Months passed. The wireless announcement played so many times a day that I eventually just kept it turned off. Anna was getting bigger before my eyes. She had been 4 months old when her mother disappeared, and now it was December, Christmas in the air and Anna 9 months old.

It became my goal to find Nymphadora before Christmas. But by December 20th, I was losing hope. I knew that she was gone, but I needed to find her, even her body. I needed to bring justice to her, to my daughter.

When I finally came to terms with the fact that Nymphadora wasn't going to be home to see her daughter's first Christmas, I decided that I was going to bring Nymphadora to Anna. I went to a stationery store and bought a notebook, pink and purple, Nymphadora's favorite colors, a pen and some paste. When I got home, I paid the sitter and checked on Anna, who was sound asleep. Then I crept back to our room, Nymphadora's and my room, chose a photograph for the cover of the notebook, affixed it and started to write.

Nymphadora Tonks, your mother, kisses like she's laughing. Her being my best friend's second cousin and 8 years my junior, I probably shouldn't know how Nymphadora Tonks kisses at all. But I do.

When she kisses, her mouth forms a sort of pouty half-grin and she snuggles into you, the warmth of the kiss combined with the warm weight of her body, and there's no other feeling quite like it in the world.

As I lay here in the half-dark of her disorganized but dust-free bedroom while she sleeps, I ponder her. I wonder what she thinks. What she feels when I make love to her.

Tonks's bedroom is a room full of memories. Her bulletin board is a flurry of movement as she and random family members chase each other back and forth. They stop to wave at me and I stare back, smiling and still pondering her existence.

I wrote until the telephone rang, startling me. I had spent nearly 3 hours scribbling down every memory, from that first Christmas before Anna was born to memories of Nymphadora as a child to how I felt when Anna was born, steeling myself, losing myself in the very essence of Nymphadora. Even so, I was not prepared for what the voice on the other end of the telephone was going to tell me.

"Hello, is this Mr. Remus Jonathan Lupin?"

"Yes..."

"This is Daemon Kalix calling..."

I do not recall the rest of the conversation. After the pivotal six words, I numbed my mind. Your wife's body has been located, the man's automaton-like voice bounced in my head.

I got up from my chair, picked Anna up from her cot and held her and rocked her for a very long time.

In the next weeks, so many things happened. People flooded in and out of the house. Sirius stayed, comforting me and trying to take my mind off of the coming memorial service, the Weasleys drifted in and out, all telling me how sorry they were.

Meanwhile, I was trying to make it right. Trying to make it up to Nymphadora, who died too soon. Tried to make it up to Anna, who would never know her mother. I didn't cry. I had cried only in the very beginning, holding Anna. Tears had dripped down into Anna's curls. Tears of despair and pain. A tear of gratification because I knew that she was at peace. Tears because I finally knew where my wife was. Tears that I had kept pent up for 5 months came spilling out, down my cheeks and onto the soft curls and pure skin of my 9-month-old daughter. Her 9-month-old daughter. I had no use for tears anymore. I just needed to make it right.