1
Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy have been sat in Robards’ claustrophobically cluttered office for nearing 2 minutes.
Harry is a hair short of beginning to twiddle his thumbs and/or beginning to kick the leg of Malfoy’s chair for something to do. The staccato rhythm Malfoy is tapping agitatedly with his fingertips atop his right leg, crossed neatly over-top of his left and angling him towards Harry, tells Harry a kick to Malfoy’s chair may get him hexed (again).
Malfoy’s looking off into the middle distance somewhere above the ‘Great Wizarding Breweries of London’ calendar magically and wonkily affixed to the wall between overflowing bookshelves behind Robards, a hard thousand-yard stare to his already steeled eye and a scowl to his mouth. Happy to have had a part in putting that scowl there, albeit with a limited understanding yet of just what he’d done to do so, the corners of Harry’s mouth lilt up before he can belatedly remind himself of the semi-seriousness of the situation.
As if sensing Harry’s poorly concealed mirth, Malfoy exhales in a huff and shoots Harry a look that would have likely killed him if looks alone could do that. Then, pausing in his aggressive finger-tapping to crack the knuckles of a rouged hand (Harry notes the redness across his skin and wonders absently how his own cheek has faired), Malfoy uncrosses his legs, shifts in his chair and swivels so his upper body is facing away from Harry, before recrossing his legs, left over right.
Harry can’t stifle his snort of laughter at this.
Malfoy huffs again, louder this time, and restarts his tapping.
This isn’t the first time Harry and Malfoy have been sat in these chairs, in this office.
As co-Head Aurors, they don’t often have the luxury of avoiding each other, try as they might. Unfortunately, it also seems neither of them have had the luxury of locating and excavating the little sliver of themselves that makes certain they will never be capable of behaving like the adults they are when in each other’s vicinity. So, this certainly isn’t the first time Harry and Malfoy have been sat in these chairs, in this office, about to receive this talking-to. Not even the first time this month.
See, the thing is: Harry might have died to save the wizarding world – and by extension, Malfoy – and Malfoy may have risked his own to misidentify the three of them that day in the Manor. Harry might have spoken in defence of Malfoy and his mother at their trials for their help in ending the war. Malfoy might have apologised to Hermione in writing, in-person, and treated her with nothing but the deserved respect since whenever their paths crossed. But. Despite all that, despite the fact the animosity of their childhood has cooled, soothed, smoothed in adulthood, Harry is certain, were he and Malfoy to have met the first time this morning, any morning, something about Malfoy would have still made him want to grab him by the throat. Something about the cut of his nose, his razor-blade tone, his varnished veneer, would have set Harry on edge, just as it has always done.
So, it’s not really about the war anymore. It’s just about Malfoy being a twat. A twat who may have slightly grown into the harsh cut of his nose more so than he’d managed at during their time at school, but a pointy-nosed twat nonetheless.
Most of the time, for the sake of keeping and actually completing their jobs as co-Head Aurors, they abide by an unspoken but strict no-talking rule. This serves them, at least Harry, pretty well about 3 days of the week. (As it turns out, Malfoy is not only capable but also excels at both silent and written condescension, a trick Harry would wager he inherited from his notoriously delightful father. So, the no-talking thing definitely isn’t a complete fail safe.) However, the other two days of the week, unfortunately for everyone in the office, require talking. Not just talking, but spell-work. Spell-work aimed at each other. As can be imagined, this spell-work aimed at each other sometimes becomes duelling with intent to maim and/or grievously injure.
On Tuesdays and Thursdays, Harry and Malfoy run defensive duelling seminars with the new Auror recruits. Today is a Tuesday.
All in all, everything had been going quite pleasantly fine for most of this particularly Tuesday’s session. And by ‘quite pleasantly fine’, it must be noted that Malfoy had dinted one of the walls of the facility being thrown back into it by one of Harry’s Bombarda Maxima hexes and a dodged Diffindo had avoided Harry having his throat slashed, but sacrificed about 4 inches of the hair on the left side of his head. And by ‘most of the session’, it’s relevant to know class had been in session for all of 4 minutes.
