Archive of Our Own ^beta

Marius shakes off their mockery, if he even sees it for such, as a duck shakes excess water from its back after surfacing. Grantaire shamelessly encourages his friends in their jest, and despite his ulterior motives they follow suit. Ducklings then, all in a row, waddling ever forward into the sights of gendarme leadshot.

Grantaire looks at them through a wine-haze and silently acknowledges the flaw in his metaphor; for if his friends are the chicks following anyone then surely Enjolras is the mother, not he - caring and loyal yet ruthless when needed. To Grantaire’s eyes, their Apollo is certainly ruthless when it comes to his most faithful, most unacknowledged, most unfit supplicant.

He takes a long, slow gulp of wine and makes comparison of Marius to Don Juan for all assembled to hear; it succeeds in diverting Enjolras’ attention from his precious plans to Grantaire himself, and he sweetens the thrill of notice with more wine, more wine, always more wine.

They are chided for their levity. Enjolras would have them piously righteous and ready to raise the barricade at a moment’s notice, and a happy people are one who do not revolt.

Grantaire knows better, of course; it is a terrified people who do not revolt, because happy people are revolting.

He tries to fish his keys from his pocket; it’s not going well. Enjolras is juggling his backpack, the stack of books under one arm which he was unable to fit in the bag with with rest, and a paper cup of university-café coffee in one hand. He's already regretting buying the americano as it's bound to be cold by now, and is just about to sacrifice it to the noble cause of getting out of the frigid winter evening right the fuck now when the door is pulled open - just his luck that it turns out it wasn’t locked anyway. Relieved, he relinquishes the books when Combeferre reaches out.

“Thanks, man,” Enjolras maneuvers around his housemate as best he can and kicks the door closed behind him. “The library was an absolute nightmare but I managed to get everything on the list.”

Combeferre follows him down the hall into the back room of the house, stowing the books onto their dining table. He leans in the doorway and watches as Enjolras puts down the coffee, the backpack being swung off his shoulder to find a home on the floor. “Have you seen your emails in the last hour?”

Enjolras pulls his hat from his head, runs a hand through his hair and says, “No. Why?” They’ve got about an hour until the meeting, and he might have just enough time to drink the reheated coffee and check his blog feeds.

Apparently reading his mind, Combeferre takes the cold cup from the table and heads for the kitchenette. “The heating’s bust in Rousseau, they’ve shut it down until it’s fixed.”

He sighs. “I should’ve seen that coming. And it’s too late to find another free room on campus.”

“We’ve got to cancel or we’ve got to go to a bar or something,” Combeferre suggests while the microwave buzzes behind him, but seeing Enjolras’ face twist into a frown at both options, he appends, “There are a few late opening coffee shops? Starbucks?”

“Tax,” Enjolras shakes his head.

Combeferre nods, “The other one, then?”

He’s still not too enamoured of the chain coffee shops, and only buys the university crap because it’s fair trade and keeps him awake; it’s a rip-off all the same. “Doesn’t Ponine’s shop open round the clock?” The microwave beeps as Combeferre shrugs; he passes Enjolras’ coffee over and the blond takes a tentative sip. “I’ll go next-door and ask. Email around - we’re still on, even if we have to cram everyone in here.”

Glad he hadn’t gotten as far as taking his Chucks off, Enjolras keeps his grip on the warmed coffee and pulls open the front door. In one seemingly-smooth move, he’s got his own front door closed, has knocked on the adjacent door to number 16, and has pushed it open until he’s barricaded in their hall instead. They have an open-door policy, and he’s had practice. “Who’s home?” He calls up the stairs.

Two shouts respond from the bedrooms above - Joly and Bahorel - and a blonde head pops around the kitchen door: Cosette. “Enje! What can we do for you?”

She disappears, and when he follows her into the kitchen she’s wiping her hands on a cloth. Cosette has been baking, and Enjolras takes a deep breath of warm, cookie-dough air into his lungs. He basks for a moment in the domesticity, something sorely lacking in his own house of five guys, and is glad the two houses are in each other’s pockets enough that he gets these brief, homely feelings. “Have you seen Eponine?”

“She’s at work until ten, then she’s got a shift at the bar,” Cosette pushes her thick-famed hipster glasses up her nose and glances at the refridgerator door where she and Eponine organise their typically hectic schedules to double-check what she’d just told Enjolras. “Yeah, you just missed her. What do you need?”

“Well, firstly I’d love a cookie?” wheedles Enjolras, flashing her a smile. He knows he has no hope of simply charming one out of her, but she’ll happily offer one up to him if there’s a batch ready.

She spins on her socked feet, walking over to the small dining table that definitely doesn’t fit the five residents around it, but does well as a cooling rack. “Just one,” she teases, “and only because you’re my favourite.”

“We both know that isn’t true,” but he takes the cookie all the same. He takes a bite and smirks when Cosette blushes.

“Hush, you know it’s complicated.”

“I do,” he concedes, because it’s absurdly complicated and relies upon some sort of Code which Enjolras will never understand completely - but he gets this little part of it just fine. The only person who doesn’t seem to understand is Marius, but everyone refuses to explain it to him so all he does is pine in the corner, hopelessly. “So, do you think Eponine would let us use the Alphabet Café for our meeting tonight? They’ve closed Rousseau and I only just found out.”

Cosette nods and takes a fresh cookie for herself. “I don’t see why not. It shouldn’t be too busy, being a Tuesday night and all. I can text her if you want?”

Enjolras shakes his head and swallows the last of the hazelnut-vanilla-chocolate cookie. “I’ll do it, it’s no problem. Thanks, Cosette,” he crosses the small kitchen and presses a crumby kiss to her cheek. He wipes away the little bits with his thumb and she beams up at him. He thinks she’s beautiful, and he thinks: poor Marius, to be unknowingly caught in this awkward triangle of love and friendship. “Best batch ever,” he says instead as he turns to leave.

“You say that every time, Enje!” He reverses the move which got him from hall to hall in seconds and without the freezing air seeping in too deeply to his bones. He digs his phone from his jeans pocket as he ascends the stairs to his room, and finds Eponine’s number.

Enjolras (18:39): Need a favour, Po! Can HRW sub-meet use your caf-? 7-9 latest, max 10 people? - E

While he awaits her reply, Enjolras gets his laptop open and logs into his emails. The Rousseau closure notice is there, plus several emails asking if the meeting is on or moved - all timed before Combeferre emailed around the update.

There’s the usual crap from other societies and the student union, and a few related to his actual course; those he prioritises. “Essay, lecture, seminar, lecture, another essay,” he mutters under his breath as he mentally plans out how little time he’s going to have this week to just relax, and gets ready to become once more absurdly acquainted with the four walls of his bedroom.

He hasn’t even started on his dissertation yet, and graduation looms from six months away.

He finds a post-it to write the deadlines down; he can deal with organising his work after he organises everyone else’s.

His phone vibrates and shifts a few centimetres across the desk; he snatches it up and is opening an email window in his browser for the whole publicity team before he even reads the text message.

Eponine (18:42): Sure. Bring me a cookie :)

Enjolras smiles, and wonders if he can get his press secretary to surrender a few more baked goods to the cause.

It would be fair to say that Grantaire only notices their entrance because he’s the only person, besides Eponine and Azzie behind the counter, in the café at all. He’s trying this new thing by which he doesn’t drink (quite so much), and so he’s taken to sketching at the back of the independent coffee house rather than the all-day opening chain-pubs he’d been frequenting.

It makes for fewer live subjects, but that’s alright - his imagination doesn’t need the drink, he needs the drink because of his imagination.

The (moderate) sobriety still doesn’t solve the problem that he lives with a bunch of twats, so he still has to get out of the house. He comes here because of Eponine, because his brain is fucked beyond belief in more ways than one, and she reminds him of someone (or because someone reminds him of her - he hasn’t worked out how this strange delusion of his about other people he’s never met actually works, and regardless: her echoing presence hurts on many levels and in the best way).

But then the rabble walk in, about a dozen of them all told, and as far as Grantaire is concerned the world stops turning.

The thing is, Robin Grantaire is a mess. He knows it, his family know it, the few friends he hasn’t completely alienated know it, and his shitty housemates definitely know it. It’s a miracle he has any higher brain function to speak of considering his attempts since the age of fifteen to turn his grey matter into a speciality cocktail through will and wine and whiskey. He doesn’t want to be this way, but he’s not sure he knows how to stop, and most days he’s not even sure it’s a good idea; life is less of a bland black hole when he’s had a few.

He’s not sure what kind of person he’ll be if the fog lifts; he’s been drunk and a drunk since his first taste of cheap, paint-stripper vodka around the back of the gymnasium one lunchtime at school, and he’s never found a good enough reason to stop and keep stopping.

He’s trying to cut down, but only because he tried complete sobriety first. It wasn’t pretty; as if he needed more proof that he was an alcoholic, he went into full-blown withdrawal.

The visions started thirty two hours in.

He’s no stranger to drunken delusions, and he had anticipated some side-effects of cold-turkey; he hadn’t expected to hallucinate the girl from his Art in the Age of Enlightenment lectures - who at the time only reminded him of his sister, in looks and temperament - taking to the streets of revolutionary-era France, dressed as a boy below a red flag, with the same shade of spilled blood spreading across her white shirt.

He hadn’t expected to hallucinate a group of boys he didn’t know sitting around a café he’d never been to, talking of the death of a General whose name he’d never heard before.

He hadn’t expected to hallucinate his own death at the hands of a firing squad in a wine shop with a man he loved more than life itself by his side, finally felled by eight musket balls.

Well, perhaps he could have expected the wine shop.

“Do you permit it?”

He saw the moment over and over, felt French words fall from his lips to a man he did not recognise, he felt his own drunkenness though he was painfully sober, and he felt the overwhelming need to have this man’s permission just to give his own life up side-by-side.

Grantaire hadn’t experienced emotion so overpowering in all his life, and it was the reality of the fact that his own existence was sadder than that of a dream-self whose life was ended by musket balls in a failed revolution which drove him to the nearest off-licence for a few bottles of red wine.

Much of what he’d seen had faded, and quickly, but it was the red that he couldn’t shake.

Red; like the unnamed man’s jacket and Eponine’s blood.

Red; like the flag they’d made, the flag they’d waved and the flag he’d died with.

Red; like the beanie upon the head of the last man to walk through the Alphabet Café’s door at six-fifty on a late January evening.

Though he does not have any inclination to participate, he accepts the invitation to the gathering at an unfamiliar café from the younger man all the same. Courfeyrac, as he’d introduced himself to the patrons around Grantaire’s favourite drinking spot of this week, promised their leader could convince even him; it was a challenge Grantaire’s sometime-drinking partner Bahorel echoed with mirth and fervour, giving some credence.

He sits at the back, unnoticed by most and ignoring all but the figure of charisma and passion personified before them all. He has yet to catch the orator’s name, but until Grantaire learns of it then he is content to name him Apollo, perhaps an Athena in breeches and sprung fully-formed from the King’s nightmares.

Grantaire leaves the gathering far from convinced, but he’s willing to let this man try.

Enjolras ushers everyone through the door, holding it open for Cosette and her boxful of baked treats until he’s the last in and they can hide out in the warmth for a few hours. It’s only a fifteen minute walk from their house to the Alphabet but the wind-chill is biting. He pulls his hat off and compulsively runs a hand through his hair, going straight to Eponine behind the counter as the rest of the committee (minus a few people who aren’t ten minutes early by virtue of living with or next-door to the society president) pick a few tables near each other.

“Don’t move the tables!” shouts Eponine over the new buzz of conversation.

Courfeyrac shouts back jovially, “We’ll move the chairs!”

“Eponine, you’re a life-saver,” Enjolras claps his hands together as if in prayer and grins at the girl across the counter.

“Yeah, yeah, just do me a favour and make sure you actually buy something,” she rolls her eyes and shouts past him, “Cosette! Feed me!” She gapes expectantly, and Enjolras rolls his eyes as a small blonde hurricane brushes past him and shoves a cookie into Eponine’s open, waiting mouth.

“You two are ridiculous,” he says, though he means, I love you both so much, you crazy, crazy girls.

“Yeah, ridiculously awesome,” Eponine replies with her mouth full and Cosette cuddles up to her side. “Now, would you please order something?”

Enjolras pretends to peruse the chalk-board menu above the counter. “Your customer service truly is top notch.”

“It’s not my fault I’ve worked here for a year and a half, known you for only a few days less than that, and yet you’ve never once visited me at work, ‘Ass,” the brunette barista smiles sweetly, “And now you need something, and in return all I ask-”

He can’t keep the grin growing on his face from cracking into all out laughter, “Alright, alright, Po, I’m sorry. I’ll have an americano.”

“Good, I’ll even bring it over for you,” she flounces off to the coffee machine once he’s paid, and Cosette eyes him with an exaggerated frown.

She walks back to the customer side of the counter and he holds out an arm to escort her back to the table; Cosette tucks herself into Enjolras’ side just as tightly as she had to Eponine’s. “You two,” she coos, and then sighs, “Such a shame.”

“Ours is a doomed love,” he acts with fervour and bright eyes. The performance draws Marius’ attention, and both he and Cosette note it with careful ignorance. “The unrequited and the unattainable.”

“You aren’t unattainable,” admonishes Cosette as he walks her to their haphazard organisation of chairs and people around static, rustic-effect tables. “Well, you are for ‘Ponine.” They share a conspiratorial grin before she squeezes Enjolras’ arm slightly and breaks away to take a seat between Combeferre and Jehan.

He's not unattainable, just disinterested.

Enjolras has been left a seat at the head of the column of people and chairs, and it’s only as he walks around to take it, positioning him with his back to the counter, that he spots the figure in the corner.

His first thought is: not one of mine. His second is appreciative and almost wordless, but then again when he does find himself appreciating someone, he does tend towards a type. Another student, Enjolras surmises quickly, and an artist judging by the intent sketching he seems to be engrossed in at a four-seating table in the corner. Enjolras takes off his coat and can’t help his eyes flicking back to take in the mop of messy black curls and pale skin contrasting a dark green, well-worn t-shirt.

When Enjolras realises he’s paying far too much attention to the stranger in corner, he turns back to the group, and sits down. “Who are we waiting on, Combeferre?” He asks, loud enough to carry to the rest of the attendees but directed primarily at the exec secretary who needs to record attendance in the first place.

“Waiting on Bossuet but he warned me he might get held up in the lab,” Joly replies from further down, and Combeferre checks his notes. “I think Feuilly should be here, right?”

“Yeah, we’re missing Phillipe,” agrees Combeferre, watching wickedly as they all wince at the use of someone’s first name, a trick only ever used for teasing.

“Must you, Noel?” emphasises Joly.

It was a habit they’d developed in the first few days of meeting in freshers’ week and had stuck among Enjolras, Courfeyrac, and Combeferre - it was only Jean and Marius who had somehow had their given names, or variations thereof, stick. Once they’d advanced to second year and they met Eponine, Cosette, Feuilly, Joly, Bahorel, it had only been the girls who’d escaped the tradition.

Bossuet was the only exception; he had the misfortune of going up against Enjolras in debate soc and was subsequently anointed with a nickname like the monarchy he argued so well for - even if it were ultimately in vain against Enjolras’ revolutionary zeal.

Courfeyrac smirks at Joly, “Pot and kettle now, Blaise.”

“Adrien.”

“Alright,” Enjolras rolls his eyes, “Ceasefire, guys.” They all share a smile, but none dares to turn the trick on Enjolras. “Why don’t you all get a drink or something and we’ll start when Feuilly arrives?”

Eponine appears at his side and sets a large mug of coffee in front of him, already fixed with some milk and - as he discovers when he takes a sip - just the right amount of sugar. “You’re perfect, Po,” he smiles up at her and it’s her turn to roll her eyes.

“My perfect coffee is proof that you should start coming here more often,” she turns to the rest, “and if you guys wanna order, you’ll have to come up to the counter because I am not a waitress.” And because Eponine is terrifying but they all love her anyway, there’s a quick negotiation of money and manpower before Combeferre takes a handful of cash and follows their friend back to the tills.

Throughout the chaos, Enjolras sips at his coffee and surreptitiously watches the mysterious and attractive artist in the corner.

Grantaire keeps his eyes on his sketchbook and lets his hands move continuously without any thought for what it is he's creating; if he stops, he may look up and that could be disastrous. He can feel a pair of eyes on him as it is and if he glances through his eyelashes just a little, he can see that the man in the red plaid shirt - whose name has yet to be mentioned - is drinking his coffee and watching him back subtly.

The voices of the assembled cohort carry easily over the quiet jazz playing through the café and the hiss of the coffee machine; their banter is friendly and familiar. Grantaire misses something terribly to hear it though it isn’t as though he’s ever had friends like that before to miss; he doesn’t want to entertain those dreams, but he thinks they might all be the boys he saw during his withdrawal-fuelled visions.

This is bad, very bad indeed.

The door opens again, a blast of cold air which doesn’t quite make it all the way to Grantaire’s seat in the corner but which makes the other guests of the café shiver, and another student arrives.

“Feuilly!” They greet him, and Grantaire glances up properly at the loud interruption, his watcher conveniently distracted by the newcomer too. He realises he knows the latest arrival - Phillipe is on the Fine Art degree, the same as Grantaire and Eponine - and it’s only because he’s looking enough to match the faint words over the conversational din with reading Phillipe’s lips that he finally catches his mysterious, red-plaid-shirted watcher’s name.

“Sorry I’m a little late, Enjolras, I lost track of time in the studio.”

“Not a problem, come on and sit down,” Enjolras replies with a wide smile, and though he can only see the edges of it from this perspective, Grantaire has to look away.

He focuses instead on his sketchbook and the face that was taking shape on the page; it’s no-one he recognises, certainly no-one here, he’s older and more distinguished. He doesn’t often sketch people, he tends to paint directly in whatever style suits him at the time, and it gives his portfolio a manic feel.

He doesn’t like this development, this formation of a personality on his page in simple pencil without his consent.

Eponine plonks herself into the seat opposite him, and looks over to the group commencing their meeting. “I’d say sorry about those guys but it’s not like I claim any responsibility for them,” she says. She has a plate with two cookies on it and offers one to Grantaire.

Grantaire, given a cookie and an opening for information gathering on the visitors (on Enjolras), is not above taking advantage for a tasty treat and a fishing expedition. “Who are they, anyway? You seem pretty friendly.”

She turns to meet Grantaire’s curious look and raises an eyebrow. Grantaire would try to look innocent but he knows from experience that it just doesn’t work for him. Plus, Eponine was always too perceptive for everyone else’s good. “My housemates,” she answers, “the guys from next door and the rest of the student chapter of the Human Rights Watch.”

“Oh god, bleeding-heart campaigners,” Grantaire groans dramatically and Eponine sniggers.

“They aren’t that bad,” she insists. “I mean, Enje is pretty hardcore, but they mostly publicise, fund-raise, debate and drink. Most of them have other interests - it’s Enjolras and Combeferre who’ll be a big deals politically one day.”

She looks very certain of this prediction, and it’s reminiscent enough of his strange detox visions of the man that he can believe it. Enjolras, it would seem, likes a cause.

"Let me guess then," he's fairly certain of his own prediction as he slouches in the chair and pointedly doesn't look at the blond force of nature across the room, "Enjolras. PPE?"

"You don't win anything," warns Eponine, "but yeah, he's got more of a philosophical focus and the politics is a practicality. I don't think he has to do any economics now he's in his third year."

Grantaire's only outward show of his surprise is a raise of one eyebrow. "He's a finalist?" For some reason he'd expected Enjolras to be a second year like he and Eponine, but it would explain how he hadn't seen this man around before; if they had no course content or drinking establishments in common, it was a safe bet Grantaire had never crossed paths with this manifestation of Apollo on earth.

Eponine nodded. "And that's all the insider info you're getting. I've seen that look in your eye before, R, and I don't think this will go the way you expect." With that as her parting shot, she stands and walks over to the group. and Grantaire watches as she whispers to Cosette, who can't stop her eyes from finding Grantaire's with a small smile, and then Po is back behind the counter - Grantaire is left alone with his sketchbook.

The unfamiliar face on his page continues to take shape in the wake of his pencil as he studiously blocks out the voices of his coffee-shop companions as best he can.

He loses track of time, but he could probably account for every word Enjolras says; the group are preparing their publicity for the university’s International Awareness Week and he’s keen to stress abuses in political hot-button areas like Kenya, Syria and Iran. Grantaire keeps his eye-rolling to himself, and while his words register, it’s more the tone Enjolras uses which draws Grantaire in.

Enjolras is compelling, although doomed to a life of slow disillusionment; it’s almost sad.

Grantaire turns the page away from the unrecognisable face and starts afresh.

The strangest thing is that after about forty minutes of what sounds like genuine work, the meeting seems to dissolve into a group of friends chatting; Enjolras is quieter, but no less involved. Eponine gets dragged into the conversation since there aren’t any other customers to speak of, and it’s Eponine who pulls him into orbit around Enjolras in turn.

He hears his name shouted across the café and looks up from the sketch of another café from another time. “Yeah, what?”

Eponine smirks at him from the other side of the other side of the crowd, “I said, you’re an artist.”

