[author's note: aargh. after idly re-reading the prologue and first chapter of FOTR while waiting for my car's wheels to be aligned, i find that this is not canon. drat. ah, well. be warned, this is evidently AU. unless of course, i set it some hours after the Hundredweight Feast, with Frodo feeling melancholy after the guests have gone. ummm. perhaps Merry missed the feast because he had a flat tire or something, and so has arrived well after the party was over. in hobbit terms, his pony threw a shoe? The Professor does not say, after all, *who* was at the Hundredweight Feast, as I recall.]

Happy Birthday, Bilbo and Frodo!

A bottle, two glasses, a toast to an absent cousin: 'Happy eleventy-second birthday, Bilbo.’ A sip, a sigh.

A knock at the door, at this time of night?

‘Merry! Whatever are you doing here?’

‘Happy birthday, Frodo! Where’s my present?’

‘Would a glass of Old Winyards do?’

‘Very nicely indeed!’ A sip, a sigh, a wondering eye. ‘Two glasses? Were you expecting someone?’

‘Just drinking Bilbo’s health. Mine’s not the only birthday this day.’

‘I see.’

‘Somehow I think you do. So, a toast: Happy birthday, Bilbo!’

Merry echoes: ‘Happy birthday, Bilbo. And many happy returns.’

A sip, a sigh.