A/N: Though this is NOT a songfic, this is inspired by the song Need You Now by Lady Antebellum. It's really a beautiful song, and made me think of Remus and Tonks the very first time I heard it. So I had to write this! I hope it captures the raw emotion of the song, which is hard to do, since Lady Antebellum has already done it so well. If you haven't heard that song, go listen, it's really great.

Takes place during HBP. Please, please, please leave a review... it really does wonders for the confidence of writers. I know I get hits, but not so many reviews, so... whether you liked it or not, let me know! Let's end FF's reviewing dry spell! Thank you and enjoy!

Words: 2960
Characters: Tonks, Lupin
Time: Sometime during Half-Blood Prince
Genre: Angst/Romance

Disclaimer: Everything you recognize belongs to J.K. Rowling, not me.

Rain slipped gently over the windowpanes of the Three Broomsticks. Only one woman noticed the subtle patterns of the current weather; how the drops would fall a little bit faster, then back off again, the pitter-patter that was usually so loud in her ears fluctuating as if alternating between a bitter hailstorm and a sunny afternoon. She watched as the drops that landed on her window slid ever so slowly at first, then shot to the windowsill as they gained momentum, engulfing all the smaller drops that were in their way. She traced the path of one such drop with her finger. Three drops, four drops… it felt as if she were guiding them to the windowsill.

Tonight, the bar was quiet. Well, nowadays, it was quiet almost every night. Any place that wasn't home was too frightening.

But Tonks visited as often as she could. Whenever she was in the area, she told herself – and being stationed at Hogwarts, she was in the area quite often. Madam Rosmerta seemed grateful for her presence, if not her company. With her hands around a warm firewhisky and her eyes fixed on the dark night, Tonks knew that she didn't exactly welcome comforting conversation.

The evening soon tapered off into night. Tonks didn't move, didn't say a word. Rosmerta brought her another bottle of firewhisky – a small one – and they nodded at each other. Over the past few nights Tonks had begun to wonder if her voice would vanish from lack of use. She couldn't bring herself to speak, for she was afraid her thoughts would burst unbidden into the open, real and dangerous and painful.

It had been three weeks, more or less, since she had last heard from him.

And yet she hadn't known he was returning from his underground duties tonight – not until this very morning. Dumbledore had told Mad-Eye, and Mad-Eye had told her, quite accidentally, she was sure. He had mentioned Remus in an offhand remark, and Tonks had whipped around. She knew Moody well enough to read what was usually so inscrutable in his scarred face. He'd assumed that she had already known – and the fact that she didn't know probably meant that she shouldn't. Tonks hadn't waited for words or an explanation.

Now, she was doing nothing but waiting. Waiting for herself to make a decision, waiting for she didn't even know what.

Her fingers clenched around her half-empty drink without her conscious consent. When she realized what she was doing, she relaxed her grip, but also ripped her eyes from the night and shut them tight, fighting the tears.

Why? Why had he just forgotten to tell her? Had it not crossed his mind, just never occurred to him, that she would appreciate knowing if there was a day that, hopefully, she could stop wondering if he was even still alive? Because for three weeks – three goddamn weeks, hearing tales of nothing but death and heartbreak – he could have been dead, that entire time, and she would have no idea.

Stupid old man, she thought, taking bitter pleasure in her choice of words.

The firewhisky was clouding her mind; she could feel it now, just a little bit of damp unconcern surrounded by familiar fear. But more than anything, she felt not her mind, but her heart. Her chest seemed so tight that it was incredible and impossible that her heart was still beating through the invisible restraints. Was her heart aching and straining to escape her chest? But it couldn't, ever; she could not let it out. Not into this world of fury and pain, where she had already allowed herself to be hurt once.

All of a sudden, she rose, the scraping of her wooden stool clanging like metal on metal. Rosmerta jumped to see Tonks move, but Tonks left without a word, nodding numbly again and leaving a few Galleons on the table.

Now the rain pounded against her pale face instead of the cold window. With each drop that slid down her cheek like one of a thousand tears, she walked faster, until she broke into a run, heading nowhere, her face burning with the chill of the night. Her hands stung and throbbed, as cold as ice, so she tucked them under her arms and kept running. Only once the road dead-ended did she stop. She found a railing to steady herself, and her eyes flew open just as a single whisper escaped her lips.

"Remus," she murmured into the night. "Remus?"

Even the name tasted bittersweet on her tongue.

Her palms began to tingle with the frosty chill of the rain and the iron-wrought railing. Something compelled her to look up, to open her eyes through the pounding gale. Her feet had carried her to the gate outside the Shrieking Shack. With a great effort, Tonks stepped into familiar, disconcerting, tight nothingness, turning on the spot until she was no longer in Hogsmeade, but breathing in the sharp and metallic London air surrounding Grimmauld Place.

