V'la Joli Vent
You may not be as strong as me,
and I may not care to teach you;
It may be hard to keep up with me,
But I'll always be able to reach you.
It seemed like fate had brought them together against their will; he out of guilt, she from a long-time ache for company, whosever it was. The bourgeois rebel, who could weave words of fire through the air like strands of magic, had retreated inside himself after the disastrous uprising that summer; and the gamine with her dark velvet eyes and bare feet had latched upon him, a barnacle frantically clinging to an empty shell, desperate and wanting. People thought them a strange couple, this pair of foreigners who had arrived in London, muttering in broken English and limping as though from hidden wounds; what marriage involved lovers who didn't appear to like each other? For they wore wedding bands on their fingers, but their hands never intertwined; they bickered in quiet, rapid French when choosing fruit at the market, but rarely looked each other in the eye. His voice was a clear and elegant drawl, whilst hers was a low and husky growl; a suspicious voice they said, and she would dance on the cobbled stone pavement beside him, cackling at the scandalised glances of passersby as her twirling skirts offered them a glimpse of her bare ankles. Neighbours whispered about the heated fights that would erupt through the walls of their little two-up, two-down house, and wondered.
Inside those thin walls, Enjolras and Eponine never spoke about the time before. In fact they never spoke about anything, really. It was a far cry from the fairytale romance Eponine had always envisaged, huddled on a cold stone floor under a thin blanket and devouring the book she'd once stolen from a stall in the Christmas market. She couldn't read it, of course, but she'd create her own stories to go with the pictures, and whisper them with eyes shining to Azelma, tales of brave knights and beautiful princesses, and prisoners in disguise. Here, there was no Azelma; her life here with Enjolras had nothing of the romantic sentiments of her stories, but she had learned to take what she could get and cling to it determinedly. In this land far, far away, the daughter of the wolf would build her own house of stone and turn her back on the biting wind.
Life gave me you, there the change was made
There's no beginning over;
You are not happy, but what is love?
Hate gave you me for a lover.
Enjolras, for his part, both craved and loathed Eponine's company. She had followed him across the sea to this new world, revelling in that last glorious shred of hope called Escape. And he, too anxious to delay, and too tired to fight, had put up with her unshakeable presence. Both had breathed a sigh of relief upon discovering a mutual reluctance to discuss the things they were leaving behind. In the time before, they had barely spared each other a glance, and now here they were, at once a burden and a lifeline to one another. On the coldest nights, he would sometimes hear her mumbling in her sleep. These were the only times she ever made mention of her past, their past, the very thing he was trying so desperately to both escape and hold on to, and his heart would race, her words echoing like a war drum in his mind. Tell Marius his friends are waiting for him at the barricade. On these nights he would crawl in beside her, shivering, and hum a soft refrain. V'la l'bon vent, V'la l'joli vent, V'la l'bon vent, m'amie m'appelle. Hesitantly taking her freezing hand in his, Enjolras would try and fail to rub some warmth into them both, cursing himself silently. Failing. It's the only thing I've ever managed to achieve.
By morning he would be gone from her bed, and the indifferent silence that lapsed between them once more, after a quiet and groggy 'Good morning' (he'd not slept a wink), told him she was unaware of his nightly visits. The sight of her bare feet padding across the cold stone floor would make his stomach twist in memory of his empty promises, and he would guiltily offer her the last of the milk; when she asked him to hand her the newspaper he would glance up, startled to see Gavroche's eyes staring back at him across the table. He hated those eyes turned down upon him, cold and grey and innocent. Accusing. Bitterly, he would turn away and an icy silence would descend and envelope them both. Eponine was used to this; she had been a huntress, had she not? Being light on her feet, she had known how to weave silence, how to tread in shadows in the time before.
And if you go forward, I'll meet you there;
and if you climb up through the cold freezing air;
Look down below you, search out above;
Cry out to life for a frozen love;
Cry, Love, cry...
