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Curufin reached out and flicked a piece of it out of Celegorm’s face. “There’s too much of it.”

Celegorm made a face at him. “Not all of us feel like rocking the Fëanor 2.0.”

“I bet we could swap resumes, right now, and I’d still be more likely to get hired than you, because I don’t look like an afghan hound conceived during the summer of love.”

“Leave poor Tyelko alone,” said Aredhel, uncurling from where she’d been napping on the couch.

Celegorm sniffed and leaned back against the couch, resting a beleaguered head on her knee. “They’re bullying me somethin’ awful.”

“Aw, don’t worry, baby. I’ll fix it.” Aredhel pulled him upright and began fiddling with his hair, which was indeed very shaggy, and reached to his shoulders.

Celegorm started to speak, then winced. “Ouch! What are you doing?”

“Giving you French braids. You’re going to look like Heidi!”

Maedhros stuck his head through the front door just as Celegorm made an outraged noise. “Hello? Anyone home? I brought bagels, as ordered, and…oh my god, Tyelko, you look like Artanis on steroids.”

“Everyone leave off!” bellowed Celegorm, shaking free of Aredhel, who was chuckling and had half plaited his hair. “Look, maybe it’s gotten a bit out of control, but I like it long, and so does…other people…and I’m not about to spend sixty bucks on some hipster haircut just so I can end up looking like Nelyo.”

Maedhros ran a self-conscious hand through his hair as Curufin dropped into a chair and crossed his arms and legs, still watching Celegorm critically. “It’s not sixty…”

“No,” said Maglor, “it’s more. And you don’t have to go somewhere, Tyelko, I can do it for you.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Let him.” Curufin nodded in a businesslike fashion. “He can’t make it worse than it is. For god’s sake, didn’t you and your meathead friends used to shave your heads every year? Why pull a Samson hissy fit now?”

“It’s different.” Celegorm looked woebegone, and his bangs flopped into his eyes again as the half formed braid Aredhel had started unwound completely. “Gawd, you assholes.” Huan trotted across the room and laid his head comfortingly in Celegorm’s lap. Celegorm scratched at his ears and Huan drooled happily onto his leg.

“I’ll get the good scissors,” said Maglor, heading out of the room. “Curvo, can you get a bowl of water and a comb?”

Curufin jumped out of his chair with surprising alacrity and darted into the kitchen. Maedhros began setting out bagels and cream cheese on the coffee table, while Aredhel poured fresh coffee from the pot.

Half an hour later, Celegorm was sitting cross-legged and shirtless on a towel on the ground while Maglor knelt behind him wielding scissors and comb and frowning thoughtfully. Curufin hovered just to his right.

“It’s uneven under the ear.”

“I know, give me a sec.”

“And look,” Curufin reached out and pulled two strands of Celegorm’s hair down on either side of his face. “Did you thin these sections unevenly?”

“Help,” whispered Celegorm, and twitched as water dripped down his back.

“Shut up, it’s a work in progress.” Maglor tucked his own hair back under his bandana and waved his scissors threateningly at Curufin. “And if I hear one more peep, you can do it yourself.”

“Uh uh, don’t let Curvo do it,” said Celegorm immediately. “He’ll turn me into Mitt Romney or something.”

“Still better than looking like a mangy He-Man.”

“Shut up, Curvo.”

Across the room, Maedhros passed the lox to Aredhel, who was busily spreading cream cheese on a poppy seed bagel. “Want some morning fish?”

“You know I love that morning fish.”

Maglor snipped very carefully. Celegorm squeezed his eyes closed, and Curufin bit his lips to keep from saying anything. Maglor leaned back and examined his work. “Hmm.”

No one spoke.

Maglor hemmed and hawed for another minute, then turned reluctantly to Curufin. “Is it even on the sides?”

Curufin immediately jumped forward and took Celegorm’s face in his hands, turning it from side to side as he studied it with a focus he usually reserved for micro-circuitry. “Take another half centimeter on the left and let’s try some long layers in the back.”

“Agreed.”

“I don’t want it short,” said Celegorm pathetically. “Just a little neater.”

“That’s what we’re doing, sh.”

Caranthir’s door opened and he ambled out, yawning. “I smelled coffee. Is there food? You’re all being too loud for this early in the – Oh, are we shearing Tyelko? ‘Bout time.”

“Some people like me with long hair,” mumbled Celegorm, slumping, and immediately straightening up again as Curufin poked him in the chest.

“Yeah, leave enough so that his boyfriend still has something to grab onto,” said Caranthir, sniggering, and grabbed a bagel from Maedhros’ plate. “Ew, is that salmon?”

