Dumbledore was dead. The thought of it still sent a shiver creeping down her spine and made her stomach feel cold. A part of her had died along with him; then again, some would argue that she had already been halfway dead, anyway. And it was true; that is, if death is simply considered an absence of life, of spirit, of the will and the determination to live.
She had lost these things a while ago, so if that’s what death was, she was a walking corpse. It really didn’t matter anyway, for she had lost three of the most important people in her life in the past year. First Sirius, then Remus, and now Dumbledore, too. Her life was a right bloody mess.
She didn’t lose Remus the way she lost her cousin and her mentor. He was still here with her, a living, breathing person, but she had lost him, anyway. He had not been stolen by death but by his own bloody self-righteous martyrdom.
She couldn’t help but think that, maybe, he just didn’t care about her the way she cared about him, and he didn’t want to admit it and hurt her feelings. Although, it would have been better if he just came out with it already; it would at least oust the hope that still burned in her heart. Hope, she thought to herself, could kill a person. Hope that came to nothing was, in some ways, worse than no hope at all.
Or maybe it wasn’t the hope that was destroying her. Maybe it was the thought that he, too, was hurting over this as much as she was. Because no matter how much he hurt her, no matter how much she desperately wanted to hate him, she just couldn’t bring herself to do so. She loved him, and it broke her heart to think that he was in as much pain as she was. That’s why she convinced herself he didn’t love her. And after yesterday’s events, she was starting to think that perhaps she was right in that assumption, though a part of her desperately wanted to be wrong.
As these dark thoughts ran through her head, she strode back and forth across her old room at Grimmauld Place like a zombie, picking up her things and throwing them haphazardly into her trunk. The cold dreariness of the house didn’t help her sour mood.
It had been only one day since Dumbledore’s death, but it felt like this pain had been with her for so much longer than that. And looking around at this place, she was reminded of Sirius, and the pain that had come with his loss was renewed as well. She felt like crying, but she didn’t want Remus to see tears on her face when they met in the entrance hall afterward; the last thing she needed was his pity.
Now that Dumbledore was… gone, the best option seemed to be packing up everything important that they were storing in Grimmauld Place before the funeral, since the Fidelius Charm was not as strong now as it once was. Everyone else had already finished packing, and now it was just Remus and herself who remained.
They were the two with the most memories here, so it was natural for them to take longer than the rest of the Order members. And even as she threw her last sock pell-mell into the trunk and sat on the lid in order to close it properly, a part of her wanted to dump its contents back on the floor again, just so that she could stay here for a little bit longer. But she wasn’t going to do that, of course; she had begun to stop listening to her heart by now. All it ever did was cause her pain.
So, trunk lid closed and possessions packed, Tonks made her way out of the room. Just as she was about to begin her descent down the stairs, she turned around and began to walk down the hallway again, but this time in the opposite direction. She found herself in front of Sirius’ room, and she cursed her blasted heart for bringing her here. But she opened the door anyway.
Seeing all of his things sitting there just as he’d left them brought tears to her eyes. It seemed like she had taken to crying constantly these days; it seemed so easy to let the tears fall, even though she tried her hardest to hold them back whenever the others were around. But this time she was alone, so she allowed herself the small comfort of falling onto the red and gold sheets of her late cousin’s bed and crying her eyes out.
What a sad sight she must have been, lying there sobbing into the bedclothes of a dead man, mourning a loss that she still felt the painful repercussions of a year later. Even to herself it sounded pitiful, but at the moment she didn’t care. When she finally regained control of herself, she sat up in order to look around more closely. The walls were covered in posters of skinny, beautiful Muggle girls in bikinis, and of motorbikes and broomsticks and a million other things. You could barely even see the color of the wallpaper anymore with everything plastered on top of it.
Mixed in amongst these were Gryffindor banners and old photographs from his school days. It was as though this room was a portal into Sirius’ past, a small space that was lost in time. It was a material representation of her cousin’s teenage years, complete with everything he held dear to him. And as she continued to survey the walls, her eyes fell upon a photo of a baby with hair that was constantly changing color, and the tears once again threatened to fall. She could still imagine a fifteen-year-old Sirius tacking a picture of her to his wall.
As her eyes wandered to the bedside table, she spotted a more recent addition to the room. On it sat an everlasting gobstopper wrapped in Muggle cellophane. It was one of Fred and George’s favorite inventions; they got the idea from a Muggle children’s book by Roald Dahl called Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Even though they loved it, the supplies used to make it were rare so the confection sitting on the bedside table was one of around fifty.
For some reason she was drawn to this little invention, so she picked up the colorful candy and pocketed it. She probably liked it so much because she remembered Sirius’ amazement at receiving it. He had been fascinated by it, and she remembered the wide grin that had passed over his face when it had been given to him. And she preferred to remember him happy and smiling.