Their life in London was a quiet one, their days filled with journeys to and from the post office where Enjolras now worked, and the sewing shop a few doors down where Éponine would spend her day. Together they earned just enough money to get by on. Once or twice they shared a vacant laugh about the stern-faced clerk at the post office, and the snobbish old ladies who came to buy wool. On these days they would amble home, a strange light in their step and rare smiles tugging at the corners of their lips. Éponine had a wicked sense of humour that Enjolras didn't always get, and he found her cackling laugh at once infuriating and endearing, but she would only breathe a sigh of relief and slip her hand through the crook of his arm, and once home he would settle that bit closer to her on the couch. Other times, they would fight in a whirlwind, angry and unkind, their cruel words bouncing off the kitchen tiles and cracking in their throats as they furiously tried to out-scream each other. (Love is wasted on you, you'll never be happy with anything you get). More often than not, the argument would arise out of nothing much at all, but once the wounds were opened, there was little holding back. Both were stubborn, and despite Enjolras' well-bred manners, months of tortured thoughts had created in him a foul street language, well able to compete with her own vulgar tongue. And so their stinging words would rip each other to shreds. (You coward, you ran. You didn't even look back). Voices hoarse, they would revert into their cold reserve, broken by an unuttered forgiveness when Enjolras would find a cold cup of tea outside his bedroom door in the morning (he would resolve to buy her some French pastries from the bakery on the way home from work).
V'la l'bon vent, V'la joli vent
V'la l'bon vent, M'amie m'attend.
It is a particularly cold winter this year, and the twinkling fairy-lights are casting a soft coloured glow on the crisp white cobblestones. Miss Constance Smith sits by a crackling fire, the light from the flames creating dancing shadows on the flowered wallpaper. She has never loved this time of year, but at her age it has become positively vile. The air injects every nook and cranny with icy cold, and what's more, the snow gets inside her boots. She huddles further into the thick sheepskin blankets that Nelly has wrapped around her knees and shoulders, and lets out a sigh of exasperation. She is about to tuck in to a warm plate of toasted cakes and hot sherry when a high-pitched squeal erupts from outside and she leaps so high the sherry drenches the blankets. Cursing the devil, she makes her way towards the window, prepared in spite of the cold to fling the window wide and sharply reprimand that fool of a sweep's apprentice boy who has no doubt been the cause of her shock, the good-for-nothing little scoundrel. But the sight she is met with stuns the old lady into silence.
It's them.
They are scrabbling and stumbling past her window, gripping each other for support. At first she is scandalised to find them drunk, until she notices the heavy bundle both are struggling to carry between them. So. It seems the man has finally, finally agreed to buy a Christmas tree from the market. Her maid had overheard them bickering about it nearby the fruit stalls a few weeks ago whilst picking up some last minute bits and bobs for Christmas. The girl had whined and stomped her foot, but to no avail; the man had marched off with his nose in the air, and the girl had followed with a scowling face. ("I 'ad to leap out of the way so quick I dropped me walnuts!" Nelly gasped. "Miss Harriet Davis said she'd never seen the like of it, but what do you expect from foreigners, I s'pose?").
Constance Smith watches in fascination as together the pair haul the tree on unsteady feet back towards their tiny house, slipping and sliding on the icy cobblestones. Strange, the old lady thinks. How often these two strangers had been heard from the street, pent up in their house and screaming insults at each other about some barricade. (Or was it brigade?). Neighbours discussed their odd accusations in low whispers on the street the next morning, and tried to make sense of the couple's story. ("Don't tell me how I could have led them better!"; "Comb fair (or was it comb hair?) would have understood!"). Well, they certainly had yet to get to the bottom of the mysterious exchanges, but the ladies of Baker's Row most definitely agreed that the girl needed to comb her hair, at any rate. And yet, here on this quiet Christmas Eve was a perplexing picture of domesticity which reminded Miss Smith of her own past lovers, long ago. She sniffs and shakes her head at the strangers. Who are they? The old lady is abruptly brought out of her reverie by a loud squeal as the girl's feet slip once more, but this time the man's arms reach out too late to steady her, and she falls to the ground, bringing him crashing down beside her. Constance sees the curtains twitch in the house opposite, where it seems Alice Gilbert has also been disturbed by the din outside.
There is a pause, and the man starts to chuckle, louder and louder, until the street echoes with his barking laughter. The girl stares at him for a while, a strange light in her eyes; before he has time to react, she has thrown her arms around the man's neck and is kissing him full on the mouth, to which he responds with enthusiasm. As his chortles are muffled into her lips, and his hands tangle into her (really quite untidy) hair, Miss Constance catches Miss Alice's eye and turns her head away with an embarrassed sniff.
Yes, they were an odd couple, neighbours agreed.
Fin.
Translations:
V'la l'bon vent, v'la l'joli vent, v'la l'bon vent, m'amie m'appelle.
Go good wind, go pretty wind, go good wind, my friend is calling.
V'la l'bon vent, v'la l'joli vent, v'la l'bon vent, m'amie m'attend.
Go good wind, go pretty wind, go good wind, my friend is waiting.