BEFORE:

Adam slept restlessly.

His slumber was intermittent, fickle, and fleeting. He woke up feeling displaced and confused as he rubbed his eyes exhaustedly and looked upon a bedroom he did not immediately recognize. The room was smaller than that of his own, and, with the sun shining through curtains which he had not bothered to close, brighter, too. Judging by the luminance of the sky, he had overslept— or slept later than was respectable for a guest lodging in someone else's home, at least.

He had no plan for the day, no itinerary, or goals which led him to question if he could have accused himself of oversleeping in the first place. If one had no reason to get out of bed at a precise hour then what difference did it make when he awoke? What if he never got out of bed, he wondered as he stared up at the ceiling. What if he remained here forever instead? He snorted, disgusted by the melancholic thought. He had never been a man to wallow in self-pity. He was not going to allow himself to fall into such habits now. Just because he did not know what he was doing currently that did not mean he never would. Having taken Peggy where she needed to be, he needed to decide where he himself belonged. What did he want? What did he need in order to live a happier, more fulfilling life?

The question was more easily asked then answered. The passing of the night had done little to soothe his doubt. In fact, it seemed more glaring in the mid-morning light. He was still unsure what his motives for taking Peggy had been. He did not know why he had done such an impulsive thing. Surely, she would have ended up with Aunt Lil eventually, and he certainly was doing her a kindness by abruptly removing her from her stepfather's care.

Why should Peggy have been forced to remain in derelict conditions? Why should Will have been given more chances to care for her than he already had? Why would Adam's father hesitate to step in between Will and Peggy? With all the people Pa had advocated for in the past, this was possibly the detail that bothered Adam the most. If Will had not shared their last name, would Pa have hesitated then? If Adam and Peggy would not have shared such a strong bond, would his father have acted differently than he had? These were more questions he could not answer, queries he promptly decided not to think about and dismiss entirely instead. It did not matter how they had gotten to this point, all that mattered was what they did now that they were.

He rose from bed with a groan. Standing erect, his feet planted firmly on the floor, he extended his arms toward the ceiling and elongated his shoulder and back muscles. Satisfied by the stretch, he groaned again. He may not have slept well but rest had done wonders for his body. His back no longer felt tight or his muscles inflamed.

He ran his fingers over his shirt, a futile effort to dislodge the deep wrinkles which had settled into the dark fabric. Though unwrinkled, his pants were not in much better condition. He had worn this outfit for days now. It appeared as unkempt as he suddenly felt, running his fingers through his hair before lowering his hands to appraise the facial hair covering his upper lip, cheeks, and chin. He was overdue for a shave, a bath, and a pair of clean clothes. All things he decided to take care of sooner rather than later.

Tucking his shirt in, he redonned his belt and boots, and then emerged from the bedroom. The house was painfully quiet. His footsteps seemed to echo around him as peaked into the bedroom where he had left Peggy the evening before. It was empty; the book the girl had been reading was abandoned on a side table next to her tidily-made bed. He wondered if she had slept as poorly as he had, and how early she had risen, emancipating herself from the unfamiliar bed and room. Suddenly he was anxious again, a deep need rising in his chest, prompting him to verify Peggy's whereabouts.

He should not have been worried, somewhere in the back of his mind he knew that as he strode quickly toward the staircase and then down it, the sound of each quick step he took seeming to ricochet off the walls around him. He did not need to be worried about her anymore. Not now that she was here in the safety of Lil's house. This was knowledge that should have eased his worry but did not.

"Peggy," he called as his foot left the bottom step and he moved toward the hallway which served as a pathway to the parlor, the dining room, and kitchen. Looking into the parlor, he cast an anxious gaze upon its confines, his feet coming to an abrupt stop. All his breath seemed to rush from his chest as he looked upon a scene he could not have anticipated.

Sitting upon the chaise sofa was a woman he had not seen before. She was significantly younger than Lil but no older than he. Having removed her shoes, she had abandoned them on the floor in front of the chaise. Her feet were curled up beneath her, hidden away underneath the unpretentious fabric of her dress. Her blonde hair was simply styled, pulled up into a bun that allowed a few long strands to fall around her face. In her lap lay a book, seemingly the sole focus of her attention before he had walked into the room. She looked up, gazing upon him with the most striking blue eyes he had ever seen, pools of sapphire, the deepness of which he had never known before.

