The next morning, Éponine woke up warmer than she normally did. Without opening her eyes, she took stock of her surroundings. She felt safe, probably due to the strong arms locking her to her spot on the bed. Her head was on a smooth, chiseled chest. She heard and felt a heartbeat right under her ear. While she was warm, she could also feel a breeze flowing through the sheet onto her naked stomach. Lastly, she smelled the most amazing smell in the world. The smell was what brought her memory back. It was just so him. It was the smell of old books, which he had lining the walls of his room on bookshelves, and ink, and the lavender fabric softener they bought last week to do laundry with.
She finally opened her eyes, and looking back at her, were the beautiful cerulean eyes that she associated with her boyfriend.
"Hey." He said.
"Hey." She said, smirking.
"You look like Gavroche when you do that." He told her. That only made her smirk widen. She leaned up to kiss him good morning. Just then, they heard the front door open.
"Gavroche, freeze where you are. Let me check where Éponine and Enjolras are before you go wake them up." The voice of their perky blonde friend carried through Enjolras' bedroom door.
The two adults lying in the bed looked at each other and simultaneously said, "Shit." They sprung into action. Éponine would have to cross the living room to get to her room to get any clothes besides her costume from the night previous. Enjolras grabbed a baggy sweatshirt and gym shorts, which he threw to his girlfriend, before grabbing t-shirt, boxers, and his pajama pants for himself.
"Go in the bathroom and turn the shower on. I'll take care of Gavroche and Cosette until you can sneak back to your room to get your own clothes." Enjolras told the girl. She nodded and started doing what he said, but then saw the time.
"Shit! Gabe, we have classes today! All of us." She said.
"Just go. Like I said, I'll take care of Gavroche." He responded. Éponine went into the bathroom, dropped Enjolras' clothes on the floor and jumped in the shower.
Outside of the bathroom, Enjolras walked out of his room and into the hallway, almost running into a bubble of blondeness. "Hey, Cosette. Thanks for bringing Gavroche back. You can be on your way now. See you in your dad's class!" He said, trying to push her out of the hallway and out the door.
"Not so fast, Mister. Did I hear the shower just turn on? If I remember correctly, Éponine has her own bathroom on the opposite side of the apartment…"
"Well, she decided she wanted to shower in ours today. I don't know, I don't pretend to understand the female mind."
"I knew it! I know what you did. I just knew the costume would work! Tell Éponine I expect a full report later!" She responded, letting him push her out the door. Once it was closed, he sunk against it. The peace was short lived, as the man remembered the boy Cosette brought back to him.
"What did Miss Cosette mean? What did you and Éponine do?" Gavroche questioned.
"Nothing. Don't worry about it. Did you eat breakfast already?" When the boy nodded, Enjolras continued. "Then go get dressed and ready for school. Don't come out of your room until I come get you, okay?" The boy eyed him suspiciously, but nodded and went into his room.
Enjolras went back to his room to clean up and got dressed himself. He made a pile of Éponine's wonderful costume pieces, stripped the bed, and put new sheets on it. He would do laundry after Éponine and Gavroche left for class. He heard the shower turn off, and looked up as the door opened. How was it possible that she looked as good in his old high school physics sweatshirt as she did in her sexy Halloween costume? She really was a goddess. He walked up to her, put his hands on her hips, and kissed her lightly.
"You are beautiful, Éponine Jondrette." He told her. She blushed.
"Where is Gavroche?" She asked.
"He's in his room. I told him to stay there until I come to get him."
"Thank you. I have to go finish getting ready for class." She said, sneaking out of his embrace to go to her own room. Once he saw her close the door to her room, he knocked on Gavroche's door.
"You can come out now. You have about ten minutes before I'll walk you to school." Gavroche came out of his room.
"Where is Éponine?" He asked.
"She woke up late, so she is still getting ready." Enjolras responded.
"And why did she shower in our bathroom instead of her own?" The boy asked.
"Because, like I told Cosette, I have no idea. She wanted to? If there's one thing I can teach you about the female species, it's to never try to understand them." The boy nodded and walked past the man, into the living room. Enjolras sunk against the wall, glad he had kept their secret from the boy, if not the blonde. He stood and walked back into his room to finish getting ready for the day.
When Éponine arrived at Intro to Child Psych that day, she noticed that there was not a seat open next to her boyfriend. Instead, there was a seat open between Azelma and Cosette. Begrudgingly, she sat down in it.
"So-" Cosette began.
"Can we wait until after class to do this?" The brunette responded, not letting either of them begin their questioning. "We can go to lunch, just like we did for Azelma?"
The other two girls looked at each other before nodding. Éponine looked past both her blonde friend and the blonde's boyfriend at Enjolras. She mouthed "Help Me." Which he just chuckled and shook his head at.
After class, Éponine told Enjolras that she couldn't go to lunch with him, which he just laughed and kissed her forehead, saying he would see her after classes were over. She trudged back to where the other two girls were waiting for her. "I guess I'm all yours." She said, smiling and then rolling her eyes. They took off towards the Union to get lunch. They sat in their same secluded corner.
"We should really just make this a regular monthly thing. Or weekly! We don't have nearly enough time together, just us girls." Cosette gushed. The Jondrette sisters looked at each other and burst out laughing.
"Whatever you want, 'Sette. Whatever you want." Éponine said.
"But we aren't here for just any girl talk. I want the deets, 'Ponine!" The blonde squealed.
