Chapter 9: The One with the Bachelor (Part 1)

It was a cold and drizzly morning in New York. A woman in dark green dress and tan trench coat was making her way to the coffee shop near her place. Her right hand was holding the umbrella to protect herself from the rain and the other was clutching her phone, typing a text furiously. She looked furious and quite frankly, pretty nervous.

Eponine woke up early this morning and received a text from her boss, saying that her co-worker, Lucy, who was supposed to conduct an interview with the famous millionaire Jesse Ashworth, had succumbed to fever and was now too sick to even get out of bed. As Eponine's boss could not reschedule the interview, he told Eponine who was utterly unprepared to take Lucy's place in conducting the most important piece that the company had ever done. He would not take no for an answer and although Eponine was always up for a challenge, this was a huge deal for her and she was scared that she might really screw things up.

She quickened her steps, trying to get rid of the frustration and anxiety that were building in her chest. She did not know how fast her pace was but the famous green logo of Starbucks was seen in the matter of minutes and her legs felt a little bit sore while her face was sweaty. Sighing, she walked ahead and stepped into the coffee shop.

It was still early but the place was already crowded. She glanced around and saw the person that she was looking for sitting at the table by the window, reading today's newspaper. He was wearing crisp black button down shirt with black slacks and dark blazer. His striking blue eyes were so engrossed in reading the newspaper that he did not realize Eponine's gaze on him. She smiled fondly. She loved seeing him wearing black on black. He was always so attractive but this outfit made him look even more beautiful. Eponine felt her annoyance towards her boss slowly ebbed away at the sight of Enjolras. She wondered why he still had this effect on her even after everything that happened between them.

She supposed that she was staring at him for quite a while because suddenly, she heard complaints from people behind her. As it turned out, she was blocking the entrance. Feeling a little bit ashamed, she cursed herself under her breath and strutted towards the counter where a friendly barista greeted her, ready to take her order. Eponine ordered herself a bagel and a latte and then made her way to Enjolras' table.

It had been going on for two weeks now. At first, it started as lunch between friends who just wanted to catch up. Then, they started going out for dinner. The next morning, she called him and wondered whether he wanted to get breakfast together. Before they knew it, they fell into this comfortable pattern where they would meet every day to just chat and tell each other about their day. Both of them did not know what they just got themselves into but to them, what mattered most was that they could finally be in each other's company without feeling any awkwardness. Cosette, when Eponine told her about the situation with Enjolras, felt like they're just going back to the past and was very concerned. Cosette did not believe that Eponine and Enjolras could ever be friends, not after what they had been through. But what did she know? Eponine and Enjolras were friends now, good friends. At least, that's what they're forcing themselves to believe.

Enjolras did not hear her approach and only looked up after she had sat down and cleared her throat to announce her presence. He could not help but to feel his heart flutter when he saw her. He beamed.

"Hi."

"Hi."

"Anything interesting?" Eponine asked, gesturing to the newspaper. Enjolras only sighed and closed the paper that he was reading earlier.

"Nothing of importance,"

Eponine merely nodded and returned to her breakfast. However, she could feel Enjolras' eyes on her. The woman looked up and saw her friend staring at her, his eyes full of questions. Enjolras could tell that she was under a lot of stress, she knew it. She could not hide anything from him. Years of dating caused him to be able to read her better than anybody else.

"Anything you want to tell me?" he asked knowingly. Eponine sighed as she drank her latte. She contemplated about not telling him. After all, her problems were her business, not anybody else's but knowing Enjolras, she figured that he would not shut up until he squeezed the truth out of her. That was what made him a good lawyer; that annoying curiosity.

"We're doing this very important piece on Jesse Ashworth and my boss assigned me to it." Eponine murmured solemnly. She felt her heart beating rapidly against her chest again, her nervousness came rushing in, and the overjoyed look from Enjolras did not help at all.

"Congratulations!" he exclaimed happily. However, when he saw that she was not as excited as he was, he started, "Why? What's wrong? Why are you not happy?"

"I am just not sure whether I am up to it."

