Sweet and Sour

"What the hell are we going to do?" asked Lucius Malfoy, in the tone of a man who was truly at his wit's end, as he sat on the end of his king-sized bed. Cornelius Fudge, who lay in the middle of the bed, looked at him with adoring eyes. To have called Fudge scantily clad would have been overly generous, as he wore little more than a diamante g-string.

"I can think of one thing," the King of Wedgies replied, a knowing look in his eyes. Lucius made an odd noise that came halfway between a snort and a sniff.

"No," he said firmly, with the air of one who has finally put his foot down. "No we are not going to do that. We have been up all night doing that, and we need a plan. Anyway, I'm wearing my three-quarter length black satin dressing-gown, and you know that when the gown's on it ain't coming off again, not even for you, Fudgie." Fudge's face drooped.

"Please, Luce?"

"Nope. Need a plan. Preferably evil."

"Does Narcissa know about...about..."

"About what?"

"About...us?"

Lucius smiled, his eyes glowing with an emotion that Fudge had never seen glow before. It was evil. But with Lucius, it didn't matter so much. He was so charismatic and, as Fudge had to admit, just plain gorgeous as well. In the Minister's experience, evil had always been such a cold, deadening feeling, but Lucius brought it to life and gave it so much radiance and warmth that he found it almost attractive.

"Stop looking at me like that. I know I'm the most gorgeous, sexy, openly gay and willing-to-shag-you embodiment of evil you've ever seen, but it doesn't mean I want sex with your eyeballs." Fudge looked shocked.

"If that's how you really feel, maybe we should just break it off."

"Yeah, sure, as the most senior Ministry official and the most natural blonde in the office building, we can just break it off. Maybe no one'll notice. I mean, the Prophet is already having a field day; I'm sure if we say it's all over now they'll just ignore us and leave us alone. Think, candy boy! This is the biggest news of the century. I shot seventeen journalists this morning for trespassing on my lawns, God knows how many I'll have to shoot this afternoon!"

They were interrupted by the screech of the large barn owl that had just landed on the windowsill. Lucius paid the owl and looked at the front page of the paper. Again. It was littered with unflattering pictures, including one of Fudge wearing a woman's bikini (the memory of which he still shuddered at) and one of himself in heavy makeup, a lurid green mini dress and fishnet tights. Although, he thought, green was definitely his colour.

"No," he said, almost without thinking. "Ciss doesn't know." Then, he thought about what he had said.

"Actually, she probably does. She knows I'm, I'm... well, she knows that I'm in our way inclined." Fudge looked puzzled for a moment, until it finally clicked.

"Oh, she knows you're gay."

"Well, to put it that way, yes."

"Oh," replied Fudge. It was obvious to him that Malfoy's sexuality raised no questions with his wife, which seemed a little odd.

"Doesn't she have...needs?" he asked, with as much tact as he could muster.

"I'm sure she does," Lucius replied. "I think she sees a man down in the village sometimes." He spoke vaguely, as if he didn't really know.

"I get the feeling that there are still some things that I don't know about you, Lucius."

"There are many things that you don't know about me. For example, did you know that my parents were both hippies, disgraces to the Malfoy name, and that my real name is Loofah?" Fudge had to admit that he didn't. Lucius continued.

"Narcissa and I have an...agreement. We actually met through her roommate, when we were both just out of Hogwarts. I had noticed her at school, and we had had a few dates until I realised that I was...well, in this way inclined, and broke it off. I had a date with her roommate; we went to a sleazy nightclub around the back of Diagon Alley. We didn't have a very good time there, but I was cold and far from home so I went back to his flat for coffee. Ciss was there, and she sort of guessed that I was...in this way inclined.

I, well, we, well, Brian was my...male companion for some time. He wasn't a very good lover but I got to spend time with Narcissa. Her wonderful, witty conversations were like a breath of fresh air to me. Plus, she was beautiful. I hated to admit it, I found myself attracted to a woman. Anyway, she looked a bit like me, and I was already in love with myself.

I broke it off with Brian, and my mother started pestering me to get married. She still thought I was straight. So I married Narcissa to shut her up. We get on very well together. I would go as far as to say that I love her, although in more of a friendly way than anything else. She had gotten used to living with a man who was...in our way inclined, and so it all works very well. "

"Is Draco your son?"

"Yes."

"Oh," said Fudge, with a glazed look of amazement on his face. "I'd probably better go. It would be best if I left now." Lucius felt anger surge through his body. He felt his blood boil and flow through his veins like quicksilver.

"Ok, then, go. If you can't handle the pies, don't stick your fingers in them." Fudge backed away from the angry blonde, who towered above him, like a wounded animal. Then, with a soft pop, he disapparated.

