What Is

What Is

He thinks of her when he closes his eyes and lies down for the night. His arms are full of his wife's love but in his dreams he finds his face buried anotherꍔs dry frizz and lilac smell. And it is in that land of ghosts and futures and hazy unreality that he sees her surprised eyes; and he sees her tears and he sees his reflection, old and tired and lost.

In the morning he smells warmth and burnt bacon and Tonks - it doesn't matter.

He thinks of her when he looks in the mirror. Shuffle across the floor and feel the carpet between his toes, feel the silk of Tonks's discarded blouse brush against his foot. And all he can think about is the way her own blouse was devoid of Tonksꍔs silk wrinkles; all he can think about is the cotton and the starch, and he sees the collar sharp and creased against the fine white of her skin. She reflects in the mirror, and when he blinks he sees himself.

And still he thinks of her.

*

It is a fog, the world. He sees the war through foggy eyes. His wife smiles and kisses his cheek and he knows she thinks he's just remembering the way things used to be years and years ago. The last time they were fighting for their lives.

No. He sees himself shaking his head, but can't seem to do so in Tonks's presence and break the safe, disillusioned space. But still, no, no it is not true. He's remembering the way things could never be, but he can't tell her that.

Tonks is so happy with this fog. Tonks is in love and he wants that to be enough but it isn't.

Because he remembers her at dinnertime, and when the sun sets, and while he reads Pound and Yeats and Cocteau. He remembers the way she said (with a seriousness Tonks could never capture), These words are beautiful but I like it when things are concrete. And he showed her Williams's ꍔRed Wheelbarrowꍔ and she smiled.

That is love, he thinks; that is love.

*

Maybe he has thought too much. She is still out there swimming between bodies real and imagined and looking for questions to infinite answers and all his thinking doesn't change that. He stares out the kitchen window.

"I'll be there in a moment," Tonks says. "Go to bed."

And she had said that too, Go to bed. The library's shadows had played in the wrinkles on his face, and she was stern and worried. He had to be alert the next day, he had to continue being a member of the Order, and he had to, Sleep.

Sleep? There was no way he could sleep with her looking at him like that, and he felt like he didn't know what he felt. But she would be there for the rest of the summer, and she would be there for some leaves and some snowflakes, and maybe she would be there if he gave her Faulkner wrapped up in holiday paper and ribbon.

She would be there, and so he slept.

But he only closes his eyes now and as Tonks runs her fingers through his hair he thinks of someone else saying, Sleep, sleep. Sleep.

*

The space between fantasy and reality is filled with half-true lies. She turns at the edge of the lake and he is blinded by the sun filtering through her dark hair. Her lines are fuzzy, vague, and so are her words. The way she asks, Do you love Tonks? The way she asks, Do you love me?

He knows the answers and so does she. He doesn't say anything, just stands there with his hands in the black pockets of his black slacks and his black overcoat flapping on this sunny, sunny day.

She is immobile save for one of her stocking-clad feet and the way it circles in the wet sand. Her face is bent and they are like marionettes someone forgot to move.

And then she looks up.

And she smiles.

There are tears on her cheeks. He says, I'm sorry, I'm sorry for everything, and he touches her face gently with his fingertips. He touches her lips. We are very different. We are the same, but you belong to the future and I am somewhere in the past.

And the sun is starting to set now, and he sees her glass eyes. She's remarkably brilliant and still she asks, If Tonks will be happy why won't I?

It's not the same at all. He shakes his head and closes his eyes and knows she will never understand.

*

From his bed he watches the sun rise and thinks that's not exactly how it happened. He tried to explain, and she did understand, in the end. She understood that he missed his friends and he missed the world and he could never be comfortable. She understood how she made him comfortable but he refused to sacrifice her like that. She understood that he didn't want to hurt her.

But maybe she missed how he did love her. He thinks that he would trade a million poets for another glimpse of her serious smile.

He thinks of her again and again but all he smells is warmth and burnt bacon and Tonks.