Note: On the occasion of my good friend Gelly Bean's birthday! So...Happy Birthday Giselle! I hope you have an awesome day and that you think this fic is at least a little bit awesome too! =)

I'm sorry it's a bit on the short side...I've only found the time to write this evening...and the big day is tomorrow! I also attempted to write something at least vaguely amusing...or maybe even funny...so you've been warned!

Oh, and I threw in a bit of fluff, too! YAY for fluff! =)

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter, nor am I making any profit from this piece of writing.

A Piece of Cake

Nymphadora Tonks would be the first to admit that, as people went, she was not even vaguely conventional. Indeed, when looking at the population of the world at large, being a witch made her part of a small minority that the majority would think far from normal. Then, within the wizarding community Tonks was yet more unconventional still, for a metamorphmagus was by no means common.

And then of course there was the fact that, currently, her hair was an alarming shade of lightening blue. Yesterday it had been a odd shade of peppermint green (a decision she was still regretting), and the day before bright bubblegum pink. Her hair blinded conventionality and caused it to veer wildly to one side until it missed her by miles.

She liked to dress in equally as vibrant clothes that, upon her arrival at the Ministry, made a few people smile and the rest frown or even tut. She had a stash of muggle Strawberry Laces in her desk and she ate at least half a packet per shift. Sometimes, if she was reading through a particularly boring file, she would lean back in her chair and put her feet on her desk. And she didn't care if the other Aurors raised eyebrows or looked disproving.

She swore she could live on caffeine, or would just die trying. She firmly believed that four hours was plenty enough sleep to last her for the next twenty four and her colleagues found her energy both alarming and awe-inspiring. Kingsley claimed that she could not possibly be human.

Outside of work, she wasn't any closer to normal.

She was in love with a werewolf, for one thing, and she was proud of it too. She was pretty sure not many people could lay claim to that.

These unconventional attributes for the most part made Tonks smile. She was glad to be different, unique. But there was one oddity that the young Auror simply couldn't stand.

Or even understand.

How was it, she wondered irritably as she stood, glaring down at the large bowl that was set down upon the table before her, that she could pass NEWT Level Potions with an Outstanding grade, and yet be completely incapable of baking a simple birthday cake?

Tonks' gaze came to rest upon the crispy black remains of her first two attempts, before she looked up at the clock upon the kitchen wall.

"Bugger!" she muttered, grip upon the wooden spoon tightening with frustration.

It was at that precise moment that the dim atmosphere of the basement kitchen of Grimmauld Place was disturbed by a fist banging upon the firmly closed door.

"Tonks?"

At the sound of Sirius Black's irritated tone, the blue haired witch couldn't help but wince.

"Go away!" she called back, reaching to snatch up a bag of flour. "I'm not done yet!"

There was a long, uncomprehending silence before the Azkaban escapee complained:

"But...you've been in there for HOURS!"

"Yeah...what's your point?"

"How long does it take to make a bloody sponge cake?"

"You can't rush art, Sirius."

"It's FOOD!"

"Nobody ever said that art couldn't be edible..."

"And Moony's going to be here soon! How do you expect me to throw him a birthday party if you won't let me get to the booze cupboard?"

"Shut up! Just...just go and put some balloons in the sitting room or something..."

"Balloons...?"

"Yeah. Loads of them."

"But..." Sirius trailed off, and even through the thick wooden door Tonks heard him let out a heavy sigh of defeat. "Okay then," he grumbled, much to her relief. "But this better be the best bloody cake I've ever tasted!"

At the sound of his stomping footsteps retreating up the stairs, Tonks turned her attention back to the mixing bowl.

She scowled at it.

It was at moments like this that she often found herself asking: What would Mad-Eye do?

He'd probably claim that the Dark Arts were clearly involved in one form or another, or that the eggs were conspiring with the butter against him, before making a swift retreat to the pantry to formulate a meticulous plan of attack.

Tonks decided against the possibility of Imperised kitchen scales and evil, malicious cake tins, and decided to skip to the part that involved making a plan.

It was important, she supposed, to first consider what had gone wrong with her previous attempts.

Merlin, she thought irritably, posture slumping as she leaned against the scrubbed wooden table. Where to begin?

First there had been the scales catapulting the butter at the ceiling, and then there had been the eggshell getting into the mixture, and then of course she had put the oven on the wrong temperature and gotten distracted trying to make the icing thicken...

