It's set in the U.S., so I get to say "ass" instead of "arse." Also? Inadvertent unsafe sex practices contained within (clearly I'm too used to writing magically-protected sex). Don't you kids try this at home: use a condom!)

At Ganymede's Hands
by Beth H.
(c) August 10, 2007

***

"Nay, faith, let not me play a woman : I have a beard coming"
- Flute (A Midsummer-Night's Dream. Act I. Scene II.)

***

He took one last drag of his cigarette before dropping it into the bottle he held in his left hand. There was a satisfying hiss as the still-lit end hit the dregs of the beer and then...silence. For a moment, Harry could almost believe that he was alone in his dressing room, but when the assistant stage manager cleared his throat twice in succession, the illusion shattered.

"He says you have to go out there." Neville said, standing uncomfortably just inside the doorway and clutching his ever-present clipboard tightly against his chest.

"I don't have to do anything that I don't want to do," Harry said belligerently, flicking some ashes which had fallen between the laces on the bodice of his dress. "Tell him he can go fuck himself."

"Oh no," said Neville, shaking his head. "No way. I value my life too much."

Harry rolled his eyes, but he didn't bother to argue. Everyone in the company knew that Neville was terrified of the new artistic director, and it wasn't exactly hard to see why. Incredibly talented he might be, but Severus Snape could be a complete bastard. Whichever board members thought it would be a welcome idea to hire him as a replacement when the much-loved Albus Dumbledore finally retired should have their asses kicked.

"You can hide out in here all day if you want," said Harry, tugging the heavy fabric of his skirts up over his knees and scratching at an annoying spider bite on his inner thigh. "But I'm not going anywhere except home after I've had another beer, so you might as well get back to the stage and let Snape know that as far as I'm concerned, rehearsals are over for the day."

Neville sighed, and a few seconds later, Harry could hear his heavy footsteps retreating down the corridor. As soon as the room was empty again, Harry leaned down and took another Heineken from the cooler on the floor. Using the edge of the dressing table as a bottle opener, he let the bottle cap fall and took a drink.

"Adding 'drunkard' to your extremely limited repertoire of stock characters, I see."

It was all Harry could do to keep from jumping out of his chair at the unexpected sound of Snape's voice just behind him. Up until a few years ago, all Snape had to do was say his name and Harry would practically roll over and show his belly, but now? No, Harry wouldn't give him the satisfaction of any reaction.

"Say what you like," Harry said, turning around slowly. "I'm not going back out there."

"Despite the fact that your fellow cast members have been waiting for thirty minutes already? You always were a selfish brat," Snape said with a sneer on his face. "Thinking of nobody but yourself, just like your father. Why you didn't just become an idiotic television performer like he did is beyond me, but...."

"Don't talk about my father," Harry said angrily. "He's a great man!"

"A great man? Your father is no more than a mediocre talent who owes his success entirely to a pair of exaggeratedly oversized glasses, a comical hairstyle, and the fact that the American viewing public would rather watch puerile situation comedies than serious dramatic works."

"You know," Harry said. "I know what your problem is. You're jealous."

"Jealous?" Snape narrowed his eyes dangerously. "Jealous of what?"

"Six Emmy awards and eight Golden Globes, for a start. Everybody knows that you always wanted a series of your own, but nobody would...."

"That's absolutely absurd!"

"Dad told me about the letter you wrote to Sirius Broadcasting [1] in the eighties," Harry said. "He said you were practically on your knees offering to suck them off for funding."

"That is a damned lie, and even if it weren't, it would be entirely beside the point," Snape said, his face flushed. "You have a contract to fulfill, and either you'll meet the conditions of the agreement, or I'll see to it that no Equity theatre ever hires you again."

Harry took another drink of beer, then set the bottle down on the dressing table. "First of all, I don't think you have that kind of power- -"

"Oh? Just try me, boy. I learned how to destroy careers while you were still playing with your Legos."

"- - and second of all, if anybody is breaking a contract, it's you. Albus hired me to play specific roles this season, then you swanned in and...no, there's no point in discussing this with you."

"Your contract," Snape said, "assuming you even bothered to read it before you signed, calls for you to play multiple roles as required. The plays we're offering this season changed, and so did the parts that were available for you to play. Even an idiot should be able to understand that."

"What I understand is that you've resented me since the first time we met."

Snape snorted. "I had no feelings about you one way or the other whilst directing your infantile gurglings in that Gerber Baby Food advertisement."

"Don't pretend you don't know what I mean. You blame me for the fact that you made yourself look like an ass when you were drunk enough to think I was a girl at that costume party in New Haven three years ago and you tried to kiss me. You've been looking for a way to get back at me ever since, and now you think you've done it, but...."

"I've given you the lead in the opening production of the season, for God's sake. How could you possibly construe that as "getting back" at you?"

"I'm playing the damned female lead!" Harry held the edges of his dress up and offered a mock curtsey. "In a damned dress!"

"In Shakespeare's day, boys and young men played all the female roles."

