A/N: Sorry, sorry, sorry this took so long getting up. It’s gone through three drafts, a name change, and over a week in Houston and the Texas hill country, which kinda helped finish it. Also my computer was being mean and wouldn’t let me log on or update for the LONGEST time. But now we have a new modem, which is absolutely wonderful. It's so good not to have to wait, I can't believe it...anyway, I’m already a good way through chapter eight, so that's good news too. On a more mundane note, Dereck, Miriam, Katy, and Androcles are my OC's. All other characters, situations, etc. belong to J.K. Rowling. I'm just inviting them over for playgroup. :)
I think I like this better.
Nymphadora Tonks yawned, stretched, got out of be, walked into the hall, and stopped dead. “Oh. My. God.”
Sirius walked out of the bathroom, followed by a billow of steam. A towel was around his waist and he was using another to dry his hair. “Oh my god what?”
Tonks scowled at him. “It’s August.”
He put his head to one side a little. “Yeah. August second, actually.”
She just sighed and glared. “Next time stay in there, okay? And you better not have used all the hot water.”
Sirius laughed. “Touchy, aren’t we? Don’t worry, there’s still some left.”
Tonks rolled her eyes. “Yeah. Whatever. Mum up yet?”
He shook his head. “But if you want a shower, I think your dad’s next.”
Tonks cursed under her breath. “Fine. What ever. At least you’re showering.” She started to head back into her room, then turned around and stuck her head back out. “And get some clothes on!”
“’Get some clothes on’,” Sirius said mockingly as he sat down to breakfast. “Geez, only thirteen and you’re already starting to turn into Andie.” He sighed. “You’d think you’d never seen a guy in a towel before.”
“Maybe I just don’t particularly want to see you in a towel,” Tonks told him; Sirius jabbed a thumb at his chest.
“Hey, normal girls fantasize about this body!”
Tonks passed him the toast. “Yeah, well, I’ve never exactly considered you a very good judge of what’s normal and what isn’t.”
“I’m not going to ask,” said Remus from behind the Daily Prophet; most of the front page was taken up with a large article about Abraxas Malfoy, who had apparently just donated a large amount of gold to something-or-other.
“You don’t want to know,” Tonks assured him.
“Anything interesting, Moony?” James said, looking up from his cereal.
“Well...it’s supposed to rain,” he said, frowning slightly and resting the end of his pen on his lip. “I hate these crosswords, they don’t stay”hey!” A drop of water had fallen onto his nose. “And the kitchen ceiling leaks, I’m afraid.” Androcles trotted in, flopped on his back, and tried to look as cute as possible. Once he’d gotten Tonks’ attention, he started nosing his empty food bowl around; she laughed.
“Again? You’re always hungry.” She got up to fill his bowl with kibbles and checked the window on the way back. “Yep, raining,” she said over the loud chomping of Androcles having his second breakfast. “Pretty hard, too.”
“Well, it’s got nearly four weeks of drought to make up for, doesn’t it?” Peter said, stretching. Tonks returned to her seat to find James attempting to steal the last sausage”off her plate. She slapped his hand away and he grinned sheepishly. After he’d finished with the kibbles, Androcles disappeared down the hall and returned carrying a leash in his mouth; he was followed by Ted.
“I think the dog wants to go on a walk,” he remarked unnecessarily. “Don’t tell me you five ate all the sausages.”
“You wouldn’t want them anyway,” said Remus, who was now trying to find a drip-free spot to sit. “Prongs burned them.”
“Okay, so I can’t cook,” James admitted. “But, hey, it could have been worse, right? I could have set fire to the house instead of just the sausages.”
Ted laughed. “I remember when I was just learning to cook. I was making tomato soup, but I accidentally used a red bell pepper instead.” Everybody laughed at this.
Tonks mused, “I wonder what that would taste like?”
“Horrible,” said her father, pulling a face. “I couldn’t eat it and neither would the dog. In the end, I put in some beans and tomato, poured it over rice, brought it to the family reunion, and called it vegetarian chili.”
“Let me guess,” Sirius said, grinning widely, “nobody ever asked you to bring food again.”
