Histories, Chapter 1

(Note: This modern AU fic is inspired by the setting of the novel The Secret History by Donna Tartt. The plot however is all my own random thoughts.)

Jean Prouvaire sat on a wooden bench, the leaves of the willow tree that stood beside it occasionally brushing against his cheek when the wind blew. The tree cast a shadow over him so that he remained hidden from the groups of talking and laughing students that walked past. Invisible. He reached into his satchel and retrieved his notebook. It was his first day at the university, and he still couldn't quite believe that he had won the scholarship to study poetry there. He still had yet to choose other classes, as he was given the option to do so; he had decided that he would first learn more about the place and what it had to offer academically that would be fun and a good experience that he wouldn't necessarily get elsewhere. He buried himself in the notebook, writing and crossing out lines, going through pages and pages, and he would have stayed there for hours, if they had not come along and destroyed his peace.

"Did you really have to show up so drunk? You made us look like idiots!"

"What does it matter? I showed up."

There came a burst of laughter. Jehan looked up, the laugh drawing his attention. There were three boys about his age, maybe a year older, and they had stopped right in front of where he was sitting. The laughing boy had bright eyes and a brighter smile, and he wore a bright blue jacket that looked oddly modern against his button-up shirt and brown trousers. It wasn't until the boy's eyes met Jehan's that he realised he was staring, and he quickly looked away, feeling his cheeks burn scarlet. The other two boys appeared to be arguing now, but he barely heard the cacophony of loud voices; the sound of laughter was still playing in his mind.

"Who are they?"

It was the first thing he asked the girl who lived in his dormitory when he felt like asking questions would be appropriate. He had met her in the small and rather dully-decorated study room after he had unpacked in his smaller and equally dull room. (It wouldn't take long for him to cheer up the space with pots of flowers and shelves of poetry books.)

The girl was named Cosette and she studied Art History. Presently, Jehan stood by the open window. Outside, the two arguing boys from earlier stood by the river; the boy he would have recognized by appearance was no longer with them, and he only realised who they were when he heard their voices. Cosette came to stand beside him, and smiled.

"That's Enjolras, in the red, and Grantaire, with the beer bottle. They're part of Les Amis de l'ABC."

"Les...?"

She turned to him. "That's what they call themselves. There's more of them, and they're the students of Professor Valjean's French History class."

"French History?" Jehan considered this for a moment. "I didn't know that was a class, but I suppose there's no good reason for it not to be. The history of one's own country is surely very interesting, because we could be standing right in the very spot where that history has taken place. I'm quite interested in it myself."

Cosette walked away from the window, tucking her blonde hair behind her ears. She flopped onto the sofa and picked up a book. "I know what you're thinking. You want to join the class. But there are things you'll learn about it, Jehan. It's not really how it sounds. Les Amis, they're all obsessed with revolution. And they seem to think that when the time calls for another French revolution, they'll be the ones to start it."

Jehan raised an eyebrow at that, but said no more. She clearly wished to be left alone now, and he went back to his room to consider what he had learned.

His name was Courfeyrac. How could it ever be anything else?

Jehan had spent the first few days at the university before classes started slowly getting to know his way around campus and talking to the other people who lived in his dormitory. The second time he saw the boy, this time alone, he was with Cosette, as they lay on the grass by the lake and smiled up at the clouds. He felt the boy's presence before he even saw him, somehow, and he sat up suddenly to see him grinning at him from the wooden bench that Jehan had been sitting on the first time he saw him. He then strolled over, with the sort of confidence that suggested not arrogance but just a full awareness of the kind of effect his presence could have on people, and introduced himself to Jehan.

"Hi, I'm Courfeyrac."

Cosette sat up too then and smiled at him, shielding her eyes from the sun as she squinted upwards. "Hey, Courf. This is Jean Prouvaire. He's a first-year poetry student, he took the empty room in my dorm."

Jehan nodded at Courfeyrac and said, "You can call me Jehan."

"Jehan. It's a pretty name, like the flower in your hair."

Jehan blushed and pulled the pale blue flower out from where it was tied into his sand-coloured hair and looked at it in his hand. "It fell off the plant on my windowsill, so..."

Cosette giggled. "You embarrassed him, Courf. Leave the new boy alone."

"I'm only getting to know him. Jehan, you should come and meet and my friends. Cosette, there might be something in it for you, too." He winked, and she narrowed her eyes.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean Marius is back."

At that, her eyes widened and it was her turn to blush slightly. "He is?!" She scrambled to her feet. "Where is he?"

"With the others at the café, if you and Jehan care to join me."

Jehan gave Cosette a look. She didn't tell him that she was actually friends with any of these people. But she wasn't paying him the slightest bit of attention now, she was just nodding enthusiastically and brushing blades of grass off her white dress. Jehan stood up and walked with them toward the café that he had not yet been to, wondering what kind of people he would meet there.