Disclaimer: Not mine. Not any of it.
Narcissa Malfoy lifted her arms to the sky and tilted her head up while she turned in a slow circle. It was raining at Malfoy Manor. She loved the rain. As she had been told all her life, the Black family did not cry. The rain gave her the opportunity to. No one noticed. No one ever did.
Except him. No ever noticed except for Sirius. Even though family ties bound her to hate him, she couldn't bring herself to. She loved him. Just like she loved Andromeda. And all the other outcasts. She wanted to be an outcast. The outcasts were happy. What she would give to have let the hat make her a Ravenclaw.
Memories flooded from the little box Narcissa kept them locked up in. She was eleven, at the Sorting. Sirius was thirteen.
Narcissa twisted a lock of gold hair nervously. It was now or never. She could go the easy route or the hard route. The joyless route or the happy route. McGonnagal called her name.
"Black, Narcissa!" Narcissa approached the hat and sat on the stool, jamming the hat over her head.
Ahh. Difficult. Very intelligent I see, but your bloodline screams Slytherin. But your mind, which is the important thing, says Ravenclaw would be wonderful for you.
'I do love to read. But Mother would be furious.'
Are you saying you want Slytherin, like your sister and mother and ancestors? That would be the easy choice, wouldn't it?
'I'm not sure! I want to please my family, but I still love Sirius and Andromeda! I want to be like them, but I'm afraid. Yes, I want Slytherin! I want Slytherin!'
Very well. I hope you do not regret your choice to be in SLYTHERIN!
The hat shouted the last word to the Hall. A table on the right cheered. But Narcissa only looked to the left of that table. Sirius' face showed plain disappointment and anger, as well as hurt and betrayal. Narcissa breathed out and walked to the Slytherin table. It was only one person against the world anyway.
So why did it suddenly feel like that one person was more important then the world?
The memory changed. Narcissa let the tears come freely now.
It was fourth year. Narcissa was out on the grounds. It was raining. She was glad. News had come from home today, and she needed to cry. But Blacks didn't cry.
Little did she know that another Black was up in the Gryffindor Common Room, looking out the window at a familiar small figure in Slytherin robes. This other Black put down his homework and went to his dorm, where he jumped out his window on a broom and flew to the figure.
"Cissa. What's wrong? Why are you out here in the freezing rain, you'll catch your death! Get back inside." Sirius looked at his younger cousin. Her face seemed unusually wet, even for being out in a rainstorm.
"I just got news of my betrothal to Lucius Malfoy." Narcissa spoke in ragged breaths. Having him out here, showing that he cared about the family that had thrown him out, being noble again, was too much.
Sirius' face took on a stony look. He had been betrothed to someone before being formally disowned. He patted his cousin gruffly on the shoulder and flew back up to the castle and around a corner.
Somehow she knew she would never see him again after graduation. And he wasn't somewhere crying about that.
Because Blacks didn't cry.
The last time she had seen her beloved cousin had been on the front page of the Daily Prophet, the day he was arrested. And now he was dead. He wasn't coming back. And she wasn't going to cry over that. Because, when all the legal chants and dances were over, she was still a Black.
And Blacks don't cry.