Disclaimer: I don't own the characters, places, etc.

Summary: A day in the life of each of the three Black sisters shortly after Voldemort's first fall from power.

What Did I Do to Deserve This?

bellatrix

… Andy's elopement with a mudblood… Sirius' abandonment of the Black family legacy… Regulus' look of horror when she killed him… the Dark Lord's fall from power…

"Oh, please, not again," moaned the young woman, burying her hands in her thick, ebony hair and pulling. "I can't take anymore! Make it stop!"

Nothing queenly remained in Bellatrix Lestrange, née Black, at that moment. How could she have let herself be taken here, where the dementors lurked around every corner, where she had to relive her worst moments over and over again? Why had she not put up more of a fight? Had she made the right decision when she proclaimed her allegiance to a Lord that had lost his powers? A Lord most said no longer lived?

What was she talking about? Of course she had made the right decision! The Dark Lord would rise again, and he would reward her for her loyalty! He, more than any other wizard, had made precautions to ensure his continued existence. How could he have truly died?

… Andy's elopement with a mudblood… Sirius' abandonment of the Black family legacy… Regulus' look of horror when she killed him… the Dark Lord's fall from power…

Enough! She didn't need to relive those moments! Once was quite enough! Curse her devotion to the Dark Lord! Curse the Dark Lord himself!

… Oh, dear, she hadn't really thought that, had she? She was a mere mortal, while he was a god among men; she had absolutely no right to doubt him!

Yet, she couldn't help but think, if he was a god among men, if he really was still alive, then why had she not been able to get any information concerning his whereabouts from the Longbottoms? Surely some news of the Dark Lord would have been known by now, especially by the Aurors, but even after hours of torture, the Longbottoms still gave nothing away. They had no information to give away, they screamed over and over in agony. Agony. Pain. Oh, Merlin, she loved the feeling of power that coursed through her when torturing the blood-traitorous couple.

… Andy's elopement with a mudblood… Sirius' abandonment of the Black family legacy… Regulus' look of horror when she killed him… the Dark Lord's fall from power…

"Don't you have someone else to suck the life out of?" she wailed in despair. … Wailed? Her? She was Bellatrix Lestrange, the Dark Lord's most faithful servant! She never wailed! Such petty begging could be expected from a Muggle or Muggle-lover, but certainly not from her!

But, oh, she would have sweet revenge on those who sent her here for shaming her so. Yes, when the Dark Lord rose to power again, every single mudblood and mudblood-lover would certainly pay the penalty—preferably, through the bone-chilling breath of the dementors, so that they, too, would be reduced to begging in a disgraceful manner. And, giving the idea more thought, she realized it would be surprisingly easy to convince the dementors to join the Dark Lord's side. After all, the Dark Lord could off the dementors the freedom to feed off of thousands of souls.

That is, if the Dark Lord did ever rise again…

Which he would, of course! Where were these foolish uncertainties even coming from? She knew enough of her master to know that no grown man, let alone a little boy, could ever vanquish him. Soon enough, the Dark Lord would rise again, with even more knowledge about how to escape death than he had before his supposed "death."

Her rewards when this happened would be wonderful… She loved just imaging the possibilities.

… Andy's elopement with a mudblood… Sirius' abandonment of the Black family legacy… Regulus' look of horror when she killed him… the Dark Lord's fall from power…

Honestly, this was getting to be ridiculous! These memories shouldn't even bother her anymore! Her entire family had betrayed her; she no longer had any family. Even Cissy turned out to be a disappointment, for she supported her husband's assertion that the Dark Lord had "bewitched" him into joining the Death Eaters.

"Bewitched?" Bellatrix asked out loud, laughing derisively. "Give me break!"

Oh, she couldn't wait for Lucius to receive his comeuppance from the Dark Lord, once he achieved his former greatness! The very thought made her smile.

… Andy's elopement with a mudblood… Sirius' abandonment of the Black family legacy… Regulus' look of horror when she killed him… the Dark Lord's fall from power…

Was she allowed to have no happy thoughts here, no matter how brief those thoughts were?

