(no subject)
Title: Little Things
Author: carnivalgirl
Rating and Warnings: K+, no warnings, except perhaps spurious references to tea and gratuitous flashbacks.
Prompts: Library, Angst or Action/Adventure, Muggleborn Registration Commission, Day of Understanding
Word Count: 2,228
Summary: Set during early DH. Tonks is sacked from the Ministry after finding out something she shouldn't, and is slightly upset that her dream of being an Auror is over. Remus, disturbed by recognising his own pain in her, tries to cheer her up and seems to succeed, but are they really understanding each other?
Author's notes: This is my first submission and it was a little bit of a struggle. I started university this month and it has drained my creativity a bit, though don't think I'm trying to excuse myself. Please enjoy, and comment! Happy Halloween!
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The Little Things
Before we were married, people would often ask or wonder amongst themselves what, if anything, Tonks and I really had in common, besides a desire for peace and affection for the same friends. We got jokes about it sometimes; we're not even both human, for instance, or, as we've heard enough times, we both have a time of the month. It is all in the little things, after all. But once we were together and staying that way I found it easier to embrace the muddle that was our relationship. I felt I was still too old, too dangerous and too poor, but I was coming to realise such feelings would get me nowhere, and I wasn't about to lose this woman even if I tried to. Old - forget about it. Dangerous-she wasn’t going to be safe anywhere. Poor...
Then came one of those days when I felt not that Tonks and I had too little in common, but too much. It was a day in July a short while after our wedding. The afternoon was breezy but sunny and Andromeda and Ted seemed to be having a moment in the garden. I didn't want to disturb them, knowing that my other half and I would probably have such moments later, so I sat in one of their battered armchairs with a copy of a book and tried to lose myself for an hour or so.
Suddenly, there was a blast of light and heat, as a revolving shape appeared in the fire and my wife staggered forwards, nearly crashing onto the coffee table on a pair of high heels that certainly weren't hers. I jumped forwards and took her arms, and she looked me in the face. For a split second, I felt a terrible shock. I saw messy brown hair, greyish skin, dull eyes with dark circles around them...even her body felt too thin.
She grimaced and said; "Remus, I've been sacked."
I couldn't react. The familiarity of the situation was overwhelming me...
"Shall I refresh your tea?"
Lily's smile was almost too friendly. She was glowing, and not just with happiness. She had a secret she didn't know I'd guessed. I couldn't look at her, I felt so guilty. She and James, in the most polite and kind way possible, wanted me out, and I wasn't budging.
"No, thank you." I choked, downing the rest of my cold tea. I wondered what it must look like, a happy and lovely woman supporting a feeble man so tired he was aging prematurely.
She put her hand on my shoulder. "Remus, it's OK. You don't have to feel under pressure to get a job, James and I can support you..."
"No, you have...other responsibilities"
"Hey, I don't want any of this 'Oh, I'm a burden' nonsense. We're friends; we stick together and help each other out. Besides, if everyone keeps dismissing you, we're probably the only ones left with sense!" She clapped me on the shoulder. "Smile, Remus! We'll try the library tomorrow. They love you there."
I gave her a look a million miles from smiling."That's where I've just come from."
But Tonks wasn't me. The library was just an idea I had at the time, being an Auror was her lifelong dream. We moved away from the table and shared a tight embrace. Though for a moment she buried her face in my shoulder, she was strangely quick to move away and stand alone.
"I should be happy, shouldn't I?" she said, frustratedly. “I wanted to quit, remember?”
I remembered a dramatic performance of what she'd tell Rufus Scrimgeour one time when she’d had a few drinks. “Resigning and being sacked are never the same. I would know.”
It was the resigning from the dream job we had in common as much as the sacking, but if she realised this she ignored it.
“You would, I suppose. Do you want to know why I was sacked?”
I couldn’t help a sardonic laugh. “Did it have anything to do with being part of an organisation that fundamentally opposes them and hopes to bring them down as soon as possible?”
“Well, there was that,” she admitted. “I’ve been under suspicion for a few weeks now. But specifically, I...found out something I shouldn’t.”
Being a Metamorphmagus made it easy to snoop. While people on Polyjuice could be caught out simply by being locked in a room without access to it, Tonks could have spent the rest of her life looking exactly like another person with minimal effort required.
Marianne Jones was Hestia's niece and attached to the Order in a similar way to Tonks's parents; though not a member, she helped when she could. She had been working under senior staff at the Ministry for the past two years and despised it. Her plan, she confided with Tonks, was to leave for Hestia's one day and never come back to the Ministry, something Tonks wouldn't have minded herself. But they both knew there was information to be gained while their jobs were still remotely secure. Marianne had the access, Tonks had the skills. Marianne was terrified, Tonks was not. The answer was easy. Marianne packed her bags for Hestia's that night and Tonks appeared in her clothes and appearance the following morning, locking her own office and putting some music on to play for an hour, just enough time to listen to Thicknesse in the corridor below with the help of an Extendable Ear.
"They're going to round up Muggleborns." she said, her voice strained as if she wished she were lying. "Their plan is to accuse them of stealing magic from wizards, which I guess explains Squibs in their worldview. Once they've put them on a so-called trial they'll have them thrown in jail, though I doubt that's their final solution."
I wondered if Tonks had heard the words final solution in their earlier context. Her Muggle history was very poor. A shiver went down my spine.
"They're hoping to classify people. My mum will be a B, Dad'll be a D, I'll be a C, or possibly an F."
"F?"
"For Freak." she spat, with a bitter smile. "Umbridge’s little joke. Metamorphmagi are too weird for their taste. You'll probably be one too. I think I'd have preferred 'Outcast', it sounds sexier."
