Ink: An Epistolary Romance

By the time Remus returned, Tonks had worked herself into a foul mood. No matter where she sat or what position she sat in, she could not work up enough concentration to read any of Sirius' Daily Prophet, and for this she blamed Remus. Blaming him made her think of the kiss he'd given her that morning. And the kiss made her angry. And her anger made her unable to concentrate - and her inability to concentrate made her think of Remus again.

The bastard.

As soon as he walked through that door, she resolved, she would give him a look that could make a gargoyle tremble. He would ask what was wrong, and then... and then she would bloody well tell him. Not loudly, because Sirius was hiding from her somewhere upstairs, but forcefully. Yes, she would tell him forcefully.

The thought calmed her somewhat, but she still couldn't concentrate. So she flipped through the pages of the newspaper, hoping that some article or other would be interesting enough to capture her attention until Remus returned.

Stray dragon accidentally burning a Wizarding village in Romania. Woman claiming that her illegitimate child was part pixie. Nine-year-old boy rescuing his Muggle grandmother from a particularly nasty Crup. Remus saying "Hello" as he walked into the room.

Remus.

Tonks looked up, startled. He was smiling. Her anger, which had been building up for hours upon hours, melted away in a matter of seconds.

"Hi," she said.

"Where's Sirius?" he asked quietly, shedding his cloak and draping it over the back of a chair.

"Upstairs," she replied expectantly. She wanted to add, "So nobody can overhear if you want to tell me anything," but decided that that might be just a little too forward.

He paused for a moment, then sat down almost gingerly in the chair opposite her. "Have you been here all day?"

"Yes," she said in a flat voice. He took the hint and did not inquire further.

They sat there for a moment longer, each staring silently at the other. Tonks waited impatiently for him to say something. Anything. Well, at least anything that had to do with their conversation of that morning.

Remus looked away and furrowed his brow, as if getting ready to say something. And then he didn't. Tonks felt her impatience turning swiftly back into annoyance. Remus looked up at her again; her heart pounded frantically.

"Anything interesting in the paper?" he ventured.

"Remus!" she practically shouted as she threw the paper to the floor. His eyes went wide, and for the first time in a long time - perhaps ever - she sensed that he was not completely at ease. The feeling heartened her; it was a nice change, somehow. "Look," she continued, "I told you something this morning that I... that I thought... something very important. So stop pretending that it isn't, and bloody well say something!"

Her words left little tremors in the air between them, and he let them die down a bit before he said anything. "I'm not pretending it isn't important," he said, and although his voice was still quiet, it was a different sort of quiet than before. Not a secretive quiet, but a quiet born of uncertainty.

"Then what?" she said, horrified to hear a pleading tone in her words. She tried again: "Say something." It came out in the same tone, and she fell silent.

He took a moment and a breath to gather his thoughts; oddly, when he spoke again, he did not raise his eyes to look at her. Usually he did.

"Tonks, I'm not entirely sure how to say this..."

"Then say it anyway," she prodded. He glanced quickly up at her, then looked down at his hands again.

Such lovely hands.

"I can't tell you how... flattered I am that you said... what you said. But there are things, you see, that I don't - I mean...." He looked up at her again, and as she held his gaze he seemed to pull himself together. "It's because of the letters, Tonks, am I right?"

She furrowed her brow, and she thought: Haystack.

"I've loved writing to you, and I've loved reading what you write to me, but you must understand--"

She looked sharply back at him. A new idea was slowly forming in her mind.

"I mean," he said, and cut himself off again.

She frowned. "Are you married, Remus?"

The calm, pleasant Remus that she'd come to know so well was gone in an instant, and in his place was a confused and perhaps mildly shocked Remus. "Married?" he repeated. "No, I'm not married."

"Gay, then?" she asked coolly.

"No!"

"Then what the hell is it?"

Her question hung in the air, and he rubbed his forehead in an irritated gesture. For a moment she wasn't sure whether he had a headache or he was trying to figure out his reply.

"I'm a werewolf, Tonks," he said almost cautiously.

She paused. "And...?"

The ellipsis and the question mark hung heavily in the air, and Remus and Tonks stared at one another, both utterly bewildered.

"And I'm a werewolf," he said.

"Meaning what?" she challenged.

"Meaning," he said slowly, "that things in real life aren't the same as they are on paper. Meaning that in real life, I change into a great ravenous beast once a month, who would just as soon kill you as look at you. Meaning that laws have decreed that I am not fully human, and should be treated accordingly. Meaning that--"

"And what," she broke in, "does this have to do with my being madly in love with you?"

He blinked, and there was a pause again. "Madly?" he said. "You didn't say 'madly' before."

