Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

1

The place that I know where they all know me
I gotta get back now to the ones who love me
Wrap myself around you, never let you go
There’s nothin’ in the world that feels like
Coming home

“Coming Home,” Keith Urban, Julia Michaels

Finrod’s truck rumbled down a pebbled and pitted country road that wound through endless cow pastures, the landscape that passed by outside Galadriel’s open passenger-side window dotted with grazing cattle. Accustomed to the huge ranch trucks like the one Finrod inexplicably favored, the bovines paid the passersby little attention. Weathered fences, sagging and sloping where gravity and bulls scratching their horns had taken their toll, lined both sides of the road that was likewise dwindling away to little more than a track through the wilderness.

Overhead the wide-open skies threatened rain from great, roiling clouds the color of day-old bruises. The December air bit and stung at Galadriel’s cheeks, but she preferred the scent of parched earth, distant wood smoke, hay, and livestock to the little air freshener swinging wildly on Finrod’s dash—needed to remember these smells, needed to remember where she was, needed to remember she was safe now.

Her brother glanced over at her, steering his Ford F-150 with one lazy hand on the wheel. “If you’re up to it, once we get you unpacked, Mom and Dad said they’d take us out to the Pits.”

Galadriel smiled, pulling her chin off her hand. “Really?”

Finrod grinned. “How long’s it been since you had barbecue?”

“They had barbecue in Virginia—”

“Oh, don’t even compare pulled pork on a freaking bun to real barbecue, Gal, come on. Damn, we shoulda gotten you out of there years ago!” The corners of his eyes crinkled, and Galadriel could have hung the moon on her brother’s smile. But Finrod’s words, a lighthearted joke glossing over the circumstances of her return to Texas after ten years away, tugged her own smile off her face. “You have to try this new sausage plate they started up in October—Oaxaca sausage, it’s stuffed with jalapeños and queso, and it is so fucking good, Gal, you won’t even believe it. They brought back the street corn too—you remember their street corn, right?”

Galadriel offered another smaller, softer smile. “Yeah.”

As Finrod continued to wax poetic about real barbecue (the Texan kind), she shifted her gaze back to the fields beyond the truck. Thunder boomed somewhere far in the distance, but thankfully, she only brought a few light suitcases on the two-and-a-half-day drive down from Doriath, Virginia. She’d be unpacked in no time. Not that she would have the energy to unpack tonight—all Galadriel really wanted to do was collapse on her new bed and curl up beneath the covers. It didn’t even matter that it would be her childhood summer room in her grandparents’ now-empty country house, which her parents were allowing her to rent while she got back on her feet. It didn’t matter that the house would need to be renovated and restored, or that she didn’t have a job, or that she’d blocked Celeborn on every form and fashion of social media she could think of—even LinkedIn.

She just wanted to sleep.

Movement along the right side of the road caught her eye. Galadriel brushed some golden flyways out of her eyes as a crisp roll of winter wind blustered through the fields. Someone was running along the road, a steady, even pace, with perfect posture that suggested a comfortable familiarity with long distances. An elastic headband kept any stray brown curls out of the runner’s eyes, the rest tied up in a tiny man-bun at the crown of his head. Sweat glimmered on the lean, bunching muscles of his bare back. Galadriel rolled her eyes to herself—no matter how cold it got, there was always some guy running shirtless in shorts.

As they passed the runner, Finrod lifted his hand in a lazy greeting. The runner glanced at their truck—looked right at Galadriel—and reached up to adjust his AirPods without returning the wave. Galadriel watched him shrink in the rear-view mirror until he was out of sight, a little cloud of dust from his grey tennis shoes the only indication of another life along this long, lonely road.

“Somebody you know?” she asked absently.

“Nah.”

Right. She’d forgotten people waved at each other here—a habit she’d carried with her to Virginia when she first moved there as a bright-eyed freshman … and quickly abandoned after the first few times Celeborn mocked her for it. Playfully, she’d thought at the time. Galadriel clenched her hands in her lap, her teeth worrying on her bottom lip as she gnawed at a patch of dry skin.

A few minutes later, Finrod took a left turn, and the road led them down a gentle slope towards a more forested swath of land. Down the righthand portion of the road, which diverged from their path at a T in front of yet another pasture, Galadriel recalled a few other houses—she didn’t remember the names of any of her grandparents’ neighbors, though. All their elderly friends from her childhood were gone now, just like Finwë and Indis themselves. Maybe young families had moved in now, or middle-aged empty nesters, or somebody who’d taken one look at an aged farmhouse and fallen in love.

Maybe some of them were hiding away in the cow fields, five miles from town, just like she was.

Galadriel squeezed her eyes shut when Finrod drove over the low water crossing half a mile from the house. He laughed, saying something about how it hadn’t rained in months, but she always had horrible visions of being swept away like a paper boat in a strong current. Galadriel blamed the day Aegnor pushed her into a part of the creek neither of them realized was quite so deep, and even though Finrod fished her out swiftly, she never much liked creeks since then. Her body relaxed again when they crossed the shallow waters, and then she was leaning forward, trying to catch a glimpse of their grandparents’ house through the oak trees.

It was a two-storied structure with a weathered exterior that had once been white, a traditional blend of clapboard siding supported by a sturdy stone foundation. Peeling paint revealed the bare wood beneath. The expansive wrap-around porch had wilted with time, and its once pristine railings were now dull and chipped. Tall, double-hung windows framed with slightly askew shutters punctuated the façade, covered in a thin layer of dust. Reflecting the overcast sky, they bestowed upon the house an almost haunted appearance.

Hanging flower baskets, now empty, swayed gently in the December air. Weeds and Bermuda grass had reclaimed the beds in the front yard that had once been a well-tended garden. Brittle oak leaves littered the road and clumped on the seat of a wide wooden swing hanging from the sturdiest of the grove. Another swing, this one situated on the porch beneath cobweb-netted ceiling fans, boasted the additional comfort of sun-bleached, flowery cushions.

Finrod glanced at her, his bright and unflappable demeanor now replaced with thoughtful stillness. He reached over and squeezed her hand. Galadriel didn’t have it in her to squeeze back. “Come on,” he said, “let’s get your stuff unloaded, and then we’ll grab supper. Sound okay?”

She nodded slightly but didn’t say a word, her gaze never leaving the house.

Her brother exited the truck first, going to fetch her suitcases from the bed. Galadriel peered at the long drop from the passenger seat to the ground, then half-slithered, half-launched her small frame out of the ridiculously tall vehicle. Finrod handed her the lightest of her bags, taking all the rest in hand, and followed her up to the porch steps. Thunder rolled miles away, and Galadriel briefly spared a thought to the runner, wondering if he’d make it home in time to stay out of the rain.

The front door of the house was solid oak, but the varnish had long since worn away. Her brother unlocked it and pushed the door open with a creak, revealing an interior that was just as neglected as the exterior. Dust motes danced in the dim light that filtered through the grimy windows. The wooden floors were scuffed and scratched, and the grandmotherly wallpaper was peeling in places. The furniture, covered in white sheets, reminded her of slapdash Halloween ghost costumes.

Galadriel felt a pang of despair as she realized how much work needed to be done to restore the house to its former glory. Her father had been holding on to the house in memory of his parents—he’d grown up there, and all four of his children spent their childhood summers in this house—but apparently his nostalgia had not included the wherewithal to keep it in good condition. Why had he let it deteriorate like this?

Then again, grief did funny things to people.

And, well, they were letting her rent an entire five-bedroom country house for practically pennies, so Galadriel could put up with a few cobwebs and tragic wallpaper. If anything, the cleanup would give her focus and purpose while she tried to figure out her new life in Lindon, Texas. New, and old too—standing here in the entryway of her grandparents’ house, with Finrod at her side, Galadriel could have been ten again, running in from playing in a rare rainstorm with giggles and wet hair, chased down with a towel by her laughing grandmother before she got too far down the hallway.

“Well,” Finrod said, starting up the stairs with her bags, “which room do you want? You’ve got the whole place to yourself. You can sleep in a different room every night if you want!”

Galadriel smiled at last and followed her brother up the creaking steps. “My old room’s fine.”

“Blue room it is.”

Each of the bedrooms were styled in different colors, and she and her siblings all had a designated room since they were old enough to spend the nights on their own. Galadriel’s room was blue, Finrod’s white, Aegnor’s beige, and Angrod’s green. The twins usually slept in the same room, but when they were fighting during the tumultuous teenaged years, one usually ended up in Finrod’s room and the other sulking elsewhere. They were in college now and wouldn’t be home until Christmas, but Galadriel didn’t mind—her younger brothers were rowdy and playful in a way she did not yet think she could handle. Not right now, not yet. She loved them to pieces, of course, but even Finrod’s more sensitive, steady friendliness was going to be an adjustment.

As Galadriel deposited her bag in the blue room, she thought about begging off going to the Pits with their parents. They’d understand, wouldn’t they, if she wanted to rest after the long drive? Then again, she hadn’t seen them in years, and they’d done so much for her lately. She could put up with one noisy night at the most popular barbecue joint in Lindon. And then, she’d come home and fling herself on the bed and sleep like she was dead.

