Help in an Unexpected Place

Pippin walked hurriedly away from the house and quickly disappeared in the twisting streets of Minas Tirith. He knew he would have no trouble getting lost, so to speak. Bergil had showed him all the back ways and hidden places in the upper circles of the city. Not that they would follow him. Why should they follow him. He frustrated Frodo, and usually no one managed to frustrate his patient cousin. It was quite clear what Merry thought of him.

The thought of Merry brought a sudden rush of angry heat to Pippin’s face followed closely by a chill that grabbed his heart and wrung it. The stone in the well. The palantir. The plunk of the stone finding water. The horrible voice from the flames tearing at his mind.

And now, added to those sounds was Merry’s voice - “You’re always sorry!”

Yes. A sorry excuse for a Hobbit.

And Sam . . .

Oh how Pippin didn’t want his thoughts to go to Sam.

Sam knew.

Sam knew that he, Pippin, was falling apart. That he was broken inside as well as out.

Pippin didn’t know, as he never knew, that he had gone blank twice since he had slammed the garden gate behind him. Like a sleep walker, continuing on his way but not really there. But now he was doing something else.

Hobbits don’t often dream of flying as most are afraid of heights. But Pippin wasn’t afraid and had sometimes dreamed he was like the birds. Now, he was watching himself walking down a narrow alleyway. Above himself, over his own left shoulder. Separated. Apart.

But he was awake.

It had happened before. He was helping Sam in the kitchen when he had watched himself walk to the sink. Pippin had no idea why he seemed to be floating about, nor why this other Pippin had walked to the sink, nor why Sam only seemed to see the Pippin walking on the floor and standing at the sink, not the Pippin hovering in mid air. Then, just as mysteriously, he was inside himself where he belonged; standing at the sink, no longer floating, but looking out the window and feeling as though he might swoon.

This time the walking Pippin was heading towards a pile of debris.

He wasn’t floating any longer, but was back together, just walking toward the pile. Pippin sat down amidst the rubble feeling too weary to walk any further. Although he didn’t feel as badly as the time he floated in the kitchen; not as though he might swoon, just weary. He looked around.

Pieces of broken buildings. Broken furniture. Broken pottery. A broken doll.

A broken hobbit.

He laid back against a rounded chunk of stone that had once been a column and closed his eyes. His left hand closed around the handle of the knife he had picked up off the kitchen table.

Broken. He was broken. Like all of the things thrown carelessly on this heap. Broken. It was almost funny that his feet had brought him here where broken things were sent to die and be forgotten.

Although the blade still lay flat against his chest, the point was resting above his heart. Peregrin Took drew in a few deep breaths to steady himself. It was all that was left to do.

He hoped it wouldn’t hurt too much.

Then he heard light footsteps coming toward him.

“Go away!” Peregrin thought. “Or go past. There is nothing here but broken remains.”

“Feva!”

It was a child that was coming, almost upon him actually.

“Feva, I found you!”

He could sense her closeness, she was right beside him.

“I didn’t do it, dear Feva. Madam Talaitha did it. She doesn’t understand, Feva.”

Pippin opened his eyes. The child was cuddling the broken doll he had noticed earlier. She caressed its dull matted hair as her happy tears spotted it’s grimy dress. He turned his head to have a better view of the waif.

She jumped back, her eyes wide with surprise. She hugged Feva tight to her chest. “You’re not dead?”

“No,” Pippin replied as he thought how close he had been to being so. Then he thought how sad it was that the sight of a supposed dead body hadn’t kept her from the doll. It pained him. The children of this realm had seen too much death.

“No, I’m not dead.” He turned the knife so the blade was hidden beneath his arm. “Is she yours?”

“Yes!” She said brightly, holding the doll out for the not dead person to see. “This is Feva. Feva, this is . . . Who are you?”

“Pippin. And you are?”

“Mallefinnros.”

“Hello, Mallefinnros.” Pippin sat up. slipping the knife onto the rubble beside him as he did so. He nodded toward the doll. “Hello Feva.” He looked back at Mallefinnros. “What was it you were telling her you didn’t do?”

“Oh! Feva needed to know I didn’t want her put here. She knew, of course, that I didn’t bring her here, but she thought Madam Talaitha did it because I didn’t want her anymore and that’s not true.”

Mallefinnros was still holding the doll out toward Pippin. Poor Feva was a bedraggled mess. Dirty hair, though Pippin knew from living with three sisters that doll hair had a way of getting very dirty. Her porcelain face had a fresh looking crack in it, but the doll’s head was still intact. Feva was missing her left arm, her porcelain right hand had no fingers, she had no foot on her left leg. The dress she wore had once been a fine satin gown, but now was dingy and torn.

