Lance's head was spinning.

He kept his composure outside, but Bastien had looked at him with more anger and disappointment than ever. Come to think of it, Lance couldn't recall a single time when Bastien was disappointed in him. Thirty-three years of being a good dad, and their relationship was teetering because he was with Narcissa? It felt a bit ridiculous. He tried to shrug that off and walked back into Blaise's house.

Parvati was curled up on one sofa cushion in the snug. God, she was pretty. Pretty in a way Padma wasn't. Padma was strong, fierce, not unlike Narcissa in many ways. Parvati was far more effortless in her appearance, generally more relaxed in life. At that moment, however, she looked rather defeated. She was in jeans and a lilac jumper with little embroidered hearts hanging off it, head resting on one fist as she scrolled through something on her phone.

Lance plopped onto the sofa and asked, "Do you want to talk about it?"

Parvati shook her head and stared out the window. Lance didn't want to push her; she would speak when she was ready. He leaned backward on the sofa and crossed his legs at the ankles. It was nice to have space to stretch out in. Most people's snugs were so tightly packed Lance could barely move. Blaise Zabini understood that, in London at least, space was the biggest luxury.

Blaise was a decent man. He'd've made a better woman in this world. All that money and what Blaise really wanted was to be a parent, cook meals, and have a fat cock to ride at the end of the day. That Dean bloke was tall, with all the confidence of a well-endowed man. He was nice, too, from a fairly middle-class upbringing. Overall a good match for Blaise if he could survive the cesspool of wealthy English people.

"I ended things with Cedric."

Lance was surprised when Parvati spoke. She revealed,

"I dumped him. Then I dumped him again. And I phoned him a few weeks ago to dump him again. Would you like to know what he told me?"

"Of course."

"He told me he would get dumped by me over and over again, just as long as I kept saying I love him while I did it." Parvati sniffled, "It's not even his fault, he's perfect."

"Yeah, Pavi, he is." Lance admitted, "I don't see how what happened caused you to lose the person you love."

"So you know, then?"

"Bas told me vaguely, just now, but I can put some pieces together. I can empathise a bit with an unplanned pregnancy. I love my son, but I'd envisioned spending my twenties fucking around, having a laugh with my mates, shagging women left and right. I didn't think I'd spend my twenties as a dad, married to someone I didn't love. Sure as hell didn't think I'd be fifty-two with a thirty-three-year-old son and three other boys who are nearly sons to me. Life never turns out the way we expect."

"It was our life together," said Parvati, "me and Ced, our future just dripping out of me in blood and clumps of something else. Ced and I wanted a family and I couldn't give it to him. I failed."

Lance frowned and wondered, "Is that why you dumped him? Because you thought … I'm not understanding at all, Pavi."

"I ended things because Ced doesn't love me the way Bastien loves my sister. Bas knew immediately, right when he saw Padma that she was the one. Ced and I have been together eight months and it wasn't until I'd dumped him the third time that I understood he might've truly felt like we were good together."

"My son is mad. He and Padma are perfect for each other, I'll give him that, but there was no need for them to go about things as they did. Bas shouldn't have chased after Padma on the street. I yelled at him for that when he told me, we're far too large of men to be running after women like that."

"I think it's romantic."

"You think wrong, then. If a man large enough to be an amateur heavyweight is running after you down the street, Pavi, you should probably scream and run away. Bas is just an academic trapped in a boxer's body. He's an exception to the rule, and you shouldn't expect men to fall head-over-heels instantaneously for you."

"How long did it take for you to fall in love with Draco's mum?"

Lance laughed. He shook his head and insisted,

"I'm not in love with Narcissa. Romantic love has never been part of my life; I gave up on it decades ago."

"I'm sure." Parvati rolled her eyes and said, "You gave up on it when you realized Narcissa was committed to someone else."

"That's …" Lance frowned. "That's not how we were. How we are."

"Right. Before I had my own money, d'you know I'd drive by the fancy houses in rich neighborhoods like this one. I'd look at them thinking, 'One day, that'll be mine. One day I'll live there.' That's the look I have always seen in your eyes when you look at Narcissa Malfoy. That someday, if you work hard enough, that woman could be yours. Are you pleased now the day's arrived?"

