Chapter Text
Year One
Bilbo plants his tree. It is not the first thing he does when he arrives, it is not even the first thing that he thinks of. No, the first order of business is to get back all of his belongings from his vulture of a family and acquaintances. In a way, he’s grateful to them for the distraction; in another, more significant way, he notices as soon as he crosses the threshold that his mother’s linens, the ones embroidered with her initials that she loved so much, are all gone, and Bilbo has faced a dragon recently so whoever has them had better give them back.
Year Two
His most respectable neighbours still turn their noses up at him, though the less prickly members of his family (mostly from the Took side, which is renowned to hold a grudge but also to enjoy a good story) have begun reaching out to him. He doesn’t know how to feel about that, but he is so lonely he accepts the invitation to tea and almost doesn’t weep when his cousin Amaranth hugs him goodbye.
Year Three
His mother used to tell him stories about the elves she’d met in Rivendell, and no one featured more in them then Glorfindel, and the many adventures he went on.
It is a more peaceful era now, and Glorfindel, Bilbo assumes when he runs into him during one of his long walks, must be dreadfully bored.
Bilbo is too polite to say this. Glorfindel asks how his Sindarin is going (or so Bilbo believes, since he asks this in Sindarin, and his grasp on the language is too shaky to be certain).
By the time they bid each other goodbye, it is night and Bilbo thinks that Glorfindel must be beyond bored, because he’s offered to have in-person lessons, not just via letters.
Year Four
Gandalf comes back and brings Balin with him. Bilbo puts on a good front, laughs with them and sees Balin smirk at the golden buttons Bilbo bought indulgently (and a little bit to annoy his peskier relations).
Overall, the visit goes well, and Bilbo is even surprised and proud of himself. They stay for a few days. The morning of their departure, Bilbo thinks that he may be fine after all.
He is not fine after all. His eyes track their fading shapes on the road until they are gone and he can’t breathe.
Year Five
Some days, most days, he is a full hobbit. Perhaps one who socialises less than hobbits naturally do, but then that has always been rather a preference of his, though he used to be better at enduring family obligations.
And it's not that he doesn't want company. He does, desperately. Only, there is something that feels so profoundly unfair about the idea that the one person whose company he wants the most is the one that he’ll never have again. And he’ll be attending Romaric’s Yule party and wonder if there is one person in this room that he wouldn’t trade for that one person. It horrifies him, it truly does, especially the voice that doesn't belong to him that tells him that it would be possible.
Of course it isn’t; of course the dead can’t be brought back or traded for the living.
(But would he?)
Still; most days, he’s fine.
Year Six
And other days, he’s not fine. Other days find him lying on the floor of his vestibule because his skin is wrong and the air is not breathable and he just realised that he can’t remember the first words Thorin ever said to him. He used to think that remembering was the most painful part, but it’s not. Forgetting is far worse.
These days get rarer and rarer, but when they come, they are more intense. One day, he is sure that they will kill him.
Year Seven
Of course, Dwalin chooses one of these days to visit him.
“May I ask what you were doing down there?” he asks once Bilbo has recovered enough to offer him a cup of tea. It was probably the best option of all the dwarves to find him like that. The others would have panicked or been awkward. Dwalin, to his credit, made sure that Bilbo was not dead and then pretended that it was normal for someone to stare unblinking at the ceiling in the middle of the afternoon.
“Oh, you know,” replies Bilbo. “I was wondering about repainting the ceiling.”
Dwalin does not believe him. He stays three weeks, and repaints the ceiling.
Year Eight
The oak tree is becoming big enough to provide some nice shade, at least for someone of Bilbo’s height. Gandalf does not seem impressed by it, even as he compliments the rest of Bilbo’s garden.
“You didn’t come to recruit me for another scheme of yours, I hope,” Bilbo says, grinning.
“No, no, my friend,” Gandalf laughs. “My intentions are solely social.”
Bilbo cannot tell if he is disappointed or not. He doesn’t want to go on another adventure; at the same time, if he followed Gandalf, he would be with Gandalf. They might even run into old friends or make new ones.
“Tea,” declares Bilbo. He goes inside, leaving Gandalf to stand in the garden, which is rude, but less rude than bursting into tears in front of an unsuspecting guest.
When he comes back out, Gandalf is smoking on the bench. Bilbo sets down the tray between them and joins him. They don’t touch the tea.
“Glorfindel mentioned that he is still giving you Sindarin lessons,” Gandalf says. “Is it going well?”
“Úiston, cin trenerich nin.”
Gandalf laughs. “Very good.”
“I’m better at writing than speaking, I’m afraid.”
“Of course you are. You should go to Rivendell for a while. Practice. It would do you good, I think.”
Year Nine
He drags his feet to the Summer Festival and does not stop complaining about it until he catches one of his younger cousins’s pitying look.
“Aren’t you so lonely, Bilbo?” asks Primula.
He can’t bring himself to reply, but he stops complaining.
Year Ten
You don’t have to be lonely.
Bilbo stares at the ceiling, and mouths the words to himself. “You said this place would be easy to find.” But he was talking to Gandalf then, so it doesn’t count. Something about weapons, but he can’t recall the exact phrasing of it. He wonders if he is destined to lose everything about Thorin, one piece after the other, until there is nothing left. He wonders if it would be better for him, if it is only stubbornness that makes him hold on to the things that hurt him.