A/N: Okay, so this is my first ever Tonks/Remus piece, so I apologise if they're both a bit OOC. This is also the first fanfic I've written in longer than I'm willing to admit and the first one I've written while battling this latest case of writer's block, and because I've been teaching myself to write in a way that my school approves of I'm going to warn you now that my writing style has drastically changed.
Anyway, this fic is a for the Winter Wonderland Challenge on HPFC, so HUGE thanks to ToxicRainfall and TayaCurragh for inspiring me enough that I could convince myself to write this.
My prompts were: Remus/Tonks, Staying at Hogwarts over Christmas, Owl Post and Fireworks.
And yes, I am aware that soem of them aren't intergrated very elegantly at all :)!
Enjoy!
"I'm sorry, Remus-"
"Moony!"
"I'm so sad for your loss-"
" Oi, Moony!"
"Look, I heard-"
"Remus!"
"I know this time must be difficult-"
"Remus Lupin, get up, you bloody git!"
Moony started as what he could only assume was a tie hit him hard on the side, making him jerk violently, further messing up the already tangled sheets of his four-poster bed in the mostly empty Gryffindor dormitory.
"Uuhmmkffl..." he mumbled, pulling his blanket in a vain attempt to disappear back into the pleasant darkness of sleep.
But it was no to be so, as once again Padfoot's tie came flying through the air, this time striking his friend around the ears. The tie wrapped uncomfortably around Moony's head, grazing over his eyes and settling on his partly-open mouth before being violently pulled back, with such force that it dragged Moony's head up with it, until he suddenly found himself sitting up in bed, his blurry gaze fixed on Padfoot, who was already pulling the tie back to strike again. Swiftly, Moony ran a hand over his face, subtly checking that his jaw was still fully intact and that the pain in his neck was just a crick and not a dislocated vertebra.
Again, the tie came sailing through the air, but this time Moony was ready and he snatched the stupid thing as it neared him, tugging it cleanly out of Padfoot's hands before it could do any real harm.
"Hey!" his friend exclaimed, somewhat petulantly. "I was having fun with that!"
"Well, I wasn't," Moony replied shortly, stuffing the tie under his mattress as he swung his legs over the side of bed, straightening to stretch his arms in preparation to stand up. "And what are you doing up, anyway?"
Padfoot laughed, dodging out of his friend's way as Moony slowly stood, rolling his shoulders and stretching again before walking around to his trunk and bending down to ruffle through its contents, searching for a clean pair of robes. While the bed was unguarded, Padfoot took the opportunity to dart around and snatch his tie from under the mattress, making no effort whatsoever to stretch the creases out of it as he put it on, leaving the knot messy and loose, completing his look of effortless disarray.
"It's the last day of term, which means it's Quidditch day," he reminded Moony, jerking his thumb over his shoulder to indicate James's empty bed. "So naturally, Prongs had to make sure I was up at the crack of dawn like he was, stressing about the match. Don't know why he bothers worrying, to be honest. I mean, the match is only against Hufflepuff. As if we could lose to those losers!"
Moony rolled his eyes as he pulled his robes on, knowing it was better to stay silent than to respond.
"Anyway, thankfully little Wormy woke up, so I could refer Prongs to him and send them down to breakfast early. That meant I got another half hour of my beauty sleep, and now... well-" he broke off, and Moony sensed the cue to spare his friend a quick glance, hiding his smirk at Padfoot's open arms, proudly displaying his signature dishevelled appearance.
"Good to know you didn't fall behind on your precious beauty sleep," he said sarcastically, looking back at the grubby mirror to do up his tie and pull it neatly to his collar. "All your admirers wouldn't be able to stand it if you looked one degree less beautiful that you do now."
Padfoot shrugged, "I have to keep the people pleased."
"Of course you do."
