“Tell me something of yourself I do not already know.”
What a ploy it was for me to say to him. To tempt Ithilwe to speak softly in my ears as I try to stay awake. His words trembled in his chest and his breath brushed against my ears so softly as he spoke of the name of his horse that he has passed between steeds over the years. He brushed gently my chest with hands that were draped around me to hold me close, to coax me to sleep. Little did I know, in sooth, how well that would work, but not before he asked of me this;
“Will you tell me something I do not know about you?”
I did not know how terribly that question would ruin me. All at once I was awake and my mind was swimming with words I could use to craft him something beautiful that I had not before. I wanted to tell him that I had given up on love ere my eyes met his for the first time. I wanted to tell him that I thought he was as lovely and lovelier than the stars; I wanted my words to become something I could wrap him up in because at that moment he was saving me, he was holding me, and I thought I needed to warm and to save him.
But I did not need to.
And my words died in my throat.
“I loathe cinnamon,” I said, “for my sister once tainted my drink with it in our youth.”
But I am a liar, my love; a coward. I am someone who cannot divide his pride from his heart; I am one who sat with his anger until his anger told him that its real name was grief. I am still learning how to put the pieces of myself that I lost to the Shadow back together. And I hope you see that when I hesitate to answer you. I hope you see me trying to temper myself when someone asks me “what happened then?” because what happened then was horrible and damning and I will forever be haunted by that place but it is not their fault that I am in my own way a ghost.
I wanted to tell you that night that I love the taste of fresh cranberries on my tongue, and that my favorite time of day is the sunrise because I like to think of beginnings rather than endings; how I didn’t have a favorite color until you told me that yours was blue and how I’ve never seen anything so blue so beautiful before, and I wanted to tell you that if I could paint I would paint you in blue and myself in red but the whole damn thing would be purple because you and I are so close in the soul we might as well be one.
But I told you instead that I don’t like cinnamon.
And I told you of the time I cut my hair.
You told me not to cut my hair again, as if I would take away the one thing I look forward to every night; your fingers running through it to pull it back into a braid, tied off with that same blue ribbon that kept me courageous through Angmar; in sooth, my love, there were nights in that horrid place that I kept myself awake sobbing, clutching that ribbon to my chest, because I feared I would never again see the stars in your eyes light up as you laughed.
You seemed so incredulous when you saw me return with the ribbon tied around my wrist.
“You still have this?” You asked; you were in disbelief I would ever hold onto something so small, so passive.
My love, you have no idea how tightly I held to it.
Even now, in Imladris, you smile and braid my hair back with it; until it’s threadbare, I had promised, and even after.
Tell me something of yourself I do not already know.
You were never the one who needed saving.
