A Winter's Tale
Title: A Winter’s Tale
Rating & Warnings: PG-13, for language and sexual implications.
Prompt: "Oh, life is like that. Sometimes, at the height of our revelries, when our joy is at its zenith, when all is most right with the world, the most unthinkable disasters descend upon us." A Christmas Story The word prompt Cooking is only in there if you squint fairly hard.
Word Count: 7296
Summary: It’s what you do at this time, isn’t it? Tell stories after dinner of Christmases both past and present, while you’re sitting dreamily round the fire and too full and content to get up and turn the wireless on. Tonks and Remus tell each other and their unborn child, the story of the three Christmases since they met...
Author’s Notes: Originally written for The Pink Christmas Advent over at metamorfic_moon, December 2008.
A Winter’s Tale
Tell me about you, back then. The things I don’t know.
Remus asks me this at Christmas, the first year of our marriage. The third one since I met him. It’s what you do at this time, isn’t it? Tell stories after dinner of Christmases both past and present, while you’re sitting dreamily round the fire and too full and content to get up and turn the wireless on. In our case, we‘re both lying on my old sofa which is handily long enough, and wide enough, to take one thin man and one increasingly fat woman (thanks to you, Teddy) as long as we don’t mind squashing up close and we’ve never minded that. Though one of us thought for a while that he should, and the other surprised herself with her certainty that we shouldn’t.
“So you want our unborn child to listen in to our story?” I tilt my head to look up at him, and watch the lines by his mouth and his eyes crease into the familiar smile. He looks tired, but it’s a good tired. He kisses my forehead and his hand traces the curve of my ear where the hair falls away from it.
“You think it’s suitable for kids then, do you?” I ask.
“Well…” He pretends to think, chuckles against my hair, but I know what he wants and it’s for both of us. You see, Teddy, we’ve spent a lot of time apart, and those first two Christmases are a case in point. And the trouble with the world we live in is that there’s never time for long explanations or talking things through; never time to look back and share moments where I see Remus and know him all over again. I’m never been much good at simply sitting down, but thanks to you (though I could do without how you’re making me want the loo every hour, on the hour) and your father’s warped idea that a good day is one in which he’s worn himself out by being useful to others, I’m learning to. And so you’ve given us a great gift this Christmas, Teddy, the best there is; you’ve made us pause and catch our breath, and think about ourselves and the future to come with you.
As with all the best stories, it depends so much on the telling of it. I could make ours about destiny, tragedy or some daft, romantic fairytale, though none of those on their own or even together are quite right. Your father’s a great storyteller himself - one day, ask him to hold you spellbound like he did me with the one about how he and Sirius Black were reunited in the Shrieking Shack, or some of his tales about teaching Harry Potter - but right now he wants mine. Which means ours. Wants to know what he might have missed at the time, and what I haven’t had chance to tell him. It’s a measure of how far he’s come, how far we’ve come, that he’s asking to be told it all.
I look at his hand and his fingers holding mine, see how they fit and lock together. I know what I want from him, too.
“I will if you will,” I say.
Christmas, 1995.
Tonks
I’m not going to talk about love at first sight, or any guff like that. And I’ll leave the Once upon a time bit to Remus, who is a typical, romantic Gryffindor with lofty ideals, a fact which has caused us umpteen problems and frequently made me want to shake him as hard as I do right now at the smirk he’s giving me. Besides, it didn’t happen at first sight and it wasn’t love. But the first time we met there was certainly something. There was a connection, if you like. Remus will have to tell me if it was entirely one way, but while I can’t really remember what we said, I do remember the hint of amused surprise in his eyes afterwards. And I bet it was in mine, too. I certainly thought about him later on, a couple of times, in a well, who’d have thought he’d be like that then kind of way.
There may have been something about him having a nice smile as well (I hadn’t seen the annoying smirk then). I did notice his hair which I later on realised was the giveaway: it was a little too long and thick and unruly for complete respectability, and he ignored (wisely) all Molly Weasley’s offers of cuts. There were a lot of layers going on in there. Much like Remus himself.
The thing was, I don’t think either of us were expecting it. I certainly wasn’t. Remus looks scholarly and sober and well-behaved, and none of those are exactly attention-grabbing, are they? But it wasn’t long before he grabbed mine. He possesses a wonderful gift, which is that of listening to people and wanting to help them. A non-judgemental kindness which is rare these days. We had the same sense of humour as well, could wind each other up and make each other laugh, and almost before I knew it, I was wanting to see him to make him laugh and to laugh in return. To know there was so much more to him than I’d first thought, and that he trusted me enough in return to let me see it.
We talked a lot about a lot of things. It’s hard to tell people you’re an Auror, even more so when you’re an Auror and a Black. We’re more renowned as a family for either breaking the law or inventing our own. But people either make stupid jokes when you meet them - “Ooh, better not tell you all about my criminal past!” - or they’re just stupid: “That’s not a very female career, is it?” Actually it’s very, very female and if people aren’t intelligent enough to understand that, then it’s their loss and their prejudice. And if I sound a bit sore here, it’s because it’s been a hard career as well as all I’ve ever wanted to do. You work a lot of unsociable hours, do a lot of unsociable things, see relationships fall by the wayside, and occasionally I did wonder if something of me was getting lost in the crap along the way. But then I met Remus, and he understood that being an Auror meant there’s always something to talk about, always a joke to hide behind and always a need to prove yourself. Because a lot of it was the same for him and made it like a little enclosed world that bound us together. That feeling got stronger and stronger, but neither of us quite had the guts to say: “What’s happening here, then?”
So we came up to Christmas in something of a stalemate. Well, I was thinking increasingly hot and heavy thoughts at night (and day) about mating, though that’s a joke it’s taken Remus a long time to laugh at. He’s always so steady and clear-thinking, except when it comes down to himself. Meanwhile, I was wondering if I was kidding myself that he’d be interested in me. Molly, who knows a thing or two about love, dropped hints as subtle as a Bludger, and Sirius, who should have had the chance to know a whole lot more, took to ragging us openly. All of which made me nervous; partly because you can enjoy having fun with someone and then realise that’s all it is - fun, which is going nowhere - and partly because the more they kept on, the quieter Remus got.
I was quiet as well, which is unusual for me.
I don’t lack for confidence in some things, but this? It already felt pretty serious, as though someone was saying this is it and it’s him and you’ve found your home, and yet we’d said nothing, done nothing. Just looked and smiled, and sometimes not even smiled but just looked. I felt like I was standing on a ledge, barefoot, with my arms stretched out. Becoming a different person and wanting to take that leap, but also with a moment of still wanting to cling to… Well, girlhood, I suppose. It was as though I knew there’d be no turning back.
It also felt wrong to even be thinking of such things when Arthur was bitten at the Ministry, and suddenly it was forcibly brought home that the war wasn’t just being fought in the streets outside, but was inside our workplaces and everywhere. If it hadn’t been for Harry’s vision, Arthur would probably have died. Would have bled to death all alone in the dark while most people were sat by the fireside wrapping presents, and wondering if they should have gone for parsnips instead of sprouts for the Christmas dinner.
“Like before,” Remus said grimly, “picking us off one by one. It should be a warning to us all not to be complacent,” he added, looking at me in the dull lamplight of Grimmauld’s kitchen. Me standing with my feet in one of Sirius’ magical snow drifts, and Remus with a holly garland above his head as the house slept and creaked and dreamed around us.
“Complacent?” We’d spent the last few days before Christmas - and now on the day itself, it seemed - moving round each other like wary dancers, when we weren’t out hunting for murderous snakes and their pals. ‘Complacent’ wasn’t the word I’d use.
He nodded. “And not to care too much.”
“What happened today? When you went to see Arthur with the kids?”
“Nothing,” he said flatly. “Arthur was looking better.”
“Something did.”
For a moment I thought he wasn’t going to answer. Then: “Arthur has a werewolf in the bed opposite him. Not the best of Christmas presents, to get bitten just beforehand.” Remus smiled, without looking much amused. “Arthur had tried to cheer him up, told him that he knew someone who found the condition quite easy to manage.”
“What did you say to him?”
“Oh…” His voice was light and easy, his eyes no longer meeting mine. “I told him I found the condition quite easy to manage.”
