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A loud knock woke Enjolras from his sleep and startled him. It sounded a lot like something had been knocking on his window. But he was living on the fourth floor, so he was pretty sure this hadn't happened. Blaming in on a bird or whatever, he turned over and tried to get back to sleep. It had been a very long day, who was he kidding it had been a very long week. It was the 21st, three days before Christmas and that as usual meant that all of his friends were juggling school work and volunteering. To be honest it was exhausting. At least he had survived his last exam today, so he had really earned those precious hours of sleep.
Another knock. And a second one right after the first one.
Apparently, somebody didn't allow him to finally sleep. Enjolras hid his face in his pillow and groaned. This wasn't fair.
He was quite sure that somebody was playing a joke on him. A terribly rude one.
Another knock, this time much more insisting.
With another groan, Enjolras got up, searching blindly for his glasses, before he headed over to his window.
Right in time as it seemed - another knock startled him out of his sleepwalking state. Somebody was standing down there in the garden and was throwing pebbles at his window.
He opened the window and could just duck out of the way before he was hit with another pebble.
"Are you fucking kidding me?", he hissed and watched the pebble roll over his bedroom floor.
"Shit! I am sorry!", the person down in the garden drawled, judging by their voice it was a man. A very drunk man. God, he was loud. Enjolras just hoped none of his neighbors in the apartments below would wake up. Most of them were nice elder ladies and he wouldn't want them to get scared. Or pissed.
"Who are you?", he demanded and the man only laughed.
"What, are you seriously playing that game now?" He sounded honestly hurt and Enjolras was just about to apologize when the man spoke up again.
"Anyway, I don't care right now. It is my turn to apologize, for once and I am here to do exactly that." And then he hurried away to the hedge, just to come back not ten seconds later with a guitar.
"Uh, I am pretty sure you are in the wrong..."
"No, I am not shut up and listen goddamnit I am trying to fix our relationship." A yeah, Enjolras was sure that was the way to do that.
And then the man began to strum the rhythm was wobbly at first, probably because of the cold. Enjolras wondered how long the man had been out here. When he felt comfortable, the man started to sing, with a voice that was smooth despite his inebriated state.
Choirs will be singing Silent Night.
Christmas carols by candlelight.
Please come home for Christmas.
Please come home for Christmas.
If not for Christmas by New Years night
Friends and relations send salutations.
Enjolras was sure he didn't know the song, it was something sad about Christmas and a lost love and yeah pretty much about sadness. Still, it sounded amazing and he wanted the song to never end. The man was really talented. But it did end after all and the man down there in his garden looked up to him.
"So what do you say?"
"I still think you are at the wrong address." Enjolras winced at his own answer. "And I am sorry." He saw the other man flinch.
"That can't be, that's the address you gave me months ago!"
Enjorlas hesitated, he really was sorry for the guy.
"I guess that dude has been winding you up. But ok you look like your freezing. Do you want to come in?"
He didn't catch the man's response only told him to wait and then went down to get him.
*
Ten minutes, an awkward introduction and a just as awkward excuse later the two of them had ended up on Enjolras couch.
The man as it turned out, was called Grantaire, had been in a terrible relationship he had been trying to forget by drinking himself into unconsciousness (what didn't work apparently) and then on a whim had decided to win his douchebag of an ex-partner back with an improvised serenade. That much Enjolras had learned over a cup of tea in his living room. They were sitting on the sofa, Grantaire bundled up in several blankets still shivering slightly. He must have been out there for way too long.
Enjolras also noticed that Grantaire was quite good-looking, despite his slightly damaged appearance, that could be blamed on the mix of alcohol, heartbreak and standing out in the cold for so long. It was only a bit concerning that his type as of late seemed to include freezing drunkards. Maybe it was the blue of his eyes.
"I am sorry," Grantaire said again impatiently trying to get some of his black curls out of his face. Since he had come inside he had sobered up a bit and seemed to be completely mortified by what he had done.
"I swear to god I was sure it was the right address. Bossuet double-checked it before he showed it to the taxi-driver!"