Home. Galadriel bit at her lip again.

“Ready?” Finrod asked, blue eyes finding hers. He smiled, just a light lift of his lips. He cut a striking figure in the watery yellow light of the old bulb burning in the ceiling fan overhead. She’d need to replace it, or its almost imperceptible sputtering was going to give her a migraine. Her brother’s military haircut and plain white t-shirt beneath a brown leather jacket seemed wildly out of place in her childhood bedroom, which had never been redecorated as she grew into a teenager and then a woman—an infringement of sterilized modernity upon the southern time capsule of her youth in which they now stood.

Galadriel couldn’t bring herself to browse all the knickknacks on the shelves lining the walls, or the tenderly preserved toys she knew were tucked away in the closet; she could barely look at the blue room, didn’t want to. It was just another reminder of everything she’d left behind when she moved to Virginia, all the pieces of herself she wasn’t sure she belonged to anymore.

So she nodded to Finrod, suddenly desperate to leave the house even though they’d just arrived. He put an arm around her shoulders, and they headed back downstairs as the first light drops of rain began to fall.

//

Water pounded onto the cool, dry earth, seeping into the thirsty cracks, down, down, down into the lonely places untouched by the sun. Brittle, brown grass winked and waved beneath the onslaught, collecting diamond droplets and flinging them to the dirt in a ceaseless cadence. Cattle congregated beneath oak trees, mist gathering on their short, dusty hair, on their eyelashes, on their hooves. Clouds rolled and mounted high above the pastureland like ephemeral cathedrals constructed from silent prayers and the dust of country roads—if God existed, surely He made His home among those towering heights.

//

A tumultuous sea of dark, rolling clouds presided over the skies as Galadriel and Finrod pulled up to the Pits of Utumno. Rain poured down in silvery sheets, transforming the parking lot into a muddy expanse riddled with puddles reflecting the dim light of the weathered streetlamps. Finrod’s headlights barely pierced the downpour, casting only a fleeting glow on the rustic tin sign that marked their destination. The tantalizing aroma of hot, smoked meats wafted through the gloom, mingling with the crisp, earthy petrichor of cold December rain.

Finrod jumped out first, his boots sinking slightly into the mud. He quickly made his way around the car, rain dripping off his jacket, and opened the door for Galadriel. “Shit!” he laughed, helping her down from the passenger seat. She grimaced as her well-worn Hey Dudes hit the pooling mud. They both hiked their jackets up over their heads and raced for the restaurant.

Despite the rain, the parking lot teemed with life. A few other newcomers fled for the safety of the awning and interior alongside Galadriel and Finrod; he held the door for all of them on the way in, everyone exchanging smiles and chuckles about how much we needed the rain.

By the time they reached the entrance, both were breathless and drenched. Finrod’s short blonde hair clung to his forehead, water streaming down his cheeks. Galadriel’s braid darkened to shades of brown where it hung limp on her shoulder, chunks and frizzy strands freed by moisture and the dash from the truck. Not precisely how she wanted to greet her parents for the first time since they flew to Virginia for Christmas three years ago—sodden and winded.   

But then Finrod was ushering her inside, saying something about keeping an eye open for Mom and Dad, and Galadriel followed obediently. The Pits embraced them with a classic Texan welcome, featuring wooden beams stretching across the ceiling and walls adorned with vintage cowboy hats, old photographs, and worn-out (Texas) license plates. Heady scents of brisket, onions, beer, and people wafted through the smoke-tinged air, mingling with the sounds of laughter and clinking glasses. Tables and chairs made of sturdy, seasoned wood packed the establishment, their surfaces shined smooth from years of daily use. Beneath the condiments and stored menus topping each table, a brand of the restaurant’s logo marked ownership of the furniture. Mason jar lanterns hung from the ceiling.

Galadriel’s gaze was drawn towards the well-stocked bar when a group of young men broke into raucous laughter. Situated behind its polished wooden counter and rows of gleaming bottles, the bartender mixed drinks for her enthusiastic patrons with speed and a smile. Photographs taken with famous visitors, along with more generic Texas paraphernalia, decorated what little space wasn’t occupied by shelves of Shiner Bock, Lone Star, and local Lindon brands like Beleriand Brewhouse.

Out back, a small concert stage was another main draw of the Pits, where local bands played on the regular and more illustrious guests on special occasions. But considering the weather, the music tonight came courtesy of the overhead speakers. The tunes were a lively mix of classic country hits and more modern songs, and their energy was infectious (possibly helped along by the copious alcohol being served at nearly every table). People occasionally broke into spontaneous clapping and foot-tapping.

The place was jam-packed, not unusual on any night of the week for the Pits, but the crowd seemed friendly and welcoming. Strangers chatted like old friends, and the waitstaff moved efficiently through the throng, balancing trays laden with plates of brisket, ribs, and coleslaw. Hearty laughter saturated the restaurant, along with the sizzle of the barbecue pit and the occasional cheer from the bar area when a favorite song came on.

Galadriel smiled.

Finrod guided her to a corner table where their parents, Eärwen and Finarfin, awaited them. Her heart fluttered with a synthesis of nerves and excitement despite the support they’d given her over the phone since she announced, bawling, that she was coming home to stay. Money appeared on her Venmo account (from her parents and her brothers), and Finarfin was quick to make all the travel arrangements. He paid for everything—gas, hotels, even Finrod’s and her travel food.

“Don’t worry about the money,” Eärwen insisted when Galadriel swore she would pay them back. “Just come home.”

Still, the circumstances were less than ideal—she didn’t currently have a penny to her name—and her own sense of shame over the ending of her long marriage rubbed raw. Galadriel imagined she would have been married to Celeborn until the day she died, mother of his children, a loving, steadfast wife cherished by an equally doting husband. Now here she was, a few weeks before Christmas: flat broke and single.   

Eärwen’s face lit up with joy as she spotted her children, her eyes sparkling with unshed tears. Finarfin stood first, his expression that of pure delight, and enveloped Galadriel in a warm embrace. “It’s so good to see you, honey,” he said, his voice thick with emotion. Eärwen snagged the hug when Finarfin released her, her touch gentle and reassuring. A wave of relief washed over Galadriel along the tears swimming in her eyes; despite the context of her return, her parents’ love remained unchanged.

“Hi,” she mumbled back, breaking into another shy smile when her mother set her back with a grin of her own. Unlike Galadriel, who preferred oversized sweaters and the jeans she’d had since high school, Eärwen was the very picture of Southern charm and elegance in her tailored cornflower-blue blouse. Made from a luxurious silk blend, the blouse displayed a subtle V-neckline and billowy sleeves that gathered at the cuffs. Her accessories were carefully chosen to complement her outfit without overpowering it: a delicate gold necklace with a small pendant shaped like a leaf, which Galadriel gave her that Christmas they came to visit her and Celeborn. Her mother’s earrings were simple yet sophisticated gold hoops. On her wrist, she boasted a vintage gold watch that Finarfin gifted her on their anniversary. Eärwen paired her blouse with high-waisted, crisply white jeans that settled on her trim waist perfectly, along with nude pumps. Soft waves of golden hair framed her face, and she wore only minimal makeup to highlight her natural beauty—a hint of blush, a swipe of mascara, and a nude lipstick.

Well-dressed and well-mannered, kind and sensible, and gorgeous as all get out.

Galadriel fumbled with the wet end of her braid and shifted in her mud-spattered shoes, hoping her mother hadn’t caught a whiff of the shirt she hadn’t changed in a few days beneath her fraying denim jacket.

Finarfin put a hand to her back and asked with a wink, “Has Fin mentioned the menu changes?”

She took a seat alongside her parents and brothers, confirming with a chuckle, “Yes! Once when we left Virginia, once on the drive down, and another time in the fields on the way to the house. I think I just about have the new menu memorized by now.”

Finrod grinned, his smile identical to their father’s, and leaned closer to start pointing out all the new offerings on the slightly sticky menu Galadriel now held in her hands. Her mouth watered just reading the entries—platters of chicken, turkey, and sausage; pork and queso nachos; chicken fried steak; wings, burgers, salads, pulled pork sandwiches …

Finrod was right—they didn’t have this in Virginia.

“Evening, y’all,” a waitress greeted a few minutes later, having to raise her voice a bit to be heard over the pleasant background din. “How’re we doing tonight? Can I get you any drinks? Let’s start with you, sugar.” She gestured to Finrod, smiling down at Galadriel’s brother with a sweetness that may not have been prompted entirely by customer service. Finrod and Finarfin ordered beer, her mother a water with lemon (on the side), and Galadriel elected for a sweet tea—maybe the sugar would keep her chin from nodding onto her chest while they waited for their food. Luckily, her parents seemed to note her tiredness, and apart from a few obligatory questions about the drive and the hotels, they did not badger her with all the questions she could see brimming in their eyes.

