A Good Father

by Cella N

Your father, a good father, who wanted nothing more than his son to make him proud. DRACO. LUCIUS. Failure, parenthood, and life's choices gone awry.

Title: A Good Father
Author: Cella
Fandom:Harry Potter (I'm back!)
Ship: Draco, Lucius (mentions of Malfoycest)
Summary: Your father, a good father, who wanted nothing more than his son to make him proud. DRACO. LUCIUS. Failure, parenthood, and life's choices gone awry.
Spoilers: Everything.
Dedications: To Perseus and Draco, the best Lucius/Draco I've ever had the pleasure to meet; whom I appreciate inmensely, and am so glad to have been included in their little group at Lumos. Malfoys only peddle with the very best, you know?

A Good Father
You'll live, but I'll not; perhaps,
The final turn is that.
Oh, how strongly grabs us
The secret plot of fate.
Anna Akhmatova

Running away.

Running away is something you're good at, it seems. You've spent your life running away from something, from someone. Running away to hide. Hiding is also something you're good at. Maybe it's because you've always hated responsibility, or maybe it's because you're not sure of how to deal with it, that hiding behind your father's name and power comes almost natural to you.

You remember your whole life, and it's always been like this…

inhale

When you were very little, your mother tells you, you used to love spending time in your father's arms.

He would hold you as if you were his most precious jewel, as he walked around his office, telling your mother about the high expectations he had in you. "Our boy will be important," he said, "You'll see, my love. Look at him," he would say, looking down at you with impossibly soft eyes. "He's a Malfoy from head to toe." He would lift you up into his arms, and you would giggle like the baby you were, and he'd smile proudly saying, "I have great expectations from you, my boy."

Your father was not a very constant man. Most of the time, he was away on Ministry business, or business with Hogwarts. Sometimes he was away on business for his Lord, but you do not think of, or mention those. Your mother complained to him, when he would return, saying that you hadn't let her sleep the whole night. You stop crying the exact moment you see your father stepping into the room.

Your first word was for him, and he will always remember it. When times got difficult, he'd replay that memory in his mind, and it was beautiful, it was perfect, and it was calming.

He buys you your first pet when you're five, a little kitten, recently birthed, and laughs proudly when you name it 'Crucio'. He has a fight with your mother when he buys you your first broom; your mother is opposed to you flying, and he goes on for hour about how 'nothing will be denied to my only son'. You learn then, that your father is very malleable in your hands. Perhaps this is his mistake, or perhaps it is yours. But this is when you begin to use your father's name in each and every threat of yours.

For a while, he doesn't mind, even though he pulls you in a room one time, and tells you that there are things in life with which you have to learn to deal by yourself.

exhale

When you start school, everything becomes different.

Your father becomes a different man. He gives you a lecture about how you must give exactly what you receive, and how it is your duty to make him proud. He tells you about the social status (something you knew of from before, anyway), and about how no-one is more pure than a pureblood. He tells you whom you can associate with, whom you must hate, whom you must try to bring to your side, etc. You are his emissary at Hogwarts, he tells you. He has taught you well, so you must be subtle, and you must obey him, and make him proud, and reward him with your success. Because he has been a good father to you, this whole life, and he wants you to realise it.

Your first failure is Harry Potter. You write to your father, a letter about this infernal brat, and he writes back. He tells you not to mix with people of his calibre, especially not with Potter. He tells you that there are plans for Potter, and that he will end up paying everything he's done, one day. You want to ask, for a moment, what could a 11-year-old do that would be so bad as to deserve punishment; but you do not ask, because you're guessing your father wouldn't share the answer.

So you become the antagonist, because you think that this is how you're helping your progenitor. You try your very best to turn Potter's life into a permanent hell, and in between, you start putting in a few 'good words' with your fellow Slytherins. Surely, your father will like that. But then, Potter and his minions start biting back, and you find yourself, once again, transported back to your childhood, using your father's name to threat everyone near you. You tell them all 'my father will hear of this', but in truth, he will never hear of it. You'd rather die than show him that you're not capable of defending yourself. He is a good father, and you, like a good son, must show him that you're grateful for all he's done for you, and that you a re able to make him proud. You will make him proud.

In your third year, however, you fail to do so. The shame that falls over your shoulder is as giant as a rock, when your father enters the Infirmary, robes billowing behind him, his face pale and worried. And then he sees your arm, scratched from the Hippogryff, and scoffs, asking you if that's it. If that's why you disturbed him from his work, for a mere scratch. Then he waves off your answers, and says that since he's here, he might as well deal with it himself, since you're obviously incapable of doing so; and after all, the Malfoy name will not be disturbed by a flea-bag like Buckbeak. Realisation comes like a ton of bricks: he's disappointed in you. You've failed him. What sort of a son are you to a good father like him? You cry into your pillow that night, fists digging into the mattress with anger and fury; and you swear that someone will pay for this.

