Amelia Goldern hadn't always wished to be normal.
when she was little having really curly hair and big feet (with more curly hair) and being short hadn't mattered. Neither had her hatred of shoes and penchant for bright green and yellow.
It hadn't mattered in kindergarten when she told the teacher she was 5 instead of 10 like her father told her too, She thought that was funny!
-and the fact that she switched schools every year
-and that she took almost every grade twice but could never tell anyone
-and that she brought 3x as much lunch as everyone else
But the teasing began soon after the start of her first day in her first year as a third grader (now telling everyone she was 8)
That's when she got her first nickname- Shorty
Years of misery (and worse nicknames) followed
it didn't help she was always the new girl
Finally, when she was 26 her father agreed that for highschool she could stay at the same school all four years, and not retake any of them!
She was NOT going to mess this up! This time she'd be normal!
So, Amy bought a straightener, and the highest heels allowed by the dress code in the smallest size she could possibly fit, and clothes that looked like all the other girls (even if they were in kids sizes). She practiced walking and talking just like them and surviving on a normal size lunch. She watched endless tutorials off youtube on how to apply makeup to hide her too-red cheeks and give her a perfect tan and she bought a razor for her feet.
Her plan worked flawlessly, and she quickly was accepted into a group of popular girls who said they were her friends. And for her freshman year Amy was on top of the world.
Then disaster struck.
It was at the annual beach party hosted by the richest family at school- she'd been so thrilled to be invited, this was an honor not conveyed on just any student. She was so thrilled that she ignored the rumors of what happened during the weekend of unsupervised partying. So unwilling to give it up that she told her father that it was perfectly safe.
She never remembered exactly how they had convinced her to drink it- perhaps there was already something clouding her system from that suspicious tasting punch. But no matter how you slice it- when the parents of one boy that had sneaked off to the party without permission walked in they found a bunch of rather tipsy teens engaged in a raucous game of truth or dare.
It didn't mater that she was actually over the legal drinking age, because nobody knew that, and she certainly looked 15. What did matter was how very angry her father was, and how very grounded she was forced to be. She was now forbidden to speak to a very long list of her friends, and there was a still longer list of places she was forbidden to go. So it was a girl with shattered dreams and even less hope that returned to the same school for her sophomore year. Her "friends" didn't understand why she obeyed her father, and quickly ceased even acknowledging her presence. Amy spent every night of her first week of school crying herself to sleep.
**********
"your Amy right?" Amy turned to look at her new seat partner, he was a tall boy with glasses and he was wearing a T-shirt that was an advertisement of some movie and he had he was the sort that got mostly A's -even if his notebooks were filled with doodles of guys with bows and arrows and swords and pointy ears instead of notes. (the pointy ears kind of interested her- she had pointy ears herself, but made sure to keep them covered)
If she was still friends with her old group this guy would be totally off-limits. Now though, what did she have to lose?
"Yeah, that's me," she said "what's your name?"
"Sam- short for Samuel, but I like to say it's short for Samwise cause that's lot's cooler" He grinned at her
"Samwise?" she said "what kind of a name is that?"
His eyes went wide "You mean you don't know where that's from?"
"Not a clue" she said "where is it from?"
"only from THE greatest book and movie series EVER" he said "Lord of the Rings!"
"Oh. In that case you'd be surprised to know I've never even heard of it before!"
Amy grinned at the flabbergasted look on his face
Just then class started, and Sam was left still shaking his head and muttering incredulously to himself without being able to talk to her again.
Sam waylaid her at the door of her third period class as she left for lunch. There were two girls with him he introduced them as Sarah and Grace- but they insisted she call them Merry and Eowyn
"you want to sit with us?" Eowyn offered
"I gue-"
"Thats great!" said Merry "C'mon you've just got to meet everybody- they'll Never believe you haven't heard of Lotr!"
She was dragged off to a table in the corner of the courtyard under a big Willow tree.(what in the world was Lotr?) There she was introduced to James (Legolas), Hannah (Pippin), Emily (Arwen), Rickart (Gandalf), and Joey who prefered being called Gimli.
In short order Amy's head was spinning with Elvish, mushrooms, and rings, and her backpack contained three more books and she had a standing invite to a weekly movie marathon of Lotr.
She figured weird friends were better than no friends, and they all seemed nice enough- but she'd have to read the books, and probably that other one, the Simli-something-or-rother eventually to get Anything they were talking about!
So she read the books and convinced her dad that these kids probably had parents that were around and didn't let them get beer. So one day about a month later she walked to Sam's house which was only a few blocks away. She wasn't wearing shoes because she knew they wouldn't care and Amy hadn't bothered to straighten her hair that morning either.
