Fleur was trying to work. Emphasis on trying. It seemed British men were obnoxious and rude and had no work ethic, or perhaps that was just Elias Johnson, her coworker. He was not the only one in the shared workspace of the publishing house, but he was the most callous one.
After she finished her college course and her masters in record time (three and a half years for college, one and a half for her masters, too much coffee and Wideye potions to count) and the whole war business was over and done, Fleur got a job translating magical tomes from French to English.
Sure, her spoken words had a terrible accent that only popped when she couldn't control it anymore, but she could write well enough. The Veela-suppressing ring she wore helped people pass her by, coupled with the too thickly rimmed glasses, the badly done bun of blonde hair, distractions from her natural beauty. Who would've thought that Delacour from editorial, who dressed herself in comfy sweaters, and always had her nose in a book that hadn't seen the light of day since it was published, was that same haughty girl from a few years ago, who could barely control the allure? No one.
That's how Fleur preferred it: anonymous and quiet, only doing her job and going home to her boyfriend after a long day of work, with her eyes tired and red from reading books written in cursive centuries before she even thought of being born.
Most books, nowadays, were translated through a translation spell, with little to no problems. The issue was pre-1940 books, the era the spell had been invented, which usually contained too many little differences in terminology to have an automatized spell do its work, and as such, could not be trusted to provide accurate translations. There was where Fleur's job entered: she slaved away over the books so they could be republished in newer, more correct editions, in either France or Britain. It paid well enough to let her have a comfortable lifestyle.
Right now, working on a book from the 16th century about the influence of the plague on magic Ley lines, with more than one dictionary open to check if her translation was correct, Fleur was three seconds away from snapping, taking her wand from its holster, and then killing him there on the spot.
But maybe that was a bad idea. She was not in the mood for dealing with the aurors who would've been inevitably been brought in because a Veela went into a rampage.
Wait, no, maybe that would be a sexy surprise to him. But then, again, dealing with the law was always such a chore - and Fleur had read enough law books from the past century or three to know she did not want to get caught in British laws regarding murders, since their law code hadn't been updated since the 17th century.
"Are you sure you don't want to go down to take a coffee? The little shop near the Menagerie is fantastic, and you look like you need some warming up." Elias said, and Fleur wondered if he didn't have work to do. Everyone except him seemed to be working, and yet there Elias was, hovering over Fleur like that was his job.
"Yes, Johnson, pretty sure." Fleur gritted, eyes raised to check a word in the dictionary. Elias leaned into her, leaking his disgusting cologne all over her nose. Gross.
"Then how about after work? We could call it a date." Merlin, maybe the Aurors were the better option. "There's a bar, near Knockturn Alley, but sure it's a nice enough place for…"
Merlin, Fleur did not want to have this conversation.
"I have a boyfriend, Johnson." Fleur turned the pages of one dictionary, not looking at him to see if he got a hint. He did not. That shouldn't surprise Fleur.
Elias, instead of leaving to do his work - and why was no one else in this damned place interfering? -, simply snorted. The quill she had been using to annotate made a sharp cracking noise in the silent room.
"Yeah, right." He sat on her desk, almost disrupting the pile of dictionaries she had carefully stacked that day, and she hissed. Just because she was not dressed like a beauty queen did not mean she wasn't pretty. This man was an idiot, she concluded. "Come on, Fleur, it's just a date. Can I call you Fleur?"
"You're already calling me my name, Johnson." Fleur, perhaps, should stab him with her quill, teach him a lesson. The suppression ring glowed in a warm orange, a warning sign for her to calm down lest she break the item, but Fleur summarily ignored it. "Get off my desk before I get you off it."
He snorted again. The ring shone even more, and Fleur decided that actually, maybe she should murder someone. It surely would be a fun bonding exercise.
"Try it, then. Do they even teach spells in Beauxbatons?" Fleur opened her mouth, raising herself from her seat and palming her wand holster, sensing heads turning rather than seeing them, when Alice from the reception peeked her head in the door. That broke the mood a little, and her ring seemed to shine less orange.
