Hey #2

"This is Gabriel Enjolras. If you would like to know more about the Society of the ABC, please visit our website. Otherwise, please leave a message with your name and number, and I'll get back to you as soon as possible."

"I swear to God, every time I call you, your voicemail message gets even longer. Hey, just wanted to remind you that it's okay to take a few days off every now and then. Actually, you should count on it—next week, Thursday through Monday. That's why I'm calling. To make sure you get a substitute. God knows there are enough grad students running around to cover a few lectures. And don't you dare say you're too busy. Come home for dinner and I'll make something good. Love you."

How Could I Ever Forget?

Enjolras should have known that taking a few days off where Éponine was involved wouldn't involve sleeping in.

"It's four in the goddamn morning, Éponine."

She's hovering over him with a grin like a tiger hunting its prey. "It's not my fault that you couldn't finish grad school last year like some of us."

He could pull her down against him. Instead he serves a pillow into her face and she lets out a squeak of rage. "I have something to make this early wake-up worth your while," she purrs in his ear, not to be deterred.

"The only thing that will make it worth my while is if you go away and let me sleep."

She groans. "It was going to be a surprise, but if I tell you that you can sleep in the car and that we're going to the beach for the weekend, will you please stop being an intolerable asshole?" He sits up and blinks at her, making sure she's not kidding. Her smile doesn't falter. "I even packed and made coffee already."

Slowly he smiles in return. "You are a gift from the gods."

She saunters towards the door with a cocky grin. "I know."

True to her promise, she offers to drive the first stretch and let him sleep a little longer. He's close to falling asleep before they even get out of the city, but there's a niggling thought at the back of his head that he can't seem to pin down. Éponine makes a familiar turn and it hits him hard. He swallows in remembrance. "Hey, do you think we could maybe take a different way out of the city than the BQE—oh, for fucks sake," he groans. It's too late. And of course the godforsaken highway is crowded.

"Nope," Éponine says, popping the 'p' and smirking. "Just go to sleep, Enj."

Why Stay?

It was an accident. She's said the words so many times that they're embossed in her mouth like cotton and lies. It was sort of an accident that they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Anyone who knew the Patron-Minette knew it wasn't really an accident. The Patron-Minette never did anything by accident.

They were going to dinner. It was an accident. Babet was in the alley. It was an accident. She agreed to testify against her father, who was arrested. It was an accident. Enjolras' head was split open. It was an accident.

"You should go home and get some rest."

Éponine lifts her head from the hospital bed and blinks at Combeferre, scrubbing at her eyes with her hands and smudging her eyeliner. "I need to be here when he wakes up."

Combeferre hesitates in the doorway. "We don't know when that'll be," he says gently.

"So it could be in five minutes or it could be in five days, but if you're leaving him, then for fucks sake someone ought to be here," she snaps, and he recoils slightly. "Look, I'm sorry," she grumbles, reaching for the thermos of coffee. "I just…I need to be here, you know?" Because it's my fault. "And I'm not in med school, so I require slightly less sleep than you do."

He smiles gratefully and leaves, and Éponine waits, tearing the knitted edge of the hospital blanket into shreds and determinedly not looking at the row of stitches on Enjolras' head.

The Break

"Éponine."

"Mmph."

"Éponine!"

"Go 'way."

"Ép, you have to go to court today."

"No, I'm not going," she groans, pulling the duvet over her head.

"What do you mean you're not going?" Enjolras pulls the duvet back with a snap and she glares at him with a shiver.

"I decided I wasn't going to do it after what happened in the alley," she sighs.

He blinks as if this is the most absurd and unrelated thing in the world. "What?"

"It was one of my dad's cronies that beat you and gave me a black eye. For agreeing to testify. They found out. They will always find out."

"But your father will be declared guilty, and with your testimony, the rest of his gang will be indicted," Enjolras says confidently.

Éponine rolls her eyes. "I'm so glad that for people with money, the justice system works the way it's supposed to," she says bitterly, seeing the heat rise in Enjolras' cheeks.

"You know I don't live like that. Not anymore."

"Do you have any idea what would happen to me or you if I went to testify against my father? Do you? Let's pretend that either of us don't get bludgeoned to death in an alleyway. It'll most certainly involve the witness protection program, and that would be really inconvenient, and I don't know about you, but I for one am not about to discredit the possibility that we, you know, get beaten or stabbed to death in an alley, and I promise they'd make it look like an accident," she says in a half-shouted voice, out of breath.

"You'd be able to get your sister back if you testified," he says winningly, but they both know it's half a lie.

"Yeah, if I don't get knifed in a parking lot by Montparnasse, beaten by Babet, or abducted and sold into prostitution by Claquesous," she laughs harshly.

He groans and pulls at his hair. "If you can't do it for yourself, can you at least do it for me?"

She stops and looks at him in sarcastic surprise. "Wow, that's really fucking selfish, Enjolras."

He rolls his eyes impatiently. "That's not what I meant, you always fucking do this, can you just listen for five minutes, Christ"—

"Right, because you know so much about this," she screeches, "because you grew up in an ivory tower and the closest to a bad situation you've ever gotten is me." She doesn't mean what she says, but the words pour out. "Do you actually love me, or am I a charity case, a poster girl for the dregs of New York society that can be elevated by your precious organization?"

