again as the cost of the rental and they're still going to be on a tight budget until at least another contract comes in.

Cam spends the entire length of the drive out to Black Mountain filling up the SUV with nervous chatter. Family history, Who's Who, tips on what to say and what not to say. "Mitchell," JD finally says, amused. Cam takes a deep breath to cut him off, and then the surreality of JD never bothering with his first name makes him want to crack up. JD tips him a quick look, tinged with a grin. "I told you. I've got it covered. You relax."

Cam hushes, but he doesn't relax. JD might have spent seven years dealing with alien cultures so varied that Cam knows he'll never even have a glimmer of a clue about the breadth of them, but JD's never seen the Mitchells at a holiday, and Cam's willing to bet money they're weirder.

Still, it's nice to be home again. Momma's expecting them, so as soon as the car pulls up in the driveway, she's out on the porch like a bullet. What with one thing and another, it's been a good two years -- no, two and a half -- since Cam's been back; they've built out the house again. Looks like another two, three bedrooms. He occupies himself with getting himself plus the cane out of the car; JD's in charge of their gear. Momma doesn't come on down to help -- she knows better than to get in the way -- but Cam can feel her eyes on the whole process, already assessing JD.

He stumbles a little -- the "driveway" is really more of a parking lot, gravel-covered, designed so it can be expanded if necessary if they have more cars, long-term, than the driveway can support, and gravel's a bitch to try to walk on. JD's at his elbow before he even finishes righting himself. Doesn't try to catch him -- JD never has; he knows without having to be told that Cam's sense of balance might be a bit shaky from time to time, but "help" is more of a hindrance. JD's the only person Cam's ever seen who doesn't instinctively grab at him to help keep him upright and wind up knocking him over. JD just puts himself within Cam's reach, holds out an arm, and lets Cam decide whether or not he needs to grab it. Momma doesn't miss that, either, Cam knows.

"You must be JD," Momma says, when they make their way up to the porch. It's got a ramp, not steps, and the railing's sturdy enough that Cam doesn't worry about leaning his weight on it. The whole house is full of little touches like that, has been just about as long as Cam can remember.

Next to Cam, JD straightens up and looks Momma directly in the eye. "Yes ma'am," he says, and holds out a hand. "JD Nielson. Pleased to meet you. Cam's told me so much about you."

Cam's holding his breath. Momma makes up her mind about someone in the first thirty seconds, usually, and Momma sets the tone for the whole damn family. But JD's got her eyes, and as Cam watches, he sees JD do something he doesn't often (ever) do: he lets his face shift, his balance re-adjust, and for nothing more than the briefest flash of a second, presents himself as Jack O'Neill wearing JD's skin.

And then it's gone, and JD is smiling and saying something about how grateful he is for the invitation, and Momma's looking at him with fascination but she's holding up her side of the ritual conversational volley without a problem. Cam knows they could spend upwards of fifteen minutes on the small talk before they even get through the front door -- despite the chaos Cam can already hear starting inside -- and his legs ache like someone's pushed razors through them; air travel leaves him miserable. He puts two fingers on JD's elbow to interrupt him and says, "Momma, I'm beat, and I wanna lie down for a few; where are you putting us?"

Momma gives him a look, and oh, yeah, there's the trouble he's been expecting; he's in the doghouse. Momma works out the sleeping arrangements for holidays a week or so in advance, when all the stragglers have reported in as to how many guests they're bringing. But Cam never found a way to tell her his partner looks like he hasn't even graduated high school yet, and Momma might be brilliant at taking things in stride, but he knows full well this crosses one of her lines.

But all she says is, "You and JD are in the peach bedroom, honey. I don't have anybody in with you right now, since I knew you'd be like to beat after flying. You need me to get any of the cousins to help you with your stuff?"

JD shakes his head. "Thank you, ma'am, but no," he says, then turns to Cam. "After you."