“Whatever gave me away?” He calls back, pointing his pencil at her with a smile. He doesn’t know what she’s playing at, but he’s willing to play along - especially since Enjolras is trying to make it look as though he isn’t watching the interplay between his friend and the stranger in the corner with keen interest. “Are you in sudden need of another artist? There are at least two of you at that table already.”

He turns the pencil to Feuilly, who shrugs but is smiling. Grantaire doesn’t know Phillipe too well but he seems content to go along with his housemate’s flight of fancy.

“That’s the point, we need you to settle an argument.”

Grantaire laughs, “We both know I wasn’t made to settle arguments, Ponine.”

“Indulge me?” She commands with deceptive sweetness.

He puts down the pencil and closes his sketchbook slowly. He makes a drama of putting them down on the table and crossing his arms. “Alright. Go.”

“The act of making art precludes anarchy. I say no, Feuilly says yes, the rest of the non-artists are equally split.”

“Or don’t give a shit,” offers Courefeyrac.

Eponine shrugs. “Or don’t give a shit,” she repeats.

Grantaire has an opinion, but Eponine has called on him for a reason and he very much doubts it’s for his honest contribution; she already knows his views on art and anarchy. “Ep, you’re post-modern, you think art can do anything. And Feuilly,” he uses Phillipe’s surname as apparently that’s the done thing around here, “Does the anti-art movement mean nothing to you?”

Feuilly leans forward and rests his chin on his fist. He regards Grantaire carefully for a moment then answers, “I’ve always found it too pretentious. Completely up it’s own arse.”

“And I completely agree,” grins Grantaire, and Feuilly sits back to remove himself from the conversation. Grantaire goes on, using a quote from John Irving to illustrate his point, “Life is serious, but art is fun.”

Enjolras, who had remained silent, now smirks, “A witty saying proves nothing.”

“Voltaire,” he looks directly at Enjolras, finally able to. He quickly takes in the golden blond hair which, if any longer, would become the angelic curls he’s sadly familiar with; he observes the red plaid shirt with black jeans, and the battered Chucks; and he finds Enjolras’ eyes again eventually and knows his obvious appreciative once-over has been noted. “Nice,” Grantaire says and quirks an eyebrow - he’ll let Enjolras decide whether he means the quote or the specimen of god-like beauty. “I’m not a deist, but when it comes to Voltaire I prefer this: God gave us the gift of life; it’s up to us to give ourselves the gift of living..”

“A man starts to live when he lives outside himself,” posits Enjolras, turning in his chair to face Grantaire bodily.

“Einstein was a genius, but I disagree. And he can take his ‘only a life lived for others is worthwhile’ and shove it, too. It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”

“But the devil can cite Scripture for his purpose,” Enjolras’ lips seem to twitch upward as he offers Merchant of Venice for Grantaire’s Macbeth.

"I'm flattered you think me a devil," flirts Grantaire, who wishes strongly for some wine, or even a beer. This is intellectual porn for him, and Enjolras is meeting him on his favourite battlefield of all: wit. “The only way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it.”

Frowning, Enjolras correctly identifies Grantaire’s quote from Oscar Wilde and offers a more classical note. “It is the nature of the wise to resist pleasures, but the foolish to be a slave to them.”

Now Grantaire is insulted, but he doesn’t want to jump this beautiful, brilliant man any less. “Epictetus? Interesting. But why then live, if you do not care to live well?”

Enjolras raises an eyebrow and seems impressed, though he’s far from happy. “Diogenes,” he says, “You're a cynic in the grand old tradition, then? Cynicism is humour in ill health.”

Everyone’s eyes are doing the tennis-ball tracking key to any gripping argument with an audience. Grantaire and Enjolras refuse to look away from each other. This is a quote-off to the death and Grantaire knows he will lose, so he supposes he might try to challenge Enjolras to a different kind of argument. He feigns nonchalance; he hasn’t felt this tense and electrified in a while. “Wells may be right about that, but I suppose if you want to categorise me, you can call me a nihilist,” he slouches in the chair, finally feeling like he has some control of the conversation. “Morally and existentially.”

“You believe in nothing?”

And he thought Enjolras was a student of philosophy. Grantaire smirks, “That’s the typical definition of nihilism, yes.”

Enjolras blinks. The pause is long, and yet they don’t waver; Grantaire refuses to be the first to break and Enjolras seems to think that if he stares intently, Grantaire’s soul will be an open book to him. “Yet you’re an artist; you create.”

“And we’re back full circle,” Grantaire’s smile is a little twisted. “Anarchy nor nihilism preclude creation, and life is beautiful; humanity is not. I live my life for me, and I make art for myself too.”

The tense silence returns, but Grantaire’s statement was taken as a full-stop by some of the other members of the group, clearly uncomfortable with the more serious turn the conversation between their society president and this stranger had taken. Combeferre whispers something to Enjolras and pulls away grinning, and Eponine looks entirely too triumphant. Cosette is also looking at Grantaire like he’s a particularly fascinating puzzle (just without the undercurrent of sexual tension Grantaire likes to think was present with Enjolras) and Marius isn’t looking at him at all.

Grantaire goes back to his drawing and conversation picks back up. The chattering din covers Enjolras’ approach until he’s pulling out the seat opposite him, and Grantaire looks up bemusedly and quickly closes the sketchbook to prying eyes.

The conversation throughout the rest of the room continues.

“Have you always been so...?”

“Obstinate?” offers Grantaire with a smirk. “Pessimistic? Irritating?”

Enjolras rolls his eyes, unimpressed. Grantaire finds this familiar enough to be forced to bite back a laugh. “Cynical? In the more modern sense, that is.”

Grantaire knows Enjolras is looking for the buried optimist, the spurned idealist which supposedly lurks beneath the skin of any hardened cynic; Grantaire wishes him luck with that, he really does. “If you’re looking for an event,” Grantaire quirks an eyebrow, “to define a turning point in my worldview, I must disappoint you. I’m sure I was born without any views at all, but people suck and society generally sucks harder.”

“I disagree -”

“Of course you do,” replies Grantaire, weary indulgence which almost visibly raises Enjolras’ hackles. They don’t know each other, Grantaire has no reason to be fond or exasperated or anything that implies an acquaintance that spans time.

As such, Enjolras’ expression is slowly darkening. “Society has problems but people, generally, are good.”

“Well it could be worse,” sighs Grantaire, “You could believe in the myth human altruism.”

“People have a great capacity for altruism,” Enjolras shakes his head and Grantaire groans.

“No, don’t you see? Anyone who claims or even just appears to act in an altruistic way only does so because of the selfish rush and pride it give them to have done something good. There’s no such thing as altruism in humanity,” his voice is rising, he knows, but it’s been a long time since he’s had a good argument, even over some basic tenets such as these.

Enjolras leans in, voice promising danger, “And what of morality?”

“People suck so much, inherently, that they need church leaders and the threats of laws and, god, even reality television, to warn them of the dangers of giving into all that seething rage,” he can see Enjolras’ fists clenching on the surface of the table, the tightening of his eyes. The other man is even gritting his teeth, and Grantaire feels like swooning. Instead, he continues with snide triumph, “If people were inherently good, you wouldn’t be desperate to wring my neck right now!”

“The fact that I’m not shows that people can control themselves,” counters a furious Enjolras.

“Why don’t you? No,” he baits when Enjolras rolls his eyes, “Seriously, why aren’t you strangling me? Your fists are clenched, you really, really want to punch my face in for being so obstinate, but you’re not. Why?”

Enjolras stands in an explosion of movement and the chair screeches across the floor. “Wouldn’t be worth the effort.”

Grantaire laughs as he walks away, back to his friends. He opens up his sketchbook and takes a new page, setting about capturing Enjolras’ righteous anger. The man himself has taken his seat back with his friends, and if it weren’t for the thick tension in the café it would be as if their exchange hadn’t occurred; everyone ignores it.

Slowly and eventually, the group splinters off until just Enjolras, Combeferre, and Courfeyrac are left, with only Eponine behind the counter. He makes a show of pointedly not looking as the three friends say their clearly audible goodbyes and thanks to Po, and watches from beneath his lashes as Enjolras hesitates just for a moment at the door.

He stays until Eponine’s shift ends fifteen minutes later and walks part of the way to her next job with her. He considers following her to the bar but she’s being uncharacteristically quiet and he’s not sure he’ll like what she has to say when she decides to stop censoring herself.

He curses Enjolras as a life ruiner who ruins lives, and bids Eponine a distracted goodnight.

Grantaire goes home via a supermarket (they’re quite happy to sell several bottles of spirits to a sober student at ten in the evening; he’ll have to remember that for future reference) and drinks until he passes out.

If he dreams, he doesn’t remember.

He shuffles into Alphabet late the next morning with a hangover he’d estimate as a solid 6.4 on the Richter scale. He’s certainly had worse, but it’s worthy of a worn, warm hoodie and a quiet corner. He has a book on the French neo-classical movement and he intends to sit mutely and not be accosted by memory or by hot, intellectual bleeding-heart Apollos.

In fact, he just wants a day to be silent and ghostly, to let the world float by for a while and allow him not to participate.

It looks as though he may get his wish too, because Musichetta is behind the counter and in one glance she has him sussed. She pours him a cup of tea - something warm and spicy, rich and delicious with a fading hint of Christmas that is so appropriate, in Grantaire’s eyes, to January - and orders him over to his usual table with an offer of refills forthcoming. The fireplace is home to a crackling blaze (Musichetta, being the owner, is the only one ever allowed to light this now, and Eponine knows why), and Grantaire sits with his back to the door and the counter to watch the flickering tongues of fire.

He sips his tea and forgets about his book for a little while.

His thoughts instead turn, of course, to Enjolras.

Witty, beautiful Enjolras who would appear to view Grantaire with righteous disdain regardless of era. The cutting disappointment isn’t a new feeling to the artist, but it’s rare he feels inspired to try and prove someone wrong about him. Usually he’s content to take the easy way out and live down to expectations; the only time he’s truly used success to stick the finger up at an underestimation was at his parents. Their faces when he’d informed them he did actually get into university to read Fine Arts, thank you very much for nothing, is some days the only reason he sticks around and attends classes.

Graduating is going to be sweet.

With that in mind, he cracks open the book and settles in to actually study for a little while.

He gets a third of the way though before he hears the door to the cafe open, but pays it no mind until he hears a voice he recognises from last night: Bahorel’s. It’s accompanied by Bossuet’s light tones and Grantaire’s disbelief grows; between Musichetta and Eponine, and how often Grantaire finds himself sitting in this corner sketching or retreating from society, it doesn’t compute that the existence of Enjolras and his flock had managed to passed him by until yesterday.

Perhaps “flock” was harsh for Enjolras’ group; horde, then.

Bossuet stays at the counter, but Grantaire is surprised to find that Bahorel waltzes to the back of the café and takes the seat opposite him. He’s torn, because he was enjoying the simple silence of brooding alone in a corner, but Bahorel smiles widely and offers Grantaire a hand to shake.

“I thought that was you. Nice work going toe-to-toe with Enjolras last night,” Bahorel is huge, but he reminds Grantaire of a gentle Mastiff. He can’t help but smile back and shake the man’s large hand. “I’m Bahorel. Alain, but just call me Bahorel.”

“Grantaire, and thanks, that’s one impassioned society president you’ve got there,” Grantaire replies, setting his book aside.

Bahorel’s wide smile only grows and he gives a short boom of laughter, “That’s our Enjolras, thinks he’s Robespierre.”

“I see,” Grantaire smiles, ducking his head as he does, because of course.

“Yeah, but I got him drunk at his birthday party and I bet Robespierre never got smashed and danced to Beyoncé with Cosette and Eponine.”

Grantaire thinks he’s found his new best friend. He says as much to Bahorel and adds, “Please tell me it was Single Ladies and that there’s evidence on someone’s phone.”

“Well, as far as he’s concerned it was all deleted,” winks Bahorel.

The artist laughs, “Take me, I’m yours.”

“Oh, we are forward aren’t we,” Bossuet slips into the seat beside Grantaire and claps the man on the shoulder. He’s quite wiry in terms of build, but perhaps everyone looks that way next to buff Bahorel. His bald head distinguishes him. “Grantaire, right? I’m Bossuet. Well,” he offers a self-deprecating smile, “Boyce Laigle, but I don’t even get the surname treatment from these guys. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone render Enjolras speechless before, man, well done. Just my luck that I missed it.”

“Apparently a cynic with no belief structure at all to speak of is the antithesis of your fearless leader’s world view.”

Bossuet whistles low, “Well, I suppose that would do it. Then again, it’s best to keep him on his toes; who knows what mischief he could cause if everyone blindly followed his rule. He likes a challenge.”

Grantaire is happy to oblige.

And that’s how it begins. He starts to experience strange echoes, not intrusive but enough to make him drink a little more and laugh a little louder to drown them out. At night, it’s a fifty-fifty chance whether his dreams will be run-of-the-mill or a run through the streets of early eighteen-hundreds Paris.

The habit of tagging along with Eponine to the café after lectures evolves into tagging along back to her sofa and hanging out with her housemates (who turn out to be Feuilly, Joly, Bahorel and Cosette) all of two days after meeting them. He finds quickly that the three guys in the house are the three men he could claim to know best from his crazy hallucinations, but Cosette he can’t claim to know at all.

He does however, know of Marius, the literal boy next door. He remembers gentle, mostly good-natured mockery at his lovestruck foolishness over the Mademoiselle Fauchelevant and his blindness to the affections of his street-urchin shadow, Eponine. It is a key difference between his imagined then and the now, and it’s clear that the friendship between Eponine and Cosette is what keeps the young paramours apart. He can’t be sure of the deeper reason, but he occasionally sees their eyes meet when avoiding Marius’ and he can maybe guess; some sort of sisters before misters pact is in effect. He’d try to coax some explanation out of the boy in question, but the occupants of the house next-door are still seemingly a world away, Enjolras included.

If the two houses socialise at all, then neither Marius, Enjolras, Combeferre, Courfeyrac nor Jehan have ventured into Eponine’s living room while Grantaire’s been there.

So when Bahorel convinces him to attend a general meeting, this time with them rather than with his sketchbook, he finds himself agreeing if only to get some verbal sparring time with the blond-haired fury he’d riled last week.

Without something to fix his eyes on (or keep his hands occupied, or keep his mind distracted from a visual overlay of a long-gone café) he convinces Bahorel to take drinks with them so they can go bar-hopping after.

The meeting is, for him at least, a success. Enjolras gives a short speech which Grantaire graciously does not interrupt - but by the time he and Bahorel are through their first bottle of wine together (it’s entirely possibly Grantaire had a head-start this afternoon), he’s gleefully interrupting Enjolras’ presentation on a History of Middle-Eastern Revolution with factual inaccuracies (plus a few counterpoints he doesn’t even believe in) and Enjolras is getting that look again.

Only this time, it’s worse. Or better, maybe, Grantaire thinks.

The blue eyes are flinted and the brows are drawn tight. Enjolras fights him for every point and begrudges every little victory Grantaire savours. It’s beautiful, and it’s vicious. Grantaire isn’t exactly sure if he’s happy about it, but he does feel satisfied by the time the meeting adjourns and Enjolras pointedly ignores him in favour of talking to Combeferre.

The bar-hopping ploy becomes, by the second bottle of wine, a bar-hopping plan. Grantaire and Bahorel manage to convince Courfeyrac, Jehan and Marius to join them from House 2, along with Eponine, Cosette and Feuilly, and it promises for an eventful night-out.

It doesn’t disappoint, even if Marius pines all evening (he’s a melancholy drunk, and both Cosette and Eponine were ignoring him). Eponine glares when he asks, “What’s Marius’ problem, then?” and Cosette only rolls her eyes and drags her best friend off to dance.

Courfeyrac shrugs, Marius mopes, and Bahorel grins as he hands out another round of shots.

They’re resoundingly drunk by the time Grantaire, Courfeyrac and Bahorel manage to get kicked out of a bar around 1am while defending Jehan’s honour. Feuilly somehow escapes the repercussions, even though he was the one throwing most of the punches; ever the gentleman, he escorts the ladies, and Jehan out to the street, Marius following. After a brief negotiation on the side of the street, they manage to agree to stumble back to Eponine’s for one last drink before bed, and by the time Grantaire passes out on her sofa, he’s feeling pretty damn good about his life choices.

The next day, Courfeyrac pokes at his face until he wakes up, and hands Grantaire a mug of coffee. “You’ll do,” he says cryptically, and walks out of the house.

The coffee is perfect.

They’re still using the Alphabet as a meeting place a fortnight later, and Enjolras can’t give a good explanation as to why, considering Rousseau was only closed for three days in total and Grantaire is almost always there, and in varying states of inebriation.

Irritating, cynical, argumentative Grantaire, who seems to delight in turning Enjolras’ life into one frustrating moment followed by another. Most days, he can barely believe he was attracted to the mouthy little hipster in the first place, but the rest of the time he knows that Grantaire’s insistence on challenging Enjolras at every turn is half the draw.

Even his beanies are stupid, thinks Enjolras as he aggressively increases the speed on his treadmill.

They stick to Alphabet because of Eponine, because of Bossuet and Joly and Musichetta, and because it’s a welcoming place to be. Grantaire is just an unfortunate side-effect.

They come to cross words three meetings out of every four, but no-one tries to stop them; the boys seem to think it’s entertaining and the girls keep hawkish eyes on them both but never say a word. He knows what Courfeyrac thinks - he’s made that abundantly clear, thankfully out of Grantaire’s earshot - but as usual Courfeyrac is wrong.

Not completely wrong, just mostly wrong.

Enjolras reaches out for his sports bottle; he takes a sip of water and continues to run.

The thing is, Enjolras is attracted to Grantaire, physically. Enjolras isn’t picky about gender but he’s definitely picky about everything else he wants in a partner, and as well as that he’ll be the first to admit that his restricted dating history has a certain aesthetic type to it. His high-school girlfriend Kat had been dark and slim just like Grantaire, but she was just so sweet and Enjolras has a vast capacity for douchebaggery - ultimately he and Kat knew they weren’t right for each other. They’d both cried when they had called it quits and they haven’t seen each other since they’d each left home for university. He and Jasper were more alike in temperament, which was almost worse. Nowadays they only saw each-other at demonstrations, and while Enjolras is more built for monogamy, he isn’t averse to a tumble between the sheets with his ex (especially after some good speeches and close encounters with oppressive authority types; Enjolras has kinks and they involve expressing his democracy and revolutionary zeal).

Hell, he’d entertained the briefest stirrings of interest for Eponine, similarly dark and funny, but that initial appreciation didn’t blossom into anything beyond a friendship.

He may then have a type, but he’s hardly shallow; Kat and Jasper were both passionate and intelligent, with strong convictions and if they didn’t agree with Enjolras at least they believed in something - which is more than can be said of Grantaire.

How can a person believe in nothing?

He finishes up running ten kilometers and slows the treadmill to a stop.

He waits for his peripheral vision to stop moving and when it does he steps off the belt and heads out to his locker. It’s a short walk from the sports centre to his house, and his mind doesn’t slow for a second.

The thing is, he’d give into this pull he has to Grantaire in a heartbeat if the artist’s personality wasn’t so objectionable. Sure, the first time they met Grantaire was mostly sober, and Enjolras isn’t ashamed of the fact that he’d looked forward to their next verbal sparring - until of course it came and Grantaire started off fairly drunk and only proceeded to get drunker.

He and Bahorel had been sharing wine and through Grantaire’s interjections, Enjolras had struggled to control the meeting - and his disappointment. As the alcohol increasingly exerted its influence over Grantaire, the man became more boisterous and contentious and it had happened at every meeting since: Grantaire picks fights with Enjolras, and jokes with Courfeyrac, and generally makes himself an indolent nuisance.

As soon as Enjolras reaches home, he heads straight for the shower and peels the sweat-soaked t-shirt from his back. The beach shorts (which are ugly as hell but are the most comfortable to run in) go the same way and his training shoes hit the bathroom door with a thud that rattles when they impact. He turns the water temperature down to a luke-warm spray and ducks under it with a sigh.

Grantaire is a distraction in more ways than one, and he’s unwelcome.

Enjolras has a million other things to do and while he’s happy to soliloquise to the Student HRW and take comments and issues on board ahead of his trip this weekend with the international HRW, he’s taking a weekend out of his studies already - he could do with using this evening for actual work.

Instead, he seems to be spending the night ignoring Grantaire as he riles up a subset of his friends in the corner.

If Enjolras felt like being fair, he’d concede that nothing is being achieved in this meeting anyway and he should just cut it short, send everyone home and allow contributions by email. He would, if he felt like being fair, admit that his friends deserve a break as much as everyone else and their presence here at the café for the general meeting is a show of solidarity and support, not necessarily revolution for human rights worldwide. And if Enjolras were so inclined, he’d give in to the notion that Grantaire is just trying to entertain himself while boring housekeeping is conducted in a public place.

Enjolras really needs to move the meetings back to a university seminar room.

Also, he really doesn’t feel like being fair.

He’s trying to concentrate, trying to give the concerns of his chapter of the HRW the attention and care they are entitled to. Instead, Grantaire’s laugh and dirty banter seem to grate on his every nerve, and he’s hyper-sensitive to every bad joke and somehow absurdly-loud swallow of wine.

