CHAPTER 8

I wanted to know what was going on in your mind. At the same time, I was afraid of knowing. We were rather desperate with each other and with ourselves...
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Outside in the Hogwarts grounds, watching a Thestral wing its way back towards the Forbidden Forest, Severus Snape was pacing up and down in deep thought, his face frown-furrowed and sullen.

Severus realised that he hated Harry because Harry was not the spoilt shallow brat Severus so desperately wanted to see in him; he always thought of Sirius Black and James Potter when he looked at Harry and projected his hate for them onto Harry; but basically, he hardly knew Harry. Was he jealous of Harry? Severus brooded over that question. Yes, he admitted that he was jealous of Harry. Harry was innocent, kind, smart (when he was willing to make the effort) and very brave. He had also grown into a handsome young man. It was easy to like him...and it was more than difficult to like Severus. Severus knew that it was his own fault; he went great lengths to make himself disliked. He followed the eye-for-an-eye principle, and cheating on Harry had been part of getting back at the youth for sneaking into the Pensieve and viewing his, Severus's, worst memory. Severus watched two Red Admiral butterflies flutter about in the sunlight. He turned away, his mood souring at their frolicsome behaviour. His mind flitted back to his husband and the impending consummation.

Severus was used to fucking his sexual partners from behind, often keeping a hand on their necks to pin them securely to the mattress. He didn't want to look into his partner's eyes; as a Legilimens, he knew how intense a gaze could be. How intimate. How eloquent. A gaze was capable of talking. In the case of sex, he preferred to let his cock do the talking. Eye contact was too uncomfortable for him. Severus sat down on a bench. He could not imagine taking Harry like a piece of meat. His body agreed as a vague sensation of nausea swept over him. He could see Harry twisting away from him – or, seeing that Harry was such stoic, simply clenching his jaw and submitting to the whole ordeal, waiting disgustedly until Severus was finished with him. "I cannot," Severus whispered to himself, "I cannot..."

The bottom line was that he was at a complete loss with this situation. Severus Snape did not know what it was like to be kind. He considered kindness a weakness – a maudlin sentiment.

It was a sour-grapes phenomenon: he had not received kindness, therefore he looked down on it with scorn; and when he did receive it, he did not know how to appreciate it; he interpreted it as pity or even condescension. Harry had called him pathetic in his second year – and the worst thing was that he was right, Severus concluded bitterly. The butterflies re-emerged in his field of view, fluttering towards the Great Lake. Severus rubbed fiddled with the hem of his sleeve. It would take so little to make Harry happy, a dusty part of his mind spoke to him faintly, he is not selfish and egocentric like you. Severus rubbed his temples, as if trying to massage this alien thought away into oblivion. He rose from the bench and went back to the castle. September was not far away, and he had to prepare his class material for the brats which would soon invade the school. A flying entity which was definitely not a bird appeared on the periphery of his vision. Severus looked up; Harry was on his broom, high up in the sky, carefree as the butterflies which had fluttered past Severus – or perhaps not so carefree? Severus narrowed his eyes. Harry was flying in a slow solemn circle, bent low over the handle of the Firebolt; there was something almost ritualistic about it. Then Harry seemed to spot him watching from the ground, and he turned his broom towards the Great Lake.

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Severus had a frankly unpleasant night – it was not surprising after his quarrel with Dumbledore. It was like he had quarrelled with his father. He was visited by a nightmare in which he saw Harry lying on his, Severus's, bed, staring at him lifelessly. He was naked.

"It is time," Severus said to him. Harry averted his face. His legs fell open quiescently. Too quiescently. One arm lay limply next to his side, the other dangled over the side of the bed like something dead. Severus climbed on the bed and pushed Harry's thighs further apart, meeting with no resistance at all. Harry closed his eyes, his arm still dangling over the side of the bed. Severus thrust into him. Harry did not move. Severus withdrew, and a gush of blood poured out Harry's rectum, flooding the bed, splashing over Severus's chest, face and hair. Harry opened his eyes, staring at him glassily. His eyes were scarlet, as if the blood had leaked into them. Voldemort's eyes. Severus began to scream.

A glass of water shattered as Severus's flailing hand struck it, knocking it from his bedside table. The Potions Master sat up abruptly and turned on the lights, rubbing his arms for warmth. He brooded over the dream and grimaced. He could lock up his fears when he was awake, but at night, with his mind at the mercy of sleep and his subconscious, he was exposed to all the things which secretly nagged at him. He turned his head and saw the glass on the tiles, shattered to pieces. He reached for his wand, repaired the glass and got rid of the spilt water. He refilled the glass and drank thirstily, trying to rinse away the foul aftertaste of the dream. It was three o'clock in the morning. Severus dressed and sought the adjoining library with feline silence. Sitting among the bookshelves, he pondered the raw violence and brutality of what he had done to Harry in his dream and whether a breach of trust could be likened to rape. No matter how much they both struggled against their marriage – they would have to consummate the bond, and Severus realised that he was actually terrified about the whole thing. How could Harry possible welcome him into his body, in one of the most intimate forms of interactions? Yes, Harry would take it stoically. Take his cock stoically, to be precise. Pleasure was at the bottom of the list; it was all political, geared towards Voldemort's downfall. Harry would be nervous when the time to consummate their wedding arrived. He would want tenderness, kindness, trust and all that clichéd trash...and he would know only too well not to expect these things from Severus, of all people. And what if he gave Harry the tenderness that he, Severus, so desperately coveted and had craved all his life? Was he capable of such a thing? Harry was his husband now. They lived together. They shared the same rooms and more things in common than Severus was comfortable with; and when they consummated their marriage, they would share a bed. Why only penetrative sex, initiated and performed by the older party in gay relationships, was regarded as the sole valid sexual consummation practice in the eyes of the Ministry, was an enigma to Severus. In his opinion, sex was a vast limitless domain, and the Ministry was as narrow-minded as a cell in Azkaban. In fact, it was an insult. Severus brushed his long hair out of his eyes with his hand and suddenly laughed softly. He had not failed to wash his hair with shampoo every day since he had married Harry. He had washed his hair only twice a week with nothing more than water in the past. If he did not care one little bit about Harry, then why was he maintaining this new practise of paying more attention to his personal cleanliness and appearance? Was he actually nervous around his young spouse? Severus slammed one hand over his head, as if trying to stifle his thoughts with the gesture. The fact was that Severus was not at all immune to that low sweet call of Harry's awaking manhood and sexuality. He could not prevent himself from recognising the sensual man in Harry or stop his nerves from picking up those beckoning signals; and it was so like Harry to be utterly unaware of the signals he was sending out. For now, the vast majority of the signals between them were discordant. Severus was not used to apologising sincerely for anything. He was, however, going to have to apologise to Harry. Convincingly.

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