Author's Note: Once again, thank you to fluffypurple chainsaw (I
LOVE YOUR NAME!). And here's Chapter 5, where the biggest truth is about
to be discovered. A note that everything in this story is fictional, and
the clues that are found do not pertain to Tolkien in any way and I am not
an expert of Tolkien. Everything in this story is fictional and made up.
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Chapter 5: Clues at the Bird and Baby
We had stopped only once on our way to Oxford, and it was at a KFC for a large box of popcorn chicken, a large fry, and 2 large Cokes. I was shovelling through the popcorn chicken, watching the road carefully. Edith was flipping through my CD wallet, commenting on my odd taste in music. She discovered my collection of Anime CD's. It wasn't my fault they were so bloody catchy! She finally picked out the one with Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody on it. I, who have hated the song since Edith had been known to burst out singing it and NOT shutting up after leaving the movie theater, even found myself helping her with the middle of the song and harmonizing for her. She laughed as the song faded, and I popped another piece of chicken into my mouth. I knew why I was so hungry for chicken. I got major salt cravings around my period for some reason. Great, I thought. This week was off to an agonizing start.
"So who's this guy who wants you to write this article?" She had to ask that question. Out of her usual Top 20 Questions and Sayings to break ackward silences that was a tie with "I like Lord of the Rings." However I would have much preferred, "I like Lord of the Rings' over that right about now. Talking about Tobias wasn't funny. It was actually very Very VERY Annoying.
"He's...charming." I said hesitantly. "In a weird way. I can honestly see you becoming someone like him." Edith was playing with the keychains on her keyrings. "Or already being someone like him." She looked up wtih her wide eyes and played with the keychain a little more, still smiling giddily. "I don't know. He claims to have found a way into Middle Earth through Kensington Park and is completely obssessed with making my life miserable."
Edith nodded, still flicking the keychain. I glanced over at her confused from my spot on the right side and looked back to the road. "Why do you ask?"
There was a long while of silence, and at first I thought Edith wasn't going to answer. When she finally did, I was really wishing she hadn't.
"I like Lord of the Rings." She replied with a smile and a laugh. Even if she hadn't have said anything it would have saved me the moments of listening to her again. I sighed and leaned into the steering wheel, looking at the road signs. Apparently I was travelling 4 km over the speed limit. I shrugged and slowed down a little bit.
"I am very aware of your obssession with Lord of the Rings." I replied a little sadistically. She grinned again. "You remind me any time you lose your train of thought and have nothing better to say."
"Why don't you read them anymore?" Alright, that was the number one question I didn't want Edith to ask me. It was also on her Top 20 Questions and Sayings to Break and Ackward Silence, it being number three, just behind her natural, 'I like Lord of the Rings,' and, 'Orlando Bloom/Johnny Depp is sexy/hot.' I looked at the road, without another sound or response, not giving her the pleasure of hearing me torture myself subliminally over my past difficulties with the books I had once regarded as my Treasures. I stared ahead of me, knowing Edith was wanting a response.
"I don't read them because I don't like them you know that." I said, still not looking at her. She grinned somewhat, slightly amused with what I had just said. I looked over at her. "What?" I asked. She laughed slightly.
"You go from them being your prized possession to them being decorative piece on your mantle? That's some change Lane." I was getting angry, and I knew it was from the salt of the chicken mixed with the forebodense of my monthly friend, but I shook off the urge to snap at Edith for her comment on my disability to enjoy Middle Earth as I once had.
"Well, Edith, people change over the years." I looked at the road sign saying Oxford was a littl over a half hour away. I grinned. Good, I thought. Hopefully Edith will be too amazed looking at the Eagle and Child Tavern that she'll forget that I hate the man who once visited there and will stop bothering me about the problems I have with my father. Wait, not father, my father's books.
"I just don't see how someone who grew up with the books, who has the ORIGINAL copies (Note: Edith has always been jealous of my original copies of the books), and a father who loved them more then life itself now hates them as much as she hates the memory of her father." I looked shocked and gaped at her, looking hurt and wounded at what she had said.
