Questions of the Heart
He had never met a woman so intent on asking the toughest questions in life. The six questions that shaped the love and marriage of Remus John Lupin: Who, Why, What, Where, When and How.
DISCLAIMER: I don't own any of the HP characters. All belongs to Rowling.
Chapter 1: "Who do you want me to be, Remus?"
June 23, 1997
He'd actually stopped listening to her quite some time ago. Right now, to him, it was rather nice to have her screaming at him somewhere a little lesser exposed than the hospital wing of Hogwarts.
It wasn't the first time he'd had the fairer sex screaming at him. Lily had screamed at him every time he'd failed to talk James out of another stupid stunt with Sirius. But somehow this time was different. Somehow this time it stung just that little bit more, to know that she was angry with him. And somehow he didn't want her angry with him.
The whole scene was beginning to feel a little too uncomfortably reminiscent of Sarah, and Remus began to feel the slightest urge to walk out before he got any more attached.
"Merlin, Remus, are you even listening to me?" she demanded, bringing him abruptly back to present times.
He thought a moment, figured if he survived the night with the mood she was in, it'd be a miracle any way, and said frankly, "No." Sighing, Remus got to his feet and left the young beguiling Auror fuming in the sitting room.
"Remus!" she howled in frustration.
***
She was clearly losing steam at about 2 AM.
"Finished yet?" he asked quietly as he set down the Prophet, when she had stopped screaming. "It's a bit late, you really ought to go to sleep." Without another word said, he got to his feet and began to walk out of her flat to go home, convinced that she would be all right on her own now.
"Merlin..." she groaned, and he was unpleasantly surprised to hear a muffled sob coming from the other end of the room. "Can't we... can't we just talk about this?"
"I'm not talking about anything with you except the fact that it is 2 AM," Remus began to say, stopping in his tracks when she caught the hem of his sleeve. "Tonks..."
"Who do you want me to be, Remus?" she asked angrily, placing herself stubbornly in his path, her grip still holding his sleeve captive, and reaching up on tiptoes to look him in the eyes. Bloodshot from tears and a sleepless night, her dark blue eyes didn't waver for a second from his own light blue as she repeated, a little more softly, "Who do you want me to be, that you will talk about it?"
There was dead silence in the flat as they looked at each other. Then, when he saw the tears threaten to cascade down those soft cheeks again, he finally gave up the fight.
"Don't ever be anybody else except you," he murmured as he laid a light, gentle kiss on her lips. He lingered there a moment, trapped in his own thoughts and memories, until he felt her lips press back against his, as she slid her arms around his neck and he just stopped thinking.
He allowed her to tug him back towards the bedroom, the taste of her intoxicating, addicting, entrancing, enthralling, ensnaring...
Moony, old boy, you think too much. James' frank observation cut into his whirlwind of thought and his kaleidoscope of colours. Just shut off your brain and enjoy it.
***
Maybe that was the trick to it, Tonks thought briefly to herself. You just had to catch him off-guard and make him stop thinking.
She felt the breeze, cool against her skin, as clothes were shed. The temperature in the room seemed to drop about twenty degrees from where it had been, making her shiver instinctively. He pulled her in against his body, wonderfully warm and perfectly conformed to her. Reaching up on tiptoes again, she kissed him once more.
Oh, if she could have this for the rest of her life, she would never need alcohol again.
***
She woke a few hours later to the sensation of his kisses trailing light paths of burning desire across her face. Moaning sleepily, she shifted slightly. "Remus..." she mumbled, eyes fluttering open.
"Shh, Dora," came his soft, raspy whisper, kisses traveling down her throat and across her collarbone, growing increasingly desperate the closer they got to intimate territory. "Just relax..."
***
He woke up the next morning still a little blurry on the details, but generally in knowledge of the overall event. It was rather disturbingly like the morning after full moon.
Oh, Merlin.
Heart suddenly racing, Remus looked over to see her still asleep, face buried deep into her pillows, nestling snugly against his side. Trying not to let the panic overtake him (Merlin, how could he have been so stupid? Had he not spent months among the werewolves, had he not heard and seen the results of such a loss of control?), he leaned forward, carefully tilting her succulent (No, wrong word, definitely wrong word... Merlin, he'd spent way too much time around Greyback...) body away from him, eyes searching for any hint of savaging. Not a scratch on her, not a scratch on her, thank Merlin... (Stupid, stupid, stupid, stupid to the n-th degree!...)
Long lashes fluttered open, and drowsy blue eyes slowly focused on him as she mumbled sleepily, "You, Professor Lupin, need to stop thinking and worrying so much. Go back to sleep." And with that, she snuggled back down into the blankets, closing her eyes again.
