A/N- This is my first fic, so please be patient with me, and any feedback would be great :)
Disclaimer- I WISH I owned Les Mis- then I could make Eponine and Courfeyrac have a history together ;)
"Ep Ep Ep wake up!" Eponine opened her bleary eyes to Courfeyrac excitedly shaking her.
Checking her clock, she groans to him, "Couuurf, it's only 7 am! Go back to bed!" She pulls the covers up further over her head only to have it yanked back down again. "But it's my birthday!"
She mumbles incoherently, once again trying to burrow herself under the beautifully warm comforter, and revisit her dream about Courf's gift to her on her birthday. "Huh?" Comes the impatient reply.
"I said, that it's 6 am, and you're 22, not 12, so go back to sleep for a couple of hours or I'll withhold your birthday gift until tomorrow."
Courfeyrac pouts in response, but settles back into the bed, pulling her against his chest.
"Ep Ep Ep wake up!"
"God help me can a girl not get any sleep in this apartment?!" Gavroche excitedly jumping on the bed had now replaced Courfeyrac's incessant shaking of her shoulder.
It was now 9 am and Eponine figured she couldn't keep the two excited boys in bed much longer before they insisted on getting their day started.
"But it's my birthday!" Courfeyrac was failing at hiding his laughter as Eponine's eyes went wide at how similar her brother was to her boyfriend in his complaints for her to wake up.
Sitting up from his sleeping position on the bed, Courf said to Gav, "Happy birthday buddy, 12 years old now!"
Scowling at Courf calling him buddy, Gavroche cheekily replied, "Happy birthday little guy, 22 years old now!"
"God," Eponine said to the two, "How is it that you're both so similar, and you share the same birthday?"
"That's exactly it, love- we're birthday brothers!" Courfeyrac responded with a kiss on Eponine's cheek.
"Yeah!" Came Gavroche's enthusiastic response.
More like birthday trouble makers, Eponine thought as the two high fived.
"So what do you two want to do for your birthdays?" As Eponine asked this, she immediately regretted it seeing the mischievous look shared between the close pair.
Three hours later, Eponine was trying her very hardest to respect the wishes of her two favorite men – as Gavroche now insisted on being called. However, Eponine would have never, never, in a million years taken Gavroche to a place like this, if it weren't for Courfeyrac, whom she sometimes wondered how old he really was, backing up Gavroche's plan, and giving her his sweetest face, that she just couldn't refuse.
"Thank you so much Ep! I promise you'll have fun too!" Gavroche was gaining more and more energy as they approached the restaurant, which doubled as an arcade from hell, as Eponine so kindly liked to call the place.
It wasn't that Eponine didn't like to have fun – because she did – it was just that she didn't believe in winning prizes with coupons that you had to pay for. Why not just pay for the damn prize?
"Come on Ep, I know how you feel about these places, but Gav wanted to go here, and I promise, you and I can still have our own fun in here!" Courf gave her a wink, before adding, "And I promise, I'm not being cheeky when I say our own kind of fun- there's actually some things I'd do with you here."
"Okay…Let's get this going then!" Eponine could be skeptical of Courf and Gav's ideas sometimes, but she also never turned down the chance to have a day of fun with her loving boyfriend.
Eponine didn't know how Courfeyrac and Gavroche could do it. They both had eaten the same amount she could have for lunch and dinner combined, and now they were running around the arcade, playing every game they came across. Even worse was that Gav still insisted on playing his favorites more than once. This resulted in nearly an hour of her playing Air hockey with the two, who found too much happiness in playing against her and winning. Every damn time.
Now, Courf had finally found a game that Gavroche could not seem to match his skill in – "Hoop Fever," in which the player had to continually try to score points shooting a basketball into the net. With years of experience from high school basketball under his belt, Courfeyrac found that he could not lose. Seeing this, Gavroche now refused to stop playing until he had beat Courf's record.
"Come with me," Courfeyrac whispered into Eponine's ear. Gavroche had been playing for nearly 15 minutes now, and Courfeyrac saw an opportunity to have some fun with Eponine while the little man was busy.
"Hey Gav, you keep trying to beat my record, and I'm going to take 'Ponine around to some other games while you try."
All they heard was a grunt of, "You're going down old man!"
"You're kidding me." Eponine looked at the box with skepticism.
"Come on, I've always wanted to try something like this! Courfeyrac dragged her towards the booth knowing it wouldn't take much to convince her.
"Don't you think such beautiful creatures such as ourselves would make beautiful children?