The peach bedroom is the furthest you can possibly get from the door and still be in the same zip code, but it's on the ground floor at least; Momma knows better than to put him up a flight of stairs, which is why he's not in his old bedroom. They make it back there without running into anyone, which is a minor miracle. Cam lets JD drop their shared duffel on the floor while he stretches out on the bed and feels everything in his back start to relax with the weight taken off of it.

"You want me to rub anything?" JD asks, coming to stand at the side of the bed. He's back to being just JD again. There's a peculiar kind of cognitive dissonance involved; Cam knows full well who, what JD is, and he never forgets it, but JD has a way of carrying himself that makes it settle into nothing more than background knowledge. He's got the body language of a man in his fifties, but he's tempered it with something wholly unique, something Cam can't ever put a finger on, enough to keep from sticking out like a sore thumb. Cam's never met anyone with more conscious control over how he presents himself. He wonders why JD let it drop to show Momma; he knows better than to think it was an accident.

"No, I'm okay," Cam says. He shut the door behind him, but a shut door in this house doesn't mean much during the day; knock-and-open-immediately is a family habit, and he doesn't think it'd go over well for someone to find JD kneeling over him.

JD touches his cheek, a light affectionate gesture. "Liar," he says. JD's grown expert at reading the lines around Cam's eyes, the set of his mouth; JD can gauge the amount of pain he's in at any given moment down to the inch. "Take something, at least?"

"I don't want to abandon you to the family," Cam says. "Just gimme five minutes."

But JD's shaking his head already, turning away to open up their gear and riffle through it. "Told you," he says, over his shoulder. "I'll be fine. Here."

He fishes out the army of prescription bottles, pops each in turn and presents Cam a handful of pills and the leftover bottle of water they brought in from the car. "I'll wake you up in an hour or two," JD says. "I can make myself useful until then."

Cam knows better than to argue when JD's got that note of finality in his voice, so he takes the drugs (muscle relaxants, painkillers, anti-inflammatories, something for the neuropathic pain; he'll be popping pills until the day he dies) and swallows them down. "You come get me if you need me," he says.

JD's amused. "I remember the story," he says. "You worry too much, Mitchell. Your momma's no match for Hammond in a bad mood, and I always dealt with him just fine."

They've built a network of cover story, enough to answer just about any question that might come up: JD is twenty (it's about as far as they thought they could push it), child prodigy, high school graduate at sixteen, a friend of the daughter of one of Cam's old service buddies. Orphaned at an early age, ward of the state until he petitioned for emancipated-minor status, and has been working in the dot-com industry in lieu of college ever since. JD supplied most of the details; Cam's got a sneaking suspicion he's drawing from the life experience of someone he knew somewhere, but he doesn't press further. It papers over the worst of the incongruities.

The drugs won't kick in for another ten, fifteen minutes, but Cam's already exhausted -- it's been a long fucking day, and it's not even close to being over yet, and dealing with his family, however much he loves them, is draining. And just being horizontal has brought the exhaustion he was holding off crashing down on him, so he closes his eyes. "You come get me if you need me," he repeats. It's not that he thinks JD can't take care of himself; it's that it's rude to bring someone as your guest and then go off to take a nap while you throw him to the wolves.

"I will," JD says. The bed dips underneath his weight; he sits next to Cam, runs his fingers through Cam's hair. Feels damn good. "Sleep," JD says, low and soothing, and Cam does.

When he wakes up, the room's in shadow, though not completely dark yet. He can hear the sounds of a small riot going on outside his door, which pretty much is par for the course around here even when they're not full up for the holidays. The tail end of a drug hangover is nibbling at the edges of his consciousness, but he's used to that, and he'll admit that JD was right; the sleep did him a world of good.

