Author Note: Welcome to Hands Made for Holding, an É/C/E Modern AU. Written for unicornesque, a.k.a. youarethesentinels on tumblr. We hope you enjoy. :)
Disclaimer: I am not Victor Hugo. I do not own the book, the musical, or the film, and I certainly do not own the characters.
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Hands Made for Holding
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He first meets her when he is seven years old.
He is at the park, reading a book because he's asthmatic and playing tag is difficult, and besides, his new glasses keep on falling off every time he tries to run at anything faster than a trot.
She is a little girl in a red jumper, and she sprints the fastest out of anyone there. She's a scarlet blur in the corner of his eye, all flashing eyes and dark hair, weaving in and out of the swing sets and slides like she was made for movement, easy and graceful and carefree. She reminds him of the cheetahs in the documentary he watched on the Discovery Channel. He likes cheetahs.
Soon, he's paying more attention to her than he is to his book, and his mother notices and smiles.
"Why don't you go play with them?" she suggests.
He shakes his head, and buries his face back in his book, staying solidly on his bench. His mother sighs, but leaves him alone to go talk with the other parents.
He doesn't stay alone for long, however.
"Whatcha readin'?"
He looks up to find the girl right in front of him, her face pressed in close. He screams in shock.
"Whoa, whoa! Sorry! I didn't mean to scare you!" she says, leaning down to pick up the book he's dropped. Her lips purse as she surveys the cover. "Greek m-my-thologgie?" she says, pronouncing the "y" with a long "i" sound and the "gy" as if it were the first part of "geek."
He blushes in embarrassment, sure she is going to make fun of him. Everyone his age who knows him thinks he's weird. Actually, no—he is weird. Nobody wants to be his friend, so why would this girl be any different?
Instead, she smiles and says, "I like the flying horse on it! Is it like Pegasus from Hercules? I liked that movie! Have you seen it?"
He nods silently.
"Is this book sorta like that? Does it have Pain and Panic and lots of singing?"
He shrugs and pushes his glasses further up on his nose.
"You don't talk much, do you?"
He shakes his head, certain this is going to be the deal-breaker.
She grins at him anyway. "That's okay. Me and my best friend Cosette—she's the girl over there with the pretty yellow hair—we talk a lot. Her mommy says we talk so much to make up for the people who like being quiet. So maybe you can be my quiet person, and I can be your talky person, and then I won't have to stay quiet when my mommy tells me so."
He clears his throat and manages to say, "I'd like that."
"Cool! You wanna play hide and seek with us now?"
"I can't." The last time he tried, he hid behind the slide and somebody ran into him and he twisted his ankle.
"Why not? You'd be good at hiding, and I could come and find you. I'm a really, really good finder. Cosette will tell you."
He bites his lip uncertainly. She sees the motion and pounces, widening her eyes and clasping his hands. "Pretty, pretty please? For me?"
He takes one look at big, dark, beautiful eyes, and he knows that he won't ever be able to say no to her, knows he's a goner for her with a bone-deep certainty.
"Okay," he says.
"Yay!" she replies, grabbing his hand and pulling him over to where the other children are waiting. "Hey, guys! I found us a new friend! His name is—" She turns to look at him. "Hey, what is your name?"
"S-simon Combeferre," he stutters.
She smiles at him again, and he thinks he will say his name for her as many times as she likes if she keeps on doing that. "Nice to meet you, Simon! I'm Éponine Thénardier."
Éponine Thénardier. He decides it's the most beautiful name in the world.
He sees her at the park every week for the rest of the summer, and nearly dies of happiness when she declares him her "second-best friend" and "second-favorite boy." Second-place has never felt so good, he thinks to himself, especially when before he's always been dead last.
"You can't be my best friend, cuz that's Cosette, and my favorite boy is Gavroche—you see him over there, right? He's in the stroller and he's really cute and I love him because he's my brother and crosses his eyes when I smile at him. But I love you, too, because you have a nice smile and your glasses are funny and you know lots of cool things about animals. You'd make a really good vet someday, and I could bring my cats to you," Éponine tells him as he stares at her adoringly.
He decides right there and then that he's going to be a veterinarian when he grows up.
Anything for Éponine.
Their golden summers don't last. Autumn comes, and with it, hardship and tragedy and a kiss goodbye pressed to his cheek.
Her father lost his job and they have to move halfway across the country, but she promises to write to him, and he promises to feed the ducks for her (named after every character in Greek mythology, her favorite is the one she named Chiron, "because he's like you"), and they both pretend they aren't crying.
It's been a year since they met. They're eight-year-olds now. Eight-year-olds don't cry.
Except she leaves, and he's left behind, sobbing into his pillow, his mother rubbing soothing circles onto his back, and it feels like nothing's ever going to be right again.
He writes to her and writes to her and writes to her.
She writes back, until years later in the spring, when she stops.
He's miserable for months. Ten years old and already his heart has been broken, the little fluttering curl of it wrapped around the part where her smile carved itself into his soul.
Eventually, he dusts himself off and gets back to living, his mother giving a small relieved sigh.
"You'll find somebody else," she tells him. "You'll make other friends."
He nods silently. He doesn't tell her that even if he does find somebody else, it's not going to be the same. They're not going to be Éponine.
He'll make other friends, but he won't forget her.
He first meets him when he is twelve years old.
It's autumn and the first day of middle school, and he accidentally runs into someone when he's trying to find his homeroom, and his backpack hits the floor, all his books tumbling out.
He sighs wearily. Nothing will ever change, will it? He crouches down to gather his things, and a long-fingered, elegant hand reaches out and grabs his copy of Animal Farm before he can do it himself.
"Orwell, huh? I love his work," the other boy says, and Combeferre looks up to see golden hair and clear blue eyes, and swallows heavily. He looks like the very embodiment of a summer god, straight out of the books Combeferre would read to Éponine.
(Combeferre likes summer. It's his favorite season, for obvious reasons.)
"Have you read his other books?" Combeferre asks.
The other boys smiles, and there's something terribly intense and passionate about the bright, sharp curve of it. "Yes," he says. "Animal Farm's my favorite, though. You have good taste." He extends a hand to help Combeferre up, his grip firm and steady, strange for a boy who can't be any older than Combeferre himself.
He keeps hold of his hand afterward, says confidently, "I'm Enjolras. What's your name, Comrade?"
(His eyes are glinting with mischief and challenge, and Combeferre remembers the last time he met someone who shone like this, and he can feel his heart stir all over again.)
"Combeferre," he says. "It's nice to meet you."
It's the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
Enjolras is all things fierce and beautiful and terrible, more like the ancient gods than Combeferre could ever have imagined when he first met him.
Now when he reads the tales of Zeus and Poseidon and Hades tearing down the old regime and rebelling against the Titans, he imagines that the god of the underworld wears Enjolras's face—Zeus is too arrogant, Poseidon too fickle, but the serious god who rules over the lost and forgotten ones, punishes the evil, and makes all his judgments with calm, implacable justice fits him just right.
He tells him this one day, and Enjolras gifts him with one of his rare, soft smiles, and asks who he would be.
"Chiron," he replies automatically, remembering a fluffy duck and a lovely smile and warmth in his heart. "I'd be Chiron."
"The mentor and guide of heroes," Enjolras says, nodding. "It suits you. Good choice."
Later, after Enjolras has come to take up as much space in his heart as Éponine (not more, never more, but equal), he will show him the letters, and tell the story of the swift-footed, laughing-eyed Artemis who had been his friend and his light and his goddess.
But for now, he simply says, "Thank you," keeping the fact that the name of Chiron had been a gift and not a choice silent.
He falls in love with Enjolras sometime in their third year of high school, and doesn't realize it well until their second year of college, right when the object of his affections stands up in the middle of their philosophy class to give an impromptu speech on the importance of feminism.
He blinks, shocked out of his mind at the sudden epiphany, and doesn't have the presence of mind to stop Enjolras from yelling at the professor and getting them both thrown out of class.
It takes him a few days to go over his feelings.
It's different than it was with Éponine—Éponine had been a lightning bolt, an earthquake, shaking the very foundations of his world and setting his soul on fire.
Enjolras had been a friend first, a leader second, and it wasn't until hours and hours of quiet laughter and stirring conversations, and more rallies and debates and protests (and a few parties and drunken revels here and there to appease Courfeyrac and Grantaire) than Combeferre can remember that he realizes he wants Enjolras as a lover, too.
Now how to tell his best friend that...
He's unsuccessfully come up with and discarded several plans, and he's watching Enjolras talking to a petite blond girl at one of Courf's parties when he decides to just fuck it.
He steals a shot from Grantaire, ignores his friend's annoyed "Hey!" and tosses it back for courage.
He can do this. It's no big deal.
He starts striding across the room to where Enjolras is when Courf yells, "Combeferre! You left your book behind!"
He ignores him and keeps on walking.