Malfoy had strut into the training room 4 and a half minutes prior to said dramatic happenings, face like the wettest weekend in recorded history. Harry made a soon-to-be-ignored mental note not to poke that bear.
“Morning, everyone. Morning,” Harry greets, the trainees chorusing a good morning as Malfoy walks past the cloud of students clustered in the middle of the space and moves to stand at the head of the room with Harry.
“Let’s get on with it,” Malfoy mutters once he’s taken his spot, glancing over the trainees with an appraising eye, and Harry casts a glance at him.
“Brilliant,” Harry intones in response, turning back to the rest of the room. “So, last week we worked on shield training: honing those duelling instincts for the protection of yourself, your team and any incapacitated victims you may be transporting,” the room nods along as Harry talks. “Today, we start on our endurance training. Most of you are good duellists but we need stable ones,” Harry says, then turns, nodding to Malfoy to continue.
“Perhaps fortunately, not all of us have the sheer and demented force of will possessed by The Boy Who Lived,” Malfoy opens with, not looking at Harry, and Harry turns back to the room, hiding his hard eye roll from the class with a long blink. “We do not expect you to be capable of throwing off Unforgivables like our bespectacled accompaniment here, and most importantly, we do not expect you to get yourselves eviscerated in the line of fire because you have exerted too much magical energy in combat,” Malfoy states, with his usual aplomb drama. “There is an art and a patience to balancing the demands of prolonged casting with the well of magic you have available to draw from.”
“Sometimes, the easiest and least draining spells to cast have the most pay off,” Harry adds in Malfoy’s pause, looking over at him. He sees Malfoy’s reaction in the indiscreet twitch of his sharp nose before Malfoy speaks.
“Spoken like a true, devout caster of the Stunning Spell.” Malfoy says without looking at Harry, voice tight, and the room titters. “We will demonstrate.”
As the room watches, Malfoy turns to Harry and unsheathes his wand from his thigh holster. Harry, reminded of his mental note to go easy on Malfoy, pulls his wand from his magically lengthened jean pocket but doesn’t raise it.
Malfoy rolls his eyes, eying Harry’s relaxed stance.
“Don’t play coy, Potter. It’s horribly boring,” Malfoy mutters, too quiet for the spectating trainees to hear. Then, louder, he says, “Notice shortly how we do not pull our proverbial punches, nor do we cast any overly exerting spells. Instead, we rely on a manageable, consistent stream of magic.”
Before Malfoy can cast, Harry throws a Disarming Charm and a Leg-Locking Curse. He aims them just north of the flat plain of Malfoy’s right shoulder, intending them to sail close but not land on Malfoy. Malfoy steps neatly out of the way, avoiding the spells by even greater of a margin, but his eyes harden.
“Confringo. Impedimenta.” Malfoy casts quickly to Harry’s left. But, as Harry steps to the right to clear them, Malfoy sends another stinging hex to his right. Harry casts a shield instantaneously, as Malfoy knew he would, and stares at Malfoy, his brow furrowed.
Usually, known from experience, it takes longer than two spells to get Malfoy worked-up enough to tighten his aim in one of their demonstrations (though, not a single demonstration has gone by where Malfoy hasn’t purposefully tried to hit Harry with some kind of experimental hex).
Harry doesn’t have long to continue his pondering of just what has tied so thorough of a knot in Malfoy’s knickers before Malfoy’s wand is whipping out at him again.
And so the volley of curses and hexes and jinxes begins, the raptly still-watching trainees humming and harring like they’re at the tennis. It must make for a good show: Malfoy isn’t holding back, and Harry quite quickly realises that Harry’s holding back is only angering Malfoy further.
In an attempt to knock him out and hopefully exhaust whatever bizarre fury Malfoy is currently being fuelled by, Harry casts a stronger Bombarda Maxima than strictly necessary, which only serves to promote an unfortunately not-unconscious Malfoy to send a sharp Diffindo at Harry from the floor and give him a very cheap haircut.
Within a moment, Malfoy is back on his feet and charging towards Harry with a determined stride, face like thunder and wand poised. The crowd watches with baited breath.
