Thank you so much for taking the time to spell it out for me.
You know, this story has become something of a classic to me. If I wanted an infidelity fic that makes me feel as though my guts are being wrenched out through my nostrils, I'd read snegurochka_lee's The Blue Door. But if I wanted to ponder the whole thing, feeling some of the emotional tumult, but able to think through it, this is the one for me.
I mean that doesn't take into account the sheer joy I have reading your writing - so beautiful, so laden with sensual and startling imagery: it disrupted a nerve in Severus' arm and sent unpleasant thorns skittering up the violetting veins.
And In the light of the mirror their gazes realigned, and Severus felt himself widen, further than before, his heart thinning at the edge into an inexplicable membrane of space and inconsequence, momentary but for the warmth of the hand now fitting to his. So exquisitely beautiful.