She stood, knock-kneed, in the door, her face flushed and her throat heaving.
"I just wanted to tell you good-bye," she whispered, her throat scratchy.
Remus sat his cracked suitcase down, looking up and flinching slightly as he met her grey eyes. "Andromeda..." Shoulders hunched, he slid down onto the bed. A spring creaked.
She twisted her handkerchief round and round her finger, and her left heel rocked back and forth as the words burst away from her, ballooning into the dusty air. This wasn't fair... Remus listened patiently, a calm expression on his face.
"I can't," he said, when she was through. His response popped the hope that her words had hung in the air. Andromeda's chin wobbled, and her face grew pinker from the tears that threatened to drip.
"Why not?" she despaired. He didn't look up for a century, it seemed; until he was done pulling at his hangnail.
"Andromeda," he said, gently, "Look at what you have. A beautiful daughter, an adoring husband ..." He shook his head. "I cannot let myself steal you away from them, or to let you do this to yourself."
"But..." Her face was splotchy from her barely audible weeping.
He stood, and grasped her hand, pulling it to him. "I'm your villain," he whispered. She bit her lip, and he dropped her hand, and picked up his suitcase.
"Good-bye," he said forlornly, tipping his hat to her, and turned out of the room, quietly clicking the door shut as Andromeda sank to the musty mattress.
As he walked down the hall, carefully trying to keep the tap of his shoes unobtrusive, he could hear her quiet little sobs morph into an almost animal- like keening. Guiltily, he prayed she wouldn't wake Dora or the snoring Ted.
-fin.