"Hate my father? Are you serious?" She nodded, with that look on her face that surely meant, 'Yeah, and you know I'm right.' I looked back at the road, still gaping. I stopped to swallow the saliva that was developing in my mouth but look back at her for a moment. "You can't be. I loved my father."
"I never said you didn't." Edith said frankly and flatly. "All I said was that you hate his memory. Not him as a person." I was still in shock. Edith had basically told me...to my face...that I was scorning my father's memory. Sure, there was the tiny lie I told to Tobias in the park and the other lie I told to him on the phone, but other then that, they were just lies. It wasn't like anyone cared if I loved the books or not. Past was past, and I'm planning to bury it...one way or another.
"I can't believe you just said that." I said, trying not to laugh, still in shock at what Edith had just said. Edith shrugged and I looked at her again. "I cannot believe you basically just told me that I was massacring my father's corpse." Edith shrugged again and still said nothing. I think at that moment I was very close to going on one of those self ritious rants. You know the ones in movies where the main character breaks down into tears (usually the female) and begins crying about everything hard in their life and how nothign ever works for them? But then I remembered that I had chose to live in the house he died in, and I of course, made the choice to keep the books on my mantle, and I of course made the choice to keep his library locked and never cry at his funeral and...
"Whoa, Delanely calm down." I was breathing heavily and I realized suddenly I had just done it. I'd done the break down. Edith placed her hand on my shoulder and I wiped the tears from my face, still a little afraid. I looked back at the road. Edith moved her hand back. "Are you okay?" I nodded, still a little shocked. Edith was looking scared.
"Yeah, yeah I'm okay." I sighed again, and Edith didn't say anything. I reached for the radio and put Bohemian Rhapsody on again, just to please Edith. She didn't say anything, and for a while we just sat there in silence.
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My first impression of Tolkien was that he was a sexist old git who did nothing with his time except write stories. Alright this was my second impression of Tolkien. My first was that he was the biggest genius of my time, and should be regarded with respect and all that other stuff. Edith always thought like that. After my father died Tolkien transformed from being a genius into a grumpy, sexist, old man with no sense of humour and a big vocabulary.
Walking into the Tavern, I suddenly saw another side to this once fabled Genius. Now he was not just a grumpy, sexist, old man with no sense of humour and a big vocabulary in my mind. He was now a grumpy, sexist, and intoxicated old man with no sense of humour and a big vocabulary. All in all, a bad mix. Edith was in awe of the hardwood area of the whole building. I felt a little silly. Edith, being this short and stout woman with fluffy hair and a blue jacket and myself in my long black tenchcoat and striped glove. If anything, we were an odd pair and were probably considered lesbians. I think Eden got that from the atmosphere too, since she and I walked apart from one another for a moment.
The tavern was apparantly 'bar served' and was obscure, according to the Oxford Pub Guide I found on the Internet. I looked around, the few tables and stools filled with elderly men. Out of everyone there was only one woman, and she was a fright. An elderly woman, whose hair was hanging out of a loose bun in gray strands that covered every inch of the top of her head. She had a pipe in her mouth, and her right hand was clasped on the end of it, her other arm folded across her waist.
The bar tender, another fright was a young guy with a weird french mustache. He was quiet with myself and Edith. I looked at him and smiled slightly. "Hi." I began. "I'm Delaney Marks from The London Times. I was wondering if I could get a look at the room where JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis used to talk?" He nodded and nudged his head back, still not saying a word. I looked oddly at him and he suddenly got all shirty with me.
"Well what are you waiting for woman? Walk." I gaped at him again and then my tongue, which I have been told is my greatest weapon besides my pen, moved without me thinking.
"I will. Wouldn't want to be in the presence of a pompous bastard like you any longer." I walked off, Edith in toe and my coat flaring off the ground. I could hear the bar tender breathing heavily, like he was shocked with what I said to him. I looked behind me and stuck out my tongue, going into the back rooms where JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis, two of the supposed most acclaimed authors of the 20th century, had once sat and spoke of their two worlds. CS Lewis was more of a Catholic, or so I read somewhere. Edith tapped me on the shoulder as we walked inside.
