Summary: A look at Sue Ellen Terry from The Sisters. What she felt and thought during her time with Adam. Author’s Note: I started this piece as a pinecone challenge in July 2023, then I developed it a bit more into a short story.

Rating: T    Wordcount: 3,314

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I had never met a man like Adam Cartwright before.

This thought kept needling my mind every time I saw him in the Saloon. How he talked to the Saloon girls: so kind and courteous.  How he treated the Saloon girls: as if they were worthwhile people deserving attention and respect and not as a side order of pleasure to be used on the whim of any man with a few silver coins in his pocket.

As a Saloon girl myself, being in Adam’s company was like a refreshing Spring shower cleansing me from the abuse and misuse I was so used to receiving from the “man’s land” of the Saloon.

Adam always made a point of talking to me when he came into the Saloon and he always looked in my eyes when he talked to me – not staring at the generous swell of my breasts or at some other body part below the frill of my neckline – like so many other men did as if that was the sum of my worth. In short, Adam Cartwright treated me like a person who had ideas, thoughts, and feelings of my own. He seemed genuinely interested in what I had to say and paid attention to me as if I were deserving of his attention. Adam treated me like an equal and made me feel like I mattered. And I am so grateful to him for that, more than I can say.

~~1~~

   The morning of my birthday broke like a robin’s egg over the sky, the sunshine yolk spreading her light of creation across the eggshell blue celestial expanse. White cottony clouds swept every which way with their halcyon strokes.

My sister Amelia was going to San Francisco with her newest male admirer for a brief sojourn. I don’t think she even remembered it was my birthday. But I wasn’t going to let that stain my day. Secretly, I was relieved.

I had a rare day off from the Saloon…and I had plans.

~~2~~

   The clock on the mantle struck one o’clock that afternoon, and as if on cue, there was a knock at the door. I ran to answer it with my heart in my throat. It was Adam Cartwright.

“Sue Ellen,” he said as he took off his sterling grey Stetson.

“Adam. I’m so glad you could come,” I said a little breathless and not without a pink flush speckling my creamy fair skin. I had hoped that he would come of course. I baked myself a birthday cake and tidied up the house while it was in the oven, and later cooling on the counter before I could frost it. I had stepped outside for a few moments to drop off a short note at the Saloon. I left it with Sam the bartender. For Adam’s eyes only, I had instructed. It was just a short note, an invitation saying:

Dear Adam,

Today is my birthday and I baked a cake. If you would like to, you may come over this afternoon around one o’clock for cake and wine.

Fondly,

Sue Ellen

   I really didn’t know if Adam would be coming to Virginia City today, and most especially I didn’t know even if he did, would he be coming into the Saloon. I just left it with Sam in case he did. I knew I could trust Sam not to read it and to give it to Adam when – if – he came in.

With how kind Adam had been to me, I really wanted to do something for him. The least I could do, I thought to myself, was to share my birthday with him if he would like to join me. I was so very happy that he did.

“Thank-you for the invitation,” he said as he stepped inside and beamed at me the most beautiful smile I had ever seen.

And so, over the rest of the afternoon, Adam gave me the best birthday present of all: he spent time with me. He talked to me about the places he’d been, the things he saw, stories he read. He was so well-educated and cultured and again, I was so grateful for how he talked to me like I was a worthwhile person and not as if I was nothing more than an ignorant Saloon girl.  Another gift.

“I have something for you,” Adam said as he set his wine glass down on the table with the chocolate cake and took a package out of the inside of his black vest. It was a very pretty package wrapped in shiny pink paper and tied with a purple ribbon.

“Oh, Adam, you didn’t have to get me anything,” I said as he placed the gift on the table in front of me. “Just you being here is all the gift I need.”

“I saw this in the mercantile and immediately thought of you,” Adam said, his hazel eyes exuding a warmth that I could bask under for an eternity and never would I wish for any other sunshine than that which came from Adam’s eyes. “Mary at the General store wrapped it.”

With trembling hands, I untied the ribbon and tore the pretty pink paper as I unwrapped Adam’s gift. It was a book. On unicorns. I smiled as my fingers lightly touched the embossed gilded lettering on the cover. Then I so carefully let my fingers flutter through the vanilla pages as I read some of the titles of this classic short story collection on unicorns. Some of the titles I remembered from childhood. Our mother used to read these kinds of stories to Amelia and I. Of the two of us, it was I who loved the unicorn stories the most and I kept asking mother to reread them to me.

“A book on unicorns reminded you of me?” I had to ask. Though I genuinely loved the gift more than I could say, and I was touched by the childhood memory it evoked in me, the purity of unicorns seemed so far removed from where I was in my soiled dove life now.

“Yes, it really did,” Adam said with fathomless sincerity. His smile was so warm and welcoming.