"Combeferre? Simon Combeferre?" says a woman's voice, low and husky and full of startled surprise.
He'd have ignored her, too, if she hadn't grabbed his arm and turned him around to face her. She's a pretty thing, all dark hair and smoky eyes, and she has on a silver dress the exact same shade as moonlight, and normally he'd be flattered at her attention, but he has to go tell his best friend he's in love with him.
"Excuse me," he tells her angrily, "but I'm busy right now and—"
"Simon!" The woman—no, girl, really—throws her arms around him and laughs.
Combeferre freezes. That laugh…
The girl pulls back, and there it is, that lovely, achingly gorgeous smile that had stolen his heart all those years ago, a decade older but just as gut-wrenching. "I'm sorry," she says, "you probably don't remember me, but—"
"Éponine," he says stunned and happy and desperate all at once. It's his turn to surprise her as he envelopes her in a bone-crushing hug, running his hands up and down her back as if to make certain she isn't a dream. "My God, is it really you?" he asks.
She laughs again. "It really is." She takes his face in her hands, rubbing her thumbs over his cheekbones, and he leans into the familiar, never-forgotten touch. "You haven't changed at all," she says, her voice filled with wonder.
"You—you haven't, either," he gets out.
She raises a brow at him. "Really? Not even a little bit?"
No. You're still the most beautiful thing I've ever seen, he wants to tell her. But he can't get the words out, so instead he shakes his head and doesn't say anything more, just looks at her and looks at her and looks at her like he'll never get enough.
She smiles at him as if she can hear exactly what he isn't saying, then starts in surprise before turning around and pulling him after her. "Oh! I should introduce you to Cosette again! We came here with her boyfriend, Marius, and she's—"
"Marius?" Combeferre repeats dumbly. Cosette—Marius's Cosette—of course she would be the same Cosette, it isn't as if it's a common name, why didn't he think to ask if it was the same person, he could have found Éponine again ages ago—
Éponine stops them right in front of the blond girl and Enjolras.
Enjolras.
Combeferre feels a sickening sort of confusion as he suddenly remembers what it was he was planning on telling him tonight, before Éponine came crashing back into his life, and his heart feels like it's being torn in two directions as he glances from Éponine to his best friend.
Enjolras looks at him in confusion. "Combeferre, what's wrong? You look like you've seen a ghost. Are you al—"
"Cosette!" Éponine laughs, interrupting him. "I found Simon!" She holds up their joined hands triumphantly, and the other girl's mouth drops open.
"Simon? What—oh, of course, Combeferre! I can't believe it! Why didn't I pay better attention when Marius when telling me about you? Oh, it's so good to see you," Cosette says, smiling prettily at him. "Éponine was just talking about you the other day—"
"Cosette!" Éponine yells, blushing.
"You talk about me still?" Combeferre says, pleasantly surprised and inordinately happy.
"Éponine?" Enjolras says, a frown settling upon his face as he looks at the two of them. "Your childhood sweetheart?"
"Friend, actually," Éponine corrects. "And you are?"
"Enjolras," he says. "I'm Combeferre's best friend." He holds his hand out for her to shake, and Éponine lets go of Combeferre to place her palm against his.
The second they touch, Enjolras's eyes widen and Éponine sucks in a breath, and there's something in their faces that causes Combeferre's heart to drop straight through the floor.
No.
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For the longest time he thinks he just imagined it, the little frisson that went through both of them when they first touched.
After all, nothing much actually changes. Éponine fits surprisingly well into their group, with she and Cosette forming a girls' corner with Musichetta, Joly's pretty girlfriend, and Aimée, Bahorel's fiancée with the throaty, full-bodied laugh, whenever Les Amis hangs out in La Musain. She trades barbs with Grantaire, teases Marius, listens to Jehan's poems, brings good luck charms from her elderly Chinese neighbor for Bousset, models Feiully's fans, jokes with Courfeyrac, arm-wrestles with Bahorel, and solemnly assures Joly that no, the rash on his elbow is not a symptom of Chagas disease.
And she always, always sits next to him, dropping a hand to his knee and smiling widely whenever he says something she likes.
She and Enjolras, however—
They don't get along. At all. They argue and debate and yell at each other, and Combeferre more often than not has to be the voice of reason and talk them down out of their towering rages.
This, more than anything else, is what convinces him that he must have been seeing things that weren't there, must have been too drunk to observe properly that first time, or just too confused at seeing the two people he cares about most in the world interacting to make sense of things.
Just look at the way they hate each other.
She's on the track team here at their university, ever his swift-footed Artemis, with a full-ride scholarship that's paying for her business degree, which is one of the many reasons Enjolras dislikes her, claiming that she is nothing more than a corporate sell-out.
Éponine just thins her lips and glares, and Combeferre is the one to leap in to defend her. She hasn't had the chances or the support that Enjolras had—can he really blame her for picking the route that would give her the most stability?
"Why do you always take her side?" Enjolras asks angrily when they're alone. "You're my best friend."
Combeferre, having opened his mouth to explain yet again that Éponine is entitled to make whatever choices she pleases, shuts it with a click and blinks in surprise. "Are you jealous?" he asks incredulously.
Enjolras glares at him, but he's pretty sure the red in his cheeks is from embarrassment, and not anger. "No," his best friend replies, crossing his arms and looking huffily into the distance. "I just feel that between Marius mooning over Cosette and you trailing after Éponine like a lost puppy, nobody has time anymore to take our causes seriously—"
"I'm here for you, Enjolras," Combeferre says, his heart full of aching tenderness for this marble man of his who is only too human underneath it all, however unwilling he is to show it. "I'll always be here for you."
Enjolras only glances at him from the corner of his eye, but his posture relaxes, and from then on, he treats Éponine with a smidgen or so more civility than he used to.
Just a smidgen, mind you.
Combeferre belatedly realizes that the main reason Enjolras had disliked Éponine so much was because he's never had to share Combeferre before.
He laughs for five minutes straight, until he has to stop to wave away Joly's concerned questions.
It isn't until later that he thinks to wonder why it is that Éponine dislikes Enjolras, and Éponine being a much more forthcoming person than Enjolras is, he merely asks her.
She shrugs, never once taking her eyes from the t.v. "He was a dick. And he didn't seem to realize you were mine, too."
Oh. Well. That answers that.
He never asks her why she stopped writing to him.
She never asks him when he stopped writing to her.
(The truth is that he never did; there are bundles of letters he'd written but never sent, and only Enjolras has ever seen them.)
Life has not been as kind to Éponine as Combeferre would have wished, and it shows in the way she acts and the way she talks, in the set of her shoulders and the jut of her chin, in how she presents a hard-eyed, challenging, and distrustful front to the whole world, standing tall and straight like she's daring it to try and knock her over.
It's in the way that her waist is too tiny in his hands when they dance together, and her clothes are too threadbare to have been designed that way, and her words are too sharp whenever she meets someone new, as if she expects them to hurt her and decides to strike first.
It's in the way that she never talks about her parents, except to mention that they have nothing to do with her now. It's in the way that she argues on the phone for hours with her siblings' social worker, and sobs angrily after she loses. It's in the way she flinches whenever Bahorel slams his palm against the table to emphasize his point, and her shoulders instinctively hunch as if waiting for a blow.
(At this last, Combeferre—perhaps the least violent of all their friends, with the exception of Jehan—feels his hands ball into fists and his mouth pull back into a snarl, and a restless, seething anger takes him over.
Never again, he promises to himself. Never again will she ever suffer like that.)
So it so much more of a gift when she lets her guard down for him, when she entwines his hand in hers, when she so trustingly leans her head against his shoulder, especially now that she is no longer the carefree, happy girl he knew, but instead a young woman with shadows in her eyes and scars on her skin.
She doesn't do that for anyone else but him, and sometimes Cosette, so he does his very best to make her smile that lovely, incomparable smile at him. He does his best to make her forget, and he does it by giving her better things to remember.
He brings her coffee with a hint of cinnamon in the mornings, buttery French rolls and celery in the afternoons, and Chinese take-out at night. He watches endless hours of Doctor Who with her, rents Hercules and every other Disney movie under the sun, wordlessly passes her the tissues when they decide to have a Studio Ghibli marathon. He drives her places, lets her crash on his couch, wheedles her into going to the animal shelter he volunteers at.
"I can't believe you're actually going to be a vet," she tells him laughingly as they try to coax a Great Dane into taking a bath. "Montparnasse will have free healthcare for the rest of his life," she says, naming her finicky, beautiful Siamese cat who has a tendency to steal people's food from right under their noses.
"Anything for you," he says, smiling at her, his heart thumping wildly when she smiles back.
He means it. He'd do anything.
Anything but this, that is.
"What's wrong?" Éponine says as she pulls back, staring at him in concern.
He puts a hand to his mouth, still wet from where she'd just kissed him, hot and greedy and entirely unexpected. "I—you—you kissed me," he says.
