#i am a people pleaser at the depths of my (canine-like) soul

[windmilltothestars]

Another (less) short piece for @mynameisremyiamadumbass - who suggested the other day be “Grantaire Appreciation Day” - right before I had to my tutoring job.  I thought of this idea WHILE I was tutoring, when I supposed to be thinking of eighth grade math!!  Anyway, it ended up being more of ensemble piece, and (of course) longer than planned, but Grantaire does get appreciated!  Enjoy a very ridiculous story, my friend!

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Combeferre, Feuilly and Enjolras were all hunched over the table in the back room of the Café Musain, in serious consultation of the wording of their latest manifesto to be taken to the printers’.  Enjolras was grinning faintly – out all of his friends, these two were the least likely to let women or booze or even artistic excitement or personal problems interfere with their focus on the cause, and today’s progress had been swift and efficient.  

Suddenly, the thudding of urgent, ungainly footsteps approached, and they all tensed and raised their eyes to the door in anticipation.  The sound had been so loud and forceful that they were all surprised when it was Jehan who appeared in the doorway, pale-faced, clinging to the doorframe, and gasping for breath.

“Jehan?  What is it?” wondered Feuilly, approaching him in concern.

“I was – just – talking to –” Jehan panted, leaning over and bracing his hands on his knees.

“Catch your breath first,” Combeferre advised, laying a calming hand on his shoulder.  Jehan nodded vaguely and held them all in suspense as he inhaled.

“To an inspector!” he said at last, straightening up.  “He seemed – suspicious – heard some rumor!  He was asking – questions – about our organization – ‘What is the aim and purpose of the Friends of the ABC?’  I told him – we teach poor children – teach them to read!  ABCs, you know!  Then he asked – where?  Where we met – and did our teaching!  And – I – I panicked, I thought – I’d better not say here – so I said – the Café Corinthe!  And he’s going there – now!  And I’m – I’m sorry,” his contrite eyes were more on Enjolras than the others, “I didn’t know what to say – I panicked.”

They all glanced at each other anxiously.

“Is anyone there now?” Combeferre wondered.

“It’s too late for breakfast –”

“They might all be in class –”

“Though it’s possible – Bahorel or Grantaire –”

“But if he questions the staff, poor old Mère Hucheloup – might not know what to say,” Feuilly concluded uneasily.

“I’m sorry,” Jehan repeated, ducking his eyes.

“It’s alright,” Enjolras told him firmly, “you did nothing wrong.  We’ve just got to go there now – and pray God we can get him off the scent.”

This was all the incentive they needed to be on their way.  They even sprung for a carriage ride just to get them there faster and stand a better chance of catching the inspector and minimizing the possible damage to their cause – not to mention their lives.

With terror hammering in each of their hearts to varying degrees, the four of them poured through the door and came upon a surprising sight.

Grantaire, fists raised in front of his face, was mock-sparring – the blows connecting but ever-so-lightly – with a scrawny, ragged young boy who sometimes delivered messages for them, whilst the inspector, tall, imposing, and in full uniform, stood to the side and watched the proceedings with a puzzled expression.  There was a faint blush to Grantaire’s cheeks that someone who didn’t know him might have taken for exertion or embarrassment, but he seemed, on the whole, but minimally impaired; he had the presence of mind to subtly roll his hastily-hidden wine bottle further behind the counter with his foot as he passed. He allowed the boy to get a good mock-hit on face, before tumbling dramatically to the floor in response as the boy cheered his victory, and then straightening up and smiling pleasantly to the inspector.

“So you see,” he panted, “how he’s improving in his self-defense lessons!  Now, I may be biased, Monsieur Inspector, but to my mind, self-defense is one of the most important skills for our students to learn!  Though the others –” his eyes turned upon his four friends at last, and his grin widened – “are sure to correct me!  Monsieur, might I introduce our afternoon teachers?”

