Chapter Text
His lips, his mouth, they’re both sticky with cheap wine and he’s uncomfortably warm.
Enjolras is lying on his back looking up at the slow spin of the ceiling fan, sprawled across the still-made bed, fully clothed. He’s not positive, but he thinks he might be a bit drunk. His stomach twists suddenly and scratch that he’s not a bit drunk he’s really just full-on drunk and it’s all Grantaire’s fault.
(“Well you can’t blame me.” He’d laughed and propped Enjolras against the doorframe so he could unlock the door for him. “I’m not the one who drank enough wine to kill a horse. I thought you didn’t even like wine?”)
Fucking Grantaire with his idiot jokes and the way he laughs before he’s even finished telling them and the stupid way his eyes crinkle when he smiles and it’s just stupid, stupid, stupid.
He’s so fucking pretty.
Enjolras has been having that thought a lot lately, during meetings, during work, during class – basically, during inconvenient times when he needs to focus on something else. He had done okay today, though, had hardly thought about Grantaire at all. And then the subject in question had tripped into Enjolras’s office with that out-of-control grin and invited Enjolras to the party.
(“I’m not asking,sweetheart,” he’d said as he sat himself on top of Enjolras’s paperwork. “I’m telling. You don’t get out enough.)
So Enjolras had found himself at Courfeyrac’s party with a plastic cup of what he expects is two dollar wine in one hand and nothing at all to do with the other.
Parties make him nervous.
Which was remarkable, Combeferre was prone to point out, seeing as so few things make Enjolras nervous. He doesn’t get nervous before tests, or speeches. Put him in front of a classroom full of the best and brightest – well, he’d just sail by. But put Enjolras into a crowded room full of his peers, loud music, and weird smells, and his stomach was in knots. Which is how he found himself drunk.
Enjolras was an infamous lightweight, so he often didn’t drink for fear of making a fool of himself.
(“He just always looks so nice.” He’d sighed to Courfeyrac two months ago, after just two bottles of some sort of spiked cider, and an evening of watching Grantaire play piano. Enjolras was still being teased about that.)
But when he had been nervous and found that a sip or two eased the turmoil in his chest, he hadn’t been great at stopping. So, one cup of shitty wine turned into two, and two to four, and next thing he knows he’s leaning against a staircase banister swaying slighting and his mind is finally, finally, quiet.
Enjolras liked to people watch sober and found that this interest only increased while intoxicated. Specifically, he liked to watch Grantaire.
Grantaire was a god at parties, a regular Dionysus.
(Enjolras had told him this once, unable to keep a note of bitter jealousy from slipping through. At Grantaire’s laugh regarding the Hellenistic nickname, Enjolras had only huffed. “Well, if I have to be Apollo, it’s only fair you get a god name too.”)
Grantaire was just pure magic in social situations. He was effortlessly charming, friendly, funny. But it was more than that. He was genuinely kind, and thoughtful. Grantaire made sure no one felt left out, or isolated. Everyone got a smile, a conversation, a greeting. It didn’t matter who the host was or where the party was at – if Grantaire was there, he assumed all hosting duties as naturally as breathing.
There was something about watching him in a crowd. The way it energized him, the way it caused his eyes to shine, the way he would throw smiles over at Enjolras with absolute abandon.
Sometimes, like tonight, as he watched the ceiling fan make another rotation, Enjolras wondered if Grantaire had a cruel streak. Maybe he knew Enjolras was smitten with him, how those smiles made him weak. Maybe he did it on purpose. Maybe he was enthralling because he knew it’d torment Enjolras. It’d almost be easier that way.
However, Enjolras was pretty sure Grantaire was just happily oblivious. He probably thought he was like this with every one of his friends. And, while Enjolras would never admit it sober, that hurt. It hurt because if he knew Grantaire was just being cruel, he could curse him and move on. He could chalk up Grantaire’s dazzling ways to just be for show, a trick of the light. But if he wasn’t just being cruel, if he was just being who he was…well, Enjolras was pretty much screwed. Tonight had only made his crush worse.
He should have gone home sooner.
It had been an hour, or maybe more, Enjolras wasn’t great with keeping track of time while intoxicated. He really hadn’t moved from his spot against the banister, and while he had managed to engage in a few conversations, for the most part he’d spent the whole time watching Grantaire. Probably staring “like some sort of lovesick Byronic hero” as Courfeyrac tended to put it.
(“You know you’re meant to have fun at a party.” Grantaire had teased, suddenly very much in front of him. “You haven’t moved or smiled in about an hour. Everything okay?”)
Something about his voice sent shivers down Enjolras spine. The way he had to lean too close so he didn’t have to shout above Courfeyrac’s frankly hideous playlist. Grantaire was taller than Enjolras, just enough for him to have to tilt his head up. Just enough that, while leaning over him, Grantaire’s long curls brushed Enjolras’s forehead. That had sent the same shivers down his spine.
(“Just…drunk. Maybe.” He’d managed to say, after having to take a second to catch his breath and praying that Grantaire just chalked his paused up to too much wine. “Fine, though, good.”)
A few minutes later, because on top of being incredibly beautiful and funny and charming and dazzling, Grantaire was also a fucking gentleman, he’d told Enjolras he was going to take him home.
(“Don’t want you doing anything you’d regret, huh?” His voice was low in Enjolras’s ear and his hand was firm against his back as he steered them toward the door. “I think I might be anyway.” Enjolras had breathed and couldn’t decide if he wanted the other to hear him or not.)
The walk home seemed longer than usual, and the midnight breeze chilled Enjolras through the thin jacket he had haphazardly wrapped around himself. And, try as he might, he couldn’t seem to walk steadily on the sidewalk without Grantaire’s arm wrapped around his waist, which was pretty much just pure torture at this point.
(“Relax, Apollo,” he’d joked, pulling Enjolras flush against his side, despite his protestations. “Touching a mere mortal like myself won’t ruin your divinity, I promise.” Enjolras had wanted to explain that it wasn’t that he didn’t want to touch Grantaire, it was that he wanted to touch him too much.)
Despite the clumsiness, they’d managed to get themselves to the front door of Enjolras’s apartment building, and Grantaire had unlocked it for him, propelled him up the stairs and into the apartment, and deposited him onto the bed, and promptly disappeared into the kitchen. Which is how Enjolras found himself spread eagle on his still-made bed, watching the fan and thinking about the man that was currently in the kitchen doing god knows what.
He could just tell him.
A bad idea, sure, but, really, did he have any better ones? Complete and total rejection would, for lack of a better word, suck, but, god, it had to be better than this. Surely anything was better than this goddamn pining.
Enjolras was uncomfortably warm.
After what seemed like a lifetime, but was actually about five minutes, Grantaire came back, carrying a glass of water, presumably for Enjolras. He was smiling, he was always smiling, but it was softer now, quieter. A muted, blurry version of Grantaire’s party smile. He knelt next to the bed, setting the cup on the nightstand.
“How’s it going, Apollo?”
Enjolras turned to face him. They were eye to eye, barely a breath apart.
“If I tell you something, do you promise to forget it tomorrow?”
Grantaire laughed. “Not a chance, sweetheart, but tell me anyway.”
Enjolras took just one breath and then -
“I think I might be falling in love with you."