Title : Gadabout
Tonks can follow Remus anywhere but there.
Pairing : Remus/Tonks
Rating : PG for language (one swear word)
Summary: Tonks blinks back the sting of tears and tries to find solace in the fact that there are places where they both can go.
Word count : 710 (approximately)
Author's note: Inspired by the short story i Sorrow Rides A Fast Horse /i by Dorothy Gilman. Thanks toparanoidsistah andsionnain for giving this a look over. All remaining errors are mine.
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books, Scholastic Books and Raincoast Books, and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended
The ocean unfurls past the boundaries of her eyesight and beyond, infinite shades of ultramarine and aquamarine bleeding to transparency on shore.
Tonks kneels, feeling the grains of sand shifting underneath her weight and tasting the salt on her lips.
The airborne sand stings their flesh, settles in their shoes and clothes, but she does not mind.
They are alone, as they should be.
She grips Remus' hand as the coaster car slowly creeps up the rails; the metallic clacking of the gears brings the world into focus, a span of brown and blue.
The world clicks slowly into position as it should do before it momentarily pauses- her and him and this moment - before the surroundings plunge into a blur of colours and screams.
She does not hold on to the safety harness as tightly as she does to him. The plunge of the coaster does not affect her-because he already steals her breath away.
Remus' chapped lips brush her forehead, his arm warm and heavy around her shoulders. She will be blinded by the sheer beauty of this moment she thinks; the sizzling glare of sun as it sears off the white-blue surface of the icebergs, the hue of sea and sky sharply contrasting shades of blue but oddly complimentary in their own way.
The silence is dense here- because there is no wind to carry noise- broken by the sharp cracking of the icebergs as they inch across the horizon.
If she could stopper the measure of this piece and moment in a pensieve, she would.
They spend sunset entranced by the liquid wails of the muzziencalling people to prayer, the minarets stark silhouettes against the roseate and orange swathes of sky. The air is redolent with notes of sharp greens, the acrid aroma of coffee and earthy smell of horse shit. Their skins are slick with the high sweetish scent of feslegen yagi to keep the mosquitoes away.
It's a local secret , he tells her and she smiles at that, because he would know.
Tonks holds his hand, feeling blessings washing over her like a benediction and she is torn between joys and weeping. The language is strange, the food is odd and her feet are too warm in her sandals. It does not matter, because she is here with him.
Despite their travels, there are places Remus goes that Tonks will never be able to follow.
Their borders open when they stop moving: Tonks feels their pull as Remus stops to make a cup of tea, or when he stills for mere moments at a time, or when she is dragged from him by the undertow of sleep, her fingers slackening their hold on his arm before she tumbles off into dreams.
Remus has taken another trip, one unique to his travels and his previous life paths.
The past is a foreign country and they do things differently there.
Tonks is unaware of the customs and does not know the language.
Remus does not see it fit to send her postcards from his memories' edge, nor does he encourage her to apply for a passport.
The language is his alone, given to him by default – because the other speakers have died- if rites are observed they are done so only by him.
When she wakes, Remus is standing in the shadows and looking out of their window, his eyes shadowed by his fringe. She knows that he sees past a leaf fringed evening in spring time Paris (just outside their window) and looks beyond Brisbane (where they were two weeks ago).
There is the much thumbed atlas on the pillow beside her. Its cover is grubby and sepia with use, the edges of the pages are softened and furred from the acid of finger tips. With shaky fingers she turns to the page bookmarked by a brightly coloured feather.
Alberta, Canada .
Tonks blinks back the sting of tears and tries to find solace in the fact that there are places where they both can go. They will travel as much as they can for as long as she can.
One day, if there is enough history between them – in his frequent trips to that foreign country of the mind- he might find her there too.