Title: Loving Simplicity.
Author: pekeleke
Pairing: Harry Potter/Severus Snape.
Rating: PG
Warning(s): Fluff. Established colleague-with-benefits relationship.
Word count: 365
Disclaimer: Don't own these characters. No money is being made out of this work.
Written for: hogwarts365 Prompt #121#3: Champagne.
A/N: This piece was written in honor of Severus Snape's birthday. May he keep us all busy singing his praises for many years to come!
Summary: Severus studied Harry's reddening features with incredulous dark eyes. A hundred insane butterflies fluttered in his stomach and he felt strangely dizzy. Hopeful. Terrified. “Are you asking for commitment?”

Loving Simplicity.

Severus stared at the framed picture Harry had just handed him, wondering how his... -what, exactly? Casual lover? Intimate friend? Colleague-with-benefits?- expected him to react to his unusual 'gift'.

“Why preserve such unremarkable instant from the surprise birthday party Minerva sprung on me last year?” He finally asked, uncertain of what else he should say. “Turning pensive memories into pictures is prohibitively expensive. Wasting that amount of galleons on immortalizing my face seems woefully...”

“That was the first smile you ever gave me, Severus.”

“Oh!”

“It was the beginning of us. I'd have never flirted with you, or offered to cook you breakfast, if it wasn't for that smile.”

Severus' gaze lowered towards the frame and he stared at his picture-self's expression with a dazzled sort of wonder.
“I didn't realize you wanted smiles.” He said softly. “I thought you approached me because I was there. I was convenient, bored, willing... I assumed you'd continue 'seeing' me to keep Mistress Loneliness at bay until someone better came along.”

“There's no one better than you. Not for me, at least.”

Severus fidgeted uncomfortably and looked up to stare at Harry's reddening features with incredulous dark eyes. A hundred insane butterflies fluttered in his stomach and he felt strangely dizzy. Hopeful. Terrified.
“Are you asking for commitment?”

Harry twitched nervously:
“I realize that picking your birthday, of all days, to do this isn't ideal but... today is our first anniversary, too. It's been a year already. An entire year. And we—we've survived it.”

“Permanence requires more than survival. It requires romance and flowers. Chocolates. Champagne. Soft violin music… I'm terrible at all that, Harry.”

“That's not permanence. That's fanfare. And I'm terrible at it, too.”

“I—”

“I love you.” Harry interrupted him quietly, cradling his pale face oh-so-tenderly between visibly trembling hands: “Let the Lockharts of this world keep the fanfare to themselves. All I need is you. Your loyalty. Your wit. Your beautiful, shy, smile. Let me call you mine, Severus.”

“I—you must agree to be mine in return then.” Severus answered hoarsely and his supposedly cold heart literally melted upon hearing Harry's soft-toned reply:

“That's all I want to be, my love.”