Bahorel is dividing his attention as equally as he can, but Bossuet and Joly are drinking with Grantaire and Jehan is scribbling away in his Moleskin; Courfeyrac is playing on his phone but Combeferre is taking notes and they actually resemble the conversation Enjolras is having so at least that’s one person with their priorities right around here.

This shit never happened until Grantaire showed up.

“I agree it’s something we need to look at,” Enjolras pinches his nose and wishes he’d drank more water today. This headache is going to make him useless until he’s slept a little. He addresses the precocious little first year (he’s forgotten what he was saying, and Enjolras hopes he was never this bad to Jasper in his first year, but considering Jasper is still willing to sleep with him, he supposes not) and the rest of the room falls silent, “We’re getting nowhere like this. If you email me before Friday, Combeferre and I can draw up an agenda to take and I guarantee I won’t leave until I’ve taken it up with the head of the Student chapters, alright?”

He pointedly ignores Courfeyrac’s, “You’ll take something up with Jasper, I’ll bet.”

A few people look disgruntled but he can guarantee they’ll email him with their concerns; he’ll just be better placed to deal with them when he’s had more sleep, more coffee and less Grantaire.

He wanders over to the counter to order that much needed coffee and to avoid anyone trying to get his attention on the way out. Eponine pushes an already-made, hot americano his way with a sympathetic smile. “Go home and sleep, Enje.”

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead, Ponine,” he slumps against the counter. He’s got four months left until his university career ends and he’s exhausted, but he’ll be going almost straight into a summer internship before he takes up a graduate position at a prominent think-tank. He needs a break, but it’s not going to come any time soon. “In the meantime, I’ve got two essays due next week and a thesis plan to write.”

She rolls her eyes, “I’d suggest you blowing off this weekend but...” She trails off when she sees in his face that her pun would not be appreciated. His friends are far too involved in the rare events of his love life - and Jasper hardly counts as part of that any more. It’s casual, it’s fun and it’s exactly what he needs.

He hears Grantaire laugh explosively and winces. “You don’t happen to have any painkillers behind that counter do you?”

Grantaire wakes up and just knows this is the start of a bad day, despite it being Friday. He doesn’t have a hangover for a change, since he didn’t quite drink to his usual excess last night, and he’s even awake before nine in the morning. He has no lectures or workshops to attend until the afternoon, so he doesn’t have to move any time soon and that suits him just fine; except he’s on Eponine’s sofa and so he really should move some time soon.

For a student sofa, it’s pretty damn comfortable and Eponine supplied him with a pillow and blanket after their little DVD fest left him less than keen on moving to go home. He’s warm and content, right here. Getting up and going anywhere will bring nothing but hassle and trouble.

This is usually the point at which he reaches into his bedside cabinet for the bottle of whiskey there and uses the liquid kick to rouse him. There’s no such luck here, in the living room Eponine shares with her four other housemates, people who have quickly become his friends.

He feels a hand run through his hair and he looks up without moving away from the pleasant sensation; it’s Cosette. “You looked miles away,” she says quietly, her fingers teasing the tangles of curls apart. It strikes him as a very motherly gesture, though he’s got no basis for comparison - his parents aren’t stand-out examples of good parental behaviour. Oh, how proud they must be.

“Just zoned out,” he replies. This is usually the part where, when asked by someone what’s up or what’s wrong, he’ll take a swig of whatever alcohol is present and proclaim he was pondering the mysteries of the universe, or of an attractive person’s neck, or their mother. He blames his sobriety and the early hour in the face of Cosette’s sweet nature for his unguarded response.

And he still hasn’t moved.

“Do you want a cup of tea, or anything?” asks Cosette and he could kiss her, he really could; especially when, because the house is so quiet, he hears the distant click of the boiled kettle in the kitchen.

“If it’s not too much trouble,” says Grantaire, and he means it.

She smiles and shakes her head, “Of course it isn’t.” She gives his curls one last little tug and taps his nose adorably before walking away. He listens to the clink of mugs and teaspoons, and stares at the ceiling until he hears her coming back. “Do you have classes today?” Cosette continues the conversation like there was no pause, “Or, whatever, studio right?”

“Studio, yeah. I’ve got some stuff at two, but I’ll clear out back to my flat or the café in a bit.”

His enthusiasm for that idea must show; as she walks around the other end of the sofa she gives him an eloquent look which pins him in place. “You’re free to stay here for as long as you like, you know that,” she hands him the mug of tea carefully. “Just move your feet so I can sit down.”

“And just try to stay out of our Fearless Leader’s way,” he smiles weakly and pulls his knees up to his chest; Cosette adopts a similar position at the opposite end of the sofa. They’re facing each-other, sipping their tea and their socked toes are touching. It’s strange, because he and Cosette haven’t had much one-on-one interaction in the few weeks he’s known Eponine’s extended group, and what he knows besides is second-hand from either Eponine or his own imagination, but what he knows, he simply adores.

It’s hard not to love Cosette, really.

“Enjolras,” she stresses with a roll of her eyes and a nudge of her foot against his (everyone knows how much Enjolras hates the nicknames Grantaire insists on using for him), “is at a protest out of town for the weekend.”

He’s a muted mix of relieved and disappointed; some days, baiting Enjolras as good as whiskey as a reason to leave bed. “Why aren’t the rest of you with him?”

“Well, I’m passionate about the work, but I’m good at PR and marketing, not so much with the rallying,” she pushes her glasses up her nose as she shrugs. “And, well, Combeferre went with him but everyone else has assignments due imminently. Enjolras wouldn’t let anyone else take time out. Plus, we might try to talk him out of baiting the police.”

Grantaire likes to think that such behaviour from Enjolras is a surprise; it isn’t. “How big of him, and also horrifically masochistic.”

“Hush,” chides Cosette with a smile, “he’s not as bad as you think.”

“Oh, believe me, I know,” he clenches his hands around the mug of tea and searches for a simple excuse for his tumult of Enjolras-inspired emotions. “He just rubs me the wrong way.”

Cosette snorts inelegantly and Grantaire can’t help but grin at her; it’s brief, but it’s natural. “Cosette! Get your brain out of the gutter!”

“Sorry,” she giggles. “You just... Sorry. So I had some really boring reading planned for today. Do you want to help me rip apart some romantic comedies instead?”

He doesn’t feel pressured to say yes, which is exactly why he does.

They nap as much as they talk, and when Eponine joins them half way through the third truly awful movie of the morning, they form a warm puppy-pile on the sofa. He knows several people who’d give anything to swap places with him, but he’d not leave this spot for all the whiskey in the Scottish highlands. These great, gorgeous girls let him be quiet and lewd in whatever measure he likes, and though he’s come to adore them, he can only think: God, I miss my sister. He cuddles closer to Eponine, and he falls back into a doze as she plays with his hair just as Cosette had.

Later, he borrows the shower and a fresher t-shirt from Feuilly, and he almost feels like he’s on an even keel by the time Eponine drags him to their lecture at two o’clock; he hasn’t had a drop of alcohol in sixteen hours though, and his hands shake so much he gives up trying to take notes five minutes in.

He and Eponine grab a late lunch in the local pub, the fries and beef burger only an excuse for the beer on special offer.

He dreams of the aftermath of a good-old nineteenth-century brawl and wakes sweating, phantom bruises echoing across his body. Grantaire is gasping for breath as he reaches out toward the nightstand for some water to quench his thirst; he almost knocks over the glass, he’s shaking so profoundly.

Enjolras’ face, twisted in disdain at the sight of Grantaire and Bahorel so beaten and joyous at his oh-so-important meeting, haunts him as he settles back down and tries to stop the racing of his heart.

Sunday night finds them all back in the Alphabet, spread across many tables yet somehow all jostling for space. Grantaire sits with Cosette and they’re all awaiting Enjolras and Combeferre, and their account of their weekend exploits; they’re both coming directly from the train station.

They’re right on time, and their arrival garners a cheer from all assembled; even Grantaire tips his spiked coffee in the direction of the leader and his right-hand man. If Enjolras notices Grantaire’s less than overtly enthusiastic reception, he doesn’t recognise it. At all.

Business as usual, then.

Grantaire does a quick visual inspection of their returned leader, not seeing any overt signs that Enjolras had taken advantage of an easily provoked member of law enforcement. He’s heard stories of broken noses, head-wounds and cracked ribs, and part of him had expected to find Enjolras come back as a walking bruise. He’s seen Apollo bloodied and defiant before, he isn’t keen to see it outside of his own dreams.

For his part, Enjolras has stopped looking at Grantaire strangely whenever he finds the dark-haired disruptor with the rest of his friends; while it’s not acceptance, Grantaire will happily take it as such. Enjolras shrugs off his coat and sits down, because of course there were seats left for him and Combeferre in the middle of the horde, and he grins around at the group. Someone is in a good mood, thinks Grantaire. “Good weekend, guys?” Enjolras asks, as Combeferre approaches the Eponine at the counter.

Variations on a shrug - some verbal, like Feuilly’s ‘uneventful’ - ripple around the group. “And how’s Jasper,” smirks Courfeyrac and the undercurrent of teasing mischief causes Grantaire fixes his eyes on Enjolras.

“He’s just fine, thanks, Courf,” the blond says as he rolls his eyes, and Grantaire feels a hot wave of jealousy for whoever this Jasper guy is, not least when Courfeyrac adds in an undertone ‘Oh, we know he’s fine.’ Combeferre takes his seat though he hasn’t brought coffee with him from the counter, and Eponine follows in his wake to perch on a table by Cosette; the café is otherwise empty of patrons. “Now, let’s get down to business.”

One of the boys breaks into a hum which threatens to turn into a Disney sing-along, while Eponine sniggers and through her giggles manages to ask, “Is that what he said?” She gets a swat on the arm from Cosette and a ‘That doesn’t even make sense, Po.

“It makes perfect sense-”

“To defeat the hun!”

“I bet Jasper hit that so hard it made Enje’s ancestors dizzy.”

“You really have no shame, do you Courf?”

Grantaire, even while singing and encouraging a brief Mulan-themed interlude, barely takes his eyes off Enjolras for the entirety of the ribbing (though he hears every word in terrible high definition). Enjolras is blushing and he runs a hand over his face with a huff. “Seriously, guys, would you just drop it? Please, shut up.”

They do, but Grantaire ignores the second plea and is more disruptive and argumentative than usual for the rest of the evening.

Saturday nights, Enjolras remembers fondly, used to be fun. At least, he’s fairly certain they were fun, because if feels like he can’t really remember the last Saturday night he wasn’t at his laptop working. He blinks, and the cursor in his word processing package blinks back, patiently waiting. He groans; he’s completely lost his train of thought. Just, great.

It’s after nine PM, and even if he worked in full flow Enjolras expects he’s two hours away from a first draft of this essay. His desk is a mess, and his coffee ran out long enough ago that the cup is stone-cold to the touch.

Coffee.

Coffee is certainly the solution to this problem.

Enjolras pushes himself away from his desk-trap and rolls a third of the way towards the door with his cold, empty mug in hand. He gets out of the chair as gracefully as he can, but he supposes he hasn’t moved in several hours so the little stumble isn’t a shock. He rights himself by the time he’s at his bedroom door and he trudges down to the kitchen.

He turns away from the loud voices from the living room - a very impassioned argument on the relative merits of the Star Trek movies between Jehan, Courfeyrac and Joly - and with a smile he pads up to the kettle to boil some water.

“They’ve been at this for forty minutes,” comes a weary voice from the corner. Enjolras, rather than jumping in his startelement, goes carefully still at Grantaire’s voice. “I think I understand why everyone just ignores us when we argue.”

Enjolras turns around. Grantaire looks worn out. There are deep, dark bags under his eyes and he looks thinner than Enjolras thought he was; he’s standing by the refrigerator, door open, caught in the act of retrieving another bottle of beer as far as Enjolras can tell. “We don’t argue,” Enjolras responds, “An argument is meant to come to a conclusion.”

Grantaire barks a laugh, genuine amusement surprised out of him - Enjolras acknowledges a spark of enjoyment in causing it. “I will concede that point.”

“Ah, so you are capable of conceding, then,” smirks Enjolras as he fills the kettle with water and clicks it on to boil. “I had wondered.”

He hears the fridge door close and he turns back to Grantaire to find him, sure enough, opening a bottle of beer. “You’ve yet to convince me of anything,” Grantaire says, holding Enjolras’ gaze as he takes a long pull from the bottle. It’s overtly seductive to Enjolras’ eyes and he looks away to fuss around with the freeze-dried coffee. “And,” continues Grantaire after an audible swallow, which is just plain unnecessary, “I enjoy our arguments - sorry, bickering - too much.”

Enjolras is glad his back is to Grantaire, because his instinctive smile can remain a secret. For all that Grantaire is a pain in the arse, Enjolras does appreciate his constructive efforts to counter-arguments. It helps hone his language, sharpen his debating skills and forces him to dig deep for better material, more convincing points.

His smile fades when he remembers it’s the less constructive interjections - the innuendos, the belligerent attacks on his tactics and the sheer irritating cynicism of the man - which he doesn’t appreciate.

“You’re a mixed blessing,” is what Enjolras says eventually, waiting for the now-boiled water to cool.

Grantaire’s voice, close behind him, is all too smug. “A blessing, Apollo?”

“Did I say blessing?” Enjolras fixes his coffee, his own tone of voice carefully mild, knowing he’s misstepped horribly, “I meant nightmare.”

“Sure you did,” and when Enjolras turns around, Grantaire’s grin is obscenely wide. “Admit it, Fearless Leader, you like me.”

Enjolras sips his scalding-hot coffee and pushes past the artist. “No, Grantaire,” he says firmly as he leaves the kitchen and his irritatingly interesting acquaintance behind. He escapes upstairs, and realises his answer - to the liking or the admission - is all too ambiguous, especially to himself.

He’s had a bottle of wine atop some beers with lunch before he even turns up at Eponine’s house for the pre-drinking late in the evening - an evening which is guaranteed to turn into a messy night out for their favourite barista’s twentieth birthday, but only after a couple of hours of drinking games around her living room. Grantaire is buzzed, and a good night with his friends is just what the figurative doctor ordered.

(Though Grantaire has unfortunately been subject to Joly’s impromptu seminar on the comparative dangers of alcohol abuse and withdrawal. He knows what the doctor-in-training would prefer to order.)

The door is on the latch and he can hear music and voices as he lets himself in with a cursory knock; he hangs his coat up in the hall and heads straight for the kitchen. He brought a bottle of Po’s favoured raspberry vodka, labelled with a colourful tag saying “HAPPY BIRTHDAY!” in obnoxiously pink glitter lettering, and another bottle of wine for himself. The kitchen is empty, so he just grabs the last wine glass and heads into the living room.

He’s not the last to arrive - everyone else only really has to come from next door, after all - but he’s close to it; only Bossuet and Joly are missing of the two houses and Grantaire recognises a few faces from their course.

He clocks Enjolras’ presence immediately: to his right and in conversation with Combeferre beside the spread of snacks and drinks across the dining table. He purposefully ignores the man and heads to Eponine instead; she’s sat on the arm of the fully occupied sofa, laughing at a joke Bahorel has just finished telling, and she’s conveniently at the opposite side of the room to Apollo and his stupid crimson shirt.

When she spots him she jumps up. “Grantaire, you made it!”

“Of course I did,” he grins as she stands and pulls him into a tight hug.

Bahorel laughs his deep booming laugh, “Like our R would miss the chance to get smashed with us.”

“True,” Grantaire agrees with him from over Eponine’s shoulder. She pulls away eventually, and he holds out the vodka for her. “A gift for the birthday girl,” he presses a kiss to her cheek. “Don’t drink it all at once.”

“Mm, my favourite,” she hums and pulls him towards the table and the stack of plastic cups. Unfortunately that means she’s also pulling him across the room towards Enjolras, and he’s not so keen on this plan all of a sudden. “You want some?”

He brandishes the other bottle as Eponine grabs two cups, and he ignores Enjolras and Combeferre. “I came prepared.”

Enjolras does not ignore him. “You always do.”

Grantaire closes his eyes briefly and vows to be the bigger person. He’d adept at self-deceit; he turns to face their noble leader and smirks. “Thorough preparation is important for optimal enjoyment.”

Combeferre, standing behind Enjolras now he and the blond have drawn yet another battle-line between them, raises an eyebrow and smirks at the innuendo. Enjolras makes no indication beyond a muscle in his jaw twitching as he grits his teeth.

“Then get to the enjoying,” Eponine takes Grantaire’s wine bottle from him and fills a cup. She hands it back with a stern look and so he goes meekly when she pulls him back to the sofa where she’d been holding court. She pushes him down into a space beside Bahorel, and Grantaire gets on with his night.

It’s twenty minutes before Courfeyrac makes a grand entrance holding a pack of cards above his head triumphantly and declares they are playing games. It prompts a quick scramble for alcohol and mixers people don’t mind downing in large quantities, and a search for extra makeshift shot-glasses; Grantaire ends up with an egg cup full of black sambuca and a second cup of whiskey and lemonade.

He was told flat-out not to down his wine by the birthday girl.

They form a ring around the coffee table, though there’s so many of them and the ring is so large that they can’t actually use it to place their drinks on. Rules are debated for a few minutes, and Grantaire takes the opportunity to sip at his wine and pointedly not look at Enjolras who’d had the misfortune to end up directly opposite him.

Courfeyrac writes all the agreed rules on a sheet of paper, and the game begins.

Hours later, Grantaire is on the dancefloor of a local club and he has no idea what’s playing but he’s loving it. Eponine elbows her way through the crowd and shoves another shot under his nose - it has no smell, which he can only assume means he’s so far gone he’s obliterated that sense for the night - and after he’s knocked it back, she plasters herself to Grantaire’s front. He braces himself as best he can and wraps his arms around the birthday girl.

“I think we’re moving on!” She shouts into his ear, swaying to the beat of whatever dance track is thumping in the background. “The K-Bar is open til four!”

He squeezes her tightly and runs a hand over her sweaty, free-flowing hair. Her resemblance to his sister is simultaneously striking and incongruent; she’s so beautiful and so alive. He grins at her, letting the buzz of whatever that shot was flow through him, “Great, let’s go!”

She kisses him on the cheek then slips her hand into his, beginning to poke people around them in the arm and making frantic militaristic hand-signals. Someone takes his other hand and they form a human chain of drunken friends as they make their way out, past the unblinking bouncers and into the night air.

Under the streetlamps, he sees that it was Jehan who took his other hand, and the boy is several sheets to the wind and smiling dopily. Grantaire can’t help but smile back, and Jehan rests his head on Grantaire’s shoulder. “Come on, Tulip, we’ve got another bar to get to yet,” says the artist to the poet, and he sees Courfeyrac - on Jehan’s other hand - frown a little and Grantaire gets it so he lets go and nudges Jehan into Courfeyrac’s arms.

Grantaire is just a saint this evening.

Eponine is pulling him down the street, and if Grantaire doesn’t get into another club in a crush of people and alcohol fumes, he’s in danger of starting to sober up.

Speaking of sober, Grantaire looks behind him. The group is a little dispersed, and it would seem that he and Eponine are the only ones still holding hands, but they haven’t left anyone behind; Enjolras and Combeferre are taking up the rear.

He sniggers at his own innuendo, and Courfeyrac points at him accusingly, “You made mental innuendo! Share!”

“No!” Grantaire giggles and shakes his head. Fuck, he hasn’t felt this great in a long time. “It’s mine, and you can’t take it from me!”

What ensues could only be described as an imaginary sword fight, as Courfeyrac screams a terrible Braveheart impression about freedom at Grantaire, and Grantaire manages to respond with a laugh-mangled, “Liberté, Egalité, Fraternité!” Eponine flings herself out of the way and Combeferre appears from nowhere to catch her before she hits a wall, while Jehan slips back to join Marius and Cosette (and now Enjolras, too) to watch from a safe distance.

Grantaire loves his friends, loves his life and Courfeyrac is pushing in close and claiming his victory in the name of revolution.

Revolution. The word filters through his haze and embeds itself in whatever remains of Grantaire’s awareness. “Revolution?”

“Yeah, man,” Courfeyrac stumbles against Grantaire and they steady each other. The bar is still a hundred meters away. “Revolution. You know, what you said? Liberté, blah, blah. That’s my degree.”

“You’re...” he frowns, trying to put his thoughts in order because it would seem like his sense of reality is breaking down and he’s usually more drunk at that point, “Your degree is on French Revolution?”

Courfeyrac shakes his head and then rests it on Grantaire’s shoulder. Grantaire wonders if his shoulders are the solution to world peace, because everyone seems to be loving them this evening. “History, R. But yeah, dissertation. French Revolution. Not, you know, the main one, but the sort of intermediate period between the end of the... the... First Empire under Napoleon and the Second Republic. France had another king then, you know - three actually.”

“You don’t say?”

“Absolutely,” confirms Courfeyrac. “Hey, we’re here!”

They are, and the K-Bar isn’t closing for another three hours. Once they’re in, Grantaire gets everyone a round of tequila shots and is as surprised as everyone else when Enjolras actually drinks his (and properly) rather than handing it off to the nearest amenable person.

Three more hours with his friends. Grantaire’s life is awesome.

The hangover is completely worth it.