Finrod was happy to field Finarfin’s questions after a time, while Eärwen squeezed Galadriel’s hand and asked tentatively, “How was the house? Is it bad?”

“It’s … going to take some work,” Galadriel admitted. “But I’m happy to do it. It’ll keep me busy, and the place has a lot of potential. I mean, it was so beautiful when Meemaw and Papaw lived there. And I don’t want to sell it, so …” She shrugged. “I’ll make it work, even if it takes me a while.”

Eärwen smiled. “Yeah, and your dad loves that house so much. He and Fin can help with the repairs, if you ever need them to. Not me, though—but you call me when you need help picking out wallpaper and decorations, and I’ll be over in a jiffy,” she added with a grin, and Galadriel laughed.

“I’ll need to make some money before I can start with any repairs. It’s functional enough for now.”

“Mm,” Finarfin said, setting down his beer, “Gal, I might actually have a lead on a job for you. I was talking to—”

“All right, folks, here we are!” Their waitress reappeared with a serving tray on her shoulder, loaded with barbecue. She set the food down on the stand she carried in her other hand and began divvying out the plates. In front of Finrod, she set an Oaxaca sausage platter, complemented with street corn, potato salad, green beans, and a slice of untoasted white bread. Finarfin ordered chicken fried steak, which he paired with gravy-slathered mashed potatoes and a side salad. Eärwen received a grilled chicken salad (fondly nicknamed the “Gil-salad,” after the beloved mayor of Lindon). And Galadriel chose a two-meat plate with sausage and brisket, along with potato salad, coleslaw, and green beans—pretty much the most standard sampling of Texas barbecue she could have picked.

It was divine.

The table fell silent for a few minutes as everyone dug into their food, and only once Galadriel swore she’d died and gone to heaven instead of Lindon, Texas, did Finarfin pick up with his earlier conversation about a job. “Honey, tell her about the job,” Eärwen prodded, and he brightened, pausing to dab his mouth with a napkin first.

“Mm! Right, right. So I was talking to my friend Durin—great guy, known him for years—and he and his wife Disa bought that old restaurant on Sundering Street a few years back. You remember Waldreg’s? Food was terrible, service too. You could have started a campfire with all that grease on their pizza. Anyway, it shut down after it failed a health inspection, and it was vacant for a year or two before Durin took a chance on it. They fixed it up just—really nice, and the renovations are due to finish in the next few weeks. He’s looking for staff; pickings are slim with the holidays right around the corner, people being out of town and all that, but he really wants to be open in time for Christmas. I told him you didn’t have any restaurant experience, but you worked in a coffee shop in college, and wouldn’t ya know? He needs a barista! Several, in fact.”

Finrod beamed over at Galadriel. “That’s great!”

“I know it’s not much,” Finarfin assured her, “but maybe it could hold you over until you find something that pays better. And, you know, people tip well in this town. Plus we’re all excited to see what Durin’s done with the place. I’ve popped my head in a few times, and I think it’s gonna be great, Gal. He’s a super nice guy, and his wife is an angel—everyone adores Disa. You’ll love them.”

Galadriel fiddled with her fork while she chewed slowly. “It’s been ten years since I worked in the café … I doubt I’d even remember how to use an espresso machine at this point. Not one of the fancy ones, anyway.”

“He promised me they’d teach you everything you need to know,” Finarfin said, the edges of his eyes crinkling with a hopeful smile. “They’re still training up the staff. You wouldn’t be the only new person on the job, honey. But—take a few days to think about it, if you want. If you decide you want to try it, you let me know, and Durin will get everything arranged for you.”

“Yeah, take some time to rest first,” Eärwen urged, patting her hand again. “I know the drive down here was long. And everything else that happened—”

“Yeah!” Galadriel cut her mother off quickly, adding a slight smile to soothe her abruptness—but the last thing she wanted to talk about at dinner was Celeborn. “Yeah, I am pretty tired. It’d be nice to have a few days to relax first. But thanks, Dad, really. It sounds like it could be a good place to start. I’ll think it over.”

Finarfin beamed, and his gratification brought another smile to Galadriel’s lips. It was kind of him, truly, to try and hunt down a job for her; Eärwen had told her over text back in Virginia that he’d been scouring every job site he could think of to help her find something. And the heartfelt gesture was not unappreciated, even if Galadriel didn’t have the emotional bandwidth to express her thankfulness just yet. But hugs and smiles, she could do.

“You’re buying us all dessert tonight, right, Dad?” Finrod said, clapping Finarfin’s shoulder with a cheeky grin. Galadriel’s mouth watered at the thought of warm fruit cobbler or maybe sopapilla cheesecake (the Pits’ was the best in town, naturally). She was already stuffed from her dinner and would be taking home most of it in a box, but she definitely wouldn’t pass up dessert if Finarfin was paying for it.

Their father laughed and gestured in her direction with his beer, a broad grin splitting his face. “Ah, what the hell, sure. Gal’s home! Get whatever you want, honey. Fin, there’s a very firm five-dollar limit on your choice.”

“Five dollars! All that’s gonna get me is a scoop of ice cream!”

“Then you can have a scoop of ice cream,” Finarfin laughed. “Gal, you gonna need a box for that? Eärwen, what about for your salad?” When next their waitress wandered by, he waved her over, and they placed their dessert orders (Finrod ended up paying the difference so he could get peach cobbler). Galadriel ordered sopapilla cheesecake with perhaps the biggest smile she’d given all day.

A popular classic country song began playing overhead, and the young men at the bar were singing along with such drunken enthusiasm that everybody in the restaurant was quietly chuckling. Eärwen shook her head, even though she smiled too, and Finrod leaned over to sing along in Galadriel’s ear before she swatted him away with a giggle. “Aw, c’mon, didn’t you miss me?” he laughed.

“I did not miss you bursting my eardrums with Willie Nelson.”

Finrod groaned, and so did Finarfin. “This is George Strait!” Finarfin lamented, and both Galadriel and Eärwen laughed at the men’s visible anguish.

“Call yourself a Texan.” Finrod shook his head, and Galadriel waved him off. And then their dessert was arriving, and she was spared any further lectures about country music artists from Texas. Along with her combo platter, she bagged up about half of the cheesecake to go. She wished she could have eaten the entire thing, but her stomach was already going to give her hell tomorrow.

They exited the Pits the same time as an influx of new customers, leading to a great deal of shuffling and shifting in the short hallway between the interior entrance door and the exterior one. Galadriel tripped on Finrod’s foot and smacked into a rain-damp, black-t-shirt-clad set of pecs right at her eye-level. A hand seized her elbow to steady her, firm but not painful.

“Easy, love, ya all right?”

“Sorry,” she muttered, too embarrassed to even look up at the face attached to the rich, accented voice. British? She couldn’t tell—and she couldn’t get away from him fast enough.

Galadriel dove after her parents and back into the rain, wincing as the downpour slapped her in the face along with a brisk wind. Finrod was yelling goodbye to Eärwen and Finarfin as they all scattered, and Galadriel only had time to wave before he was tugging her along to his truck. It was a miracle she didn’t drop her leftovers in the mud. Finrod opened the door for her and got her situated in his monster of a truck, then leapt into his own seat and carefully pulled out of the parking lot while Galadriel warmed her cold fingers on the dashboard vents.

“Well, that was refreshing,” he remarked, grinning as he ran a hand over his hair, soaked once more. “Back to the house?”

“Back to the house,” she confirmed. Finrod put on some George Strait with a pointed look in her direction, and Galadriel rolled her eyes as she took out her phone to check the weather for tomorrow. Thunderstorms—good. She could sleep all day without feeling guilty, if she needed to. Even thinking about sleeping had Galadriel’s head nodding towards her chest, and by the time Finrod shook her shoulder in the driveway of her new house, she was alarmed to find she’d drooled a little in her sleep. Thankfully, it was dark, and her brother hadn’t noticed.

Finrod escorted her inside. Galadriel stashed her leftovers in the fridge, then yawned her way through a goodbye to Finrod. He laughed and pulled her into a hug, holding on a little longer than she’d expected. She relaxed, sighing into his shoulder, and closed her eyes.

“I’m glad you’re home,” he said, all hints of teasing gone. “I was worried about you. We all were.”

Galadriel’s eyes watered, and she squeezed them tighter shut. All she could do was nod.

Finrod let her go then, a warm smile on his face, and he opened the front door to leave. “Night, Gal. Text me if you need anything, okay?”

“I will. Night.” She started to close the door behind him as he jogged down the porch steps, then called after her brother, “Fin!” He paused, waiting. Galadriel hesitated, shifting in her damp shoes, and said with every ounce of sincerity she could will into her tired voice, “Thank you.”

He grinned, his smile bright in the stormy gloom of the night. “Anytime. And I mean it, Gal. See you later.”

“See ya.” Galadriel closed and locked the door, then turned around and gazed at her quiet, empty house. Rain pattered on the windowpanes, and its soothing lullaby beckoned her towards sleep at long last. She trudged back upstairs to the blue room. Galadriel peeled off her wet clothes in the bathroom and then closed and locked her bedroom door (just in case).