Tonks' eyes came to rest upon the wand that she had thrown down upon the table some minutes previously with a small shriek of frustration, and it was at that moment that realisation struck.

What if she didn't use magic?

What if she weighed the ingredients out by hand, instead of attempting to levitate them and making the scales turn rogue catapult with a poorly aimed spell? What if she didn't attempt to crack the eggs using magic and simply gave them a firm tap against the edge of the bowl instead? What if she kept both hands upon the bowl instead of none at all when pouring the mixture into the tin so that half of it slopped didn't out onto the floor?

And so it was decided. Nymphadora Tonks was going to do this the muggle way.

Two left feet or not...

She was barely aware that she was biting her lip as she set the right weights upon one end of the scales as if they were made of glass. She reached for the bag of flour with both hands, grip like iron as she slowly began to tip the notorious substance into the waiting dish. Had she not been concentrating so furiously, she might have felt foolish to realise just how her heart was pounding as she watched the scales begin to tip...

Bit more...just a bit more...nearly...STOP!

Tonks jerked the paper bag upright, only to send a burst of flour up into the air, and as she let out a gasp she felt the powdery substance shooting down her throat, causing her to burst into a coughing fit...

The bag of flour slipped from her grasp and fell with a thud to the floor in an explosion of white.

"Oh...bu...BUGGER!" the witch managed to exclaim between her choking coughing, and it was not until long after the flour had settled like a blanket of snow upon her surroundings that she managed to recover enough to inspect the damage.

"Oh for the love of Merlin!" she complained to the flour-coated room at large. "How the bloody hell am I going to clean this up?"

The kitchen looked...festive. Indeed, had it been Christmas Tonks might have felt pleased at the new decor.

Except it was in actual fact early May, and consequently this accidental stroke of genius had occurred a number of months too late. Or possibly too early. Tonks wasn't sure which.

As she stood attempting to brush the flour from her robes with little success, Tonks wondered whether or not Remus would see the funny side. She strongly suspected that both he and Sirius would be more than a little amused, which would be a terrible shame because if that did turn out to be the case, Tonks might be forced to wipe the smiles off their faces with a hex or two, and really, that wasn't quite the birthday present for Remus that she had had in mind...

Still determined to get the job done, Tonks reached to roll up the floury sleeves of her once blue robes and reached to grab the dish of measured flour, tipping it into the mixing bowl, scowling once again.

Whoever had said baking was a piece of cake had clearly been very misguided indeed.

Tonks ransacked the drawers until she found a clean knife and set about measuring out the appropriate amount of butter onto the scales. It soon became apparent that a firm tap against the side of the dish was not enough to dislodge the glue-like butter from the knife, and after several failed attempts Tonks could not find time to reason with herself as she drew the knife back, teeth gritted with frustration, before bringing the knife back down again with such force that it hit the dish with an audible bang.

Suffice to say this was a very successful method of separating butter from knife. However, it was an equally as successful method of separating dish from scales, and before Tonks could react she found said dish heading the same way as the bag of flour at an alarming fast pace.

The dish hit the floor with a crash, accompanied by the soft splat of butter on tiles.

Which was in turn joined by a series of loud and increasingly furious expletives as Tonks dropped the knife down upon the table and reached to grasp at her hair in sheer fury at herself.

Thank Merlin nobody was watching her, she thought as she squeezed her eyes firmly shut in an attempt to retain at least a shred of composure.

Speaking of somebodies...

Tonks' eyes snapped back open as she glanced back over at the clock. Sirius had informed her some hours earlier that Remus planned on arriving at about half past six. Which gave her...bloody hell...ten minutes?

Still determined not to be beaten, Tonks decided to simply cut off a slab of butter and dump it in the mixing bowl. Surely the scales weren't that important, she told herself as she hurried to the fridge to fetch the eggs. If they were whoever had invented them wouldn't have made them so impossible to use.

Box of eggs held firmly in both hands, Tonks hurried back towards the mixing bowl, glancing worriedly up at the clock again as she went, attempting to calculate just how quickly she could have the cake safely in the oven. It would probably depend, she supposed, on how quickly she could mix all of the ingredients to...

