There are in this world some distances which cannot be traversed, for they are not within our sphere to breach them. Javert offered his hand, and in that offer was more besides, but it was up to Valjean to bridge the gap should he choose, and decide what manner of reconciliation was reached.

For what seemed to them both was centuries but in truth scant seconds of time, Valjean considered all that was being gifted to him should he decide to accept it. In that infinite moment, Javert's patience was absolute.

At last, with a hesitancy born of fear in one who deems themselves undeserving, Valjean bridged that small and desolate space between them, and grasped Javert's arm, clasping hand to hand and wrist to wrist.

Javert levered him to his feet, and they stood like that in further silence, the Inspector's knife-grey eyes looking upon Valjean's darker and more harrowed gaze.

"When one begins life with nothing," Javert said quietly, "One schools oneself to never miss what one has. It is all too easily lost or taken away. In my life, I have looked upon all I have gained with the same eye as all I have lost: as a fleeting thing neither fêted nor mourned, for to do either is folly – it is the way of the world to change." A tilting of the head and a tensing of the jaw. "As such, I have not missed you. And were you to leave I would not miss you now. But that is my way; it does not lessen the fact that I would be..." the slightest of pauses and stress upon the next word, "honoured, should you stay." Here he gave a rueful smile as he mapped the direction of Valjean's expression. "No," he commanded, "don't look like that unless it is my offer that displeases you."

Valjean's eyes widened with an edge of anxiety and he shook his head, tried to form the words to explain how he wished to accept such an offer but could not in good conscience because he did not find himself worthy...

Javert did not possess Valjean's easy empathy, but he was all too adept at reading between the lines of another's expression, especially when it was writ so plain across their face.

"Valjean," he said quietly, the opening to a longer explanation that lost itself in a sigh. "I am no good at this," he admitted with a supremely crooked smile. There passed a second of silence, brimful of potential. The Inspector had ever found it difficult to explain himself and this was perhaps hardest of all. (It is one thing to acquiesce to circumstance, it is quite another to instigate them of one's own volition.) He gazed upon the man before him and knew, as any with any sense, that in some way this was a dance: if nothing else, they were as close chest to chest as partners in a waltz. Valjean had accepted the invitation, but it was up to Javert himself to lead, to take initiative and plot the timing of the music they moved to. He allowed his eyes to convey in their look an eloquence he was more in the habit of shutting away; but even as he bestowed it, he knew that was not enough.

He made a short sound, a huff and semi-laugh together, then, "Damn your scruples," he declared, and tugged Valjean closer to him and into a kiss that possessed that same careful yet meaningful manner in which he himself had once been kissed and never forgot.

Lips parted from their brief embrace but still brow was close to brow and eyes viewed one another barely an inch apart. "Come to bed," Javert ordered. "No more, no less - sleep – you are exhausted." The light within his eyes changed, a sliver of hope, a dash of desperation to be interpreted how it may. "Stay." Such a simple command – although in truth it was more entreaty – one word that held within it a wealth of possibilities. "And in the morning, let us see what path might be wrought," he said, showing he was not ignorant of those possibilities, and the tone of his voice had not been an accident.

"I..."

A twist of annoyance. "If you say something in disparagement of yourself I shall lose all patience with you."

Words struggled from his throat to articulate the most petty of protests "I – I have no..."

He smiled, a flash of God-given inspiration allowing him to both cut and counter what had scarce been aired. "You already have a shirt here. Come. It's past time you claimed it."

And with that he silenced all of Valjean's objections.