Suddenly she realized that Remus was probably already done packing and waiting for her in the entrance hall, so she stood and returned to the creaky old stairs, this time not stopping or even so much as turning her head before making her way down. Sure enough, Remus was in the entrance hall, but he was not waiting impatiently; not that she’d expected him to be. He was never impatient and he didn’t get angry over stupid things. This attribute only irritated her more because she would always feel guilty for being angry with him; he was such a mellow man.
Rather than standing in front of the door and tapping his worn loafer against the wood floor as she half wanted him to do, just so that she would have the chance to snap at him for his impatience, he was looking at something sitting in a glass case on the wall opposite the door. It was quite spotless compared to the filthy wall that surrounded it, covered in blotches of dirt and old stains. Obviously he heard her footsteps as she came down the stairs, for he spoke to her as soon as she reached the floor. He didn’t turn to face her, but rather just talked to the wall.
“You know, with the picture of Sirius’ mother in here, I never really got a chance to look around,” he murmured, his voice barely more than a whisper in order to refrain from awakening said picture. “But this is rather fascinating.” Tonks stepped up beside him so that she, too, could see whatever it was that had caught his attention.
When she peered into the case, she saw a wood-framed hourglass filled with fine white sand standing atop a wooden pedestal attached to which was a gold plaque engraved with the words Time is the one power no man can control. Her curiosity got the better of her; Tonks reached forward and pulled the glass door to the case open. Remus’ hand darted out to yank hers back abruptly, and after making sure that she was unharmed, he rounded on her and stared at her with fire in his eyes. “Are you insane?!” he cried. His voice sounded funny when he tried to sound upset and still whisper at the same time. “That stupid thing could have been cursed!” So much for not getting angry over stupid things.
“Well, it obviously wasn’t,” she replied matter-of-factly before darting out her other hand to snatch the hour glass. She did this just in order to irritate him; let him be just as unhappy as she was. She knew that she was just being vindictive and she didn’t really mean it, but she thought that, perhaps, putting herself in danger might force him to confess his love in order to stop her from doing it again. He pulled her roughly away from the case and slammed the door shut.
It didn’t look like he was about to profess his love for her; in fact, he seemed livid. “What the hell did you think you were doing? You’re going to get yourself killed.” When she just shrugged, something flashed in his eyes that wasn’t quite anger. She couldn’t very well recognize the emotion, but she didn’t care because now she was mad, stamping her foot defiantly.
“Nothing happened, Remus. Honestly, there’s no reason to get your knockers in a twist. Besides, I didn’t really think you’d care, anyway.” She stuck her chin out in the air.
“You’re being obstinate,” he growled, before replying to her accusations. “Obviously, you were wrong about my not caring,” he snapped back, gritting his teeth. “Let’s just get out of here.”
She allowed him to grab her wrist and pull her out the door and away from the house without fighting or wriggling and trying to get free. She didn’t even drag her feet along the filthy green carpet that covered the floor. It was so stained and encrusted with dirt and dust that her feet didn’t even sink into it. She exited the dark, gloomy house out into the bright sun, but her heart seemed to latch onto a bit of the dreary atmosphere within the house. She was long past trying to fight. It was pointless, she had found, so she just submitted and allowed herself to be led away, her fighting spirit lost. She really was dead, wasn’t she? And the one man who could bring her back to life didn’t care to do so.
No, he didn’t love her. And finally that last little flicker of hope died, but it didn’t give her the comfort she had been hoping for. Rather, she just felt even more empty and alone than before. She still clutched the hourglass in her other hand, clinging to it because she had nothing else in the world left to hold onto.
Remus didn’t let go of her wrist until they had climbed the steep stairs up onto the Knight Bus, and even then he kept his eyes on her as though he thought she might launch herself out one of the windows at any second. She crossed her arms and legs, refusing to return his stare and sticking her chin out defiantly. She did this more out of habit than any real emotion.
Usually, she would have been indignant that he thought she’d be so stupid, but now she no longer had the energy to feel anything at all. Now she was just going through the motions, acting but not really meaning it. All she could do was clutch the hourglass tightly in her hand. It seemed to be radiating powerful magical energy, and normally that would have fascinated her, but right now all it did was provide the smallest stitch of comfort for her lonely, broken heart.
They didn’t talk at all on the ride to Hogwarts castle and they remained silent as they made their way up to the large wrought iron gates. Remus opened them wordlessly and gestured for Tonks to enter the grounds first before following along behind. As they walked up the rocky dirt pathway toward the castle, Remus leveled out with her, his longer strides bringing him up to walk beside her. His torn and patched old robes billowed out behind him as he walked, and his sandy hair was tousled in the wind. She considered speeding up, in order to lose him in the dust she left in the wake of her footsteps, but decided that would be childish.
So she grudgingly allowed him to stride along beside her. Through the entrance hall they went, up the stairs and through the hallway, making their way to the hospital wing where Bill Weasley still lay in a bed, having been mauled by a werewolf in human form. Tonks knew this disconcerted Remus greatly; the attacker had been the same creature that bit Remus and turned him into a werewolf.
Why couldn’t Remus understand that he was so very different from monsters like Fenrir Greyback? He may have been a werewolf, but he wasn’t anything like that; Remus was so much kinder, with so much love in his heart. Love, of course, that didn’t seem to extend to Tonks.
