An(other) Unexpected Party

[ringwinner]

In a kitchen on an island there was a hobbit. Not a small, comfortable hobbit kitchen, nor a great, lofty cavernous kitchen. It was merely the sort meant for cooking and that was quite enough for the hobbit in question. It was not the sort of kitchen that Bilbo was used to and he still found it rather unnerving that he was roughly the same

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[spirited_lissie]

When Felicity first signed up for several science courses at once, she later thought that maybe, just maybe, she bit off more than she could chew. Especially with 'intro to computers, which-if she were completely honest-didn't especially seem all that interesting, but she knew that computers were a major thing in the 'modern era' and was determined to understand how they worked.

She didn't have that class though, instead just returning from her chemistry class and was rather starving at the moment. Seeing what was obviously a 'tea spread' out on the kitchen table, it was a pleasent surprise and welcome surprise. Of course it was more substancial than what she was used to back home, but she remembered the tea party she'd had with Coraline and this was very much like it-only better because she didn't have to bake anything.

"Is this an anniversary of a sort?" It was an educated guess really: she could recall enough that Mr. Baggins hadn't been on the island for a year just yet, so he must be celebrating something.

[ringwinner]

"Not particularly. At least, not technically? After all, I think you need to already have a year before an anniversary is appropriate." Bilbo shrugged and went back to fiddling with the tea. "This is just tea-time."

[spirited_lissie]

"But not if it was one you meant to celebrate off the island." She paused. "Oh, does that mean this is for everyone then?" She was already hungry, and tea-time did sound like a good idea especially since she didn't have to dress up.

"We didn't have a tea spread like this back home." Well, granted, it became 'coffee-time' rather than 'tea-time', but that was besides the point. "My friend Coraline once arranged something like this, but she left me in charge of the baking." Because apparrently, Coraline and baking are like mud and her sister Nan-the two just didn't didn't fit.

[ringwinner]

"I didn't have tea like this at home either," Bilbo said with a bit of a disappointed sigh. Really, the table was so sparse that he felt almost embarrassed even thinking of attempting to pass it off as a birthday gift. "But this will have to do for now. After all, I have had less food before. Not for tea of course, but still less."

[seeyousoonthen]

"Oh my gosh! Raisin cake!" Savannah said cheerfully and then looked at the small man who seemed to be the baker of the day. "Are these for a special occasion? They're so pretty and smell so good."

All baked things commanded her attention- or the baby's attention. Her stomach was a round ball beneath her dress and was the sole reason, she was sure, that she wanted sweets all the time.

"How rude of me. I'm Savannah. I'm sorry I got distracted by cake," she laughed. "I do that more and more often lately."

[ringwinner]

"Don't worry," the hobbit replied with a laugh. It may have been a bit impolite, but he was already nibbling on a piece of cake, just enough to tide him over until everyone else had had their fill. "There are much worse things to be distracted by than cake. Why, it happens to me all the time! Even if I'm the one making them!"

[seeyousoonthen]

That put her immediately at ease.

"And did you bake all of these? It looks as if you're having a party!" she said happily. The parties here were plentiful she had found. It seemed hardly a week passed without some sort of get together among friends.

[ringwinner]

"Not a proper party, I'm afraid. Why, there isn't even enough here to make a decent tea spread! But I am trying. I made all of it and I daresay I could eat it too, but I really would prefer to share it with friends." He smiled and got the woman a plate and utensils. "Please help yourself."

[somanytitles]

The smells coming from the kitchen were tantalizingly familiar. Even given the limited supplies on the island, the smell of Hobbit food was unmistakable, which meant that Bilbo was in the kitchen. Given the date, he could imagine that Bilbo was going all out with the food. Aragorn thought that he should in turn do his best to eat as much as he could.

"I do believe that congratulations are in order, my friend," he said with a smile as he came into the kitchen. "How do you feel today?"

[ringwinner]

"Quite well. Not a bit older than I was though. I suppose this will simply have to be a sort of practice birthday. Then I can celebrate the real one next September the twenty-second and everything can be all caught up and set to rights." Bilbo smiled at the man he had already fully accepted as a friend.

"It's all just as well, really. To tell the truth, I'm not entirely ready to be fifty-two yet."

[somanytitles]

"I must be completely honest with you, my friend, I do not think you are ready to be fifty-two yet," Aragorn said, smiling at Bilbo. "You seem far too young and spry to be fifty-two just yet."

Aragorn knew that Bilbo had many, many good years ahead of himself, all of them feeling rather spry. But there was no reason that Bilbo should be in any hurry to get to those years.

"You are adjusting well to the use of this kitchen, I see."

[ringwinner]

"One kitchen is very much like another if you give it some time," he said. And it was true. The modern appliances and -of course- electricity had given the hobbit a bit of a shock at first, but it was soon overcome and he was now almost as at ease there as he had been in his own kitchen back in Bag End.

"Of course, it isn't home though. And everything is so deucedly big here too. You may not realize it, but for someone of my height it's quite the trial."

[_kinginthenorth]

A hungry young man's nose never leads him astray. Robb's just coming back from patrol, and his stomach is growling--and the smells from the kitchen aren't exactly helping.

"Oh!" he says, as Grey Wind follows him into the kitchen. "That all smells delicious."

[endlessdel]

"Don't encourage him Robb Stark," Delirium said scowling at the hobbit and her co-teacher. Delirium had already decided he was going to be her new Stephen but this, this chaos when it was her kitchen time had just sealed his fate. "I want you to ask me out on a date."

[_kinginthenorth]

"What?" Robb asks, as usual feeling like he's missing something. "Don't encourage him to what? It all does smell delicious." Which sounds like a stalling technique, though it isn't quite. "What sort of date?"

[endlessdel]

"He's in my classroom, in my kitchen..." Delirium replied, a strange look on her face before she smiled brightly. Bilbo would soon learn that the Endless didn't like to share and got their revenge in strange and unusual ways. "But that's okay I'm going to make him feel welcome. Just like I did with Stephen."

Delirium turned her head to look at Robb before smiling much more kinder at him. And not quite as manic. "The human courting sort like in the books and moving pictures. So... you should ask me out on a date."

[endlessdel]

Delirium scowled at Bilbo, staring at him with a fierceness that should probably scare the hobbit. Delirium was going to get him back for this and for co-teaching with her. She was thinking bedazzling and dyeing his hair and oooh peppering his food with frogs. Delirium's scowl turned into a smile as she stared at him intently.

"Don'T wORry it Won't Hurt a bIT," Delirium said in a sing-song voice as she headed towards the hobbit.

[ringwinner]

Bilbo quickly backed away from the madwoman, his arm raising defensively so all that stood between him and an unknown (but undoubtedly nasty) fate was a spatula.

"It's not hurting a bit that worries me, it's hurting a lot," he squeaked, backing up a bit more. He still didn't know what had possessed him to sign up to teach cooking with the woman, but he was very quickly regretting it.

[endlessdel]

Delirium watched, grinning as he backed away from her perhaps in terror. Delirium giggled before pouncing, wrapping her arms around him and hugging him tight. He expected hurting a lot so she would give him the opposite, she would always keep him wound tight and expecting the worse just like Stephen.

"I like you," Delirium said before adding. "I put dead, rotting mice in you food."

Delirium grinned. She hadn't but well, she wanted to see how he reacted.

[ringwinner]

"You did not." Nonetheless Bilbo glanced suspiciously towards the seedcake. He had not left the kitchen the entire time he had been cooking and surely she could not have sabotaged his food without his noticing. Surely. Though he would certainly be checking as soon as he was released from the hug, just to be on the safe and certain side of things.