TITLE: Dances With Uncles
AUTHOR: Tinuviel's Song

Disclaimer: I don't own LotR, nor do I own Frodo, Bilbo, or anything else LotR related- Except for the characters I made up, such as Dinadoc Brandybuck-Grubb, Gypsophila Chubb, Duldo Armstrong, Herilac Took, etc.
SUMMARY: Bilbo wants Frodo to get a life and learn to dance, so what does he do? Well, read and find out…
RATING: G
CHARACTERS: Bilbo, Frodo, Sam, Merry, Pippin
SPOILERS: Not much, if you didn't know squat about LotR, already…
NOTES: This is my first fanfic… Eva! I know it sorta stinks, but I tried, all right? FLAMES ARE NOT WELCOME! Um… Enjoy… (scoots off somewhere)

Chap. 4: In Sleep He Sang To Me, In Dreams He Came…

Frodo found himself walking through a field of many-colored flowers. He took in the sweet smells of roses and petunias, staring in wonder at the beautiful shade of orange-red the sky had taken on, and breathing in the fresh golden air around him. All of a sudden, rotted hands broke through the wet soil, grabbing avariciously at his ankles. Frodo cried out in horror and ran away from the field into a dark wooded area. He thought that he was free of the horrid fiends, when he nearly ran head on into a ghostly figure: His dearly departed mother, Primula. Frodo's face went pale with fright, though he felt overjoyed to see he mother once more. 'Mum!' Frodo whispered, tears coming to his eyes.

"Yes, sweetness." Primula said, her grayed face taking on a bright smile. "Frodo, your cousin only has good intentions for you, and he wants you to be happy, as I do." She said, touching his cheek lightly.

"But, I'm perfectly happy the way I am!" Frodo argued.

"You're happy with not having a lady by your side? You're happy with sitting in dark corner at parties, having casual conversations with the wallpaper? You're happy?" Primula disputed, raising an eyebrow.

"Eh… Good point." Frodo agreed, turning his head from his mother, though his eyes were still glued to her dusty presence.

"Let Bilbo teach you to dance." Primula advised, turning Frodo's gaze to her's with the heel of her long, white hand and kissing his forehead softly. "You shan't regret it, I promise." She said, giving him a playful tap in the nose with her slender finger, backing away into shadow.

"Mum! Mother! Come back!" Frodo called to the wind, receiving no answer. Suddenly, a thick fog overcame him and Frodo gasped…

'Gah!' Frodo cried as he shot up in bed, his breathing at seventy miles per hour. The room was filled with the silvery light of morning and a cardinal was screeching outside his window. Frodo groggily got out of bed and stretched his joints. He opened his near-translucent yellowed curtains and was greeted by a blinding flash of white, for the windows were covered in a thick crust of ice and snow. 'It looks like Yavanna has decided to take a little holiday.' Frodo mumbled, squinting tiredly. He pressed both hands to the glass and was hailed by a great bolt of cold, immediately waking him up. 'Lawks, it's freezing!' He cried, shivering loudly and picking up a robe from off of the floor, putting it on and walking out his door to the hallway.

Halfway down the hall, Frodo caught the whiff of bacon and eggs cooking in the kitchen. Walking curiously to the kitchen, he saw Bilbo standing at the table with two big plates of bacon, eggs, some sort of potato dish, and sausage, as well as a rather large basket of rolls, placing them on either side of the table. Frodo walked up to him and Bilbo looked up at him to give a smile.

'Good morning, m'lad.' Bilbo said, his voice full of warm sunshine.

'Good morning, Uncle. What's all this? No one else is even up yet.' Bilbo nodded and stuck a finger in the air.

'Exactly! That means more time to eat and a faster start on the day, so start eating!' Bilbo exclaimed, scooting Frodo's plate nearer to the lad. Frodo sat down quietly and poked at it carefully, as if it would jump off the plate and eat him instead. 'Er… Would you like some milk… or something?' Bilbo asked, not expecting the outcome of his offering. Frodo nodded, his ethereal blue eyes drooping with exhaustion. Bilbo laughed to himself over some unknown thing and went to fetch the milk tin. As Frodo sat alone, he listened intently to the sound of birds chirping outside and children screaming with glee as they played blissfully in the snow. Above all this, he could hear Bilbo bumbling about clumsily in the cellar, and Frodo began to dread his upcoming session even more than before. Bilbo came up the stairs, huffing and puffing as he heaved the heavy milk tin up the stone steps.

'Do you need help?' Frodo asked indifferently, poking boredly at his sausage with the tip of a fingernail.

'No, m'lad, I've got it.' Bilbo insisted through gritted teeth, setting down the milk tin, the bottom hitting the floor so hard that it made a loud "THWUMMMM", shaking the floor so that the plates shook on the table. Frodo slapped a hand on his plate to keep it still. 'There we are. Drink up.' Bilbo persuaded wheezily, plopping down wearily in his chair and moaning uncomfortably. 'Ooh… I'm not as young as I used to be, lad. No more trudging through mountains and such, I suppose.' Bilbo proclaimed, rubbing his back and arching it with a grotesque crack. Frodo simply sat staring at his food. 'You'd best eat your food, now. It's probably getting cold. And good heavens, stop poking at it, it isn't going to jump off of your plate and eat you!' He cried, laughing softly.

