Chasing Moonbeams. Ch26.

[pekeleke]

Title: Chasing Moonbeams.
Author: pekeleke
Pairing(s): Severus Snape/Harry Potter
Rating: NC-17, eventually.
Length: 82K+
Warnings: Extremely Slow burn. Pre-slash to slash. Enemies to friends to lovers. Pinning!Harry. Oblivious!Severus. Implied Bottom!Severus. EWE.
Disclaimer: Don't own these characters. I make no profit from writing fanfiction.
Summary: “Really?” Harry beams, green eyes wide and full of wonder. “You’re going to let me snog you to my heart’s content?”

“Of course not.” Severus replies contrarily, curling elegant digits around the brat’s neck and tugging him down low enough for a quick and dirty kiss before the Savior has a chance to protest. “I’m going to let you snog me to my heart’s content, Potter.”

 

Chapter 26.

 

It turns out that drinking tea with a former student who wants to become his friend is about a million miles away from doing the same thing with an actual friend who makes no bones about being madly in love with him. Severus has been in this bakery before, has drunk the exact same variety of tea he is currently drinking and ordered the same fruit-encrusted scones presently sitting on a plate between them. They’ve done all of this before, maybe not a hundred times yet, but definitely often enough that the experience shouldn’t feel as alien as it does.

Back in the earlier days of his romance with Regulus, Severus had been young, smitten, and inexperienced. He is none of those things now, and yet he can’t help but feel equally unpracticed this time around. Severus never truly ‘dated’ Regulus. They lived together, in a way. Shared all there was to share, from breakfast to showers, to a common room, to the student-related restrictions placed upon both, their movements and finances, that shaped everything they did as a couple. Those circumstances no longer apply, and Severus’s lack of familiarity with a situation he honestly hadn’t expected to be so different makes him feel unexpectedly wrong-footed.

Harry is positively glowing with delight across from him, babbling a mile a minute while his nervous fingertips absentmindedly tear the scone he’d served himself to shreds. It’s also patently obvious that the Auror went home after work and primped himself to within an inch of his life for their date. Severus hasn’t been able to stop staring at Harry’s formal robes since he first saw them. They look so odd on him, turning him into someone he isn’t. Severus wonders how Harry’s friends and allies feel about the fact that the boy is so ill-suited to formality. He doesn’t look like a future Minister of Magic and, now that Severus has seen what he believes is Harry’s best attempt at looking sophisticated, Severus realizes that the boy will never fit the mold they want to stuff him in. They’ll have to make a new one just for him. Harry’s strength isn’t in playing the smooth, worldly gentleman but on being the boy next door. That charming, walking disaster everyone adores just because he’s— Harry. The mere sight of the atrociously flat hairstyle the Gryffindor is currently sporting, coupled with those deeply starched robes is giving Severus heartburn. He hates Harry’s new look viscerally but has no intention of disparaging it when his companion has put so much effort into his appearance.

“What’s wrong?” Harry asks suddenly, fluttering right hand reaching out to poke his in a gesture that manages to convey both increasing wariness and instinctive boldness. “You’re a million miles away from here, Severus.”

Severus takes a deep breath, weights the pros and cons of diverting the Auror’s attention with some random remark in a bid to salvage the moment, and promptly decides that course of action won’t help them achieve their mutual goal of turning their friendship into something more intimate. “I don’t like whatever it is you’ve done to your hair,” Severus says in the end, praying to Merlin that Harry won’t reward his honesty with a face full of tepid tea before he storms out in a fit of pique.

Harry’s reaction is much worse than that. His green gaze widens with hurt. His smile dims, and suddenly self-conscious fingertips rise towards his head, broadcasting blatant insecurity. Severus hates the sight of that even more so he adds in a rush: “I don’t like those stuffy robes you’re wearing either. They make you look like someone you aren’t, and I— Salazar help me, Potter, but I prefer to see you messy and horribly put together. I prefer you looking like you.”

The hurt expression vanishes from Harry’s face so fast that Severus wonders if he’d hallucinated it. The brat beams at him, broad smile bright and disgustingly mushy with undisguised affection. “So you’re saying you like me the way I am. That’s— incredibly romantic, professor.”

Severus blinks, positively horrified by the sappy implication. “It is not.”

Harry has the gall to laugh at him. “Of course it is. It’s the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me.” He insists, both green gaze and manly voice softening with fondness as he dares to place that audacious hand of his over Severus’s own, right there, on top of the bakery table, in full sight of about a dozen paparazzi and fifty customers, some of whom are former members of the Slytherin house.

Severus becomes instantly flustered. He can literally feel the blush climbing up his chest and neck like the most unwelcome wave of prickly heat imaginable. His pulse starts racing, and he feels that sickening butterfly fluttering explode in the pit of his stomach for the first time in ages. He remembers this awkwardness. This giddy and terrifying mix of hope and attraction, of reckless overconfidence and crippling insecurity, and he finds it as frightening now as he found it back then. “What are you doing?” He hears himself whisper, staring not up into his companion’s eyes but down towards their linked hands.

Harry doesn’t miss a beat, “I’m holding my dear friend’s hand,” he says calmly, squeezing Severus’s suddenly cold fingers reassuringly.

“I’ve never seen you hold Weasley thus.”

“That doesn’t mean I haven’t, Severus. There’s a lot of stuff you miss when you ignore someone as hard as you’ve been ignoring me.”

“That’s not it.” Severus disagrees. “You’re attempting to out this, out us, with typical Gryffindor disregard for either subtlety or decorum.”

