Fear and Loathing in Romania
Disclaimer: Sue me not. For JK Rowling I will never be. And contrary to popular belief, I'm not Nancy Sinatra either, so unfortunately the song lyrics I did not write.
Rating: R (language, sex, violence)
Summary: Tonks is begrudgingly sent to Romania to fetch Charlie Weasley and bring him back to the Order. Everything that can go wrong manages to go wrong and the two find themselves running for their lives, without magic, from both Death Eaters and the Muggle police and somehow manage to re-discover each other along the way.
Author's Note: Oh, wow. Bah whizzers…do I feel bad for making you wait three months (!) another installment. My sincerest apologies. Writer's block and second semester are both a bitch and both equally chose to pounce on my delicate frame of mind simultaneously. Forgive me. But school is out for summer, until August 20-something-or-other, so until then, I am yours. Me and my prose: all yours. And I will do my best to keep you entertained. Or utterly depressed, emo or morose. I apologize for the depressed tone. No, actually, that's a lie. What we have here for our lovely Nymphadora Tonks and dashing Charlie Weasley is an identity crisis of sorts, and one shall find that with that comes downright, debilitating depression and I unfortunately lack the Prozac to cure them. But they're leaving the hotel. Finally. Even though they've been there, what, three days tops? Hmm, can't even keep my own story straight. Not sure that's the best of signs. Anyway, I shall let you read from here…Please enjoy and thanks for sticking with me. That is if any of you are still around ;)
(Oh, and if worst comes to worst and boots me off here like every other author it seems, any suggests as to where to post? Other than Many thanks.)
Oh, and Author's Note #2: I'm attempting another story. Possibly. Huge epic on the Death Eaters and the Order of the Phoenix circa the "Reign of Terror", the first time around. We'll see. Not sure I can handle it… Anyway, be on the lookout and please, if submitted, do read.
Chapter Eleven: Bang, Bang
"Seasons came and changed the time
When I grew up, I called him mine
He would always laugh and say
Remember when we used to play
Bang bang
I shot you down, bang bang
You hit the ground , bang bang
That awful sound, bang bang
I used to shoot you down"
- "Bang Bang" – Nancy Sinatra
Turning around, shutting the door softly behind him, key digging into the palm of his hand, he thinks to himself. He hates change. He always has. There has never come a point in his life where he has met it head-on, with a grin and wide-open arms, screaming, come, come and turn my universe on its axis and watch me hang upside down. He knows he can't speak those words; he can't smile in the face and the glare of the unknown. Instead, he will brood and think of all the doom and gloom, the magic that might have transpired. The magic which shall never, ever, come, for the first time or again, wrapped in the same neat, messy, tangled package he might have unknowingly unwrapped.
He wonders when he became so poetic. He finds himself blaming her.
She has changed. And he hates it. So he will return the key to the pathetic excuse for a front desk, bid farewell to trysts in dirty, foreign hotel rooms and pray the emotions, the words, the actions of the past days will remain hidden behind the stained walls, never to rear their ugly heads again. At least not between the two of them.
He will pray he has left her behind, hidden in the closet or under the bed in one of those colorless rooms.
He knows a song. And its tune is disappointment. He knows a song, and he sings it loud. And he knows by now both you and her want nothing more than to cover your ears to drown him out. It's okay. He wasn't going to tell you anyway
She's waiting for him outside. She's waiting for London. And he finds that he is too.
It's cold. Degrees have droppedand grey skies threaten to unleash their flurried fury. Barometers are falling.
She doesn't have a coat. She had a cloak, now ripped to shreds and left behind in the first in their succession of hotel rooms. She didn't fancy it much anyway. But now she wishes for just a hint of warmth.
The angst of the morning has seemed to have dissipated. The tone has changed, lightened, if possible, over the course of a shower and the exit of the building. She no longer feels the woman with intentions of plummets out of second story windows, the woman with visions of graveyards and silent death dancing through her head. It frightens her that she had come to that.
