[Valier]

Valier's post

Bunny stood trying not to drip mud on the floor, while attempting to pull her soaked cloak from her back. "Well I think I should save my story till I'm a little more dry" Bunny stated with a small giggle. "Do you have extra clothing I could borrow?" Bunny placed her sack and wet belongings by the front door while Tansy scurried off to find her some clothing and draw a bath. Bunny wiped her face on her sleeve and looked around. The small dwelling was quiet and warm. Everyone had gone to bed, just like Bunny hoped. She wanted to have a few minutes to talk with Tansy with no one around.

After washing, (with minimal splashing) and putting on Tansy's dry night clothes, Bunny came into the kitchen, where Tansy was making tea and ladling out a bowl of delicious smelling stew. "Tansy that smells just delicious!! I'm just starved! And you've made tea!! you read my mind, I swear it!! If I had not taken my little tumble, I would have arrived a little earlier and a lot more presentable. Sorry to keep you waiting, I hope you didn't worry too much." Bunny gobbled down her bowl, barely looking up and plunged into another before she slowed to ask Tansy the most important question.

"Tansy dear you do still want to come with me.....don't you? I really think we can do it, I know it may seem like a fools journey, but what else do we have to do? I long to see what my eyes have never seen, I long to do something!!..... To be known far and wide, as the brave traveller Bella Took who found the lost Entwives....Please say you feel the same? I ...well, I want you to come so badly... please say you'll come." Bunny stated in one last lame attempt to convince Tansy to come and to even convince herself a little, that she was doing the right thing and was not acting like a foolhardy Hobbit Lass. Bunny slurped some stew from her spoon and shyly gazed at Tansy, fearing the worst.. a trip to glory on her own.


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Thinlómien's post

"Tansy dear you do still want to come with me.....don't you? I really think we can do it, I know it may seem like a fools journey, but what else do we have to do? I long to see what my eyes have never seen, I long to do something!!..... To be known far and wide, as the brave traveller Bella Took who found the lost Entwives....Please say you feel the same? I ...well, I want you to come so badly... please say you'll come."

Tansy had been dreading for this question. She had first promised to come, not giving much thought to anything. Just as if I still was on my tweens, she thought dryly. The truth was, she was not sure if she could leave her family for a long time. Both Grandma Daphne and Fred needed help in order to manage with their daily life. Tansy's mother and father were both quite old and neither of them worked at home. True, they didn't work as long hours as they once had, but they still spent hours at the inn they workes as waiters. Tansy's sister Daisy could not come to help the family, as she had little children to look after. There's only me... and if I leave for a long time with no idea when I'm coming back... Tansy suppressed a sigh. Waiters didn't earn that much and the income of the family had long depended on Tansy's needlework. Tansy knew her parents had savings, but it hurt her to even think about that they'd use them to cover for the hole in their economy caused by Tansy's selfish absence.

"Tansy?" Bunny asked nervously. Tansy looked at her. Her eyes were full of hope but there was some fear deep behind. Sometimes Bunny reminded her so much of a little, innocent child. She could not break Bunny's trust, nor her own promise.

"Of course I'm coming", she said and hoped Bunny did not notice that her smile was a bit forced. Tansy took a sip from her teacup. She had chosen an old flavour she seldom used: a rich, black tea with the flavour of blackcurrant and cardamom. The taste reminded her of her and Daisy's visit to the Southfarthing so long time ago. They had eaten Mrs Bolger's blackcurrants and got the angry old widow chasing them around her garden with a broom in her hands. She couldn't help smiling... How they had been young and carefree back then, and how they had traveled in the woods and fields, avoiding settlement, because they had thought everybody would know that they had stolen the blackcurrants and beat them with broomsticks.

"What are you smiling at?" Bunny asked, sounding curious.
"Recalling an old adventure", Tansy replied. She took another sip of tea and then told her friend the history of the balckcurrant thievery. Bunny seemed to find the idea of an angry old woman chasing Tansy and trying to hit her with a broomstick incredibly funny.

When they had finished the dinner, Tansy showed Bunny to Daisy's old room that nowadays served as a guestroom. They wished each other good night and Tansy lumbered to her own room.

It took a long time for her to fall asleep. She wondered what her parents would say of her adventure and how would they manage without her. She wondered if she had to refuse Bunny's invitation after all. She worried how Bunny would take the news. She would not want to disappoint her. Nor herself, for wasn't she really expecting this adventure? Possible, but she was definitely not expecting leaving her family all alone for days, weeks, possibly months.

But when Tansy finally fell asleep, she didn't dream of Grandma Daphne and Fred at home alone, trying to manage, nor about her parents working day and night in order to get money for food. She dreamed of a long, untrodden road before her feet, of unknown woods and fields, of good company and of new challenges - of an adventure.