The Littlest Pontmercy: Eight Years later

By the time Victoire Pontmercy was eight years old she had become a very beautiful little girl. She was very loving, very sensitive to other people feelings and so adorable, but unfortunately her parents fears were found to be true when it had become apparent that she was indeed feeble minded. She wasn't a complete imbecile mind you, but after she had reached the age of five her education had plateaued somewhat, she could barely write anything more than her own name and her reading ability had just stalled completely. Marius and Cosette wouldn't give up on her though, they were still trying to help her progress, they had hired tutors for her but little had changed in her education and they had also taken her to see many doctors already in her short life, they had all said the same thing though, that there was nothing physically wrong with her, it was just her mind that was slow.

You wouldn't have thought it to look at her, she was such a happy and carefree child and she was so affectionate to everybody she met. But she had such trouble understanding simple things sometimes that it took a lot of patience and love to deal with her.
Her family loved her dearly, but her parents were incredibly overprotective of their youngest child and they seemed to shelter her from things more so than any of her siblings. They didn't want her to know she was different from other children, and they didn't ever want her to know that she was feeble.

One afternoon though little Victoire got a rude awakening from an unexpected source, it was a weekday and the children had finished their studies for the day and were now able to do as they pleased for the rest of the afternoon until their father came home, he wasn't expected for a few hours though.

Someone had upset Victoire that afternoon and she was hurrying to her bedroom that she shared with her sisters when she ran into her brother Jean who was coming out of his room.

"Ooops, Sorry Vic" he said as she bumped into him. He smiled at her, until he noticed she had tears in her eyes, then his face fell. He couldn't stand to see his little sister upset, or any of his siblings actually, but he had always had a special bond with his baby sister so he always felt like he had to do something if she was sad. Even though he was fifteen now, he still made time for his favourite sister when she needed him, he promised his father years ago that he would always look after her, and he wasn't going to back out of that promise, in fact sometimes he felt so strongly about her that he thought of her more like his daughter, not his sister.

"What's the matter petit?" he said to her when he saw her tears. That was his pet name for her, since she was so small.

"Nothing" she said sadly, looking at the floor.

"Something must be wrong Vic if you're crying" Jean said. "Come in here" he said taking her hand and leading her into his room. He sat her down on his bed and knelt down to be at her level. Jean was very tall for his age and little Victoire barely came up to his waist when she stood up; they certainly were an adorable pair to look at when they played together.

He wiped her eyes with his sleeve and tapped her playfully on the nose, something his mother had always done to her children that he liked to continue. "Tell me what's upset you petit" he said.

"Courfeyrac" she simply said

Jean tutted when she said that, Courfeyrac, his middle brother had a habit of teasing his sisters, he wasn't a malicious boy by any means but sometimes he could just go too far with his taunting and someone would usually end up in tears.

"Aw Vic" he said smiling slightly at her, "What's he done now?"

"I asked him to help me read because maman was busy, but he just laughed at me and said I was stupid" She told Jean, whose face now looked very serious.

"What?" he said lividly

"He said I was stupid, then he said I embarrassed the family because I was an imbecile, I asked him what that meant and then he just laughed at me again".

Jean now looked horrified at what Victoire just told him.

"Vic, did he really say that to you? You're not making it up?" He asked her, even though he already believed her, he just wanted to make sure she was absolutely certain.

"That's what he said, he said imbecile. What does it mean Jean?" She asked him

"How dare he say that to you" he said softly, avoiding her question. "Did you tell maman about this?" he asked her

Victoire shook her head at him, still confused about the word she didn't understand.

"Good" he said, and he stood up and reached out his hand to his little sister. "Come with me" he said as she took his hand "Where's Courfeyrac?"

"He was in the parlour reading". She told him.

Jean led his sister downstairs again and into the parlour where Courfeyrac was indeed reading, he looked annoyed at being disturbed again by his siblings.

"Go away Jean, I'm trying to read" he said to his elder brother

The two elder brothers of the Pontmercy family had always had quite a good relationship, since they were so close in age they had a lot of similar interests and when they were younger they used to playfight a lot, but right now Jean was about ready for a real fight with his brother.

Jean walked up to Courfeyrac and pulled the book out of his hand and threw it to the ground and dragged him out of his seat by his shirt.

"HEY…" he yelled, surprised at being manhandled by his brother

"Shut up!" Jean said angrily "You're going to apologise right now to Victoire for what you said to her".

"Get off me Jean" he yelled at his elder brother and managed to squirm out of his grasp

"You do not insult my sister Courfeyrac" Jean said lividly "You're going to apologise now or I'll make you sorry"

"You can't bully me Jean" Courfeyrac said, slightly arrogantly.

