A street light bursts above Eponine. She can see the glow of the sparks behind her closed eyes. With a shaky hand she brushes away her tears and stands. It was just a kiss, she tells herself; the next street light explodes. It probably didn't mean anything. The lie she tell herself doesn't work; the closer she gets to each lamp the brighter it glows before exploding. Marius is in love with Cosette. This was an undeniable fact now. Eponine doesn't know how she could ever have fooled herself into thinking that Marius might have feelings for herself. No one even wanted to be friends with her, why would anyone be in love with her. But tonight she'd seen Marius, her Marius, and Cosette in the corner booth of the restaurant holding hands, kissing. She tried to hold herself together until the end of her shift, but after starting the grill on fire, she had to excuse herself three hours early. She thinks of his shy hand on Cosette's knee, his beautiful dark fingers barely brushing her skin, the way he smiled into the kiss, practically laughing. It ties her stomach up in knots.

The street lights are flickering out now, rather than exploding. Eponine stops to catch her breath. She's hyperventilating, knowing that Marius has never, and will never care about her. Not the way he does for Cosette. No one will ever look at her the way Marius looks at Cosette, or kiss her and mean it the way he does. Or- Epnine looks down the street and sees that two whole blocks have gone dark. She needs to get her emotions in check.

In through the nose, out through the mouth, in through the nose. She stills her trembling hands and tries to put a stop to the crackling electricity in the air around her. If she's not careful it'll start to rain, the perfect end to a perfect night. Eponine kicks off her work shoes and stands on the tree lawn. The grass beneath her feet becomes brittle and brown. He's just a boy, she tells herself. He's her friend and this doesn't change that. He never lied about caring for her, she just blew his apparent affections out of proportion. She thinks about all the times Marius had sat on her bed and talked about Cosette. How she thought he was doing it just to make her jealous. It makes the air around her head pop with energy.You're being a child, Eponine scolds herself.

Each step she takes kills more grass, but at least the street lights have stopped going out. Walk and breathe, walk and breathe, that's all she can do. Marius deserves to have someone who isn't a freak of nature. He deserves to not have people constantly whispering that his girlfriend is a witch, egging his house and car, graffiting his driveway because they hate him by association. He already gets enough shit for eating lunch with me. No-dating the local witch would ruin him more than befriending her ever had.

Not for the first time, she imagined herself running away and starting over again. Alone. For good. But Marius. Marius. Even if he didn't love her the way that she loved him, she'd never be able to leave him.