Revelation
It is a tricky thing, love. The moment you are sure you understand all there is to know about it, something unexpected happens that contradicts everything you believed. There is nothing constant about love, nothing that stays the same. It is as turbulent and ever-changing as the ocean, tides rising and ebbing, emotions strengthening and fading.
For Remus, love was taboo. He did not think of it, nor did he speak of it, for what was to be gained by wishing for something he could never possibly hope to have? He watched his friends as they grew attracted to one another, and he rejoiced for them, for this watching-waiting-outside-view of the emotion was the closest he was ever going to get to the real thing. It wrenched his heart to know so, but then that knowledge had always pained; he had just never fully thought about it before.
Love is a light-fingered thief, coming in the night to steal away your heart and refusing to give it back, no matter how hard you try to snatch it away and lock it up forever. Resolutions and resolves to never love again are useless against this penetrating force; it wheedles its way into any situation, no matter how impossible.
For Tonks, love was an adventure. She had fallen into it on numerous occasions, first with her parents, then with her best friend, then with the lead singer of her favourite rock band. The emotion wasn't unusual for her; in fact, it was something she welcomed in her otherwise dreary and dangerous world. But there came a time when Tonks began to feel her heart pull away from her once more, began to sense it pouring into someone else. And it was the oddest feeling, for surely the object of her affections was entirely unreachable?
Anger at love only makes the feeling stronger. It feeds on passion, on flesh and fire, and willing it to go away never works. It is a rising river, eroding down the earthy banks until all that it left is loose silt that soon breaks away and flows along with the current. Love is evanescent, love is lasting, love is jubilant, love is grief. Love can be anything it wants to be, except the thing you need it for most.
When Remus first saw her, he thought nothing of the boom-boom-boom of his heart. He dismissed his flushed cheeks as the heat in the room when she arrived; he ignored the ache beginning in his chest. On second sighting, it happened again, and this time he registered the feelings, knowing with wonder what they were. He observed her more closely, to see why it occurred with only her; but whenever she caught his eye, he found his heart sped up again, inexplicably, and he would turn hastily away. He did not want or need this complication; it would only make things worse when his time came.
When Tonks met him initially, she put the wildly thrumming pulse inside her heart down to nerves and adrenaline. They spoke casually, and when she flushed, she believed it only to be the lack of cross-breeze in the stifling kitchen. But the second time round, when meeting his amber and gold gaze once more sent her heart into palpitations, she had to face facts; she was falling for this man, certainly, but whether into love or something better, she couldn't be sure.
There is nothing more satisfying than realising love for what it is; there is nothing on earth more fulfilling than sharing that first shocking kiss.
Whenever they were alone together, he would disguise his affection somewhat better than she; casually talking about last night's meeting, or the significance of certain events happening in the normal world, outside of his broiling emotions. She would blush and mutter when he stared like that at her, all fierceness and intensity and genuine curiosity.
And when at last she could stand it no longer, when she approached him suddenly, defiantly, and took his scarred hand, he simply stared. When she leant forward, her nose brushing his, it was all he could do not to mumble incoherently. And when their lips met, when their arms encircled one another, and when they somehow ended up on the floor, she cradled in his lap; he forgot all his reasons not to be in love, and started looking at her, and only her.
She was beautiful, and it was in that single moment when she pulled away from his embrace for a breath of fresh air that Remus Lupin knew exactly what love was.
It was much later, however, when he realised just how important she would become. And by then it was almost too late.
Almost.
Author's Note:Hmm…too vague? Anyway, it was fun to write; I felt like some fluffiness, and I needed a break away from the intensity of my next chapters of Sixty Seven and Shine As Bright. They'll both be up soon (hopefully!). Anyway, please read, review, fave, alert, etc. You know how much it means to me!