If we want the rewards of being loved we have to submit to the mortifying ordeal of being known.
-Tim Kreider, I Know What You Think of Me
The Mortifying Ordeal (of Love)
It was a rainy Tuesday evening of dead winter, when Tonks arrived at Number 12, Grimmauld Place and quietly let herself in. Quietly, that is, until she stepped over the threshold and promptly knocked over the umbrella stand waiting for her there. She dove forwards to catch its lip but missed the edge and over-balanced, kicking it further and wincing as the stand and its assortment of still-dripping umbrellas came down with a crash.
"Hello Tonks!" called a few good-natured voices from the kitchen. No one had even seen her yet. She stood on the doormat, feeling soggy and a bit abashed. This was not necessarily the reputation she'd wanted to carve out for herself amongst the Order.
"Need a bit of help?" came a familiar voice. She glanced up as a figure rounded the corner, his smile looking a little more amused than it had any right to, and she felt her heart warm at the sight.
"Here," he said, and with a casual flick of his wand, Remus had righted the stand and sent its scattered belongings back to their places.
"Sorry," she muttered. He grinned and shot a charm at her chest, sending a warm blast of air through her clothes that left her feeling clean and freshly laundered. Maybe she even smelled better.
"Don't mention it," he said. He picked up the corner of her sleeve and inspected his handiwork, and Tonks did her very best not to notice how close he was standing. The spell seemed to meet his own self-criticism for he nodded at her hand and looked back up, only then realizing their proximity and taking a half step away.
"Well, thank you then," she said quickly. "Got caught in the downpour. I had to run for it after work to find a good place to Disapparate from."
"Is Moody really keeping your nose that close to the grindstone?" he said teasingly. "I'll be sure to tell him he's being too hard on you."
"Don't you dare," she growled, "He'd double my load and you know it." Remus only grinned and she couldn't help but join him. "I actually got sucked into a conversation at report submissions," she said. "One of the clerks, this woman named Hubbard, wouldn't let me get away without hearing every last detail about her weekend."
"Hubbard," said Remus, "Not Eleanor Hubbard?"
"You know her?"
A wicked grin lit his features and he leaned in conspiratorially. Tonks couldn't help but feel a bit flattered. She'd rarely caught him in a mood like this, even briefly, and certainly not since last June, what with Sirius…
"If she ever starts dragging your time out again," Remus said. "Just try to interest her in the topic of horses. She'll never trust you again but she'll never bother you."
"Horses?"
Remus nodded gravely. "Horses."
His tone made her immediately suspect the worst.
"Not as in likes-likes horses though?" she said. "Eleanor, she's not got…a horse thing, does she?" But Remus didn't budge. "Does she?" Tonks said.
He raised his hands in easy surrender.
"I wouldn't know, per se," he said. "But when she was a fifth year, I was in my seventh. And one night on prefect patrol, Lily and I happened to pass a broom cupboard with some very strange noises coming out of it." Tonks' jaw dropped. He shrugged. "I'll just say that once we'd told them to put their clothes back on and clear off, we both agreed that we'd heard…"
"Horses."
"Exactly."
They maintained a straight face with each other for nearly three seconds before bursting out with a laugh. She touched his arm as she giggled and he placed his hand over hers in an equally familiar gesture before they both caught themselves and pulled their hands away, noting again that somehow they were standing closer than they'd intended.
"Eh, come on then," Remus said quickly, sobering back up. "You missed the lovely dinner Molly made, but the meeting should be starting soon." He shuffled off and she followed him to where the others were gathered.
"Ambushed at the door were you?" growled Moody upon her entering. With a jump she feared he was referring to Remus before realizing her mentor only meant to prey on her poor treatment of the umbrella stand.
"Piss off Alastor," she replied in as kind a voice as she possessed, receiving a hard glare for it. Remus' tweed-clad shoulders, still just ahead, shook for a moment as if to laugh at her but when he turned round again, his face was neutral.
There were seven of them together in the room, with Remus, Moody, McGonagall, herself, and Molly and Arthur arranged around the edges of the kitchen. Voices from nearby rooms signaled that others had come to join for a light supper before the Order business was called together and the plates around the room attested to the gathering. Most of members though wore grim faces and while Tonks found herself feeling more and more somber in general these days with each new disappearance or village attack announced in the papers, she suspected that dinner had hardly been a festive affair.
"Managed to get away from the school for the night?" she asked after a moment. McGonagall roused from her own thoughts.
"Hm, oh yes," she said. "I suppose this is how the nights off go these days, but that's just how it will have to be for a while."