It's odd how you realise the world can change in seconds. Or that you can change it, with the choices you make. I knew, of course, that Remus had suffered so much loss and you either survive that sort of thing or you don’t. That he rarely showed what it had cost him to do so.
He was showing it then. A tremor in the slim, elegant hand which rested on the edge of the table. I’d dreamt all week of that same hand on me. It suddenly occurred to me that I hadn’t been the only one dreaming and it was time to get to the heart of all this.
“And do you?” I heard my voice say as if from a great distance.
“Do I what?”
“Find it easy to manage now there’s me?”
Again, I thought he wasn’t going to answer. Then: “Don’t, Tonks.” Almost on a whisper, his eyes burning into me with a kind of grief. “Nothing good can come of this for you. Nobody knows what’s going to happen in the days ahead.”
I was stood on that ledge again, and there was nothing beneath my feet but that vast, empty space. Remus had become pretty good at catching me as I tripped over things in my usual haphazard fashion, but I had no idea if he was going to catch me this time. Or if the damage of all those years to both child and man, was stronger than what was between us now in this silent room.
“It’s still Christmas Day,” I said. “And I do know I love you. So what are you going to do about it?”
Remus
I’m a little perturbed, Teddy, that apparently your mother wasn’t bowled over by my charm the first time we met, but instead seems simply to have noticed that I needed a haircut. Layers? Besides, she’s a fine one to talk about hair, though I’m sure you’re going to take after me and not be that concerned about yourself as long as you look presentable.
She’s also looking as if she’s going to thump me now or, even worse, squash me, so I’m obviously going to have to stop doing what she once accused me of - avoiding things I don’t want to face up to with smartarse remarks. Especially as this was my suggestion in the first place. I expect you noticed that your mother told her tale while hardly mentioning the word werewolf. It doesn’t feature very largely in her vocabulary, certainly not in comparison with wotcher, or I don’t know how but the dinner’s burnt itself again, or you stupid git, Lupin. My biggest wish for you, Teddy, is that one day you’ll meet someone exactly like her. And that you won’t make as many mistakes as I did when you do, but hold her to you and never let her go.
So, once upon a time, I met an entirely unexpected girl called Nymphadora Tonks. There was no warning, but there she was: trim, slim and gorgeous, without much of a self-esteem problem and a mouth I soon badly wanted to kiss. We talked like ordinary people with ordinary lives and only ordinary concerns, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d done that or enjoyed myself so much doing so. I resolved to do what I normally do in these situations, which is nothing. Except that this wasn’t the usual situation and Dora (who I thought of as Tonks back then, with occasional, risky Nymphadora moments) had no intention of letting anyone do nothing, least of all me.
“Your trouble,” she announced firmly one day, “is that you have an inferiority complex.”
“Hmm…” I smiled at her. “I’m not sure I’m important enough for one of those?”
She looked at me in exasperation and then laughed - and when she laughed, she did so from her eyes downwards - while I shoved the most basic of urges back where it belonged. There was still much to be enjoyed in the way of friendship, and it wasn’t likely I’d be seeing much of her apart from at Order meetings.
Of course, I’d forgotten one essential: I neglected to share this plan with Tonks herself. In my defence, I can only say that it never entered my head that an attractive young woman would actively seek me out, and that by the time it did dawn on me I was in far too deep. I grew to love being with her and learning about her; watching her read a book and wriggling her bare toes and grinning widely at certain pages, her energy and small, eager movements when she’d try to explain something, and the way she absently twisted strands of whatever coloured hair it was round one finger when lost in thought. We’re all victims of manners and embarrassment nowadays, but Tonks asked me straight out one day how I’d coped after James and Lily had died. Not only was it a relief to say their names and remember them so that she would, too, but I found myself trying to explain a little of what I’d never told another soul. That with their deaths, I’d wondered if every moment of my time at Hogwarts had been a lie.
She nodded and looked at me with sorrow in her eyes. She knew when to be quiet too.
Meanwhile, I did try. I did tell her there were better men she should surely be spending her time with. Better conveying a multitude of meanings, all of which she wilfully ignored.
“Are there?” she asked with interest. “Name them?” And when I hesitated for a second, fatally, because there was a world of difference between what I was saying and what I wanted to, she helpfully added, “There’s Donaghan Tremlett of the Weird Sisters, of course. He’d be a much better bass guitarist than you, I expect. Gawain Robards, in the Auror department, does the best Hover Charms I’ve ever seen anyone do so I expect he’d be better then you as well. Cornelius Pratchett is the world’s foremost Exploding Snap exponent-”
“Tonks.”
“Yeah?”
“Shut up.”
The dark eyes laughed at me, and so did the rest of her, and so it went on. While Molly and Sirius at last found a common ground by prodding and probing to find out what my intentions were, and I wondered - when I wasn’t enjoying myself far too much to do any such thing - if I was the only sane one left because at least I still occasionally cared that werewolves had no rights only wrongs, and so anything between us, whether intended or not, would be wrong for her.
There’s a moment, of course, where you make a choice. Sometimes I think mine was at that first Order meeting, where she stood up at her introduction and knocked her chair sideways into the person next to her, who just happened to be Severus Snape taking a supercilious sip from his goblet. Or was it all those nights out on patrol, where we took to inventing our own language to keep out the cold and the horrors. Mizzle being that light rain when there’s sun and mist too, moreish being chocolate or anything you can’t get enough of, and mirokulous, which was when we had a major breakthrough that was somewhere between a miracle and completely ridiculous that it had ever worked in the first place.
I think, though, that mine was the freezing December night I was due to meet her after her Auror duty had finished. Tonks was running late, having been called out to what turned out to be an irate Kneazle stuck up a chimney and an even more irate owner, and I- I was early.
I wanted to see her.
When I did, she was stood with her darkly cloaked back to me, reassuring the Kneazle owner that it was merely the animal’s pride that had been hurt, and that if the owner ignored the broken bricks and dust - which were the Kneazle’s fault - then the Auror department would be prepared to ignore the scratches to one of their team. Which were also the Kneazle’s fault and possibly that of the owner, who’d said that Billykins would never hurt a fly or an Auror grabbing his very fat backside and hauling it downwards.
I sank back into the shadows to wait, smiling; listening to her voice which was low and soft, conversational and intimate.
“Who’s that?” This voice was male and without warning, making me jump with its note of sharp authority. “Identify yourself.”
I hadn’t noticed the other Auror, also hidden by shadows but now moving towards me with his wand raised in suspicion. You great, distracted idiot, Lupin. Using Memory Charms on members of the Ministry in a public street was going to go down an absolute storm with Mad-Eye.
“Wait.” Tonks had spun round. “Lumos,” she added quickly, and the tip of her wand flared and caught light, illuminating her hooded face with a crimson halo. She pushed the hood back with her free hand and I could see her pink hair, cropped jagged and short, the white, heart-shaped oval of her face and the dark luminous eyes staring into mine.
There was a second when we were all completely still, frozen as if under a Stunning Spell. Except that I was only conscious of the two of us, facing each other through the light. The flicker and flame of red and gold across her face changed her from a powerful witch to a burning and dangerous warrior, then back to the young, slender woman who had courage enough for both of us.
The other Auror said something to her, but I only made out a few words. Lupin, notorious and werewolf seemed to pretty much cover it all, anyway.
“No.” Tonks smiled slowly, shook her head. “He’s with me.”
I wondered if I could possibly love her this much and not lose her. It seemed unlikely.
Christmas, 1996
Tonks
Remus never hesitated. That’s what I always remember. That he took the risk for us both back then.
He took the two strides that seperated us in the kitchen at Grimmauld on Christmas Day, and his hands were on my face, sliding into my hair, even as his mouth came down on mine.
I closed my eyes and kissed him and was astonished. The shudder that I felt inside, swaying back against that old stove before he pulled me fiercely against him, shook me and warmed me and I could feel exactly the same in him.
We kissed again and again stood there in the dark, and then I slid my lips from his, laid my head on his shoulder, and wound and twisted my fingers into his thin jumper to hold him to me as hard as I could. He held me and his heart thudded against mine.