"Well, yes," she says, smiling, but there's a hint of uncertainty in her eyes, so at odds with her usual bold confidence. "I figured you'd never make the first move, so—"
"I'm in love with Enjolras," he blurts out.
Her eyes widen. "Oh," she says, the single syllable a hollow, broken sound. "I thought—the past few months have been—I misunderstood, I'm sorry." She gets up and pulls on her jacket, fumbling with the sleeves as she bends her head away from him.
He gets up and goes to her. "Don't cry," he tells her. "Don't cry. I'm sorry, don't leave, I was being an idiot." He takes her face in his hands and wipes away her tears with shaking fingers, cursing himself for being so stupid. What else was she supposed to think, with the way he treated her? She's had so little kindness in her life; of course she'd mistake a friend's love for something more.
(Is it just a friend's love? a corner of his mind whispers. You've loved her since the day you met her, pined after her for years and years, and you never stopped, not even when you fell for Enjolras. The minute you saw her again, you forgot all about him—
Shut up, shut up, he whispers fiercely back.)
"First Marius, now you," she says, forcing out a laugh. "What's wrong with me, falling in love with men who are already in love with my friends?"
"You consider Enjolras a friend?" he says, surprised.
She rolls her eyes. "Of course I do. He's your closest friend, I figured he'd be the best man at our wedding, so I'd have to get used to him now."
"Our wedding?" he repeats. God, he sounds like a mindless parrot, but he can't help it right now. He's so confused.
She bites her lip, looking suddenly sheepish, just the way she used to when she'd disobeyed one of the neighborhood parents and got caught. "Do you remember when we were seven, and you proposed to me?" she says softly.
He nods. He'd gotten down on one knee and given her a Ring Pop, she'd said yes and kissed him on the cheek, and he'd refused to wash his face for days afterward.
He remembers it as if it were yesterday; he remembers everything about her.
She takes a deep breath. "And do you remember how I told you that you would be a vet, and I would be an actress, and we'd live in a house with lots of cats and maybe a dog if one of our kids wanted one?"
He nods again.
"Well…growing up, after—after everything went wrong, I used to imagine that I would meet you again, and we would get married, and you would take care of me like you always promised you would. I stopped after a while, because daydreams were pretty useless, and I figured I was just exaggerating all your good qualities anyway. Nobody's that nice in real life."
His heart turns painfully in his chest.
She looks down at their joined hands. "And then I met you again, and you were better than the fantasy. I couldn't believe it—I didn't believe it at first, actually. I tried so hard not to read anything into it, reminded myself that we'd been kids and you'd moved on, and obviously I should, too. But then you treated me just like you always did, like I made your day just by fucking breathing, and you brought me food, and you invited me places, and you let me name one of the rescued dogs…and Cosette was telling me that I was being an idiot. That you liked me, duh."
He winces.
"So I started thinking again, maybe, maybe I could have that dream. Maybe I could make it come true." She smiled up at him. "I was wrong. Obviously. I'm always wrong when it comes to stuff like this, seriously, my theme song would be titled 'On My Own' or something—"
"It wouldn't," he insists. "It would be 'Something Amazing,' or 'Éponine Rocks,' or, or—"
"Stop it, you suck at creating fake band names, what makes you think you'd be any better at song titles?" she says, her smile not quite reaching her eyes.
He leans down and kisses her forehead, then trails his lips over each eye, down the bridge of her nose, following each of her silvery tear tracks. "I could try for you," he says. "If you want this, I could try for you—"
Because he was wrong. He'd do anything for her. Anything. Even this.
She considers it; he sees her weigh his offer in her mind; he sees the exact second she decides to turn him down. He barely manages to keep in a sigh of relief.
(Or was it one of disappointment? that cold corner of his mind asks.
Shut up, shut up.)
"No," she says. "No. Besides, don't you think I'd be doing the world a favor if I helped Enjolras get laid? Your professors would certainly think so."
He gives a bark of laughter, and holds her tightly in his arms, crushing her to him like he'll never let her go. "Thank you, thank you, thank you," he whispers into her hair.
She closes her eyes.
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...
Weirdly, things go back to normal, though he tries awkwardly avoiding Éponine a few days after the disastrous kiss, since he figures she'd want some space, yes? And, no, he is not being a coward about this.
(Liar, liar.
Shut up, shut up.)
But eventually she gets fed up, so she hunts him down and yells some sense into him.
"I'm a big, tough girl!" she shouts. "I can tie my own sandals and everything!"
(Yes, she just quoted Hercules at him. It's their movie, and Megaera is honestly like the animated version of Éponine, all gruff swagger laid over a heart as good as gold and fragile as glass. She laughed when he told her this, a few days after they met again, and laid her hand on his arm and asked, "So does that make you my Hercules?"
…In hindsight, he really should have seen the signs.)
Their friends laugh and cheer her on (she'd kept the yelling non-specific, not mentioning his confession or her confession, for which he was grateful—Enjolras was right there), and Courfeyrac yells, "Just kiss and make up already!"
Éponine blanches a little, but manages to cover it up by rolling her eyes. "Idiot, we're not like that. I take payment in coffee, not kisses."
He gets the hint and gets up to buy her one, a cinnamon dolce latte, her favorite.
When he gets back to their table, he hands it to her and starts to take his usual seat.
"No," she says archly, a hint of mischief in her gaze. "I have forgiven you enough to take your coffee, but not enough to let you bask in my glory. That'll take three more days of being my slave. Go sit over there," she says, tilting her chin at the seat across from Joly.
He stares at her in confusion, a little hurt. "But I always sit by you."
She gives him an incredulous look, similar to the ones she bestows on Montparnasse when he's gotten himself trapped in a tree. "Not today, you don't," she says pointedly.
He looks at the spot she indicated and realizes it's next to Enjolras.
Oh. Oh!
He moves to obey her, and his best friend shuffles aside enough to let him pass.
"He's a grown man, Thénardier," Enjolras says, not looking up from the speech he's writing. "He can sit where he wants."
"He is sitting where he wants," she shoots back, and her gaze meets Combeferre's, a world of meaning in her eyes.
Be happy, she silently tells him. Don't worry about me.
His thigh brushes against Enjolras's as he settles down, but the usual rush of heat at the contact is accompanied by a sense of guilt and loss, and he can't help but wish for a fleeting moment that her hand was on his other knee, squeezing it gently as he says something to make her smile.
But no. He's chosen Enjolras, and if there's one thing Combeferre is, it's loyal, and he won't betray his best friend, not even for his first one.
It's selfish to even consider having both of them.
Right?
"Okay, you aren't puppy-like enough to pull off a Marius, so you have to stop this, Simon," Cosette says as she drops her bag by his feet and sits down across from him.
He blinks at her, looking up from his laptop where he's been trying to write a fifteen-page paper and not thinking about how to finally confess to Enjolras. "What?"
She looks at him, earnest and serious and friendly, the little girl he'd known and liked grown into a beautiful, lovely young woman. "You can't pull a Marius. You can't make Éponine your wingman when you're trying to woo the love of your life—that's just cruel."
He reaches out and slowly shuts his laptop. "I'm not," he says carefully. It's really not his fault that the three of them have been hanging out more and more lately—Enjolras has finally decided to make use of Éponine's not inconsiderable business savvy in their campaigns, and Combeferre finds that he often has to be there to mediate if they want to get any work done.
Cosette searches his face and finds something in his expression that makes her shoulders droop. "Oh, great. Then it's just Éponine being a martyr again, isn't it?"
"…lately I feel like I've been missing half the information in my conversations. Would someone please just tell me what's going on?" he asks, half exasperated, half genuinely concerned.
Cosette rubs her nose, a habit familiar to him from childhood. "Éponine…did she tell you how she was in love with Marius?"
He nods cautiously.
"And did she tell you how she basically coached him through half of his dates with me? How she'd run messages back and forth so my dad wouldn't freak out? How she went way above the call of duty to make sure our relationship worked out? How she did all this while knowing him first and being in love with him longer, all because she wanted him to be happy and she wanted me to be happy?"
He gapes at her. "I thought you both just had a crush on him, and she gave up on him after he decided to date you."
Cosette closes her eyes and sighs. "I wish. She didn't even tell me she liked him before she introduced us—you know how she doesn't like airing details about her personal life. And I just fell for him so fast that I didn't notice…"
"How much you were hurting her?" he asks gently.
She nods, teary-eyed. "I don't want you to make the same mistakes," she whispers. "Especially since half this mess was my fault in the first place. If I hadn't told her to go after you—"
"Not your fault," he interrupts. "I mean, it's not exactly obvious that—"
"—that you're gay? It kinda is, actually. I just have a sucky gaydar, Éponine always makes fun of me—"
"I was going to say it's not obvious that I'm in love with Enjolras. I'm bisexual," he explains.
"Oh," she says, blinking. "Well, either way, I just want you to be careful. Éponine doesn't think she needs people to take care of her, but she does. Everybody does."
