Desperate Times, Desperate Measures

Thanks to Everyone who has reviewed so far, and a big shout out and much Thanks go out to Salon_Kitty for support and advice, this chapter would not be what it without her. Sorry to all, that this took so long, and is a bit short, though not as short as he feared it might be

Chapter 5: Guilty Party

On the morning of his sixteenth birthday, Harry dozed half awake in bed. He was completely naked and still partially intertwined with his wife. His brain though slightly befuddled by post-coital bliss was never the less still active enough to be awed and confused at the recent course his life at taken. He’d woken up that earlier that morning to a strange sensation, and without his glasses on, he’d looked down and saw a blurry blob of pink where his groin should have been. Being woken up via a blowjob had not been the kind of birthday gift he’d ever expected to receive, which wasn’t to say he hadn’t enjoyed it immensely.

He’d been even more surprised when afterwards she’d mounted him again, riding him relentlessly until he erupted in another glorious orgasm. It had a certainly been a lot better than the last time they’d tried it and the sight of Tonks writhing on top of him completely naked, pert tits bouncing slightly with her motions and capped with hard, dark pink nipples, was something Harry hoped would remained plastered into his memories for quite some time.

So they lay there, enjoying the pleasant afterglow and marvelling slightly at the beauty of Tonks’ sleeping face. Despite the short length of their time together, Harry realised that he couldn’t actually remember what life without Tonks had been like. He remembered that it had happened but for the life of him he couldn’t imagine her not being around.

For the next couple of hours, Harry lay on his side, watching Tonks sleep; trying to memorise the soft lines of her body, the slow motion of her breathing and the peaceful look on her heart shaped face but all good things must come to an end, and by the time sunlight was blazing through their windows, Tonks’ eyelids fluttering open showing off that today her irises were going to be a soft turquoise colour, a similar to shade to the sea, which Harry was not even sure was a colour that an eye could be.

“Good morning,” She said, looking up at him as she stretched, still completely bare. Harry tried not to stare too obviously, he didn’t want Tonks to see and think he was still that immature about the whole thing. It was an endeavour that he failed at utterly. Fortunately Tonks just treated him to an indulgent smile and asked;

“Ready for our big day out Harry?”

Harry grinned broadly. Tonks had dropped this metaphorical bombshell on him the night before, after an apparently long discussion (Harry took this to mean; ‘an argument’) Dumbledore was allowing them out of Privet Drive for one day and one day only, to visit The Burrow and his friends for his birthday.

“Well I was thinking we might like to find some clothes, first,” He said, “The Weasleys might just consider us to be underdressed if we went like this”

“Oh I’m sure they’d be no objections from the younger members of the family if we did.” Tonks winked at him.

Harry just laughed as he started towards their wardrobe.

~O~

Remarkably and with the exception that they called the Knight Bus up right outside Privet Drive, which was going to cause no end of complaining from the Dursleys when they returned that evening, the trip to The Burrow went off entirely without incident. Unless you counted almost getting splattered by stray frog spawn form Madam Marsh’s shopping as a particular large jump of the bus sent it flying across the middle deck as Harry and Tonks made their way to the top deck.

Half a hour later, the Knight Bus finally pulled up in Ottery St. Catchpole and feeling slightly green themselves, Harry and Tonks departed from the bus and headed up the beaten path towards The Burrow and knocked on the front door.

If there was one thing Harry felt was a universal constant; that could be relied upon no matter what, that he’d be highly disturbed if it ever failed to appear, was a warm welcome to from The Weasley family. Although it was a Wednesday and thus most of them were at work, Ron, Ginny and Mrs Weasley, aided and abetted by Hermione, (who in Harry’s opinion was going to become a Weasley someday anyway) did not fail to uphold this long standing tradition; greeting him with smiles, congratulations and copious amounts of Mrs Weasley’s excellent food. Harry surprised Hermione by immediately seizing in a tight hug. While there was nothing unusual about the two friends hugging, it was unusual for Harry to initiate them. Harry however had a lot to be grateful for recently when it came to Hermione and had been thinking about how to reward her. As he squeezed her, he said quietly into her bushy brown hair about where he hoped her ear was.

“Thanks, ‘Mione,”

“Err.. anytime,” Hermione said back, “Though maybe you should let go now or I’ll be in trouble with your wife,”

Harry let out a cheerful laugh and let her go turning to his other best friend. Ron’s posture was slightly tense for some reason that Harry couldn’t imagine, but he grinned back at Harry readily enough. Clearly a hug was not the greeting here though, so they contented themselves with a manly gripping of arms and pounding each other on the back and from there the day passed in an almost blissful and all too fast blur of fun and games.