Grantaire doesn’t drink alone if he can help it (a shot of whiskey to get him out of a cold bed on the bad days notwithstanding of course) because the depressed consuming a depressant doesn’t make a right.

Or something.

He drinks with company because with it and them, he succeeds in becoming the clown, the fool, the light-hearted comic relief and so someone everyone is happy to have around. Occasionally he shows himself for the sad cynic he wishes he weren’t, sometimes lets the scathing sarcasm and biting vitriol out, but more often he brings bright annoyance and frivolity to proceedings. The more time he spends with the lads, the more he loves them and the more he needs to make himself useful the only way he can - by drinking and by entertaining.

As a result, he finds himself becoming more like the Grantaire of 1832 than perhaps he’s comfortable with, if only because of the way Enjolras reacts.

He pines and he drinks and he hangs on Enjolras’ every word even when pushing his buttons - especially when pushing Enjolras’ buttons - because any attention is good attention, and the more he reverts, he finds Enjolras reacting more like the implacable, disapproving leader of the nineteenth century. It’s a vicious cycle, and it seems they’re doomed to repeat history.

Grantaire just hopes it’s without the bloody, bloody end.

He dreams.

Enjolras is intoxicated by life and the prospect of progress; though the loss of their champion General is a blow to their hearts, their plans can now be more than dreams, more than thoughtful fancies in a Parisian café. To Grantaire, Enjolras passes into the sublime, his typical fervour turned to joy and rapture. Their normally abstinent leader even joins them in a toast, to Lamarque and their noble cause, and Grantaire cannot be swept up by it, cannot submit to the dream they may succeed as hard as he may wish it.

He knows they will not prevail, knows this can only end with blood on the streets of this city they love, and it will be their blood, spilled foolishly and senselessly in the name of freedom and equality and Enjolras. He hadn't ever expected to die for something he believed in, and shall not be disappointed in that regard, but he may yet die alongside someone he believes in and that is a shock indeed.

Grantaire is intoxicated in the more traditional way, having replenished his bottle of wine several times throughout the evening and drank for pleasure and for pointed defiance; teasing Marius had been a consequence of that wine as much as it was an encouragement to continue. Perhaps, precisely, the encouragement to persevere with his habit came from Enjolras’ reaction, more so than that of their young Pontmercy; the edict to put the bottle down and to not let the wine go to his brain had riled Grantaire in his state and prompted belligerence.

He had taken, after a stumble or two, a seat near the centre of the room in which he intended to stay until a drunken blackness overtook him or, more likely, one of the fine fellows of their group took to him kindly and escorted him home. Joly sat with him, and their dear Jehan, and they discussed all the merits of love in its fine forms, refraining from mentioning the clear and unrequited adoration Grantaire possessed for Enjolras.

He had felt his veneration keenly on many occasions - when he heard Apollo speak or read his writings; when Enjolras submitted to enter debate with him on any manner of subjects; when his leader chose to give something other than a dark word or pointed chastisement Grantaire’s way - but this evening Enjolras is in good spirits, high spirits and fortified spirits, and Grantaire lives for these moments to bear out those when the object of his adoration wasn’t so sparing of Grantaire’s failings.

A call rings out and Grantaire’s attention is diverted from his musings and his conversation, “Come! A toast!”

“Another?” cries Grantaire, “And demanded by someone other than myself! How historical an evening indeed.”

Bahorel raises his bottle, “Absolutely, R. Here we prepare for the dawn of a new republic for Enjolras’ beloved mistress!” A laugh circulates the room but none so bitterly as Grantaire’s. “So to she! To Patria!”

Enjolras rolls his eyes but his smile is wide and belaying of his mockery; his eyes gloss over Grantaire and he is deaf to Grantaire’s scoffs. He tips his glass all the same to Bahorel’s toast and returns swiftly to his conversation with his loyalest of lieutenants, Combeferre and Courefyrac.

Grantaire will savour this night, their laugher and their intoxication, the joy of his friends to find reason to fight and which will be their reason for dying, and he will use it as a reminder of their humanity, by which he means their mortality.

When he wakes with a start, once more on Eponine’s sofa, Grantaire is crying; he has an urge to check the rooms of the house are occupied but instead he lies awake until the sun rises and he can hear Po and her housemates moving about upstairs. Then, and only when he has that small proof, does he go back to sleep.

The date of his deadline and the actual exhibition in May creeps closer and closer, and all Grantaire has to show for his preparation is a stack of sketchbooks full of memories that aren’t even his. He hasn’t been able to draw, paint or even doodle anything unrelated to the June Rebellion since Christmas time, and once he’d seen Enjolras’ face in the café he was lost.

When it comes to informing the art department which spaces he wants, he picks four pieces for the Romantic styles and two for post-modernism and resigns himself to wherever this inspiration leads. The main problem is explaining it to the satisfaction of his lecturers and, should any of the lads chose to attend, the new Amis.

It would seem Grantaire will still need to crack a book for this work, though specifically on French revolutionary history rather than on techniques - because if he’s to paint Enjolras then only a Neoclassical or Romantic Apollo will do.

He relates his artistic intentions over a couple of pints with his lunch at the pub with Courfeyrac, leaving out the weird reincarnation madness and his all-too-obvious-anyway obsession with Enjolras, and Courfeyrac eagerly recommends a few books for light reading. (He blames the lack of hangover and so-far-today limited drinking for his clear thinking on the matter.) Rather than pick Courfeyrac’s brains - the man has a lecture to go to and actually attends them - Grantaire bids him adieu and heads straight for the library; there is no time, after all, like the present.

Unless that time is 1832.

Enjolras is staring out of the library window, wishing he’d been able to find a seat without such an easy distraction. He’s on the fourth floor, and outside there’s a busy four-road junction with crossings full of students heading onto the campus and a popular pub on the corner. It’s a people-watcher’s dream to sit up here and zone out.

His essay is going less than well as a result.

He’s actually resorted to doodling, and his notepad is covered in little French flags atop little Napoleonic war ships. His artistic flair leaves a lot to be desired, but he’s hardly concerned beyond the fact that the pad ought to be covered in notes for his Theories of Liberty class.

Liberty is pretty much Enjolras’ niche, so to be stumped and distracted is frustrating.

He shuffles in his chair and tries to sit up straight, determined to focus on the laptop before him and the empty document awaiting an essay, when his eyes are drawn to the street below by the change of the traffic lights and a fast-moving flash of red and black.

Grantaire.

Enjolras is on the top floor but he can still see the artist unmistakably as he crosses the road, the typical vibrant beanie against the inky curls, the stubble and the hoodie; Enjolras likes to think he can see the dark circles under Grantaire’s red-rimmed eyes, but he knows he’s being ridiculous.

He has a sudden and rather disturbing realisation: he’s never seen Grantaire outside of the café or a bar, without coffee or more often something alcoholic in his hand. He hasn’t seen Grantaire shop for food, or go to a lecture, or read a newspaper. He knows Grantaire is on the same Fine Arts with Art History degree as Eponine, but Enjolras hasn’t to his recollection seen Grantaire leave to attend a lecture or explicitly mention having been to one. And yet, Grantaire is across the road now, officially on campus and (unless Enjolras is mistaken) headed into the library complex.

He looks around the fourth floor as covertly as he can, considering he has his back to the entire room; the art section of the library is on the fourth floor, along with philosophy, politics and history. Everyone is working, or at least Facebooking at their laptops, and a few people are milling about the stacks. He turns back to the window and spends a few tense minutes free-writing to look busy, flipping pages in his books and clicking wikipedia links. The main stairs are central to the stacks, and the art section is to Enjolras’ right; he’s is too well disciplined to facepalm or headdesk, but it takes a surprising amount of restraint - Grantaire will spot him easily. He curses his unfortunate choice of seat and the delusion that he might work better in the library.

He hates working in the library.

“I thought you hated working in the library,” speaks the devil, though Enjolras doesn’t recall ever telling Grantaire that. He turns slightly in his hair to find Grantaire standing with his hands stuffed in the pockets of his jacket, his beanie still in place and his curls threatening a messy escape; his lips are curved in a curious smile and his brow is furrowed. He looks tired but not hungover, and Enjolras is happy for small mercies.

He doesn’t recall ever telling Grantaire of his aversion to working in the library, but then again he makes a habit of ignoring the man as much as possible (to varying degrees of success) so who knows what he’s picked up about Enjolras. He tries not to relax; his body seems to want to slouch and recline in his seat and he won’t allow Grantaire to think he’s welcome in Enjolras’ space. “I do hate it,” he confirms, “but Jehan’s orchestra has a performance coming up and he can’t get any rehearsal space on his own. He’s practicing in his bedroom.”

Grantaire nods and rocks back on his heels, “I see.”

There’s a momentary pause and Enjolras feels a need to fill the silence before it becomes awkward. “What brings you to the library?” He doesn’t mean it to sounds so very accusing, but it does; his words never seem to hit the correct target when talking with Grantaire.

The artist doesn’t acknowledge the biting tone with anything more than a one-shouldered shrug, “I need to do some background reading for my exhibition pieces.”

“You’re exhibiting?” Grantaire is notorious now among their friends for never showing his sketches to anyone, not even Eponine; an exhibition almost seems anathema.

“All of the second years are,” replies Grantaire, though of course now it’s been mentioned, Enjolras is sure he’s heard Feuilly and Eponine discussing their end of year event. Sure enough, Grantaire adds, “Eponine and Feuilly will be too. You should come.”

He doesn’t hesitate, “Maybe I will.”

Grantaire smirks and there’s mischief brewing behind his eyes, boding ill for Enjolras. “Come grace the mortals with your presence.”

Enjolras realises he’s been gripping his pen tightly throughout this entire exchange, and he puts it down. Too confrontationally, he asks, “And what do you mean by that?”

His counterpart raises an eyebrow. “I mean even the gods of Olympus came down to earth every now and again to relax. Give yourself a break, Apollo.”

He’s not at all sure what to do with that statement, or the wholly incongruous nickname Grantaire has just bestowed upon him. “I’m hardly a god,” is what he says, but what he means is, Don’t revere me. His meaning is either lost on Grantaire or the man refuses to obey.

“A vengeful angel then?” The artist’s smile is wicked, “Here to purge humanity of its blasphemies and injustices?”

Enjolras rolls his eyes, “You’re mocking me.” Strangely, though, he doesn’t feel slighted by it. Grantaire is comparing him to gods and angels, and it has to be mockery, but Enjolras is flattered all the same.

“Only the idea of a one-man crusade, Apollo,” Grantaire chuckles a little as he holds up his hands in surrender, and Enjolras realises that he did that, he made Grantaire smile and laugh and this is the first actual conversation they’ve had which hasn’t devolved into pure argument. “Chill out, for a change, is all I’m saying. If I ever actually make these damn pieces for the exhibition, I’m sure it’ll be a night to remember.”

“Are you sure you will remember it?”

Grantaire’s eyes shutter, and Enjolras realises he’s ruined what was a perfectly fine conversation with poorly chosen words. “I need to be sober to work. And speaking of...” He trails off with a shrug and physically backs away.

Enjolras doesn’t like that one bit. “I’m sorry,” and though he has no idea where the words come from, he doesn’t take them back. “I didn’t mean-”

“Yeah, you did,” counters Grantaire, half turned away. Enjolras knows everyone has to be watching, they weren’t exactly keeping their voices down throughout their little banter, and Grantaire’s far enough away now that neither can whisper. “I’ve got work to do. And Jehan has a Poetry Society meeting in fifteen minutes so you can probably do yours at home.”

“Grantaire -”

“Later, Apollo.”

And he’s gone, disappearing into the history section like a ghost.

Enjolras ignores the eyes on him and turns back to his screen and his view from the fourth floor window. He and Grantaire seem doomed to forever be on different pages of the same story. They rarely agree on anything, apparently can’t even conduct a civil conversation when Grantaire is as sober as he gets and Enjolras is trying, and it makes him wonder just what he might have done in a past life to warrant such torture.

He’ll go to that exhibition, he decides, packing up his laptop and books. He’ll go and he’ll see what Grantaire is usually so eager to hide in his art, and he’ll ask pertinent questions about the subject matter (what was he looking for in the history section, anyway?) and Enjolras will categorically not fuck up something so simple as a conversation with another human being.

For heaven’s sake, it’s only Grantaire.

Grantaire escapes down the wrong stack, stuck somewhere in twentieth century British politics rather than nineteenth-century French rebellions, and he sighs deeply. He meant to check the digital listings on his way in but got distracted by the sunlight from the wide windows in Enjolras’ hair, looking like a Disney prince. He’d intended to open with some mockery of that fact, to detract from how ridiculous Grantaire felt even making the comparison, but he’d remembered how Enjolras never, ever works outside of his own bedroom if he can help it and wondered why the man was trying and failing to work here instead.

Albeit strange, it was nice to know that for a minute there, they actually managed to hold a conversation.

Now he has no idea where to find the books he needs, and if he were to walk back out he’d find himself right into Enjolras’ path; he’s not up for round-two of let’s point out Grantaire’s obvious flaws with his host, Christien Enjolras. He’s had that for one lifetime, and today he just wants to catch a break.

Luckily, there’s someone in the same aisle as Grantaire, and he’s only flipping idly through some books on the run up to World War II, so he hopes this guy might actually know his way around. He looks fairly unassuming, in chucks, skinny black jeans and a hoodie with writing so faded, he suspects only the man wearing it knows what it once said. “Hey, man, I don’t suppose you know where the books on France in the early eighteen hundreds are?”

The guy looks up slowly, gives Grantaire a once-over and raises an eyebrow. He’s smiling as he says, “Do I look like a fucking directory?”

So much for unassuming, thinks Grantaire, but the once-over was an ego boost. “You look like you know your way around,” he counters with a matching expression.

“Is that slight on my virtue?” gasps the stranger.

Grantaire affects shock, enjoying the simple banter after the exchange with Enjolras, “You have virtue? I’m so sorry to hear that.”

He laughs and Grantaire grins at him. “I’m Ray, and you’re loitering around nine-forty-one when you should be getting your sweet French ass down around nine-forty-four,” replies Ray, gesticulating wildly and only generally directing Grantaire further down the stacks.

“Grantaire,” he replies, clapping Ray on the shoulder as he walks past, “And thanks, you’re a life-saver.”

“No worries, homes,” Ray shrugs and pulls another book, seemingly at random, from the shelves as he talks to himself. “I’m killing time waiting on a hot librarian.”

“Good luck with that,” says Grantaire honestly, and he counts up along the spines of the books to nine-four-four. The books start to have ‘France’ and variations thereof in the titles and he isn’t above muttering, “Jackpot,” under his breath. He finds one of those ‘A Short Introduction To...’ books on the French Revolution, and figures that’s a place to start. He manages to find the two titles Courfeyrac recommended too, clearly required reading for some History module, and he flicks through one until he finds reference to June 1832 - then he skims; he’ll read them properly later.

According to historians, the Société es Amis du Peuple had decided to hold themselves in readiness for any “collision” that might develop. On the morning of 5 June, law and medical students joined the assembled Amis along the route; many young men provocatively had daggers and pistols half-visible under their coats.*

These will do, then, he thinks, but he picks another which looks more generic (“July Monarchy, 1830 to 1848”) to give him a bit of context. He closes the book titled Barricades and does a quick inventory of his pockets to find his student ID. He pulls it triumphantly from his back jeans pocket and heads for the back staircase, rather than risk Enjolras having stuck around, and hopes the checking-out process is straightforward.

They assemble at the Café Musain in the small hours of the morning as the sun begins to ascend over the rooftops of Paris, and Grantaire has not been to sleep; he suspects the same of his cohorts though for different reasons. Their excitement is palpable. Enjolras is, unusually, the last to arrive, though all preparations were made the day previous and all that was required was their presence on the morning of the funeral, to better acquire their front-line positions for the procession; to a man they are ready, well-prepared, anticipatory. They expect the next dawn to be the dawn of a new age, a new republic; Grantaire expects the next dawn to be red with the blood of boys who were so sure the angry men would rise

Grantaire hangs back, keeping to the shadow in the corner with a bottle in his hand and a leaden heart. Enjolras speaks, words of courage and hope twisting around the room, and he does not see Grantaire at all. Though frequently a source of pain, Enjolras’ sweeping, ignorant gaze over Grantaire brings the artist comfort this morning - if he is not seen, he shall not be missed, and he is as yet unsure if he will truly, honestly join Enjolras at his barricade in the later hours of this day. Most of all, he doesn’t not want to give Enjolras the false impression that Grantaire has become a believer, nor face Enjolras’ disdain and surety that Grantaire will once more fail in his attempts to be a champion of his noble cause. “Red. Be easy,” he had once said in the face of Enjolras’ reluctant faith in him, and he had spit that faith back in Enjolras’ unsurprised, hurt face over a game of dominoes.

He is happy to live down to Enjolras’ expectations as he, in turn, expected Enjolras to rise above Grantaire’s own. He does not expect, however, Enjolras’ final stand in the Rue de Vilette to foil his expectations; this will end in bloodshed and waste, and Grantaire has yet to decide if he wishes to remain to see it.

The faithful trickle beyond the doors, a few at the back of the room who had noted Grantaire’s presence and silence nodding in acknowledgement or claiming they will see him when they return. Grantaire does not correct them, but allows them to go with their impressions, however erroneous.

Enjolras is one of the last out of the café, but if he notices Grantaire then he leaves the man, as ever, unacknowledged.

Grantaire stays, stewing over what to do, where to go, and flirting with the women who remained behind. He claims to be the back-up, the General, the stock-boy found miles behind the front lines waiting to take inventory of who returns and who does not, but in the end he is only passing time until Enjolras returns - because it was never a question that Grantaire would wait, would remain, would stay after all. Without Enjolras he is nothing, even with Enjolras he is a waif, a stray begging for scraps at the foot of Olympus, but it is better than this dark corner, alone. He has no doubt that the next dawn will bring his death and the death of his friends and whoever is foolish enough as him to devote their lives to someone in the cause, but his only other option is dying alone for nothing, and this may yet allow him some consideration in Enjolras’ eyes.

He distantly hears the approaching mob, and Marius appears, “It’s starting,” and so it begins: the end.

He has three weeks, he has preparatory sketches and he has all the paints, prepared canvases and brushes he’ll need. The art department has given keys to small studio spaces in exchange of a hefty deposit to the students intending to exhibit, but Grantaire has somewhere else to go: he rents the back room of the Alphabet from Musichetta for the full three weeks preceding the event and covers it in some cheap, flat cotton bedsheets.

He doesn’t exactly tell everyone to back off for the duration, but he doesn’t tell them where he’s going either. Eponine knows, because she works there and she’s secretly a druid priestess, and so by osmosis Cosette is aware; he just doesn’t want continuous interruptions from the curious cohort of Amis.

He eats when he remembers and has a stash of sugary sweets for when he can’t leave; he has a sink for water and an overnight bag with some clothes to stay fresh; and he has a plan.

Three weeks, six pieces of varying complexity, and no distractions.

He’s already accepted he’s doomed.

Grantaire hasn’t been seen in a week, even by Bahorel and Eponine, and Eponine has reduced her hours at the Alphabet to the point where Cosette is the only one to really see her at all, and that’s only because they share a bathroom and a frighteningly co-dependent platonic relationship. Enjolras only connects the absences with the upcoming exhibit when Feuilly jokes, “I’ve barely slept but at I started working on mine months ago.”

Enjolras realises he hasn’t seen Grantaire since he walked off into the stacks of the library.

It’s strangely quiet and almost unbalanced without Grantaire, and yet he’s only really been a part of their friendship group for a few months. Of course, in a university environment, a few months is a whole semester which is a long time, but to Enjolras it seems simultaneously that Grantaire is brand new and yet has always been around. His absence at the Alphabet this Sunday night is noticeable, even though it’s not unusual.

Enjolras is confused. He vastly dislikes being confused.

He doesn’t know where Grantaire is, doesn’t know how his project is going, doesn’t know why he was in the library in the first place; and Enjolras thinks he might, just a little, miss the often-drunk, dark artist with his snark and his blue eyes and his dedication to being disruptive.

What he says aloud is, “It’s not surprising he left it all to the last minute.”

Conversation picks up in their corner of the room, and Enjolras tries not to think of Grantaire, probably somewhere in the art department, feverishly moving before a canvas. He tries not to see red paint in black curls, bare feet on a cold floor, and images forming under the expertly-wielded brush. He doesn’t know why he’s so sure Grantaire is good at this, only assumes he must be, he has to be, to be here at all.

Later, when it’s just Enjolras and Combeferre sitting in their living room having a cup of coffee before getting back to their respective mountains of work, it’s abundantly clear to his best friend that Enjolras is distracted.

“Out with it,” orders Combeferre, snapping Enjolras from his reverie. He’d been staring at the swirls of steam dancing up from the coffee and had been seeing swirls of paint instead. He blinks before looking over to his highly amused blond number two.

“Sorry, what?”

Combeferre slouches further into the sofa with a sigh, “You’ve been distracted all day. All week, in fact. Now, I’d be willing to put it down to work fatigue but you forget that I,” he pokes his chest pointedly, “have been here since day zero, and I know what this looks like.”

