A/N: Hey everybody!  You knew it would only be a matter of time before I decided to do a romantic fic in the Lord of the Rings section.  This story line might be over used, being a sorta of Mary sue, but it is going to be different in most respects, so please don't hurt me!   I don't really know if it would be considered a Mary Sue or not, so please read before you shun it.  *Crosses fingers and hisses* If it seemed like I copied something, I didn't know, sorry.  Just e-mail me, and I'll try to change it or take it off . . . even though it took me near to six months to finish it.  That's right, I've finished it, but instead of uploading it all at one time I decided to do it chapter by chapter to make my readers suffer a little.  Ah, the great power of being an author.  Anyway, this is a romance fic, of course, and knowing me, it will be sappy.  Anyway enjoy!

Disclaimer:  I don't own any characters from Lord of the Rings.  I only own my characters Drogo (Not Frodo's father.  That is a copyrighted name and character of the book.), Aubrey and the other lovely original characters of my story!

What a Trip . . .

A/N:  This is a very, very, very, very small intro to the story, just introducing you to Aubrey and who she is, so please don't get mad at its shortness.  And I tried to get away from traditional Mary Sue as much as possible.  The beginning is a little misleading, but the romance concerning my character does not include Frodo.  And I just wanted to say that writing is something that some people like to do as an outlet, so please, if you want to speak your mind on my fiction, please keep this in mind.  Thank you. Now enough of my nearly useless rambling . . . on with the story!

"Planet Earth to Aubrey.  Come in Aubrey," Jane waved her hand in front of her friend's face.  Aubrey paid no heed to her friend; only moving once in a while to place some of her lunch in her mouth.  "Hey Aubrey!  Wake up!"  Jane picked up her soda bottle and opened the lid about to tip the contents of it on her friend's brunet head.  

Before she could tip even the first drop out, Aubrey looked over at her, "I'm sorry, Jane.  Did you say something?"

Jane slapped her forehead with her hand and sighed.  "What were you thinking of?  I almost threw all of my soda on you."

            "What else would I be thinking about, but my perfect guy?"

            Jane raised her eyebrow, "Don't you mean perfect hobbit?"  Aubrey glared at Jane.  Only a few days ago they both saw the Lord of the Rings movie for only God knows how many times they have seen that movie, and Aubrey fell for Frodo Baggins each and every time.

"Just shut up Jane."

            "I can't help it if you fell for a guy that is four-foot-seven.  And can you say fictional?"

            "Can you say cute?"

            "You're hopeless.  You know Frodo is just played by an actor right?" Jane turned away from Aubrey.

            "That's what you keep telling me.  But you have to admit, a fictional boyfriend is better then one that cheats."

            "You're right, but you just have to get over it, you're sixteen!"  When Jane didn't get a response from her friend she looked over at her friend, who was yet again, spaced out.  Jane just sighed and looked at the door of the band room.  "Hey, there's Josh."

At the mention of his name he came over, "Hey you two," he put his arm around Jane and gave her a peck on her cheek.  Aubrey just sighed and got up.  She picked up her backpack and started heading off to the more open part of the school.

            "Hey, where are you going, Aubrey?"
            "You two are going to gag me with your lovey-dovey stuff, so I'm leaving.  Talk to you laters."

            "Laters," Jane looked sympathetically at her best friend.

Aubrey walked away from her normal eating spot and wondered around campus.  Ever since her break up with her boyfriend -that only lasted two days before he 'got to know' another girl- she can't stand being around Josh and Jane, they just remind her too much of her time with him.

Even though she was dumped for a prettier girl, Aubrey wasn't that bad looking.  She had shiny, curly chestnut hair, with almost glowing green eyes.  She wasn't fat at all, but she also wasn't as anorexic skinny as her ex's new girl.  So most people would say that she was at a perfect weight, and other guys have even told her that she was hot.  But what did that matter to her when she got dumped for a blond, prep airhead?  That was over two weeks ago.

She walked by her locker and, of course; the hall was crowded so she had to elbow people to get to her locker in the middle.

"Ow!  Watch where you're going!  Oh- it's you Aubrey," the girl paused and giggled under her breath, "Nice to see you."

            "Hello Cara," Aubrey's voice dripped with hatred, "How's Jeremy doing?  Fallen off a cliff yet?" she hit her locker open as it needed persuasion every once in a while.

            "No, but we were hoping you did."

            "Very funny, Cara, but we both know that only you and Jeremy have just the right amount of brain power to be able to walk and talk, so you two would be the perfect candidates."

            Aubrey didn't even look at Cara as she talked, and grunted just to fit her backpack into her locker for her physical education class.

"Is that the best come back you can do? You're more pathetic then I thought.  No wonder he dumped you," Cara glared at Aubrey.

Aubrey stopped and looked Cara right in the eyes and leaned close enough to bite off her nose, "You can walk the walk, and talk the preppy talk, but that's pretty much all you brain can handle isn't it?"  Aubrey grabbed her clothes, slammed her locker shut, turned away from Cara slapping her face with her hair, and walked off.  She hurried to her class as the bell rang giving her two more minutes to get to class.  She barely made it.

