"Tonks, are you all right, dear?" asked Mrs. Weasley suddenly, pausing to note the blank, stone expression upon Tonks's face, and her rapidly changing hair color as she jumped from thought to thought and back again.
"Hm? Oh - yes," Tonks finally said as her hair stopped on an eye-catching neon green color. "Just thinking."
"About Remus again?" suggested Mrs. Weasley quietly as Remus was only in the next room with Mr. Weasley, turning her back to tend to the dinner-in-progress on the stove. (A/N: I can't remember if the people in the wizarding world have stoves or not, but I don't care.)
Tonks shrugged. "Er…sort of," she answered. "I mean, Molly, we're, um, together, y'know…" She said it both modestly and as if Mrs. Weasley should have already known.
"Well, dear, I don't live in a cave," replied Mrs. Weasley. "Don't think I didn't see the two of you at Dumbledore's funeral."
"What? Oh - yeah-" Tonks hadn't been paying much attention; she'd been distracted by the revolving string of thoughts in her head, scraping against her brain. She propped her elbow up on the table and rested her chin in her hand, letting her mind free to bring back whatever memories it pleased to bring to her…
She was suddenly remembering being in the sitting room with Ginny, Hermione, and Ron, half-asleep one morning a couple days before the funeral. The three teenagers in the room were talking about Dumbledore, but Tonks paid no mind to their conversation. She was too tired - she'd been up all night, trying to resist tears, but found that it was near impossible. Her mouse-colored hair hung lazily in her face.
"Er, Tonks?"
A certain voice started Tonks as she looked up to see Remus standing in the doorway, looking extraordinarily tired as well, and almost sick. Tonks felt her pulse quicken; he hadn't wanted to even make eye contact with her since their confrontation in the hospital wing a few days previous, so what could he possibly want?
"Yes, Remus?" she managed, feeling as though her mouth was glued shut. Looking at him was even a bit hard, and she felt her eyes darting around on their own, trying to avoid the sight of the man who attracted her so much.
"Can I have a quick word with you?" Remus asked a little quietly, and Tonks noticed the strange, slightly nervous look about his pale features. "In private," he added.
"What about?" Tonks asked, not bothering to get off of the extremely comfortable couch in the sitting room until she found out what he was acting so strange for. Never had she seen such a look on his face. Then she began to worry: was something wrong?
"An important issue," said Remus impatiently, "come on, now…"
Tonks finally got up and followed him into Percy Weasley's old bedroom, the one she knew Remus was staying in, and she started to feel a bit jumpy when he closed the door behind them; what was he leading her to? There were far too many questions rolling through her mind, and she just decided to cooperate with him rather than be a pest about it. He sat down on the double-bed and invited her to sit next to him, and she did.
"What's wrong?" Tonks immediately asked upon the suspicion something had, indeed, gone horribly wrong, such as You-Know-Who taking over something or the other - she could barely follow the Order these days with so many things going on in her private life.
"Well," began Remus in an uneasy voice, "there's just something I want to talk to you about. That's all." He was silent for a moment, and at Tonks's blank expression he cleared his throat.
"Go on…"
"I don't know how I want to say this," said Remus. "I know that I want to, it's just that…the words are stuck on the tip of my tongue, jumbled-up and not knowing where to put themselves."
"Stop beating around the bush!" said Tonks impatiently. "Get to the point, Remus." She looked up at him now, directly into his eyes, and for the first time, she noticed how his chocolate-colored eyes held something different in them when they looked at each other, as if they were bursting with a secret to tell.
Remus broke eye contact with her after a moment. "I honestly don't know how to go about this," he said, sounding near embarrassed.
"You can tell me," said Tonks in a quite voice. "Just say it, don't be afraid to."
"I…" Remus was biting his lip. "Tonks, I wanted to tell you that I regret what I said the other night in the hospital wing."
Tonks nearly fell off the bed; her mouth had dropped slightly open and she stared at his averted face. Had he really just said what she'd thought he had? Was she just dreaming? Her heart beating too fast to breathe regularly, she said, "Remus…wh-what do you mean? What exactly do you regret?"
"What I said about how you don't deserve someone like me," he said quietly, still refusing to meet her eyes. She noticed the redness in his cheeks. "How you deserved someone younger and whole…"
Tonks was now fighting the urge to just kiss him all over, but remained still next to him. "But what makes you regret it?" she asked in a small, shy voice.
"I…was talking to Bill," said Remus. "I suppose that talking to him, who'd still been afflicted by a werewolf - even though, as I said, was different than my case - made me feel different. There was just…something there. He kept talking about how he was so excited to marry Fluer, and…I don't know…" He paused, biting his lip again. "And I realized how much I really am in love with you, Tonks." He said the last part very quietly, but this time he finally met her astonished gaze, and a very small smile played across his lips.
Tears were forming in Tonks's eyes, but for the first time in days, these were not tears of mourning or sadness. These tears were of the opposite element, of happiness and joy, but she tried not to let them fall anyway.
"Oh, Remus," she said in a mere shadow of a breath of a whisper. Overwhelmed, she felt a bitter substance in her mouth, not realizing a tear had snuck its way out of her eye. She licked her lips, not caring about the taste. "Remus, I love you, too…" It was all she could think of to say, and the last thing she saw before closing her eyes was Remus leaning towards her.
And their lips met. It was almost a bizarre moment; Tonks had never expected this and neither had Remus, of course, but it was still a kiss all the same. She was careful not to slip him her tongue, for she was unsure about how he'd take it. But she was even a little surprised when she felt his hand caressing her thigh…
When they broke apart, they simultaneously opened their eyes, and at Remus's awkward smile Tonks almost broke out laughing. Remus took hold of both her hands and he led her to stand with him, only to get back down on one knee before her.
Tonks went from sheer joy to pure shock as he pressed his lips lightly to the top of one of her hands, and he looked up with her, his chocolate eyes shining like never before. She stared down at him with a mixture of emotions in her own eyes, and then the words she'd never thought she would ever hear came out of his mouth.
"Nymphadora Tonks…Will you marry me?"
Tonks could hardly feel her own heart beating within her. She looked down at him for a few seconds more before she believed her vocal cords would work for her, and at this time she nearly shouted, "Yes!"
Remus stood up, her hands still in his, and he kissed her again, smiling broadly, and Tonks could tell how madly in love with her he was, and she returned his expression with glee…
Tonks had not yet told anybody else that Remus had proposed, and neither had her fiancée. She grinned, looking down at the finger where the ring would soon be, and made that hand a fist happily, trying to imagine what the wedding would be like.
Hee...questions, suggestions, comments, compliments, or just plain old reviews? You're welcome to tell me what you'd like. Even flames; in Napoleon voice heck yes!!