Chapter 11

Éponine's Point of View

"Éponine!" said Marius as he gave her hug. "How are you? You look surprised. Did you forget that I told you about Cossette? I am pretty sure that I told you that. Actually I did tell you that the other night when I introduced you to Enjolras. " Marius looked very concerned about his friend.

Éponine had not seen Cossette in years, but they did write to each other as often as they could. It was difficult between her father's drunken nights when she would have to hide her siblings, finding enough food for the boys, and convincing a young scared Gavorche that it was okay to come back the house so he didn't have to hide in the Elephant anymore. Éponine knew that it was also hard for Cossette, since her father would have been furious if he had realized that they were writing to each other. Her father would have afraid that Éponine was not he one receiving the letters, but Thenardier himself, in order to plan a meet and greet so he could take Cossette back to barter for money. To be honest Éponine understood the man's fears and she of all people should know to never put something like that past her father.

Éponine could hardly believe what she was seeing. She remember Marius telling her the other day that he had meet Cossette. Although she could not remember when he had meet her. Now come to think of that Marius didn't tell her any of those details. And how did Éponine come up as a conversation topic between the two anyway. As far as Éponine knew she was the only mutual friend they had. Éponine made a mental note to ask one of the two later. Normally Éponine was good at remembering things like that.

Well, normally she was good at remembering things, but also in her defense a lot had happened in the last couple of days. First, for starters she had meet Enjolras. And God knows how good looking, and captivating he is to look at and talk too. And now all the information about the upcoming trial did not help matters.

"Yes Marius! I remember you telling me about Cossette. I just didn't realize that you were bringing her here." Said Éponine shyly.

Éponine had not been able to write to her friend since she started living in the café. She did not have time between work and watching over the boys. She knew that was not really an excuse because she used to write to Cossette when she lived in the Inn. Éponine was just embarrassed about her old life. She didn't want Cossette to know how bad things were; even though she was sure Cossette had figured it out towards the end.

"Marius! I am sure Éponine has a lot on her mind. She probably didn't hear you say that I was coming, or didn't realize that you meant today. It happens to everyone," said Cossette.

Cossette was about 5'4 and had pretty blonde hair. She was thin with striking porcelain like facial figures. Her blue eyes were soft but they had a bright shine to them, like sapphires.

Éponine noticed that everyone was staring at both her and Cossette. She felt a hand on her shoulder as she turned around to see that the hand belonged to Enjolras. He gave her a small smile and nodded telling her to go talk to her.

Éponine gave him a quick smile back. As she turned around she saw Cossette walking towards. Éponine then took a few steps forward, as she and Cossette hugged each other.

"Éponine" said Cossette with a weak voice. "I have missed you so much. I got so worried when I didn't hear from you. I walked by the Inn once to see if you were there, but it was all boarded up. Then when I heard your parents were arrested I tried to find you again, but I had no luck. I thought you parents had finally gotten to all of you."

As the two pulled away Éponine realized that both she and Cossette were both starting to cry.

"Cossette! I am so sorry I never wrote to you after a while. A lot of things happened. I will tell you about all of it soon." Said Éponine. "I just needed time to process everything before I told you. I wanted to get in touch sooner. Then the other day Marius told me that he meet you, and all this other stuff happened"

Éponine's heart was pounding. She did not realized until this moment how much she missed her old foster sister, and how much their letters had meant to the two of them over the years.

"I know don't worry about It." said Cossette as she dried her eyes. "We will sit down tomorrow or in a few days. There are a lot of thing we need to talk about. But there is also a lot of lost time to make up for" said Cossette with a big and bright smile.

"You are right!" said Éponine. The two women smiled at each other. Éponine noticed that Cossette looked relieved. She must of have been worried about seeing Éponine again, and talking about things.

Éponine then realized that she felt better seeing Cossette too. It would be nice to have another friend to talk to and spend time with.

Éponine could then feel everyone else looking around at them with confused looks on their face.

Marius must have picked up on this too, and then began to look around at the boys.

"Everyone, sorry for my poor manners. This is Cossette." Said Marius as he put his arm around Cossette's waist. "We meet a couple of weeks ago. She and Éponine happen to be old friends. Small world right?"