After a big brunch of Mrs Weasley’s cooking, Harry, Ron and Ginny, took up their brooms and headed out to the paddock above the Weasley’s house to play Quidditch with a clearly reluctant Hermione trailing along behind, armed with Tonks’ own broomstick which she’d forced on Hermione with a meaning smile.

Which abruptly left Tonks and Molly Weasley all alone in the house, Tonks fidgeted nervously, she knew Molly from The Order of course and Molly had always been friendly to her, but then it seemed friendly was pretty much Molly Weasley’s default state. Tonks abruptly felt very silly; here she was, qualified Auror and she was nervous about simply asking her fellow witch for some advice. There was a sudden clunk in front of her and Tonks looked down to find a fresh cup of white tea placed in front of her as Molly sat in down next to her, smiling gently at her. Tonks hurried took a sip of her tea, it was incredibly sweet, so much so Tonks though Molly might have just poured sugar until it stopped dissolving. A genuine smile crossed her face.

“Just the way I like it. Thanks, Molly ” Tonks said.

The silence dragged on a bit after that, though the two women tried to cover it up by sipping at their tea. Just ask her about it! Tonks’ inner self yelled at her.

Finally Molly broke the silence.

“So,” she said, “how are things going?”

“Alright,” Tonks said, neutrally, “Harry’s holding up ok. I mean, his family really aren’t helpful but he seems cheerful, enough. I’m being giving my old Auror reading to look at, to keep busy.”

Molly smiled softly.

“Believe it or not, dear,” Molly said, “I wasn’t asking about Harry.”

“Me? I’m fine,” Tonks lied hurriedly, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

Molly just looked at her over the teacups; a red eyebrow rose ever so slightly.

“Fine, fine,” Tonks gave in, “maybe because I’m a twenty two year old woman married to a boy who’s just turned sixteen, not entirely through my own choice, for reasons that have more to do with saving the world than anything else, such as love. Don’t get me wrong, Molly, Harry’s a great guy, really; he’s brave, kind, modest almost to the point of it being a flaw, but he’s got the entire weight of the world on his shoulders and anytime I’m nice to him or try to help him, he just gets so.. grateful. Like any kindness is an unexpected wonder for him. And that’s were my problem lies.”

“I’m sorry, dear,” Molly said, taking another sip of tea, “I’m not sure I follow.”

“I’m sorry, I’m not explaining well,” Tonks took a deep breathe and then tried again, “It’s just, when he get so grateful, well I feel good about it, of course and its almost addictive, I just want to keep making him happy.”

“I know what you mean,” Molly said, smiling fondly, “I feel the same way about him,”

Golly, I hope not Tonks thought, while simultaneously feeling herself go red.

“Umm… not the way, I’ve been comforting him.” She blurted out.

Molly’s eyebrows creased together in confusion, then her eyes widened as she realised what Tonks meant.

“Oh, so its about sex, then?” She said and Tokns thought she saw her suppress a laugh, “So tell me… how is Harry in the sack?”

Tonks spluttered and sloshed tea all over herself and the quite innocent tabletop. Of all the responses she’d expected, she’d never thought Molly would actually ask that. After all Molly had never exactly kept it secret that she considered Harry another son and well, mother’s just didn’t wonder that about their offspring did they? Tonks glanced at Molly and saw that her eyes were dancing with amusement at Tonks’ reaction.

“Now, come on, Tonks,” Molly said mater-of-factly, “If I hadn’t asked we’d have just ended up dancing about the subject for another quarter of an hour, wouldn’t we? Besides, what do you think we married woman gossip about?”

Tonks brain went into overdrive, Molly at least had managed to broach very nearly the topic she’d been wanting to talk about anyway, considering the amount of kids Molly had, Tonks thought she shouldn’t be as surprised as she was that Molly would be so frank about sex. On the other hand, the fact that Molly seemed to consider them to be enough of an age to gossip about their sex lives was setting off alarm bells for entirely different reasons. Sure, Tonks hadn’t been above gossiping with her classmates about boyfriends back at Hogwarts but still she thought herself and Molly Weasley as being tow entirely separate generations, thank you very much.

“Let’s just say,” Tonks forced herself to say, “that Harry’s proving to be a quick learner.”

“And you’re giving him lots of practise?” Molly asked, knowingly.

“Yes,” Tonks sighed, “I mean I know we had to at least once, you know, because of the whole consummation clause on the marriage but after that…” Tonk shrugged guiltily, “I’m a dirty old woman aren’t I?”

