Work Text:
January 4
Grantaire was very busy: his to-do list could have given the United Nations' agenda a run for its money. He was locked in a battle with himself, trying to beat his own high score on the Journey to the Center of Hawkthorne computer game, channelling pure energy and focus into the screen. He also had to send several people birthday wishes on Facebook, finish reading that Game of Thrones fanfiction he'd started on, and compile a mix CD of screamo band recommendations because Éponine had been bugging him about that for weeks now. In short, he was far too busy doing things he didn't need to do, in order to avoid doing anything he was actually supposed to be doing. Like replying to the fifty texts, thirteen voicemails, and possibly a hundred e-mails that Enjolras had left him.
Clearly, their fearless leader took Grantaire's token membership of Amis des les ABC far more seriously than Grantaire himself. All the unseen messages probably said the same thing: "Where's the economic retrospective for the blog that you promised me three weeks ago?" However, there were more pressing matters at hand: his game character (Troy as a Zombie) was being besieged by hippies, and Grantaire couldn't kill them fast enough.
That was the state in which Éponine found him, when she crawled into his room through the window. It was actually horrifyingly easy to break into his flat, considering he lived on the ground floor.
"Am I interrupting?"
"Your CD's not done yet. Come back later."
"Okay. Sure. Great. No problem. Do you mind telling Enjolras that yourself, though? Because I'm pretty sure he's having sex with Marius right now."
Grantaire's finger slipped on the keys, and he ended up blowing himself up instead of the hippies.
Behind every outrageous statement, there is always a simple explanation. Except when the statement itself is the truth, and you can't get any simpler than that. Grantaire soon realised that this was a case of the latter variety.
Call me when you get this, he texted Enjolras.
Or reply to one of my many messages. Thats be okay too. Its sort of urgent so
Hold on here comes the 46th one
I HEARD YOURE FUCKING MARIUS. PLEASE EXPLAIN THE SITUATION
Hey. Sorry about the capslock. Ponine hijacked my phone. Im just curious about the situation, not insane. Forget it you dont owe me explanations or anything
SHE DID NOT HIJACK ANYTHING. THE CAPSLOCKING WAS ALL ME I.E. GRANTAIRE. AND YOUR EXPLANATION IS LONG OVERDUE. CALL ME, I.E. GRANTAIRE, BACK ASAP.
Six hours and half a bottle later, a reply came: I was in bed earlier. Everything is fine.
Grantaire stared at his phone, disgusted, before showing it to Éponine. "I sent him forty-nine texts, and he replies with that? Is he asking to be punched?"
Earlier that week
It all started because Enjolras took the Tour de France a bit more seriously than what any of them had anticipated. Disgusted by the haphazard way in which Lance Armstrong's case was being handled, Enjolras decided to write a strongly-worded letter to the relevant authorities.
"But my grasp of American law is abysmal," protested the first and only free lawyer that he could get hold of. Standing in line at the university's mess hall, Marius clutched his tray and tried to make Enjolras understand. "Do you have any idea how different their legal system is from ours? I might invoke the wrong precedent and have Armstrong banned from cycling for the next three lifetimes."
Enjolras waved away his concerns, seeing it as a matter of splitting hairs. After all, Americans were supposed to be terrified of legal battles. Not that the Amis des les ABC could afford to start one, but careful bluffs were powerful weapons.
"But your English is impeccable, isn't it? We could do the right research, and draft a perfectly acceptable letter."
"You have no idea—"
"Marius." Enjolras turned that quietly fiery blue gaze on him, and he groaned, expecting to be hit with something sweepingly inspirational. "Do you want to let an innocent man's career and reputation be destroyed?"
"He's been officially found guilty of being a worse drug peddler than the fellow from RENT, I'm not sure if he can be called 'innocent' anymore."
"But you'll help?"
"Of course," he said, sighing. He didn't have the heart to remind Enjolras that Bahorel, too, studied law. It would take a joint, two bottles of Stoli, and three days even to convince Bahorel, after which he would just grin, shrug, and say participating in this legal nonsense would compromise the betting pool he and Grantaire were running about Armstrong's actual innocence.
Enjolras knew the theoretical necessity of working out of Marius's flat, because legal tomes were heavy as fuck to tote around. The problem was that any living space shared with Courfeyrac was usually a biohazard zone. While both he and Marius were mutually at fault for leaving dirty laundry, beer cans, and cigarette butts all over the flat, Courfeyrac was especially bad at getting rid of his weekly flings. Being possibly the laziest Casanova in the history of sexual proclivity, he usually depended on his friends to do the 'get ridding' for him.
