4. Such a fine line
Life moves forward and conspires.
She stood in the middle of her apartment and hesitated. The sun shone through the skylight bathing the studio in a warm golden light that set aflame the dust lingering in the air – the same dust that she had fiercely battled against for three years and kept losing to. Everything was in its proper place – or properly misplaced like some items were wont to be despite her ingrained tidiness. Her home was waiting for her to go through her usual daily motions, to start a kettle, turn on the music – she had been humming the tune to "Dancing queen" the whole morning and her eyes migrated to the stack of CD-s placed on the bottom shelf of her coffee table.
It was tempting, to do so. To simply enjoy the Saturday morning with the cheerful tunes of the Seventies' pop reverberating through the attic while she read the Klaus Weber book she had purchased the week before and sipped tea, furiously scribbling notes in the small hardback notebook she had finally purchased after nearly losing all her notes to a gust of wind in Bute Park
But she couldn't.
Now that she had gotten the honours there was no reason for her to stay in Cardiff any longer. And she had already told her landlord she would vacate the apartment by the end of that week. She would be going home to Bristol for the rest of the summer, save from the week she was planning to spend in London, apartment hunting.
She grinned at the thought. She could hardly wait to go to the capital. A whole week in London and in Autumn she would be moving there. For two whole years. Maybe even more if she chose to do her doctorate there – she had no doubts about wanting to get a Ph.D., it was only the University she would be doing her doctorate at she had not yet decided about, but there was plenty of time for that.
London was going to be splendid. She just knew. She never had a bad time in London, not even when she had gotten lost or when a sudden thunderstorm had left her drenched to the bone – nothing could compare to riding a pony in the rain for a whole fortnight, she recalled wryly.
And she was going to stay at Thorin's.
She was so excited about this. But at the same time there was a knot of sadness that bound her thoughts tightly. Before she could think of travelling to the capital she had to pack all of her belongings and bid her Cardiff home farewell. And that was not so splendid. Not at all.
She looked around herself, taking in the details of her home and committing them to memory.
She had gotten fond of the small attic apartment. It was the first home she had ever had – in both her lives – just for herself. And that made it a special place. Her special place. But now she had to break it apart, book by book, pillow by pillow and plate by plate, each and every item would have to be taken away from its usual lodging and packed into the cardboard boxes that laid limply folded near the door.
She heaved a heavy sigh. She had to do it, but it was hard. It was like leaving the Blue Mountains all over again. There was the excitement of the days to come, the brightness of a future that beckoned Ori to move forward, to peel away from the past, from what was comfortably familiar and trudge into the unknown. But there was also the knowledge that some things would be forever lost. Things that may seem small and unimportant, but which held a unique value in her heart. Her favourite chair in the kitchenette or the way the light filtered through the bookshelf, painting lines and shapes on her bed in the mornings.
It was the same grief Ori had felt at leaving the sooth-covered hearth of their home in Thorin's Halls or the small desk Ori had written daily at.
She had felt it before, this reluctance at letting go. But like Ori had done in the past she would do it again. She only hoped the analogy with leaving for the Quest would not extend to her stay at London. Because while Erebor had been a marvellous place, a kingdom comparable only with the halls of Khazad-Dûm, it had claimed a price too high to bear paying once, let alone ever again. And so had the Halls of Durin, her mind added sombrely.
She closed her eyes for a brief moment and breathed deeply. After she blinked them open she went to her coffee table and rummaged through her CD-s before putting her favourite ABBA album in the player and setting to work, singing along.
His mobile phone chimed loudly and Thorin moved the pile of folders laid above it to a relatively empty spot on his desk and retrieved the device. He flicked it open, smiling when Ori's message greeted him:
"Back to Bristol! I haven't realised I own so many things. My room looks like a bazaar. XD"
He leaned back on his chair and chuckled. He could picture Ori sitting in a small room besieged by her belongings, much like he felt when he looked at the crowed chaos of paperwork that his desk sported. Thorin had noticed the amount of belongings she owned, books mostly, but also knick-knacks and pillows and various unidentifiable knitted items which had been placed around her studio, so he wasn't surprised at all and duly texted her so.
After pressing "send" he put the phone in his pocket and raised from his chair, taking his mug of coffee to sip from it – tea was too mild to deal with his work lately – and stretched his legs a bit. He thankfully had an office large enough to allow some pacing before retracing his steps. He stopped by the window, mug hovering in mid-air and smiled.
It was nice to hear from Ori. They hadn't been in touch so much in the past month, she had been very busy with her graduation and he had been more so here at the Ministry. The past couple of months had been very taxing, changes in the budget had made the workload exponentially increase and he had been hard pressed to finish his reports, on top of another fifty other tasks. And to make it worse, Roberts, his assistant, had been temporarily relocated – temporarily only because Thorin had raised hell after a fortnight of being subjected to the sheer incompetence and stupidity of the new P.A. he had been given. The return of his cripplingly shy assistant had been a blessing, even if Thorin still had way more work that needed to be done that actual time to do it.
