Aftermath of the Surprise
Favourite walked home feeling lighter than she had in years. Blachevelle, the weight around her neck, was finally gone. His letter made it clear that he was never, ever coming back. It was wonderful.
Some people would be upset by this, she knew. Fantine was clearly upset but she had, for once, tried to be good about it and laughed along with them until they had parted ways. Maybe she would remember her more kindly for that, when she bothered to remember her at all. She certainly had no intention of seeking her out.
She would not seek out Dahlia and Zephine, either, because there was really no need. She had had many friends just like them and would likely have more who were the same in the future. She wouldn't miss them because she wouldn't be losing them. She wouldn't mind seeing them personally in the future but there was no need to go looking since their type was never far away.
And Blachevelle was gone.
He was a horrid little man and she had no idea how she had survived two years of his company. It had not been so bad at first. It was never so bad at first, before she got close enough to really grow disgusted at the spoiled little rich boys with nothing better to do than take some pretty little grisette and shower her with enough money that she will put up with him.
It was only the fools like Fantine who did not know how to play the game, who were stupid enough to bring a child into it. And now Tholomyes was gone, too, and too much of a hedonist to bother himself about the child. What would become of Fantine and the child now? She really should have thought of that before. It seemed likely that she was one of the rare ones whose first love affair would be her last, despite Tholomyes not paying to support her. One had to be sure that there would be support before allowing such things. It was really a toss-up whether that had simply not occurred to Fantine or if she had thought that there would be support but she was just as much a fool either way.
That wasn't to be Favourite's fate, however. She had had her rich students and she would have them again. She did not, perhaps, need them with the home her father had left her but her mother was always there, rough, ill-tempered, and drinking. She was utterly ungrateful but Favourite still felt enough of daughterly duty to not throw her out in the streets like a common beggar as of yet. Who could say what she would feel tomorrow or the day after that?
Still, she preferred the extra income from rich boys who would take her out and call her pretty than spending her life drudging away in a factory somewhere. One day, if she did not find a man to support her and she was no longer young and beautiful enough to be a mistress, she may have to turn to such employments but she still had time before she needed to seriously consider a man to be the permanent mistress of or wife of. Picking one man and sticking to him…it did not sound like something she would enjoy. What if he were someone like Blachevelle?
Blachevelle with his grubby little hands and his avarice. He had so much and yet was resenting having to give her any at the end. Why did a man like that have to offer if not his purse?
But that was a worry for another day. She could not afford to slip too far into pleasure and ignore reality but she had just been left by Blachevelle and she had an artist waiting for her.
She had no great love for the rat-ridden garret but her young artist liked it there and so she went up there to find him.
He was diligently sketching when she approached, his tongue visible between his teeth.
"Monsieur Moreau," she breathed. Moreau was a common enough name and she had said it many times to many people but it had never sounded quite like this before. Saying it had never made her feel so…What was it? Happy? Who could tell?
He looked up, his dark eyes smouldering. "Favourite."
She liked the way her name sounded when he said it, too.
"I have a story to tell you," she informed him. "It will make you laugh."
He grinned at her. He didn't put the sketchbook down but turned to another page and started scribbling in earnest. From the way he was staring, he was drawing her. She wondered if she would be wearing clothing in this particular drawing. "I do so love to laugh."
"Well then you will love this," Favourite said, walking to the other side of the garret, fully aware of how she looked doing it. "You are aware that I had that early date with Blachevelle today?"
"Mmm," Moreau affirmed, nodding. "Seems like a perfectly beastly thing to do."
"Oh, it was!" Favourite agreed. "But we wanted the whole day and so we had little choice. We cannot control what time the sun sets but our day can go on longer if we set out earlier."
"That still doesn't make any sense," Moreau said slowly. "Because then you must spend the whole day with Blachevelle!"
Favourite laughed. "That is true but we were in for a surprise today and we had been asking for so long that I could not bear to miss a moment of it!"
"Did they really make you wait an entire year for it?" Moreau couldn't believe it.
"They did!" Favourite exclaimed. "If we hadn't kept reminding them then they might not have bothered at all."
"Why do you stay with him?" Moreau asked, shaking his head.
She had asked herself that question quite a lot over the past two years. She had been asking it more ever since she had met Moreau. She had not been happy with him but he had given her money and security and it had been amusing enough. One did not have to love or even like a man in order to have fun with him.
