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Professor Grantaire was a favorite of both the visual art and art history students. He was known for his laid back nature, entertaining diversions, and just general fantastic lecture style. His favorite game to play on art history students was to see if they could tell his forgeries from the original work, when shown side by side.
His students knew he wore a ring on his ring finger—but it wasn’t until Zoom University began that they realized it was because he was married. They could be forgiven this confusion because Grantaire wore a fair number of rings, but didn’t always wear any at all—especially while painting, he rarely wore any at all. But when classes moved online, and he started to focus more heavily on digital art, and they saw his hands up close more often, they noticed that he rarely took off the hammered silver and gold ring that sat on his left hand, though it was sometimes joined by a narrow, dark band.
“Alright, y’all are free to go if you want, start your weekend a little early, or we can chill here for the last forty minutes of class doing a free draw and chat.”
Gavroche unmuted himself. “Can we ask you personal questions if we vote to free draw?”
R laughed. “Sure, but I have to pretend to be professional—no promises I’ll answer.”
They decided to stay.
He fiddled with the silver and gold band. “Alright, what are we drawing?” His eyes scanned the chat. “A seascape? You ask a lot of me, alright. Let’s do it.”
He had just sketched out a ship on the water when a student spoke up.
“Prof, you wear a lot of rings, which is your favorite?”
He paused and looked at the camera, miffed. “My wedding ring? Obviously?”
Chat exploded. He laughed.
“Whoa, whoa, okay. I didn’t realize you didn’t know I was married.” His eyes twinkled with mirth as he scanned the comments. “Yes, I’m wearing it now. I don’t wear it when I’m working with oil paints because they’re a pain to get off.” He pulls the dark band off, and then his wedding ring, holding it up so they could see it. “Handmade, because my partner is a nerd who decided that buying a ring was too capitalist and decided to make it instead.” He slips it back on, and picks up the dark ring, but pauses before putting it on. “Oh, this is my engagement ring.” He smiles fondly down at his hand, then goes back to drawing. “The proposal was very sweet. I’ll tell you some stories another day, if my partner is okay with it.”
And that was that—at least for the next four days.
On Wednesday, the chaos resumed. About half an hour into class, the sound of a door slamming shut and something clattering interrupted Grantaire’s lecture. He sighed. “I better go figure out what that was.” He took off his headphones, and as he was muting himself yelled, “Shouldn’t you be at work, my love?” Then disappeared for a moment.
When he returned both his lips and his cheeks were pink, and his hair was even messier than it had been before. He tugged at the collar of his henley, and put his headphones back on, clearly distracted. “What was I saying? Right! Impressionists!”
Near the end of the lecture, someone walked into Grantaire’s office. He muted himself and smiled upwards at the person, his cheeks staining red. Chat got excited, then quiet. This must be the spouse. The class watched intently.
Grantaire said something, paused briefly for a response or reaction, then laughed, hard, the way they’d only ever seen him do when someone made a really bad pun. A slim hand appeared on the edge of the screen, moving like someone was trying to figure out what to do with the bad joke or calm R down, but whatever was being said only served to make him laugh harder. After a minute of silent laughter, the back of a blond head in a fluffy red sweater ducked into view. The long, curly hair was up in a ponytail, looking much more professional than the red sweater, which looked well worn and homey. The Spouse ducked into their professor’s space and kissed him hard, apparently shutting him up.
By the time they ducked away, back out of frame, Grantaire looked a bit dazed. His eyes stayed on the blond, who seemed to be standing next to the desk. Then he glanced at his computer screen, froze, and turned bright red. He said something, gesturing to his computer, then his eyes went all soft. He picked up his headphones, and the words “I love you,” very clearly passed his lips before he unmuted.
“Sorry. Someone,” he raised his eyebrows towards The Spouse, who must still be hovering off screen. “Doesn’t understand professional decorum or behavior, apparently.” A soft noise of protest. Grantaire scanned the chat and sighed. “Yes, that’s my spouse. He was supposed to be at work, but the power is out so he decided to come harass me while I’m working instead of, say, going to your best friend’s house and actually working.” His lips twitched with a smile, betraying his words. He was clearly glad to have his husband home. The Husband laughed, softly and musically.
