Lamentable Laughs
Bad Writing by Jennan O Possums
What Really Happened
Okay, so here’s the real scoop, not the bald-faced lies and ego book of
certain hobbits and other free folk of Middle-earth they made up in the
Red Book of Westmarch. THIS is the real deal! This is the story as
handed down through the marsupials in the Grey Book of Easttrot! No
copies are around anymore, but I heard it from many marsupials over the
years and they DON’T LIE!
It all began when Bilbo Baggins (his preferred name, as opposed to his
real name of Bil-bob Bagboy) was going to throw a bash for his 111th
birthday. It was supposed to be a joint party for him and his nephew,
Frodo. The party, like all the rest since Frodo came to live with his
cousin (Bilbo called him his nephew, but hobbits can’t tell the truth
no matter what!), would mean everything was for Bilbo and not a shiny
button for poor Frodo. He’d seen it all before. Bilbo DID feed and
clothe him, but never once had he given him even a plucked chicken
feather and Frodo was getting kind of miffed. Everybody considered his
‘uncle’ weird, but they -- like everybody else who ever lived -- put up
with anything the old hobbit did because he was rich and they hoped
he’d die and leave them something. (He never did Neither -- die or
leave them anything -- but you already know that.)
Anyway, the night of the party they were in the hole they lived in,
talking to Gandalf the Geezer (usually called just ‘the Geezer’ when he
wasn’t around). They sent Frodo (who was really Bilbo’s slave) down in
the cellar for more booze and began to talk, suspicious like.
“Bilbo,” said the Geezer. “You know I was sent to Middle-earth to stick
my nose into everybody’s business. Well, your time has come.”
“What?” Said Bilbo. He always pretended to be hard of hearing when he heard something he didn’t like.
“You heard me Shorty!” the Geezer said, having caught-on to the hobbit years ago.
“Oh, all right,” said Bilbo, who wasn’t very clever at not getting
caught, though he could write his name and that was supposed to be a
big deal in the Shire. “What do you want?”
“You’ve got to take that ring you found to the land of Mordor, and
throw it into the cracks of... DOOM! We (meaning you) need to get rid
of Sauron.” Thunder clapped loudly, figuring the only good hobbit was a
dead one. (Lightening politely cheered.)
Bilbo, looked at the Geezer in terror, then regained some of his
composure and straightened up. “Say what?” This time he held his hand
to his ear so as to be more believable.
At that moment, Frodo tripped over his feet, but knew enough to keep
the liquor upright as he fell on the floor. (He knew what Bilbo truly
valued.)
“What are you guys talkin’ about?” he asked (like he hadn’t been listening).
“Nothing,” the Geezer growled. “Go pot a plant with Sam.” Frodo did as
he was told. The Geezer looked back to Bilbo. He picked up a glass of
clear liquor, and took a long, drawn out slurp. Bilbo, as expected
watched intensely. “Do as your told and there won’t be any trouble if
you get my drift. Unless, you want to visit Frodo’s parents?”
“No, no, I’ll do it,” squeaked Bilbo, who feared nothing more than the Geezer.
So, they had the party. When it came time for Bilbo’s speech, he said
pretty much what you know and vanished! Bilbo was old, odd and truly a
little deaf, but he was NO FOOL! He was out of the Shire before you
could say, “Pop the hobbit,” as most people said before shooting them.
He wandered around a lot after that until he could find somebody stupid
enough to take him in. At last he
heard of a half elf, half ‘supposedly’ man named Elrond who would take
in strangers if the price was right and they would even consider
marrying his daughter who was well over 2,000 years old and had never
had a date (which should tell you something). He was also well known
for taking in loons claiming to be king of this or that, but up until
that time, they all had been a bunch of losers who never became kings,
but their mothers paid well.
Okay, back to the party. Frodo, who wasn’t no fool neither, knew
exactly what the old hole rat had done and feared the worst. When he
got back to Bag Hole, there was the ring hanging on the doorbell with a
note addressed to him from Bilbo. Frodo grabbed the ring,
ripped the note off the door, went inside and read it: “YOU take it,
sucker!” A great tear drooled out of his northeast, azure eye; not
because he loved the old hobbit, but because he knew he was, indeed, a
sucker.
He just had time to wipe it off and blow his nose in his sleeve when
the Geezer showed up. He tore the note from the poor, young, blue-eyed
hobbit, who’s gleaming curls rippled from the shock and read it to
himself (mainly because he tended to choke when reading out loud to
others).
