Bring Me With Her

Sour Tastes

It all looked the same. The sky, the grass, even the leaves of the trees, they all looked grey to Talia. Then again, it just happened to be raining outside as she sat by her window. The young woman brought her mug of coffee to her lips, and continued to stare. The world looked completely dull, and she knew that it had nothing to do with the weather. It was her eyes that had grown dull, along with her sight.

She didn't know how long it took her to stop crying after Gandalf the Grey had taken her back home. She could still feel it. The tears that fell like a waterfall from her eyes, the aching in her chest that wouldn't cease, the constant flow of memories through her mind. She could still feel the pain in her body as she forced herself out of bed in the morning, and the effort it took for her just to turn the corners of her lips to smile.

Talia remembered when her older brother, Jimmy, had died tragically in a horse-related accident. She remembered her long road to recovery and being able to smile and feel happy again. The young woman had to admit that she found this time around much harder to do. Especially with everything she had to learn to accept.

When her mother came home from work the day Talia came back, she thought that she was seeing a ghost. She ran into her bedroom and locked the door, leaving her daughter on her knees, longing for her mother's embrace. When she saw that Talia was really there, she could hardly touch her, as if she would disappear at any moment. It wasn't long before she called the police, informing them that Talia was finally home. That was when the questions arose.

Talia claimed that everything that she could remember of her supposed "kidnapping" didn't make sense, and wasn't worth going deeper into. She merely explained how she remembered being in some kind of alternate universe, though she "knew" that wasn't at all what happened to her. After finding no signs of drugs in her system, people were convinced that Talia's mind created a fantasy world called "Middle Earth" in order to cope with all the trauma she was facing.

It was torture. All of it. She had even been asked to be interviewed for some TV show, to which Talia refused. These people hardly knew anything about what she saw and felt. They didn't even know she existed before all this happened, and now they were turning her story into some kind of sick entertainment. The counseling and therapy were even worse. The poor girl was forced to sit in a chair, while some complete stranger would try to "help" her by telling her that Middle Earth was all in her head and that her Dwarves were a bunch of predators who broke into her house and abducted her.

The young woman really thought that she could tune all that stuff out. It proved to be much more difficult. As sad as it was, she found herself starting to believe in that story. It was just...easier...no, not even that word could describe it. There was just something about believing what everyone else believed that allowed her to blend in. It allowed her to be invisible.

She still found it hard to get up in the morning, to force food down her throat, and try to see the good in life. How could she see the good? Her...her Dwarf was gone. He had breathed his last a long time ago, and he was never coming back. She and her mom had a pretty strained relationship since she got back. And her friends...they were all at college, living their own lives. Talia was alone.

Her mind often turned to her Dwarves. What were they up to now? Who was the king? Were they doing well? She figured that by now, they would have forgotten all about that one burglar who did that one favor for them. Now, they had a kingdom to reconstruct. And when that was finished, they would be living very comfortable lives. There were even times when Talia wished that she had stayed with them.

Gandalf had offered to take her back during the times that he had come to visit. She turned his offers down every time. Talia couldn't go back. It reminded her too much of everything that happened. She couldn't go back knowing that Thorin wouldn't be there.