Bilbo's wedding was neither as big nor as posh as Frodo had feared, but it was still disquietingly grand. Even the photographers were wearing tuxedos, for crying out loud, and come to think of it the fact that there were photographers, plural, was already out of the range of Frodo's experience with wedding parties.
After offering his congratulations Frodo did his best to hide without actually appearing unsociable. He amused himself by watching the other guests - it was a largely family affair, and you could instantly spot whose side any guest was on. Bagginses tended to be short and boisterous, and while not much taller the groom's relations nearly all sported long hair, shaggy beards and impressively large noses. Though thankfully the groom's immediate family were among the most modest in the nose and beard department. One of them only had stubble, if Frodo recalled correctly. They were all dark-haired and good-looking in a sturdy sort of way, and seemed to like Bilbo.
Bilbo himself looked dizzyingly happy 90% of the time and like he was about to faint the other 10%. His new husband watched him like he was the best thing since hedge funds, or whatever it was billionaires liked more than sliced bread, so Frodo wasn't worried about Bilbo despite the suddenness of the marriage. It had caused quite the uproar when Bilbo, already pushing forty and looking it, had taken up with some filthy rich foreigner who'd once famously said he would rather single-handedly battle a dragon than get married. And now, only a year after meeting each other, they'd gotten shackled. Surely, if that proved something it was that it was never too late to find the right person.
Or at least, Frodo liked to think so. He hadn't dated in so long it was starting to feel like his last relationship had been in another lifetime. No, that wasn't quite right, possibly he hadn't dated for several lifetimes. It was getting so bad, random people were telling him it was high time to get over Sam, or asking him if Sam, Rosie and he had an arrangement. Realizing that he apparently babysat his best friend's kids so often that disinterested onlookers assumed he must be nursing an unrequited love or getting sex out of the deal was a bit of a wake-up call. Clearly, "hopelessly single" didn't even begin to cover Frodo's situation. And it wasn't like dating was that hard, you just avoided sleeping with your cousins and anyone who claimed to be receiving psychic messages from giant burning eyeballs and that was it. Except Frodo was still somehow really bad at it.
Bilbo had been much the same once, written off by the whole family as a loner, even though Bilbo himself had always seemed perfectly fine with that. When he was little Frodo's parents had wandered all over the world shooting documentaries about the wonders of salt-water plant life, and since Frodo could get seasick in the bathtub he saw a lot of his Uncle Bilbo. He'd practically spent half his childhood in Bilbo's bakery, one of Bilbo's dusty books in one hand and a pastry fresh out of the oven in the other. Frodo's mother often said he took after Bilbo more than anyone, what with his taste for reading, old maps, gardens and sweets. Frodo was lucky she and his father had been kept form coming by what they'd called a sudden algae emergency, otherwise he never would have gotten away with avoiding mingling as long as he had.
His strategy of avoiding eye contact, walking at a steady pace, and raising his champagne glass strategically from time to time worked wonders, so Frodo managed to make his way out of the wedding pavilion without being cornered by a tipsy relation. He sipped his champagne, admiring the view.
He had heard Bilbo's husband owned a mountain so positively stuffed with diamonds, gold, gas and every other conceivable type of natural resource it seemed a wonder there was any space left for the rocks, and was hoping the wedding might take place there. Frodo hadn't even known you could own a mountain nowadays. Now it was Bilbo's mountain too, he supposed. Sort of. Likely not really. There had to be a pre-nup, probably a foot-thick one with so many addendums that it unfolded like an origami.
Anyway, the mountain was probably too obvious, and must have been crawling with camouflaged paparazzi armed with long-distance photo lenses right about now. Instead, they were in a waterfall-lined valley so picturesque Frodo seriously wondered if it had been especially constructed for the wedding. He was idly fantasizing about going to stand under one of the waterfalls when he heard heavy but brisk footsteps approaching from behind.
"There you are, Frodo, right?" said a cheerfully energetic voice behind him and a hand descended on his shoulder. Hopefully a hand, though Frodo hadn't been aware hands came in this size.
He turned around quickly to find he was being accosted by one of the photographers, judging by the camera tucked under the man's arm. At first glance Frodo registered only golden, shoulder length hair carelessly pulled back from a healthily-tanned, handsome face covered by the ubiquitous beard. Then the man smiled at Frodo with so much charming confidence it was practically a physical force. His eyes were very blue, and he sort of had dimples without having them, if that made any sense. To his profound horror, Frodo felt himself blush.
"Bilbo wanted a few unofficial pictures taken with you before one of your cousins' kids smeared something all over his suit. There've been a couple of close calls already," said the man, either not noticing or choosing to attribute Frodo's fluster to alcohol. Like everyone else here he spoke perfect, barely accented English. "I'm Fili by the way."
"Frodo," said Frodo stupidly. "Of course you already know that."
He transferred his champagne glass in the other hand so he could shake hands, and by God, the man - Fili - did have some mitts on him. Warm and slightly callused as well as large, Frodo discovered, though the handshake was surprisingly gentle. His hand tingled even after he took it back.