Neither of us spoke. There was nothing to say. I’d kissed boys before and thought, even said straight away afterwards, it was just a snog. Just a kiss.
Only now I knew there was no such thing.
So we kissed and kept on kissing in every moment we could snatch, steal, or borrow. And weeks later we made love, and if the first time was as much a mixture of laughter, embarrassment and downright awkwardness as passion, then the second time was so much need and tenderness that it felt as if it broke something inside me, and the third time…
…the third time we made love.
Only I didn’t know it, but the war was keeping pace with us and soon to overtake us. I was lost in a blur of happiness - yes, love is that selfish at times - and the departures and losses and sadness registered with me but not nearly enough. It was that old cliché that I never quite believed it would happen to anyone I knew, I suppose, or if it did, like Arthur, they’d always pull through. I’ve never said this before, but Remus was right back then when he said I was ‘too young’. Molly used to give him hell about the age gap not being even worth considering and he never said a word in reply, but it wasn’t literally that he meant it, and even I didn’t realise that for a long while. I was too busy feeling the invincibility of those who love and are loved in return, and so forgot that though I used to sit on the stairs as a small child listening to my father in the kitchen reading out the obituaries in the paper, Remus had actually known and lived amongst those people. Knew what it felt like to lose them.
There was a lifetime of grief and experience between us. A lifetime of damage. And I thought I was putting it all right with a few kisses just above the deep frown line on his forehead which since me, since us, had faded away to nearly nothing.
Then Sirius died and a light went out for us all. The man who’d so generously let me into his friendship with Remus, who’d less generously pinched all my crisps and chocolate every opportunity he got, and who’d had me laughing one minute (“I have got house-elf skills, it’s just that imbecile Kreacher doesn’t realise it!”) and swallowing hard the next at his sharp and careless observations (“Ah, Tonks. Only you would want to take on Moony, who’s like an open book shut away in a stuck drawer and locked in a desk.”) And for the first time ever, I couldn’t talk to Remus about something because neither of us could bear to. I wanted to scream against the injustice of it all - what was the point of Sirius surviving Azkaban, only to end up in another bloody cage? - and I went over the fight at the Ministry again and again. Why hadn’t I waited? Why hadn’t I beaten Bellatrix? Why, oh why?
“We got the chance to put things right between us, he and I,” Remus said quietly. “Others never get a second chance. And he got to know Harry and died to save him. It’s what he would have wanted.”
We both pretended that was enough.
I still think Remus and I would have survived if everything hadn’t happened all at once. But it did, and the final blow was Dumbledore’s mission for him. I still thought I could love him out of anything, but I didn’t understand fully what the request meant to him or what it would do to him - though I’m sure Dumbledore did - and that the only way he could cope was by doing it alone. As he’d always done. I don’t want to dwell on this because we have talked about it all, had to talk about it afterwards, but I have to tell the bad as well as the good because in all the best stories you have to struggle and fight for your happiness, don’t you? To make sure you never take it for granted again.
I didn’t say much the day he left. He told me all the reasons and, in a way, he was quite right. In the way that mattered most, quite wrong. And he sounded cold and distant, in the way he does when he tries to cut himself off from feeling anything, and I wanted to yell at him, but he wasn’t going to leave for God knows what thinking of that. I told him I’d wait. He told me not to. I told him that was tough. And then the door closed behind him and the small, shabby bag he took with him, and without sounding melodramatic, it felt as if part of me had gone with him.
So I clung to my work like a rock in a sea of fear, while my magic and my face betrayed me, and everyone, or so it seemed, had an opinion and advice to give me.
“Tell him he’s being ridiculous,” said Molly crossly. “I’m going to, at every opportunity I get.”
“Give him time, lass,” said Mad-Eye gruffly. “Lupin has to see things for himself.”
“Men aren’t always very sensible,” said Arthur apologetically. “Especially when they think they’re right.” And a shadow crossed his face as he no doubt thought of Percy.
Oddly, I think it was Ron, of all people, who best summed up afterwards what had happened to Remus during that time when he said, “It can’t be easy living with people who get treated like shit, and sound as if they behave like shit in return, and not feel that way yourself.” And he was right.
Remus and I saw each other at the Order meetings he could attend, and he got thinner and grimmer, while I feared more and more for his safety. On the occasions we talked, he said the same about me. I alternated between a kind of numb grief and raging fury at the world and Remus himself, which must have made me bundles of fun to work with, and the turning point came, as it always seemed to for us, at Christmas.
He came to see me.
I found out afterwards that Molly had helpfully filled him in on the fact that I wasn’t going to my parents’ house (or anywhere) for Christmas - although I’d told her not to - and that Harry had helpfully filled him in on the change in my Patronus. I’m not sure how I could have told him not to do that, as at the time he saw it I was too busy considering the most painful way to hex Severus Snape in the balls. If he had any. All I knew was that I opened the door to find a white-faced man, who used to joke that we slept curled round each other like commas on a page, standing on my doorstep carrying half a dozen mince pies, a bag of satsumas and looking dreadfully ill.
He said he was fine. So did I. We carried on lying for a while and tried to stick to safe subjects, but there weren’t many that didn’t lead to war, death and how the sight and sound of him, sitting uneasily on my sofa, made me ache both inside and out. Eventually, he got round to what he wanted to talk about, which was a rehash of everything before.
“I don’t understand,” he said, avoiding my eyes as usual. “Why you haven’t- I mean, you should move on. I’ve treated you shamefully, and you should hate me for it.”
“Find a better man, you mean?” I said, and nearly gave the most hollow laugh when he raised his head and nodded because the conflict on his face was so obvious, as was his struggle to hide it.
“Remus.” I said it gently, almost as if to a child, because I suddenly realised why he didn’t, why he couldn’t understand this. In his world, people had always left him. “You move on from relationships when you can’t stand the sight of each other, or when one of you is shagging someone else, or when it’s not working out. You don’t move on simply because you know the world won’t approve.”
He opened his mouth to protest, and I added quickly: “You know, you’re much too young for me. Too inexperienced. I deserve someone less thick.”
His mouth stayed open. Then he laughed. A short, unwilling laugh, but a Remus laugh, nonetheless.
Any doubts I had about us being worth fighting for vanished in a second. He was still fighting himself, fighting against himself, just too pig-headed to see it. He smiled at me, and it turned my heart over.
And Christmas was a time of hope once more.
Remus
I kissed Dora before I left that Christmas night, which was a mistake because it brought back every feeling and every memory I’d tried to bury in the mud of the werewolf camp for months now. Every night I’d ached for her and dreamed of her. I dreaded each meeting and longed for them equally; telling myself that staying away was the best thing for her. Only the too-thin young woman with the sad brown hair slid her arms round me and kissed me fiercely back, and my body was on fire for hers within seconds. One kiss led only to more and it was exactly as if nothing had changed between us. As if I hadn’t done my damndest to break her heart and destroy the part of her that was colour and light.
I had just about enough decency left to wrench myself away. Every time we met it didn’t do Dora any good and all I could think was that I learnt nothing from it, no matter how many times I hurt her. Afterwards, I felt exactly like one of the children that were brought in to camp after being bitten (and frequently abandoned on the spot); as we tried to explain what had happened to them and that they were all right now, they’d burst into tears and were usually violently and repeatedly sick.
They knew we were lying. There was never going to be an ‘all right’ for them again.
The only one who’d had things differently was me. The exception to every werewolf rule. I’d had parents who’d cared, then friends, then Dora. Cosseted at every turn, and I’d repaid everyone by betraying their faith in me when it really mattered.
I’ve talked a lot about this time to Dora when we were back together again, but the one thing I’ve never told her is that the overriding fear throughout it all was that she might see me for what I really am. Or what I could be. I’ve always known that I’d be prepared to kill as a man, to save those I love if there was no other choice, and that I’d live with it on my conscience. As I once said to Harry, there are worse fates; like losing your very soul to evil. But I’ve also known that to bite someone as a werewolf would kill me.
Perhaps she knows that already. She’s seen the worst in me and the miracle is that she’s still here.
Whatever arguments I gave myself, I was convinced that there shouldn’t and couldn’t be a future for us both together, no matter how much I wanted it, right up until the moment of Dumbledore’s death. When the unthinkable happened, and the world turned and spun wildly on its axis in a moment.