Lance looked away. He wished he could combat Parvati's assertions, but they didn't feel as false as he wished they did. Bastien had just said something similar. If everyone was seeing the same thing, there had to be truth to it.

"She's a beautiful woman," offered Parvati. "Everyone at Downing Street hates her, which means she must've done something right in her life. Given how shit of a man Draco's father was, he's treated Hermione very well. Though I have to wonder how much of that is Narcissa's influence, and how much of it is yours."

"Cissa didn't need to teach her son how to treat women. Lucius was exceptional in that regard. Shit in everything else, but Lucius Malfoy was the most devoted husband. Narcissa said she trusted me with Draco's education in what it means to be a man. He came to me for all the questions he couldn't ask, particularly in his teenage years when his sexuality was quite the issue."

"An issue?"

"Men can't have proper gay sex until twenty-one, you know. It's illegal for anyone under twenty-one to partake in certain things. Draco was sleeping around with other boys at sixteen, so he didn't have anywhere to go, nobody to trust with those questions. I'd been 'round the gay clubs twenty years by then—"

"You?" Parvati asked, shocked. "Went to gay clubs?"

"One of my primary school mates got the shit beat out of him because he was gay. Now, I've never minded that sort of thing. I did think it a bit odd, particularly back then. I must've been sixteen, so I just didn't get it. I thought, well, if you've got two dicks happening down there during sex instead of one, where's your dick supposed to go?" Lance shook his head and admitted, "That was a question I regret getting the answer to."

"Why were you at the clubs?"

"Because I was huge compared to everyone else. If I stood next to my mate, people tended to leave us alone. Now, I wasn't going into the clubs at first. Didn't want to see shit. I stood outside and all the homophobic wankers gave the door a wide berth. Management noticed, started paying me for the trouble, and I got my first gig as a bouncer."

"Wow."

"I became part of the gay community just by being there. It wasn't really what I'd thought my life was going to be, but then I had Bas to provide for at nineteen. I got paid twenty quid an hour back then just to stand outside the door and knock a few bastards' heads into the ground. It was a win all the way around for me."

"Did …" Parvati paused and shook her head. "I don't want to be rude."

"Pavi, come off it, you can ask me anything."

"Did you go to university?"

"No. I was busy with my son, had a gig as a bouncer, apprenticed as a blacksmith … Never felt the need to go."

"Oh." Parvati shrugged. "You speak like you went, but I wondered how you found the time to go with everything else you were responsible for."

"My parents would've been happy to hear you say that." Lance glanced quickly upward, hoping his family was up there somewhere. The library in the clouds, as it were. "They were medieval scholars. How do you think I wound up with a name like Lancelot?"

"I never gave it much thought. You're quite gallant, and I think it suits you."

Lance teased, "I'm happy I didn't wind up with a middle name like Escaliber."

"What is your middle name then?"

"William."

Parvati said, rather surprised, "Oh. That's curiously normal."

"Lancelot, named for the knight of the round table. William, named for Will Scarlet, the best swordsman of Robin Hood's gang of merry men."

"Your parents must have been very interesting."

"They were. I think I might've had the only scholar parents in the world who wouldn't judge me for getting a girl pregnant, marrying her at twenty, divorcing her at twenty-nine, and never setting foot in university save for my son's graduations. They didn't judge me, didn't cast me out, just paid for what I couldn't. Gave my wife a far nicer life than she deserved."

"Can I ask you about her?"

Lance rolled his eyes and offered, "You can, but you might think less of me afterward."

"It is quite rare to hear you speak negatively about a person in your life. I wonder why you have such disdain for her."

Lance looked around, then twisted himself to get a good view of the dining room and entryway. Before he could finish scouting, Parvati said,

"There you go again, making sure no one is around to hear you speak of her."

"I don't like for my son to hear me speak ill of his mother."

