At the appointed time, with a thump of boots and the rattle of keys, Ginny appeared in the doorway of the tiny flat Tonks sublet from her. "Greetings, She Whose First Name Must Not Be Said Out Loud," she said with a grin, sweeping off her floppy velvet hat dramatically and bowing low. To the extent that she'd tried to disguise herself as a Muggle, she seemed to have aimed for 'Renaissance Faire Nerd'. At least the frockcoat-over-jeans wouldn't seem too terribly out-of-place in this part of London.
"Pub?" she offered cheerfully. "I daresay we could both use it."
Tonks came out of the bathroom fiddling with waist tie of a lime-green-and-gold kimono blouse -- a bargain prize picked up in Camden Town several weeks before. The marked-down price probably had something to do with the fact that no one other than Tonks would dare to wear that shade of green.
"Pub," she agreed with a grin. "Smashing hat you've got there."
"It used to be curtains," Ginny grinned as she arranged it on her head again. "We had a bit of an... incident with students practicing incendio too close to a window. I asked McG for the salvage. House colors, you know. Mum's piecing the rest of it out, but won't tell me what she's making."
She held the door open for Tonks. "Shall we go dazzle the Muggles with our fabulousness? I'll let you pick the pub, I'm up for just about anything. And have I mentioned yet how great it is to see you?"
"Let's be off. How about The Blue Posts? I'm thinking classic old-fashioned Soho pub for the evening, myself." She gave Ginny an enthusiastic hug. "And it is wonderful to see you, love. I've been so utterly isolated these days."
Ginny returned the hug, equally enthusiastically. "You should come work at Hogwarts. Except then I suspect neither of us would ever get any work done."
She released Tonks and waited while she locked up. "And also," she added after a moment, "I'm glad we've still got someone on the inside, you know?"
"Oi! I did all right when I was there with Dawlish and the others." She smiled wryly. "Of course, different times and all, then."
Tonks pocketed her keys. "And yeah, I know what you mean. As much as I whinge and moan, I'm not sorry I'm there. I just wish --" She sighed. "Ah, neither here nor there, really. Still, I miss the Hogwarts job sometimes. I don't miss why I was there, but in a weird sort of way, it was good to be there, y'know?"
Ginny nodded and started down the stairs. "I feel so much more... I dunno, grounded maybe, when I'm there. Parts of it still make me crazy, of course, but it's just so easy to look around and see exactly why we're doing what we're doing that it makes up for the rubbish bits."
She smirked, and in a tone to match Umbridge's high-pitched girlish simper added, "We're doing it for the children."
Tonks snickered at the impression and, very briefly, shaped her own features to mimic Umbridge's. "It's for their own good," she said, and changed back as quickly as she could. "And now I want to wash that off," she laughed.
"How'd the OWLs and NEWTs go? Or are we not talking about work?"
"Oh, no, we can talk about work." Ginny reached the bottom of the stairs and kicked the door to the street, hard. It flew open, bounced off the brick wall, and slammed again in their faces.
"OWLs and NEWTs went fine, can't you tell?" She gave Tonks a tight-lipped smile and nudged the door again, more gently this time. "Stupid WEA."
"That well, eh," Tonks said sympathetically. She held the door for Ginny. "I don't get up in the WEA offices much, but there's no mistaking the cheerful gloating in the Ministry canteen." She rolled her eyes.
Out on the street, she paused a moment (not least to look around to see if anyone she recognised was in the vicinity). "'S about five blocks this way," she said, indicating.
Ginny cast a quick cautious glance down the street and fell into step beside Tonks. In a low voice, barely audible over the clomp of her boots, she said, "It's not enough that they changed the exams at the last minute to be practically all writing; then it's the things they're asking the students to write! I had an owl from one of my NEWTs students that the very first question on the 'practicum' was in essence, 'Detail three simple strategies that would have been effective in keeping a polymorphed impostor off the Hogwarts faculty'. The nerve!" She made a guttural sound and spat onto the street.