Lucius sat down on the bed with a sigh. Fudge had gone. He didn't feel like pursuing him. Ignorant, self-righteous old git. A typical Gryffindor! Always doing good, and sacrificing themselves. Didn't the old fool realise that, as the Minister, he couldn't just walk away. What would the Prophet say? Then, Lucius realised he didn't really care.

*

Harry tossed and turned, as he slept through a sea of dreams. They were fast and meaningless, and he drifted in and out of them as though they were waves. As each one crashed over him, he was transported to its nonsensical world for a few seconds. It was nearly Christmas, so unsurprisingly, tinsel featured heavily in the dreams. Usually protecting the modesty of cute girls. Then, suddenly, a familiar face appeared to him, seemingly hovering above him in his dream.

It was a pale and pointy face that looked slightly familiar but a lot more mature than usual. It's long blonde hair cascaded over him, brushing against his face and tickling his nose. Harry opened his eyes sleepily, but nothing changed. After a second, he realised that Lucius Malfoy was standing over his bed.

"What the fuck are you doing here," Harry yelled.

"Ssssshhhh. Keep your voice down, you little fool. The whole world already knows I'm gay, do you want them to think I'm some sort of pervert as well?"

"Yes," replied Harry, very quickly.

"That was a rhetorical question, you skunky-haired little tosser!" Harry decided that now was a very good time to run, and without warning he shot down the stairs and into the common room like a bullet. Lucius chased after him, and grabbed him by the collar of his threadbare pyjamas. Being a lot taller than the skinny sixteen year old, it was not difficult for him to lift Harry over to a sofa.

He plonked Harry down and sat next to him. They sat in awkward silence for a long while, until Lucius took a deep breath and began to speak.

"Harry, I'm here, well, I'm here because, well... can you guess why I'm here?"

"Ummm, no?" Lucius looked at him pleadingly, and Harry found something in the man's eyes impossible to resist.

"Urr, ok. You're...evil, so is it about...Voldemort?" Lucius shook his head. "Is it anything about Draco? Is his grandmother sick or something?" Lucius shook his head again.

"Is it to do with your wife?"

"Getting warmer, Potter."

"No, it wouldn't be about your wife, would it, because you're gay," Harry replied with a wicked smile. "Is it about Fudge?" Lucius nodded. "Have you broken up?" Lucius nodded again. Harry's eyes widened.

"I know why you're here. You and Fudge have broken up, and you saw me in Diagon Alley last September and you thought I looked kinda gorgeous, and I probably batted for your team, and your son hates me so he wouldn't suspect a thing if you came to my bedroom late one night and we had passionate but meaningless sex!"

"Why you little... I ought to kill you!" Harry realised that this might also be a good time to run. He had obviously hit the nail on the head.

Lucius chased him out onto the snow-covered lawns, crashing into him and knocking them both to the floor. They rolled for several yards until Harry noticed his legs were unusually cold. He lowered his hand and also realised that Lucius was clutching his trouser-leg and nibbling his buttocks.

It was not, he had to admit, the weirdest thing that had ever happened to him, and so he allowed the older man to continue for a while.

"Listen, Luce, can we go inside. I may not be a brass monkey but I can still have the balls frozen off of me. And you wouldn't want that, would you?"

Lucius got up, and dragged Harry along.

When they arrived back inside the castle Lucius bundled Harry into a broom cupboard. He did...things that men who were his way inclined were liable to do when in a small space with a sixteen-year-old with a god-like body (compared to Fudge).

"Guess what?" asked Harry when he was sure the thrusting and clawing had stopped. "I just mooned Hagrid!"

*

"Have you seen the front page of the Prophet?" asked Hermione of Harry as he sat down to breakfast the next morning. "Fudge and Malfoy have broken up!"

"I know," replied Harry, sleepily. Ron and Hermione gave him looks of astonishment.

"How exactly do you know?" asked Ron. "The paper only just arrived."

"I know. A second-year had a copy on the staircase. I read over her shoulder." Oooooooooh, he thought, close one.

"Are you alright, mate? You look as though you didn't get much sleep last night."

"I'm fine Ron. I just had a lot of homework to do yesterday evening, so I stayed up a bit later doing it." Not to mention, he thought, the fact that I had Lucius Malfoy in me for most of the night.

Ron eyed him suspiciously, but decided to leave it. If Harry had something to tell him, he was sure that he would either talk about it when he felt ready or that it would explode into a huge volcanic eruption of scandal and he would find out about it at the same time as the whole school did. Either way, he knew it had better be good...

