Chapter Sixty: Dreams Come True

I had the greatest joy any could know, my Sam, to wake and find you sleeping beside me, alive. I have not seen a more beautiful sight than you laying there and I don’t think anything even in the West will be able to compare, at least not until you come to stand upon those shores. I smiled with all the joy and love that swelled in my heart as I stroked your curls gently, now so soft and clean again, then I snuggled down next to you again, kissing your brow and breathing you in, holding you close and feeling your arms tighten around me. Oh, my Sam, how much time now will pass before we will do that again?

If only it were true what you said about everything sad becoming untrue. Much of it did - we returned home, all four of us, and that was beyond what seemed possible. But my tattered hopes were woven into new cloth and so I hope the rest will come untrue where I will journey next, where the memories won’t be so sharp and cut at me until I am bleeding, but will be dulled by time, darkness dispelled by Light. If only I could have done what Pippin feared, and forgotten half of it, forgotten all of it, but your loving care. But it is so much a part of me too, indelible I fear, but just as permanent is your tender watch over me. That I have no wish to forget ever.

There was joy the days after we woke, when we were sung to and feted and reunited with those so dear to us. It seemed then that indeed everything sad was going to come untrue. If I didn’t look down at my finger, I could almost believe it was just a nightmare. But slowly, slowly the darkness came again to cover me. Then though, I was content enough to be with you, to be away from the terrible burden, to hold your hand and know that I had made it through because of you. How I could have sung your praises for days on end if I didn’t know it would have caused you to blush to no end. I was sorely tempted to do it. When you slept I did, at times I still do. For you deserve it, my beloved guardian, my heart, you deserve every moment of it. None of it belongs to me, for I could not have done anywhere as much without you. Middle-earth is safe because of you, because of Smeagol, not me.

I hear the song Legolas sang of the Sea and the West often in my dreams. I dream of what it must be like there, so very different than anything we have ever felt or seen. I know I am very blessed to have been given the grace to step onto those shores, far beyond anything I deserve and if I wasn’t so desperate for surcease to my torment, I would not even dare to accept it. But I have. Everyone but you and my Merry and my Pippin know. Gandalf and Elrond have given me counsel and blessing and Aragorn as well. I wonder again as I did when I woke in Rivendell why such great lords should look after me with such kind care, but I am grateful for it, for my wounds are deep and there will be no cure for them here.

I dream of what the sea voyage will be like. How long I have dreamt of the Sea. I hope for your sake, it will be a smooth one. Perhaps even you can be put asleep like we were after the Fire and the time will pass without notice and you will only wake when you see my face smiling down on you once more. Perhaps they could do the same for me for I fear how long it will be until that time comes. But I will not ask for that. I would not be able to heal then, I would not be able to work on myself until I am shined and polished and you can see me as you still remember me. Oh, Sam, oh Sam, I can’t wait for that day, the mirror to the one in Ithilien. I hope for me the voyage will be spent in becoming clean again, in trying to be worthy of this great gift. I know the latter is not possible, and it may well be that I will step on those great shores, still covered in filth, and wonder if I will be welcome when they see me as I truly am. Still I long for it more and more. It can’t come soon enough and it will come too soon. I hate sleeping anymore. There is too much to do. I have meadows to walk through, stars and starlight to look up at, you to watch sleep, to listen to, to feel the touch of your caresses, your arms around me. There have been times that I have wished to tell you where I am going, but always I hold back. This is your home. You should desire no other until the time is right. You cannot be torn like I am, longing to stay and longing to leave. All your other dreams have come true. There is just one left and I will make sure that is fulfilled when you see me next.

* * *

Oh, my dear, could anything compare to the joy of seeing you sleeping beside me, alive, washed and clean and at peace? All the time I watched you on the journey and loved you more each moment for all you were doing, all you were giving, the very last drop of yourself. Seeing you then my heart swelled anew to see you wrapped in a clean nightshirt and soft sheet and laying on a soft bed, not gasping for your next breath, not so drawn with exhaustion and cold that you were trembling. Your lips were no longer cracked and bleeding, your cheeks were not so hollow. Your face was not creased with strain and was just that beautiful, even as it had been on the Road, but even more so now. It did seem to be all a dream and that I was merely watching you from your bed at Bag End before I woke you in the morning. If it had not been for your hand, laying atop the coverlet, bandaged and healing, but missing a finger, it could have been true. I wish at times that all it was, just a nightmare, but then I think of how much my love for you has grown and how proud I am of you and all you did. No one else could have done it. You deserve every moment of the songs and praise given and I would have sung to you everyday if I didn’t know it would cause you worse pain. I hope where you are now you have discovered the truth. I just walked beside you.

The best gift of all was your laughter as you teased me about being a sleepyhead! Oh, my love, do you have any idea how much my heart soared to hear that most delightful of sounds? Every time I hear one of my bairns laugh, I think of you, I hear you. It is because of you that they are able to do it at all. What joy, what incredible joy you have given me.

I have not forgotten my promise, dear, that I made to Mr. Gandalf before we even set out and repeated to Mr. Gildor. I was ready to follow you to the end, to the very end, but it did not come. It is still ahead of us. I am still ready. I hope it will end the way we thought it would then, with your hand in mine. But before then I hope I will have the same joy I had when I first woke, with you sleeping beside me, watching your light shine until you seemed to be hardly a body at all, but something so much more. How many, many times have I wished that your words then had remained true - that other than your finger, you were all right. I think now they have finally come true again. I know they have, but I still can’t wait to see it myself, to see you other than by a gift of the Lady, to reach out to touch you and not fear I won’t really touch anything and know then you aren’t truly there, to have you hear what I say to you now only to the wind, to the stars, to that magic vision of you. Sometimes I think I hear you respond or brush my brow with a kiss to return the ones I have given in care of the wind, but perhaps the crack in my heart has spread to my head. I am whole, dear, as you wished me to be, or at least as whole as I can be, without you filling up the corners and so much more. I know you are whole too, so how can that be begrudged? Merry and Pippin think the same thing. How we miss you still though! But how much happier we are, even in our sadness that can still overcome us at times, that you are happy and still near to us. That you are healed has helped heal us. The sadness of losing you can still overcome us at times, especially around your birthday or other times that we wish you were still with us. We stare across the vast expanse of the Sea and realize how very far away you are. Then we look into our hearts and realize how very near you are and that there is not a single thing you have missed of our lives. The children all call you Uncle and talk to you, too, at times. How much there will there be to tell you when I come, but I wonder, if you will just smile and kiss my head and tell me you know it all all ready.