Title: Winter Silence
Author: aces
Rating: G
Pairings: n/a (Main characters are Pippin and son Faramir)
Summary: Long walks and conversations.
Warnings: None…? Mildly poignant at most, I assure, and much more likely to hedge in the soppily sentimental direction. Follows book canon more so than movie, but as I haven't read the books that many times, I apologize in advance for any errors that may occur (though Tolkien doesn't seem to have much to say about the younger generation in any case…).
Notes: For Marigold's second challenge. The weather inspired me at the time. ;-) Also, I think I had some of Baylor's stories wandering around in the back of my head while writing this, so if anything sounds vaguely familiar, that might be why.
WINTER SILENCE
"Come on, Faramir, pick up your feet, lad. We've got a long way to go yet."
"But da, why do we have to march so quickly?" Faramir was not pouting, because lads of eight do not pout. Or so Faramir would have pointed out to his father if his father had so much as breathed a word about the idea. Thankfully his father seemed too preoccupied with his own thoughts to remonstrate or lecture about tones of voice.
Though Faramir really wasn't pouting.
"I don't trust that weather," Peregrin Took said absently, nodding his head toward the lowering grey clouds above them.
"It's not that cold…"
Pippin glanced down at his son wryly. "You won't say that when snow starts falling."
"But I like snow! I'm the best snowball-thrower of everyone at home," Faramir said proudly.
"You've obviously never seen me throw a snowball," his father answered smartly, and the boy frowned. He had a point.
"But Uncle Merry can throw farther than you, I think," Faramir said after a while.
A laugh was surprised out of his father, and Faramir grinned with pride again. Sometimes, when his da was in this mood, distracted and quiet, he was the only one who could cheer him up. Or perhaps Uncle Merry, if he was visiting, but he wasn't often visiting, and Faramir had taken it upon himself to keep his father cheerful. Usually, this was not very difficult; Peregrin Took had kept a naturally sunny disposition through the years, coloured now with perhaps a tinge more diplomacy, tact, and practicality than in his earlier, more exuberant and carefree years.
But then there were days like these, when lines were too visible on his face, and his curls seemed greyer than they had any right to be for a hobbit still so young, and sometimes Faramir would do something he knew he shouldn't, such as setting up elaborate scenarios with his cousins to sneak into the pantries for extra sweets, just so he could see his da try to keep a straight and stern face when he truly wanted to laugh and tell Faramir how to improve his schemes for the next time. The lightening in his father's fire-bright eyes was always worth the talking-to from his mother.
"Meriadoc Brandybuck may do many a thing better than I," the Thain was telling his son, taking a small hand to hurry the boy along a bit more, "but he could never throw a snowball further than I could."
Faramir nodded dutifully but did not speak, all his concentration centred on keeping up with his impatient father. It was awfully hard having such a tall father, sometimes. Long strides.
The weather had been sulky but not too ominous when they had left yesterday morning to check on some of the more distant parts of the Took lands. Pippin had elected to bring his son along mainly because said son had begged, pleaded, cajoled, and worn his mother out with asking if he could go too. They had stayed in a distant relation's home for the evening, and when they'd woken up in preparation to go back to the Smials and had seen how the weather was turning, Pippin had turned to this strange mood.
"Da?"
"Yes, lad?"
"Could we please slow down a bit?"
Pippin glanced down at his son again, abstracted frown clearing as he noticed the little boy huffing along next to him, and laughed with sad wryness. "Ah, lad," he sighed and scooped up his son, resting him as comfortably as possible against his side—not quite so easy as a year ago, but not too hard yet at least (one of the nice things about having an unusually tall father, it had to be said; Faramir sometimes wished some of his father's extremely tall and important-looking friends would come again, so he could compare heights and see how well he fitted against their sides). "I'm sorry. Your old da should pay better attention, shouldn't he?"
Faramir wiggled a little, unwilling to answer that question, and that odd, sadly wry smile crossed his father's face again. Faramir snuggled closer, grateful in any case not to walk for a while.
