Éponine smiled as she received a letter the next morning. She was remembering for the thousandth time those glorious moments in the alley outside her house when 'Crecia came with a fat envelope that said her name with Enjolras' distinctive letter and she smiled, throwing herself to her bed with a sigh.
Enjolras and Éponine kissed twice, the first time he had given the first step and the second time, she had answered him with tenderness and an urgency she had never felt before. Afterwards, they stayed there, hugged. She searched for warmth in his chest and his arms molded perfectly in her back; they felt complete.
"Enjolras,"
She wanted to spill all of her feelings at once, which wasn't a smart thing to do but she felt like it was right at the moment. She knew Enjolras wouldn't open his heart quite often and she had to take advantage of this opportunity.
But he answered simply putting his fingers in her lips, caressing the lips that now belonged to him.
"Shh…don't say anything, my dear 'Ponine," he said softly to her ear and she closed her eyes.
"It's the first time I've ever kissed a man," she said.
"It's the first time I've craved for a kiss," he answered and gave her a soft, chaste kiss.
He took her home afterwards, hugging her tenderly. Since they were being observed, they couldn't kiss again for as much as they both were dying to do so. He kissed her hand with such devotion it made her caress it afterwards and left, promising he would write.
She entered to her room and sighed, a long tender sigh of a lover girl. All the night, she spent pacing around the room, walking up and down, her head just bearing thoughts of love, thoughts of Enjolras.
On his part, that same time she spent thinking about him, he spent writing to her. He touched his lips a few times, thinking of her reddish and warm lips. His thoughts took him to the point in which he went to sleep hugging a pillow and imagining it was Éponine. He was living a dream, something her thought he would never live.
She had the letter in her hand, five folded papers written side by side, with the neatest of letters. She read half of the first page and it was enough to make her smile widely.
Dearest Éponine,
I want to thank you for the most amazing day of my life. I felt much more pleased than many other times that I would've considered the best. This might not sound romantic at all, but I'm going to be truthful in this letter that's written in the name of the most intense feelings towards a person that have ever struck my body. Although I had already experimented what kissing was like and saw nothing important with it, today I felt as if your lips and your company would be the only things I would ask for if I was to die tomorrow.
You might believe it's not me who's writing this but this is the first time I've ever felt this towards a woman…Éponine to be truthful I don't know what I'm feeling. It's ridiculous. I'm the leader of a revolution and I cannot decide what to feel for you. Don't judge me as foolish; in this moment I'm just a romantic fool and this letter…. this letter and our kiss, they were my ways of telling you, you've trapped me Éponine I don't know what you did to me, but you've trapped me.
Éponine saved the letter in her drawer and ran to the piano room; she had to continue with the lyrics of the song to Enjolras.
And I have finally realized, what you mean.
Enjolras was talking halfheartedly during the debates that night. He was completely disappointed because Éponine was there, he expected her to be there. Everyone was commenting in a low voice of how he was so distracted but then she appeared, thirty minutes before the end and it made Enjolras' power in the last speeches rise to a point in which everyone felt completely fulfilled by everything he said.
"His muse came back to him," Marius said, relieved.
"Well, I think "his muse" has brown hair, blue dress and plays the piano," said Joly while pointing at Éponine, who was just sitting down.
"Do you think Enjolras and her? No, I don't think so…" said Combeferre from out of nowhere.
"Come on don't tell me you didn't see them going out yesterday?" Grantaire said from behind.
"You were drunk!" exclaimed Combeferre.
"Apparently not as drunk as you," he answered.
"I don't believe they're a couple…I mean she's a nice girl and he's just a stone-cold revolutionary," Combeferre said.
"Got any problem 'Ferre?" Courfeyrac asked.
"Nothing…just don't think 'Jolras will fall for a girl at this critical point," he answered, not very convinced.
"His problem. Personally there's nothing wrong with wanting to be happy, good that he has found a girl," Marius said.
Then, they noticed Enjolras was looking at all of them.
"The debates are over, gentlemen," he said severely, while looking at them directly.
Enjolras went to the second floor alone to work on some things, forgetting for a second about Éponine. She approached to les amis and said hi to every one of them, especially Grantaire who wasn't past drunk as she had seen him the afternoon before but normally drunk as she saw him every day so they had a normal conversation were all of them laughed.
Éponine realized those guys were really good people.
"This is unreal," she said.
"What is it?" Courfeyrac asked.
"I mean, you guys…are fantastic!" she answered and they all smiled.
