"That summer was a fertile one, for crops and for children.
(...) Rosie fell pregnant too, but lost the child, and nearly her life as well when she fainted while swimming. Frodo sat by her bed, and thought of his mother and father."
Tired as death (1430)
By Cuthálion (email)
This summer was like an explosion of new life, it smelled of ripe fruits, spicy weeds and sunwarmed earth. Diamond and Estella were mothers for the first time and Merry and Pippin sat near the cradles telling their wives stories about the gondorean heroes who gave their strange names for the two new born hobbit babies.
It was after a visit in Buckland when Rosie first felt that something had changed. A certain warmth filled her belly, like a soft glowing seed planted deep inside her. Late in that night she stood at the open window. A sweet smelling breeze cooled her face; behind her, Frodo and Sam were two quiet physiques under the thin linen covers on the bed. Rosie laid both hands over her tummy, like a shield. She had carried five children to birth yet and each time easily left behind the confinement. She knew that she was born to be a mother and her body was facile in creating new life. She was deeply thankful for that... her sister-in-law Marigold was an eminently sad example what could happen to a woman when her body remained empty.
Suddenly, in the midst of her peaceful contentment, she felt a small icy sting of fear inside her heart. For a strange, frightening second the air was filled with the sharp scent of pennyroyal tea and her body anxiously seemed to remember an old pain.
What if...
No. She was strong and she was healthy. It couldn't happen twice.
*****
The following two weeks were unusually hot. Rosie struggled with the familiar turns of morning nausea. She tried to hide it from the rest of the family without exactly knowing why; Sam had seen her carrying five babies already and he was accustomed to the attending circumstances. She was sure he would have been overjoyed with the outlook of the next child scrambling through the rooms of Bag End, but still she didn't speak. She got up earlier as even her husband did and carefully kept her secret.
Day after day the sun burned down on cornfields and colour-flaming flower beds, and the green beans growing up the bean stalks like an army of vegetable soldiers threw sharp black shadows. Rosie found out that most of her chores could only be done shortly after dawn. On midday even simple dish-washing was an unbearable misery.
She hungered for water. In every free moment she was found resting on her favourite arm chair, cooling her feet in a tin tub nearly filled to the brim. Finally she couldn`t stand it any longer. She left Frodo in his study, the children in the garden and Sam to his endless duty of watering the dry earth and escaped to the river.
The water had sunk deeply beyond its usual level. Big, smoothwashed stones lay free and offered a natural stair to her weary feet. The water surface sparkled in the dazzling white sunshine like a stream of diamonds.
Rosie hid in the dry copsewood and stripped off her clothes. Skirt and blouse, though both made of thin cotton, had been a far too heavy burden through the whole morning, and Rosie sighed with blissful relief when she got rid of them. She stepped forward carefully and stifled a small scream when the coolness of the river sent surprising shivers up her legs and throughout her whole body. At last she swam; slow, well trained movements carried her deliciously weightless along with the gentle current. The water smelled somehow green, and leaves from hanging branches of the trees near the riverbank touched her head and her cheeks with a tender caressing. She smiled up to the sky and for a wonderful lazy moment she was sure she would never come out of the water again.
The next second, the pain hit her like a sudden strike. It was like a hot, angry fist around her belly, burning amidst the cool water and raging through her body like a vicious beast. Rosie gasped and sunk, eyes wide open close under the surface. Then she came up again, spitting und sobbing. The pain was still growing, holding her tummy in a cruel grip and when she dared to look down she saw that the water was not green anymore... it turned red, red, red.
With a last effort she managed to scream; it was not a very loud sound, but it reached the ears of Frodo wandering down to the riverbank with a well thumbed book under his arm. He stood still, eyes wide open in sheer disbelief... he saw Rosie's head vanishing under the surface of the water and he caught a short horrible glimpse of her pale face flowing on the river like a strange flower.
Then the book lay forgotten in the dry grass and he dived in. He hadn't taken the time to undress, but he didn't care for the weight of his clothes. After three or four swimming movements his hand got hold of her wrist and he struggled back and reached the bank, breathless and shivering with desperate panic. Her body was incredibly heavy, her long wet hair seemed to pull her back into the river.
