aurortina‌:

At first there had been anger with her tone, confusion as to why he was there but the moment he started to explain himself she felt her body ease. That anger shifting ever so slightly but not completely. She was still unsure why any of that mattered when he was supposed to be getting married. Surely a wedding took some time and planning, wasn’t his future wife wondering where he was? Again, her slight envy was shining through in the back of her mind but that was NOT something she could afford to waste time worrying over. 

“I guess there is little point in us discussing the matter any further. I needed to get more information and I was very close to finding out what I need to. I am certain of that but now I’m not so sure, unless there is some way of us bringing him back and finding out WHAT he knows.” 

Tina pulled her coat closer around her, the cold Parisian air bringing a chill to her body. Was it the air? Perhaps it was just the sheer thought of Credence being out there on his own while Grindelwald was baiting him. Not that she knew too much about WHAT Grindelwald was doing but she could calculate that much. After all, he had been stalking after the boy in the guise of Graves. Something Tina still felt pretty terrible about. How could she NOT see that he wasn’t Graves? All those times reporting to him, all the times she TRIED to speak reason with him over Newt. It should have been OBVIOUS. 

Sighing heavily, Tina glanced down to the case within his grasp and couldn’t help but smile ever so slightly at the thought. Those creatures were something else, something she had swiftly grown very fond of. 

“So you brought ‘em with you. I hope I’m not gonna have to chase after a niffler again.” There it was again, a sign of annoyance in her tone but she really was pleased to see him. All she wanted to do was TELL HIM that. Tell him how much she had been missing him. How happy she was to see him now. It just wasn’t that simple. It never would be, not while he was getting married. 

And if her own issues weren’t enough, he had called her a FRIEND. Friendships could definitely survive between those who were otherwise engaged … she really was being a little immature with it all. “Oh and congratulations, I’m very happy for you and your future wife. I had no idea you had rekindled whatever it was that Queenie saw … but I am happy for you.” Bitterness was evident but mostly a sign of heart ache, no matter how badly she tried to mask it with genuine happiness for him. 

You’re an Auror, I’m sure you could find a way to force answers out of him, the bitterly distrustful part of him says. He knows better than to say as much– shuts up the thought– since finding Tina he’d tried to be careful about stifling the quiet anger that had been filling him for days. Frankness only served when she asked direct questions. It’s not Tina who he distrusts to begin with, either, and it was that very fact that keeps him at her side even when he’d walk away from any other Auror without batting an eyelash.

He instead makes a non-commital noise, feet torn between her and the pavement before them. A heaviness in his chest that he’s not quite sure what to do with, but then that had been his state for quite some time now. Mouth twitching at the corners when Tina speaks he casts her a look before running a finger over the lock over his case.

“No, you’ll find he’s quite well trained now. He’s the one who helped me track you down,” Newt admitted with no lack of fond amusement, hastily adding, “it’s the babies you’ll have to watch out for now. And he won’t go very far without them.” So maybe telling Tina there was not one niffler but babies– plural– who were causing their own amount of delightful terror was a bad idea. But, well, he was who he was and as soon as the babies were grown and trained as the eldest was they’d be perfectly reasonable. So long as he kept them from the best silver.

The amusement is lost nearly as quickly as it comes and he’s once more blinking dumbfoundedly at the woman. The pit of his stomach twisting with apprehension and he thinks this is silly, but how does heright something he never knew was wrong in the first place? His mouth twists as a free hand goes for his pocket– The place he’d earlier made certain to stuff her picture in before they left. Kept close and tight and in spare moments he’d eyed it questioningly as if to ask the printed Tina what he should say.

“Tina,” Newt started abruptly, saying her name before her mind quite caught up. He blinks dazedly a moment, nimble fingers reaching to gently grip her by the wrist to stop her from continuing on– A glance around and he steps aside on the Parisian street, pulling them into a side street where no one was walking.

Now what?

“If you had returned my last letter you might have found that such an absurd rumor is untrue,” He ambles on after a moment, cerulean eyes shifting from her shoulder to her face before finally looking her in the eyes. It’s a careful measured moment. “There is nothing to congratulate me for, but I have been told you have found some happiness… And I am glad, that you are happy.” He’s not happy, though, but he does not say it. The man’s features hosts no judgement, no anger, and no bitterness. Disappointment perhaps, yes, but he is genuinely glad that Tina is happy even if he himself is not.

If anything he was hurt she had stopped writing and even more hurt that she thought he’d do as much when he… Well, he thought he’d made his intentions to return to her as clear as possible. Life, it seemed, however had been against him– Nothing abnormal about that one.

“Leta is marrying my brother,” He adds softly, allowing his hand to slacken while his eyes dart away, “I’ve— Well, I’ve been waiting for someone I met in New York to write back. And when she didn’t and the opportunity arose— I…Well, I took it upon myself to find her since I had promised, after all.” He’d promised to return on the New York harbor and had been rejected five times. Paris was far easier to go to than America, though it was not with a lack of trying.

The hand he’d dropped from hers hovered then, just above the pocket where the newsprint was nestled. Freckled cheeks pinkening at the mentioning before he gave a short nod as if he was wrestling with what more to do or say.