This time, Molly actually did laugh, it was a wonderfully rich musical sound but that didn’t stop Tonks fighting a surge of annoyance.

“Oh, I’m sorry, my dear,” Molly said, still mirthful, “But really; you’re barely past twenty, if you’re old, the rest of us are in serious trouble.”

“But Harry’s…” Tonks said.

“Harry’s sixteen,” Molly finished, “Now think back to being sixteen yourself, don’t tell me you didn’t want to have it off with some lucky fella back then?”

Tonks thought and felt the heat rising in her cheeks again, if only because at least one of those ‘lucky fellas’ that she’d lusted after had been Molly’s own son, (though she was reasonably she she hadn’t ‘had it off’ with him, as far as she recalled at least)

“Tonks, You’re married, and I’m sure what’s going on is entirely healthy and consensual and you really should just have some fun while you can.” Molly said, still smiling broadly.

Tonks thought some more and thinking it would be rude to contradict her host, simply smiled, nodded and drank some more tea.”

~O~

Out on the hills, Hermione had fallen off her broom again. Letting out a short scream and wet thump as she landed in the soft mud after a terrible drop of about two feet. Harry followed her descent, but slowly, seeing as Ron had zoomed to her aide at once.

“Ouch!” Hermione complained loudly, pulling herself gingerly to her feet, “That’s it, I’m giving up!”

“Oh come on, Hermione,” Ron said, “You were getting the hang of it that time; I’m sure.”

“Ronald Weasley,” Hermione growled, “You are a terrible liar! You just like beating me at something for a change.”

Ron pulled off his best impression of being abashed at being caught, which didn’t fool Harry or Hermione for a second. Harry glanced at his watch slightly whistfully, it was getting late.

“In any case,” he said, managing to keep all but the merest trace of disappointment from his voice and turned to wave Ginny back down beside them. “I think its time we head back to the house anyway,”

Ginny zoomed to a halt beside them and shouldered her broom, tossing her fiery locks out of her face.

“So what’s the final score then?” She gloated slightly, “Weasleys at 29 to the guest’s 13?”

“Well it was hardly fair,” Hermione sniffed, “you three are all on the quidditch team. How was I supposed to compete?”

“Don’t worry about it, ‘Mione,” Harry said, “It was fun, whatever the score.”

“Spoken like a true loser, Harry,” Ginny giggled at him.

“You better be careful, Ginny,” Ron smirked, “Tease him too much and Harry might not let us back on the team this year.”

“Oh?” Hermione asked, “Are you the new Captain, Harry?”

“Well, we won’t know until we get our letters but I guess I could be,” Harry said as they started to trudge their way back to The Burrow, “I mean it’s either me or Katie, I suppose. We started at the same time. McGonagell will probably pick Katie, she is older after all.”

“She could easily pick you instead, Harry,” Ron said, “After all it’d be nice to have a captain stay for more than one year at a time and Katie’s not really serious about quidditch as a career. She might not want the gig, anyway.”

Harry just grinned at his friend.

“So, anyway,” Ron said a couple of minutes later as they squeezed through a narrow style, “How’s… how’s married life treating you?”

Harry glanced at Ron, just as he paused and realised that hadn’t been what he’d intended to ask, he saw Ron’s gaze flicker across the two girls as his ears went pink. Had they been alone, Harry would probably have answered Ron’s unasked question, hell if it had just been them and Hermione he might have. After all its not like Hermione didn’t know what he and Tonks had been up to. Harry gaze flickered towards Ginny, there was just now way he was going to talk about his sex life in front of Ron’s sister though. Though from the way Ginny and Hermione we’re looking at him, he didn’t think he was the only one to recognised the unasked question. He shrugged slightly and simply replied,

“We’re getting along alright, given the circumstances. Really all thanks to Hermione’s advice though. Other wise you’d be scraping me or the Dursleys off the ceiling by now.”

Luckily the comment caused enough of a laugh to smooth over the slightly awkward moment as the group traipsed back into The Burrow.

Oddly Harry reflected, as he and Tonks eventually made their farewlls, he didn’t feel half as sad as he usually would have leaving his friends and going back to the Dursleys. It was odd, he thought as Tonks sat comfortably close to him on one of the Knight Bus’ sofas, but as long as she was there. He was content.


A/n: I need to stop getting into the flow of thing, in the late evening. Another chapter finished in the small hours. Hope its not too horrendous. Let me know! Reviews are made of awesome.

Next: The Four Letter Word