I think I turned with it, in a way.
If Dumbledore could die, then we could lose everything. If Snape, who he’d always trusted, could be the one to kill him, then Dumbledore’s judgement could be wrong and so, perhaps, was mine. It was just like all those years ago, when everything I’d believed in and trusted in was turned on its head in an instant. But this time, I was left with one thought that overrode everything else: if everyone was telling me that it was right for Dora and me to be together, then perhaps I ought to start listening to them. And finally to her.
I didn’t care any more about trying to do what was right in a world where Dumbledore could die. I was somewhere beyond exhaustion, and beyond rational thought, and I simply… did not care.
What happened next, Dora knows as well as I do. What we said and did then is only for ourselves to remember; she made it far too easy for me, of course. I tried to match her honesty because I couldn’t match her in anything else. But we talked for a long time, talked finally until we could laugh together again, and I pulled her to me and touched her face with the same sense of wonder that I had the very first time. She’d always felt like coming home to me, like recognising a part of myself, and the dark eyes, which were such a mirror to her self, were dancing with light and mischief again.
“You’re not going to be all boring and honourable and leave me alone tonight, are you?” She flushed suddenly. “I mean I’m sad and I’m scared, and I’m even more scared if I think about things too much, but we’ve wasted so much time apart already.”
“So you want to waste it with me instead?” I kissed her. It made me light-headed, partly through the feel of her in my arms and partly because it was such a relief not to have to fight this any more. I’m sure I was rambling, saying all the things I’d never even dared to say to myself, as my mouth moved down the soft white skin of her throat and I felt her let out an unsteady breath against my hair.
“We used to be very good at doing this lying down, you know.” She was grinning at me.
“Well, all right.” I pretended to look at her doubtfully, kissed her again. Murmured against her lips, “As long as I can marry you afterwards.”
She jerked her head up. “What did you say?” Her eyes were huge, her fingers digging into my arms, and I laughed, pulled her fiercely to me again and said, “You heard” into her ear.
We were married on the sunniest of July days, and though I’m sure her parents wished she’d found a better man, and I wished I could have given her more on the day itself, we were happy. Molly cried, Mad-Eye slapped me so hard on the back I winced but still couldn’t stop smiling, and I thought of Sirius, who’d said he’d be at my side on this day. Perhaps he was. Our friends contrived to give us the most useful of presents, and for a while, despite what was going on all around us, I thought that this wasn’t a mistake. The joy and intimacy of sharing a bed with Dora, a life with her, waking to the close warmth of her body, and the endless conversations through dusks and dawns couldn’t possibly be wrong.
Except it seemed it could.
Dora says that our lives are like a wheel that is always turning. When it spun again to disaster, all I could think was that I’d known this would happen all along. And I’d still gone ahead and led her to ruin, even though every instinct I possessed had told me not to.
All my fault.
It’s not easy to describe what happened next; I’ve never felt so powerless nor so terrified. Unable to do anything but stand by uselessly as she lost her job, was relentlessly questioned and bullied after Bill and Fleur’s wedding while I watched, and I wasn’t even there when her parents were being tortured. Just turned up when it was all over to utter platitudes. Useless, useless, useless.
I could get her pregnant, though. A baby, in the middle of a war, with a werewolf. If I hadn’t put a target on her by marrying her, then I certainly had now. And I’d already shown I couldn’t protect either of them from anybody else, let alone myself.
It’s easy to say blind panic led to my offer to Harry, that I wasn’t thinking straight or seeing clearly. But that’s too easy because I thought I was doing both; my wife and child would be better off without me and, that way, might both stand a chance.
“It’s because you think I’ll end up hating you,” Dora said flatly afterwards, Harry’s words, which had been like James speaking to me from beyond the grave, going round and round in my head. “For ruining my life. And you think our child will, too.”
“Don’t you now?” I couldn’t look at her.
“Keep pulling things like this and I might.” She shook her head impatiently. “Why do you think I married you?”
“I-”
“Because I wanted to more than anything else in the world. I sort of presumed you felt the same. That hasn’t changed, no matter what those bastards throw at us. This is their fault, not yours, and that’s what we’re fighting to stop and change, isn’t it? And do you really think our child is better off without you to fight for him?”
I thought about those werewolf children, abandoned by their parents out of fear for themselves. Remembered their bewildered weeping and desperate longing for their mothers and fathers. Wondered how I’d even contemplated doing that to my own child for a single second, and thinking he would grow up to understand.
I looked at my wife, watching me gravely with her dark, intelligent eyes. She was being careful with her morphing now, but she still glowed with vibrant colour. As full of joy as she had been from the moment she’d found out. The one thing I did know was that we’d made him out of love and shouldn’t every child be so fortunate?
“You want Teddy, don’t you?” she asked urgently. “I saw your face when you first knew and it was only later the fear set in. Tell me the truth, Remus.”
“I-” I tried to say something, but the words I thought I should say wouldn’t come. Something about always knowing that a werewolf would live and die a lonely, undignified and painful death, and how could I possibly wish that on a child of mine? About fearing that my son would be so ashamed of me. Of his father.
“Yes.” I told her the truth and it was like a burden lifting. “I do. Very much.”
“Thank God,” she said, and as I buried my face in my hands I felt her strong, slender arms go round me.
I wasn’t alone any more. I never would be again. And neither would our child if I had anything to do with it.
Christmas, 1997
Tonks
Once upon a time, Remus and I met, we talked, we kissed, we fell in love, we made love (a lot), we broke up traumatically, we made up dramatically, we got married, we made love (a lot more), we got pregnant, we could have broken up again, but… Against all odds, as some very overrated songwriters would say, we’re happy and we’re together. And that’s all that matters, in the end. Life itself may be transitory these days, but this isn’t. He knows now he rocks and shapes my world, as he always did, and that I do his. I even let him smirk about it a bit.
Oh, and it’s Christmas.
You may not think there’s much to celebrate this year, but then you’d be doing what Voldemort wants and so you’d be wrong. We have the most wonderful tree, which is taking up most of our little room, but then as Remus says, very deadpan, it’s not much use being a werewolf if you’re no good in the woods. The neighbours all undertook to supply something each so that everyone had a proper dinner, and though I worry a bit for those who actually tried to cook my home-grown carrots (at least they're orange), we had as good a meal as ever. Thanks to Remus, who cooked ours in a calm, methodical way, and deciphered Molly’s notes on the best way to stuff your turkey which had me hiding in the loo for half an hour.
It’s a time of great sorrow, as well. For the people who should be here and can’t be, for those that never will again. We’ve toasted them, and talked of them, and wiped away the tears. We did a special early Potterwatch this morning, Remus and me, with the twins, where we read out dedications to loved ones in the hope they’ll hear them. I have to believe my dad’s out there, have to believe he’s doing what he thinks is best for mum, and most of all, I try to believe he’s safe. Though I know he’ll be trying to help others out there, too. It’s for him we call you Teddy - in the letter he left, he said that if you’re a boy to remember what a great name Ted is. Well, we know now that you are and I was always determined on a short, simple name, and ‘Teddy’ will have to be in there somewhere as we both seem to love it.
Remus hides a yawn, smiles at me and squeezes my hand. He was up at some unearthly hour, to visit the werewolf camp. It seems he can’t stop being a teacher because he gives the children lessons, and some of the adults there as well. They tell me that when they first asked him, he said: “I’m sure we’ll all get along and work very hard and make a great team, and if I find anyone raising a hand to a child he’s out.” He came back this morning with an absolute pile of handmade scarves and gloves and rather embarrassed pink cheeks.
So you see, Teddy, that’s our story, which is yours. I didn’t even know I wanted a child till you were on your way, but then it was the same feeling of being right, of coming home again. Like the pieces of a jigsaw fitting into place. Some would say we’re mad to have a baby now, and they might well be right. But we believe there couldn’t be a better time for us. For the world.
Remus is asleep against my shoulder now, and I can feel myself wanting to lie back against the warmth of him and dream of a peaceful future too. But then there’s no ending to our story, only hope.
It’s Christmas, you see.
And you’ve already brought us tidings of comfort and joy.