“Well, my lad,” he said, clapping an old gnarled claw on the extremely gorgeous waif. “Pack yer bags.”
He informed Frodo he would have to leave the next day and went to bed.
Oh, yeah, before that he had caught Sam outside the window where he had
been lurking with a pair of razor sharp grass trimmers, hoping to do
everybody a favor and skewer the old Geezer, but he got caught and
hauled through the window. He stood there shaking as the Geezer said
his piece to Frodo. After the old guy went to bed he said, “Want me to
git yer bags, sir?” smiling knowingly.
Frodo glared at him with his glowing, curly hair and sapphire eyes. Then, replied,”You know I don’t have any bags. Go home!”
Sam was gone in a flash leaving nothing but skid marks. He took the
shears with him, (since they were Bilbo’s) figuring his Gaffer could
get a good price for them at the flea market.
Frodo dropped the ring and note on the floor, opened all the windows
and doors in case a wandering thief was passing by, and went out into
the garden to weep. His aquamarine eyes were like crystal
mousefountains, unsoiled and pure, but running over a lot.
Suddenly, right in front of him was a shimmering of lights! They looked something like a transporter beam, but cooler.
Just as suddenly, there before him stood the most beautiful being he
had ever seen! It was a female, without a doubt, because her polished
and shapely nails were painted perfectly to match her pink nose. Her
hair, her maddeningly wonderful STRAIGHT hair, was the purest white,
tipped with black, her ears looked like flawless ebony rose petals, her
tail was white and wrapped itself around his
shoulders gently. Her eyes looked like soft, sable orbs. But the thing
that, really GOT him were her feet! They were black with
white toes, as were her hands, and they had no HAIR on
them!! Frodo had never seen anything like her before and he would have
fallen on his face from the sight of such stunning beauty had she not
held him up with her tail.
“Are... Are you an elf?” he asked. (Remember, up until this time Frodo
had never been out of the Shire, unless you counted Buckland where he
grew up. After seeing hobbit women, anything would have looked
beautiful to him.)
“No,” she replied, laughing softly. “What ails you squirt?” She gave
him the once over, wondering how such a living dream could be a hobbit,
since their origins had been a crossing of elves and woodchucks. (A
fact that, if known, would have driven either species to WAR.)
As he lay cradled in her tail, held against her chest -- but above her
pouch, while she absently brushed his luxurious curls back from his
face, revealing his China blue eyes -- the story of the impossible task
burst from him like a Gamgee in a tater grubbing race.
“There’s nothing to cry about, my baby-blue eyed pumpkin,” she said. I
heard it all when Sam was outside the window trying to get up enough
nerve to stab the old busybody.”
“Sam never said anything about you. Does he know you?” Frodo found it
hard to believe his simple gardener could know such an enchanting,
lovely creature and never have told him or anybody else about her.
“No, Sam doesn’t know me. I was there but I used my cloaking device.
Now, don ’t you fret,”she said, running her fingers through his
shockingly sensuous curls. “Everything is going to be all right.” She
restrained herself from looking into the deep wells that were his eyes.
“But, but you don’t understand!” cried the azure-eyed hobbit. “If I go,
I just KNOW I’m going to be stabbed with a Morgul blade! I bet, I bet I
get stuck between some anvil and hammer in an abandoned dwarf cave when
an orc chieftain throws a spear at me, and no doubt I’ll SEE DEAD
PEOPLE in a stinky swamp! Worse still, I’ll have to go alone! Nobody in
all of Middle-earth would be stupid enough to go with me! Well, Sam
would probably go with me if I asked him. He ’d go with anybody who
asked him to go anywhere. Nobody ever asks, though. And I have this
really awful feeling that that slimy Gollum guy that Bilbo used
to go on and on and on about, will show up and latch onto me like a
leach! And, and I think I’ll wake up in a tower and all my clothes will
be gone! What must I do? I don’t even know the way,” he said, clutching
her luxurious hair with both of his hands, his deep, indigo eyes
brimming over once again. “Did I tell you I’m afraid of spiders?”
“No, you didn’t, little turquoise peepers, but it doesn’t matter. I
think you ’re adorable. Oh, what the heck, I wasn’t doing anything
important, today. Give me The Ring! I haven’t been to Mordor in a while
and Sauron is getting to be a general pain.”