"I'll be careful," he promises. Were it anyone else, he'd take offense that they would even have to ask him to watch after Éponine, but this is Cosette, her oldest and dearest friend. The only person besides her siblings that she possibly loves more than Combeferre. If anyone has the right to be worried about her, it's Cosette.
"Thank you," she says, before biting her lip. "So…could you hold off asking Enjolras out for a week or two? Just long enough for Éponine to get back on her feet?"
He nods. That's an easy enough promise to keep.
It's been six months since that night he almost confessed, after all, and he still hasn't made a move. Cosette has nothing to worry about.
You see, it's difficult to tell Enjolras of his feelings when he's not drunk. In fact, the closest he'd ever gotten was the night when he met Éponine again. After that, he'd had second thoughts, and third thoughts, and fourth thoughts, and they all revolved around the fact that if he said anything, everything would change.
He wasn't sure he wanted it to.
He looks at Enjolras sometimes, and he's so beautiful it hurts, not least because whether it's working on a poster campaign, or writing scathing articles, or even just discussing the latest Game of Thrones episode, Enjolras is always full of passion, of fire. He shines so brightly that Combeferre is more than a little convinced that no one can get close to him without getting burned.
But then he'll glance over at Combeferre, amusement in his eyes and an inside-joke in the quirk of his mouth, and smile at him, soft and earnest and only at him, and the words "I love you," rise unbidden to Combeferre's lips.
He bites them down, however.
Enjolras has made his opinion on romantic attachments in regards to himself clear, and Combeferre knows better than to ask for something his best friend can't give.
He tries explaining this to Éponine and fails miserably.
"Just tell him," she insists. She'd explained to him that if he wouldn't have her, he'd bloody better well get off his ass and go after the person he does want.
"It's not that easy," he snaps back.
"Of course it is!" she says, rolling her eyes.
"And how you would know?" he says, his mouth bypassing his higher brain functions in his anxiety. "It's not like you're dating anyone!"
She looks absolutely devastated for one heart-breaking moment, and he immediately wants to find the nearest several-story building and throw himself off of it.
She recovers before he does. "No, but the worst he can do is say no. He won't stop being your friend because of it. Enjolras isn't that kind of person."
He looks at her suspiciously. "Have you met Enjolras?"
She raises a brow at him. "Have you, if you even have to doubt what I'm saying? He's the fairest person I know—he makes quick judgments, sure, but they're rarely wrong, and when they are, he'll listen to reason and change them. He'll give you a chance. Take it."
But I'm not brave, he wants to tell her. Not when it comes to things like this. I'm not like you.
And he's not. He really, really isn't. Otherwise, when she kissed him on The-Night-That-Must-Never-Be-Mentioned, he would have stopped her the moment he read her intent in her eyes.
(Or you would have kissed her back.
Shut up, shut up.)
He says nothing, and after a few moments, she heaves a sigh and snuggles against him. "You know, when I told you I would be your talky person and you would be my quiet person, I wasn't actually expecting to do all your talking for you."
He smiles a little wistfully. "Oh, yes, you were."
"So you want me to go up to Enjolras tomorrow and say, 'Hey, wanna fuck Combeferre? Because he's got the hots for you, just saying, and if you don't tap that, I will'?"
"Don't you dare."
She laughs. "You've got three months, Simon. After that, we're going with Plan B."
He sighs and kisses her forehead. "Whatever you say, Éponine."
Three months. He could do it.
Maybe.
Enjolras isn't cooperating, however. He always has a test to study for, or a personal project to work on, or a new protest to plan. And they're never, ever alone together—they only see each other at La Musain when all the Les Amis are gathered, or in classes, or at parties.
If Combeferre didn't know any better, he would have said Enjolras was avoiding him.
He mentions this to Éponine, who furrows her brow.
"Really? He always has time to hang out with me. You sure you're not just imagining things?"
"No, which is why I'm asking you if anything's weird."
"Not that I've noticed. He's a little more stressed out, maybe, but then he's Enjolras. You know how he gets," she says, something casually possessive in her tone, as if Enjolras is hers to know, hers and nobody else's.
That odd feeling of dread he felt when their hands first touched returns, and he angrily pushes it away.
No. He's just imagining things.
There's nothing to worry about.
Even though he isn't spending a lot of time alone with Enjolras, he is spending an inordinate amount time with Enjolras and Éponine.
The two of them make a decidedly dynamic duo once they've gotten over their mutual hatred. They still argue and debate and fight as passionately as ever, but the edge of genuine anger that once accompanied their words is replaced with a tolerant sort of amusement, turning their loud interactions into friendly (albeit forceful) banter.
At first, Combeferre sits back contentedly at their little meetings, happy to watch them enjoy themselves so much. Nobody else can quite get Enjolras so riled up with such apparent ease, and nobody else is stubborn enough to really challenge Éponine. They're good for each other, he thinks, the two brightest people he knows encouraging each other to greater and greater heights.
As long as he's there to put out the resulting fires, everything should be fine.
Still, sometimes there's a look in Enjolras's eyes that he's never seen before, a sort of burning intensity that's different from way his eyes light up when he's talking about one of his causes. And it's only there if Éponine's in the room.
And sometimes, Enjolras will run his hand through his hair or gesture wildly to make his point, and Éponine's fingers will reach out almost involuntarily, as if she's about to touch him before she catches herself and goes back to yelling at him instead.
And always, always, there's a strange kind of tension that fills the room whenever they end an argument and stare each other down, breathing hard, postures straight, perfectly balanced, until one of them cracks and flashes the other a smile and a quick nod of the head.
They're worthy opponents, the two of them, and Combeferre has gotten so used to convincing them not to fight over custody of him that it takes him a while to realize he's jealous of this new relationship they have with each other.
It's an unsettling insight, that the two of them might fit together better than either of them fit with him.
It's an insight he does his best to forget, though he never quite succeeds.
"So what're you getting your girlfriend for her birthday?" Courfeyrac casually asks.
Combeferre blinks and pushes up his glasses. "I'm sorry, were you talking to me?"
"Uh, yeah? Éponine is the only person with a birthday coming up. Who else would I be talking to?"
He stares at his friends, who simply look back at him expectantly, all except for Enjolras, who keeps his back turned to the group, though Combeferre can see his shoulders tense beneath his red jacket. "I'm not dating Éponine," he says pointedly.
"Get out, man!" Bahorel laughs. "Do you even hear what the fuck you're saying? Look, we know you don't like talking about your personal life and shit, but we're your friends. Not like we're going out and telling everybody your business."
"Wait, we should send Marius outside first, otherwise that statement isn't true," Grantaire says with a wink.
"Guys!" Marius protests as everyone bursts out laughing.
"Seriously, though, Éponine and I aren't dating," Combeferre says after the chuckling dies down. "We're just friends."
"Aw, you serious? You mean I could've been hitting on her all this time without breaking bro-code?" Courfeyrac complains.
"As if she'd even give you the time of day," Joly scoffs.
The group soon turns to other matters, such as Courfeyrac's exact desirability quotient amongst the ladies, and the subject is forgotten.
At least until it's just him and Enjolras, working alone together for the first time in what feels like forever.
"You really aren't dating Éponine?" his best friend asks seemingly out of the blue. His intense blue eyes bore into Combeferre's, and the other man can feel his heart thump in his chest.
"No," he says, his throat suddenly dry. "We're not."
Enjolras's shoulders lose the tension that's been plaguing them all night. "That's…unexpected," he says, his tone mostly impassive, but Combeferre thinks he can hear the relief underneath it. "With her being the great love of your childhood, I thought—"
"The love of my childhood, yes. But I've grown up," Combeferre interrupts.
"Oh. Good," Enjolras says.
Combeferre waits for him to say something more, anything more, but he just goes back to shuffling papers.
Tell him, Éponine's voice whispers in his mind. Tell him how you feel. Look how obvious he's being.
Later, he replies silently. I'll tell him properly later.
Her voice sighs. Do it soon. You'll never know how much time you'll have, she warns before fading away.
But Combeferre is twenty-one-years-old, and he thinks he has all the time in the world to wait for Enjolras to be ready.
He's wrong.
...
...
...
Everything changes on the night of Éponine's birthday.
Les Amis have all chipped in, and they're taking her out to a fancy dinner at a high-class restaurant, with Courfeyrac demanding, "Everyone has to come totally pimped out! Marius, that means you're letting Cosette pick out your clothes—no, don't argue, you're fucking colorblind, man."
Everyone's gathered in the private dining area they rented for the party, talking and laughing and being their usual outrageous selves, when the guest of honor finally walks in.
Combeferre would bet that everyone's jaw dropped to the floor upon seeing her.
