That's Not Right
Disclaimer: I do not own Les Misérables.
Marius did not know much about how normal people grieved. When his father had died, he renounced his royalist principles in favor of Bonapartism (but he resented Enjolras' friendly suggestion that his belief was in any way shallow, thank you very much) and ran away from home to live in poverty for five years. He regretted nothing as it had all led up to his marrying the most wonderful girl in the world but he understood that it wasn't a normal way to grieve.
He had a much harder time with the deaths of his friends since there were so many more of them and, unlike with his father, he knew them on a personal level. He missed them and not just what might have been combined with guilt for having felt nothing for all those years while he had been so loved. And though his father had died alone, he had died an old man more or less at peace with his life as opposed to those vibrant young men who only wished to save France cut down in their prime.
His grief had not been half so…dramatic but he had already had that experience was and then there was Cosette to think of.
Marius knew that grief manifested itself in different ways but he wasn't quite sure how he felt about literally seeing ghosts. Did that make him crazy? He felt like that might make him crazy.
"Well?" Enjolras asked, looking at him as if he were being appalling rude. "Are you going to invite us in or has returning to your grandfather's house robbed you of any lingering republican sentiment?"
He wasn't quite sure what the manners to invite guests (however unexpected and, well, dead) into his house had to do with republicanism but that was Enjolras for you.
"By all means," Marius said, beckoning for them to come in. He did not meet anyone as he led them to the sitting room and he was not sure if this was a boon or not. He didn't want anyone to see him addressing the air and think that he was crazy but, well, a little normality would be nice. And he was a baron and so he could be as eccentric as he wanted to be.
As he sat down, he saw Éponine and Enjolras let go of each other's hands (they were holding hands? The world was changing, alright)and took a seat on the duvet almost too closely to be considered decent.
"Look, I don't mean to be rude," Marius began haltingly.
"You never do but you're quite good at it regardless," Éponine assured him.
Was that an insult? It sounded like it was but this was Éponine. And it hardly mattered anyway when he had so many other things to address.
"Why aren't you dead?" he asked, wincing a little at his own bluntness.
"You want us dead?" Éponine demanded. "You are a terrible person."
"He's a monarchist," Enjolras said by way of explanation.
"That was six years ago!" Marius exclaimed automatically. "And it's not like I want you to be dead, I just have very clear memories of Éponine dying."
Éponine peered at him closely. "Are you sure?"
"Pretty certain!" he cried, the memories knocking around in his head. "It's not every day that someone takes a bullet for you."
Éponine considered that. "Yes, I saved you while you were saving the barricade thus indirectly saving the barricade myself, didn't I? I am willing to accept that."
Marius was pretty sure that, this being the past, Éponine's acceptance of what happened had nothing to do with anything. "And yet…you're still here."
"What did you expect?" Enjolras asked. "Her to fall over and die or just fade out of existence when she was fine two minutes ago?"
"Well, when you put it like that…" Marius muttered, flushing. He thought that he probably had expected something like that, actually. "But you know what I mean. If Éponine died to save me and she even acknowledges this, how is she still sitting here? Is she a ghost?"
Éponine laughed at him. "Oh, Monsieur Marius, you should know better than to believe in ghosts."
"I hope you know that there is no way I can possibly take you seriously on that," Marius replied.
Éponine pouted. "You are such a snob."
"I don't think that's really fair," Marius protested. Who could possibly take a ghost at its word that there were no such things as ghosts?
"You say things badly," Éponine said, looking at him pityingly. "I suppose I should put you out of your misery. I was shot, yes, but not killed."
"I stayed with you as you died and kissed your forehead afterwards!" Marius objected.
"Let me tell you, that was not actually what I had been looking for," Éponine said bluntly.
"You asked me to kiss you once you died," Marius reminded her.
"It's not that I wanted you to make out with my corpse, I just wanted…" she trailed off. "Actually, yes, that is exactly what I wanted."
Marius shuddered at that. "You just said that you weren't dead. You can't have it both ways."
"I'm not trying to have it both ways," Éponine insisted. "I had just expected to die and, if I had died, I'm telling you that you did not do what I would have wanted."
"Did you really expect that I would make out with your corpse, though?" Marius demanded.
Éponine glared at him. "I would thank you to leave my romantic dreams alone."
Marius wondered what it said about her that that was the kind of thing that her romantic dreams were made of. "And I'm sure you were dead."
"How do you know?" she asked him. "You're not a doctor."
"That's true," Marius conceded. "But when I was trying to get you to go in for medical attention you claimed that you were dying."
Éponine shrugged. "How would I know? I'm not a doctor, either."
"But…I just…what?" Marius was understandably confused.
"I was just sort of left there and fortunately not trampled by the National Guard or the revolutionaries when the barricade was stormed," Éponine told him. "I don't remember this, of course, but after the fighting was over and people were cleaning up and sorting out the bodies, people discovered that I wasn't dead and nursed me back to health."
Marius thought about once again protesting that he was absolutely positive that she was dead, how he had watched her stop breathing, but he was still not a doctor and so she would still not accept that.
