A.N. And here's the last little bit of fluff and setup. Things start to change next chapter!

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The last thing Sam remembered was feeling warm, content and comfortable, sitting in the Riles' living room watching Finding Dory. He'd laughed at the cranky octopus, found young Dory to be absolutely adorable—which was weird because she was essentially all eyes… how can something that is all eyes be adorable?—and felt his heart melt at the shorebird short before the movie. Seriously. He'd been thoroughly enjoying himself once he'd banished his phone to somewhere out of sight and allowed himself to ignore Ed's constant calls and texts; he really hadn't felt like getting chewed out again. So he was a little surprised to wake up and realize that early morning light was filtering through the windows, the TV was off, the Riles' were nowhere to be seen, he had a blanket over him, and judging by the time, he'd slept the whole night straight through. He hadn't done that in he didn't know how long.

Sitting up stiffly, his leg and ribs made known their protest to yesterday's mistreatment. His eyes were bleary, but he felt more rested than he had in forever. It took several moments of processing before he realized, Oh my god, I just crashed on them and spent the night at their house completely uninvited. Shit! They probably can't believe how rude and careless I am! Leaping to his feet, Sam was wide awake now and immediately went to grab his phone, fully prepared to flee the house and walk the three hours to his home with the idea that he would never see the Riles' again. But as his hand closed around his phone, his eyes fell on a handwritten note lying next to it. Hesitantly, he picked it up instead of his phone, immediately recognizing Libby's familiar scrawl.

Stop right there! Don't even think about it! If you set foot outside of this house before saying goodbye, I will hunt you down and pester you forever! And you know how determined I can be. Besides, this is an adult-napping! Remember? You can't leave the house without permission when you've been adult-napped.

If you wake up in the middle of the night and are reading this, please go back to sleep! You can either stay on the couch, or find your way to our guest room just down the hall on the right (the door is open). We are more than happy that you spent the night—we would have offered at the end of the movie anyway if you were still awake. So please don't feel embarrassed or guilty (knowing you, you probably still will, but stop it!). My parents will be up around 7:30 and I will be up at 8. We plan to go shopping for some house things downtown in the morning, and then take a trip to have a walk in a park this afternoon if you would like to join us. But no pressure! My adult-napping of you is over once we wake up, so no matter how much I want to keep you, I promise to drop you off at the location of your choice—or rather, I will make my parents drop you off at said location, and I will come along for the ride.

Hope you slept well! See you soon!

Sam collapsed back onto the couch, head in his hands. How can these people be so generous and trusting with me? They barely know me! And they welcomed me into their home, let me play with their kids, and didn't blink twice at me falling asleep and accidentally spending the night. Sam couldn't help but feel that he was going to wake up at any moment, back in his apartment, to discover that this whole experience had just been a dream. A lovely dream, but nothing more. He'd wake up, the events of yesterday—the horrible hot call gone wrong, Spike's blood… all of it—would flood him, his body would scream in protest as he forced himself to move, he'd have numerous angry messages from his teammates, and his lovely evening with the Riles' would only be a dream, fading as the claws of cold, harsh reality sunk into him.

He sat for several moments, waiting for the bubble to pop, waiting for reality to set in … but it didn't. Yes, he'd woken up, yes the events of yesterday were threatening to clamor to the forefront of his mind, but he pushed them back. Yes, his body was stiff and sore, and he had quite a few messages from Ed blinking at him on his phone, but he was most certainly still in the Riles' house. His evening with them most certainly wasn't a dream.

Head still in his hands, a slow smile spread across his face. Never in a million years had he ever imagined that Libby would come back into his life. They'd daydreamed about it whenever she managed a clandestine phone call, but he'd never thought it would actually happen. And the timing couldn't have been more perfect. Just when he was feeling terribly alone, she'd waltzed in with her sunny attitude, wit and gift of friendship, and suddenly, he no longer felt like he was about to drown. Her family was everything he'd wished his family could have been, so just watching their interaction and feeling like a part of them for a fleeting moment… well, it was enough for Sam. Even if this never happened again, even if they put him in their rearview mirror, feeling like they'd repaid their debt to him—even though he didn't feel like they owed him a debt—and never spoke to him again, he would hold onto the memory of these past twelve hours with everything he had. He would add it to the very small group of memories that he turned to in his darkest moments—Libby's unwavering faith in him and her letter being some of the others.

Glancing at his phone, he saw it was seven-thirty now and realized Alex and David would probably be making their way downstairs any minute. To occupy his time until then, Sam steeled himself and decided to go through all of his phone's messages.

There were thirty-eight text messages. All of them were various iterations of "Where the hell are you?" and "Answer your damn phone!" but a few—such as "Good god you had better be okay"—differed from that harsh messages to show some concern. That surprised him a little—he'd honestly never expected anything but anger—and made him think that maybe there was hope after all. Maybe Ed and the rest of Team One weren't ready to write Sam off completely.

There were also twelve missed calls and four voicemails. He couldn't bring himself to listen to them, so he just deleted them instead.