“She’s broken,” Pippin said softly. “Why do you want her?”

Mallefinnros hugged Feva to her thin chest, rocking the doll from side to side as she did so, as one would rock a baby.

“Because I love her,” the child firmly replied. “Madam Talaitha said the same thing you did, but she didn’t understand and you don’t either.”

“I’d like to understand. I’m sorry I hurt your and Feva’s feelings.” Pippin knew about being able to hurt a doll’s feelings - and a wee girl’s. “I’m sure she’s glad you love her so much.”

Mallefinnros nodded as she moved Feva up to her shoulder so she could cuddle her with her cheek. “She knows. She knew from the very first day we met on my birthday two years ago.”

Pippin quickly reminded himself that Men received gifts on their birthdays instead of giving them as Hobbits did. “She was a birthday present?”

“Uh-huh. From Mummy and Daddy. Madam Talaitha gave me a new doll that someone brought to the orphanage. She’s a nice dolly, but she said she didn’t know why Feva had to go away as she thought Feva was a very nice doll-friend to have. She told me I should find Feva and bring her back home. Her name is Sister, but she said how can she be a sister if Feva is gone.”

Pippin smiled at the tale. It made his heart ache that little Mallefinnros was orphaned, but he liked her cleverness and pluck. He was certain she wasn’t supposed to be away from the orphanage.

The lass’s voice interrupted his thoughts. “Why are you here?”

This brought Pippin’s musing to an abrupt halt. What could he tell the child, that he’d sat down amongst the rubble and discarded goods to kill himself?

“I’m broken,” he sighed, surprising himself with his honesty.

“You don’t look broken.”

The hurting hobbit held up his right arm, its hand, as always now, hung limply from the wrist. He slowly, with effort, raised it a bit but it soon fell back.

“I can only move my first two fingers and my thumb,” Pippin said as he demonstrated. “And they’re quite weak. I can’t even do my own buttons.”

Mallefinnros and Feva inched closer. She seemed to draw the story from him.

“My shoulder is hurt, it’s why my hand doesn’t work any longer, and sometimes it pains me. I hurt my left knee and sometimes I still limp and other times my calf cramps so badly I can’t walk at all for a while. And I think something is wrong inside me. I get tired and clumsy. I think my brain isn’t working as it should. I’m driving them all mad, my kin and friends that is. They say I’m ignoring them and not paying attention, but I think I am paying attention. I don’t know why they are so upset with me.”

He stopped. It wasn’t one of his blank times, he stopped because it felt good to have said it all while at the same time it hurt to have said it all. Tears were threatening to fall, but he did not let them.

“I’m broken and much of it can never be fixed,” he whispered.

Mallefinnros and Feva had inched closer until they could come no nearer because of the debris, but it was close enough. The little girl laid her hand on Pippin’s right hand. She laid Feva’s fingerless hand on it as well. Her tears fell on his hand as well.

“Feva wants to know if you have someone that loves you.”

Pippin was looking at the hands resting on his hand, feeling the tear drops when they fell near his ‘good’ fingers. He thought of Frodo, Merry and Sam. Of Gandalf, Legolas, Gimli and Strider. Faramir, Parsow, Beregond and Bergil. His family back in the Shire. They all cared about him, he knew they did, no matter how it may have appeared at times since he’d been hurt.

No, since they had all been hurt. They all had been hurt in some way. Every one of them.

He nodded. “Yes. I have folks who love me.”

The little girl made the doll’s hand pat Pippin’s as her own did the same. He looked up to see her smiling. Strange, even Feva somehow looked cleaner and happier.

“Feva says it’s all right then. She says being broken doesn’t matter so much if you’re loved.”

The words pierced him, sinking deeper even than Merry’s words that morning. It took his breath away. He couldn’t take his eyes from hers.

“Feva says you should go talk to one of the healers. They help broken people. I have friends at the orphanage who are broken and some of the healers come and teach them different ways to do things and bring them crutches and stuff.”

Mallefinnros paused before adding, “They even say the King is a healer.”

She smiled as she patted his hand a few more times, more firmly than before. “Farewell, Pippin. I need to go back before Madam Talaitha misses me.” She held her doll up by her face and waggled her arm. “Feva says fare you well.”

She turned and in a moment was gone from view.

Pippin slowly stood and walked off toward the Houses of Healing. He needed to talk to Parsow.