"Look at this," cried Jean Prouvaire exultantly. "Look at it!"

It was one of the first warm days of the year, and certain of the Amis had succeeded in getting the rest out to a park for the afternoon. Yes, Combeferre had insisted on bringing one of his textbooks and discussing population health in relation to demographics, and most of the others had digressed into a conversation on various lady park-goers, but all in all it was a sort of triumph for Jehan, in whose mind the idea had originated, and he was determined to enjoy every last bit of it.

Enjolras, hearing Jehan's call, went over. He stood examining the ground where Jehan knelt. His air was slightly puzzled, as though he was not sure what cause there was for fascination.

What a pity, Jehan thought, that Enjolras has never taken the time to learn to appreciate these things. For beauty speaks deep things unto the soul, and especially to those souls that are already deep, like his.

But perhaps Enjolras could learn. Perhaps Jehan could teach him.

Perhaps they could begin with the newly-sprung grass before them.

"Look," Jehan said Socraticly, "what is this?"

Enjolras graced him with a tolerant answer. "That is grass, my friend."

"Yes, grass! What color is it?"

"It's green."

Jehan ran a finger along the blade of grass and smiled up at Enjolras. "And what does that mean?"

"Jehan," said Combeferre from beside them, "how can he explain the meaning of green?"

"Not of green," Jehan corrected. "Of green grass." He turned back to Enjolras. "Well?"

Enjolras simply looked at him with a face of grave bemusement. Jehan sighed. All right, a new example.

Enjolras allowed himself to be led as Jehan took his wrist and made his way up to a nearby tree.

Jehan pulled down a low, thin branch. "What is this?"

"A tree."

"No, this, specifically."

"A branch."

"These?"

"Leaves, Jehan."

"Yes, tiny ones." He caressed them. "And what color are they?"

Enjolras pulled his eyebrows together. "They are green."

"Yes!" exclaimed Jehan. "And that means?"

Enjolras gave no answer.

"When do leaves turn green?"

"Leaves," interjected Combeferre, "are green when they first form. They don't turn green."

Jehan ignored him. "If leaves are tiny and green, what does that mean?"

"They are—" Enjolras looked at Combeferre—"newly formed. Jehan—"

"Please." Jehan blushed. "Just…just look. When do leaves form? Do they form in the winter?"

"No," Enjolras answered.

"When is the grass green? In the winter?"

"No."

"What season was it, until recently?"

"Winter," said Enjolras.

"Yes!" cried Jehan. "But now the leaves are here and the grass is green! Is it winter now?"

"No," Enjolras said. Then he added, very slowly, "It is spring."

"Yes!" Jehan cried again. "Spring! Can't you see it? Can't you hear it? It's spring!"

"Spring," repeated Enjolras. Gently, he turned Jehan's question back on him. "And what does that mean?"

"It means the future," said Jehan. "The future dream becoming the present reality. Nature's idealism rising to life. That's spring. A gentle swell of revolution. A world about to dawn."

Enjolras turned in a slow circle. He looked at the leaves, at the grass, at the sun and clear sky, at the budding flowers in scattered clumps.

"Winter is a tyrant, you see," Jehan said. "Sometimes a grand and lovely tyrant, but a tyrant nevertheless. And every year, the world decides it has had enough. So it revolts. It struggles. Winter against Spring, and Spring—she always wins. Frost still comes after the first few warm days, and sometimes it kills the first leaves. But others rise. Others take their place. And Spring always wins in the end."

Enjolras brought his eyes back to Jehan's. "A metaphor, then," he said. "You have been trying to show me a metaphor of our cause?"

Jehan sat down in the new grass to consider. "No," he said at last. "I think the cause is a metaphor of this. No, they are both metaphors of something greater. Of the infinite."

And Jehan then lay down on his back with his face to the sky contemplate those greater things.

Enjolras gazed at him one last time. But in the next moment Combeferre put to him a question of social justice, and Enjolras returned to ignoring the spring.