Rating & Warnings: PG-13, for language and sexual implications.
Prompt: "Oh, life is like that. Sometimes, at the height of our revelries, when our joy is at its zenith, when all is most right with the world, the most unthinkable disasters descend upon us." A Christmas Story The word prompt Cooking is only in there if you squint fairly hard.
Word Count: 7296
Summary: It’s what you do at this time, isn’t it? Tell stories after dinner of Christmases both past and present, while you’re sitting dreamily round the fire and too full and content to get up and turn the wireless on. Tonks and Remus tell each other and their unborn child, the story of the three Christmases since they met...
Author’s Notes: Originally written for The Pink Christmas Advent over at metamorfic_moon, December 2008.
A Winter’s Tale
Tell me about you, back then. The things I don’t know.
Remus asks me this at Christmas, the first year of our marriage. The third one since I met him. It’s what you do at this time, isn’t it? Tell stories after dinner of Christmases both past and present, while you’re sitting dreamily round the fire and too full and content to get up and turn the wireless on. In our case, we‘re both lying on my old sofa which is handily long enough, and wide enough, to take one thin man and one increasingly fat woman (thanks to you, Teddy) as long as we don’t mind squashing up close and we’ve never minded that. Though one of us thought for a while that he should, and the other surprised herself with her certainty that we shouldn’t.
“So you want our unborn child to listen in to our story?” I tilt my head to look up at him, and watch the lines by his mouth and his eyes crease into the familiar smile. He looks tired, but it’s a good tired. He kisses my forehead and his hand traces the curve of my ear where the hair falls away from it.
“You think it’s suitable for kids then, do you?” I ask.
“Well…” He pretends to think, chuckles against my hair, but I know what he wants and it’s for both of us. You see, Teddy, we’ve spent a lot of time apart, and those first two Christmases are a case in point. And the trouble with the world we live in is that there’s never time for long explanations or talking things through; never time to look back and share moments where I see Remus and know him all over again. I’m never been much good at simply sitting down, but thanks to you (though I could do without how you’re making me want the loo every hour, on the hour) and your father’s warped idea that a good day is one in which he’s worn himself out by being useful to others, I’m learning to. And so you’ve given us a great gift this Christmas, Teddy, the best there is; you’ve made us pause and catch our breath, and think about ourselves and the future to come with you.
As with all the best stories, it depends so much on the telling of it. I could make ours about destiny, tragedy or some daft, romantic fairytale, though none of those on their own or even together are quite right. Your father’s a great storyteller himself - one day, ask him to hold you spellbound like he did me with the one about how he and Sirius Black were reunited in the Shrieking Shack, or some of his tales about teaching Harry Potter - but right now he wants mine. Which means ours. Wants to know what he might have missed at the time, and what I haven’t had chance to tell him. It’s a measure of how far he’s come, how far we’ve come, that he’s asking to be told it all.
I look at his hand and his fingers holding mine, see how they fit and lock together. I know what I want from him, too.
“I will if you will,” I say.
Christmas, 1995.
Tonks
I’m not going to talk about love at first sight, or any guff like that. And I’ll leave the Once upon a time bit to Remus, who is a typical, romantic Gryffindor with lofty ideals, a fact which has caused us umpteen problems and frequently made me want to shake him as hard as I do right now at the smirk he’s giving me. Besides, it didn’t happen at first sight and it wasn’t love. But the first time we met there was certainly something. There was a connection, if you like. Remus will have to tell me if it was entirely one way, but while I can’t really remember what we said, I do remember the hint of amused surprise in his eyes afterwards. And I bet it was in mine, too. I certainly thought about him later on, a couple of times, in a well, who’d have thought he’d be like that then kind of way.
There may have been something about him having a nice smile as well (I hadn’t seen the annoying smirk then). I did notice his hair which I later on realised was the giveaway: it was a little too long and thick and unruly for complete respectability, and he ignored (wisely) all Molly Weasley’s offers of cuts. There were a lot of layers going on in there. Much like Remus himself.
The thing was, I don’t think either of us were expecting it. I certainly wasn’t. Remus looks scholarly and sober and well-behaved, and none of those are exactly attention-grabbing, are they? But it wasn’t long before he grabbed mine. He possesses a wonderful gift, which is that of listening to people and wanting to help them. A non-judgemental kindness which is rare these days. We had the same sense of humour as well, could wind each other up and make each other laugh, and almost before I knew it, I was wanting to see him to make him laugh and to laugh in return. To know there was so much more to him than I’d first thought, and that he trusted me enough in return to let me see it.
We talked a lot about a lot of things. It’s hard to tell people you’re an Auror, even more so when you’re an Auror and a Black. We’re more renowned as a family for either breaking the law or inventing our own. But people either make stupid jokes when you meet them - “Ooh, better not tell you all about my criminal past!” - or they’re just stupid: “That’s not a very female career, is it?” Actually it’s very, very female and if people aren’t intelligent enough to understand that, then it’s their loss and their prejudice. And if I sound a bit sore here, it’s because it’s been a hard career as well as all I’ve ever wanted to do. You work a lot of unsociable hours, do a lot of unsociable things, see relationships fall by the wayside, and occasionally I did wonder if something of me was getting lost in the crap along the way. But then I met Remus, and he understood that being an Auror meant there’s always something to talk about, always a joke to hide behind and always a need to prove yourself. Because a lot of it was the same for him and made it like a little enclosed world that bound us together. That feeling got stronger and stronger, but neither of us quite had the guts to say: “What’s happening here, then?”
So we came up to Christmas in something of a stalemate. Well, I was thinking increasingly hot and heavy thoughts at night (and day) about mating, though that’s a joke it’s taken Remus a long time to laugh at. He’s always so steady and clear-thinking, except when it comes down to himself. Meanwhile, I was wondering if I was kidding myself that he’d be interested in me. Molly, who knows a thing or two about love, dropped hints as subtle as a Bludger, and Sirius, who should have had the chance to know a whole lot more, took to ragging us openly. All of which made me nervous; partly because you can enjoy having fun with someone and then realise that’s all it is - fun, which is going nowhere - and partly because the more they kept on, the quieter Remus got.
I was quiet as well, which is unusual for me.
I don’t lack for confidence in some things, but this? It already felt pretty serious, as though someone was saying this is it and it’s him and you’ve found your home, and yet we’d said nothing, done nothing. Just looked and smiled, and sometimes not even smiled but just looked. I felt like I was standing on a ledge, barefoot, with my arms stretched out. Becoming a different person and wanting to take that leap, but also with a moment of still wanting to cling to… Well, girlhood, I suppose. It was as though I knew there’d be no turning back.
It also felt wrong to even be thinking of such things when Arthur was bitten at the Ministry, and suddenly it was forcibly brought home that the war wasn’t just being fought in the streets outside, but was inside our workplaces and everywhere. If it hadn’t been for Harry’s vision, Arthur would probably have died. Would have bled to death all alone in the dark while most people were sat by the fireside wrapping presents, and wondering if they should have gone for parsnips instead of sprouts for the Christmas dinner.
“Like before,” Remus said grimly, “picking us off one by one. It should be a warning to us all not to be complacent,” he added, looking at me in the dull lamplight of Grimmauld’s kitchen. Me standing with my feet in one of Sirius’ magical snow drifts, and Remus with a holly garland above his head as the house slept and creaked and dreamed around us.
“Complacent?” We’d spent the last few days before Christmas - and now on the day itself, it seemed - moving round each other like wary dancers, when we weren’t out hunting for murderous snakes and their pals. ‘Complacent’ wasn’t the word I’d use.
He nodded. “And not to care too much.”
“What happened today? When you went to see Arthur with the kids?”
“Nothing,” he said flatly. “Arthur was looking better.”
“Something did.”
For a moment I thought he wasn’t going to answer. Then: “Arthur has a werewolf in the bed opposite him. Not the best of Christmas presents, to get bitten just beforehand.” Remus smiled, without looking much amused. “Arthur had tried to cheer him up, told him that he knew someone who found the condition quite easy to manage.”
“What did you say to him?”
“Oh…” His voice was light and easy, his eyes no longer meeting mine. “I told him I found the condition quite easy to manage.”