“Give me my breakfast back, you thief.”

Caranthir carefully let his mouthful of half chewed bagel and lox drop back onto the plate while Maedhros looked revolted.

“You gonna shave him bald?” Caranthir addressed Maglor while absently handing the plate back to Maedhros, who dropped it immediately. “It’ll be better than whatever this is.”

“You are not one to talk shit about haircuts.” Celegorm glowered across the room at Caranthir. “Mr. Goth phase, Mr. Emo phase, Mr. It’s-not-asymmetrical-the-world-is-asymetrical-you’re-all-just-squares. You’ve been having bad hair days since 1996.”

“But I never looked like Thor with a gland problem.”

“Is this national kick Tyelko in the balls day? Christ.”

“If it is, I think it should be an annual holiday.” Aredhel looked cheerful at the prospect.

“Done!” Maglor announced, and stepped back. Everyone crowded around to look while Celegorm struggled to his feet.

“Back up, you bastards, let me at a mirror.”

“He looks sort of well-groomed!”

“Let’s not overstate things. He looks less poorly groomed than before…”

“You should try some side swept bangs next time.”

“You should try an electric buzzer next time.”

“Has he always been that blond? Tyelko, do you dye your hair?”

“How dare you?” Celegorm growled and pushed assorted brothers out of the way. “Where’s a goddamn mirror?”

Everyone peered around the bathroom door as Celegorm leaned close to the mirror and examined himself. He ran a hand over his jaw and squinted.

“Hunh.”

“I think it looks good,” said Maglor mildly, from the back of the crowd.

“Yeah,” said Celegorm after an interlude. “Yeah, hell yeah. Not that it’s hard for me to look good; I am clearly the hottest member of the family, and honestly, I was trying to downplay it by going for the shaggy look, try to shield y’all from some of the inferiority issues that must come up by being exposed to this much sex appeal – ”

“That’s quite enough of that,” said Curufin. He smiled brightly at his brother in the mirror, and then swept the door shut, wedging a chair under the handle and locking Celegorm in the bathroom by himself. The crowd nodded and murmured approval and shuffled back into the living room as Celegorm hammered on the door and roared threats. “Are there any more sesame bagels?”

“Yes, and we put it in a separate bag so the onion bagel wouldn’t affect it, as requested,” said Maedhros, handing over a bagel on a plate. “Voila. So hey, I’ve been meaning to ask, Curvo, how are things going with – ”

“I’m going to take a shower,” Caranthir interrupted. “Save me some food and someone make more coffee.” He headed upstairs as Maglor started to refill the coffee pot.

“How are things going with Findaráto?” persisted Maedhros, a somewhat forced smile on his face. “Are you going to see him this weekend?”

“You’re census-taking again, mother,” said Curufin, buttering his bagel.

“No, he is ‘Taking an Active Interest’,” said Maglor. “Heaven knows why, Nelyo, you know it’s like hitting your head against a locked door.” As he spoke, the chair holding the bathroom door shut finally slipped loose and skittered across the hallway as Celegorm bulled his way through the door.

“Right,” he said, dangerously, shaking his newly shorn hair and balling his fists. “Right.”

“I’m in the middle of a conversation with Maitimo,” said Curufin hastily, as Celegorm started for him.

“Yes, Tyelko, knock it off.” Maedhros reached out a hand, absently grabbing Celegorm’s shoulder and shoving him down. Celegorm dropped, grumbling but submissive. “So? Are you going to be doing anything with Findaráto this weekend?”

“No,” said Curufin, still keeping one eye on Celegorm. “He’s with his sister and grandparents on the Vineyard.”

“Oh, good, Artanis needed to get out and about.” Aredhel patted the couch next to her as Lómion slunk into the room. He cast a deeply suspicious look at Huan before jumping up next to Aredhel. “And that’ll probably be a good way to keep Ingoldo from obsessing over the fact that Turno and Amarië have their first date this weekend.”

“True.” Maglor sat down cautiously next to Lómion, who eyed him balefully but didn’t move.

“Wait,” said Curufin, pausing with a cup of coffee halfway to his mouth. “What was that last part?”

* * *

The sun glinted so brightly off the waves that even wearing sunglasses, Finrod had to shade his eyes with one hand. His other was on the tiller of Le Cygne, the boat he and his siblings had grown up learning to sail when visiting their grandparents on the coast. The wind sang in the rigging, scattering a spray of salt water from the tops of the waves frothing against the prow of the boat. Finrod let his hand slide down the tiller, and called out to his sister. Galadriel slipped lightly from the bow, ducking the boom, and made her way to the mast, her hands flying nimbly over the rigging to let out the sail. The wind caught her long hair and it streamed over her face as she ducked once more and pressed herself to the other side of the boat.