Enjolras can’t help but rolls his eyes and smile back, even though he knows what Combeferre is getting at. It’s true, that ‘Ferre was the first person he met back at the pre-application open day, and they had discovered they lived only a few miles apart back home. By the time they had their offers from the university, they were best friends and by the time they had arrived, Combeferre knew Enjolras like the battered copy of Neil Gaiman’s American Gods the voracious reader refuses to be parted from for more than a weekend.

“I know what this looks like,” concedes Enjolras. “But it’s not.”

“I beg to differ,” sing-songs Combeferre.

“Shut up.”

Combeferre wins the exchange and a rueful Enjolras retreats to his bedroom to continue working. When he finally steps away from his essay and crawls into bed, he dreams of red paint among black curls; and when his dream-self pulls away his hands from those soft locks, there’s red on Enjolras’ hands too.

He means to take the day off, this day of all days. It’s twelve days into his seclusion; he has it circled on the free wall-planner he got at the beginning of the year, and has an alert in his phone to remind him and wake him if he’s already drunk or comatose. Grantaire has never managed to forget in nine years, but he’s never worked flat out like this before.

He’s mostly sober but for his rationed beer from the supply Musichetta will only replenish daily, but he’s been working on the centre-piece for his work and he doesn’t realise his phone has died until Eponine pops her head around the door around lunchtime.

“Wanna sandwich?” She asks and he steps away from the canvas, blinking.

Grantaire has no idea what day it is, no idea what time it is, and he asks Eponine to repeat herself.

“Sandwich,” she obliges with a frown. “Do you want one? We’re having lunch.”

“We?” He asks dopily.

Eponine steps into the room and closes the door behind her. “Cosette’s here. Are... are you alright?”

He shakes his head, more to banish the fog than to indicate he’s not alright, and he says, “I’m fine, just really in the zone, I guess.” He looks at the little camp-mattress he’d put in here to sleep on and wonders when he last used it. “What day is it?”

“It’s Tuesday, R. Seriously, are you sure you’re okay?”

He shrugs and looks back at the piece taking shape on the canvas. He’s decided to call it jusqu'à la monde est libre, if only because calling it Apollo would be too obvious; he uses that nickname daily and the prone form on the barricade is not meant to be recognised. Now he’s distracted, he can feel the fatigue and hunger kick in and he turns back to Eponine with a weak smile. “I’m fine, I promise. Some food would be good.”

“And a cup of tea,” she suggests, reaching out to take him by the hand and lead him into the café itself.

He counters that a glass of wine would be better, but follows meekly all the same.

Alphabet is fairly empty - a few students reading, which is typical middle-of-the-day on Tuesday fare - and Eponine pushes him down onto a newly-acquired squishy leather sofa. “Stay there,” she orders as she backs away; he obeys but his eyes follow her as she goes to the counter, moves around as she fixes some drinks and comes back. She sets a large mug of black tea down in front of him and a fruitier tea down for herself. He silently wonders for a moment where Cosette is, until the door opens on the other side of the café and she walks in with a bag from the little sandwich place down the road.

“Was there a new European working directive on lunch hours or something? I swear, everyone in town must have had hunger pangs simultaneously,” gripes Cosette as she unpacks the bag onto the low coffee-table. There’s a BLT for Eponine, a turkey salad for herself and finally some hideously overstuffed baguette of vegetables, potentially some ham, and cooked chicken is placed in front of Grantaire. He smiles, because he knows he doesn’t eat properly pretty much ever and it’s sweet and lovely and god, he misses his sister -

It hits him suddenly what day it is.

He desperately hopes he’s wrong, because how could he have forgotten for a moment, for a single second?

Someone takes his hand and he realises he’s shaking; someone is asking if he’s alright and calling his name distantly and he can’t believe he might have forgotten.

Hoarsely, he asks, “What’s the date?”

He blinks, trying to bring his two friends into focus. Eponine has moved round the end of the coffee table and is on her knees in front of him, her hands clutching his tightly. Cosette is beside him on the sofa, an arm around his shoulders. They’re confused and concerned and, god, so is he, but he needs to know. He’s squeezing her hands too hard, he’s sure, and his breath is coming too fast, “The date, Ep. Today. What is it?”

“It’s the twenty-ninth, sweetheart,” Eponine replies softly.

To Grantaire, it sounds like a roar, and he makes a sound like a wounded puppy, “Maddy.”

He’s moving, under his own steam or not, he doesn’t know, but he’s back in his painting room at the back of the café and the door is closed and Cosette has their food and tea, and he still can’t breathe.

“...I need you to breathe with me, R, okay? In and out, that’s right -”

“Shall I call Joly?”

Grantaire shakes his head, eyes clenched tightly shut, and concentrates on Cosette’s calm voice, her even breathing; he tries to match it. The world is spinning with colour when he opens his eyes to meet her gaze, and she has a hand on his cheek. It’s grounding, and slowly he feels like the world comes back with every exhale.

“I’m okay,” he shudders out each slow breath, and he’s aware of the tears on his cheeks being rubbed away by Cosette’s soft thumbs, “I’m okay.”

Cosette’s eyes don’t waver from his. “Sure?”

“No,” answers Grantaire honestly, “But no more panic attack.”

“Good,” Eponine looks stern but shaken, “Because that was the most terrifying twenty minutes of my life and I once had to tell Enjolras we were out of coffee.”

He laughs involuntarily and it’s a wet, sad sound. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry, just be okay,” Cosette’s hands move away from his face and she sits back - they’re sitting on his camp-mattress and his back is against the cold wall. He concentrates on its unyielding cool presence at his back and continues to breathe. He owes them an explanation, even wants to explain, but he has no idea where to start.

“It’s my sister’s birthday.”

He hasn’t spoken of her to anyone, not in years and certainly not here at university, so he knows that simple statement won’t be enough, because words aren’t ever enough, but he waits regardless; they’ll ask, and he’ll tease the details from memories he tries not to touch.

Their confused pouts return and Eponine shakes her head, “Grantaire... I didn’t know you have a sister.”

He shakes his head and more tears well up, clouding his sight of the girls. “Had,” he chokes out eventually. “I had Maddy.”

Cosette says nothing but he hears Eponine breath out a simple, “Oh my god,” over the deafening drumbeat of his own heart. The camp-mattress shifts either side of him and he finds himself between the two girls, their heads resting on his shoulders and their hands around each of his. “I’m so, so sorry, Robin.”

The flood-gates open. Cosette and Eponine hold him as he cries and cries and cries, longer and harder than he has for Maddy since he lost her. They stroke his hair and don’t complain about the disgusting mucus-and-tears on their clothes; they murmur words that don’t matter in a tone that absolutely does, and he’s only aware that he’s fallen asleep when he wakes up to evening light through the windows between two whispering beauties.

They fall silent once it becomes clear he’s no longer sleeping; his head is pillowed on Eponine’s chest and Cosette is behind him, and arm over his waist. A scumbag part of his brain wants to make a joke, wants to deflect and run, but he breathes deeply and speaks into the privileged quiet, “She was turning nineteen, and I was eleven. She was brilliant,” he smiles, remembering her dark hair and blue eyes, just like his own, and her smiles rarer than stardust, “She was so smart, and beautiful, and funny. I didn’t really understand why she used to get so quiet, or why she was always taking pills and would spend hours just playing with my hair or singing to me. I just knew she was sad, but she would smile a little more around me.”

There are fingers running through his hair now, and Cosette presses a kiss to his forehead.

“She started taking more pills, different pills, back and forth from the doctor all the time. We didn’t know,” his voice breaks and he feels the rising wall of panic and tears. He swallows, grits his teeth and breathes. He corrects himself, “I didn’t know she was suicidal.”

The grips the girls have on him get firmer but they say nothing.

“I found her. She said she was sorry, said she tried, said the pills were making her worse and it was bad enough without them, said she wished our parents had listened,” he forces the words out in a rush. “It was her birthday.”

There’s so much more he wants to say, about how she’d babysit him and drop whatever she was doing to watch cartoons with him; how he got his first big set of crayons from her for his sixth birthday; how her’s was the first face he ever sketched and he hasn’t once done her justice since; how, when he finally stood on the wrong side of that dark place she’d inhabited, he’d stared into it and vowed never to medicate himself; how he thinks she’d be proud of his art but hate his alcohol dependency.

He wants to talk about her hair like Eponine’s, but darker, and her temperament like Cosette’s but more melancholy, and the fierce way she could hold an argument with their parents, just like Enjolras.

But he can’t, because if he starts he may never stop, and while he only has eight good years worth of memories of Madélène Grantaire, he could idolise her for a lifetime.

Eventually they move, eat, and Grantaire is left alone as Cosette goes back to her house and Eponine returns to work to make up for the impromptu afternoon off. He thinks he should feel guilty, because Eponine has pieces to produce too, but he knows she’s been working on them longer than he has, and he’d never presume to dictate when he can’t even organise his own life.

He wants to drink until he’s comatose, but instead he has a beer from his stash and settles back on the camp-mattress with his sketchbook.

He still doesn’t do Maddy justice - her smile, her beauty, her unflinching love for her doomed younger brother - but he thinks maybe he’s closer than ever before.

There’s a knock on his bedroom door and Enjolras calls out a distracted, “Come in.” He’s ready for a break anyhow, and by the smell of it his visitor has brought coffee - he finished his last cup some time ago. Courfeyrac walks in and he has a large mug of steaming coffee in each hand. “I could kiss you,” confesses Enjolras as he reaches out for one; Courfeyrac lets it go with a laugh.

“But you won’t because you’re a horrific tease,” chides the dark-haired bringer of caffeine and he settles himself on the floor with his back against the now-closed door. “How’s it going?”

“Slowly. These things always seem easier to talk about, rather than write and cite,” replies Enjolras with a tired, self-deprecating smile. “Yours?”

“The juste milieu of the July Monarchy is hilariously somewhat fair to middling at the moment,” he says, mirroring his friend’s expression. He shrugs, and adds more brightly, “I actually come on a related matter.”

Enjolras turns his chair away from his desk to face Courfeyrac properly. “Oh?”

“Po, Feuilly and Grantaire’s exhibition,” he confesses, sipping idly at his coffee. “It’s in a couple of weeks but Po needs us to confirm numbers.”

Enjolras doesn’t see the connection and he wonders just how little sleep he’s actually been getting while trying to complete his thesis. “How are those things related?”

“Subject matter,” shrugs Courfeyrac, “And I’ve been dispatched to make sure that ‘Ferre, Bahorel and you agree to make appearances.”

This is making less and less sense, “Why us, specifically?”

“You’re the last on the list to be asked,” say Courfeyrac, as pure as untouched snow and as though innocence is his middle name.

“I see,” replies Enjolras, despite the fact that he really doesn’t. He wraps his hands around the warm mug and frowns. He remembers his last, perhaps only, proper conversation with Grantaire in the library a few weeks ago and recalls the initial invitation. “Well,” he replies to Courfeyrac, “I’ve already said I’d be there.”

This is news to the dark haired coffee-god on the floor. “Really? When?”

“Grantaire mentioned it last month,” Enjolras admits, but stops short of elaborating.

Courfeyrac doesn’t let it go though, because he’s a dick. “Since when do you and R actually talk?”

Enjolras sighs. His best friend really is sent from Hell to torture him. “I bumped into him at the library.”

“Since when does R go to the- oh, right, research,” Courfeyrac’s voice goes from a shrill pitch likely alerting all nearby dogs to the apocalypse to something far more reasonable. “So he invited you to the exhibition, then?”

“Yes.”

“Uh-huh,” Courefyrac hums and his innocent face breaks. Whatever it was he was trying to hide, he has no intention to any longer, and Enjolras knows that it has all been at his expense. “So, are you his plus-one?” There’s a creepy attempt at an eyebrow wiggle to go with the term, and Enjolras hangs his head.

His friends are awful, and it really is a burden to love them so much.

“No,” says Enjolras, categorically, because his approach with Combeferre had been too soft and vague and concessionary by half. “On every level, Courf. No.”

“Methinks the lady doth protest too much.”

Enjolras throws a pen at him with spectacular accuracy. “You misquoted the Bard.”

Courfeyrac has to put his coffee down, he’s laughing so hard. “Oh my god, you’re actually protesting too much. I thought this was a joke but Enje, you actually...” He looks at Enjolras’ face, and he can’t be sure what his face is showing but Enjolras is fairly certain it’s nothing pleasant.

“Please drop it,” Enjolras asks, both plaintive and dangerous. He doesn’t want to deal with his complicated introspective situation with Grantaire, he has bigger things to think and worry about, and he certainly doesn’t want Courfeyrac involved. There’s nothing to be involved in; Grantaire is someone who is friends with his friends, and he happens to be intelligent and good-looking, but also drunk and belligerent. There’s nothing there, not really.

Courfeyrac picks his coffee back up, and he nods - he doesn’t look convinced, so Enjolras can almost certainly expect interrogation at a later date, but it’ll do for now.. “So what going on with Combeferre and Eponine?”

Either the caffeine is kicking in or everything is starting to make sense again, finally; it could be both. But, because Courfeyrac stopped talking about a perceived romantic interest by talking about another, Enjolras is going to shut this down, fast. “I don’t know, what’s going on between you and Jehan?”

“Point taken,” Courfeyrac stands up and scrambles to leave. Enjolras is too tired to really laugh but he does smile, and that’s distraction enough. Courf’s parting shot, “Don’t work too hard!”, can be heard just before Enjolras’ bedroom door slams shut.

He’s once again entombed with his thesis.

Enjolras rolls his shoulders, puts down the coffee, and gets back to work. He very pointedly does not think about Grantaire.

They’re done, and with two days to spare; his final piece will have to be set by the south-facing window to dry the oil out quicker, but the others are at least dry to the touch. He has six canvases for display, and he feels like crying; he’s exhausted, drained. He wants to sleep but now he’s done, he can’t face the cot in the corner.

He shuffles around the room, catching the sunset out of the corner of his eyes through the windows. With the light almost permanently on, the days have blurred together and it’s only the date and time on his phone which has kept him straight. And Eponine, he thinks, remembering last week.

He slips a pair of socks on and his trainers - it’s been a day or two since he last showered, so about that long since he left the back room of the Alphabet, and he knows he smells a little ripe. Eponine won’t mind him stealing her bathroom, nor Cosette. He picks up his keys, and with a final look at the Apollo drying on the last canvas, he leaves. He locks up, and Musichetta only nods as he passes through the quiet café; none of his friends are there tonight.

It’s still a little cold outside, and so he walks up to Eponine’s quickly, only a paint-splattered t-shirt on his back. He’s carrying a hoodie, but it has been carefully kept away from the flying acrylic and oil and so it would be a waste to have it take on the mess now. He’ll put it on after he’s cleaned up; it’s a good hoodie for sleeping in.

He knocks on Eponine’s door as he lets himself in, and walks straight into the living room.

Courfeyrac and Jehan are watching You’ve Got Mail on the sofa, and they both turn with a strange synchronicity to look at the intruder at their door. Grantaire idly notes that they’re sitting pretty comfortably close, even for a group of friends who have little perception of personal space, and he smiles.

They aren’t smiling.

“R,” Jehan says carefully, making no sudden movements as though Grantaire is a skittish kitten. “You look terrible.”

Grantaire clears his throat and replies, “Feel it too.”

“Are you done, then?” Jehan reaches for the remote and pauses the movie as he asks, and Grantaire nods. “Good - go have a shower and I’ll make you some food.”

“I don’t want to-”

“Fuck off, we’re feeding you before you fall down,” says Courfeyrac as Jehan leaves the room. He stands, looking stern. “Eponine’s upstairs, off you go.”

He opens his mouth to protest again, he really just wants to clean up and crash, and so what if he hasn’t really been eating properly - he can have an awesome breakfast tomorrow - but it’s late and he’s drained and he just wants to sleep.

Courfeyrac slaps his hand over Grantaire’s mouth. “Not another word. You will go upstairs, you will have a long hot shower and Eponine will supply you with our fluffiest towel. You will come back downstairs and you will eat, and only then can you sleep.”

Grantaire nods obediently, and is glad he doesn’t have to say anything through the lump in his throat. He’s then forcefully turned on the spot and pushed back towards the stairs. “Upsie-daisy,” mocks Courfeyrac. Grantaire rolls his eyes but starts to climb the stairs; Courfeyrac disappears into the kitchen to join Jehan.

Eponine and Cosette share a bathroom on the second floor, with the first floor bedrooms belonging to Feuilly and Bahorel. (Joly has a ground-floor bedroom he isn’t often found in as he’s usually either with Bossuet or Musichetta.) The climb up to the attic space seems to take an age, but eventually he reaches the two bedrooms with their doors wide-open for the girls roll from room to room on their chairs. The top flight of stairs creaks, giving the girls an efficient early warning system, and they both come rolling to the landing from Cosette’s room at the sound.

They both coo at Grantaire.

He’s so tired, he simply endures the flurry of hands; he goes along with the hugging, the ridiculous way they strip him down to his boxers, and the manhandling as they get him into the bathroom and shove him under the warm spray of the water. He relaxes, and sleepily assures them he can handle the rest, thanks, even if they shoved him into the shower with his boxers still on.

Eponine appears at his side and rolls her eyes - rolls, but doesn’t avert. Grantaire has little dignity to speak of, and he and Eponine have no sexual tension to speak of either. “Hand them over,” she demands, and he struggles out of the wet cotton, taking a little pride in the way he manages to get them to slap her in the face when he tosses them over the cubicle wall.

“Can you wash your own hair, or can we trust you with that at least?” Eponine smirks, hands on hips but eyes worried. “I will get in there with you if you can’t.”

“I think I can handle it, Po,” he can move, even if his words are a little sluggish, “but if I’m not out in fifteen, then I’ve definitely succumbed to sleep.”

“Alright,” she looks skeptical. “I’ll get you a towel and scrounge something for you to sleep in.”

Grantaire sighs, water spitting forward as he does; he fully intended to put his jeans and a hoodie back on. “I can just-”

“No arguments,” Eponine sing-songs as she walks away. It would seem Grantaire is not allowed to finish his sentences this evening. “You’re sleeping with me.”

There’s a compulsory wolf-whistle from somewhere in the house.

The shower wakes him up just enough. He picks up a few of the bottles in the rack and after an awkward moment where he mistakes the shaving gel for body-wash, he takes full advantage of their apple-scented conditioner. He scrubs himself clean, the paint on his skin coming off eventually, and eventually he’s only standing under the spray because leaving the cubicle seems an insurmountable effort.

Eponine reappears - his fifteen minutes must be up - and she has, as promised, the fluffiest towel in the house. She brandishes it wildly on the other side of the glass and Grantaire finally turns off the water and opens the door. “I am not drying you off, you lazy beanpole,” she insists as she shoves the towel at him unceremoniously. She puts a small pile of clothes - a pair of socks (plain, probably Feuilly’s), a pair of sweatpants (roughly his size, would have to be Joly’s) and a t-shirt (indeterminate origin) - down on the top of the closed toilet seat and walks away.

Grantaire manages to dress himself without stumbling and hitting his head on the sink and thus ending his short but thoroughly pickled life, but it’s a close thing. The clothes are soft against his clean skin, and it’s nice. He doesn’t like relying on his friends like this, and it’s strange to be taken care of in this way, but it’s... nice. Comforting. The t-shirt smells familiar, whoever’s it is, and he feels good.

It’s a rare enough sensation that he’s a little dazed by it all.

He hangs the towel up to dry and walks back onto the landing and into Eponine’s room; she and Cosette are sitting on the bed, talking in looks and silence. When he appears in the doorway, they stop and Grantaire feels his ears burning. “Good,” nods Cosette. “Now, come and eat.”

They escort him downstairs, each of his hands in one of theirs like a human daisy chain, and he’s pushed down onto the sofa with a bowl of some sort of slow-cooked casserole in his hands within seconds. Jehan strikes up some idle conversation, Grantaire isn’t really listening, and he lets the back-and-forth of soft voices wash over him. The bowl is taken from his hands at some point, and when he wakes in Eponine’s bed in the morning, he doesn’t remember leaving the sofa at all.

The day of the exhibition dawns bright and temperate. Enjolras, in a strange and very rare moment of perfect social clarity, awakes knowing exactly which day it is and where he is expected to be at eight o’clock that evening. He hasn’t actually seen Grantaire since he went into art-seclusion, but heard from Courfeyrac that Grantaire had returned to Eponine’s sofa two days ago; Enjolras has been avoiding the house next-door, out of a simple lack of anything to say to him.

Actually, Enjolras has to be honest: it’s not a lack of things to say to Grantaire; it’s a need to pick, and choose, and he desperately doesn’t want to fuck up again. He has a vague notion what he wants, but it’s not as simple as a quick tumble between the sheets or even a relationship; he wants something with Grantaire, wants something from Grantaire, but there’s something about the Grantaire of it all which gives him pause.

He lies in bed, listening to the movement around the house and the laughter from the kitchen, wondering what the evening will bring.

He has a feeling it will be spectacular in one way or another.

The day passes with a glacial tempo, and since he can’t concentrate enough to work, all of the little chores Enjolras had been putting off (as well as a few he invents for the occasion) are suddenly tempting and valuable time-passers. He doesn't just do his laundry, he does everyone's, finding several items he knows don't belong this side of the wall (at least he hopes the lacy knickers are Eponine's, otherwise he's learning more about his best friend than he cares to) and he's definitely missing at least one t-shirt and a pair of socks. All of their dishes are washed and put away, the carpet is cleaned and vacuumed, and the windows are crystal-clear.

