Well Fleur is closer in age to Harry and while that doesn't always play a factor, it may help in some cases.

There's also the fact that they're both in the tournament, something which they might bond over. Life threatening situtations do have a tendency to bring people closer together (As evident by Harry and Ron saving Hermione from the troll in the Philospher's Stone).

Harry also "saved" Fleur's sister and being good with the younger siblings of a potential love interest always helps score points.

And besides, do you really want the sloppy seconds of a werewolf?

 

Lol, I don't usually imagine Harry/Tonks after Tonks/Lupin...

 

I always imagined that Lupin and Tonks had a one night stand or something in the time between OOTP and HBP, hence why she was so down all the time. Then again, I may just be seeing things that aren't there.

Besides, if Harry got with Tonks before she got with Lupin, he would have been 15 (?) at the time.

 

You can always butterfly it away some how. It doesn't have to be at 15. You can also screw with the timeline and make Tonks younger - it's fanfic after all.

 

Erm, changing the age of any character in your story just to shoehorn them into your narrative is pretty much the worst thing you can do short of soul bonds to get two characters together.

 

I can't agree with that. It depends entirely on how it's done and why.

---------- Post automerged at 00:49 ---------- Previous post was at 00:48 ----------

I'm wonder if i need a new thread for this.

 

*Cough* Marriage Contract

 

A new thread to try and justify a cliche that is used because authors can't come up with a plausible explanation for why two people of different ages could get together? There's no way that doesn't turn into a clusterfuck.

 

Na. While a Marriage Contract is some kind of unborn fetus abomination of a plot-line and terribly contrived, age changing from the outset feels like 'because I said so/I want to make my job easier' authorial-fiat and feels egregiously bad.

Of course, as a case-in-point for "there are no terrible/unforgivable ideas, only bad writing" Newcomb's excellent What You Leave Behind has a randomly one year older Harry. While it cannot be said for certain, especially given the non-canon compliance/AU setting, it appears that the shorter age gap between Harry & Fleur facilitates their relationship in a more positive way than if you imagined a normal aged Harry in the same situation.

 

No, but the Harry/Tonks pairing is a lot more open to creative interpretations, simply because there's less interaction between the two in canon. Harry/Fleur, in the vast majority of cases, inevitably means the Triwizard Tournament, and for me at least, that really gets boring after a while regardless of how many wrinkles authors try to add to it.

I really wish there were more adult-age (good) Harry/Fleur stories - Balancing Destinies, the follow-up to Altered Destinies, was one of the more interesting expansive AUs that finally started being H/F... right before it was abandoned.

 

WYLB isn't primarily a romance, so it's acceptable, if that makes sense. When you are bending a timeline just to make the romance work that weakens the narrative IMO.

It just so happens the Fleur is the pairing in WYLB.

And IDK who posted that originally, but some ways to make the previous romance-idea work : Taking Umbridge does a good job; I remember one fic where Bill and Ginny both die, leaving Fleur pregnant.

I think Bill cheating is a shitty trope, because most men (and Bill was the epitome of badassawesome in the books) do not cheat on their perfect dime wives. If you're going to explain why it happened it your story, feel free to mark it as Drama/Romance - Bill is unlikely to be the kind of guy who survives a werewolf attack and does Indy Jones shit full-time then cry a fucking river when his girl leaves - sorry, that's not character-consistent.


The alternate ending for another story (with Daphne as the *other* girl) made sense, H/F was a good initial pairing but it didn't work out, she left him for Bill.

Shit happens, that's the natural order of things - firsts almost never work out. Why is that so favored? That your first should be your only?Is that some kinda of romantic media-narrative that people just flocked to because it sounded nice?

 

Unless I'm mistaken, the most recent Beyonce album is in large part about how Jay-Z cheated on her? So that's not really true. There are people who are in marriages for any length of time and find themselves feeling trapped by the thought of "forever" or by a feeling of repetition, and cheat, regardless of how good looking their spouse is.

 

I can see what you mean, but that's where the rest of Bill's (admittedly limited) characterization comes in - he's got his shit together, living a life he loves, and nothing to prove to anyone. It doesn't seem to fit.

But hey, Jay Z (idk about the truths there) is a possibiility.

 

Do you blindly label everything you dislike a cliché? And that wasn't what I was suggesting.

---------- Post automerged at 11:08 ---------- Previous post was at 11:07 ----------

That way you wrote that makes you come off as irrationally angry.

 

No, it's just that this thread is nothing but rehashes of the same arguments for 29 pages and there's nothing really to add by beating a dead horse.

 

Set the story post Hogwarts and get creative enough to have Fleur not be with Bill for [INSERT REASON HERE]. Maybe they were never together in the first place. Or maybe it just didn't work like roughly half of all marriages these days. Two otherwise decent humans can have a failed relationship for many different reasons.

Don't start with "I want Harry to get with Fleur." You'll get nowhere (just like this whole thread). Start with a plot. If that is good enough, no one reading is gonna care why Bill and Fleur aren't together. From there, it's just a matter of creativity and writing ability.

 

I ... don't think you get why people engage in infidelity?

It's a core flaw in humans, we've pushed ourselves (most societies if not all) into becoming monogamous when the animalistic part of us seeks more variety than that provides. If not the actions, the mental explorations and considerations that lead to infidelity surface to some degree in everyone who spends any time in a committed relationship let alone a marriage.

I don't mean to say that both of your parents have fucked other people without clearing it with their partners, but it's crossed both of their minds as an idle curiosity at least, probably around when you hit 3 under the stress of dealing with you.

 

FWIW, you can write a post-Hogwarts Harry/Fleur story without mentioning anything about Bill at all. If he's not relevant to the plot, simply don't include him. There's not need to go into all these elaborate plots to say why Bill/Fleur didn't happen, when just not having it happen is an equally viable (even preferable) alternative. I'm always an advocate of keeping it simple, otherwise your story might kill itself before it gets anywhere.

 

Keep it respectful, this part is unnecessary.

 

Actually, that's fine. Ollie isn't personally attacking you or your parents. He's making a generalisation, perhaps overly broad, but not grossly so. It's common to most relationships when dealing with new children in the household. Pretty soon there's a part of you that just wants to get out of there, even if for only a few hours. Fantasies are an escape.

I can understand why it might look like Ollie picked you out as being stressful for your parents, but what he's saying is that we were all stressful for our parents - Yes, you too.