Implausible, Irrational, Preposterous, Peculiar, and Just Plain Luna by The Treacle Tart (PG-13)

[bethbethbeth.livejournal.com]

Fandom: HARRY POTTER
Pairing: Snape/Luna
Length: 6300 words
Author on LJ: thetreacletart
Author Website: Her Skyehawke Page and Tart Confections.
Why this must be read: The Treacle Tart introduces this pre-DH story by saying she likes "the idea of taking two characters who have *absolutely* no business being together and trying to make a relationship between them plausible." On the surface, she's absolutely right about bitter, sharp, angry Snape and accepting, insightful, other-worldly Luna having no business being together, yet in the hands of a very good author, this pairing works - as it does here - extremely well.

"Implausible, Irrational, Preposterous, Peculiar, and Just Plain Luna" is far more than just a romance (what romantic interactions there are in this story are more suggested than seen): it is a story of friendship, of understanding, of hope, and of what makes life worth living. And...given that last, it's interesting that the story begins with Severus thinking he's no longer alive...

***

He thought he was dead. It was the only way he could explain it.

The last thing he remembered was trying to sleep on the slab of concrete they called a bed in a cramped cell in Azkaban. There he waited, nearly a year, for the trial that everyone said was coming but that he doubted he'd live long enough to see. Suddenly, he heard voices--only not from inside his head, as was the normal case, but from outside his cell. There was a brief scuffle, a flash of bright yellow light and then--this. This place….

The sky was a soft violet, with clouds shaped like large puffy animals. Nifflers and snidgets, tadfoals and unicorns, drifted happily across the horizon. The grass at his feet was lush and striped like a candy cane. The landscape was dotted in a dizzying array of flowers of no recognizable species, colored in shades pinks and purples and blues and yellows and greens that he never knew existed in nature. Out of curiosity, he plucked a magenta-ish colored specimen whose petals started off slender and ballooned out so they appeared like overlapping teardrops. He leaned in and inhaled only to find that they smelled of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies.

Yes, he was definitely dead. Whether it was heaven or hell remained to be seen.

***

Treat yourself: read "Implausible, Irrational, Preposterous, Peculiar, and Just Plain Luna"