The rest of the house looks on with amused horror.

By the time he's run out of things to do, Enjolras despairs that it's only just gone one in the afternoon.

He throws himself down on the sofa in a petulant sprawl and ignores Combeferre’s snicker from the sparklingly clean kitchen. His housemates had yet to say a word, and Enjolras knows it’s not because they had little to say and more because they knew they didn’t have to say it at all. Enjolras turns and glares at the amused Combeferre. “Do you have anything to say, ‘Ferre?”

“Not at all,” he grins uncaringly at Enjolras as he leans against the counter. Unlike Enjolras, he’s actually been working and by the looks of his hair (all over the place) and his glasses (askew), it’s going less than well. “Unless you’re willing to talk about this now?”

Enjolras crosses his arms, “No.”

“You must have been the most adorable toddler. I can see you leading your play-group in a mutiny for more play-time or naps,” chuckles Combeferre, shoving his hands into the pockets of his sweatpants.

It’s not too far from the truth, so Enjolras says nothing.

Combeferre is savvy enough with Enjolras’ eloquent silences to know he’s right. “Yeah, I figured as much. Look,” he walks forward and leans over the back of the sofa. “Enje - he’s a great guy. He’s funny, he’s talented, he’s very intelligent and pretty damn well read - which is something coming from me -”

It is, actually, thinks Enjolras. He’s never really heard Combeferre speak like this about anyone, but it’s not often he’s called upon to defend someone’s character.

“And,” continues Enjolras’ best friend, “He drives you up the wall, he challenges you. You need that. Sure, he’s not conventionally attractive but I get it. And you can’t deny that you’re attracted to him.”

“I don’t deny any of that.”

“But?” prompts Combeferre. He pushes his glasses up his nose.

Enjolras sighs and shrugs. “I don’t know. It’s complicated.”

Combeferre stares at him for a few moments, and Enjolras just knows ‘Ferre wants to say something and that he knows Enjolras won’t like. But, Combeferre simply straightens and shrugs, “We’re leaving about seven.”

He returns to the kitchen, and Enjolras is so determined to say nothing and pass the time that he falls asleep. When he wakes, it’s only nearly four o’clock and Jehan is curled in the armchair scribbling in a notebook. Enjolras is now under a blanket, and either he’s pulled one of the cushions beneath his head or someone has put it there; he can sleep pretty soundly sometimes. He stretches - the sofa isn’t exactly comfortable - and Jehan looks up.

“Sleep well?”

“Didn’t exactly intend to,” replies Enjolras with a rueful smile. He feels foggy, brain unused to mid-day snoozes, and yet he feels more relaxed than when he woke this morning.

Jehan smiles, “You must have needed it.”

“I guess.”

As Jehan returns to writing, Enjolras trudges upstairs to his room and resolves to work. As a result, he ends up rushing around at half six to have a shower and put his suit on.

Grantaire, Feuilly and Eponine had to be at the gallery far earlier to set up, be briefed and generally mill around with the department representatives; the delegation from the two houses ends up being everyone else, plus Bossuet and Musichetta. Enjolras tries not to think about the fact that everyone seems to be watching him out of the corner of their eyes, and instead makes a point of being the first through the door and the first to grab a flute of champagne.

This only makes them smirk harder, as far as he can tell.

The student gallery is fairly large, an annex of the art department itself, and the various corridors made by free-standing walls increase the hanging space. If there's an organisation to it, Enjolras can't tell, but a flyer is thrust under his nose by Courfeyrac and the university's logo is emblazoned across the top and apparently the exhibits are organised by style rather than student surname or any sort of merit system. This isn't exactly helpful, though, as Enjolras has no idea what style Grantaire had chosen, nor his subject matter.

Combeferre heads towards the post-modern section to the left of the hall to find Eponine, and the rest naturally follow. For a moment, Enjolras intends to do the same, unusually paralysed by his lack of knowledge, by his uncertainty; Courfeyrac murmurs as he walks past, "try the early 1800s," and so with a fortifying swig of champagne, Enjolras heads right down the centre of the room.

He doesn't see Grantaire, only a swarm of people under the carefully even lighting with their voices clambering over the sound of some soft, background jazz. He sees some general labels for the sections by date, and spots some Impressionist work to the right and some Baroque to his left, but not being sure what to look for exactly, he starts scanning the art itself and hopes something will scream 'Grantaire' when he finds it.

It's all very good, Enjolras notes as he idly appreciates a landscape of an imagined, overgrown, rotting Palace of Versailles, the gold dripping from the gates and pooling with blood. The general standard is quite high, if some (like this Death of Versailles) is a little too pretentious for his tastes.

A fleeting panic sets in, that perhaps this Versailles piece he dislikes is Grantaire's, but as he looks to the small caption for the painting he's relieved to see the artist is unknown to him. Upon reflection, it’s almost too cynical to be Grantaire’s; he hasn’t seen any of his work but he likes to think Grantaire would be more of the disappointed idealist on canvas.

There is a tap on his left shoulder and he turns: Grantaire has found him, a matching glass of champagne in hand and a smirk on his lips. He looks good, curls clean if not tamed, and a black English-cut suit paired with a green shirt; the suit could only have been tailored for it to fit so well. (Enjolras hates that he still recognises these things, hates that his parents managed to drill any of this higher class bullshit into his head at all. What’s worse is, he can see what a good job the tailor has done, and knows how much workmanship like that would cost, and he has no idea how Grantaire managed to afford it. It bothers him, and he wishes it didn’t.)

Enjolras salutes Grantaire silently with a raise of his glass, and Grantaire welcomes it with a nod of his head. “I’m glad you graced us with your presence after all.”

“Wouldn’t have missed it,” Enjolras admits, more nonchalantly than he feels. Despite the fact that he walked off alone to find Grantaire, he hadn’t expected to be alone with the artist; he has no idea what to say. Enjolras is the type to analyse everything, prepare for every eventuality. He rehearses every speech, plans every important conversation and charts its potential outcomes; he’s a planner, he’s organised, he’s methodical almost to a fault (apparently).

He didn’t plan for Grantaire, and never has done or been able to.

There’s a moment of silence between them as they simply smile at one another, Enjolras raising a questioning eyebrow and Grantaire shrugging slightly. It’s ridiculous, and Enjolras can’t stand the strange tension. “I have to confess that I haven’t found your work, yet.”

“Romanticism was surprisingly popular this year,” Grantaire rolls his eyes and Enjolras groans.

“Please don’t go all hipster on me,” he begs with a grin which belies his desperate tone.

Grantaire gasps theatrically, “I would never!” He gestures behind Enjolras with a gentle tip of his champagne glass. “My, uh, my stuff’s further down.”

“Care to give me the tour?” Enjolras cannot deny, at least to himself, that he’s flirting. He’s self-aware enough to recognise that tone in his own voice, can feel himself leaning in and their shared smiles have a conspiratorial edge. He hopes Grantaire hasn’t noticed, but wishes he would in equal measure.

A woman sidles up beside them and interrupts apologetically, introducing herself as a representative from the City Art Gallery. Seeing a chance to escape and allow Grantaire some professional attention, Enjolras excuses himself politely and meets Grantaire’s eyes firmly as he does: they’ll be continuing this later. He walks in the direction Grantaire had casually waved, and seeks out the pieces he’d created.

They aren’t hard to find, because they stop Enjolras in his tracks.

By the time he’s finished speaking to the rep, Enjolras is standing before the centrepiece of Grantaire's main project of work, jusqu'à la monde est libre. Grantaire is paralysed by fear. It’s not recognisably Enjolras, the tragic fallen hero held in place, prone on the barricade, by his own revolutionary red flag; Grantaire is terrified the unknowing subject will work it out all the same, as preposterous a prospect that would be.

But Enjolras’ gaze doesn’t stay on the figure alone; his eyes travel the listing wall of the Café in the background, tracing the name and then jumping to the cobbles where they skate over muddied puddles of blood. Grantaire watches as Enjolras takes in every inch of the painting, flicking to the short description he’d written underneath the title and his own name (R. Grantaire, he signed it) and back again, as though nothing matched up, as though none of these things belonged together.

The suspense is too much, Grantaire needs to know what Enjolras thinks, needs it like he needs air in his lungs and a drink in his hand. The champagne has run out, so he gets a glass of red wine instead and makes his way over. He steps up alongside Enjolras, barely making a sound but he’s still heard, still noticed; Grantaire can’t stand anything less than being ignored, but for better or worse, Enjolras always notices him.

That wasn’t always a good thing. “I can barely believe you did this,” says Enjolras.

And they’d been doing so well before they were interrupted. Immediately Enjolras looks like he wants to bite back the words; it’s too late. Grantaire barks a humourless laugh because of course it couldn’t last, and of course Enjolras still thinks he’s a waste of flesh and bone; he takes a deep swallow of wine. “Why? Because of the quality, or because of the subject matter?”

“I didn’t mean -”

“Yes, you did,” the artist scoffs surely, “So which is it?”

“Neither,” Enjolras insists. “I didn’t mean either of those things. They’re just...”

And now Grantaire thinks he understands. It’s sad, that he can predict Enjolras’ low opinion of him so well, but he’s used to underestimation, and used to Enjolras’ disdain. How he wishes history weren’t repeating itself in so many ways. “Better than you expected of a drunk waster like me, then, right?”

The other man huffs angrily but doesn’t say anything to refute the claim. Grantaire takes that as agreement. “That’s what I thought. Well fuck you, Enjolras, and the high-horse you rode in on.”

“That’s unfair,” Enjolras steps in close, eyes blazing as he finds his voice again. “You’re putting words in my mouth.”

Grantaire hisses back, “Then just say what you mean. Aren’t you meant to be the one with all the right words? Just say it, Apollo: you don’t think I’m good enough to shine your shoes let alone produce something as beautiful and tragic as this. You’ve disliked me from the moment you sat down opposite me in the café and it just burns you that I don’t follow your lead.”

“That’s not true,” and Enjolras is so close that Grantaire can feel his breath as he speaks in a low tone. They aren’t shouting, harsh as their argument is becoming, but the vitriol spits like fire. “I gave you the benefit of the doubt when I met you and I liked that you were different and passionate about your opinions, but you ruined it, Grantaire, like you seem determined to ruin everything. No-one but the damned bottle in your hand said you weren’t worthy, you did, so don’t put this on me.”

Enjolras has his jaw clenched tightly as he all but storms out of the gallery. Grantaire considers letting him get away, but he’s got an alcohol-fuelled fight brewing in his blood now and who gave Enjolras the right to judge what Grantaire was capable of?

They couldn't all be perfect, mortal embodiments of gods and heroic, legendary ideals. They didn't all have the luxury of good, middle-class parents, or a robust belief in humanity, or perfect fucking hair.

He drains the glass of wine - it would be a tragedy to do anything less, after all, it’s free - and follows Enjolras out. He sees Courfeyrac step towards him as he nears the door, but Combeferre gently pulls him back. Grantaire doesn’t stop, and the blast of chilly spring air shocks his system; he walks into the middle of the street and looks up the road in the direction of Enjolras’ house, and in the opposite direction toward the centre of town and the Alphabet.

He doesn’t see Enjolras.

“Fuck,” he swears loudly and shoves his hands into the pockets of his trousers. After several weeks of what felt like tentative progress, he’s managed to fuck things up again and he’s not even sure how.

Being smashed probably isn’t helping.

He feels tired suddenly, and his head is swimming; he wants to go home.

It’s strange how it’s Eponine’s sofa he thinks about and not the room he pays for in a house with housemates he detests, but he can’t go to Eponine’s now. He swears again just because he can, and decides he’ll go to his own bed in his own house and he’ll sleep off the alcohol and tomorrow he’ll talk to Enjolras with a clear head and the world might be a little brighter for it. He turns -

- and Enjolras is leaning against the gallery wall, watching him.

Grantaire hangs his head and swears for a third time, under his breath. The fire that fueled him inside has subsided now he’s acknowledged how drunk and tired he is, and Enjolras’ eyes on him are intent and searching; he knows he won’t escape this unscathed and he wishes hard for a bottle of wine in his hand, even if that would only provoke Enjolras further.

He can’t move, so it’s Enjolras that breaches the distance between them.

Enjolras turns his palms up as he walks forward, a universal gesture of non-aggression. “Can I start over?”

Grantaire only shrugs, so Enjolras takes a deep breath and says what he meant to say in the first place before he put his foot so spectacularly in his mouth. “Your art is amazing, you know.”

You’ve changed your tune, Apollo, thinks Grantaire, and while he knows he’s damn good, he plays at modesty to deny Enjolras his easy victory. “I had to be good at something.”

“You’re good at many things,” counters Enjolras, but Grantaire doesn’t look impressed or convinced. He looks pained.

Enjolras shakes his head and confesses, “I expected you to be brilliant.” He can feel a blush rising on his cheeks but it’s hopefully dark enough that Grantaire won’t notice. Part of Enjolras wants to run back inside and stare at Grantaire’s work forever. “I knew you had to be good, but I didn’t expect anything like that.”

Grantaire has yet to say a word.

“I just don’t understand you,” Enjolras gives Grantaire a baffled smile. “I don’t understand why someone so talented would think so little of himself and allow others to do the same. I don’t understand why you would ever think yourself unworthy, or be so happy to live down to the expectations you give yourself to back up this, this self-loathing!”

Enjolras is in the swing of things now, and he can’t stop the flow of words, words he didn’t even realise he was holding in until they’re spilling out between them on the street.

“I don’t understand why you drink the way you do,” he says sadly but with no less impact, “Or joke the way you do, hide the way you do, just to distract everyone from whatever is truly going on in that head of yours!”

More than anything, he wants to understand, because if he can do that then perhaps -

Perhaps, what? Enjolras thinks. Perhaps Grantaire can be saved? It isn’t up to Enjolras to save the guy.

Perhaps Enjolras can help? But he’s already trying to help, he’s just not very good at expressing himself. Grantaire seems to have that effect on him; when it comes to discussing actual principles or views, they can debate and argue in a somewhat constructive way - less so when it’s just about them. They can talk, just can’t talk to each other.

So Enjolras has to admit the real reason he wants to understand Grantaire: if he understands, if he can just get his head around what makes this funny, talented, supremely unhappy guy function, then maybe he can find Grantaire something to believe in, maybe Grantaire can believe in himself. He just wants Grantaire to be more - because if Grantaire is more than this drunken shell of a person who shows flashes of pure brilliance when he tries, then Enjolras can give in to the pull he feels towards Grantaire, and can stop feeling so guilty about it.

God, he’s a dick! He only wants Grantaire to change so he’ll be worthy of Enjolras’ attention.

Enjolras needs to leave, now, before any of this spills out too and he shows himself for the horrendous twat he apparently is. “I just don’t understand you,” he repeats with quiet, longing vehemence; what he means is I don’t want you to change, I swear, just tell me what to do here.

Grantaire stays silent, because what else can he do. He’s several sheets to the wind, wine-fogged and yet he remembers dreaming clearly how this all went down last time; he remembers being asked why he stayed at all, when he believed in nothing. He remembers believing in Enjolras.

But times have changed and there is no revolution to free their country now; this is a wider cause, a larger and even more unattainable goal, but Enjolras is determined to make the world a better place. For the rest of the boys, Enjolras is their leader - still charismatic and strong, but they don’t follow him fanatically as they once did in another life.

Times have changed, and yet Grantaire stays for Enjolras.

Enjolras who might not care for him, but at least is interested enough to be curious, to want to understand him. It’s better than nothing but it’s not something either, it’s not what he wants. He wants Enjolras’ arms around him, he wants to sleep skin-to-skin and be able to wake Enjolras up with a kiss or a blowjob or a smile. He wants to take Enjolras to all the galleries in the city and show him his favourite pieces and he wants to watch Enjolras speak and plan and write. He wants stupid romantic picnics in the summer and huddling for warmth under blankets in the winter, and he wants to hear what this Enjolras has to say about everything and anything while they do it.

He wants Enjolras, body and soul; but Enjolras doesn’t understand him, doesn’t like his drinking or his self-deprecation or his lack of ambition or belief.

He’s a lost cause, then.

He can’t bring himself to say any of this, can’t admit to this insanity and certainly can’t lay his emotional cards on the table the way he maybe once did. Instead he stays silent, and Enjolras gets tired of waiting very quickly.

Enjolras turns away and walks off down the street.

Grantaire doesn’t move until Enjolras is out of view, then he heads back into the gallery and to the free wine.

The thing is, Enjolras knows he can be a prize douchebag. At his heart, he’s a gentleman and he’d go to the ends of the earth for his friends but sometimes that gets steamrolled by his temper, or his ferocity. He tends to let his opinions and ideals steamroll his pragmatism and worst of all his friends; for evidence, see his doomed relationship with his highschool sweetheart and how he and Jasper have a strictly citizens-with-benefits arrangement. For all his charm, he can let his mouth run away with his brain sometimes, and worse is sometimes he just itches to force his way on everyone.

For someone who prides himself on his desire for equality for all, he has a terrible habit of insisting it be on his terms. As he walks home, he realises he’s done it again.

He lets himself into the house and stalks straight upstairs to his bedroom. It’s hardly late, but he changes out of the suit he’d donned and flops dramatically onto his bed.

Grantaire has reduced him to dramatics; how mortifying.

He wiggles around a little awkwardly until he feels comfortable, his hands behind his head and his legs crossed at the ankles; it's a relaxed pose despite how un-relaxed he feels. He wants to fight, and part of him regrets not pushing harder with Grantaire, but he also wants to run as hard and fast as he can, he just isn't certain of the direction. He can't make his mind up, but one thing is abundantly clear to him: he's fucked up with, about and for Grantaire - one way or another.

Enjolras is the kind to examine problems from all angles before choosing how to react, but Grantaire is disruptive, immediate, and present. Grantaire demands reaction and any hesitation is deemed weakness; Enjolras isn’t slow, but he is considered, and Grantaire doesn’t allow him any of that on a personal level.

Is it such a bad thing, thinks Enjolras, that someone pushes him out of his comfort zone? For all that he socialises and shares his space with his friends, he guards himself fiercely. Not even ‘Ferre or Courfeyrac know much about his parents, and it’s only because they lived through it that his friends know about him and Jasper, and that ended over two years ago. Is it so terrible, wonders Enjolras, that someone demands something more than his selfless politics and indulgent behaviour with his friends? Is it reprehensible that a person challenges him to live for himself?

And is it really so awful that the person is Grantaire?

Grantaire doesn't see the morning after, waking instead to a blinding headache and afternoon sunlight through his unclosed curtains. He somehow made it to his own room after all, but the couple of empty wine bottles beside his bed would suggest something close to divine intervention is responsible for him waking up at all.

He’d even stripped off before he collapsed into his bed and passed out last night it would seem, and there’s a vague recollection of evacuating his stomach of whatever contents remained. He gropes under his pillow hopefully for his phone.

He’s missed four calls: Eponine, Courfeyrac, Bahorel and -

- and Enjolras, plus a number he doesn’t recognise.

He has a string of text messages from Eponine, Cosette and Courfeyrac, and a quick scroll up reveals his own typical brand of drunk texting; it seems they all lost track of him around midnight. All of the calls are before two in the morning with the exception of Enjolras’. He called at ten, just over four hours ago.

He types out a quick reply to Courfeyrac and Bahorel, i’m alive, sorry for anything i don’t remember, kisses bitches and texts Eponine and Cosette, i’m alive, please tell me i didn’t do anything stupid xx.

Burrowing deeper under the blanket, his thumb hovers over the call button for his voicemail. He has two messages waiting, and he has to get through the one from 10:03 before he can get to the one from the unknown number at 11:36.

He googles the unrecognisable number instead.

It’s the rep from the City Gallery, Adèle Marieux. She’d been at the exhibition scouting for a small up and coming presentation for a few weeks at the City, and had suggested he was in the running to contribute.

He just has to listen to Enjolras’ message before he can find out if Adèle is about to let him down easy.

He pulls the blanket over his head, dials his voicemail service and closes his eyes.

“Hi, it’s... it’s me. So, we’re really bad at this. I... I wanted to say - we should probably talk. Try and make a better job of it this time. I really want-. Well,” Enjolras sighs. “Courf says you made quite a night of it so, I guess you’re asleep. ...Just call me when you’re sober. Or come round, if you prefer. Bye.”

Grantaire saves the message, and moves on.

Hello, Robin, this is Adèle Marieux from the City Gallery. We’re very impressed with your work and would like to include your June Rebellion series in an exhibition we’re planning for the 200th anniversary of Bourbon Restoration. We intend to show a span of French history from the Revolution to the dawn of the Third Republic, and your quartet would fit fantastically. If you could call me back to arrange an appointment, we can discuss the lease of the work in person. Thank you.”

He hasn’t breathed since he dialed the voicemail number, and it’s released in a shuddering gasp which is almost more of a sob. He can’t say which of those messages affects him more, but he knows which he has to deal with first.