"No, it doesn't. We're not gypsies in Notre Dame, for Merlin's sake." I retorted, more angrily than was called for. I'd had enough of that word for about four lifetimes.
"I'm sorry," she replied. "I guess I'm just trying...to see the best of things."
She used to say that a lot when we were at Grimmauld Place two years ago. Usually with a big sunny smile as she told me how much she admired my fondness for such simple things as spaghetti bolognaise and huge cups of tea and always being able to have books. She had taken it upon herself in those darkening times to remind me of all the beautiful things in the world that war and poverty could never destroy, like love. "Always look on the bright side of life...".
Now she was not whistling as much as drawling, like a blues singer with a second-hand smoker's cough. It wasn’t the voice of the Tonks I knew.
"But on with my story," she continued. "I'm not entirely sure how they realised I was there. Kingsley reckons they've got spies, but they could have just broken into my office. Or both, of course. But basically I was summoned to see Dawlish and given the heave-ho, with a warning not to spread any Ministry secrets or else, though I’m sure he knew that was exactly what I was about to do.” She smirked. “He didn't show me any feeling, in fact if anything he was glad. I think he’s had a grudge since I spilt coffee on him in my first year of training, though I don’t think he exactly approved of my recent marriage, either.”
I felt myself grow tense. "I still don't know how everyone found out."
"We're celebrities. Plus they're all jealous. Let’s face it, life’s never dull...but yes...I'm not an Auror anymore."
Her voice was quiet. Despair was finally sinking in. I was reminded of the day I handed in my notice to Dumbledore. I hadn’t known what to do with my life.
"You're an Auror in principle and in heart." I told her. "After all, Mad-Eye's not officially an Auror anymore, but I don't think even Voldemort would tell that to his face."
She didn't laugh, instead her eyes filled with tears. Mentioning her mentor probably hadn’t helped matters.
"Oh, God...Oh, Remus, everything's just changed so much. I'm living with my parents, I'm not an Auror, you're being optimistic and I’m worrying about bloody money! I mean...Jesus! You don't have a job, Dad’s been sacked, I’ve been sacked, Mum probably will be soon, and then what? Where are we supposed to get money from, how are we supposed to survive!"
She had never been so poor before, and it was all too much for her. I watched her fretting and felt myself yearning to help her. Her hands were flailing wildly as she began to imagine and describe us having to sell the house, and her mother’s precious piano and oh Merlin, her engagement ring...tears were pouring down her face now, she looked quite distraught.
“I’m sorry,” she said thickly. “I know I told you I didn’t care about money, but the thing is I...never mind.”
I tried to stretch out an arm to put around her but she turned away from me. Her pain of a crushed dream was entirely her own and no well-meaning lover could help or understand...
Merlin, she was acting like me. She was feeling my pain-she was an unemployed and poorly-looking shape-shifting half-blood freak with a mad determination to help the world, and the beautiful person she really was was crumbling because of it. But if she understood me, and I understood her, I knew how I had to act. The only thing in the world that made me truly happy, besides the thought of peace, was her. I thought of those reassuring nights with her in Grimmauld Place and told her;
“Dora, we can manage with little money. I’ve been there before. You’d be surprised how long things can last, and there are so many ways to save money! I mean we could...recycle everything. When was the last time you made something out of papier maché?”
She burst out laughing. “Have you still got that bowl I made you? The badly painted one?”
“Of course! And...er...we can borrow books from the library! Sell all our old books!”
“If you think my mum’s letting Lord Bryon or whoever he is go without a fight you’ve got another think coming.”
“In fact...” I was seriously channelling Nymphadora Tonks at this point-it was like we’d been under one of those Body-Swapping Jinxes you see in children’s books- “as long as...as long as nothing else comes up to force us to spend more money we might possibly be okay.”
She sniffed loudly. “Yeah, yeah, nothing expensive.”
I couldn’t help noticing she wasn’t looking at me. “...yes.” My logic was flawed and I knew it, but seeing her like this was painful.
“I can manage that,” she said, with an air that suggested she suddenly wanted the conversation to be over. “I can definitely manage that.”
I smiled. “Absolutely. Do you want some tea?”
“You read my mind,” she replied, seeming more cheerful and relaxed. “Can I have some of the dandelion tea?”
I was puzzled. “I thought you hated that? Everyone hates it; it’s gathering dust in the larder.”
She shrugged. “I feel like some of that tea. Perhaps my taste buds have changed. Or maybe the Muggleborn Registration Commission is leaving a bitter taste in my mouth.”
I couldn’t argue with that. Tonks slouched in the chair with a quiet sigh, resting her hands over her stomach, and I headed to the kitchen in a strange mood. Things were getting worse every day, and yet she and I had experienced a connection that meant a lot to me.
In a state of reverie, I concluded, not for the first time or the last, that Dora and I were perfectly matched. Our personalities were balanced. It was a bond that could not be improved, least of all by any expensive items. When I joined her again, she had picked up my book and was reading it in the middle (a bad habit of hers) still sniffing and looking slightly tear-stained.
“Let’s not sell them all just yet,” she said. “I mean, this one has chocolate on it. Can’t do that with a library book.”
“Was that my chocolate or yours?”
She smirked. “Either.”
I handed her the strange tea. “Take this, I can hardly bear to smell it.”
She breathed it the steam. “Hmm...I don’t like it but...it kinda hits the spot, you know?”
I shook my head, but I was happy she was feeling better. I thought that if the only thing we didn’t understand about each other was a bizarre taste in tea, then that had to be a good sign.
However, as I have said, whether we understand each other or not, it is all in the little things.