"So what'd you do at school today, Gilderoy?" the ten-year-old boy's father asked him in a stately manner.
His tone was a dry, crisp one, like he was trying to determine whether his son were cut out for a job at the Ministry of Magic, like he did with various other workers he interviewed. Little did the boy know, this was exactly what Nerolinus Dictate Lockhart was doing.
The boy bent down to where his sack lay at his feet, and took out a notebook. Making his way toward the spiral staircase, he responded to his father, eager to spend as little time in his demanding elder's company as possible.
"We did some advanced arithmetic that I think I did okay on. Then we did social studies, but all we learn about there is Muggles—
"Gilderoy, it's a Muggle school, learning about Muggles is a benefit. You need to learn the basics before you go to Hogwarts. I've told you this before. And turn around and face me like a man while you're talking to me. What's that you've got there?"
The boy heaved a small sigh and turned to face his father. So much for spending the rest of the afternoon doing his favorite activity. He mentally berated himself for letting his father see the notebook.
"It's just a sketch pad sir," he said honestly.
"Let me see it."
Gilderoy obediently handed the sketch pad over to his father, and watched as he examined it, an expression of distaste fixed on his features. Gilderoy waited half-hopefully as Nerolinus flipped open the book and scanned a couple of pages, his hard expression intensifying with every page he turned. Finally, he snapped the sketch book shut and tucked it under his arm, looking mildly angry. Gilderoy's heart sank.
"How long ago, boy," Lockhart senior whispered steadily, "Did I order you to cease this foolish pleasure? Did I not tell you ever since you were young, did I not warn you explicitly to wake up to the idiocy of this-this-
"Art, sir," Gilderoy whispered, only too aware of the tears threatening to spill from his eyes. Why did he have to be so damn sensitive?
His father glared at him and he lowered his head.
"This is absolute feminine garbage. What does a man gain from sitting doodling things like the ocean and birds and other such insignificant fodder!" He spat out each word as if it tasted of phlegm. He paused for a second to rake a hand through his slicked back blond hair in exasperation.
"If this continues, you will have no deeds, nothing in your name when you lie in death's cold embrace. Nothing, Gilderoy. That is not what I want from a son of mine."
Taking his son roughly by the arm, Nerolinus shoved him into the adjacent living room and turned to the leaping fire.
Gilderoy realized only too late what he was doing. A strangled sound halfway between a sob and an anguished whimper escaped him as his father ceremoniously chucked his precious sketchbook filled with years' worth of beautifully made drawings, hours and hours of work and the joy and pleasure that came when he had finished, into the ravenous flames. The book went alight extremely easily.
"I am ashamed of you, Gilderoy," he could faintly hear his father say over the seemingly deafening, heart-wrenching crackle of flames devouring paper. "Very ashamed."
Tears were now streaming freely down the boy's face, some hitting the floor to spread out into soft pools, others running down his neck and robes. His eyes remained fixed on the smouldering heap of ash which had once been his passion, his life, his pride.
Gilderoy woke in a cold sweat to the worried face of Healer Loell.