Set a couple of days after Deathly Hallows Ch11, The Bribe.

The Doorbell

The last few days of July were hot. Rooftops and tarmac were scorching and windows were propped open even at night. At the Burrow everybody agreed that it was perfect weather for a wedding and hadn't Bill and Fleur been lucky.

The heatwave has broken now. It's raining as Remus trudges up the street towards the house belonging to his parents-in-law. He's only been here a few times before - his first visit was a month ago. He and Tonks had agreed that she'd tell her parents about their engagement on her own, and he would visit the next evening for dinner. Andromeda was openly hostile and even Ted, who had attempted to be friendly, had eyed his shabby clothes with disapproval. Remus had worn his best tie and least moth-eaten jumper, but his attire still screamed "Your daughter will spend the rest of her life supporting me because I cannot hold down a job". He'd wanted to apologise and assure them that he had done everything he could to make their daughter fall out of love with him and that he'd tried to shut down the same feelings in himself but neither had worked. He'd wanted to explain that he's got a routine for the full moon and wouldn't be anywhere near her. He wanted to swear that he isn't the type of man they doubtless believe he is; he isn't violent, he doesn't live like an animal and he'll kill himself before he lays a finger on her. Remus hadn't said any of that of course. He'd thanked Tonks' parents for dinner about a hundred times and tried not to wince at his own bland conversation and Andromeda's barbs. When they'd left (Ted had shaken his hand, which was a shock, but one that Remus was quite proud of), Dora had breathed a long sigh of relief and, once they were home, hugged him tight and covered his face with kisses.

No chance of hugs, kisses, a handshake or any sighs of relief today. Remus isn't sure what to expect, though he knows it won't be good. He's getting closer to the house now. When he was a boy Remus had liked to remember the numbers of all the houses he'd lived in, although by the time he was ten there were too many to keep a track of. Is that what life is going to be like for his child?

He passes number fifty-four. Fifty-two. Fifty. Forty-eight, then stops in front of forty-six. Swallowing, Remus pushes open the green gate (Dora had once told him that her mother had painted it) and walks up the path. Their front door looms. He steps onto the porch, reaches for the doorbell, then retracts his arm. Shoves his hand in his overcoat pocket. Grimaces at himself. Harry was right, he is a coward. Remus screws his eyes shut, takes a deep breath and forces himself to reach about again and punch the doorbell with his thumb. It is hard and cold. He hears the bell chime inside the house. No going back now. He's hardly thought about what he's going to say or do. Beg, probably. His stupid heart hammers under his jumper. Remus opens his eyes. The door takes forever too open and the door opens far too quickly. When it does, Andromeda's face meets him. The face then curls into a glare. Beautifully terrifying, like her big sister. There's an excruciatingly long pause while the drizzle patters down.

Then Andromeda says, "What jumper was my husband wearing the day we met?"

It's an intentionally hard question. Remus thinks for a moment, then states, "Ballycastle Bats versus Wigtown Wanderers, Four Nations Final 1982,"

Andromeda nods curtly, satisfied with the answer. It's the only thing she is satisfied about.

"Remus," she says coldly.

"Hello, Andromeda,"

It's a good job that she's not the type of woman mollified by smiles, because Remus can't muster one.

"Mum?" calls a voice, "Whose there? Have you checked them, I don't-" the words die in Tonks' mouth as she stumbles into the hallway. Remus' heart stops pounding and performs a horribly wonderful flip-clench-spasm-skip-lurch manoeuvre. Her hair's shoulder-length and green, she's wearing her rip-kneed black jeans and her navy tailcoat, and is it his imagination or does she look paler than usual? If she does, if she's pale or ill or tired it's all his fault. All of this is his fault.

This pause isn't as long as the previous one, which surprises him. Then Tonks says, "You look like shit,"

"I know," Remus manages to respond, voice rasping.

Dora looks him in the eye for a painful moment, then says, "Mum, I'm going out,"

"Nymphadora-" Andromeda protests, but Tonks cuts across her.

"I'll be back later,"

She jams her feet into her Converse (they were originally white but she's doodled on them so much over the years that they're now a blur of variously coloured inks), grabs the red cagoule that's hanging on the banister and wrestles it on over her tailcoat, and marches out of the house without a backward glance. She swerves around Remus as she passes to avoid touching him. He grimaces and watches as Dora strides down the garden path and out of the gate. Remus isn't sure what he's supposed to do, but Tonks swings around snaps, "Come on".