Then she flopped down on her bed in her underwear and bare feet, and she passed out with an exhausted sigh.

Chapter Text

2

Old friends, they shine like diamonds
 Old friends, you can always call
 Old friends, Lord, you can’t buy ‘em
 You know it’s old friends, after all

“Old Friends,” Chris Stapleton

Galadriel stirred as the first low rumbles of thunder rolled across the sky. Flashes of lightning punctuated the early morning darkness, casting eerie, fleeting shadows across the walls. In lieu of a blanket, the heavy, darkly electric atmosphere of the blue room pressed down on her bare skin, pinning her to the mattress just like—

Her eyes darted to the bedroom door. Still locked.

She rolled around on her bed so she could pull the covers up and over her body, then yawned as she settled down into the toasty, shallow crater created by her sleeping form. The distant roar of the storm approached, like a great beast awakening from slumber. Wind began to whisper through the trees outside her window, the leaves rustling in anticipation of the impending downpour—a windchime she’d failed to notice yesterday clanged somewhere below her window, maybe the back porch.

As the thunderstorm drew nearer, rain began to fall, first in hesitant drops, then in a steady, relentless torrent. Raindrops drummed a wild cacophony on the roof above, the discordant music of the countryside come to fill the precarious silence of the early hour. She’d left the curtains of her bedroom window open, and if she shuffled closer to the edge of the bed, Galadriel could glimpse the rain from her little nest. The sky was a canvas of dark, swirling clouds, illuminated sporadically by brilliant, jagged streaks of lightning. The scent of rain-soaked earth and the fresh, clean air filled her lungs via the tiny crack left by a windowpane that didn’t shut completely.

Celeborn was hundreds of miles away. And even if he did try to come looking for her, he didn’t have her new address, or her new phone number. Galadriel hadn’t told him where she was going, although he knew her family lived in Lindon. She’d blocked him on every form of media or communication possible, and she hadn’t posted anything about her new life. How would he find her?

Even so, she pulled the blankets tighter around her thin body. Gooseflesh prickled on her skin; Galadriel could only imagine the look on his face if he saw her in bed wearing nothing but her underwear. As if she stripped down just for him, as if she wanted his attention, as if he was entitled to her body just because she dared to show a little skin. Once, maybe, when they were first married, Galadriel would have planned an encounter like that—slipping gleefully beneath the covers in some lacy lingerie, awaiting his footsteps on the stairs, her body and face flushed and burning with desire when she witnessed the gleam in his eyes when he realized what was waiting for him beneath their blankets.

But it wasn’t long before saying no to Celeborn stopped being an option.

Shuddering, she tossed off her covers and went to find a fresh shirt and some pajama shorts. Galadriel pulled on a navy-blue, acid wash shirt from the Doriath University Department of Marketing—it was buttery-soft against her skin after almost ten years of weekly washes, and the hem reached just below her butt cheeks. Her frame was swallowed whole in shirts like this, all her curves hidden, and she’d packed her suitcase full of them when she left Doriath. Going to the antique white vanity across the room from her bed, Galadriel scooped up her hair and piled it in a messy bun atop her head. Glancing towards the locked door again, she debated putting on her shorts … then decided to forgo them and stay in her underwear.

Celeborn wasn’t here—and she’d be damned if she let him dictate what she wore in her own house halfway across the country.

Hopping back atop the bed with her Kindle in hand, Galadriel banished all thoughts of her former husband from her mind. He didn’t deserve to take up any more space inside her head. She’d told Eärwen she needed a few days to relax, and she meant to do exactly that. After lunch Galadriel wanted to walk through the house and catalogue some of the smallest renovations she could make on her currently limited budget. Dusting would be a priority. Sweeping, wiping, spraying—whatever she could do to freshen up the place before a job took away a big chunk of her time. Galadriel didn’t expect a barista job would seal her away inside a restaurant for forty hours every week, but she also needed enough money to survive.

Later, later, she told herself. The December chill seeped through the window, but she settled in, snug under her thick quilt. The rhythmic patter of rain against the windowpane was punctuated occasionally by the low rumble of thunder, and if Galadriel could have purred with contentment, she would have—all she needed now was some hot tea, but she was fairly certain any tea bags left in the dusty cupboards would be unfit for human consumption. Adding “go to the grocery store” to the top of her mental list of chores for the day, Galadriel then set about deciding what she wanted to read.

As she navigated through her digital library, the overhead light bulb flickered faintly. The barely perceptible blinking began to irritate her, the intermittent motion casting fleeting shadows across the room. She tried to focus on the words on her Kindle, but the quivering persisted, gradually building into a headache that throbbed at her temples. Galadriel glanced up in annoyance, willing the light to stabilize, but it only seemed to mock her with its erratic behavior.

Sound like anyone else you know? she asked herself with only a little bit of humor.

Just as she was about to give up and switch to the dim glow of her Kindle’s backlight, the light bulb gave one final sputter and went out completely, plunging the room into early morning darkness. Galadriel sighed deeply. She set her Kindle aside and reluctantly pushed the quilt off her legs, cold air immediately rushing to take its place.

Tugging on her shoes to protect her bare feet, Galadriel pondered where she might locate a replacement bulb. She thought she recalled a closet downstairs where her grandparents kept small household essentials (or at least some supplies). Worth a check. She could always filch one from another room if she got desperate, but if she was going to the store anyway, she might as well pick some up while she was in town.

The creaky floorboards groaned under Galadriel’s slight weight as she made her way to the bedroom door and unlocked it. An occasional flash of lightning illuminated the hallway outside her room in dim intervals, providing just enough light to navigate by. With the expertise of someone who had walked these halls for years, she beelined for the hallway light switch and flipped it on. Then she made her way downstairs to resume her hunt.

Galadriel opened the squeaky wooden door, a faint scent of cedar and mothballs wafting out. A single bare bulb hung from the ceiling, flickering just as wildly as the one in the blue room. Shelves lined the walls, filled with neatly stacked linens, old photo albums, and various accumulated knick-knacks. On the floor sat a few worn-out cardboard boxes labeled with her grandmother Indis’s looping handwriting, containing everything from holiday decorations to old toys. A dusty sewing machine hunkered in one corner, perhaps the very same one Indis used to craft the quilts covering each of their beds.

She carefully navigated through the closet, her eyes scanning the shelves for the elusive spare light bulb. Finally, she spotted a small, unassuming box tucked away on the top shelf, labeled “light bulbs.” Standing on her tiptoes (and then a box when that method proved insufficient), Galadriel reached up and strained to pull it down, then sighed.

It was completely empty.

“Really?” she muttered. “We couldn’t even throw the box away?”

Taking the box into the kitchen, Galadriel did exactly that. Then she rifled through the cabinets, peered into the refrigerator, and jotted down a list on a little notepad she located in a small drawer beneath the long-disconnected house phone. Just the essentials for now, she decided. Food and whatever cleaning supplies would make the house look—and smell—better after a quick pass or two.

Speaking of smells … Galadriel paused and lifted the neck of her shirt to her nose. While the shirt was fresh from her suitcase, the rest of her could definitely use a shower before she set a single foot off this property. Squeezing through that little junk closet probably did her no favors either—or sleeping on a bed that had been gathering dust for a while now. Galadriel grimaced; she’d been too tired to even think about the bed last night when she got home, but she suddenly shivered at the thought of the stale bedding and resolved to throw everything in the wash as soon as possible.

She finished up her list and took it back to the blue room, leaving it on her nightstand. So much for a relaxing morning reading a book—but Galadriel didn’t honestly mind. Cleaning could be its own form of relaxation, and all of this prep work would have to be done anyway before she could truly relax. She stripped the sheets and everything washable on the bed, taking them to the laundry room and dumping them into the mercifully contemporary washing machine. While her bedding washed, Galadriel dug up a presentable outfit from her suitcase and headed into the upstairs bathroom.

The spacious room was a charming blend of rustic and vintage. Floral wallpaper adorned the walls, slightly faded but still lovely. In one corner, a clawfoot tub stood proud, its brass fixtures dulled to a cozy glow with age. An old porcelain basin served as her sink, overseen by a wide mirror framed in ornate wood, both of them survivors of an earlier (and prettier) era. United with the tub, the shower setup was simple: an oval rod from which hung a floral-patterned curtain that matched the wallpaper. She pulled back the slightly stiff curtain and was relieved to find a modern shower head installed—her grandparents must have done some miniature renovations in the years she was away.

Galadriel closed and locked the door behind her, depositing her folded t-shirt, shoes, and underwear on the closed toilet lid. As she stepped into the shower and turned on the water, she half-expected it to be as temperamental as the lightbulb, but to her pleasant surprise, the shower worked flawlessly. The water pressure was perfect, and the temperature quickly adjusted to a comforting warmth. She let the water cascade over her, washing away the dust of her bedding and the junk closet. A small luxury amid the disrepair of the old country house—at least there was something she wouldn’t have to fix or replace.