Giving Moony a punch in the shoulder to acknowledge that his sarcasm had not been appreciated, Padfoot headed towards the dormitory door, checking that his friend was following as they started downstairs. Both cringed when they reached the empty common room, and sped up as they passed through the portrait hole, knowing with startling conviction that Prongs would murder them if they were late to the Quidditch match. Moony headed for the main staircase, but Padfoot grabbed the back of his robes, pulling him to the mouth of a hidden passageway behind a suit of armour. Taking that, they reached the Entrance Hall in less than a minute and sprinted through the doors and along the path to the Quidditch pitch, already able to hear the chatter of voices as the rest of school waited in the stands.
"At least the match hasn't started yet," Padfoot panted as they approached back the nearest stand.
Moony didn't have the energy to reply, and nodded mutely as they slowed to a walk, taking in the sight of the stairs leading up, up, up past rows filled with noisy Gryffindors to the top row of seats, where Wormtail was standing, motioning frantically to his friends.
"Prongs is going to kill you two!" Wormtail accused as soon as Moony and Padfoot had joined him in the stands, collapsing exhaustedly onto the seats he'd saved.
"No... he's not... mate," Padfoot managed to say as he continued to gasp for air. "Because... as long as... you... don't tell him... he'll think... we were here... the whole... time."
Wormtail looked at Moony who, still unable to speak, just nodded in agreement.
"Fine," Wormtail relented. "But you both owe me!"
"Cheers, mate," Padfoot nodded to him, clapping him on the shoulder.
Moony looked up in time to catch the glance that Padfoot sent him – see, it said, it made sense to half-kill ourselves from exhaustion, just to get here in time for Prongs's game – and could only shake his in response.
"I'm sorry, Remus, you must really miss him-"
"Who's the best?" "Gryffindor!"
"I'm so sad for your loss. My father died not long ago, so I know-"
"Who's gonna win?" "Gryffindor!"
"Look, I heard the bad news. You must be so-"
"Who's gonna lead us to victory?" "Potter!"
"I know this time must be difficult for you, losing such a close-"
"You know, Remus, I sort of thought you'd be happier for your friend."
Moony smiled, turning to look at the tall, dark-haired Hufflepuff boy, standing by the Great Doors, wearing a tired but amused expression as he stood aside to let the stream of Gryffindor fans pass.
"I am happy for Prongs," Moony explained. "I'm just not as exuberant about my happiness as others." He shot a meaningful glance at Padfoot, who was at the head of group, standing at the top of marble staircase and conducting the yells of the masses below.
The Hufflepuff laughed, his beam faltering as his arm shot out to hold back a tiny first-year girl with turquoise hair who didn't seem to have noticed the parade of Gryffindors blocking the doors.
"You have to be careful, Nymphadora," he said to girl sternly. "Gryffindors like Lupin here-" he motioned to Moony, who was watching the exchange with a bemused expression "-sometimes get a bit too excited when they win a Quidditch match. We should try to keep out of their way, at least while they're still celebrating their victory."
The girl nodded silently, her wide eyes fixed on the ground before her, apparently too shy to meet the gazes of either of the seventh-years.
Moony grinned at the girl's reaction, muttering, "See, you scared her!" to the Hufflepuff boy. The boy glanced guiltily down at the girl's turquoise head, as if he wanted to apologise to her but knew it would just terrify her even more.
"It's probably safe to go now," he said eventually, and without a backwards glance, the little first-year hurried inside, almost tripping as she crossed the threshold and disappeared into the Entrance Hall.
"Nightmare, that one," the Hufflepuff whispered to Moony as they too headed inside. "Manages to trip over everything in sight at every possible opportunity. She's smart though," he added, "And a metamorphmagus. Talented little girl, which doesn't make any sense, if you ask me, because she can barely stay upright for long enough to put her talents to good use."
Moony laughed, waving goodbye to the boy and ducking around a corner, heading for the same passageway he and Padfoot had taken downstairs. Hopefully, this way he'd get to the common room before the Gryffindor mob. That'd give him time to set up the fireworks...
Already grinning at the possibilities, he hurried upstairs.