Oh, he's supposed to follow. Remus hurries down the path and trots behind his wife as she keeps walking, out of the gate and out onto the pavement. Tonks steps in a puddle and the muddy water splashes around them both. After dinner with her parents that first time he'd offered her his arm as they walked back down here (she'd rolled her eyes at his old-fashioned manners but linked her arm through the crook of his anyway). It seems a universe away. Gingerly, Remus speeds up so that he's walking on a level with Tonks, and he's grateful that she doesn't look at him.

But she starts to talk. "When we were first together," Dora says thoughtfully, "I thought you were perfect. I really did. I know nobody's supposed to be perfect but I thought you were the exception,"

Rain pitters. Tonks snorts mirthlessly and continues, "I was an idiot. You were too good to be true. But I'm not going to scream and shout at you, because that's what you want, isn't it? You want me to tell you that you're a worthless excuse of a man and I hate you, so that you can go away forever and wallow in your worthlessness and how much I hate you. I'm not going to give you the satisfaction. I love you. I love you so bloody much that it hurts. Okay, now you talk," she orders.

Usually Remus would digest everything she's said before replying, but this time he blurts, "I'm sorry. I am so sorry. I panicked, but I'm back now, I promise. And I'm in this a hundred percent if you still want me to be,"

"Don't do that. Don't give me that 'if you want me to be' self-pity. Don't put this in my hands," she snaps, "Of course I want you to be. That's not the point. This is on you. How can I trust you? How do I know you're not going to do this the next time you panic?". Her voice is sharper than he's ever heard it, and her fingers sketch quotation marks around the last word.

"I swear to you-"

"On what, Remus? What's left for you to swear on? Your life? You risked that running away from us to spy on Greyback, you risk it all the time. Our marriage? Oh right, the marriage that you wrote in your note was a 'grave mistake'. Our baby? You abandoned our baby,"

He takes a breath. "Sirius. I swear to you on Sirius,"

"For Merlin's sake, it's not about finding something to swear on! It's not about your oaths and your apologies and your obsession with proving to everybody how little you deserve,"

She always gets to the point, even when she's angry. How could he have hurt her like this again? How could he have ruined this so badly?

Remus wracks his brain for some kind of explanation, and settles on telling her, "I went to see Harry. I won't tell you where they are in case we get questioned, though as were suspected they're undertaking a mission for Dumbledore. Harry wouldn't tell me what it was but I offered them my help," he pauses, wondering how to verbalise what happened next. He should tell her the truth but he isn't sure he can. He hadn't realised Harry was so astute- he's clearly been underestimating everybody. Remus Lupin is the idiot after all.

"Harry refused. He was angry at me, furious. He told me that his father would want me to stay with my own child,"

Dora meets his eye. "You're back because Harry Potter told you to be?"

He doesn't know how to answer that.

"Think for yourself for once," she spits, wheeling round to face him, "What do you want? Not what you think you should do, or what Harry says, or what any of our dead friends would tell you to do. You. What do you want?"

Remus thinks. He remembers Harry's face, twisted with hurt, rage and indigence. He remembers that face when that face was a year old, a week old, a happy baby. He'd giggled and wriggled; Remus had liked touching his tiny fingers and chubby fists, and then he'd met him on the train all those years later, still a boy then but a man now. He'd been so angry. Remus thinks of his twelve wilderness years taking awful jobs and living in damp, dilapidated houses he'd had to hold up with magic. Of being so lonely and feeling such a waste. Colleagues came and went, and he didn't like to impinge his reputation on his family too often; books were his only constant. He remembers the moment before he kissed Tonks for the first time, realising what was about to happen and knowing he should be scared, but then her lips touched his and it felt comfortable and exciting and like home. She was thrilled when she told him she was pregnant and her face crumpled when he didn't return her joy.

He remembers the werewolf camp and the men and women whom Greyback had raised after biting them. They were so aggressive even in amongst their werewolf family, bubbling with resentment, not for the man who had bitten them but for the world he'd convinced them that they didn't belong to. If it hadn't been for Mam and Dad, Remus would have had that rage too. Mam and Dad could have abandoned him, they could have smothered him in his sleep after he was bitten. It would have made life easier for them. Spared them all from this pain. But they didn't. They loved him and cared for him, like Tonks does. Mam got tired and ill, Dad was twitchy about people finding out. They had thought it was worth it. He was worth it. They wanted to give him a chance at happiness. Dora makes him so incredibly happy and alive that it astonishes him...but could the baby? What if the baby's like him (he's sure it'll be like him) and he and Dora aren't as strong as Mam and Dad? What if they argue? They've argued plenty since they got married, and before. It wouldn't be fair for the child to grow up like that, on top of the fact that the child will be a werewolf. How could he have done this to an innocent? He's spent his whole life terrified of biting someone and now he's done something even worse.