"Surely he knows—"

"Of course he knows how I feel, that doesn't mean it requires confirmation. But yes, I loathe Ellie in a way I reserve for few people. When you talk about someone like Lucius Malfoy, there are things about him I find admirable. The rest of him could've been chucked in the bin, but he did good things for me and my boy. Ellie did shit for Bas. I married her because we had a son together and I thought that our kid needed a unit to support him. Something solid. I learned we were more solid without her."

"Nothing redeeming in her?"

"Not in my eyes, no."

"You raised a good son." Parvati crossed her arms and said, "Bastien understands Padma in a way I never thought anyone would."

Lance sighed and asked, "Can I say something you may not want to hear?"

Parvati nodded.

"You may be right."

"So far it sounds like something I might want to hear," she teased.

"You may be right that I love Narcissa. Asking me about romance, that's like asking me to fly an airplane; I wouldn't know the place to begin. What I do know is the character of people. That Diggory boy, he's an honest man. He's a quiet soul, but what he did for Hermione Granger took balls, Pavi. Standing up to the BBC like that? Imagine what he would do for the woman he loves. I imagine he would do anything. I imagine he might even answer the phone when he knows that woman is going to do nothing but puncture another hole through his heart."

Parvati didn't say anything for awhile. Lance knew she got the message, so he leaned further back in the cushion and hoped Narcissa had found someone else to occupy her time. This was the best part of Parvati, the comfort in silence. He could sit next to her for hours without a word passing between them.

"I don't know how to apologize."

"You can't, Pavi. You need to let Diggory come to the realization on his own that you are worth another chance at a broken heart."

Her voice was soft when she asked, "What if I'm not?"

"You are." Lance stood up and winked. "Be good, baby girl."

Pavi pressed her hand against her chest and groaned, "You know what that does to me."

"I do. I love the face you make when I say it."

"I can't believe it took Narcissa twenty years to see that you've been in love with her. The first day I met you, I wanted you to love me. I felt so safe with you, and you never touched me."

"And I won't."

"I know."

"A miscarriage is no one's fault, Parvati." Lance lowered his voice so she would understand the importance of what he had to say. "It doesn't make you any less of a woman."

"If you say it, then I believe you."

.oOo.

"I need you to drive."

"Oh?" Narcissa looked at him overtop of the car. She said, "You always ask to drive the Aston Martin."

Lance opened the driver's side door and said, "Pavi shook me up a bit."

Narcissa didn't press. She gave his arm a gentle squeeze before sliding into the driver's seat. Lance gently closed the door once her feet were inside. He walked around the boot and made his way to the passenger seat. Before fastening the belt, he watched Narcissa as she went through her pre-drive routine. She pulled her driving gloves from the glovebox—

"You are the only person I know who uses the glovebox for its intended purpose."

Narcissa smiled softly, but didn't respond. She fastened the gloves around her wrists then opened the centre console to remove her sunglasses. She adjusted the mirrors, tossed her hair, and backed the car out of the drive. Lance looked over and said,

"I'm glad you left your hair down today."

"Oh?"

"You look younger when it's down, so severe and dangerous when it's pulled back the way you usually have it. I like seeing you lighter, happier."

Narcissa smiled and said, "You have brought a lightness to my life I never had before. This party, even with your son charging at me, was far more delightful than anything I have done in years. Even my vacations with Penelope were taxing in their own way. I have nothing to prove to you, Lance. You saw me at my lowest and are still here, caring for me as you always have."

He remembered those moments with stark clarity. At the end of Narcissa's first month with an incarcerated husband, Lewin phoned Lance completely out of sorts. Mrs. Malfoy is in the bathtub. Why is that a problem? Mrs. Malfoy has been in the bathtub since six o'clock this morning. It's four in the afternoon. I am not permitted to go into the bathroom. I am phoning the only person I know who may be able to help her. Lance had raced over to Wiltshire, far quicker than his car had any right to go. After all, he had a history of helping Malfoys in need.

