Chapter 2: A Hobbit Hole

Something small, thought Frodo. Yes, something small.

He gazed up at the tall white building before him. There were as many as three stories, he thought. Perhaps there were four. He couldn't tell, really, as this part of the city rose from the shores up the side of cliffs. Dwellings and towers, foot bridges and pathways intermingled in a fluid jumble where no building was the same as its neighbour, yet all were pleasing to those that beheld them.

Not unlike Minas Tirith, Frodo decided, and yet very unlike. Elven creations were both old and new, solemn and joyful, while the White City of Gondor was meant to be impressive.

Avallónë was impressive, although it didn't weigh one down with it. Small bays that held benches, unexpected passageways that opened up where one least expected it, flowers trailing from balconies -- these all beckoned and they invited him to explore.

But he was not Bilbo, and he was no longer the nephew who wanted to follow in his uncle's footsteps. He felt ill at ease in this strange land.

"Nonsense," Bilbo had said last night when Frodo confessed his desire to stay in his room. "You're a Baggins, and Bagginses explore. Never forget that, lad."

But when Frodo suggested that they explore together, Bilbo hesitated. He had friends that he had already made, and songs to listen to. No, Frodo would be better off exploring on his own. Bilbo wouldn't want to hold him back.

It was more as if it were the other way around, Frodo thought. Bilbo, after many years in Rivendell, was fluent in Sindarin and had studied Quenyan extensively. Frodo's own halting and poor Sindarin still far outshone his pitifully few words and phrases in Quenyan. He could not construct any useful sentences in Quenyan, and most of the elves spoke Quenyan here. Even the ones who did speak Sindarin spoke in a different style - sounds that Frodo wasn’t used to - vowels that sounded pleasing but that confused him. Words that didn’t make sense even if he managed to follow along in some small way.

Definitely something small, he decided again. Unobtrusive, fit for a hobbit. After all, he was a hobbit, wasn’t he?

* * *

Elves came to do Frodo's bidding. He had scarce asked for it but many delighted in doing as he wished, and soon a hobbit hole came to be fashioned.

It was an odd hobbit hole, for it was built of the same white stuff that made much of the buildings around. It was, of course, partly under ground, but the front was white. The round door waited for colour to be put upon it.

Frodo walked through it. The craftwork was meticulous. Wooden panels of a pale wood were steamed and bent to the rounded hall. Three rooms had their windows to the outside facing the Sea - a study, the kitchen and a bedroom. There was room available to be dug further into the cliff if he so wanted.

Frodo walked back out again and sat upon the path at the cliff. Other dwellings of Avallónë were nearby but they did not intrude. He had a beautiful view. Surely he was lucky? His own home was exactly what he needed, wasn’t it? A proper hobbit home?

* * *

"You seem sad," said Celebrían when she came upon him the evening of the finishing of his house. "Doesn’t your home please you?"

Frodo looked up at her and then very slowly shook his head. "It troubles me to say this," he murmured, "but even after the beautiful craftsmanship and artful touches that your folk have done, I feel as if I will not be content here. And yet, it is a hole that any hobbit would delight in back home. I have designed it and the Elves have answered my every request, and made improvements that I would have been grateful for when I still lived in Bag End. This bench that we sit on -- it is in the same spot as the one outside Bag End's door was. It is even more comfortable than the one I had.

"Why then am I not content? Bilbo likes it, and he is willing to live here... when he is not with his new friends."

"Does it trouble you that Bilbo will keep his own rooms in Elven dwellings?" asked Celebrían.

"No," answered Frodo. "He has lived with Elves for a long time and he is comfortable with them. He spends time with me each evening. I can't ask for more than that."

"I can't ask for more than that," repeated Celebrían softly. "It is a hole that any hobbit would delight in back home. It sounds like you are trying hard to play the part expected of you."