He's a little afraid of what he might find going on out there, but there's no point in putting it off, so he gets himself in order, grabs his cane, and heads on out. There's a few places he can look. The kids (cousins, nieces, nephews, a byzantine conglomeration of kinship ties; nobody ever bothers tracking exact relationships in this family except Momma, and Cam's used to being Uncle Cam to anyone younger than he is no matter what the ties) are probably out in the backyard, running up and down, with one or two adults to make sure that nobody falls into the creek. The men are always in the den, door shut behind them, sports on the TV being ignored in favor of whatever topic of conversation is hottest; the old women keep a lazy eye on the kids from the back porch, knitting in hand. And then, of course, there's the kitchen, which is the true center of any family event.

Cam tries the kitchen first, because he knows that's where Momma will be, and he's pretty sure Momma's fixing to give him a piece of her mind. Easier all around if he gets it over with quickly. But he stops just outside the kitchen doorway, because he can hear JD's very best happy/amused laugh cutting through all the noise and chatter. Aunt Lorena's saying something about college -- her oldest just started at Duke in the fall, Cam remembers -- and Uncle Fred is complaining about the mess George Lucas made of the new Star Wars movies, and Cam's cousin Stella sounds like she's halfway through a rant about her latest idiot CO (who, from what Cam's had passed on to him secondhand, deserves the title of idiot and then some).

He can parse out the threads of conversation automatically -- to be a Mitchell is to be able to listen for four conversations while carrying on a fifth -- but he's a little surprised to find, when he takes a deep breath and heads on in, that JD is right in the thick of it, standing at the table with an apron tossed over his long-sleeved black t-shirt to keep it clean, peeler in hand and a mound of naked potatoes elbow-high next to him. He's got his head turned away from the door, saying something over his shoulder to Stella at the counter -- some suggestion for how to deal with the idiot Major, and knowing JD, it'll be a good one. He doesn't see Cam come in.

Momma, though, is getting something out of the pantry, and she's turned to face the door; she's across the room from him, but that doesn't matter. Cam watches her eyebrows go up (that's Momma's we-have-to-talk-young-man face, always has been), and then she uses her chin to gesture at JD. Or maybe at the potatoes. Cam takes a deep breath, and then makes his way over to the table. There's an unclaimed peeler, and he picks it up.

"Hey," JD says, leaning back against him without having to look to see who it is. JD always knows when Cam's in touching distance. He reaches out with one foot to snag one of the chairs that have been pushed to the side, dragging it over to the table so Cam can sit down while he's being put to work.

Cam takes another deep breath. "Hey," he says, and -- onlookers be damned -- snakes an arm around JD's waist for a quick squeeze before sitting down. JD passes him a potato.

Stella says "Cam, you gotta hear this one," and JD interrupts Uncle Al (who teaches archaeology down at U.T. Austin, and who stages a re-enactment of the siege of Dapur, complete with ladders, chariots, and archers, in the stadium once every four years) to make a multi-layered pun about the hills of Galilee that has Uncle Al snorting into the beer he just claimed from the fridge, and Cindy Lou, Cam's sister-in-law, comes storming in with the baby, who's fussing up a storm, to pull a teething ring out of the freezer. Aunt Annabeth inquires about Cam's health -- not just for form's sake; Annabeth's husband Stephen is just back from Iraq, minus a right foot from a bad detonation at the wrong time, and Annabeth has been keeping track of Cam's progress through Momma, because she knows Stephen's got good odds of running through the same problems.

JD puts down the peeler and takes the baby from Cindy, not missing a beat in his defense of Anakin Skywalker, and Lucy stops screaming the minute JD gets his hands on her, blinking up at him with wide blue eyes. "Hush, you, life's not that bad," JD says straight to her, with none of the cooing or fussing people use for babies when they don't know what to do with them. JD holds her like an expert. Cam knows O'Neill had a son, knows it ended in disaster, not much more; it took JD a long time to even get out those few bare bones. But there's no old pain in JD's eyes, just ease.

"Those potatoes won't peel themselves, Cameron," Momma says on her way back to the sink. Well, the full name is a bad sign, but at least it wasn't "Cameron Everett", because the invocation of the Holy Middle Name always means trouble. Cam sets to peeling potatoes, and JD sticks a finger into Lucy's mouth to rub her gums, and people come in and people go out and yeah, it's nice to be back home.