Fourth year comes, and your father tells you this will be an important year, a decisive year for all of you. He orders you not to get into any trouble, or compromise him in any way; and you listen to him. You still play your bad-boy part at school, because it's what you do best, but you try to omit bringing up his name. Letters come and go, and it seems that your father is content with your progress, and with the fact that you're finally standing up for yourself. You're so elated that you've made him proud, that when the news of Voldemort's revival come, you don't have the time to go into shock.

Fifth year is the last year you see your father free. You don't know that future that awaits you, so during the summer, even though you barely see him, you don't mind his absence. He comes home one night, strangely drunk. Your mother is asleep already, and you have to drag him to his studio, where he can sleep. You are only doing what any son would do for their father. You don't question his state, but manage to catch a few mumbles coming from his mouth. He grabs your arm, and pulls you down until you're kneeling down beside his bedside. "My precious boy," he mumbles against the skin of your hand. "I'll never let them take you from me." You lean down to listen to the rest of the mumbles better. "I'm so proud of my boy," he's saying. Your heart leaps. Before you have the time to recover, there's a hand at the back of your neck, pulling you down. And you're kissing your father. Better said, he's kissing you, because you don't know how to react. His breath reeks of alcohol, and his lips are cold and wet; this shouldn't be your first kiss--thanks to Pansy, it isn't--, but you feel exactly like when you had your first kiss. Because he knows what he's doing, even if he's drunk stiff. And then you snap, because you're kissing your father, and that is so wrong. You pull away, and notice that he's fallen unconscious. On trembling legs, you retire to your room, and spend the night awake and uncomfortable; and guilty, because you enjoyed it. In the morning, he doesn't remember a thing, and when he leaves, it's for a long time. You barely see your father that summer, or hear from him during your school year.

And then news come, of his imprisonment.

crouch

You visit him in Azkaban two times. The first is during summer, with your mother. She cries, and tells him to come back. You stand behind her chair, eyes never moving from your father's hands (so skinny and pale), breathing going shallow. You're taken away from Azkaban, because you faint from the pressure. They blame it on Dementors. You blame it on your own weakness.

The second time you visit him, is the day after the Dark Lord has enlisted you. You enter his cage, and observe the both of you. Him, your father, the good father who wanted nothing more than his son to make him proud, sitting on the ground, skinny and greasy and bloody. You, the son, the struggling son that wants nothing more than to prove himself worthy of his father's respect, standing tall in new robes, hair glistening in the dark cell, a picture of utter aristocracy. You tell him of your Lord's mission, and show him your Mark, proud. "I will not fail you," you say, and exit the cell, your left hand touching the lips he once kissed. In the cell, unbeknownst to you, he feels proud of you already, but guilty for what he's made you do.

leap

Your father does not dry in prison.

You're in hiding, and he isn't allowed to see you. It is your punishment for failure. There's a new war brewing, a new world in the making; and you will not be there to see it. You spend your days wondering if you will ever see him again, wondering if he's being punished because of your failures. You wonder, and wonder, and never cease to wonder about what he thinks of you now. Is he proud? Was he ever proud? Are you a disappointment? Are you a good son? Were you a good son? Does he love you?

A letter comes, the last letter you get from him.

My son,

I am sorry for everything I have ever done to you. Ever since you were born, you life has been determined for you. I regret having clipped your wings, and taken the decisions for you. Perhaps, if I had given you a choice, we would not be here today. You would not be hiding, and I would not be…

I always wanted to be a good father, but I feel as if I've failed you. I've not only spoiled you when I shouldn't have, and scolded you when I shouldn't have, but I've done when a father should never do to his son. Yes, Draco, I remember parts of the night when I was drunk, not a year and a half ago. I remember, and if I ever caused you pain by my actions, I ask that you forgive me.

Tomorrow, we go into battle. I do not know if we will see each other again. I've asked Our Lord not to include you in the battle. You have to continue our legacy, my son. You have to live, because I want it so. I would not bear to know that it was I who killed my son with my beliefs.

I may not be the best of fathers, but I do love my son.

Attentively,
Your father.

You want to write back a letter, to tell him how wrong he is, and how there is nothing to forgive. But you do not have contact with the outside world anymore, you're not allowed. Perhaps this is the worst punishment so far. So if you can't write a letter to him, you shall constantly think of it. Thinking of it, in hopes that maybe, just maybe, he will receive your messages, if luck so allows it.

He is, after all, a good father.

:end: