Muse
Summary: The one in which Narcissa Black runs away from home and becomes a model. No, seriously.
A/N: Many, many moons ago I wrote a cracktastic oneshot called "No False Modesty" featuring fashionphotographer!Draco and bemused-model!Ginny. This could be considered an equally cracktastic prelude to that oneshot.
Disclaimer: I don't own HP, any of the canon characters, situations or settings.
When he was a boy, Draco would often be found in his mother's elegant, perfumed boudoir, watching her dress for the evening. He would flick through her fashion magazines and admire her rich, varied wardrobe. Narcissa was always elegant, effortlessly stylish and chic – she favoured silken dress robes, exquisitely cut and draped, in classic jewel tones to suit her ice-queen beauty. But one day at the back of her closet he found a camphor chest, and inside, neatly packed away and enfolded in tissue paper, were some of the most outlandish outfits Draco had ever seen.
Soft, flowing paisley tunics and bright headscarves. A double-breasted – safari jacket? – with a belt of interlocking circles. And a pinstriped tuxedo, severely cut, but clearly designed for a woman –
"Did you actually wear this, mum?" he asked, gently drawing it out of the chest. He had learned very early on to handle her clothes gently, always with clean hands.
She looked up, saw what he was holding out, and laughed. "I'd forgotten I had those," she said, smiling indulgently. "Well, when I married your father, dear, I had to put all those clothes away. But I couldn't bear to throw them out."
She rose, in a whisper of hushed silk and expensive scent, took the tuxedo jacket from him and held it up against her torso, looking at herself in the mirror. "Well, I was a very wild child once, Draco. And this –" she ran her beautifully manicured hand down the pinstriped lapels – "this was the ultimate in daring. We would all wear them out to go dancing and partying, and sometimes the clubs wouldn't let us in because we were in trousers!"
She looked around, making sure that Lucius was nowhere to be seen. "Now, don't tell your father darling, but –" She disappeared behind the silk changing screen, and emerged moments later wearing the tuxedo jacket and thin pinstsriped trousers, her hair bundled up in a severe bun. Her whole attitude had changed, her usually gentle beauty more resolute, more daring. The long, slim lines of the jacket and trousers made her look taller than ever, and her severe hairstyle only highlighted the beauty and elegance of her bone structure.
She looked nothing like his distant, elegant mother in her couture robes and exquisite tailoring. She looked like a strong, daring, resolute woman.
To Draco, it was a revelation.
When she was seventeen years old, and her mother had gently drawn her aside and told her that her father had arranged her marriage to Lucius Malfoy, (my dear, what a coup! Oh, think of the prestige, the jewels, the dresses!) Narcissa Black gathered up what was left of her quarterly allowance, packed her bags, and ran away from home. She went to Diagon Alley first, but that was the first place she knew they would look for her; to evade the long arm of the Black family, she left the wizarding world completely and plunged directly into the Muggle one.
It was 1971, and the Muggle world was nothing – nothing at all – like the wizarding world.
She drifted at first, trying to get her bearings, to understand the rushing machines and curious and the swirling, multi-coloured strangeness of it all. She knew nothing of cars or buses or trains, nothing of muggle money or customs, and certainly nothing of 1971, the end of a riotous decade of change and excitement that had seen men walking on the moon and a magic pill that could give women the same sexual freedom as their male counterparts.
She had never had to worry about money and had never worked a day in her life. But what Narcissa lacked in practical experience and street-smarts, she made up for in the quiet, resolute determination of an aristocratic daughter of the most noble House of Black, the innate, unconscious confidence that comes of money, and breeding, and – for lack of a better word – quality.
She had a cut-glass accent and held herself like a queen, but looked about her with wide-eyed eager curiosity.
It was not long before she was talent-spotted.
Modelling in the wizarding world – especially in the rarefied salons of magical haute couture she was used to – was a matter of frozen attitudes and fixed smiles. In the muggle world, it was fun, exciting, playful; the clothes were like nothing she had ever before seen.
She lived with two other girls, both models, in a tiny set of rooms with unreliable heating and intermittent hot water. There were clothes everywhere, shoes, stockings, interchangeable dresses scattered in a multi-coloured rainbow across the tiny flat; they were all the same size. They shopped at Camden market on the weekends, looking out for cheap antiques and old clothes to add to their eclectic wardrobes; one of her roommates favoured flowing paisley and jewel-coloured scarves, the other had recently purchased a safari jacket with a belt of interlocking circles.
And then one day, giggling, they pooled their meagre savings and bought a severely styled pinstriped tuxedo jacket and matching trousers, brought it back to their flat, and took turns slicking their hair back and dressing up like men. Stiletto heels, severe makeup, attitude and a snappy hat –
Looking at herself in the mirror, her chin held high, she found that she held herself completely differently –
More, she found that she loved it.