“Well, that might be a bit of an understatement,” said Ted. At that point Androcles tried to jump on him. “No. Nuh-uh. Go bother her.” Androcles went over to Tonks and sat there, looking up at her with big brown puppy eyes. Tonks looked up at her father, who said, “You can all walk him. It’ll get you out of the way and build character.”
There were only three umbrellas, so Peter got a raincoat and Tonks insisted on her T-shirt, shorts, and flip-flops. (“Fine. But if you die of pneumonia it’ll be you your mother blames, not me.”) After much grumbling, everyone was out the door. The trip was eventful from the start; Peter stepped out the door, fell off the steps, and got tangled in the garden hose. Once he had been extricated with mush laughing and joking, they were off and either trying to avoid (Remus and Peter) or trying to run through (Sirius, James, Tonks, and Androcles) the puddles, some of which were at least a foot deep. Inevitably, a water fight broke out, and even Peter with his raincoat was soaked. (“Well, now we’ll look like fools for having the umbrellas, won’t we?” said Sirius, after Androcles dragged Tonks through a particularly deep puddle.) Tonks emerged from said puddle, however, minus one bright orange flip-flop, so the next ten minutes were spent in a frantic search for the shoe. As it turned out, it was stuck in a crack in the pavement under some two feet of water, but they had to empty the puddle to discover that. Stuck without magic, in the end they had to use a hastily patched inner tube found in a ditch and a trick Sirius got from Regulus (he wouldn’t say how they’d used it, but Remus had his suspicions); James was the only one brave (or stupid) enough to suck on the other end until water came out.
“This is the LAST time I do ANYTHING with you,” James groaned, spitting out water and trying to scrub out his mouth while at the same time keeping his glasses dry. “Godric, I wish I’d though of Impervius.”
“Little late for that now, isn’t it?” said Remus dryly, trying to help Tonks prize her sandal from the crack and rather ironically getting soaked in the process.
Once they’d gotten her flip-flop back on her foot, Androcles dragged them off again. When they drew near Miriam’s house (Miriam was the name of Sirius’ new Muggle girlfriend), Sirius began moaning that she would laugh and think he was a total idiot and break up with him.
“You shouldn’t be dating if you can’t handle rejection,” Tonks said sagely.
“I’d like to see how you’d do,” Sirius muttered under his breath.
Miriam was actually sitting on her front porch despite the continuing torrential rain and began waving and giggling when she saw them. This seemed to cheer Sirius up substantially; he had his head up a little higher and his walk became more like a strut. Unfortunately in this state it was pretty hard for him to see where he was going...and so he fell headlong into one of the biggest puddles yet.
“Siri!” Miriam squealed, running over and pulling him up. “Hey, Dora,” she said, wiggling her fingers at Tonks.
“Oh...yeah, hi, Johnston.”
“So that’s the Muggle girl Sirius’s seeing?” James whispered to Tonks, who nodded.
“Miri, where have you been” said Sirius, hugging Miriam tightly and flattening some of her bright red curls in the process (though she didn’t seem to mind). (“Siri and Miri. How nauseatingly cute,” Peter said.)
“Looking for you,” she said adoringly, kissing his nose. After they had been kissing for two minutes by James’ watch, he tapped Sirius on the shoulder.
“Pads? Planning on finishing that anytime soon?”
“Oh. Yeah,” he said, surfacing. “Hey, Miri, I’ve got a ticket to Creatures From Space with your name on it...”
“Isn’t it scary?”
“Don’t worry; I’ll be there to protect you!”
“Oh, I’d love to! Saturday, then?”
“Three o’clock, and not a minute later,” he replied, twisting a strand of her hair around his finger. James waited another five minutes before breaking up the resulting songfest again, pulling Sirius away and glowering at Tonks, who was standing against a tree some feet away, pretending not to notice that anything was going on. His complaint (or so he told her) was that she’d let go of Androcles’ leash.
“He wouldn’t run off,” she told him once they were out of earshot of Miriam. “He likes me too much.”
“Oh yeah?” James demanded. “He sure doesn’t like me.”
“That big fat dog of yours is an idiot,” Sirius said, in considerably a better tone (than both his previous and James’.)
“Androcles is not fat,” shot back Tonks, cuddling the aforementioned dog indignantly. “He’s just fluffy.”
Remus shook his head. “There are three things you should never insult in a woman, Pads...her dress, her weight, and her pets.”