Frodo was so shocked at this, that he fell deeply in love with her
immediately. “But I don’t even know your name, fairest of all and I
LOVE you!!!”
She flashed a smile like a Silmaril at this, and her
fifty-two teeth, like perfect snow capped mountains -- with very sharp
tips -- reflected the moonlight into his sky-blue eyes. “You’ve got
quite a line for a hobbit,” she purred.
Then she put him down gently and told him to go get The Ring. He ran
like someone made wind in the grass and was back almost before she
finished speaking. She took it from him, and slipped it into her pouch.
There was that same shimmering light and she was gone! (He didn’t know
it at the time, but she had a couple of stops to make on the way.)
Frodo had just enough time to realize he still hadn’t gotten her name
or even her number, when he suddenly felt like a great Shadow had
departed the world. There was another shimmer and she stood in front of
him once again, dazzling him with her beauteousness.
“Well, that’s done,” she said, while seeming to restrain a laughing
fit. “I wish you could have seen Sauron when I plucked his eye off the
top of the tower and dribbled it! I always told him he should have
stopped while he was a head.” (Get it?)
“Take me with you!” Frodo cried, running to her and clutching her leg
like a barnacle. She pried him off and held him back a bit.
“I’m afraid you can’t go where I am going,” she said.
“Are you going,” Frodo turned his head and pointed,”into the... West? “
“That ELF HOLE, no way! I don’t just watch over Middle-earth, you know.
There’s also Upper and Lower to deal with. Just make sure you never
tell anybody who really got rid of The Ring. There could be, uh,
complications... And I have things to do other than talk to handsome...
vulnerable... young hobbits... with eyes like the depths of a mountain
spring... at night with the stars reflected... ” She forced herself to
stop. She shook herself as if to break the spell.
He started blubbering out of his robin’s egg eyes, and she looked at
him once more. After all, he really wasn’t bad for a hobbit. No, he
wasn’t bad for a, man or elf, either, come to think of it. She didn’t
even consider the dwarves.
“Listen,“ she said. “If you ever need me, no matter where I am, if you
click your feet together three times and say ‘Possums rule’ with each
click, I’ll be here faster than you can say, Pop the hob... Oops, never
mind. I’ll BE here, ok? But now,” she sighed, “I must go.”
She turned away. His feet began to move and she whipped her head
around, and glared at him accusingly. “Don’t even!” she
said. His feet froze in place like they were stuck in
cement, even though it hadn’t been invented yet. There was a shimmer of
light and she was gone.
As you can imagine a WHOLE lot of people were pretty ticked when word
got out what had happened; not the least of which was the Geezer
himself! The elves had suddenly found their rings of power were
useless. It seemed that when Sauron left Middle-earth, he had taken all
the elves batteries with him. Even the ring the Geezer had traded
Elrond’s wife for, from a seemingly drunk pirate who talked ceaselessly
about some black pearl, wouldn’t work! He had more than most to be
angry about. It seems his REAL job in Middle-earth was to defeat
Sauron, using as many others to do the dirty work of course, without
getting personally involved in any danger himself. He had never thought
he was doing more than killing off another one of those accursed
hobbits when he gave Frodo his mission, he hadn’t counted on losing the
only paying job he’d had for an Age!
A council was called at the Elf inn where Bilbo was quickly running out
of money, to decide what to do. Frodo was ordered to be there. There
were reps from all the free folk there: An elf who endlessly combed his
hair over his tattered tights who finally succeeded in covering the
holes, but only if he sat hunched over; The expected, but dirtier
than usual, bum claiming to be king; A dwarf who sat next to the elf
watching every stroke of the elf’s comb, wondering how he could get his
hands on the three strands of hair he had bee commanded to get, (The
dwarves had for years been trying to get their hands on some elf DNA so
they could mix it with their own and be TALLER); A roadworn
guy who kept going on about having to SAVE HIS PEOPLE, but now that
they were safe, what was he supposed to do? (His dad was strict.) Oh,
yeah, Sam was there and a couple of Frodo’s cousins.
ANYWAY, it ended up where the ‘wise,’ meaning Elrond the half-breed and
the Geezer came up with the idea of the Red Book of Westmarch and all
decided as Frodo had ruined everybody’s day in one way or another, he
would have to write it if it took the rest of his natural life. And it
had better be done RIGHT and he better make them all look like heroes.
