From up close, the blades of grass look like wide velvet emerald ribbons, twisting themselves into loops and swirls and spirals until they are all a maze of green, indiscernible from one blade to the next. The impeccably blue eyes of one seven-year-old Elanor Garder survey their misty silken depths with a serious air, while the rest of her stretches out across the expanse of green, spread-eagle and belly-down on Bag End's roof.
Her ponderous gaze wanders an inch or so until it comes across a caterpillar, hunching its way across a leaf it's been enjoying. Elanor scrunches her nose at the sight, curious, but still remembering the fear and surprise of her first touch of caterpillar at the age of five months.
The caterpillar drops from the leaf and out of her vision, and Elanor's thoughts are as fragmented and wispy as the few spun sugar clouds that puff across today's expanse of robin's egg sky. Sunlight touches the tip of her nose, and Elanor wonders whether everyone's hearts would be nicer if they had the chance to be this golden, this pure every now and then.
Elanor feels a hand on her back, and turns her head sideways to find herself staring into the equally blue eyes of one Uncle Frodo. She smiles slightly, and pokes her tongue out, not far enough to be insulting, just far enough to be playful. He lifts an eyebrow at her choice of greetings, but smiles still, and lets out a long breath, relieved to be living again. His four-fingered hand finds her chubby white one, and he squeezes it tight, feeling the life in her palm travel in to his own willingly.
They sit up together, basking in the golden light as it slowly begins to slip down beyond the horizon, feeling that slight but slow taffy-like pull of the day slipping away, wanting it to linger but willing to let it go. Elanor pulls herself into Frodo's lap, slight beginnings of evening air brushing her cheeks as she kisses his lips, light as a butterfly's wings, just enough to let him know she loves him. Burying her face in his dark hair, she snuggles in closer, content to enjoy a moment that was once just hers with him.
Twilight slips into evening with barely a moment's notice, and before long there are sounds of clambering feet from below that bring their attention out of their own minds where it's been for so long. Soon they hear a chorus of voices calling their names, and, without a verbal word, both acknowledge that it's time to leave this second, this minute, this day, this year, this lifetime, this eternity, in exchange for a succulent morsel of Rosie's lovely garlic chicken. Before they rise, Elanor pushes Frodo's hair away from his ear and murmurs something sweet, something wanting, that could have been a "Love you, Fo," or could have been something else, Frodo will never know.
Then, slowly, pale hand grasping pale hand, they meander their way down the hill into the growing darkness.