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Echoes
“Why don’t you come with us, Frodo?” she had asked one last time. “It’s so
warm today, and you can read your book later tonight, you know.”
But Frodo had moodily shook his head, not looking up at her. The day was
quite nearly hot, the air was still, and rippling through the water like a
small, raven-curled water sprite would have felt lovely, without a doubt,
but there was something indefinable that held him back. His mother’s tone
was light, but a certain brittleness was there, a quality that had crept
into her voice all too often as of late, and that was a matter that he did
not want to acknowledge, did not want to cope with.
So better to shake his head and take his book into the tall grass behind the
smial, and then to let it fall, forgotten at his side, and lose himself in
dreams and fancies, as he usually did.
But he never saw either of them again.
&&&&&
Sam had been weeding the long beans that afternoon: he remembered it quite
well years and years later. The late summer’s day had been hot and sultry,
and he would have given anything for a quick swallow of water, but his
father had been uncharacteristically distracted. The elder Gamgee kept
looking towards the gate, although who he was expecting, Sam could not have
begun to guess. Mr. Bilbo was indoors, that he knew, because the elderly
gentlehobbit kept popping his head out the kitchen window and glancing up
the road towards Hobbiton.
At last though, late that afternoon, a wagon had rumbled up the lane from
town, and had halted in front of Bag End. Sam had been in the back garden at
the time, and had only caught a glimpse of the wagon leaving, but from his
father’s brief muttered explanation, discovered that Mister Bilbo had taken
in a poor father- and mother-less lad, a young cousin of his, to be brought
up proper. Sam caught only a bare glimpse of dark hair, and stormy blue eyes
that glanced both at the neatly tended garden, and then at Sam, and saw
neither.
But Sam had been transfixed, enthralled by the sight of a creature unlike
any other he had ever known. Possibly still in his teens, and certainly not
of age, but Sam had caught a quick sense of concealed unhappiness and buried
anger in that haughty glance, and he had never, in his short life thus far,
known the like. All he knew was that something quite new and different had
fallen into his unsuspecting existence, and that Bag End had suddenly become
infinitely more fascinating.
&&&&&
It hadn’t really taken that long for Frodo to discover Number Three, Bagshot
Row, but it wasn’t for the sake of the shy young lad who reddened and stared
fixedly at the ground whenever he happened to glance in his direction. No,
it was far more for the sake of the gardener’s wife, a motherly creature,
with the kindest and warmest heart that Frodo had ever known; at least, up
until then. With a quick wit, and a perceptive spirit, she saw quickly
enough that although Mr. Bilbo meant the best in the world as far as his
young cousin went, there were those times when a gentle hand to the cheek, a
motherly pat, and perhaps a lap to cry in, were what was needed for a young
confused teen. And so, when the illness took her so suddenly, and Daisy, her
young daughter and apprentice, try as she would, could not save her, Frodo
reeled through his life at a loss once again. No-one had thought of him, in
her last hours, and he swallowed his grief for the sake of her young son,
who needed what comfort he could offer as few ever had. But he never had a
chance to say goodbye.
&&&&&
He had never suspected, never guessed, that Bilbo would leave without a word
to him. Certainly he had known, although Bilbo had never explicitly informed
him of the fact, that the elderly hobbit was planning to leave the Shire in
order to retrace that journey that still was etched irrevocably in his
memories. But he had always thought that Bilbo would at least give him some
parting words of advice, would at least ask for his companionship, even if
he never actually thought that Frodo would accompany him upon the wild road.
And so when he returned that evening and could not find Bilbo anywhere, it
cut like the sharpest of knives, and somehow he felt, once again, that
others expected too much of him, that they assumed he was strong enough to
need neither sympathy nor counsel, and not even a kindly word of
encouragement. Instead, he was left once more bereft and alone, and trying
his best to conceal that fact.
&&&&&
So, as Sam lay senseless in the great bed at his side, and as Frodo softly
touched his cheek, and whispered his name, he could not help but feel the
certainty that, once more, he had been left behind. But no-one had ever, in
all his life, been dearer to him than the hobbit whose gaunt and ravaged
face lay next to his on the bleached white pillow, whose shallow breaths and
painful gasps, even as he lay unconscious, bespoke of hardships, cruel
wounds, and sacrifices beyond measure. And if he could not speak to this
treasured one before he lost him forever, then this time, indeed, his heart
would break, and there would never, not in all of what remained of his life,
ever be solace enough for that hurt.
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