Of course, everybody was mad about something and made their own demands.
Gandalf the Geezer, wanted to be sure it was made clear he was the
instigator behind every great or cool thing that happened. Elrond, who
had lost his home and the power of the ring he had (The possum had made
sure she got the batteries from all the elf rings when she left Frodo
and dropped them all into the Mountain of fire along with The Ring,
thus getting rid of two aggravations at one time), wanted himself
portrayed as wise, a warrior of great prowess and future father-in-law
of the king. He also insisted that his daughter, who had clearly been
stuck with an ugly stick early in life, be painted as the most
beautiful elf since Tin?viel. Since he was afraid of his mother-in-law,
who also had batteries stolen and was sure to take it out on him, he
demanded she be portrayed as a real babe, too. The scruffy bum who they
decided should be king (because nobody else wanted the job) wanted it
said he married Elrond’s daughter (figuring her dad had to have money
someplace). The dwarf and elf wanted themselves to be shown as great
warriors and the best of friends. They knew this would really tick off
both their fathers. The dwarf also wanted it said he got three strands
of elf hair (at least, he could get credit for them, even if in fact,
he never truly got them), which raised not a few eyebrows among the
fair folk, (who had no clue of the black plot by the dwarves to pilfer
their genetic code). Frodo’s cousins wanted to do something really
special.
“Make us friends of a talking tree, “ said the one.
“Yeah, and I want to STAB Sauron’s main bad guy!” said the other.
“I want to kill a troll!!” added the first.
Even Sam, the most unlikely of all, wanted to be portrayed as Frodo’s
faithful servant who went with him all the way to the mountain... even
carrying him (for more drama). He also wanted to inherit Bag Hole, get
married and have not less than a dozen children! (‘Not bloody likely,’
thought Frodo, unless Sam was planning to pull the bag he called a hat
the rest of the way down over his face.)
Everybody wanted something, and Frodo took notes faithfully, fearing
the Geezer could still do some damage. The only person that didn’t ask
for anything, was the man who wanted to SAVE HIS PEOPLE, but had now
decided to go the Riviera instead. A sore mistake on his part because
in the finished book, as you well know, he went crazy and was killed
off as soon as possible.
So, Frodo trudged back to Bag End, er, Hole, and diligently wrote the
Red Book and included everything everybody wanted. Yet as he wrote, his
mind was ever bent on the voluptuous vision of marsupial gloriousness
that he loved. One night, when he could take no more, he called Sam out
of the hole and told him to bring the book.
“I can’t do this,“ he said. “You must finish it and add anything you
like. I ’ll give you the hole and everything in it if you do it.” Sam,
who had long ago appraised everything Frodo had, grabbed the book from
his arms and agreed to do as Frodo asked.
“Are you going into the... West now, Master?” he asked, hopefully.
“I hope I’m going someplace better,” said Frodo. “I only wish I had learned her name, “ he added wistfully.
“Who’s name?” asked Sam, one foot already inside the door getting ready to lock Frodo out.
“HER name, the most exquisite creature in all of Middle-earth.”
“You don’t know?” replied Sam, who was good for listening at key holes
if nothing else. “I heard Elrond and Gandalf talking about her, and
they didn’t like her one bit, but I think it was more they were
jealous.”
Frodo turned with amazing speed and grabbed Sam’s vest.
“Tell me, TELL ME!” he cried, his cobalt eyes flashing.
Sam, a bit more than a little startled blurted out: “Why Mr. Frodo! It
was Jennan O, the Divine Possum Queen: She who created Il?vatar,
Middle-earth, the stars, the sky, and everything that ever was, and the
first male and female of every animal, dwarf, elf, man, hobbit....” He
ran inside the door. “... and Tom Bombadil!”
The door slammed shut and Frodo heard the lock click and the crossbar
fall, and the faint sound of wedges being hammered home as he skipped
farther down the path.
When there was no sound of his master trying to claw back inside, Sam
crept over to the window overlooking the garden and peaked out.
Suddenly, the darkness was lit by a sparkling, glimmering, glowing,
glaring cascade of multicolored light. Just as suddenly, it was gone.
Frodo was never seen in the Shire or anywhere else in Middle-earth again.
(Though, he may have been been there, but hidden by a cloaking device.)
The End.
(Or is it?)
