A/N: The prompt for this rtchallenge piece was simply "walk". :)
Unmistakable by Jess Pallas
Maybe it's the way she walks.
That could be it. There is a quality to the way she moves that's so distinctly her – an unstable fluency, a jaunty roll of the hips accompanied by the constant risk of ever-imminent stumble. Her arms seem to swing and gesture with a life all their own, uncoordinated, uncontrolled, sometimes dragging her off balance before she's even aware of the danger but somehow it gives her walk a strange anticipation, a flow of movement just waiting to overreach itself and tumble to a halt. There's so much joy, so much youth, so much life in her walk. There's nobody else in the world who moves in quite the same way as Nymphadora Tonks.
Or perhaps that's just the signal. Perhaps that so distinctive walk is the thing that makes me look twice at her, makes me peer past mad blue curls or an iron-grey bun, platinum blonde or fiery red to recognise the woman within. But all I know is this – wrinkled or smooth skinned, rainbow-haired or mousy brown, long nose or pig snout, if I look into her eyes, I always know it's her.
I love her too much not to.
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Maybe it's the way he walks.
That could be it. The same careful, almost graceful tread, the same thoughtful but so natural movement, as though being a werewolf -even one fully dosed on Wolfsbane - and moving on four feet and not two makes no difference whatsoever. But it's more than just his footsteps; the way his ears twitch when I speak to him or stroke his fur, the frown that creases that lupine forehead, the long, slow looks he gives me when I make a silly joke or say something to tease him… It's so alien, so strange, his expressions on a wolfish face, but yet it's so utterly Remus Lupin that there's simply no mistaking it. I spend my full moon nights these days in the company of a beast feared and reviled throughout the wizarding world, but yet I find myself loving it because it's still so clearly him.
But maybe the real answer lies there, inside those eyes. Yes, they gleam as golden as a pair of galleons rather than the rich brown I know so well but I still see him staring through them, my Remus behind a haze of gold. There is no animal now, no Dark Creature, not since he has regained access to the Wolfsbane, and in spite of all his protests, under those conditions I don't see how he could think I would ever be afraid. I always know it's him.
I love him too much not to.
A/N: Many thanks to last weeks reviewers: MollyCoddles, elka78, TheGoldenSeraphim, Klappa, Bardlover, ishandtwofourths, thee-unknown-factor, MissLinuxthePenguin, purebristles, phoenixtear19, NaginiFay, kailin, The Allknowing Tonks, sexyface, Kileava, Gothiccotton, siriuslycoco and RahNee. Thank you all muchly. :)