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1142h – Cissy
1143h – Are mom and dad coming home for dinner tonight
1145h – No
1145h – They’re having dinner with the lawyer
1146h – Company lawyer or dad’s saviour lawyer
1147h – Wills and probate lawyer
1147h – They’re writing Andy out
1150h – Lol yes finally
1150h – I get where they’re coming from
1151h – Trailer park trash is still trailer park trash
1152h – And his family is weird and gross
1153h – Gross like they don’t brush their teeth gross or
1155h – Gross like I think two of his dad’s siblings went away for four months and came back married or sth
1156h – Ew
1157h – None of that in our family
1158h – Right
1159h – Um
1159h – Uncle Orion and Aunty Walburga are cousins
1201h – But they’re second cousins
1202h – Um
1203h – You have your cousins, then you have your first cousins, then you have your second cousins
1204h – No Bella I don’t think that’s right
1205h – But anyways
1205h – Disowning Andy
1205h – Like
1206h – That’s a bit harsh?
1207h – Well like mom said
1207h – You can’t eat love
1208h – So like
1208h – They can now not eat love
1208h – Together
1209h – Without mooching off mom and dad
1210h – I think that was their point though
1210h – Wtv I’m bored of this conversation
1211h – Do you still have your lab goggles from high school
1212h – Yeah just ask Karolina where she put them
1213h – Why
1224h – Bella
1225h – Bella
1225h – Bella
1232h – Ugh you suck
Narcissa is tired, boneless, aching, and sweaty after three hours of rehearsal and the last thing that she wants to do is walk in on her sister and her sister’s weird, drug-dealing, oddly attractive associates in her family’s restaurant-standard kitchen cooking meth.
Obviously, that’s just what happens.
There’s Bella, a sulky-looking hulk who looks like he spends more time at the gym than he does anything else in his life, and the pissy blonde elf straight out of the less impressive Hobbit film trilogy (Thranduil? Right?) who’s sporting a manbun, a tattoo sleeve, and a T-shirt with “Peace! Land! Bread!” emblazoned in drippy red font that he’s paired with a limited edition Rolex.
Is irony still a thing?
Narcissa fights the urge to roll her eyes as she skirts around the kitchen island and the makeshift lab to snag an apple from the fruit bowl sitting safely by the toaster.
“Cissy!” Bella shrieks, and almost drops the petri dish she’s holding. The hulk makes an actual leap for the double French doors leading to the patio before Bella pulls herself together. “I thought you were going to be at class!”
“Um. Obviously, I came home after it.” She peers suspiciously into the sink; there’s some residue at the bottom of it that she really doesn’t want to look too closely into (will the sink explode if she runs water into it?) so she decides to just rinse her apple off upstairs in her own bathroom.
“Lucius! Stop staring at my sister’s legs!”
She whirls around just in time to catch Bella kicking Thranduil into one of the countertops. She winces – Bella is weirdly strong and she’s always in combat boots – but he just sighs, picks himself up, and nods respectfully in her direction before turning to fiddle with a beaker.
Narcissa glares at him for a moment, eyes narrowed, before stalking off with her apple. The nerve! And Lucius? At least Thranduil was the name of a fantasy elf king. Which parents would name their child Lucius?
Where does Bella find these people?
1410h – Bella
1410h – Bella
1410h – Bella
1411h – Bella
1412h – Mom just told Karolina to clean your room because it literally looks like New Orleans after Katrina
1413h – So if you want me to head her off before she walks into your wardrobe and tries to water your houseplants
1414h – You have to tell me now
1414h – Because I’m leaving for class
1415h – Like
1415h – NOW
1416h – Bella?
1728h – JESUS FUCKING CHRIST
Unsurprisingly, the Great Weed Reveal does not land Bella in any sort of trouble with their parents. Their father merely inquires into the balance of profitability and risk in the drug-distributorship industry, pats Bella thoughtfully on the head and invites her associates over for dinner while he decides if he wants to speak to their boss about further business opportunities.
So that’s why Narcissa is lounging about the drawing room for post-dinner drinks trying not to look like she’s completely bored out of her skull while Bella holds court with their parents and the sulky hulk (who’s unsubtly gawping at Bella with nothing short of adoration – what’s up with that, by the way?).
Lucius, who has been scrutinising the gigantic family portrait that hangs over their fireplace (their mother had gotten Andy painted over, and no matter how skilled the portrait artist was, it was obvious), seems to realise that Narcissa is this close to throwing a tantrum just so that she’d have something to do. At least, that’s what she reasons when he casually moves away from the fireplace and her family and sinks gracefully into the armchair beside hers.
She eyes him beadily as he sets his glass of scotch down on the marble end table and is doubly certain that she isn’t imagining the brief glance that he directs at her legs. He cleans up pretty well, she admits – his tattoos are hidden under a long-sleeved, blue dress shirt that brings out the grey of his eyes, and his cheekbones are sharp and his jaw is strong – but he’s still got a man-bun and she isn’t sure how to feel about that.
“Narcissa, right? Bellatrix tells me that you are her favourite sister.”
Something in Narcissa’s chest clenches, and she notes how her mother has shifted in her seat in order to keep better tabs on this conversation. She takes a sip from her own wineglass in a bid to have something to do with her hands. “I’m her only sister,” she replies, all smiles and sunshine even though the words are ash on her tongue.
From the corner of her eye, Narcissa can see her mother nod approvingly and the sweet dessert wine abruptly turns sour in her belly.
