Christmas Falls (or was that balls?)
“Be more careful, Tonks. Watch your step, Tonks. Look out for that bloody stoop, Tonks!” Nymphadora Tonks growled to herself as she hobbled along the damp cobblestone street that lead to her flat. The day was suitably cold and wet; it fit her mood nicely. Irritably, she smacked a stray aluminum can that lay in the gutter and grunted in satisfaction when she heard the tell-tale clattering that meant she had sent it some considerable distance. The warm feeling that followed the sorrowful fate of the can was fleeting however, as the hulking image of Kingsly Shacklebolt sprang back into her mind, his last words echoing in her ears. “Tonks, I’m sorry, but the Auror team just can’t use you right now. Not on the field anyway. You know that. Take a vacation or something...you look peaky.”
“Of course I look peaky, dearest Kingsly” Tonks muttered. “I’ve got a broken leg. A bloody broken leg! What good witch gets an unfixable broken leg?” She was getting to point where saying the words aloud was possible without excessive swearing, but the voice in her head was screaming in indignity. So far the experience of breaking limbs had been one she had managed to avoid - a revelation that always seemed to amaze her chums (a reaction that irritated Tonks to no end) and a symbol of some inner grace that she secretly held to tightly. Losing this last marker of pride stung. A lot.
Stairs were the worst, she thought bitterly as she reached the slick narrow staircase that ended at her front door. Stairs meant balancing whatever packages you might be carrying in one hand as well as your crutch, grabbing the rail with the other and clamping the other crutch beneath your armpit while you tried hoisting yourself up. Repeat this fifteen times and you’d be home. It was a battle Tonks was already sick of fighting every time she cared to get in and out of her flat, and this was only the second day. Apparation was prohibited with broken limbs - disappearing from one locale and reappearing in another was difficult enough with all appendages properly attached, trying to do it while one part of you was hanging on by some spare skin and plaster was out of the question.
“Drat!” Tonks muttered dropping her Auror bag as her front door swung open. Grumbling at her reflection staring back from the hall mirror- pale, mousy haired and angry - she clumped inside and threw her unopened umbrella into the can by the door. “Fancy that, Dora. Bloody leg. Any other witch or wizard could waltz right in to St. Mungo’s and within two flicks be out with perfectly operable leg. No, not Nymphadora,” she spat out the unsavory name, “she’s a metamorphagus. Metamorphs don’t get two bloody flicks, they get heavy, stinky, itchy Muggle plaster casts!” Flinging her bag onto the worn purple couch, Tonks hobbled into the kitchen. Glaring at the dirty dishes in the sink, she waved her wand over them, put a bit too much feeling behind it, and caused one offending plate to leap out of the sink, sail through the air and smash against a cabinet with peeling yellow paint. “Perfect!” She wailed, leaning heavily on the countertop. “I actually liked that plate.”
“So tell me Dora,” said a mild voice from the corner of the room, “why is it that metamorphs wear, how did you put it, heavy stinky itchy Muggle casts?” Tonks wheeled around in surprise, drawing her wand at the thin man standing, arms laden with bags, by her living room doorway.
“REMUS! Don’t bloody do that!” she sputtered, lowering her wand and fixing him with a glare. Remus Lupin merely grinned congenially and shuffled into the kitchen and set down the white plastic shopping bags on the counter, which smelled appetizingly of fried chicken, and ignored the look of contempt that Tonks was trying her best to shoot at him from her place by the sink.
“I brought dinner,” he said unnecessarily, and gestured to the aromatic bags. “Molly and I thought you probably didn’t feel much like cooking, so she sent me over with a plate.” Sighing, Tonks felt some of her irritation slide away as she looked at the calm expression on Remus’ prematurely lined face. He knew her, she thought grudgingly, perhaps a bit too well. Seeing the resignation in her expression, Remus waved his wand lazily over the kitchen scene. The broken plate repaired itself instantly and flew back into the sink with a slight plop, while two clean dishes sprang from suddenly open cupboards and settled neatly on the small round table on the other side of the counter. Tonks busied herself with maneuvering her crutches around Remus’ tall frame and sank into one of the little wooden chairs with a small sigh. It was a relief to not think about fixing dinner tonight, and a small warm glow of affection grew in her belly as she watched Remus dish steaming helpings of chicken, mashed potatoes and vegetables onto her plate.
“You never answered my question.” Remus remarked as he sat down across from her and picked up his fork.
“What? Oh, right,” Tonks said, her mind quickly rewinding until she remembered what he was talking about. “Metamorphs aren’t healable like normal wizards. At least, we have to grow our bones back the Muggle way if we break them. There’s too much molecular variation in us for the magic to work properly. So I’m told, anyway.” She scowled, and stabbed at an errant carrot. Remus nodded, and for the next couple of minutes they ate in companionable silence.
“I can’t do any other morphing until this legs healed, either,” Tonks spat suddenly. “I went into work today and Kingsly took one look at me and told me to take leave. Temporarily suspended from the field team I am, and all because of this bloody broken leg!” The indignity of it rankled deeply, and to her keen embarrassment, she felt a familiar prickling in her nose and eyes. She hated crying, and here she was, nearly ready to dissolve over her mashed potatoes. She blinked and swallowed hard, her vision swimming blurrily before her. Taking a deep breath, she opened her mouth to excuse herself when she felt two large, warm hands on her shoulders.