"Wait what do you mean Bossuet double-checked it?", the name had Enjolras sit up.
"You know Bossuet?", he asked.
"Uh if we mean the same guy? Tall, bald, unlucky? Gorgeous boy- and girlfriend?", Grantaire looked at him with wide eyes.
Enjolras just nodded.
"Yes, that's him. How drunk was he? He knows my address!"
Grantaire let out a breathless laugh. "Uhm well, he decided to cheer me up, by drinking me under the table and let's say the tab was a very long number?" Yeah, okay that at least explained why he hadn't recognized Enjolras’ address.
He only nodded, that was one hell of a coincidence.
“Wait you came all the way here from the bar you were at? That’s like thirty minutes by cab?”
That must have cost a small fortune. Grantaire only shrugged.
“Maybe? I don’t know, I slept through most of it. But I am pretty sure I paid the taxi driver too much.”
He looked at the ground embarrassed. “My thoughts were kinda preoccupied.”
“Ah yes I guess I get it.”
They fell into a comfortable silence, both of them drinking their tea and trying to not stare at each other too obviously.
Enjolras’ radio played something that sounded just as sad as the song Grantaire had played earlier and noticed that the other man visibly tensed. He sighed. Looked like Grantaire had been Hurt really badly.
Grantaire set his cup down and shuffled to his feet.
“Look, again I am really sorry. For waking you up, for almost hitting you in the face with that pebble, for serenading you so badly and for taking up even more of your time. Like for basically everything I have done tonight. I should really get going.”
Enjolras almost jumped to his feet and the two of them collided, holding onto each other in order to not fall over. Clearing his throat Enjolras brought a bit of space between them, not letting go of Grantaire's arm.
“Look…”, he wasn’t even sure what he wanted to say. Just… Grantaire looked truly miserable and he didn’t want him to get out into the cold. Not in the middle of the night, when it was this cold.
“Look, you can’t go out there. It’s freezing, and you are still drunk and in kind of a bad state. You can stay on my sofa, if you want to and take the bus first thing tomorrow morning if you want to.”
Grantaire looked at him and then shrugged again. "Yeah fine. Thanks, really."
"It's fine. Want another cup of tea?"
"Thank god I was afraid you wouldn't offer another one, this stuff is amazing."
*
They stayed awake for three more cups of tea each of them.
Grantaire, Enjolras learned fast, was more than a drunk and lovesick guy with an amazing singing voice. He also held some strong opinions on basically anything. After their second cup, Enjolras had to get up and bring out his philosophy books, just to be proven horribly wrong by Grantaire, who seemed to know his old greeks better than anybody else. Talking to him was, interesting to say the least.
When Enjolras had finished a rant about how much he wanted to change basically everything at some point, but at the moment mostly details of their unis' policy, Grantaire scoffed and rolled his eyes. It didn't look mean, more like he was exasperated but in a fond way. It was the way Enjolras sometimes looked at Courfeyrac when he was off to do something extremely stupid.
"Yeah, I don't think that would work.", Grantaire pointed out with a smirk. And when Enjolras was just about to argue with him further, he shushed him. "I said I don't think it would work, but if it would you would be the one to actually make it work."
And well, that did shut Enjolras up.
Halfway through their third cup Enjolras got up again to get more blankets for himself from his bedroom and bundled himself up, next to Grantaire. The radio station started to repeat the Christmas songs and they felt more and more depressing as the time went on.
Still, he caught Grantaire humming along to some of them. Enjolras had really planned to, at some point, get up and leave for his own bed. Just...
At some point, both of them were way too tired to keep up with the conversation. The warmth of the blankets and Grantaire's humming slowly lulled Enjolras to sleep and then the both of them were laying sprawled on the sofa snoring, while the radio had finally changed to something much happier.
The last thing he heard before he fell asleep was Grantaire's voice, sounding just as sleepy as he felt: "But honestly on a scale from one to ten would you take me back?"
Enjolras groaned in response. "Oh God Grantaire, go to sleep."