undunoops (undunoops) wrote in lupin_snape, @ 2008-04-28 23:38:00 |
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Entry tags: | family fest |
Family Fest Fic: Love and a Hard Place - R, Parts 1 and 2
Cripes, I'm so nervous about posting this. There are 14 parts in all.
Title: Love and a Hard Place
Author/Artist: undun
Rating: R (mature/adult content)
Pairing(s)/character(s): Remus Lupin, Severus Snape, Nymphadora Tonks, Hermione Granger, et al.
Challenge: lupin_snape's Family Fest
Summary: Remus would do anything to be a father.
Disclaimer: Not-for-profit fan creation.
Warnings: I hate warnings. I don’t think anyone dies…
Notes: This story was started before the release of Deathly Hallows and is therefore non-compliant with that storyline. I leave it to the reader whether they judge it to be AU. Beta was gifted to me by the extraordinary Dillis. Thanks to lore for running the fest!
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I.
"Why are you asking me?"
Remus sighed.
"I just explained, Severus. The curse renders me infertile. Werewolves can't breed the traditional way."
"Yes, I know that, fool! I meant, why me?"
"You, in particular?" Remus asked, eyebrows rising. He'd thought Snape would have jumped at the chance to cuckold him with his permission. Another humiliation to chalk up.
"Yes!"
"Well, strangely enough, I respect you," he murmured uncomfortably. At this, a strange sound escaped Snape. "I do, really!" Remus asserted.
"And your... partner? I'm quite sure she could not be accused of harbouring any tender feelings for me."
"Well, no. She doesn't," Remus confirmed, dropping his gaze.
"So?"
"So...” Remus looked away from Snape, studying the floor as if it was suddenly the most interesting phenomenon he'd ever discovered. “Well, you were the compromise."
"I'm the compromise," Snape repeated slowly.
There was an imperative to answer the unspoken question.
"Yes. I know that she'd… she won't be...” Remus waved his hand wordlessly for a moment. “I know that she won't fall in love with you in the process and leave me!" he finally confessed, almost shouting with the release of pent up frustration, anger and embarrassment.
"I see."
The quiet acknowledgement unnerved him. Remus crossed his arms defensively.
"It wasn't a good idea, coming here," he muttered, remnants of hurt and anger threading through his voice. Silence followed. Remus could hear a rat scurrying inside the wainscoting. Full moon tomorrow night.
"Will you be present for the act?"
Remus’ eyes flicked up to look at Snape's face. He couldn't be really suggesting...? Surely not!
"Um, I didn't actually plan that far," he admitted.
"And yet you came here as part of a plan to have a child with her. The traditional way."
There was a hint of mockery in the statement, but for Snape it was almost friendly.
"I suppose I could be a sort of witness, if that's what you want," Remus ventured, mind boggling at the thought of... watching.
"In that case, I'll do it," Snape stated tersely.
Remus' mind went perfectly blank.
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“It didn’t take,” Remus said.
“What?” Snape looked up from a bubbling cauldron, his face outlined in purple.
“She’s not pregnant.”
Snape looked back to his potion, stirring with mechanical precision. “Really.”
“Yes, really,” Remus said, huffing a breath.
“And what exactly do you want me to do about it?” Snape queried with an abstracted air.
“Try again, of course!”
“Surely you jest?”
“No. Why would I joke about it? We want to have a baby and you said that you would help us.”
“And what happens if, for instance, your partner in this venture is also infertile? How many times do you expect me to go through with this procedure, Lupin? Shall I move in?”
Remus’ mind did a double take. Snape, in their bed, every night?
“She isn’t infertile. We went to St. Mungo’s and she was tested.” It was all he could think of to refute Snape’s argument.
With a great sigh, Snape moved his cauldron to a trivet and laid down his stirring rod.
“One more performance is all I am willing to grant you, Lupin,” he announced.
“Do you…?” Remus swallowed thickly. “Am I to attend as before?”
Snape looked at him with a sneer. “Of course.”
Later that night Snape's eyes met his and Remus felt his blood freeze and boil simultaneously; his face flush then drain of blood so rapidly he thought he would black out and slide senseless to the floor. He closed his eyes, desperate to preserve some dignity, though the notion was somehow ludicrous when watching someone who loathed him having intercourse with his wife.
Even later that night he asked Tonks if it had felt okay to do that again with Snape. She snuggled against him, warm and muzzy-headed with post-coital fatigue. "Oh, yeah – he's bloody good at what he does is old Snape."
Old Snape. He hadn't looked even slightly old to Remus. He'd looked dangerous. He'd looked graceful, powerful, desirable...
... and knowing.
Merlin!
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II.
“Permit me to guess,” Snape drawled at him as he opened the door. “It didn’t take,” he finished as he sat down behind his desk.
“No, it didn’t,” Remus confirmed, crossing his arms and gazing back. It had been a strained fortnight at home: odd little disagreements and festering resentments for which he’d had no ready remedies.
“You’ll have to find someone else to service her, Lupin. I’ve hung up my cock,” Snape said, his lip curled up on one side.
“Why did you do it?” Remus asked.
