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Enjolras sat on the chaise outside on the lawn, frown on his face as he peered down at the copy of the Social Contract in his lap, eyes skimming the words that seemed at once familiar and elusive. He knew he was looking for a specific passage; he just couldn’t remember which.
As he tucked a silvery-blond curl behind his ear, one that had escaped the loose ponytail he had pulled his hair into, a man sat on the chaise next to his, grinning at him with sparkling blue eyes surrounded by crinkled laugh lines. “Beautiful day, isn’t it?” the man asked, running a hand through his salt-and-pepper hair.
Squinting up at the sky as if only noticing it for the first time, Enjolras shrugged. “I suppose so.” He paused for a moment longer than was perhaps necessary, then asked in what he hoped wasn’t a rude tone, “Who are you?”
“Oh, no one in particular,” the man answered with a wink. “A fellow resident. You can call me R.”
“R?” Enjolras repeated, raising an incredulous eyebrow. “What sort of name is R supposed to be?”
The man - R - shrugged unconcernedly. “The sort of name that belongs to me, I suppose. What are you reading?”
Enjolras was surprised by the sudden change in subject and glanced down at his book as if surprised to see it there. “Um, the Social Contract. I’ve read it before and I’m trying to find a specific passage, but I can’t seem to remember where it is.”
R nodded sagely. “Ahh. Yes. Can’t say as I’ve read it, myself. You’d probably find me more apt to read Kierkegaard than Rousseau.”
Enjolras’s lip curled. “You mean to say you’re a nihilist,” he stated bluntly, looking almost disgusted with that fact.
He was met with light laughter as R told him, “No, no. I’d consider myself far more a realist than anything, though I imagine you’d debate the difference.”
The conversation, matched with the light laughter, seemed almost familiar to Enjolras, and he frowned at R. “This is going to sound odd, and I’m sorry, but do I know you? Have we met?”
“I get that a lot,” R told him, shrugging slightly. He stood and offered his hand to Enjolras. “Come on. Walk with me to get some food, and we can have the argument I know you’re dying to have about realism versus nihilism.”
Enjolras hesitated for only a moment before taking R’s hand, surprised at how easily their fingers seemed to slot together, the warmth of R’s hand at once entirely alien and completely familiar, and he smiled slightly at R before following him to the dining hall.
“You are insufferable,” Enjolras sighed, crossing his arms in front of his chest, though a smile lifted his lips as arms wrapped around his shoulders from behind and lips pressed against his jaw.
“And you are the only twenty-four year old I know who still insists that he can somehow live on a diet of Red Bull and ramen the way he used to when he was still at university. And really, your metabolism is not the way it used to be. Trust me, I would know.”
A finger poked Enjolras’s stomach and Enjolras squeaked before growling low in his throat and pulling the man into his lap, kissing him roughly as he brushed the raven curls away from the man’s sparkling blue eyes. “You’re hardly one to talk about the condition of one’s midsection,” he sniped, kissing Grantaire again.
Grantaire chuckled lightly but pulled away from Enjolras enough to grab the fork from the table and scoop up some pasta. “Very funny, but I’m not the one who needs to eat right now. So open up.” When Enjolras’s closed his lips into a thin line, Grantaire added wryly, “Or no sex for you tonight.”
“You are a cruel, cruel man,” Enjolras sighed, but he opened his mouth obediently, letting Grantaire feed him the bite of pasta. He sighed at the taste of it and grinned at Grantaire, kissing him lightly. “Delicious as always.”
“Yeah, yeah,” Grantaire muttered, blushing slightly, though he looked pleased, even as he scooped up another bite for Enjolras. “I’d appreciate it more if you actually ate my food regularly instead of when I literally force-feed you.”
Enjolras ate more pasta before saying with his mouth full, “I’m sorry.” He swallowed, then repeated, “I’m sorry. Truly. I know that I should be better about feeding myself, I just…”
Grantaire kissed him, then fed him another bite. “I know. You get caught up in your work. And I understand that. But you still have to eat. You’re not going to be able to help anyone if you waste away.”