"There was no reason not to," Favourite told him frankly. "I was content."
"Was?" Moreau repeated pointedly.
"If you will let me finish," Favourite said, a smile playing over her lips.
Moreau inclined his head her way. "As you will."
"We had a nice day, all except for Fantine who made it clear that she thought she was superior and refused to have fun," Favourite began.
"Why would she even come if she was just going to make people miserable?" Moreau wondered.
"I don't know," Favourite replied, shrugging. "She's not even as pure as she pretends to be and that just makes it worse. She is such a hypocrite and I'm glad to be done with her. At the end, we went to Bombardas and they finally told us they were going to give us our surprise. They kissed us all on the brow and left the room."
"They each kissed each of you on the brow or they each kissed their mistress on the brow?" Moreau asked.
"They each kissed their mistress," Favourite clarified.
"Did Tholomyes kiss the right one this time?"
Favourite laughed. "He did, yes, but he called out to Fantine to embrace him and ended up embracing me. Again."
Moreau curled his lips in disgust. "Does he really think that anybody doesn't know he's doing it on purpose?"
"I don't think he much cares. He went on another long, tedious rant no one cared about and it was all his friends could do to try and shut him up," Favourite said, sighing. "If he could only be amusing about it I would not mind so much but it is always the same. Happiness is a lie, do not trust me, everything is stupid and you are stupid, too."
"How pretentious," Moreau complained.
"He has money and he is willing to spend it," Favourite countered.
"…Suddenly he seems a lot less pretentious than he did two minutes ago."
Favourite laughed again. "After about an hour, we got our surprise."
Moreau's brown furrowed. "What kind of surprise took an hour to prepare?"
"It didn't, exactly," Favourite answered. "They just wanted a head-start."
Understanding dawned in his eyes. "They just left you there?"
"Well it certainly was a surprise!" Favourite exclaimed. "They did have a note delivered an hour after they had departed or who knows how long we would have waited there? We might have thought that they were killed or some other dreadful fate had befallen them and then we would have had to mourn them."
Moreau's lip twitched. "Ah, I can see how they met the minimum standards of consideration. Did they at least pay for dinner?"
Favourite nodded primly. "But of course! What do you take them for, rakes?"
"Of course not!"
They looked at each other for a moment and started giggling.
"I certainly was surprised," Favourite said at last, wiping her eyes. "Their parents needed them at home or something so they just up and left us."
"What a thing to do!" Moreau exclaimed. "Who even does that?"
"It was Tholomyes' idea, of course," Favourite told him.
"And you will never see any of them again?" Moreau pressed.
Favourite laughed. "God willing!" She tilted her head. "It is odd, though."
"What is?"
"I was just thinking, right before he left, that I should be glad to never see Blachevelle again and then once he left I almost wanted him back by my side," she said thoughtfully.
Moreau raised a delicate eyebrow. "Don't tell me you are secretly fond of the old bear?"
Favourite shook her head. "No, no, nothing like that. I just hadn't been expecting him to leave and I do so hate to be given no choice in the matter. But I do love surprises, too…"
"Would there have been anything that surprised you more than this?" Moreau asked her.
Favourite considered. "I do not believe so. If he had come back with a marriage proposal – or Tholomyes had – then I would have been less shocked. So they did fulfill their end of the bargain."
"They never said it was to be a nice surprise?" Moreau asked rhetorically.
"They did not," Favourite confirmed. She stepped a little closer to him. "But I don't know. I think that Blachevelle leaving and no longer being tied to Fantine or Tholomyes ended up being a nice surprise after all."
"Just for that?" Moreau asked teasingly.
"Is there any other reason I should be glad to be rid of him?" Favourite asked coyly.
Without a word, Moreau abruptly stood up, set his sketchpad down, and walked over to her. He kissed her wrist and held it to his lips.
Favourite felt her heart speed up but she was determined not to give herself away.
"Well?" she asked as coolly as she could.
"Let us go to your kitchen," he suggested. "You may make your fritter gloves and we shall see where things go from there."
When he turned his back to her, she allowed herself to smile as widely as she liked and she considered that the day had been well-spent indeed. Blachevelle was an already-fading memory and now she was to have Moreau.
It was all the better since she actually liked this one.