Hey there, readers, I'm back! It's been about a month - exactly a month, actually - since the first chapter and since then, I've had one hell of a finals season and an equally stressful holiday season, but hey, I also found time to write!
Just a reminder, I do not own Lord of the Rings. The only thing here I can call my own is my OC.
Knock knock knock.
Katie grumbled and rolled over in her sleep.
Knock knock knock.
"Go away," she mumbled into her pillow.
Knock knock knock.
"What?" she snapped, and the knocking stopped, only to be replaced by the squeaking of her door hinges.
"Miss Katie? Are you awake?" someone asked, she guessed one of the hobbits.
"I damn well am now," she said under her breath. "Yeah, whaddaya want?" she asked, loud enough to be heard through the door.
"We hoped you might show us how to use your stove," the voice asked. Katie groaned and rolled back over in bed to get a look at her clock. It was seven in the fucking morning. She really did not want to get up. But, she also really didn't want these hobbits to burn her house to the ground, so somehow, she managed to haul herself out of bed. Katie navigated her way through her messy room to the door and opened it to see Sam standing there, looking both hopeful and hungry. Katie sighed.
"Alright, come on," she conceded, closing her door behind her an brushing past Sam to lead the way downstairs. As she walked, she threw her hair up into a messy knot on the top of her head. "Okay, so, breakfast," she muttered under her breath as she opened the fridge and scanned its contents. Her eyes finally settled on her two cartons of eggs (she'd been planning on some stress baking, but so much for that now) and on a loaf of bread. Breakfast was going to be eggs and toast and if these fictional characters didn't like it, they could shove it up their fictional asses.
Katie really needed some coffee.
Making that her first priority, hungry hobbits be damned, she got the coffee maker started. Once it was going, though, she pulled out the eggs and a large bowl. There were - how many? - ten people she had to feed, including herself. Katie ended up with eighteen eggshells in her trash can that morning. She trusted sam with the task of beating said eggs and went to fetch a frying pan and turn on the stove. On another note, her coffee was almost ready.
Sam finished with the eggs and so while the pan was heating up, Katie educated Samwise Gamgee in the art of the toaster. He seemed to get it, so when her coffee was ready, she left him to it. (He under toasted the first one, burnt the second, but by the third he got the hang of it). By the time Katie poured her first cup of coffee, the pan was hot. She got out a large bowl for all of the eggs once they were done and got to work. It ended up taking four batches to scramble all those eggs. She was definitely going to be guilting these men into doing her dishes.
Katie set the eggs on the counter with strict instructions to the hobbits not to take seconds until everyone had had first and then retreated to her coffee (although she did take a serving of eggs and a slice of toast with her).
As the rest of the Fellowship woke and wandered into the kitchen, they were greeted by the sight of Katie sitting on her kitchen counter, nursing her second cup of coffee while her dirty plate sat on the counter beside her. But each and every one of them seemed to be acting a bit awkward. She greeted them as politely as three hours of sleep plus one finished cup of coffee allowed, but hardly any of them would even make eye contact with her. It was weird.
"Okay, what's you guys' deal?" she finally asked, and they all looked up, but still not directly at her.
"What do you mean?" Legolas had the audacity to ask.
"You guys are avoiding me like the plague, that's what I mean, and I want to know why," she said plainly, folding her arms across her chest. They exchanged looks and pointed glares until finally Gimli spoke up.
"It's nothing much, lass, it's just that your attire is a bit, eh, revealing, and some of the lads are a bit uncomfortable about it," he explained. Katie looked down at herself. Oh, right. She was wearing that shirt. It was one of her favorite sleep shirts, but the old, ratty, and baggy tank top did have some pretty wide arm holes that tended to show off a little side boob. Oops.
"I'll go change then, problem solved," she said simply, taking a swig of coffee and then pushing herself off the counter.
In her room, she threw on a t-shirt instead (and a bra as an afterthought) and was back downstairs in a flash. They were considerably less awkward now.
Things calmed down, they finished breakfast, and Katie managed to convince Boromir to help her out with the dishes. She stuck him with washer duty.
"Do you live alone, Lady Katie?" he asked once they had established a nice assembly line.
"I've told you, just Katie, but no, I don't," she replied, taking ac lean plate from him and beginning to dry it off. "I live with four other girls my age - early twenties if you wanna know," she added with a smirk. "But they're not back on campus yet," she said to explain their absence.
"Back on campus?"
