Okay, here's (obviously) chapter ten. Chapter eleven might already be up when you read this, I'm not sure. Like I said I'm going out of town tomorrow directly from school, so this evening is the last chance I have.

I do not own Les Mis.

Chapter Ten: Letters

On a warm, clear afternoon nearly six weeks from the time Marius had left the Thenardiers', a small, dirty-faced, barefooted gamin showed up at the doorway of the Musain, a cream colored enveloped in his hand. He asked for Monsieur Marius, and a woman sweeping the area behind the counter pointed in the direction of the back corridor.

Marius was sitting in a corner of the room, hunched over his translations, pretending to pay attention to them. He was not alone in the room; Courfeyrac, Grantaire, and Feuilly were seated around another table, playing a game of cards in which Marius did not care to take part. When the door opened, the four looked up, expecting Enjolras, who was to be arriving soon, but seeing only the small gamin.

"Monsieur Marius?" the child asked. Marius rose from his seat and said, "Oui?"

The boy looked for a moment as though he was gathering his bearings to launch into either a long story or a long list. "Gavroche gave this to me," he said slowly. "It's from his sister, who said it came from some people who lived in your tenement, who sent it to you… I don't really remember." The child was quite confused, Marius thought. He took the letter from the grubby hands and read the address on the back. It was from England.

"Merci beaucoup," Marius replied quickly. "Here-" He reached into his coat and handed a sou to the gamin, who, grinning, scampered back down the corridor and out of the café.

"Who is it from?" asked Courfeyrac, turning away from the car game, which he was winning with flying colors.

Marius did not answer. He just took his seat once more and opened the letter carefully. The creamy paper and the delicate lady's calligraphy on the envelope gave it the appearance that if he were to handle it too vigorously it would dissolve into powder in his hands. He breathed in slowly; it could have been his imagination at work, but the paper inside did still smell faintly of perfume and flowers.

The letter contained, written in Cosette's telltale script, read as follows:

My dearest Marius (Oh, how nice it is to use your name again and know that you shall read it),

The two months since I have left feel like two separate eternities in my mind. I will not say that England is horrible, for it is not, or at least not for the English. Papa has nearly recreated our house on the Rue Plumet, our lovely little garden and all. He believes it will make me happy. Truly, it only makes me sad, seeing such a familiar sight just outside my window and knowing that just beyond it is a bustling town in which I know no one, and in which no one speaks a language I know. Two of our neighbors are Spanish, says Papa. I was fascinated to at first meeting them, but they talk with such an odd tongue that I can not stand to listen to them for long before my mind wanders.

I miss France greatly. Every morning, when I wake up to see the garden outside, I think for a moment that I am home once more. Then, I gaze upon the dreary rooftops outside (the houses are so cluttered here!) and remember that Paris is an ocean away. I still spend my evenings in the garden, as I once did, but it is not the same, not without the hope of seeing your face at any moment on the other side of the gate. The loneliness here is taking away my appetite and my energy. Papa and Toussaint think me ill. Perhaps if they realized that my illness has been brought on by this dreadful move, then they would return me to Paris. Perhaps then we could wed and Papa would not even have to stay in France!

Here I am, talking like a silly child. I know Papa would not allow such a thing. I have been trying to get out of him what it was that caused us to take flight in the first place; he had told me nothing. He has always been singular in this sense. He carries around a small suitcase wherever he goes, have I told you? I call it the "inseparable". As I speak it is tucked in a closet in Papa's room.

I do wish that I could hear your voice again, Marius. You do not know how greatly I wish it. Every night I dream of our garden. I do hope you will write back to me, will you not? I at last mustered up the courage to tell Papa of you. If he was angry, then he did not show it. After all, anger would do no good in this case. Berating me would not keep away my memories. You are not here, Papa reasons. Writing to you will do me to harm, so he allows me to write, and you to write back. I was so happy when he told me, just moments ago, that I nearly knocked over the inkwell taking my seat to begin writing! What a mess that would have been!

I think about you every day, my dear Marius, and every night as well. I dream of the day we will see each other once more.