*

'Attractive blond male, 43, seeks similar for lots of horny sex'. Lucius flipped his pencil over, rubbed the last sentence out and began again.

Gorgeous, sexy, hunk-o'-man seeks other male for intense pleasure. Inferiority complex useful but not essential. Lucius sighed. It was harder than he had thought to write the little adverts in the personals section of the Daily Prophet.

"Hey, Cissy, can you give me a hand?" he yelled to his wife, who was painting his toenails while her exfoliating facemask set. They both wore dressing gowns in identical shades of cerise. Her hair was set in curlers whilst his was wrapped up turban-style in a towel on the top of his head.

They both loved the little sleepover-style parties that they had every weekend (in term time- Draco had no idea!)

Narcissa came over to him, and looked over what he had written on the small notepad. She took it from him, careful not to smudge her newly polished fingernails.

"Ah," he said, after looking over her corrections.

"This way," she shouted, over the noise of the blow dryer. "You sound nice, not pervy, and you might have more of a chance of getting as nice guy. Not like that awful Fudge -" she made a face "-he was nasty. Get a cute little brunette." He nodded in agreement. It was so good that he and his wife had such an open and honest relationship.

He knew he loved her, and that she loved him, but in a different way to that expected of a married couple. As far as they both were concerned, they were more like sisters or flatmates than husband and wife, and neither minded.

The last time they had ever done... anything remotely like what was... expected of a heterosexual couple, had been many years ago. Sixteen, to be precise. He hadn't particularly enjoyed himself, but he was a Malfoy, and the duty of a Malfoy was to continue the family line regardless of sexual orientation.

He knew that she saw other people just as he did, but he also felt that they had something to offer each other that they could not give any sexual partner. They had become accustomed to each other, and he knew that if anything ever came between them he would have lost a part of himself.

"Now, hon, if you send that into the Prophet the guys will not be able to resist you!" she laughed, and pointed to the advert scribbled on a little piece of parchment.

"Severus!" he called, and a huge brown owl flew into the room through the open window. Narcissa tutted as the owl flew past.

"I wish you hadn't called the owl after that greasy slime ball. It makes me shudder every time you call the blasted thing!" She screwed her nose up, and Lucius laughed.

"I'm just poking fun at poor old Sev behind his back. I don't like him any more than you do, but he's family."

"So he keeps reminding me, by kissing me every time we meet. Uggh, I swear that man needs a good exfoliation potion." Lucius chuckled again.

"At least he doesn't kiss me," he replied. "Although there have been reports that he...prefers the company of the chaps."

"Oooooooooh," said Narcissa, pricking up her perfectly formed, milk-white ears at the sound of gossip. "Do tell!"

Lucius smiled. Tonight they would have some fun...

*

"I've got you now, Potter," sneered Draco Malfoy. Harry had to admit that he was right. Trapped in a corner, with no obvious means of escape, Malfoy most certainly had gotten him. Maybe he shouldn't have called Malfoy's mother a tramp.

Harry had absolutely no idea what to do until he was visited by a sudden flash of inspiration.

"Malfoy, I have to tell you something. I just wanted to say that I have always admired you. It must be tough always having to play up to a nasty image. I've met your father-" and I know him a little too well, he thought, "- and it can't have been easy growing up in his house. Plus, I find you... attractive."

Harry had definitely not been expecting what came next. He had thought that Malfoy would be so startled that he could easily make his escape. Instead, the guy looked flattered. Amorous, even.

"Well, Potter, you're not too bad looking yourself. I always thought I'd like to...get to know you a little better." Harry was completely unprepared for this.

He had to think fast.

"Well then," he gabbled, saying the first things that came into his head. "If you like me, prove it. Lets have sex." Malfoy's eyes lit up.

"Meet me in the dungeons in ten minutes," said the blonde boy, a dribble of drool escaping onto his chin, and he ran off.

It wouldn't have been fair, even to Malfoy, to stand him up, so Harry had no choice but to go along.

*

Lucius sighed, drained his coffee cup, and placed his head in his hands. He had gotten several replies from his ad in the Prophet, but none of them had been quite right. Maybe he should have stated that his preference was for human men. Although, the marsh-creature had been kind of cute. Maybe he would owl him later.

Ever since he had broken up with Fudge, nothing had been going his way. There had been more owls from Hogwarts, saying that Draco was in trouble, Narcissa had been remote lately, and most of all he couldn't stop thinking of that night with Harry Potter. He shouldn't have remembered it; it meant nothing, and hadn't even been very good, but something about the boy had hooked him, and left him wanting more.

The more he thought about the mess that his love life had become, the more obvious the answer became to him. He had to write to Harry, and he had to do it now...