*back after reading again* This time, I'm struck even more by the parallels between Moody and Snape, both of them angry, bitter, paranoid, both of them accepting what Snape calls Minerva's "charity," which puts her in another light -- savior!Minerva, healing both men. In my first reading, I'd been struck by the opening sentence, wondering if, by the end, we would conclude that it had been a case of Minerva's "slyness" and not just a coincidental saving of Severus from suicide (however much he might not see it). And I like this interpretation more and more. She does take from Severus, but nothing he isn't willing to give (I don't think), and she gives back a great deal, too, as his gradual retreat from the shorelines and cliffs of suicide suggest. Her refusal throughout to comment or judge -- as Snape thinks, She was very good at not saying things. -- it's a way of giving both Snape and Moody the space and peace to heal themselves (to the extent that they can and however much she can't resist the occasional disapproving purse of the lips or "exasperated gaze.")
Minerva is IC and yet so wonderfully enigmatic in this story; I can't quite make her out, which I love -- I feel like Severus on that last train ride, looking at Minerva and having her not look back, not answer, and yet, her presence itself is an answer. Though she's not terribly "irascible" in this story, she reminds me of Potter's thoughts about her in OoP -- "solidly and dependably there."
And I love how the sex between her and Severus becomes more and more equal as he comes into his own (they start with her as his teacher yet again and end with that perfect give-and-take of mutual pleasure and manipulation behind closed curtains); their relationship is such a complex and interesting contrast to his sex/fights with Moody. (Speaking of whom, in this second reading, I was cut even more by his pain, that whole, huge, untold story behind one word -- "Gideon.")
I love the whole ghost story, too -- is she a real ghost? is she Snape's hopes and fears and past and subconscious made manifest, her cheap comb an emblem of his constant fear that the world will see through to his fundamental unworthiness and give him the "sack"? how much does her description of being dead influence his choice not to be? (That description, btw, is a piece of genius.) It's such a fascinating take on death: death not as the Big Sleep, but as the Eternal Waking -- but not waking to any heaven or hell beyond the ones you lived in life.
And I can just hear the two of them bickering; I laughed aloud at this exchange: "What did you die of?" "Oh, what does that matter? Murder. Suicide. Consumption. . .Don't worry - they washed the sheets." (And in the end, of course, what does it matter?) He does have the last word, and it's one for himself as well as for her -- yes, as he says, she's dead, but what I hear even more loudly are the words he doesn't say: she's dead and he's not, nor is he going to be (yet [*sniff*]).
Severus himself is such a triumph: awkward and suspicious and prickly and vulnerable and bright and self-serving and yet wanting to be accepted and considerate (in his unique Snapey way). What you've done with him epitomizes everything that compels me about this character. And of course, my love for your Minerva is just without bounds. (I adore, for instance, the way you sum up their fundmamental differences through your description of their prep for the new school year, Minerva with her calendars and schedules and satchels of books [and ha! the walking trunks]; Severus with his hilarious vague plan to repeat what he had done last year, only with less misery on his part and more on his students')
It's impossible for me to pick a favorite part of this story, but I have to give special place to that glorious scene in the library of (superbly-chosen) poetry and sex and Severus's final, mumbled "not you." Of course they have sex there and then: there's no aprhodisiac like poetry coupled with "the scent of paper and glue and vellum." This whole scene is a marvel, and I savored every word.
I'll stop (for now), but I can't promise that I won't be back.