Chapter 3
Most days now, I wondered what I would even do with myself if and when my babysitters vanished. The day that Rose and Esme and Estella and all the rest left me—would I be strong enough to handle Faramir on my own? It had been six weeks since his tumultuous birth, now mid-December, and winter was fully upon the Shire.
I was getting stronger each day, making little progresses, standing, walking down the hall to the privy. But my meals were still cooked; my son still taken care of but for his feedings, and my every want was met and fulfilled by someone else, most often, before I even voiced the need. I felt like a patient to be sure, and though I don't think that's quite what the women around me were going for, they couldn't change how it felt.
Heavy skirts, along with woolen vests and sweaters concealed my soft and lack luster form from myself, and concealed the weight I was losing from everyone else. I had no appetite, and the only reason I ate anything at all was to be able to feed my little redheaded baby. The baby weight I had gained while pregnant seemed to slip from me, with no effort on my own part. I slept often, the light was so low and the world was so muffled with the snows.
There is something incomprehensible about the face of an infant. A tiny person, brand new, without a past, unscarred. They are wholly terrifying.
It has been weeks since his birth; and still, I cannot believe him.
This baby, red-haired, wrinkled and hungry all of the time, is completely mine. And he will be the only one. He will never know the bother of a crying sister waking him up at night. Will never have to learn to share his mother, or his favorite toy.
I still do not know what to say to him. As we sit and rock, I look at his little face, a miniature of the face that I have looked upon and loved for countless days, mounting months; and am speechless. I stutter out simple sentences and hum because he seems to like the sound. But I cannot find any words to weave him a story.
I have tried telling him about his namesake, about his father, his birth. But all of it comes out garbled. The memories seem to run away from me.
I didn't know what I was waiting for, but I couldn't seem to start again since Faramir's birth, didn't feel a whole person anymore, capable of going on. Once upon a time, I would have hated myself for the weakness of it all—now I just lived with it and slept.
OOO
Rosie's pregnancy seemed to be the final brick in the wall that Merna had built between herself and the rest of us. Rose was over four months along when she and Sam finally let word get out.
I don't think Merna was jealous. Though that is what the others surmised. The pain in her face after she knew, stemmed from something else. After that, she was just, blank. The only one who got any emotion out of her at all was little Faramir. He could smile now, and she smiled back at her son with real love.
The rest of us got nothing. We might as well not have existed.
As Rosie got bigger, Merna got smaller. Faramir was two months old and doing well, he was getting chubbier by the day. I wondered how she did it. How that baby put on weight as his mother withered away in front of us.
Sam and Rosie pulled away from her, spending less and less time at her home, as they prepared themselves for the new member of their family. I think that was best either way. It must have been hard for Merna to watch. To see another baby be welcomed into a loving, complete home, while it was still, just her and Faramir.
I wanted to get close to her, be someone she could trust. But Merna and I had never been close…I ranked last in her friendships, it didn't bother me, it was how it was. Still, I tried to hug her a little tighter when I left at night with Estella, hold her a second longer. She needed it, even if she wouldn't say so.
And not for the first time, did I find myself wishing that one of those two that had been so madly in love with her, would just step up, and be the person that she needed.
"Come now, hush, hush. Here it is, don't cry." Merna coos. Faramir is wriggling, turning his face away, and crying quietly.
Merna bends to press kisses on his face, breathing sweetly across his little nose. "You're hungry, I know you are. So calm down, baby, shhh." She croons. Faramir's eyes settle on his mother's face, his chest swelling with a sigh; and he turns his face back and latches on.
"Alright, we're decent, you can look."
I turned around and Merna smiled, she'd settled a blanket lightly over herself and Faramir's round head. She laughed quietly at me in that old-Merna way I had missed.
I was sure my ears red to their tips, and wished ruefully that I had just waited in the kitchen for her, after she'd said it was time to feed the baby.
"Hi." I tell her, grinning. "I've brought the groceries. They're in the pantry already. How are you?"
