quixotic chaotic

Slower ♥

“A little bit slower - I said slower - it’s not a bloody jig, Thorin!” 

Thorin slows, even as stiffness crawls up his spine. Bilbo makes a little hmmph noise, a satisfied if put-upon little sound, and he guides Thorin through the movements again. It’s awkward and clumsy and Thorin is so incredibly aware that he’s not been able to capture any of his usual grace; he feels thick and blocky, every inch the cliched, blunt-edged dwarf.

If Bilbo notices, he doesn’t say anything. “One-two-three, one-two-three,” he counts, stepping, sliding, stepping. “See? It’s easier with music, of course, but it’s not so complicated.” 

The dance itself is not, no - but this? Holding Bilbo is his arms, feeling the heat of his body under his palm, moving so closely together that he could smell the faint traces of flour and vanilla in Bilbo’s hair? 

Not complicated at all. 

They move together in the silence, with nothing but the sound of their breath and their steps echoing throughout Thorin’s empty chambers. Bilbo’d offered to show him a few steps for the upcoming coronation celebrations, but what had started as some fast-paced celebration rounds had somehow changed to this: something slow and intimate, close enough to feel the warmth of Bilbo’s body, close enough to share the air between them.

Thorin fumbles his feet, taking a little hop at the last second to avoid stepping on Bilbo’s toes. Bilbo huffs a bit of a laugh. 

“Don’t worry so much. You won’t hurt me even if you do step on me,” he says, stepping, sliding, stepping. “I didn’t walk all the way across Middle Earth with feet that couldn’t have stood up to a bit of a dance.”

“Right,” Thorin says, flushing. He searches for something else to say, some way to break the tension. “This is a different sort of dance though, isn’t it? From the ones you showed me before.” 

“Well, yes,” Bilbo nods. “It’s a more solemn sort of thing, yes.” He grins, a little self-deprecatingly. “We’d dance it at the end of the night, when we’re getting a little sentimental, a little silly about it. When we’re less interested in being with the party and more in just our partner.” 

Thorin’s heart beat faster, and he swallows hard, searching for a response. “And, um. What sort of music would play, then?” 

“Depends. If we danced it at the end of a party, it would just be a pair of fiddles.“

“When else would you dance it?”

Bilbo hesitates, but eventually he shifts the tiniest bit closer, and his smile turns from self-deprecating to remembering, to fond nostalgia. “In the garden,” he says. “After the parties are over. We go home, and stand under the stars, and dance this last dance. Then there’s no music but the crickets and the wind, our own hearts beating out the rhythm.” 

Thorin’s heart must be deafening in its beating by now.

This is a dance for lovers. A dance that Bilbo remembers having shared in the gardens of the Shire, and yet still has chosen to teach to Thorin. 

“Have you done that?” Thorin dares to ask. His voice doesn’t tremble, but he has to whisper to get the words past his lips. “Danced this dance, in the quiet of your garden? With someone’s who’s heart you could hear?”

The step, slide, step of their movements, so fluid now that Thorin has nearly forgotten they have been going through the paces, slows, and slows, and slows, until Bilbo is stood still in front of him. His eyes are dark in the candlelight. 

“I’ve danced it,” Bilbo admits. “But I haven’t meant it, I think. Not the way I think it was meant to be meant.”

Thorin’s hand shakes as it travels, practically of its own accord, from Bilbo’s shoulder to the line of his neck, the hinge of his jaw. The skin of his cheek. “How is it meant to be meant?” 

“I don’t know for sure,” Bilbo says softly, leaning in, reaching up, “but I think like this.”

And he kisses Thorin.

And Thorin thinks, oh.

And Thorin thinks, I can hear his heart beat.

“I mean that too,” Thorin says, when Bilbo draws back. Bilbo huffs, and they smile, and then they laugh, and there’s another kiss, and another, and the sound of two heartbeats thundering in thrilled, delighted elation. 

“Good,” Bilbo says, laughing. “I think dances are best when they’re meant.” 

And then, smiling, Bilbo steps, and Thorin follows, and together they step, and slide, and step, and no, Thorin thinks: it’s really not so complicated.