When we got to Madam Malkin's, mother left me to get my robes fitted alone while she went off to 'just have a look in that shop over there'. I looked over my shoulder as I walked in through the door, and saw her nervously vanishing down a small alleyway which I knew led to Knockturn Alley, a place I was forbidden to go. Inwardly, I raised my eyebrows and sighed, but on the outside my face remained haughty and expectant. After giving my name and imperiously instructing the assistant to charge everything to the family account, I found myself stood on a stool in front of a large wall of mirrors with a piece of the finest - and most expensive - robe material draped around my shoulders. As the assistant started pinning the material to the right length I admired my reflection in the mirror - the high, defined cheekbones which I had inherited from my mother and the silvery grey eyes from my father. My expression remained indifferent as I hid my true self behind a steel wall inside my mind.
After a few minutes, another boy was led to the stool next to mine. He looked about my age, but was incredibly skinny - although that may have been because the muggle clothes he was wearing were far too big for him. I observed him out of the corner of my eye as Madam Malkin started pinning his robes. He may have looked uncared for, but his bright green eyes were alive with excitement and wonder. This was obviously his first trip to Diagon Alley.
"Hullo, Hogwarts too?" I enquired. My father would expect me to have made 'acquaintances' by the time I arrived at school.
"Yes," he replied.
"My father's next door buying my books and mother's up the street looking at wands," I lied, trying to impress the boy. I couldn't exactly tell him the truth - that my father was at home 'entertaining' female guests supposedly without my mother's knowledge, and she had disappeared into Knockturn Alley, probably to an illegal Dark Arts shop to find a way to take revenge upon my father. So I said what I would be expected to say. "Then I'm going to drag them off to look at racing brooms. I don't see why first-years can't have their own. I think I'll bully my father into getting me one and I'll smuggle it in somehow." A small, almost unnoticeable, smirk had appeared on the boy's face. I wondered what he was thinking.
"Have you got your own broom?" I asked.
"No"
"Play Quidditch at all?"
"No," he repeated, looking more uncomfortable, almost as if he had not idea what Quidditch was.
I continued acting like the spoilt single-child descendant of an ancient pure-blood family that I was.
"I do - Father says it's a crime if I'm not picked to play for my house, and I must say, I agree. Know what house you'll be in yet?"
"No"
I wondered whether he really didn't know what I was talking about.
"Well, no one really knows until they get there, do they, but I know I'll be in Slytherin, all our family have been."
But only because anyone who isn't has been disowned, I thought disgustedly.
"Imagine being in Hufflepuff, I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?"
"Mmm," replied the boy noncommittally. I wondered whether he was just being polite and actually thought that Hufflepuff was great. Other opinions that my father held were not considered universally popular, so why would that one be any different?
I looked around for a change of subject, and found one standing outside the window, holding two ice creams and waving, apparently at the boy. "I say, look at that man!" I exclaimed
"That's Hagrid, he works at Hogwarts," replied the boy, obviously happy to be able to answer with more than one word. I was annoyed that he knew something that I didn't, especially since he hadn't seem to know much about Quidditch and the houses.
"Oh, I've heard of him. He's a sort of servant, isn't he?" I said, to prove that I wasn't completely ignorant.
"He's the gamekeeper," the boy replied. He obviously liked the giant man.
"Yes, exactly," I said, trying to provoke him. "I heard he's a sort of savage - lives in a hut in the school grounds and every now and then he gets drunk, tries to do magic and ends up setting fire to his bed."
"I think he's brilliant," scowled the boy. He seemed to not be easily led.
"Do you?" I asked, condescendingly. "Why is he with you? Where are your parents?" I made sure I kept any hint of jealousy out of my voice.
"They're dead," he stated in a way that prevented more questions being asked about them.
"Oh, sorry." I replied, keeping my voice devoid of all emotion, in case the jealousy crept in. The boy probably thought I was being cold and uncaring. I could take a guess at who had killed his parents though, and it bothered me. I wondered, "But they were our kind, weren't they?"
"They were a witch and wizard, if that's what you mean."
I took a deep breath in, and breathed out confidence. Searching through my list of 'disguises', I pulled out my father's personality and wore it.
"I really don't think they should let the other sort in, do you?" I enquired, superiorly. "They're just not the same; they've never been brought up to know our ways. Some of them haven't even heard of Hogwarts until they get the letter, imagine," I sneered. "I think they should keep it in the old wizarding families." I paused. "What's your surname, anyway?"
But, before the boy could answer, Madam Malkin had finished his robes and he stepped off the stool as she said, "That's you done, my dear." He looked like he hadn't really wanted to continue the conversation anyway.
"Well, I'll see you at Hogwarts, I suppose," I drawled, as the boy nodded and headed towards the front of the shop to pay for his robes. The assistant finished mine a minute of so later, but as I headed back to the Leaky Cauldron to wait for my mother, I couldn't see the giant man and his skinny companion anywhere. I pulled the pure-blooded, arrogant, Malfoy mask down over my true identity and prepared to live a lie.
The Start Of A Life Of Lies by ZephyrDragon
Story Notes:
All speech is taken from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Chapter 5: Diagon Alley (page 60 & 61 of the British children's edition)
Chapter Notes: All speech is taken from Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Chapter 5: Diagon Alley (page 60 & 61 of the British children's edition)