“Thank-you, Adam. This is the best birthday I’ve ever had,” I said, my blue eyes swimming with tears, then finally, a few broke loose to trickle down my rouged cheeks. I reached out to touch Adam’s hand, then stopped in mid-air, thinking maybe that wasn’t the appropriate thing to do. But before I could pull my hand back, Adam took it. My small hand enclosed by the kind strength of his.

He smiled at me and all I could do was smile back. There was no need for words in this moment that seemed to be frozen. Then, like ice cream melting on a hot July day, Time melted forward again. Still, there was no need for words. My heart was so full, all I could do was sparkle a smile at Adam. And Adam seemed to share the sparkle too. Did I dare believe…?

~~3~~

   Later that night, after brushing out my long golden mane and changing from my green satin party dress into my favorite lace-trimmed white nightgown, I laid in bed as I read Adam’s gift…my book on unicorns.

There was one story I particularly liked. In fact, a warm tingle rushed beneath my skin when I read it. The story raised the question of what was “real” virginity.

The author tells the tale of a beautiful temptress witch-woman named Rita. Though technically a virgin, she practiced the art of sorcery by concocting a potion that caused a young man to become blind one evening. She also tempted, teased, and enticed this young man until he was mad with desire.

In his drugged state, he stumbled out into the night. A simple, kind, gentle-hearted woman named Barbara found him and wanted to take care of him as she could see that he was hurt. But as he was still caught in the throes of his delirium, he rapes her.

It was soon revealed that this kind and gentle woman was the friend of a unicorn. Barbara feared that the unicorn would never come to her again because of her lost virginity, but in a “test of purity” with Rita the temptress witch-woman, the unicorn shuns Rita and lays his head in Barbara’s lap instead.

There was a footnote at the end that spoke of the story’s moral: “Purity is a matter of the heart and mind, not the body – and the wise unicorn can instantly spot those who are pure of heart, regardless of physical technicalities. “

I smiled as I read the story’s moral. “There’s hope for me yet,” I sighed softly to myself as I laid the book on my chest and fell to sleep, dreaming of Adam’s bright sparkling eyes and warm smile…and unicorns.

~~4~~

   The sun was pasted in the sky like a red wafer on that Sunday afternoon of our picnic, its rays were fingers peeling back the layers of my heart to expose myself for my self-scrutiny.  But I already felt exposed: to myself and most of all before this rare jewel of a man who wanted to take me on this picnic-date, as if I were a person worthy to be in his company, as if I was a lady worthy of respect and consideration…and not what I really was.

No, I didn’t need the sun to expose me to myself and this man, but I felt exposed nevertheless.  Despite its brilliant illumination reigning over our picnic, it was not nearly as bright and pure as the light in this man’s hazel eyes. I looked at them and I was scorched bare by the beauty I saw.

In my young life I had seen so much of the worst of men – and experienced so much too as those men dehumanized me into an object for their desires, only good for one thing and I think you know what that is without me saying. But in my young life there were two things I knew for sure, only two things I knew unequivocally without a doubt:  I had never felt beautiful in my life. And I had never met a man like Adam Cartwright before.

More than anything, I wanted to be honest with Adam, more than any other man I had known (and there were many) Adam deserved my honesty. I told him, though I wasn’t as bad as what he may have been led to believe from the hearsay of the Saloon-gossipers, it’s true that I have known many men. Many, many men.

I couldn’t look at him as I admitted this ugly fact about myself. I couldn’t stand to see the loathing and disgust that must be in his eyes as I revealed my true self. But I dared a quick sideways glance at him and you know what? He wasn’t looking at me in disgust and revulsion! I saw kindness and compassion in his eyes – and something more – as he said “I don’t think you’re bad.” His voice was a soothing caress upon the ragged edges of my heart.

He didn’t think I was bad? I looked at him and thought “how could a man remain so good and possess such a pure heart, a man so rare as to believe a whore such as me could be a lady? He must be a unicorn…”

Then he said “Come here,” his voice was a low rumble like thunder bringing with it the promise of rain to quench the drought of the thirstiest Summer’s day. Oh, how I thirsted for the rain, Adam’s rain to drench me thoroughly, right through to the permeable skin of my soul. I thirsted for the healing presence of the rain.

As if he could see my thirstiness, as if he knew I was a lonely parched desert flower in need of sustenance, Adam opened his arms and pulled me to him, his strong arms were locked around me and he held me to him as if I was a rare gift meant to be cherished as he slowly unwrapped me.

I’ve been held by men before…no, not men, patrons…patrons of the Saloon where I worked. But being held by Adam, I finally knew the difference between a patron and a man. I realized that I never had been held by a man before and this stark realization choked the breath from me for a moment. But Adam gave me his breath in the kiss we shared and I could breathe again.

Adam Cartwright. The first man to hold me and the first man to share space in my heart and soul. If only he was the first male to share my body…but if it was possible to be renewed and reborn then this whore was on her way to being a virgin again. That’s how being gift-wrapped in Adam’s embrace felt…I felt new. I felt like an unblemished pearl. If it was possible to rinse the filth from my soiled dove wings and be reborn a dove-white lady again, then that’s what I felt was happening to me as Adam showed me what a real man is and what a real man should be on that Sunday afternoon of our picnic.