"What do you mean you are not up to it?"

"I am not sure whether I can do this. This is huge, Enjolras," she muttered, her voice small and shaky, "I have never covered anything this big before. I am not prepared. Hell, I just found out about it this morning! Now, I look like a total mess and I am so nervous, I think I am going to throw up. God, I am so afraid that I might screw this up!" She finished, clutching her stomach. She looked as pale as sheet and her hands trembling. She was hyperventilating, surprising Enjolras because Eponine was always calm, even when she's under a lot of pressure.

"Hey, hey, you are not going to screw up!" Enjolras reached out and took her hand in his. His grip tightened and Eponine felt her nervousness slowly disappearing. Her breathing went back to normal and she stopped trembling. Her eyes met his mesmerizing blue ones and again, she was left speechless. In a way, she loved that he still had this effect on her. When her mind was clouded by emotions and she could not think straight, his hand holding hers made everything clearer, calming her down. He gave her hope and courage; he made her believe in herself again.

Eponine then took a deep breath and cracked a little smile, assuring him that she was going to be okay.

"And by the way," he added, smiling impishly, "you don't look like a mess. You're beautiful."

Eponine chuckled and felt her face heating up. Seeing her laugh, Enjolras could not help but to grin widely. His thumb stroked her hand, loving how it still managed to make her shiver a little.

Both of them fell into such comfortable silence that it took them a while to realize that they were still holding hands and were gazing into each other's eyes. Enjolras was the one who noticed this first and when he did, he reluctantly let go of her, ignoring how he immediately missed the warmth of her hand. He cleared his throat and looked out of the window while she sipped on her latte, waiting for him to say something. Eponine could practically hear Enjolras' brain searching for topics to talk about to steer them away from this awkwardness.

"So, who is this Jesse Ashworth? Is he famous?" he asked out of the sudden.

Eponine raised an eyebrow and smiled wickedly. Trying to lighten the mood, she joked "And since when do you care about famous people?"

"Since two days ago," he answered shortly, his cheeks reddening as he remembered one of the most embarrassing moments that ever happened to him.

Two days ago, Enjolras, Eponine, Grantaire, Combeferre, Courfeyrac and Eva went to Marius and Cosette's house because Cosette finally let Marius use the kitchen and he was so excited that he invited everybody for dinner so that they could taste his cooking. Although they were so scared that they might get food poisoning, out of the spirit of friendship, they went anyway. While waiting for the dinner to be ready, all of them got together in the living room to watch the game on television. Courfeyrac kept rambling on and on to anyone who cared (Combeferre, Eponine and Eva listened intently but others were only half-listening) about Beyoncé's albums that Eva bought for him last week and how he's now a 'Bey', whatever that meant. Then, out of the blue, Enjolras asked them a question that no human in the right mind (or in this decade) would ever ask.

"Who the hell is Beyoncé?" he questioned innocently while his eyes were still watching the game on television. When he heard everyone suddenly became silent, he turned and seemed surprised to find that everyone was staring at him like he had lost his mind. He saw Combeferre and Eponine basically mirrored each other, with their jaw dropped and eyes widened because of shock. Courfeyrac, Eva and Marius appeared to be extremely offended while Grantaire and Cosette froze in the middle of the fight for the remote control. Nevertheless, his next question was the one that caused them to make fun of him all night long. He asked, "What? Is this Beyoncé famous or something?"

Eponine giggled at the memory of Combeferre saying unbelievingly to Enjolras, "Enjolras, even my grandmother knows who Beyoncé is and she's 80". However, her giggle turned into full on laughter when she recalled how Courfeyrac, Eva and Marius gave him cold shoulders for the rest of the night, offended that their group leader didn't know anything about their 'Queen Bey'. The morning after, when she was having her breakfast with Enjolras, Marius came all the way from his apartment to join them and gave Enjolras his full set of Beyoncé's albums, demanding him to listen to her. Eponine could barely contain her laughter now, tears fell from her eyes and her stomach was starting to hurt.