Though dressed plainly, she was an effortless beauty. She needed no material adornments in order to be seen. She needed to speak no words in order to be noticed. Adam had never met her before, but he recognized her. Heart fluttering his his chest, he realized he knew her—or he soon would. It was the funniest feeling, the likes of which he had never experienced before. Something about this moment felt right. It was as though he had been waiting for it his entire life. Everything he knew, everything he had done had been leading him to this very moment, so he could stumble upon this very woman in this very room.

"There he is," she said, her voice sounding warm and melodic. "Like Sleeping Beauty, he awakens, the strange man who has been sleeping in my bed."

"Your bed?" he asked dumbly.

"Yes." The woman smiled, seemingly enjoying his confusion.

"I didn't…" Adam hesitated as he reached for words that seemed to float beyond his grasp. What was it he had intended to do? He was not sure anymore. His uncertainty, however, had ceased to matter somehow, because something about being in the company of this woman felt so undeniably right. Calmness overcame him, his expression softening, his lips curling into a smile.

"There's coffee in the kitchen, if you like," the woman said.

Adam neither responded nor moved, both actions feeling so utterly beyond him now.

"You can help yourself," she added, taking his lack of action as an indication of his expectations of her. "I'm not here to wait on you."

Adam shook his head. Of course, she was not here to wait on him. He would never expect such a thing. Not in this house, not from any of the women who lived inside of it, and especially not from the one in front of him. He did not want to ask her for anything. He wanted to give her everything he had.

The woman sighed, her expression falling with mild impatience. "You do talk, don't you?" she asked. "Of course, you do. I heard you calling for Peggy a moment ago. She's not here. Mommy took her out to see a the city and to buy some dresses, no doubt."

"Mommy?" Adam asked, finally finding his voice again. "You're Lil's daughter?"

She laughed genially, a sound that held no malice or ill-will. She was genuinely amused by his confusion, and Adam thought he could be convinced to remain confused forever if it meant bringing her joy and being responsible for the laughter that made his heart flutter and skip a beat.

"Are you always this slow to make obvious realizations?" she teased.

"Lil didn't say anything about having a child, or even a daughter."

"Oh, she never does. I am such an embarrassment, after all."

"Embarrassment?"

"Yes, embarrassment." She grinned. "Can you imagine having a daughter like me? Who is still unmarried and childless at my age? Who would rather spend a night reading a book than attending societal functions so that I can find a proper husband?"

"You're not interested in finding a husband?" Strangely, he was slightly disappointed. How could this woman, out of all the others he had come across in his life, be the one who did not want to marry? It seemed like a cruel twist of fate. Another unkind development in a series of unfortunate evolutions.

"I'm not interested in finding a man who would demand I change who I am for the sole purpose that I appear more acceptable for a society I want no place in," she explained.

"Who are you?"

"Eddie Manfred."

"Eddie?"

"It's short for Edna which was my mother's choice. My father wanted a boy, so the endearment was a gift from him, among other things. And you are Laura's Adam."

Adam's stomach turned. "I'm not Laura's anything."

"Well, of course, not anymore, but you used to be." Eddie smiled coyly. "Oh, lord, the things she used to write to me about you, before she left you for your cousin, of course."

Oh, that's not good, he thought. He did not know her, but she knew him—Laura had made sure of that. He thought about the diary that had been left behind and the scandalous things that had been written inside of it. Surely, Eddie and Lil did not know about that. Surely, Laura's lies would not have extended, embedding themselves into her letters to her aunt. It was not seemly for a woman to write about such things—lies or not—at least not to their elders. Their peers on the other hand… Adam shook his head to dislodge the troublesome thought.

"She didn't leave me," he said.

"Oh, come on," Eddie laughed, her eyes sparkling "Is your pride really going to insist that you left her? Buddy, that may have been a believable story had she not immediately married someone else."

Buddy. Whether the sobriquet had been accidental or purposeful, Adam found he liked it either way. As soon as she had said it, he was anxious to hear it again.

"Buddy," he said, shifting their conversation away from Laura. He did not want to speak about her. It did not matter what had led to the dissolution of their potential union. All that mattered was that he did not belong to her. He had never belonged to her, and that left him free to belong to someone else.

"Buddy," she repeated lightly.

"I call people that, too," he said.

