A/N: Hi, everybody (You: Hi, Dr. Nick!). This is a fic about Marius' mother, whom I have named Véronique. According to the Brick, she died when Marius was five years old (in 1815, the same year as Valjean's release from prison and the Battle of Waterloo). That's pretty much all we hear about her. We don't know why she died. She just kinda did.
It just makes me mad that Marius worships his dead dad but never even thinks about his mom, just because being a woman prevented her from being a general or anything like that. Gillenormand and his living daughter never talk about her either. This seriously effing pisses me off. I have come to right this wrong.
1804, age 16
Today is the day my family returned to Paris. My father, mother, half-sister, and our servants have been living in our country estate in Rouen for the past thirteen years. I was born in Paris, but I remember nothing of it, since we had to flee the Terror when I was only a year old.
Papa says that I will have to find a husband soon or else I will become an old maid like ma souer, Bérenice. Bérenice just scowled and puckered up her lips when he said that, like she always does. She's only twenty-five, but Papa says she'll make a fine prude someday and keep him company in his old age. Maman just laughed in agreement. We both know that she spoils me. Naturally, because I'm hers, I'm the favorite child.
It's not fair. Why is a woman considered old when she's my sister's age? Why should we have to marry so young? I'm in no hurry to get married. I don't want to mingle with Paris high society. Under Napoleon, all the most eligible bachelors are petit-bourgeois or even lower-class officers old enough to be my father. My father doesn't like the scene any more than I do, but he says that's the way it is now with that damn Corsican in charge and I'd better learn to like it because he never would. I'm happy to throw any of the men I get my sister's way. We'd both be the happier for it.
Somehow our home has escaped total destruction. Papa's friends managed to pull some strings to save some of the funds for it. It's nice, but I don't think I'll ever see it as home. Home is acres of sprawling farmland and gardens, an agrarian paradise, our own miniature version of Versailles. Paris is just so... dirty. Crowded. But in its own way, it is beautiful as well. It has a certain grandeur, a history, with which nothing else in France can compete. And if the things people say about the new Emperor are true, he may not be as bad for the country as Papa thinks.
1806, age 18
Papa is angry. He says I am becoming an old maid like my sister. He says that he will never have any grandchildren, now that Maman is dead. I tell him that I have been trying hard to find a suitor in Napoleon's army, but that he rejects every one because they do not meet his standards of high breeding. He tells me that I reject them myself. These days almost all our conversations end with one of us slamming a door.
But Georges is different. He is fifteen years my senior, but has all the vigor of a much younger man. Oh, he is terribly handsome. He has the most striking black hair and eyes, like my own, and a high, intelligent brow that makes him distinguishable at a distance. He speaks to me of his admiration for the Emperor, and his dreams of glory for a new and freer France, and somehow it is different from the hundreds of other discourses I have heard on the subject. Slowly, the lessons of my childhood and youth are fading away. I am no longer a monarchist like my father. No, I am a Bonapartist.
1808, age 20
You'd think Papa would be happy. But nothing I can do apparently pleases that man. I swear, he is such a child. He threw a fit when I refused to get married, and now that I am getting married, he throws a fit because I am marrying the wrong person. He tells me, I'd rather see you become an old maid like your sister and never have grandchildren, than have you bear the children of that Buonapartist scum. It is a bit late, but I am now married to Georges Pontmercy and happier than ever. And Papa hasn't disowned me yet. I can't wait to begin a family.
1809, age 21
I just found out that I am pregnant with our first child! I hope it is a son, so that he can be the son Papa always wanted and never had. I cannot wait to tell Georges. I know he will be an excellent father. He is such a kind and loving man. Our child will have everything in the world: wealth, love and happiness.
1810, age 22
This is the happiest day of my life! I am a mother! I have a son! He is a beautiful, healthy boy with our dark hair, and Georges and I adore him. Even Papa adores him. Bérenice merely looked into the cradle and sneered, but none of us paid any mind to her.
We have named our son Marius, after Mars, the Roman god of war. It was Georges' idea. He wants our son to grow up with the same martial spirit and desire to serve France that he has. It is a romantic name, to be sure. But I did not tell him that it also worries me. I fear that our son will be injured or even killed in a war. I can only hope that all the fighting will be done in this generation, so that the world will be safe and free by the time little Marius is grown. I shall go tell Georges that I do not want to have any other children for a while.
May 1815, age 27
Georges' furlough ends tomorrow. I told him I want another child in case he doesn't come back. Someone to remember him by. He consented, clearly relieved that I had finally come to my senses. Yet he worried that he was growing too old to sire healthy children. "My papa was nearly fifty when I was born, and look how I turned out," I told him. He merely laughed and smiled.
I know that Georges wants this child to be another boy, but I would like it to be a girl. I want Marius to grow up having a little sister. I love him dearly, but I can tell already that he is growing up to be very spoiled. Papa adores him, though he does not always show it, and Georges and I dote on him constantly, so it will be good for him to be out of the spotlight for a while.