Éponine is wearing a screaming red dress, eye-catching and bold and utterly, utterly her. It molds itself to her body like a lover's worshipful hands, clinging to the swell of her breasts, the bend of her waist, the curve of her hips, until falling in a sinuous swirl along the lines of her legs to stop just above her delicate ankles. The sleeves hang artfully off her shoulders, and when she turns to give her coat to the waiter, her bare back is revealed, inches of dusky, smooth skin covered by nothing except the long, lush waves of her dark, lustrous hair.
Combeferre literally can't breathe, she's so beautiful.
"Damn, Éponine!" Grantaire says appreciatively. "I could get drunk just looking at you!"
Everybody else crowds in around her, the women reaching out to touch the silky fabric of the dress and motioning for her to twirl around and show it off, the men falling over themselves to shower her with compliments.
Éponine's eyes cut straight past all of them to meet his own, and his heart slams against his chest, his blood roaring in his ears. Her mouth quirks just the tiniest bit, and she takes a step forward as if to meet him.
He starts to raise his hand to reach for hers, suddenly eager to feel the soft skin between her fingers—
"You look beautiful."
The room goes instantly quiet, the way any room always does when Enjolras pronounces something with that tone of voice that marks it as indelibly, inarguably true.
Combeferre turns his head to see his best friend staring at Éponine, something warm and intimate in his gaze, as if they were the only two people in the room. As if he had eyes for only her.
Éponine is staring back at him, speechless for once, the moment stretching on and on until she finally clears her throat and says, "Thanks. You look nice, too, pretty boy."
Combeferre doesn't think he's imagining the husky, breathless quality in her words, or the way her eyes linger over Enjolras's broad shoulders and slim hips, clothed to perfection in a sleek charcoal gray suit.
He's definitely not imagining the smile Enjolras gives her, a smile Combeferre has never seen before, inviting and challenging and almost wicked with the way one corner of his mouth curves up more than the other.
No.
Then Marius interrupts in his usual, timely way. "Enjolras, what's wrong with your face?" he asks, eyes wide. "Look at you! You're smiling! With teeth!"
Enjolras immediately looks at him and scowls. "Yes, Marius, I imagine that's how a smile works," he says scathingly.
Everyone laughs, and the moment is sufficiently broken, with the rest of the dinner progressing without a hitch.
But Enjolras never takes his eyes off Éponine, and whenever Éponine glances back at him—though she seems to be making a concerted effort not to, which is worrying in and of itself—Combeferre can see for a moment or two what it looks like when two people are so enraptured with each other that the whole universe falls away, leaving only him and only her.
Leaving Combeferre behind.
At least until Éponine turns to face him, taking his face in her hands and tracing his cheekbones, smiling at him as he tells her happy birthday, her eyes on him and no one else.
(Had he been able to tear his eyes away, he would have seen the flash of jealousy in Enjolras's, quick and fleeting but there nevertheless.)
He dreams that night.
In his dream, she is Artemis and he is Actaeon, the disciple who dared look upon what no man had any right to touch, a goddess in full glory standing unashamed in moonlight. Her dark eyes, originally warm and joyful, turn cold and deadly as she beholds him there. With a single sharp word, she transforms him into a stag—a king of the forest, a prize for the hunters. With a piercing whistle, she calls upon his own hounds and sets them upon him, and though he runs and runs, he cannot escape them.
He is torn to pieces as she watches, the icy look of displeasure never once leaving her face.
He opens his eyes, and he is in the Underworld, his recently acquired antlers in his hands. He gives them to the Ferryman as payment for his passage, and he is taken before the judges of Hades, kings all, as he was the son of a king in life.
Will he go to the Asphodel Meadows? The Pits of Tartarus? The Fields of Punishment? Once, he would have guessed the Elysian Fields, a reward of serving his goddess well, but she has turned on him, the loss of her regard the price he pays for one moment of utter, perfect ecstasy.
He is not sure he would have chosen differently, had he been given the chance to do it all again. The sight of her is still burned into his eyes, and even if they consign him to the deepest hell, they cannot take that from him.
"Send him to the Fields of Punishment," a smooth, low voice says, and he lifts his head to see the Lord of the Dead himself walk towards him, as golden and bright as the realm that shares his name is dark and shadowed.
"He looked upon the Virgin Huntress. Let him have his eyes gouged out, day after day, and let men hear his cries and remember their place. The Goddess of the Moon was not meant for mortal hands," he solemnly intones.
He feels his mouth stretch into a grin. "Jealous, O God of the Lost?" he asks. "I have gazed upon divinity itself, seen perfection that you can't even imagine, and not even this will wipe the memory of her from my mind. I will remember. Tell my goddess that she will have to come and offer me the waters of Lethe from her own two hands before I will forget her."
"So be it," Hades—Enjolras—says. He reaches out to trace Actaeon's—Comberre's—face, and his impassive gaze the last thing he sees before he wakes.
He doesn't know what the dream means, but it leaves a sour taste in his mouth.
"Are you and Enjolras…?" Combeferre trails off, not knowing how to finish that sentence, not knowing if he even wants to.
"Having an argument over his continued refusal to acknowledge that Daenerys is the most bad-ass character on the show? Yes, yes we are," Éponine quips flippantly, not bothering to take her eyes off her book.
"That's not what I meant," he says, exasperated.
This time, she looks up at him, and his expression has her putting her book down and coming over to him, straddling his lap and cradling his face in her hands, thumbs brushing over his cheekbones. "Simon," she says tenderly. "Nothing is going on. I promise." She leans her forehead against his, and he closes his eyes.
I love you, he wants to tell her, but even he's not sure what it means anymore when he says it to her, so he stays quiet.
She invites Les Amis to one of their movie nights and puts Hercules on so they can finally understand all the references the two of them make.
"Watch closely," she says. "Megaera is my Disney alter ego, and she completely steals the show."
"Like you do?" Courf says.
"Like I do," she replies, winking, then instructs everyone to settle down so she can start the movie. Combeferre ends up on her couch, sandwiched between the armrest and Éponine, while Enjolras sits at their feet.
As the movie progresses, Enjolras shoots him a look and says, "I hope it wasn't this incarnation of Hades you were comparing me to when we were younger."
Éponine laughs. "He thought you were like Hades? No way! You're not funny enough."
Enjolras frowns at her, but there's amusement glinting in his eyes. "You think so? I bet I could make you laugh."
"Prove it," she challenges.
He grabs her feet and tickles the soles, not stopping until Éponine falls off the couch and into his lap, shrieking with laughter.
"Quiet!" Musichetta says eventually. "We're at a good part!"
Combeferre looks up to see Megaera and Hercules onscreen, Hercules being his awkward self and confessing yet again.
"Meg, when I'm with you, I-I don't feel so alone," he says.
"Sometimes it's better to be alone," she says.
"What do you mean?" he asks.
"Nobody can hurt you," is her reply.
Combeferre feels like he's been punched in the gut, and he gets off the couch to join Éponine and Enjolras on the floor, suddenly needing to wrap himself around his oldest friend.
She smoothes a hand over his cheekbones and says, "Don't worry, Simon. She figures it out in the end."
Combeferre nods, but doesn't let go.
He sees Enjolras's hand creep towards Éponine's, then stop, and he doesn't know what to make of it, that his best friend would even be tempted to try and physically comfort someone.
It's so at odds with his usual demeanor.
The sinking feeling in his heart returns.
If he's being perfectly honest with himself, he loves them equally, exactly the same, one no more than the other.
If he's being really, really honest with himself, he'll admit he's equally in love with the both of them, too.
But Éponine left him, and he can't forget what it felt like to lose her, how she took the best of him with her, and how inevitable it had seemed afterwards—of course she left him. Of course. Why would she ever stay with somebody like him?
His goddess has always been too good for him. She deserves better. She deserves the best.
It's a few days later when his world falls apart.
He's running late to their weekly meeting to talk over their organization's finances, and even as he races up the steps he can already imagine the shouting. They don't do well alone together, Éponine's temper being as dark as gunpowder, Enjolras's anger burning bright as a spark—together the combination is explosive.
He pauses for a moment to catch his breath before opening the door and letting himself in.
And there is the yelling, right on schedule.
They're outside on the balcony, where they probably planned to bask in the summer sun before devolving into a heated shouting match. Éponine is jabbing her finger into Enjolras's chest as he gestures wildly with his hands, both of their faces flushed from anger.
He can tell from their frustrated expressions that it's one of the serious arguments, and he steps forward to intervene.
Before he can make his presence known, however, Enjolras grabs hold of Éponine's shoulders and he—
He kisses her.
Éponine's eyes widen in shock, and her hands reach up to fist in his golden hair, and Combeferre thinks that she'll pull him away from her, she has to pull him away from her, she can't do this to him, she can't—
But Enjolras moves his hands to her waist and pulls her in closer, kissing her like he's a dying man and she's his last breath of freedom, and she closes her eyes and kisses him back, molding herself to his body like she belongs there, placing her palm against the nape of his neck and holding his mouth fierce against hers.