It's odd how you realise the world can change in seconds. Or that you can change it, with the choices you make. I knew, of course, that Remus had suffered so much loss and you either survive that sort of thing or you don’t. That he rarely showed what it had cost him to do so.
He was showing it then. A tremor in the slim, elegant hand which rested on the edge of the table. I’d dreamt all week of that same hand on me. It suddenly occurred to me that I hadn’t been the only one dreaming and it was time to get to the heart of all this.
“And do you?” I heard my voice say as if from a great distance.
“Do I what?”
“Find it easy to manage now there’s me?”
Again, I thought he wasn’t going to answer. Then: “Don’t, Tonks.” Almost on a whisper, his eyes burning into me with a kind of grief. “Nothing good can come of this for you. Nobody knows what’s going to happen in the days ahead.”
I was stood on that ledge again, and there was nothing beneath my feet but that vast, empty space. Remus had become pretty good at catching me as I tripped over things in my usual haphazard fashion, but I had no idea if he was going to catch me this time. Or if the damage of all those years to both child and man, was stronger than what was between us now in this silent room.
“It’s still Christmas Day,” I said. “And I do know I love you. So what are you going to do about it?”
Remus
I’m a little perturbed, Teddy, that apparently your mother wasn’t bowled over by my charm the first time we met, but instead seems simply to have noticed that I needed a haircut. Layers? Besides, she’s a fine one to talk about hair, though I’m sure you’re going to take after me and not be that concerned about yourself as long as you look presentable.
She’s also looking as if she’s going to thump me now or, even worse, squash me, so I’m obviously going to have to stop doing what she once accused me of - avoiding things I don’t want to face up to with smartarse remarks. Especially as this was my suggestion in the first place. I expect you noticed that your mother told her tale while hardly mentioning the word werewolf. It doesn’t feature very largely in her vocabulary, certainly not in comparison with wotcher, or I don’t know how but the dinner’s burnt itself again, or you stupid git, Lupin. My biggest wish for you, Teddy, is that one day you’ll meet someone exactly like her. And that you won’t make as many mistakes as I did when you do, but hold her to you and never let her go.
So, once upon a time, I met an entirely unexpected girl called Nymphadora Tonks. There was no warning, but there she was: trim, slim and gorgeous, without much of a self-esteem problem and a mouth I soon badly wanted to kiss. We talked like ordinary people with ordinary lives and only ordinary concerns, and I couldn’t remember the last time I’d done that or enjoyed myself so much doing so. I resolved to do what I normally do in these situations, which is nothing. Except that this wasn’t the usual situation and Dora (who I thought of as Tonks back then, with occasional, risky Nymphadora moments) had no intention of letting anyone do nothing, least of all me.
“Your trouble,” she announced firmly one day, “is that you have an inferiority complex.”
“Hmm…” I smiled at her. “I’m not sure I’m important enough for one of those?”
She looked at me in exasperation and then laughed - and when she laughed, she did so from her eyes downwards - while I shoved the most basic of urges back where it belonged. There was still much to be enjoyed in the way of friendship, and it wasn’t likely I’d be seeing much of her apart from at Order meetings.
Of course, I’d forgotten one essential: I neglected to share this plan with Tonks herself. In my defence, I can only say that it never entered my head that an attractive young woman would actively seek me out, and that by the time it did dawn on me I was in far too deep. I grew to love being with her and learning about her; watching her read a book and wriggling her bare toes and grinning widely at certain pages, her energy and small, eager movements when she’d try to explain something, and the way she absently twisted strands of whatever coloured hair it was round one finger when lost in thought. We’re all victims of manners and embarrassment nowadays, but Tonks asked me straight out one day how I’d coped after James and Lily had died. Not only was it a relief to say their names and remember them so that she would, too, but I found myself trying to explain a little of what I’d never told another soul. That with their deaths, I’d wondered if every moment of my time at Hogwarts had been a lie.
She nodded and looked at me with sorrow in her eyes. She knew when to be quiet too.
Meanwhile, I did try. I did tell her there were better men she should surely be spending her time with. Better conveying a multitude of meanings, all of which she wilfully ignored.
“Are there?” she asked with interest. “Name them?” And when I hesitated for a second, fatally, because there was a world of difference between what I was saying and what I wanted to, she helpfully added, “There’s Donaghan Tremlett of the Weird Sisters, of course. He’d be a much better bass guitarist than you, I expect. Gawain Robards, in the Auror department, does the best Hover Charms I’ve ever seen anyone do so I expect he’d be better then you as well. Cornelius Pratchett is the world’s foremost Exploding Snap exponent-”
“Tonks.”
“Yeah?”
“Shut up.”
The dark eyes laughed at me, and so did the rest of her, and so it went on. While Molly and Sirius at last found a common ground by prodding and probing to find out what my intentions were, and I wondered - when I wasn’t enjoying myself far too much to do any such thing - if I was the only sane one left because at least I still occasionally cared that werewolves had no rights only wrongs, and so anything between us, whether intended or not, would be wrong for her.
There’s a moment, of course, where you make a choice. Sometimes I think mine was at that first Order meeting, where she stood up at her introduction and knocked her chair sideways into the person next to her, who just happened to be Severus Snape taking a supercilious sip from his goblet. Or was it all those nights out on patrol, where we took to inventing our own language to keep out the cold and the horrors. Mizzle being that light rain when there’s sun and mist too, moreish being chocolate or anything you can’t get enough of, and mirokulous, which was when we had a major breakthrough that was somewhere between a miracle and completely ridiculous that it had ever worked in the first place.
I think, though, that mine was the freezing December night I was due to meet her after her Auror duty had finished. Tonks was running late, having been called out to what turned out to be an irate Kneazle stuck up a chimney and an even more irate owner, and I- I was early.
I wanted to see her.
When I did, she was stood with her darkly cloaked back to me, reassuring the Kneazle owner that it was merely the animal’s pride that had been hurt, and that if the owner ignored the broken bricks and dust - which were the Kneazle’s fault - then the Auror department would be prepared to ignore the scratches to one of their team. Which were also the Kneazle’s fault and possibly that of the owner, who’d said that Billykins would never hurt a fly or an Auror grabbing his very fat backside and hauling it downwards.
I sank back into the shadows to wait, smiling; listening to her voice which was low and soft, conversational and intimate.
“Who’s that?” This voice was male and without warning, making me jump with its note of sharp authority. “Identify yourself.”
I hadn’t noticed the other Auror, also hidden by shadows but now moving towards me with his wand raised in suspicion. You great, distracted idiot, Lupin. Using Memory Charms on members of the Ministry in a public street was going to go down an absolute storm with Mad-Eye.
“Wait.” Tonks had spun round. “Lumos,” she added quickly, and the tip of her wand flared and caught light, illuminating her hooded face with a crimson halo. She pushed the hood back with her free hand and I could see her pink hair, cropped jagged and short, the white, heart-shaped oval of her face and the dark luminous eyes staring into mine.
There was a second when we were all completely still, frozen as if under a Stunning Spell. Except that I was only conscious of the two of us, facing each other through the light. The flicker and flame of red and gold across her face changed her from a powerful witch to a burning and dangerous warrior, then back to the young, slender woman who had courage enough for both of us.
The other Auror said something to her, but I only made out a few words. Lupin, notorious and werewolf seemed to pretty much cover it all, anyway.
“No.” Tonks smiled slowly, shook her head. “He’s with me.”
I wondered if I could possibly love her this much and not lose her. It seemed unlikely.
Christmas, 1996
Tonks
Remus never hesitated. That’s what I always remember. That he took the risk for us both back then.
He took the two strides that seperated us in the kitchen at Grimmauld on Christmas Day, and his hands were on my face, sliding into my hair, even as his mouth came down on mine.
I closed my eyes and kissed him and was astonished. The shudder that I felt inside, swaying back against that old stove before he pulled me fiercely against him, shook me and warmed me and I could feel exactly the same in him.
We kissed again and again stood there in the dark, and then I slid my lips from his, laid my head on his shoulder, and wound and twisted my fingers into his thin jumper to hold him to me as hard as I could. He held me and his heart thudded against mine.
