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Enjolras wove expertly through the crowded bar, having done this far too many times, especially recently. He saw the man he was looking for half-slumped at the bar, a row of empty shot glasses in front of him, and Enjolras sighed heavily.
Grantaire spotted him as he approached, and even now, even after everything, Grantaire’s entire expression lit up as he did. “Enjolras!”
His smile was wide and wicked, his eyes glinting in the dim light of the bar, but even his ebullient greeting couldn’t quite hide the fact that he slurred a little on Enjolras’s name. Enjolras pursed his lips, just slightly. After the fight that they’d had, he had fully expected Grantaire to drink his cares away, but Grantaire seemed long past the point of any cares whatsoever.
“C’mon,” Grantaire said, patting the barstool next to him. “Sit. Drink. You’re a few behind.”
It occurred to Enjolras, as Grantaire tugged him onto the barstool next to his and slung an arm around his shoulders, that he hadn’t seen Grantaire this drunk in quite a while. Drinking, sure, even tipsy, but since the first time they’d stumbled back to Enjolras’s together, Grantaire’s drinking had never reached this level.
Which was definitely not a good sign.
Grantaire propped his chin on his hand and smiled at Enjolras. “So what’re you drinking?” he asked, his voice too loud. “Shots? You wanna do shots, Apollo?”
“No thanks,” Enjolras said, nodding to the bartender and muttering, “Water, for both of us.”
“Ah, c’mon, Enj,” Grantaire said with an exaggerated sigh. “Have a little fun.”
Enjolras gave him an even look. “I think you’ve probably had enough fun for the both of us,” he said firmly, pressing one of the glasses of water in Grantaire’s hand. “Drink this and then I’m taking you home. It’s been a long day.”
Grantaire snorted and rubbed a hand across his face, his smile disappearing in an instant. “It has been a long day,” he agreed, looking and sounding exhausted. “Long day, long week, long month…” He trailed off and forced a smile back on his face as he leered at Enjolras. “Long boyfriend, if you know what I mean.”
He tipped an enormous wink at him, and Enjolras rolled his eyes. “Normally the lecherous thing works for me, but not here, not now.”
The smile again slid off of Grantaire’s face. “Then what do you want, Enj?” he asked, sounding tired and upset and everything Enjolras had expected when he had gotten Bossuet’s text advising him that Grantaire seemed to be attempting to drown himself in vodka. “You want to dissect every single thing you said to me during our fight this morning? Because I already did that somewhere around drink 4. You want to ask me why I picked a fight in the first place when everything seemed to be going so well? That was the topic of conversation at drink 6. Oh, or perhaps you’d like to remind me that you expect more of me, or at the very least, you expect me to pretend like I care – oh look, I beat you to it.”
His voice had grown in volume as he had gone on, and Enjolras winced at the vitriol in his words, acutely aware that people were beginning to stare at them. “Keep your voice down,” he told Grantaire, aiming to keep his own voice calm and soothing, but Grantaire clearly wanted no part of it.
“What, are you embarrassed by your drunk, loser boyfriend?”
Grantaire practically flung the words in Enjolras’s face, and Enjolras flinched, biting back his initial instinct to contradict Grantaire. Partially because he didn’t actually think that Grantaire was a loser, but most because he knew when Grantaire was picking a fight, and the last thing he wanted was for Grantaire to twist his attempt at comfort into something it wasn’t. “The only one you’re embarrassing is yourself,” he said instead, struggling to keep his voice even and controlled. “Now you can either come home with me or I’m calling you an Uber, but I’m not doing this with you here.”
For one long moment, Grantaire just glared at him, and Enjolras shrugged, pulling out his phone so that he could order an Uber for him. Suddenly, Grantaire’s hand shot out, closing around Enjolras’s wrist, and Enjolras glanced up at him, Grantaire’s expression inscrutable. “I love you, you know,” Grantaire said, his voice still several decibels too loud, as if he didn’t care that the entire bar could still hear him. “But for the life of me, I can’t understand why you would ever love me back.”
Enjolras stared at him, completely taken aback by the words that had just come out of Grantaire’s mouth. “Are you…are you serious right now?” he asked, his voice cracking, just slightly, and when Grantaire shrugged, Enjolras twisted his wrist out of his grip so that he could reach out and take Grantaire’s hand in both of his. There were a million things he wanted to say, a million reasons he wanted to give, but instead, he did the only thing he could, and turned it back on Grantaire. “Why do you love me?”
