The Wizarding Award Scheme Programme (or W.A.S.P. for short)

3. They Got Me A Wife

He was just about to ask about a room when a slurred voice mumbled next to him, 'you've probably had enough. It's not a good idea for Aurors to get drunk in public, especially the famous poster-boy ones still in their uniforms. It would give the Ministry a royal headache if someone were to get a snapshot of that and put it on the front page of The Prophet.'

That hurt, possibly because it was too close to the truth for Harry to want to admit.

The voice had emerged from the man heaped over the bar with his head in his arms but Harry didn't need to see his face or his platinum blond hair to recognise the drunken drawl. His heart seemed to falter in an unwarranted manner; he hadn't seen the man since his trail after the war.

'I'll join him...' the voice elided from beneath the crook in his elbows.

'I think that's a case of pot calling the kettle black when it comes to having anymore to drink.'

'Haha! Was that a pun, Potter?'

'What?'

'About you stealing my noble Black heritage...' Malfoy slowly lifted his head from his arms, it looked too heavy for the task. His slightly wavy hair fell softly around his face. Malfoy wore it longer in the post-war days and it just brushed his jawline.

'No ... it's a muggle saying ... oh, never mind...' Harry stared into a pair of watery-grey eyes, they looked red-rimmed, as if he'd not slept for twenty-four hours and he had definitely been crying. 'You look like shite, Malfoy,' he said, before he could stop his wayward blunt tongue.

'Thanks,' he pushed his empty tumbler towards Old Tom, who tentatively poured another two drinks at arm's length and backed away quickly from the renowned enemies sitting side-by-side at his bar.

'I'm celebrating...' Malfoy slurred.

'Oh, congratulations then,' Harry clinked his glass against Malfoy's.

'Aren't you going to ask why?' the blond man demanded before Harry was able to take a sip.

Harry sighed and placed his glass back on the bar. 'Why?'

'Happy fucking nineteenth birthday to me!' Draco was slurring a little too loud and people were starting to listen in. 'Do you want to know what my darling parents got me for my fucking birthday, Potter?' he drawled in drunken languid tones.

Harry wasn't sure he wanted to know but he was fairly certain he was going to hear.

'They got me a wife... There you go, son, happy fucking birthday, now go proliferate the family name and to hell with your happiness...' he went to knock back his drink in one but Harry rested a hand on his forearm and prevented him.

'Probably not a good idea,' he murmured.

Malfoy tried half-heartedly to shake Harry's hand away but gave up quickly; Harry's grip remained firm and the effort proved too much.

'I'm getting fucking married, in August, before the Greengrasses can find an excuse to renege...' he hiccupped.

'Congratulations again, I suppose...' Harry muttered, but somehow, he knew he didn't really mean it, he felt his innards sinking and the Firewhiskey churning at the news. Suddenly he felt rather sick and he pushed his own drink away, unable to stomach it anymore. He couldn't believe that Malfoy was being pushed into an arranged marriage, let alone at nineteen-years-old.

'Stop fucking trying to offer meaningless felicitations for the fucking disaster I'm trying to drown out.'

Harry definitely decided it was Malfoy who needed a room and who probably shouldn't be talking like this in such a very public sphere.