Tonks actually stopped in her tracks out of plain shock. "They what?" she exclaimed, a little too loudly. She glanced around and hurried to catch up with Ginny. "That's just ... Ginny, I've not got the words for that. That's just ... ooh!" She shook her head and scowled. "Terrible."
Pink splotches appeared high on Ginny's cheeks, a sign of temper barely suppressed. "They've got a whole learning objective called Defence In Historical Context, which... I expected it to be bad, but not THAT bad. I console myself that most of my students are scarcely old enough to remember that particular incident; it's practically ancient history as far as they're concerned. But---" Her voice dropped to a low hiss. "What if they ask about Dumbledore? Or--- Or---" She scowled and shook her head furiously. "That ever comes up on one of their exams, I won't be held responsible for my actions."
She took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. "Right. Done venting now."
"Vent away." Tonks squeezed Ginny's arm in an attempt at comfort. "My god, Ginny, I can only imagine the sorts of things the might say." She sighed. "And you know, I won't even bring up the New School save to allude to it sideways, because that, frankly, is too depressing a thought to bear."
She shoved her hands in her pockets. "How'd it come to this, I wonder sometimes. Everything was supposed to be ... I dunno. Better. Easier. Not like this."
"I know. In books, it's always 'Happily Ever After', not 'And Then The Heroes Got Mired In A Giant Bureaucracy, The End'." Ginny frowned, but without much ire. "But I suppose there are plenty of people who think this IS better and easier. We call them 'sheep'."
She linked an arm through Tonks's, perhaps to express solidarity as a non-sheep. "I just hope they've got the sense to watch themselves now that the wolf has come back. How was the mood in your office this week?"
"Well, you saw my rant about the 'have a nice day' memos. Bizarre is what it is ... half the DMLE is serene as you please, and the other half is twitching with barely restrained anxiety. Which we are not officially allowed to express." She was unable to suppress a tiny shiver. "And now my shoulder's started to hurt again."
"Ow. Oh, I'm so sorry, love." Ginny cast a sidelong sympathetic look at Tonks. "Mum makes a poultice that's dead brilliant on sore muscles. Dunno whether it would help your shoulder, but I could ask her what's in it. Only downside is that it smells like unwashed Quidditch robes left in a mouldy locker for three years. Which... I suppose might be what's in it."
Tonks chuckled. "Ah, thanks -- but I dunno if even your mum's poultice would help. It's the -- you know. From the Department of Mysteries. Pucey's suggested a healer who deals in that sort of thing. And before you ask -- I hadn't done anything about it before because it had been quiet for ages. It's like all this news has brought it up again."
"I, ah. I was afraid that's what you meant. You know---"
Ginny fell silent for a long moment. In a small sort of voice, she said, "H-Harry's scar used to hurt when, ah, the one that gave it to him was close by." It's the first time in years Tonks had heard Ginny say his name out loud. "So if it suddenly starts hurting really badly, you should probably let someone know. Or, you know, run." She smiled a grim, tight-lipped smile.
Tonks bit her lip and looked worriedly at Ginny, startled at the mention of Harry's name. She was quiet for a moment, holding her friend's arm, and as they drew up to the door of the pub, she managed a sort of smile and said, "I'm sure it's all, y'know. Psychological. Not like -- but yeah, I'll keep an eye on it." She let out a long breath. "Right. We really do both need a drink, eh? First round's mine."
"You're on. And I've got the next one." Ginny reached for the door with her free hand and returned the smile. "Throwing back a few pints and perhaps ogling a pretty boy or two sounds like just what the healer ordered."
The Blue Posts was slightly less crowded than usual, it seemed -- at any rate, there was no trouble finding a couple of seats not far from the bar. A gaggle of what appeared to be bankers or some other brand of Muggle high-earning professionals sat nearby, arguing about -- football? some sport, anyway, from what Tonks could gather.