He kneeled beside her, touching the white, inanimate face with trembling hands, murmuring her name with a voice like a choking sob.
"Mr. Frodo? Frodo? What... Rosie!"
Sam. There as always when he was needed. Even Rosie reacted to the comforting, beloved voice. She moved her head and moaned, then she coughed and vomited up water. Sam lifted her up on his lap and she burrowed her wet face against his shirt and moaned again. Her body tensed with agony.
"Sam... Sam... the baby..."
Sam didn't say a word. He carried Rose up the hill, leaving Frodo behind for the moment as if he didn't exist. Frodo sat up arduously, staring with blind eyes on the trail of water staining the grass. With a shock he recognized that it was not only water he saw. His head fell back and he began to cry helplessly.
*****
Seven days since it happened.
She lay still, surrounded by a thick white wall of silence. Carefully tucked in her bed, covered with linen, her heavy head resting on a soft pillow. She didn't want to open her eyes. She didn't want to see anything. She didn't want to see anyone.
The pain had quietened, but it had left her empty again. Once more her body had betrayed her. Not a sister for her little ones. Not a brother. Not this time.
And what if something important was destroyed? What if she never regained her strength? She saw herself staying in bed for months and months, a pale shadow of the woman she had been. A pale shadow like Frodo.
Her eyes flew open. Frodo sat beside her bed, his head bowed down, his eyes closed. One of his hands lay motionless in his lap, the other one was stretched out halfway to reach her fingers. It seemed as if he hadn't dared to touch her.
She looked at him, thankful for the fact that he didn't see her. In her heart there was a confusing mixup of emotions - sorrow, love, despair, all at once. And in the first place there was a big anger, surprising and scaring her at the same time.
It would have been your child. It is your fault, not mine. It is you.
A cold grim voice inside her head, like a judge, passing a strict sentence. She shied away from that voice.
"Frodo...?"
His head twitched up.
"Rosie."
She hardly recognized his voice. Even in his worst moments, coming back from one of his turns, he hadn't sound that desperate and rueful. The anger vanished into nothing when she saw the deep, tired lines in his face, the narrowed lips and shadowed eyes.
"Rosie, I'm so sorry. It must have been me. It was my fault. I'm so sorry, Rosie."
It was like an echo of her own thoughts and that was more than she was able to bear.
"Come here, love."
She opened her arms. For a hurting second he hesitated, then he leaned towards her and she pulled him down by her side on the bed. His face lay on her breast and she felt the wetness of tears soaking through her nightshirt. She was tired as death, but this time she wouldn't cry.
"It must have been this way when my parents drowned..." A stifled murmur against her skin. "I've never been that anxious in my whole life."
He of all people had suffered the greatest of all fears - for her?
Astonishingly enough, she caught herself smiling. A pale smile, but nonetheless a smile.
"You're kidding, dear." she whispered. "What about these black riders? And those Uruk-hai?"
He chuckled and shaked his head lightly.
"This was worse. I love you, Rose. And, to protect you for the future..."
She covered his mouth with one hand and laid her face against his. She saw her twinned reflection in the sad blue eyes she loved so dearly.
"Sshh, silly. Quiet now."
The door opened. Sam rushed in, behind him all her little ones… and something grey and fluffy in the middle of them all, with a busily waving tail and a mouth that seemed to grin.
"What is that? Where does this dog come from?"
Sam took her in his arms and kissed her. All the children started babbling the same time.
"Mom, he's new... he's ours... Sam-Dad brought him... his name is Arky, mom!"
"Not so loud, my little ones." Sam smiled, but he sounded resolute. "Your mother needs a rest." He stuffed the covers carefully around her body and kissed her again. She closed her eyes, filled with deep thankfulness. They all went out on the tips of their toes, taking Frodo with them and closing the door silently.
She was still tired and deeply wounded. And she was certainly weak. But in the midst of her painful loss something new grew inside her again: a warm, tiny, shining seed of courage.
She would never give up.
And she would try again.
~
Pretty Good Year