Chapter One
Of Fluff And Stuff: The Day When Everything Went Wrong
"Oh…Les Champs-Elysees" – Joe Dassin
Draco was having one of the worst days of his life. Granted, he had the best position in the Ministry, power, women and money. What he did not have now however, were his house elves.
Yeap, Hermione's S.P.E.W saved those creatures. Not only were they free to go, but Draco had to now do his own laundry!
What a sight!
Clothes were flying everywhere as he scurried hurriedly to find a pair of cashmere socks and a silk tie.
"Damn it! Damn those house elves! And Damn you HERMIONE GRANGER!" he cursed loudly and pointed his finger towards the ceiling. It really was a funny sight, simply because when he looked up with his finger pointing accusingly to an imaginary target, his Mirror-finish ceiling reflected back his own image.
Rather contrary, but Draco was like that.
Twisting his mouth into a disgruntled frown, he tweaked his messy tie irritably. His usually impeccable appearance gave way to lackluster today. He just wanted to get the day over an done with, and if he was going to have a miserable day, he would just as well pull as many people down with him as he possibly could.
Grabbing his handcrafted leather suitcase, he stormed out of the Malfoy Manor as fast as he could.
Deciding to take a jab at being a little more cheery, he thought to himself, "Well, as Minister, I guess one should exude a kind of confidence."
As he dashed down the steps, he caught sight of a blurry white streak flapping at his heels. A long stream of white toilet paper caught on his shoe was what he mistook to be a magic manifestation of his bad mood.
"What the bloody hell is everyone snickering at me like that for?!" Draco could not help but wonder irately.
As he was waiting for his cup of hot java at the coffee house, kids were sneering in laughter together as they stared at Draco. He looked down immediately to ensure that he had remembered to wear his pants that morning. He gulped in relief and patted his fine tailored pant suit, almost to convince himself that the material was real and tangible.
"Mr. Maa-ly-foi! Won Caapa-chino?"
The broken accent of the Chinese lady barista pained his ears. She had screeched his name across the busy coffee house.
"Yes, yes. That's mine." He reached across the coffee-stained counter and grabbed the takeaway.
He caught a glance of his crocodile leather watch. Shoot! He was going to be late if he didn't hurry!
With toilet paper flapping at his shoes, he made it just in time through the elevator doors to squeeze along with 9 other Ministry workers and aurors reporting for work.
"Mr. Minister." Many of them recognized Draco and gave their respective greetings. All of them had bemused looks on their faces that morning and Draco looked down once more at his suit. Everything was still there. He didn't understand. Groaning inwardly, he didn't think he wanted to anyway.
Draco was not one to be deflated easily, but after 25 years of acting cool, calm and totally in control, today was his first true, down day.
Striding out through the golden doors, he could've sworn he heard muffled laughter from the elevator. Ignoring it, he pushed the clear glass doors through his large office. He had a view like no other of the whole city. Feeling slightly cheered by this, he tried smiling just a little.
"Morning Janice."
"Good morning Mr. Malfoy."
Janice Kingsley was Draco's secretary of 3 years and was very efficient. She was the only witch who could really tolerate Draco's unpredictable style of bossing people around.
Dumping his case haphazardly across his desk, he settled on his chair which, that day, was creaking dangerously backwards.
"Well Mr. Malfoy, I have some news for you. I'm going to have to be on leave for the next 5 months. My babies are coming and I would like some time off. It's getting pretty hard to manage with twins in me." Janice said as she entered his office, patting her ever-expanding tummy.
"I know Janice, you've told me this before. Have you found someone to replace your duties?" Draco questioned with annoyance.
He knew it would be hard to replace Janice and he would probably have to prepare to go trough scaring at least 15 secretaries before she came back to work.
"Yes. In fact, she's just in the pantry clearing up the little "Midnight Party" you had with Mr. Zabini last night."
"Oh. Well, details then. Who is she?"
Flipping through her pink clipboard, she stopped at a slip of paper. "Sophie Zelphani, aged 19, doing her internship here in preparation for her degree in Hospitality."
"Right. Send her in with my coffee." He shoved his takeaway into her hands to be transferred into his favourite mug. It was an emerald green and silver stripped, with the words, "Minister of Magic" magically scribed onto it, they could dance around the cup.
Running his slender fingers through his hair, he stood up to face to magic board on his wall to read and rearrange his already hectic schedule for the day.
"Now, let's just shift the meeting to 10.30 and…" he mumbled softly to himself as he waved his wand to change the timings.
He took a step backward to reread his timetable.
He lifted his right foot.
BANG! CLASH! CRASH!
"OWW! Fuck!! What the HELL!!"
Draco's voice boomed through his office. He, she, well, whoever had done it, had REALLY done it this time. He was mad, fuming mad.
Our very own Minister had tripped backwards over his new intern, Sophie.
Sophie's eyes widened in fear and pure trepidation, she raised her right palm which held the toilet paper, that slip of soft paper which had caused Draco so much humiliation and distress that morning was now exposed and uncovered.
"I… toilet paper?" she whispered hoarsely.
"ARGH!! Get out of here. NOW!" Draco commanded with so much order and fierceness behind his voice that she gathered up the broken pieces of mug hurriedly and rushed out, tripping on her own robes and long flow-y skirts as she attempted to exit his wrath.
"AHH!"
Draco let himself express a strong show of exasperated emotion. He fell back into his chair with a hard thump. As he leaned too far backwards for his own good and covered his face with his palms, his chair showed its true colours.
"FUUUUCK!!"
His furniture didn't like him that much I guess.
Snickers