“Tonks,” Remus said softly. Opening her eyes, she saw he was there, kneeling before her on the dusty floor so they were eye to eye. “Tonks, it’s okay. A broken leg isn’t forever, you know.” Hiccupping, she nodded, feeling foolish and simultaneously mesmerized by his golden eyes looking so deeply into her own.
“Remus, it’s not all right,” she said eventually. “What am I going to do for ten weeks while this damn leg heals? I suppose I can go in a push paper around for a while, but it’s not useful, not really. I’m best on the field! I can’t be helpful sitting around here like a lump while everyone else is working and doing important things for the Ministry or the Order. I’m useless now, useless because I’m dead clumsy all the time, and what good comes of that? Nothing. One stupid misstep and I’ve gone from being something to being nothing at all.” Taking a shuddering breath, Tonks fought the suddenly overwhelming urge to scream in frustration.
“You’re not nothing, Dora.” Remus said, and his voice was surprisingly deep next to her ear. “You’re one of the brightest, innovative, funny witches I have ever met. You’ll have to live up to the fact that a lot of people think you’re someone good to have around; they won’t forget you because you’re out of the main action for a little bit. I don’t doubt Kinglsy or McGonagall or Molly will have something just as important for you now that you couldn’t do two days ago. You’ll never be nothing - not to the Ministry, or to the Order…or to me.” Tonks tried to stifle a sniff and failed, finally letting mixed tears of gratitude and frustration slide down her face and onto Remus’ thinly jumpered shoulder.
* * * *
Sometime later, after Tonks had regained her composure enough to let Remus get up and finish the dishes, they sat curled up on her sagging purple couch sipping cocoa and watching two fairies wrestle on the upmost branch of Tonk’s skinny Christmas tree.
“What I don’t understand,” Remus remarked lightly as he levitated a few colored balls out from under the tree, “is how you managed to find such garish Christmas decorations.” Tonks smacked him lightly on the shoulder and pointed her own wand at the star atop the tree, which was leaning at a precarious angle due to the vigorous shaking caused by the quarreling fairies.
“Ginny Weasley, actually. She and I found them the other day in this old Muggle shop outside of Diagon Alley a bit.”
“I would have thought she had better taste than to suggest you buy neon orange Christmas balls,” Remus replied, sounding amused.
“I think she bought them for Ron, actually.”
“Chudley Cannons colors then.”
“Yes. I reckon she felt a bit badly though, after I broke my leg, so she gave them to me.” Sitting up a little straighter, Remus looked at her curiously.
“Why would she feel like that?”
“We’d been shopping most of the day, the two of us. Molly wouldn’t let her go out alone, and since I was around the Burrow that day, I volunteered. I suppose Ginny thought if I hadn’t have offered to help her, I wouldn’t have gotten hurt.”
“How exactly did you manage this, then? I’ve not yet gotten the whole story.” Remus asked, gesturing to Tonks’ plastered leg, which was resting on an overstuffed ottoman that looked thoroughly out of place in her otherwise eclectically decorated apartment.
“I’ve decided to blame Fred and George, actually.”
“Lovely evasion of the question, Tonks.” Suppressing a chuckle, Tonks looked over at him and grinned. Remus did know her well. It was heartening to hear him say things like that; there were so many tiny things that made her heart glow, because she knew he had been watching her, studying her, being absorbed by her, as she had him.
“It was their bloody socks.”
“Socks?”
“When Ginny and I went in to see them while we were in Diagon Alley they had us try on their new line of wizarding apparel - namely, stockings in every size and color imaginable.” Taking a sip from her cocoa mug, she studied him over the rim of the red ceramic. He looked expectant.
“They had just waxed the floor, Remus.” Tonks elaborated helpfully. “I took one step in a hideous maroon and lime striped pair and fell flat on my back. Except, well, obviously not quite like that, because I landed funny.”
Remus stared at her.
“Are you telling me seriously that you broke your leg because Fred and George made you try on a new pair of socks? On a freshly waxed floor?” Tonks nodded slowly, feeling the twinges of returning worry. “Well that was right stupid of them, that was. Could have killed you!” Spluttering on her drink, Tonks grabbed a pillow and held it aloft.
“Take that back!” She yelped good naturedly. Remus, laughing, vanished the offending pillow with a wave if his wand. Giggling, they fell into comfortable silence, watching the fire crackle in Tonks’ conjured hearth. After some time, Remus stretched languidly and stood up. He stepped over towards the mantle, and stopped short while reaching for a fire poker.
“Tonks? These aren’t those same stockings, are they?” He asked in a voice strangled with laughter, and gestured to a pair of long green and purple striped stockings which had been hanging over the flickering fire and whose colors had invisible in the shadows. From the couch, Tonks grinned broadly.
“I’ve gotten my revenge on those socks. They didn’t reckon they’d spend the rest of their lives nailed to my mantle, did they?”
“I suppose not,” Remus mused, an expression of deep amusement still on his face. “But they do go rather well with the orange Christmas balls, I must say.”