Neither of us spoke. There was nothing to say. I’d kissed boys before and thought, even said straight away afterwards, it was just a snog. Just a kiss.
Only now I knew there was no such thing.
So we kissed and kept on kissing in every moment we could snatch, steal, or borrow. And weeks later we made love, and if the first time was as much a mixture of laughter, embarrassment and downright awkwardness as passion, then the second time was so much need and tenderness that it felt as if it broke something inside me, and the third time…
…the third time we made love.
Only I didn’t know it, but the war was keeping pace with us and soon to overtake us. I was lost in a blur of happiness - yes, love is that selfish at times - and the departures and losses and sadness registered with me but not nearly enough. It was that old cliché that I never quite believed it would happen to anyone I knew, I suppose, or if it did, like Arthur, they’d always pull through. I’ve never said this before, but Remus was right back then when he said I was ‘too young’. Molly used to give him hell about the age gap not being even worth considering and he never said a word in reply, but it wasn’t literally that he meant it, and even I didn’t realise that for a long while. I was too busy feeling the invincibility of those who love and are loved in return, and so forgot that though I used to sit on the stairs as a small child listening to my father in the kitchen reading out the obituaries in the paper, Remus had actually known and lived amongst those people. Knew what it felt like to lose them.
There was a lifetime of grief and experience between us. A lifetime of damage. And I thought I was putting it all right with a few kisses just above the deep frown line on his forehead which since me, since us, had faded away to nearly nothing.
Then Sirius died and a light went out for us all. The man who’d so generously let me into his friendship with Remus, who’d less generously pinched all my crisps and chocolate every opportunity he got, and who’d had me laughing one minute (“I have got house-elf skills, it’s just that imbecile Kreacher doesn’t realise it!”) and swallowing hard the next at his sharp and careless observations (“Ah, Tonks. Only you would want to take on Moony, who’s like an open book shut away in a stuck drawer and locked in a desk.”) And for the first time ever, I couldn’t talk to Remus about something because neither of us could bear to. I wanted to scream against the injustice of it all - what was the point of Sirius surviving Azkaban, only to end up in another bloody cage? - and I went over the fight at the Ministry again and again. Why hadn’t I waited? Why hadn’t I beaten Bellatrix? Why, oh why?
“We got the chance to put things right between us, he and I,” Remus said quietly. “Others never get a second chance. And he got to know Harry and died to save him. It’s what he would have wanted.”
We both pretended that was enough.
I still think Remus and I would have survived if everything hadn’t happened all at once. But it did, and the final blow was Dumbledore’s mission for him. I still thought I could love him out of anything, but I didn’t understand fully what the request meant to him or what it would do to him - though I’m sure Dumbledore did - and that the only way he could cope was by doing it alone. As he’d always done. I don’t want to dwell on this because we have talked about it all, had to talk about it afterwards, but I have to tell the bad as well as the good because in all the best stories you have to struggle and fight for your happiness, don’t you? To make sure you never take it for granted again.
I didn’t say much the day he left. He told me all the reasons and, in a way, he was quite right. In the way that mattered most, quite wrong. And he sounded cold and distant, in the way he does when he tries to cut himself off from feeling anything, and I wanted to yell at him, but he wasn’t going to leave for God knows what thinking of that. I told him I’d wait. He told me not to. I told him that was tough. And then the door closed behind him and the small, shabby bag he took with him, and without sounding melodramatic, it felt as if part of me had gone with him.
So I clung to my work like a rock in a sea of fear, while my magic and my face betrayed me, and everyone, or so it seemed, had an opinion and advice to give me.
“Tell him he’s being ridiculous,” said Molly crossly. “I’m going to, at every opportunity I get.”
“Give him time, lass,” said Mad-Eye gruffly. “Lupin has to see things for himself.”
“Men aren’t always very sensible,” said Arthur apologetically. “Especially when they think they’re right.” And a shadow crossed his face as he no doubt thought of Percy.
Oddly, I think it was Ron, of all people, who best summed up afterwards what had happened to Remus during that time when he said, “It can’t be easy living with people who get treated like shit, and sound as if they behave like shit in return, and not feel that way yourself.” And he was right.
Remus and I saw each other at the Order meetings he could attend, and he got thinner and grimmer, while I feared more and more for his safety. On the occasions we talked, he said the same about me. I alternated between a kind of numb grief and raging fury at the world and Remus himself, which must have made me bundles of fun to work with, and the turning point came, as it always seemed to for us, at Christmas.
He came to see me.
I found out afterwards that Molly had helpfully filled him in on the fact that I wasn’t going to my parents’ house (or anywhere) for Christmas - although I’d told her not to - and that Harry had helpfully filled him in on the change in my Patronus. I’m not sure how I could have told him not to do that, as at the time he saw it I was too busy considering the most painful way to hex Severus Snape in the balls. If he had any. All I knew was that I opened the door to find a white-faced man, who used to joke that we slept curled round each other like commas on a page, standing on my doorstep carrying half a dozen mince pies, a bag of satsumas and looking dreadfully ill.
He said he was fine. So did I. We carried on lying for a while and tried to stick to safe subjects, but there weren’t many that didn’t lead to war, death and how the sight and sound of him, sitting uneasily on my sofa, made me ache both inside and out. Eventually, he got round to what he wanted to talk about, which was a rehash of everything before.
“I don’t understand,” he said, avoiding my eyes as usual. “Why you haven’t- I mean, you should move on. I’ve treated you shamefully, and you should hate me for it.”
“Find a better man, you mean?” I said, and nearly gave the most hollow laugh when he raised his head and nodded because the conflict on his face was so obvious, as was his struggle to hide it.
“Remus.” I said it gently, almost as if to a child, because I suddenly realised why he didn’t, why he couldn’t understand this. In his world, people had always left him. “You move on from relationships when you can’t stand the sight of each other, or when one of you is shagging someone else, or when it’s not working out. You don’t move on simply because you know the world won’t approve.”
He opened his mouth to protest, and I added quickly: “You know, you’re much too young for me. Too inexperienced. I deserve someone less thick.”
His mouth stayed open. Then he laughed. A short, unwilling laugh, but a Remus laugh, nonetheless.
Any doubts I had about us being worth fighting for vanished in a second. He was still fighting himself, fighting against himself, just too pig-headed to see it. He smiled at me, and it turned my heart over.
And Christmas was a time of hope once more.
Remus
I kissed Dora before I left that Christmas night, which was a mistake because it brought back every feeling and every memory I’d tried to bury in the mud of the werewolf camp for months now. Every night I’d ached for her and dreamed of her. I dreaded each meeting and longed for them equally; telling myself that staying away was the best thing for her. Only the too-thin young woman with the sad brown hair slid her arms round me and kissed me fiercely back, and my body was on fire for hers within seconds. One kiss led only to more and it was exactly as if nothing had changed between us. As if I hadn’t done my damndest to break her heart and destroy the part of her that was colour and light.
I had just about enough decency left to wrench myself away. Every time we met it didn’t do Dora any good and all I could think was that I learnt nothing from it, no matter how many times I hurt her. Afterwards, I felt exactly like one of the children that were brought in to camp after being bitten (and frequently abandoned on the spot); as we tried to explain what had happened to them and that they were all right now, they’d burst into tears and were usually violently and repeatedly sick.
They knew we were lying. There was never going to be an ‘all right’ for them again.
The only one who’d had things differently was me. The exception to every werewolf rule. I’d had parents who’d cared, then friends, then Dora. Cosseted at every turn, and I’d repaid everyone by betraying their faith in me when it really mattered.
I’ve talked a lot about this time to Dora when we were back together again, but the one thing I’ve never told her is that the overriding fear throughout it all was that she might see me for what I really am. Or what I could be. I’ve always known that I’d be prepared to kill as a man, to save those I love if there was no other choice, and that I’d live with it on my conscience. As I once said to Harry, there are worse fates; like losing your very soul to evil. But I’ve also known that to bite someone as a werewolf would kill me.
Perhaps she knows that already. She’s seen the worst in me and the miracle is that she’s still here.
Whatever arguments I gave myself, I was convinced that there shouldn’t and couldn’t be a future for us both together, no matter how much I wanted it, right up until the moment of Dumbledore’s death. When the unthinkable happened, and the world turned and spun wildly on its axis in a moment.
