-Chapter 5-

"I would do it again" Enjolras imitated his words in a sarcastic and ironic way as soon as Èponine had closed the front door behind her "I would always put myself in danger for you again…".

Enjolras banged his fist on the table and felt directly the acute pain shooting through his hand. He was mad at himself because he didn't know why he had said those words. It was one of those moments where he couldn't deny, no… Where he knew that people were led by their feelings.

Realizing the fact that the bandages around his hand crimsoned, he cursed and unwrapped his hand. Last night he hadn't felt the pain, but now he felt the punishment for not controlling his feelings. Below the fresh blood, which was covering his hand, the three lacerations on his knuckles had opened up again. He disquietingly threw away the old bandages and wrapped a new one around his hand. There was no time now, he had to tell the Les Amis that the police was trying to get inside information about them. One of them had already fallen victim to the National Guard and that was for sure enough.

….

Enjolras entered the café by dawn. The Les Amis had already arrived and they sat at a table in the corner of the room. Marius, Combeferre, Courfeyrac and Joly sat with their backs to him not noticing him entering the room while Grantaire and Èponine sat across them with their backs leaned against the wall, having a good view over the room. Èponine had tucked up her legs to her chest and her chin rested on her knees. Grantaire and the rest of the men were laughing about something and Èponine smiled slightly.

Before he had even reached the table, Enjolras heard a loud voice calling.

"So here comes our fearless leader!" It was Grantaire, who had now stood up to take an ironic bow, his face straight-faced. Giving his friend a gloomy look, Enjolras threw his books and notes on the table and sat down. He saw Èponine smiling and when Grantaire sat down beside her, he gave her an amused look, leaned back against the wall and took a mouthful of wine from his bottle.

"I need to talk to you. All of you…" Enjolras started "I'm sure Joly told you why Èponine was attacked?" everyone nodded except Èponine. She looked uncomfortable as if she didn't like it to be the conversation's main theme.

"We have to be careful from now on! Keep an eye out for spies in our ranks. We can't afford to lose any of our members. That includes keeping your mouths shut about your places of residence or others'! When the National Guard finds out any personal details about us, we are damned! Grantaire! Drunken people are easy targets and can't control their tongues! Especially you! So if I find you lying drunk in a street by night sleeping off your hangover, I will personally beat the alcohol from your blood!" Enjolras ended his small speech and saw his friends nodding.

"Enjolras is right. What they did to Èponine was horrible and the luck won't always be on our side and send Joly" Combeferre agreed "By the way, the two inspectors' bodies…"

"…are gone. I know, Marius told me today" Enjolras interrupted his friend.

"Well, the alley has also been cleaned. There are no signs of a fight and the blood has been wiped off the ground too." This time it was Joly, who had spoken "Do you think they survived?".

Enjolras looked a bit startled. "Excuse me Joly? Am I the student of medicine or are you?"

The young men turned around when the heard Èponine laughing. "Well, one of the inspectors is for sure dead." She said and looked at Enjolras, who remembered that one officer had already been knocked out by the time of their arrival at the scene.

"What did you do to him?" he asked, wondering how such a fragile gamine could kill a grown and armed man.

"If you break someone's nose the right way, the nose's bone is cracked up and pushed into the brain causing internal bleeding and brain-injuries" Èponine looked up from her hands, when everything went silent around the friends' table. All six men looked at her totally perplexed. Marius' and Courfeyrac's mouths were both standing open bearing resemblance to a fish. Combeferre and Joly looked at her with respect, they were both students of medicine and totally surprised about Èponine's knowledge about internal brain-bleedings and their deathly consequences.

But inside Enjolras' gaze was something despite all the astonishment, which surprised Èponine. Was it sympathy? She wasn't sure.

Her statement was unbiased, but still there was something wrong about it. A young woman shouldn't know that precisely how to kill in self-defence. Enjolras somehow felt sympathy arising. In contrast to the other boys, Enjolras understood that he wasn't talking to a girl, which knew so much about self-defence because she was interested in it, but rather because she was depending on it. How often had she been assaulted or attacked, that she had this expert knowledge?

The silence was broken by Grantaire "Well Èponine, I don't want to meet you on the street by night!"

Èponine chuckled "Oh chérie! You wouldn't be a challenge for me!"

Grantaire gave her a dig with the elbow and she suddenly yelped in pain.

"Damn it, Grantaire! Can't you be more careful! She's still injured!" Enjolras burst out, surprised about his sudden anger. Èponine looked a bit shocked too but assured that she was alright and that both men shouldn't worry. Grantaire was easily convinced but Enjolras still looked at her. The angry tension in his eyes still hadn't ceased.

The rest of the evening went on without any disruptions. Grantaire was now talking to a young woman, who was standing near the bar and he was buying her a drink. Entirely altruistic of cause!

Combeferre and Joly were discussing an essay, which they had to hand in until the end of the week. Marius and Courfeyrac were also intent upon their conversation about Marius' new life. Since the young man had married Cosette, his life had totally changed. To the better of cause! His Grandfather was supporting his marriage with the bourgeois Cosette and therefore he had started sponsoring Marius' life again. Right now Marius and Cosette were furnishing their new residence, a flat near Cosette's father's apartment in La Rue de L'Homme Arme.

Èponine didn't understand Cosette's request to stay as near to her father as possible. If Èponine had the chance to marry and start a new life… She would already be miles away, somewhere where her family would never find her. Especially her father…

Her father, who had sold his daughter's freedom to the National Guard for his own peace, left her that night all on her own and Èponine was sure that her father had been aware of the brutality, which the National Guard made use of, when they really wanted to force information out of people. But he didn't care, he never cared.