She knows it's not behind her. Whatever this dark cloud is called which has chosen to plague her with emotions she's too shocked and afraid to name.
She waits for him outside. Arms crossed, hugging her middle. Inhaling deeply, she looks to the ground, and there in the frost-bitten grass lies a bird. Cold and dead and freezing, wings which shall fly no more. She turns away, knowing a bad omen when she spots one.
"Hey." There he is, in all his morning, mourning glory. This is not my Charlie.
"Let's go."
She turns to walk, moving a few steps down the sidewalk, heading left, when she realizes. She has no idea where she is headed.
This is Bucharest. They are in Bucharest. And there should be a train station, a depot, somewhere hidden in this mess of a city. But here they are, in the outskirts, residing in flea-bag motels and living off of cheap liquor and individually packaged snacks.
She turns back around, and sees him standing there, leaning against the streetlight, map in hand. Red hair standing out against the grey of the city, like firelight.
She could almost worship at the altar of his practicality. But pride won't let her kneel.
"Right. I haven't a bloody clue as to where we're going, do I?" Her attempt at a light-hearted, congenial tone backfires,causing her tosound like a hysterical beauty pageant contestant instead.
"Yeah…" He doesn't lift his eyes. He chooses to follow the bisecting and the dissecting streets with names she can't pronounce.
"If we take a right up until the corner and then hang a left, we should be able to catch a bus which'll carry us to downtown Bucharest. There's a train station there…"
She wishes in vain she could pin the reason down, but the words he speaks sound foreign to his tongue. She can't remember ever hearing Charlie Weasley speak of bus stops and the like. It's not him. But she's tired, tired of questioning him, questioning her, questioning him and her. The never-answered question and answer round is wearing thin on her.
"Right, so…shall we?" She nods, and follows in step behind him.
Why do we do this? Why do we bother?
He's beginning to slow, his pace faltering, and she soon finds him beside her, head turned, gazing curiously at her.
"Tonks…we need to talk."
She can recognize the kiss of death when she tastes it, when its tongue begs entrance to her mouth.
"Why don't we just get to London first?"
Fuck diplomacy.
She drops the coins down into the slot and hears them rattle down below.
She moves to the back of the bus, stepping over misplaced purses and obese extremities.
She sits by the window, folds her hands deep in her lap. He doesn't sit beside her. He chooses the seat across, alone, the empty plastic cold and unforgiving. It all fits.
She rests her head against the window and blankly stares ahead, dimly processing the grimy buildings whipping by, painting their own disheartening landscape for her to enjoy.
The sky begins to fall. Dainty, pointed, white and wet, it falls from up above. She longs to be outside, out and walking, letting the cold air burn her lungs and the cold snow get lost in her hair.
Winter has always been her favorite season, mainly for theunconditional love affair she shares with the snow. She's always loved it. She knows the entire world and everyone in it seemingly hates it, despises it, throwing curses at the weatherman and the bewildered traffic cop. But she loves it.
She watches it fall, watches it turn the entire world white instead of gray, covering everything which lingers dully beneath it. She watches it fall, light enough to quell the sting, hard enough to leave an imprint, a reminder that it was here.
She can see snowdrifts to come and soggy socks. She can see herself laying there, snow angels in her wake, the icy tickle as it serpentines down the open neck of her jacket, past the scarf and onto her skin. She can see the home fires burning and the hot chocolate bubbling.
She pulls away from the window a bit, and she finds that she can see herself. She can see her face amid the snowflakes, and for the first time in days, maybe even weeks, she can see a smile forming.
When it snows, everything goes away. Just for a few minutes. Those few minutes.
Descending the bus, she stares straight ahead, down into the intersections and into the faces and facades of buildings steadily increasing in age. The cars, the buses, the stamp of the times looks out of place next to the old stone and the towering architecture of old. She finds the paradox slightly amusing and simultaneously finds comfort in the fact she still can silently entertain herself.