"Delacour, you've got a visit!" She said, giggling childishly, and that made Fleur realize that maybe, just maybe, her wish had been realized with no murder attempts. "It's Harry Potter!"
There were a few gasps, and she smiled, cockily so. Fleur adjusted her sweater and passed by Elias, hitting his shoulder on the way out as her sweet, sweet boyfriend appeared on the door.
He looked terrible, like he had just rolled out of bed. A quick glance at the clock told Fleur that yes, he was late to work - and yet he had passed by her work before going down to the Auror office. She all but skipped to him, not even bothering to greet Harry before adjusting the tie he wore. Crooked, as usual. She wasn't surprised.
"What are you doing here?" Fleur asked, adjusting his crooked tie, gently, but surely, guiding Harry back into the privacy of the hallway.
She gave a glare to her coworkers, who quickly went back to their own translations. Frankly, why was everyone always like this? Fleur had been here for five years already, but she never got used to this.
Harry rose his hand, showing a familiar package: her lunch, which she distinctly remembered now having left on top of the counter, forgotten and abandoned. She slapped her own forehead gently, and Harry chuckled as she gave him a quick peck of the lips.
"Thanks, sweetheart. I would've been in a terrible mood when I realized." Fleur did not mention the fact she had been a few moments away from spelling Elias into a slow death, taking the package from his hands, lazily using a spell to float it to a safe corner of her desk, before finishing to adjust his tie. "You won't be late, will you?"
"I'd always get late for you, dear." Harry kissed her, and Fleur smiled into the comfort his arms brought to her, the smell of her soap and his cologne on his skin intermingling into a familiarity that made her feel instantly better.
After that awful Triwizard Tournament, he'd sent her letters. Little things, really, as if the boy had been touch-starved his whole life and did not know how to talk. Fleur, amused as she was bored, replied. The communication had spanned his last years at Hogwarts and her entire college life, with Fleur helping him study, explaining concepts with little, terrible drawing, when needed, and Harry sometimes keeping her company through a Floo call, as Fleur rambled about her major in a mixture of French and English he grew used to. She had missed Harry dearly the year he'd gone into the hunt, and out of sheer headstrongness, had done better on her tests just she could show him them.
When Fleur came in to England, five years after they first met, Harry offered to let Fleur crash in his flat - an opportunity that she, jobless and only with her meager savings from freelancing a translation here and there during college, took gladly, eager to cut costs anywhere she could -, and somewhere during the period between then and now, the intimacy the two shared had gone from platonic to romantic.
Fleur couldn't pinpoint a moment when kisses had become normal, when the second room she'd been given was converted into a home office because frankly, Fleur had been spending more time in Harry's bed than on her own, when he started cooking her lunch: it just had happened, as natural as breathing, and that was fine. Some things did not need over complicated explanations.
She separated herself from Harry, and looked into his green eyes.
"Alright, I'm feeling better." Fleur smiled to Harry, and poked his chest. "Go to work. You might've saved the world, sweetheart, but I'm sure the minister can still fire you."
Harry smiled, kissed her once more, and Fleur felt her knees getting weak. When he separated, she could feel her cheeks reddening.
"Same to you. See you after work? I can come and pick you up."
"If you don't get wrapped in a case, sure." Fleur replied, fixing her hair, and Harry nodded. "Until later, sweetheart."
They heard scurrying coming from the room, and Fleur had to bite her lower lip to not laugh, and Harry - well, he tried. Unfortunately, he failed.
"I'll try. See you later, dear." With a last peck on her lips, Harry left, and Fleur straightened her sweater, adjusted her glasses, and went back inside the editorial room, where it seemed every pair of eyes was upon her.
At least Elias was back on his table. With a sigh, Fleur went back to work, already ready for this day to end - after all, Harry had promised to come pick her up, and Fleur wanted to have everything done by the time he did.