A sudden feeling of melancholy and despair filled her soul. Did anyone ever care? Her parents had forced her into the grey world she now lived in, they didn't love her, never had. Azelma was in prison, following her parents' path without thinking twice. Gavroche was gone; having died the death of a martyr he would be the only Thénardier worth remembering.

Marius had chosen Cosette, not even considering the fact that a gamine would be an option. Èponine had survived the barricade, but had she really wanted to live on? Deep inside Èponine was aware of the fact that she had chosen to die that day. But her unfair fate didn't even grant her a peaceful death that day. She had been so near to a peaceful death in Marius' arms. She had been ready, but fate was too cruel to let her escape from this life. And so she had survived, survived to find out that Gavroche died, survived to find out that Marius' world would have gone on turning, even if she had passed away.

From that moment on Èponine saw her life as a wasted one. Marius had been her only spark of hope for a long time and she had lost him. Not as a friend, but as a chance for a new life, which she had always dreamed of, but dreams were not dreams, if they came true…

But she had been able to hold on. She had tried to live as if nothing had happened, slowly she had been able to forget Marius and she had gotten used to the always present numbness, which had taken over her body. And yesterday night she had gotten another chance to die. And once again life didn't want to let her go, imprisoning her in this cruel reality, sending her two saviours, who ripped the comforting blackness away from her once again. Waking her from the restorative slumber, which would have lasted forever, if no one had found her. The sensation that she would never have to worry about her life again, the comfortable peace ripped away from her by two young students, who believed in the illusion that they could change her world and the world of many others, who suffered day by day from the Parisian street life. It seemed so clear to her now…

Èponine didn't realise which process she just finished in her mind. If she would have looked at it rationally, she might have realised that she mentally just made the decision to kill herself…

Enjolras tried to concentrate on the notes and books in front of him, but somehow he couldn't. The noise always distracted him and his gaze came to rest upon Èponine more often than it would usually have. She had a strange look in her eyes. Her chocolate brown eyes revealed how far away she was with her mind. Somewhere lost in her thoughts… Her face wasn't easy to read, it was closed up and it looked as if a veil covered her eyes. Enjolras had seen her like this more often after the barricade fell, but this time she reminded him of someone. He was combing through his brain, but didn't find the object, he thought, she resembled now.

It was that moment when she stood up. Slowly but determined… She didn't look at any of the boys and was about to approach the door when Enjolras spoke up "Èponine, where are you going?".

Èponine looked almost as if she was caught red-handed. Her eyes focused at him for a moment but then they turned numb again. "I just need to get some air, Monsieur. I didn't want to disturb you from your studies."

Enjolras nodded and she turned to leave. He didn't know her like that, normally her answer would have been snappy. Usually she would have questioned his right to be interested in her business, but right now it seemed as if all her strength had left her.

The blond revolutionist shook his head over Èponine's strange behavior, but he couldn't stop thinking about her. Minutes went by and suddenly Enjolras remembered where he had seen this strange expression in someone's eyes before.

About one year ago he had seen a young woman climbing over a bridge's guard rail. She had stood there some minutes looking down into the splashing water of the Seine. He had seen how an Inspector had tried to talk her out of this madness but she had made her decision and no one had been able to safe her….

The second he remembered the suicidal girl he stormed out of the café. There was no time!

….

The wind was playing with her long hair as she was sitting on the bridge's guard rail. Fortunately the streets were dark and empty and the silvery moonlight reflected on the water surface. Èponine heard the dark water sweeping underneath her. Its sound was calming her down. Since she left the café she hadn't been able to think clearly, but now it all made sense. It would be just one small step, a short moment of falling and then she could let go…

If someone would have asked her right now, she would have never admitted herself being suicidal. In Èponine's vision 'suicidal' meant that someone wanted to die. She didn't want to die; she just wanted the pain and suffering to stop! No one could judge her for that!

For a minute she thought about the aftereffects, which her death would bring with it. She would be announced as missing. And of cause Marius and maybe even the other men from the Les Amis de L'ABC might miss her, at least a bit. But her absence wouldn't leave a too grand gap within their web of friendship. At least she thought so… Maybe someone would one day discover her corpse floating in the water, but she hoped that until that day her friends had already forgotten her. She didn't want them to know... It wouldn't be good for them.

Èponine didn't even notice that she was crying silent tears. 'Come on Èponine. Don't be such a girly. Gavroche was a child and didn't fear the death! If he was capable of taking two gunshots, you can let go of this guard rail now!' she thought.

Closing her eyes she took one deep breath and let go. She felt herself falling and as she broke through the water surface the cold hit her body.

The cold water broke into her lungs and tried to take her breath. Against her will her body started fighting against the feeling of being pulled deeper and deeper under the water surface. It felt like her body and her mind were two different fighters. Her body was trying to survive whatever price it would take, but her mind had already shut down. The cold had closed her eyes as she felt the numbness overtaking her body, preventing her body from moving, telling her arms to stop the forlorn fight…

Èponine hoped that the suffering would soon be over, her lungs hurt like hell. Her body was trembling from the cold water and she felt dizzy…

That was when something clutched her wrist. It was an iron grip, which didn't let go of her, and she realised that it was a hand. She felt another hand gripping her waist to get a better hold on her body so that the water couldn't free her from the grip.

Then blackness released her from her suffering…

Well, that was a tragic chapter! I still hope you like it, because I thought about it for a long time…

I also wanted to thank you all. Due to the fact that this story can be found in both fandoms (plays and books), I realised that about 33 people are following this story and it makes me so happy to know that there are people reading each of my chapters.

I hope for some reviews and feedback! I'm quite aware of the fact that I have some really long internal monologues in this chapter. Is it too much? I'm not quite sure… Until next time!