InsaneJournal

[drabble] After the Fall (snarry, PG)
It's that time again! I'd be much obliged if you wended your way over to snarry_ldws and cast your vote - there are only 6 drabbles this week, and they're all yummy non-magic AUs, so it should be a piece of cake. YOU HAVE NO EXCUSE NOT TO.

Title: After the Fall
Prompts: Angst, "cunning"
Summary: Harry wakes up in a bad mood and burns the porridge on purpose.
Rating/Warnings: PG, angst
Word Count: 300
Notes: Got a bit experimental with the stylistic stuff this time. *vbg* Big props to [Bad username: beetle_comma_the] for all the beta/cheerleading!

Some mornings you wake up and roll out of bed, look at the man still sleeping there and all you see is a hooked nose, a bony frame with stringy hair and a sour mouth. In the shower you run the water hot and hard, close your eyes against the image burned into them, and tell yourself this is the man I love.

Love has never come easily between you two. It is work; it is a fight against everyone you know and everything you ever thought you felt. You can't remember, anymore, why you thought this a battle worth fighting. You dimly remember passion, promises, but you can't feel any of it anymore...

Hate is easy.

So...

easy.

You put the kettle on and suddenly it flares in your veins again, acid sharp. He's left the latest issue of Potions Quarterly on the counter right where you can see it, the cunning old...

You hate that journal; hate that it's the only thing he reads even though he knows you're too stupid to discuss Theoretical Potions with him; he's cutting you off and boxing you out and he fucking knows it.

The acid is sharp.

Bitter.

It hurts.

But you can feel nothing else, so you clench it into a tight fist and cherish it, stoking its fires ever higher.

You cook enough porridge for two, but you leave it on the heat far too long and when it burns you take what's unburnt and leave the crusty, blackened, bitter bottom for Severus.

He pads into the kitchen and you watch keenly for his reaction, something savage inside wanting to see him rage and storm.

But the bony shoulders only slump, defeated. He makes toast.

You watch, and can't remember how this should make you feel.

There's nothing left.

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psssst, go vote now, or else I might not make it through this round AND THEN THERE WOULD BE NO MORE SNARRY DRABBLES HERE, BOO HOO. [angst! angst! angst!]