The summer before she was set to graduate, Lucius asked Narcissa to be his bride. Amid planning the wedding and dancing attendance on her parents, she spent a lot of time with Lucius.

She learned how to use makeup, not magic, damnit, to cover her blunders. She learned the pretty lies to cover her sins; I fell down the stairs, I tripped over the dog, I cut myself. She learned that if Lucius corrected her errors, her parents would repeat the lesson. She learned to love because of pain.

She learned more that summer than in six years at Hogwarts.

mood: creative
audio: Crash Test Dummies - God Shuffled his Feet