The professor originally intended Rose and Sam to have fourteen children, the last child being Lily. He later decided that they should outnumber the Old Took by only one child instead of two, and removed Lily from the family tree. Which begs the question, whatever happened to Lily Gamgee?

Written for my flist, as my birthday mathom to them.

Lily Gamgee

Summer 1450 SR

Lily is the most perfect little sister any lass could hope for. She does whatever you ask without complaint and she always wants to do the same things I do. We like to wear the same clothes and to eat the same things. She even agrees with me about my silly brothers and how annoying they can be sometimes. She even agrees that Robin and Tom shouldn’t be allowed to ignore her just because they’re older. It’s so very rude when they barge in while we’re having tea and eat all her biscuits, as though she were not even there! But Lily isn’t vindictive. She understands they can’t help being that way and she doesn’t mind sharing, so long as she can get a bite of mine. And that is why Lily Gamgee is the most perfect sister.

Sam put the essay down and looked at his youngest daughter. Ruby stared up at him, her wide brown eyes full of eager hope. He cleared his throat. “Well, it’s well writ, it is,” he allowed and Ruby beamed. “Good sentence structure and only a couple of minor errors, but the assignment was to write about one of your actual siblings.”

“Lily’s my sister,” Ruby said, her smile drooping into a frown. “You don’t like Lily either.”

“I love Lily. She’s the only one of you as don’t give us any headaches,” Sam said. “But you’ve twelve other brothers and sisters to be writing about. Choose one of them and write another essay. There’s more to being a good sibling than agreeing with you all the time.”

“Yes, Daddy,” Ruby said dutifully and took back the essay.

Sam patted her head, his way of dismissing her. Ruby skulked out of the library and padded across the tunnel to the parlor, where Merry-lad and Hamfast were playing pennies. They looked up as she entered the room.

“Why the long face?” Merry asked.

“Sam-dad didn’t like my essay on Lily,” Ruby said and flopped onto the stuffed blue rocking chair, careless of everything her mother ever told her about sitting like a lady.

“What’s wrong with Grandmum?” Hamfast asked.

“Not Grandmum Lily! Our sister Lily!” Ruby shot back.

“Oh. Her,” Merry said with a roll of his eyes. “When are you going to stop playing at pretend, Rubes?”

“She’s not pretend. She’s real and she’s a much better sibling than you are!” Ruby said hotly, sitting up and glaring at her brothers. The old raspberry birthmark on her ankle, faded with the years, grew red hot with her rage. Her brothers sat up cautiously.

“Of course she is,” Hamfast complied. “But has she ever brought you milk and biscuits in the middle of the night? Or sat up with you when you were feeling scared or sick? When was the last time Lily braiding your hair or helped you with your sums or taught you how to fish?”

“How is she supposed to do any of those things for me?” Ruby asked. “She’s younger, the baby. We’re supposed to take care of her, remember?”

“She’s got you there,” Merry-lad said.

Ruby sighed. “Never mind. None of you understand her. Come, Lily. Let’s go outside.”

She hopped off the chair and started to head for the front door, ignoring her brothers’ teasing whispers as she left the parlor. She was passing the study when she stopped and turned into the little room. They weren’t allowed to come in here without permission, but she was feeling reckless enough to ignore that rule. No one but Mama, Elanor and Goldilocks ever thought about poor Lily at mealtimes, and none of her brothers except Frodo-lad and Pippin would even acknowledge her existence. Everyone else forgot about her all the time, and Ruby was tired of it.

She marched to the desk and climbed onto the chair. She opened the Red Book to the back where the family trees were and before she could allow herself to think and stop herself, she dipped a quill in the ink and wrote on the Longfather-Tree after Tolman: ‘Lily, 1350’. She stared at her correction in triumph, but as the ink slowly dried she began to realize just what she had done. She had ruined Uncle Frodo’s book! Her father’s book!

Panicking, she dropped the quill on the floor and fled outside. She ran down the path and out the gate, her heart beating in her throat. What had she done?  

Sometime later, Sam left the library and went into the study. He spotted the quill on the floor first. He bent down and picked it up, wondering at the wet tip. He frowned down at the stain on the rug and figured it was still fresh enough to get most of it out. He was reaching over the desk to put the quill in its inkpot when he noticed the Red Book was opened to the family tree. A half-moment later, he noticed Ruby’s addition to the tree and huffed in frustration.