He buried his face in his father's coat, breathing in his father's scent, and sighed, relaxing. There were too many intervening layers for him to feel a heartbeat echoing his own, but he knew it was there, and it was reassuring. His father was usually very reassuring, even in this mood.
"Da?"
A tiny sigh, nonetheless noted by the eight-year-old. "Yes, Faramir-lad?"
"Why are you sad?"
Faramir hesitated over the question. He'd wanted to ask it many times before but had always pulled back before he could pull together his courage to do so. It seemed a baby's question, and he quite firmly wasn't a baby anymore. But he'd often thought that if he knew why his da was sad, it'd make it easier for him to cheer him up.
And right now he felt comfortable, and warm despite the coldness of the air around them, and safe. And they were alone, with a long quiet walk ahead of them. Surely his da would forgive him for asking.
Pippin's stride paused, and then he continued, adjusting Faramir's position against him slightly. "What makes you think I'm sad, sweet?"
"You're not laughing, or singing, or telling me tales," Faramir answered promptly and shivered when a momentary bite of wind whipped past him. Pippin instinctively raised one of his arms from around Faramir's middle to Faramir's head, adjusting the scarf there one-handed. "You've got your sad frown."
"I have a sad frown?" Pippin sounded surprised by the news. "Some people would have you know my face is incapable of making such an expression."
Faramir should his head vigorously. "It's a sad frown. I've seen it before."
"Oh, you have, have you?"
Faramir didn't know what to make of his father's tone of voice and so ploughed on out of uncertainty and a wish to avoid the silence that would fall, because his father in this mood was never very talkative. "Yes. Sometimes. You won't talk, and mum doesn't know what to do with you and walks away, and Uncle Merry says something outradg—outrag—silly, and sometimes when that happens you look like you would rather cry than laugh." The thought of his father crying was positively terrifying, but Faramir didn't feel this was the time or place to mention that as well.
Pippin was blinking repeatedly as this sentence spilled out, and Faramir for a moment worried that he had in fact caused his father a need to decide whether laughing or crying were in order for the moment. "Has anyone ever told you you're quite like me?" The older man's voice sounded a little odd.
"Yes?" said Faramir.
"They were right," was his answer, and that was all for a while.
Faramir waited, but his father seemed disinclined to continue the conversation. Faramir wiggled. Pippin sighed and readjusted his son again. Faramir still wiggled. Pippin glanced down, meeting large green eyes with his own.
Faramir immediately went for his most appealing look.
Pippin pursed his lips. "I think you've had enough rest," he said and gently but firmly lowered his son to the ground.
Faramir was not pouting, because boys of eight do not pout. Or so he reassured himself, while trying to stop his own lips from pursing.
They walked a while longer in silence, and then Faramir gasped. "Snow!" he cried, as the tiny white flakes began to gently waft down toward them. He stilled, looking up happily. There weren't many yet, and they weren't sticking, but it'd been well over a year since he'd last seen snow, and he didn't see how anyone could get over the marvel of the phenomenon.
His father also stopped, looking up as well, seemingly right past the clouds into some other time or place entirely. It was Faramir's turn to frown, and his hand slipped up to grasp his father's, as if to bring his father back to earth through his touch.
And perhaps it worked, because after a moment Pippin shivered and looked down again, glancing at his son before quickly looking away.
"Come along, Faramir," he said and started walking again, gently breaking contact with Faramir. "Still a long way to go." His words were soft. Faramir hurried after him.
"Will you throw snowballs with me if enough snow falls?" The boy's question was almost timid.
"What?" Pippin looked at his son. "Oh. If I have time, Faramir-lad. We weren't expecting this snow. I shall be quite busy, you know."
"Don't you like snow anymore?"
There was an odd air of stillness around Pippin, even as he continued his steady march forward, toward home. "I suppose it's lost some of its charm for me through the years," he seemed to pick his words carefully, and the fact that it showed was alarming. While Pippin through the years had indeed begun to pick his words with great care, they still tripped off his tongue lightly, easily, no hint of the mental effort involved. "I just can't seem to enjoy it the way I used to, sweet."
Faramir reached up again, taking his father's gloved hand in his own. "I'm sorry, da," he said, and paused.