She stayed under the water longer than usual, enjoying the heat as she tested the upper limits of the hot water. Eventually, though, Galadriel remembered she had to pay for all this hot water and turned off the shower. Wrapping herself in a (clean) fluffy towel from the white wooden cupboard mounted next to the tub, she carefully exited the shower with a contented sigh.

As she dressed, her phone vibrated with a text. Galadriel peered over to check the sender, then smiled and plucked it off the counter when she saw it came from Finrod. Her brother had sent her a photo of a white paper bag fresh from Second Breakfast, a food truck that served some of the best breakfast food Galadriel had ever sampled. She didn’t even need to know what was in the bag to gasp in surprised delight. A moment later, another text came through:

8:01 am Fin: Come and get it!

A patterned knock on her front door followed directly thereafter, the one everyone in her family knew and used when visiting one another. Galadriel chuckled to herself and threw on her clothes before tucking her phone into her back pocket and hurrying downstairs, her hair thrown down her back in the world’s hastiest braid.

Finrod grinned at her from the damp front porch when she flung the door open, shaking the bag at her like it was a bag of dog treats. “Thought that might get you out of bed!” he teased, and Galadriel rolled her eyes as she accepted one of the two small coffees he’d brought along with their breakfast. Plain, no cream or sugar, but she sipped gratefully as they took a seat on the porch swing together to eat.

As her brother divvied out the breakfast tacos and accompanying plastic salsa ramekins, Galadriel remarked, “Surprised you’re not at work already. Aren’t you usually there by the butt-crack of dawn?”

Finrod chuckled. “Not quite that early, but yeah, today’s a later day. I’m on the way in, but I don’t have to be there until nine, so I thought I’d stop by Second Breakfast. Told them that my little sister had just moved back to town, and they fished this one out of the trash for you—” He laughed again as Galadriel playfully whacked his arm.

She took the taco he was proffering and loaded it with salsa before taking a covetous bite. Her eyes nearly rolled back in her head. As far as breakfast tacos went, Galadriel preferred a more complex offering than the potatoes-egg-and-sausage option Finrod always went for. Hers also included potatoes and eggs, with the addition of chili-lime crema, cooked red onions, charred poblano strips, and cotija cheese, all wrapped up in a warm flour tortilla. She couldn’t even remember the last time she’d had this particular taco; she hadn’t had the chance when she was here for her grandmother’s funeral.

Both of them were silent for a few minutes as they enjoyed their breakfast, nodding to each other in appreciation of the Texan breakfast staple spread out on their laps amid foil and white paper bags. The rain drummed steady and insistent against the roof with a calming rhythm that could have put Galadriel straight back to sleep if she laid down on the swing. They watched the curtains of water sweep across the overgrown yard and cow fields, the tree line at the back of the property blurred into mist.

“How’s work?” Galadriel asked eventually. He worked a few towns over at an army base called Fort Nargothrond; she wasn’t exactly sure what he did, and he couldn’t say, but she knew it involved intelligence work. They were all just glad he’d been stationed at the closest possible base, rather than being shipped off across the sea, or even somewhere just far enough away to be inconvenient for visits. Like Virginia.

Finrod gave a little shrug. “Fine. They’re shifting some schedules around, so I’m on later days this week and nights next week. Nothing crazy.” He took a sip of his coffee, steam curling into the air. “Oh, yeah, before I forget—I saw Elrond at the gas station last night on the way home from dropping you off.”

Galadriel’s smile warmed immediately. “Elrond!” she exclaimed around a mouthful of taco. “Mm, how is he?”

“He asked about you, and I told him you were home again,” Finrod said, smiling back. “Didn’t want to give out your number without checking, but he’d like to catch up with you sometime, if you want.”

She nodded swiftly, her first real spark of excitement igniting in her chest since she’d returned to Lindon. Not that being among her family again wasn’t exciting, but Elrond Peredhel was one of her oldest and closest friends, and she hadn’t seen him for many years—at least not long enough to count as a real visit. “I’d love that. Can you text me his number, and I’ll give him a call?”

“Sure.”

They both took out their phones, and Galadriel entered Elrond’s number into her new phone. On the off chance Celeborn tried locating her in Lindon, she had traded in her old phone and number for new ones when she and Finrod drove down from Virginia. In her haste to get rid of the phone, she’d completely forgotten to take down everyone’s numbers from her contacts list. But most of those people who still lived in Virginia weren’t ones she wanted to keep in touch with, anyway, so it wasn’t any real loss. Galadriel smiled down at her phone as she entered in Elrond’s name and then resumed devouring her taco, feeling lighter than she had in days at the thought of reuniting with her friend soon. Now was the perfect time, too, before she got involved with a job and the renovations on the house.

Her brother finished up his own breakfast a few minutes later and started gathering up their trash. Galadriel offered to throw it all away, and then they exchanged a brief hug as he prepared to head off to work. “Thanks for the food,” she told him. “I can’t believe I haven’t had Second Breakfast in so long.”

“Me neither!” he grinned, heading back out into the rain for his truck. “See ya! Let me know how it goes with Elrond!”

“I will! Bye, Fin!”

Galadriel already had her phone back out as Finrod’s truck rumbled away, the bag of taco trash and empty coffee cups clutched in her other hand. Going into the kitchen, she deposited it into the can while she texted Elrond so he wouldn’t be confused why an unknown number was calling him. She had scarcely hit “send” before he was calling her. Galadriel grinned so widely her cheeks ached and answered her friend’s call.

“Galadriel! You didn’t tell me you were back in town!”

She laughed and apologized, “I know, I’m sorry—I got a new phone and forgot to save everyone’s numbers beforehand. How are you?”

“I’m doing wonderfully, Galadriel—I’m very happy to hear from you. We really ought to get together over coffee soon, whenever you want. How are you, my friend?”

Galadriel headed back upstairs as she spoke to her friend, debating how much she wanted to tell him about what happened. That was a topic she was still considering how to broach with her friends and family. Her parents knew most of it, and so did Finrod, but her younger brothers and Texan friends were not so well-informed, by her own preference. Certain aspects of her failed marriage did not need to be known by everyone, no matter how much she trusted them. Galadriel also did not want to burden her loved ones with the details, particularly when she herself was still loath to revisit them unless necessary. Right now, more than anything, she was pissed off that she’d had to uproot her entire life because of Celeborn—but nobody wanted to listen to her rant and rave about her ex-husband.

“I’m— Well, I’m all right,” she said in the end. “Did Fin tell you I’m living in my grandparents’ old house now?”

“He did,” Elrond replied, the sound of typing in the background vanishing as he focused on their conversation. “How are you enjoying it so far? It was quite a charming place back in the day, if I remember correctly.” He’d spent many summers at her grandparents’ house growing up, along with various gaggles of her brothers’ friends, groups which tended to overlap into one big circle. Galadriel’s group of friends usually consisted of Elrond (and to a lesser extent, his twin brother Elros) and one or two others who moved away when they were all still children, like her cousin Celebrimbor.

“‘Back in the day,’” she chuckled. “You sound like my Papaw, talking like that. It was charming. It still is, if you keep the lights off so you can’t see the two-inch layer of dust. And I will be keeping the lights off, at least in my bedroom, because the bulb shorted right as I sat down to read this morning.”

He laughed. “Ah, the romantic allure of rustic living.”

“Rustic’s one word for it,” she said dryly. Galadriel paused at the top of the stairs, leaning (gently) on the railing while she talked. “It needs some work. I was actually thinking about heading into town to pick up some things—groceries, light bulbs, some cleaning supplies. And I’ve only just realized I don’t actually have a car yet.”

“That would make things slightly trickier.”

Finarfin had discussed the car situation with Galadriel over text before Finrod drove to Virginia, and she was grateful that was one less thing she had to worry about, especially given her dire money situation. Galadriel couldn’t imagine how she would have navigated Lindon without a vehicle—there wasn’t exactly a bus stop at every corner, and neither of her parents would want to tote her around for months on end. Finrod might, but since he worked several towns away, relying on him for transportation would simply be impractical.

“My dad’s going to let me use Angrod’s car while the twins are off at college, but it’s still in the shop. Supposed to be ready tomorrow. So—if you’re free sometime today—I’ll take you up on that coffee date if you’ll be so kind as to come pick me up. I’ll pay you back in gas money.”

Elrond made an amused scoffing sound. “Oh, please, no—there’s no need to pay me any gas money. I’ll be more than happy to come and get you. It’s hardly a long drive. You’ll need to send me the address again, though.”

“I can do that. Let me buy your coffee, then.”

“Absolutely not. Text me the address, and I’ll see you in a few, Galadriel.” The warmth in her friend’s voice bled through the phone, and she rolled her eyes fondly but didn’t fight him again.

“All right, fine,” she relented, smiling. “Thank you, El. Want to go to The Drowsy Dúnedain?”

“That sounds perfect.”

