A/N: Inspired by the poem, Five Things You Know and One Thing You Don't and a certain photoset. I really love that poem. Set in 2012 movie canon. Favorites, reviews, and critique are appreciated!
i.
first. he touches you and you light on fire. your wrist blazes where his fingers meet your skin. the burns don't show, but it's hard to breathe with ash in your lungs. it's so hard to breathe. you're suffocating daily.
It's not nice to compare two people. Eponine knows that. Because sooner or later, you start to favor one person over the other and then suddenly, the former becomes a standard that the latter will never reach up to.
But Eponine Thenardier is not a nice girl and could you really blame her for comparing two men who are actually decent to her? A gamine has to occupy herself somehow in a life of misery and hunger.
Marius Pontmercy hardly touches her. But if it's Cosette, it's like his hands can't stop getting the feel of her soft skin beneath his fingertips. It hurts Eponine more than she cares to admit, but she can't blame him. Her skin and her rags are marred with dirt and they're probably going to remain that way. Him growing up in bourgeois France alienates him to the feel of the soil beneath his bare feet and to the layer of dirt and dust that cocoons around the skin. He may claim to be a revolutionary, but there will always be parts of him that stays true to his roots. For example: his preference for the Lark dressed in satin and lace rather than her, the dirty gamine.
But when he does touch Eponine, his touch is gentle and it is kind. It is not forceful and it is not cruel like her father and his dirt-stained palms, and his callused précised fingers always used in some form of malice. It coaxes her attention like a baby to its mother. She can't brush it aside and she can't ignore it. If she did, she'd feel guilty. Eponine likes the feel of Marius fingers around her. It makes her feel safe, warm, and maybe even loved in her own messed-up way.
Enjolras' touch (if he had a first name, Eponine wouldn't know. Not that she cares anyways), however, is different. Much like Marius, he has hardly touched her, but there have never been many circumstances that would require him to do so, let alone talk to her. That's also that he's like that with everyone, unless it's his friends, his ever vigilant comrades. There is no reason to be offended.
But in the few times where they have crossed paths, he does not hesitate to make contact. His grip is not soft, but it is not rough either. It is firm, his grasp around her arm like a clamp. Sturdy, steady, and unyielding. She should know. He does not need to cajole for attention. From the way he takes ahold of her arm, he only demands her attention. To look away is unforgivable.
"Excuse me, mademoiselle. I believe you dropped this."
In his other hand, he holds out a handkerchief with the initials MP embroidered in corner with crimson thread. It was once Marius', but now it is hers, a gift bestowed from the former to the latter. He calls it a token of appreciation, but for Eponine, the handkerchief is a reminder of him, a piece of him that belongs to her, not Cosette.
Her eyes fall on the handkerchief, but she makes no move to retrieve it. Her attention is not on the handkerchief, but rather the hand that has encircled around her arm. It burns her skin, the sensation scorching and only spreading until the heat has consumed her entire body. If he is the undying flame, then she is the water, the rain drenches everything and everyone.
Her breath hitches. She takes a sharp breath of air. It is hard for the air to fill her lungs when there is already smoke.
"Madamoiselle?"
She snaps out of her haze, the smoke in her lungs dissipating. He releases her as she snatches the handkerchief out of his hand. Their fingers graze for the briefest of moments and the feeling of fire meeting water and smoke returns in a spilt second.
Without meeting his eyes, she nods gruffly. "Merci, monsieur." And she slips away, her forearm still warm.
ii.
second. it hurts to watch him. he shines. he's brighter than the sun, he's too beautiful for your eyes. it's hard to look at him. it's even harder to look away from him. you're going blind.
In a sea of people, she always knows how to locate Marius, even if his back is turned to her.
She is the daughter of a con-man so perhaps she can only be expected to have this talent. She knows how to spot the details, the tiny insignificant aspects that become so significant should they be brought up. Baby steps, says her father, are the keys to any successful con.
If the freckles cannot point Marius out for her, then Eponine recognizes him by the tricolor badge he wears with pride on his brown coat, which also matches the color of his hair. Mahogany. She slept in a mahogany bed once, back when her parents had the inn and her life wasn't defined by dirt, hunger, and misery. She misses the bed, but likes the color mahogany.
Gold, however, outshines mahogany without a question. She would know that- nothing catches the attention of her parents like the glint of francs in the light. She really must be her parents' daughter if Enjolras' curls, glistening in the sunlight remind her of money. In a street full of strangers and thieves, it is even easier to pick out Enjolras, his scarlet waistcoat billowing as he strides on the opposite side of the street.
