Chapter 1

"Shit, shit, shit" Éponine muttered to herself. She glared at the small pink plus sign. She was very proud of her glares, she had once reduced Joly to tears with one look, and yet no matter how hard she stared the pink plus sign defiantly remained. Did it have to be such a happy color? She hated pink; it was as if it was mocking her.

She sighed and threw the test on the pile with the others. She didn't really know what she had expected, one negative would not have negated the five positive results she had already received. And yet as her last ounce of hope started to fade away she felt tears begin to prick her eyes.

She glanced around her tiny bathroom with its scuffed floor and dirty shower curtain. When she was young she used to pretend her dolls were children, and she would play house with the little boy Montparnasse from down the street. But as she grew up and her parents money dried up along with their humanity, she had not allowed herself to pretend anymore. The little boy grew up to be one of her dad's cronies, and the dolls were sold to children who could afford them. She was always so careful, so practical, lest she ended up stuck in that life forever. She had gotten out, made good friends, but now it looked like this tiny apartment that she had once considered a stepping stone to a better life would be her last stop. This was as far as she would move up in the world if she was saddled down with a child.

Would she resent it? Would she end up like her parents, seeing her child as a burden, as the end to her own dreams?

She thought back to that night six weeks ago. The bitterness she had felt as she watched Marius joyfully dance with Cosette at their engagement party. She had tried to drown her sorrows in champagne as she listened to everyone gush about the beautiful couple. She did this for about an hour until he had kneeled down beside her and offered to drive her home. She accepted with a nod and ignored the stares of Les Amis, filled with pity, as he took her hand and led her to the exit.

Marius hadn't even noticed her leaving.

When they reached her house she asked him to come upstairs. He declined politely until she explained that she didn't want to be alone. She was past caring how pitiful she sounded. He had nodded and followed her wordlessly upstairs. She immediately poured herself a glass of wine and he surprised her by pouring himself one too, not wanting her to drown her sorrows alone. Soon one glass had turned into two and then half a bottle of vodka and from here her memories are scattered.

She remembers the first kiss, although she could not recall who initiated it. It was gentle at first but quickly escalated into something more. She recalls the tangle of limbs, a feeling of ecstasy and contentment. There had been a moment where his piercing blue eyes had connected with hers and she had realized, even through her clouded mind, that this would change everything.

When she woke up the next morning, she allowed herself a moment of calm within his warm, muscular arms before carefully extracting herself without waking him, an art she had perfected over the years.

After she had dressed she looked at his face, so angelically calm and unlike his usual intense, passionate scowl. For a moment she allowed herself to imagine how the day could go if he woke up. At first it would be awkward, but then he would offer to make breakfast and they would laugh about the night before over scrambled eggs and french toast. He would suggest that maybe last night did not have to be a one time occasion, that he liked spending time with her, that he wanted to be more than friends.

But this was not how her life worked, she reminded herself. She was not the type of girl that guys wanted to spend more than one night with. She was a good fuck but nothing more, something Montparnasse had reminded her on her 18th birthday when she had told him she loved him. And although he was not Montparnasse and he was ten times the man Montparnasse had ever been, he was still a man. And she would always be Éponine, the poor girl from the slums in slightly better clothing. If Marius, the nicest boy she had ever met, couldn't see through that then no one would.

So she left for work, not even glancing back at the naked man whose feet were hanging endearingly over the edge of her tiny bed. And when she saw him later in Café Musain and he glanced at her but said nothing, she knew she had been right. No matter how angelic he seemed on the outside, he was just a man.

Since that night they had seen each other regularly and talked politics and rallies as if nothing had happened, although he never seemed to look her directly in the eyes. Sometimes she wondered if she had imagined the whole thing. When she had returned to her room that night the bed was made and it was almost as if he had never been there at all.

Sometimes she thought she could feel his gaze on her when she was across the room drinking with Grantaire or pretending to listen to Marius gush about Cosette's beautiful eyes or hair or collarbones or whatever he went on about. But whenever she looked back he was always looking down at his schoolwork or one of his speeches, and she told herself that she was just imagining it.

But now there was no getting around talking about what had happened, even if it seemed like he had no desire to. She briefly contemplated just getting rid of it and pretending nothing had ever happened. It would certainly be easier, but she didn't know what she wanted and he didn't deserve that. Besides she didn't even have the money for something like that, as evidenced by her tiny bathroom. She took a deep breath and slowly stood, steeling her resolve for what she knew she had to do.

Thirty minutes later, she stared up at the thick wooden door to his apartment and willed herself to knock. She knew he was a good man, yet she couldn't help imagining him responding to her news the way Montparnasse would, telling her she was a slut, that it couldn't be his, that she should have been on the pill, that she was trying to trap him. She finally raised a shaking hand.

He answered on the fifth knock and looked at her in surprise. His blonde curls were in disarray and she realized he had been sleeping. She hadn't bothered looking at the clock when she had left but estimated it was about 2 am. I guess time doesn't stop when your world comes crashing down she mused.

"Éponine," Enjolras breathed. "What...?" but his sentence trailed off as she simply handed him one of the tests she had taken earlier that evening. His hair fell into his eyes and his brow wrinkled in confusion as he looked down at the test. His head then snapped up rather suddenly as he looked at her in awe.

"You're..." he barely whispered.

She nodded before he could finish his sentence.

"Shit," he muttered.

She nodded again.