“I know.” Enjolras captured Grantaire hand and lifted it to his mouth, kissing the center of his palm lightly, his lips curving into a smile as they remained against Grantaire’s callused skin. “And thank you for reminding me of that. What can I say - I would be completely lost without you.”
Enjolras stopped in the middle of walking, reaching out a shaking hand to steady himself against the wall. He had passed by here before. He was sure of it. Which meant only one thing - he was lost.
No, he wasn’t. He couldn’t be. He was in the home, he was where he lived, he just couldn’t find his room. It had…it had moved on him, or something, and his throat seemed to swell at the thought, because who would do that? And why?
His room should be here, it should, and his liver-spotted hand scrabbled at the wall in a desperate attempt to hold himself up because it felt like the panic was going to break him down if he didn’t do something about it, and he felt like he was about to collapse when a warm hand touched his shoulder. “Are you ok?”
Enjolras turned to see R standing there, staring at him with concern. “I’m—” The word ‘fine’ couldn’t seem to choke past his lips, and he swallowed, feeling inexplicable tears well in his eyes as he whispered, “I’m l-lost. I can’t find my room.”
“Hey, that’s ok,” R said gently, reaching out to take Enjolras’s arm, wrapping Enjolras’s hand around his upper arm and resting his own hand on top of it. “I’m sure that between the two of us, we’ll be able to find it. Ok?”
Nodding, Enjolras took a deep, steadying breath. “Ok. Lead on.”
The smile seemed to falter on R’s face, but it smoothed out half a second later. “No, no, you lead. I’m just here to assist.” He squeezed Enjolras’s hand gently. “I’ve got you. I promise. Now, you lead on. I’ll be right beside you.”
Enjolras nodded and took another deep breath before walking in the direction he hoped his room was in.
Grantaire burrowed against Enjolras on the couch, setting his head against Enjolras’s chest. Enjolras chuckled, automatically lifting a hand to card through Grantaire’s curls. “You know, I think I see a few gray hairs in here,” he commented off-handedly, grinning when Grantaire half-heartedly swatted at his hand without lifting his head off Enjolras’s chest.
“Ass. You hardly need to remind me that I’m older than you.”
Enjolras continued running his fingers through Grantaire’s hair, head cocked contemplatively as he watched the fine, dark hairs slip through his fingers. “I kind of like the idea,” he said quietly.
Now Grantaire sat up, frowning. “You like the idea of me being older than you? We’ve been together for far too long for that to be a sudden kink.”
“No, not that,” Enjolras said, rolling his eyes as he pulled Grantaire back to him, pressing a gentle kiss to his lips before elaborating, “You getting gray hair. I just…I like the idea of us growing old together.”
Grantaire smiled, a soft, sweet sort of smile, the kind that made Enjolras want to kiss him, but before he could, Grantaire said in a gruff voice, “Well, luckily, I don’t plan on going anywhere, so…”
Now Enjolras did kiss him, a long, heady kiss, and then muttered against Grantaire’s lips, “I kind of had something more formal in mind.” He had been fumbling in his pocket with the hand not currently locked in Grantaire’s hair, and he pulled out a ring box, flipping it open one-handed and asking breathlessly, “Grantaire, will you marry me?”
Staring at the ring box for a long moment, Grantaire pulled the smooth platinum band out and slid it onto his ring finger. “Of course,” he said simply, leaning in to kiss Enjolras again. “Of course.”
The next morning found Enjolras standing stiffly next to where R lounged on one of the couches in the common room. “I wanted to thank you for yesterday,” he said softly, eyes focused on R’s gnarled, rough hands.
“It’s nothing,” R said, waving his left hand dismissively. “Seriously, it was the least I could do. Besides, our rooms are really close to each other, so I had to walk that way anyway.”
Enjolras nodded, but he was focused on the platinum band that rested on R’s ring finger. Over time, the skin had swelled and grown around it, such that Enjolras doubted R was able to take it off. Still, there was no mistaking it. “Your wedding ring looks a lot like mine,” he said, holding his own hand out in comparison.