Harry tries a Disarming Charm, and interestingly, it lands, sending Malfoy’s wand whistling through the air into Harry’s palm. Harry doesn’t have long enough to take any further preventative measures against attack as he glances down in surprise at Malfoy’s wand in his hand, expecting Malfoy to have shielded himself, and looks back up at Malfoy, across the room. Except Malfoy isn’t across the room, he’s a lot closer than Harry would have guessed because he hasn’t stopped moving and doesn’t until he’s less a foot away and swinging his arm back to punch Harry soundly in the face.
And so, here they are, class cancelled for the day and Harry with a renewed appreciation for the effectiveness of muggle means of violence.
Above too precarious of a stack of notes and folders and documents, as 2:38 minutes have elapsed since the two sat, Robards meets the eyes of his co-Head Aurors with the kind of abject disappointment one uses when disciplining a dog whose pissed on your carpet.
“The two of you need to grow up.”
Harry blinks. Malfoy’s fingers still in their tapping.
The words hang in the air for a second then settle on the must-be-magically-reinforced pile of papers. Harry would swear the sentence weighed so much the pile teetered.
In response to Harry’s lack of response and whatever Malfoy’s face is doing, Robards’ own eyebrows tug together, so they’re all just frowning at each other over the most cluttered desk in existence.
Harry’s mouth is open and talking before he’s properly counselled himself on the most appropriate response.
“I’m 32?”
It comes out like a question, the sounds swept from him dumbly like they’re the first words he’s ever said. Malfoy groans under his breath, and Harry’s not sure how a sound can be so arrogant but he’s abstractly aware Malfoy is being condescending. Again. Which is rich, Harry thinks, because they’re the same bloody age and Malfoy has apparently gone mute apart from snarky noises.
Robards grunts.
“You are by best Aurors, but I can’t ignore that, put together, the two of you act like you’re still dithering about the Hogwarts halls. And when you’re not twatting around, punching each other during duel drills,” he pauses for emphasis, and Harry feels a swell of indignity puff his chest up: only Malfoy had done the punching, “you spend the rest of the time staring at each other like ruddy 4th years gearing up to ask Dumbledore to dance at the Yule Ball.” Harry is absently aware that next to him, Malfoy has swapped his tapping out for what Harry can only liken to actually full-body vibrating in his chair.
“Either buck up and have it out, or buck up,” Robards pauses with emphasis, face scrunched intentionally with the double meaning in his words, “and have it out.”
The musty air in the cramped little office sings with the rippling, corrosive magic Malfoy is restraining. Harry wouldn’t be surprised if all that energy had actually warped time somehow, making the seconds drag and skip unevenly. To be fair to Malfoy, which Harry isn’t often, he’s still doing better than Harry, who’s brain is just skimming over thoughts like a broken record.
“Gawain-,“ Malfoy starts, uncrossing his legs and leaning forward in his chair, tone dark and tight. Harry’s noticed Malfoy will call everyone but Harry by their first names. Apparently, he’ll still do it even when he’s so cross at them his magic has started to make all the printed words Harry can see on the papers on Robards’ desk dance and rearrange themselves, flying across the pages like buzzing bees.
“Malfoy,” Robards says, no-nonsense in his usual gruff tone. Before Malfoy can say anything more, Robards continues. “Sort your shit out, lads.”
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Robards’ office is close to the training rooms, making for a speedy intervention, but a walk from the rest of the departmental offices, making for a delightful journey back to their desks. Malfoy sets a punishing pace fresh out of Robard’s door, clearly intending to walk alone. Harry settles into a brisk near-jog to keep up.
“Mind sharing why you’re in such a bloody mood today?”
Malfoy’s eyes flash over to Harry’s as they walk (run?), casting an inscrutable eye at him and then flicking up to his hair, still unevenly shorn. Malfoy huffs.
Harry hums questioningly, prodding, looking across at Malfoy as they walk.