He doesn’t reach Ms. Marieux but he reaches her assistant, and together they arrange an appointment for tomorrow morning. It takes all of three minutes, and that’s one thing dealt with. He’s about to listen to Enjolras’ message again, to discern how he actually feels about it, when his phone buzzes in his hand repeatedly with replies from Cosette and Courfeyrac; lots of replies from Courfeyrac.

Cosette (14:22): Don’t worry sweetheart, we’re just glad you’re safe. No casualties. Get some more sleep and come for tea. c&e xxx

Courfeyrac (14:22): no worries R. do me a favour tho - call enj.
Courfeyrac (14:23): whatever happened between u 2 yday made u go for suicide by vodka shot and he didn’t sleep. like at all. he was up when i got back, drinking coffee and reading voltaire. VOLTAIRE, R, at 3 AM. this is srs. he won’t say anything.
Courfeyrac (14:23): he only stress-reads voltaire. this is NOT OF THE GOOD
Courfeyrac (14:23): look, i kno u 2 must have fucked up simple communication AGAIN and i kno u both need ur heads butting 2gthr but i thought it was finally working out. please?
Courfeyrac (14:24): xxxxx :(

Grantaire tells Cosette he’ll be round about six, and tells Courfeyrac, I’ll think about it.

Courfeyrac’s response is prompt for how long it is: ok but if it helps, he totally sucks at this kind of thing. like jasper had to throw himself at enj to get him to notice and kat was his highschool gf and from what he says it was a given theyd get 2gthr. jasper was a dick but we put up with him for e’s sake. we’re rooting for you xxxx

He listens to the message again, hears Enjolras say call me when you’re sober, and he cries himself back to sleep.

He wakes up a few hours later, calmer and full of purpose, though no less hungover.

He can’t stop immediately, he knows that’s where he went wrong last time. Even if he’d been unintentionally lowering his intake during his seclusion while painting, he blew it with last night’s binge. He’s back at square one, and he needs to start from scratch. He reckons he has until tomorrow lunchtime before his system starts to demand more alcohol, and his meeting with Ms. Marieux is at eleven AM.

He pulls out his phone again, flips to his calendar and looks at the week ahead.

It’s Saturday. If he times this right, he can cut down over the week, and go through the worst of it on the next weekend. It’s going to suck, he knows, but the cutting down will do most of the work for him. With that in mind, he gets out of bed and he opens his bedroom window - it’s starting to heat up a little, the end of May giving way to the beginning of summer. He collects up all the bottles and ignores his housemates as ardently as they usually ignore him as he disposes of them all. There’s no alcohol left in his room.

He showers, googles the best way to go through the withdrawal - and quickly realises he’s out of his depth. The cutting down method will only prolong his pain, and there is no way he’s going to survive this alone.

He packs a rucksack and heads over to see Eponine and Cosette a little earlier than planned.

Tuesday Morning

Eponine texts him immediately after the first violent smash, which is a rude awakening for a Tuesday morning, especially now classes have ended and the exam season is almost complete. Enjolras’ alarm is due to go off soon, he still has deadlines to complete, and he would have appreciated a little longer asleep.

Eponine (07:42): sorry, R’s fault. hit a rough patch in a sea of rough x

He sits up, heart pounding. He calls Eponine but she doesn’t pick up. He texts her, Explain. Now.

He slides out of bed and boots up his laptop, pulling on a t-shirt and wiping the sleep from his eyes. He stares at his phone and watches the minutes flip by. He’s half in and half out of his sweatpants when Eponine replies. He hastily pulls them up and reaches for the message.

Eponine (07:47): oops, wasn’t meant for you. kinda busy. ask Ferre.

The fuck he will, he thinks. He pulls on a pair of socks and slides into his running shoes, slipping his phone into his pocket. He wrenches open the bedroom door with what is almost certainly too much force only to find Combeferre blocking his way. “Going somewhere?”

Eponine clearly sent a warning signal.

Enjolras needs to get to Grantaire. “Next door,” he replies, attempting to dodge around his immovable best friend.

“No, you’re not,” Combeferre says firmly pushing Enjolras back. “You’re going to stay here with me, and you’re going to let Eponine, Cosette and Joly handle it.”

Enjolras shakes his head, “I’m going.” He has to. He has no idea what’s going on here, but Grantaire is clearly upset and unusually violent (bar-brawls notwithstanding) and Enjolras’ friends are engaged in a conspiracy against him.

Combeferre forces Enjolras back into his bedroom and closes the door behind them. “Enjolras, no. He specifically said you weren’t to go.”

“What?” He freezes.

“I’m sorry. He just doesn’t want you to see him like this. It’s... not pretty,” winces Combeferre, casting a look over his shoulder as if he could see through walls and to Grantaire, curled up and desperate on Eponine’s bedroom floor.

Enjolras stumbles back to sit on his bed. “What the hell is going on, ‘Ferre?”

Combeferre sighs and takes a seat beside his friend. “Grantaire showed up on Saturday night, hungover and with a bag of clothes, toiletries and a few books, a sketchbook, whatever,” he waves a hand. “Stuff for a few days, maybe a week. He had this full schedule worked out, Enjolras, starting on Sunday. He spent Saturday night with Eponine, and had a bottle of wine. He had some interview on Sunday morning and came straight back, and he had a couple of light beers in the early afternoon and then we cleared out next door of anything alcoholic.”

“Wait,” Enjolras interrupts, twisting to face Combeferre, “We?”

“He doesn’t want you involved,” Combeferre pushes his glasses up his nose, a nervous habit. “You kept to yourself most of the day anyway, we just didn’t interrupt you.”

Enjolras breathes deeply. “Tell me the rest.”

“He wasn’t too bad through Sunday night, but the shakes kicked in yesterday morning. By last night, he was vomiting and had stomach cramps, he couldn’t keep anything down. He didn’t sleep, and Eponine says he’s been disoriented. Apparently he’s tried this before and,” he leans into Enjolras’ shoulder, “last time he had full-blown hallucinations.”

“He’s tried this before?” Enjolras’ voice sounds dull even to his own ears.

Combeferre shrugs, “So Po says. Before we met him. It didn’t work out,” he says with a ghost of a smile.

They sit in subdued silence.

Through it, they can hear the thuds and muffled shouts of a disagreement next door; Eponine is giving as good as she’s being given on that score.

Next door, Grantaire is going through alcohol withdrawal, this time with people around him to help and support him, and Enjolras finds that all he wants to do is rush in there and shut this madness down. As he and Combeferre sit, not saying a word, shoulder to shoulder as they listen, Grantaire’s ranting gives way to a quiet whine and sob. Enjolras can’t say he’s given much thought to the thinness of the walls (beyond Courfeyrac’s latest conquest between the sheets, and Cosette’s penchant for playing boy-band pop at absurd volumes) but it seems that in this early, muted hour of the day, every creak and cry can be heard.

Grantaire is crying.

Enjolras should be there. He should be holding Grantaire, he should be smoothing back his curls as he retches over the sink, and he should be helping him grip reality and come back from whatever delirium has taken over; he should be giving Grantaire a drink whether it be of water or wine, just whatever he wants. He shouldn’t be just sitting here, being forced to listen. “If this is only day two...” starts Enjolras, breaking the stalemate of silence.

Combeferre finishes the thought with a sympathetic sigh, “Yeah, he’s got a few more days of this.”

“Fuck.”

Tuesday Evening

Joly turns to look through the bedroom door when hears the creak of the stairs; Combeferre comes into view, climbing up to the attic with purpose and his blond hair in disarray. He looks troubled, though they’re all troubled with all of this going on so it’s hardly a surprise. It only takes one good look, once Combeferre has joined him in Eponine’s room, to realise what it is that has Combeferre frowning, shoulders slumped and his glasses slipping down his nose.

“He knows,” sighs Joly.

“He knows,” agrees Combeferre, and they look at the shaking, huddled figure of their friend in the corner. “How is he?”

Joly crosses his arms and leans against the wall. They’re standing several feet away from Grantaire, who’d made it very clear he didn’t want anyone near him right now, but his trembling sobs are still very obvious. “The retching finally stopped around six o’clock, but it might not last,” Joly keeps his voice soft, “We’re trying to get some biscuits down him at least, and small sips of water. You remember that stomach flu you had last year?”

Combeferre nods with a small smile, “I remember you running for the hills. So has he had anything to eat at all?”

“No, and the nausea has gone but he’s still having stomach pains. He’s anxious, he’s depressed and he’s had a few moments of disorientation.” Joly shares a pointed look with Combeferre. The two of them had been top of Eponine’s call list when Grantaire had brought this plan to her, and what had followed was a frenzy of literature searching and information mining on alcohol withdrawal. The word ‘fatal’ had come up far too often for their liking, and they’d agreed behind Grantaire’s back to take him to hospital should his condition deteriorate that far. While their unfortunate patient had been at his interview, Eponine had revealed that Grantaire had tried this before - and had failed - after hallucinations he refused to tell even her about. Their research had taken a more dismal turn, and they had to prepare for a man who they liked to think they knew seeing things they never could.

“Shit,” Combeferre rubs a hand over his face wearily. It’s late, almost midnight, and Joly knows Ferre still has work to do and was up at near-enough dawn this morning. “How bad?”

Joly purses his lips and winces; he’s misplaced his chapstick. “The first time he recognised us - me and Eponine - but he had no idea where he was. The other times he didn’t seem to be aware of us at all, and he was talking to... well, people who aren’t here.”

They watch Grantaire in concern for a moment, until Combeferre sighs. “Alright. I wish I could stay,” ‘Ferre starts apologetically but Joly cuts him off.

“It’s fine, get some sleep,” Joly reaches out to squeeze his friend’s shoulder supportively. When Eponine returns from work, Joly resolves to send her straight to Combeferre next door. “Just tell me that Enjolras isn’t going to descend on us all in righteous fury for trying to keep him out of the loop?”

Combeferre’s laugh is thoroughly humourless, “Not us. Can’t say dear R won’t get an earful once he’s out the other side. He might try to sneak in, but just let him. I think...” His yawn is nearly jaw-breaking. “I think he needs it. Anyway, good night.”

“Hm,” is all Joly says, because from what he can see, balancing Enjolras’ needs with Grantaire’s is a delicate, potentially apocalyptic business for which Joly does not wish to take responsibility. Enjolras has a habit of blazing in like fire, consuming and fierce; but Grantaire is a thunderstorm, loud and flashing brightly to cover dark rains. They run the risk of extinguishing each other completely.

Grantaire has his knees brought up to his chest, his arms folded and his face hidden, and he already looks utterly broken.

Wednesday Evening

Grantaire feels awful.

It’s something of an understatement and completely expected, but shouldn’t a shower and some food improve matters? Instead, he has to grit his teeth under the spray and remind himself that just because his brain said it was pink and gloopy like that shit out of Ghostbusters II, didn’t mean a damn thing; and that his eyes said the biscuits were slabs of meat that tasted like ferrous ash in his mouth, meant less; and the water wasn’t wine, and the electric lamp lights weren’t spitting tallow candles, and the walls weren’t cracking eighteenth century plaster, and his Apollo wasn’t standing in the doorway.

He’s been getting better at telling the difference, especially with Cosette there; not having met the girl in 1832, he knows she is real in the here and now and can be his point of reference.

Cosette had been here all day, with some help from Musichetta to keep him entertained. They’d played cards (Musichetta is a shark), chess (Cosette is a terrifying and imposing tactical mastermind), and a very interesting game of I Spy (never play with someone hallucinating, they’d discovered).

But Enjolras is in jeans and a short-sleeved t-shirt, and he hasn’t ever hallucinated his modern Apollo; Cosette has left the room so he has only his wits to rely on.

Heaven help him.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Grantaire accuses tiredly.

Enjolras stiffens, spine as tight as a bow-string, “I wanted to help.”

“This isn’t exactly a team sport, more of a spectator one,” sneers Grantaire, closing his eyes and leaning back against the edge of the bed. He had been lying on the mattress earlier after his shower, attempting sleep; he’d managed a few fifteen minutes micro-naps but a wave of nausea hit and he had to sit up. That somehow graduated to sitting on the floor, because he became convinced the mattress was made of water.

He got seasick.

His visitor makes no motions further into the room, so Grantaire waves a lethargic hand. “Don’t just stand there; in or out, Perseus.” He cracks an eye open and watches Enjolras deliberate before striding purposefully forward. So like him, to deliberate but commit with no hesitation.

Enjolras sinks down to take a seat next to Grantaire on the floor, and Grantaire can feel it as a wall of fire down his right-hand side - and they’re not even touching, there’s inches of space between them. He thinks perhaps his system is out of whack, and then mentally scoffs because of course his system is fucked up: he’s going through the DTs.

He glances to his right only to see a fierce angel with long curls and a red jacket, tricolore cockade on his lapel. He looks away and shakes his head to dispel the illusion. He continues to cravenly look away just in case his 1832 Apollo has displaced his modern one. “And how did you propose to help me?” he asks.

“I thought to distract you,” replies Enjolras.

“Ah, distract me,” Grantaire rolls his eyes and tips his head back against the mattress again. “Well everyone else has given it a damn good go, why not you?”

“Is that your sketchbook?” Enjolras has pointed at the spiral-bound pad, one of several Grantaire had brought with him just for the purpose of distracting himself and specifically the one Grantaire had been using throughout the night.

Grantaire nods and crawls forward to retrieve it. He looks at Enjolras, who flickers between the modern and revolutionary; hallucination or real thing, it hardly matters at this point, it’s real enough to him. “Yeah, so I was drawing... well, through the night.”

He clutches the sides of the A3 spiral-bound sketchbook, his right thumb rubbing over the Sharpie-written initials in the top corner. RG.

“May I see?”

He considers refusing for less than a second, just long enough for fear to bubble through him; Enjolras’ last brush with Grantaire’s art hadn’t exactly run smoothly. This sketchbook isn’t as Enjolras-centric as some back in his bedroom, but it is still personal, like all his art. He breathes deeply and nods, opening it slowly.

The first page is Maddy’s as usual, borne of a memory of her sitting on her bed listening to chart tapes. She’s in a pair of pyjamas, with her long hair tied back; her eyes, Grantaire remembers, were closed and she was smiling. When she opened them and spotted her little brother in the doorway, she laughed and scrambled off the bed to pull him into the room and dance with her. The fly-away pencil lines capture her movement, free and frenetic. Grantaire says nothing, and nor does Enjolras.

He turns the page, and from here most sheets have two versions of the same face. He started with Eponine, purely because she was on babysitting duty when he had dragged the sketchbook out within the first hours. His progress had been wild through Sunday evening and into Monday, fueled as he was more by anxiety than his need for a distraction.

The Eponine on the left is the girl he knows; her counterpart on the left is the one he remembers, who looks tired, older, more broken and beaten by her life. Po smiles, where her shadow does not in order to conceal a few missing teeth. His Eponine has her lustrous dark hair tumbling around her shoulders with her black bar uniform shirt on; the Eponine on the other side of the page has lank, tatted hair escaping a boyish cap, which only accentuates her bony, thin shoulders. It’s a sad comparison, the saddest of all in the sketchbook, and he hopes Eponine never sees this page.

“Two versions?” prompts Enjolras. Grantaire is startled by the interruption of his thoughts and finds a patient Apollo awaiting his explanation. He still looks like both versions himself.

Grantaire swallows and clears his dry throat, “The person now, and the person then. If,” he bullshits, “they had existed then. They tie in with the exhibition pieces.”

Enjolras nods, “She looks so sad.”

“I’d prefer to draw her in fine dresses, a rich courtier or flourishing business-woman. I’d draw her with Cosette and Musichetta, walking by the river on Ile de la Cité arm-in-arm and chattering about novels and the weather and their lovers. But that’s not Eponine,” rambles the artist. He shrugs and turns the page: Combeferre.

The differences here are less striking, with his blond hair and keen blue eyes behind a pair of glasses, but his friend now has a shorter, more stylish haircut and the glasses are thick, trendy frames. In the place of a shirt and cravat he wears a shirt and thin sweater, and for all he has small creases at the corner of his eyes from all the squinting at typeface when he’s lost his glasses, and bags beneath his eyes for all the hard work he does, his face is more relaxed. “Just as serious, but now he plays hard sometimes too.”

Next: Jehan, who again has shorter hair about his heart-shaped face but retains the dreamy eyes and floral fashion sense. He narrates his way through, followed by Joly, who Grantaire can’t see any differences in at all and so perhaps it was a waste of a second sketch, and Bossuet’s more wiry frame (just as bald now as then). Musichetta comes next, naturally, but as he doesn’t remember her from 1832, he has a full page of her wide smile, her short chestnut hair and deep-set eyes, his simply pencil insufficient to capture her soft, dark golden skin. He drew her yesterday, in her skinny jeans and loose jersey, a game of spot-the-ink and guess-the-tattoo. Cosette receives the same treatment, her long, sunflower blonde hair scraped back into a messy bun, sat cross-legged in sweat-pants and a t-shirt. She’s depicted playing him at chess, her brow a furrow of concentration.

Bahorel comes next, “all Roman nose but with fewer breaks this time around,” followed by Courfeyrac’s wider smile, a sketch of their play fight at Eponine’s birthday. Feuilly, less tired and more serene, no mutton-chops to be seen.

A blank page is eventually reached. “Everyone looks happier, here,” says Enjolras.

“It was a harder life,” replies Grantaire sadly, “Trying times.”

He feels a small breeze as Enjolras sighs, “I’m not in there.”

It’s true, he’s not. Though Grantaire has sketchbooks full of both versions of Enjolras, he has omitted the man here, in this book of comparisons and delusions. If pushed to admit anything, he would probably say that he couldn’t bear to, or maybe even that he’s already committed his revolutionary Apollo to canvas and soon enough the entire city will be able to walk into the Gallery and see it, so who needs pencil now. But the truth is he just didn’t think about it, didn’t get around to it, it simply had slipped his mind and hadn’t come up.

He’s not sure what that says, that he so easily didn’t think about Enjolras. “No, you’re not,” is what Grantaire says, eventually.

“Not what?” Cosette says sunnily, and Grantaire’s eyes snap up from the blank paper; Enjolras is gone.

He huffs out a laugh, as Cosette unpacks the Chinese take-away they’re going to attempt on Grantaire’s stomach. “Nothing,” he waves off her question. “I was just talking to myself.”

Thursday Afternoon

It was the only shift in their little system of Grantaire Watch which Jehan was able to take, and he feels guilty that it would seem to be the easiest of the lot. Eponine is at the Alphabet, Cosette has work to do, and though others volunteered to keep Jehan company, he’s happy to watch over Grantaire’s fitful sleep.

Grantaire talks in his sleep; it makes Jehan feel like he’s intruding, a witness to secrets he has no right to hear, so he soothes Grantaire - with a stroke of his hair, a gentle shake of his shoulder, or a string of whispered nonsense - and he pretends he has heard nothing at all.

Friday Afternoon

She strokes his sweat-soaked curls tenderly as they watch cartoons on her laptop. They’re almost through the worst; it’s Friday afternoon and Grantaire’s been calmer, fairly lucid, and he’s stopped talking to himself and phantom people around him - but he’s still confused, and it’s breaking Eponine’s heart.

He keeps calling her Maddy.

He'd slept for Jehan yesterday, but had been silent and darkly depressed all evening. He finally managed to sleep once again in the small hours, but when she'd attempted to extricate herself he'd bolted awake and clung like a child to her side. She'd attempted to talk to him, but it was as if he couldn't hear her and instead he saw his sister and spoke the most heartbreaking truths to her as if she were Madélène's ghost.

She wonders if he often thinks her reminiscent of his sister, and if that’s the reason they became friends; but they only really started to speak once their second year began, so perhaps not.

With Grantaire’s head in her lap, she can only shift her hips to relieve the ache developing in her lower back, but she wiggles all the same.

If she reminds Grantaire of his sister, then Grantaire reminds her of her brother. There is no-one on this earth she cares for and misses more than Gavroche, but it helps to know that he’s safe in the system with a long-term foster parents, Elodie and Peter, and his social worker is impossibly great so he’s allowed to come stay with her sometimes, but usually she goes to him or takes him out for the day. She hasn’t seen him in a couple of months though, because of her work and her studies, and this is just the kind of thing she would do with Gavroche when he was younger.

Their parents were notoriously shitty. Known to the authorities, it had taken a remarkable amount of planning on both sides to legally get herself and Gavroche away from that house, and she’d only been fourteen; Gavroche a precocious four-year-old. Running away wasn’t an option if she’d had to leave him behind, leave him to grow up to be just like their father - a cheat and a gambler, a low-life with a hand in every kind of dodgy deal, a bastard with no time for his kids. Their mother was no better, a match for their dad in every way and with just as much compassion. Things had been great when she was younger, but a headstrong daughter wasn’t exactly what her mother had wanted; her mother wanted a doll to truss up and direct as needed.

Eponine had taught herself to read, Eponine had taught herself to write, Eponine had stolen pencils from the other kids and hidden under her school desk after-hours to draw and avoid going home. (When she was inevitably caught and sent home to her parents, she’d hide under the bed instead.) Once Gavroche had come along, she’d been left literally holding the baby while her parents chased down schemes and hand-outs to feed their various addictions.

Oh, Eponine had seen someone forced into withdrawal before. Grantaire’s was a walk in the park in comparison; he doesn’t have a truly violent bone in his body, not towards his friends.

