meretricula | fic of the LotR variety

I wrote this... summer before last? Maybe? I was digging around in my purse and found the journal I'd written it in, and since it made me smile a little, I hope it'll make someone else smile too!

Why Erestor Never Says I Love You

Erestor is good with words. It's his job to be good with words, and given a pen and an unlimited supply of parchment, he can have foreign nations begging for mercy in the space of five letters.

He studied for years to sharpen his silver tongue, read long-dead authors until the flow of verbiage just came without thinking, argument, counter-argument. He can talk circles around any issue, cloak it in obscure vocabulary, strip it with stinging sarcasm. He can make people believe that the sky is green and prove that cats are creatures of higher intellect than men.

Erestor can talk, and talk, and talk, and the more he does, the more he realizes that words don't actually mean anything at all. They're just game-pieces, easily manipulated if you know what you're doing. Erestor always knows what he's doing.

So every time Glorfindel says, "I love you," when they say good-morning or good-bye or they've been kissing for hours and they need to go to sleep, Erestor just smiles and thinks, me too.

He really, truly means it. That's why he won't ever say the words.

Coda: Why Glorfindel Never Minds

Glorfindel is the particular kind of stupid that doesn't know how to be anything but honest. He means everything he says, and he says everything he means. It's an uncomplicated way to live, if occasionally inconvenient, and he doesn't regret it, even when he's stuck sitting between Elrond and Erestor at dinner and can only understand about a third of what either of them says.

He isn't good with words, which means that the ones he uses are artless but true. Every time he tells Erestor, "I love you," he means it. But Glorfindel's a fighter at heart, and he believes actions always speak louder.

So every time he comes home at odd hours of the morning and finds Erestor waiting up for him, or drools on Erestor's shoulder during Council and doesn't get chewed out for it, or just looks across a crowded room and sees Erestor smiling at him, he doesn't let silence confuse the issue. He just grins and says, "I love you, too."