"And what about you?" he asked instead, turning to Enjolras.
"What about me?" Enjolras asked calmly.
"I didn't actually see you die but I cannot imagine that you would willingly leave the barricade after everything and you were the leader who actually killed one of the big National Guard people so there's no way that they wouldn't make sure you were dead," Marius told him. "Or at least capture you so they could publicly execute you for treason, I suppose."
"To be fair, they did try to make sure," Enjolras replied. "They even shot me eight times and that is usually more than enough to kill anyone."
Marius twitched. "Then what happened?"
"Grantaire stood in front of me when they started firing and the bullets only hit me after passing through him. I needed some time to recover but I am fine," Enjolras said serenely.
Actually, Marius could absolutely see Grantaire doing that but getting hit eight times, no matter what those bullets had to pass through, should not leave Enjolras so well-off.
"I was expecting that there would be some serious scarring from those eight bullet wounds," Éponine said casually, "but there is literally no scarring at all. Nothing to mar his perfection. But then, I don't have any scarring from that bullet that went through me either so maybe National Guard bullets just don't work the way other bullets do."
"I'm pretty sure that they do," Marius protested.
Éponine shrugged. "Well we have no scars and there must be some sort of an explanation for that."
"Yes the explanation is that you're both dead!" Marius burst out.
"Now Marius, if we're dead and there's no such things as ghosts then you seeing us must make you crazy," Enjolras said reasonably. "Do you want to be crazy?"
Marius sighed. "Of course not but I can't just choose if I'm crazy or not."
"There are many who would not believe that and say that if you were a more moral person then you would not be punished with mental disease," Enjolras retorted.
"Well I can't choose if you're real or not!"
Enjolras tilted his head. "Not believing in us if we're real or believing in us if you don't both make you crazy but I'd say that seeing people who aren't there is slightly crazier."
"This just can't be real even if I ignore the fact that you should have some serious scars if you survived those wounds that I know you didn't," Marius said, closing his eyes briefly and praying for patience.
"Why not?" Éponine asked blankly.
"Well, for one thing you're usually missing at least four teeth and your voice is so rough I've confused you with a man before," Marius said matter-of-factly. "Maybe your voice could change if you took better care of it but I don't see how your teeth are just going to grow back."
Éponine looked annoyed. "This really isn't the sort of thing one speaks about, Marius."
"And that's another thing!" he exclaimed. "You're usually not quite so…" He struggled to find a word. "That!"
"I see what's going on," Éponine said, still frowning at him. "You just want me to fawn over you forever even when you don't care less and can barely even remember me."
"I'm trying to find a tactful way to say that there was something severely wrong with you, in the head, the last time I saw you but I don't actually think that anyone could find a tactful way to say that. And if they could then I am certainly not that person," Marius said sheepishly. "And yet you seem to be fine now."
"Well after I got clean, was given some nicer clothes, had a better roof over my head, and was given all the hot meals that I could eat I just started feeling a lot better," Éponine said shrugging.
"I'm hardly an expert but I don't think that it works like that…" Marius said, frowning. "If such horrendous poverty is going to have such an effect on you I don't think that merely taking away that poverty automatically takes away the problems."
"You just don't want me to be happy," Éponine accused.
"I assure you, that's not it," Marius defended himself. "But the sudden change is a bit…sudden."
"Nothing is sudden about it, I haven't seen you in well over half a year," Éponine declared. "And Enjolras helped me come into my own. We're very happy."
"And where is all this 'you and Enjolras' coming from?" Marius demanded, feeling the beginning of a headache coming on. "You two never even met!"
"Not before the barricades, no," Enjolras spoke up. "I was too busy preparing for a revolution."
"I was sort of stalking you," Éponine admitted. "That was not my best life decision but I found Cosette for you so you don't even get to complain."
"You also stole her letter telling me where she was and only gave it to me right before you died," Marius remembered.
Éponine rolled her eyes. "So I gave it to you a few hours later. I thought I was dying and I still gave it to you! What do you want?"
"Stop interfering with my love life!"
"Without me you wouldn't even have a love life more involved than thinking about some girl you never spoke to all the time and sitting in some random meadow that somehow reminded you of her even though she's probably never been there," Éponine pointed out.
"And I'm very grateful," Marius ground out. "But that doesn't mean-"
"And you've spent all these months thinking I was dead so I'm hardly interfering," Éponine interrupted.
Marius decided to switch his focus back to Enjolras. "What do you even see in her?"
"Hey!" Éponine protested. "Aren't you going to ask what I see in him?"
"I've heard enough people go on about what there is to see in Enjolras – usually drunkenly – that I don't need to ask," Marius replied. He winced. "And since we were talking about me saying things badly earlier…I did not actually mean for that to come out like you were incredibly hideous and I can't imagine how anyone could ever see anything in you."
"It's good that you acknowledge that that is exactly how that came out," Éponine said, irked.
