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Marius had been going out with Cosette for a few months when she finally let him walk her home. Her family was really secretive, she said, and she needed to make sure he was serious about her before he was allowed to know where she lived.
Marius was intrigued, sure, but he was old enough at that stage to know why a woman might not want a man to know where she lives until she's certain about his intentions, so he wrote it off. Told her he understood, which he did.
He hadn't expected to meet her father at the door. Cosette had walked up and knocked, and he'd just about asked her why she didn't have her own key when the door swung open and a middle-aged man with a wide and welcoming smile appeared at the other end.
"Cosette, my darling," he said excitedly, and greeted Cosette with a hug and a kiss on the cheek, as if he hadn't seen her in a very long time, but Marius knew he'd seen her only that very morning. "Welcome back!"
Marius was charmed by this display, if not fascinated by it. He had never been privy to this sort of display before, and his heart clenched at the sight of it. The feelings he had for Cosette were already brimming inside him after such a short time, and to see that she obviously had someone, a family, who cared about her so much immediately endeared him to her father.
Once her father had greeted her properly, his eyes had slid over to Marius, waiting agonizingly at the doorstep still. Marius had expected his eyes to harden, his composure to wind up tighter. Obviously since Cosette was bringing him here, she had told her father about their relationship, whatever that was currently.
But even though Marius had braced himself for hostility, it never came. Cosette's father remained all the same, leisurely, open and beaming same as ever. Marius was almost expecting to be hugged as well.
"You must be Marius," So Cosette had told him Marius' name. "A pleasure to meet you, finally!" His voice was low and gruff, but his disposition anything but.
"You too, Monsieur -" Marius looked for an appropriate continuation to his statement.
"This is my Papa Jean, Marius." Cosette saved him from further thought with an introduction.
"Monsieur Jean, the pleasure is all mine." Marius finished up his comment neatly, widening his lips into the least nervous smile he could muster in that moment.
Upon second inspection, Cosette's papa was much more becoming than a man his age ought to be. His silvery hair and beard and his kindly eyes had distracted Marius from noticing the width of the man. He was certainly built like an oak tree, and though Marius was taller than him, it didn't feel like it whatsoever. The man could probably snap him in half. Marius swallowed nervously and blessed his lucky stars for Monsieur Jean's obviously mild temperament.
"You'll have to come around sometime to have dinner with us, Marius. It'll be lovely to get to know my daughter's partner more." Monsieur Jean remarked, and Marius was flattered enough to turn pink, much like Cosette was doing next to her father.
They hadn't really called each other anything like that, not yet, but Marius found he liked the sound of it. He spared a small smile towards Cosette, and she returned it to him. With his heart fluttering inside his chest, Marius bid Cosette and Monsieur Jean goodbye and turned to walk back home, feeling as though with each step he ascended higher and higher into the air.
__
That same elation turned to a horrific, wretched jealously only a few days after that.
Marius had been studying in the library for his exam the very next week, when Courfeyrac and Grantaire had burst in, in apparent hysterics, and startled the life out of the librarian, and Marius himself.
"Marius!" Courfeyrac had shouted, out of breath from how quickly he'd been running. "We were just walking through the park and we saw Cosette with this guy!"
"Yeah, they were walking about with their arms linked together!" Grantaire supplemented, and Marius felt his heart collapse to the bottom of his shoes. He desperately tried to look for a logical answer.
"Wait, was he old?" he asked first, abandoning his pen above his unfinished work.
"Like middle aged, I'd say," Courfeyrac responded and Grantaire nodded in agreement.
"And his hair was white?" Marius said excitedly, feeling his worry fading away. Evidently, Courfeyrac had seen Cosette with Monsieur Jean and had drawn the incorrect conclusion.
Courfeyrac and Grantaire looked at each other first, and then shook their heads.
"No, no, his hair was black. And it was maybe shoulder length long." They said, and Marius was already packing up his stuff halfway through their sentence.
"Show me!"
___
Marius was faced with the sight and still couldn't believe it.
There was his beloved Cosette draped over the arm of some guy, strolling through the park. He had almost felt ridiculous, hiding behind trees to get a good view, but the confirmation of the sight had been enough to wipe away his embarrassment entirely.
"I can't believe it," He was whispering, while Courfeyrac and Grantaire rubbed his back comfortingly. "I can't believe it at all."
"Maybe she's got an uncle you don't know about?" Courfeyrac attempted to reason.
"She's said she lives with her parents and that's the only family she knows." Marius responded back bitterly. "What in the world does she see in him?"
"Who knows," Grantaire scoffed, taking a long look at the guy who was walking by Cosette. "Certainly not his looks."
He was maybe in his forties and he wore a long black coat which highlighter how tall he was. His dark hair went along well with his skin and his eyes, and his face seemed to be permanently in a neutral expression which teemed towards a scowl much more easily than it did towards a smile. Marius felt even more upset to realise Grantaire was probably lying to make him feel better, because the man wasn't bad looking, despite how much the ugly expression on his face tried to make it be so. He just looked distinguished, sure of himself. Marius knew he probably couldn't look that self-assured even if he tried.