This time, there was a startled yelp as a blur of dark hair and pink shirt flashed past. A bedroom door distantly slammed, as Marius closed the front door after Enjolras. A minute later, a sheet-wrapped Courfeyrac strolled out, fooling no one with his nonchalance.
"Is it someone we know?" asked Enjolras carefully, nodding in the direction of the closed door.
"Maybe," said Courfeyrac with a shifty shrug. "Oh come on," he protested, seeing their matching expressions, "don't look at me like that. It's not like that was an ex of anyone we know."
"Nobody we know even has exes," Marius pointed out, but Courfeyrac ignored this. "By the way, your lover has an interesting taste in boxers." Courfeyrac followed his flatmate's gaze to the cartoon-duck-print underwear on the floor, and grinned smarmily.
"Don't be jealous." Scooping a pair of Tuborgs out of the fridge, he disappeared into his bedroom, ready to resume things with his elusive duck-loving shag.
There was an awkward silence in the flat, as both Enjolras and Marius pretended they couldn't hear the muffled voices whispering in Courfeyrac's bedroom.
"Strict liability in light of Article 3 of WADA," said Enjolras suddenly and loudly, with surprising tact. "That should be a good starting point for our strongly-worded letter."
"Definitely," agreed Marius, keen to drown out Courfeyrac's activities with the sound of their own voices. "I'll get the Code, you get the laptop."
*
As it turned out, mounting a legal defence for Lance Armstrong from across the pond wasn't as easy as either of them had prayed. Barring a miracle, they were running short of arguments and out of time.
"You two are still going on about that American cyclist?" asked Éponine exasperatedly, when she found them nearly shouting at each other in a corner of the Café Musain, clearly pushed to the brink of desperation.
"We are, yes," said Enjolras in a tightly controlled voice. He stared down at his notes, as if the words would rearrange themselves into inspiration. "Éponine, look this is important, and some quiet is paramount. I can't hear myself think if you're around. Or if anyone else is, for that matter." He swept his notes back into their folder, glowering across the table at Marius. "Come on, we're leaving. There's going to be no privacy here. Your place or mine?"
"Um, yours. We spent all morning at mine, and I'm sick of tripping over underwear and beer bottles."
Enjolras was already halfway out the door, and Marius hastily grabbed his things to follow suit. "Bye, Éponine, sorry, we'll chat more another time!"
"Trust me, if you'd seen it, you would know what I mean. 'Whipped' is the word I'm looking for. Are they going at it like rabbits, leaving underwear and beer bottles all over Enjolras's place too?" Éponine paced the oblivious Grantaire's living room, practically read to wring her hands in despair or kick over chairs to vent her frustration. "And what kind of underwear anyway?"
"Briefs, I think. More functional that way," muttered Grantaire not looking up from his computer. He was playing some online game based on some tv show, and concentration was radiating from him in near-palpable waves.
Éponine wrinkled her nose in distaste as the penny dropped. "Too much information. It wasn't Enjolras's choices I'm interested in."
"Oh, well, then this conversation might get awkward because I don't want to know that much about Marius, either, so just… okay? And will you please stop overthinking this? They're working, not shagging their brains out. Enjolras is the six-hundred-year-old virgin, remember? He's married to his country, and cheats on her with his work." The last part came out more bitter than he probably intended, and Éponine just watched him viciously kick a few pixellated zombies to the curb.
"Um, Grantaire? Why is your game avatar a blonde in a leather jacket?"
There was silence, except the howl of dying zombies. "I was alone when I picked it, okay? It's not like I play this game when company's around."
(Enjolras 15:18) It's New Year's Week. Now would be a good time for us to publish that economic retrospective you promised me. A fortnight ago. Do you even remember?
If Grantaire wasn't going to believe in the truth, Éponine would clearly have to bring the truth to him. The first step in her fact-finding mission was to drop in at Marius's, unannounced. Grantaire seemed to think her plan was certifiably insane, but again, he didn't believe that something extremely suspect was happening between Enjolras and Marius either, so there. Scanning her flat for a handy excuse, she seized the empty coffee jar.
Perfect!
Courfeyrac was the only other person she knew who preferred nicely roasted beans in his coffee, and he liked it as café ferré, not watery at all. In fact, the only reason she and Courfeyrac were even friends despite his bisexual philandering ways was because he always had excellent coffee.
Armed with a flawless alibi, she rang their bell. Immediately, there was muffled swearing on the other side of the door, urgent whispering, and what distinctly sounded like Enjolras muttering, "For god's sake…"
"Who is it?" yelled Courfeyrac, not even opening the door.