"How's Harry doing?" she asked. From the corner of her eye she caught Remus smile ruefully.
"Well, I think," McGonagall replied. "He's been Captain of the Quidditch team this year, and it seems to be a good distraction for him."
"He'd do better keeping away from distractions like that," muttered Alastor, to which Remus only said,
"Well then perhaps we can allow him just this one."
They lapsed back into strained, brooding silence and Tonks was only too grateful when they heard the front door open to a new arrival. Moody took it as a cue.
"Getting towards starting time, if you can make your ways to the great room." He started out and was wearily followed by Arthur and McGonagall. Molly grabbed a few plates and made for the sink but Remus stopped her.
"I've got this," he said, gathering the dishes from her with one movement. "You go on, I'm not going to make this one anyway." Molly nodded with sympathy and touched the younger man's cheek before she slipped out to join her husband. Tonks looked him over before turning to follow. He was handsome as ever in her own opinion, but the past months she knew had been particularly hard on him. There were still meeting in Sirius' house after all, and it certainly wasn't making the loss of a best friend any easier. His usually shabbiness had grown worse since last June and his eyes were always tired, hands prone to shake.
But even as he cleaned the dishes off, Tonks couldn't help but appreciate the little subtleties about him that had grown so lovely to her in the past year. The over-annunciated movement of his wand, making even the smallest movements meticulous and elegant, the precision and efficiency displayed in each decision. She liked the way he bobbed when he stood so that he was never quite still but always swinging slightly in motion; she'd noticed that it made him ready to move quickly should something go wrong, as his momentum was always keyed up to duck and roll. She liked the way he chewed his lip when he was thinking or ruffled his hair up when he was absent-minded or made little half-hearted snaps when was distracted. They were nuances that no one else would ever notice, and yet that she found them all the more charming and attractive than any deliberate romance. As he turned his head, the scars along his neck peaked from beneath his collar and her heart ached a little for him all over again.
"It wouldn't ever work," he'd said quietly.
"I don't agree," she'd replied. It had taken her this long to tell him how she felt, knowing that with Remus, timing would be everything, but for all her deliberation she could feel the moment slipping away from her and wanted very badly now not to sound helpless.
"I'm too old for you," he said.
"Shouldn't I get to decide things like that?"
"Maybe you're too young for me then," he joked gently. She didn't laugh.
"Tonks, there are so many other people…anyway, I thought you and Charlie Weasley were—or had—?"
She dismissed this quickly. "In school for a bit, but we've been only friends for years now. I want—" she took a step forward and his eyes lighted for half a second. It was so very fleeting yet she took the look as small encouragement. He wasn't refusing her because the feeling wasn't mutual, he was refusing her because he currently had duty and needless self-denial mixed up. Even now there was a tension in his expression, something stuck between admiration and frustration.
"Remus, I like you rather a lot," she said. "And I don't care if—"
"Tonks," he stopped her. "I can't. Not like this." He instinctively cupped his neck and rubbed his palm across the old lines just beneath his neckline.
"I don't care about those," she said softly.
"I'm sorry," he said, his voice still quiet, and she painfully knew that he did mean it. "But I do."
"Alright there?" she asked him, coming out of her thoughts. She gestured as if to help with the dishes, but he just shrugged and sent the cleaned plates and cups flying to their separate cupboards in one spell. He never meant to show off, but of course it was a move that would have required most wizards at least a two-spell process.
"No, thank you," he said, "But I need to be heading on."
"Heading on?" she asked, but he moved at that moment and his head was framed in the window by the dim light of the setting sun.
The sun was going down and, she remembered, the moon would soon come up. The lines under his eyes were deeper than usual and his pinkies trembled. She realized he'd been leaning against another surface ever since entering the room to help him stand up.
"Oh." She said. "It's that night."
"Yes," he said, resignedly. "It's that night."
They stood looking at each other for half a moment and then, spontaneously, opened their mouths to speak, to stammer, to apologize for something neither wanted to mention but equally felt ashamed of, when someone from the entrance distinctly cleared their throat.
The pair looked up to see Severus Snape in the doorway, his lip curled and a knowing look in his eyes as he flicked between the two of them.
"If I'm not interrupting anything," he said, with a voice that knew fully well what he was interrupting.
"Nothing at all, Severus," Remus said, recovering faster of the two of them. He stepped forwards gratefully. "Have you got it then?"
"Of course," said Snape, withdrawing a vial from within his cloak. He swirled it testily in front of Remus' nose. "Cutting things a little close tonight aren't we?" he said, looking towards the window. It was already getting dark out. Tonks felt the blood build up in her temples. Snape had only grown worse after Sirius' death, but aggravation like this was repugnant.
