This is one of the best fics I have ever read. I absolutely adored it. Some of the passages just hit me right between the eyes, and I was moved to tears more than once. And the ending - so sweet and perfect. Thank you, Odo, thank you for this beautiful love song of a fic. It's gone onto my Kindle, where it will no doubt be read over and over. I cannot tell you how much I loved it.
For some reason, with few exceptions, the poorer students tended to be placed in either Slytherin or Hufflepuff. She had always supposed it had to do with whether a particular student felt more ambition to prove themselves or more in need of nurturing and stability. One thing Pomona had learnt was that Severus Snape was wary of nurturing at best.
So insightful and rings like a bell with truth.
Snape became an epithet a generation of resentful students came to know instead of the weary, solitary, frustrated man behind the name.
The first of many times my heart ached and tears came into my eyes. Oh, I'm filling up now. The loneliness, and the sadness that they could not help one another.
There was not a single Slytherin student who could say they felt unsupported by their Head. Severus defended his little snakes much as she did her badgers, regardless of status.
I have so often said that Snape in canon was seen through the filter of a boy who despised him, and we saw only a tiny facet of the man. Why on earth would an intelligent man like Dumbledore place someone in charge of a house that wasn't able to look after his charges with care. Of course he would make sure the poorer ones were looked after.
"Just... don't lose faith in me. Please." His voice was strangled and he blinked to keep the telltale moisture from his too dry and tired eyes.
Oh, how could you lose faith in such a faithful man? Again, my heart broke for him.
And the Obliviate! I was terrified he'd erased everything, but cleverly, he only erased what he had to answer for then, not his past. At least there, he knew he could remain dear in someone's heart. Even then, his need for self-preservation included her.
I could blab on and on about this fic, but I just want to say thank you again, for this wonderful story of love and its power to heal and see beyond the physical. Fallow Fields will stay with me for a long time.