"I can't believe I'm actually here." She said shocked, moving her hands over the walls of woods. "I can't believe I'm here, in the Tavern where HE used to sit." She said he like she was talking about Christ himself. She walked and sat in one of the chairs, her hand still on the wall and still feeling the grains of wood. "Can you believe it? He actually sat here...in this very room."
"Rivetting." I said emotionlessly, looking around. My father would have loved this. He would have adored this. I still never believed the fact that he never went to the Eagle and Child Tavern. Ever, in his life. I think as a child I never believed him, like I did right now. I looked around again, realizing I wasn't going to find anything here. Believing it to be a wasted trip I turned and look at Edith. "Come on, let's go before the University closes. I still have to see the libraries." Edith looked sad to leaved, and I walked out, suddenly tripping on a cracking floorboard. A second later and my foot fell through the boards and my knees and hands connected with the ground.
I waited for a moment, half expecting the bartender to enter. I smiled when he did not. Edith helped me to my feet. "Are you alright?" She asked me. I nodded, pulling my heel from the floor and looking at the hole more shooe had made. Great, I thought.
"Come on, leave quickly and he might not noti..." My voice faded mid sentence as I look back into the floor and found a box hidden under the boards. Edith looked at it oddly too. I pulled it from under the boards and knelt down, Edith following suit. I blew off the dust. It was an old cigar box, faded with time and wearing with age. I moved my fingers along the lid, still looking behind me.
"Open it Lane." Edith willed me and my fingers pulled the top open, sending dust into the air. After a moment of coughing, we looked and saw a pile of papers, note papers. full of writing and notes about things. I pulled them from the box and found several notes and letters, signed by Tolkien himself. Edith tried to grab them from me but I shoved them back into the box and concealed the box within my jacket.
"Later." I said, and pried the floorboard back up, making it look half presentable. We left without another word, say for a few dirty glances at the bartender.
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Prepare for the Oxford Libraries and most definitely, the letter that gives the clue.
PLEASE R&R!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Chapter 5: Clues at the Bird and Baby
We had stopped only once on our way to Oxford, and it was at a KFC for a large box of popcorn chicken, a large fry, and 2 large Cokes. I was shovelling through the popcorn chicken, watching the road carefully. Edith was flipping through my CD wallet, commenting on my odd taste in music. She discovered my collection of Anime CD's. It wasn't my fault they were so bloody catchy! She finally picked out the one with Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody on it. I, who have hated the song since Edith had been known to burst out singing it and NOT shutting up after leaving the movie theater, even found myself helping her with the middle of the song and harmonizing for her. She laughed as the song faded, and I popped another piece of chicken into my mouth. I knew why I was so hungry for chicken. I got major salt cravings around my period for some reason. Great, I thought. This week was off to an agonizing start.
"So who's this guy who wants you to write this article?" She had to ask that question. Out of her usual Top 20 Questions and Sayings to break ackward silences that was a tie with "I like Lord of the Rings." However I would have much preferred, "I like Lord of the Rings' over that right about now. Talking about Tobias wasn't funny. It was actually very Very VERY Annoying.
"He's...charming." I said hesitantly. "In a weird way. I can honestly see you becoming someone like him." Edith was playing with the keychains on her keyrings. "Or already being someone like him." She looked up wtih her wide eyes and played with the keychain a little more, still smiling giddily. "I don't know. He claims to have found a way into Middle Earth through Kensington Park and is completely obssessed with making my life miserable."
Edith nodded, still flicking the keychain. I glanced over at her confused from my spot on the right side and looked back to the road. "Why do you ask?"
There was a long while of silence, and at first I thought Edith wasn't going to answer. When she finally did, I was really wishing she hadn't.
