This chapter and the next are from Tonks's POV and consider how Lupin and Tonks would deal with the other's time of the month. This one involes Lupin accidentally saying the L word (love, not lyncanthropy), or very nearly.
In case anyone wonders, "fy nghariad" is just "cariad" with the Welsh for "my" in front of it, but the c mutates so it looks like a bit like a different word. It's what I imagine Remus calling Tonks in unguarded moments.
CW for some sexual references (though nobody's having any sex at Grimmauld Place today).
Very unusually, it's a quiet Sunday evening at Grimmauld Place. Sirius and I are listening to music in the drawing room, and he's pent up and on edge as usual but endearingly eager to share his favourite bands with me, and even though I'm curled up in agony because my period's just started and the cramps are always a total bitch for the first 36 hours, it's really nice. I think, again, about how great it would have been to have had Sirius in my life as I grew up.
Remus has been off on a surveillance op with Dung for a few days over at Malfoy Manor and they came in earlier, briefly, to catch Sirius up and leave a report in case Moody drops by before they finish, before heading off again to finish off erasing any traces of their presence. Remus had taken the risk of dropping a kiss on my head as he set off again, despite Dung being there. Dung isn't the most observant member of the Order (which I reckon must make doing surveillance ops with him pretty hard work for Remus), but all the same. It's an hour later when Remus comes back in, alone, with a flimsy white plastic bag that shows he's been down to the muggle corner shop for milk on his way home.
He softly places something wrapped in shiny purple plastic in front of me as he passes out of the room and towards the kitchen to put the milk away.
"What's this?" I ask.
He looks at me, a bit surprised. "It's a bar of Cadbury's dairy milk chocolate. Muggle chocolate."
"I know what it is, Remus, my Gran's a muggle, remember? She gives me a selection box every Christmas. Love the stuff. What I mean is, what's it doing here?"
"Oh, I went down to the corner shop to get some milk and to get Sirius some cigarettes and I thought maybe you'd like some chocolate. You know, because -"
"Because what?"
"Don't overthink it, Tonks, he loves giving people chocolate, he's just generally creepy like that," Sirius pipes up, obviously worried for Remus if he answers himself. But Remus has already floundered in.
"Oh, um, just because you look pale and tired and, well, you know... sometimes people - well, women specifically- might not feel as, well, as ebullient as they normally do for perfectly normal medical - well, not medical, but you know, um, hormonal reasons, and other people- specifically men, I suppose - might notice and want to express sympathy but not know how to do it with words and - as you can see, they'd be wise to avoid attempting to do so with words given how this is going..." He looks so folorn that I can hardly help myself from ruffling his hair. He's evasive even beyond what I'd expect for such a reserved man, and I find myself wondering whether he'd worked out that I'm on the rag from the regular signs or whether he could smell blood. I never mention it in case it's a werewolf thing but he has got an exceptionally strong sense of smell. I find that I don't mind either way.
"You're a love," I tell him, relenting. Then I open the chocolate bar and add, "I'm not sharing this, mind."
He smiles gently and makes to carry on through to the kitchen, but I brush his leg with my hand. "Sit with me and you can have maybe one small piece."
"What about me, coz?" Sirius throws himself elaborately on all the remaining space on the sofa. "How many pieces for me, if I sit with you?"
"None, you great oaf," I say, pushing him off the sofa with my feet. Remus has disappeared and I'm a bit disappointed but distract mysely by throwing a piece of dairy milk into Sirius's open mouth whilst he's haranguing me for pushing him off his own antique sofa.
When Remus comes back in, he's holding a mug of tea, which he puts casually down on top of a battered paperback on the side table next to me before he sits down.
"Chamomile and honey," he says, when I arch an eyebrow at him. "For the cramps."
"Right, which they also happen to sell at the muggle 7/11 shop down the street?" I'm so touched by how thoughtful he is, I've no idea why I'm giving him a hard time. (Yes, I have. It's because I normally express my feelings for him through the very effecitve medium of sex and now that's not on the table due to fact that I feel like shit, I don't know quite how to act and I'm panicking a bit.)
"They don't sell it there. I just noticed that you were in pain last month and looked out for these teabags when I was buying groceries," he says, calmly. I love it when he refuses to let me ruffle him, though I love it even more when he doesn't succeed.
"Thank you," is all I can think of to say, and I put a square of chocolate into his mouth, taking my time to extract my finger. I eat the rest myself, not because I really want it right now but because 30 muggle pennies or however much it cost isn't nothing to him and I want him to know how much it means. As I lean over to pick up my mug of tea, I squint sideways at the book he'd placed it on.
"Won't The Collected Poems of Dylan Thomas mind getting a tea-mug ring on its cover?" I ask, because the mug has marked the faded cover slightly. It's mostly a joke but that man does treat his books like personal friends so it isn't quite.
There's a pause and then he says, quietly, "In years to come, if I'm blessed with many, I'll look at that ring and think how lucky I was to bring you tea and chocolate when you were under the weather. The book won't mind."
"Oh." It must be the hormones because I think I might cry. Thank Merlin that Sirius starts talking.
"Funny how when I got fag ash on one of your books last week you acted like I'd murdered a baby," Sirius says, pointedly, pacing over to his old record player. "Hey, d'you reckon Tonks would like the Velvet Underground?"
Turns out I really like the Velvet Underground and we listen to music. I don't think the tea makes a lot of difference to be honest, but I wrap my hands around the mug lovingly and drink it all. We stay up, mostly in comfortable silence with the music washing over us, until the no-longer haunted clock in the hall chimes midnight and I groan. I've got work in the morning.
When we get into bed, I curl up on my side because the cramps are still raging and the only thing that helps is curling around a cushion that I've charmed to emanate heat. Remus potters about tidying up, but when he gets into bed he immediately wraps himself around me with his arm around my waist, pulling me into him and nuzzling my neck. It's so lovely, but after a minute or so I can feel his body reacting to it. I completely get it, and I'd be the same under normal circumstances, but it's the last thing I want right now. Still, he's absolutely rock hard and he's been such a bloody gentleman. It feels a bit crap to leave him hanging, so I reckon I can at least give him a hand job. I move to turn over, a bit wearily, and he holds me firmly in place.
"Absolutely not," he says, his voice low and sweet in my ear. "Go to sleep."
"But you're-"
"Thirty six years old and quite able to control myself."
"Seems harsh," I object, although I've already sunk back heavily into my pillow.
"It seems perfectly resonable. It'll subside on its own in a minute or two."
It doesn't. He chuckles. "Maybe a bit longer than a minute. Don't worry, cariad. Go to sleep."
"What did you just call me?"
"Oh. Cariad. It means - well, it's like "darling." It means "love"."
I'm grinning from ear to ear in the dark and I know that he knows it.
"You called me "love"," I point out.
"You called me a love earlier, when I got you that chocolate bar," he counters, but I can tell from his rueful tone that he knows he's beaten.
"Yeah, but "you're a love" is what old ladies say if you help them across the road. It's a world away from calling someone "love." Say it again."
"Cariad," he murmurs, and it's the most beautiful sound I've ever heard. "Cariad, fy nghariad." He says it again, and then again, and it doesn't sound rueful anymore, it sounds almost like it's a relief for him to say it.
"Knew you'd crack first," I say, and I fall asleep with his body pressed to mine and a smile on my lips.