Tonks caught the eye of a waiter and ordered pints for herself and Ginny. "There's the pints. Now where's the pretty boys, I ask you. That lot --" she nodded at the bankers, "-- doesn't look promising, unless you're into prats."
"The one I grew up with has been more than enough prat for one lifetime, thanks," Ginny replied with a smirk. "And speaking of Percy, I don't suppose your paths ever cross at the Ministry, do they?"
"I see him in the halls now and again, but Aurors and International Trading Standards have very little to do with one another, ordinarily." She shrugged and smiled. "If I'm lucky, I get a curt nod of recognition, but usually he's too busy going from one thing to the other, seems."
"It's almost -- almost -- worth asking him about his work just to hear him say 'the regulation of magical fruits'." The corner of Ginny's mouth twitched in amusement.
"I've been trying to decide whether to owl him about the Qu--- er, pick-up game," she corrected as the drinks arrived. "He's never been much of a sports fan, but I think his kids would love it."
"Kids. I'm still not used to the idea that Percy has children. How old are they now?"
"James is coming up on seven, believe it or not, practically an actual person. Tally is four, and is karmic justice for every snide thing Percy ever said about the twins. She's a Weasley through and through." Ginny smiled in obvious pride. "I predict she'll make Beater her first year at Hogwarts."
"Aw. They sound lovely." Tonks grinned. "I've envied you a bit, y'know. I mean, I know family's not easy -- ha, just ask my mum -- but there's just something about a big family like yours --" She shrugged. "Greener grass and all, I know. Still wouldn't trade my mum and dad for the world, though."
Ginny smiled fondly. "How are they, anyway? Have you gotten to see much of them, recently?" ...since all this shite came out, she didn't add, but the tiny crease of concern between her brows said it for her. She sipped her drink.
Tonks took a sip of her ale. "I've got to make some time to go see them, but we've talked. Mum's all right -- well, she says she's all right, but you can tell she's rattled. They've been shoring up the wards just like the rest of us." She smiled wryly. "Dad's gone all protective. As fathers do. I get an owl or a floo call pretty much every other day."
"Ahh, fathers," Ginny said, and raised her glass as if in toast. She took another sip and wiped her sleeve across her mouth. "Hey, yours haven't been using this whole mess as an excuse to ask when you're going to settle down, have they? Which---" she put on her most comical nosy-mother face "---is also my cue to ask after your... ah... social life, I believe."
Tonks lifted her glass as well and chuckled. "Mercifully, Dad stopped asking about the settling-down a few years ago -- I think he and Mum finally figured I'd tell them when I was good and ready. And as a matter of fact, there hasn't been much 'social life', as you put it, to speak of." She sighed. "Not that I have time for it, which is a large part of the reason why. And you?"
"Nah, I'm in the same boat. Especially during the school year. The students are absolutely, completely off-limits, of course, no matter how much my instincts sometimes prod me to flirt with the cute Quidditch-playing seventh-years." Ginny smiled wryly and took a large swallow of ale.
"And then there's the rest of the faculty, which would be... I dunno, kind of weird. Especially since--- well, have you noticed how gynocentric the Hogwarts faculty has got lately? And no matter how much I might think that what Granger really needs is a good, hard, knicker-searing kiss, I don't really fancy myself the one to give it to her." She grinned at Tonks over the top of her glass.
Tonks had to laugh at that. "Yeah, not seeing it, really," she said, "especially since you two are as near as I've got to sisters, and -- yeah, definitely not seeing it. I'd not thought about it, but you're right -- about Hogwarts, I mean. Headmaster McGonagall, plus you and Granger, and you already had Pince and Pomfrey and Trelawney and the rest." She sat back, an amused, thoughtful look on her face. "And it's not just Hogwarts -- there's Umbridge at the Ministry. Which last, I'm afraid, puts paid to the notion that the world would be better off if women were running it."
"Yeah, but Umbridge is not so much a 'woman' as she is a splodgy old toad in a dress. And I've not ever heard anyone propose that the world would be better off run by toads. Except maybe the toads." Ginny flared her nostrils and stuck out her tongue.