"I like Lord of the Rings." She replied with a smile and a laugh. Even if she hadn't have said anything it would have saved me the moments of listening to her again. I sighed and leaned into the steering wheel, looking at the road signs. Apparently I was travelling 4 km over the speed limit. I shrugged and slowed down a little bit.
"I am very aware of your obssession with Lord of the Rings." I replied a little sadistically. She grinned again. "You remind me any time you lose your train of thought and have nothing better to say."
"Why don't you read them anymore?" Alright, that was the number one question I didn't want Edith to ask me. It was also on her Top 20 Questions and Sayings to Break and Ackward Silence, it being number three, just behind her natural, 'I like Lord of the Rings,' and, 'Orlando Bloom/Johnny Depp is sexy/hot.' I looked at the road, without another sound or response, not giving her the pleasure of hearing me torture myself subliminally over my past difficulties with the books I had once regarded as my Treasures. I stared ahead of me, knowing Edith was wanting a response.
"I don't read them because I don't like them you know that." I said, still not looking at her. She grinned somewhat, slightly amused with what I had just said. I looked over at her. "What?" I asked. She laughed slightly.
"You go from them being your prized possession to them being decorative piece on your mantle? That's some change Lane." I was getting angry, and I knew it was from the salt of the chicken mixed with the forebodense of my monthly friend, but I shook off the urge to snap at Edith for her comment on my disability to enjoy Middle Earth as I once had.
"Well, Edith, people change over the years." I looked at the road sign saying Oxford was a littl over a half hour away. I grinned. Good, I thought. Hopefully Edith will be too amazed looking at the Eagle and Child Tavern that she'll forget that I hate the man who once visited there and will stop bothering me about the problems I have with my father. Wait, not father, my father's books.
"I just don't see how someone who grew up with the books, who has the ORIGINAL copies (Note: Edith has always been jealous of my original copies of the books), and a father who loved them more then life itself now hates them as much as she hates the memory of her father." I looked shocked and gaped at her, looking hurt and wounded at what she had said.
"Hate my father? Are you serious?" She nodded, with that look on her face that surely meant, 'Yeah, and you know I'm right.' I looked back at the road, still gaping. I stopped to swallow the saliva that was developing in my mouth but look back at her for a moment. "You can't be. I loved my father."
"I never said you didn't." Edith said frankly and flatly. "All I said was that you hate his memory. Not him as a person." I was still in shock. Edith had basically told me...to my face...that I was scorning my father's memory. Sure, there was the tiny lie I told to Tobias in the park and the other lie I told to him on the phone, but other then that, they were just lies. It wasn't like anyone cared if I loved the books or not. Past was past, and I'm planning to bury it...one way or another.
"I can't believe you just said that." I said, trying not to laugh, still in shock at what Edith had just said. Edith shrugged and I looked at her again. "I cannot believe you basically just told me that I was massacring my father's corpse." Edith shrugged again and still said nothing. I think at that moment I was very close to going on one of those self ritious rants. You know the ones in movies where the main character breaks down into tears (usually the female) and begins crying about everything hard in their life and how nothign ever works for them? But then I remembered that I had chose to live in the house he died in, and I of course, made the choice to keep the books on my mantle, and I of course made the choice to keep his library locked and never cry at his funeral and...
"Whoa, Delanely calm down." I was breathing heavily and I realized suddenly I had just done it. I'd done the break down. Edith placed her hand on my shoulder and I wiped the tears from my face, still a little afraid. I looked back at the road. Edith moved her hand back. "Are you okay?" I nodded, still a little shocked. Edith was looking scared.
"Yeah, yeah I'm okay." I sighed again, and Edith didn't say anything. I reached for the radio and put Bohemian Rhapsody on again, just to please Edith. She didn't say anything, and for a while we just sat there in silence.
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My first impression of Tolkien was that he was a sexist old git who did nothing with his time except write stories. Alright this was my second impression of Tolkien. My first was that he was the biggest genius of my time, and should be regarded with respect and all that other stuff. Edith always thought like that. After my father died Tolkien transformed from being a genius into a grumpy, sexist, old man with no sense of humour and a big vocabulary.