“We’re lost,” Tonks said miserably some thirty minutes later. True, it had stopped raining...but they were in a part of the neighborhood that none of them knew.
“Whaddya mean we’re lost?” said James, striking a pose. “We’re intrepid explorers! The word ‘lost’ isn’t even in our vocabulary!”
Androcles sat down, threw back his head, and howled. “’Lost’”, commented Remus. “Adjective: Ruined; destroyed. Not to be found; missing. No longer held, seen, heard, etc. Not gained or won. Having wandered astray. Wasted. Adjective substantive: One lost through death, etc.”
There was a creepy silence during which everyone looked at Remus. Then Tonks said, “Merlin’s beard, what do you do in your spare time, read the dictionary?”
“What would you do if you had to sit in the hospital wing for a week every month?”
“True,” she admitted”“Oi, Potter, if you kick my dog once more, I will rip your head off, stuff it down your throat, hog-tie you to a spit, and roast you over a slow fire until you’re cooked. Then I will cut you into little pieces and feed you to Androcles and Baxter, and what they do not eat, I will coat with birdseed and feed to the pigeons. (Baxter, it had transpired, was Miriam’s dog.)
“Well, you make him shut up then,” said James.
“Quiet, Androcles,” Tonks said; the dog immediately stopped barking.
“Good. Now I can hear myself think,” said James, folding his arms. “So, what’re we going to do?”
Tonks shrugged. “We could always knock on a door and ask where we are.”
“Are you kidding?” Sirius said. “We do NOT need to ask ANYONE ANYTHING.”
She rolled her eyes. “What is it with men and asking for directions?”
“Hey, you were the one who said we were lost.”
“That is so beside the point.”
“What’s the point, then?”
“Would you two mind giving it a rest?” Remus leaned against a telephone pole, resting his head on his hand. “All you ever do is bicker, bicker, bicker, argue, argue, argue, fight, fight, fight. It’s driving me out of whatever semblance of sanity I have left after six years with James and Sirius, and quite frankly, I can’t stand it.”
There was a short (and almost surprised) silence; then Sirius put his arm around Remus’ shoulders. “Sorry, Moony...I had no idea it bothered you so much.” For her part, Tonks bounded over and hugged him tightly.
“Awwww,” James said, grinning. “C’mon, group hug!” Remus struggled for a minute, then relented. “Fine. Whatever. I love you guys too.”
“Glad to hear it,” Sirius said, punching him on the shoulder. “Hear that, Dora? You’re not unloved.”
“I never said I was,” Tonks replied. “And, didn’t I ask you not to call me that?”
“Erm...yeah. Anyway, saves time later if you ever do get to feeling unloved,” Sirius said, shrugging. Tonks sighed in a weary sort of way. She picked Androcles’ leash back up and turned to face the others. “I can see a street sign over there”we’re on Elm Street, and that’s Ash Road. I live on Cherry Tree Lane, which dead-ends into Ash somewhere, oh, thataway,” continued Tonks, waving her hand vaguely. “This is North Ash, which is too far north. Sooo...” She muttered to herself, moved her arms about, and turned around several times, then stopped suddenly, facing toward the street. “If I’m right, we need to go that way.”
James sighed. “Why couldn’t you have done that earlier?”
“’Cause I was too busy bickering, fighting, and arguing with you and my dear cousin,” Tonks said, turning to face them. “Let’s go.” She started to walk away, but was suddenly stopped by a dead weight on the other end of the leash; Androcles had apparently decided against going anywhere.
“Oh no,” groaned James, “Now what’s wrong with that dog?” ‘That dog’ was sitting, immovable, at the very end of the leash, staring up at the house and growling. Tonks tugged on the leash, pulled from other directions, and finally held the end and leaned as far as she could, with no result except that her hands slipped on the leash and she fell back onto the sidewalk. Almost immediately there was the sound of laughter.
“That doesn’t sound good,” said Peter, as Tonks hastily pulled herself off the sidewalk. As if to confirm his statement, out from behind a nearby tree stepped a tall, fifteen-ish boy with a Roman nose and short, wavy dark hair whom Remus recognized with a sinking feeling as Dereck Reigo.
