Title: Merry Meetings
By: Pipspebble
Rating: G
Story type: Angsty hobbity love - ain't it grand?
Setting: The Grand Smials, Winter, Pre-Pre-Quest
For: Marigold's Challenge #6
Thanks: To the Marigoddess ™ for, well, everything!
And to Dana, 'cause she was sick and needed a merry meeting
Oh, yes, they all belong to JRRT. I just play with them.

~~~~~

"Merry! Wait for me!"

"I'm here, Pip." Merry bathed his cousin's brow with a cloth dipped in cool water. So had he done for hours upon hours as he waited for the teen's fever to break. The Winter Sickness had come to call at the Smials, and many were ill. Once again Pippin was among the first to succumb.

Aunt Eglantine was next to fall, worn out from nursing her only son and taking no time to rest herself. His sisters followed in short order and thus Merry had been summoned from Buckland to help a desperate Paladin look after his loved ones. It was understood by all that Pippin was Merry's to care for, and no one questioned his authority when he arrived and began ordering people about as he gauged the situation with his ill cousin. He had sat with Pippin through enough childhood illnesses to know what to do, exactly how to care for him, how to bring him through the sickness, sometimes through the strength of his love alone. He would bring him through this one as well.

"Merry! Where are you going?" Pippin's voice rose, his hands reaching.

"Shhh, dearest," Merry soothed, leaving the cloth on Pippin's brow and taking both flailing hands in his own, bringing them to his lips, where he pressed a gentle kiss. "I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere, my Pippin, not without you."

"Come back, Merry mine," the fretful voice continued unabated. "Don't leave me alone. Don't leave me alone."

Merry leaned down and pressed his cheek to Pippin's flushed face, frowning as he felt the heat coming off of him in waves. This was always the worst part of any illness with Pippin. Fever dreams, sometimes followed by fever fits, horribly frightening and all the more so because they were so unpredictable.

"I would never leave you alone, Pippin," he said, freeing one hand so that he could stroke the lad's sweaty curls. "I'm here, and here I shall stay, until you wake and we merry meet again."

"Merry meet," Pippin murmured, and Merry smiled to realize that their familiar word play had penetrated the grip of the fever and infiltrated his cousin's dreams. Perhaps if he tried a bit more he could make him wake fully.

"And merry part," he continued, "and merry meet again. 'Tis what we do, isn't it, Pippin?

"Merry meet," Pippin repeated, his voice a little stronger, and no longer frantic. "Merry meet again. My Merry meet again."

"Yes, my Pippin," Merry choked through sudden tears. "Your Merry is here again. Wake up and let me see those lovely eyes. Give your Merry a cheeky smile. Come back to me, dearest."

Lashes quivered, lids rose, and sea green eyes looked up at him, fever bright but aware. Merry smiled and tightened his hold on his cousin's hands. "Well, hullo there, Pippin. Merry meet."

"Again," the teen murmured, looking up into his cousin's worried face. "Merry meet and merry meet again. But never to part, my Merry. Stay with me always."

Merry leaned forward and brushed his lips against Pippin's cheek. "Always," he promised. "As ever. Now sleep, dearest. I shall be here when you wake. And then we shall merry meet again."

Pippin smiled, closed his eyes like a good patient. "My silly Merry," he breathed just as sleep claimed him.

Merry replaced the warmed cloth with a fresh cool one and the hours passed in silence as he waited. He prayed to the Valar that when Pippin next opened his eyes, they would be clear, and lucent, and he would not have to fear their closing forever.

"Merry meet, my Pippin," he whispered. "And merry part. And merry meet again. I'll be here, my dearest. When you wake again, your Merry will be here to greet you."

~~~~~