They look right together, and Combeferre wonders how he could have missed it, all those moments when they were falling in love right in front of him, because that's what this is—it's love, written in every line of their bodies, in each desperate touch, in the way that Enjolras gasps out Éponine's name as if it's the only word he'll ever want to say again.
The second he does so, however, is the second she pulls away.
"What are you doing?" she shouts, perhaps not as loudly as she would have liked, as breathless as his kisses have left her.
"I thought that was obvious," Enjolras shoots back, touching his fingers to his swollen lips.
"Why? You don't even like me!" she yells.
"Yes, I do! I love you," Enjolras says, then his eyes widen in shock, as if he hadn't meant to say those words out loud.
Combeferre feels his heart break, tearing clean in half. No.
Éponine stares at him, mouth hanging open. "You—you—what?"
"That is to say, I—perhaps love isn't the word I'm looking for—I meant to say I care about you, that I've never felt like this before, that you make me—God, this isn't going according to plan at all," he says, running a nervous hand through his hair as he stands there, looking at her helplessly. "Look, perhaps could discuss this over coffee sometime—"
"Are you asking me out on a date?" she says, incredulous.
Enjolras takes a deep breath. "Yes."
"But why?"
"Because I like you."
Éponine looks at him, eyes huge and frightened and oh-so-vulnerable. "I'm sorry," she says, "I can't. I just can't."
Enjolras reaches for her again, but she steps away, frantically shaking her head.
"Why not?" he demands. "You want me, too, I know you do."
"Simon," she answers, holding her open hands in front of her as if she's asking for understanding.
"Ah," Enjolras says, his eyes softening. "I see." He reaches out to tuck a strand of dark hair behind her ear, something unspeakably tender about the action. "He doesn't love you like that. He told me."
I lied! I lied so you wouldn't think I didn't love you! Combeferre wants to scream, but his body is frozen and he can only watch as the scene unfolds in front of him, the actors unaware of their silent audience.
Éponine takes a shuddering breath. "I know," she says brokenly. "He told me, too."
Enjolras caresses her cheek. "Then give me a chance. Give me a chance to love you the way he doesn't," he says, laying his heart so easily at her feet, and Combeferre thinks he looks as brave and hopeful as she had been, months ago on The-Night-That-Must-Never-Be-Mentioned.
Éponine's eyes fill with a startled kind of wonder at his words, enraptured.
Combeferre turns and runs out the door before he can watch her say yes.
He does a pretty successful job of avoiding the both of them in the days after, but eventually his luck has to run out.
"Simon! Simon!" Éponine yells.
He turns around to face her, steeling himself against the heartbreak. "Hi, Éponine."
She smacks his shoulder in response. "Where have you been?" she says accusingly. "You've been avoiding me."
"I saw," he blurts out.
"Saw what?" Her tone is trying for casual, but her shoulders are too tense to pull it off.
"I saw you kiss him," he says, his turn to be accusing.
Her face instantly crumples, and she reaches out for him with both hands, but he pulls away. He can't take if she touches him, if she cradles his face like she's always done when he's worried or stressed or simply needed to remind himself that she's here, she's back, she's found him again.
It'll remind him that her touches belong to Enjolras now.
"I'm sorry," she says, wrapping her arms around herself instead. "I didn't mean to hurt you. I never meant to hurt you, Simon."
His heart is splintering in his chest, breaking for her and breaking for himself. "I know," he croaks out. "I forgive you."
Of course he forgives her. She's beautiful and brave and shines brighter than anyone he knows, save Enjolras.
Of course she would be the one he chooses, like calling to like, the gunpowder to his spark.
Of course.
He musters a smile. "You'll be good together."
She stares at him in disbelief. "What do you mean we'll be—? Oh, no, you thought I said yes? I turned him down, you idiot!"
He gapes at her. "What?"
"Do you think I would do that to you? Of course I turned him down! I would never betray you, Simon! Never!"
The first feeling that rushes over him is relief, but suspicion quickly follows. He looks carefully at her and replays her words in his mind, noting exactly what is was she said, and what it was she didn't. "If I wasn't in love with him, would you have said yes?" he asks slowly.
She blanches. "Of course not!"
He knows her to well not to hear the lie in her voice.
"You love him," he says, his voice leaden with resignation.
"I love you," she replies, but he notices how she doesn't deny it.
"But he doesn't," Combeferre says. "He loves you."
"No, he doesn't. We'd never work out. We drive each other crazy! He's just confusing lust with love," she argues.
He flinches and she winces in response.
"That came out wrong," she says.
"Say yes," Combeferre says abruptly.
"Huh?" She gapes at him.
"Say yes. You've done enough sacrificing for me; I want you to say yes and be happy and not worry about me." He grabs her hands and brings them to his lips. "Do something for yourself for once," he whispers fiercely.
"Are you sure?" she asks.
He nods, not trusting himself to say the words again.
He can see her weigh his offer in her mind, sees the exact moment when she decides to take him up on it, and he flashes back all those months ago to The-Night-That-Must-Never-Be-Mentioned, and he wonders how they went from him breaking her heart over Enjolras, to her breaking his over the same man.
(He knows the answer, though.
Anything for Éponine.)
"Thank you," she whispers, wrapping her arms around him and burying her face against his throat. "Thank you, thank you, thank you."
He closes his eyes.
...
...
...
He's right.
They're good together.
Admittedly, two of them do catch the rest of their friends off-guard, with the general attitude being, "I didn't even know they liked each other!"
But as the weeks pass by, everyone can agree that somehow, Éponine and Enjolras…work.
His speeches and articles stay impassioned and intense, but they've become more real, more understanding, a side-effect of seeing the scars poverty and injustice have left on Éponine up close. Her sharp words stay sharp, but she uses them with more care, no longer desperately defending herself against a world seemingly intent on battering her down, not now when she sees there are people willing to fight for someone like her.
Not now when she sees she's worth fighting for.
Combeferre wishes he'd been able to make her feel that way, but he missed his chance, and his goddess is in better hands now—the best.
He wishes he could be happy about that, but it's difficult when those hands belong to Enjolras, and he spends half his time being jealous of Enjolras for having Éponine, and the other half jealous of Éponine for having Enjolras.
It's a no-win situation, and the most frustrating thing about it is that it's his own damn fault.
They're not often physically affectionate, unlike Marius and Cosette, both of them being rather more private than the resident lovebirds—but the signs of their relationship are there for anyone who watches them closely.
And Combeferre watches them very closely indeed.
It's in the softening of Enjolras's mouth when he looks at her; it's in the way Éponine absent-mindedly reaches out a hand and runs it through his curls; it's in the way he automatically shifts his body to face hers; it's in the spark of her eyes when he walks into the room.
Combeferre watches them and watches them and watches them, and tries not to let the longing eat him up alive, or at the very least make sure it's not obvious to anyone else. He mostly succeeds, though once or twice he meets Cosette's compassionate gaze and knows there's at least one person he hasn't fooled.
It's alright. Éponine stops asking him if he's okay after the third week, so all the important people are convinced.
Combeferre doubts Enjolras even noticed.
He's wrong about that, as it turns out.
"Are you certain you're alright?"
"Hmm?" He looks up from his laptop to find his best friend staring intently at him. He nervously pushes up his glasses in reflex.
"Are you alright about Éponine and I being together?" Enjolras asks.
A distant corner of his mind notes how he says "being together"—not dating, not seeing each other—"being together" is the term he uses, as if it's an essential state of their existence. Mostly, however, Combeferre feels like he's been punched in the gut; he forgets sometimes how direct Enjolras can be.
"Yes," he manages to say, his voice surprisingly steady. "Why wouldn't I be?"
"You look at her sometimes," Enjolras says, his tone halfway between somewhat accusatory and merely inquisitive. "And I would swear it's the same way you always looked at her, but—" He breaks off and shakes his head. "Forget it. I'm being stupid and jealous."
You're not, Combeferre wants to say. I do look at her the way I've always done—I look at her like I'm in love with her. It's the same way I look at you.
But he knows how well that would go over and stays quiet, simply raising a brow in response.
Enjolras's mouth quirks in amusement. "I know, I know. I never would have pictured myself as the possessive boyfriend, either, but apparently I am."
"Really? I had you pegged as that from the moment we met. Don't you remember how you initially disliked Éponine because I started spending so much time with her instead of you?"
Enjolras groans. "Don't remind me. I was being a horrible friend and a terrible human being in general."
"Not really. I thought it was adorable," he teases.
"Well, I'm sorry about that," Enjolras says frankly. "And I'm sorry for avoiding you later."
Combeferre raises his eyebrows in surprise. "I knew I wasn't imagining things. What was that about, anyway?" he asks, genuinely curious.
Enjolras looks sheepish. "Well, after I got my head out of my ass and realized Éponine wasn't a professional friend-thief—"
"Though she is a friendly amateur thief," Combeferre notes.
