3Okay...normally I would NEVER post something like this, or even write it, but it just popped into my head. Just a short one shot about good ole Remus and Tonks, set sometime after Sirius death. I hate one sided Remus/Tonks...but it came out anyways. ENJOY!
Tonks pulled away from their tight embrace, her arms falling limply to her sides, lips still burning from where they had met. "You love him." There was no need to say who he was, it was written all over his face. She tried so desperately to keep the tears at bay, they welled up inside her eyes as a tital wave of emotion coursed through her.
"Yes, but you already knew that before you came here. Why?" Remus couldn't look at her, couldn't bare to face the hurt he knew he had caused. Once again there ability to understand each other shined thruogh and Tonks knew he was asking her why she had come.
"I thought - " She cut herself off, no that was not true she did not think that she was wrong, and that he would admit to loving her instead, nor did she think that that would ever change. She took a deep breath to steady her voice, gaining the courage to look him in the eye as she spoke. "You need someone to be there for you, to take care of you, and to not judge you when you can't bare the pain to face another day without him. I love you enough to know that I could never be him, never replace him, but I still want to comfort you. I cannot give you what you really need, but I can give you everything I have."
Somewhere in the back of his mind a voice told Remus that she could have easily been a Gryffindor, she was so much stronger than she gave herself credit for, so much stronger than he was. "No. I won't have you sacrifice you're happiness for mine." His tone, was perhaps a little harsh and might have scared someone who didn't know him better.
"It's not that simple, I cannot live with myself knowing I could have made things easier for you, any more than I could simply stop loving you. You are not able to refuse this, if we cannot live the life we wanted, we'll take what we can get from each other. Perhaps selfishly, but that doesn't matter now anymore than it did the last time." Tonks said, repeating a mantra over and over in her mind that she would be strong, she would not let him go on alone.
"The last time..." Remus spoke slowly, softly, he remembered the nightly vividely. They had found comfort in each others arms the night after Sirius had slipped through the veil, it was small, not enough to truly forget the grief or to truly be happy, but enough to continue on. "We won't really be living, just alive..."
"It's enough." Tonks said and stepped towards him, twining her arms around his neck, "It has to be." And they kissed one another passionately, just not with the same passion.