She shakes her head. "If I keep getting deliveries like this, I'll be bigger soon than I was when I was pregnant. I'm wonderful, how are you?"
Looking ruefully at the way her collarbones jut from above the blanket draped across her, I can only shrug. "Bored. Pippin is still being swarmed by his sisters…not to mention his mum now that they aren't occupied with you, and Sam and Rosie are swimming in each others' eyes an even higher percentage of the time."
"What about Estella?"
"Being sent off seems to have touched a nerve. She knew it was time for you to have the baby to yourself, but I got two earfuls all week about it." I sighed.
"And Frodo?" Merna twitched a bit, just at the sound of his name and Faramir seemed to tense. He was his mother's son, as in tune to her heart as she was. She patted his little back, and rocked a little more insistently.
"Frodo doesn't come out of his hole." Merry bit his lip.
"What? What else is wrong?" Merna questioned, smoothing a hand over Faramir's back, patting gently.
"I guess he's covered most of the windows in his study with maps. Maps of the mountains, and of Rivendell. It seems like he wants to leave again, venture out of the Shire completely."
Merna swallowed, nodded. Talking about anything that concerns Frodo upsets her. And I still don't understand how she went from homeless to owning Frodo's second hole. What could have possessed Frodo to be so generous when even hearing her name obviously still upset him as well.
At this point, it didn't seem as if anymore meddling was going to improve the situation, so I tried to just stay out of it. It had been a few days over a week since Merna had expelled all of her helpers from her home, and Estella was prodding on an almost daily basis to go check on Merna and the baby. It was obvious that Estella didn't wholly trust her to be alone with Faramir. But from what he could see, she was doing just fine. The little tyke didn't look any worse for wear, and it was reassuring to see Merna out of bed, and up and about.
"Do you think he'll leave then?" She asked quietly, chewing her lip, still looking intently down at the baby instead of up at me.
"No—well, at least not for a while yet. Winter in the Shire is one thing, winter in the mountains is another, and I think we all learned that lesson well. Even the trek to Rivendell would be more horrible than usual this time of year."
He knew she already knew this, just needed some reassurance.
Merna looked up, eyes glassy. "I can't bear the thought of him leaving, as selfish and horrible as that makes me. Does he ever ask about me?" She reached a trembling hand up and smoothed a long strand of hair back from her eyebrow, thumb playing across the scar there.
And sitting there in her parlor, snow falling outside, I knew that the answer to that question would hurt her, but lying would just prolong the pain.
"No, Merna. He doesn't."
At that, she gave me a watery smile, and asked if I'd be on my way so she could put the baby down for a nap.
Ooo
A large part of Frodo Baggins wanted to come to her rescue. He knew how bad off she was—at the present he'd stopped having Merry, or Pippin to Bag End just because he couldn't take listening to the retelling of just how bad.
His heart ached for her, for the babe that they all told him had his eyes. However uncanny the resemblance, he was self-assured that it could be explained away by the blood he shared with Pippin's family, on his mother's side. Though, a small voice inside of him piped up that Faramir could well be his, and the child's red hair explained by that same family tie with the Tooks.
And so Merna still tormented his heart, though he hadn't seen her face in weeks. Bag End was his prison—even trips to the bakery or the post were uncomfortable. He sensed knowing glances and could almost palpate the nervous energy of the hobbits around him. He wondered how they all suddenly knew so much about his once private, existence.
Sam had taken to shopping and gardening for him once again, refusing payment in all forms except for the occasional sharing of dinner or second lunch.
The weeks passed, while the days got shorter, colder, darker. They mirrored his mood. Even letters from Gandalf did nothing to cheer him. His maps and charts were unpleasant to look on as well, for as much as he would have loved to leave the Shire, he knew putting more distance between him and Merna wouldn't lessen the hurt.
Disgusted at the stalemate they were now locked in, but too dismayed to do anything proactive about it—Frodo continued to wait.
OOO