"Sure do. Bilbo talks about you so much I feel like I know you already," Fili said, and Frodo felt a sudden pang of fondness for his uncle. Bilbo had likely made friends with everyone here already, from the photographers to the cooks. This made him relax somewhat and stop acting like a stunned rabbit.
"I'd ask if it was good things but with Bilbo it couldn't be anything else," he said, and ventured a smile himself, which made Fili tip his head back and laugh out loud, not because it was funny, but because it was a happy occasion and the wine was very good, and they had the fondness for Bilbo in common if nothing else.
"He's something else, isn't he?" Fili touched Frodo's back companionably, likely only getting ready to steer him in the crowd, and there went Frodo's composure again. He clutched his glass tighter for comfort.
Fili, meanwhile, had been scanning the guests. He apparently found what he was looking for and patted Frodo's back in celebration. Frodo had to suppress the urge to squirm ticklishly, his cock giving an interested twinge in his pants. Really, this was getting embarrassing. He wasn't a teenager getting touched for the first time. He tried to concentrate on what Fili was saying.
"-but he won't be getting away anytime soon. You can hang out with me in the meantime."
Frodo would have been alarmed by that, but the sight of Bilbo dancing with a portly man with an enormous ginger beard provided ample distraction. Bilbo had to lean back a whole foot to avoid getting a faceful of it and that made it look like they were going for one of those stiff ballroom dances where the female dancer bent backwards so far she might as well have been doing the Limbo.
Which was how Frodo ended up spending the rest of the reception with Fili, who turned out to be surprisingly knowledgeable about gossip. Because it was noisy, he had to whisper rather close to Frodo's ear, which meant Frodo found out a whole host of other information, like what Fili smelled like (subtly expensive pine cologne and Bilbo's cinnamon rolls) and how soft his hair was (very soft). It made him feel a little stalkerish even though it probably wasn't creepy to smell someone when they were standing practically on top of you.
When they finally got to Bilbo it occurred to Frodo that Fili had essentially been skivvying off work all this time. He worried Fili might get in trouble over this, and so didn't pay as much attention to Bilbo as he would have otherwise. For some reason Bilbo kept saying how glad he was Frodo was getting along with his nephew. Strange, considering Frodo hadn't said more than a few words to the guy and that he'd apparently spent the whole afternoon trying to get the attention of a redhead in the security detail of some long-haired, blond business rival of Bilbo's husband who kept glaring at everyone as if they'd personally offended him. Rich people were so peculiar, Frodo thought.
Eventually, Bilbo got whisked away by his husband and Frodo picked up an ill-advised sixth glass of wine, and he and Fili rolled their trouser legs and dipped their feet in a fountain. Which was very rude, but still not as bad as what a bald guy with a tattooed scalp and some guy with braided eyebrows were doing behind the rose bushes, so it was probably all right.
"I bet it would feel really good to stand under one of those waterfalls," Frodo told Fili confidentially. His head felt too heavy, so he let if fall to Fili's shoulder. Possibly he'd had just a teensy bit too much to drink.
"Nah, cold enough to freeze your balls off," Fili answered with suspicious certainty. His arm circled Frodo's waist securely, and Frodo dozed off just like that.
He remembered staggering up stairs, dropping his shoes every now and then and giggling, and the feeling of a whiskery grin against his temple. He remembered his door had been curiously difficult to open. His bed had made up for it, soft and fluffy and containing a large, warm object Frodo happily wound around.
There was simply no graceful way to interact with someone after you'd just woken up drooling on them.
"I apologise that you had to take care of me last night," Frodo said. This was one thing he didn't have in common with Bilbo. When mortified, Bilbo babbled; Frodo just got stiffly polite.
Fili squinted up at him in confusion, before yawning widely. Somehow he managed to make even that attractive. He looked different from last night in just his trousers and shirt, hair in disarray, the nice, thick muscles underneath his clothes much more obvious. There still wasn't a trace of self-consciousness about him.
"I don't mind if you don't. I would have left you alone to sleep it off, but you clung onto me and wouldn't let go," Fili said, and the way he was looking up at Frodo with his hair fanned out over the pillow did things to him even as the awkwardness factor of the situation jumped up exponentially.
Frodo meant to apologize and steer the conversation towards safer topics like breakfast, transportation and Fili's horrible work ethic - where had his camera even got to, Frodo had no idea - but what came out of his mouth instead was "nothing happened last night, did it?"
"No. Of course not," Fili answered flatly, and pushed up to sit with his back against the headboard. Yeah, it had been silly to ask, they were still more or less dressed, and anyway Frodo was a black hole of physical attraction, so of course nothing had happened. "I didn't want to take advantage, so I figured I'd wait until you were sober."
Frodo felt his lips part at this with no input from his brain. He looked at Fili's face searchingly, but for all the other man had shown himself to be a joker last night he looked nothing but sincere right now.
