Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter.
A/N: I was rereading some of the reviews for my older stories, and I just wanted to thank everybody again for being so awesome in your support. Hope you like this little bit. Due to the Mature Content throughout this chapter I'm rating it MA just to be safe, but it's really very mild.
Crashing Down
The first time Severus wrapped his arms around Harry, several months after the final battle after they'd gotten to know each other better, the man had trembled. Severus paid little attention to it, contributing it to nerves or pleasure. Or, just as likely, the boy, despite being eighteen, was more innocent than he let on. That thought went out the window as the beautiful man rode him expertly. His experience didn't bother Severus since firstly it would make him a hypocrite if it did and secondly it meant he didn't have to be gentle with him until he got used to it. In the aftermath the insignificant tremors became less than a memory. It happened a few more times, but eventually the reaction simply wasn't there anymore.
The first time Harry stayed in his bed through the night he woke the older man with nightmares. It was understandable. After all the young adult had been through who could blame him? Even Severus still had the occasional unpleasant dream. As their nights together became more frequent they died down slowly. As they became consistent the dreams gradually tapered off.
The first time they fought and Severus raised his voice the younger male grew unusually quiet and withdrawn. They hardly spoke for a week. Their next spat was much the same. Eventually Harry fought back… in a quiet, controlled way that drove him crazy or, more truthfully, unnerved him.
Eventually Harry stopped flinching when Severus raised a hand to touch his hair or face. Eventually he started smiling again, albeit rarely. And eventually Severus noticed… but not without a shove from that terrible Skeeter woman and another of her exposés. This time, though, she'd done her research. This time her accusations were horribly, sickeningly true.
The Boy Who… Lived?
"Ever since that first night at Hogwarts he would wake the dorm nearly every night with his screams," former best friend Ron Weasley says about Harry Potter. "It wasn't hard to figure out what they were about. The scars on his body stood out like a sore thumb any time they weren't covered by his clothes. He was always too skinny too, never ate much, and he asked us a few times to send him food over the summers. The poor bloke practically jumped at his own shadow. We knew something was off about his home life. He'd let things slip sometimes. Once he mentioned something about 'his cupboard' and after we pestered him relentlessly about it he admitted to sleeping in a cupboard under a staircase until he was almost eleven.
"When my brothers and I went to get him the summer before my second year I was deeply disturbed to find that there were half a dozen locks and a cat flap on his door as well as bars on his window. That wasn't the extent of it though. In my sixth year when I lost my v-card I asked him nonchalantly whether or not he'd ever sealed the deal. He froze and turned slowly to look at me with this horrified expression and he just seemed to choke on his words. His mouth would open soundlessly and his head would shake negatively in a rhythmic way, like he was dazed. He seemed frantic and his eyes were full of pain and anguish. He just kept shaking his head 'no' even after I told him I believed him. I didn't. I knew right then just why he had such a strong aversion to touch."
Severus threw the paper away from him violently, unable to read anymore without being ill. It all made utterly perfect sense. The front door of the home they'd shared for nearly a year closed with a resounding click and he watched helplessly as Harry walked toward him, eyes wide and unfocused as his mask crumbled.
It had taken one bold action and a night of passion for Severus Snape to catch Harry Potter. Three months to get him to smile, brittle though it might have been. Nine months for him to sleep peacefully through the nights with any consistency. Twelve months to get him to voice his opinions. Fifteen months to convince him to move in with him. Eighteen months to make him believe it when Severus said "I love you". Twenty before he'd hesitantly say it back. Twenty-three months for the haunted look in his eyes to go away. Twenty-five months, two weeks and four days exactly for him to completely fall apart. And one hundred and three painful hours to piece him back together.
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Severus watched helplessly as the love of his life fell to his knees and shattered right before him. The stoic male that Severus had never once seen shed a tear sobbed his heart out into the plush carpet just inside the door. The older man rushed over to his lover and placed a gentle hand on his back at which point the smaller male threw himself into Severus's lap and clutched at him tightly. He held him securely and rocked him back and forth making soothing noises. He hadn't had much experience comforting anyone before so he wasn't sure if he was doing it right, but eventually, after several hours, his harsh sobs turned into small hiccups and his gasping breaths evened out.