Galadriel re-dressed after she texted Elrond her new address. Minding the thunderstorm rumbling outside but still preferring not to greet her friend like a ragamuffin, she switched out the t-shirt and jeans ensemble she’d chosen for the store in favor of a pearl-tone turtleneck and a different pair of high-waisted jeans that were slightly dressier. Meeting her parents at a barbecue joint after a long drive was one thing, but she hadn’t seen Elrond in years, and the coffee shop she wanted to revisit was a few steps above a Starbucks in terms of class—the sort of place Eärwen and her friends frequented. Galadriel blow-dried and then pulled her long hair up into a neat ponytail, allowing her soft curls to wave down her back. She bothered only with the barest hints of makeup—another small rebellion against the ghost of Celeborn breathing down her neck as she dressed.

She paused when she took out what little jewelry she still owned, looking at the empty space on her ring finger. Galadriel swallowed, then shoved her jewelry back into storage. No need for any of that. It was just a coffee shop. It was just Elrond. Beyond the fact that Elrond was gay (and she wasn’t trying to attract him anyway), Galadriel didn’t want anyone’s attention so soon after leaving Doriath, so she forewent any further adornments and nodded to her reflection in approval.

Galadriel made her way back into the blue room, treading softly over the floorboards as thunder rolled lazily in the distance. She reached down and tested the switch on the nightstand lamp. It blinked once, then held steady with a cozy, honeyed glow, brightened by the contrast of the storm-dark air beyond her room.

Good enough.

She sat down gingerly on the edge of the uncovered mattress (surprisingly clean to her eyes). The springs gave the softest creak beneath her as she pulled her feet up. Galadriel’s Kindle screen lit up as she thumbed it awake, still open to the novel she’d started earlier—a quiet, character-driven book, with just enough yearning romance to keep her interest. She hadn’t always been an enjoyer of romances, but after ten years of enduring Celeborn’s notions of marriage, she needed to remind herself that he was absurd, and real love did exist … if only in books. For now, reading about wholesome true love was enough. Galadriel wasn’t exactly ready to jump in bed with the first guy she met, or even try dating one.

But at least these fictional men would treat her right. And if they didn’t, she could just delete them out of her Kindle library and start a new book. So far, so good with this one.

Galadriel leaned back against the headboard, legs crossed beneath her, and let herself get lost in the digital pages. The glow from the nightstand lamp cast a soft halo across the room, catching on the edges of the old blue wallpaper. Outside, rain pattered steadily against the windows, and the wind moved through the oak trees as if searching for someone who didn’t live there anymore.

For now, despite all the work that needed doing, it was enough for Galadriel—her old room, this borrowed stillness, and the knowledge that someone who knew her before Celeborn imploded her life would be pulling up the road any minute now.

//

The crunch of tires on wet pebbles broke her reading trance. Galadriel glanced up from her Kindle, smiled, then swung her legs off the bed. She hurried downstairs after putting on her shoes and pulled open the front door. To her mild disappointment, the storm had quieted some—just a steady drizzle now, the air heavy and gray, the sky the color of pewter.

She stepped out onto the front porch, wrapping her arms loosely across her chest against the morning chill. The wind tugged playfully at her ponytail. Elrond’s car pulled up the strip of dirt and rocks that passed as her driveway. His headlights (turned on despite the morning hour to guide him through the rain) swept over the mighty trunks of the oak trees and the rusted fence that separated the huge yard from the open pastures beyond. Cows meandered in the distance, indifferent and damp, watercolor shapes against the horizon.

He parked and stepped out onto the drive with a light smile. Elrond wore a charcoal wool coat, which looked far too elegant for rural Texas … or perhaps rural Texas wasn’t elegant enough for him. Beneath the coat, he wore a deep green Aran sweater layered over a crisp white button-down. Dark jeans and a pair of brown leather boots completed his scholarly ensemble. His chestnut hair, still a little damp from the walk from his office to his car, was neatly combed back, though a few strands had already started to rebel in the humidity. Elrond always reminded Galadriel of someone who tarried in antique bookshops or gave PowerPoint presentations at academic conferences—and yet, somehow, he belonged here in her cow pastures too, if only because she said so.

Galadriel smiled as he approached, one hand resting on the porch railing, the other lifting slightly in a wave. “Hey, stranger.” She hadn’t even realized how much she’d missed him until she laid eyes on him again. Had it really been ten years since she’d seen him face-to-face? (FaceTime didn’t count, and neither really did her very brief visit for her grandmother’s funeral several years back.) Galadriel’s heart twisted a bit, and all of a sudden she was fifteen again, helping Elrond get over his first breakup, or riding bikes with him down this very same country road in the summertime, following her brothers down to the creek for some fishing.

Elrond grinned, his coat already speckled with rain. “You know,” he said, gesturing towards the house with his key fob, “I love what you’ve done with the place.”

She laughed, descending the steps as he reached the porch. He looked good, she thought, happier than when she’d seen him at the funeral—though admittedly the encounter was brief and tinged with her own sorrow. Galadriel wondered what Elrond thought of her, if she’d changed beyond recognition … or if she too looked happier now. She wanted to, tried to. But maybe, especially right now, happiness was still a ways off for Galadriel. She didn’t think he’d mind.

“You’re lucky I’m letting you anywhere near it,” she teased. “I could’ve made you park in the pasture with the cows.”

“I’d blend right in. I, too, am a slow-moving herbivore.”

He chuckled at Galadriel’s subsequent eye-roll, and then they were close enough to fold into a hug—there was no awkwardness between them, only warmth and silence: a quiet comfort only achievable when you’ve known someone long enough that not every gap needs filling.

“It’s good to see you, El,” she said quietly. Galadriel blinked hard over his shoulder, willing herself not to cry at how tangible and solid he was, a piece of her past falling back into place as if she’d never left it behind. 

“You too,” Elrond replied, just as softly. Then he set her back from their hug and smiled. “Ready for coffee? I most certainly am. I need some pep in my step on a dreary morning like this.”

Galadriel laughed at the thought of Elrond ever being peppy, but nodded affirmative with a grin. “Ready,” she said.  

//

Lindon rolled past her window in idle, familiar vignettes—weathered storefronts with hand-painted signs; gas stations that hadn’t replaced their pumps in decades; a feed and supply store with a sun-bleached bench out front and an American flag rippling above the porch right next to a burgundy Texas A&M flag of the same size. Churches and diners seemed to populate every street corner, sometimes right next to each other, like God might stop by for some brisket when the service was done. Half the buildings bore the names of families who’d lived there for generations. Lune Creek cut through the center of town like a crystal vein, winding past limestone banks and beneath the old wooden bridge she and her brothers used to jump from in the summer. Life moved slow in Lindon, not because it lacked progress, but because no one saw the point in rushing what was already good.

//

The Drowsy Dúnedain had changed, but not so much she didn’t still recognize it.

Galadriel stepped inside behind Elrond, brushing rain from her coat sleeves as the door shut with a soft chime. He closed it to keep the drizzle from following them in; its foggy glass still bore the coffee shop’s logo and slogan (“Not all who wander are awake yet”). Familiar scents hit her first—espresso, steamed milk, and whispers of cinnamon, hazelnut, and nutmeg.

She breathed them in with an involuntary smile; although Eärwen and her well-to-do friends frequented the Dúnedain for its high-quality ingredients, surprisingly extensive organic menu, and the more subtly selective atmosphere of a shop only financially available to a certain demographic of Lindon, Galadriel had grown to love its unconventional offerings when she tagged along with her mother in her high school years. And Eärwen never hesitated to buy Galadriel and her friends whatever they wanted when they studied for AP exams or wrote college-entrance essays, mostly to motivate them to keep scholarly company in a quiet, Eärwen-approved environment other than her equally tidy home.

Elrond, in particular, reaped the benefits of the Dúnedain throughout their high school years, and Galadriel noted with a smile as he went to the register how utterly comfortable and at-home her best friend seemed amid the tastefully-vintage décor and locally-crafted soy candles flickering on deceptively-rugged tables. Galadriel was quite sure she didn’t want to know how much each one cost.

Golden lanterns hung from the high ceilings, which were lined with dark, exposed wooden beams running the length of the shop. Lightly distressed bricks, ranging in hue from deep brown to charcoal and rust, peeked from behind the draping greenery of string of pearls, monstera leaves, snake plants, and various perfectly-pruned foliage. Elegant, jewel-toned plush chairs provided comfort for guests alongside the polished wooden tables, and gold-framed local art presided over each two- and four-top, awaiting their destined purchasers.

The barista bar (the centerpiece of the Dúnedain) was a work of art in itself, outfitted with live succulent arrangements, meticulously matching gold furnishings, and only the finest brewing machinery (color-coordinated to match its surroundings, of course). Menu chalkboards decorated with calligraphy worthy of a high-end restaurant hung over the counter, and a smaller one mounted over the decadent pastry case displayed the seasonal offerings.

A single, neatly-tied silvery bow in the corner of the winter-menu chalkboard was the only suggestion of the approaching holidays in the entire shop—and Galadriel didn’t mind, because she hadn’t even begun to process that she would be spending her first Christmas in ten years unmarried. Tightening her jaw, she pushed those invasive thoughts quickly from her head.