"No," she said, surprised at how easily the words came out as she looked at him. "I said 'you' before. But I meant madly. Read between the bloody lines, Remus. You're usually good at that."

He let out a deep breath, as if weighed down by this new information. "Quill and ink is a bit different from face to face," he said, and she wasn't sure if he was talking to himself or to her.

She took a chance. "Is it really?" she said.

"It is," he said.

"How? I love you in ink, and I love you right here too. Where's the difference? Show me the difference."

He furrowed his brow and did not reply right away.

And she decided to do what might have been the bravest thing she had ever done in her life. "Do you love me too?" she said.

His answer came more quickly than she could have hoped: "Yes." His voice was steady and clear, and his eyes held no lies.

But she had been bracing herself for No, and it took her a moment to wrap her mind around Yes.

"Oh," she breathed.

"You thought I didn't," he said softly, and since it wasn't a question, she didn't bother to reply. "You have to understand, Tonks, I've had girlfriends. More than a few of them. Some for a few nights, some for months. But not one of them stayed after finding out."

She almost said, "Finding out what?" but stopped herself, realizing that she already knew the answer.

"That's cruel," she said softly.

He chuckled. "No, it's not. It's just life. I don't blame any of them."

"But I know, Remus. I know about you already, it's never been some great dark secret to me, and you know that, so how--"

He shifted slightly, very slightly, but it was enough to stop her mid-thought. His hands seemed to tense in his lap, and that little crease appeared between his eyebrows, and she was suddenly aware that she was going in the wrong direction.

So she abandoned that train of thought and tried again. "That isn't the problem, is it? The werewolf thing?" A pause. "What is it?"

She realized that she had scooted forward to the very edge of her seat (the word Brink crossed her mind), and moved back. She felt steadier somehow.

He seemed to go automatically on the defensive, taking a deep breath in preparation for some kind of excuse - but none came out. Instead, he took another breath, and she waited. He looked at her again and said, "The letters. It is the, er, werewolf thing... but it's the letters."

The next word that she made herself think was Calm. "What about the letters, Remus?"

"You want somebody like... you want the guy in those letters. It's so easy to fall in love with someone on paper, Tonks."

"I already told you, there's no difference--"

"And I've already told you there is a difference. On paper, I write what I like, and you fill in the rest for yourself. In real life you'd have to deal with all of the other - everything! And I do mean everything. So in answer to your question: yes, it is about the werewolf thing!"

"And how many times do I have to tell you that I don't bloody well care? I love you" - every time she said it, she somehow felt her resolve growing stronger - "I love you, and I'm not asking for a lifelong commitment, see? I'm just asking you to... just - for heaven's sake! You said you loved me too! Just try it!" She paused, realizing that she'd begun to raise her voice; he was looking very intently at her, and she went on, speaking in a normal tone again. "And if it doesn't work, it doesn't work."

Remus nodded, looking pensive and slightly miserable.

"But I think it will," she said quietly.

He shook his head slightly. "Do you really think it would be the same as how we wrote it?"

"No," she said, and he looked at her strangely. "I don't expect it to be the same," she went on, and then she patiently explained about the princess, the stable boy, and the haystack. "Neither of them would have done it in real life. Er. You know. If they were real. But they still would have got together in real life, because how and where doesn't matter. It's the people who matter. Like... you know. Us."

She wasn't sure exactly how all of those words had found their way out of her mouth in the right order, but after they had, she decided that they deserved some kind of award for their brilliant performance. She felt a smug smile crawl across her face.

"A princess and a stable boy," mused Remus. "Is that the sort of thing you normally read, Tonks?"

Her smile faded, and she was about to become very offended when she realized that he was trying to smother a laugh. She decided that it wasn't worth it to act insulted, because that wasn't the point. So she gave up and laughed with him.

"I'm serious, Remus," she said after a moment, happy that the mood was a bit lighter. "I don't expect it to be the same. I don't think I even want it to be the same."

"You don't?"

"No."

His brow furrowed again, and he said, "Then what is it you do want?"

Her mind screamed, You, you, you! but she ignored it out of an innate disdain for predictability. Instead, she smiled and said, "I just want to see what happens."

He opened his mouth as if to reply, but then closed it again. She waited, but he stood up instead of speaking. She waited, but he silently took hold of her hands. She waited, but he pulled her to her feet. She waited.

He brushed his lips against hers, ever so cautiously.

"Is that what you wanted?" he asked, and she suddenly found herself unable to speak.

She nodded just once, and he wrapped his arms around her, holding her tightly against him. A hand threaded itself through her hair, and she smiled into his shoulder.

"It is different than ink," she said softly. "It's better."

He neither agreed nor disagreed. He just kissed her again.