The inspector turned to look at the four of them.  Combeferre faintly raised a hand in greeting, and Grantaire therefore honed in on him as the calmest and most ready to convincingly play his part.

“This is Monsieur Combeferre,” he said, indicating him.  “He teaches anatomy and other sciences.  Fantastically gruesome stuff! Talking for hours about blood and bones!”

“Pleased to meet you, sir,” Combeferre greeted the inspector, shaking his hand.  He turned pleasantly to the raggedy boy. “Can you tell the inspector what you call the bones in your fingers?”

“Knuckles!” the boy shot back.

“He prefers boxing to science,” Combeferre informed the inspector ruefully.  “We’re working on it.  Though it’s a testament to my honored colleague Monsieur Grantaire’s skill, I’m sure.  He also teaches art.”

“Art and science?” the inspector wondered, tilting his head.  “And self-defense?  I was given to believe you were teaching them to read!”

“We here of the Friends of ABC believe in a balanced education,” Feuilly put in.  He, too, held out his hand to shake the inspector’s. “In started with just literacy, but we’ve since expanded our aims.  I’m Monsieur Feuilly; I teach woodworking and handicrafts.  And here, you’ve met Monsieur Prouvaire.  He helps our advanced readers to reach a higher understanding of literature and poetry; sometimes they write their own!”

“And he teaches the Bible in Hebrew and Greek!  Quite a polymath, our Monsieur Prouvaire,” Grantaire added fondly, causing Jehan to hastily withdraw the hand he was extending to the inspector and use it to quickly hide his furiously-blushing face.

“And this,” Grantaire went on as his eyes fell with their regular glowing admiration on Enjolras, who had been standing like a statue watching the proceedings, “is the chief and foundation of our whole enterprise, Monsieur Enjolras!”

Enjolras gave him a slight nod and shook his hand mechanically, but said nothing.

“And – what do you teach, Monsieur Enjolras?” the inspector asked, his expression unreadable.

“History,” he replied swiftly.  “French history – especially of the last century – is my specialty, and quite enough to fill a whole course, I daresay, but Monsieur Feuilly has persuaded me to expand the area of study across centuries and continents – to have a more whole and complete picture of the world.”

“The way he tells those stories,” Jehan put in shyly, “why, he puts you there, in the shoes one living in that moment!  To listen to them is to be enthralled by some fey creature!  His is the magic to transport one across time and space!”

“I can see why he teaches poetry,” the inspector muttered.

“Monsieur Prouvaire is right,” the boy added suddenly, dashing over to Enjolras and clinging to his leg.  “Monsieur Enjolras’s stories are amazing!  His class is my favorite – after boxing, of course!”  Enjolras awkwardly patted the boy’s shoulder.

“It’s true,” added Mère Hucheloup, ducking her head out of the kitchen, “Even I get distracted in my serving by dear Monsieur Enjolras’s history lessons!”

The boy faced down the inspector and continued. “I was one of the first students to learn with the Friends the ABC!  Back when it was just Monsiers Enjolras and Combeferre teaching reading!  Monsieur Enjolras taught me my ABCs – right at that table over there!”

There was a silence as they all gazed intently at the inspector’s impassive face – even Mère Hucheloup had paused in laying out oysters – and collectively willed him to believe their elaborate castle of lies and half-truths.  He gazed from face to face and seemed to be reading for nerves or lies in each of them.  They each internally trembled for Jehan’s exceptionally timid manners and propensity for blushing.  But his inner valor upheld him, and his face stayed pale, and he did not duck his eyes.

At last, the inspector completed his sweep, he gave a soft breath of satisfaction, and slightly smiled. Five pairs of tensed shoulders relaxed.

“Is there anything else, Inspector?” Combeferre said.  “Only our afternoon students will be arriving in twenty minutes, and we really must prepare!”

“And the sort of children we teach,” Feuilly made bold to add, “are sometimes afraid of the police! They might not show up today if they see you here!”