I think I turned with it, in a way.
If Dumbledore could die, then we could lose everything. If Snape, who he’d always trusted, could be the one to kill him, then Dumbledore’s judgement could be wrong and so, perhaps, was mine. It was just like all those years ago, when everything I’d believed in and trusted in was turned on its head in an instant. But this time, I was left with one thought that overrode everything else: if everyone was telling me that it was right for Dora and me to be together, then perhaps I ought to start listening to them. And finally to her.
I didn’t care any more about trying to do what was right in a world where Dumbledore could die. I was somewhere beyond exhaustion, and beyond rational thought, and I simply… did not care.
What happened next, Dora knows as well as I do. What we said and did then is only for ourselves to remember; she made it far too easy for me, of course. I tried to match her honesty because I couldn’t match her in anything else. But we talked for a long time, talked finally until we could laugh together again, and I pulled her to me and touched her face with the same sense of wonder that I had the very first time. She’d always felt like coming home to me, like recognising a part of myself, and the dark eyes, which were such a mirror to her self, were dancing with light and mischief again.
“You’re not going to be all boring and honourable and leave me alone tonight, are you?” She flushed suddenly. “I mean I’m sad and I’m scared, and I’m even more scared if I think about things too much, but we’ve wasted so much time apart already.”
“So you want to waste it with me instead?” I kissed her. It made me light-headed, partly through the feel of her in my arms and partly because it was such a relief not to have to fight this any more. I’m sure I was rambling, saying all the things I’d never even dared to say to myself, as my mouth moved down the soft white skin of her throat and I felt her let out an unsteady breath against my hair.
“We used to be very good at doing this lying down, you know.” She was grinning at me.
“Well, all right.” I pretended to look at her doubtfully, kissed her again. Murmured against her lips, “As long as I can marry you afterwards.”
She jerked her head up. “What did you say?” Her eyes were huge, her fingers digging into my arms, and I laughed, pulled her fiercely to me again and said, “You heard” into her ear.
We were married on the sunniest of July days, and though I’m sure her parents wished she’d found a better man, and I wished I could have given her more on the day itself, we were happy. Molly cried, Mad-Eye slapped me so hard on the back I winced but still couldn’t stop smiling, and I thought of Sirius, who’d said he’d be at my side on this day. Perhaps he was. Our friends contrived to give us the most useful of presents, and for a while, despite what was going on all around us, I thought that this wasn’t a mistake. The joy and intimacy of sharing a bed with Dora, a life with her, waking to the close warmth of her body, and the endless conversations through dusks and dawns couldn’t possibly be wrong.
Except it seemed it could.
Dora says that our lives are like a wheel that is always turning. When it spun again to disaster, all I could think was that I’d known this would happen all along. And I’d still gone ahead and led her to ruin, even though every instinct I possessed had told me not to.
All my fault.
It’s not easy to describe what happened next; I’ve never felt so powerless nor so terrified. Unable to do anything but stand by uselessly as she lost her job, was relentlessly questioned and bullied after Bill and Fleur’s wedding while I watched, and I wasn’t even there when her parents were being tortured. Just turned up when it was all over to utter platitudes. Useless, useless, useless.
I could get her pregnant, though. A baby, in the middle of a war, with a werewolf. If I hadn’t put a target on her by marrying her, then I certainly had now. And I’d already shown I couldn’t protect either of them from anybody else, let alone myself.
It’s easy to say blind panic led to my offer to Harry, that I wasn’t thinking straight or seeing clearly. But that’s too easy because I thought I was doing both; my wife and child would be better off without me and, that way, might both stand a chance.
“It’s because you think I’ll end up hating you,” Dora said flatly afterwards, Harry’s words, which had been like James speaking to me from beyond the grave, going round and round in my head. “For ruining my life. And you think our child will, too.”
“Don’t you now?” I couldn’t look at her.
“Keep pulling things like this and I might.” She shook her head impatiently. “Why do you think I married you?”
“I-”
“Because I wanted to more than anything else in the world. I sort of presumed you felt the same. That hasn’t changed, no matter what those bastards throw at us. This is their fault, not yours, and that’s what we’re fighting to stop and change, isn’t it? And do you really think our child is better off without you to fight for him?”
I thought about those werewolf children, abandoned by their parents out of fear for themselves. Remembered their bewildered weeping and desperate longing for their mothers and fathers. Wondered how I’d even contemplated doing that to my own child for a single second, and thinking he would grow up to understand.
I looked at my wife, watching me gravely with her dark, intelligent eyes. She was being careful with her morphing now, but she still glowed with vibrant colour. As full of joy as she had been from the moment she’d found out. The one thing I did know was that we’d made him out of love and shouldn’t every child be so fortunate?
“You want Teddy, don’t you?” she asked urgently. “I saw your face when you first knew and it was only later the fear set in. Tell me the truth, Remus.”
“I-” I tried to say something, but the words I thought I should say wouldn’t come. Something about always knowing that a werewolf would live and die a lonely, undignified and painful death, and how could I possibly wish that on a child of mine? About fearing that my son would be so ashamed of me. Of his father.
“Yes.” I told her the truth and it was like a burden lifting. “I do. Very much.”
“Thank God,” she said, and as I buried my face in my hands I felt her strong, slender arms go round me.
I wasn’t alone any more. I never would be again. And neither would our child if I had anything to do with it.
Christmas, 1997
Tonks
Once upon a time, Remus and I met, we talked, we kissed, we fell in love, we made love (a lot), we broke up traumatically, we made up dramatically, we got married, we made love (a lot more), we got pregnant, we could have broken up again, but… Against all odds, as some very overrated songwriters would say, we’re happy and we’re together. And that’s all that matters, in the end. Life itself may be transitory these days, but this isn’t. He knows now he rocks and shapes my world, as he always did, and that I do his. I even let him smirk about it a bit.
Oh, and it’s Christmas.
You may not think there’s much to celebrate this year, but then you’d be doing what Voldemort wants and so you’d be wrong. We have the most wonderful tree, which is taking up most of our little room, but then as Remus says, very deadpan, it’s not much use being a werewolf if you’re no good in the woods. The neighbours all undertook to supply something each so that everyone had a proper dinner, and though I worry a bit for those who actually tried to cook my home-grown carrots (at least they're orange), we had as good a meal as ever. Thanks to Remus, who cooked ours in a calm, methodical way, and deciphered Molly’s notes on the best way to stuff your turkey which had me hiding in the loo for half an hour.
It’s a time of great sorrow, as well. For the people who should be here and can’t be, for those that never will again. We’ve toasted them, and talked of them, and wiped away the tears. We did a special early Potterwatch this morning, Remus and me, with the twins, where we read out dedications to loved ones in the hope they’ll hear them. I have to believe my dad’s out there, have to believe he’s doing what he thinks is best for mum, and most of all, I try to believe he’s safe. Though I know he’ll be trying to help others out there, too. It’s for him we call you Teddy - in the letter he left, he said that if you’re a boy to remember what a great name Ted is. Well, we know now that you are and I was always determined on a short, simple name, and ‘Teddy’ will have to be in there somewhere as we both seem to love it.
Remus hides a yawn, smiles at me and squeezes my hand. He was up at some unearthly hour, to visit the werewolf camp. It seems he can’t stop being a teacher because he gives the children lessons, and some of the adults there as well. They tell me that when they first asked him, he said: “I’m sure we’ll all get along and work very hard and make a great team, and if I find anyone raising a hand to a child he’s out.” He came back this morning with an absolute pile of handmade scarves and gloves and rather embarrassed pink cheeks.
So you see, Teddy, that’s our story, which is yours. I didn’t even know I wanted a child till you were on your way, but then it was the same feeling of being right, of coming home again. Like the pieces of a jigsaw fitting into place. Some would say we’re mad to have a baby now, and they might well be right. But we believe there couldn’t be a better time for us. For the world.
Remus is asleep against my shoulder now, and I can feel myself wanting to lie back against the warmth of him and dream of a peaceful future too. But then there’s no ending to our story, only hope.
It’s Christmas, you see.
And you’ve already brought us tidings of comfort and joy.