"Éponine. Stop dicking around and let me in, will you? I need my monthly fix of Carte Noire." Of course, only Courfeyrac would be living as a poor student and blowing his budget on expensive coffee, but she could hardly complain.
"Hold on."
There were much shushing and urgings of "stop arguing and hide," "I have nothing to hide," "I will replace your caffeine with Kahlúa," and finally the door swung open a crack, Courfeyrac angling his body to shield her view of the interior. Éponine frowned.
"What was that all about?"
"Absolutely nothing."
She raised an eyebrow. Courfeyrac looked shiftily belligerent. She sighed and held up the empty coffee jar. "I might die if I have to drink ditchwater-masquerading-as-coffee one more day. Can I come in?"
"Uh."
Warning bells were now pealing so loudly in Éponine's head that they deafened her. Ordinarily, Courfeyrac and Marius had an open door policy of "abandon all hope ye who enter." She had never been so unsubtly denied entry before.
"Is this a bad time?" she asked cautiously, pretending she would go away if it were. (She would, definitely, but only after getting what she came for.) "Do have a girl over? Or a guy? Basically, am I getting in the way of you getting laid? Because my coffee can wait if…"
This was where normal non-shifty Courfeyrac would have smirked, chucked her under the chin, turned her around and sent her off with a cheesy one-liner about returning to his bedroom conquest. This was where shifty Courfeyrac looked panicked and said quickly:
"Marius isn't home, okay? Come back when he is."
Wait what. Was her crush on their friend just that obvious, or was Courfeyrac protecting said friend's guilty secret? Certainly the latter.
"You know," she said, frowning (fractionally) up at him, "you're acting really weird. Suspicious even."
It took Courfeyrac five seconds to cave and let her in. She noticed that Enjolras was conveniently gone.
(Eponine 11:04) 1 attached photo image.
(Eponine 11:05) Saw it under the couch.
(Eponine 11:06) Grossest thing I have done for you in the name of friendship #36.
"Was that Éponine?" asked Enjolras, walking out of the bathroom.
"Yeah," said Courfeyrac, sidling closer to the couch, from beneath which a pair of three-leaf-clover-printed boxers was visible. "She, uh, just left."
Enjolras shrugged. "Okay. What's keeping Marius?"
"No idea." Surreptitiously, Courfeyrac bent down, picking up the boxers with lightning speed and stuffing them into his pocket.
*
So there it was. Proof. Some semblance of it, at least. It was suddenly hard to argue with the veracity of what Éponine was saying.
Twelve hours of agonising and avoiding anyone remotely connected to any Amis des les ABC (Éponine didn't count), Grantaire came to the adult and responsible conclusion that Enjolras's private sex life was not his concern.
He then undid all the spiritual maturity points he gained from the above thought by storming into the Café Musain, intent on physically ripping Marius Pontmercy in half. Friends did not fuck their friends' long-term, hopeless crushes. (And that statement sounded much less hypocritical and more logical in his head, so that was precisely where it would be staying.)
"Marius? You just missed him," said Combeferre, when accosted by Grantaire. "He left with Enjolras actually." The waitress who was about to bring Combeferre the cheesecake he ordered, quickly made a detour in the opposite direction when she spotted the thunderous look on Grantaire's face.
(Enjolras 19:19) Remember that retrospective?
(Grantaire 19:20) Working on it
(Enjolras 19:20) It's freezing outside your damn window.
(Grantaire 19:20) Go away then
(Enjolras 19:21) This is the part where you bribe me with that article to make me leave.
(Grantaire 19:22) Im sure marius will be happy to warm you right up
(Enjolras 19:25) ?
For the record, Grantaire was perfectly prepared to let Enjolras turn into an icicle.
He had surreptitiously peeked out between the curtains, feeling a mix of savage pleasure and wayward conscience to see Enjolras indeed bundled up in a coat and scarf, sitting on the sleety front steps of the building. It had been ten minutes, and the desire of disproportionate retribution was valiantly battling the part of him that definitely did not think with his brain.
When he poured his delicious French coffee into a Thermos and took it outside into the cold to where Enjolras sitting, frowning down at his phone, let the record state that Grantaire positively hated himself for caving. What was he even thinking? Marble statutes couldn't feel the cold.
"Hey."
Enjolras looked up, frown still in place, cheeks pink from the nippy air outside. "Hey. Did you finish the retrospective then?"
"I said I was working on it, didn't I?"