Here, it was no longer raining, but thick clouds still cloaked the moon and stars. Tonks herself was soaked to the bone, her hair dripping limply into her eyes. Was it a full moon tonight? Or was that last night? Didn't he always return after full moons, when the rest of the werewolves would be too busy gloating and glorifying their kills to notice his absence? Remus couldn't stand that, she knew; it was one thing for him to spy on their actions, but quite another to be forced to take part.

He'd told her, once, what so many of his kind so often did. And now, he had to pretend to be one of them, to watch them murder and ravage, to barely escape before he was required to participate. It was hard enough to remain there during the full moons themselves, though the werewolves always kept a supply of Wolfsbane. It was provided for the cruelest of them all, for those who desired to keep their minds when they transformed so they could savor each drop of blood and each life they destroyed. As he told her of the daily horrors, his voice shimmered with quiet fury. If he did not take the potion, volunteer to guard the base, or watch as another group stalked and attacked their victims… he would never be trusted. Tonks remembered how violently she had trembled when she'd heard all this, appalled at what the Order was forcing Remus to endure.

But he didn't tell her any of those stories now. Shivering, her steps heavy under the weight of her thoughts, Tonks swept into Number Twelve as soon as it popped into life between Numbers Eleven and Thirteen. The house was completely dark, still, and silent. Surely someone was here?

"Remus?" she said again, her voice scratchy. She coughed.

Footsteps echoed from the floor above, growing louder on the stairs and in the foyer. Surprised, Tonks stumbled a few steps backward, knocking over the umbrella stand and cursing.

The footsteps stopped at once.

"Remus?" repeated Tonks. With a swift wave, she lit her wand-tip.

He had done the same thing at the exact moment that she did. They faced each other at a distance, each face thrown into sharp relief by the shimmering wand-light. Tonks could see very little except a sparkle in the shadows where his eyes should have been.

He approached her swiftly, wand still raised. Now that he was closer, she could see that he was wearing only torn Muggle jeans and his oldest, shabbiest cloak. His chest was bare and covered in bloody scratches. Fresh cuts and old scars crisscrossed his tired face.

"It's really me," she said at once, and with a great effort, she closed her eyes and forced her hair to turn bright blue. No amount of Polyjuice Potion could recreate the skills of a Metamorphmagus. Remus's wand dropped, and now they stood so close that she could feel his harsh breathing. His sudden proximity broke her concentration, making her hair fade back to dull brown.

"Why did you come?" he said simply, his voice as flat as his carefully controlled gaze. "How did you know I was here?"

The sound of his voice resonated with something inside her. Her heart, her soul; she didn't know, and she didn't care. Desperately she stared into his eyes, her gaze flicking from one eye to the other, as if hoping to see something different in each.

"I certainly didn't find out from you," she hissed, shocked at the fury in her voice. "Didn't you even consider the possibility that I might want to know when you'd come back? Do I even cross your mind anymore? I didn't know if you were even alive until Mad-Eye accidentally told me you were returning tonight! Why, Remus? Why do I mean so little to you now? Is it really all just your stupid sense of honor? Because I'm sick and tired of it!"

Her voice cracked at the end, as she knew it would. The thoughts and feelings that she had bottled up inside her, trapped in her silence, exploded out in a rush, cascading into the open, into reality. With each word she spoke, she saw the coolness in his gaze begin to melt.

"Do you ever cross my mind?" he repeated incredulously. His voice was dangerously soft, his eyes pained. "I couldn't tell you for precisely that reason. I am selfish, Tonks… If I spent all my time knowing that you would be waiting for me when I returned, I would never be able to stay and do my job."

"You'd stay. I've never met anyone more stubborn than you."

"Other than yourself, you mean."

For a moment, Tonks had an impossible urge to smile. Her lips twitched despite the pain still wringing her heart. Remus, too, seemed as if he were about to grin, but the look didn't quite reach his eyes. He moved his hand strangely, as if meaning to touch her cheek, but then he stopped halfway and ran his hand through his hair instead. "You should go," he said roughly. "It's late."

"I can't go," she whispered. "I need you, Remus. Don't you understand? Right now… I need you now. Please, Remus."

Her words hung tantalizingly in the air between them. She watched as something in Remus's gaze snapped, leaving his dark eyes stormy with indecision. His breathing quickened; she could see every harsh breath with the rise and fall of his bare, bleeding chest. Tonks could hardly think over the beating of her own heart. All she knew was that she needed to feel his arms around her, kiss his scarred cheek, wipe the blood from his skin, rest against his strong warmth.

In the same moment, they both moved. She pressed her head to the dip beneath his collarbone, breathing in the swirling scents of sweat and blood that were all so familiar and so Remus; the damp chill that had been hidden so deep inside her heart seemed to evaporate the instant his arms encircled her. He didn't seem to mind that she was soaked through; rather, he held her all the tighter, burying his face in her hair then kissing away the mix of raindrops and tears that still glimmered on her cheeks. Tonks' heart leapt at the sudden fervor between them. Her hands began to tremble as they crossed his shoulders, as if her body no longer knew how to deal with the odd combination of joy and desire that was blindingly bright in her soul.