Frodo laughed then, a bitter sound. "I don't know how I should behave... what I must do. Bilbo seems to have no trouble at all. He fit in almost immediately. I still have yet to do so. I still, even after these past months, must wear the cloth over my eyes. They tire easily in this brightness. Bilbo is happy, and that delights me, but I feel as if I am the most wretched, ungrateful creature. I did as you asked me, and I have been rewarded with this fair dwelling, beyond anything I could have hoped for. Yet I don't feel as if... as if I fit it somehow.... or it doesn't fit me."

"Tell me," said Celebrían, "did you build this home for a hobbit, or did you build it for Frodo."

Frodo looked at her puzzled. "For me," he said. "I am a hobbit, and this is a hobbit-hole. The furniture is the right size for me."

Celebrían nodded gravely. "All that you say is true." She stood, turned and opened the door of the new hole. She peered inside but did not go in. Presently she spoke without turning around. "The first day you awoke in Avallónë -- did you not say that you no longer knew who you were?"

"I did," Frodo said.

"Do you now?" Celebrían asked.

"No," said Frodo, and he moved restlessly on the bench. "I thought that building this house would give me answers, but it hasn't."

Celebrían shut the door and sat down once more upon the bench. Side by side they looked out over the sea in quiet thought.

"Tell me, Frodo," Celebrían said suddenly. "How many names have you had?"

Frodo shrugged. "I hardly know. There seem so many."

"But I would like to know," said Celebrían. "All the names you have been called -- during your life in the Shire to more recent times."

Frodo looked at her oddly but then leaned back with a sigh.

"The Brandybuck," he said. "Mad Baggins' nephew. The Master of Bag End. Underhill. Ring-bearer. The Halfling. Master. Bronwe Athan Harthad. Frodo of the Nine Fingers. Cormacolindo. Deputy Mayor. Iorhael.... and Mr. Frodo."

"I like the last name the best," said Celebrían.

"Why?" asked Frodo. He tilted his head and regarded her closely.

"It was the only name that you said with a soft voice," she answered. "You have a lovely voice, Frodo, yet it seemed hard while you spoke the other names. Why would that be?"

"Sam called me Mr. Frodo," Frodo said softly. He ran his hand over the wooden seat of the bench and looked out to sea. "It wasn't a title, or a role. Every time he said it, he was talking to me -- just to me. He knew who I was, and who I wasn't. He knew my flaws and loved me in spite of them."

He stopped then and Celebrían waited. Suddenly Frodo chuckled a little. "In the beginning I disliked it, you know. It felt uncomfortable. But he would not stop, and I became used to it, and even liked it. It was Sam. Now I would give anything to hear him say it once more."

"He must be a friend of great value," said Celebrían.

"He is... or was." Frodo said and stood slowly. He turned and went to the door, laying his hand upon the bare wood. "He was a true hobbit. He would delight in making this a home. He wouldn't feel any awkwardness."

"Tied to the Shire?" suggested Celebrían.

"Yes," answered Frodo.

"In the way you are not?" Celebrían added. Her voice was light.

Frodo nodded. His gaze was distant, unseeing. "I don't belong to the Shire. I didn't when I returned from my journey. I always felt as if I were on the outside looking in."

"You never came home," said Celebrían

"No," said Frodo.

"And now you have built a hobbit-hole, in the fashion of your people -- a place where you do not feel as if you could be 'at home'," Celebrían said quietly.

Frodo looked at her, and then back at the door. "I suppose I have," he whispered. "I suppose I'm no longer a hobbit, although," he added with a short laugh, "I don't know what I am instead."

Celebrían swiftly rose and came to stand behind Frodo. She placed one hand upon his shoulder and another softly upon his head.

"You are a hobbit, Frodo," she said. "But you are also something more. And perhaps you need a house in which the Frodo you have become can feel at home.

"All those names you told me each hold some part of you -- some part of 'Frodo'. Perhaps there is some part of Frodo that no name bestowed by others can show. Find out. And do not shy away from those names. Do not shy away from what you have become. Learn. Only then can you be at peace with yourself. Only then can you build a home."

To be continued