You could kill me
Those words whirl through his mind as if imprinted by the longing in which the drunk had spoken them. He shudders delicately in the flickering candlelight, pulling his knees to his chest and wrapping long slender arms around them with his eyes clenched shut. Nothing would remove the torture of such a simple phrase. Nothing.
Trembling, Enjolras thought back to the night previous…it had started innocuously enough with their meeting.
"Etienne! Really, if you say something like that, to them, what do you expect? As long as those at Pipcus are on our side, I suppose it doesn't matter what you said to them…"
The young doctor was about to respond but for the simple fact that they had finished ascending the stairs to the back room of the Musain and had entered the haven of the Ami. He refused to glance back to his companion now, knowing that Enjolras had slipped into his leader role and was not going to return from it until late, perhaps not for a couple days. He bit back a sad sigh at the terrible look on the face of his childhood friend, pushing aside memories of happier times for the cause. For la Revolution. For the lady who had claimed the younger man's life. Even so, it bit into his heart every time he felt the other man slipping further from Paris and closer to France.
The evening had gone normally enough to begin with. Enjolras roused Courfeyrac from his reverie of amours and Joly from the mirror. With a roiling yet attentive audience les Ami bickered, listened, laughed, and conversed. It would have ended customarily had one strange event not then occurred. Grantaire was not drunk. To be accurate, Grantaire was not drunk enough to be passed out and merely hovered upon the stage of inebriation that made one louder and stupider – even though according to the man he often gazed at with strange tenderness, this would be impossible since he was always loud and stupid.
J'aimons les filles, et j'aimons le bon vin…j'aimons les filles…
But the song was cut short by the Winecask himself. He began with a harsh laugh looking at all there and none before boasting, most likely simply to himself, "J'aimons les garcons, et j'aimons l'Apollo!" This brought a strange countenance over he who was often praised such by the drunk and Ami alike, rage brewing in a storm of radiance. With measured steps, so unlike the rebel energy that characterized Enjolras, the man paced to the 'Drunkard's Corner' towering over the rambling heap. He didn't need speech to order the room emptied, by the time his journey across it was complete only he and Grantaire remained. Silently they stared at each other, one swallowing fear into a grin of false confidence, the other holding himself back from explosion…
In pallor unnatural even for him, Enjolras barely takes notice of the rest of his flat. He hasn't perceived the passage of days, the rumbles of hunger and thirst pushed away from his mind by iron will long cultivated. Those words continue the agonizing tattoo behind his eyes, barely softening when a familiar hand reaches out for his shoulder. The other man was intelligent enough not to speak immediately, waiting for the leader to acknowledge him; he had never gone as far as to actually use his key to the blonde's flat, he had never needed to.
The long hours spent staring at nothing had caught up to him, and though Enjolras looked angered at being disturbed, he couldn't articulate thus. His mouth too dry, his body too exhausted, he collapsed into Combeferre's strong arms.
…"J'aimons le garcons…" Grantaire was intoxicated enough to the point of actual idiocy. His god pulled back his hand, letting it fall upon the Winecasks' face, hardly realizing that he had made the blow. Yet it gained what he wished, Capital R grew silent. Their gazes matched again, R's one of rapture at being so close to Enjolras, the lawyer's one of repulsion. "Disgusting boy" he spits out, comprehending that he enjoyed the flinch caused from the other, "You would be prudent to find another café to frequent. The Musain's garret is no longer open to you." The crushed look he found on the drunk's face only heightened the need to remove him, the hidden soul inside Enjolras truly regretted leading R on this long, letting him stay as if he deserved to be with les Ami.
Babbling, not knowing what he was saying, Grantaire tried to beg for some sort of mercy from a merciless god, "Please, Enjolras…I…I'll be quiet. I won't drink. Not a drop. No singing. No words. Nothing. Silence. Si vous plait, just let me remain here." Fear sobers as easily as stillness can, and Grantaire was imploring for the sanity of his being. "The abased must be raised, non? But how can you raise a multitude when you cast others to the cold nights of hel? Let a freezing man to fire while you save your Lady from the leers of others, personified in the suffering of the belittled. I must stay…I entreat you to let me continue. I beseech you!"
One look into the marble statue that remained before him split the drunkard's heart. Terror gripped him at Enjolras's next words, "Go. I have little patience for those who spend their lives trying to lower themselves. And I have no patience for you. Leave!" As close as the taciturn man came to bellowing, this was it. His response came in silently trickling tears as R shrunk, trying to hide from the flame he was drawn to. The moth was already caught, consumed by conflagration too blistering for him to endure. "I have nothing…no life but you." He was speaking from the heart that was wrenched with pain, "I have no where, no place but here, your side."
If he was wishing for kindness, a spark from soul to Enjolras's core, it did not come. The other man simply let out an exasperated sigh, trying a track different than anger to drive the Winecask away. "What shall I do? You know that you will no longer gain entry here" it was as close to a lie as Enjolras could get, for Combeferre often spoke on the other man's behalf. Etienne, in kindness that would mark a gentle surgeon, always ensured Grantaire's access to the back room of the Musain. The doctor was not blind to the need of the moth to his flame.
You could kill me
(Not so much as an author's note as an author's plea): Unfortunately the formatting decided to die on me...seems doesn't like line breaks with "stars"'s (shift 8's), or there's a secret password I need to be able to access that clause. If anyone had any hints, I would be more than grateful to know how to make it work better. As well, line breaks. Again, it has chosen to make the process of putting in empty space much more difficult than I believe it should be. And resorting to line breaks is annoying for all of us