Grantaire sighed, giving up on getting anything done for the time being between his distracted class and his distracting husband. “No, you can’t see him right now.” Grantaire glanced at his husband wearing booty shorts that had “enemy of the state” branded on the ass. Not terribly professional. “What does he do? He’s a secret agent—very James Bond.” The Husband’s laugh made it clear that that was a lie, but Grantaire didn’t offer a real answer.
“Oh you want the story I promised you? What story was that?”
“Did I say that? Oh. He kept proposing, over and over again. Finally wore me down.” The Husband’s hand came into view as it gently smacked R’s shoulder. The Husband’s voice came through faintly. “As I recall, you said yes every time.” He laughed. “Fine, fine, he only asked three times.”
The chat lit up with various versions of “Three???”
Grantaire nodded. “The first time, we’d been dating for two years, and he was only twenty two. It was his graduation, party, actually and a good friend of ours got him tremendously drunk. He walked up to me—well, stumbled, really—and told me,” he looked off screen, smirking. “What was it exactly you said? ‘R, you’re the worst person ever, and I want to marry you’?” He looked at his class. “Romantic, right? Well—” “You said I know like Han fucking Solo! And you were only slightly less drunk! These are lies and slander.” R shrugged with a smile, the “argument” clearly well worn. “The second time three years later, he woke up with anesthesia induced temporary amnesia and a concussion after getting hit on the head, and upon learning that I was his boyfriend, he said—” He’s interrupted by the husband, who seems to speak louder, intending the mic to pick it up. “I said I must be the luckiest guy on the planet to have such a beautiful and brilliant boyfriend, and we ought to get married, because it’s an important symbol to show how devoted you are to someone, even if it is all kinds of messed up, societally, and that the institution and subsidization of marriage is a problem. You said ‘I can’t wait to marry you, you concussed idiot, but you should ask me when you’re not loopy.’” Grantaire shrugged, shameless. “That I did. Oh would you look at the time, class is over. Email me if you have any questions!”
(Enjolras waited for him to close the meeting, then walked over to Grantaire’s chair and sat on his lap, knees on either side of his husband’s hips and arms around his neck. Grantaire growled, eyes dark. “You are a menace.” He leaned up and bit at Enjolras’s lips and was pressed backwards into his chair in return. “I simply intend to make the most of my unexpected day off,” Enjolras said, voice calm and reasonable. He smirked. “I’ll make it worth your while…”)
The next week, they had some extra time to chat. Gavroche unmuted himself. “You said he proposed three times—What’s the third story?”
Grantaire smiled, his eyes going soft. “He proposed on Valentine’s day, to surprise me. He’s a very unconventional sort, so he knew I wouldn’t expect it. He proposed with a cigar ring because he didn’t want to buy an engagement ring I might not like.”
On the second to last day of class, Gavroche asked one more question. “What does he actually do?”
Grantaire hummed, surprised. “Who, Enjolras? He’s a lawyer.”
They had a name.
After a little internet stalking, Gavroche found The Husband online. He was a human rights lawyer, it turned out, and ran a social justice organization with several chapters, the original one being in their city. With minimal poking, Gavroche found their video archive—recorded meetings going back as far as 2009. The first video he opened showed a group of college students; one very clearly a younger version of their professor, another a younger version of his husband. He had expected to see the same kind of sickening domesticity he had become used to imagining from the way Grantaire spoke of his husband—and was shocked when the meeting devolved into a screaming match between the two. He clicked on a video from a year later. Arguing.
2011: Arguing.
2012: Arguing
2013: Arguing.
He skipped a few years ahead.
- The arguing was much tamer, more debate than screaming match, but he had never seen his mild tempered professor angry before. Ever.
And the husband—the husband was intimidating. Almost terrifying.
On the last day of class, Grantaire smiled at them. “I’ve got a treat for you, since you’ve all been incorrigible. Reminds me a bit of someone else stubborn…” The husband walks into frame and kisses him briefly, then sits down in the chair he’d dragged over. Grantaire unplugs his headphones. “This is my husband, Enjolras. Enjolras, these are the menaces who have been harassing me for details about you.”
The husband smirked. “I have a story or two about your professor from his college days…” Grantaire looked betrayed. “You wouldn’t.”
Enjolras shrugged. “Maybe.”
Grantaire put his head in his hands. “Just don’t get me fucking fired.” Enjolras looked at him, softening from a smirk to a real smile. “You have nothing to worry about.”
(Fifteen minutes later Gavroche got a first hand account of their mild professor arguing.)