"Do you now?" Though her smile did not falter, it was obvious she was unimpressed. "Imagine that; although, it is a fairly common nickname."

"It is," he agreed. "But I've never heard a woman use it before."

"Oh, buddy, that is because you have never met a woman like me."

Adam could not disagree. "You said something about coffee."

"Sure did. It's in the kitchen. Like I said, you can help yourself."

She did not follow him into the kitchen, making him believe she was not interested in him at all. Pouring himself a cup of coffee, Adam wondered how he could change that. How could he impress a woman who seemed so decidedly unimpressed by what a man could offer her?

He was certain he had never felt a pull toward someone who did not seem to share the attraction; admittedly, the only time such a thing had taken place had been when he was a teenager, the object of his affection much older than he, rendering the strength of his feelings unactionable and therefore irrelevant. It was a crush that while painful and bruising had passed with time. His instantaneous fondness for Eddie was not like that. It was not something he wanted to pass, rather he wanted to explore it. He wanted her to want to explore it, too.

He returned to the sitting room only to find Eddie had relocated somewhere else. Her bedroom, perhaps? The room he had unknowingly taken the evening before. Lil had not mentioned having a daughter. Of course, she had not been explicit about the room she was offering either. This was a detail he was having trouble feeling upset about. If Lil had tricked him into her daughter's bed then so be it; he could not pretend it was not where he wanted to be.

Pacing restlessly, he became more aware of his disheveled appearance with each moment that passed. He needed a change of clothes, a bath, a shave, and, maybe, a haircut. Quietly slipping out of the front entrance of the house, he set about transforming himself. The next time Eddie saw him he would look so striking and handsome she simply would have no choice but to notice him. It was not until he was at the bathhouse that his alluring thoughts of Eddie were pushed aside to make room for the reality of the situation.

What was he doing? Did he really believe now was the proper time to be chasing after a woman? Lil's daughter, no less.

Though Eddie was a welcome distraction, his problems existed despite her sudden appearance. He did not know what he was going to do, how he was going to leave Peggy, or what he would say to her when he inevitably did. He could not stay where he was indefinitely. At some point he would have to leave. He would either return home to deal with the situation he had left behind or he would not deal with it at all, choosing instead to go somewhere else completely. The world was suddenly at his fingertips, it seemed. He only wished he wanted it.

He could not stay in San Francisco forever; there were too many people he could stumble across. Friends, business associates, and others who would recognize his face and last name, potentially relaying the information to his family and father should they ever want to look for him. If he stayed here, he was destined to be found eventually.

Did he want to be found?

This was a startling thought that overtook him as he was donning his new clothes, dark pants, paired with a lighter colored shirt. Dark tan, almost brown beneath the right light, the shirt was bound to highlight the color of his eyes, making the uniqueness of their hue difficult to disregard. They were neither brown like his father's, nor blue like Hoss's, nor green like Joe's; they were different from any others he had ever seen. Pa called them hazel; he had once fondly said that when Adam had finally come into the world, he could not decide whether he wanted his father's eyes or his mother's, so he had picked both, his eye color a distinctive mixture of what Ben and Elizabeth both had offered. In his eyes, Adam saw a hint of doubt as he assessed himself in the mirror the tailor had provided. His uncertainty regarding what he had done and what he had yet to do was so clear to him. He wondered if it was clear to others, too.

Leaving the dirty outfit from which he had changed behind to be cleaned, he obtained a haircut and shave, and then he took himself on a long solitary walk. He did not know what to do, or say. How he was going to return to life in his father's home or how he would ever be strong enough to walk away from it. Who was he without his father's counsel or accomplishments? Who was he if he was not Adam Cartwright, son of Ben, oldest heir to the great Ponderosa?

He did not know, but everything inside of his heart was pleading he summon the courage to find out, and all at once he knew something else, the very thing he had once been so determined not to see. He did not want to go home. Back to deal with Will's nonsense. Back to his father's anger and lingering authority. Back to the predictability of ranch life, the land which once seemed so sprawling and grand that now felt more like a prison than anything else.

He did not want to go back. He wanted to go somewhere else, where he could be someone else entirely. He needed to be someone else, because the person he had been had ceased to exist. Somewhere between the day he had witnessed Frank Dayton's death and now, he had changed. The events that had happened between had changed him. He had not meant for it to happen; he had not intended to change, rather the change had just come, unfolding all on its own.