Harry doesn’t even bother to play dumb any further. “I didn’t realize we were trying to hide it.”

“What part of ‘please, go slow’ don’t you understand?” Severus sighs, pulling his hand away and instantly grabbing the delicate handle of his tea-cup, turning the gesture into one that neither Harry nor anyone else who may be looking, can possibly interpret as a rejection.

“I am going slow.” Harry protests instantly. “I haven’t made a single inappropriate comment so far. Haven’t tried to snog you blind or even hinted at how hot you look in that bottle-green shirt.”

Severus feels his throat go dry upon hearing the last two examples of Harry’s impassioned self-defense. He finds himself blinking in shock, equally intrigued and overwhelmed by those words and, when his lips open to reply, they don’t bother to consult his brain at all. “Y-you think me hot?”

Surprisingly, Harry neither laughs in his face nor tries to take advantage of the moment by engaging in sexual flirting. The Auror’s jaw drops open as he blinks in bafflement. “Please don’t tell me that you’ve managed to live this long without realizing you’re one hell of an attractive wizard, Severus.”

“Er-

“Oh. My. God!”

“I-

“No. That’s— No. Gosh! What the fuck happened? Surely you don’t believe Regulus Black got into your pants because he liked the sharpness of your mind.”

Severus fidgets, instantly uncomfortable. “Regulus was an oddball, Harry. He often admired the unusual.”

“That’s— unhelpful.”

Severus’s lips quirk upwards ever so slightly. “Regulus adored being unhelpful. It was part of his charm.”

“I see. Even if he had a thing for unusual things, you realize that doesn’t mean he thought you odd, right?”

“Oh, he definitely did. I was the studious, grumpy arsehole who hated his big brother’s guts. I preferred smelly potions to the more common Slytherin pursuits of Quidditch, sharing and spreading gossip or making advantageous bargains. Regulus was a self-proclaimed addict to my peculiarity.”

“Fine. But that doesn’t mean anything either. Odd things aren’t unattractive by definition, Severus.”

“Maybe not. But large noses, greasy hair, and sallow skin surely are.”

“Your hair is not greasy at all, you berk. And you have beautiful skin. It’s all pale and glow-y like a moonbeam.” Harry says, and there’s something so playful, so daring and oh-so-mischievous in his expression as that last word leaves his lips that Severus scowls instinctively.

“Oh, no. No, Potter. Don’t you dare-

“My moonbeam,” Harry whispers softly, rudely bringing Severus’s protest to a flustered halt.

“I can’t believe you just called me that.” Severus gasps, halfway between thoroughly appalled and oddly bashful.

“Why not? I like it, and the nickname suits you perfectly, professor. You’re pale. Gorgeous. Mysterious. And you enjoy tricking others into believing that nothing they do or think can actually touch you. I’d say you’re a moonbeam alright. The hottest one I’ve ever seen.”

Severus has no idea what to say to that. He stares at the Gryffindor stupidly, mute, and so red in the face that he’s pretty confident he could brew Pepper-Up successfully using the heat coming off his cheeks. Two excruciatingly long minutes pass before Harry comes to his aid, reaching out across the table to grab his hand once more and giving it a small, reassuring squeeze.

“I won’t ever call you that again if you find it offensive, Severus,” Harry promises earnestly, and the idea of losing the only sweetheart nickname he’s ever received before his would-be lover even uses it properly for the first time makes the something small but oh-so-hopeful currently attempting to take root inside Severus’s chest shiver with immeasurable horror.

“This doesn’t feel slow, Harry.” He tries to deflect, uncertain of what he wants, but Harry refuses to play ball. The Auror’s sincere green gaze pins him to the moment, demanding the answer to a question the boy has no qualms voicing.

“You need to tell me if I’ve offended you, professor. Going slow doesn’t mean not advancing. It means making an effort to  ensure we’re both on the same page. I can’t do that on my own.”

“I— No one has ever called me anything other than Snape. Or Severus.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

“It’s a lot to digest. You liking me. Lusting after me. Ca-calling me moonbeam.”

“Do you want me to call you Severus instead?”

“No. No. I- Everyone else uses that. It’s what all my friends call me.”

“I am your friend.” Harry points out carefully, the calloused thumb of the hand holding his own rubbing his skin soothingly. Severus looks down at their connected limbs, gives into the grounding, affectionate touch, and lets himself just feel it. He wonders if he’d really be able to go back to not having it now that he knows what it’s like. Yes, they’re friends, but they could easily become so much more. Severus is more interested in finding out the exact shape and feel of that nebulous ‘more’ than in keeping the status quo.

“And yet here we are. Out together. On a date. I thought you wanted to court me, Potter.”

Harry’s caressing thumb twitches and the boy’s entire hand grows instantly bolder, grasping his own more firmly, trying to interlock their fingers. “I do.” The Auror rasps, tone and gaze doing absolutely nothing to hide the pure, unadulterated rawness of his emotions.

“Then it’s perfectly appropriate for you to call me a name that’s only yours. And mine. A name that’s only ours.”

“Oh, moonbeam-” Harry chokes out, and Severus’s insides tremble upon hearing the endearment for the very first time. Something warm and profoundly beautiful settles in his gut. In his chest. He stares unblinkingly into Harry’s tear-bright gaze, smiles a little bit bashfully, and squeezes the hand trembling within his reassuringly. ‘Yes.’ He thinks. ‘I could definitely get used to this.’


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