cissas:
She wishes Marlene would stop asking her questions that are clearly posed with barbed edges that are supposed to snag, supposed to pull at imported silk threads which will pucker and tear should they get caught on anything. Narcissa can deal with people wanting to pry– there’s a compliment in there somewhere about others wanting to learn more about her simply because she won’t let them. What she doesn’t like is that everything this woman asks is accompanied by a layer of insincerity that makes it all sound as though it ought to be a joke at her own expense. “You’ve made the mistake of assuming that you know me,” she replies, a hint of warning creeping into her tone. “What makes you think that maintaining my reputation and upholding expectations aren’t precisely what makes me happy?” It’s all too easy to get defensive over a topic like this. It isn’t the first time someone has tried to suggest that she’s trapped in some sort of gilded cage and she very much doubts that it will be the last. If she were to speak truthfully, she’d make a point of saying that she can’t guarantee that other ways of living would make her any happier – but she can, with no small amount of certainty, predict that losing her position of influence and falling into obscurity would make her exceedingly unhappy. She isn’t supposed to exist away from the eyes of others.
“I already do what I want. Don’t project your desires and past decisions onto me.” Something cold slips down her spine, punctuating the sentence with a chilling thought. Was this the first time Marlene had attempted to convince a member of the Black family to selfishly set aside their responsibilities? Mascara-lined lashes narrow as she assesses the other, attempting to read something on her features which she can’t quite identify. Narcissa takes a single step closer, the light material of her dress tickling against the back of her calves. “How long have you known Sirius for?” It’s a difficult pill to swallow that her family is the cause of his fall from the heights of high society, which is precisely why she doesn’t. There is always someone else to blame; usually Sirius himself. And she stands by that argument, because if she can manage, and Bellatrix can manage, and Andromeda can attempt to manage, and Regulus can– she stops herself there and prevents herself from speculating the reasons for him disappearing ( not that it will prevent others from suggesting that maybe, just maybe, the same family who drove his brother out had done the same to him – they were going to need to deal with that quickly and efficiently, she notes ).
“It was an idiom,” Narcissa points out, gloss wand wiping a tan-coloured sheen across her lips, gaze fixed squarely on the mirror in her palm, “not an observation. You’ve already proved that you don’t understand a single thing about me, so I highly doubt the way you see me is going to be correct.” She studies her reflection for a heartbeat before clicking the compact shut and slipping her belongings back into her Burberry clutch. The corners of her mouth lift at Marlene’s misconception, presenting her with a falsely sweet smile. “Oh darling, it has absolutely nothing to do with you whatsoever. I care about accuracy. If you – or anyone else, for that matter – are going to dislike me, I’d rather it be for reasons that are true rather than incorrect presumptions. If you want to attempt to annoy me because you wish that you still came from a place of privilege, or because you disagree with my prioritisation of personal appearance, that’s fine. But don’t do it because you think you have the ability to convince me that I could be living an alternative lifestyle where I sleep with you just because my father would disapprove it.” The curve of her lips drops, deeming the point made. “Evidently, me being here any longer isn’t going to achieve anything. Please ensure Sirius gets my message.”
A shrug rolls off Marlene’s shoulders. “Because that happiness stems from an arbitrary source.” Somehow, a noteworthy realization surfaces from all this useless pettiness, sweeping her being with a wave of gratefulness and relief: however flawed she may be, Marlene has fallen deeply in love with the person she has become. Perhaps some gears might be rusty, and perhaps some components might need repairing, and perhaps whatever deeply buried guilt and irrational loathing she might still harbor against herself requires an active dismantling, but mostly, she has risen from her upbringing, outgrown the need to rearrange every broken shard of herself until her being formed the shape of something worthy of love. Cynical and vulgar and difficult as she may be, Marlene McKinnon has always been worthy of love. Nothing can take that away from her. Marlene’s brow quirks. The lack of sharpness in Narcissa’s question throws her off. “I’ve known him since he started working here,” she says, tone dripping with mild confusion, though she doesn’t deign ask for any explanation. Not many can sympathize with the strife of a poor little rich girl, but more than anyone, Marlene understands that the high society life is not without it’s troubles, contrary to what most people would assume. With the Order’s propaganda shaping her perspective, and the lasting trauma of her abandonment leaving a scar of inerasable cynicism, it’s easy to forget, easy to make assumptions about the likes of Narcissa Black. But perhaps the attempt to correct her predisposed assumptions with attempts at empathy had been dire miscalculation. As similar as their histories might have seemed, it was a mistake to assume their ugliness looked alike at all. The difference, it seems, is that as a child once burdened with the demand for perfection, the core desire that lingered within Marlene was to be accepted for her imperfections. Narcissa would rather everybody and herself pretend that hers did not exist. Even with all the empathy she strives to summon — though Marlene is humble enough to admit that none of her own actions merited any respect — she is dignified enough to acknowledge that the disrespect Narcissa has been hurling at her direction is excessive. Marlene sighs. “If you want to avoid people’s incorrect presumptions, then perhaps you’d make yourself out to be less of a hypocrite if you didn’t go around throwing your own as often as you do.” She understands that this is pointless. The tiredness is evident in Marlene’s dismissive tone, in the way her shoulders hang heavy, her determination to dignify Narcissa’s retorts only motivated by a small, annoying, and useless shred of pride dictating that it is Marlene’s obligation to finish whatever petty squabble she initiates. You got yourself into this mess, she reminds herself. “Accuracy. Right. Perhaps I can draw conclusions from the facts I’ve been given. What offended you the most was that I implied that you beg. Your automatic response to me making a blatantly untrue and easily disprovable jab at your expense was to threaten to tear apart my business, which tells me that you’re both willing to abuse your privilege and entitled enough to believe your bruised ego matters more than the welfare of the human beings that make their livelihood here. You’re constantly making degrading accusations about my personal history and prioritized winning an argument over any other response when I revealed the truth. You assume I envy you, which means you think everyone’s standards of success are the same as yours, that wealth is everything, that status is everything. It’s fair that you accuse me of not caring for your cousin’s situation seeing as I’ve made no attempt to regard it in this conversation, but I’m not endangering anybody else by disclosing a his older brother’s location to a family he doesn’t have a positive relationship with. Provoking you was a an admittedly poor way of gauging whether you were different from my admittedly unfair expectations of you, but I guess even my hastiest of instincts were right. Congratulations. The bar was already low, but you’ve proved to be far more pretentious, petty, and overly self-important than I initially assumed you would be.” Fighting the last fit of exhaustion that threatens to overtake her, Marlene spreads her lips into a small smile. “Thank you for coming to The Leaky Bucket. We hope you were satisfied with our service.”













