Cage Him Not.

[pekeleke]

Title: Cage Him Not.
Author: pekeleke
Pairing: Harry Potter/Severus Snape.
Rating: PG.
Warning(s): Angst. Pining. Pre-snarry.
Word count: 365
Disclaimer: Don't own these characters. No money is being made out of this work.
Written for: hogwarts365 Prompt #126#3: Essential.
Summary: Harry sought someone better for years, someone willing to give him the love without the cage.

Cage Him Not.

Harry Potter loves risk, thrives on it, needs it even. He's been accused of getting off on danger many times -and he does- but that doesn't mean he'll choose peril over safety in every aspect of his life.

He needs his heart to be safe. He chose Ginny and Oliver because they were sane, stable, lovely people. They were beautiful inside and out, heroes fit for The Savior; but they tried to 'rescue' him from his weird addiction to danger. They'd promised him marriage, children and the essential vanilla future that all heroes -and Saviors- deserve if only he turned his back on risk, but that had struck Harry as too steep a prize to pay for the kind of love that's built on boundaries and conditions.

He sought someone better for years, someone willing to give him the love without the cage. He consistently shied away from comfortable, tender and romantic until his heart finally settled for cold, acerbic and so-ridiculously-out-of-touch-with-his-own-emotions-that-the-dammned-things-might-as-well-be-bloody-aliens.

Harry's heart has chosen well, but it's made the fatal mistake of falling for the kind of hardened warrior who wouldn’t recognize a happy ending if it punched him on the nose. So Harry thinks he has the love, and suspects he'll never face the cage, but wishes Severus would tether him with every breath he takes.

“Severus! I thought you were too busy grading to come over.” Harry smiles brightly, welcoming the only man he'd ever settle for a vanilla future with -and the only one who'll never offer it- into his flat.

“I'll grade here instead. I realized I haven't seen you in ages and Merlin knows you get into enough trouble whenever I turn around. No untreated injuries, I hope?” Severus asks quietly, raking Harry's body in search of 'trouble' with painfully familiar obliviousness.

“Three days is not 'ages.'”

“It sure feels like it.” Severus mumbles distractedly, and although Harry's heart begs him to kiss his love breathless and confess the feelings burning the tip of his tongue, he doesn't dare to risk it. He needs his heart to be safe. He needs Severus to be safe. And he knows that Severus, war-wary, twice-owned, emotionally-fragile Severus, won't survive another cage.