The Best Gift Given

The sounds of It's a Wonderful Life were emitted from the television, filling the silent room of the Goodmans. Eponine fingered the mug of tea in her hands, barely focusing on the movie in front of her. Her sister and brother had fallen asleep a while ago, and Leanne was the only other person awake. Leanne toyed with Azelma's hair, braiding the strands and then taking them out with gentle care.

Eponine looked at her aunt. The effects of the environment they were in were shown upon closer inspection. Wrinkles and creases had formed on her forehead, and her mouth rested in a worrisome pout. Bags beneath her eyes were even more clearly expressed. She was pale, too.

Eponine reached out to her. "Leanne?"

Leanne glanced at Eponine quickly before continuing her ministrations with Azelma's hair. "Hm?"

Eponine was planning on asking her aunt some questions about their safety, but she thought better of it. Her aunt had been trying hard to keep them sound. it was also Christmas Eve. There was no need to worry about something. It was time for them to relax and put their worries at rest. Instead, Eponine looked at her aunt solemnly. "Thank you for everything."

Her aunt laughed, a light tinkle, matching the bells from the movie.

"Anything for you guys. I love you, and you guys don't deserve that kind of treatment." she sighed heavily. "Nobody does."

Eponine looked at her skeptically. "You speak like you know exactly what we went through- er- are going through."

Another heavy sigh. She stopped braiding Azelma's hair, looking off into the distance. "I don't know it that well… but the fear is familiar."

Eponine watched her aunt shift uncomfortably. "When my sister met Thenardier… He just exuded negative vibes."

"So you guys knew about him?"

"You know james dean?"

"Of course."

"Yeah well that was him except mixed with the demon barber of fleet street."

Eponine laughed unsteadily. It was funny yet true.

"You're in your last year of high school, Ep," Leanne said quietly. She reached out to brush Eponine's hair out of her face. "Your dance was ruined because he appeared. They're around us constantly, and you guys don't deserve that. You've been through enough abnormal things for a girl your age. This environment isn't something anyone should be living in."

"I was born into it."

"That doesn't mean you can't get out of it. They need to be locked up and taken far away from here."

Eponine nodded. She couldn't agree more, but she knew her father. He was too known in the dark, outside world for her to ever be safe. He had connections that caused him to be a threat to her even when he was in prison.

Eponine rubbed her arms up and down. The day at the park had felt so normal and relaxed. Everything over her head had disappeared for just those few hours. Even baking with her family had helped relieve the tension. Normal. That's all she wanted. It was so close. It was in her reach. Normal was what she kind of had when she had originally moved away. Then the past caught up to her and started creating a stressful, complicated storm. First her friends had appeared and then her father decided to join the party too. Guilt settled in her stomach when she thought about Leanne, who never had to deal with the drama if she just didn't agree to take care of them.

"You're the best gift we could have ever received you know? And you didn't even show up during Christmas!" she said jokingly at the end. They both laughed lightly.

"All I'd like is safety for this family, quite honestly," Leanne said.

Eponine looked at her and scoffed. "I'm sorry Leanne, but that's never fully happening to this family."

Leanne sighed. "Well, it was nice to just get it out there."

The pair laughed together again before settling down. To punctuate the end of their conversation, Eponine's alarm for Christmas went off. She grabbed her phone quickly, not wanting to wake up her siblings. Seeing that it was already 12, Eponine realized the evening flew by. She looked at Leanne and gestured at her brother and sister who were very much asleep. Leanne picked up Gavroche and signaled for Eponine to pick up Azelma.

"Uh-uh. Definitely not," Eponine objected.

"Okay, well then wake her up. She can't sleep like that for the whole night. She's going to have a serious neck cramp in the morning," said Leanne as she carried Gavroche up the stairs. He seemed to be too big for her to do that now, as his limbs spilled over her arms and hung limply.