"Yeah, see we all go to the school here in this town, like, higher learning for the professions we want to go into," she explained. "We just had our winter break, but I came back early to get away from my family."
"You say that this learning is for professions you want to pursue?" Boromir asked, steering the conversation away from what he sensed to be the sore spot of her family. Katie nodded.
"Yeah, like, one of my roommates, Alexis, is studying to be a nurse. Dani is an art major - see all these gorgeous bowls?" Katie said, going over to one of the cabinets and pointing out a specific stack. Boromir nodded. "She made all of those, she wants to be a potter," she bragged.
"And what of yourself?" Boromir inquired.
"I'm studying English Education, so eventually, once I'm done with school, I'll be teaching kids to read, write, understand and appreciate literature, write well, and other stuff like that," she explained. Boromir raised his eyebrows at that, but from what Katie could tell, he looked impressed.
"You must be an intelligent woman, then," he assessed. Yep, impressed.
"I like to think so," Katie said with a shrug and a little smile.
They finished up the dishes fairly quickly after that and the next hour found them in various places about the house. The hobbits were gathered at the kitchen counter, talking amongst themselves; Gandalf, Aragorn, and Legolas were at the dining table, discussing how they'd all ended up in central Illinois in the first place; and Boromir, Gimli, and Katie were in the living room, the latter nursing her third cup of coffee for the morning.
By nine o'clock, the hobbits were hungry again and that meant second breakfast. Katie ended up making them a pound of pasta, but hey were still hungry. Like the frickin hungry hungry caterpillar, she remarked inwardly. She was going to need to go grocery shopping.
Once she convinced them that no, she did not need anyone to go with her, yes, they would be perfectly safe in her home, and yes, she would kill them if they burned town the house, even by accident, she was out the door. What the actual fuck was her life? Her trips to Aldi and Dollar Tree ended up putting a serious dent in her bank account. These guys owed her big time. Especially for the sweatpants and t-shirts and other clothes she picked up at the dollar store and the thrift shop for them all.
She pulled her blue station wagon back into her driveway, trunk jam-packed with food and cheap men's clothes. Shifting to park, turning on the parking brake, and removing her keys from the ignition, she jammed her hat back on her head, returned her scarf to its rightful place around her neck, and stepped out of the car, her snow boots leaving tracks in the white shit on her driveway. She grabbed two bags in each hand and stomped up her front stairs, only to remember that the door was locked.
"Hey, someone come get the door!" she shouted, kicking the door a few times. She caught the sound of feet shuffling and saw a head peeking around the corner into the front room. Katie rolled her eyes at Aragorn who was now approaching the door and when he opened it for her, she brushed past him, pushing two of her bags into his hands.
"Go put this stuff in the kitchen, I'm gonna go get the rest."
"Do you need help?" he asked, even as Legolas and Boromir were walking into the room.
"No!" Katie dissented sharply, catching the three men off-guard. "I mean, I've got it," she backtracked.
"It's no trouble," Boromir insisted.
"Guys, I appreciate the offer, but you're not exactly inconspicuous, just look at yourselves," Katie finally said with a sigh. The three of them exchanged looks, observing each other, only to turn back to Katie with slightly puzzled looks on their faces. "Oh, for god's sake, just stay here and I'll be back with the rest of the shit," she said firmly, walking out the door and slamming it behind her. Grumbling to herself about damn chivalrous and stubborn nobility, she stomped back out to her car and pulled the next five bags from the trunk. She dropped them inside the door, gave the guys a severe look to keep them from following her, and fetched the three remaining bags.
Katie ended up supervising with Gandalf while the rest of the Fellowship put away the groceries. It was pretty damn great. At least, until Legolas came across the first bag of clothes.
"Katie, what is this?" he asked, looking up from the bag he had been rifling through. Katie pushed herself off of the counter where she'd been sitting and came over to the table where the elf was examining the thrift shop bags.
"This is for you guys," she said, pulling sweatpants and t-shirts and worn-out flannel button downs out of the bags and laying them out on the table. "You guys were so damn stubborn about helping me with my errands, but since I'm pretty sure you'd give my elderly neighbors heart attacks if they saw you looking like you normally do, I thought I'd get some stuff to make you less conspicuous. That is, if you want, I don't know, it was just a thought. Also I guarantee that sweatpants will be the comfiest things you ever wear," she declared. The guys had gathered around her and the bags and had started digging through to see what they could find.
"I had to guess on the sizing for it all," Katie told them, running a nervous hand through her hair. "I did what I could with what I could afford."
