A/N: Hey guys, I know it's been a while... I miss this story though and I have some DH bits I've already written that I'm dying for you to read so I am back now!

Writing this story helped me so much through lockdown and honestly anyone who's left feedback/favourited/followed has made me so happy! Thank you so much to anyone who's still reading.

This chapter has Tonks and Remus's first encounter since he left for his mission! Next chapter after this will be Christmas told from both of their perspectives...

The night before the Order meeting Remus barely slept. His racing mind kept playing out various scenes in which Dora cornered him, furious and yelling, her hair blazing red as she did so. Or worse, scenes in which she looked at him quietly, her disappointment in his lack of progress with his mission, apparent in those wide dark eyes. Or, he hated to admit it, worse still was the idea that she may not even attend the meeting. Was she staying away because she didn't want to see him? Or perhaps she just didn't care about him enough anymore to attend.

Since Greyback's warning and instruction to Cyprian, Remus was unsure how he'd manage to get away from the pack long enough to attend the Order meeting. Luckily with winter approaching thick and fast and the air colder and colder by the day, many of the pack had lost interest in his traps and were far more concerned with making scavenging trips to the villages for blankets and steaks and many had taken to hanging around by the soup kitchen. Those who were less inclined to scavenge were busy tending to the fire which was needing significantly more attention now with the amount of rainfall and morning frost.

Under the guise of testing out some larger scale traps for deer, Remus was able to part from the group when they left for the village and the anxiety he felt around blowing his cover only increased tenfold when he appeared in front of The Burrow and was faced with the prospect of seeing Dora for the first time in months.

When he entered the cosy kitchen of The Burrow, his eyes did an initial sweep of the room and his heart sank as he quickly realised that there was no pink hair in sight. She hadn't shown up. He tried to tell himself that perhaps she was late, held up at work maybe, and then hurriedly tried to tell himself that it shouldn't matter anyway because the whole point of all this pain was that he needed to keep his distance. It all seemed stupid now anyway, as if keeping his distance had done anything to quell his terrifying, burning affection for her.

"Tonks" Mad-Eye's gruff voice could be heard from across the room and Remus's heart leapt as he looked over to the corner and saw that he'd been mistaken. Sat quietly in the armchair away from the other conversing Order members was a Dora who looked even less Dora like than the one he'd last seen in The Burrow's garden some months ago. In all his thoughts of her since being in the camp, he'd never seriously entertained the idea that she wouldn't be back to her bouncy, pink haired, fun-loving self. But as he watched her talking to Mad-Eye there were no wild hand gestures, no winks, no grins. Her hair was the same natural brown it had been when he'd last seen her and she was pale, perhaps more pale than he'd ever seen her, and he was sure she'd lost weight.

When he'd contemplated in the camp what exactly he wanted to know about her that would make him feel better, he'd thought that seeing her happy without him would be painful. But whatever pain that would have brought would be nothing compared to the pain of seeing her like this.

Remus sat stiffly through the Order meeting, trying to pretend he wasn't aware of the glances that were being thrown his way by almost all of the Order, save the one person who seemed to be doing everything in her power not to look at him. His eyes travelled in her direction far too frequently, even whilst he was giving his brief and somewhat unhelpful update regarding his own mission. His mind was working furiously to try to determine what his approach should be. Should he just leave without speaking to her at the end of the meeting? That would be rude really. But what good could talking to her do either of them?

As the meeting drew to a close Tonks continued to frown into her completely untouched mug of tea. She had known Remus would likely be here this evening, but it hadn't helped her prepare for it. She'd felt his eyes on her all through the meeting but hadn't dared to look back at him. He looked awful. She knew he hated his hair all messy like that and she could tell from the way he was carrying himself that his ribs were causing him pain. If her heart wasn't broken already, seeing him now only broke it further. And then there was the mess of other emotions that always came with thinking about him - pain that he'd left her, hope from that quote he'd underlined in the muggle book, frustration at his stubbornness, and amidst all of it, a love that just wouldn't go away.

As the meeting drew to a close, she knew she'd regret it if she left without speaking to him, she didn't know when she'd even see him again... she wouldn't let herself entertain the idea that she could never see him again, that was just too painful.

Her legs felt weak with nerves as she made her way over to him. She didn't miss the way his exhausted features contorted in surprise when she made her presence known to him.

"Uhh... hey" she took a deep breath, shifting awkwardly.

"Tonks" Remus nodded stiffly and then frowned against his own awkwardness. In the same way as it had many months ago, hearing him refer to her by her surname in such an impersonal way stung more than she'd ever admit.

"So-"

"Are you-"

They both spoke at the same time and she cringed. It had never been like this with them, their conversation had always flowed so naturally.

He smiled a little at her though it didn't reach his eyes, indicating with a tilt of his head for her to go first.

Suddenly after the last months desperate to be in his presence again, she had no idea what to say.

"Are you... going to be able to come back again at some point... do you think?" she asked, grimacing even as she spoke for she didn't know what the point was. Why would she even want to see him again if this awkward mess was the extent of their relationship now?

"I'm not sure, it really depends how close an eye they keep on me" Remus replied honestly.

Tonks nodded slowly as Remus continued to frown, contemplating his next move.

"Are you... alright?" he asked, trying to keep the extent of his concern for her out of his voice.

"Mmm" she replied vaguely, it was her turn to frown now, "are you?"