Her mouth watered just to read the descriptions of each beverage, much less glance at the food contained within the glass case beneath. Galadriel suspected her appetite would vanish once she got a look at the prices, though—it was a good thing Elrond was paying, honestly; otherwise, she wouldn’t have been able to afford much more than two black coffees and a bran muffin for each of them.

She lingered by the pastry case, eyes scanning the chalkboard menu above the counter—it was even more extensive than she remembered, offering a wide variety of drinks with hipster-y names like The Ranger’s Rest (a smoky vanilla cold brew with toasted oak bitters) and The Third Watch (a triple shot espresso with hazelnut, black tea syrup, and oat milk, topped with nutmeg).

Galadriel wet her lips longingly as she perused the options; it had been far, far too long since she’d been here, just like it’d been far too long since she’d eaten Second Breakfast with Finrod or scarfed down barbeque at the Pits. A brief, irrational panic came over her that she might make the wrong choice before she remembered that she lived here now … There would be plenty of time to try them all (once Galadriel had her own money again, that is).

Nearby, Elrond was already placing his order, charming the barista with his gracious approachability. She smiled to herself just to observe her friend interact with others, recalling how awkward and shy he had been as a teenager. In some ways, their roles seemed to have reversed in the last ten years; now she was the one hanging back, quiet and cautious, while Elrond took the natural lead.

Galadriel watched the barista work, her fingers slipping into her coat pockets as she sighed to herself. The milk frother hissed, and the espresso machine gave a mechanical hum that stirred something muscle-deep in her memory. She hadn’t pulled a shot in years—not since her college café job in Doriath—but the motions were still tucked somewhere inside her. Surveying the barista move with easy confidence, Galadriel felt the itch in her hands again. It was just coffee, sure—but it was also rhythm and routine, both of which had been sorely lacking in her life. Coffee was something she could learn again, maybe even something she wanted back in her life. She thought again, briefly, of Finarfin telling her about the barista job his friend Durin was looking to fill. 

At least that was one area of her life Celeborn hadn’t ruined—she’d changed to a different job shortly before they met. Not that it mattered in the end; her coffee mug collection had taken a major hit once they got married. First he made a “one mug in, one mug out” rule, which turned into “no new mugs,” and finally, “get rid of those fucking things, they’re taking up so much space.” Galadriel arrived in Lindon with only one mug to her name, and she intended to remedy that as soon as possible. What else was she going to do with all that new cupboard space?

“Galadriel?” Elrond’s voice broke gently through her thoughts. He was already waiting at the pickup counter, drink in hand. “Your turn.”

She blinked. “Right. Sorry.” She shook off thoughts of Celeborn (again); the barista greeted her with a polite nod, wiping her hands on a linen towel as Galadriel stepped up to the register. “Hello. I’ll have a grande Sunset Sage, decaf please,” she said, nodding to the seasonal menu.

“Good choice,” the barista replied, already reaching for a ceramic mug. “It comes with oat milk; does that work okay for you?”

“Oat milk’s great, thank you.”

The girl gave her a smile Galadriel liked to think seemed genuine, and she returned it quickly. “No problem. That’ll be $6.71.” So saying, she turned away to start preparing the drink while the total awaited resolution on her register screen.

Elrond tapped his card on the screen; she gave him another quiet thanks. He smiled and slid into a two-top near the windows—one of the small round tables framed by leafy plants and soft lamplight. He claimed the seat with the better view of the storm outside but left the cozier chair against the wall for her.

She joined him just as the barista called her name, and Elrond stood to retrieve her drink before she could. That was fast, Galadriel noted appreciatively in regards to the barista’s swift creation of her drink. Which Elrond then handed over with an over-the-top flourish, as if presenting her with a royal goblet.

“Your drink, my lady.”

She arched a brow, amused. “You’re lucky I didn’t order something with foam art. You would have had to bow.”

Elrond laughed as he settled back into his plush chair. “Perhaps next time. Don’t hold back on my account.”

Galadriel chuckled and wrapped her hands around the warm mug, inhaling the rich scent of her Sunset Sage before taking her first sip. It was certainly an interesting combination—dark roast espresso with blackberry syrup, sage simple syrup, and a splash of oat milk, topped with a pinch of sea salt. She hadn’t been sure about the sage, but she also wasn’t afraid to try something new. When she worked in the café, her frazzled manager had quickly handed off the task of developing new drinks to Galadriel, and several of her creations had become student favorites. Overall, the more she sampled the Sunset Sage, the more she liked it, and she smiled when she lowered the mug back to the table.

The rain had amped up again outside, soft and steady, and the windows blurred with droplets. Inside, the coffee shop was a low murmur of conversation and clinking dishware—providing just enough backdrop sound to let them have their own quiet corner of the world without feeling like they had to compromise on volume. Elrond let her try his drink (a London fog made with organic earl grey tea and almond milk) but politely declined sampling hers when she offered.

Galadriel laughed and admitted, “I wasn’t sure I’d like the sage, but it’s quite good. Everything here is, though—I shouldn’t be surprised.”

With her hands wrapped around the heated ceramic, she took a moment to gaze around the Dúnedain and appreciate once again how much and yet how little it had changed. The other guests certainly radiated a more Austinite energy than small-town Lindon, which was different still from Doriath, and Galadriel had the distinct impression of being the only person within that café who didn’t truly belong anywhere. Her heart sank a little, and her hands tightened once more on the mug.

“It almost doesn’t feel real yet, being back here, living here again,” she said, unsure if she was speaking to Elrond or herself. “When I was younger, I couldn’t wait to leave Lindon, and now … here I am again.”

Her parents hadn’t been thrilled when she decided to move halfway across the country at seventeen, having graduated from high school a year early thanks to her college-credit courses during her junior and senior years. Far less thrilled when Galadriel started dating the suave young professor of one of her gen-eds … and positively dismayed when she married him the day after she turned eighteen. For all their worries and quiet complaints on their only daughter’s behalf, Celeborn had seemed like the perfect husband and son-in-law … until he wasn’t, and Galadriel had been too ashamed and confused to ask for help from the very people who warned her against marrying him in the first place. She’d thought herself so capable and grown when she married him, so beautiful and untouchable …

Her eyes watered slightly, and Galadriel slurped at her drink hastily before she could start crying into her coffee. Elrond, not apprised of the full story but enough to know why she was back in Texas, gave her a cautious smile and remarked, “Here you are. And I for one am thrilled you’re home, even if it’s not for a particularly happy reason.”

Home.

Maybe one day she could hear that word without feeling an empty pang in her heart.

Galadriel reached out to squeeze his hand, and they exchanged fond smiles. If nothing else, she decided, moving back to Lindon meant she got to reunite with Elrond, and that alone was worth more than she could express.

“It is happy, I think,” she mused after another long minute. “Or, I don’t know … It’s—a relief. It’ll take some time before I’m—happy here, but at least now I’ve got the chance. Celeborn never cared if I was happy, as long as he was happy.” Galadriel kept fiddling with her drink, sipping here and there as the liquid began cooling. “I … don’t think I want to get into everything today, El; it’s so good to see you again, and I don’t want to spoil our time together by talking about Celeborn, but what I can say is that leaving him was the hardest and also the best thing I’ve ever done for myself, and I have no idea what my life looks like now, and that terrifies me as much as it excites me. I-I don’t have a job, I barely have any money, my house needs more renovations than I’ll be able to afford for a long time …”

She shook her head, eyes glinting softly as she gazed out at the rain; Galadriel sniffled once and then looked back to Elrond with a smile that bore the weight of ten miserable years.

“But I’m free.”

Her friend’s eyes grew a little misty too, but he smiled back. “And I hope you know that if you need anything—anything at all, Galadriel, understand?—you have people in Lindon who want to help you. Family, friends: we’re all rooting for you. Don’t ever hesitate to reach out, all right? I’m only ever a text away.”

Galadriel wiped at her eyes, nodding. “Oh, I told myself I wouldn’t cry. Thank you, El, really. It means more than you know.” What had she ever done to deserve a friend like Elrond? Nothing, really, but here he was anyway. She could only hope that as she got her life back together, she could return the favor one day.

He gave a chuckle and replied, “Not all tears are an evil, or so they say. Anytime you find yourself in need of a listening ear, Galadriel, I’m here.”

“You may come to regret that,” she laughed.

“Not a chance.”

Galadriel gave his hand another quick squeeze and then resumed working on her Sunset Sage, savoring it by the sip as the last dregs of its heat faded away. “All right, enough about me—tell me what you’ve been up to.”

She had only the vaguest notion of what Elrond had been doing since she moved away, having not kept up with him as much as she would have liked after her early marriage. Celeborn didn’t approve of her small-town friends, and his mother (just as prim and proper as Eärwen, minus a good heart and inherent kindness) made certain Galadriel mingled only with other families of the same standing in Doriath, where Celeborn’s wealthy family was practically royalty. So, much to her chagrin, her Lindon friends fell by the wayside—and at the time, she had thought it for the best, believing her destiny was to dangle on her husband’s arm and help him carry on the Wise family name with a bevy of silver-haired children, well-behaved and well-educated.