She’d hardly been an angel herself, but she’d kept Gavroche out of it. She acted as a distraction, a small and skinny girl who could be cute, beguiling or throw a tantrum as needed, and on the side she’d shoplifted, fenced and pickpocketed to help cover bills and pay for her lunch at school.

But the final straw had been catching Gavroche working as a runner, unknowingly, between their dad and Montparnasse, the drug-dealer and general thieving low-life a few streets over. She’d used the school computers to find the local office for social services, skipped out of school for the afternoon and walked the three miles with the directions she’d painstakingly copied out from the road-route planner.

It had taken a few months, there were procedures to be followed after all, and if it were just Eponine she’d have run away and never looked back. But she couldn’t leave Gavroche, and she couldn’t just take him either.

The first few homes were rough, group homes and less-than-ideal placements, but every single foster carer was an improvement on their parents, even if Eponine relied upon old habits sometimes around actual, legal, paying jobs. They’d met Elodie and Peter when Eponine was sixteen, and everything fell into place. Under their foster care, Gavroche learned to read properly (if a little late), and not like Eponine had - from discarded newspapers and shop-window adverts. Eponine’s grades improved and Gavroche actually started to make friends, until he was the most popular kid in class and Eponine’s teachers realised she wasn’t just that delinquent kid but she had talent too. Art college was mentioned, but it was too expensive; a university though, that was a real possibility if she could get a scholarship.

Both she and Gavroche had pretended not to cry when she moved out, and so did their impossibly proud foster parents.

Eponine strokes Grantaire’s hair and sighs. She misses her brother, but it’s Elodie’s birthday soon and she hasn’t seen El and Peter since Christmas. They were more of a unit than she’d realised at the time, so stand-offish as she’d been as a teenager against the world with nothing but her little brother, the school uniform on her back, a fistful of drawings and a whole lot of pride, but her time at university with these two houses of crazy fools has made her understand.

It’s strange, this group; a mix of ages and experiences and interests and, at the beginning and on the face of it, only Enjolras and the society to keep them together. Grantaire especially hadn’t expected the kind of compassionate help he’d received over the last few days; everyone but Enjolras had donated everything from five minutes to five hours or more and only because he was explicitly banned.

Combeferre, ever the mediator, has been splitting his time between his best friend, his whatever-Eponine-was-but-they-really-aren’t-labeling-things-yet, and the final draft of his thesis. Eponine is glad of any time they can get together, not least because there is so little of it; it’s an odd, comfortable, easy thing, this relationship with Noel, but she’s never felt so strongly for anyone, even her admittedly childish infatuation with Marius (and that clusterfuck of a situation with Montparnasse and a string of deadbeats through her teens just like him). Noel was her constant, as passionate with her as he was about his work, about his desire for equality for all, about his own family. He was loving (but reserved in public, and secretly a massive goofball), caring (but gave her space when she needed it), and explicit about his own needs (which helped Eponine, who was admittedly a bit terrible at anticipating and recognising them). Sure, he worked a little too much for her liking but she knew she did too; they made it work when they could and the sex was spectacular once they finally decided the time was right to start having it.

She sighs, she would like nothing better than an evening cuddled up with Noel under his blankets, watching television or listening to him read aloud for her. They’d spent Tuesday night together, courtesy of Joly’s small interference, but they’d been too exhausted to do more than curl together and sleep until morning.

She has to go out to work later (Musichetta is more of an understanding boss than Craig at the nightclub and Bahorel will be up to watch Grantaire sleep), but for now she’s watch cartoons with her friend and do what she can to help her rag-tag family, and perhaps she can crawl into Combeferre’s bed afterward and show him just how much she appreciates how perfect he is for her.

Grantaire sends Jehan out with some cash and a request, one the poet is all too happy to help with. He returns far faster than expected, and Jehan confesses, “From my own collection. Blank,” he assures Grantaire, “But I didn’t want you to wait any longer.”

Jehan tries to hand back the note Grantaire had given him but R refuses. “Can you pass me that sharpie?” He asks, pointing steadily at Eponine’s desk; the shakes have abated.

Permanent marker in hand, he strokes the green cover of the slim, pocket-sized Moleskin. He writes an unstyled ‘R’, small in the top left corner of the cover, and then opens it to page one, then page two. As Jehan watches, he swaps the marker for a simple, fine-line pen and draws a vertical line in the top right corner, no more than half an inch long.

He caps the pen, and closes the book.

Day one.

It’s a full fortnight after the exhibition before Enjolras sees Grantaire. He doesn’t know if Grantaire has been seen since his full-blown symptoms finished last Sunday; Enjolras doesn’t know if he’s succeeding in keeping off the alcohol now it’s Friday; and Enjolras doesn’t know if, in fact, Grantaire is even alive.

Those melodramatics keep making their appearance. He’s certain Grantaire is alive, at least, but he hasn’t been at the Alphabet, hasn’t been on the sofa next door (at least when Enjolras has been there), and, hasn’t been present even as a voice in the corner of the room picking arguments just for the fun of it.

Enjolras actually, unexpectedly, misses Grantaire.

And he’s beginning to suspect that his friends are purposefully keeping them apart.

It’s a glorious June day, with bright, warm sunlight streaming in through the windows and cerulean blue skies. There’s a romantic part of him tempted to compare it to Grantaire’s eyes, but that’s more the artist’s style than Enjolras’. Instead he opens the window wide to permit any breeze he can, and he lies back on his bed in a t-shirt and shorts and sweats out one of the dwindling number of summer days he has left before he graduates and has to move on with his life.

He’s reading - A Tale of Two Cities - when he hears someone knocking on the front door. He has the first floor bedroom at the front of the house, and usually it’s quiet; the wide-open window means that instead, he hears Jehan let Grantaire in.

There are a million reasons why Grantaire would be here, rather than next door. Grantaire and Courfeyrac are good friends, as are he and Jehan; there’s no reason to expect Grantaire is here to talk to him, because they haven’t talked since the exhibition.

He can hear footsteps on the stairs, two pairs, and words are exchanged. Grantaire laughs, and he hears Jehan’s door close further down the hall. The footsteps continue, but there’s nothing to suggest Grantaire will knock on Enjolras’ door.

Apart from the fact that Grantaire does indeed knock on Enjolras’ door.

Enjolras folds the corner of his page in A Tale of Two Cities and sets it on the bedside table. He sits up, rubs his hands on his shorts, finally stands and walks over to the door before he can feel any overwhelming trepidation.

On the other side, Grantaire looks both better and worse for the week without alcohol. He’s dressed similarly to Enjolras, in dark blue beach shorts, a pair of flip-flops and a threadbare white t-shirt. His eyes are just a Enjolras had thought, the same colour as the summer sky outside, but they aren’t as red-rimmed Enjolras is familiar with. He looks so very tired, though; his shoulders are tense and his hair is as untamed as usual. “Can I come in?”

“Yeah,” he steps out of the way to let Grantaire pass. He watches as the artist takes a quick, furtive look around. There’s not much for Grantaire to see, as Enjolras is a fairly tidy person at the best of times and he hated lounging around his own room with the mess, despite the heat. He doesn’t have much on the walls - a noticeboard with society pamphlets and business cards taking up space, and one of the free wall-calendars they hand out every year during the first week of the year - and so Grantaire turns back to face him pretty quickly.

When he speaks, he’s clear and decisive. “So we need to talk.”

Enjolras doesn’t mean to be purposefully obtuse, but he’s stalling. Grantaire is here, Grantaire is sober, Grantaire hasn’t been seen in a week and the last time Enjolras heard Grantaire’s voice it was a seemingly endless rant and cry. “What about?”

“Everything. Anything,” Grantaire throws his hands up in the air, a brief explosion of movement. He sighs and throws himself into the computer chair at Enjolras’ desk, and he acts just like he usually does when they bicker; it’s familiar ground. “You didn’t seem to want to talk to me like a human being unless I was sober, and so I had to be if I wanted us to talk about whatever is going on with us.”

The familiar ground is torn away from him; Enjolras feels his stomach lurch and blood roars in his ears. He sits on the bed and forces the quiet question out; he hopes he can live through the answer. “You went through all of that for me?”

“I wouldn’t put it that way,” shrugs the artist, all affected nonchalance and casual grace. “It wasn’t just that. I suppose I found that inner idealism or whatever.”

“I don’t...”

Grantaire’s mouth twists, not entirely a frown but not exactly a smile either. “Understand me, I remember. I chose to be brave, Enjolras. I chose to stop being a self-fulfilling prophecy. I chose to make this life, this little life that is supposedly the only one I get,” he laughs a little involuntarily at that, “into something worth living, because anything else would be an insult to -” He cuts himself off, and shakes his head. “I may be a cynic and I may think my life will have no effect on the state of this sorry world, but I can have an effect on my friends and I can choose to be more than a waste of oxygen and cheap merlot.”

“I didn’t want you to change for me.”

“I know you have reason to flatter yourself,” Grantaire does smile this time, “But I didn’t change for you. Hell, let’s face it, I’m going to fall off the wagon sooner or later.” Enjolras rolls his eyes but he’s smiling and Grantaire is smiling back. “No jokes about my lack of conviction please.”

“I think you can do anything you put your mind to. You can stick with it.”

“I have vague aspirations in that direction,” admits Grantaire, and for a moment it feels to Enjolras as though Grantaire has delivered that line wrong; there’s too much honesty, too little bitterness. The moment passes, and Grantaire is looking at the floor.

“Were you...” The question is swallowed up, replaced with another. “You... heard, right? I know I was loud but,” he trails off.

Enjolras nods. He’s fairly sure he’ll never forget any of it. He doesn’t lie. “I did.”

“You heard about Maddy?” He’d heard Grantaire say many things, and some of it was clearer (and more sane) than the rest; but he’d heard the name, and hadn’t wanted to ask. He says as much, and Grantaire nods; he’s still staring at a shadow on the carpet. “I can tell you the full story some other time, I think I’d like to,” he confesses, “But the short version is that she was my sister and if she could see-”

Once again, Grantaire cuts himself off and looks as though he may cry. Enjolras is moving before he realises it, and he hates that Grantaire has this effect on him. He hates that Grantaire makes him lose control and doesn’t give Enjolras a chance to stop and think, for just a minute. He’s kneeling in front of Grantaire without any input from his brain, and he’s drawn the artist’s clever, clutching hands into his.

Grantaire is just as shocked as him.

“What are you doing?” whispers Grantaire, eyes wide and fixed to Enjolras’, the shadow on the floor forgotten.

Enjolras shrugs, and to move away is unthinkable, “I don’t know.”

“Where has that revolutionary eloquence gone,” he teases, softly. Grantaire’s hands are shaking and not from the withdrawal, he’s simply terrified. Enjolras has no idea what he’s doing, he’s running on instinct, but this feels important - it’s the conversation in the library all over again and he will not fuck it up, not this time.

It’s only Grantaire, he thinks, and it means something very different than it seemed to in April. It’s only Grantaire, and Enjolras has nothing to fear, nothing to worry about, nothing to hide. “You make me lose my words,” says Enjolras, helplessly. He rubs his thumbs over Grantaire’s wrists, tracing the soft skin over sharp bone. “I rarely seem to say what I mean around you. You’re the most frustrating, infuriating man I have ever met and it’s like I have to learn to speak all over again.”

Grantaire smirks, and it’s the old R resurfacing; it’s strangely relieving. “I make you speechless, Apollo?”

“Like that,” Enjolras’ grip tightens but not painfully. He shakes his head, “That right there. Why do you call me that? You’re always giving me nicknames.”

“What would you have me call you?” asks Grantaire, expression wary. He looks remarkably like a puppy waiting for a kick, and Enjolras knows he wasn’t the first to cause that but he didn’t avoid it either.

So Enjolras shrugs, half-joking, determined not to fumble now, “My name?” He watches Grantaire roll his eyes and it feels like a victory. He shuffles closer on his knees, and pretends not to notice Grantaire lean in just a little; he’s not going to jump the gun here, and just because he’s decided what he wants doesn’t mean Grantaire wants the same. “I’m not saying don’t, I mean, call me whatever you like, but why that? I’m not perfect.”

“Neither was Apollo,” Grantaire smirks. “I’m not under any illusions here, I promise.”

Enjolras is unwillingly amused, “Oh?”

“Mm-hm,” he slinks closer, “You work insanely hard and put one hundred percent into every cause, even your friends, but you don’t look after yourself at all. You live on coffee and righteous fury and frequently forget to eat. You are under the illusion that a raspberry muffin is superior to a toffee one, and that pineapple belongs on a pizza. You like to think nobody knows about your addiction to trashy reality shows, but we all do, and you cry at those terrible human interest stories on the local news. You’d go without bread and milk before you went without hair product and if you own a t-shirt that isn’t red, black, white or blue then I will be shocked. You-”

As he claps a hand over Grantaire’s mouth, Enjolras is outright laughing. “I get it, I’m no saint.”

Grantaire speaks, words garbled against Enjolras’ palm. Enjolras pulls his hand away before Grantaire can do something childish like lick his hand, and he realises how close they are. “You’re no god, either, for all you look like a Michaelangelo marble.”

“You’re a flatterer,” accuses Enjolras with a grin.

“I’ve been called worse,” replies Grantaire too lightly, and it hits Enjolras like a freight train to the gut.

Clearly, Grantaire still believes he’s the lesser in this, in whatever this is. Enjolras refuses to let that persist, refuses to be superior in any way and certainly not to Grantaire, who has the kind of strength of character and fortitude which saw him through a cold turkey alcohol detox, who is an artist of exceptional talent, who is so beautiful and devoted and capable of so much.

“You’re a flatterer, but you only ever see that light in everyone else, never yourself.”

Grantaire shakes his head, “Enjolras-”

“No, it’s my turn,” Enjolras slips a hand up Grantaire’s arm, over his shoulder to rest on the back of his neck. He knows it’s a prelude, a gesture of intent, and when Grantaire realises it, he shuts up. “You think Eurovision is a genuine musical achievement, and yet you don’t see the appeal of procedural investigation shows. If there’s a chocolate fudge cake on the dessert menu, you won’t even entertain the idea of anything else and I’ve seen you order a kids’ portion just to make sure you have room for it.” They laugh into the scant inches between their faces. “You take contrary positions just to argue for fun, and you put everyone else in the world before yourself because you’re desperate for someone to prove you wrong.”

“You prove me wrong,” whispers Grantaire, leaning down. One of his hands is now playing with Enjolras’ hair at the back of his head, pulling and skritching as if he were a cat. Enjolras pushes into the sensation. “I believe in you.”

He nods shallowly, holding Grantaire’s gaze, “I’m going to kiss you now.”

“Okay.”

The kiss is soft and awkward. With Grantaire leaning forward, Enjolras has to strain up, neck arched uncomfortably. The rolling desk chair Grantaire is sat in is slowly moving away, and Enjolras has to lean closer to maintain precious contact.

He’s hyper aware of the carpet beneath his bare knees, his torso bracketed by Grantaire’s legs. His hands are on Grantaire’s slim hips, pulling him closer, and exacerbating the unfortunate angle they were forced to keep.

It’s still one of the better kisses Enjolras has ever had. Grantaire’s lips are plump and gentle, a little roughness suggesting he’s spent time worrying at them; Enjolras takes the time to do the same, taking Grantaire’s flushed bottom lip between his own and raking his teeth over it as he pulls away. Grantaire lets out a plaintive moan and leans forward -

- the chair moves backward, and Grantaire goes crashing into Enjolras, the two of them sprawling on the floor in an uncoordinated tangle of limbs. Grantaire misses headbutting Enjolras by a hair’s breadth and the knee to the groin by an impossibly smaller margin. If it had been planned, Enjolras wouldn’t have his own calves bent underneath him, and he wouldn’t have let Grantaire risk carpet burns such as the ones he’s likely to have; but he can’t say this isn’t good.

“Uh,” Grantaire’s face is pressed to Enjolras’ chest, voice muffled in his t-shirt, “That could have been a million percent smoother.”

Enjolras laughs, and laughs harder when Grantaire lifts his head to stare incredulously. “Just, just give me a second here,” he chuckles out, and lifts his hips to straighten out his legs. He ends up with a very quiet Grantaire laying at top of him, pressing down deliciously against his hip. This is more like it; an embrace more than a crash of two twenty-somethings on the floor.

Grantaire hums and leans up on one elbow. “We can, uh, try that again?”

Nothing would please Enjolras more, now that he’s comfortable and this all seems so easy, why did they take so long to get here?

His eyes flutter closed as Grantaire leans in, and oh, the second time is better.

Grantaire reluctantly slips out of bed, taking care to tuck the sheet back around the still-sleeping Enjolras; it’s a warm night but Grantaire has learned that Enjolras prefers to have something over him while he sleeps. Grantaire runs a hand through the tousled blond hair and feels his heart clench when Enjolras smiles ever so slightly and inches closer to what is rapidly becoming Grantaire’s side of the bed.

He picks a pair of boxers and a t-shirt from the floor - there’s a fifty-fifty chance that the boxers are his but he’s pretty sure the t-shirt is Enjolras’ - and uses the scarce light from the street-lamp outside to get to the door. He grabs the notebook from the desk on his way.

A glass of water is all he needs and then he’ll slip back into bed with Enjolras and try to get back to sleep.

He pads downstairs to the kitchen and settles himself on the sofa with his quarry.

Once upon a time (meaning last month, the last few years, most of his life it seems), he’d have had a glass of wine or a glass of whiskey, or a glass of whatever he could get his hands on to knock him out. He’d almost forgotten his periods of adolescent insomnia when sober.

Sober; a sobering thought.

Cutting-down after his fight with Enjolras at the gallery was rough; he hopes he never forgets and never truly remembers the final detox. He’ll always be an addict, and he knows he’s probably replaced an alcohol dependency with an Enjolras dependency, but that sits strangely well with both parties involved.

The rest of the boys have moved their alcohol to their bedrooms, not in the kitchen, and though he hasn’t yet been tested socially, he suspects with Enjolras beside him, he can deal with it.

Enjolras was never more than a social drinker anyway, and they’ve both gone tee-total now.

The green moleskin notebook goes with him everywhere. He sets down the glass of water and holds it in his hands, rubbing his thumb over the permanent-marker ‘R’.

It’s become more than simply a record of his sobriety - it’s a touchstone. The idea came to him when he realised his hands had stopped shaking, that Sunday morning. He opens it, and sees the first page, still blank; he hasn’t decided what he wants to go there yet. The second page though plays host to five complete hashes plus four as-yet uncrossed lines. It’s day twenty-nine of sobriety, well thirty now it’s after midnight.

The tally mark for day seven is actually a stick figure, wearing a somewhat incongruous sombrero for no reason what-so-ever, denoting a different day one. They’re now three weeks into this, his and Enjolras’ new relationship; it’s early days but even so he thinks he might just be able to do this, to be the person Enjolras sees, to succeed where he once failed so terribly and all he achieved was a death alongside his Apollo.

And if he can do that, then what’s one more day of sobriety?

They’ll be celebrating Grantaire’s first month tomorrow - tonight - with a trip to the City Gallery, a meal at a restaurant they can barely afford, and a movie in bed that will almost certainly be ignored.

“Couldn’t sleep?”

He turns and for a moment, it’s not his modern-day Enjolras in the doorway, it’s the young, fierce French revolutionary. Enjolras too has picked some clothes from the floor and it’s Grantaire’s white, threadbare t-shirt stretched across his broad shoulders, his bed-hair all over the place and so easily mistaken for the longer curls from 1832, and yet it’s the soft expression which sets him apart.

This Enjolras is both clearer and realer than anything he’s seen before, and the illusion is dispelled.

“Thirsty,” he reaches forward and taps the glass, murmuring back, “Just water. I promise.”

Enjolras shakes his head, the soft smile still present. “I know.” He walks forward and puts a sleep-warm hand to Grantaire’s cheek to guide him into a closed-mouth kiss. His other hand closes around the notebook. “I have faith in you.”

“You shouldn’t,” Grantaire warns but he doesn’t mean it and they both know it. Enjolras just kisses him again, and sits down with him until the glass is empty, thighs pressed together and shoulders bumping in every synchronised inhale.

He listens to Enjolras breathe, listens to the stillness of the rest of the house, and feels himself relax.

Eventually the glass is plucked from Grantaire’s grip and placed on the coffee table, and then Enjolras is standing and taking Grantaire’s hand to pull him up as well, “Come back to bed.”

Grantaire nods and allows himself to be guided back upstairs, back into Enjolras’ room and back to his bed. Once it’s morning, he’ll put tally number thirty in the book, but for now he returns it to Enjolras’ desk. He feels pliant and relaxed again as Enjolras first removes the t-shirt from Grantaire’s back and then his own, and they slip back under the covers atop sheets that haven’t had a chance to cool completely without them. Enjolras curls around Grantaire, his breath at the back of Grantaire’s neck and their legs slotting together. Enjolras continues to breathe evenly, his arm over Grantaire’s waist and his hand over Grantaire’s heart.

Slowly, Enjolras slips back into sleep, and Grantaire follows.

*1 = Harsin, Jill. Barricades: The War of the Streets in Revolutionary Paris, 1830-1848