#caughtintheactofdeerpanic

Oh, dear Anon—pun absolutely intended—

I regret to inform you that I am already a creature of anxiety. Simply dressed in elf-form. If I were to suddenly shift into the shape of a deer, with no reduction in my current nervous disposition, I daresay I would not last a day in civilized woodland society.

Imagine.

I am a lovely, wide-eyed doe, trembling behind a thistle bush because someone rustled too loudly in the underbrush. I’ve overthought the direction of the wind for twenty minutes. A sparrow sneezes and I FLING myself into a ravine out of pure reflex. Every twig snap is a potential ambush. Every leaf fall? A calculated omen. And if someone were to look at me with affection? I would sprint headfirst into a tree.

Elrond would most certainly step in—not out of malice, but out of sheer concern. I imagine it would go something like: “Lindir. Dearest. You have mistaken wind for wolves three times in one hour. You are vibrating. I must insist you be relocated to a quiet, secluded pasture with plenty of grass and absolutely no unexpected sounds. You may take your emotional support moss with you.”

And I—glassy-eyed and panicked—would nod in frantic agreement before galloping off, but tripping halfway through the glade because I’m trying to carry a bundle of scrolls with my mouth.

I do love deer, though. So soft, so watchful. I admire the gentleness of does, the shy boldness of fawns, and the sheer drama of a startled stag vanishing like a ghost. I would like to believe I’d be a graceful woodland vision... but realistically? I’d be the anxious blur in the distance, running from a butterfly and crying because I left my snacks behind.

Ah, but of course—because no matter how far I fled, how many rivers I forded in a panicked canter, or how many times I tried to disguise myself as a shrub out of sheer embarrassment—Elrond would find me.

He’d appear like some majestic parental warden of peace, cloak unruffled, expression calm, hair unbothered by the journey (how does he do that?), standing at the edge of my chosen panic-clearing while I, a disheveled and slightly grass-stained deer, stared back at him mid-graze with the haunted eyes of someone who has mistaken a squirrel for a specter.

“Lindir,” he would say, voice like the river and judgment all at once. “You cannot keep attempting to live in exile every time a cricket looks at you.”

I’d blink. Slowly. Then try to bolt, of course. But alas—Elrond would already have somehow anticipated this and casually sidestep to reveal that he had brought not only a very soft blanket and an herbal tonic... but Eredin. Holding a saddlebag full of my favorite scrolls. And maybe a bottle of mango chutney. (He knows what lures me.)

Eredin, of course, would immediately say something like, “You are covered in mud and you smell like daisies. Are you alright?” in that infuriating, sweet tone of his, and I’d crumble. Like a soggy leaf.

And thus, I would be escorted back—safe, sound, and thoroughly chastised for thinking I could out-worry my way into deer-based freedom.