Remus thinks of Dolores Umbridge's laws, and the names Sirius used about her to cheer him up. He remembers late nights with Sirius in their school dormitory, hooting with cackles about what the Blacks would say if they knew that Sirius' best friend was a werewolf. If Sirius was here now he'd be- no. Dora told him not to think of what anybody else would say. This is on him. What do you want? This is not black or white, there is no right choice to be made. Perhaps that's why he panicked; he likes having rules and Right Choices. But this time there is only his choice, what he wants. And suddenly Remus knows that in spite of everything, he wants this child and this family. This. This life. This joy.

"I want this. I want us,"

His voice sounds hoarse.

"Are you sure?" Dora demands, "Because you were sure at our wedding,"

"Yes. Yes, I am sure," Remus says, and as the words come out of his mouth he believes it. He looks here in the eye. "I've been a terrible husband and I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, and I will spend the rest of my life making it up to you and to the baby, I don't care if it's a werewolf or a Squib or an elephant,"

"I don't think our baby's an elephant," she says, and she's smirking, and he risks a smile back.

"I'm sorry for everything, not just for leaving but for how moody and miserable I was before. I'm done with that now. All I've ever wanted is to do right by you, and I thought that that's what I was doing, but I was wrong,"

"Again. Twice you've done this to me now," Dora points out, and her voice is now more hurt than accusatory. The rain's plastering her hair to her face and shoulders.

"I know. All I can tell you is that it won't be three. Pushing you away or running off isn't doing right by you and I know that now. It makes everything worse because-" he cuts himself off, unable to finish the sentence. Can he even believe it's true after all this?

"Say it. You know it's true so say it," Tonks orders, as if reading his mind.

Remus forces the words out hurriedly: "It makes everything worse because you love me,"

"Yeah I do, and do you know how much it hurts when you act like you don't believe it or that it isn't enough? Like my feelings for you aren't as important. You have no idea how patronising that is,"

"I'm sorry. You're right, I don't have any idea so I should start listening to you more,"

"You should start believing me more,"

Remus starts to tell her that he'll try but before he can she bursts out, "My parents were tortured! Death Eaters put the Cruciatus on my parents and the next day you take off claiming it's you whose putting me in danger?!"

She laughs. He tries not to notice that it's the same hysterical laugh as her aunt Bellatrix, "Could you be any more self-centred?!"

Remus doesn't know what to say to that, but fortunately he doesn't have to because Tonks continues, "Is this why you didn't want a wedding ring, because you had it in the back of your mind that you'd bail if things didn't go your way? You disappeared in the night leaving a note! Who knew you were such a drama queen? You have no idea how humiliating that was for me, how much it was for Mum and Dad to deal with after they were tortured. Didn't you think they hated you enough?"

It's true, it's all true, and that makes it hurt more. Remus lets her words crash over him.

"And if it is a werewolf," she says witheringly, "Did you honestly believe that you were doing me a favour by leaving me to deal with it on my own? Were you going to wash your hands of us completely or would it get a birthday card and a sickle every year? Lucky bloody kid,"

It sounds so stupid when she puts it like that. She always talks sense- why hadn't he listened before? Why hadn't he asked her?

Then Dora says in a quieter voice, "I said I wasn't going to shout and scream and tell you that you're awful,"

"No. Though I suppose I'm an easy target," he mutters. Water's seeping in through the broken soles of his shoes, dampening his toes.

"Yeah, you bloody are," Tonks growls. She turns away, rakes a hand through her green hair. Remus suspects that she's crying, and it hurts that she doesn't want him to see. But when she turns back there's no trace of tears.

"Let's go home, let's not make a spectacle of ourselves in public again. I wasn't kidding when I said you look shit. You need a decent meal and a bath," (she does not say this kindly), "I'll go back to Mum and Dad's to tell them we're going and to make sure they'll be alright without me. You can wait at the end of the street,"

"Thank you," he acknowledges. Sparing him from the wrath of his parents-in-law a small mercy, although Remus doubts that she's acting out of generosity towards him.

Tonks looks at him with narrowed eyes as if considering snapping something, but seems to decide against it. She turns away and marches back through the rain towards the house. Remus looks down at his battered, soggy shoes. But out of the corner of his eye he seems Dora turn back, just for a moment, to glance at him. He'd like to think that it's because she's missed him and once to steal another look. Although realistically, he winces to himself, Tonks is looking back to check that he hasn't gone away again.


Thank you for reading. This chapter was a challenge to write so I'd be interested to know what you thought of it. If you have time, a review or two would be much appreciated. I'll be taking a break from this fic for the next few weeks. Thanks very much to everybody who was read, favourited and reviewed this year. Have a merry Christmas and a fab New Year. See you in 2019.