Thank you so much for all the reviews on the last chapter, I really do appreciate it - keep them coming!
"Where's the father of the year this fine evening?"
"Working," Eponine said, as she spooned a mountain of rice onto Grantaire's plate.
"Is he actually going to take paternity leave when Enjolras Jr arrives?" Grantaire asked, watching Eponine cover his rice in sweet and sour sauce before handing him the now almost over-flowing plate.
"Yeah, of course." Eponine said, grabbing her own plate from the counter before leading the way into the living room.
"So he's told them about his impending fatherhood then?" Grantaire asked, as they sat down on the couch, carefully balancing the plates full of Chinese food on their laps.
"Yes he's told them," Eponine retorted. "Why wouldn't he have?"
"No reason, I just would have liked to have been a fly on the wall during that conversation. 'Eh, sir,'" Grantaire said, doing an exceptionally poor impression of Enjolras. "'I seem to have accidentally impregnated a woman and I thought you should know.'"
"You're hilarious R, absolutely fucking hilarious," Eponine said, rolling her eyes.
"Oh, I'm sorry, are we not allowed to make fun of Enjolras anymore now that you've taken him as your lover?"
Eponine felt her throat tighten and was suddenly grateful that she didn't have any food in her mouth at that moment, because she probably would have choked on it.
"What did you say?" she said, turning to look at Grantaire, who was just smiling back at her.
"Cosette told Marius about your little setup and he in turn told me." he replied. "Well, he didn't tell me as such, it was more than he mentioned it, thinking that I already knew how you two were shagging away here in your little love nest."
"It's not like that."
"Hey, you don't need to try and explain yourself to me," Grantaire replied.
"Are you mad because I didn't tell you?"
"No, why would I be? I mean you didn't bother telling me the first time you fornicated with the marble statue, so why would you even think to let me know that this has now become a regular thing?"
"Grantaire," Eponine said, setting her plate down on the coffee table, "please don't be mad at me."
"I'm not mad," Grantaire said, shoveling a forkful of food into his mouth.
"Yes you are."
He followed Eponine's example and set his plate down beside her's.
"Even Pontmercy knew before me 'Ponine."
"R," she said, grabbing his hand and resting her head on his shoulder, "please don't be mad at me."
"What are you going to do to make it up to me huh?" he said. "I'm supposed to be your best friend Eponine, and yet you kept something like this from me. I'm expecting some pretty grand gesture here."
"Like what type of grand gesture?" she asked. "I'm not letting you come to my next doctor's appointment if that's what you have in mind."
"Oh no, that's not what I had in mind at all." Grantaire replied. "What I want is for you to tell me exactly what happened the night Enjolras Jr. was conceived. Then, and only then, will I consider forgiving you for keeping such a secret from me."
Eponine should have expected it. Ever since he had found out about the baby it had become Grantaire's life goal to find out how she had ended up in bed with Enjolras. "Why are you so obsessed with that night?"
"I just want to know how this whole thing started." Grantaire said. "I just want to know how we got here, because, I'm going to be honest with you, it's still blowing my mind."
Eponine sat up.
"Fine," she said eventually, "I'll tell you."
She glanced over at Grantaire before she started speaking. He looked absolutely thrilled at the fact that his emotional blackmail was about to pay off.
"So, it was that night we were all drinking at my place," she began.
"There have been many, many nights that fit that description 'Ponine, you'll need to be more specific."
"It was the weekend Marius took Cosette away to his aunt's house in the country and I thought he was going to propose to her." Eponine said quickly. She hoped that Grantaire's memory of that weekend as a whole was pretty hazy and that he wouldn't bring up her hysterical phone call which had lead to him coming over to her apartment in her first place.
"Oh yes, I know the night you're talking about," he said, lifting his plate back up. "Enjolras was round at mine and he was all stressed, just for a change, and I brought him and that bottle of Jägermeister over with me."
Eponine nodded. "That's the one."
"OK, so continue."
"So, you passed out and we just started talking and one thing lead to another..."
"No no," Grantaire interrupted, shaking his head. "One thing lead to another doesn't count as the full story, I want the gory details here."
Eponine sighed. "I was drunk, and I was upset about the whole Marius thing and he was just being nice."
"Just being nice?"
"Yeah, you know, just saying nice things to make me feel better."
"Like what?" Grantaire asked with his mouth full. "What kind of sweet nothings was he whispering into your ear?"
"You know I really don't want to tell this story," she said, "it's embarrassing."
"Embarrassing for you or for Enjolras?"
"It's just embarrassing." she said, finally lifting her own plate back up from the coffee table.
"Why? Did he start confessing his undying love for you or something?" Grantaire said, laughing. After a few seconds he realized that Eponine wasn't laughing too. "Why aren't you laughing? I made a joke."
"It's just not really that funny." Eponine said, poking at her food.
"Did he actually tell you that he loved you?"
"No," she replied, "he didn't use the word love."
"But he did say that he had feelings for you, is that what you're trying to tell me here?"
"He was drunk Grantaire, he didn't mean it."
"Enjolras never says something he doesn't mean, drunk or not."