"Courf, I'm 21, I'm nowhere near ready to have kids, I've already got you and Gavroche!" Eponine argued back, but despite it all, found herself wondering what a child of hers and Courf would look like. Courfeyrac could see her reluctance fading, and continued to pull her towards the photo booth that would merge their faces and show what their "baby" would look like.
"Alright, but I get to choose the next thing we visit!" Courfeyrac smiled widely as Eponine gave in and followed him to the booth.
"Okay, I'm going to go in first and take my photo, and then you go and take yours, and then they're merged!"
"Yes, Courf, I know how a program like this works, I just don't think it's very accurate." Courf rolled his eyes before going in the booth and shutting the curtain behind him.
As Eponine leaned against the outside waiting, she couldn't help but wonder what she and Courf would be like as parents. Between Courf's dedication to Gavroche already, and talent of making anything fun – look at today, she never thought she'd be having the fun she was – she knew that any child would be lucky to have him as a father. They were only 21 and 22, but she knew that if and when the time came for them to have kids, they would get through it together.
"Come on Ep! It's your turn!"
"What took you so long?" She hadn't realized it, but Courf had been in there for over 5 minutes.
"I had to make sure the photo I used was perfect- can't have our child looking bad just because the camera got my bad angle!"
Giggling at his need for a perfect photo, and loving him for it as well, Eponine took her place in the bright, curtained area. Reading the directions, she put on a serious face, and stared directly into the camera, aligning her face in the designated place. How was it so difficult for Courf to do this? She wondered as the camera clicked, and she was done- all in less than 2 minutes.
"I'm done Courf- which sex should I choose for the baby?" The baby? She thought to herself- she was letting all of this get to her head- she wasn't really pregnant and she and Courf were nowhere near ready to have one. There was no baby.
"Why not choose the one that shows a boy and a girl?" Courf didn't come out, but only yelled to her from outside. Rolling her eyes at his laziness, she selected the option to see both boy and girl version of what her and Courf's child could look like.
"Alright, let's see what these kids of mine would look-" Eponine exited the booth to see Courf staring at a piece of paper in his hands, with a wonderstruck look upon his face, and glassy eyes.
"Are you crying?"
Looking up, Courf quickly blinked several times and said, "Hey- I was not crying, I was simply looking at this actually normal looking child and thinking how lucky I would be to have a baby with you."
Damm him! She thought, as she felt her own eyes welling up with tears. Leave it to Courf to drop the playful attitude and be the first to openly admit to wanting to start a family.
She walked up to him, and taking the photo from him, saw what actually appeared to be two normal looking babies. Most times, these machines usually came out with a morphed looking baby that would never actually be the case. However, what Eponine saw in front of her was not morphed, but rather a beautiful looking boy and girl, who both had features of her and Courf that she hoped would one day come to fruition.
"Oh you- you're making me all emotional with your sweetness!" Eponine rested her head against her Courfeyrac's shoulder, hugging him tightly. This was just one of many reasons why she loved Courf- he could be playful to the point of acting like he was the same age as her brother, to sensitive and loving, all within a matter of minutes. It was times like this where she thought her heart might burst with love for the man who had completely changed her world with his kindness.
"Alright Bean- it's my turn to choose where we go!" After such a serious moment, Eponine decided the least she could do on Courfeyrac's birthday was to act more enthusiastic. Especially after all that he had done for her and her brother in the time since they became friends and later started dating.
Dragging him away from the photo booth, where he had just put the picture of their "baby" in his wallet, Courfeyrac looked up and groaned at where Eponine decided she wanted them to spend their next bit of time together.
"Really? Dance Dance Revolution? Ep, you know I don't dance in public!"
"Come on Courf! You sing and dance all the time at home!" Eponine pulled him onto the mat next to hers, and the two began to choose a song to dance to.
"Okay, fine. But I get to choose the song!" Courfeyrac seemed to become much more enthusiastic as the preview of a certain song came on.
"Oh, you're on baby!" Courfeyrac selected the preferred song, and the two began to follow the moves as "Don't You Want Me" by The Human League started playing. Both put their all into the dance- remembering how they foolishly danced to it the first time they met at mutual friend Bahorel's 18th birthday party
Four rounds later, and equal wins on both sides, the two made their way towards Gav, finding him at a game in which he played a firefighter.
"Come on Gav- let's go turn in your tickets for some prizes and then go home. It's nearly 6." Had they really been in there for five hours? Eponine couldn't believe it had been so long, but then again, time always flew by when she was having fun with Courfeyrac.