"—she'd resent the 'amateur' label; did you know, she stole Grantaire's car keys when he was sober and he didn't even notice?—well, after that, I started noticing that she was…" Enjolras trails off, and Combeferre feels a sudden rush of understanding sympathy. How to put into words everything Éponine is?
(He's spent years trying and the closest he's ever gotten is "her smile holds my heart the way her hands hold my face—as if it's precious and beautiful and she never wants to let it go.")
"You started noticing that she was Éponine?" he says instead, prodding his friend.
Enjolras smiles. "Essentially, yes. It was highly distracting, and intensely annoying, and vastly inconvenient, and I absolutely despised the way everything Marius said about falling in love suddenly made sense."
Combeferre bursts out laughing.
"If you tell him or Grantaire that I said that, I will deny it with my dying breath," Enjolras says.
"Of course, of course, your secret's safe with me," he replies, waving him off. "But what does you falling in love with Éponine have to do with your sudden avoidance of me?"
Enjolras gives him an exasperated look. "Because I thought she was your girlfriend, you oblivious idiot," he says. He holds up a hand to forestall Combeferre's objections. "Which was a perfectly reasonable assumption, considering how you'd never even showed the slightest hint of interest in anyone until she came back into your life, upon which you suddenly transformed into the most perfect boyfriend imaginable."
"But I wasn't her boyfriend!" Combeferre protests. Hearing how different Enjolras's version of events from his and Éponine's was almost laughable.
Enjolras rolls his eyes. "I know that now. I didn't then. You have no idea how unbearably guilty I felt, falling in love with my best friend's girlfriend."
Combeferre bites down hard on his lip to counteract the sudden sting those words invoke in him. "So when I told you we weren't dating…?"
Enjolras shrugs. "I saw I had a chance and took it." He looks intently at Combeferre. "Are you sure you don't resent me for it? I know you told Éponine you weren't in love with her, but we've been best friends since we were twelve, and there's a box of letters under your bed addressed to her. Are you really over her?"
"Yes," he lies. "I told you, it was a childhood crush. Not that it would matter if it wasn't—she's with you and she's happy, and that's all I've ever honestly wanted for her."
Enjolras gives him one last considering look. "Alright," he says, apparently content with his answer.
That night, Combeferre goes out and gets wasted, coming home to an empty apartment and trying to forget how lonely his bed feels and how broken his heart is.
He walks in on them exactly once.
It's his fault, really, forgetting that he can't just stroll into Enjolras's apartment unannounced anymore, that there's somebody else who has a stronger claim to the space his best friend calls his own.
He doesn't think anything's out of the ordinary at first—it's quiet and peaceful, and he figures Enjolras is in his study, cooped up and working on a paper. He places the bagels he brought on the living room table, and starts making his way towards the hallway to drag him out and make sure he gets some food.
He stops dead in his tracks when he sees them in the kitchen.
Their love-making is surprisingly hushed, so unlike their usual outbursts and arguments that it takes a second for Combeferre to even register what it is he's seeing, the incontrovertible proof of them being together.
They don't notice him, too engrossed in each other. Éponine is sitting on the counter, legs wrapped around Enjolras's waist, one hand tangled in his hair as she places lazy kisses to his mouth, his cheeks, his eyelids. She's murmuring words to him, too softly for Combeferre to hear, but Enjolras groans in response and moves his hips more fervently against hers. One elegant, long-fingered hand wraps itself around her knee and lifts her closer to him, and she arches her body to meet him. His other hand is locked tight around her own, knuckles white as he presses it to the cupboard above her head, and there's something achingly lovely and intimate with how their fingers are linked in the same way their bodies are.
It's as if they can't bear to be parted, both of them straining to be as close to each other as possible.
The perfection of the picture they make is too much, and Combeferre turns and blindly stumbles out of the apartment.
All he can see is the two of them together, and how there is absolutely no room left for him.
Cosette invites them all to her family's house in the country for a week, just to enjoy themselves before summer ends.
Combeferre remembers her parents, her beautiful mother and her gentle father (technically her stepfather, but when has love and family ever been about technicalities?), and their absolute love for their daughter hasn't changed at all, if the way they enthusiastically envelope her (and Marius) in a group hug is any indication.
They remember him, too, Fantine welcoming him with a tight embrace and a bright smile identical to her daughter's, Jean with a hand on his shoulder and a "Good to see you, son."
They issue similar warm greetings to the rest of the Les Amis, but the way they treat Éponine is on another level entirely, almost as if she is another daughter. There's kisses pressed to her cheeks, exclamations over how well she looks, a quiet question about Azelma and Gavroche, and just the general sense that she is beloved and wanted and they are so very glad to see her.
Surprisingly, she takes it all in stride, merely shooting a disgruntled look at Cosette when the latter giggles and teases her that it's alright if she hugs them back, nobody will think she isn't the toughest girl alive if she does.
The first awkward moment comes when the rooms are assigned.
"Éponine, you and your Simon can share the attic room, and Courfeyrac, you and Joly can have—"
"Mom!" Cosette interrupts, mortified. "You can't put Simon and Éponine together!"
Her mother blinks at her. "Sweetheart, I was younger than you are now when I had you. Your father and I are aware of what young people get up to. It's not a problem," she says. She looks sternly at Combeferre. "But we do expect you to be responsible about it."
Combeferre blushes. "M-mrs. Valjean—"
"Aunt Fantine, we're not dating," Éponine says.
Fantine's mouth drops open. "Why not?"
Everyone else bursts out laughing, except for Combeferre and Cosette, the latter giving the former a look of sympathy.
"Yeah, we were surprised, too, but Éponine's actually with Enjolras here," Courfeyrac explains, clapping a hand on the impassive man's shoulder.
Jean suddenly turns a scrutinizing gaze on Enjolras and frowns. "Oh, really?"
Enjolras straightens in response and holds out a hand. "It's nice to meet you, sir."
"Mmm," he answers, still staring at him intently.
Fantine smacks his shoulder. "Stop that! We talked about this! You're supposed to be nice to the girls' boyfriends!"
"No, we agreed I would be nice to Marius because Cosette asked me to. All I said about Éponine's significant other was that it was a good thing if she was seeing Simon, since he was a trustworthy boy; I didn't say anything about this Enjolras," he says.
Éponine steps in front of her boyfriend and crosses her arms. "I like him," she pronounces. "You're not allowed to pull a Javert on him."
Fantine and Cosette laugh in response to this obvious family inside-joke, and Jean relaxes his posture and smiles ruefully. "Very well," he says, pressing an affectionate kiss to her cheek. "If you say so."
"I do," she says firmly, placing Enjolras's hands on her hips.
Fantine goes back to sorting out everyone's sleeping arrangements, and Combeferre ends up rooming with Feiully and Jehan and tries not to be jealous that Enjolras gets to stay in the attic room with the window seat that's perfect for two people to curl up in and read together.
He fails.
The week is a blur of picnics and hiking through meadows and swimming in the lake and taking lots of pictures of the quaint little town nearby, where the others are constantly disconcerted at how much the locals know about them without even having met them, while Éponine and Cosette are merely resigned, and Combeferre remembers enough from the summer when they were eight to take it in stride.
It's a perfect summer trip, and if his heart aches a little whenever he catches Éponine steal a kiss from Enjolras under the beech trees, well, it's a small price to pay.
Their last night there is when Fantine breaks out the home videos.
"Oh, no," Cosette moans, burying her face in Marius's shoulder. "Mom, don't!"
She merely grins at her daughter. "But sweetheart, don't you want to show off your father's impressive video-recording skills?"
"You mean how he caught every single embarrassing thing I ever did on camera? No!"
"Embarrassing? What? You were adorable," Jean insists.
"Daddy, I love you, but you are the dictionary definition of a doting parent," Cosette says. "Éponine, Combeferre, Marius, we're leaving."
"But, darling, I want to see you as a seven-year-old!" Marius exclaims.
"Yeah, so he can picture what your daughter will look like when you guys have kids," Courfeyrac says cheerfully.
Everyone laughs when Marius says, "Wow, that's a wonderful idea!"
The videos are more sweet than embarrassing, just a lot of hide and seek, and tea parties, and make-believe. Cosette and Éponine had wonderful imaginations, so Combeferre would often play the sleeping prince that Cosette-as-magician and Éponine-as-knight would have to rescue, or the mummy that the archaeologist-duo would have to uncover, or the injured tiger that they as savannah-explorers/adventurous-veterinarians would have to save. Anything that didn't involve too much running was great for him, so his asthma wouldn't act up.
"Wait, did they seriously make you Maid Marian when you guys played Robin Hood?" Courfeyrac asks, snorting.
"Hey! Simon as Maid Marian was a total bad-ass!" Éponine said. "We told you, Cosette was the best at climbing and hitting things with her slingshot, so obviously she was Robin Hood, and I could beat people up, so that made me Little John. And Simon was that smart one and provided the historical accuracy references, but we needed romance, so he couldn't be Friar Tuck."
"Why did you need romance?" Joly snickers.
