#networkabc

He can remember when it seemed impossible he could reach the double digits. He remembers when he thought it was impossible he could reach an hour with the knowledge. But eighteen days... he could calculate how many hours that is, or at least he could at one point. Now, he knows he would lose the digits in the faint haze of his mind. It can’t settle on anything, lately. He can’t even sit down and write the way he used to.

It smells like rain through the boards of his apartment, sinking into his bones and binding him to the bed. He lets his eyes settle shut again. Perhaps he won’t rise today. He still can’t walk without a limp, in any case, and the joins of his hip and knee feel wearier than usual, as though they may creak and squeal if he were to try and stand.

It’s cold, even under the blankets. He shifts, just slightly, giving his best effort to make no noise; it fails, but that doesn’t matter. The man beside him is impenetrable in his sleep. Combeferre reaches out a hand, fingers brushing across the cool rough sheets until he can feel the warm curve of Enjolras’s shoulder. Rising and falling. There it is, rich with the precious bounty of his breaths—more than Combeferre thought he would bring out of the battle. He curls his fingers into the bare skin. At night, they fall asleep tangled together, a mess of sweat and gasps and tears—Enjolras has cried every time, and Combeferre doesn’t know whether or not he hopes that it’s due to the pain. It would almost be a relief to know that the physical strain of it is worse than whatever transpires daily behind Enjolras’s impassive silver eyes. He doesn’t seem to be in quite as much agony as Combeferre, but he has always been good at hiding it when he needs to. He doesn’t need to now, of course. He doesn’t seem to realize that.

In any case, by the time they wake—Combeferre first, every morning—they’re apart, touching by the barest brush of shoulders or otherwise nothing at all.

Enjolras shifts in his sleep with a tiny grunt. Combeferre lets his eyes open again; the absence doesn’t burn quite as much when it’s at least appeased by Enjolras’s soft glow. The curve of his cheek is smooth against the soft dawn light outside the window, faintly flushed with sleep; golden hair sprawls across his neck and over his lips. Combeferre combs the wayside strands into order with tender fingertips; Enjolras frowns slightly, the barest crease along his cream-smooth forehead, then sighs and relaxes back into deeper sleep.

“Enjolras,” Combeferre says something, knowing it won’t wake him. There isn’t so much as a stir. Unconscious is the only time that Enjolras ever looks calm anymore, and Combeferre has no particular desire to wake him, so he slips quietly out of bed, doing his best not to disturb the pale sheets.

He moves to his clothing trunk and begins to remove garments without thinking. His fingers are hesitant, fragile as though dealing with breathing creatures rather than dead fabric; he will still, on occasion, come across some scrap that carries the scent, and the consequence of such a mistake is hours across the floor, weeping like some lost child. He despises himself for his unending weakness almost as much as he despises Courfeyrac for dying in the first place.

He is able to dress without disruption, this time, and when he stands again, he feels hollow. Perhaps there is no more of the scent left; perhaps water and ages have washed the last of it away. He doesn’t know whether the foggy emotion spiraling through his chest is relief, but it doesn’t feel like it.

The sunlight has crossed the room by now, illuminating the dusty corners that none of them have the strength to clean. Combeferre is working quite constantly, Grantaire is rarely in sight, and Enjolras... he spends the days at home. Perhaps plotting for some new uprising, one that won’t collapse quite so easily, though he has no haphazard scribbled notes or feverishly jabbered ideas to show for it.

Combeferre moves into the only other room of their small apartment, closing the door behind him so that Enjolras won’t be disturbed. The sitting room is no wider than the bedroom, windowless, and, right now, empty; Grantaire has vanished again. He’s taken to doing this in the mornings, when he isn’t hungover. Combeferre doesn’t know where he goes; some romantic ideal of painting sunrises is half-caught in his mind, though he’s sure that he would have seen the product if such works were being created. Grantaire, at least, takes pride in his accomplishments. The apartment would be full of smiles for at least a day if he were to turn up with a new canvas masterpiece, but they come more and more sparsely now, and the colors splashed across them are more often blue and grey than pink and orange.

A knock sounds at the door. Grantaire. That’s something, at least. Combeferre covers the flooring in a couple of quick strides, and the door creaks as he opens it.

“R—”

A huge warm weight is against him all at once, and he is buffeted by the scent—light and spiced and all around him; he’s cussing, furious, can’t believe that Grantaire would do this to him—until he hears the voice, singsong from the lips pressed against his ear.

“Did you miss me most horribly, darling?”

Courfeyrac, he tries to say, though there’s no sound—his arms are around the body curled against his, and then he’s holding him so tightly that it seems the two of them will never be able to breathe again. Silver and purple galaxies are exploding behind his eyes, and he can barely breathe; his senses twist and blur, and so he has to clutch Courfeyrac tighter than ever, hard enough that it seems the two of them will never part again.

