I doubt a Malfoy man has ever held a woman's hand. Yet there was my son, holding hands with a young woman. I have certainly offered an elbow like a proper gentleman, but I have never strolled down a path, fingers entwined with another's.
My son had grown up in a different time, where our world was learning to heal and prejudices were erased in hope of safety and peace. At least we pretended that things had changed, that we had finally learned our lessons about tolerance and justice. Maybe this illusion of a new world allowed him the comfort of romantic love with the young Ravenclaw girl.
I often caught my son looking at this girl with a force of love I thought only existed in stories. Here he was, strong and capable, a fully-grown man before me, though I refused to acknowledge anything but the young boy I knew he once was. That was simply the role of parent, to always cherish the memories of the youth they raised, sometimes shutting out the present to hold on to the past. He certainly changed from when he was a young boy. His hair had darkened to the dark blond of this mother's over time, and he often smiled, another characteristic alien to Malfoy men. There were clear indicators of his Malfoy namesake. His piercing grey eyes, so often cold and distant in my own face, were warm and kind in his. His pale high cheekbones spoke of the aristocratic past beneath, but his humility convinced you otherwise. Sometimes I wondered if you could really see me in him, but was secretly relieved that he had escaped the haughty coldness of most Malfoy men, and finally won some of the affection and hope that the women had given the Malfoy family name.
The subject of women had always been a sore spot for the Malfoy family. Naturally brides were chosen only after parents had expressed their approval or particular interest in one woman. Here my son had eagerly voiced his desire to be with this young woman without any input from my wife or myself.
When I met this girl, Olivia, she was charming enough, with her auburn hair and freckles. I assumed then she would be a passing fancy to occupy him until his mother and I started pressing the issue of marriage, where a Malfoy sanctioned-bride would quickly take her place. Instead, he spent more time with her each day, and both parties fell deeper in love.
Olivia was quite different from previous Malfoy women, which may have been due to her non-purebloodedness. I had gone to school with her father, who had been an ambitious and overzealous student. It seemed his daughter surpassed him in intelligence, and ambition, yet had still managed to endear herself to most of her peers. She was in short, the class darling. Everyone had adored her, but it was my son, she had loved back. She was a bit too opinionated, too argumentative, too righteous, but she had a wit about her that challenged all of my misgivings.
I had grown to like her well enough. I supposed this admiration for the young woman came from watching her relationship with my son bring out a side of him that I had though was long stifled by the mundane lifestyles of the wizarding elite. He became just as passionate and loving as she was, something foreign and strange to me.
It was my son who took her hands into his and clutched them tightly, as if afraid to ever let go. I was sure their life was not without its problems, as he spent many a night home with us in the manor, despite the fact that he had shared a flat with the young woman. (This move was not something I could not support as a son of the aristocracy, but as a father I knew this was safe, healthy choice for them.) But he always returned to her. He now only referred to home as anywhere she was.
He planned to marry her. He announced that today at brunch as he came to ask for my mother's engagement ring. Astoria was beside herself at the prospect of this vivacious young woman entering our family. I was petrified at the prospect of a Malfoy man risking it all to marry for love. I wished I had been that brave in my youth, even if I was quite content with the way my life had turned out. As I handed my mother's ring to my son and offered my blessings, I prayed silently that this gamble of his would succeed. I hoped he would not know the unceasing pain of fear of disappointment, the same disappointment I had inspired in my own wife. Alcoholism and stupidity had created the tension between my wife and myself. I wondered then where my son had learned to love someone so fully and so openly.
I thought of my father. He would advise caution in any relationship and surely would've expressed nothing but utter contempt for this half-blooded young woman. All of her many virtues that would make her a prized wife, sister, daughter, woman in any other situation would be declared null and void because of her parentage. Her father was a tediously dull person, but one can hardly blame that on his blood. After all Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle were not exactly stellar members of our society. Unlike my father, I would step aside and let him discover his own life, and make his own mistakes. It was time we broke this cycle of anger and resentment.
There was my son, walking along the street, with his fingers wrapped possessively around another's' and a diamond ring in his coat pocket. Olivia is completely unaware of his intentions, and I refuse to ruin the surprise.