"But I'm still your best friend?" Grantaire asked jokingly.
"Maybe if you tried not to get drunk every afternoon…" she said.
"Don't even try Éponine Lafévre," he said crossing her arms.
"I'm sorry, I had to mon ami, l'ivre fou," she said.
Since Enjolras was taking too long, she decided to leave him a message with his friends. She took a small paper and wrote something in it, folded it and gave it to Courfeyrac, who was the least drunk of all of them, asking him to please take it to Enjolras as soon as she left.
So she did and they thought they would find something provocative to tease their leader with but they just found this and not even one of them understood what it said:
If the butterfly's presence was of your liking, arrive to the place were it embraced freedom.
When it arrived to Enjolras he understood perfectly that what butterfly and freedom meant and that's why he went running to the alley where he had kissed her. She was waiting for him, somewhat scared that he wasn't showing up.
With an impulse, he hugged her from behind and kissed her softly in the cheek. She blushed again and turned around to hug him, still troubled for that loving arrival to the man she had seen so marble-like just a few minutes ago.
"I'm so sorry not to accompany you since the café but there were many things I had to do. Will you forgive me?" he asked in a hurry, hugging her tighter with each word.
She smiled at him reassuringly.
"No problem…I understand that you are too proud to admit to your amis that you're confused," she teased him and he pinched her cheek.
"Don't say that. It's not them what I fear," he said.
"Then what?" she asked.
"I fear you!" he said kind of mockingly and she crossed her arms.
"So the leader of the revolution fears a girl. That's very interesting," she said while walking past him.
"Where are you going, ma belle?" he asked grabbing her hand.
"Depends where the great leader wants to go," she said looking at him from the corner of her eye.
They walked to Éponine's academy and entered to seat in the garden were they have met the first day.
"This is a beautiful place…now I see why does Grantaire love it so much," he said gazing in amazement.
"You know? My parents wanted me to go to a conservatoire but since I refused to leave, I ended up here…it's my small palace of music," she said.
"When I was a kid, my mother wanted me to learn how to play an instrument. My father disagreed roundly and it was one of the first times he ever agreed with me on something…but my mother was determined with her desire and I finished playing the guitar for her every afternoon before I left to study university," he said feeling awkward; it was the first time he ever talked about his family.
"So you can play the guitar?" Éponine asked in awe.
"Yes, I do," he answered ashamed.
"Come with me! I've got to hear that!" she said happily while guiding him to a room full of instruments.
Éponine took a guitar and handed it to him, who refused even when having it in his hands.
"What if I play something to you?" she asked.
"But you're a pianist! I was forced to learn how to play the guitar," he said.
"And what's the point? You know how to play," she said, sitting on a chair near the piano and taking off the lid.
She refrained from playing the song she was writing for him because it wasn't complete and it would make their undetermined situation even more awkward. She smiled to him and started improvising something.
Enjolras looked at her fingers completely absorbed from reality until she finished and he just had to clap.
"That…that was simply awesome Éponine, you're really talented," he said, still absorbed.
"Well…it is your turn," she answered.
He sighed and took the guitar.
"There's a song my mother sang when I was a kid…she explained once that she got married with my father because he dedicated it to her but I never believed her; my father was too much of a proud and conceited person to actually procure a smile on somebody else's face," he explained a bi t angered.
"Well, conceited I don't know…but I can see were your pride comes from," she said.
"Oh my pride's different from his," he cleared.
"Anyways, would you sing it for me?" she asked.
"I'll try, but I'm not a guitarist and less a singer," he said before starting to play a tender ballad.
You could be my unintended
Choice to live my life extended
You could be the one I'll always love
His voice was inexperienced and unprepared but very sweet and Éponine blushed simply because of the song choice. She smiled at him and he saw her straightly in the eyes while singing softly and tenderly, only for her. She wondered if he was the same person she had seen at the Café Musain.
You should be the one I'll always love.
He stood up afterwards and put the guitar in its place. Éponine was too mesmerized to say anything. He sighed and walked towards her.
"Éponine…I swear, you're going to be the death of me," he said.
All of this happened without them noticing that Grantaire, who had spotted them when he was searching for a teacher, accompanied by Combeferre and Courfeyrac, saw them from the doorway.
Hello you guys! Thanks for reading...I have not much to say today, simply...I'm so happy, I'll continue writing this and more stuff...but something big is coming! I'm going to do a one shot for Enjolras soon, hope you also read it :)
-Cami