After the Weasley twin had been lost in the final battle the family of redheads had distanced themselves from Harry. None of them really blamed him, but their relationship was just too strained to go on. The young man had accepted it with indifference, earning Severus's admiration at the time. He'd been far more grown up than he'd ever given him credit for. With Ron Weasley went Hermione Granger, and thus Harry Potter was alone. That's when Severus had taken pity on the boy and allowed him the benefit of his company. Or so he'd told himself. In reality it was Harry who had allowed the benefit of his company since he'd hardly left Severus's bedside during his recovery.
The barely adult had taken on the majority of the tasks involved in his care, some of which had been absolutely mortifying for Severus such as aiding him in bathing and using the restroom. Yet he'd done it like he wanted nothing more than to be there to help him and finally Severus had asked him why. He'd been surprised by his answer. Because you're my hero. Never in his life had Severus been considered anything close to a hero and at first he'd feared for the young man's sanity; Harry was the hero, not he. However, as the weeks dragged on and he steadily regained his health he found that he would be sad to see the boy go, and so he'd asked him to stay.
Harry had had nowhere he needed to go, and no one who was waiting for him, and so, under the pretext of continuing to assist the man, he'd stayed, and the whole time they'd talked, just talked, every day. Severus learned more about the real Harry Potter than he ever would have guessed possible. He was intelligent, cunning and had a dark sense of humor much like his own. He was also unfailingly calm, annoyingly optimistic, and tremendously lonely. And then one day Severus couldn't restrain himself anymore; he'd reached out and taken what he so desired and it had turned out remarkably well. Shortly after that Harry had sought out his own residence, but he returned regularly and Severus took it all one step at a time.
He'd never realized just how much he didn't know about the man he'd come to care so deeply for. Sighing, his heart aching for the betrayal he'd suffered and the humiliation that had come with it, he picked the small man up and carried him to their bed, tucking him in. For a while he just sat there and looked at him, his face pinched and exhaustion radiating from him even as he kept a guarded posture despite his slumber.
Getting him to eat was tricky. He refused dinner that night and breakfast in the morning. Severus was retired, ever since the war, and so was able to care for Harry implicitly. Harry, however, had become a healer after all of the practice he'd had taking care of Severus. He'd picked it up quite easily actually, something Severus realized he should have wondered about. Most people didn't have natural ability in that subject; it usually took several years of intense study to become adept at it. Severus owled St. Mungo's and informed them that Harry would be taking some leave for the foreseeable future. It didn't take long for him to receive a sympathetic reply.
At lunch time he pushed and finally Harry ate something, though he was worried when all he forced down was a dry piece of toast. He went back to sleep after that. He woke up around dinner time and silently went to the kitchen to prepare the meal and for the first time ever Severus wondered where he'd learned to cook and how he'd become so proficient at it. So he asked him. Harry stiffened and blinked rapidly for a few seconds and then turned the bacon over and took a deep breath. Carefully not looking at him he said, "I've been cooking since I was five years old and I got good at it quickly in order to avoid the consequences." Then he went back to cooking breakfast for dinner as though he'd said nothing. It was perhaps the most personal thing he'd ever said to him.
Harry had trouble sleeping that night, tossing and turning well into the early morning hours before finally giving into a fitful sleep that lasted less than two hours at which point he was plagued by nightmares that he awoke from screaming. It was the first time Severus had ever seen him react so violently to them and he recalled the words from the dratted article. Slowly, careful not to spook the frightened man, he ran his fingertips from shoulder to wrist in a continuous motion. Eventually Harry caught his hand as it made contact with the smooth skin on the inside of his wrist and clutched tightly to it. Severus took that as his cue to draw the man to him and hold him tightly. It only took a few more minutes for Harry to turn into his embrace and bury his tear stained face in his chest.
"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked, a question he hadn't asked in over a year, and for the first time in their entire relationship Harry gave a shaky nod.