Everyone looked around still confused. Courfeyrac, Jean, Joly, and Combeferre also shot each other looks. The four of them probably realized that there was more to Éponine and Cossette's friendship, but they did not push the issue. The other boys went up to introduce themselves. If they did pick up on something, they did not show it.

Gavorche even went up to Cossette, and have her a hug. He claimed that he remembered Cossette, even though he was only three at the time.

The rest of the boys then went up to Cossette and introduced them. Joly, Combeferre, Jean, and Courfeyrac all smiled warmly at Cossette as they shook her hand. As they all turned to go back to their seats they all gave Éponine a raised eyebrow.

Éponine was going to ask them why they were giving her weird looks, but she got distracted when Enjolras sat down next to her.

Just as she was about to say something to Enjolras, she heard Marius yell at Grantaire.

"Grantaire!" said Marius as his face was filled with frustration. "Would it kill you to get off your ass to come and meet Cossette?"

"Well actually. I had a few drinks. I am not sure if it would be a good idea for me to get up. I would not want to knock into anyone or into something." Said Grantaire.

"Grantaire, how much did you have to drink?" asked Combeferre.

"Why are you even brothering to asked?" said Jean. "He doesn't know much how he had to drink until he gets the bill at the end of the night."

"Only a few beers, but that doesn't concern you," said Grantaire.

Everyone just shook his or her head.

Bossuet then started to have a conversation with Cossette.

"So Cossette, do you have an you have siblings, in particularly any sisters around your age?" asked Bossuet which earned him a hit on the head from Bahroel.

"What?" asked Bossuet? "Everyone else was thinking it. And besides weren't you the one said we were all idiots for not asking Éponine if she had any siblings?"

The rest of the boys just rolled their eyes.

"You could have asked me. Why would have that been such a problem?" asked Éponine.

"For this simple reason. They would have wanted to know if you had a sister who was dumb enough to go out with them," said Courfeyrac.

"Courfeyrac you of all people should not be commenting on how its not right to know if someone has a sister that you could date." said Enjolras. "You asked Jean about his sister three times, just so you could take her out to dinner, for the sole purpose of annoying him."

"That's not true," said Courfeyrac. "She was very pretty, just not my type. She wants a relationship. I am just a free-spirit."

"More like after one date, and she could not get away from you fast enough" said Joly.

"Coming from the guy who had a girl crawl out the bathroom window before he salad came, because she was so tired of hearing you talking about germs and diseases." Said Courfeyrac.

"Hey. I was just trying to inform her about the dangerous of not properly washing your hands" said Joly with a defensive look on his face. "And that doesn't matter anyway. I got the best girl around," as he wrapped his arms around Musichetta.

Everyone started to laugh at all of the events that had just transpired. Éponine could not believe how confortable she felt around everyone so quickly. It was not like Éponine to be so trust worthy, but she knew these people were not thieves and con artists like her parents.

She felt scared because the wall she always built up around people was coming down. She was also so shocked about her feelings about Enjolras. Éponine knew that she would have to explore these feelings more, and that her sister given the circumstances way not approve. Éponine still felt like Juliet when she first meets Romeo. She wondered if Enjolras felt the same way.

Everyone started to talk amongst each other. After about an hour, Azelma came down stairs and told Éponine that the other boys were in bed. She then took Gavorche upstairs to get him ready for bed.

Everyone else continued to talk. She noticed that Enjolras grabbed her hand. He then placed both of his hands around hers. He then highly kissed her hand.

"Do you want to take a walk?" Enjolras asked her. He looked confused, and she could tell that he wanted to talk.

"Sure" said Éponine with a smile.

The two then left the group hand and hand.

TBC

A.N. Hey everyone sorry for the long wait. The semester is under way, so updates will take longer, but I do plan to keep writing. Also I know there has not also be a lot of romance between the two, but I need to get Cossette, in the story for plot development later on, and the Barricade boys will play an important as well. That's why I wanted to show showing everyone that Éponine felt comfortable around them. THERE WILL BE MORE ÉPONINE AND ENJOLRAS ROMANCE SOON. Just so you know the next chapter will jump ahead a few months. It will make sense I promise. I just did not want to take a lot of time developing all of the relationships between the characters.

ALSO PLEASE REVIEW! It really helps me as a writer. Thank you though to everyone who has favorites/followed/reviewed so far. Please reviews only take 10 seconds to write. I am started to wonder if anyone even reads this. Tell me you are reading it with your views!