"Ough. Isn't that the truth." She took another sip of her ale and sighed. "It's a relief, I've got to tell you, to be able to talk frankly about all this shite. You hardly know who to trust at the Ministry anymore, and you don't know who's listening -- so nobody talks. Not like Auror Division was ever the friendliest of places, but at least it was ... social-like. Now? Place is like a morgue."
"I don't know how you stand it. I'd go utterly nutters." Ginny shook her head in sympathy. "I don't suppose you could start your own D.A.? That's what we did when Umbridge took over at Hogwarts." Her tone is joking. Mostly.
"Funny you should mention that. Ron said something about it the other day. Here -- you knew Padma Patil then, didn't you? She's an Auror now herself. D'you think she'd ... you know, be sympathetic?"
Ginny's eyebrows arched. "Well, I've rather lost touch with her since school, but unless her attitudes have done a complete flip-flop...." She nodded, slowly but definitively. "Sympathetic."
Tonks smiled slightly. "Good to know, then. I shall have to sound her out. If nothing else, we've got to watch each others' backs there."
"Speaking of former D.A.s who are now at the Ministry...." Ginny's tone grew noticeably cooler. "Cho Chang is Percy's assistant now. So, you know, you'll not want to bother sounding her out."
"Is she. Well, that's good to know. I thought I'd seen her about, but wasn't sure." She rubbed her forehead and sighed. "You know what really annoys me? That it's not enough that we've got the Dark sorts to fight. You know the Percys and the Chos and the like don't want the Dark to rise again either, but they've got to go at things ... the way the do." She groaned. "I know I keep saying this, but bloody hell, it wasn't supposed to be this way."
Ginny reached across the table and gave Tonks's arm a squeeze. "It wasn't this bad after the first war, was it? I wasn't exactly politically cognizant at the time, and I'm afraid Naptime with Binns -- er, I mean, History -- was never my best subject."
"Wasn't mine either," she said, smiling. "And I was just a little thing at the time, and Mum ... I think she and Dad tried to keep the worst of it from me. Still hard to get them to talk about it, you know. They ... well, it's like us, isn't it? Lost friends, lives turned upside down."
"I s'pose so, yeah. For all that I sort of grew up around their work with the Order, my mum and dad never talked much about it either. They've always been much more about the here and now. 'Course, with seventy-million kids, you'd sort of have to be, wouldn't you?" Ginny grinned, fondly.
"And it's the kids what're the future and all, right? How are they, your mum and dad? Let alone the rest of you, I've not seen them in an age."
"They're well, thanks. Mum's in a right tizzy since the Quibbler article hit," Ginny replied with a little smile. "I've spent time this week out at Neville's, which you know is just down the road from them. Mum keeps asking when -- not if -- I'm coming to stay with them this summer." Ginny shook her head in fond exasperation.
"Oh dear. You are coming back to London, right? 'Cos, you know, I've got to get the flat cleaned up," she teased.
"Did you SEE how good I was when I showed up?" Ginny asked in mock-earnestness. "I didn't even look around the flat to see whether anything was broken." She grinned, broadly.
"And actually, yes, I was going to ask you about that. I really would like to come back to London for at least a little while this summer, if it works with your schedule. I've gotten homesick for the cauldron-pho dinners. And the Boggle matches." She leaned across the table, conspiratorially. "One of us has really GOT to get a more lucrative job."
"Maybe one day they'll finally come down with that promotion that I so richly deserve," Tonks said; she smirked, but her tone was heavy with irony. "I promise you, once that happens, there will be an improvement in the living situation. Honestly though, anytime you want to come to London is grand -- I can't see how it'd be the slightest problem at all."
Ginny beamed. "Cheers," she said, and drained her pint. "Perhaps it won't be such a dreadful summer after all. Shall I get the next round?"
Tonks finished off hers as well. "Ready when you are."
Last modified: 7 January 2008