… Andy's elopement with a mudblood… Sirius' abandonment of the Black family legacy… Regulus' look of horror when she killed him… the Dark Lord's fall from power…

Okay, she got the point! No more cheerful thoughts!

… On second thought, could she perhaps keep them buried deep inside? She would never actually think them, but she'd like to have them in her mind, all the same.

… Andy's elopement with a mudblood… Sirius' abandonment of the Black family legacy… Regulus' look of horror when she killed him… the Dark Lord's fall from power…

Fine, she'd give them up! She couldn't take reliving these memories anymore! Nearly hysterical, Bellatrix cried out, "What did I do to deserve this?"

narcissa

"Dobby, the plates are not lined up evenly," carped the impatient voice of Narcissa Malfoy. Her azure eyes surveyed the rest of the table critically, but she found nothing else to correct. "I want this dinner to be perfect; Lucius has had such a hard time lately."

"Yes, miss, Dobby is very sorry! Dobby won't do it again, miss!" squeaked the house-elf, hurrying to correct his mistake.

"And I trust that Draco will be well taken care of?" she asked, moving over to the fireplace. "You'll need to add more wood, the fire's almost dying."

"Of course, miss, Dobby is taking care of Master Draco himself!"

"Funny," commented Narcissa dryly, flipping her golden hair over her shoulder, "I would have thought you'd need to be with Draco to watch him. Or do house-elves have some magic yet unknown to wizards that allows them to be in two places at once?"

"Of course, miss, Dobby is sorry!" Dobby apologized, bowing low before hurrying out of the kitchen.

"Honestly, is competence in my servants too much to ask for?" Narcissa asked herself, annoyed.

"Your servants?" a cold voice repeated behind her. "How strange; I was under the impression that the servants in this house were under my possession."

"Lucius!" Narcissa exclaimed, bringing a hand to her rapidly beating heart. "You startled me! Of course the servants belong to you, darling! Everything in this house belongs to you!"

"You'd do well to remember that, Narcissa. Now, where is my dinner? I'm famished!" Lucius sat down at the end of the mahogany table. When he saw Narcissa still standing, he gestured carelessly for her to join him.

"How was you day, darling?" Narcissa asked in a saccharine voice. "You had to leave so early! I missed you terribly; you know how I hate waking up to an empty bed."

"I had pressing matters to attend to," answered Lucius in a tight voice. "Namely, I had to give away even more of our son's inheritance."

"You should really ask me before you take such measures," said Narcissa disapprovingly.

Lucius snorted at her words. "I should have asked you permission?" he repeated mockingly. "Oh, of course I should have; you do, after all, have such a mind for business."

"What's wrong with my mind?" Narcissa asked angrily, putting down her fork and knife and glaring at her husband. "I happen to think I have a very nice mind."

"Yes, your mind is very nice, when it is engaged with things like fashion or picking out furniture. On matters such as spending money, however," Lucius continued, "you're sorely lacking in intelligence."

"You think I'm worthless, is that what your saying?" asked Narcissa, offended. Try as she might to fight them, tears started to build up in her eyes. She herself wasn't quite sure if the tears were a response of anger or sorrow to Lucius' words. "Well, I assure you, I am not worthless! I am a Black! Purebloods of lesser lines, like that of the Gibbons, may be worthless; but to call a Black worthless—!"

"The Black name means nothing anymore!" Lucius interrupted viciously, narrowing his icy gray eyes into slits. "One of your sisters is a blood-traitor; the other is rotting in Azkaban. One of your cousins in also serving a life's sentence in Azkaban; the other was murdered by your own sister—" Narcissa winced in pain—"for trying to abandon the Dark Lord. The Black bloodline is shamed, Narcissa, and you are among with it!"

"I will not be spoken to in this way," Narcissa said, though her words lacked force. A few stray tears had dripped slowly down her pale cheeks, leaving salty trails in their wake, but Narcissa paid no mind to them. "I am your wife, and for that reason alone I should have your respect, even if you value nothing else about me."

"Look at you, Narcissa," Lucius responded coldly. "You're a mess. How could I possibly respect you?"

"You used to respect me, back when the Dark Lord—" Narcissa began.