He wasn’t here about their efforts to have a child. The way things stood right now he wasn’t sure they’d be together to raise it. Remus was here to ask a question he’d been in too much of a hurry to ask at the beginning. And he really should have asked it then, before the events of those two nights took place. Before he’d sat there and watched Snape…
“It amused me the first time, fucking your little lady, and I use the term loosely – as I’m sure she does herself – while you watched. While you let me, Lupin, while you practically begged me to. The second time…? Well, I was weak. And you did plead so beautifully.”
Remus took a deep, shuddering breath.
“You’re a bastard,” he stated in flat, cold voice.
“But you respect me, Lupin. You told me so yourself,” Snape responded in mock hurt. “Do you mean to say that you lied to me?”
“I never lied to you. I did respect you. And now I despise you!”
“Careful, my dear werewolf – your temper is rising and we don’t want that, do we?” Snape hissed as he rose from his chair, moving slowly towards him.
Remus took a careful, slow breath. Much as he hated Snape right now, he was right; he had to control the wolf that was rising underneath his skin. The subjects of claiming and mating were guaranteed triggers for aggression at this point in the month.
“You treated this whole situation as a game,” he insisted quietly, a temporary calm restored.
“Why shouldn’t I? I’m not attached to either of you. I was to be the ‘anonymous donor’ as the muggles so charmingly phrase it. I should derive some pleasure for my services. Some amusement at least,” Snape said with an elegant shrug. He perched on the edge of the desk in front of Remus.
Remus struggled not to step back; he was not going to give ground. This was a non-verbal addition to their conversation and he would not be intimidated.
“Well I hope you’ve had your fun, Severus. I hope that you can enjoy a good laugh at our difficulties,” he stated with as much dignity as he could muster.
“I must admit to it having been an illuminating experience,” Snape replied, nodding slowly.
“Illuminating?” Remus couldn’t help his curiosity.
“Indeed. The way you spent each of those evenings watching me rather than your wife was very illuminating,” Snape answered with a smirk.
“What? I never… bloody hell! What exactly are you implying?” Remus spluttered.
“You didn’t want me to fuck your wife, Lupin. You wanted me to fuck you.”
There was a moment of silence in which Remus’ shock rendered him mute, and then–
"No, you're wrong! Just watching doesn't mean wanting, Severus. I'll admit I was curious, but I've never wanted to have sex with another man!"
"Is that so?"
Remus watched as Snape twirled his wand in his fingers. When had he picked it up? At the same moment it occurred to him that he should perhaps be a little concerned, Snape snapped his wrist in a sharp movement and Remus found himself bound. He fought to keep his balance; his legs weren't tied but Snape had added a Sticky Shoes hex and he couldn't move his feet.
"What the hell are you doing!" he shouted, knowing that struggling against magical ropes never, ever did any good, but helpless to stop the impulse to do just that.
"Calm down, Lupin," Snape replied smoothly. "Think of it as a little experiment. I shan't harm you."
"What? What are you going to do?" Remus panted. Sweat broke out all over his body. It wasn't the only unwanted reaction. Oh, no!
Snape continued, "You assert that you've never wanted to have sex with a man, and you believe that watching me with the former Miss Tonks was simply an act of curiosity on your part?"
Remus nodded dumbly, horror blooming in his mind. What was he going to do?
Snape leaned into him, his next words whispering into his ear. "I believe you're mistaken."
"No," Remus whispered back. It less a denial of Snape's statement than a simple rejection of what was about to happen. "Don't," he added, his voice strangely weak.
Snape's hands shoved at his coat, found the buttons to Remus’ trousers, and flew down them without preamble. "Time for the truth, Lupin," Snape murmured, lips crooking into a smirk.
"No, no!" Remus couldn't seem to catch his breath. He struggled to stay upright and attempt to pull away from Snape at the same time. He had nowhere to go. "No, this is assault!" Remus shouted, finding volume at last.
Snape snorted and looked up from his task. Remus refused to look down. He knew his arousal was evident, had sprung loose as soon as Snape had unbuttoned him.
The crooked smile had faded from Snape's face as their eyes met and held.
"You want me, but you don't want me to do this. Why?"
Remus closed his eyes – he couldn't meet Snape's gaze any longer.
"Why do you cling so desperately to this denial?"
Remus felt the words trickle along his neck, up to his ear, the question punctuated with a tongue. Some hybrid sound between a sob and cough fought its way out of his chest, burning his throat. Tears gathered behind his eyelids.
"Lupin, don't..."
The bonds disappeared from Remus’ arms, and, as his feet were suddenly freed, he pitched forward.
Snape caught him around the shoulders. "Remus," he hissed.
His eyes flew open in surprise. Snape blurred darkly in front of him, hardly a hand's breadth between them.
"Fuck!"
His mouth met Snape's with uncomfortable force. There were long moments spent kissing each other better. Remus pulled back, panting, to say–
"I'm married."
"I've slept with your wife, Lupin. I don't fucking care."
"I've actually never done this before. That was the truth, Severus," he said, still trying to avert disaster. Although, maybe it was too late now and he should simply accept that they were going down in flames.
"You've been given a blow job before, haven't you?"
"Yes," Remus replied. Tonks was wonderfully athletic. And rather adventurous. But he'd never asked her for anything gay.
"Well then," Snape said around a smirk, interrupting Remus' rambling, panicked thoughts. He knelt in front of Remus, and of course his face was then on a level with…
"Ah, God!"
There was no fiddling about with Snape, he just got right down to business.
Bowed over with his hands braced on the desk behind Snape, Remus assumed the crash position.
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