Disclaimer: We own nothing you recognise
38. Ted Tonks
You with the sad eyes
Don't be discouraged
Oh I realize
It's hard to take courage
In a world full of people
You can lose sight of it all
And the darkness, inside you
Can make you feel so small
"Oi, Black!" Ted's voice hung in the frosty air as he jogged after Andromeda. She granted him a half-glance and inaudible grunt as he fell into step with his ex-girlfriend.
An improvement.
They walked alongside each other, neither quite knowing their destination, their feet leaving twin trails in the flawless white of the snow, sparkling up in the rapidly departing sunlight.
As they walked in silence, Andromeda's eyes stayed determinedly pointed away, while Ted studied her freely. Her face, always beautiful, was held in the disapproving sneer he was most accustomed to. Her dark hair whipped around her face as their feet tread, creating fleeting shapes as the strands danced through the air. Her cheeks and ears were tinged pink from the stinging cold and her lips were slightly chapped from her habit of licking them.
In the forbidding quiet, broken only by the crunch crunch of their feet, his eyes were drawn to hers and what he saw caused his stomach to turn. There was that same empty look, helpless guilt in those sparkling brown-almost-black eyes.
It almost seemed as if it would always be there, that look of abandonment haunting her features. The look that must've crossed her face when her mother told her to not let the door hit her on the way out.
And even a month after the she'd been served a Howler for breakfast, she was still withdrawn, shut down from the rest of the students, from him.
Of course it was his fault…being the bad news she'd had to break to the family.
Dating a mudblood, he thought icily, the worst offense.
He'd seen her mother once before, after disregarding Andy's many objections. By normal standards, he was walking out of earshot but he still managed to hear her disdainful drawl concerning the amount of filth they were allowing into the school these days.
There was no doubt that Andromeda was now considered lower than the false floor of their Gringott's vault, in her mother's merciless eyes. There was also no doubt, though Dromeda hadn't said a word to him since her trip home, that Druella had told her just that.
At first, people had tried to comfort her, recounting their fights with parents or their wishes that they could stand up for themselves.
They all learned quickly not to try to console Andromeda Black.
Almost all of them.
"Can I ask you something?" Ted asked, after several minutes of silent debate and more crunch crunching.
She didn't do him the courtesy of a blink.
"Why haven't you been yourself lately?"
She snorted at the question, possibly eligible for the understatement of the year. He knew she would nominate him, if given the chance.
"Well, I mean-I know why you haven't been yourself…I guess I'm trying to ask why you're still acting like a child."
She whipped her head around in the famous Black temper, the air around her head crackling in an electrically charged halo.
"I am not acting like a child," she snarled harshly, emotion sparking behind her eyes and chasing away a bit of the coolness.
"No, you are acting just like a Black," he spat angrily.
"Maybe I am a true Black," she countered in the same clipped tones her mother exercised, "A bitchy, prejudiced, mudblood-hating Black."
She hadn't used that term since her first night at Hogwarts.
As the thought registered through his head, she glared at him cruelly.
"I certainly feel like it at the moment."
But I see your true colors
Shining through
I see your true colors
And that's why I love you
So don't be afraid to let them show
Your true colors
True colors are beautiful, like a rainbow
"Bull shit," he challenged, "I know you much too well to believe that."
"You don't know me at all," she claimed dangerously, storming off in a hurried crunch crunch crunch across the blank canvas of ground.
He caught up with her easily as she slowed to a frustrated slipslide across an icy patch of gravel.
Ted watched her struggle for a moment, both of them knowing fully he might have helped. If his ego wasn't in the way.
"I've been thinking about it," he stated, "and Black doesn't really suit you."
"Clever Tonks," she hissed, accidently-on-purpose whacking him with a stray flail of her right arm while attempting to remain on her feet.
She paid the price for her physical retaliation when her balance gave and she fell with a large thump.
He couldn't have suppressed his laughter if he had even wanted to.
Halfway back up, she let out a frustrated cry at his mockery, inadvertently landing herself back on her ice-cold bum.
His eyes widened in alarm as she glared up at him, possibly with the intent to kill. He threw his hands up in attempt to assert his innocence, but was not spared a kick that found him on the cracked surface of the mirror-like patch of black ice.
Show me a smile then,
Don't be unhappy, can't remember
When I last saw you laughing
If this world makes you crazy
And you've taken all you can bear
You call me up
Because you know I'll be there
The two of them sat staring at each other for a moment, one with apprehension and the other with appraisal. Finally a small giggle found its way through Andromeda's barriers.
To Ted, it created the curious sight that was something like a rainbow of every color, one that exploded with every breath expelled in laughter.
That might have just been hypothermia setting in, though.
He really should've worn a heavier cloak.
"There we go," he coaxed with a relieved chuckle, easily matched by another, more enthusiastic outburst of glee, hidden sloppily by a quick hand and guiltily-raised eyebrows.
"Oh no," he warned, "I heard that, no denying it now!"
She lowered her piano-player's fingers and laughed freely, throwing her head back in pure hysteria as her body shook.
Suddenly the cold, apathetic woman who had been posing as Andromeda Black for the last four weeks melted away with her glorious laughter that eventually settled into tamed chokes of mirth to allow her customary reply.
"Don't get too cocky Tonks or I may have to take you down a few notches," she threatened.
"I'd like to see you try," he challenged as he rose back to his feet, offering her his hand as he did so.
They stood for a moment before the oak doors creaked open, throwing the almost black night into relief as the sliver of yellow light spread across the upturned snow.
"Curfew," a fellow prefect sang.
Their eyes flew to the door where the fifth year's shadow still blocked the light.
"D'you mind?" Ted asked impatiently.
The boy turned on his heel angrily, but still leaving the door cracked.
"Look-" he turned around with a tired sigh.
But Andromeda was standing much closer than he remembered, her puffs of breath washing over his face (or really his neck, since he was considerably taller).
"Thank you," she whispered, "very much."
He shrugged in welcome.
"And to answer your question," she said hesitantly, "I haven't been myself lately because nobody made me want to be. I felt pressured to be a Black, and as you say, it doesn't suit me."
He nodded.
"You ever feel the need to be a Black again," he warned with authority, earning another peal of laughter "I'm always happy to knock you on your ass and make you laugh if you like."
"Good night Tonks," she said in warm tones before crunch crunching up the castle steps, "and I'll meet you at breakfast tomorrow."
And with a haphazard grin he watched her leave, a rainbow of fireworks still dominating his vision.
And I'll see your true colors
Shining through
I see your true colors
And that's why I love you
So don't be afraid to let them show
Your true colors
True colors are beautiful,
Like a rainbow
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By Padfootatheart