"How much did this cost you?" Boromir was quick to ask, and as much as Katie wanted to tell them exactly how much they owed her, he just looked so damn guilty. "Don't worry about it, at least not for now," she said, waving away his worry, though he still looked reluctant to take anything from the bags. "Look, if you want to repay me, then somebody can go shovel the snow on my driveway while I teach Sam how to use the stove so I can nap through elevensies and lunch." Boromir started to go for the door and his boots, but Katie stopped him. "Where do you think you're going?"
"To shovel your snow," he answered simply, and it took nearly everything Katie had in her not to rip her hair out.
"Did you forget the thing about how y'all stick out like a sore thumb? Put on some normal clothes and then you can shovel my snow," Katie directed him, and surprisingly to her, he followed her direction. He found a pair of sweatpants that looked like they might be long enough and grabbed a few shirts so he could figure out what fit and what didn't, and he dropped up to the bathroom to change.
When he came back downstairs, Katie was pleasantly surprised. And really damn temped to get his hair up in a man-bun. He had found a pair of grey sweatpants and a reddish flannel button own, though it looked as though he had been unable to button the collar. Honestly, it worked on him.
"Alright then. In the closed by the front door there's a large coat, like, really fucking big, and it should fit even you," Katie said as Boromir was lacing up his boots. Her dad, her six-foot-four and very broad-shouldered dad, had let her take his carheart jacket to school with her and she had expected to wear it when the weather got unbearably cold, but now it was just incredibly lucky that she had it. It fit Boromir pretty damn perfectly actually, which was a sight in itself, and Katie was finally ready to admit that he could pass for a normal guy. She showed him where she kept her snow shovel, warned him against scratching her car, and put him to work. This was great.
Sam got the hang of the stove real quick and once he was acquainted with the kitchen and where she kept everything, Katie could say for the first and probably last time that she trusted a hobbit in her kitchen. With that, she retreated up to her bedroom for a much needed nap.
By the afternoon of the Fellowship of the Ring's second day in Katie Zimmer's house, she was on the brink of a breakdown. She was going insane. She had never cooked so many meals in such a short stretch of time before. She swore that hobbits not only had two hollow legs, but they probably had seven stomachs too, one for each meal of the day. And the questions, good lord the questions. They were all so damn curious. Katie found herself talking about everything from what her roommates were like to where the nearest brewery was to explaining the goddamn checks and balances system in regards to the three branches of the United States Government.
Katie was exhausted. She couldn't handle this. She was an introvert at heart and this was far too much human (and dwarf and elf and hobbit and wizard) interaction for her. So she may or may not have introduced the Fellowship of the Ring to modern cinema.
She did have to answer questions about how TVs and the internet work, plus giving them some context, but they seemed to enjoy Disney movies, so that gave Katie a bit of a rest. She pulled up Netflix and let them have at it. They agreed that Fantasia was beautiful but kind of weird and they loved the story of Mulan. Katie herself was entertained by their reactions to Jumanji and once they moved on to her dvd collection, she was pleasantly surprised by how well they took to the Harry Potter series.
Thanks to Gandalf taking a long-ass time to figure out how to get them back to Middle Earth, the Fellowship plus Katie had the time to begin morphing into something of a mildly dysfunctional family. Katie was the default authority on practically everything, Sam and Frodo did most of the cooking, and Aragorn and Boromir took turns shoveling the driveway. Sometimes Legolas would join Katie on grocery runs, his ears hidden underneath a hideous laplander, and Gimli, Merry, and Pippin were always ready to help with whatever chores needed to be done around the house. It was pretty damn great, even if the grocery expenses were breaking the bank and they were more cramped than a pack of sardines.
As obnoxious as they all could be, Katie found that these dorks were growing on her. Sam was one of the kindest souls she had ever met, though he could be a bit of a mother hen, while Frodo had a certain amount of sass to him and it really started to come out a few days after they first arrived; he was a snarky little shit when he wanted to be. Merry and Pippin were textbook partners in crime; Tolkien had not been lying about the two of them.
Gimli loved to tell stories and hear them in return. Katie had heard a fuck-ton of stories about Erebor over the last few days. Boromir was frustratingly chivalrous, but once he got comfortable (or once you got a few drinks in him) he loved to tease people. Katie found herself exchanging good-natured barbs with him more than once and it was fucking fantastic. What surprised Katie the most was Aragorn and Legolas. Once they accepted that they couldn't do anything to help Gandalf figure out this shitstorm, they relaxed and once they had chilled out, they were almost as bad as Merry and Pippin. They were little fucking shits and were constantly giving Katie a hard time about something or other.
