draco spends a lot of time in said library. “Ma ybe it’s not about deserving it? Maybe you just get to have it anyway…I’m allowing myself to want something and to let myself have it and to fight for it.” –harry runs a daycare and also works at a library.
Little Deaths and How to Avoid Them by and dustmouth - 96k - T.but they both humanize each other in ways no one else can. “you’re just a person” has to be some kind of drarry ethics of belonging and it makes me CRY. and harry doesn’t know what to do with that bc he’s got a monster in his chest and lives as a recluse. the characterization of draco in this fic is one my favorites bc he’s earnest and neurotic and tired of harry’s shit. “an d I thought that if someone talked to you as though you were a human being you might-maybe you could act like one” –the way i think about this line daily. and honestly? they deserve a semblance of peace godDAMmit.
you read these fics to be reassured that the way forward is not always ruthless. sometimes healing is an exacting surgical knife and other times it’s a slow scabbing. they’re the quiet cleaning up after a storm. soft fics are not necessarily conflict-averse (no drarry fic rly can be, considering the context) but, they offer the reader a generous distance from the initial harm. banter with bite but without the cruelty. pregnant silences & pensive mundanity & shy smiles. the story-equivalent of a deep breath after a long day. the smallness of human lives removed from the site of that which hurts & irreparably changes. a wistful look, a rainy morning, an unexpected grace, a stupidly disarming joke.
Includes: fluff, comfort, low-stakes, slow-burn fics.