Walking into the Tavern, I suddenly saw another side to this once fabled Genius. Now he was not just a grumpy, sexist, old man with no sense of humour and a big vocabulary in my mind. He was now a grumpy, sexist, and intoxicated old man with no sense of humour and a big vocabulary. All in all, a bad mix. Edith was in awe of the hardwood area of the whole building. I felt a little silly. Edith, being this short and stout woman with fluffy hair and a blue jacket and myself in my long black tenchcoat and striped glove. If anything, we were an odd pair and were probably considered lesbians. I think Eden got that from the atmosphere too, since she and I walked apart from one another for a moment.
The tavern was apparantly 'bar served' and was obscure, according to the Oxford Pub Guide I found on the Internet. I looked around, the few tables and stools filled with elderly men. Out of everyone there was only one woman, and she was a fright. An elderly woman, whose hair was hanging out of a loose bun in gray strands that covered every inch of the top of her head. She had a pipe in her mouth, and her right hand was clasped on the end of it, her other arm folded across her waist.
The bar tender, another fright was a young guy with a weird french mustache. He was quiet with myself and Edith. I looked at him and smiled slightly. "Hi." I began. "I'm Delaney Marks from The London Times. I was wondering if I could get a look at the room where JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis used to talk?" He nodded and nudged his head back, still not saying a word. I looked oddly at him and he suddenly got all shirty with me.
"Well what are you waiting for woman? Walk." I gaped at him again and then my tongue, which I have been told is my greatest weapon besides my pen, moved without me thinking.
"I will. Wouldn't want to be in the presence of a pompous bastard like you any longer." I walked off, Edith in toe and my coat flaring off the ground. I could hear the bar tender breathing heavily, like he was shocked with what I said to him. I looked behind me and stuck out my tongue, going into the back rooms where JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis, two of the supposed most acclaimed authors of the 20th century, had once sat and spoke of their two worlds. CS Lewis was more of a Catholic, or so I read somewhere. Edith tapped me on the shoulder as we walked inside.
"I can't believe I'm actually here." She said shocked, moving her hands over the walls of woods. "I can't believe I'm here, in the Tavern where HE used to sit." She said he like she was talking about Christ himself. She walked and sat in one of the chairs, her hand still on the wall and still feeling the grains of wood. "Can you believe it? He actually sat here...in this very room."
"Rivetting." I said emotionlessly, looking around. My father would have loved this. He would have adored this. I still never believed the fact that he never went to the Eagle and Child Tavern. Ever, in his life. I think as a child I never believed him, like I did right now. I looked around again, realizing I wasn't going to find anything here. Believing it to be a wasted trip I turned and look at Edith. "Come on, let's go before the University closes. I still have to see the libraries." Edith looked sad to leaved, and I walked out, suddenly tripping on a cracking floorboard. A second later and my foot fell through the boards and my knees and hands connected with the ground.
I waited for a moment, half expecting the bartender to enter. I smiled when he did not. Edith helped me to my feet. "Are you alright?" She asked me. I nodded, pulling my heel from the floor and looking at the hole more shooe had made. Great, I thought.
"Come on, leave quickly and he might not noti..." My voice faded mid sentence as I look back into the floor and found a box hidden under the boards. Edith looked at it oddly too. I pulled it from under the boards and knelt down, Edith following suit. I blew off the dust. It was an old cigar box, faded with time and wearing with age. I moved my fingers along the lid, still looking behind me.
"Open it Lane." Edith willed me and my fingers pulled the top open, sending dust into the air. After a moment of coughing, we looked and saw a pile of papers, note papers. full of writing and notes about things. I pulled them from the box and found several notes and letters, signed by Tolkien himself. Edith tried to grab them from me but I shoved them back into the box and concealed the box within my jacket.
"Later." I said, and pried the floorboard back up, making it look half presentable. We left without another word, say for a few dirty glances at the bartender.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Prepare for the Oxford Libraries and most definitely, the letter that gives the clue.
PLEASE R&R!