The sky is overcast today, yet he shines anyways. The curls on his head are shimmering beneath the pale rays that peek out from the blanket of clouds that has wrapped around the sun. Combined with the crimson he adorns with pride, he becomes a painful combination of scarlet and gold. It hurts to watch him, even from afar. To watch means to burn her eyes, but to look away means seal the light away. He is the flame of life, the harbinger of revolution, blood, and death but also the harbinger of change, brotherhood, and life.
A bringer of change, but so, so alive.
"'Ponine? Are you coming?"
Her eyes do not leave Enjolras. He does not see her in her rags from across the street, but her gaze follows him until he turns a corner.
She averts her gaze, feeling strangely disappointed. She is not a sight for sore eyes. It is better that he doesn't notice her.
"Coming." She mutters, quickening her footsteps behind Marius.
iii.
third. your ears are tuned to his voice. you could pick him out in a sea of thousands. his voice makes pretty singers who sing pretty songs sound dull. his voice makes everything else sound ugly.
Marius' voice is much like his touch- gentle. When he speaks to her, she lets it roll over her like a warm breeze. His voice is unlike any other voices she is familiar with. Whereas the voices she knows best speak slang with rancor, his voice remains soft, his accent formal, his grammar almost flawless.
Eponine knows her voice well enough. He may say he likes the way she teases, but it is clear her voice, raspy yet teasing, does not make his heart sing. No, it is the lark's voice, dainty and light as a feather that he longs to listen to. Her voice is that of an angel, or so he claims, and her laughter rings in the air like silver bells.
Let it be known that Enjolras' tongue is made of silver. Everyone knows that, Eponine included. He talks like Marius, a cultured drawl, his accent formal and his grammar flawless. But pieces of silver fall from his lips with every word he speaks. Even the big words that would make other people look pompous sounds captivating on his lips. He has people eating out of the palm of his hand without even trying to.
Eponine will not cave to such demands, because the things he says about revolution and democracy really is crap. He may sympathize with her kind of people, but he does not understand. That does not stop her from watching him from afar when he makes a speech though. He bellows and rants, the whims and desires of the crowd he gathers at his mercy. Somehow, it is more melodic to listen to than to the songs of a minstrel. His voice reaches her the same way Marius' does, but it does not just scrape the surface. It burrows beneath her skin, scorching her insides and leaves her wanting, craving, needing more. His voice is not just pretty- it is enough to silence the birds, enough to silence everything and everyone because nothing else will ever compare.
When his speech comes to an end, the crowd gathered around has turned frenzy, emotions running high as he hops down from the platform, his throne of wood, to distribute pamphlets most likely to later be found drenched in the sewage water. There is excitement buzzing in the air, yet it does not reach her. She can only close her eyes and imagine his voice again. Eponine is not a sentimental woman, but she finds there are only a few pretty things in her life. There are even fewer beautiful things, which she guards with jealousy. If the crowds will be swept away in the heat of the moment he has created, then she will remain still and remember him, the boy with a beautiful voice.
"Pretty words, bourgeois boy." Eponine mutters, as he passes her outside of Café Musain. She's waiting for Marius to come out and doesn't expect Enjolras to hear her off-handed comment.
He paused in his footstep, head turned towards her. "You were at the rally, mademoiselle?"
"Not for you. I was there for Monsieur Marius."
There's a strange glint in his eye, but he doesn't seem offended. "That hardly changes anything. What did you think?"
She scoffs, crossing her arms. "They aren't going to come Monsieur. It may look like they're with you now, but when the National Guard comes, they'll scatter."
He pursues his lips. She's hit a nerve. "We shall see about that."
iv.
fourth. the color of his eyes is blue enough to drown in. he is turning you into a clichéd love-wrecked being. you're drowning, always sinking. down, down, down.
Marius' eyes remind Eponine of the first leaf of spring. A splash of color in an otherwise gray existence, every time she looks him in the eye, she sees nothing but hope and promises of a better tomorrow. He is the spring that comes after winter. He is the breath of fresh air that cuts through the smog of the streets she has come to call home.
The problem with hope and with being the first breath of fresh air though is that they can only last for so long before they've faded into what existed before. They are fragile things with no real source to sustain them. Perhaps the only reason Eponine has stuck around Marius is because he makes her an alcoholic, with his doe eyes. It is easy to get drunk on hope and to pray everyday that he might her to be his.