She didn't mean for it to be a rhetorical question, she genuinely did want to know whether he was okay. But when she looked up to him for an answer, their eyes properly met for the first time that evening and they got stuck just looking at each other as though both could convey purely in that one look all the things they were really feeling. That was until Mad-Eye rudely and tactlessly interrupted by dragging Remus off with him to pinpoint on a map where his next check in would be.

Their recent encounter had been anticlimactic to say the least. Tonks had wanted to ask him what it had meant when he'd underlined that quote in his book, ask him what it meant that her patronus had changed. Because she was sure that she knew what it meant. But all that pent up adrenaline at the thought of talking to him about these things and fizzled and died the moment she'd looked up at him and now in the aftermath, her spirits had plummeted to an all-time low.

But all around her life went on, not exactly as normal for they were in the midst of a war she had to spend half her time pretending she wasn't fighting. She spent her whole work week waiting for her day off, then spent her day off waiting to work again so she at least had some sort of purpose. Today she had another lunch with her parents to get through, she hated that because the stark contrast now to how these afternoons used to go was impossible to ignore. She used to natter away to her parents, she'd be practically bubbling over with news and stories and she'd have one too many glasses of wine and joke around with her dad. But now conversation was forced, she just didn't have anything to say nor the energy to try and think of anything to say. Her mum would make comments about how she wasn't herself which made her angry and defensive but really she knew her mum was right.

Tonks had congratulated herself on getting out of bed and getting a piece on toast down her but now was running very late as it had been an hour of her staring at the wall before she'd been able to muster herself to shower and start getting ready. Yet another stark contrast from the girl she'd been for the first 23 and a half years of her life who struggled to sit still for even 5 minutes. Now she looked at the unrecognisable girl in the mirror and scowled at her. "Come on Tonks" she growled at herself, "I know you're still in there somewhere."

Sometimes she could feel her in there. That girl who wanted to blast Weird Sisters and sing along at the top of her voice. The girl who wanted to dress in outrageous outfits that make people double take when she passed them. That girl who wanted to chat away to anyone who'll listen. But as much as she wanted to, this dull Tonks just didn't know how to bring that other Tonks back. So for now this was her lot and all she could do was carry on in the hope that one day, old Tonks would be back and she'd be grateful that dull Tonks had still kept going for her.

Tonks sighed as she stared blankly into the abyss of her wardrobe. Normally her day off was a chance to find an outfit that combined as many different colours and patterns as possible and she always enjoyed the challenge. But now it just didn't feel right. She riffled through her wardrobe and then her draws until all her clothes were screwed up on the floor where she'd thrown them in frustration.

She just couldn't wear a bright pink jacket, or her jeans patched with rainbows and coloured band logos, not when she was feeling like this.

In the end she managed to find some pink and black leggings, feeling that the way the pink faded into white then grey then black reflected the way the happiness had been sucked out of her until she was left with this emptiness. There was an oversized black t shirt in the back of her wardrobe hidden under old shoes she didn't wear anymore, she thought one of her friends had left it here when they stayed over once, years ago, in another lifetime. It echoed her black mood so she pulled it on along with black combat boots and a black beanie. Then she caught sight of herself again. This person was not someone she recognised, she felt eerily dissociated from the girl who stared back at her. She wondered if this would just be who she was now and in which case should she just get used to it? Maybe it wasn't that something had taken her over temporarily, maybe she had just changed.

That would make sense. War changed people after all. She could hardly imagine Mad-Eye was born too paranoid to drink his own mother's milk, so maybe this was just what war had done to her.

She realised that this realisation should probably make her sad. But somehow it didn't, she just felt nothing, a quiet sort of acceptance perhaps. After all whether her mood was pink or black or just... nothing... she was still here, war was still brewing, Harry still needed protecting, the Order still needed people inside the Ministry, Remus was still in danger. So really it made no difference, she may barely be recognisable anymore, but she could still do her job, and she was still needed to do her job. And all those things that were worth fighting for before were still worth fighting for. She was just a little smaller, a little more irrelevant in all of that and she realised that now. This wasn't about her anymore, the world could swallow her whole, chew her up and spit her out and that was ok, as long as she was still breathing she still had a purpose and that was what got her out of bed every morning, got her in the shower, got her out the door. Work, Order meetings, obligatory dinners with her parents, obligatory tea with Molly. She could do this she realised, just go on and on without feeling, go through the motions, do what she had to do, nothing more, nothing less.

She felt a slight pang in her chest, in her neediness she craved the comfort that Remus brought her now more than ever. She felt a warm tingling sensation where her wand holster brushed against her thigh but as she looked down to determine the source of the sensation, her attention was caught by the Ancient Blood Curse book sticking out from under her bed. She'd slept with it under her pillow for a while just to feel closer to Remus, until one night it had all gotten too much and she'd hidden it from herself, unable to deal with the constant reminder anymore and yet still unable to get rid of it completely.

Tonks had never had a lot of time for writing. Trying to organise her thoughts was a tricky business and putting them down on paper in a linear fashion almost impossible. But with Remus she'd always been able to just talk, and he'd always been wonderful at making sense of her random musings. She plopped herself down on the floor and found an old quill that had also been dropped under the bed at some point. She didn't think, she just wrote, she didn't even know whether she hoped or even thought that Remus would ever read what she had to say, but there was a vague sense of comfort in the act of writing to him nonetheless.