Your beloved Cosette

Marius put down the letter in silence. He could not hear the sounds of the card game, nor of the added voices since Enjolras and Bahorel had entered moments before. His face was straight; one would not have guessed he had just read a love letter.

Cosette was still in love with him, so it would seem. She had not forgotten him, and, in fact, she "thought about him every day", as she had written, "and every night as well". Marius remembered the feeling he had harbored when he was first in love with Cosette, and tried to imagine that sensation distended by an ocean separating them. He guessed he would have felt desparate; he did not know.

There was a large difference between himself and Cosette, Marius pondered. Two months of separation had only made the heart grow fonder in Cosette's case. Marius understood - she was in a foreign country in which she did not speak the native language. She had nothing to do all day but dream, he imagined. Marius, on the other hand, had had no time to grieve or dream or even think since Cosette's departure, what with the eviction. There had been no room for Cosette in his brain.

Weeks ago, that very thought ("no room for Cosette") would have been chilling to the bone to hear coming from Marius's own mind. He had been as Cosette was now, alone, and always thinking of the other. They were in love. They still were, right? This was why Marius felt such guilt. Cosette thought of him constantly, and how often did he give her a moment of though? Maybe eight times since she had moved.

Yet…

If he was still in love with Cosette, Marius thought ludicrously, why did her letter not move him? Why had his heart felt no different after than before? He could picture Cosette's reaction in his head: opening the envelope, smelling the smell of (did Courfeyrac's room have a distinctive odor? Marius had become too accustomed to it to know) on the paper, kissing it before and after each reading (there would be more than one, as is the way of girls), and tucking it away in a drawer for safe-keeping.

Marius folded up the letter, replaced it in the envelope, and put the thing in his coat pocket.

"Courfeyrac?" he called out, interrupting some conversation or another. "Would you loan me your key? I need to head back to the flat." The brunette boy threw Marius his key and watched as his friend went out the door, a blank look on his boyish face.

My Dearest Cosette…

My Darling Cosette…

My Beloved Cosette…

Marius threw aside his third sheet of paper and looked dumbly at the ink well beside it. He had a candle lit on the other side, as the sun was fading through the already dusty windows. He tapped his quill on the side of the pot and bit his lower lip. He could not even get the opening of the letter right.

My…

He scratched out the word, not wanting to waste paper. Two hours had passed since he sat down here at Courfeyrac's desk. Courfeyrac himself had stopped by once, a half of an hour ago, to say something or another about a lady friend of his (her name might have been Marie; Marius did know), meaning that he could not be expected back until the early morning hours, most likely.

Cosette…

Another scratch. Marius put down the quill and rubbed his temples with his index fingers. No words came. No love poems, no similes, nothing remotely interesting came to mind (had he cared more he might have gone to Jehan for this). Finally, with a sigh and a heavy blinking of his eyes, Marius put the quill to the paper and began to write.

Dear Cosette,

I am so glad that your father is at least accepting me to the point of letting you write to me occasionally. I have not been able to stop thinking of you since you left. I visit the garden at the Rue Plumet every week, out of habit. The flowers are in bloom this time of the year (Marius bit his lip: he knew nothing of flowers), and it seems illegal that they should be so beautiful while you are not here to see them.

I am staying with a friend, Nicolas Courfeyrac, for the time being. I will write his address on the envelope so we can continue to write. With fondest anticipation (Marius did not really know how these words fit together, but they put across the right meaning, he hoped) of your next letter, forever yours (He scratched the last two words out and dotted them with ink so one could not recognize them), love, Marius.

He took an envelope, sealed it, and laid it aside for the next time he came across a gamin. His heart felt no different than before.

"Gasp!" Could it be that the Super Velcro Couple is no more! Mon Dieu, I hope so. I despise Cosette with the power of a million suns, no offense to those of you who like her. She's a total Mary Sue when you think about it - tragic past, basically orphaned, gorgeous yet modest, the object of her affection likes her back... It's disgusting!

Well, review, please!