Lance had rushed through the front door, not bothering to so much as say hello to Lewin. He raced upstairs, terrified he'd find Narcissa in the tub with a radio or her hair dryer. Instead, he walked into the primary bathroom to find Narcissa in a half-empty tub, staring up at the ceiling. She was completely naked, using her toes to turn the taps on. Then off. Back on. Then off. Lance asked,

"You need some help there?"

Her voice was hoarse and frail when she replied, "I like watching the water."

Lance allowed himself a single moment to take in her body. Her breasts were perfect, round, the areolas a tannish-pink which complemented her skin. She left her cunt unshaven. Narcissa's hair was limp like she hadn't washed it in weeks, save for the ends which spent eleven hours in the water. Lance's heart broke to see such a fierce woman so depressed. He took off his shirt, scooped her out of the tub, grabbed a towel, and carried her to bed. Lance dried her off and dressed her in jeans and a blue jumper. He pulled a pair of thick socks onto her feet because she was rather cool to the touch. He placed one hand on her shoulder and said,

"I'll see you at dinner."

She shrugged him off and said, "I'm not hungry."

"I don't give a fuck if you eat. You're going downstairs to dinner, and I'll tell Chef to set me a plate."

"Why are you here, Lancelot?"

"You're going to kill yourself if I let this go on. I'd never forgive myself for leaving, so tell me which guestroom you want me in and I'll have your staff get some of my stuff."

And he was there every day until Lucius returned. He probably could have left the night before, but something about that didn't sit right. He did not trust Narcissa to be alone for any amount of time. Lance recalled that handoff with fondness. Lucius had said,

"We have fifteen more years of this, and I fear it will not get any easier. There is no one else I trust to care for my wife. I am forever in your debt."

"Keep that woman happy, Lucius, and the debt is paid."

Then, there he was, still doing the same goddamn thing. Caring for Narcissa Malfoy, the woman he loved, according to Parvati. The woman he loved. Sitting there, driving him home after a birthday party for their grandson. What a life this had turned out to be. Lance looked over at her and felt like everything he'd been through was worth it to get right to this moment.

"Someday, Cissa, I'm going to have you drive me around in a convertible."

"Why would you want that?"

"Because you look so much like Grace Kelly that I want nothing more than to snog you in a car, driving a convertible on the French riviera."

"Thank you, Lancelot. That may be one of the most creative ways a man has complimented me."

"You lot really are the most dull group of people. It's always, 'What a great weekend to be out on the boat.' Or, 'I'm spending the week at my vacation home in Austria to escape my hellish spouse.' Then, 'I must pick up my child from boarding school in Switzerland. Perhaps I'll send the butler.'"

"Why do you think Lucius and I wished to keep you around?" Narcissa smiled and turned onto another road. "We found you interesting. Just as you seem to find the Patil girl quite interesting."

"Pavi?" Lance sighed. "A few weeks back, apparently she had a miscarriage. It has been a rough go for her, and she ended things with the Diggory boy because of it. She said she felt as though she failed him. I didn't really know how to help her through that."

"It is a uniquely female brand of failure."

"I don't think it's a failure—"

"It feels like failure when it happens to you." Narcissa's hands tightened on the wheel. "What is there to be done? After Draco, I lost a pregnancy at fourteen weeks, then another at twelve. You make plans, you name your child, and then you're standing in the garden when all those plans begin to bleed out of you. The shame lingers for ages. Eventually I told Lucius I wouldn't try anymore because I hated feeling as though I had failed him."

"I'm sorry, Cissa. I had no idea that happened to you."

"Years before we met, Lance." Narcissa dismissed his concern with a wave of his hand. "I have a good son, when so many women never achieve such a thing."

"My wife certainly didn't."

"Lucius liked her. We had different opinions, as he said she was 'free-spirited.' Or, my personal favourite, 'Alive and connected to the universe in a way that allows her to move about as if floating through the world.' I think he envied the freedom of her life."

"That freedom came at the expense of my son, myself, and my parents."

"My words for her were often rather uncouth."

"Oh?" Lance wondered, "What would you say of her?"

"I found her to be an ungrateful, light-headed, drug-addled strumpet."