“Er – yes, alright,” the inspector agreed awkwardly.  “I’ll be going, and I’ll tell them at the precinct that we’ve nothing to fear from the Friends of the ABC, that they’re but a lot of harmless dreamers – who in my opinion,” he added, casting a dubious glance at the ragged boy now holding Enjolras’s hand, “are wasting considerable talent on this sort of riffraff!”

Enjolras’s outrage at this comment managed to confine itself to tightening his grip on the boy’s hand and clenching his fist; but Feuilly’s expression darkened dangerously.

“Now, see here, Inspector,” he said, stepping up two paces closer to the man. “To educate is to deliver a soul out of darkness, and to offer a chance at a life of use and light and joy and purpose!  Do you say we should condemn every poor man’s child to darkness?  Dismiss this whole class of people, as not worth consideration?”

“It is our philosophy,” Combeferre added, “that education – the illumination of all minds into greater truth and understanding – will bring light and progress to all the peoples of the world; thus, starting in childhood, and not excluding any class of child, is vital for the progress of the human race.”

The inspector gave a sort of snort, his mouth upturned in a somewhat derisive smile.  “What did I say?” he shrugged, “Dreamers!  Harmless dreamers!”  And without another word, he turned on his heel and left the café.

Jehan immediately sunk down into a chair.  The urchin ran to window and stuck his tongue out at the inspector’s departing back. Combeferre and Enjolras confined themselves to sighs of relief.  Grantaire, also sitting, said, “I need a drink.”

“You and me both, brother,” Feuilly said fervently, clapping him on the back and going to pick up his hidden wine bottle.  “I think perhaps we all do. Mère Hucheloup, some more cups, if you please!”

“Do you know,” Combeferre said softly to Enjolras as they watched Feuilly accepting the cups and pouring out the wine, “I rather liked the idea – all of us as teachers!  Molding young minds!  I had myself half-convinced!”

“In the new world – in the Republic,” Enjolras promised him, “that will be the way.  When that day comes, I freely pass my torch to you – in your hands, the light of illumination!”

Jehan, during this exchange, had risen to his feet and gone to the window to join the boy.  “You saved us,” he told him earnestly. “The Friends of the ABC will forever be in your debt!  Here,” he added, reaching into his pocket and handing the boy an entire five-franc coin, “get yourself something nice!”  The boy excitedly rushed to the counter to buy himself a pastry.

“And he’s not the only who saved us!” Feuilly added as he passed the cups into each of their hands. “Without Grantaire’s being here, his quick thinking and adaptability, we’d be lost!”

“Certainly, we would!” agreed Jehan, smiling warmly at him.

“Oh – oh, really,” Grantaire dismissed, ducking his own head and trying not to look too pleased by this praise, “it was nothing, my friends – nothing, really!”

“It was far from nothing,” Feuilly assured him heartily.  “Gentlemen, let’s raise our glasses – to Grantaire!”

“To Grantaire!” they all echoed, smiling at him.

Grantaire’s face was rather blank as he observed his friends – it was, like the inspector’s scanning over each one as if to ascertain this was real.  As they knew it would, it settled last of all on the fair countenance of Enjolras, a desperate question in his eyes.  To reassure him, Enjolras raised his glass a fraction of an inch again, widened his smile gave him a little nod. At last, Grantaire’s face relaxed and reflected his smile, and they all drank deep.

Next second, Bahorel burst into the shop, greeting them with a shout of, “Afternoon, my friends! ARE WE ALL READY TO SMASH THE GOVERNMENT?!?”

Jehan choked on his wine, and fell out of his chair.

#mini fic #my fic #fan fic #les miserables #i am sorry #i am a people pleaser at the depths of my (canine-like) soul #so i hope you are pleased with this :') #i forgot how to spell feuilly's name every single time i typed it #and don't ever ask me to say it out loud #ignore me #it's 4am again here