"Yeah, what exactly happened? Cosette just said you had a fun adventure last night…" Azelma said.
"Well, when we got back to our apartment, without Gav, we sort of- You know…" Éponine trailed off.
"No way! Éponine! Why didn't you tell me!?" Her sister squealed, almost as high pitched as Cosette's.
"I just did!" Éponine protested.
"But how? How did it happen?!" Cosette asked.
"Well, we got back into the apartment. He held the door for me and everything, but I didn't even have time to kick off my shoes before I was up against the door…" She started to explain.
"So he likes it rough?" Azelma pondered.
"No! Yes? I don't know! I'm not doing this." Éponine said, starting to stand.
"Oh, 'Ponine. Sit back down! You don't have to tell us the whole story." Cosette said. The brunette did as directed, sighing.
"Just tell us what you want to. There has to be something you want to get off your chest about it." Azelma prompted.
"Umm. It was kind of sort of amazing?" Éponine said before hiding her head in her hands.
"Do you regret it?" Azelma asked.
"No! Not at all. I mean, he was so gentle and kind, after the whole throwing-against-the- door thing. And then waking up with him this morning… It just seemed so- right?" She said, turning her statement into a question again.
"Awwww!" The other girls gushed. "'Ponine, you're in love." Cosette said.
"You think so?"
"I know so. But that's not all we have to talk about. Azelma, how are you doing?" Cosette asked.
"Well, we go for the six week appointment on Saturday. But so far, I've only had a little bit of nausea, and we decided that it was due to smells. Antoine bought me a new kind of shampoo that isn't as potent, and he stopped wearing overdoses of cologne. Otherwise, I feel fine. I guess we'll figure out more Saturday." The youngest girl shared.
"I'm so happy for you 'Zel." Her sister said. "I'm proud of you, too. I don't think I could handle this while still in school."
"Me neither. Marius and I talked about timelines a little bit when we found out you were pregnant. He told me he's already gotten Daddy's permission, and he'll probably propose sometime soonish, but we won't get married until after I graduate. We decided not to have kids until he has a steady job, so we won't have to move around. He's going to law school next year, after all. We're hoping he can stay here, but we'll just have to wait and see. I would really like to stay close to Mom and Dad, if we can."
Before her father got a steady job at the University, he didn't really have a steady teaching job. Éponine knew that as a kid, Cosette was uprooted a couple of times, changing families, as well as moving from place to place. She understood that she didn't want that for her child or children, just as much as Éponine wanted her children to have loving parents who could afford and want to take care of them.
"Well, I'd love to talk longer, but I do have another class today. I'll see you later, okay?" Éponine said, standing up from their table. The other girls said goodbye and went back to chatting about who knows what, and Éponine made her way to her last class of the day.
That night, Enjolras took Gavroche to buy a birthday present for one of his friends who was having a party that weekend, so Éponine had the house to herself. She decided it was time to start planning. She still hadn't told anyone except Azelma, but if she was going to try and figure it out before the end of the semester, she needed to get started. There were only a couple of weeks until Thanksgiving, and everyone knew the only thing that any college kid got done after Thanksgiving was studying for finals. So she set to work. She gathered all of the files she had on the Gavroche situation, and settled down to work.
When the boys got back to the apartment, Éponine had fallen asleep on her laptop. Enjolras sent Gav to his room to do his homework as he walked over to the girl. He smiled at her fondly before laying her down on the couch and moving her laptop and papers to cover her with a blanket. However, when he lifted the computer, he must have hit a key, because it woke the computer up and what he saw astounded him. It was a news article from five years prior.
Boy found Toddling on the Streets
Underneath was a picture of what must have been a young Gavroche. Intrigued, he sat down in the loveseat and began to read the article.
Tuesday, March 11
Dr. Jean Valjean, a professor of Children Psychology at Saint Michel University was walking home from classes one afternoon, when he saw a toddler in the middle of the street. He ran out to the boy, and picked him, safely reaching the sidewalk before looking around for the boy's parents. Upon seeing none, the professor asked the boy if he knew where his parents were. When the boy just shook his head, the professor asked what his name was. The boy responded "Gavroche." Valjean continued asking questions, finding out the boy was three-years-old, and didn't want to go home. The professor took the boy with him to the orphanage his wife ran, and called the police from there. Inspector Javert took charge of the situation, but when the boy's parents were revealed as the alleged criminals, Helena and Claude Thenardier, the state took him into custody and let him stay at the orphanage under the Valjean's. The Thenardiers have two teenage girls, one fourteen, the other thirteen, but the state has deemed them safe in their home.
After reading the article, he had already heard the story and wasn't too alarmed, Enjolras looked at the other pages that had been on Éponine's lap. He gasped after looking at Éponine and Azelma's birth certificates, which were in the pile. The parents listed were none other than Helena and Claude Thenardier.
A/N: So, kind of intense ending. I know it's not a totally realistic story, but we can pretend, right? The whole foster home thing is kind of really screwed up in America, I don't know about other places. But I'll get off my soapbox.
Sorry about kind of going MIA. I've been swamped with work and getting back together with friends and everything involved with the ending of a school year. But I remembered to update today, so that's a good thing, right?
Hmmm, what should my question be this week? Let's go with something kind of simple. What's your favorite color? But try and be creative, like turquoise or scarlet or something. Yeah, with that dumb thing, I'll see you next week for the next chapter! Keep Calm and Love Aaron Tveit!