"It was the night after Hagrid took me to Diagon Alley. It happened to be my birthday when he came for me, and it was still my birthday when I returned. The Dursleys had packed up and gone home while I was away. When I went back, something I had hoped I wouldn't have to do since I thought for just a few blissful hours that Hagrid was taking me away, my uncle informed me that I was moving up to Dudley's second bedroom. I was stunned. I was a freak, something they'd ingrained in me since as far back as I can remember, and freaks did not get bedrooms. After that night Severus, I assure you I didn't want a bedroom. I wanted nothing more than to go back to my cupboard. Apparently the only thing saving me from my uncle's advances was the fact that he couldn't possibly fit into my cupboard. Now that he had room to move it was a whole different story. It was the worst night, and the worst birthday, of my life to that date. And the nightmare continued, one I couldn't wake up from, for an entire month. I hated that bedroom Severus, and I hated myself. By the time school started I wanted nothing more than to die, because I had thought I was saved and I had been very, very wrong. There was nothing magical about being a wizard anymore."
Severus couldn't breathe past the constriction in his throat. He had hoped that the damn Weasley boy had been mistaken, but this too made a sort of morbid sense. He had wondered many times himself just how the man had gotten so good at pleasuring another. He now had his answer. "Will you tell me?" he asked gently.
"Yes," Harry whispered brokenly. Severus listened long into the day as Harry described everything he could remember up until his eleventh birthday. It was dinnertime when Severus made him pause and they ate. Harry didn't fight him much, especially since Severus cooked for him. They sat in front of the fire, with Harry draped across his lap and curled slightly into his chest, for the remainder of the evening hours. They managed to get to the summer before his second year, as Weasley had referenced, by the time Severus insisted they retire. That night, thankfully, there were no nightmares. Harry slept for only four and half hours though, and upon waking alerted Severus to the fact and brought the older man to consciousness as well. He prompted him to resume his history and the hours passed once more. By lunch, at which point Severus forced him to eat once more, they'd made it midway through the Triwizard Tournament. Harry stubbornly refused dinner so Severus decided to force every other meal until the man was feeling better.
The rest of the day covered all the way to the beginning of his fifth year, and he once again managed sleep before one o'clock. This time he slept long enough that the sun rose with him, a normal habit for the man, one Severus now knew the reason for as well. He was firm about eating breakfast and finally Harry caved. Once that was over they lay in bed together not caring about the propriety of doing so at this hour and Harry related all the way through the war by dinner. Again he forced the meal and afterwards they returned to bed. This time there wasn't much left to the story, just what Severus already knew. Still, it was intriguing to hear about it from Harry's perspective. He was surprised to learn that Harry had begun having feelings for him even before Severus had made his own realization. And now the story was finished and Severus knew everything about his love. And he only loved him more.
Slowly Severus caressed the young male, kissing him tenderly and without demand in between soothing motions. He painstakingly kindled Harry's passion and watched as he hesitantly started responding. "I love you," he murmured as he swooped in for a lingering kiss.
"You know, I never understood exactly what that meant until I found out you were alive and my heart started pounding out of my chest. Even then it took me a while to realize it. It still amazes me," he whispered breathlessly.
"I love you Harry James Potter," he reiterated making sure he understood that he meant it.
"I love you too Severus," he murmured with a conviction he usually lacked. Where he had found courage in all of this turmoil Severus couldn't fathom. He continued to stoke him into a passionate frenzy and then he offered something Harry had never asked for and he'd never thought to give. He allowed Harry to control him. The green eyed man was incredibly shy as he timidly readied him for lovemaking. Severus was no blushing virgin which undoubtedly made it easier. He moaned and muttered appropriately and Harry regained his confidence briefly before coming to a fearful halt right before he could finish the act. Severus didn't let him hesitate he simply guided him the rest of the way. As soon as Harry was seated in him he looked down at him in wonder. That in itself was enough to make Severus feel like he might have actually succeeded at bringing him back from the precipice he'd balanced so precariously on these last few days.
Harry was as usual overly attentive to Severus's pleasure. By the time he'd allowed himself completion Severus had experienced it twice. They lay together, spent, and Harry drifted off to sleep. Severus held him securely and marveled at how strong he was. It had taken one hundred and three hours to pick up the pieces, but Harry was finally whole again and he felt closer than ever to the younger man. He too relaxed into slumber, his precious cargo held tightly in his protective and loving arms. He knew he'd never be touched by such pain again, because Severus wouldn't allow it. If it took the rest of his life he would make sure that his Harry was always happy. Anything to see him smile the same smile he wore in his first truly peaceful sleep. His healing smile.