A Color to Keep

"I like that color," mused a voice just outside the open door to Nymphadora Tonks' room in Grimmauld Place. The witch inside the room was sitting on a gilded black trunk and poking pins into her hair with her wand. She jumped at the voice and whirled on the intruder with an expression somewhere between amusement and annoyance.

"Bill Weasley, do you mind?" The culprit grinned at her winningly from the doorway, braced casually with an arm to either side.

"No. Do you?" Tonks scoffed loudly and slid off the trunk, abandoning the attempt at a hairstyle to pick up a long wooly scarf from the bedside table. It had been raining all through the night, although she could hear no sound off it on the ancient roof over their heads. Grimmauld Place didn't tolerate things like, Merlin forbid, noise. Drafts were a completely different matter - it was probably though to contribute to a healthy dungeon-like atmosphere.

"I asked first, didn't I?"

"I think you're talking yourself into a circle," Bill answered calmly, not giving up his place in the doorway as she tied the scarf firmly around her neck and shoved her wand into her black Auror's robes.

"So what if I am?" Tonks hedged, eyeing the space between his arms and the floor. Sneaking and getaways had never been her strong suit, and she hated to Apparate before she had some tea.

Bill just grinned. He loved to watch Tonks in the morning; she was always a little more edgy without her tea. She also hated word games, and Bill loved to listen to her hedge around the silly little things he would say, trying to find an ulterior motive in his teasing. His eyes followed her as she buried her face in the wardrobe to find a sock, the waist-length, tomato red hair she had chosen this morning sliding over her back.

He also loved to watch her in the afternoon, when she Apparated into Diagon Alley for a drink around lunch and he saw her from his office window in Gringotts, or from a table at the Leaky Cauldron. They never spoke there, but sometimes he thought she would catch his eye and grin.

He loved to watch her in the evening, when she tried to help his mum in the kitchen and spilled tea on the biscuits and put sugar in the stew. At those times he would use his wand to switch jars and write new labels, grinning as she found that the flour bin was full of potions ingredients and the milk jug was full of vinegar.

Eventually she would push him out with firm hands on his back, laughing as soon as Molly left the room. He would disappear into the dining room for a minute, to send mail or write reports, until the time when he found his inkwell full of butterbeer and the quill had become a parakeet. Then he would jump up with a shout and see a dash of pink, brown, purple, orange, black, or blonde hair following a shriek of laughter. Eventually there would be a crash on the stairs when he caught her and they both laughed until the fear of the previous nights' Order meeting had vanished, and Sirius was yelling at them for waking up his mother's portrait.

"Serious?"

"What? No, Bill," he answered after a moment, returning to the moment and an irritated Tonks glaring at him from the inside of her bedroom, today's nose snubbed and covered with freckles.

He saw her lips quiver for a moment, as if she was holding back a laugh, and then she darted forward to hug him, knocking them both back into the hall and onto the floor as she tripped on a misplaced rug. "Bill Weasley, you're a git," she pronounced cheerily, her heart-shaped face tipped to one side and a mischievous look in her eyes. Nymphadora Tonks might be clumsy, hyper, and occasionally obnoxious - but she didn't get through Auror training by being an idiot.

Bill grinned up at her to answer, when they were interrupted by a loud crack as the twins Apparated onto the landing. George landed on one side and Fred on the other, and both looked down at their eldest brother with expressions of great and unholy glee.

"Eldest brother William!" Fred exclaimed, putting a hand to his heart.

"What is this torrid affair-"

"We see before us now?" They shared a grin over their brother's head and then dropped down to sit on the landing.

"Is this something new, dear William?"

"Does Mum know this is why you've been sneaking off?"

"And all along we thought it was Fleur the Flower."

"You know, she looks like a Weasley with that hair. Have a hidden thing for Ginny?"

Bill rolled his eyes to the ceiling as the twins continued in much the same manner and Tonks went redder and redder by the second. After approximately 20.3 seconds he pushed himself up and lifted Tonks with him, putting an arm around her waist and winking at the twins. "Exactly. So you'll excuse us while we finish what was started." With that he dragged a giggling Tonks into her room and slammed the door behind him, putting a quick imperturbable charm on it.

Tonks had sat down on the foot of her bed; her face was still flushed and her long red hair trailed behind her over the covers. "Awfully sorry, Bill. I didn't know those brothers of yours..."

"Bit much, aren't they?" Bill smiled at her, sitting down beside her on the bed and grabbing one of her hands. "I remember when they were kids, and I was going off to Hogwarts for the first time." His smile widened at the reminiscence, and Tonks smiled back, not thinking to remove her hand.

"So what did they do?"

"Time-release fireworks. Went off as the house elves were loading my trunk into the castle. Twenty elves wouldn't come near Gryffindor Tower for three years."

Tonks laughed and slumped against his shoulder. Bill stiffened momentarily and then relaxed, stealthily draping an arm around her shoulders. "Do you have any siblings?"

"Not like that! I have one brother - he's younger than me, his name is Reece. He's fun, though. He works for Cleansweep, manufacturing brooms."

They were quiet for a moment, and then somebody knocked on the door. "Tonks? Bill? The twins are quiet now." Ginny paused, and the pair inside could almost feel her satisfied smirk. "They won't bother you," she added.

They exchanged a grin and then Bill stood and pulled Tonks up with him, bowing her towards the door. "I've got to go in early today, but..."

"Yeah?" Tonks turned in the hallway, nudging the rug back into place with her foot.

"Keep the hair, alright?"