Eponine watched her aunt handle her brother with gentle care as she disappeared up the stairs. She smiled briefly before looking at the person she had to take care of. She groaned loudly. Eponine nudged the younger girl aggressively, urging her to wake up quickly. Azelma stirred in the slightest before actually opening her eyes.

"Get up. It's late. You gotta go to bed," Eponine whispered, helping her sister stand.

"Jesus Ep," Azelma said with a yawn. "Why didn't you wake me up earlier? Before I fell asleep maybe?"

Rolling her eyes, Eponine replied. "I would've left you there for your neck to cramp if it weren't for Leanne telling me to do otherwise."

Azelma looked at Eponine impassively before sneering. Her sister slowly made her way to the stairs, dragging her feet. "I'll be sure to thank her then."

Before she went to her own room, Eponine turned off the television and made sure her sister didn't fall off the staircase on her way up. As she moved to turn off the living room and tree lights, there was a noise at the door. It sounded similar, like someone dropping a package. She stiffened quickly, wondering who in the world was at their door this time of night. She quickly dashed to the kitchen to grab a knife, for defense she told herself, and crept towards the door. Looking out the peephole, she saw nothing but the lamp outside their house. She slowly unlocked the latch, pressing the door closed still, before whipping it open. A rush of cold air flew into the house, causing her to shut her eyes, but no human came along with it. She looked around the sides of the house, only to find it void of any human beings. Then, she looked down and gasped. There at her doorstep was a package.

The package was wrapped in bright red, metallic like paper. It was small, but quite heavy-looking and thick. A small, black bow was wrapped around the package, and beneath the bow an envelope rested with her name written in cursive on it.

Eponine picked up the package and shut the door, locking it quietly. Fingering the edges and curves, she had a good idea of what it was. Who sent it, on the other hand, was still a mystery.

Before going up to her room, she made sure the door was locked and put the knife back in its place. Eponine climbed the steps slowly, still admiring the package in her hands. She closed her door as she entered her room and sat down at her bed.

Eponine took the envelope off and removed the card inside. She opened the plain, white card slowly in the dim lighting of her room.

"To Eponine,

Something to commemorate you coming back into the story of my life.

Merry Christmas,

Enjolras"

Though she tried to control it, she smiled widely and couldn't help the giddiness that had controlled her body. Eagerly, she ripped the package open and took out a beautiful, purple book. It was slightly faded, and it elicited the scent of old paper. A golden bookmark fell from the spine of the book, disappearing somewhere in the story. The lettering was golden and spelled Pride and Prejudice, one of her all time favorites. She held the book close to her chest and fell back on her bed, smiling. Her heart pounded against the book, and she closed her eyes. She couldn't believe it.

Setting the book on her nightstand, she grabbed her phone and began looking for a certain contact.

"Thank you. I love it :)," she typed out.

In a few second, she received a reply. "Merry Christmas, Eponine."

"Merry Christmas Enjolras."

A/N: I'm so sorry. I haven't updated in forever. It's just sometimes i lack creativity or inspiration so I'm just barely getting these out on a normal basis so I apologize. I'm working on it. A little awkward that I'm writing christmas chapters in the middle of summer, but my schedule is off! I hope you guys enjoyed this chapter. I tried to get a little more enjonine fluff out there. It was quite a short chapter, i realize so I apologize.

I'm sorry for any grammatical mistakes, and i haven't written in a while so i'm also out of practice. I also underwent some surgery so I can barely see what I'm writing in this author's note.

As for the random reviewer's question about Cosette finding out... that is a plot hole in my story. As this is my first real big writing project, I've got quite a few of those and I'm honestly just trying to finish this story up. It's been so hard, and I don't exactly know how I'll fix that. It's an issue I needed to address so I apologize. Bear with me here. Apologies! :/

Please leave a review. I need all the support i can get, haha. Thank you for all the follows and favorites. I very much appreciate it! :) Hope you all have a wonderful day!

~FraNKY