"Don't finish that sentence!" Lucius exclaimed, suddenly breathing heavily. "Don't even think that sentence! I was bewitched, Narcissa, bewitched. You'd do well to remember that."

"Don't be so paranoid, darling. Who could possibly hear us here?"

"Just stop talking, Narcissa," Lucius snapped. "All I ask is that you be silent and look attractive; let me do everything else."

Narcissa bowed her head despondently. "I'm sorry, Lucius," she whispered.

"This argument has made me loose my appetite," Lucius sneered. "I've got a few more business matters to take care of, then I'll retire for the night."

"Goodnight, darling," Narcissa murmured, forcing herself to look up and put on a fake smile. Once her husband had left the room, she sighed and buried her pretty face in her small hands. Oh, Merlin, did she hate her life! After a few more deep breaths, she asked herself forlornly, "What did I do to deserve this?"

andromeda

There were no words to describe how Andromeda Tonks felt about her daughter; the emotion was thousands upon thousands of times more powerful and wonderful than mere love. Every time she simply looked at her daughter, she felt her heart swelling up with pride and tenderness, and she knew that she would do anything for Nymphadora, even something that would sentence Andromeda to spend the rest of her life in Azkaban.

Andromeda's mother, Druella Black, so cold and careless in regards to her children, had never prepared her dark-haired daughter for these feelings. In fact, based on Druella's example, Andromeda had expected motherhood to be a bore. Well, a bore it most certainly was not! She could watch her daughter run happily around this playground for hours without feeling even the slightest bit jaded.

Oh, god, no! Nymphadora had just tripped, and in those two seconds that she remained on the ground, Andromeda involuntarily pictured hundreds and hundreds of horrible incidents that could have possibly led to her daughter's fall. Only when Nymphadora had picked herself back up and had started to run around again did Andromeda breathe a sigh of relief.

"She never runs out of energy, does she?" her husband commented weakly from beside her, and Andromeda felt a warm smile stretch across her face at the knowledge that her husband, too, had moved forward instinctively to protect their daughter from harm. Only Ted understood how she felt during those short few seconds, for only Ted could possibly love Nymphadora as much as she did.

"No, she never does," Andromeda agreed softly. Her daughter's energy, while it often left her more exhausted than running for ten straight hours, was one of the qualities she loved most about Nymphadora. But then, Andromeda was at a loss to think of any quality in Nymphadora that she didn't love. After all, how could there be an unfavorable trait in such sheer perfection?

"What's she doing?" Ted asked suddenly, to which Andromeda raised a impeccably trimmed eyebrow. "She's talking to a boy," he explained, horror evident in his voice.

"She's playing tag with the boy, Ted, not marrying him," Andromeda replied, unable to hold back a grin.

"Oh, sure, Andy, it starts with tag," Ted said, frowning deeply, "but the next thing you know, she's sneaking out at night to meet him."

"Hm, that sounds a tad familiar," Andromeda commented, her smile widening. When she and Ted were first dating, before her family found out about the relationship, she often stole away to meet Ted in a deserted corridor of Hogwarts in the dead of the night. "Must be in the blood, huh?"

"It's not funny!" Ted exclaimed, glaring intensely at the unsuspecting little boy. "She's much too young to be talking to boys! I've got to stop this."

"Ted," Andromeda began warningly, for her husband had already started to storm his way over to where Nymphadora and the boy were playing.

"Andy, I have to do this," Ted muttered without glancing back. Andromeda rolled her dark gray eyes and watched, with more than a little amusement, as her tall, messy-haired husband took hold of Nymphadora's hand and led to a spot on the playground where no boy was present. Once there, Ted squatted down and sternly started to lecture his daughter. Andromeda couldn't hear what her husband was telling Nymphadora, yet, whatever Ted had said, Nymphadora seemed to understand, if her enthusiastically nodding head was any indication. Satisfied, Ted turned to rejoin his wife, until Nymphadora quickly grabbed his hand and tugged.

"No, Daddy, stay!" Andromeda could faintly hear her daughter say. "Pway wif me!"

Standing there, watching her husband and daughter, the two nearest to her heart, play together, Andromeda felt her heart swell with overwhelming joy. "What did I do to deserve this?" she asked softly, happily.