As she considered these things, she didn’t notice the lip in the rug until it was too late. She was already headed on a fast descent, and the hourglass went flying from her hand and careening through the air, spinning end over end towards the ground where it would surely break. As she was falling toward the ground, she reached out with both hands and stretched as far as she possibly could. It was as if it all was happening in slow motion. Her hand closed around the hourglass just as she felt strong arms wrapping around her, catching her before she hit the floor.
And then the world was spinning and everything began to blur. It was as if time were flowing backward, moving so fast that nothing around them could be made out clearly. Tonks felt dizzy and she couldn’t move an inch; it was as though everything spinning around them was closing them in, suffocating them and holding them there before dropping them off at their destination so suddenly and abruptly that Remus stumbled and almost dropped her.
Remus pulled her back up into a standing position, making sure she was upright and steady with her feet firmly on the ground before letting go of her. As the two of them turned around slowly, surveying their surroundings, they wondered what had just happened to them. Tonks noticed a big red, blue, green and yellow tapestry on the wall that hadn’t been there before. The Hogwarts coat of arms was embroidered across it, and she was certain it hadn’t been there moments ago. In fact, it seemed to be in the exact place where the painting of Friedreck the Fabulous usually hung. Something really strange was going on, Tonks thought in bewilderment.
“Well, Dorothy,” Remus breathed, “I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.”
“What?” asked Tonks, confused by the strange reference that she didn’t understand; she thought that maybe the spinning room had made him delirious.
“Oh, nothing,” replied Remus, shrugging. “It’s just a reference to a Muggle book I once read.” Tonks nodded in understanding. Then she remembered the strange changes she had seen.
“Something’s not right here,” Tonks muttered, instinctively steeping closer to the man she loved, the man who had broken her heart, and the man who, at the moment, provided the only protection that could be found in the deserted corridor. She wondered why her heart still sped up as he, too, took a step toward her; she wondered how a heart as broken as hers could still manage to love anyone, let alone the reason for her agony. But wondering about it and wishing it wouldn’t happen didn’t make any of it go away.
“I feel it too. Something’s… off,” Remus muttered in return. And then they heard the voices.
The footsteps seemed to be heading toward the hallway where they stood. The voices were getting louder by the second, and Remus did the only thing he could think of, the thing he’d always been taught to do. Duck and cover. He leapt behind a nearby statue, yanking Tonks along with him. When he was sure that they were completely obscured by both the stone figure and the surrounding shadows, he was able to breathe easier and listen more closely.
“Honestly, the students will be here in a day's time, Horace,” said a tight, strict voice in exasperation. It was a voice that both Tonks and Remus recognized. Remus sighed in relief. It was only Slughorn and Minerva. He was about to leave the safety of the statue’s cover, already feeling sheepish at having to come of hiding for no apparent reason right in front of two of his friends, but the thought that Tonks was behind there with him made him stay put. What if they assumed that something had been going on between him and the metamorphmagus?
And then her words registered in his mind. A day's time? Children arriving at the school? Hadn’t term already begun by now? Actually, it had started a long time ago; the students would soon be leaving the castle, immediately after Dumbledore’s funeral. What was the Transfiguration Professor on about?
“Yes, I know, but lesson plans take time to come up with, and time is just one thing I never seem to have,” said the Potions Master in response to his colleague’s earlier statement. “Two years ago, I forgot about the plans altogether, so you ought to be happy that isn’t the case this time.”
“Yes, I remember it perfectly. And that was three years ago, by the way, Horace. Remember, it was back in 1973.” McGonagall was obviously astounded that her colleague could mix up something that had happened just in the past five years, but her annoyance didn’t bother Remus; he was struck dumb by the fact that Minerva had just informed Slughorn that 1966 had happened three years ago. It seemed that both professors had gone batty in their old age; yet Remus couldn’t imagine how Minerva, with her sharp wits, had managed to obtain memory loss.
“Oh, how could I forget? I swear, by the time I turn seventy, I’ll have no memory left at all,” the big man laughed. Just as he said this, the two walked past the statue and into Remus’ view, and he saw Minerva smile and shake her head at Horace. But Remus just sat there, dumbfounded. There was no grey in Minerva’s hair, and Slughorn had lost many of the age lines on his face seemingly overnight. What had happened? But, wait… Slughorn was well past seventy by now.
And then it hit him. The hourglass, the strange tapestry, the date, the age difference in the professors… it was all painfully clear now. Remus’ stomach turned and he felt dread settle itself in the cavern of his chest. This was not good. Not good at all. As they continued to pass and reached a position where, if they peered over their shoulders they would be able to see him, Remus pressed forward against the cold stone of the statue. And he really wished he wasn’t right, but everything in him screamed that he was. It seemed that they had been launched back in time to the year 1976. What a right bloody mess.
Out of Place, Out of Time by The Magic Within
Chapter Endnotes: This is my first mugglenet submission. What do you think?