Jean looked his brother right in the eye and gave him one last chance to apologise, but Courfeyrac stood his ground and squared right up to his brother, not letting himself be intimidated.

Suddenly, Jean punched his brother in the face so hard that he fell to the floor, splitting his lip in the process.

Victoire screamed, she had never seen her brother hit anyone before, not like this anyway. He was on top of Courfeyrac now and had grabbed his shirt again and was screaming at him almost unintelligibly.

Cosette had heard the commotion and came running into the room her children were in, she was shocked to say the least at the sight of her boys fighting like this; she rushed to them and tried to pull Jean off his brother, which wasn't easy since Jean was nearly as tall as her already at fifteen.

"JEAN STOP!" she yelled, pulling at him "Stop it! Get away from him!" she screamed at him and finally managed to pull him away, Courfeyrac scrambled to his feet, terrified at what had just happened. Cosette saw his bloodied lip and his red eye that promised to turn into a full shiner the next morning and went to comfort him.

"Oh my poor boy" she said softly pulling out a handkerchief and pressing it against his lip "What's going on?" she said to both her boys, "Why did you hit him Jean? Tell me right now".

"Poor boy Maman? Poor boy is it?" Jean barked at her "Why don't you tell her what you said Courfeyrac? Then we'll see who's a poor boy". Jean tried to square up to his brother again but his mother put her whole body in between the two boys

"Jean, stop this right now!" She said sharply to him, and then turned to Courfeyrac again, taking his head into her hands, he had tears in his eyes and she couldn't help but want to comfort him.

"Why don't you tell her what you said Courfeyrac? Why don't you tell her how you think Victoires an imbecile, tell her how you think she's an embarrassment to our family!" Jean shouted at him, forgetting that Victoire was still in the room and was still watching the whole scene horrified at her brother.

Cosette gasped, she looked at Courfeyrac furiously, "No…" she said "Tell me you didn't say that about your sister? Tell me you didn't Courfeyrac" she said, holding back tears.

"I'm sorry Maman" Courfeyrac said through tears "Please….I'm sorry, I didn't mean it. Please maman.…don't hate me".

"Oh my boy…" she said, looking at his terrified face, whatever he had said about his sister it was just in her nature to want to comfort her son, she still saw him as her little boy even though he was thirteen. She took his head in her hands and just held him for a moment.

Jean was livid at this, "Maman, you heard what he said, how can you…."

Cosette stopped him from speaking and looked at him sharply, "Jean for god's sake, calm down. He's your brother and he's sorry".

"He's not my brother anymore, I hate him!" Jean screamed, "HE'S A BASTARD!" And at the sound of that word Cosette suddenly and sharply slapped Jean so hard across his face that he almost lost his footing.

She immediately regretted it though; she gasped and covered her mouth with her hands, shocked at herself for what she had just done. Jean was also shocked at her, she had never raised a hand to him before, his father had always been the disciplinarian in the house, but never her. He grabbed his burning cheek and looked at her in disbelief.

Everyone was silent for a moment, Jeans eyes had begun to water, as had his mothers. She reached out to him with her hands but he took a step back from her and looked at her hatefully.

"Oh Jean, I'm…" she began, but he didn't let her finish, he just turned and ran out of the room and flew up the stairs to his bedroom.
He was so angry at Cosette, he had defended his baby sister and he was treated like this, his own mother had hit him. He flung himself onto his bed and began to cry.

Cosette decided to leave Jean alone for a while to let him calm down, she would apologise to him later. First she needed to deal with Courfeyrac.

She sat him down in the parlour, Victoire was still there, having witnessed the whole horrible scene and now feeling guilty that her brothers were in trouble because of her. She was such a gentle soul though that she had forgotten what Courfeyrac had said to her not one hour ago and was sitting next to him holding his hand as he kept his mothers handkerchief close to his still bleeding lip.

Courfeyrac looked at his sister and his heart melted, "I'm sorry Victoire" he said to her. "I didn't mean what I said to you I swear".

Victoire smiled at him beautifully and kissed him on the cheek, Cosette also smiled at this, but she needed to talk to Courfeyrac alone for a moment so she sent her out of the room.

"Victoire, go and find Leon please" Cosette said "He'll play with you I'm sure, he always does". Victoire nodded and left the room, leaving Cosette alone with her son.

Courfeyrac looked at his mother, then looked down at the floor feeling ashamed of himself and prepared himself for a severe tongue lashing from his mother.