All three of them stared at the nameless man in apparent consideration of Grantaire's previous statement and seemed to snap out of it at the exact same moment and look for another excuse when the one previously offered didn't seem to hold up.
"Maybe he has a lot of money?" Grantaire gave another excuse, but Courfeyrac slapped him lightly upside the head.
"Marius has a lot of money too, genius." He hissed, turning back to Marius after with a much gentler tone than had been afforded to Grantaire.
"It doesn't matter why, Marius. You can't find reason in these sorts of things. We should leave, forget about her now, she's obviously not worth it."
Marius didn't have strength in him to counter this statement and only let his friends lead him off by the hand to leave the park, his heart which had fluttered in excitement only days earlier now breaking into little pieces.
___
A week had gone by and Marius had avoided Cosette in every possible way, from staying at his friends' flats instead of his own so that she wouldn't know where to find him to turning and running the opposite way when he happened upon her on the street.
He could tell his behaviour was confusing and even hurting her, or at least he could theorise to it, but if she was even a bit as smart as he knew she was then she would figure it out soon enough and stop trying. And that way both he and her could move on and live their lives separate.
Whenever this thought happened upon his mind he would either burst into tears or hit his head into the nearest hard surface in frustration, something his friends had become used to in their meetings.
"Marius, stop crying, I'm trying to give an impassioned speech, here." Enjolras said when a fresh wave of tears broke out of him during one of Enjolras' lengthy rants.
"I can't help it, Enjolras!" He responded through his tears, cursing his eyes for betraying him. "I just can't believe she would do this to me!"
Enjolras rolled his eyes but the rest of his friends rushed to his side to comfort him, as per usual.
It felt as if the pain of this betrayal would never end, and Marius wished that he had the strength to confront Cosette, to ask her what he did wrong, if anything, to ask her what she saw in this other man that he couldn't give to her. To remind her of how she said that she needed to make sure he was 'serious' about her and tell her how he wished he'd thought to do the same. He imagined many times how his statement would hurt her, and her pretty face would scrunch up with her hurt and her tears, and as much as he wished the thought would give him satisfaction, he could feel nothing but further unhappiness at the thought of hurting Cosette. How he wished she felt the same!
"Listen, if you're this broken up about it, the best thing to do is confront her!" Enjolras was obviously fed up enough with interruptions to his speeches that he was willing to offer advice.
"You think so?" Marius looked up to him through misty eyes.
"Of course," Enjolras had a look on his face that almost teemed towards compassion. "The best way to let something go is to get it out. Without anger, without sadness, just let her know that she hurt you and then you can move on."
"Enjolras might be onto something." Grantaire stuck up for Enjolras' ideas as per usual.
"Yeah, you might be right." Marius agreed, standing and wiping his eyes. His friends whooped and cheered around him, and he felt a small smile creep up onto his face.
"I'm going to go tell her right now!" He announced, feeling invigorated and full of confidence.
His eyes swept the room, taking in the cheers and cries of his friends. It felt like nothing would break this energy, nothing would break Marius' stride now. Suddenly, a knock was heard at the door. Everyone's heads turned to it first and then to each other in surprise.
"Who the hell could that be?" Someone muttered in the corner of the room, but Enjolras was already ahead of them in rushing to the door.
Opening it, Marius and his friends were faced once again with Cosette. The strength Marius previously felt failed him almost immediately. It was hard to feel strong in the face of such a powerful attraction, such a strong feeling that made him weak at the knees and made his heart tremble in his chest.
"Cosette?" He heard himself ask, bewildered. "How in the world did you find me here?"
"I asked around at the University." She answered, her voice meek and small. Marius was surprised to see that she, just like himself surely, looked like she had been crying.
"What are you doing here?" Marius heard one of his friends call out, it may have been Courfeyrac, his mind didn't really register it properly. There was a certain disguised aggression in the voice, and Marius found that he didn't like to see Cosette spoken to that way.
"It's okay, guys," He settled them, but wasn't willing to part with their presence. "Let Cosette speak her case." He crossed his arms over his chest and awaited her words.
He wasn't expecting to see her pretty face bloom red with anger.
"Speak my case? You're the one that's been actively ignoring me for a week now!" She cried out, distraught. Evidently, she hadn't figured out the reason why for herself. "And can we please talk somewhere privately?"
Marius heard himself huff.
"Anything you have to say to me, you can say it in front of my friends." From the murmurings of confirmation that sounded about him, his friends agreed.
"Fine!" Cosette huffed right back, crossing her arms over her chest to match Marius' stance. He noticed the beautiful white and pink dress she was wearing, the one with the half low décolleté that she loved. His heart squeezed at the sight.
"Fine then," he snapped back to the current moment as Cosette prepared to unleash her tirade. "Would you mind telling me why you've ignored me? I thought we had something special going on."
"I thought we did too," Marius continued, angry at her insistence that he was somehow in the wrong. "But obviously that's not the way you truly feel."
"That's --!" Cosette's eyes widened in her surprise, her insult apparent on her face. "Whatever do you mean by that?"
