He feels old, sometimes, and out of place. Mostly it is nothing more than an ache, a hollow hungry dissatisfaction that he can ignore; occasionally, it is a sharp, insistent, spike of pain. He will never be the same, and he knows it, and he finds himself wishing it could be otherwise.
He sits alone, when he gets like this, because being around other Hobbits just reminds him of what he can't be. Most Hobbits would find excuses to be elsewhere, because they are almost as aware as he is that there is something unhobbitish about him. So when someone comes to sit by him, during one of these spells, he does not need to turn his head to know who it is. He turns his head anyway, but doesn't otherwise move, doesn't stand up or shift position.
There is a moment where their eyes do all the talking, in a quick, almost ritual conversation -- are you all right?, and a diffident no, and mind if I stay with you? and that would be all right with an undercurrent of please, I'm lonely -- and then Merry puts his head on Pippin's shoulder.
"I've been thinking," Pippin says. There is a tightness in his throat, an old hardness from tears that haven't been shed in years. "About what life was like Before."
"That was a long time ago," Merry says quietly.
"I know, but..." He doesn't finish the sentence, and Merry doesn't press him.
From a distance, they can hear noises of children playing; the shouts carry well over the still air. Pippin's gaze fixes on two of them, small blunt wooden swords swinging wildly through the air over their heads; one of the children is Pippin's cousin, and the other is Sam's daughter, and she is winning even though she is smaller and a year younger.
Merry says, smiling, wistful, "Do you remember when we were that age? Playing Adventurer, from the stories Bilbo told."
Pippin's eyes close. "We didn't use swords."
"It was a different adventure, then." Bilbo's tales had been fanciful, romantic, exciting, easily riveting the attentions of two young eager Hobbits; the reality, so many years later, had more death, more pain, more mud, more longing.
"Do you remember learning how to fight?" Pippin's voice is soft and small. "I miss them, Merry."
Merry, guessing: "Boromir?" and Pippin shakes his head.
"Us. I miss... Oh, Merry, I'm not who I used to be. I wish I could be. I wish I could forget..." His voice breaks, and he stops and collects himself, folding the pain back up inside, neat and tidy. "Remember when mushrooms were the most important thing in the world?"
"We were young," Merry says.
"I'm tired of being old." Pippin draws his legs up closer to his chest, tightens his arm around them, curling in towards himself. "Do you know, the entire time -- from the moment we left Bree -- I wanted nothing more than to come back to the Shire. To come back home. That was the only thing I could hold on to, in the darkest moments, that there was something waiting for me back home."
"And now you're back," Merry says softly, "and it isn't home any more."
"I know too much. I've seen too much. The Shire was home because that was all I knew, but there are other things now; other needs, other desires, other... I don't know what home is, any more."
"Will you leave, then?" There is uncertainty in Merry's voice.
"Maybe. I don't know."
Merry smiles. "We could leave, you know; have our own proper Adventure --no ring, no Nazgul, just us and our imaginations."
Pippin smiles also, and looks at Merry. "We would have to bring enough mushrooms," he says lightly, teasingly.
"Naturally."
He is serious again, suddenly, as he says, "They aren't the most important thing, any more."
"What is, then?"
Pippin looks at him for a long moment, and then, with a murmured "Nothing," leans against Merry and closes his eyes; and for a moment, allows himself to believe that he is in fact home.
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Story notes: Takes place after the end of RotK, but the spoilers are only minor. The M/P-ness is either there or implied, depending on how you read it.
