aeonian

Chapter One

"I don't know why you can't just accept the fact that I made more arrests than you last year! The numbers don't lie, Malfoy. It's all right here—"

            Elsie tapped the tip of her wand on the file in front of her repeatedly, her eyes wide and her lips pursed.

            "And how many of those arrests were unassisted?" Draco Malfoy crossed his muscular arms over his chest and narrowed his eyes at his coworker.

            Elsie scoffed and pulled the file back against her chest.

            "Are you assuming that I'm incapable of doing my job independently? Because, I will have you know that—" She stormed at him with an accusatory finger pointed directly at him.

            "Don't get your knickers in a twist, Carlisle." Draco put his hand up by his chest defensively, "I'm just trying to compare fair data here. Forgive me for wanting to be accurate."

            Elsie rolled her eyes and stomped back over to her desk.   

            "If I didn't know any better, I would say that I've bruised your ego." She aggressively stacked papers before sending them back into the filing cabinet.

            "Ah, yes. My poor, fragile ego. How will I ever recover?" Draco fawned sarcastically, putting his hands over his heart before smirking and returning to the other side of his desk.

            "You two done? I'm trying to get this paper work done and can hardly focus with you two bickering." Hermione Granger huffed from her desk.

            Her quill flew over the parchment in front of her so fast, Elsie thought she saw smoke.

            "Finishing up that report on the Essex arrests?" Ron leaned on the side of Hermione's desk and peered over at her writing.

            "Yes. And I'm nearly done. So, if you would please..." Hermione glared at her fiancé warningly, telling him with her eyes that she was ready to go home already.

             "Would you like me to take a look at them before you send them in for filing?" Harry walked back into the office with a burgundy mug in his hand, filled to the brim with steaming hot coffee.

            "No. I've already revised them three times myself." Hermione sighed, dipping her quill in ink once more before signing the last page of her report.

            She set down her quill and sighed heavily, letting the tension drop from her shoulders.

            "Finally..." she sighed, collecting the pages neatly and tucking them into a black folder.

            "Malfoy, I need your reports on the arrests you made in Diagon Alley last week to complete the incident file. Do you have them ready or are you going to make me wait until Monday again?" Elsie folded her hands on her desk and looked at Draco across the room.

            "I can owl them to you over the weekend." Draco said, scribbling something down.

            Elsie huffed and leaned back in her chair, annoyed that she was having to wait on him again.

            "What? Is that not to your liking, princess?" Draco squinted at her; annoyance thick in his own voice.

            "Oh, here we go..." Ron groaned, scrubbing a hand over his face.

            "No. It's fine. Take your time. It's not like I have anything better to do this weekend than to wait around for a report that was supposed to be done this morning." Elsie exclaimed, waiving her hands about.