"I will come back in triumph and glory," Georges told me as we kissed goodbye. "By the time you next see me, France will have conquered Russia. Napoleon has returned and he will win back what he has lost. Soon our empire will stretch across all of Europe."
"And you will be a hero," I told him. "You already are a hero. The Emperor has noted your skill and bravery. He will make you a peer of France. You will have the world handed to you on a silver platter."
"I do not want the world handed to me on a silver platter," Georges said. "I only want to serve my country and emperor. And to provide a better life for our son."
"Just come home," I said, kissing his cheek. "The best thing you can do for our son is to be there for him."
"I wish I could be there for him every day," said Georges. "But I have been called and I must go."
"I know." I put a hand on his shoulder and sniffed. "I love you, Georges."
He embraces me one last time. "I love you too, Véronique."
February 1816, age 28
They say I died of a broken heart. I don't know how much of that is true. It could be so. I don't know why my heart is broken, since Georges is still alive. He told me that a sergeant named Thénardier had saved him at the battle of Waterloo, and that Marius and I owe him every debt of gratitude. Could it be because Napoleon is in exile again and the country is in shambles? Because we are returning to monarchy once more? I consider myself fairly patriotic, but I don't think that this is the explanation. Kings rise and fall, and that is a man's domain; a woman thinks about those closest to her, and when they break, she breaks as well.
Our daughter was born dead. Georges never got to see her. I lingered for a few hours more, then went into convulsions and died in my sister's arms. Basque and Nicolette were crying. My cousin Théodule, who had come to visit for the birth, was crying. Bérenice was crying. Even Papa was crying.
We were buried together in the family plot, my baby in my arms. I am glad that Papa did not let Marius see my body. If he has only one memory of his mother, let it be one of her while still alive. I trust Georges completely to raise him.
But my papa does not. He has forbidden Georges from ever seeing his son again. Now Marius is the only grandchild Papa can ever hope to have. If he does not cherish the boy... then by God, he is not my father any more.
1827, Afterlife
Georges is dead. He caught brain fever in Vernon. I think he died of a broken heart as well. For the last twelve years he has had no one, no one except for Marius, who never knew him.
They did not meet, but Marius saw his body. He did not arrive in time. He dropped his hat on the floor, but as his mother I could tell that it was not out of grief. The look in his eyes was vacant; he felt nothing. I do not blame him; he did not know how much his father had sacrificed for his happiness. It is all Papa's fault. Nor was Bérenice any help.
Georges and I are together again. Now we can truly watch over our son, as we never could in life.
1832, Afterlife
Oh dear. Oh no. I fear that Marius has gotten himself into a great deal of trouble without a mother to guide him along. I was always the peacemaker of the family, and after I died the household descended into chaos, at war with itself. Now it could be that the very worst is about to happen. Marius will probably die.
I cannot see clearly, all I can see is an older man- the girl's father- carrying his body through the sewers. I am not sure if his intentions are honorable. From what I could glimpse, he is not fond of the prospect of his daughter marrying my son. Perhaps he is dragging his wounds through the sewage in order to make sure he is dead, then plans to leave his body there and rob the corpse. I cannot look; I cannot watch. How anyone could do such a thing to my beloved Marius is beyond me. A sick part of me is hoping that he will die, so that Georges and I can touch his sweet face again. So that he can be reunited with his friends and that poor gamine girl, Thénardier's daughter, who took a bullet for him. I hope that her sacrifice will not be in vain.
Somehow, Georges' death had not prevented Marius from getting involved in politics. If anything, it had made his convictions stronger. Georges does not approve of this 'people's revolution', this rabble of students pretending to be the sans-culottes of 1789. If only he had been there for Marius, if only someone- anyone- had been there to steer him right...
But it wasn't because of politics that Marius threw himself into the abyss. It was because of this girl. The girl who was to be my daughter-in-law.
I have to admit that Marius may have inherited his romantic tendencies from his mother.
At last the stranger hires a carriage with the help of a police inspector and brings Marius home with all his wounds. Back to his broken home. My son is still breathing. The man's intentions were honorable after all. But we shall see if this tragedy finally gets Papa to show his love for his grandson.
1833, Afterlife
Marius is alive and healthy and getting married and I couldn't be happier. His bride's name is Cosette Fauchelevent, and she looks a great deal like me when I was her age! It's strange, that even without a picture or a memory of my appearance, he would fall in love with a girl who looks so much like his mother. Perhaps he does remember me after all.
Cosette and Marius seem so happy together. Even Papa and Monsieur Fauchelevent are happy for them. Bérenice still sneers in public, but I caught her smiling once to herself in her dressing room. And Basque and Nicolette are glad to have something to do that doesn't involve taking care of an old man. In short, this is the happiest my entire family has been since before I met Georges. Perhaps Cosette was exactly what the Pontmercy-Gillenormands needed to mend their wounds. Perhaps Gillenormand has grown fond of Cosette because she reminds him of his deceased favorite daughter. In any case, he proposed the first toast at their wedding.
I kiss Georges at the same time that Marius and Cosette kiss at the altar. After that, I don't want to miss an instant of their lives together.