"I'm sorry, Remus, you must really miss him. It's like losing a-"
"Uhmm...?"
"I'm so sad for your loss. My father died not long ago, so I know exactly how-"
"Mmmft..."
"Look, I heard the bad news. You must be so angry with whoever-"
"Huhnntaa...?"
"I know this time must be difficult for you, losing such a close friend is never an-"
"Shuummn..."
"Can either of you actually understand what the other is saying?"
Moony was sitting on the comfiest of armchairs in the Gryffindor common room, his favourite book on his lap and the sounds of his friends waking up breaking the silence of the cosy winter's morning.
"'Course we can... mate," Padfoot said, the last word taking an extra moment to burst gracelessly from his mouth.
"Yeah!"
Prongs's cry of assent was much too loud for the quiet morning, and Moony absent-mindedly shushed him.
"So, I can see you both had a fun night."
"The best," Padfoot assured his friend, his hand lifting so it was momentarily visible above the table he was lying behind and then falling down to cover his eyes.
"Yeah!" James exclaimed, his voice earning another shushing from Moony.
"Why's it so light?" Padfoot asked.
"Because it's midday," Moony replied evenly.
"Already?"
"Yeah!"
As Prongs yelled the word again he sat up very suddenly, and Moony watched curiously as his friend's eyes rolled back dizzily before managing to focus on the pile of rubbish that he'd been lying next to. The pile was at least half a meter high, and comprised mostly of empty butterbeer and firewhisky bottles that Prongs had insisted on keeping, having promised to burn them before the night was done. Also on the pile were the charred remnants of a Gryffindor banner which had gotten caught up in the festivities and was unfortunately destroyed by a rogue firework, effectively ending the night's celebration when McGonagall had been forced to extinguish the resulting blaze with a stream of water from her wand and banish everyone left in the room to their dormitories while (unwisely) entrusting James, Sirius and Remus with cleanup duty, as they were the only seventh years who'd still be there the next day when the Christmas Holidays started.
Far from cleaning up, Padfoot and Prongs had continued with their celebration into the relatively late hours of the morning, long after Moony had given up on fulfilling his promise to McGonagall and instead chosen to save himself from the increasingly insane ideas that kept popping into his friends' heavily intoxicated minds.
For example, Moony knew for a fact that, at some stage during the morning, Prongs's owl had been summoned and sent off with a messily scrawled letter to Lily's family, inviting them to come on holidays with James, who – according to the letter – would fly them on his own private shocket-rip to Mars, where they would meet a talking lion who would eat Lily's sister unless she was transfigured into a small pin-cushion that sang the Wacky Warlocks hit single I'll Charm You Yet every Thursday afternoon. Secretly, Moony was quite looking forward to the Lily's reply, which would doubtlessly arrive by owl post in just a few hours time, as she was already on the Hogwarts Express, heading home to her family for Christmas.
"Why are you smiling?" Prongs asked suspiciously, his gaze now having moved from the pile of rubbish to Moony's face.
"No reason," Moony replied, quickly changing the subject. "Is Padfoot doing alright? He hasn't spoken for a while."
"I'm good!" came Padfoot's voice, still from behind the table. "Just trying to remember what day it is."
"Good luck with that!" Prongs told him cheerily, turning to Moony and asking in a contrastingly conspiratorial whisper. "What day is it?"
"Thursday," Moony answered. "The first day of holidays. We're all staying at Hogwarts for Christmas, remember? You thought it might be nice to all be here for our last year."
Prongs didn't look as if he understood any of this, but murmured "Yeah..." anyway, as if he had.
"Where's Wormy?" Padfoot questioned, still not moving.
"He had to go home," explained Moony patiently. "His father isn't well."
"Oh, yeah..."
The room lapsed into silence again for a while as Prongs flopped back onto the ground, lying there with his eyes open, staring blankly at the charred spots on the ceiling. Padfoot seemed to have fallen asleep where he was, suggested by the quiet snores that were coming from his motionless body, still out of sight behind the table. Meanwhile, Moony had gone back to his book, and was happily reading the last few pages, a smug smile on his face as he silently contemplated the terrible headaches that his friends were most probably suffering from.
