~~ calling all in-character H/S fics!

[reenka]

So I subscribe to the V-Inc mailing list, and I get the digest so I skim all the the fics without reading, mostly. But seeing the random millionth reference to Harry confessing to Snape how much he finds his voice oh-so-sexy was just the last straw. I just need to know: Are there any fics out there that don't go in for these cliches? Anywhere? Anyone? Bueller?

In my sudden quest for an I-might-read-this-even-with-no-smut H/S fic, I'm looking for something--


- Where Harry isn't rabidly lusting after Snape's voice;
- Where Snape's wish to fuck Harry is UST or repressed for most of the fic, and he may not even know he wants to for the longest time-- he -definitely- didn't just suddenly have this lust-lightbulb switch on;
- Where they are not star-crossed lovers who're perfect for each other in every way, if only they'd get over themselves;
- Where no one feels the urge to call him `Severus', least of all Harry;
- Where Harry actually resents him and has childish issues with "but I HATE Snape, my GOD", through most of the fic-- and he never entirely learns to like him, though maybe he accepts that;
- Where Harry is not submissive and neither is Snape;
- Where Snape is not the most experienced and sexually potent and skilled person alive, and is in fact kinda bad except it's okay anyway. Kind of;
- Where Harry is still friends with Ron and Hermione and he's not any more "adult" or "intelligent" than ever;
- Where Harry doesn't have a "hormonal crush" and his feelings are all prickly and uncomfortable and confused;
- Where Snape is still greasy and mean to Harry, possibly moreso than ever in spite;
- Where Snape is still an amoral bastard and Harry still distrusts him and they don't like each other even though they maybe wouldn't mind using each other sexually. Maybe. Something like that. And maybe they're starting to reach an understanding (but it's an annoyed, exasperated understanding). Um?

EDIT - Trying to be reasonable, I'd say minimally:

- Harry doesn't suddenly like/want him;
- He doesn't obsess over Snape's voice;
- Both Snape and Harry remain basically the same;
- No gratuitous sweetness and usage of `Severus' occurs.

- Bonus points for this all not working out and being doomed (no, really??) and Harry -not- deciding to come back and be DADA professor, and instead getting into a nice committed hetero relationship while Snape grows more bitter. Mmmm, realism.

Is this even humanly possible to write? :/ ...I think maybe I'm impossible to please entirely, but an utter lack of "Oh Severus!-- Oh Harry!" and voice-lust would be nice.
    P.S. - heeeeee. Snape/Buckbeak - the perfect Snape pairing :D :D :D

Comments

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

I guess for me...well, there's probably any number of reasons I love H/D and don't much like H/S, but part of it is that you've got more leeway with the boys because they're boys. Like if you're thirty years old and you run into the guy you hated in high school you're probably not going to pick a fight with him the way you would have then because then you would be a bit of a loser. Or like Snape, who sees the son of the guy he hated in high school and hates him just the same. There's always the possibility that both Harry and Draco are idiots and barely know who they really are yet. And their sex can reflect that--they don't know what they're doing or what they're saying. That's why I love when Harry confronts Sirius and Remus with the Pensieve stuff and they're almost surprised this is an issue because to them it's a given that James was an ass at 15.

With Snape part of the problem for me is that okay, Snape's Harry's least favorite teacher. Not because he's rough on him but because he literally picks on him like a bully (and unlike Draco, actually). See, I think if I were Harry I would find this aspect of Snape more embarrassing than anything else. I love Snape myself as a character but his anger at Harry is pathetic. It's the part of him that keeps him from being as cool as he could be--here he is a spy, a guy who's done a lot for the order, creator of incredible Potions, man who acts competently in a crisis. Then you get him in a class with Harry and you realize Oh god, he's also a loser with no appropriate relationships because he doesn't act his age. Socially Draco is actually more mature than Snape--he hates Harry and is sometimes childishly vindictive to him, but he's got friends.