"Yeah, yeah...and even I know that in Shakespeare's day, women weren't allowed on the stage. There are women in this rep company, in case you hadn't noticed. Young women. What about Hermione?"

"Perhaps if we were mounting a production of Taming of the Shrew," Snape said disdainfully. "For the last time, you are playing Juliet."

"I am not!" Harry yelled. "You cast me in this role because you knew it would make me look like a fool."

"Idiot boy," Snape shouted in return. "I cast you in the role because you're more talented and more beautiful than any of the women in this company, and because I..."

It took Harry a moment to realize that Snape hadn't finished his sentence, but as soon as he did, his eyes widened. "You what?"

"Never mind," Snape muttered.

"Because you what?" Harry demanded, almost as forcefully as if he were Snape himself.

"Because I was attracted to you, dammit!" Snape said, sitting down heavily in one of the extra chairs.

Harry stared at Snape and frowned, as if trying to make sense of a foreign language without a dictionary.

"You...." Harry shook his head. No, this situation clearly required something other than mere conversation. "Look...do you want a beer?"

Snape nodded. Harry reached down for one of the remaining Heinekens and handed it to Snape.

"So...okay, I'm guessing you didn't think I was a girl at that party, did you?"

"No."

"Except...you liked seeing me in a dress. You thought it was hot, didn't you?" Snape's only response was a scowl before he looked away and took a long drink of beer, and that was more than enough of an answer for Harry.

He got up from his chair and stood in front of Snape. "So, is it just looking at me in women's clothing that turns you on?" he asked, prying one of Snape's hand off his beer bottle and placing it on his own skirt-covered ass. "Or are you maybe into touching me in women's clothing, too?"

Snape narrowed his eyes suspiciously, but Harry could feel Snape's fingers curling around his right buttock, tightening almost imperceptibly in synch with each of Snape's breaths. Harry lifted his hand and brushed the backs of his fingers over Snape's cheek, the red and gold brocade of the hanging sleeve trailing across Snape's pale skin.

"And what about me touching you?" Harry asked, as he slid his velvet slipper-clad foot slowly up Snape's leg. "Do you like that?"

From the expression on Snape's face, the answer was definitely a 'yes.'

"And what if I put on one of these linen gloves with the embroidery on the cuff?" Harry said, reaching over Snape for one of the gloves his dresser Molly had dropped off that morning. "Then unbuttoned your jeans and slid my hand into your boxers like...this?"

Harry wrapped his his fingers around Snape's already straining erection, and made sure Snape was watching before stroking the head of Snape's cock with his linen-covered thumb.

"Do you like that?"

Snape looked up, and for a moment the two men were silent as their gazes locked, then Snape growled and thrust his hips forward. "Get on with it," he said between clenched teeth. "You always have been too damned slow to pick up on your cues!"

With one hand, Harry tugged the blue-striped towel off the back of the chair Snape was sitting on and dropped it to the floor. The towel was still slightly damp from Harry's shower, but more comfortable on his knees than the dressing room's black and white tiles. He crawled forward, slipping in between Snape's long legs, and once more, Snape's dark, piercing gaze met his own before Harry - his gloved hand still wrapped around the base of Snape's cock - leaned in and took Snape in his mouth.

He felt the head of the long, thick cock hit the back of his throat and he swallowed automatically, just a little, but enough to make Snape jerk forward and reach out to grasp Harry's shoulders. Snape's hands loosened, then - surprisingly gently - they slipped inside the yoke of Harry's dress and slid down over his shoulder blades, stroking the smooth skin of Harry's back as Harry circled his tongue around the rim of Snape's cock, tasting the precum and swallowing it down, then taking Snape more deeply into his mouth, sucking harder and harder until Snape, eyes closed and thighs spread wide as the chair would allow, came hard into Harry's mouth.

"Christ," Snape gasped, one hand resting heavily on Harry's head. "I'd give that mouth of yours a fucking standing ovation, but I don't think I can stand up."

The corners of Harry's mouth curled up into a smile, then he touched his tongue to the tip of Snape's quiescent cock, but Snape tugged on Harry's hair and shook his head.

"No, you've got a rehearsal to get back to," he said.

Harry's eyes widened. "You can't be serious."

"Of course I am...or wasn't my reaction enough to demonstrate that I find nothing at all comical about the thought of you in a dress?"

Harry's only response was a noncommital grunt.

"I'll take that as a yes," said Snape with a smirk, then tucking his cock back into his pants, he buttoned up his trousers and left the dressing room, closing the door behind him.

"Parting is such sweet sorrow," Harry said sarcastically to the image looking back at him from the mirror. "That I shall say good night till it be morrow." [2]

The door opened again.

"No, not 'till it be morrow,' Potter. Five minutes."

"Ears like a bat," Harry muttered, but then he grinned. "And hung like a horse."

***
[1] No, no version of Sirius Broadcasting existed in the eighties. Well, at least not in this universe!

[2] Romeo and Juliet (II, ii, 185)

Comments, critiques, chit chat: bethbethbeth [at] gmail

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