Eponine shrugged.
"What did he say?"
"You're really not going to let this go, are you?"
"Nope," Grantaire said. "So you may aswell just admit defeat and tell me now."
"He said that Marius was an idiot for not being able to see what was right in front of him," Eponine said, staring at her plate as she spoke. "He said that I was too good for him anyway, that someone as smart and beautiful as me shouldn't be wasting my time on someone like Marius."
She paused, hoping that Grantaire would let her stop there - but when she looked up he was staring at her, fully expecting more. "He said that if I felt that way about him it would make him the happiest man on earth and then he kissed me." she said in a rushed tone, re-adverting her stare back to her plate.
"He loves you," Grantaire gasped. "He actually loves you."
"No he doesn't." she snapped back.
"You two are going to get married." he gushed. "I can't believe it, I can't believe this is happening."
"We're not going to get married Grantaire, stop talking crap."
"Yes you are." Grantaire said. "Here was me thinking you were just shagging, but it turns out there's all these feelings involved. This is some serious Romeo and Juilet shit here 'Ponine, you are right in the middle of one of the great love stories of our time."
"Whatever R," Eponine said, finally eating some of her food instead of just pushing it around her plate.
"You know I'm right Eponine, that's why you're being so cagey, that's why you didn't want to tell me the story in the first place." Grantaire said. "How many times have we mocked Enjolras for being emotionally stunted huh? I mean, until I found out you had slept with him I was actually pretty serious when I used to say that I thought he was still a virgin."
"You're taking this far too seriously."
"No I'm actually not. This is Enjolras. En-jol-ras. You're familiar with Enjolras and his general way, right? Anyone else I would have said he was just feeding you lines to get you into bed, but not him." Grantaire set his plate back down and sank back into the couch. "He meant what he said Eponine. Fuck. He's clearly been harboring all these feelings for you all this time, and we all had no idea."
When Eponine woke up the next morning she was greeted by a very rounded, very obvious bump protruding from her middle.
In a break from the norm she had woken up before Enjolras. It was his first day off in weeks and he was still fast asleep. She had been trying to sneak out of bed and not wake him when she had noticed it.
She just lay there for a few moments and stared at it poking out from underneath one of Enjolras's shirts that she had taken to sleeping in. To begin with she was afraid to touch it, but after a few minutes she gingerly reached down and allowed both her hands to rest on on top of it. She lay there like that for what felt like 5 minutes, but when she eventually glanced at the clock on the bedside table she realized she had been lying there in that same position for over an hour.
"Enjolras," she whispered, finally plying her hands away from her stomach and shaking the sleeping form beside her.
"Hmm?" he groaned, his eyes still tightly closed.
"Wake up," she said, grabbing his shoulder and shaking him roughly.
"Why?" he moaned, shielding his face with his arms.
"You need to see this."
Enjolras stretched as he slowly opened his eyes. "This better be good," he mumbled.
Eponine grabbed his hand and placed it on her now very swollen abdomen. His eyes suddenly shot open.
"Where did this come from?" Enjolras said, staring wide eyed at Eponine's stomach. "It wasn't there yesterday right?"
"No," she replied, "it definitely wasn't there yesterday."
"So it just popped out in the middle of the night?" he was still just staring, even though his hair had started to fall in front of his eyes and was now obstructing his view.
"Yeah," Eponine laughed, reaching over to push the dirty blonde curls from his face.
Enjolras pushed his shirt up over Eponine's stomach and re-placed his hand back on her now bare skin.
"Worth waking up for huh?" she said, smiling.
"Definitely," Enjolras said, sounding utterly amazed.
Eponine watched as he ran his hand back and forth across the bump. He looked mesmerized. She couldn't help but remember her conversation with Grantaire the night before. Surely Enjolras hadn't secretly been pining after her for God knows how long? Surely he really had just said those things that first night to try and make her feel better, to try and make her feel a little less rejected?
After Grantaire had left she had replayed her entire prior relationship with Enjolras in her head. She wouldn't have said he was someone she had been particularly close to, they hadn't shared that many deep conversations or exceptionally jovial moments, but the more she thought about it the more she could remember multiple times when she had caught him watching her across the Musain when he thought she wasn't looking. She had been able to count more than a dozen times when he had driven her home when she had gotten too drunk to do it herself. And she remembered that when Montparnasse had put her in the hospital she had woken up in the middle of the night and saw him through the window outside her room, he had just been sitting there. The next morning she thought she had dreamt it, that the pain meds had made her hallucinate; but now she wasn't so sure.
She knew how horrible it was to watch the person you were in love with be in love with someone else; she'd been there. She knew how it felt like being stabbed in the chest every time you had to watch that person waste their emotions on someone else, oblivious to the fact that you were right there. She hated that thought that she may have made Enjolras feel like that, that she had been so wrapped up in her unrequited love for Marius Pontmercy that she hadn't realized that he was right there; and that he was wonderful.
"You OK?" Enjolras said, kissing her softly and suddenly snapping her out of her train of thought.
"Yeah, I'm great," she said, smiling at him. "I'm really great."