She needs to get out of here.
She sets her glass aside, murmurs her excuses to her parents – rehearsal, I’m behind, show on Friday – and leaves the room as rapidly as decorum permits, fingers scraping her hair back into a knot, stomach sucked in and chin lifted.
Lucius watches her go with unreadable eyes.
2230h – Cissy wru
2242h – Cissy why did you leave
2243h – Cissy
2244h – Cissy
2252h – Omg Cissy are you actually dancing
2258h – It’s literally 11 at night
2300h – You’re going to wake up in 6 hours for a 7am rehearsal anyways
2301h – Can you stop dancing and come socialize
2303h – Cissy
2304h – Ugh you suck
It was Andromeda who taught her how to throw her shoulders back, strong and level. Andy had run her fingers up four-year-old Narcissa’s spine and told her reach for the sky, and then reach for the stars. Grow. It was Andy who brought her bandages and surgical tape when her toes bled, and it was Andy who clapped time when Narcissa practised travelling pirouettes from one end of their home studio to the other. Keep your core centred, she’d advised. You are gravity. You pull the moon towards you.
The black swan does thirty-two fouettes in Swan Lake. Narcissa stumbles after her first twenty. Her second attempt ends at fifteen. She pushes through her third try and ends up with twenty-six.
Then she stops counting.
The world spins around her, and all Narcissa hears is Andy shouting I love him, I love him, I love him.
She hates this boy; this Ted-fucking-Tonks. She hates him and his easy smile and his steady eyes and his strong shoulders.
And she hates Andy.
Hates her.
You weren’t supposed to leave us. Narcissa’s left leg gives way; she shakes it out, switches her balance to her right one and keeps on going.
You weren’t supposed to let someone else be your centre of gravity.
2330h – Cissy
2331h – Cissy
2331h – Cissy
2332h – Roddy and Lucius are leaving
2334h – Lucius wants to know where you are
2334h – After you RUDELY DISAPPEARED
2335h – I think he’s been checking you out
2336h – He’s a pretty good catch tbh
2336h – RICH AF
2337h – Also he looks like that hot elf from the hobbit
2338h – Thranduil right
2339h – Not the one who married miranda kerr
2339h – Anyways
2340h – Do you want to see him before he goes
2340h – We can hear your stupid prancy music from the foyer
2341h – Cissy
2342h – GODDAMMIT CISSY WHY DID WE EVEN GIVE YOU A PHONE
She doesn’t hear Lucius come in over the music for the Pas de Quatre – which is what she’s actually supposed to be rehearsing for her company’s staging of Swan Lake.
So she gives herself a silent pat on the back when she turns her head after a pas de chat, catches sight of him in the mirror, and she doesn’t fall flat on her face in shock.
She tries to ignore him, but she’s already breathing hard and her skin is flushed from the exercise and so she figures that even if she heats up a little more at the way his serious grey eyes track her movements across the studio, no one would be the wiser.
Narcissa almost dreads the arabesque that heralds the end of the dance, but it comes anyways and the music trails off into silence.
The level of awkwardness in the atmosphere kicks up about ten notches. At least, that’s what it feels like to her. Lucius still looks like butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth while Narcissa watches her sweat drip onto the sprung timber floor.
“You miss her,” he observes, and she doesn’t even pretend to not know whom he’s talking about.
She picks herself up and reaches for a towel. “I love both my sisters,” she admits, voice muffled in the fabric. She feels tears burning in the backs of her eyes, and she presses the towel harder into her skin.
His footsteps are heavy, and she doesn’t dare look up until he gently tugs the towel away from her.
Their fingers tangle in the cloth. Her heart rate accelerates.
“Family is important,” he says, and his gaze feels like a physical weight on her skin. For the first time in months, she doesn’t feel guilty for wanting Andy back.
He tucks a stray lock of hair behind her ear, and Narcissa leans into the touch.
1032h – Bella
1033h – Lucius wants you to ask Riddle to give him Friday off
1034h – Who’s Riddle
1034h – Is he your boss
1035h – Can I just say
1036h – I’m not a fan of whatever you guys are doing
1037h – With the surprise shipment of rubber snake toys that is sitting in our kitchen
1048h – Why can’t Lucius ask Riddle himself
1049h – And why can’t he come on Friday
1051h – Um
1052h – He’s going golfing
1053h – With dad
1054h – And he says that Riddle likes you best
1055h – So you should do the asking
1055h – WHAT
1057h – Yeah
1058h – It’s a rite of passage thing?
1059h – For boyfriends?
1103h – Dad wants to schedule another game with Rodolphus so you should let him know
1104h – NO
1104h – NOT THAT
1105h – What sort of name is Rodolphus btw
1105h – RIDDLE LIKES ME BEST?
1106h – CISSY FOCUS
1107h – RIDDLE
1107h – ME?
1108h – BEST?
1110h – Um
1111h – Yes?
1114h – OMFG IM SCREAMING
1115h – Bella are you going to ask him or not
1119h – YEAH OK
1120h – I JUST
1121h – FUCKING
1121h – YES
1128h – Um
1129h – I think you should calm down
1134h – CISSY YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND
1138h – Yeah ok you’re weirding me out
1139h – I’m going for lunch with Lucius now
1140h – Don’t text me unless it’s important
1145h – FUCKING
1146h – RIDDLE
1146h – LIKES
1146h – ME
1147h – BEST
1150h – For real unless war breaks out don’t text me