Finishing the last page, Moony shut his book with a loud SNAP, making Prongs wince and Padfoot's snores stop abruptly, turning into a groan of pain. Still smirking, Moony stood, taking no care to quieten his footsteps as he stepped over his friend's bodies, heading for the portrait hole.
"Well, I'm going to lunch," he announced brightly and stepped out into the chilly hallway.
"You can't!" He heard Padfoot yell from inside. "The house elves won't have started cooking the cornflakes yet!"
"Ignore him, Prongs," Moony called back, upon hearing a questioning noise from the common room and picturing his friend's confused expression as he tried to understand Padfoot's garbled nonsense in his lethargic mind. "He isn't making sense!"
"Yeah!"
Moony grinned, letting the portrait swing shut. It was only day one and already, these holidays were shaping up to be pretty awesome.
"I'm sorry, Remus, you must really miss him. It's like losing a brother – losing a friend."
Remus mourned in silence as James Potter's body was carried past him down the aisle, sealed safely in a mahogany coffin, finally gone to a place where no one, friend or foe, could hurt him.
"I'm so sad for your loss. My father died not long ago, so I know exactly how it feels to have someone close to you die."
Remus cried in silence as Lily Potter's coffin was lowered into its grave, settling on the snowy ground next to her husband's, where they would both stay indefinitely, together for eternity.
"Look, I heard the bad news. You must be so angry with whoever let this happen."
Remus fumed in silence as Dumbledore tonelessly told the story of Peter Pettigrew's betrayal to the new Order of the Phoenix, his eyes, just like everyone else's, fixed on Sirius, who he knew was fuming inside too.
"I know this time must be difficult for you, losing such a close friend is never an easy thing to go through."
Remus sat in silence at the empty table of Number Twelve Grimmauld Place, his hands grasped tightly around the glass of firewhisky before him. In one quick motion, he downed the glass, losing himself for a moment in the burst of colour that the drink conjured behind his eyes, reminding him of the sparkling fireworks James and Sirius had set off all those years ago after the Quidditch match against Hufflepuff, lighting the common room on fire.
"You know, drinking isn't usually recommended as the best way to cheer yourself up."
Looking up, Remus tried to smile at Tonks, who was hovering in the doorway, but the expression twisted on his lips, becoming more of a grimace. She half-grinned at the attempt, entering the room and taking the seat beside him, grabbing his glass and pouring herself a shot of firewhisky from the bottle, before swiftly swallowing it down, wincing as it burned her throat.
"Still, I guess we can make an exception."
Taking the bottle back, Remus didn't bother with the glass as he took another sip, again basking in the brief moment of fireworks before his eyes re-focussed on the grimy kitchen and the woman beside him with limp, mousy hair and sad, drawn face, unable to properly smile: a perfect picture of grief.
Tonks's half-grin became more resolute as she took the bottle and mimicked Remus's action, shuddering slightly this time as she swallowed, but keeping the bottle in her hand.
"Horrible stuff, isn't it?" she said conversationally, indicating the firewhisky.
Remus shrugged.
"I can only imagine the headache you'd get, drinking too much. Kids must do some crazy things at parties when they get their hands on drinks this strong. But I'm sure you'd have some war stories, right? I mean, having spent all that time partying when you were at Hogwarts."
Remus shrugged again.
"I remember you four – Potter and Pettigrew and Sirius and you – from when I was in my first year. You were crazy, absolutely insane, and I was terrified of you. I remember once, after a Quidditch match, one of you tried to talk to me, I think it was James, and I was absolutely terrified. I thought-"
"It was me."
Tonks had stood as she talked, taking the firewhisky and the glass off the table and placing them in the cupboard and sink respectively. But, on hearing Remus speak, she whirled around the look at him, her expression disbelieving.
"That was you?"
