ELF, HOBBIT, OR MAN: PT 1

CHAPTER 1: MUSIC CAN BE DANGEROUS

BY NAOKO HIRUMI

"Hin, have you eaten yet?"

"No, not yet. I'm not hungry."

"Will you please eat something? I don't have time to cook dinner for you and Jaylee and I want to know you've eaten." Mom stuck her head into the den, her hair still in curlers. "At least make your burnt Pop-Tarts, for all I care."

I rolled my eyes and turned off my iPod. "Fine, fine. Pop-Tarts it is, then. And Jay can make herself a sandwich when she gets hungry, I guess." Unfolding myself from my chair, I got up and wandered into the kitchen.

My sister Jaylee was sitting at the table, drawing, like usual, with her charcoal pencils. Her fingers were smudged with the stuff.

I stuffed my pasties into the toaster and moseyed over. "What'cha drawing now, Jay?"

"Mt. Doom and the Witch King's steed." She didn't even look up at me. "Can you get me a wet paper towel for my fingers?"

"Yeah yeah...order your older sister around, why don't you?" Grabbing the towels and tossing them in the sink, I turned the water on and hopped up on the counter.

It was just another night in with my twin sister Jaylee. Mom had another business dinner thing to go to and was leaving us seventeen year olds home alone. And it was just another night to wonder how in the name of Tolkein my sister got the normal name and I didn't.

My full name was Hinoluin Satkowiak. Long name, right? That's why I'm called Hin around the house and my friends. And my teachers, mainly because they can't pronounce my name. My twin sister, younger than me by twenty minutes, was Jaylee Satkowiak.

"Hin, my towels?"

"Oh, yeah, sorry." I shut the water off, squeezed out the excess water, and chucked them across the (ehehe) expansive kitchen at my sister. They hit her square in the face as she stood up. "Um...oops?"

"Yeah, oops." Jay peeled them off and set them down by her paper. "You hit my project and I would've impaled you with my 2B pencil."

"...Your what now?" Yeah, I wasn't exactly smart when it came to drawing supplies.

She rolled her green eyes. "One of my graphite pencils, brainiac."

"Oh."

"Girls, I'm leaving." Mom hurried in, pulling her coat on. "I left the number on the fridge, call for take out if you want. No parties, only two friends each max, and no boys. I should be back around eleven if everything goes right." She kissed our cheeks. "Hin, is something burning?"

"Just my Pop-Tarts. No worries. I've got them." Casually, I pressed the button on the toaster and they popped up, one side burnt perfectly. "There, all fixed."

Mom sighed. "Be good, girls. I don't want another call from the fire department about the bathroom catching fire again or anything."

"Mom that was one time, and it was only the curling iron." Jaylee sat back down and cleaned off her fingers. "We put it out before anything happened."

"Still. I've got to go. See you later." And with that...she was gone.

"Alright, I see you're amused for the rest of the night. I'm off to finish downloading my music." I skipped off with my oh-so-nutritious (not) dinner back to the den where my beloved iPod Video sat waiting for me. "I'm back, my love! Did you miss me?"

I was a music nut. Everywhere I went, my iPod came too. Even when I would go to the emergency room, it came along for the trip. The only times we were apart were...well never. Even while I took a shower it was in the bathroom with me, hooked up to the speakers I had for it, blaring My Chemical Romance or something. My family got tired of it but oh well. I bought it, I paid for the music and all the accessories, and I took care of it. It was mine.

Plopping back into the squishy leather chair, I put in the ear buds and went back onto iTunes, searching for more music. Grinning as the beautiful voice of Gerard Way blasted into my ears, I started downloading some more songs. Perfectly legal, I might add.

While that was going on, I grabbed my copy of The Return of the King and started reading where I left off.

My whole family was Tolkein-obsessed. My mother gave me an Elvish name, even. Hinoluin means "Lady with stained hair" and funnily enough, I had black hair. The only one in my whole family. Well, and blue streaks, as well, but those were my own doing.

Jaylee and I had been brought up on the works of one J.R.R. Tolkein. Ever since we were able to comprehend the words, our mother had read them to us. And then once we could read on our own, she bought the two of us our own copies. We were addicted.