“You’d be aware that the paperwork from the Marglevine raid last week finally made it to my desk this morning,” Malfoy says and Harry nods, turning back to look down the hall. He’d stayed late, half asleep, and finished it last night to pass on to Malfoy to add his bit this morning. “I opened it first thing and may as well have been looking at a Muggle surrealist painting,” Harry looks over at Malfoy, briefly interested he has any more than a passing knowledge of painting, let alone the Muggle surrealism movement, before he refocuses forward. “Your work on it verges on incomprehensible. If you demand to so incorrigibly attempt the paperwork, at least do so in a time-sensitive manner, so I have the luxury of more than 45 seconds to re-do it in its entirety before it’s filed for tomorrow’s meeting adgenda.”
Harry takes a second to disgest this. This isn’t the first time they’ve discussed (argued about) Harry’s lacklustre completion of paperwork, but Harry’s raw cheekbone is a new variable.
“You’ve just socked me in the face because of paperwork,” Harry says, in blank non-comprehension.
Malfoy huffs again, and speeds up imperceptibly in his charge to his office, still trying to shake Harry off. As they break from the hallway and begin through the bull-pen of junior Auror desks between the two wings of offices and training rooms, Harry feels the eyes of near every Auror in the building do a double take: eyes flicking up to them in a cursory glance, flicking down to their desks, and then immediately looking back up in interest. Needless to say, they don’t often travel together unless they’re both on stretchers and completely unconscious.
“It’s not about the paperwork, though, is it,” Malfoy gets out through gritted teeth as Harry near canters trying to match pace.
On second thought, the entire populace of the Auror department is likely tracking them across the room not because they’re together, but likely because they must appear to have taken up a midday cross-departmental jogging route, Malfoy’s got them moving so fast. “It’s about your blatant disrespect for my requests. And, I’ll add, my time, in having to correct your consistent mistakes.”
Now, Harry should be a mature adult here and apologise without any further punching, arguing, or chasing through corridors. It would be the right thing to do. But, as we’ve discussed, he’s yet to undergo the lobotomy it would require to cut that pesky Malfoy-maddened region of his brain out, so he physically cannot do ‘mature adult’ in the present company.
“I haven’t asked you to be my secretary, Malfoy,” Harry says, cutting a look at him as they move the final distance to their neighbouring offices. They slow incrementally from their sprint as they reach their doors directly across from each other at the head of the hallway towards the west-wing training rooms, and Harry turns to face Malfoy.
“Interestingly, I have explicitly asked you, many-a-time, to make improvements to the quality of your paperwork,” Malfoy pauses, staring rigidly at him from across the hall and daring Harry to argue this point. “And at each instance, you have denied culpability and continued to produce paperwork that no longer even serves it’s purpose in being a paper-trail of events, but resembles more a trail of incomprehensible droll written with all the penmanship of an only mildly intelligent duck,” at this, Harry huffs indignantly, shifting on his feet as if readying a response, making Malfoy glower. “I will continue to fix this issue until you rise to the occasion and fix it yourself because it is my job in being your companioning Co-Head Auror, as it is yours, to ensure Head Auror matters are completed accurately and timely. Until such blessed day you do decide to rise to said occasion, I will also continue to yell at you about it.”
With that, Malfoy spins, throwing open the door to his office and throwing it resolutely shut behind him.
Harry stands, equal parts chastised and incensed, staring at the slammed door for a fifth of a second, before it’s thrown back open again and Malfoy charges back out with his wand raised.
Malfoy casts a lightning fast hair re-growth spell and a healing charm at Harry’s cheek, then, looking for all the world like he’d rather have his teeth pulled, says, “Sorry about the punch. Never even attempted that before, but I’ll admit I’ve been curious since 3rd year. You can thank your Granger for such delights,” and then him and his murky expression are gone again as quickly as he came, back behind his closed office door.
Harry blinks.
He lifts a bewildered hand to his previously-but-no-longer-tender cheek, and blinks again at the closed door for another moment.
Then, with a slow startle, he remembers he’s standing in the hallway of the Auror department, having just been tailed by the eyes of near enough the whole work force in a leg race turned veritable dressing-down. Casting a furtive glance back across the bull-pen, he finds everyone to be mostly preoccupied pretending to be occupied but at least not outright staring.
His hand stays on his cheek, probably just checking Malfoy hadn’t covertly cast for it to sever itself from the rest of his face, until he’s safe from prying eyes behind his own office door.