Frodo turned his head to the left and rested his tear-stained right cheek to his knees, eyes squeezed shut. Last night Frodo had acted as if he had lost his mind. He had checked inside the trunk, which, by the order from his uncles, had been placed in his room, hoping senselessly that there would be some kind of miracle and that the trunk was now full of presents again. But that, of course, was merely Frodo’s imagination.
The eyelashes stirred as the lids fluttered open.
Amazed, Frodo looked up to the sky. This was exactly the time that his Papa had told him, the time when all the stars vanished from the night sky and were replaced by the radiant blush of sunrise. The time when the stars faded away, taking along the dark beneath them that had dominated the entire night.
All of a sudden realization embraced him like a warm quilt in this wee small hour. Dawn had come; sun had risen. The night had disappeared. Like a macrocosm of Frodo’s life, those facts made him think and see everything from a new perspective. Should he always live under the shadow of his parents’ deaths? Could he not leave everything behind and start a new life? Frodo smiled bitterly to himself, his breath hitching from the last of his sobs.
“Can you do that, Frodo Baggins?” he asked himself almost inaudibly. No matter what, he was going on, if only for a year more. Frodo realized Drogo, his father, would also want him to go on.
Frodo squinted involuntarily as bright morning sunlight bored into his eyes. The stars had actually not diminished despite the rising of the sun. They were just hiding from view, to return and shine again at night. To bear you company, as Drogo had said.
“Just like both of you, Ma, Pa,” whispered Frodo sadly. Be that as it may, they, his parents, were still here, or at least were the graves that marked their passing.
***
The door to Frodo’s room opened and closed almost soundlessly as if it did not want to disturb the stillness inside. Bilbo put down a hefty sack on the floor, huffing his breath out as relief washed over him at the riddance of his burden. Oh, he corrected himself. Not a burden. Not a burden at all.
The old gentlehobbit swept his gaze around the room, and was a bit disappointed as he did not find who he was looking for. Frodo. Where was he? Sara and Esme had told him the lad was usually still sleeping around this hour.