The Last Proposal and Other Stories

by Paris in December

A collection of unrelated and in many cases unedited drabbles I've written for the HPFC forum. This collection is for the Never Tell series and will include slash, femslash, and het.

1. The Last Proposal

Author's Note: This is where I will post any short, mostly unedited drabbles (350 words or less) I may write for the HPFC forum that take place in the Never Tell series.

The first one was written for Jenna McCoy for a drabble exchange in the 3rd anniversary party. This scene will also be explored in "Tell The Whole Story" (eventually). Pairings: Severus/Sirius.

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The Last Proposal

It was late by the time Sirius had pulled himself together enough to Apparate to Spinner's End, so that when he arrived, he had to take a minute to orient himself and remember which house belonged to Severus. Then he had to take another minute to work up the courage to actually walk up to the door and knock. It was, after all, a rather awkward situation, considering what had happened the last time he saw the other man.

When he did knock, the door opened almost immediately – and then abruptly started to close in his face. Panicking, Sirius grabbed for something to stop it, fortunately catching onto the edge of the door rather than Severus's wrist.

"Wait," he said breathlessly. "Please, listen. I wanted to apologize."

"You've nothing to apologize for," said Severus shortly. "I was out of line." He tugged at the door, but Sirius held on, determined to ride this out.

"No, you weren't! I didn't understand, I didn't know – what happened to you, where you'd been – I thought something was wrong with you." He had to stop to take a deep breath before going on. "Severus, please, I do want you to marry me. I didn't mean it when I said no earlier."

Severus stared at him for a moment, but finally shook his head. "No, you don't."

The door started to close, in spite of Sirius's best efforts. Desperate, Sirius cast about for something to say, anything that would fix this mess he'd gotten himself into.

"I love you!" he gasped at last.

Severus froze and turned back to look at him. Something in Sirius's gut clenched at the expression on his lover's (ex-lover's?) face. Somehow, incredibly, he thought he'd said exactly the right thing.

Experimenting, he said it again. "I love you." Then, "I love you. I love you. I love you!" He shouted it out that last time, gleefully. How could he have never said those words before?

The next thing he knew, Severus was pulling him inside and kissing him senseless.