Anything you recognise belongs to the incomparable J.K. Rowling. No profit is being made of this.
Children. Hateful creatures. She couldn't stand children. Disorderly, repulsive fiends, making mischief and wreaking havoc. She never had been able to tolerate her younger siblings when growing up. Her mother used to explain to her that it was a good wife and daughter's duty to bear children, but she had seldom bothered paying any attention. In those days, there was no fear of the family name dying out. That horrible spectre of extinction was yet to rear its ugly head, with plenty of relations to breed and continue the Black line, always pure, always noble. She had never seriously been able to think of herself becoming a mother.
Until now.
Her husband's uncle Regulus was dead, unmarried and childless. Among her own brothers Cygnus had failed to produce a single son with her pitiful wife, and Alphard, useless lump of lard that he was, had refused outright to marry.
It was up to her.
She distinctly remembered her wedding night, eleven years ago. She had lain down in bed and gone straight to sleep, not even bothering to look at her youthful husband as he shivered beside her. It had taken them years to consummate their union. After that, Walburga had moved her husband into his own bedroom, down the hall, with enough doors and enough distance between the two to discourage him from attempting any nasty nocturnal excursions.
She was sitting upright in bed, combing her long, glossy black hair. Her heart missed a beat as the door began to open. This early?
It was only her mother. A short, stout woman, remarkably unattractive, the prudish Irma Crabbe had never turned heads or attracted stares. Yet there was a hint of kind-heartedness, of motherly tenderness, buried deep within her shapeless bosom that was wholly lacking in her daughter.
"Are you sure you'll be alright, dear? I just thought I'd check on you before going to bed, just to make sure you're feeling alright," she ventured tentatively, seating herself at the foot of the bed.
"I shall be perfectly alright, thank you, Mother. Good night." intoned Walburga. Her tone made it perfectly plain that she meant this as a dismissal.
Irma, however, continued to hover around with a hesitant air. "You know, I'm so glad you've decided to try for...well, to try at last. I can't help but feel that you & Orion should have started a long time ago, just like dear Cygnus & Druella. Children, you know dear, are a really wonderful source of solace and comfort. To be sure, my marriage did not appear particularly successful, at the outset, but with time, and with your birth, your father and I settled into what I think we can call a rather contented matrimonial existence."
"No doubt about it, mother. Perhaps you should be going to bed, now." was her daughter's cold reply.
Irma, however, made one, last, desperate attempt at optimism. "I'm sure it'll go quite well. If you need anything, remember-"
"Mother, I shall certainly not trouble you again tonight. Good Night."
Irma edged out of the room, sighing. Left again to her own devices, Walburga resumed combing her hair, gazing pensively into her hand-mirror. Eventually, she laid her vanity case aside, and settled into her bed, drawing the covers up to her chest. As she gazed around her orderly, elaborately furnished bedroom, her mind conjured a vision of the whole place a battered wreck, with an army of faceless little horrors running around, smashing her vases, shredding her books, scrawling on the walls, jumping on the bed. She shuddered in horror.
She heard a scratching at her door. Taking a deep breath, she extinguished the candle at her bedside.
"Enter," she called out.
x. x. x.
Later that night, with her hair in disarray, and an unfamiliar bulk of warm flesh breathing steadily beside her, she rose from her bed and crossed to the window, watching the night sky. She had already decided that the child's name would be Sirius. (Of course, it could only be a boy). She wondered what it would be like, having a boy in the house, which had been devoid of sons for some three decades. She allowed a small measure pride to well up within her bosom. After all, he would bear her very own blood twice over, the sole heir of her ancestors. He would do them all proud, she thought. Let Druella & Lucretia fuss over their bothersome whelps. She'd bear the only son in the family. Once again, she was going to prove herself the only man of the brood, as her grandfather used to say. Gloating inwardly, she thought perhaps it wouldn't be that bad having a child after all.
Yawning daintily, she got back into bed, and went to sleep.