"I just want to know what Enjolras, the man who has proudly proclaimed his mistress to be Patria, could possibly see in…well, anyone who is not Patria, frankly, but you specifically since you two appear to have gotten together," Marius clarified, shaking his head.
"Éponine was at the barricade," Enjolras told him. "And, as you mentioned, she indirectly saved the barricade for several hours."
"Yes because I was at the barricade and it always annoys you when people do revolutionary activities for non-revolutionary reasons," Marius reminded him.
"She is also very poor and we must remember our poor when we're seeking our new republic," Enjolras declared.
"So you just picked a random poor person to date when you decided that you needed a real-life mistress?" Marius asked uncertainly. "And you went out with herbecause she's poor, not in spite of that or without that factoring into it at all. That's…actually extremely condescending. I think I'm offended on your behalf, Éponine."
"I don't need your help," Éponine said flatly. "If the reason he likes me is because I'm poor and went to the barricade then that's my business."
"She's also far lovelier than Cosette," Enjolras added.
Éponine beamed at him while Marius narrowed his eyes. "I will fight a duel with you right now."
"Duels," Enjolras said disdainfully, "are not republican at all."
"In case you haven't noticed we don't live in a republic," Marius bit out. "And you're not living at all."
"I had noticed that, actually," Enjolras replied. "I choose not to let that affect how I live my life, however."
"When did you even meet Cosette?" Marius wondered.
"I…haven't, technically," Enjolras admitted. "But I've seen her and Éponine is just so much more beautiful than her, even back before she was properly taken care of, that I have to conclude that you're an idiot for not seeing it and preferring Cosette." A pause. "And also for being a Bonapartist."
"I'm actually pretty much a republican by now," Marius informed him. "Combeferre just completely demolished my arguments for Napoleon with that one word 'freedom.'"
Enjolras raised an eyebrow pointedly at him.
Marius flushed. "But that is not my way of conceding that my love for Napoleon was in any way shallow!"
Enjolras did not even deign to reply.
"And while I refuse to concede that anyone ever has ever been more lovely than my Cosette, it would not matter if Éponine were the loveliest girl in the universe," Marius announced.
Éponine's eyes narrowed. "If I had not stopped loving you months ago you would be crushing my heart right now."
"No one can control who they fall in love with," Marius lectured. "Whether it is a good choice or a bad choice or even a 'I really hope I see that random stranger again because I can tell that we are so in love' choice. Choice. It's not a choice. It just happens."
"In that case why are you asking so many questions about why we love each other?" Enjolras asked reasonably.
Marius coughed. "I…well…It's just…"
"Now I have to know," Enjolras said wryly.
"I just always sort of thought that if you ever stopped thinking about Patria for long enough to date someone you'd end up with Grantaire," Marius admitted.
Enjolras' brow furrowed. "Grantaire?"
"He was just right there and you actually knew him and he was willing to die for you and not even a little bit subtle…If Courfeyrac wasn't dead you could ask him about it, he has a lot to say on that subject," Marius offered. "But since you're dead, too, maybe you could still ask him. Or the National Guard! They told everybody how the two of you died holding hands! Which is yet more proof that you're dead, by the way."
"Whatever Grantaire may or may not have felt, I am in love with Éponine," Enjolras reiterated.
"I know," Marius said, still unable to believe it. "I just don't like it."
"It's not for you to approve or disapprove," Éponine said icily.
"I think I'm going to go write sad poetry about Grantaire's feelings for you and how he'd react if he knew you had a mistress of flesh and blood," Marius decided, getting up to go leave them.
"You can't just leave in the middle of the conversation!" Éponine called after him.
"It's okay, it's just his way," Enjolras assured her. "Courfeyrac said he did it all the time with him and he was letting him stay in his nice room with no charge."
Unfortunately (or fortunately as the case may be) Marius's eyes snapped open before he could get farther than a line or two into his intended poem.
The light was shining through the curtains and Cosette was already awake.
She looked at him in some concern. "Are you well? You look…disturbed."
"I dreamed a dream that Enjolras and Éponine had quite possibly survived being shot at the barricade, though I'm still not sure that they were alive, and were together and it was so upsetting," Marius said in a rush. He felt a little silly saying that he had 'dreamed a dream' because, really, what else could one possibly dream but Cosette never laughed at him when he said things like that. "Please tell me that that will never happen."
"I…Well, if they died then I don't see how it could," Cosette said slowly.
Marius shivered. "They just…I can't un-see them. Tell me that you can't see them together."
"I never actually met either of them," Cosette tried to tell him.
Marius gripped her hand. "Please, Cosette, it's important."
Still looking bemused, Cosette dutifully replied, "They would make a terrible couple."
Marius relaxed. "And just like that, things make sense again. You always make me feel better, Cosette."
Cosette, still not sure what was going on, merely smiled.
Note: It doesn't matter that Cosette lived with the Éponine for a few years. Canonically, she has no memory of the time before coming to live with Valjean so of course she's going to be of the opinion that she never met Éponine and it's not like Valjean was ever going to tell her.
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