Part 6: After the summer, comes autumn
You know when you go to a dinner party with your child and allow them to have the extra slice of cake, and the chocolate, and the fizzy pop drink only to come home and have them bouncing off the walls in sheer delight as you pull every trick out of your hat to get them into bed like some underpaid agency magician? Then you're both late for work \ school the next morning? Only me? Act two ends like that.
Now that your couple is very much in love (though they will not admit it), it's easy to imagine you've overloaded your readers with an overabundance of beautiful optimism. There may be a chance for love to blossom after all between two people who couldn't be more mismatched. Just you wait, a cold front is coming our way this evening, news at 6. The pathway to the 3rd act of our fanfic is really where the stakes get high and the push and pull really has serious consequences. Like serious, serious consequences.
Where before our couple could just get away with having a tiff, now their fights contain major ammunition gathered from getting to know their partner over time; they know exactly the type of buttons to push to get them upset. The choices our couple will make will either make their relationship or break them apart forever. For now, every positive interaction is hanging on the thread of uncertainty. But before the shite hits the fan, here are the major milestones of this era:
I like it like that
After the terrible first stint on their wedding night, our characters finally begin to have enjoyable sex. It's sex that is just too good to be true.
"
"Oh, Fennie!" Lavender gushes as she comes home. There's a path of lavender petals leading up the stairs of their home. She drops her purse and wand and climbs up to see a hot bath running for her, complete with essential oils and bubbles and a glass of rosé floating on a wooden tray with a box of her favourite chocolates. She hops into the water and lounges there until her skin is pruny and pink.
Her husband appears with a set of freshly folded cotton. He's wearing nothing but the tightest silken trousers and looks positively delightful in his eagerness to serve and please her.
"Just how I like to be treated after a long day," Lavender thinks to herself blissfully as she allows the wolfish man to slip the pink fuzzy slippers on her feet and a bathrobe onto her shoulders. Then he carries her into the room and lowers her into their bed, taking his time to kiss every toe on her foot, every inch of skin on her legs before digging into her pussy, ravishing her with licks of his long and roaming tongue. It's the lip-biting sex Lavander had been dreaming of since she first found her grandmother's Regency-era erotica novels in the attic and she's indulging in every part of it with the man who looks nothing like Mr Darcy's brother. He's, like, so much better and he's all hers!
"
Not that ugly, if you squint
If one of your characters was repulsive to the other at the start of the fanfiction, what is important to note is the time they see them as utterly attractive. Remember, beauty truly is in the eye of the beholder. Your character will see every flaw in their Love Interest as an endearing little quirk: both physical and emotional. At first, you may want to be deadly honest in your depictions, but who wants honesty in romance? It's all about the flair. Adoring your characters is a skill. It's not too hard to master it once you get the hang of it. Just take the flaws most canonical readers dislike and soften them into their more attractive counterparts.
They have a crooked nose? It's Grecian .
They have sharp werewolf canines? They're delightful pins of pleasure .
Their body is pale grey and lifeless? They have the physique of a Roman statue in the moonlight.
See? Easy as a summer's day.
"
Harry cascades the steaming water over his back and arms in the bath. Tom Riddle's cold fortress became like home to him and so had this daily ritual: soothing and comforting. A hot lightning bolt runs up his spine; he's not alone here. Tom's undressing behind him, letting his robes pool on the floor.
His back, covered in gashes and stretched skin from his Transfigurations is now surprisingly smooth and supple after all the creams and ointments he's been applying to himself. It's nice that he's taken the effort to please Harry; after all, they did share a bed now. But there's something more there: the taut muscle of his forearms and legs, the dip between his buttocks are all suddenly more alluring by dim candlelight. Harry can't peel his eyes away from his husband's inappropriately large cock as he descends into the waters. There's a bubbling-hot feeling in Harry's belly as the water level rises up his chest. They're together. Tom's expression is warm like the steam trailing over his skin. His eyes seem brilliant like rubies, and his lack of nose- well, is convenient for long makeout sessions that the Dark Lord is surprisingly endurant at. He's like a marble figure, silken and flawless and Harry grapples with the lack of disgust that arises in his mind when he decides he wants to touch him, caress his body, and feel him up.
"
They're actually really nice (once you get to know 'em)
Never mind your character was a snarky, insecure and\or cowardly bastard for all of their canonical existence, now, they are opening up their sweet side, which is exactly what people want to see happen. Love can truly do wonders to personality, more so than shock therapy or a brain transplant. Like the old song goes 'the power of love, a force from above cleaning my soul'.
"
Harry and Ron's entire bodies stiffen like icicles in the Forbidden Forest and their blood stills like a dead unicorn's when the looming figure of their potions professor glides over to them at Slughorn's Yule Dance. It's Snape. But, Professor? Mr? Hermione's new husband? He's dressed in a fitted tuxedo and has a velvet green cape, pinned by a silver snake draped over his left shoulder.
