"What are you doing?" Moody asked suddenly, making her look up.
He had gotten her a bunch of cursed objects, literally cursed objects, and some not cursed and she had to see if she could sense which ones were the cursed ones. Apparently, an important skill to have. Saved time when on raids according to Moody because then you didn't go around casting diagnostic charms on everything. Which was the next thing she was going to be taught. Which was pretty cool. Even if Moody grumbled about not being allowed to give her stuff that was seriously cursed, something she was thankful for. She didn't particularly want to get injured if she could help it.
She was sure there was going to be lots of time for that later.
"Um, looking at these?" She said hesitantly, gesturing at the objects he had literally just placed in front of her.
That's what he had told her to do. Seriously, he had said it not even five minutes ago. And he even said he was going to give her a half an hour to try and see if she could identify anything. Which was apparently pretty generous of him. Whatever.
So why was he asking her what she was doing? As She literally just mentioned, he had told her what to do and she was doing It! There was no way she was doing It wrong because she was following his instructions exactly!
He narrowed his eyes at her and Tonks just felt even more confused. What was going on here?
"Keep doing it then," he said gruffly after glaring at her a bit and then returning to his own Apparently, work.
Tonks blinked in confusion and when it became apparent that he wasn't going to explain any further, shrugged her shoulders and returned her attention to the cursed objects.
The whole collection of them kind of gave her the creeps. But she wasn't sure if she was actually feeling the dark magic come off them as a whole or if it was just because she knew that some of them were full of dark magic and even the thought of that was giving her the creeps. It was probably the latter. She had absolutely no experience of cursed objects before now so there was no way that she would know what to even think of sensing. So, what was she even supposed to do other than stare at them until her time was up and Moody tried to explain it to her or got exasperated with her.
Then he jabbed a finger at her, right it her face and rather aggressively at that, and frowned. She went cross-eyed trying to keep her eyes on his finger so it didn't get her in the face or something.
"You did it again!"
"I don't even know what I was doing the first one never mind again!"
Was it really that difficult for this man to just speak plain English? It would save them both an awful lot of bother.
He was still frowning and staring at her but what was she supposed to do? She couldn't stop something she didn't know what she was doing!
"That stuff in your mouth."
She gave him a blank look before she realised what he was talking about. Seriously? That's what all of this was over? Of all the things that he could complain about this was it?
"It's just chewing gum," she said, sticking her tongue out with the lump of it right in the middle.
Moody screwed up his nose in disgust. Which was kind of funny because of the chunk taken out of it, him scrunching up his nose made it look folded and scrumpled looking.
One of these days she was going have to screw up the courage, be brave and ask him about how he got some of his injuries because some of them were just weird.
"Disgusting stuff," he told her.
She raised an eyebrow. "Seriously? You showed me a photo of a leg that a flesh-eating curse had torn through the other day and you think chewing gum is disgusting?"
Eurgh, even the thought of that photo made her stomach roll. Thankfully she hadn't thrown up when he had first shown her but it was a close thing. Gaffrey probably would have, apparently, he still had a sensitive stomach. She should probably be thankful that it was just a photo she had seen, apparently, he had wanted to bring her to St Mungo's and show her the real deal in person but upper management had shut that down, thank Merlin. For both her and the poor patient. She certainly wouldn't want her injuries being gaped at.
But that was Moody for you, focusing on the curse and teaching rather than the person. Quite frankly, Tonks found it hard to believe that the man ever consoled grieving families that he had to have come across throughout his career. He was just so gruff and blunt and really not at all personable. But maybe that was just all down to his paranoia. Though, had there ever been a time when he wasn't paranoid?
"Yes. It's disgusting. The leg was caused by a curse. A perfectly logical result. There is nothing logical about how disgusting gum is.
"Um, it's because it gets all chewed up it your mouth?"
Which was far tamer than a partially dissolved leg, thank you very much.
"Like I said, disgusting."
"You really don't like it?"
She thought everyone at least liked gum. What was there to dislike?
"No, I love it," he said sarcastically.
"No need to be rude."
Which earned her a glare bit it was a tame one so she just ignored it.
"Chewing gum is rude."
She snorted. "Hardly."
"It is," he insisted.
She folded her arms. Really? Was he going to go down this road?
"Since when have you cared about being polite?"
He hadn't. His was Mad-Eye Moody, renowned for being blunt and aggressive and had a general disregard from people's emotions.
"Just... keep it out of your mouth in here," he grunted at her. "And get rid of that stuff that's in your mouth."
Tonks couldn't help but grumble at that. Who was he to say that she couldn't have chewing gum? Chewing gum! It wasn't anything big or distracting. In fact, it helped her concentrate. And it kept her breath smelling nice. Not that any in would be close enough to smell her breath any time soon but a girl could dream, couldn't she?
"But it hasn't even lost its flavour yet!" She complained.
You couldn't just get rid of chewing gum that still had flavour in it. It was like a rule. Moody both glared at her and gave her a look of disgust. Or, maybe not.
With two fingers she took it from her mouth and chucked it in the bin by Moody's desk. He gave it a disdainful look and actually raised his wand and vanished it. Seriously?
"So, I guess I shouldn't be offering you chewing gum anytime soon?" She asked cheekily.
She had to quickly duck to avoid the swipe at her head.
"Hey! I didn't fall?"
He rolled his eyes at her. Oh, it was good to have Moody back.