While in PE Aubrey had to play bat mitten with her classmates whom she didn't know all that well.  Her partner was one of Cara's friends who didn't cooperate at all.  Aubrey tried to constantly remind her that if she didn't play she didn't get any participation points, but the girl was failing almost everything, so it didn't matter to her anyway.  Aubrey was so relieved to play singles so she could get away from Miss miss-all-the-shots.  Although she would gladly take the girl back when she realized that during the single matches they had mixed classes and guess who she got to play against.

"Hello again Aubrey," Cara glared from behind the net.

"Cara," Aubrey simply said and nodded her head at her.  Aubrey served first and thus began another competition between the two.  Aubrey was surprised to see how hard Cara was playing and thought that she just was never trying until now.  The two girls glared at each other as the birdie passed from one racket to the other.  Aubrey kept her mind on the game and busted the birdie over the net one time after the other.

"Prepare to lose, loner," Cara said in a sing song voice as she hit the birdie over the net at Aubrey.

"Not very likely," Aubrey jumped up and hit the birdie in a slam over the top of the net hitting Cara's square, ricocheting off the ground and hitting her in the forehead.  Aubrey smiled as Cara rubbed her head, "And that's game."

"I'll get you for that Aubrey," Cara got up holding her head and scurried off to the locker room, throwing down her racket.

"Cara, come and take the net down.  You lost you have to take the net down!  Cara!" the PE coach yelled after her.

"It's ok Coach K, I'll take it down," Aubrey volunteered and started taking down the net.  She looked after Cara as her group of airhead friends tried to remind her that 'Aubrey was just a loner/ loser and should not even be a threat to her ultimate beauty.'  Aubrey almost gagged at the statements they were making.

            Aubrey tried to hurry home after PE and getting her stuff from her locker, hoping not to bump into any of her friends.  Not that they were mean or anything, it's just that they have been trying to cheer her up from her recent break up, but so far they haven't succeeded.  Some only made it worse.  Telling her encouraging words ranging from, 'Oh it's all right honey.  You're worth so much better,' and giving her a bear hug to that, 'I still can't see why you even liked that slime ball.  I mean look at his hair!'  It just didn't help her any, especially her self esteem.

"Hey Aubrey!"

Aubrey closed her eyes hopeful that the voice she heard wasn't one that she recognized as the 'disgusting one.'  She turned around after plastering a small, fake smile on her face and stood in front of Jeremy.  The ex-football player stood above her by almost a foot, although his height only made up for the brain cells that he was obviously missing.  His grades were going down the tube, and even though he was kicked off the football team because of this fact, his father believed that he would be able to get a scholarship somewhere.  Aubrey guessed that the brain size must run in the family.

"Hey Jeremy, I got to go home."

"What's your hurry?"

"My mom might need some help in the kitchen; I'm supposed to be there for her."

"I thought she didn't get home until later."

"Oh, you actually remembered something about my life?"

"But you are making sense; you know helping your mother . . . because your dad is dead and all."

"Thanks for that daily reminder.  Now, if you don't mind."

"Cara told me that you were talking to her today," Jeremy said leaning against the gym's wall.  Aubrey stopped and looked at him.

"Yeah, I did . . . To bad my vocabulary was probably too high for her to understand, though."

"Come on, Rey-"

"Don't call me that.  Even when we were dating- those two short days- I told you that I never liked that name," Aubrey interrupted him and stared coldly into his eyes.

"Well, all you have to do is get to know her."

"Get- get to know her?" Aubrey couldn't believe her ears.

"Yeah, then maybe we could all hang out together or something."

"Jeremy . . . do you know what I have been through these past days?  These past two weeks?  I don't want to 'get to know her.'  I don't want to get to know someone who purposely took some one else's boyfriend.  And don't tell me she did it by accident, because you know better.  All those times she was flirting with you right in front of me.  And taking me out of your arms and replacing the space with her body.  I don't like her one bit, and I don't want to."

"I was just thinking . . ." he started to play with her hair and stroke the side of her face, "That maybe all of us could get to know each other."

Aubrey brought up her hand and slapped him across the face, "How dare you!  Don't even think about talking to me ever again.  And if you do, you better have a death wish!"

            She made it home in only a few minutes after her talk with Jeremy and dropped her backpack and stuff down.  'I can't believe that minuscule brained, behemoth!  How dare he!'

She popped a burrito in the microwave and waited for it to cook all the way.  She grabbed a Sprite out of the fridge and grabbed the now hot burrito out of the microwave.  "Now for some good 'ol TV to calm me down.  One of the only things these days that still makes me laugh."

As she walked into the living room, she found something she didn't expect.  Her mother was sitting on the couch, apparently home early from work. 

"Mom, why are you home so early?"

"Aubrey, honey.  I'm so glad you're home; I didn't hear you come in.  Please sit down."  She sat down in her favorite chair and sat patiently for her mother to tell her the news.  It had to be really big, or really bad if they were sitting together like this.  "Honey, I have some bad news."

            'That's all I need.  More bad news.'