"Strumpet." Lance chuckled. "She was a fucking whore, Cissa. You can say it, I know what she was doing behind my back."

"I never enjoy demeaning other women." Narcissa's jaw twitched. "Though she was horrible to you. Bastien seems to have taken up her more free-spirited outlook on life. He is a boxer, a pharmacist, a good godfather to Theo's children … So many roles for one young man, but he has embraced them all with Ellie's enthusiasm for life. Thank God he is like you in everything else."

"Can I tell you something terrible?"

"Of course." Narcissa smiled and said, "I would love to hear of the terrible misdeeds of the one and only Lancelot Queensbury."

"I want a grandkid so fucking bad, Cissa." Lance sighed. "I do, now that I'm old enough to be responsible for somebody. Don't misunderstand, I love Scorpius like my own. That little boy has so much love to give the world, he needs people to remind him that is a skill more than it is an art. But there's something about having a grandkid whose blood is yours, too."

"Bastien is thirty-three, how old is the Patil girl?"

"Thirty-four."

"They have plenty of time left for a child." Narcissa waved her hand as if to dismiss the concern entirely. "They have lived their youth for themselves, which I consider the proper course if there is no financial legacy and peerage to uphold."

Lance wondered, "Do you wish you had waited to have a son?"

"Yes and no. A woman's body changes during pregnancy in ways she cannot recover. I had my son at twenty-two, and I wish I had more time in my body before. However, as Lucius's wife it was my duty to produce a suitable heir for the Malfoy line. We needed to begin early to ensure we ended up with a viable son. Looking back, I am happy Draco was born at a time which gave him such incredible friends. If he had been born later, I would never have met you."

Don't blush. Don't blush. Don't blush.

It didn't work, as Lance felt his cheeks heating up. God, she had a way of saying things that made his insides feel as though they could float right out of his body.

"Do you miss the peerage?"

"I do, desperately." Narcissa admitted, "I would kill to be the Duchess of Wiltshire again. When Lucius and I were married, that was the first day I was referred to as Lady Malfoy. Everyone addressed me as Lady Malfoy, and now I am simply Mrs. Malfoy." She scoffed. "I took that insult far harder than Lucius, but then he was staring down a decade-and-a-half in prison. Losing the peerage was not top on his list of things to be pissed about."

"I think you'll get it back."

"No amount of goodwill could change their minds, Lance."

"I think you'll be surprised by the amount of pull Hermione Granger has."

"It would take an act of God himself to bring my title back to me." Narcissa said, "I do hope that they may one day restore it to my grandson. Draco is far too tainted by association to his father."

"And here I am," said Lance, "the only title I want is grandfather."

"Why are you so certain you will never have the opportunity?"

"Bas had a vasectomy when he was twenty-six."

"Oh!" Narcissa gasped.

Lance grabbed hold of the console to steady himself as Narcissa nearly drove them off the road. She quickly righted the car and shook her head.

"What awful news. It is so rare to find good men in this world, fewer good fathers. Your son would be both and he took that opportunity away from the world. I have never been so disappointed in Bastien."

"You and me both, Cissa. When he told me what he'd done, he said it was because I was such a good father to him that he knew he would never measure up. Bastien didn't want a child because he saw the strain it put on me to care for him. But now he's got Padma—"

"She is an exceptional young woman, working on international technology law focused on privacy in the digital age. I speak to her often at these functions, as she is the only one of that group willing to speak with me. I find her absolutely fascinating, and gorgeous. She and your son would be great parents. I find myself for the first time doubting you son's choices."

"I love both of them so much," said Lance. "I won't tell them, but there are so many people who have kids who aren't meant for it that it kills me to see two people as good, as whole as they are decide not to have kids."

"And money is of no object. Our family will always provide for your son, Lance. As well as your son's children, should he have any. What good are our millions if they are not put to use for those most important to us?"

"Am I important to you?" asked Lance.

Without taking her eyes off the road, Narcissa placed her hand on his forearm.

"Every day, I realize you are more important than before."

"I've lived decades believing I'd never be in love with someone. I never knew what it felt like, but Pavi seems to think I have been in love with you for a long time."