And that's where Jaylee and I were connected, besides the fact we were twins. We both adored the world of Middle Earth and all of its inhabitants. Alright, maybe not all of them. The Orcs and Uruk-Hai were nasty. But the Nazgul we thought were awesome. But while I composed music to go along with scenes that didn't have any, Jaylee drew scenes that were in the books and not in the movies.

I smiled, getting whisked away into Middle Earth, alongside Sam and Frodo as they waited for their end on the side of Mt. Doom. My heart yearned to be with them, to help Gwaihir and Landroval save the Hobbits from the flowing lava, to go with them back to Rivendell to heal, and then back to Hobbiton. Tears rolled down my cheeks as I got to the part when Frodo was going off to the Grey Havens with Bilbo, Elrond, and Galadriel, leaving behind Sam, Merry, and Pippin. No matter how many times I read the book, it always made me cry.

"Hin?" I ignored Jaylee, wanting to finish the book for the seventeenth time in three years. "Hin, phone." Nope, not even the phone, my third love, could tear me away from my first love.

Jaylee whacked me on the shoulder and I yelped. She had gotten my bad shoulder. "WHAT IS SO FRIGGIN' IMPORTANT THAT YOU HAD TO HIT MY BAD SHOULDER, EH?"

She backed away, eyes wide at my outburst. "Sorry. Alessandra wanted to come over, but I'll just go over there." Turning quickly, she an back into the kitchen.

I sat back down, curling up happily with my book and my music. Within ten minutes I had finished the book and my music was done downloading. Now it was time to go get some real clothes on so I could order take-out and not scare away the delivery boy.

Our house was pretty big. Not huge, like my friend Sasha's, but still big. And getting from the den to my room was exercise. One had to go to the other end of the house just to get to the stairs, go up the winding steps, then go almost halfway back to the other side of the house, go up another flight of stairs, down the hall, and then up a small step ladder since I got the attic as my room. Needless to say, if you were new to our house, you'd be panting and laying on the floor before we got to the hallway. But I was trained. I wasn't even panting when I got to my room.

"Hello boys! Er...elves." I smiled and danced across my room before sitting in my computer chair, spinning around, and standing up as I rotated to face my wardrobe.

All around my room were posters of Legolas and Haldir, and of course other miscellaneous posters from Lord of the Rings. I loved my elves.

I opened my wardrobe and sifted through my clothes. What to wear, what to wear. Deciding on a black skirt and black halter top, I changed and then went about accessorizing. I tied a red sash over my hair and pulled on black fishnet arm warmers. Then, the creme de la creme, my prized possession, the Evanstar necklace my grandmother had given me for my birthday three months ago. I loved my Nana so much. Deciding to go all out, I slipped on my black sandals. Grabbing a bottle of Vault (greatest drink ever except for coffee) and headed back downstairs to order some sushi.

Jaylee was tying her sneakers by the front door when I walked by. She went simple when it came to clothes. Tonight it was just her ripped blue jeans and Pink Floyd t-shirt. Hard to believe we were twins.

"I'm going to Al's. Probably spending the night. Tell mom when she gets home, okay?" She stood up and adjusted her shirt.

"Yeah, yeah." I grabbed the sushi menu and went back into the den to order.

Jaylee followed me. "Can I borrow your iPod?"

I gave her my best dragon glare. "No, you can't. Do I ever let you borrow it? No. Now go away, I'm ordering dinner." Grabbing the phone, I started dialing.

She grabbed it anyway. "Well too bad, it's a long walk and I need music."

"Jay! I said no!" I grabbed it back, and in the process detaching it from the cable to the comp.

And the next thing I knew, the power went out and it felt like I was hit in the head with Jay's blow dryer like when we were fourteen.

"Jaylee?" I moaned, trying to sit up. "Jay?"

I was greeted with the sounds of birds singing, water running and people talking. Where in the name of Tolkein was I? Opening my eyes, I sat up and looked around.

I was in a meeting place of some sort that looked exactly like where the Counsel of Elrond was held in the Fellowship movie. It was beautiful. Much better than the movie portrayed it.

"Where ever I am, I don't want to go home."

Little did I know that a certain brunette elf lord was standing right behind me.