"Then you're interested," Frodo ventured, less a statement and more a question, and Fili reached out to twine one of his curls between his fingers.
"I'm interested."
And the funny thing was, it wasn't awkward at all. Frodo was well aware he had the spontaneity of an annual audit, but when he unthinkingly suggested a break for freshening up Fili didn't even bat an eyelid. They brushed their teeth side by side, Fili using Frodo's extra brush and elbowing Frodo every now and then to make him smear toothpaste over his face. When they kissed it was the most natural sexual thing Frodo had ever experienced, like it was something they'd done many times before, or something that had been so long in the making all potential for embarrassment had long faded away.
There was a maddening contrast between Fili's cool, recently rinsed lips and his warm shoulders where Frodo's fingers clung to him, between Fili's coarse beard and the sleek lock of hair falling over one of his cheekbones, teasing against Frodo's own cheek. It was so distracting Frodo didn't even realize how excited he was until Fili pulled him close and he could feel how hard he was, how hard they both were.
They fucked on the bed, Frodo on his side, constantly squirming, to escape a tangle in the sheets, to push back onto Fili's cock, to press into the wide palm splayed on his chest, rubbing against his nipples. He kept letting out high, lost-sounding whines, and Fili kept whispering what is it, what's wrong, what do you needs against his ear, even as he kept fucking into Frodo slowly, maddeningly slowly and shallowly.
Frodo wasn't unsatisfied, of if he was he didn't know what he wanted, he just felt irrationally sorry for missed opportunities. He loved getting fucked like this, but he also wanted to do it face to face, to cling to Fili and have Fili press him into the mattress, to sit on Fili's lap, wriggle on his cock and hold his golden-maned head to his chest, to have Fili grind him into the mattress and to ride Fili, see those golden, smooth limbs splayed below him and those strong hips bracketed beneath his thighs. Most of all he wanted to do it without a damn condom, but he couldn't have that, they couldn't have that.
Fili sucked on the tip of Frodo's ear and Frodo cried out, and Fili cursed, slid his hand under Frodo's knee and hitched his leg up until it was pressing into his chest. Fili was over him now, fucking into him harder, groaning with what sounded like frustration. Frodo sympathized; this wasn't enough.
He rolled over the rest of the way on his belly, and in this new position with the added leverage every thrust went blissfully deeper. They moaned in unison, and Fili went wild. They fucked like they had only so much time, like a force beyond their knowledge was about to separate them any moment now, Fili's nice, large hands squeezing Frodo's hips while his nice, thick cock drove in and out of him, and oh, it was heaven. Frodo came with a shout, spasming and shaking all over the sheets, untouched. Fili folded over him, hips snapping a few times more before he went taut and stilled, arms tightening around Frodo, and Frodo only wished he could feel like this more, longer, that he could get closer, but the only thing he could do was curse the damn condom helplessly.
They lay down pressed close to avoid the wet spot, and Frodo felt pleasantly tired, weighed down by Fili's arm slung over his middle. Even his mild hangover headache had given up and disappeared sometime during the proceedings. In a moment he would suggest they go and look for something to eat, and then he would fly back home and give Sam and Rosie a heavily edited account of the wedding, and work on his thesis while waiting for Bilbo to come back from his honeymoon and call him about his wedding present, and maybe make a more serious effort to date even though he was reasonably sure he was kind of ruined for sex now. That was the plan, and it was a sound one. So Frodo was rather surprised when instead he said, wistfully:
"I wish you lived closer."
Fili smirked at him, all affable arrogance once more, like he hadn't been so ruffled just moments before.
"You don't know where I live," he said, and lifted Frodo's hand to kiss the palm.
"I still bet it's too far from me," Frodo answered, and the kiss must have distracted him, because he could never say something so embarrassing otherwise. He might not have been your typical 24-year-old, but he knew how one night stands worked in theory, and implying you would have been dating if not for distance was definitely not done.
Fili didn't seem bothered though. He had yet to release Frodo's hand; he was now rubbing his face against the palm like a cat.
"We have mutual connections. We'll be seeing each other a lot from now on."
"Maybe if Bilbo divorced and decided to remarry he'd ask you to do the pictures again. Though I doubt it, you're pants at wedding photography," Frodo smiled gently, not wanting to leave any doubt he was kidding. It was strange, but despite the lingering shadow of regret he was very glad he'd met Fili. The thought that they might have missed each other was suddenly terrible. He flexed his fingers against Fili's face, and Fili leaned into Frodo's hand.
"If Bilbo divorced Uncle Thorin and tried to marry someone else, the only way I'd be attending the wedding would be under orders to assassinate the groom," he said, then after seeing Frodo's suddenly slack-jawed expression added hurriedly. "I'm joking! We really aren't that kind of business organization. Any stories you heard were all slander, I promise. Really. Frodo?"
Uncle Thorin?
Well, bugger, there went the cousin rule.
Frodo was so bad at dating.