Remus stared up at her, the firewhisky slightly sating the feeling that her words were vaguely insulting.
"Why is that such a surprise?" He prompted her, when her incredulous silence stretched on.
"I just... I'd always thought it was James or Sirius, or maybe even Peter. Never you. I thought the first time I met you was here, in the Order." Her expression was still stunned, and she seemed to be looking at something far away as she murmured, "I guess it all makes sense now."
"What makes sense?" Remus asked with a frown.
Tonks huffed out a breath, her eyes still unfocussed. "Everything," she breathed.
Quite suddenly, her eyes snapped back to reality and fixed on Remus with a strange intensity. Cautiously, he stood, feeling entirely devoid of the firewhisky's influence as genuine concern for Tonks rose in his mind. It was no secret among the members of the Order that the young woman nursed a small crush on him – a dangerous one that could, of course, never be reciprocated – but still, Remus felt an odd need to protect her, a responsibility to ensure that she didn't get hurt, either by his or anyone else's doing.
In reaction to this strange sense of duty, he took a few steps closer to her, keeping her at arm's length so he could properly look her in the eyes. Was she going insane? Was this an after-affect of the firewhisky? Was this a disease she suffered from that he should know about?
As he took another careful step closer to Tonks, Remus abruptly realised just how little he knew about her. Her name and her age were two of the rare facts he could be sure of, but both revealed very little about her actual self. What had happened in her past? Remus briefly entertained himself with thoughts of her as a child, tripping wildly over everything in her path, just to leap up again with her usual enthusiasm. What did she want for her future? Again, for a split second, a cascade of images ran through his mind: Tonks in a wedding dress, Tonks in front of an altar next to a tall stranger in dress robes, Tonks and a baby with the turquoise hair of her youth curled on her lap.
And, in that moment Remus felt, most unexpectedly of all, a blast of emotion course through him, burning him more than the firewhisky ever could. It was stronger than the usual sense of responsibility, more powerful than a desire to protect... it was possessiveness, a very particular emotion of wanting to hold her, embrace her, and never let anyone else get this close. For now he was mere inches away from her, his face bent down to meet her still strangely-intense gaze. With a start, he realised that her eyes were amber, a perfect copy of his own.
"Your eyes, they're-" he began, breaking off when she blushed and looked away.
"I know," Tonks said, with an air of admitting something embarrassing. "It's because- because your eyes are the ones I'm always thinking of."
Remus's cheeks burnt too, but also, somewhere not so deep inside, he felt a wave of delight.
Tonks closed her eyes for a moment, concentrating hard, and then looked back up, this time with clear blue eyes. "Is that better?" she asked.
"Yes," Remus answered immediately. Then, after a moment, he changed his mind, "No. Well... I don't know."
Her eyes seemed to sparkle as Tonks laughed, and Remus wondered why the beauty of the sound had never struck him before.
"You're beautiful," he blurted out, before the courage to speak his mind dissolved. "Whatever colour your eyes are."
"Thanks."
The distance between the two of them was still only a few inches, and with Tonks's blue eyes dancing with happiness and her suddenly irresistible lips curved into a smile, Remus couldn't help leaning in and closing the distance between them.
Immediately, Tonks reacted to his kiss and her arms, which had been tamely hanging by her sides, leapt up to wrap around Remus's neck, pulling her body impossibly closer. He let his hands find her waist, and was again shocked by the pleasure that erupted within him at the feel of her body in his arms, his wild, fleeting fantasy to hold her being completely and utterly fulfilled.
After an indefinite passage of time, the pair broke apart, quite unable to deny what had just passed between them.
"See?" Tonks said, after a moment's pause. "Everything makes sense now."
And, for the first time in a long time, Remus let himself believe the words.
Hmm... that was interesting. The good news is that I really enjoyed writing it, which I suppose is all that matters.
Anyway, you're welcome to review and tell me what you thought of this experiment of mine.
Was it good? Bad? Terrible? - I'd honestly like to know!