She can feel him stand beside her. She doesn't look. She's tired of that as well.
Standing there, letting the snow collect and contrast with her dark hair, she understands. Understands that this, the frigid animosity between the two of them no longer has to do with the event seven years ago. It was the catalyst, she thinks. The match that ignited every foul thing the one felt for the other. And they've let it fester ever since.
She feels him there and she has to chant. It's all in the past, it's all in the past. It's all in the past. The schooling, the love, the boy, the past handful of days. It's all in the past.
She can feel herself approaching something grand, can almost see that door at the end of the hallway, the maze that is her mind.
"Shall we try to find the station?"
She jerks her head towards him, offering a tight-lipped smile.
He's shot her sanity to pieces. Once again.
They wander, for what seems like hours, days and weeks.
He's a man. They don't ask for directions. She hates that at times she thinks in clichés. Now being one of them.
"Charlie, we have hiked up and down this bloody avenue three times already. Thrice! Can't we just…ask somebody?"
He glares at her over his shoulder, increasing his pace, with her practically running in his wake. "You speak Romanian?" he barks at her.
"I…I could try…"
He laughs. And not all that kindly.
"Tonks, they have their own fucking alphabet. Tell me, how are you going to attempt to wing that?"
"I'd be speaking, not writing." She hates that she's giving in and beginning to act like him, the sarcasm and the cynicism conquering her system.
She doesn't think she likes it.
She quits talking, and merely tails him instead, silently.
Walking, she thinks, a constant inner monologue booming in her head.
I haven't been happy in weeks.
Rightly so. She's lost a mother, a cousin…herself.
She feels as though, no, sheknowsshe's lost herself, an ever progressing process of renovation which has resulted in pure demolition as opposed to redecoration. She's fallen through the cracks a bit, and the pace of her slipping has reached a hair-raising dive these past few days. She's adopted a persona anything but her own. And she wonders if she can return, return to the days of bright pink hair and a pseudo-punk attitude. She wonders if she can wear her boots unlaced anymore or if that look simply won't suit her.
But today, here, wandering the streets of a city she can't understand, language and otherwise, she feels she might be able to. The pieces are shifting back into place, and she's beginning to understand what she must do. What she must do in order to preserve herself.
Half an hour and a brief consultation involving two languages with a delicatessen owner later, the train station looms before them. The technology of it all surprises her. She wasn't expecting the high-powered system that lies before her, the trains that look like rocket ships whipping past and into the future.
"Wow," she muses.
He holds the door open for her and she's not sure what to say. Other than the obligatory mumbled 'thank you.'
Standing in the open lobby she watches the grey shift in the glass ceiling. The snow has stuck to the outer reaches of the panes of glass.
She watches the people come and go in that brief second. Mothers dragging belligerent children by their shirt sleeves, threatening in their myriad languages everything from deprivation of sweets to actual physical abuse. Husbands meeting their wives, others meeting their lovers, their mistresses, their long-distance yet still burning flames time hasn't managed to extinguish. Friend and foe, the arriving, the departing, all heaped under one tent, all lumped under one roof.
He grabs her by the elbow and pulls her off to the side.
"We don't have nearly enough cash to pay for a couple of train tickets back home," he launches, sans any prelude or easy opener.
"I guess we'll have to find one of those…machines. You, you, swipe the card and then type your number, and you get…money." She feels a fool for explaining. But why wouldn't he know how to work an ATM?
"Right. Well, let's find one then."
He's cold to her now. Has been since this morning. It makes it all the easier.
She spots one across the way, next to the loo. She points, "I'll just be a second." He nods, and she moves to the queue forming behind it. She stands there and watches the little girl exiting the bathroom. She couldn't be more than eight. She walks past her, hair in messy pigtails, a bright orange polka-dotted t-shirt paired with striped green pants, a pink, fur-lined parka closing the ensemble out. She can't help but think the two might just be kindred spirits. Rather, might have been.