They were a bunch of obnoxious little farts.
There was one night - Katie thought it might have been the fourth night? - where they had ended up all seated together in the living room - even Gandalf sat in the armchair, having been convinced to take a break - that they just talked. They had been talking about idle things until Gimli picked up a framed photo on the end table beside the couch.
"Is this your family, lass?" he asked, turning the photograph towards Katie. She gave him a nod and a strained almost-smile. The photo was a selfie that Katie had taken two summers ago on Father's day; her dad was crouched in the front with Katie and her phone, the dog between them, while her mom and brother leaned in behind them to fit in the frame.
"Yeah," she said tightly. "Yeah, my mom, my dad, and my little brother Tommy," she elaborated, "plus our dog, Simon," she added with a warm smile.
"You don't look much like them," Pippin said from his seat beside the dwarf. Katie shrugged. It was true. She stuck out like a sore thumb; with her blonde hair and green eyes, she looked more like their golden retriever than she did her brown haired and brown eyed family.
"Mom says I got my coloring from some Polish great aunt on her side," she explained, watching her guests pass the photograph around the room. "I've got her nose, though," she added with a little smile, "and people say we walk the same way."
Apparently satisfied, conversation turned towards the rest of their families. Gimli told stories about his family in Erebor, Aragorn told a few anecdotes about growing up in Rivendell, and the hobbits went on and on about who was related to who and how exactly that worked. Boromir noticed, though, that Katie wasn't entirely comfortable with this topic of conversation. While she had told them about her family, when conversation came back around to her, she only spoke at length about her teenage younger brother.
Later that night, after most of the Fellowship had gone to sleep, Boromir found Katie in the kitchen, sipping a cup of tea and fiddling with that small, rectangular device she always had with her. She nodded to him in greeting and said nothing as he closed the door behind him so that any conversation they might have would not wake the others. He got himself a glass of water and took a seat beside her, the pair of them sitting in silence for a few moments until Katie relaxed again.
"My brother had always been the cleverer one of the two of us," Boromir began. He did not know what trouble Katie had with her family, but he wanted her to know that he would listen if she chose to tell him. "I admire him for that. He is stubborn, tough, and wise beyond his years. He has an abundance of positive qualities, but our father does not see that," he said, his voice lowering as he spoke. Beside him, Katie set down her device and placed it face down on the countertop, its light and moving pictures now invisible.
"I have tried to make our father see Faramir's quality; I have done everything that I can, but he has a grudge that I cannot sway," Boromir continued. "It pains me to see it. Faramir tries his best to please him, to do his will, but all he gets in return is scorn. I would have my father see him for who he truly is, see him for the leader and scholar that he wishes to become, but I can do nothing," he finished, letting his words hang in the air around them.
"My parents - I know my parents love me," Katie began softly after a few moments of silence. "I know that they care about me and that they want what's best for me, but sometimes they think they know what that is when they couldn't be more wrong," she explained. Boromir's patient silence prompted her to continue. "About a week ago, a few days before I came back here, I told my parents something about myself that they didn't know. I came out with it and while they said they still love me, they took it hard. They didn't want to accept it. I think they're still in denial about it, to be honest, but I left home before I could find out."
Katie took a deep breath to steady herself before continuing.
"Tommy knew long before I told my parents about it, though, and he's as supportive as ever," she said, a grateful smile growing on her lips. "He told me this morning - sent me a message-" she gestured to the device on the counter, "that my mom had said something about me just needing to 'find the right person,' but that he defended me," she said. "I don't know what I did to deserve him as a brother," she said, and Boromir could hear the familiar tone of familial love in her voice. He was curious as to what she meant by her mother's words, but he let the matter drop. Beside him, Katie let out a sigh, running her hands through her messy hair.
All at once, Boromir was struck by how much she had done for them. This young woman - this girl who was barely more than half his age and only came up to his chin - had taken them in, fed and clothed them, and all she had asked in return was for them to do odd jobs around the house. In this moment, she reminded him of Faramir - doing everything she could and asking for hardly anything in return. She actually reminded him a lot of Faramir, if he was being honest. She had the same scholarly mind as he did, content to spend hours with her nose in a book; she had a similar stubbornness and while she was a bit more jaded than Faramir, Boromir could still see her youthful hope for better times to come.