He put the mug down on the windowsill, looking at the hot hazy day outside the window and blessing air-conditioning with all his heart.
Thorin liked his job well enough, it paid the bills and he still had enough left to live comfortably. It was perhaps a little monotonous, but no worse than any desk job could be and after spending most of his adult life moving from one place to another and too often risking his neck on a daily basis – eerily alike his past life – he was glad Harriet had been able to pull those connections of hers and made it possible for Thorin to find a job at the Ministry. It was stable and unexciting and it wasn't difficult to like it for it. Thorin had always only wanted stability. Even in his past life he had never suffered from wanderlust. Quite the contrary in fact. He had only ever wanted a home, his home. And that had made him risk his life and the lives of his companions. A home that was truly lost to him.
He ran his fingers through his hair. Perhaps one day he would be able to grieve for his lost home.
His mobile phone sounded the arrival of another message and he shook his head, fishing it out of his pocket. Ori's ability to intercept his maudlin musings was uncanny. He opened the text message and read:
"Haha, very funny. How are you? "
His thumb hovered a moment over the buttons and he glanced towards his desk.
"Busy..." he began writing and told her about his woes at work.
Message after message they continued chatting the whole afternoon. The beeps from his phone interrupted him periodically from the tedious report he had resumed editing in the meanwhile, and before he noticed the day trickled by. When Roberts knocked in his usual hesitant way and stuttered that he was going home and if Mr. Smith needed something from him, only to be waved away by, Thorin was in a far lighter mood than he would have normally been.
Ori sat on the narrow balcony of the apartment, idly flicking through the pages of "Samsara and the Soul" by Klaus Weber. The sticky heat was nearly unbearable, even that late in the evening and Ori's clothes were damp with perspiration. She took a sip of her quickly warming iced tea and tried to concentrate on the book on her lap, but the words eluded her. It wasn't that the book was poorly written. Quite the opposite. The Eastern religions scholar form Germany was an excellent prosaist and his works were devoid of the usual dryness typical of academic papers. No, it was simply too hot to think, to do anything really, let alone try to comprehend the postulates of Buddhism.
But it wasn't nearly late enough to go to sleep. She took her mobile phone from the small wicker table where it laid and checked if Thorin had replied to her last message. Unsurprisingly the screen greeted her blankly and she put the device back on its previous place. Thorin always took his time typing a response. She suspected he carefully examined his words before sending his texts. Unlike their conversations which would hiccup and reach an impasse still often enough – the sheer amount of taboo topics was impressive and it was inevitable that one or two escaped their notice until it was too late. Thankfully they always recovered rapidly from these moments of awkwardness, but they happened nonetheless. On the other hand their texting was a smooth business, flowing with ease.
Sometimes it was strange for her to think that they had become friends. They had barely exchanged words in their past life. She had been too shy and he had been too burdened. Not that he was unburdened now, she mused.
"What is it, pet?" her mother's voice snapped her form her thoughts and she hummed in puzzlement at the question.
"You were frowning, Anne" she told her, stepping out on the balcony in all her height – Ori hadn't inherited that trait for her mother, that was certain. A flurry of her turquoise summer dress accompanied her mother's steps and she gave Ori one of her strange smiles and leaned on the railing. Her long blond curls bounced at the movement.
"I was thinking, mum" Ori replied sheepishly, closing "Samsara and the Soul" and placing it on the wicker table between her phone and the glass of iced tea.
"You always think." her mother stated airily, placing her forearms on the concrete railing "Do not overdo yourself, pet. Thoughts can be a tricky thing."
"I think several millennia worth of philosophy would disagree with you." Ori told her with a chuckle and was about to add another dry jab when her phone buzzed into life. She hastily unlocked the screen and opened Thorin's reply. And laughed. Grinning, she immediately began to type a response.
"Is he handsome?" her mother asked, interrupting her mid-word.
"What?" she spluttered, snapping her head up and looking at her mother in utmost confusion.
There was a twinkle in the older woman's grey eyes.
"The guy you've been texting with all summer. Is he handsome?" she elaborated with a wave of her long-fingered hand.
Ori just looked at her for a moment, dumbfounded at her inquiry and at the same time unsurprised. She should have expected it from her to ask something utterly nonsensical, she reasoned. It was typical for her mother.
"Why do you think it is a he?" she asked defensively unable to think of a reply.
Her mother cocked a blond eyebrow and grinned smugly, showing the wrinkles at the corners of her mouth.
"A girl? I didn't know you were into the fairer sex..." she began slowly.
"Oh for crying out loud, mum!" Ori exclaimed exasperated, while her mother smiled beatifically.
"What?" Janet asked seemingly innocently "I don't really care who you're attracted to..."
"I'm not attracted to him!" she told her mother, feeling her cheeks heat up at the preposterous notion. "Th... John is just a friend" Ori said, nearly slipping her tongue.
Her mother hummed sceptically, looking at her with a knowing expression. She had the unique ability of looking off with the fairies and at the same time being extremely attentive and cunning.
"He is, mum." Ori stated firmly.