Thanksgiving Eve supper is always takeout pizza, because the ovens (two of them; they aren't needed more than a few times a year, but when they're needed, they're needed) are full. Cam fields the questions about how he's doing, lets JD handle the ones about why Colorado and what exactly it is they do for a living and how they met and what their future plans are. He spends half the meal expecting someone to ask him when he's planning on making an honest man out of JD, and that's a surprise. He's always known that his family didn't have a lick of prejudice, not after the commitment ceremony they threw for Susie Mae and her wife Maria, but Susie Mae and Maria are the same age. Then again, if JD had been a girl, Cam would have just been following in the footsteps of Uncle George. Of course, he's not too sure if he likes the thought of anyone considering him even remotely like Uncle George.

After supper, when the teenagers have retreated to the living room with the Playstation and Gran Turismo 4 and the men have closed the door of the den so they can smoke the cigars and cigarettes the women pretend they don't know about, Momma gets Cam's elbow in a lock-grip and announces to nobody in particular that Cam is going to help her take the pizza boxes out to the trash now. And her hands are empty while she's steering him out onto the front porch, and Cam's exempt from trash duty from now until the end of time so long as he's still not walking steady, but everybody knows it for a polite fiction anyway.

Momma gets him down onto the front porch swing and sits down next to him. Cam's expecting a lecture, but all she does is give him a look. "You wanna tell me what that boy's story is, Cameron?" she asks.

Cam winces. "That boy" is somewhere halfway up the scale of possible call-names. Could be a good sign, could be a bad one. He opens his mouth to give her the story they decided on, and the look turns into a Look. "Without lying to me," she finishes, and Cam closes his mouth again, because he's never been comfortable with lying to his momma to begin with, and she can always tell. But there is no way on God's green earth that he can tell her the truth.

"It's complicated, Momma," he finally settles on.

She purses her lips. "Couldn't see how not," she says. "He's not what he says he is."

No. No, he's not. And Momma's people-sense is better than anyone Cam's ever met -- it's a given in the family that if you're not sure of someone, you bring them home and put them to the Momma test -- but Cam knows damn well that if JD had wanted, she would have looked at him and seen exactly what JD was pretending to be. He's not exactly sure why JD didn't.

And JD's instincts for this sort of thing are usually right, but Cam doesn't know what he's got planned, and he knows exactly the extent of what he can't say about the situation -- which is to say, any of it -- and his momma's sitting there and waiting for him to say something. And maybe Momma sees the misery in his eyes, because she pats him on the thigh. "Doesn't mean I don't like him," she says. "I just fret about you."

That, at least, he can answer without lying. "I'm all right, Momma. Better'n I was."

"Any fool can see that," she says, sharply. To anyone else it would sound dismissive; Cam hears the relief, and knows that Momma's cutting JD a whole hell of a lot of slack, just for the improvement she's seeing in Cam. "But I know you know how bad this looks."

We raised you better than that is lurking around the edges, and Cam sighs. "I know," he says. "Momma, you gotta believe me, I know. I wish I could tell you more, I really do, but I can't."

Her eyes narrow. "Can't? Or won't?"

"Can't," he says, and oh hell, that's the traditional "it's classified" tone of voice coming out of his own mouth. They're a military family through and through, no matter how many of them in any generation march to the beat of a different drummer; there have been Mitchells and Chandlers and Hutchens and Brewers in every single armed conflict as far back as they can trace it. With a father and a husband and two sons in the armed forces, there's no chance Momma won't recognize it.

"Now isn't that interesting," Momma says, and double hell, that's her putting-things-together tone. He knows neither of his parents bought the cover story for his accident, not from the very first minute. She never asked, never even hinted at a question, but now he can see her adding things up.