"Well, I would say that in order for a good relationship to transpire between two people, certain agreements about monogamy would have to be met! And I would say that going walking around parks with your arm linked with another man is something which breaches this agreement, wouldn't you agree with me?" He spoke haughtily, his friends nodding along with him and urging him on.
Cosette suddenly seemed more confused than angry.
"What?" She queried, her anger seeming to deflate out of her in a stunned moment of confusion. "You think I... You think I'm seeing someone else?"
"Of course!" Marius felt like he was right at his wit's end with her playing coy. "We saw you! With the tall fella with the long hair!"
The room seemed to take a deep breath and hold it as Marius awaited Cosette's response and his friends all watched with bated breath. Cosette herself seemed to have moved away from anger entirely as she processed his words, thinking deeply with a gloved hand clutching at her face. Abruptly, she seemed to arrive at a revelation, and she let out a sudden laugh.
"What's so funny?" Marius asked, but found that his own anger had all but evaporated at the charming sight of her laughing over something which should be so serious. It made hope brim up inside his edges. "What are you laughing about?"
"At the park, a week ago?" She asked again, as if confirming her own thoughts. Marius glanced at Grantaire and Courfeyrac as if for confirmation, and they both looked as curious as he, nodding their heads slightly. Marius conveyed this nod to Cosette as well, at which stage a smile broke out onto her face.
"Well then this has all been a huge misunderstanding!" She spoke excitedly, evidently so happy to have it resolved that she had forgotten the insult to her character that Marius had made. Marius was keen to hear this explanation so that he could join her in her relief. "I was walking with my Papa!"
Just as quickly as hope had built up inside of him, it had evaporated once more.
"But I've already met your Papa, and I know for a fact that's not what he looked like!" He responded but couldn't find it in him to force anger into his voice, only seeking out further explanation.
Cosette seemed as merry as ever. Evidently, in her eyes the matter was already solved regardless of whether or not her explanation made any sense.
"Yes, you did meet my Papa Jean. I was walking with my other Papa, Javert!" She explained further, and Marius opened his mouth to counter argue before the words sunk in and his mouth shut again.
Another Papa? Could it be possible that Cosette had two and had never mentioned it? But now that Marius thought it over, Cosette had never mentioned the gender of her parents, only that she lived with them. Marius had simply assumed that, having met Jean, the cap on male parental figures had been met. But how stupid of him to think that way! It was fully possible that Cosette had more than one father figure, after all, the situation with her mother was already confusing enough and she hadn't even revealed much about that to him. The genuine expression on Cosette's face was winning him over.
"You can come meet him at dinner, if you'd like." She said with a slight smile, evidently kinder than he in her forgiveness. "Though I will warn you, he's not as welcoming as my other Papa."
"So, they live together?" Marius asked, convinced now but trying to gauge the situation out further. "Your Papa Jean and Papa Javert?"
"Of course they do!" Cosette giggled at his apparent misunderstanding. "They have for almost as long as Papa Jean has officially been my Papa! Twelve years now, maybe?"
Marius looked around at his friends. For everyone, this seemed to be making sense, and they were all considering the situation in their minds, nodding along once the pieces of the puzzle seemed to make sense. Grantaire and Courfeyrac wouldn't make eye contact with him, feigning interest on a spider web in the corner of the ceiling.
"And that was who you were walking with, a week ago?" Marius felt as if his questioning was not simply to delay the apology he would have to give soon.
"Yes, we walk together every Thursday with Papa Javert while he's on his break from work." Cosette explained. "He takes me to the park to get a coffee and walk around."
Marius, at this statement, finally swallowed his pride and walked closer to her, bridging the gap between them with a glance back to his friends which let them know to make themselves unheard for a little while. They all looked the other way, went back to their reading or writing or whatever they were doing previous to this debacle.
"I'm very sorry, Cosette." Marius said sincerely, grasping her hands in his gently. "I don't know what came over me. I was so jealous and heartbroken, I didn't think straight."
"And you'll have to work to make up for it," Cosette spoke, though not unkindly. "How about, at a first basis, you agree to come to speak directly to me in the future, instead of avoiding me for a week?"
Marius went red at this but nodded his head regardless and let Cosette pull him into a hug.
"Oh, Marius, how silly that this should be our first argument! Papa Jean and Papa Javert have arguments sometimes, but they always work it out in the end, and Papa Jean told me it shows that you care about each other and still want to be together, that you are willing to talk about it and not walk away." Cosette said pointedly, and Marius smiled sheepishly at her.
"I will abide by that advice in the future." He said, and leaned back into her embrace, uncaring of his friends smirking and elbowing each other to point at them behind his back.
"I hope my Papas won't hold this whole thing against you when I explain things," It was Cosette's turn to pull away from the embrace and appear sheepish. "I've told them you've been ignoring me for a week."
"Oh," Marius swallowed nervously. "Well, your Papa Jean seemed forgiving!"
Cosette's awkward smile told him more than enough about that, but Marius was more than ready to accept whatever punishment was deemed proper here. If he could move through this with Cosette in his arms, it was all worth it anyway.