“How?” he whispers, his own voice higher than he knew it was capable of rising. “My God... how? After the barricades....”

“Why, you were certainly most eager to accept my name upon the list of the dead... it was a misprint, a miswrite; I was hospitalized, and I wish I could say it was brief—you cannot imagine the feeling of knowing that you were alive, and not one, but all three....”

“Though you could have spared a moment to write us a letter,” Combeferre gets out, his tongue stumbling across the words, “surely—”

It is then that he finally steps back, holding Courfeyrac securely by the shoulders, and rakes his eyes properly across the figure of his third and youngest lover. He seems perfectly fine, without so much as a scratch or a bruise to show for why he was listed alongside the barricade’s corpses. As Combeferre catches his breath, however, there’s a movement by the doorframe—Grantaire, who has been waiting behind all along, now slips along the handle of a heavy wooden crutch, which Courfeyrac accepts gratefully.

“I could have,” Courfeyrac muses, “and perhaps I did, though you have all, I can now see, moved in together, and in a new apartment of which I could not possibly have guessed the address—intended to leave every vestige of your old lives behind, it would seem, and I wish I could be sorry to say that such won’t be quite possible—”

“Damn you, truly,” Combeferre manages to get out. Courfeyrac is perfect, even now—inky curls over a smooth bronze forehead, eyes wide and light against his skin, flawless bow-shaped lips kinked in a grin—his shoulders are a bit thinner than Combeferre remembers, and his stance a little more slouched, but otherwise, he may as well be painted from the very essence of Combeferre’s own memories.

His eyes, though they have not yet taken their fill, shift upwards to Grantaire, who is now leaning against the closed door, an unshakable wide smile across his own lips. His dark eyes are soft and grateful, not shifting from Courfeyrac’s profile.

“This....” Combeferre swallows. “Grantaire—is this what you have...?”

“Only today,” Grantaire promises, not looking away from Courfeyrac. “I was walking, as usual, and... stumbled upon him. Nothing more than that. Quite a shock—”

“A shock,” Combeferre repeats, his own words stumbling over Grantaire’s. “My God. Oh, Courfeyrac....”

It’s then that he thaws enough to pull him in for a kiss, and Courfeyrac is smiling into it, his lips as strong and insistent as ever, sweet and hard against Combeferre’s own rough demand. One swift kiss isn’t enough, and they fall into another and another, until they lapse into longer, more indulgence twists and pulls of lip and tongue; Courfeyrac’s arms are around Combeferre’s waist, the crutch fallen aside, and Combeferre’s hands are tangled in Courfeyrac’s hair, pulling until it must hurt, but he’s too consumed by the heat and the rich sweetness swelling inside of him to be concerned with anything else.

Enjolras’s voice is what breaks them apart.

“Courfeyrac?”

Combeferre spins around, dizziness swamping him, a giddy grin sprawling across his flushed features; one arm is still looped around Courfeyrac’s neck. Enjolras is standing in the doorway to the bedroom, his eyes wide and blank grey, his lips pale and parted. He’s shaking, harder than Combeferre has ever seen from him—it seems almost as though he’s on the verge of some sort of fit.

“Enj,” Courfeyrac greets.

Enjolras’s knees give in.

Grantaire and Combeferre are at either side of him in instants, grasping his shoulders and waist before he can hit the ground—Courfeyrac, one hand braced against the wall in the absence of his fallen crutch, limps hurriedly around to join them. Enjolras settles shakily to the floor with Combeferre and Grantaire’s help, his skin ice-white, still shaking. His silver eyes are wide and round as bright coins in his wan face, and racing behind them is an emotion so pure and unbridled that it seems on the verge of bursting forth from him in a swoop of tangible flame.

“Courfeyrac,” he says again.

“Enjolras....” Courfeyrac attempts to kneel, and his face gathers into a grimace. Grantaire quickly reaches over to help him, and the two of them pivot his injured leg around so that he can sit properly, reaching one hand out to thread with Enjolras’s own limp fingers and the other to pat him on the shoulder.

“How?” Enjolras demands. “How could you...?”

“It is a long, rather dull story,” Courfeyrac shrugs, “and I will tell it later, for I have no doubt that you will demand it of me. But for now, suffice to know that I am with you, that I never left you—any of you—willingly. I will be with you until the end, you absurdly beautiful young men—or, well, until the next rebellion halves our ranks once more.”

“My God, I love you,” Enjolras whispers, nearly squeaking.

Combeferre’s arm is around his shoulders, then, and Grantaire is the one who, in grasping the sides of Courfeyrac and Combeferre, pulls them all together; they’re a trembling huddle on the ground, stained by the dawn light, which is suddenly the opposite of chilly. There are still a thousand questions raging in Combeferre’s mind, but for now, he is content, and that is more than he ever expected to feel again. That, for now, is enough.

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