“Great,” he muttered. He had just finished the tree the other day and would now have to redo it.

On the way to the kitchen for the cleaning supplies, he spotted Merry and Hamfast in the parlor. “Bilbo! Robin!”

Merry and Hamfast looked up from their pennies. “Yes, Dad?” they asked without hesitation. They were all accustomed to their parents calling them by each others’ names and so thought nothing of it.

“Where’s Ruby?” he asked.

“She went outside,” Hamfast said.

“Where outside?”

“Outside the door outside,” Merry said unhelpfully.

“Go and fetch her. She’s got a mess to clean up in the study,” Sam said and proceeded down the tunnel to the kitchen.

Merry and Hamfast collected their pennies, stuffed them into their pockets and went outside. They stood on the stoop, looking around.

“Do you see her?” Merry asked.

“You go left, and I’ll go right,” Hamfast said. “One of us is bound to find her.”

They stepped off the stoop and began their patrol of the garden.  

Primrose found her first, hiding in Strider’s stall in the small stable their father had built on the Party Field. Ruby had her knees drawn up to her chest and her arms circled around her knees. She was rocking herself back and forth, her face pinched with worry and her eyes blotted with tears.

“Oh, Rubes!” Primrose said and gathered her sister in her arms. “What’s the matter, love?”

“I did something awful, Pimmie!” Ruby bawled and crumpled against her sister with sobs of remorse.

“Now, now, love. It can’t be all that bad,” Primrose said. “What did you do?”

“I wrote in Daddy’s and Frodo-dad’s book!” Ruby said and with a great amount of sobbing and sighing, told her sister exactly what she had done.

“You shouldn’t have done that, and that’s a fact,” Primrose said. “But it ain’t all that bad.”

“Isn’t. It isn’t all that bad,” Ruby corrected.

“Well, you said it, not me,” Primrose said and wiped her sister’s face with a kerchief. “Now, Daddy’s been looking for you and getting right worried. You dropped the quill on the rug and he wants you to come clean up the spot before it sets. Come along. Best get it over with.”

She helped Ruby to her feet and slipped an arm over her shoulders. They walked side by side up the Hill and through the gate of Bag End. Bilbo-lad and Frodo-lad were in the front, tending the rose bushes. Bilbo spotted them and grinned.

“Oooh! Rubes! You’re in trouble!” he said in a gleeful sing-song. Frodo reach over and flicked him on the ear. “Ow!” He reached up to grab his ear, forgetting the rose twig in his hand. A thorn caught his cheek, scratching sharply. “Ow!”

“Serves you right,” Frodo said. “Get back to work.”

“Ignore him,” Primrose said and kept a firm grip on Ruby, who had started shaking at Bilbo’s teasing. They went into Bag End and directly to the study, where Sam was on his knees attacking the ink spot. “I found her.”

Sam looked up, took in his daughters with one glance and put the rag into the soapy water. He stood up and kissed Ruby on the brow. “Get that ink spot out, then go help your mother in the kitchen.” He started to leave.

“But… what about the Red Book?” Ruby asked, sniffling loudly.

“That was confusing, and no mistake,” Sam said. “I don’t see as Lily can be doing all this agreeing with you, and her just born this year. Not to mention I could have sworn she’s been around a lot longer than that. I figured her to be closer to Tom’s age.”

“What?” Ruby asked, not understanding. “But, I wrote in the Red Book.”

“Aye, and you’re lucky as it’s the last page, or I might have to get upset. It’ll be easy enough to fix, but the next time you feel like making edits to the Book, come see me first,” Sam said. “Now get to work. That stain won’t wash itself out.”

Sam left his daughters standing there, looking bewildered but grateful. Finally, Primrose stepped over the threshold into the study and Ruby followed her. They knelt down side by side on the rug and silently went to work.

And though Sam said he was going to fix the Longfather-Tree as soon as he could, Lily Gamgee remained on that tree for many more years to come. When Sam finally did fix the page, he framed the tree with Lily’s name on it and gave it as a parting gift to Ruby before his sailing, and when she opened it, all her siblings were there to comfort her and receive her comfort in kind.

GF 8/11/09