There's gotta be something Cam can do to save this. "You'll have to ask him," he says; "it's not my place to --"

"You hush," she says, and turns around a little more fully, so that she's facing him. "You look me in the eye, Cameron Everett Mitchell --" and there's the middle name; he's in trouble now -- "and you tell me that you aren't up to something you have to be ashamed of."

There's so much lurking underneath her words, and Cam can read every inch of it. He swallows heavily and meets her gaze. "No ma'am," he says. "I'm not."

She keeps him on the hook for a good long minute before she nods. "I'll hold you to that, then," she says, "and I'll let you keep your business. For now. Now you get in there and tell that poor boy he doesn't have to work so hard to impress us."

"That poor boy" is one step up from "that boy", at least. He can still feel her disapproval, though, and it makes his heart hurt. He wants to explain that it's not JD looking to impress anyone, it's just the way he is, but there's no way he can get into that without getting into the fact that JD was actually raised fifty years ago, Momma's opinions on the ability of people who aren't family (and some of the ones who are) to raise children right and proper being legendary. So he doesn't say anything but "yes ma'am" -- safer to go for the manners in a situation like this -- and gets himself back inside.

JD's sitting out on the back porch with the women; Great-Aunt Suzette has put a set of knitting needles in his hands, and it makes Cam grin to see JD -- who Cam has personally seen fix things with his own two hands things that other people would swear were destined for the junk-heap -- hopelessly struggling to pick up a dropped stitch that's laddered down six rows of nice and boring garter. Cam leans his cane against his hip, relieves JD of the needles, and studies the mess. Aunt Suzette clicks her tongue. "A boy's gotta learn to fix up his own mistakes," she says, to nobody in particular.

"Didn't know you knit," JD says, twisting so he can look up at Cam.

"Idle hands are the Devil's work," Cam says, doing his best impression of Gran'ma -- God rest her -- and trying to figure out what the fuck JD managed to do. He's been knitting since he was six -- Gran'ma had Notions; all the Mitchell children got lessons. Knitting and woodwork and electric and plumbing and auto mechanics and cooking and baking -- which are two distinctly different things; how to get stains out of anything and how to garden a plot of land and how to shoot a gun and hit at what you're aiming at and nothing more, all of them boy and girl alike. Gran'ma was a firm believer in self-sufficiency.

Cam's one of the few of his generation who kept up knitting. He'd grown up with women; Momma and Gran'ma, Aunt Aggie and Aunt Emma and Aunt Sally. Households combine and shift and pack up and move in the family based on who's got newborns and who's overseas, and Gran'ma was always the matriarch undisputed, the one everyone came home to. Momma's inherited the title now; Daddy married strong. Cam had grown up knowing that there are things women only talk about when they've got needles to hand, and if he kept himself small and quiet and sat there with his hands busy, he could sit to listen. It's how he learned the ways of the world, and it's served him well over the years. It's a soothing hobby, too. Kept him from going crazy through more than one tour, and anyone who gave him shit usually shut up after getting their first pair of hand-knit socks.

He hasn't done any knitting since the accident; he's a little startled to realize he misses it. Gran'ma taught anyone who didn't outrun her, but Cam found he had a special gift for it, a fact that's earned him no small amount of ribbing from various and sundry. Still, he's the one Gran'ma passed her collection of needles and notions to. They're still up in his old bedroom; he'd intended to send for them once he was done with being stationed from here to hell and gone. Maybe he'll take them with him now.

"Here, sit," JD says, and gets out of the chair. (Hand-carved wood; Cam's grandpa was a master carpenter, passed his skill on down the line. There isn't a store-bought piece of furniture anywhere in the family's houses.) Cam settles himself down, fishes a crochet hook out of Aunt Emma's knit-bag, and squints at the mess of stitches. JD slides down to sit at Cam's feet; the porch chairs are all full. He puts a hand around Cam's ankle and digs his fingertips right into the knot at the back of Cam's calf.