"I was relying on you, of course," said Remus, taking the vial from him. She noticed that at least the way he snatched it was not without some spite. Remus' voice was like cooled acid. "Thank you very much, Severus."
"Of course," replied the potions master, "Wouldn't want the meeting broken up by any sort of attack you know, especially if it was one our own unwitting members." Remus stiffened at the words and Snape pressed his advantage. "It would be a poor way to end the night's discussion if we had to put down one of our own."
That was too far. Tonks coughed pointedly and Snape looked up at her. In another age, he had been her own teacher and since then become something of a colleague, but in this moment, he felt distinctly like the enemy. The impression made her think that perhaps she'd spent a little too much time listening to Sirius… Remus however, had let his hand drift deliberately to the wand stashed at his hip, and Tonks felt a bit bolder. Then again, perhaps she'd spent a little too much time listening to them both. Snape had also noticed the tension and shifted his attention to make an exit
"I assume you'll be filling each other in later," he said, smiling when her nostrils flared at the innuendo. "We'll try to keep things simple in the meeting, Lupin, I'm sure you don't want to miss much."
And with a flourish, he was gone.
"He is absolutely horrid," Tonks growled.
Remus grunted. He flicked the little stopper open and downed the dark potion in one, racking gulp, wriggling as it went down his throat. "I'll drink to that," he said, his voice raspy.
The meeting broke up a few hours later. Tonks spoke with McGonagall for a little while afterwards, catching up for an almost light-hearted moment before the deputy headmistress would have to return to her duties and the young Auror to her own. They milled for a while, but as the group began to thin, each back to their own lives, Tonks found herself floating down the corridor towards the door that would lead her to the basement. With the old Black family of course, the basement was more of a refitted dungeon, and it would be cleaned out and bared for the full moon's events, locked and bolted several times over from the outside, just in case. As a member of the Order, though, she could undo the trick fairly easily, they all used the same charm combination anyway…
"Nymphadora," came a voice down the hall. She looked up to see Arthur Weasley approaching. "I wouldn't mess with that, that's where Lupin prefers to go on nights like, well, like tonight," he said meaningfully.
"I know," she said carefully, glancing back at the door handle. He was all alone down there. The potion kept him human in his mind, even if the moonlight turned his body against him. It couldn't be an easy sort of night, not by oneself…he'd told her how Sirius used to join him, how that had made things easier…
"Let him be," Arthur said kindly. She looked up at him and saw there was a little more wisdom in his eyes than she'd expected to find there. "He has a hard enough time seeing himself like this, and he respects you very much. I don't think he'd want for you to see him like this either." From the way that he had said respect, Tonks felt like he'd nearly said a different word entirely; but she ignored the thought.
"Have you ever seen him…?" she said, vaguely trailing off. Arthur shook his head.
"Like this? I wouldn't want to. And he likely prefers that." He put a hand on her shoulder. "The war will be over someday soon," he said. "And people can have surprising changes of heart when they go through things like this together." And with that same, surprisingly clever twinkle, he turned away to rejoin his wife and the others filing out of Grimmauld.
Tonks glanced back down at the door knob and thought for a moment that she heard a noise behind it. Down below in the old Black dungeon, that wasn't whimpering, was it? She leant her forehead against the frame. It wasn't him in there, and yet it was. That immaculate disaster of a battered professor with his gentle smile and sure, unshakeable spirit, locked beneath all that self-doubt, locked in a wolf's body, locked up in a basement?
There was a small scuffle below and she heard something snort. It reminded her of the way a dragon blew its air out when it was settled and ready to rest. Underneath all that it was still Remus, of course. She remembered what the werewolf illustrations had looked like in her schoolbooks. Arched legs and long claws with a ripped and dangerous smile. She covered the imaginary wolf with a tweed jacket and immediately it was much friendlier, even looked a little bewildered at her. He didn't belong downstairs any more than he belonged inside that silly, awful animal.
"Nymphadora," called Arthur. At the end of the hall, he was still waiting for her, gesturing with his umbrella as if offering a corner of it to walk out under with him and Molly. She sighed. On the other hand, Arthur Weasley had a fair point. Remus wouldn't want her to come, in fact he'd made it clear that he didn't want her at all. Not in the way that she did at least. She knew this, and the knowledge stung a bit, but between the two of them there had always been an unspoken "yet" or at least a tacit "if only."
She thought the better of herself and slowly turned to leave.
"I'm coming," she called to Arthur.
has it really been two years since I've posted anything? (yikes!) drop a fave or a review or just come say hello! pt. 2 coming-