"Yes, yes, if you say so, pet." she said placatively, then turned her whole body in her direction and asked conspiratorially "So, is he handsome?"
"Mum!" she cried out.
She wasn't going to go down that particular lane. Thorin was her friend and her King and Ori had no business noticing that he was, in fact, very handsome, or anything. Not that she was going to share with her mother that particular insight. Janet already had her misguided notions about Thorin, namely that Ori was attracted to him, which was utterly absurd, thank you very much. No, she didn't need to encourage her mother.
She shook her head with a frown.
"I'm going to bed, mum." she told her before the older woman could pester her with more inanities – she had just opened her mouth and Ori dreaded what would follow in this particular conversation. She got up from the wicker chair she had been reclined in and scooped her belongings with her.
"Good night." she said tersely and her mother chiming laughter reverberated in the heavy summer air.
"Sleep well, pet." she said. Ori left the balcony and strode to her room with a heavy sigh. She was sweaty, bored and on top of it all he mother had notions. She almost groaned. Ori loved her dearly, but sometimes she was too much. Way too much.
The wipers swung furiously back and forth over the windscreen of his car, helpless against the downpour. It had started as drizzle a couple of miles out of Worthing and it had gotten increasingly worse the closer he had been getting to London.
Thunder clapped in the distance. The road was all but swallowed by the thick curtain of rain and the faint glow of rear lights ahead and the splashing sound of tyres on water were the only signs that Thorin wasn't alone on the road.
There was a strange peace in the apparent sensation of isolation from the world and his thoughts veered from the road ahead to the dull greyness of the Worthing sky that had been reflected in his Uncle's slightly vacant pale eyes that afternoon.
The old man had sat on a wooden bench in the care home's carefully kept garden, staring into nothingness. He hadn't visited him in a while and it had pained Thorin all over again to see him like that. The man who had given him his first proper football, who had taught him how to drive when he had been really too young to learn, who had given Thorin's mother a home for two children and her when Rosie's husband – his father – had left them, a housewife and two children.
He gripped the steering-wheel with force until his joints began to ache. Thorin refused to think about his father – John's father, Thorin had another sire and one who had stood and fought by his side against the dragon and later by Frerin's side...
He shook his head, focusing on the bleakness of the road behind the glass of the windscreen. The sound of the rain hitting against the metal of the roof was deafening and Thorin inhaled deeply, pushing away his thoughts about any of his fathers – one was too painful to think about and the other made his blood boil with a deep growling rage. He thought instead of Tony, his and Harriet's uncle, whose mind was being consumed by Alzheimer's. He felt a fierce fondness for the old wrinkled man who had been the pillar of their mother's strength. It was hard to see him reduced to a shadow of his former self. As equally hard it had been to decide to put him in a care home.
Hard but necessary. After the agonising years of caring for their dying mother until her passing, Harriet hadn't had the strength to take care of their Uncle as well and Thorin at the time had been just deployed in Iraq.
The sky was steadily darkening behind the shroud of rain and grim clouds, and the road was becoming even harder to discern. Thorin sighed. He wished sometimes things had taken a different course, especially with Harriet. He wished – but he also knew in the end it was nothing but worthless and dangerous musings – that he had acted like a true brother should have, supporting her through their mother's illness, but he hadn't been able to stay at home.
There had been a hard comfort in the martial discipline of the Army. There, amongst his fellow soldiers he had felt almost normal, almost in control. And it was ironic that the only moment he had been in control of his mind had been when he had relinquished the former to someone else, be it an officer or merely fate. The precariousness of his life had grounded him like nothing else had ever done – at least in this life.
And so Harriet had had to carry on alone with the burden of a terminally ill mother, a small child and an ex-husband who had been more trouble than support. He should have been there, but this life had always dragged him away from his sister, from anyone other than himself. He was a disappointment as a brother as he had been before. The only silver lining – as cowardly as it was – was that he had died before having to face Dís' disappointment, her hatred.
His left hand lifted from the steering-wheel to run through his short hair and he swallowed before forcing his lungs to breathe. His thought weighed heavily on him. As his heartbeats slowed to a normal pace he wondered if there was ever going to be a moment of solitude in this life that would not summon pain and regrets. And the deepest contempt for himself.
Admittedly though, he reflected, the past year had been somewhat better in that regard, but that had been mostly Ori's doing. From the epiphany she had unwittingly prompted to her shyly cheerful nature Ori had lightened the past months.
He smiled. She made him laugh, genuinely so and Thorin had trouble recalling how long it had been since he had felt that carefree. Before the Army surely, perhaps even before they had moved at Uncle Tony's. During his childhood in Islington?
He never got to answer his own question. The sudden blaring of a car-horn and a flash of light through the rain-streaked window was all his mind registered before the world collapsed in the screeching of brakes and the deafening sound of metal crumpling around him. A sharp pain engulfed him and a scream tore from his lips. Then nothing.
A/N Do not hate me... I mean well *smiles sheepishly and hurriedly walks away to finish writing the next chapter and redeem herself*.
Chapter title taken from "Heart Of Gold" by Neil Young.