Sighing with unabashed relief, Remus decided to just shut off his brain for a while, settling down again to enjoy the nearness and the smell and the goodness of her.
Her cheeks were flushed with the night's passions, lips deliriously well-kissed and perfect pink nipples still reddened and looking rather deliciously tempting at the moment...
"Go back to sleep, Remus," she murmured with a yawn, though she nestled down comfortably into his chest at his touch.
***
She woke up not long after he'd fallen asleep again. Propping herself up slightly on her elbows, she watched his face, more at peace than she'd ever seen it before, and wondered how any woman could resist such a man.
Tonks pulled herself lightly over him, leaning in to start trailing a path with her tongue across his neck, edging carefully past the bite scar she knew he was so self-conscious of and down his collarbone until she'd reached his chest. Just before she could close her lips around a nipple, however, she could feel him arouse against her, every muscle tensing. Briefly, she hesitated, considering her options.
"Don't you even dare," Remus' drowsy warning came from above, even as she simply grinned at him and went downward.
***
When he next awoke, it was because:
A – The sun was out and brightly shining through the crack in her curtains straight into his eyes.
B – She was awake and playing with his hair, running her fingers through it lightly and succeeding in an almost tickling sensation speeding through his scalp.
"Stop it," he grumbled sleepily. He tried to shield his eyes from the sun to get the focus back in them, a task made difficult by her constant playful interference. "Stop it, for Merlin's sake, Tonks..." he growled as she laughed and ducked in to nuzzle her nose against his again, her lashes tickling his cheek. Tiny, featherlight kisses were landing along his jawline.
Even as he let her continue, he could feel his brain kicking into high gear again and the excuses and reasonings and the fear and the pain come rushing back.
"Brain off, Remus," she said sternly just as she closed her lips onto his, a certain degree of pleading in the urgency of that kiss. "You think too much."
Sighing, he acquiesced again. What was the use in refusing her? She'd simply wile and beguile her way back.
She gave him a delighted smile, eyes sparkling as she returned to her morning teasing. Pinned back down by her upper body, balancing herself, the sun returned to plague his eyes. "Merlin, Tonks, stop it," he groaned, trying to reach around her with one hand to block the sun, the other gently pushing her face away.
She laughed again, pink locks of hair falling into her dare-filled eyes. "What are you going to do, professor? Give me detention?" She paused, grinning at him with the wily smile of a young woman who knows she's won. "Make me write lines?"
***
He had barely realized it when a week had passed and he was still there. It was a little disturbing to think of, to realize how far she had worked her way into his heart in a matter of days. It was unsettling to think that he could not imagine life continuing without her, yet knowing that life could not continue with her.
Remus woke up the morning of Dumbledore's funeral well after she did, for once. He could hear her radio playing something she insisted was 'good music' out in the kitchen – quietly, thank Merlin, her neighbours had probably complained about the noise already this morning – and figured he should probably go out there and rescue her from herself before she burnt down the entire block.
"Oh, look who's finally dragged himself out of bed!" she said brightly, passing him a mug of coffee and a bowl of cereal. "I won't inflict my cooking on you yet," she laughed, taking a quick sip from his coffee.
"But you will drink my coffee," he replied dryly.
"If you'll notice, I even put your cream and sugar in there, even though that wrecks the whole coffee experience," she pointed out.
"All hail the coffee queen," Remus laughed, taking a mouthful of coffee. "Have you eaten yet?"
"Yeah, I've learnt to eat when I can, between the Aurors and the Order, I barely ever get a regular schedule," Tonks said with a slight smile.
"So that's why you're only, like, twenty pounds," Remus teased briefly, eating a spoonful of cereal. As he registered the slender, warm body slipping beneath his arm and snagging his spoon, he shook his head. "I thought you said you ate already."
"I'm still hungry," she shrugged, swallowing her spoonful. "You eating much more of that?"
"Yes, I've only had a spoon. Go find your own."
He shook his head when she snagged one more spoonful of his cereal and then went to get changed for the funeral. If she had been anybody else but her, this last week most likely wouldn't have happened. Sarah hadn't even managed to monopolize his heart, attention and affections so completely.
Sighing, Remus finished his breakfast and headed back towards the bedroom. "Tonks, you almost ready to go?" he called.
"Remus, you really need to find a better name to call me than Tonks if we're going to keep on like this," she called back. "And you can't call me Nymphadora."
And for a second, a fleeting second, he could see this being a daily occurrence for the rest of his life.
Maybe there was something to James' often-flawed logic: Mate, they're not kidding about that 'for better or for worse' part. Actually, they should more rightly call it the 'for worse or for better' part, because I swear it's about 85 percent worse and 15 percent better. But when that 15 hits... it all makes up for the other 85.
