Setting: The summer, post OOp

Take Her in Your Arms

Chapter 1

Sometimes you're just bad...

It was nearly 2am when Nymphadora Tonks arrived home to Grimmald Place. Quietly shutting the door behind her, she slipped out of her fuchsia pumps, which had rubbed blisters on her heels; unmorphed her violet hair, now a sweaty brown mess and tugged off her purple sequin tank top that now reeked of smoke and alcohol. Now standing in the entry way in only her black leather mini and lace bra, she sighed with relief.

"Where have you been?" Asked a stern voice from the doorway, a blue flame lighting a still young face of a tired man.

"Remus!" Tonks jumped and covered her chest with her discarded shirt. "Merlin's ghost! What are you doing up?"

"Waiting up for you," He answered coldly as he reached into his pocket and clicked open a gold pocket watch. "Do you know what time it is?"

"Late," Tonks answered stiffly, bending to pick up her pumps.

"It's 2am."

"Well, glad to know it." Tonks replied flippantly and headed towards the staircase. "I'm going to bed."

Remus crossed his arms, his pale eyes glaring.

She wasn't a child to be reprimanded and secondly, he couldn't just glare at her in her own home. It was the third time he'd acted this way this month. Turning on her heel, her voice shook with angry, "Look Remus you're not my father, and your bloody well not my husband. If I want to go out clubbing with my girlfriends, then I damn well will!"

Remus's hand clinched the railing, knuckles white, "Nymphadora, there's a war going on out there. You can't just walk off into the night without letting someone know where you are."

"Damn it Remus. Don't you think I know that! Don't you think that sometimes I just want to get away from it all; from this house, from this war, from you..."

The last arrow shot right to the heart and Nymphadora felt no remorse. In fact, she felt spurred on by the intensity of shot and took another aim. Lips tight, pale eyes ice cold; he stood completely still as Tonks descended the stairs and pointed her index finger directly in the middle of his chest.

"I don't need a knight on a white horse or an old werewolf to save me. I am Ministry auror, I can take care of myself."

Then, flipping her hair over her shoulder, she continued up the stairs. No one would control Nymphadora Tonks, expect for Nympahdora Tonks. "I will do as I please. If you don't like it," she turned and cocked her head to the side, and offered a spiteful grin, "then you may leave."

From the bottom of the staircase, Lupin quietly replied, "This isn't what Sirius would have wanted."

"Don't Remus!" She screamed. Her eyes held back tears of pain and anger. "Don't you even say his name."

Then with she disappeared beyond into the darkness of the hallway as Mrs. Black's portrait flung its curtains opened and added its own insults.

You filthy mudblood werewolf... Tarnish the halls of my house with you cursed stain...

Tonks peeled off the rest of her clothes and stepped into the steaming hot waters of her nightly bath. She was still a bit drunk and the world spun around her as she melted beneath the bubbles and tried to let the boiling waters wash away the anger, the hurt and the guilt.

Damn! She was mad at Remus tonight. Telling her that she had a curfew! Still, it's one thing to be angry, another thing to be cruel, said the voice in her head. Opening her eyes, she sighed. She'd been really awful; saying every malicious thought that popped into her mind. And what if he took her advice and left? She really didn't want to be alone in this house.

Taking a wash cloth, she laid it over her face and breathed in the lavender steam. What had happened to them? When ever she was around Remus these days, she felt on edge and he, too, was somehow changed. She'd been going to clubs more and more as Remus retreated into the study and rarely came out except for meals. Even during those rare moments together, they hardly spoke.

Tears filled her eyes, as the pain of Sirius's death kindled in her heart. She knew without doubt, what the three ton Elephant in their relationship was, the one both of them saw but neither could acknowledge. That horrible night that Severus appeared in the fire grate and had told them about Harry going to the ministry to save Sirius, she had begged her cousin not to go. It was Remus that took her aside and told her to calm down, Sirius loved Harry way to much not to save him, even if that meant risking his own life.

Tonks had been furious that Remus had supported Sirius and not her that night. Had he completely forgotten what had happened just two years ago when Black's soul had nearly been lost to the kiss of a dementor? Then he made a fatal mistake; a false promise.

"Come on cousin, Mooney and I were doing this while you were still in diapers," Sirius laughed, shrugging on his robe.

"Nymphadora," Remus said her name calmly, his hands on her shoulders, eyes piercing her soul, "I promise Sirius will be fine."

In the cooling bath water, she cried. Sobs racked her body as he remembered his sainted words. It was his fault. He was the only who could have stopped Sirius from going to his death and he'd done nothing but make her a promise that he couldn't keep.

After several minutes, Tonks slowly pulled herself back together and out of the tub. Once into her pajamas and emotionally calmer, she opened her bedroom door and looked over to Lupin's bedroom. She learned against her door frame as she struggled with the idea of walking over and settling this once and for all.

Every time she approached him on the subject of that night, he withdrew more and more to himself. His passivity only seemed to make her angrier; more violent. She wanted to scream, she wanted to hit something until all the pain went away and she wanted to hear him say he was wrong, but so far, he wouldn't do it.

Without knowing it, she had walked to his room, and pushed open the door, "Remus?"

A single candle glowed in the darkness, but there was no one there. In fact, nothing of his was there. She opened up the wardrobe, but it was bare. Tonks had never felt lower than this moment. She'd told him to leave and he had done it. Now she was completely alone; her bitterness and regret, cold company.

Pulling back the covers, she snuggled into his four poster bed. His scent lingered on linens and she hugged a pillow to her stomach, wishing with all her will it was him that she held in her arms. As she drifted to sleep, she dreamed his stubbed chin rested against her chest and she was scattering kisses through his soft brown hair. In shadows, his long, languid body entangled with hers, his thin lips pressed against her breast in warm desire. Then, for the second time that night, she cried, but this time, it wasn't for losing her cousin, it was for losing her best friend and maybe something more.