It was slow at first. Tiny choices had led to bigger ones. His decision to foster a friendship with Peggy, a fierce kinship that had led him to spend more and more time with her mother. This was a decision that led to another. Their inevitable engagement. His fateful fall. Setting Laura free so that she could be with Will. Every decision had come with benefits and concessions, and every single one of them had changed him in their own way. Together they cast new light upon the reality of life, illuminating what he had been careful to ignore for years.

He was an adult who was dependent upon his father. A grown man who still lived in his childhood home. A man who while never shy about voicing his descensions or opinions, was always expected to yield to his father's final decision. He did not have a life of his own. For years he had operated beneath false belief that he did, because of everything he had achieved. But after his fall, the horrible injury to his back, he had been assaulted by an inconvenient and appalling truth: everything he had had belonged to his father first.

And at the basis of all his decisions was his father's voice. Pa told him what to do and when to do it. He instructed him on where to go, how long to stay gone, and when to return. There were even instances when Pa had ordered him to retire to bed, as though he was a child, as though his desires and age had no meaning at all. For years, Adam had declined looking honestly upon these things for fear of what the realizations would ruin, what they would make him feel or do. But there was no ignoring them anymore, because now he knew he did not want to go home. Now, he knew he no longer wanted anything his father could offer, because those things came at too high of a cost.

Returned to Lil's house slowly, another bitter realization overcame him. Taking Peggy away from Will and bringing her to Lil had been as much for the girl's benefit as his own. Peggy was the catalyst, but her dire situation was not the only one he had been trying to correct. Subconsciously, he had wanted to leave, too. It was difficult to look at oneself and admit such a thing. To realize that in emancipating Peggy from her troubled existence, he had been running away from his own at the same time.

Ascending the steep stairs leading to the house, he hesitated outside the of front door, not knowing if he should knock or enter unannounced. Societal rules would dictate he knock, but, then again, he was a guest of the home, rendering such behavior unnecessary. He lifted his hand, then dropped it to his side, and then lifted it again. What was it about this house that left him unable to discern what to do? What was it about this place that made him so uncertain of his motivations and next move?

As he stood frozen in place, the decision was made for him. The door opened. Her hand lingering on the knob, Eddie looked upon him, her eyes sparkling with amusement. "Do you intend to spend the remainder of the evening lingering in front of the door?" she asked.

"No," he said, the word falling almost idly from his mouth. It was the first time Eddie had stood before him. Though shorter than he, she was taller than Laura or Lil. Her body shape was the kind that garnered a lot of attention from men, one that he could not help noticing himself. He felt something stir deep inside of him; he would have stood in place forever if she asked him to.

"You're a very strange man," she said.

"I'm not strange," he said. Was she teasing him, or did she really find him strange?

"Okay, you're particular then."

"Buddy, you have no idea."

She grinned, her expression beaming. "Buddy."

"Buddy," he affirmed. If she were any other woman, he never would have dared the nickname. He would not have wanted to, something about it would have seemed improper, and yet, something about directing it toward Eddie seemed so undeniably right.

"I quite like the sound of that."

Eddie extended her hand, and Adam took it without hesitation or question, his lips curling into a smile as she pulled him inside the house.

"Welcome home," she said. "Peggy is incredibly anxious to see you."

"What about you?"

"What about me?"

Adam glanced at their hands, neither of them had yet to let go. Her skin was soft, the weight of her in his own so right somehow. He did not know how he was going to stop holding on to her. Now that she was here, he never wanted to let her go. He would not—in the moment he knew that. He wondered if she knew it, too.

"I suppose I am happy to see you've returned to us," she conceded, her gaze following his own and setting upon their entwined hands. "I have the strangest feeling about you," she added, a hint of awe seeping into her tone. "Although, I must admit, I am slightly disappointed."

"Disappointed?"

"You shaved." Eddie extended her free index finger to indicate at his barren cheek. "That's a shame. I do like a man with a beard."

That was the moment Adam resigned himself to never shaving again. And in the days that followed, overcome by all-encompassing infatuation that often left him feeling speechless and stupid, he would resign himself to never do other things. Like speak about Will and Laura, or Laura and himself and the diary she had left behind. Or think about his father and the conversation that was awaiting him back home, or even returning to his father and brothers at all.

TBC