The Trio made their way to the prize shop, where Gav could choose which prize/prizes he wanted to exchange his tickets for. Inside the shop, Gavroche was still high on energy, and running around, knocking things over in his wake. As Eponine trailed behind him, she stopped to put back the fallen stuffed animals that he had accidentally knocked over on his run past the mountain of them. Looking up, she panicked as she saw Gavroche looking with wide eyes at a display of hundreds of lined up bean shaped figures with faces stuck on the fronts.
Suddenly, Gavroche began to reach for one that he presumably wanted. Of course, this one had to be in the very last row of dozens.
As if in slow motion, she saw Gavroche's hand grasp the bean he wanted, and pull back, his extra large sleeve pulling the other hundreds of beans towards the ground.
"GAVROCHE LOUISE THENARDIER!"
"'Ponine I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to do it I was just trying to get the firefighter in the back but then I didn't see-" Gavroche was silenced with a deathly glare from his sister as she silently bent down to clean up the mess. Busy with trying to fix the mess before a worker came and kicked them out, Eponine didn't see Gavroche's thumbs up to Courfeyrac, who winked in response, as he handed the cashier a large amount of tickets in return for a small box.
Later that night, Eponine and Courfeyrac sat together on the couch, watching Gavroche play with the several toys they had gotten him from his birthday. Playing in the background was the new mix of songs that Eponine had burned onto a CD for Courf's birthday- it was all songs that had a significance in their relationship.
Kissing her on the forehead, Eponine's eyes widened as Courf suddenly pulled out a small cardboard box and balanced it on her knee.
"What is…" It was Courf's birthday, and yet he still managed to surprise her- something he found pleasure in doing often.
"I know it's my birthday, but I had such a wonderful day with you, and no matter what we did, it would have been special as long as I'm with you.
Opening the little box, Eponine's eyes filled with unshed tears as she saw the plastic ring inside it. It was obviously meant for a small girl- it was plastic and pink, and a heart, but Courf had made it special by writing "E+C" on it in Sharpie.
"How did you even manage to get this? I was with you the whole day!"
"Well…I think I owe the other birthday boy one as he helped me distract you while I chose it and paid for it."
Eponine's eyes widened with love for her brother who had obviously been knocking everything over on purpose to distract her from Courf's intentions. Her heart swelled with love for her brother then, so willing to face her wrath even on his birthday, just to help her boyfriend surprise her.
"Why don't we send the little birthday boy to bed now…I've got one more birthday gift to give you that doesn't require Gav's presence…" Eponine whispered in Courf's ear, despite Gavroche being completely oblivious to anything that had been happening since he opened his presents.
"GAV! Time for bed buddy! Give 'Ponine a kiss goodnight!" Once again taking on another personality – this time the no nonsense-taking father – Courfeyrac got Gavroche willingly into bed in record time.
Later on, Eponine curled up to Courf in the bed, pushing fallen curls out of his eyes. They lay in sleepy contentment for several minutes before Courf broke the silence.
"Ep?" She was so quiet that she could have been asleep already, had it not been for the lazy circles that she was tracing on his chest.
"Hm?"
"I've been thinking, I know we're both young and not married, but doing that photo booth thing today really got me thinking."
"Courf…What are you saying?" Eponine asked, sitting up in the bed.
"Eponine, I've loved you since that first time we danced together four years ago. Dancing with you to that song today, and seeing what any kid we have might look like just confirmed what I already knew. I know that we're young, and we would barely know what we're doing, but why wait any longer, when we already know we want to spend the rest of our lives together?"
Eponine's breath caught, as suddenly, all of her fears about the future and their age slipped away, nothing else mattering but her and Courf never leaving each other's sides. Turning away, and reaching into his nightstand drawer, Courfeyrac turned back to her, this time a small velvet box in his hands.
"I was going to wait until Christmas to do this, because that is the anniversary of when we first got together, but I've had this for several months now, and I can't wait any longer." Opening the box, Eponine's heart swelled as she recognized his mother's ring sitting on the velvet cushion.
"Eponine Thenardier, will you marry me?"
"Yes! A million times yes!" Eponine leaned forward and kissed him, as he took her hand and placed the ring on her finger.
"Thank you for the most wonderful birthday, Eponine."
"I love you."
"I love you too."
"I guess Gav and I really will be birthday brothers now."
"Shut up and hold me."