She moved with the sway of the boat, moved with the gusting wind, and lifted her head, laughing into the spray, the sun so bright behind her golden head that she stood illuminated, a slender beacon against the horizon.

Of the four of them, she had always loved the sea the most.

As children, Aegnor and Angrod had enjoyed tumbling in the waves with the rest of them well enough. They had enjoyed more the loud and raucous things one could do on the water, skimming over waves on jet skis and behind speedboats on wakeboards. But as they grew older, they turned more to the woods and hills, mountain biking in the summer and skiing in the winter, and their trips to the beach became perfunctory family trips where they spent more time playing beach volleyball and making friends with the lifeguards than going sailing with the others.

Galadriel had learned to sail youngest of them all, pressed tight to Eärwen’s side or reaching over the side to grasp at waves, so eager for the water that she risked falling in – and did, many times. She never feared the water, and she never tired of it, but she, like her brothers, had spent less and less time at the ocean as she got older and school and responsibilities took precedent. She had confided to Finrod once that she had some deep certainty that she would end up, ultimately, living far away from the ocean, and that it made her achingly sad sometimes.

“But there is nothing actually to say that will be the case,” he’d tried to reassure her, though he also knew from experience that her ‘strong hunches’ could be eerily accurate.

“No, that’s true,” she’d said. “But still… ”

Celeborn’s family came from inland; his parents’ house was in the dense woods and hills further west, and Finrod wondered if it was of this setting that Galadriel was thinking; in this setting that she assumed she would end up.

But Galadriel had always loved the sea.

Finrod himself had always loved being out on the water, ideally well away from the drone of speedboats and the clamor of beachgoers. He’d loved learning the patterns of wind and current, loved the shrieking gulls and the smell of salt. Most of all he had loved spending time at his mother’s side as she taught him how to tack and jib. Sometimes she would let the boat capsize, to get him used to the sensation and to not fear the waves and as a result Finrod was never fearful, but always deeply aware of the water’s power.

It had been a long time, though, since Finrod had spent much time at sea, as caught up in studying and work as he had been. He had declined to go the last several times Eärwen had let him know they were headed to the Vineyard house, and it had taken him until now to realize just how much he’d missed it.

Finrod lifted his face to the sun, mimicking Galadriel’s exultant gesture, and felt the sun warm on his skin. One of the great tragedies of the past several years, he thought, was how little time he had been able to spend outside and in the fresh air, much less on the water. He had spent so many early summers browned by the light reflecting off the waves and endless hours playing on the sand with his siblings, that in the absence of trips he felt he must have grown pale and brittle, made weaker and duller by the dim light of his office at the university. As he spent more time inside, so too had he turned inward, simultaneously preoccupied with expectation and the weight of what he should be doing, and doing all he could to ignore that reality. He had felt somehow disconnected from the fact that he was actually traveling through life, actually present in the warm and beating world.

It was true that recently he had started to remember again; had started to appreciate just how beautiful things could be. Small things, but meaningful.

Things such as grey eyes, a warm hand in his, a cool voice. Small things like the reminder of fresh-blooming springs, purple blossoms pressed between the pages of his journals; hot summer nights, sweet curling smoke; the reading of beloved books; the company of good friends.

It was true that there was still much he didn’t know, still much he feared, still much that chewed at his stomach naggingly – they are together this weekend, no, don’t think about it – still so much to worry about.

But the waves –

They felt like home, and fear and resentment had no place here.

Just now, Finrod felt as elated as his sister, set free by the familiarity of wave and salt and the clang and hum of the sail against the mast, feeling the boat respond to his touch as he eased them into the wind.

In the bow, Galadriel laughed into the spray, sounding young and joyful, and cried, “Look, Ingo! Seals!”

Finrod laughed too, and called out a greeting to the seals sunning themselves on the outcropping as they passed, as he thought, I am alive. It’s a good thing to remember.

* * *

“Glorfindel?”

“YES, hi, hello.” Glorfindel answered the phone so fast he nearly took his ear off.

He’d been lying on his bed, staring at the ceiling, doing what he had for more or less the past several days: replaying that moment in the alleyway over and over. Like a sap. Ecthelion, staring at him with such earnestness. Ecthelion, asking formally to kiss him. Ecthelion pressing him back against the wall and kissing him, his hands at Glorfindel’s waist, his thigh pressing between Glorfindel’s legs… Every time Glorfindel got this far into the memory, he would let out a little whistle between his teeth, thump his head against the pillows, and resist the urge to cover his face with his hands.