Heretic here. This is your edited-to-be-slash free version of Public Affairs. To find the Harry/Draco edition, please check my author page. Stories are virtually identical through chapter 5. Enjoy, gen fans!

Public Affairs

Harry opened the door to the office with "Malfoy, Malfoy & Malfoy" painted in huge black letters on the window like something out of a film noir. It fit perfectly with the third-floor Knockturn Alley location, but rather less well with the bright and cheery waiting room behind it; he had rather been expecting heavy mahogany, visible decanters and a sassy blonde secretary, not comfortable blue chairs, bare wood floors, and lamps that looked like they might have come from that IKEA Hermione was so fond of. The reception desk was unstaffed and so he looked past it to the single unmarked door behind it. He stepped into the waiting area and waited for a response – and when none came, he called tentatively, "Hello?"

A thud and an "Ow!" came from behind the door.

"Hello?" Harry said again.

"Yes, well," came the familiar drawling tone from behind the door, "you've already startled me so you may as well-" at this point the door opened and Harry Potter came face to face with Draco Malfoy for the fourth time that year – which was four times more than in the preceding eighteen.

"Potter," Malfoy said, recovering his composure with lightening speed. "Are you here to arrest me?"

Harry couldn't help himself. "Why, what have you done?"

Malfoy sneered. "I was wondering, myself, if someone was going to come and try to persuade me to 'resign' from the Wizengamot." His voice dripped with disdain and sarcasm, but somewhere under all that, Harry's Auror instincts told him, Malfoy was afraid.

"I saw what happened with your bill," Harry said, watching Malfoy's mouth, which tightened. "I'm sorry." And he was. Malfoy had spent a lot of time and effort drafting a bill designed to end the restrictions on where former Death Eaters and their associates could legally seek employment, arguing that after almost twenty years of being ostracized from the Ministry, the Auror Office and of course Hogwarts, it was time to reintegrate. The Daily Prophet had dubbed it the "Bad-Faith Bill" and printed quotes from Death Eater victims, presumably from the vaults where they kept twenty years' worth of venom, reminding the wizarding world of all the atrocities the Death Eaters had committed as though anyone could forget.

Malfoy shrugged although the gesture clearly cost him. "It was never going to pass, was it?" he said as he raised a hand to his forehead, ever-higher as his hairline ran for the back of his skull. The gesture made him so vulnerable that Harry almost wanted to comfort him.

Instead he looked away, out of the office window, back to the door. "I thought you worked alone," Harry said, making conversation. When he turned back to Malfoy, he was frowning.

"I do."

"Oh," said Harry, confused. "Then who are the other two Malfoys? On the sign?"

"Oh, they're all me," Malfoy breezed, evidently back on track. "I'm a solicitor, barrister and orator after all – I require recognition in all aspects of my brilliance."

Harry blinked rapidly, trying to process the fact that Malfoy was either a complete egomaniac or literally insane. "Er, right," he said instead.

"One can certainly tell that you are none of these things, eloquence never having been your strong suit," said Malfoy.

"And yet people listen to me," Harry retorted, slight stress on the ime/i.

Malfoy's eyes flashed, but the expression was barely there before it was gone again. It reminded Harry of the picture that had accompanied the article about the failure of Malfoy's bill – Malfoy storming out of the Wizengamot, quoted as saying, "What's the difference between this and the Muggleborn Registration Commission?" There had been the predictable outrage and counter-comments of which Harry's favourite had been Senior Undersecretary to the Minister Terry Boot's, "Likening measures to protect our society to pernicious racism tends to dangerous hyperbole." It sounded so like Hermione that Harry had smiled – and it was damn near a defence of Malfoy, too, compared to the slew of people calling for his resignation for even daring to suggest that after twenty years the wizarding world should let the past be the past.

"And yet you're getting divorced," Malfoy snapped.

Harry immediately forgot all about Malfoy's frankly reasonable bill to the Ministry. Of course no one listened to Malfoy; Malfoy was spiteful and arrogant and responded to setbacks with childish taunts. "And where's your wife, Malfoy?" he spat. Malfoy looked away.

Harry took a deep breath and said, "This is getting us nowhere."

Malfoy turned away, the closest he would ever come to apologizing. He cleared his throat and Harry watched his throat working, his long blond hair falling over pale skin. And then he frowned at himself for watching Malfoy at all.

Malfoy's head came up again and he met Harry's eyes, the cold grey ice blast back in full force. "Why did you come here, Potter?"

Harry exhaled slowly. "You know I'm no longer Head Auror?"

Malfoy nodded. "I could hardly miss the ceremony commemorating all your fine work," he drawled acidly.

"Well, er…" Harry wasn't quite sure how to put this next part.

"Spit it out, Potter," Malfoy ordered. "I've got things to do today and you just can't get the staff these days."

Perfect opening. "Actually, I'm here…"

"Bloody temp agency," Malfoy wasn't listening.

"…about a job," Harry concluded.

Malfoy looked at him for a moment. The moment stretched longer. Malfoy blinked.

"I'm sorry," he said finally, "Would you repeat that?"

"I'm here about a job," Harry obliged.

Malfoy's face was making the most comical expression Harry had ever seen – and Malfoy had a plethora of comical expressions, Harry remembered well. He was half-frowning, half-squinting, with his mouth trying to jerk itself into a sneer and hang open in shock all at once. The only feature consistent with Malfoy's usual poise was the left eyebrow, half raised and causing the forehead above to crinkle into by-now well-worn lines.

"Why?" said Malfoy.

Harry tried to grin disarmingly. "Would you believe I want to help?"

"No," Malfoy said flatly.

Harry huffed in surprised laughter.

"Well, all right, yes," Malfoy conceded. "You always were the one helping puppies across the road when you weren't eviscerating people in bathrooms –"

"You were trying to cruciate me!" Harry retorted.

"But why would you suddenly care about Death Eater rights when you…" Malfoy's breath hissed out in a rush as he visibly realized something. "Your younger son."

Harry tensed. "What about him?"

Malfoy's mouth curled. "You know what about him. He's a Slytherin, isn't he?"

Harry nodded. "And it doesn't make him less of a person," he said harshly, hoping that Malfoy would hear something that would make him listen.

But Malfoy was thinking about something else as he mused, "Of course not, Potter. But getting other people to accept that is something of a challenge these days."

"It's really bad for him at school," Harry said, shifting uncomfortably, watching Malfoy carefully. "I don't want-"

Malfoy was smiling again, sharp and bright as a knife, as he interrupted, "Well, altruism be damned, I'll trust self-interest every time. Were you thinking of a receptionist position?"

"I won't be working for you, Malfoy," Harry told him bluntly.

Malfoy tilted his head, confused. "Then what…?"

"I'll be working with you… as equal partners."

Malfoy looked appalled. "Oh, I don't know about-"

He might not but Harry did. Time for the plain speaking: "You can lord it over me and pretend that you don't need my help, and I can stand here for another hour boring both of us by reminding you why you do or, here's a suggestion, I can make us some tea, acting in a receptionist capacity for this one time only, and we can thrash out a plan. So what's it going to be?"

Malfoy allowed a reluctant smile to tug one side of his mouth upward. "All right then. But in the morning I drink coffee, thank you very much."

Harry smiled. "See, this is going to work out. I can make that, too."