“Well, well, well, if it isn’t Little Blue. Or, what is it you’re going by these days?...Freakadora, isn’t it?” He took a few steps toward Tonks; Androcles growled a little louder. “What’s this, Blue? You’ve got yourself a dog...well, I guess you had to get something that would listen to you...”
Tonks’ voice shook. “Sh-shut up, Reigo.”
“Now, do you really want to say that? You know I have every right to say what I want, you warthog-faced buffoon.” Tonks opened her mouth to say something, but Reigo cut her off. “Ah-ah-ah, don’t talk while I’m talking. You might huwt youw wittwe bwain. Not that I imagine there’s much left to damage, though...or that there ever was. Tell me, what’s it like to have been born with less than normal intelligence? ...or are those words too big for you? Shall...I...speak...more...slow...ly?” He grinned at the sight of Tonks shrinking and backing up a little. “Aww. Poor Blue...can’t even take a joke without falling apart. Lucky you brought your hired goons here, else there might not have been any witnesses...pity...I guess you’re getting off easy, then.”
“What are you doing here?”
Reigo gave Tonks an amused look. “I live here, Blue, unlike yourself. I’d tell you to get off my property, but then I’d have to sit here all day without anything to do...Freakadora.”
“Leave me alone, or I’ll...I’ll...I’ll set my dog on you!” Admittedly this was not the most effective threat, but Remus thought Androcles was still at least mildly frightening. Reigo merely laughed and whistled loudly. From around the corner of the house bounded a large, menacing-looking Rottweiler, who stood to one side of Reigo, teeth bared.
“This is Katy, Blue. If I told her to, she could rip your klutzy excuse for a dog over there to shreds, so...” He smirked at Tonks. “I think the odds are slightly in my favor. What kind of dog is that, anyway?” Reigo continued with a pronounced sneer, “Mutt, I expect?”
“Actually, he’s part Doberman, Great Dane, St. Bernard, Lhasa Apso, Pekingese, Chihuahua, Rottweiler, sheep dog, pug, bulldog, Dalmatian, Scottish terrier, bloodhound, fox terrier, poodle, and greyhound...but mostly Newfoundland. ” How she said it with a straight face to Reigo, Remus would never know.
Reigo sneered again. “Yep...a mutt. But, if I didn’t know better, I’d say you were cheeking me, Blue.” Tonks shook her head furiously, backed up another step, and ran into Sirius, who turned to Reigo.
“And you would be...”
“Reigo. Dereck Reigo,” he replied. “Black, isn’t it?”
Sirius ignored this and started in on Reigo. “You messing with my cousin?” It was as though someone had deflated Reigo with a pin; he turned very pale.
“I...your...cousin?” He looked nervously from Sirius to Tonks, swallowed, and backed up so rapidly that he hit a tree. “I...no idea”“
“Stop babbling,” Sirius said scornfully, putting an arm around Tonks. “And yeah, she is. You got a problem with that?”
“N-n-no,” Reigo managed to squeak out.
“Good,” he replied, folding his arms and glaring at Reigo. “Now, apologize to the lady.”
“Erm...Pads?” James gestured down the street. Tonks was no longer standing next to the five boys; she had simply disappeared.
Sirius groaned. “I’ll deal with you later,” he growled at Reigo. “Just get out of my sight.” Only too glad to leave, Reigo scrambled up the steps to the house and slammed the door behind him.
It took the four boys about half an hour to find the Tonks’ house, even with Androcles (who apparently knew the neighborhood better than any of them, even Tonks.) They then scouted the yard and house until Remus finally found her hiding in the hedge in the back yard.
“This is your hideout?” James said, crouching next to the shrubs. “A hole in the hedge?”
“Usually it’s just me and the dog,” she snapped back at him, raising her tearstained face from its place on her knees; Androcles wormed his way in beside her.
“We can, er, leave if you want us to”“ Sirius began cautiously, trying to avoid a row, but
Tonks shook her head.
“’S okay...” She turned and buried her face in Androcles’ fur. “I hate Dereck Reigo.”
“Great, so do we,” James said cheerfully. “So we can all go do something horrible to him together.”
"Yeah," Sirius said darkly, "that one's a bad hat.” Tonks did not lift her face from her dog’s side but made a muffled noise of assent.