Grantaire stared at him. “What?”
“You heard me,” Enjolras said. “You don’t understand why I love you? Well, then I want you to explain why you love me.”
“I– that’s not the same thing!” Grantaire spluttered. “You’re – you’re you!”
He gestured so emphatically at Enjolras that he almost toppled off his barstool, and Enjolras rolled his eyes as he helped right him in his seat. “And you’re going to have to do better than that.”
Grantaire just shook his head. “I don’t understand how anyone could not love you,” he told Enjolras, with the kind of honesty brought on by far too many shots of vodka. “I don’t understand how Combeferre and Courfeyrac can spend as much time with you as they have and not just fallen head over heels in love with you.”
“I imagine the amount of time they’ve spent with me is probably why they haven’t,” Enjolras murmured wryly.
But Grantaire ignored him. “You just—” He shook his head admiringly. “There is so much broken in this world, so much that it’s, it’s incomprehensible for any person to even begin to make a difference, and somehow, you do. You give every part of yourself to trying to make the world better in whatever little way you can, and you never let anything, including and especially me, stop you from trying.”
Enjolras nodded slowly. “And that’s why you love me?”
“Yes.” Grantaire barked a laugh and scrubbed his free hand across his mouth. “No. I don’t know.” He dropped his hand and tilted his head to look up at Enjolras. “I love you because you make me want to be someone more than I am.”
Enjolras squeezed his hand. “And I love you because you make me better.”
Grantaire made a small note of dissent. “Be serious.”
“I am.” Enjolras pronounced the words with as much iron as he usually saved for his calls to arms. “You make me better. You make me want to be better. You ground me and remind of exactly why I do this. And you soften my rough edges and keep me from working myself to the bone on a half-brained idea that probably won’t even accomplish what I was intending anyway.”
He echoed Grantaire’s words from earlier in the day back to him, but gentler, sweeter, with a teasing lilt and no sharp bite, and when Grantaire smiled, just slightly, Enjolras smiled as well, lifting Grantaire’s hand to his mouth to press a kiss against the back of his hand. “I love you because you helped me figure out how to be whole.”
There was something unreadable but impossibly soft in Grantaire's expression as he looked at Enjolras. “I want to kiss you,” he told him.
Enjolras laughed lightly, feeling for the first time since he’d set foot in this bar like they were still them. “What are you waiting for, my permission?” he asked with a grin.
“No,” Grantaire said, swaying just slightly in his seat as he searched Enjolras’s face before confessing, “I’m drunk and there seems to be two of you, and I’m not sure which one I’m supposed to kiss.”
Enjolras rolled his eyes affectionately before leaning in to kiss Grantaire on the forehead. “C’mon,” he said, his voice rough. “Let’s get you home before you say something else you’re going to regret in the morning.”
Grantaire let Enjolras pull him to his feet, patting automatically for his wallet. “Wait, I need to pay my tab—”
“I got it,” Enjolras told him, having slipped his credit card to the bartender almost as soon as he had sat down.
Grantaire leaned heavily against him. “You better have tipped well,” he said.
“Believe me, I did,” Enjolras muttered.
Grantaire blinked up at him. “I love you,” he repeated, as Enjolras wrapped an arm around his waist and steered him towards the exit. “And I’m not gonna regret this in the morning.” He considered it for a moment. “Well, maybe just a little.”
Enjolras just shook his head. “Well, you’ll have to call me in the morning and let me know.”
Grantaire frowned. “Why don’t you come home with me and find out for yourself?” he asked, with just a little bit of a whine in his voice. “Save me from having to make a phone call.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Enjolras told him. “Not tonight.”
“Not like that,” Grantaire said, a little impatiently. “I mean – just come home with me, Enj.” Enjolras’s resolve was already wavering when Grantaire added softly, “Please.”
Enjolras sighed. “Fine,” he said. “But if you regret it in the morning, it’s your fault, not mine.”
Grantaire gave him a bright, genuine smile. “I won’t,” he promised.
“Good,” Enjolras said, pressing a kiss to the top of Grantaire’s head. “Because given how shitty your mattress is, I might.”