Winner of the Five Senses Challenge on themiddleearth, a LoTR challenge community on LJ.
"Do you remember the taste of strawberries?" I had asked him, there, at the end of all things. Or so it felt, with the weight of the world pulling so hard that I could almost feel my bones warping under it.
I don't know why I asked that, though. Maybe it was because I was so thirsty and hungry all at once. No water had passed my cracked and bleeding lips in what seemed an age, and my stomach churned and gurgled to be filled with something besides the inhaled dust and ash that left a bitter, acrid taste in my mouth. Maybe it was because they were one of Rosie's favorite things in the whole world, and thinking of them reminded me of home. Home: the sweet and peaceful Shire, which lay a lifetime and a ruined innocence away from where I was. Maybe it was because I wanted to take his mind off of this accursed land- or rather this festering wound in Middle Earth- to give him a moment of hope, however fleeting and false.
But mostly, I think it's because I couldn't remember either.