Nymphadora Tonks had never wanted a typical romance. She supposed she should try it once in a while, try bringing home someone that didn't make her father gasp and her mother cry out in worry, but she couldn't do it. Her previous boyfriends had come with flavour, with toppings on the ice-cream, so to speak. Ink smeared across their skin in the form of dragons and motorbikes, relentless, smoky hazes pouring from their mouths and an attitude that blatantly stated "I don't give a damn."
There was something refreshing about them, she thought, about their ability to defy logic and still make perfect sense to her. They were reckless and untamable and lived for rebellion yet, but they were also … well, they were her sort of people, she decided.
They were wild and insane, and she loved each and every single one of them – Derek, Sean, Raymond, Paul, oh fuck, who came next, John – for it.
Cards were used as bookmarks for Quidditch magazines, flowers made it into the compost heap in the back garden and 'I love you's' were buried beneath layers of harsh kisses and profanity.
"Happy Valenti- fuck, I left my wallet at work, I'll be back later."
It was all so typical of them, and Tonks loved every minute of it.
She lived for the unexpected, for those moments when they would whisk her away on their motorbikes, shaggy locks flying in the cool winter air. And if they couldn't remember her birthday or bring themselves to take her out for dinner once in a while, she didn't mind, because they were wild and insane, and that was the sort of wild and insane behaviour you had to expect from such men, right?
Remus Lupin was different.
"Tonks," Remus asked, his voice full of concern, "how are you?" He knelt beside the threadbare couch as she collapsed into it, her face mutated into an expression of mingled agony and irritation.
"Fine, thanks," she snapped, even though her ankle ached like hell – damn Walburga Black's obsession with umbrella stands and damn her son for not removing them. She wasn't used to this, to being treated like she was special.
When Tonks thought about it, she'd always been special, but back then, special had been a relative word, and sympathy had been nothing more than something other people waved about like wands.
"Are you sure? I can get you some ice? Or find Sirius – healing spells were the one thing he was always better at than me. Lay down; anyway, you can't sit up like this." Tenderly, Remus caressed her ankle, his deep brown eyes wide with the compassion that seemed to radiate from his entire body.
"I'm fine, Remus. Go talk to Sirius or something, I'm fine."
He almost cared too much, it was almost suffocating, Tonks decided. She really wasn't used to this sort of treatment.
"Tonks?" Remus asked again, poking his head around the door as she climbed gingerly into bed that night. "How's your ankle?"
"Fine!" She made to elaborate as she slipped between the sheets; they were soft against her skin. Remus' eyes flickered to her ankle, which was still swollen with both blood and resentment. She felt so hopeless.
"These are for you," he mumbled quietly, pointing to the flowers that drooped and cascaded over his outstretched arm. "I'm sorry about your ankle."
Tonks watched in silence as he padded slowly across the room, his feet sinking into the carpet, and his socks leaving indents in the floor. Curiously, she noticed the lust in his eyes, the barely controlled emotion, the concern and the hunger that he held for her as he captured her lips with his.
And with that, Nymphadora Tonks decided that Remus Lupin too was wild and insane, in his own little way.
And that she liked his style of insanity so much better.
a/n: This is just a little ficlet that I wrote for rtchallenge on Livejournal a while ago, which I thought I'd share with ou here as a little Remus/Tonks love while I persevere with Snapshots. ;) Please leave a comment, and make me feel loved.