Though his hands were not nearly as rough as R’s, they were nonetheless more wrinkled than Enjolras imagined they had been when the ring had first been placed on his finger, though Enjolras could not precisely recall when that had been. It was like a memory just out of reach.
Sure enough, his ring was practically identical to R’s, and R just smiled slightly, though it didn’t seem to meet his eyes, and he said lightly, “What can I say? Apparently my husband just had really good taste.”
“Jesus fuck,” Courfeyrac groaned, leaning against the wall as he over-dramatically wiped sweat from his forehead. “How much shit can you two possibly own? Next time you move I am refusing to help you.”
Enjolras snorted as he brushed past him carrying a box marked “KITCHEN - FRAGILE - BOSSUET NOT ALLOWED TO TOUCH”. “As I seem to recall, you were the one who moved nine times during university, and I was there to help you move every single one of those times.”
Courfeyrac pouted at him. “My roommates all sucked,” he complained. “I wasn’t lucky enough to get stuck with Combeferre.”
“Thank God for that,” Combeferre muttered, helping Grantaire carry the couch. “As I seem to recall, you lived with half of our friends. Are you saying they all sucked as well?”
Waggling his eyebrows at Combeferre, Courfeyrac grinned wickedly and said, “Well, some of them did.”
“You walked into that one,” Grantaire chuckled as Combeferre blushed scarlet. “Seriously, though, we lived together for a bit. I wasn’t that bad of a roommate, was I?”
Courfeyrac turned his pout to him. “You told me I wasn’t allowed to have sex in your bed.”
Grantaire blinked at him. “And that was a problem?”
“Yes. Your bed was more comfy.”
As Grantaire threw a pillow at Courfeyrac, Enjolras cleared his throat and pulled out four glasses from the box he had just brought into the kitchen. “Not to break this up, but I thought we might take a moment to toast?”
All four gathered in the kitchen, where Enjolras poured them each a glass of champagne before holding his own up, eyes locked on Grantaire, who smiled gently at him. “To old friends, and to new beginnings,” he declared, favoring Grantaire with a smile of his own.
“To never having to help you assholes move again,” Courfeyrac added.
Grantaire grinned even wider and said simply, “To happily ever after.”
Combeferre’s voice was droll as he said, “To never having to hear Enjolras and Grantaire have sex again.”
There was a moment of silence as both Grantaire and Enjolras blushed, and then all of them quickly said, “Cheers!” before clinking glasses and tossing the champagne back.
A shadow fell over Enjolras and he looked up to see R standing there, grinning at him in that mischievous way that he had. “Good morning,” he said cheerfully. “I have some friends visiting me today. Want to meet them?”
Enjolras raised an eyebrow at the two men standing behind Grantaire, one with faded sandy hair and thick glasses, the other with silver curls, both smiling cautiously at him. “It appears I have no choice,” he said dryly, though he smiled at them both. “Any friend of R’s is a friend of mine, I suppose.”
He shook both of their proffered hands as they each introduced themselves. “Courfeyrac,” said the silver haired one, plopping down into the chair.
The one with the glasses seemed to linger for a second, searching for something in Enjolras’s face before releasing his hand. “I’m Combeferre,” he said quietly, sitting as well.
Enjolras was content to let R and his friends talk for the most part, though he was surprised to find Combeferre and Courfeyrac shared political sympathies with him far more so than with R. “You never told me your friends were smarter than you,” he told R in a joking rebuke.
“Of course,” R said, smiling at him. “I should have known that my friends would be more interesting to you than I am, at least in terms of politics.”
Leaning forward, Enjolras was about to reply when he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he turned to look up at an orderly. “Time to go see the doctor,” the orderly told him cheerfully. “You can visit with your friends when you get back.”
Enjolras smiled apologetically at Combeferre and Courfeyrac as he corrected the orderly. “Oh, they’re not my friends. They’re R’s friends.”
He didn’t see the way the smiles slid off of Combeferre and Courfeyrac’s faces.
Once Enjolras had left, leaning heavily on the orderly’s arm, Combeferre turned to R, expression grim. “He’s getting worse.”