It was at that precise moment that she felt her foot slip in the remains of the butter upon the floor, and as she found herself falling backwards, in what felt like despairing slow motion, eggs flung up into the air, Nymphadora Tonks felt an overwhelming urge to simply sigh.

The back of her head struck the floor with a crack and as an egg shattered against her forehead, leaking its slimy contents down her face, the young Auror let out a soft groan.

That's it, she thought to herself thickly as her head throbbed in protest and the egg white ran down her neck, causing her to shiver. That's it. I'm done. I give up.

On the bright side, she thought as she slowly raised a hand and reached to pick a stray shard of eggshell from her fringe, if she could just clean away the evidence nice and quickly, nobody would ever have to know just how stupid she...

There were footsteps upon the basement stairs.

Bugger, bugger, bugger...

A voice inside of her head demanded that Tonks get up, scramble to her feet as quickly as she could, but the dull ache from her fall seemed to muffle it until she could think of doing nothing but staring at the door, waiting for what might possibly be the most embarrassing moment of her entire life. And that was quite something, she mused as whoever it was came to a halt at the bottom of the stairs and reached for the doorhandles. Because embarrassing was Tonks' middle name.

It was a shame that she hadn't hit her head a little harder, she thought dully as the door handle twisted and the door creaked open. That way she might not have had to seen the look on Sirius' face.

It was Sirius, she decided. It had to be. Because if it were Remus she would quite possibly die of embarrassment. And the opportunity to attend her funeral had not been the sort of present she had been considering giving him either.

Merlin, what was the world coming to when you found yourself hoping that Sirius Black would be the one to discover you sprawled upon the floor caked in a sticky mix of flour and raw eggs?

Tonks was about to let out a despairing little sigh, only for her to find herself staring up at a certain werewolf who had just taken the smallest of decidedly uncertain steps into the room.

Bugger didn't quite cover it, if she were honest.

Remus' face was what most people would describe as a picture, but Tonks was in no mood for such descriptions. His eyes grew slowly wider as he paused, halfway through shrugging the smoky blue robes from his shoulders. After what seemed like an eternity, he drew breath to say something, only for Tonks to demand:

"Don't. Say. ANYTHING!" At the sight of a small frown of protest creasing his brow, she informed him: "I mean it, Lupin! I don't care if it's your birthday, open your mouth and I'll hex it shut again!"

The wizard pursed his lips together in an exaggerated line before finally shrugging off the robes. He seemed to have some sort of dilemma spotting a flour-free place to abandon them, resorting to dropping them down onto a chair in one corner. As he turned back to look down at the witch once more, a voice from upstairs called:
"Moony? Is there any Ogden's left?"

Tonks found herself offered a raised eyebrow as the mute gave a rather helpless shrug. Despite herself, the young Auror giggled.

"Remus? I know you're a year older, but you've not gone deaf already...have you?"

Sirius' calls were muffled as Remus reached to push the door firmly shut. As she watched him advance on her, lips still pursed obediently shut, Tonks felt her cheeks reddening in embarrassment.

"I...I was just...well...it was meant to be a cake." she found herself babbling as he crouched down beside her, still perfectly mute. "A birthday cake. For you...careful, you're going to get flour all over you..." she trailed off into silence as he reached forwards to extract another piece of eggshell from her hair, and quite suddenly she found that she too was unable to speak.

He shuffled until he was upon his knees, seemingly oblivious to the coating of flour and egg upon his trousers as he reached forward to put his arms around her. As she found herself being slowly eased up into a sitting position, Tonks noticed the corners of his mouth seemed determined to curve themselves upwards, yet he refused to allow himself to laugh. She had no doubt that he was in hysterics behind those pursed lips. He reached to wipe the specs of flour from her cheek with his thumb, only to frown deeply when he only managed to smear it further across her face.

It made her giggle again, and the twitch of his lips as he began to fail in his mute endeavor made her laugh yet more still, leaning forward until her face was buried in his shoulder. She quite forgot that her face was covered in the remnants of the eggs, that were now seeping through the cotton of his shirt, and as she drew back to look at him, their faces mere inches apart, she finally decided:

"You can open your mouth now."

It was, Tonks decided as she felt his warm lips press gently against her own, her eyes drifting closed as she blindly reached to entangle her floury hands in his hair, quite possibly the best decision she had made all day.

Even better than her decision to bake Remus a birthday cake.

Finish