"Love is a child's emotion, Lance. I find your thoughts to be rather half-baked," said Narcissa.

"I don't have another way to phrase it."

"As I told you weeks ago, what we have is a consistent respect for each other. Love is easy, love is simple and fleeting, which is why it is so easy for children to grasp. I have loved you for twenty years, Lance, though I do not believe you loved me in return. I always thought you found me repulsive."

Lance shook his head and asked, "Repulsive?"

"Not physically, to be clear. I was a very beautiful young woman—"

"You are still a beautiful woman."

"—but you are such a good man. You helped me through that first year my husband was incarcerated, held me, saw me in the most vulnerable state of my life. You never asked whether I wanted you to be a substitute for my husband. It was as though the thought never crossed your mind, which I presumed was because you found my moral sensibilities and penchant for illegal activity rather repulsive."

"I respect what you do for your family, as you respect me for what I do for mine. I have never found you repulsive. If this is love, then I was in love with you even before my marriage ended. As for being a substitute, Cissa? No man wants that." Lance rephrased, "No secure man wants that."

"What of now?" asked Narcissa. "My husband has been dead nearly two years, and you never expressed any interest in being with me like this."

"I don't know what 'this' is. Other than sleeping with you, I don't know what's changed."

"Nor I."

Lance confirmed, "I don't feel any differently for you. I respect you, I care for you, and I feel honoured to have that affection returned. The real question is, will you kiss me in front of people at the gala next weekend?"

"If you will permit me to, I would." Narcissa's cheeks turned a bit pink. "I want to enjoy myself, and I would find it difficult to have a good time if I must be so careful with how I express my affection for you."

"Are we dating?"

"I don't know."

"How can we not know?" Lance threw his head back and laughed. "What the fuck are we doing, Cissa? I know you came to me for comfort, but if we're together behind closed doors and in front of people … Aren't we dating?"

"It feels like the wrong word."

"Am I …" He chuckled again, because it was so wrong to say. "Am I your boyfriend?"

"Oh, God," Narcissa's face scrunched up in the most adorable look of disgust. "Never that word. Boyfriend. Are we fourteen years old, Lance? You are my best friend in this world, my confidant, the man who makes my husband's deafening call for my soul to join him seem so quiet."

The man who makes my husband's deafening call for my soul to join him seem so quiet.

Lance knew Narcissa had a handful of years left. Her commitment to Lucius was ironclad, and the separation while Lucius was incarcerated was unbearable. Now that he was a lifetime away, Narcissa couldn't keep going much longer. She said three years, and Lance knew Narcissa to be someone who knew herself very well. He admitted,

"It scares me to care for you like this."

"Why?"

"Because you'll die a few years from now, and I will be here pretending it hasn't broken me beyond repair."

"My husband considered me divine. Our connection remains spiritual, a soul bond, something unbreakable. He is my husband in this life and through the next—"

"Bastien says that."

"Hmm?"

"Bastien uses that phrase. He tells Padma, 'I am your husband in this life and through the next.' I had no idea it came from you."

"Draco must have used it, then. It is the only way I have to describe my commitment to Lucius. You see, I believe our souls transverse different dimensions. When we die, our souls move onto yet another plane. My connection to my husband is unbreakable, and I will find him in my next life just as I found him here. I also believe each life can have a touchstone, something remarkable within it that leaves a soul forever changed. That is what you are to me, Lance. You have touched my soul, made it softer. While my connection to Lucius is deeper than anything else the universe has to offer, you will always be part of me."

Lance sat with that for awhile. It had to be the most romantic thing anyone ever said to him. You will always be part of me, in this life and through the next. He felt the tears in the corners of his eyes right before they fell onto his cheeks. He grimaced and cursed,

"Shit."

Narcissa glanced over and noticed him crying. She said,

"I am sorry to have made you sad. I didn't mean to offend."

"No, I've waited fifty years for somebody to love me. I never knew what it felt like, always thought the films were overselling it. But uh, I uh, I'm feeling it right now."

"And?"

"It's worth the wait."