Pippin seemed to struggle with something for a moment, then glanced around as if he expected another traveller to suddenly appear on their lonely path and discover him about to unburden some confession. "It reminds me of Frodo, you see." The soft admission seemed to burst out of him, and afterward he was relieved. "My cousin, not your Uncle Sam's son."
Faramir nodded. "Is he why you have a sad frown?"
"I'd rather not think of it that way, thank you," his father replied primly. "The lack of Frodo Baggins causes my sad frown, if you please."
Faramir squeezed his father's hand, though he wasn't sure the older man could feel it through the glove. "Why does the snow remind you of him?"
It was Pippin's turn to shake himself rather than give a direct answer. Faramir waited with all the patience an eight-year-old could muster. At last Pippin sighed deeply. "Why he called us fools I'll never know," he said under his breath. "Far too perceptive for our own good at times…"
"Da?"
"Never mind, lad. Frodo and your Uncle Merry and I and Uncle Sam, along with some other very dear friends of ours, had a rather unfortunate experience with snow. This snow was so deep it almost covered the four of us entirely—this was when Merry and I were still quite as small as most hobbits—and…it was not very pleasant."
Faramir kept waiting.
Pippin sighed again. The flakes were heavier and thicker now, and beginning to stick. Faramir watched one snowflake fall on his father's face and dissolve, sliding down his cheek. "One of my best-est memories of Frodo," he said at last, and Faramir wanted to laugh to hear his father say "best-est" like one of his own little cousins, but he didn't because he would never laugh at his own father, "is throwing snowballs behind Bilbo's home in Hobbiton. I was just about your age probably, and Sam was quite upset at all the trampling we were doing to his gardens, and Merry was quite upset because I was such a better thrower than he, but Frodo just laughed and laughed. And then he threw a snowball right at Merry's nose—he had really quite wonderful aim, even better than mine—and I laughed and laughed too. And after a moment so did Merry. And then he tackled Frodo and Sam, and I jumped on them all, and eventually we went inside and spread our clothes out in front of the fire and made tea."
Pippin's voice paused while they continued walking. "That was a much nicer winter than the one on Caradhras." His voice was quiet.
Faramir squeezed his father's hand again. "Maybe Uncle Merry's gotten better at throwing snowballs since then," he suggested after a long, long silence of steady marching.
Pippin's laugh was not quite the happy sound Faramir had been hoping for. "Perhaps we should invite him to the Smials for a friendly competition," he suggested, but Faramir was unsure how serious he was, and he let the conversation lapse again into silence.
"Da?"
Faramir was not a lad to appreciate silence for long. Pippin's voice was infinitely patient. "Yes, sweet?"
"I think Frodo would want you to throw snowballs with me," Faramir said in a rush. "I think he would want you to enjoy it. That's what mum always told me, anyhow, about grandda after he went away."
Pippin took a long moment before he answered. "Are you sure this isn't simply a ploy to get your father to play with you rather than attend to his duties and responsibilities like a good Thain?"
Faramir shook his head fiercely, curls bouncing.
Pippin looked down at him, eyebrows quirked sceptically. Faramir went immediately for his best innocent look.
Pip's face relaxed into a grin, his usual sunny grin that lightened the heart of anyone who glimpsed it, and most everyone who had met him had had it shining directly on them. Faramir beamed back, proud of a job well done. Once that grin showed up, he knew, there would be no more sad frowns for a while at least.
And the next time there was, Faramir knew he would be there to helpfully make it go away.
"Well, then," said Peregrin Took judiciously. "If there is enough snow with this fall, and I am not too busy getting the Smials prepared and buckled down, perhaps I could be persuaded to show you the finer points of snowball-throwing." He paused thoughtfully. "We could even invite my Cousin Merry to join us."
"And Uncle Sam?" Faramir suggested, half-uncertain he shouldn't have mentioned it.
But Pippin's grin turned sly. "In that case, perhaps we should all invite ourselves to Hobbiton," and his voice was light and merry.
And it was Faramir's turn to laugh and laugh.