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One evening it’s all too much and Grantaire goes from the occasional yelling to a full-blown rant, about Enjolras views, how much hope Enjolras has – too much, they will all die – how he’s only human. Calling him names and accusing him of only thinking of himself, noting the irony in it as he says it, and waving his arms in grand gestures, splashing wine everywhere and getting so riled up that he stumbles over his own tongue. Bites his cheek, gets grammar wrong and threatens physical violence and Enjolras just stands in the middle, trying not to react to the idiot, the drunk idiot that just can’t shut up, being so offended with what he says that he’d instantly agree to a fight, if he didn’t knew that he’d be taking advantage of Grantaire’s position.
Everybody else just slowly backing off, leaving them to grit their teeth and stare at each other and get closer and closer as they get angrier and angrier and Grantaire really wants to punch some sense into him, so does Enjolras, and then there’s a moment where you just hear the heavy breathing and the gnashing of teeth and cracking of the knuckles of their fists and you could think the air between them to be solid.
Then Combeferre tries to calm the situation by putting a hand on each of the men’s chests and turns to Grantaire and says “You are drunk.” and Grantaire exploding at that. Yes, he is drunk, but all of the others are suicidal, apparently he’s the only one with common sense here that sees how utopian they think, and that they are educated, they know how this will end: in blood and no change at all, valuable personalities having thrown their lives away for naught.
Cue Enjolras’ attention to fully hit when Grantaire calls his Cause meaningless, that it won’t make a difference, basically calling him a child. So he holds his fist beneath Grantaires chin and grits through his teeth “I fight for what I believe Grantaire, it’s a sad thing that you believe in nothing, I pity you.” And then it’s Grantaire’s turn. Because he wants every bit of attention, he craves it, he survives on it, but pity? That is too much. “You Social Romantic idiot, I don’t believe in any Cause, I believe in you!” and Enjolras already riled up to counter that he is not a Social Romantic, that his views have a future, that he was right, that Grantaire didn’t believe in a cause and then his mind halts at the last fragment and his hand drops. Grantaire huffing as he sees it and saying in a quite, defeated voice “I wish I wouldn’t.”
The whole room has been silent since the beginning of this face-off, desperately trying to act as if nothing has happened. They had faith IN Enjolras, in his Cause, but they also had faith in the steadiness that radiated from a cynic. First has been questioned, as it usually is, but the second, very important nuance to the atmosphere of their very beings – this nuance was trampled like a bug on a sidewalk. Discovering that the faithless had faith was too much to take.
Enjolras stood as still as if he’d just encountered Medusa herself, turning him into stone. It all made sense now, at least it should, but Grantaire was now not any longer a rather annoying puppet at the side, he had become a fully developed character with something that Enjolras never thought he had: conviction. Conviction, as in, believing in something. Not just believing in believing nothing. Whereas latter had seemed so easy, as if it come naturally to Grantaire, not as if it was a forced attitude to hide his core. What was there, terrified Enjolras, because he saw himself.
Enjolras believed in his Cause, the Les Amis and that the end justifies the means.
He believed himself to be just another tool, like everything else, for the realization of his hopes. He induced it in others, made them fight with him, but now he found one that only fought for him, in the oddest way imaginable and Enjolras doubted that he was able to deal with it.
So he stood and absentmindedly flexed his right hand, waiting for the room to empty.
But not even that helped his mind to sort things out, because usually, after everyone else was gone, there would still be Grantaire in the darkest corner, barely visible, but obviously present. To find this presence missing was less helpful than Enjolras had imagined, he fled the scene of action, in something that is not quite terror but as close as it gets.
The next days are strained, Grantaire makes an effort to comment and Enjolras makes an effort to brush him aside. Enjolras notices that Grantaire is seen less with bottles, Grantaire knows that he ditched them for stronger remedies of this curse.
Grantaire looks even worse than usually, the bags under his eyes have a whole different colour than the rest of his face, the white in his eyes is always tinged red and the glossy shine is so thick you could think that he was becoming blind.
Oh how he would love that. To be blind to what was going on, but what he could do to his body, he couldn’t do to his soul. A soul always sees, always notices, you can’t silence it the way you could by sewing your own lips shut.
This is not to say, that Grantaire hadn’t tried, but he gave up after he couldn’t find a needle. His mental walls barely held, he felt like he had to alter his physical appearance to make them work. So his eyes turned glassy, his tongue bled from the constant biting and his palms bled from the sharp fingernails that dug into them. If numbness didn’t work, pain had to.
