The headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix may be found at number twelve, Grimmauld Place, London.
"Is that it, then?" Penelope asked as they stepped into the house. "I can join the Order now?"
"I think you already have," Remus said quietly. "It's just none of us knew it."
None of them had known it, but they should have. She'd proven her worth to the Order, many times over. And only now—when she'd risked everything and lost most of it, when she'd, when she'd offered her life to the Order's cause, when she was in mortal danger everywhere else—only now was she offered entrance into number twelve, Grimmauld Place. It wrenched his heart because she'd wanted to be part of the Order for so long, and now that she was, even he had to question whether it had been worth it. She'd lost her boyfriend, her job, most of her friends. She'd lost her only source of comfort, her only sense of belonging, and what must have seemed her only chance at happiness. And yet there she was, bearing it all with a strength he didn't know she possessed, and ready to continue fighting.
She couldn't hold it in forever, he knew, and one day she'd break down. One day, the reality of all she'd experienced would fully sink in, and she'd collapse from the sheer horror of it all.
He couldn't stop it. He could only hope to be there when it happened.
The Order wasn't at all what Penelope had expected.
She hadn't meant to expect anything from it—she'd learned her lesson with the Ministry—but after hearing about the Order and working with the Order for so long, it was hard not to have expectations. And it wasn't a disappointment, at all; it was just different.
The attack on the Informer had been the first outright attack—there'd been the Department of Mysteries that summer, of course, but that had been a different beast entirely—and the Order had reacted as everyone had expected, by stepping up their activity. Penelope worked almost exclusively inside the house, coordinating schedules and sifting through information; it was the same job Sirius had once had, Remus told her, but she'd accepted it with much more enthusiasm than he had, mostly because she didn't mind spending so much time in the house. Actually, with the exception of the Davies' funeral and a few visits to Dust and Mildewe—which usually weren't necessary, as Oliver's mother sent him most of Penelope's editing—she hadn't left the house at all.
But it wasn't lonely, by any means. The increase in the Order's activity meant that number twelve, Grimmauld Place was almost constantly filled with people. Arthur and Molly Weasley spent so much time at the house that Penelope was almost convinced they actually lived there; and Tonks, Kingsley Shacklebolt, and Bill Weasley actually did live there, although Kingsley threatened to move out every few days.
They rarely dined with fewer than eight people around the kitchen table, and conversation and laughter flowed freely, but it always seemed to Penelope that something was missing. Maybe it was a morale issue; maybe it was hard to keep spirits genuinely high when they'd seen so much destruction and lost so much ground. Maybe she'd seen so much destruction that she now saw the world through different eyes. Or maybe those eyes weren't so different, after all; maybe it was that everyone else had begun to treat her differently.
Oliver didn't, but she saw so little of him—he'd stayed at the house for a few days following the attack on the paper, but he'd been back to Puddlemere United within the week. He returned for Order meetings and the odd visit to the house, but those visits were few and far between, especially when it seemed no one else could treat her like a normal, sane person.
"You don't have to be so careful around me," she told Remus one day. "It's not as though I'm going to break."
"Perhaps not," he replied softly. Then he sighed. "Penelope, do you regret coming here?"
Before she could answer, Tonks appeared, and then it was impossible to have a conversation over the sound of interminable clumsiness—thuds and crashes that seemed to come from nowhere. It was impossible to have a conversation, anyway, because Tonks was always there, always attached to Remus like she'd been spellotaped to his robes.
Remus himself was nearly always attached to Penelope, but that was different; he'd pulled her out of the wreckage of Dust and Mildewe, after all, and his primary concern was for her safety and sanity. Tonks, meanwhile—well, Penelope wasn't entirely sure what Tonks wanted. But wherever Penelope went, Remus went, and Tonks trailed along too, and it might have been comedic were she not part of their bizarre parade.
"I do care for you," Penelope," Tonks said one evening, as they helped Molly clear the dinner dishes. "And I don't blame Remus for being concerned about you. You're like a daughter to him, really, so it's understandable."
Penelope stared at her, any thought of a reply disappearing with the sound of a plate shattering on the floor. And for once, the plate hadn't slipped through Tonks's fingers, but through her own.
She'd been there just over a month when the tears finally fell.
When they did, it happened all at once. One moment she was standing calmly in the foyer, and the next, she was on her knees, sobbing bitterly, her forehead pressed against the cold stone floor. The tears fell not just for Roger, or her coworkers, or the Informer. They fell for Percy, and Oliver, and her career and dreams—for her past, present, and future.
"Mudblood harlot!" the portrait of Mrs. Black screeched, as the curtains flew away from it, but Penelope didn't even process the words. "Your filthy tears have no place in my house!"
There was screaming, yes, and a flurry of activity around her, but Penelope couldn't force herself to care about that. Someone tugged gently at her arm, and she looked up to see a blur of pink that she assumed was Tonks, but then the tears obscured her vision again, and she slumped back to the floor.
Then a pair of arms encircled her, lifting her from the cold stones and holding her securely against a warm chest. She didn't know whose embrace it was, but it felt so safe that she could have stayed there forever, she thought lazily, as she finally let her eyes slide closed.
"What you have to remember, Remus," Arthur Weasley said, "is that—"
"Mudblood harlot!"
The unmistakable screeching of Mrs. Black's portrait made them both sprint into the foyer, and by the time they reached it, Molly had already Stunned the other portraits, and Mrs. Black had begun to scream about filthy tears.
Remus ran to the portrait immediately, almost tripping over the pile of robes on the floor, and gave a tremendous tug on the curtains. Then Arthur, suddenly beside him, grabbed the other side, and with great effort, they dragged the curtains closed. The screaming died away, and only then, when Arthur physically turned him around, did Remus realize that the pile of robes he'd almost tripped over was actually a person—Penelope, in fact, responding less than admirably to Tonks's attempts to pull her to her feet.
She'd finally broken down, he realized, and no sooner did that thought sink in than he ran to her, gently pushing Tonks aside as he bent down and lifted Penelope off the floor, holding her securely against his chest. "Remus, what are you doing?" Tonks hissed, glancing from Remus to the girl in his arms. "She can walk on her own."
Remus looked down at Penelope's limp form. "She's cried herself unconscious, Tonks. I think she'll need some help."
Tonks muttered something almost unintelligible about just what type of help he'd give her, and while he caught the gist, he hardly thought it merited a comment. He glances down at Penelope again, shifted her weight slightly, and headed for the staircase.
"If you were waiting for the time to stop following her around like a lost puppy, and actually show her what she means to you," Arthur murmured as he passed, "I think this is it."
Tonks huffed quietly and flounced up the stairs; Lupin heard a door slam as he reached the top of the staircase. She'd chosen an empty bedroom, he noticed with a sense of relief, as he stepped into the room and kicked the door shut behind him.
Penelope didn't stir as he carefully undressed her and laid her to bed, and he couldn't help but think that this wasn't exactly the way he'd have chosen for her to first share his bed. As it was, there seemed very little sharing in his immediate future; he was destined for a night spent awake, sitting beside the bed and watching her sleep.
Then a quiet sob escaped her throat, and she clutched at the pillow, and he'd shed his robes and jumped into bed beside her before he even had an opportunity to consider the pros and cons.
If there were any cons, they disappeared the instant she relaxed against his chest. He was a lost cause when it came to Penelope, it seemed, but at least there was hope left for her.
And if there was hope left for Penelope, then maybe, just maybe, there was hope left for him.