Remus's lips moved desperately, frantically; his kisses travelled away from her forehead to her lips, and then away from them too, all the way down to her neck and collarbone. Each touch shimmered like ice on her rain-watered skin. She tilted her head back against the wall, gripping his shoulders, aware of her thoughts as if they were someone else's, but feeling every inch of her body respond powerfully to Remus's gentle touch. It was all coming back to her, slowly, now. With every gasp of Grimmauld Place's musty air, she remembered how to experience this something she had relinquished in her desolation, whether it be love or desire or happiness or lust. A fresh tide of memories threatened to overwhelm her.

And then everything stopped. Remus leapt away from her, his hands fisted in his own hair instead of hers now. Panting and leaning heavily against the wall to steady her weak knees, she squinted through the darkness to see him, for their wands had long since dropped darkly to the ground.

"I can't," Remus breathed. She heard his voice tremble, but still could not see him. "It's too much. You need to be safe. It's better to be hurt in life than to feel nothing at all in death… and life is too short for you to waste it with me!"

His words sliced into her heart like raw daggers.

"Waste? Waste it with you?" Even to her own ringing ears, her voice sounded far too high-pitched and shaky. "Don't see, Remus? Life is too short for me waste it away from you! It's too short for you to keep beating yourself up over nothing, nothing! We could all die tomorrow, but what do you care? You'd rather waste away in misery, wouldn't you? Everything we know might disappear. You could be killed, I could be killed… and what would we have lived for if we never had love? I can't deal with this anymore, Remus!"

Her stumbling feet moved without her conscious consent. Whether she was walking toward or away from him, she didn't know, and she didn't care. She slipped on something on the floor – a wand. She snatched it up, unaware of its unfamiliarity for a moment.

"Wait."

A scramble of feet, a swish of robes. Light flooded the hallway, almost blinding her, so much this time so that Tonks had to wait several seconds before Remus's face came into focus. He was holding a wand, and without even blinking, he passed it to her. It was hers – the wand clutched tightly in her own hand, she suddenly realized, belonged to Remus. Silently she handed it over.

As their hands touched, his fingers closed around hers. Distantly, Tonks realized that she should hear her heart pounding in her ears right about now, or feel the blood rush to her cheeks. But there was nothing anymore. Nothing but the dull knowledge that this must be the end.

Remus drew her hand to his lips. He kissed it so lightly that she could feel him tremble with the force of his control.

"You're right," he whispered. "You're right, about everything… I can't deal with it any more, either."

"So? How does that change anything?" she asked dully. "Now we're both unhappy. Congratulations."

"That's not what I meant," he said, still holding her hand as if it were made of porcelain. "Life is too short, especially these days… too short to be lived in despair."

Still Tonks's heart did not race. She observed him carefully, watching as his gaze flicked from her face to the floor, his eyes gleaming each time they flashed at her. Bit by bit the meaning of his words began to permeate her mind. The ringing in her ears returned.

"Do you truly mean that, Remus?"

He nodded evenly. With his wand still in his hand, he brushed a spare strand of hair away from her face, which made the wand-light flicker strangely in the corner of her vision. He let his hand linger there, his expression pleading.

Tonks blinked rapidly, an action not in the least intended to chase the tears that she could already feel pricking behind her eyes. "Your cuts," she murmured, glancing back at his chest. "Let's get you cleaned up. It looks like they hurt."

"Don't worry. I've felt worse, I assure you."

"That doesn't comfort me."

For a long moment, they stood frozen in place, in time, staring into each other's eyes as if they shared a single mind.

A sheepish smile crept onto Tonks's face. She felt the tears slide down her cheeks, but they were warm tears, born of cautious contentment. Remus smiled, too, and the difference in his face was remarkable. His eyes sparkled like they had on the day they first met, when times were so much calmer and simpler. He looked years younger, the scars and fresh scrapes fading into insignificance.

Fumbling, Tonks pulled a handkerchief from her pocket, the pink piece of cloth as soaked as the rest of her. With Remus's wandlight as her guide, she wiped the blood from each of the long, narrow slashes on his chest, the work slow and quiet. When she tried to wash his face, too, the handkerchief left only a wide, pale red mark on his cheek, for it was too saturated with blood to be of any more use.

"You could have used magic," Remus said, his voice quite warm.

"I'm not sure I trust myself to cast a spell at the moment. My hands are shaking too much."

"Understandable."

Tonks used the sleeve of her robe to wipe the last of the blood from his face. His eyes traced the movement of her arm. Then she kissed his cheek, her eyes shut tightly, her lips lingering longer than she had intended. When she pulled away, Remus wrapped both arms around her shoulders and held her close, so close that she thought – or perhaps imagined – that she could feel his proud heart beating in time against hers.