She walked up the driveway and rang the bell Gimli opened the door
"Your late!" he said with mock disapproval
Amy knew the proper response now,
"A wizard is never late, Frodo Baggins, nor is he early- he arrives precisely when he means to!'
they both laughed as she walked in
A chorus of Hi!'s and Elvish greetings ensued
"You know Amy," said Eowyn "you look sort of hobbity with your hair like that, and you know barefoot and all"
"Really?" said Amy looking at her feet "Well I certainly am short enough!"
Everybody laughed and they all settled down to watch the movie (Fellowship of the ring extended version) with a big bowl of popcorn.
She meant to stay awake- but for some reason she just couldn't keep her eyes open. Amy fell asleep and slid off the couch- hitting her head on the floor.
"Amy! wake up!" It was Eowyn's worried voice that woke her (that and the cup of water they dumped on her face) "Are you ok?"
"I'm fine" Said Amy standing up tentatively and pushing her wet hair behind her ears ad wincing "My ear just hurts a bit" she noticed the rest of the group gawking at her "What?" she said "is my ear bleeding or something?"
"n-no"said Legolas finally "it's just well,"
"Pointed!" put in Pippin
"So?" said Amy "I've always had pointed ears, probably just some weird birth defect"
Sam looked at her then he walked over and shut off the movie which was still running in the background.
"Amy," he said, "we need to talk"
"Guys," said Amy "This is ridiculous! I am not a hobbit!"
"But look at the evidence!" said Eowyn excitedly "1-your really short, 2- you have big feet and hate wearing shoes (even if they aren't hairy) 3-"
"Actually, they are" said Amy sheepishly "but it looks dumb so I shave them"
"See?" said Merry and Pippin together
"3-" continued Eowyn "you have pointy ears and curly hair and-" Eowyn paused before the final blow "You like mushrooms!"
"but she'd have to be like 20 something to look old enough!" said Legolas skeptically
"and she isn't hungry all the time" said Pippin dissapointedly "that's very non-hobbity"
"there's another great theory down the drain" sighed Gandalf
Amy looked around at their disappointed faces and realized that crazy as it sounded, they just might have a point-
she cleared her throat "well - none of you have actually asked how old I am" she said hesitantly "and if I said what my dad wants me to say I'd tell you I was 15, but I'm going to tell the truth just this once- I'm 27, and I'll be 28 in March" She went on carefully.
"All my life I've been moved from school to school, each year, taking most grades twice until now- and I'd been told to lie about my age, but I could never figure out why"
She took a deep breath "all my life I've been different and tried to change myself to fit in- but now crazy as it sounds, this is all starting to fit together and make sense"
She looked at Pippin pointedly "and if it means that much to you, I must confess, I'm starving- almost all the time- but I would get weird looks at school if I ate too much," Amy sighed "and before I met all of you, I was very concerned about what people thought of me"
It took a moment for this all to sink in
"your not just pulling our legs?" said Arwen
"nope. Why would I? I don't want to be a hobbit! and I'd be very glad if you thought I wasn't" Amy said. "And you guys are probably better at figuring out if people are hobbits or not than I am!"
"Wow-"Breathed Merry "a real live hobbit!"
"We better keep this a secret!" said Pippin
"Of course, you fool of a Took!" said Sam "everybody would go crazy and kidnap Amy or think we're crazy!"
"Well then," said Arwen "It'll be our little secret!"
It was Gandalf that said what the all were thinking
"the real question is- how did a hobbit get here from middle earth?"
"and how are you going to get back?" asked Pippin
Get Back? thought Amy- It was bad enough being a hobbit- but moving to middle earth?
did middle earth even exist?
well, just a few hours ago hobbits hadn't either...
"hey Amy" said Gimli "do you want to finish the movie or not?"
"Sure!" said Amy "I claim the seat by the popcorn!"
"So what movie did you watch Amy?"
"um... I think it was a Disney movie- a twist on Beauty and the Beast sort of" said Heather thinking of a movie she'd seen on the rack at the grocery store she- remembered noticing the rating had been PG-13 which her dad considered ok.
"that's nice"
Amy wondered why her dad had never told her she was a hobbit, he'd gone to all that trouble to keep it a secret so he must have known. Amy felt instinctively he wouldn't be happy if he knew she knew. So she decided to keep her findings a secret- and she was now pretty sure why she'd never heard of Lord of the rings. He didn't want her to find out! Amy decided to fish a little though-
"Dad?"
'Hm?"
"Am I- adopted?"
"No, why do you ask?"
"Just curious"
"ok tnen"
He went back to reading his book.
Ta-da! Chapter one! R&R please!