He was surprised and curious to see that they stopped shortly after eleven the previous night. And while he figured that could have just been when Ed had finally given up and gone to bed, he thought there might be more to it. Checking more thoroughly in his history, he saw that he'd apparently answered one of Ed's calls—his last call. And according to his phone, Sam had proceeded to have a two minute conversation with him… a conversation Sam had no memory of. Had he answered in his sleep? He must have…

Movement behind him alerted him to the fact that he was no longer alone. Looking over his shoulder, his eyes landed on the sight of Alex standing in the kitchen doorway. She waved sleepily at him. "Good morning," she called softly. "I hope you slept well. Can I interest you in a cup of coffee? David tells me that I am very unpleasant company before I've had my first cup of coffee. But I could say the same thing about him."

Sam rose to his feet immediately. "I did sleep well, thank you. Best night's sleep I've gotten in a long time," he admitted. "And I'm so sorry about imposing on you. I honestly can't believe I did that."

She flapped her hand at him dismissively. "Oh there you go apologizing. Libby told me you would. There's absolutely no need!" She turned to head into the kitchen, stifling a yawn. "But I can't have a proper conversation with you until I've had coffee. Otherwise my brain won't be able to properly rebuke you for your horrendous ideas of imposition." She gestured for him to follow her and he obliged.

Once in the kitchen, she pushed start on the coffee machine—having prepared it the night before—and proceeded to stand there staring at it.

Sam was about to say something, but reconsidered when he saw how intent her stare was. Instead, he grabbed two mugs out of the cupboard, set them down in front of Alex—he was pretty sure she mumbled a thank you—then sat at the small kitchen table.

Two minutes later and the machine beeped that it had finished. A few seconds after that and Alex placed a steaming mug in front of Sam before sitting across from him and sighing contentedly as she took her first sip.

"You're not a morning person, I take it," Sam commented after taking his own sip of coffee.

She smiled ruefully at him. "What gave it away?"

"Oh, just a wild guess."

"I envy those of you who are."

Sam shook his head. "Eh, to be honest I've never been one by choice, only by necessity."

She settled farther back into her chair, regarding him with soft eyes. "From your time in the military, you mean?"

"Yes, but not just from that. Or rather, not just from what you're thinking. While deployed, yes, but I've been a part of the military one way or another my whole life. Even when I was younger, the General made sure we were always up early being productive. And then once I left the military behind, the SRU keeps me up early, too."

"'The General?'" she asks curiously.

"Oh, uh, my dad," Sam explained a little self-consciously.

She seemed about to ask another question, but was interrupted by the arrival of David.

"Morning everyone," he greeted them cheerily.

Alex narrowed her eyes at him. "How on Earth are you so chipper already?"

"What can I say, I'm a morning person!"

"Well that's an outright lie if I've ever heard one." She stared at him for several seconds more before her face cleared. "You used the coffee machine in my office, didn't you," she stated authoritatively. "You didn't want to embarrass yourself with your grumpiness in front of Sam." At David's guilty look, she smiled smugly. "I thought so."

"Yes, well, moving on," David continued hurriedly. "Sam, have you thought about whether you'd like to join us for our family shopping and park outing?"

"David!" Alex scolded. "Don't corner the man with such a direct question so early in the morning! You'll make him feel obliged to go!"

"No no," Sam reassured her, "I don't feel like you are pressuring me. Honestly, I feel guilty that you and your kids are putting all of this effort into including me and I'm just sitting here like a bump on a log, mooching off of your home cooking and falling asleep in your house. You really don't have to continue to do this."

The pair stared at him for several long moments, making Sam feel uncomfortable, before they broke eye contact with him to look at each other.

"He thinks we're doing all of this out of some sort of feeling of obligation," Alex surmised.

"And he probably thinks we're grumbling about having to include him and will forget about him the moment he finally leaves, a moment we can't wait for," David added.

The pair looked back at him expectantly.

"Well…" Sam started self-consciously. "Yeah, I guess you could say that."

Alex set her coffee mug down and looked at him earnestly. "Sam, now that I've had some caffeine, I think I can manage to communicate something to you without screwing it up. No, we did not have you over for dinner, basketball and a movie, let you sleep in our house and then invite you on a family outing because of some feeling of pity or obligation towards you. Yes, three years ago you saved our kids' lives, and we will never be able to repay you for that, but that's not what this is about. Sam, you are without a doubt both Libby's and Tulio's hero. There is no one that they look up to so much as you. And frankly, from everything that Libby's told me about you, and from yours and my all too brief conversations in the past twelve hours, you seem like a pretty darn amazing human being. To put it bluntly, we," she gestured at David and herself, "want you as a friend. We want you to feel comfortable with us and to feel like a part of our family, just like Libby feels comfortable with you. So yes, maybe some of what we are doing stems from gratitude and a desire to return to you what you have given our kids, but it also stems from us wanting to get to know you better. That's it. Plain and simple," Alex finished sincerely. "There are no hidden agendas and there's no talking behind others' backs in this household. What we say is what we mean. Maybe that's not something you're very familiar with…" she left it open ended, not quite a question but not quite a statement… "but that's how the Riles house rolls."

Sam sat stunned into silence. Before he was finally able to muster up, "Okay. Then yes, I would be honored to join you on your family outing."