Rec: Substitute

[paranoidangel]

Hello, I'm Paranoidangel, one of your reccers this week. I'll be bringing you an assortment of recs all by authors not previously recced on here.

Story: Substitute
Author: orbythesea
Rating: Teen
Word Count: 2614
Author's Summary: Harry never saw himself falling for a woman who was incapable of loving him back.
Characters/Pairings: Harry/Sarah
Warnings: None

Recced because: I can't quite believe orbythesea hasn't been recced before because she writes such great Sarah & Harry stuff. But if I have to choose just one, it's Substitute. It's utterly heartbreaking, but of all the stories I've read, I think this is the most realistic look at what a relationship between Sarah and Harry would be like. And that just makes it all the more sad.

Theirs is nothing even remotely resembling a normal relationship, but how exactly can two former-time-travellers working for a secret government agency have a normal relationship anyway? Sarah's not the type of woman Harry ever saw himself falling for.

She rarely cooks and she's developed a habit of disappearing, only occasionally leaving a note (I've got a lead in Paris, the last one read. Back soon). Mostly, he never saw himself falling for a woman who was incapable of loving him back.

That's not entirely true, he knows. Sarah does love him, in her way. It's more of a grudging affection than anything resembling what he feels for her, and sometimes he thinks she's just biding her time until the Doctor comes back or something better comes along. He doesn't like to feel used, and Sarah Jane has mastered the art of using people.

Comments

[nonelvis]

"Heartbreaking" was definitely the right word for this. If the rest of orbythesea's work is this good, I'm going to have to read all of it.

[minerva-fan.livejournal.com]

Lovely story. One of the first I read with this pairing.