And as the horses stood nearby, the only witnesses to our intimacies, Adam made love to me with such sweet tenderness and complete abandon I had never been shown before. He had already given so much to my heart, he had given so much of himself to me: his time and attention, his kindness and the sweet way he treated me. These are the true gifts, the only real gifts that mattered. And it seemed that Adam kept on giving to me, as if giving of himself was all he knew how to do. Oh, how I wanted to give back to Adam. But what did I have to give that could ever come close to what Adam had already given me?

I offered to pleasure him in the way that I knew men loved. But no, he didn’t want me to “service” him as he gently pushed my hands away from his belt. Instead, he wanted to put himself at the service of my pleasure… as if my pleasure mattered. It never had before to any of the “male patrons” of the Saloon. But Adam was different. Adam was a real man and, on that afternoon, Adam taught me that real men care about their lady’s pleasure.

When he brought me home from our picnic, night had already fallen as she swept away the last tendrils of light with her tresses of shadows. Adam carried me from the carriage, cradled me against him as we shared another passionate kiss, then set me down on my feet with such tenderness and care.

Even when the town drunkard came up to us and said “Sorry Adam, I thought you were with a lady,” Adam defended my name and honor (what was left of it). I never thought I had a reputation and honor worth defending but, that night, Adam defended me as if I was a royal princess.

At the door he enveloped me in his embrace again as he kissed me so sizzlingly slow. I had never been shown such tenderness before. I placed my hand on his manly cheek as he continued to smolder me with his kiss. I wanted him to know that I cherished him too.

As our lips parted and our faces were just a breath away I looked into his eyes. What I saw in Adam’s eyes looked so beautiful, I couldn’t help a wayward tear from trickling free. I was crying at seeing a beauty I had never seen before.

Tenderly, Adam brushed away my tear and cradling my face in both of his hands he said “You are so much more.” His words – so warm and compassionate – brushed away the dirt and mire from my heart. Then, for the first time in a very long time, I felt my heart beat.

Over the next few days, I revealed more of the ugliness I kept locked away in the cobwebs of my heart. I felt Adam should know who I really was. He just said “I already know” as he beamed at me the pure light of his soul. What a pair we made: The whore and the unicorn.

Then, that cloudy day came when John Henry, Virginia City’s most notorious gambler, grew jealous of Adam monopolizing my time inside the Saloon and outside of its whiskey-splattered batwing doors too. He challenged Adam to a duel and on an early mist-begotten morning, Adam risked his life. Over me. I couldn’t believe it. But I have no choice but to believe it as I was there. I had ridden my horse to the destined meadow and hid behind a thicket of aspen, their branches entangled together like lovers’ limbs as if they were making love, their wooden fingers entwined with their neighbor so lovingly… but they also created a window for me to witness the duelists’ drama. ‘I couldn’t be worth all this, surely not’, I thought to myself.

I know because my big sister Amelia told me often enough since childhood. I was seven years old when our parents died and eighteen-year-old Amelia was put in charge of my raising. Since that tender age, Amelia told me that a woman’s worth was only to pleasure a man. And I was no different, she sneered. She taught me how to flirt and tease, how to trick men to spend their money as I sat in the Saloon at ten years of age and watched big sister “work.” When I hit puberty, it was Amelia who decided it was time for my “initiation” into the life of a Saloon girl. She had me “entertain” a customer, thus earning my soiled dove reputation. I cried the entire time.

Now, here was Adam who had just fought a duel over me. As if I was worthy of such a risk to his life. Later, I had to ask. “Adam why, why would you risk your life in a duel over me? I’m not worth that.”

He just looked at me with a crinkle of sadness around his eyes and lightly caressed my cheek as he asked “aren’t you?” His touch was so tender, his words were so gentle, and oh how I’ve yearned for tenderness, how I’ve hungered for a show of gentleness to carry me away from the grit of a Saloon girl’s life. Should I dare believe my unicorn? Oh, how I wanted to…

   I looked at Adam and he looked at me with that something more I couldn’t yet name. But whatever it was it looked warm and caring…it looked like…?

The way Adam looked at me, he made me feel beautiful. For the first time in my life I felt beautiful, and more than that…I felt worthwhile, like a lady. Like a human being.

But what was that something more I saw in his eyes? I had never seen it before, but it made me nostalgic for a feeling I barely remembered, a gift I’ve always yearned for but one so precious it remained just out of my reach…was this love? Yes, the look in Adam’s eyes reminded me of love. This must be what it’s like to be loved. If only Adam would keep looking at me like that I would willingly die a thousand deaths in his arms.

I would die knowing what it was like to feel beautiful. And to be loved. I would die happy. And most of all, I would die knowing I was worth it.

Anyway, I’ve always believed in unicorns.