She sees the ocean in Enjolras' eyes. Or at least, that's how she imagines the ocean to look like. She wouldn't know any better and that's fine, she doesn't expect to ever see the ocean anyways. If she did, then she supposes she'd like to drown herself there. Sink to the bottom where no one else can find her.
Eponine does not feel like doing that when she looks at Enjolras. No, definitely not. His eyes are blue, yes, the kind she imagined herself drowning in, but just no. He is fire, she tells herself. He is an untamed wildfire, waiting to spread and take, take, and take everything he can. She burns herself when she looks at him.
The ocean does not do that, she decides, until the faithful day at the barricade. She dresses in men's clothing if only to die with Marius in battle.
Enjolras recognizes her too late into battle and that's only because he was too busy with preparations to notice sooner.
"Go," He orders, a terse look set in stone. His eyes ablaze with fury. "You have no reason to be here."
She thinks of the lark's note for Marius, but decides to omit that and wonders if it's possible to be both water and fire. He sets her on fire without meaning to, but when she looks him in the eye, she feels like drowning in whatever's hiding in those depths. She would guess whatever's there consists of passion and determination. And like hope, those two things are easy to get drunk on.
The only difference is, they can't be discarded on a whim. They have a foundation built on knowledge, emotion, and most importantly, sheer will power. They're almost impossible to give up. He is summer. He is the everlasting heat that scorches all without mercy.
"I have no reason to go either, Monsieur." She answers, unable to break eye contact. It's almost like she wants to choke on the water. "Revolution or not, nothing really changes for me. My life stays the same."
"Not for long," He insists, furrowing his brow. "A new age is upon us, mademoiselle."
She shrugs. "We'll see about that. Either way, I'd rather stay and find out for myself."
v.
fifth. you know him. you love him. through a thousand lifetimes, across millions of stars, you'd find him, you'd never leave him. you love him, till death do you part.
She's been a fool. Why didn't she realize it sooner?
As she sits in Marius' arms with a bullet lodged in her chest, her life (and other lifetimes) flashes before her eyes and she realizes the hints have always been there. She was just too blind to see them. Enjolras was the one. And she couldn't see past Marius to recognize him sooner.
But it's too late now. Her breathing grows shallower as Marius holds her head steady. It takes too much energy to turn her head, let alone let her eyes scan the surroundings.
Enjolras stands a few feet away from her, drenched in the rain in the corner of her eye. And she remembers in a montage of clumsy stringed flashbacks.
There have been lifetimes like this, where they go on with their lives, none the wiser or aware of the other. In other lifetimes, they're so close, yet they keep missing one another. But in the end, it always ends the same way. Sometimes he's the first to go. Other times, she leaves instead. They haven't gotten it right.
This is not the first lifetime they've shared together and it will be not the last. She won't let it be.
"And rain," she murmurs, closing her eyes. She thinks of a revolutionary boy with a touch of fire, hair of gold, a voice of music, and eyes of summer and the ocean. "Will make flowers grow."
Perhaps she will be luckier in the next lifetime.
vi.i.
(sixth. he loves you too.)
Enjolras would be lying if he said he never noticed her, the gamine that flanked Marius' side like a shadow. Marius describes her the best.
"Her name was Eponine. Her life was cold and dark, yet she was unafraid."
A murmur of agreements breaks out and while he cannot deny the truth in those words, Enjolras cannot help but feel bothered that it was Marius who said them and not him.
It is strange, indeed. They were not close. She was not family. She was not a friend either. And though they shared a few stinted conversations, he did not know her name, until now. He did not bother to remember because Patria is his mistress and he will not leave his revolution behind for a gamine he barely knows. And yet, as she lays dying in Marius' arms, something in Enjolras screams and he knows he's about to lose something important. He's been missing something important for a long time now.
It is too late though. Her head rests against Marius, who twists so he can kiss her on the forehead. She is gone. The rain continues to fall.
He sighs, exhausted and motions to Combeferre to help him carry her body. There is not much he can do now. And as the leader of the revolution, he cannot show a sign of weakness. Mourning (her) comes later. First, they must win the battle.
He soldiers on, the thought of a dead gamine lingering at the back of his mind. The National Guard is relentless, but he knows that. At this point, even if the revolution is doomed to fail, they can only continue until the very end.
When the National Guard shoots him and Grantaire, Eponine comes back to mind. He does not see the explosion of gunfire. He sees her instead, dancing in rain made of silver. She is beautiful.
He falls through the window of his fortress, caked in blood, the symbol of revolution clenched in one hand and realizes he was a little bit in love with her too.
.
.
Fin.