Cam tries to keep his eyes from rolling back in his head. He finds the dropped stitch, ladders it up partway, realizes JD has inadvertently reinvented the "knit front & back" stitch, and shakes his head. "This is a mess," he informs JD, who laughs.

"Rip it out," JD says, carelessly. "Show me again."

Cam undoes the stitches, casts on a row of twenty. Feels good in his hands; it's been a while since he made something. He indulges the impulse, lets his fingers fly through one row, another. JD watches. There's no way he can figure out what Cam's doing: not from his angle, not with Cam's speed. Doesn't matter. Cam doesn't think JD's interested in learning how to knit, not any more than his perpetual interest in learning anything presented to him. Someone must have mentioned Cam's knitting to him, and JD realized Cam would need a nudge to get back to it, and worked out the easiest way to provide that nudge without getting Cam's back up.

It would be annoying -- the way JD can read him like that, the way JD can manipulate him like that -- if it weren't so damn sweet all the time. "Pain in my ass," Cam mutters under his breath, fingers clicking the needles against each other, Gran'ma's old rhyme, in through the front door, round the back, peek through the window, off jumps Jack.

His fingers shuffle the stitches along the needles without him having to tell them. JD grins, bright and unrepentant. "Yup," he says, and bounds easily to his feet. "You're welcome." He leans over, tips Cam's chin up with two fingers, kisses him quick but thorough. "I'll be inside in the den."

"Poker game'll be starting soon," Cam says. "Come 'n get me when it does."

JD's grin turns sharkish. He's a brilliant poker player; Cam's seen him ride jack-high and force Cam to fold a pair of queens, fold aces over fours somehow knowing Cam was betting aces over eights. The family game flips from five-card stud to hold 'em to Omaha, depends on who starts it. Literally penny-ante, but they play with chips anyway, because nobody wants five hundred pennies kicking around their pockets. Cam doesn't usually play, but he knows JD will want to, and if Cam's there, nobody will "suggest" JD might feel more comfortable with the cousins in the living room.

And sure enough, JD wins just enough to establish that he knows what he's doing and loses just enough to keep from there being sore feelings. Cam knows he's throwing it; he's picked up on just enough of JD's tells to catch when JD folds hands he should have bet out. Cam thinks his daddy might be able to tell, too; his daddy's watching JD like a hawk, and his daddy's good at reading people like JD's good at reading people. But he can't tell what his father's thinking, good or bad.

The talk is about the war. Seems like half the family's overseas right now or just come back, and they're graduating one each from West Point and Annapolis this spring. Cam keeps his mouth shut. He did his time serving his country, and he did his time serving his planet, and knowing what's out there -- even as little as he does; he knows better than to think he knows everything -- makes him ache deep in his heart that he can't see there being peace on Earth anytime soon so they can face the war out there united. They told him when they brought him into the Snakeskinners (the official name of the 302 wing was Project Heliotrope; nobody ever used it) that the greatest danger he'd face wouldn't be out there; it'd be the way his perspective changed about back home. None of Cam's squad had believed them until it had started happening.

JD catches Cam's eye while Great-Uncle George (the other one; his war was World War Two, staff sergeant in the Pacific theater, and he taught Cam everything there was to know about how to keep a unit running right) is warming up to full throttle. Uncle George doesn't approve of war, but he disapproves in the way that only people who've lived it can; he's got no patience for opinions coming from people who don't know how to face costs in practice, not only in theory. Cam can see JD's itching to jump in, but JD doesn't say anything, just bends his head down over his cards. It's tough for Cam; he can only imagine how bad it must be for JD. Cam put in fifteen years, give or take. JD put in thirty, and he didn't choose to walk away.

It's not often that someone gets dragged into conversation without putting himself forward, but JD is new, and they don't have his measure yet, and they still think he's what he appears to be. And Uncle Bayliss gets going on how the armed forces have been going downhill ever since Vietnam turned service from a matter of honor to a matter of shame -- a topic upon which he'll discourse until the cows come home -- until Cam's daddy stirs, looks to JD, and says, "you've been awfully quiet, JD, what do you think?"

