Endgame

Chapter 44

(Please play the song now!)

It matters not what someone is born, but what they grow to be - Albus Dumbledore

***
May 1971

Andromeda entered the living room feeling very giddy from her date with Ted Tonks. Both of them had met during their time at Hogwarts and over the years, Andromeda had grown very fond of his ability to make her laugh even when she didn't feel like it. As she entered the living room, which was papered with black silk designs and decorated with a classy chandelier in the pinnacle of the room, her eyes flickered towards her father, who was standing by the fireplace.

The floor was made of grey marble, which made her small heeled shoes clatter and click as she walked over to him. Above the fireplace lay a picture of Cygnus and Druella Black, the parents of Bellatrix, Andromeda, and Narcissa, who were also pictured in the photograph. She looked at the grey settee that engulfed a great deal of space in the prolonged living room. As she sat down on it, she felt the cold leather cascade onto her warm, pale skin. Her father didn't look at her as he turned around.

"Where were you?" He demanded in a tone of authority.

"I was out, father," Andromeda stated, looking at him with her brown eyes that were the same colour as the furnishings on the fire place. "I had a few errands to run, that's all."

"Your sister told me otherwise," he growled, making Andromeda nervous.

"Well Narcissa has no business sticking her nose in where it doesn't belong," she remarked.

"Don't you talk so ill of your sister like that!" He roared. "Now you tell me where you were or you'll end up in the same place as last time."

"You can't treat me like that any more," she stuttered. "I—I'm not a child. I'm an adult."

"You're still young enough for a good thrashing, Andromeda," he replied fiercely, while she looked at him with tears running down her face.

"Crying is for the weak!" He folded his arms. "You were with that mudblood weren't you? Straighten your posture when you look at me!"

She quivered in his presence. "I—I—I."

He slapped her hard across the face, giving no sympathy for the mascara he saw running down her cheeks.

"Yes!" She shouted, standing up and moving herself away. "Yes, I was!"

"You wretched little imbecile," he spat at her. The words went off her back like water, she was well used to it. "You will cut all ties with this mudblood, and I won't hear another word about it!"

"I can't," Andromeda stated, almost inaudibly.

"You can't? You mean you won't! Don't you dare defy me."

"We're engaged to be married," Andromeda stated, more confidence growing in her voice. "And that's it."

"Ah so I see, you've decided to choose love over your own flesh and blood," he shook his head.

"And I see you're happy enough losing another daughter after losing one to madness," she said, thinking of Bellatrix. "It's time to change your ways, father."

"My father would turn in his grave if he heard you speaking so ill to your father!"

"He was a decrepit old fool! Like father, like son."

After years of being spoken down to, Andromeda had finally had enough.

"You're dead to me, Andromeda," he shouted at her. "Only ever a disappointment to me and your mother. You are nothing.  NOTHING!"