“He’s not.” Grantaire’s tone was firm and almost fierce. “He’ll remember in time. He always does. He just needs time.”
Courfeyrac exchanged an uneasy glance with Combeferre and leaned forward, concern evident. “But what if he doesn’t?” he asked quietly. “We all know it’s a possibility. What about when he’s never able to remember?”
Grantaire’s knuckles had turned white from how tightly they were gripping the arms of his chair. “That won’t happen,” he said flatly. “He's the love of my life and somehow, he will always remember me.” In a softer voice, such that Combeferre and Courfeyrac could barely hear him, Grantaire whispered, “He promised he would always come back to me.”
Enjolras bent over the bed and kissed Grantaire lightly on the lips, grinning as Grantaire’s eyes fluttered open. “Hey,” Grantaire murmured, grinning. “Off to work?”
“Someone has to make the money in this house,” Enjolras told him wryly, though his smile softened the words. “I’ll be back this evening.”
Grantaire reached up to pull Enjolras back down to him, kissing him soundly, his hands wrapped in Enjolras’s curls (though he took care not to ruin them too badly, knowing Enjolras didn’t like having sex hair at work). When he released him, he told him in undertones, same as he did every morning, “Come back to me soon.”
Pressing a kiss to the center of Grantaire’s forehead, Enjolras told him - same as he did every morning - “I always do. And I always will.”
That night, R knocked on Enjolras’s door. “Hey,” he said, leaning against the doorframe. “I just wanted to see how you were doing after your appointment.”
Enjolras looked up to see the familiar smile on R’s face, and suddenly, his heart clenched, recognizing why that smile was so familiar. He stood, the book he had been holding in his lap falling to the floor, his eyes wide. “Grantaire?” he asked.
A small noise like a cross between a sob and a sigh escaped from Grantaire’s mouth and he nodded. “Enjolras.”
Then Grantaire had crossed to him, pulling Enjolras into his arms and holding him tightly, Enjolras clutching at him as if unable to believe that he was really there, and kissed Grantaire repeatedly, peppering kisses all over Grantaire’s face. “I missed you,” Grantaire told him, tears in his eyes as he pulled him even closer.
“How long was I gone?” Enjolras asked quietly, cupping Grantaire’s cheek with one hand, rubbing his thumb across Grantaire’s cheekbone.
Grantaire smiled sadly, reaching up to hold Enjolras’s hand against his cheek, lacing their fingers together. “Almost two months this time.”
Enjolras ducked his head and swallowed. “I’m so sorry,” he said in a low voice. “So, so sorry. And it’s only going to get worse—”
“Hey,” Grantaire said, tipping Enjolras’s face up to kiss him gently on the lips. “Don’t you dare apologize. None of this is your fault. Besides, you always come back to me in the end. So don’t apologize for that. I love you.”
Enjolras kissed him again, the tears from both their cheeks mingling together. “I love you, too,” he whispered. “And I will always come back to you. I promise.”
Enjolras pulled Grantaire close to him, the smile on his face seemingly permanent as his eyes ran up and down Grantaire’s body. “You look good in a tux,” he told him. “I’d be jealous, but I seem to remember that I did something stupid like marry you today.”
Grantaire laughed and kissed him. “You don’t look so bad yourself. And you’re all mine.” He sounded immensely satisfied with that, his hand dropping from Enjolras’s waist to squeeze his ass. “I can do that whenever I want now.”
“Like it ever stopped you before,” Enjolras said, rolling his eyes. Reluctantly, he pulled away from Grantaire slightly. “You know I love you, and I promised to spend as much time as I could dancing with you this evening, but I haven’t peed since before the ceremony, so I really need to go to the bathroom.”
Though Grantaire pouted, he pulled Enjolras back in, dipping him in his arms and kissing him firmly before telling him, “Fine. Baby. Man up, son.” He set Enjolras back on his feet, their fingers still laced together, and told him, his voice semi-serious, “Just come back to me soon.”
Enjolras smiled, taking a few steps back, their fingers still gripped together. “I always do,” he said, his tone light, his eyes bright, the pair of them the perfect picture of love and happiness. “And I always will.”