I suppose part of what seems to be necessarily in a teacher/student fic is that the student is attracted to the teacher's very adulthood. When Harry looked at Sirius he saw a cool man he wanted to be like: handsome, dashing, heroic. So far he hasn't seen anything like that in Snape, it doesn't seem. Draco, for instance, presumably sees Snape's good qualities (he's intelligent, sees things the way they are (in Draco's pov), gets to Harry in ways Draco can not) and denies or twists anything to the contrary. If I were to think of the kind of student relationship I can imagine Snape in, I think it would be with some sweet girl who wanted to help him or something...not something I'd necessarily want to read. This is not to say I don't think somebody couldn't take the feelings that *are* there in H/S and slash them. I just don't think it would be a romance.

And while I'm going on and on about teacher/student pairings, which I don't really like normally, I might as well throw out the only one that really intrigues me strange as it sounds: Draco/Lupin. Yup. Draco/Remus Lupin. Go figure.

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

Hehehe. Yeah, um, no one has to convince me as to the sheer unlikelihood and ridiculousness of H/S. The only thing, really, is that I myself don't tend to like pairings because of their plausibility, their usefulness to the characters or their ability to stand the test of time. I don't usually feel like I can justify any romantic coupling I like based on "well, this just makes sense". In fact, the less sense it makes, the more I tend to like it.

So... I dunno. On the one hand, I'm just lucky that I think there are all these in-depth reasons to explore H/D. On the other hand, the only reason it's occurred to me was because I loved the over-the-top romance and the sex and the angst and the adolescent snark of the first fics I'd read in the fandom. Looking back on it, I dunno how canonically plausible or even related IP and Haven and Penguin's stuff and LUW's first few chapters and riddle's fics are-- so I guess what I'm saying is, it's not enough to just talk about canon all the time, in terms of wanting stuff from pairings. I just want a fanon I can believe in~:)

Which, I realize, makes it leave the realm of objective discourse entirely and goes straight into "well, does this hit my buttons", heh. I was just re-reading one of riddle's fics recently-- `harry potter and the little white pill', in particular. Riddle was one of my very first HP authors, one of those major influences that got me into the fandom. There's like very very little relationship with the "real" Harry and Draco there. But there's a vibe. I think there's just some sort of vibe that feels real to me-- like, real emotion, stuff I can believe it. Hard to quantify, but there.

I like H/S (pornily) 'cause in some fics Harry is shown as having turned the tables on Snape. He knows what he wants and he's all dom and the war has started and they're in a different situation and the cards are being played and boom. I like it because I like jaded!Harry. And all that `Severus' and voice-lust stuff seems extraneous. Whereas I wouldn't put Draco with any adult 'cause he's so subby, eheheh. And the only way an adult/adolescent relationship works for me is to have an aggressive adolescent who seduces the adult. And I dislike Snape just enough to like seeing him fall apart as Harry decides to mind-fuck him, and I don't dislike any other adult in the Potterverse in quite the same way. I mean, Lucius-- I just -hate- Lucius.

So yeah. Different evaluation approaches, I think ^^;

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Yah--see, that's exactly the type of H/S that seems to use canon to me as well: Harry basically making Snape more humiliated in revenge. That gets into some definite Harry material, where he's kind of wallowing in the awfulness. Of course, it also makes him a bit more like Malfoy without his realizing it--you know, "Look at him! The great lump. I can make him crawl in the dirt. Go me!!"

What's weird with Draco/Lupin for me is that usually I agree that Draco is totally subby but when I picture that pairing I do see Lupin as the subby one. I never considering this pairing before OotP, and I think it might have something to do with Remus there. Like...he's the nice Marauder who's therefore passively mean to Snape. Doesn't stick up for him, but doesn't attack him either. I think that made me suddenly imagine a situatuion where Draco, of all people, could take him in hand, as it were. Sort of like, "Look you're a werewolf. You're a monster. You're despised. I'm a little monster myself. Stop apologizing." And of course Draco would also have reason to want to mindfuck him because he likes Harry, etc. etc. It's like, "What are you? You think you can be friends with bullies and still be a nice guy? Give it up!" Something like that. I just suddenly saw all this potential weirdness in Remus after OotP I never did before. (Perhaps NA helped me along too.) Anyway, even though I usually always see Draco as the one being seduced, this was suddenly one adult I could picture Draco seducing--and thus my D/R fettish was born.:-)