Five things that never happened to Lily Proudfoot

Five

The older Lily gets, the more she likes the honeysuckle arbor in the back garden of Bag End. Sam planted it for her and it was finished and the wooden arch properly overgrown when she celebrated her 60th birthday. Frodo was nearly 84 at that time, and – given the circumstances and the occasional memories of his body in March and October – astonishingly well.

There have been bright years and dark years. When Elanor married Fastred Greenholm in May 1451, Frodo wasn’t able to be at the wedding; the “March illness” refused to leave in time, and he remained frail, pale and disordered the whole summer. But when winter came and the first snow fell, he had recovered enough to spend long evenings with Sam, playing chess and recalling those parts of their legendary adventure that left no dark shadow on his soul.

In 1465 Freddy visited the Great Smials and met Clover Took, a niece of Everard Took. A few days with her were enough to make him fall in love, and three months later he brought her to Bag End to introduce her to his parents. Frodo gave her a warm welcome, eyeing her red-blonde frizzy hair and the sun-speckled face with a mischievous curl of his lips, and congratulated his son. Late that night he told Lily with a chuckle that this was the second attempt of a Baggins to court a Took-girl of that name and with exactly those looks. Lily listened to the story of the “first” Clover and fell asleep, still giggling, her face buried against his chest.*

Freddy married Clover in summer 1466, and now, when Lily sits in the vivid shadow of the honeysuckle arbor, she often finds one of her grandchildren climbing on her lap and waiting for tales. She feeds them seedcakes and currant juice and after a while their grandfather approaches, his steps slow and careful, his hair completely white now and his eyes twinkling behind the round glasses Meriadoc Brandybuck sent him last year – the only reason that he’s still able to read properly. And together with the little ones he listens to her warm voice speaking of elves and dwarves, of a legendary White City and a noble and gentle King she once met. He keeps his own stories for himself these days, but Lily knows them all.

When she looks up, she sees him smile at her the way he has done for more than sixty years … and for her, he is still beautiful, he will always be. He will always be her master, her lover and her teacher, and she is his indil and his chestnut. She forgets her aching joints and swollen feet… she gets lost in his eyes and is young again once more.

FIN

*that story is told in Hay and Clover (also here on OSA)