"Good evening Mr Potter, Mr Weasley," he says, extending his hand. And the conversation flows like mead from there. At the end of it, Harry and Ron have cracked a few jokes with the tyrant of their youth and were left with a few friendly pats on the back as the wizard excused himself to find more punch for Hermione.
Then speak of Salazar's tonsils, their childhood friend runs over, red as a beet.
"So..err, he's not too bad?" Hermione says, brows knotting together.
"Kidding? He's bloody brilliant." Ron's barely able to hold back a smile. "You know, I never thought I'd be able to have a decent conversation with him in my life without getting all Gryffindor House points deducted to compensate."
"Yeah, your new bloke- err, husband is pretty great," Harry says, rubbing the back of his neck. "Even told us to call him Severus."
Hermione grins. She locks a knowing gaze with Severus and nods her head approvingly.
"See it wasn't so hard to find common ground with him after all!" she says hugging her two friends.
"
But then, your characters get..
Too close for comfort
So comfortable around each other, one character reveals a secret that will destroy the other. Your MC is simply shocked at the development. They had just begun to fall in love when it feels like they've moved back to square 1. Part of them wishes they never got close in the first place. There are a few ways to do the embarrassing reveal:
In Vino Veritas - this is done after indulging in wine
In Sexus Veritas- this is done after indulging in sex
Or a magical favorite…
In Pensieve Veritas - this is done when a character magically sees a misattributed memory or their partner
"
Whatever memory could have been lurking in the beautiful blue vial in Luna's hands? Curiosity overcomes her. Lucius did say 'all that was his was hers' in the manor and she could do as she pleased. The only place she isn't allowed to be is here: his personal chambers in the west wing. But that's all changed now that they've had mind-blowing sex and confessed their feelings to each other. Right?
Luna opens the sliding doors to reveal a hidden nook with a Pensieve inside. Even more curious. Luna dribbles the vial's contents inside and lowers her face into the brilliant waters.
She sees nothing, then everything at once. A baby version of herself sits in the garden with her father Xeno. He's younger too. Inside the home her mother Pandora, young and beautiful, is tending to some potions. But there's a third figure in the room. Luna turns to see a young Lucius Malfoy coming in to request a potion and pay her a large sum of money.
Then the waters swirl around indicating the passage of time. Luna's mother is brewing. An explosion. The entire witch's body is consumed by flames from the scourging hot cauldron. Luna screams, running over to help, but her presence is futile. She's but an Apparition. She rips her face from the Pensieve; it's wet with tears and magic water. It becomes perfectly clear to her who the culprit was of her mother's death: the man who warms Luna's conjugal bed.
"
Or perhaps, your character finds a letter or overhears a conversation they weren't supposed to. Of course, instead of clarifying the misunderstanding, they immediately assume the worst, closing all portals of reason.
"
Ginny's once again in the wrong place at the right time. She's only come to surprise Draco during his lunch break with biscuits and scones at the Ministry when she finds other visitors have occupied his attention. Inside his office are Minister Fudge and Dolores Umbridge. Ginny is glad she has the magic listening ear from her brother's joke shop on her so she overhears the conversation.
"-don't know how long I'll have to keep pretending-" Draco says solemnly.
"-just a few more years and it will all be over. As soon as the Pureblood child is born from your union-" says Fudge.
"-or until the people figure out their marriages are not binding-" giggles Umbridge maniacally.
"-no I don't think-" Draco begins.
Ginny needs no other explanation. The carbohydrates strewn on the floor, she storms out of the building into the rain, hoping one of her brothers will be available to offer her a REAL listening ear. Perhaps she could have stayed to overhear the rest of the conversation, but she sees no reason to clarify the message that has formed in her mind. Draco does not love her. He doesn't want her. She's merely a vessel for birthing out Pureblood children to appease the Ministry."
"
Which will lead us to the end of act 2 …. the highest point of tension in the story: THE BLACK POINT.
The Black Point
The narrative presents a clear way and reason to break off the marriage. One of your characters is finally caught for treason, a parent finds a loophole in the wedding contract, and Hermione Granger comes to her senses, overthrowing the Wizengamot. Needless to say, it's certain that your couple's days are numbered. Done. Finite Incantatem. For one character, this is a very welcome thing because they've just found out that horrible terrible truth their Love Interest shared with them and now want to stay as far away from them as possible.
"
When word got out that Dumbledore's Army had taken over the Wizengamot and Neville Longbottom is running for Magical Minister instead of Fudge, Luna needs no reason to keep pretending to be happy in Wiltshire, inside the Malfoy Manor.
"You're the one who ordered that potion from my mother? The one which caused her death as she was brewing it?" Luna yells at Lucius, her entire miniature body shaking with rage. "How could I ever forgive that?"
She's packing all her strawberry hair clips into a large trunk, ready to head home to her father.
"I didn't know it then. It was an accident, my dove-" Lucius falls to his knees, arms around his wife's skirts.
"Don't call me that again." Inconsolable, the young woman prys herself from the grasp of that monster, regretting the day she thought he could become a beloved husband. No. Some things could never be forgiven.
"
Oh no! Stay tuned for act three, dear writer. We're not done yet.