But the years passed, and no bouncing babies appeared … and not for lack of trying, and trying, and trying, whether Galadriel wanted to or not.

Her inability to give Celeborn and his parents an heir was far from her only transgression against the Wise family, but it was certainly the most prominent.

So at least she hadn’t returned to Lindon to find Elrond married and pushing a baby stroller, or she might have found herself unable to face him, and that would have been yet another good thing Celeborn had stolen from her life.

Elrond chuckled at her request and said wryly, “Me? All right, let’s see … Well, I work in an office now: Harbor and Haven, in Rivendell. Resettlement and social services, which sounds dreadfully boring out loud, but I’ve truly enjoyed my time there. And paperwork is soothing.”

Galadriel fixed him with a fond look, only barely restraining herself from laughing aloud—not because she thought his answer was ridiculous, but because it was so simply Elrond that she probably could have guessed it for herself if she’d tried. “You know, I would say I’m surprised, but I’m really not. You’ve got such a good soul, El. Although I admit I expected you to do something more along the lines of … I don’t know, library work, or something in academia.”

“Well, academia is the dream, of course, but for now I’ve got to make a living, and thankfully it’s a decent one. I’ve made my peace with being terminally unexciting so long as I can do something useful. And honestly, Galadriel, being able to help immigrating families relocate to Texas has been rewarding in a way I never anticipated when I started. There are cases where we can’t help, and it breaks my heart, but we’re also doing a lot of good, and I’m happy to wait on my dreams for now so long as I can help others achieve theirs.”

Her heart warmed at the quiet passion in his voice; he truly seemed happy, and Galadriel hoped—prayed, even—that one day, she would be able to find work for herself that elicited the same joy. It probably wouldn’t be a barista job in her hometown, but … maybe that could be a stepping stone on her path to something greater.

“Good for you,” she said sincerely. “Rivendell is lucky to have you. Now, what else are you up to? Tell me everything.”

Elrond folded his arms, fixing her with a wry smile, which she returned guiltily. “I’m not seeing anyone, if that’s what you’re politely not asking.” Galadriel shrugged with all possible innocence, and he laughed. “It’s been a while, and I’m not especially interested in any romance at the moment. I believe that I’m … content, honestly. I have a quiet life, stable and fulfilling job, evenings at home reading, and the occasional dinner with Elros when he’s in town. Nothing revolutionary.”

“That sounds wonderful, honestly,” she admitted, fiddling with her nearly-empty mug. “Normal and uncomplicated.”

“It is,” Elrond agreed. “And I’m very fortunate, I know that. I’m not climbing any mountains, but I like where I’ve landed.”

Galadriel’s smile deepened. “I’m really glad, El.”

He looked at her for a moment, eyes kind as summer. “Me too.”

Then she asked after Elros with genuine fondness, and Elrond perked up a little as he answered her questions about his twin brother. Elros was still living out west—married now, with two kids, balancing a hectic career in government with weekend camping trips and family game nights. That led naturally into a stretch of warm, winding conversation about their brothers and families. They swapped updates, jokes, and affectionate complaints about family group chats, slipping back into the consoling rhythm of people who had grown up alongside each other—even if their lives had branched in different directions for a time.

It was exactly what Galadriel needed.

And although she would have loved to stay and chat with Elrond for the rest of the day, he did, in fact, need to get back to work sometime before 5 pm, so they came to a stopping point. Galadriel neatly stacked their dishes (she always appreciated it when customers did the same during her tenure in food service), and then they darted, laughing, out to Elrond’s car amid the still-pouring rain. Then he drove Galadriel by the local grocery store. The stop was quick—she picked up some bare essentials: sandwich makings, tea, a few frozen meals, and a pack of lightbulbs and cleaning supplies.

All the while, she thought of the Dúnedain, and her Sunset Sage, and how easily conversation flowed with her friend in that little corner of Lindon—and how much she truly missed working in an environment that fostered such healing connections. Galadriel didn’t currently have much idea what her dreams were, not like Elrond did, but she knew whatever they might be, she’d already put them on hold for Celeborn for a decade.

She’d never even touched her marketing degree. Celeborn resented that she wanted to work; he took offense since having a working wife suggested he couldn’t provide for her, and it had always been clear that the very moment she got pregnant, Galadriel was to cease working immediately. But as the years passed, and no babies appeared, she wouldn’t have felt right just sitting at home dusting and baking. So he allowed her to work as a secretary at his father’s corporation—and Galadriel loathed every second of it. But it was better than not working at all.

Now, however, the idea of taking up coffee again, of going to work and enjoying what she did … It almost sounded too good to be true. A coffee shop in need of a barista, and a former barista in need of a coffee shop …

Galadriel exhaled as she piled into Elrond’s car with her groceries. She already knew what her parents and Finrod thought of her going to work for Finarfin’s friend, and she could probably guess what Elrond would say too, but she found herself eager to hear his thoughts, and that alone was enough to propel her to speak. As they pulled out of the grocery store parking lot, she shifted the bags off her lap and gave her friend a sidelong glance as she resettled them at her feet.

“So … my dad mentioned something about a possible job doing barista work. His friend Durin Prince owns a new restaurant that’s opening soon, and they’re hiring while the renovations are finishing up.”

“Durin!” Elrond exclaimed, a smile spreading over his face instantly. Galadriel blinked, having not expected that; did everyone in Lindon know this Durin? A good sign, though, that her friend responded so positively to the sound of his name. “I’m well acquainted with the Princes; my father worked with Durin’s father years ago, and we keep in touch. I’m actually helping out one of their employees, over at Harbor and Haven. I know the place you’re talking about—or, well, I knew the pizza place, which was there before. Durin and Disa bought it after Waldreg’s finally bit the dust.”

Galadriel chuckled, thinking of Finarfin’s not-so-delicate disdain when he mentioned the old pizza joint at the Pits last night. “Bit the dust is generous, from what I hear. Didn’t it fail a health inspection?”

“Spectacularly,” Elrond concurred with a grin. “Someone discovered a dead lizard in the soda machine—and a raccoon living in the dry storage room.”

She winced through another laugh. “Eugh, my skin’s crawling just thinking about it. And now it’s going to be a café?”

“More of a hybrid thing, I believe. Durin’s planned an entire renovation, from top to bottom—a new layout, a new menu, and actual food safety standards. They’re turning it into a mix of … a coffeehouse, Texas comfort food spot, and bar. He and Disa have dreamed of owning their own restaurant for years now; they were positively thrilled when the chance came along.”

Galadriel chewed the inside of her cheek, thoughtful. “Quite the project. Hmm. Well, I haven’t worked in food service in years, but … it might be a good way to get back into the game. At least until I can find something more long-term. I’d like something steady, and local would be nice. Not corporate—I’ve been there and done that.”

Barista-work wasn’t precisely known for its low turnover rate, but Finarfin mentioned the Princes were having trouble finding help during the holidays, so maybe being a twenty-eight-year-old single woman with no outside obligations would actually be in her favor. Certainly she would be preferred over a high schooler or college student who would graduate in a year and also had band or sports practice every night.

“And I daresay it would be pleasant,” Elrond added. “Durin runs a tight ship, but he’s a great boss, or so I hear. Disa’s essentially sunshine in human form; I think it’ll be love at first sight for the pair of you. You’d thrive there, Galadriel. Especially now, when everything’s still taking shape—you’d have some say in how things are done.”

Galadriel smiled a little, her fingers playing with the seam on her jeans. How long had it been since she’d had a say in anything in her life? And maybe … maybe if they were still planning out the coffee bar, she could put her rusty creative skills to good use helping them develop a drink menu. Maybe they even needed some marketing or graphic design input for their website. A tiny, long-buried spark kindled in Galadriel’s heart.

“That actually sounds kind of … fun?”

“It would be,” he agreed. “And I think it would be a good fit for you as well. You’re organized and responsible; you’re great with people, when you want to be—”

“El,” she cut in, rolling her eyes and chuckling.

“—and you make wonderful lattes,” Elrond finished, grinning. “It’s not far from here. Shall we make a detour and see how the place is shaping up?”

She chuckled, pleasantly surprised by how much more tantalizing the job seemed already. What could it hurt to at least take a look? Galadriel didn’t necessarily believe in God or fate or destiny, but she’d always thought she had a decent intuition for when things were about to change. She’d felt that held breath, that electric charging of air before the lightning struck, when she met Celeborn—and change, things most certainly had. It visited her again right before she made the decision to leave Doriath behind forever.

Galadriel could only hope that when the lightning struck this time, it was to illuminate the path forward.

“All right,” she breathed after a long moment. “I’m intrigued. Let’s drive by; worst case scenario, I can peek through the windows.”

Elrond smiled and turned on his blinker.