She turns away. She has been so down and out, so dark as of late she knows she wouldn't be able to recognize where the light would be, that is if she ever bothered to try and look for it. All she has felt has been grief and pain, inadequacies and failures, and the only things she has been able to find in the past months have been disappointments. She's not happy. She knows this. It's not that she's forgotten, but rather, she's been re-taught, taught the reality of life and all the cruel tricks it can play. And she's been miserable. She has lost too much in too little time. And now, over a couple of days, it has taken its toll. And she knows why. She feels a joke, stupid and a fool. She thinks she's up, when it all falls down and when she's down she convinces herself she's really up.
It's him; it's because of him.
She feels a tap on her shoulder, and turns around. A tiny old woman stands there and smiles, pointing at the machine. She realizes it's her turn.
"Oh, I'm sorry. Thank you." She knows the words have fallen on deaf ears, the language barrier working as soundly as ear plugs.
The woman smiles, pats Tonks's arm and lets her move ahead.
I'm going to be alright.
She walks back to Charlie, money stuffed in her back pocket.
"Let's go home."
The ticket line is horrific. Chaos and claustrophobia all in one space. They stand, or attempt to, as the frenzied travelers move about them.
Finally, they make their way to the ticket booth, Charlie standing back, letting her do all the talking.
"Excuse me! Excuse me, sir?" He is rummaging through papers, back turned to her. "Hey!"
He turns, and she can't pin why he seems so familiar. She has seen him somewhere. She's just not sure where…
"Salutare, ce faci?" Oh, fuck.
"Do you speak English? The English?" She's practically lying flat on the countertop, attempting communication with a Romanian, the din around them reaching a deafening roar.
She's not sure why she became the negotiator, their cultural broker. Charlie lived in this bloody country for years at a time, while she was but a loyal denizen of England.
"The English? Yes, yes I do." It sounds like a foreign language all its own; words she knows lost in a heavy, stilting accent.
"Excellent, bloody brilliant. Okay…we, me and my friend here, we need tickets for a train that'll take us to London, London, England. You understand?" She realizes she's yelling and speaking as though she's attempting to contact the deaf and the dead. She can feel the flush rising in her cheeks.
"Yes," she can sense the irritation. "Yes, I understand. But, uh, there is no, uh, there is no train from here to there."
"From here to London?"
"You speak correctly."
"Okay…then, is there…is there a connection?"
"We have train that goes from here to Bulgaria, Bulgaria near Turk border, yes?"
The geography lesson throws her for a loop. She's not sure if he's asking for her agreement or if this is a true scholastic inquiry on his part. "Yeah…"
"Okay, then. You go to Bulgaria."
"And from Bulgaria…"
He looks at her, condescension dripping off his nose. "London. You buy ticket there, and, London."
"Fine, fantastic. When's the next departure?"
"For Bulgaria?"
She feels the urge to throttle him with his uniform sanctioned tie. "Yes." Gritted teeth work miracles.
"At the 2:15. In two hours time. You take?"
"There's not a sooner train?"
"No. Booked full for the 12:30 and there are no others for today. Before. We have later if you wish."
"No, no. That's fine…" she peeks at his crooked nametag, "Dorin. That'll be fine…"
There they sit. Luggageless and alone on the wooden bench, the loudspeakers booming the incoming and the outcoming in Romanian, English, French, Russian and others she doesn't have the patience to attempt to decipher.
Sitting there, she feels old.
In the past few hours, she has come to terms. With herself.
She has fallen apart. And the reason is sitting next to her.
Sitting there, she traces her name over and over again on the wood of the bench, scrawling an invisible Dora only she will ever know is there. She can feel him watching her. And then she feels his hand, closing over hers.
She wrenches hers away, shaking her head imperceptibly, placing it gingerly in her lap, not saying a word.
If she's ever to live her life again, in peace,she will have to let him go.