Cam wants to jump in, wants to save JD from the pitfalls he sees lurking, and he knows that he can't. If he does, if he steps in and steers the conversation away, it's going to look like exactly what they've been doing their best to avoid: an older man, crippled, exiled from everything he ever knew, latching on to a boy and controlling everything down to the opinions he's supposed to have. So he bites his tongue, and he prays to God, and he should have had more faith, because JD looks up and meets Daddy's eyes like the old soldiers they both are.

"I think that the people who reject 'my country right or wrong' forget about the other half of it," JD says. "The part about 'if right, to be kept right; if wrong, to be set right'." And Cam realizes right there that for as much as he knows JD, for as much as they've talked and fought and argued and learned each other, there are some things he's never going to understand -- never going to be able to understand -- because there are things JD lived through that he'll never say a word about.

They talk about Vice President Kinsey's resignation (JD's smirking a little; Cam makes note to ask why later) and President Hayes' foreign policy ("about time we got a man with a lick of sense in office," Uncle Bayliss says, which is as close as anyone in the family ever gets to revealing who they voted for; Gran'ma apparently instituted that rule back during the '64 election when Uncle Al and Uncle Jock nearly came to pistols at dawn, and it's held fast ever since) and slowly, bit by bit, Cam starts to relax. Nobody's questioned the fact that JD catches all their references, makes a few of his own. Nobody's called him "kid" in a few hours. Nobody's looked at Cam like he's crazy for bringing JD here.

"I like your family," JD says, when they've retreated back to the bedroom and settled in for the night. It's a little wistful, a little sad. Cam hears it for what's lurking underneath: I miss mine.

He rolls over and gets face-to-face, which they don't often do. JD likes tucking in behind him, wrapping his arm over Cam's chest and resting his hand against Cam's heartbeat. New moon, and it's dark as sin outside and in, and Cam can only see the shadowy outlines of JD's face. Doesn't matter. He puts his hand against JD's cheek, brushes his thumb along the cheekbone.

"I got you now," he says, careful not to stress any one word more than another.

"Yeah," JD says, quiet in the darkness. Cam can feel his sigh. "I'm looking forward to looking like myself again."

Simple pronouncement. Cam knows better than to show pity, just like JD knows better than to ever show it to him. So he lets it go, but he files it away, slots it into the picture he's building of the man he's sharing his life with. He'll be figuring it out for the next twenty years, if this lasts that long. "I'm glad we came," he says. Because he is. It's been an awkward and uncomfortable day, and tomorrow when the rest of the family descends it's only going to get worse, and they're here until Sunday and Cam's sure he's going to want to hang himself by tomorrow afternoon at the latest. But he's glad they came.

"So am I," JD says. "It's good for you."

And that's it, Cam realizes; that's the real reason JD's been trying so hard to shake everyone up all day, trying to integrate who he is and who he appears to be and present something in between for everyone around him to chew over. He's been cueing the family all day that he's not what he looks like, in so many subtle ways that they've all been, unconsciously, responding to him as though he were the man he really is, and it's confusing them and shaking them up and it's going to take a while for them to settle down, but the one thing it's done is made them think, instead of just leaping to judgement.

And he's been doing it for Cam's sake. Because Cam needs his family to think well of him, and JD knows that, and all of a sudden Cam wonders how far JD would go to keep him happy and settled. A long damn way, he thinks. He's JD's people now.

"I appreciate you," Cam says. They tell each other that a lot. It's better than using words that scare them both to say.

"I do too," JD says. Then sighs, and brushes his lips over Cam's forehead, like a blessing. "Go to sleep," he says, and Cam rolls over in the darkness and does.

He wakes up the next morning to the distant sound of "Jonathan Daniel Nielson, you get back in here and help me get this turkey in the oven before I take a spoon to you," and he smiles into his pillow. It's the sound of Momma threatening family.

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