'Mrmf.' Frodo mumbled, rubbing an eye tiredly with the heel of his hand and reaching blindly for the nearest fork, shoveling it into his food.

As Bilbo ladled the thin milk into a glass, he decided to fill up the silence, as well. 'So… How are your lessons going?'

'Well, you teach me half of the things that I know, so how do you think I'm doing?' Frodo asked a bit too snippily. Bilbo sighed sadly, looking at the table.

'You're doing fine.' Bilbo said in a hushed tone, cutting into his slice of bacon like a lumberjack to wood. Frodo quickly felt guilty and he decided to start over again.

'So… When exactly are you going to teach me to dance?' Frodo asked, reaching over to the bread basket and taking a round, brown roll from it.

'As soon as you're done eating.' Bilbo said tersely, taking a bite of poached egg from his fork. Frodo nodded and ate the rest of his roll quietly, finishing it off and moving on to two slices of bacon and half an egg. After guzzling down the remains of his milk, Frodo sat there, chewing patiently on his sausage link, waiting for his much older cousin to finish eating his food, which took longer than Frodo expected (then again, Frodo almost half expected it, considering that Bilbo always chewed very slowly so that his 'old jaw' didn't 'dislocate' itself as he was eating). Letting out a sharp breath, Bilbo turned his head toward Frodo. 'Are you ready?'

'Well, I'd like to dress first, if that's all right.' Frodo said at top speed.

'Hm… Well, all right, but don't dawdle!' Bilbo warned as Frodo tore out of the room. 'Bless my soul! Youth these days! Back in my day they asked to be excused from the table before they left it! You would think that he was trying to get away from me.' Bilbo said ironically, walking to pick up the milk tin once more, trudging it down the stairs, coming back up empty-handed and waiting for Frodo in the living room.

Frodo soon came out in virtually the same thing he'd worn the previous day, save fresh underwear and a subtle green overcoat, plus his curly mat of hair was now neatly brushed. 'I'm ready, I guess…' Frodo shrugged, throwing himself in a velvety scarlet-colored chair.

'Well, what in Middle-Earth are you doing, sitting? Tut-tut-tut! Up you go, we must get to work immediately!' Bilbo rushed, tipping Frodo's chair over and letting the lad fall to the floor. As Frodo made good friends with the tan-colored rug, he wondered if he'd be as mad as Bilbo one day.

'All right, All right, I'm up! There's no use in breaking my nose on the floor!' Frodo yelled obnoxiously, getting up on his feet and giving his nose a little squeeze to see if anything was out of place.

'No time to shilly-shally! Come with me.' Bilbo directed, beckoning Frodo to follow him to the biggest, most spacious room in the house: the cellar. It was a cold, dark place, and Bilbo carried two lit candles with him as the two hobbits ventured down the stairs. After they reached the bottom, Bilbo searching about the room for the window. Frodo felt something slick and furry slide across his foot. Hoping it was just the barn cat, Daisy, he gulped and concentrated on focusing his eyesight.

Finding what he was looking for, Bilbo quickly opened the opaque, dark purple curtains surrounding the little foggy window on the wall, letting in an inadequate amount of light. Bilbo blew out his candles and said, 'Now, you may think that this is a strange place to hop about in, considering that it is so dark and dank. But you are forgetting the finer points. As I hum a tune, the noise is carried louder, thus, you catch the tune faster.' Bilbo demonstrated by humming a string of notes, which were carried off in a spacey echo. Frodo found this vaguely fascinating.

'Uh-huh…' Frodo palled, looking uneasily at the cobwebs on the walls, wondering if the spiders were still around. It then occurred to him that they would have migrated upstairs to somewhere warmer and that made him even uneasier.

'…Anyways, let's get moving, shall we?' Bilbo sighed. 'This is called The Farrow-Barrow (nice name, eh?). It's a fairly simple dance, so you might catch on quickly. Now, hold my right hand and put your right arm around my waist.' Frodo blinked skeptically. 'O, come now, just do it, please?' Bilbo begged desperately. Slowly and rigidly, Frodo did what Bilbo told him. 'There's a lad! Now, follow my lead. One, two, three. One, two, three…' Bilbo chanted, beginning to take Frodo in a slow, sideways circle, a bit like a modern-day polka. After a few awkward steps, the pair began to loosen up to each other and Frodo eventually learned the steps in no time flat… about two and a half hours, actually.

After they had both become quite sick of the fast-moving dance, Bilbo moved on to numerous other dances: The Apple Juggler, The Beer-Jug Jig, The Plow-Puller, and various other minor Hobbit dances.

Each day Frodo went with Bilbo to the cold cellar, the more he learned. And each day, Frodo became better at it… 'Til along came the Springle-Ring…

Well, that was quite a long chapter… Didya like it nonetheless? Ya see that little purplish button down there to your far right? Well, ya see, us writers need fuel to keep our fics alive, so press that button and review, give constructive criticism, so I can write again and liiiiiiive!