The frown furrowed deeper. "Oh." Enjolras got to his feet, dusting off his knees and butt. Grantaire's hands twitched, but he heroically suppressed the urge to help Enjolras out. "What are you doing out here, then? I thought you came to say that you e-mailed the article."
Grantaire rolled his eyes, and just thrust out the Thermos in reply. He wasn't going to be petulant and claim he was lured out here on false pretences; Enjolras hardly looked like an icicle in his current state.
"What's this?" Enjolras unscrewed the cap of the Thermos and took an experimental sniff. "Orangey. Is this liqueur? Grantaire, you know I don't—"
"There's coffee in it too, and very little rum," interrupted Grantaire, a little testily. "I was trying to warm you up, not lower your inhibitions with alcohol, fuck."
Enjolras sniffed at the Thermos again, and it looked like a corner of his mouth had turned up in a tiny smile, but the stupid flask blocked Grantaire's view. His freezing extremities started to feel just a bit warmer now…
"I drove here, so I'm going to have to give this back to you tomorrow, all right?"
"Uh. Sure."
Enjolras made no movement to leave. Grantaire's fingers might be twitching madly now.
"What is it? You're staring."
"You, uh. Your jeans."
Enjolras twisted around awkwardly to see; the back of his jeans were damp and dirty from sitting on the front steps. He didn't seem particularly concerned. "It's fine. I'll just go home and change."
"I have sweatpants," offered Grantaire like a non-sequitur. "They're probably not as comfortable as Marius's but mine have the advantage of literally being two minutes away."
Enjolras gave him a weird look, and shrugged. "Okay." There was a pause, and Grantaire waited for him to acknowledge the random Marius references. It was the perfect opportunity to slip in an explanation, but that never happened. "Thank you."
"Here. These should fit."
It was his softest, bluest pair of cotton pyjama bottoms, and Grantaire had a feeling that he had bought them because sub-consciously he had been thinking of the antithesis of Enjolras. Of course, he did have a really scratchy pair of track pants that made you feel like you were wearing cats, but his earlier howling need for vengeance had somewhat subsided.
Enjolras leaned forward from the bed to take them from Grantaire. "What were you doing?" he asked conversationally. "Before I came, that is."
"Stuff," said Grantaire vaguely. "Browsing the Internet for updates on the world."
"Facebook," Enjolras translated dryly, starting to undo his jeans. Grantaire tried not to look, and mumbled something about the bathroom. The jeans were halfway down Enjolras's legs, the sight of his naked, muscled thighs taking Grantaire's mind places it should really not be in. "You don't mind, do you?"
Are you mad? "Not if you don't."
In a flash, the jeans were on the floor and the pyjama bottoms riding up those legs again. Grantaire turned away, embarrassed by his palpable disappointment. Enjolras looked equal parts endearing and ridiculous, wearing pyjamas under his jacket and scarf. He tried not to imagine those pants being pulled back on again, Enjolras sweaty and vaguely spent from fucking Marius.
"Isn't he going to mind?" he found himself asking perversely, pushing at whatever quiet peace there was between them for a change.
Enjolras was trying to dry his jeans over the radiator, and didn't look around. "Who'll mind what?"
"Marius. If you're going to be wearing another guy's pants."
This time Enjolras did look around, brow furrowed in wonder. "I can't imagine why he'd mind. They're just pants. Grantaire, you're acting obsessed."
"Éponine says you're sleeping with him."
"I know. You told me." Enjolras didn't seem inclined to say anymore, which wasn't doing much for the level of Grantaire's temper.
"So?"
"I don't follow."
"That's a first, you pretending to be dim. Are you? Are you fucking Marius Pontmercy, and if you are, it'd be nice to let your friends know, now won't it?"
"Grantaire. I thought I already answered your question. The first time you asked."
"Éponine had proof. Lots of it."
"I'm sure she did."
He sank back into his desk chair, staring half-resentfully at Enjolras who was calmly drying his jeans. These weren't State secrets. They were friends. Maybe he didn't have a right to know, but not being kept in the dark would be nice.
It felt like an age before Enjolras spoke again. His voice was still as level and detached as it ever was throughout this conversation. "Do you remember how you said that you may not believe in anything, but you believe in me?"
Grantaire looked away, purposely missing Enjolras's attempt to catch his eye.
"Well, sometimes, my Dionysus, you have to believe me."
*
From: [email protected]
Subject: PFA
Btw letting me make your e-mail account was the best thing you ever did.
1 attachment: from_coal_to_gold_reviewing_the_last_century.docx