Enjolras kept riling the people up, convincing them as if nothing had happened, bright and radiating conviction like no other could. Grantaire’s attacks ceased and he became the shadow in the corner, eyes too dark to reflect any possible light, clothes too stained to be anything different than the walls.
Grantaire didn’t live, he had decided that he had willingly given up the only thing worth living for and decided that this was his punishment. A vegetative state, the moss between the bricks in the stained walls of the town, reaching for the sun but not being able to grow any higher. Being able to see the sun and knowing you needed it to live whilst it wouldn’t make you grow, was worse than knowing you were content with the moon and became a beautiful blooming flower at night.
Reality hit Grantaire when he found himself sitting in the streets and a person having tossed him a coin. Grantaire was no beggar that needed alms.
He managed to keep himself from punching the wall.
Grantaire’s walls had a crack, and from pleasant not-caring he turned to something that could have been hatred, if it wasn’t for the person it was aimed at. He couldn’t hate Enjolras, even if he tried. It was more of a despising, for him pulling Grantaire into his orbit, for being a person people dared to hope in, for making Grantaire care so much that he couldn’t take it anymore.
He didn’t decide this, he didn’t want this, he didn’t wake up with a craving for depending on somebody that didn’t even acknowledge his existence. It felt like Stockholm Syndrome.
Grantaire decided that company had to be found, if things without life made it worse, these could only make it better. So he turned to the only other Romantic he knew, Prouvaire, the poet with the pot of flowers.
It did not go the way Grantaire had planned this, if he had the slightest idea of a plan, this was miles away from it. He had wanted company, that listened and that c9ould contribute wise worse, but his company went for physical contact, and what Grantaire lived through now made him wish for a punch to the chin. To leave out the details: Prouvaire had kissed him, not anything comforting on the temple or anything like that, but on the mouth. With full intent.
Grantaire wanted to scream. He could not hurt another one, he was already guilty and filthy enough, he could not stain another soul. But he found himself leaning into the caresses of the other’s hands and thinking that any Romantic would be good right now, missing the feeling of curls beneath his fingers and cursing the freckles on the boy’s shoulders. If Enjolras was ancient Greek, Jehan was modern Arts. He forced himself not to care and it came more naturally to him that he had wished for. So he fucked Prouvaire in his own bed, pushing his head down so he didn’t have to see it and actually thanking the gods that Enjolras name sounded enough of a moan to pass.
When it’s over he barricades himself in the bathroom and scrubs until his skin is bleeding.
He finds Jehan sitting on the madness, wearing a white shirt and a weak smile. Grantaire thinks of how he could make this any less worse, how he could not damage anything that Jehan had managed to mend.
His thoughts were interrupted by a firm “I know.”
And he should be happy that he did not have to explain anything, should be happy that he had such a great friend in Prouvaire, but all his mind focused on was that Jehan had allowed Grantaire to pity fuck him and that was what we would describe as “hitting Rock Bottom” whereas to Grantaire it’s just another disappointing point on his list of fuck-ups.
He storms out of the flat. Maybe it would have comforted him to know that Prouvaire cursed Enjolras every time he saw Grantaire, that he prayed to the gods to make him a tiny bit less oblivious, but none of the gods would listen and Enjolras is no angel that would react to curses.
Grantaire forces his feelings to calm, which leads to him realizing, that he has no idea where he currently stays at. He also has no idea when the last time was he changed his clothes or ate. So Courfeyrac was the first call. He was not home, but the emergency key was easy to find and the refrigerator contained a pot of leftovers with a post-it that simply said “R”. The cynic’s equivalent of crying of joy was to settle down with the pot of microwaved food on the floor, he did not dare stain Courfeyracs furniture.
He found his bag of clothes, changed, and headed to the café.
He could not exactly be welcome any less, that was sheer impossible, but people noticed how he had changed, even if it was a more aware stepping to the sides when somebody approached. He did not find it unsettling that Jehan was present, no longer angry, but back to indifference. Indifference and a bottle of cheap wine, the cynic’s Liquid Luck.
Enjolras took this as a hint to provoke him again. The banter took an almost normal course and when Enjolras called it quits everyone was a bit more at ease. Grantaire’s blood alcohol had risen to average again and he took pride in not taking pride about his indifference.
Now press repeat.