Enjolras seemed to be offended but then he saw how happy she was now and he could not bring himself to be mad at her. So he simply sighed and drank his coffee, looking out the window, waiting for her to stop laughing.

When she finally did, she saw that Enjolras was no longer looking at her. Suddenly, she was afraid that he might be angry at her for making fun of him. She tried to remain cool as she put on her most sincere smile and cooed, "Enjolras…"

He turned and found her grinning at him. He smiled back, indicating that he's not mad at her, which caused the brunette to breathe a sigh of relief. Enjolras then repeated his question earlier, "So, now will you tell me who Jesse Ashworth is?"

Eponine smiled apologetically and answered, "He's the head of Ashworth Corporation. A millionaire with the heart of gold, according to my boss. From what I've read about him this morning, I can conclude that he's quite brilliant. Graduated from Harvard with the highest honour, started to work with his dad and took over the company not long after. He's now a millionaire but he's really sweet and humble. He set up charity funds and helped lots of people to get back on their feet. I mean, that's just quite remarkable, don't you think?"

"Yes, it is."

"And to do all that before turning 30…" Eponine continued but stopped when Enjolras held up his hand, looking utterly surprised.

"I'm sorry. 'Before turning 30'? How old is this guy?"

"He's 29. He's turning 30 this year. Wait, I saved his pictures in here," Eponine said, unlocking her phone and searched the gallery. A frown formed on Enjolras' face. He felt uneasy about the fact that she had pictures of some 29-year-old stranger in her phone. He knew he shouldn't be worried or at all offended but he did so there's that.

"Here," she handed him her phone. He took it from her and was surprised to see how young Jesse Ashworth was, or how amazingly good-looking he was. Enjolras felt his heart grew heavier. His eyes darted back to Eponine who was looking at him expectantly. While he was excited for Eponine and her interview, right now, he was not exactly keen about her meeting Jesse Ashworth. Enjolras could not quite fathom his feelings right now. He was jealous and was suddenly so protective of her, but it started to hurt when he remembered that he did not have any right to feel this way.

"He's okay." He said stubbornly. Jealousy was clear in his tone, much to his dismay, but he was glad that Eponine did not comment anything about that. Eponine glanced at her watch and suddenly cursed. She rose from her chair, grabbed her phone from Enjolras' hand, said goodbye and almost ran towards the door, leaving Enjolras dumbfounded.

However, she stopped and made her way back to Enjolras to ask, "Want to have dinner together tonight?"

Enjolras simply snorted and reminded her of her plans this night "Ep, I am going out with the guys and you're going out with Cosette, Eva and Musichetta. Remember?"

"Oh shit, I forgot about that. Well, I guess… I'll see you around?"

"I'll see you around." Enjolras answered shortly.

Enjolras sighed as he watched her got into a cab and went away. He was battling a feeling that he could not quite comprehend. He had absolutely no right to be possessive and resentful but after spending so much time with her, he could not help but to think that she was still his Eponine and he would do anything to protect her from any threat. Right now, he saw this Jesse guy as a threat (although he was more of a threat to him than to Eponine). He did not like the probability of Jesse flirting with her, especially when he could not do anything about it. Heck, he did not like the idea of them being in the same room. He had really bad feeling about this. He felt like something was going to go wrong. He felt like she was slipping away from him and no matter how tightly he held on to her, she's going to go away. This feeling made him sick to his stomach as it reminded him of what he thought about the night he and Eponine broke up.

No, Enjolras. No. You shouldn't feel this way. You're not allowed to feel this way, he told himself. Besides, this interview might be strictly professional and he actually had absolutely nothing to worry about. Eponine was not the kind of girl who would go for someone like Jesse. So, no, he had nothing to worry about. He was just overthinking everything again. Yes, he was just overthinking.

With that thought, he rose from his chair and made his way out of the coffee house, trying hard to shake off the sinking feeling in his heart which was telling him that he really was going to lose her all over again and there was nothing that he could do to stop it.

A/N: So what do you think? Will Eponine ace this interview? Is something going to happen between Eponine and Jesse? Is Enjolras right when he feels like he's going to lose her?