"If your family will not accept you as you are, then they are fools," Boromir finally said, and Katie raised her head to look up at him with doubt, anxiety, and a faint glimmer of hope in her eyes. "You are a generous, intelligent, and kind young woman, Katie, and if they cannot look past their grudges to see those qualities then that is not your fault," he insisted, placing a hand on her shoulder.
"Do not agonize over it. It is out of your hands," he said, repeating words he had told Faramir countless times over. Katie nodded in response and, taking Boromir by surprise, lowered herself from her stool and went over to him, hugging him around his middle. It took Boromir a moment to hug her back, and he realized that she was burying her face in his shoulder. Again, she reminded him of Faramir, for when he was only five years old, he had done the same at their mother's funeral.
They stood there for awhile, the clock on the wall ticking away the seconds, until finally, Katie spoke.
"Thank you," was all she said, but if was soft and muffled by Boromir's shoulder.
"It's no trouble," Boromir insisted, carefully loosening their embrace so he could look her in the eye. "Family is not restricted to blood," he said, and Katie could feel the gravity of his words. "I may not have a sister, but I would be proud to have one like you," he said with a smile, bringing up a hand to wipe away a stray tear that had begun to roll down Katie's cheek.
"Thank you," she said again, a slightly tearful smile upon her lips.
"Think nothing of it," Boromir insisted. "Go, get some rest, you'll feel better in the morning," he said. Katie nodded and with one more hug, she bid him goodnight and retreated up to her bedroom.
On the sixth day since the Fellowship of the Fucking Ring had turned up on Katie's doorstep, they were sitting in the living room, bowls of popcorn in strategic places so that everyone could reach at least one of them, and Indiana Jones: The Last Crusade was playing on the TV.
"The penitent man shall pass, the penitent man shall pass, the penitent man shall-"
"Ha!" Indy's muttering about the saw trap was interrupted by a triumphant shout from the dining room where Gandalf had set up shop, writing things out and sketching things up and otherwise trying to figure out what the fuck had happened and how to undo it. It seemed like he had.
"What?" Katie shouted to the wizard through a mouthful of popcorn. Merry slapped her lightly on the shoulder, wordlessly scolding her for her manners or lack thereof. There was a sound of a chair scraping against the floor and of papers rustling and all of a sudden, Gandalf was standing in the doorway of the living room.
"I know how to get back!" the grey wizard told them, and the mood of the room turned somber. Going back meant leaving this comfort; going back meant not just returning to their home, but returning to their quest.
It was time for them to go.
The next morning they got back into their traveling clothes, their cloaks fastened around their necks (though a few of them had stuffed sweatpants and sweatshirts into their packs). Gimli had a bottle of hard cider in his pack, Sam had taken a small sampling of spices, and Aragorn had snatched Legolas's hideous laplander. Katie herself was now in possession of a small dagger from Aragorn because according to him, Legolas, Gimli, and Boromir, a young woman living alone (no matter the fact that she did have roommates) should have something better with which to defend herself than an eighteen ounce carpentry hammer. The blade was simple, its handle wrapped in black leather with a blade about half the length of her forearm.
Katie stood with them now in her front hallway, having exchanged hugs with them all and waiting to say goodbye. She hugged herself around her middle, her new dagger in hand and shifting her weight from boot-clad foot to boot-clad foot (Boromir had insisted on shoveling her driveway one last time before they left and she had leant him a hand), and looked on with a surprising amount of sadness. She was really going to miss them.
They bid her farewell and Gandalf recited the spell he had worked out, a ball of light growing from the tip of his staff and engulfing the Fellowship. The light was blinding and Katie threw an arm up to shield her eyes from the brightness of it all as a wind whipped around them, blowing her hair every which way.
When the light faded, Katherine Zimmer's home was empty.
Completely empty.
"Are you fucking kidding me?" Katie shouted, her voice bouncing back from the mountains and echoing all around.
"Lass?"
"What's she doing here?"
"Gandalf, what happened?"
"Someone better give me one of their goddamn thrift shop sweatshirts right now or I swear on my grandfather's grave I will castrate each and every one of you."
Katie never asked to get thrown into this shitstorm. She never asked to host the Fellowship of the Fucking Ring in her house for a week and she sure as hell never asked to get sucked back into Middle Earth with them.
But sometimes, life's a bitch.
Thanks for reading! I can't say when I'll have the next chapter written by, but I can say that I'm working on it.
If you liked the chapter, let me know in a review! I love hearing back from you guys.
Natalie out.