I'd Die for You

You're a god

When Harry was with the Dursley's one summer and Dudley was out with his friends instead of commandeering the television in the living room, he and Aunt Petunia had watched a programme about people that chase tornadoes.

He never would have spent time with Aunt Petunia willingly if he could be in his room instead, but that summer had been unbearably hot. He went downstairs to sit in front of the air conditioner for a few minutes.

They called them storm chasers. Some of them were paid for their work, to take pictures and record footage. But some of them were just people that liked watching natural destructive forces, who just wanted to see how close to a raging tornado they could get, who were just curious.

The way he and Snape started spending every free moment together after the Veil reminded him of those storm chasers. They could spot a vortex in the distance and were getting in a car together, driving fast and hard toward doom while everyone else drove away. It was like that, baring his heart to Snape when he wasn't really sure he saw him for who he was. For Snape, it clearly went against his every war-tested instinct but Harry knew he was drawn in as powerfully by it as if he were made of paper and in a tornado's way.

It felt inevitable, their ending up together each night. The night of the tragedy on Tower Bridge, Snape had taken him by the hand and led him to the fireplace, where he told Harry to Floo to his room.

Harry did it without resistance but later, when he was laying on his side in Snape's bed and watching Snape's back as he wrote at his desk, he told him he wouldn't be able to stand it if he was letting him stay there because he felt bad for Harry.

"Just tell me to leave now if you do."

The scratching of Snape's quill on parchment didn't stop right away but when it did, Snape said, "I don't pity you. You had a choice. You have a job at Hogwarts that you leave willingly to try to save the world. Again."

"Not save the world. Just...help."

"Help yourself, Harry."

He retreated back into silence, and then there were no words between them, just Snape going about his nightly business and Harry watching him or numbly watching nothing. Snape wrote for what seemed like an eternity and undressed and showered and pulled on socks and read a book and Harry didn't move. Not until Snape closed the volume he was reading and went to retrieve clothes from a drawer. He threw them unceremoniously at Harry's face, exactly as he had the last time.

When he changed and they were both back in bed, the lights just went out as if Snape had done it without his wand. He waited, desperately hoping for Snape to reach for him but not wanting to ask, because he was asking for so much already.

Snape's hands were there then and easy, pulling Harry to him, his mouth near Harry's ear when they were done shifting, his palm over Harry's heart.

"The password to my door is beautitudo, " he said. The feel of his breath and body around him and the meaning of his whisper in the dark were almost enough to stirr Harry's libido alive. He thought of how Snape had been the night before when they were touching and telling each other what they really wanted, who they really were. He thought of how Snape had been sweet, protective almost, how maybe that was how Snape was in between the times he thought he had to be a total prick. Or maybe he was just like that with people he liked, or just when he was having sex with them.

He thought this was the thing about Snape that his mother must have understood.

Harry found Snape's hand, interlacing their fingers together.

It should have scared him that he needed this so much but storms don't scare storm chasers, they just urge them on endlessly, living in wait for the day another one will come around.