And then the door slams and he's gone and she laughs because it's just so goddamn ridiculous that he's the one who ended up leaving. And she laughs because if she doesn't, she'll realize that it's serious because he's Enjolras and he never leaves. And she laughs.

Maybe

Éponine doesn't make lists. She chooses to take things as they come as much as humanly possible. But after a stern talking-to from Cosette, she makes two columns on the back of a receipt and fights the urge to cringe as she scratches 'pro' and 'con' above each column. She fiddles with the pen and swallows the rising tide of absurdity, trying to focus on pure, logical implications. It's only seven, and court doesn't start til noon. She distracts herself, snapping the tattered hair elastic against her wrist and watching the patterns of clouds shift in her morning coffee.

Maybe it didn't have to be like this, she'll admit. She doubts very much that either of her siblings remembered what her own childhood was like, when there was enough to eat and she called her father Papa and he brought her presents and her mother doted on her. She slumps, chin in hand, leaving ink blots on the grubby receipt. Maybe she'll go to court and give her sister what she'd failed to give Gavroche. Maybe she won't go to court because it wouldn't make a damn difference.

Her fingers itch for her phone, dial Enjolras' number, and promptly drop the phone into the couch cushions.

Hey #3

You know you're holding your breath, but you slip in the back of the courtroom anyway, determinedly not looking around. The prosecutor calls her name once, twice, and you sigh until you catch a glimpse of blue. Her dress is probably too bright and tight for a courtroom, but her stockings don't have holes and her hair is neatly pinned up and she faces the court with angry determination glinting in her eyes.

She is unflinching and relentless and barely pauses for breath, her gaze not wavering from her father's, and your heart swells. She is impossible, stubborn, and very seldom recognizes a big picture, but she is yours.

The list of charges—even with the statute of limitations—is so impossibly long that the trial will not be finished today. But she climbs from the stand and marches straight out the door, clearly done. You bolt from your seat and catch her arm in the hallway. "Hey."

Her brown eyes turn to yours. "Hey."

"You came."

"Well…I thought that I might. I knew I had to." She shrugs, like she'd just admitted to going to the grocery store.

You let out your breath and set your back teeth. "I'm sorry for pushing you."

She nods. "I know." She fidgets. "I'm sorry for yelling."

"I know."

"Want to go home?"

"Very much." You take her arm in mockery of a gentleman, and she raises her eyebrow and laughs.

So Anyway

"Hello?" It's seven-thirty in the morning on Éponine's day off and it's a herculean effort not to snarl.

"Miss Thénardier? This is Celeste Simplice with New York Child Protective Services."

Éponine slumps back on the pillow, her heart in her throat. Not Azelma, not Azelma, not Azelma.

"Miss Thénardier?" Éponine makes a quiet noise to let the woman know she's still on the line. "Miss Thénardier, I understand that a year ago, you sought custody of your siblings but were denied due to a prior arrest record."

"Look, is my sister okay?" Éponine breathed.

"What? Oh! Yes, she's fine. That's why I called. Due to—ahem—extenuating circumstances, we don't believe foster care would be fit for Azelma at this time. Pending examination by a social worker and a state-appointed psychiatrist, would you be in a position to financially and emotionally care for Azelma in your home?" Simplice says.

"Yes, yes, absolutely," Éponine says, bolting out of bed and grabbing the first clothes she can find. "When should I come get her? Where should I come get her?" The thoughts fall out of her head too quickly to be processed.

The woman on the other line laughs, not unkindly. "If you'll provide me an email address, we can set up appointments with the social worker and psychiatrist, but if everything checks out, you could have her by the end of the week."

Éponine stands in the bathroom to catch her breath, holding onto the countertop. Enjolras comes in and raises an eyebrow at her in the mirror. She manages a shaky smile and abruptly bursts into tears. His hands go around her shoulders. "What's wrong?" he says automatically.

But she laughs through her stupid tears. "How would you like to help me adopt a ten-year-old?"

He stares at her until understanding dawns on him. He smiles slightly. "I'd say we have some work to do."

Light

"Are you going to marry my sister?" Azelma asks with narrowed eyes.

"Marriage is an antiquated institution that seeks only to oppress women and keep men in positions of authority!" Éponine sings with a sly grin on her face, parroting the words Enjolras has said so many times before.

Azelma gives her sister the same sort of look Éponine herself gives when she is having none of it, thank you very much, and Enjolras chuckles. "Do you think I should?" he looks at her over the edge of his glass.

She twirls her spaghetti and shrugs. "You cook good enough. If you marry her I can eat your cooking forever."

He laughs. "Éponine, your sister has just given her blessing for our marriage."

"Who said I'd marry you? You snore!" she calls from the kitchen.

"Who said I'd ask? You hog the covers!" he calls back.

Azelma wrinkles her face. "Can we not? Ugh."

Éponine swirls the lemonade powder in the pitcher of water and smiles. She'd confessed to her sister on the day she brought her home that she had no idea how to raise a ten-year-old, having tried very hard to forget being ten herself. Her sister had just given her the Thénardier stare and said she could raise herself. Éponine would never call herself maternal in any sense of the word, so it's good that Azelma can take care of herself. But she'll do the best she can. She looks over at Azelma challenging Enjolras in some sort of verbal war and grins and thinks that sometimes, things aren't so bad after all.

This story is now complete! Thanks for all your support! I've got some things in the works, so check back for them soon. In the meantime, if you'd like to check out my tumblr and come say hi, the name is nymeriatully. Love to you all.