"Because it was fun, duh!" Éponine rolls her eyes. "Look at Disney! Romance in every movie! You don't mess with a winning combination, my friends."
"Speaking of romance," Fantine says, "here's the last video of the night. Simon, I'm sure you remember this." She winks at him.
Puzzled, he turns to the t.v. screen, where Cosette and Éponine were putting dish-towels on their heads and—
"Oh!" he says. "It's our wedding!"
"Wow, Éponine, you're really rocking the curtain," Grantaire says dryly.
"It was a dish-towel, and shut up," she replies.
Cosette giggles. "We had so much fun putting on Mom's make-up, remember?"
"Yeah, poor Simon had to wait for hours," Éponine replies.
"You looked beautiful," Marius says, whereupon everyone starts yelling at him: "Please, say something else for once! It's like you're a broken record!"
Combeferre, though, catches Enjolras's low whisper: "You looked lovely, but then you always do."
He sees Éponine duck her head and smile, and tears his eyes away to stare at the t.v. screen.
Little Cosette is throwing flower petals across the yard as Éponine walks behind her, the both of them humming "Here Comes the Bride," as his younger self waits under the tree, staring at Éponine walking towards him like she was his every dream come true.
She smiles at him when she gets there and he lifts her veil. She smiles at him when he says his vows ("Do you swear to make her peanut butter sandwiches without jelly whenever she asks?" Cosette intoned. "I do," he answered.). She smiles at him when he leans forward and presses a clumsy kiss to her cheek.
She smiles at him as she tells him, "I love you."
She smiles wider when he blushes and looks at his feet before shyly saying it back, and the look in her eyes is so familiar but so unexpected that grown-up Combeferre's mouth drops open.
"Oh," he says, seeing that smile and that look, shocked beyond belief. "Oh, I didn't know—"
"Didn't know what?" Enjolras asks.
"Didn't know she looked at me like I looked at her," he says, not really paying attention to his words, just blurting out the truth.
He's too busy staring at the video that he doesn't see Éponine whip her head towards him, surprise on her face.
But Enjolras does, and his eyes turn thoughtful, looking between his girlfriend and his best friend.
Combeferre doesn't know it, but that's when things change.
A few days after they get back home, Éponine asks if she can hang out at his place for a while. Enjolras is far gone into a project, and he and Éponine haven't hung out together, just them, in a while, so Combeferre says yes.
They read books and watch t.v. until he receives a frantic call from the animal shelter, asking for his help. She waves him off and settles herself on his couch. "Go ahead," she says. "I'll be here when you get back."
The emergency takes a few hours to settle, though, and it's dark once he gets home.
"Éponine? You still here?" he says as he takes his shoes off by the door.
There isn't an answer, so he assumes she's gone home until he spies the light coming through the crack under his bedroom door. He smiles a little, imagining that Éponine decided his bed was a comfier place to read.
He pushes the door open. "How far have you gotten on—" he says, cutting off when he sees what's inside.
She looks up at him, an unreadable emotion in her eyes, an open box in her lap, and his letters strewn around her, a kaleidoscope map of a one-sided love affair a dozen years old.
He swallows roughly as the silence stretches on. "I can explain—" he starts to say.
"You know," she says thoughtfully, "that night I kissed you, you never did say you weren't in love with me."
He says nothing, but his heart is pounding in his ears.
"And when I asked Enjolras," she continues, "he said that you told him that we weren't dating, that I was the love of your childhood, and that you'd grown up."
She stands and walks toward him, the movement easy, graceful, and inherently seductive, not stopping until she's right in front of him.
He takes a shuddery breath as she lifts her hands and cups his face.
"You never said you stopped loving me," she says quietly.
He shakes his head.
"Did you?" she asks.
He shakes his head again, and she smiles, the exact same smile she gave him when they first met, when they played at getting married, when she promised to write to him, when she found him again.
The exact same smile she gave him right before she kissed him, on The-Night-That-Must-Never-Be-Mentioned (on The-Night-He-Can-Never-Forget).
She kisses him now, soft and slow and tender, moving her mouth against his as if she has all the time in the world, and finally, finally, he lets himself kiss her back.
"I love you," he murmurs against her lips. "I love you so much, I've loved you for years, I never stopped loving you—"
She laughs and breaks away. "Silly Simon," she says. "I love you, too."
He grins at her, elated and happy as he brushes a strand of hair behind her ear. Then he freezes, because he's forgotten about—
"Oh, no," he says, eyes widening. "Oh, no, oh, no, wait, I didn't mean it, I didn't—"
"Shh," she says, putting her fingers against his lips. "Shh. It's okay, it's okay. Enjolras and I talked, and we agreed you were being stupid."
"Huh?" Combeferre says, blinking at her.
"You love him, too, right?"
He glances at her sideways, but gives a cautious nod.
"More than you love me?"
He bites his lip and shakes his head.
"But you thought you couldn't have the both of us," Éponine says, looking at him expectantly.
"Well, no," he admits. "That seemed a bit greedy."
She wraps her arms around him and pulls him close, running her hand through his light brown hair. "Silly Simon," she says again. "So you fell in love with Enjolras while I was gone, and decided to choose him, so you turned me down when I came back. Then after he fell in love with me, you stepped aside so he could be happy."
"And you could be happy, too," Combeferre adds. "He's the better man, so of course he'd deserve you more. You should stay with him, Éponine."
She gives him an exasperated look. "You know, I'm starting to understand why Cosette gets so annoyed whenever people get too self-sacrificing." She looks down at his chest and starts fiddling with his shirt buttons. "The point is…you can have us both."
He gapes at her. "What?"
"I said you can have us both. Enjolras didn't like the idea at first, because you know how he hates to share—"
Combeferre makes a noise of agreement.
"—but eventually I pointed out that we were able to share you as a best friend just fine, and if you and I had been together like he figured—"
"I still can't believe he thought we were dating," Combeferre mutters.
"—I thought we were dating; don't be so harsh on him. Anyway, if we'd been together, then he would have been where you are now, and he agrees that it would've been horrible and he wouldn't have handled half as well as you have."
Combeferre chuckles. "No, he wouldn't have."
Éponine grins at him. "So the solution to all our problems is to simply be us. You can love me and him, he can love you and I, and I can love you both." She takes a step back, closer to the bed, and he follows. "Does that sound good?"
He nods, she smiles, and all is right in his world.
Later, when he is drowsy with sleep and happiness, he hears his bedroom door open.
"So you told him?" a low, smooth, and infinitely beloved voice says.
"Mmhm," Éponine replies. He can feel her hand lift from his cheek, and though he doesn't open his eyes, she can imagine her holding it out to his best friend in gentle invitation. "Come to bed," she whispers.
Enjolras slides in behind him, his solid, lean body fitting a little awkwardly into the already crowded bed, but Éponine moves a bit, and Combeferre adjusts, and the three of them settle comfortably together.
A part of Combeferre is surprised that, yes, there is room for him after all.
It's right between them, Enjolras's arm around his waist, Éponine's hand against his cheek, happiness the space between their two hearts.
Finally, finally, he's right where he belongs.
Later, years later when they move into their house—one with three cats and no dogs, where Enjolras's law books are side by side with Éponine's business reports and Combeferre's veterinary texts, where Enjolras's minimalist art is hung next to Éponine's concert posters and Combeferre's favorite photographs, and where a tattered Greek mythology book for children rests side-by-side a dog-eared copy of Animal Farm, Éponine says, "I hope she looks like you."
"Mm?" Combeferre blinks. "You think it's a girl?"
"I hope it's a girl," Enjolras says.
Éponine rolls her eyes. "You would."
"Girls are amazing," Enjolras proclaims.
"You're just hoping to raise her into a terrifying, institution-defying, intersectionality-promoting, feminist hellion," Éponine retorts.
"She's your daughter, do you really think she'd be anything but terrifying?" Enjolras asks.
"And she could be Enjolras's," Combeferre points out. "There's no way we could avoid it then."
"Silly Simon," Éponine says. "Even if Enjolras's sperm was the lucky one, she'd still be all of ours. But I hope she looks like you. The next one can be like Enjolras, but I want this first one to be like you. I hope she has your smile and the way you laugh and your patience. I hope she has your eyes and your wit and your kindness. I hope she'll need cool glasses like yours and learn lots of fun facts about animals and know every single moment of every single day that I love her. I hope she'll be happy."
Combeferre smiles. "She will," he promises. "She will. But frankly, I hope she has your hands."
"My hands?" Éponine asks.
"Yes," Combeferre says, placing his hand over Enjolras's on her slightly protruding belly, the other raising her fingers to his lips. "They're hands made for holding my heart, and she'll have mine as soon as she's born."
After all, he thinks, her mother stole half of it the day we met, her father the rest five years later. Of course I'll give it to their daughter without a second thought.
Of course.
And Combeferre closes his eyes and smiles.
Endnote: Thank you for reading. Please review. :)