Sexual Education (closed RP for Hook and Snape)

[methleigh]

Severus works in his office, preparing more supplies of the more commonly useful potions, waiting for a chance to see Hook. An owl would at this point be further embarrassment

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[doctor_hook]

"She needs to respect you enough to accept your fears," says Hook simply. "Even if she privately doesn't think they're very well-founded." He uncrosses his legs and leans forward. "Let me be a cautionary example. For a while, I thought my girlfriend was a ghost. She looked transparent to me. I was avoiding her because of it, because I didn't know how to tell her that in a way that she'd believe. We were both busy in our work so it was easy for me to avoid her, but she finally cornered me and made me talk. Of course, when I told her I thought she might be a ghost, she understandably thought I was daft." He sighs. "However it turned out there were other psychic phenomena at work, and I should have told her what I saw, and she should have listened to me."

[methleigh]

Severus thinks about this. "Thank you." He says it simply, for the confidence. He recognises it. "In this case, perhaps as in yours, she is right to be alarmed. She wishes to know the truth, but it is perhaps darker than she imagines any truth could be. For I am gentle, considerate with her, in the present if not in the past. But both are... true, and it is wrong to hide such a large thing."

He pauses, then says defensively, taking some more scotch, "I can be, you know. Gentle." The liquor is beginning to affect him.

"She should listen to me, but..." But he wants her and still thinks that will be impossible, if she listens. As it will be false if he doesn't tell her.

[doctor_hook]

"Dark truths are hard to share," Hook agrees, rubbing his forehead with splayed thumb and forefinger. "Maybe there are some truths people don't need to know about one another. My situation was pretty idiosyncratic, what with both Judith and I working in a haunted hospital."

[methleigh]

"But in your cautionary tale, it seemed critical. And if I am serious, if this is not flippant or casual, she should know who I am, what I am. What... betrayal... to find out afterwards!" 'Betrayal' is not an easy word, but he finds it is the apt one.

"It is not this only, but perhaps fear of my manner being offensive, small things as well as large ones." He manages to get this out, thanks to the slight but present effect of the liquor.

[doctor_hook]

Hook decides that knowing specifics will help. "Is there something specific you're worried about doing or saying?"

[methleigh]

He is worried about everything, is still getting by imitating Lucius, doing his best not to imitate himself. The problem is, he is not fun. There is no fun in him, and Daisy has a laugh like silver. "I am not sure what girls like. That was teh computer question. 'What do men like?' How can I provide pleasant context for deeper talk... and more... What does one do on a date, or afterwards? I know what to do, how to do it carefully, kindly, but... I don't know when, or how to begin." His face is heating. He pretends it is the alcohol and his expression doesn't falter.

[doctor_hook]

"Ah." Hook leans back again. "OK, here's something that might help. The whole 'what do women like,' 'what do men like', 'men are from Mars and women are from Venus' thing? Is bullshit. At least in my experience."

Hook is (or was) dating a fellow neurologist, after all.

"Sure, hormones affect the developing brain differently, but not enough to occlude the essential similarities. A woman is a human being with different plumbing than what you've got. The way she deals with relationships probably is going to owe more to her family upbringing than her gender. So it can't be reduced down to 'what do women like', it's going to be way more complicated than that. 'What does this individual like?' I realize that's not very reassuring on the face of it. But it's the truth. What you do on a date depends on what the individual you're dating wants and likes."

[methleigh]

This does not help. Severus does not know what anyone likes, least of all himself. "Perhaps I might word that differently. How does one begin? After one buys sweets and shows her newspapers, after we eat and take a drink, what might one do at that point? It seems inappropriate to talk of potions or my own disciplines, disingenuous to try to be merely amusing."

[doctor_hook]

Hook grins. "Ask her about her work. I mean -- ask her about herself." With Judith those things are synonymous.

[methleigh]

Severus is beginning to frown. Daisy does not work, has no interests. She does not like talking about herself, becomes nervous, even afraid. "I can show her magic, of course." He retreats. What does he think he is doing anyway? He had slept with her - slept, warm, human, even tender, even happy. He wants to be with Daisy for what it makes him. He is selfish.

[doctor_hook]

Hook is puzzled. "You can do that, I guess, if you're running out of things to say and want to jumpstart the conversation. You just said you didn't want to talk about your potions and you didn't want to try to be 'merely amusing', though. Is the problem that you two don't have much in common? I've never had a hard time coming up with things to talk about with a girl I get on with. That's how I can tell I get on well with the girl."

[methleigh]

Severus is running out of things to say before he begins. There is too much to him. It is perilous. At the same time there is too little of him. He can turn away and disappear. It is not Daisy, he is convinced. There is no middle ground inside him, no point of connection. But he does not despair, he finds, surprised, for there is Daisy herself. The small connections growing between them, the heady notion, watching for her, in the halls, knowing she was watching him in the class, consciousness and closeness. "No, she is wonderful. Who is there, after all, to have anything in common with me, a girl? That is not everything."

He takes a long draught of scotch while he thinks, and suddenly blurts out a real question. "What if I am too clinical or cold? What if I want too much, am too sudden? Not just... touch, but understanding? How can I be... better than that, with a girl?"

[doctor_hook]

Hook rubs his forehead again. "I could see how that would be a concern for you. Your computer posts were very clinical." A sense of humor has always been integral to Hook's relationships with women. Hook isn't sure whether Snape has a sense of humor. "Can you try not to think of the process in clinical terms? Diagrams and lectures aren't what should be in your mind when you're with a girl. Focus on her, on how you feel about her."

[methleigh]

"How do you move from showing her magic to showing her... feeling about her?" He had been about to protest that such knowledge would allow him to know how to touch her, give her pleasure, give him confidence and keep him from blundering painfully. But Hook is being kind without pity.

[doctor_hook]

"Well, if she likes you, she's going to want the same thing. It's a collaboration -- you both want to get to the good part, you just have to give one another excuses to go for it. Humor works well."

[methleigh]

Humour is something that, for Severus, ranges merely from unlikely to impossible. "I believe we both wish to get to that part. She likes me, it would seem." He reddens. "It seems a little sudden to simply ask, in any context at all." Even when I am sleeping with her, holding her in bed. But that had been so much, even on its own. He can scarcely imagine himself asking. May I...