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Grantaire hovered in the doorway, hands tucked in his pockets as he watched Enjolras do one last, distracted scan of the room. “Are you packed?”
Enjolras rolled his eyes. “Yes, Mom,” he muttered, even as he double checked his backpack for the twentieth time, just in case.
“Mom?” Grantaire repeated mildly, leaning against the door jamb. ““Listen, if you want to start incorporating some kinky shit into our sex life, just say the word, really.”
Enjolras glanced up at him. “Hilarious.”
Grantaire smirked. “I like to think I am.”
“Well that at least makes one of us,” Enjolras murmured.
Grantaire snorted a laugh. “Now look who’s got the jokes.” He hesitated before strolling into the room, hands still in his pockets. “Are you ready?”
Enjolras took a deep breath before letting out a long sigh. “Can you ever be ready for this?” he asked, sounding far more like Grantaire than himself.
“The entirety of your future summed up in one test?” Grantaire said, perching on the edge of Enjolras’s desk. “Probably not.”
“Because that’s such a reassuring way to put it,” Enjolras said sourly, zipping his backpack up decisively.
Grantaire didn’t look remotely abashed. “Combeferre and Courfeyrac will give you plenty of reassurance while they drive you up to your hotel,” he pointed out evenly.
Enjolras hesitated before glancing over at him. “You sure you don’t want to come?”
Grantaire’s expression softened. “If I thought it would help more than hinder, you know I’d drive to the moon and back for you,” he said, and Enjolras half-smiled at the sentiment that Grantaire promptly ruined by adding, “Besides, someone has to clean out your lair.”
He gestured around them at the room Enjolras had been using as his study room for the past few months. Enjolras scowled as he glanced around. “It’s not that bad,” he said.
Grantaire gave him a look. “It smells like the bedroom of a twelve year old boy who hasn’t discovered deodorant yet,” he said dryly. “I half-expect I’ll find a secret cache of empty cans of Mountain Dew or some shit.”
Enjolras rolled his eyes again. “Just Red Bull.”
Grantaire wrinkled his nose. “Red Bull without liquor is just sad.”
Enjolras opened his mouth to reply and thought better of it, shaking his head. “You know what, I’m not even going to touch that one.”
Grantaire grinned. “Wise,” he said, reaching out to grab Enjolras’s hand, tugging him in. “Maybe you actually did learn something from all this studying.”
Enjolras laughed lightly, putting his arms around Grantaire’s neck. “I better have learned more than just that.”
“You did,” Grantaire said, resting his hands on Enjolras’s hips.
“Mm,” Enjolras hummed noncommittally. “Normally when you’re this confident about something, I end up having to bail you out of jail.”
Grantaire grinned. “To be fair, normally when I’m this confident, I’m drunk, and my confidence is somewhat misplaced.”
Enjolras laughed again. “As opposed to now.”
“Sober as a church mouse,” Grantaire assured him solemnly.
Enjolras’s brow furrowed. “That’s not the saying.”
Grantaire tilted his head. “No?”
“It’s sober as a judge,” Enjolras told him.
Grantaire’s grin widened. “Ok, but you and I both know better on that one.”
“You’re not wrong,” Enjolras muttered.
Grantaire tipped his head up to kiss Enjolras before telling him, his voice low and steady, “More importantly than my relative sobriety, my confidence is not misplaced.”
Enjolras just sighed, his brow puckering with the same slight frown that he’d seemed to have permanently acquired over the course of studying. “Well, I certainly hope it’s not.”
“It’s not,” Grantaire said firmly, in a tone that brooked no argument. “You will pass.”
Enjolras wrinkled his nose, unable or unwilling to say the same. “I definitely want to.”
Grantaire rested a hand against Enjolras’s chest, rubbing his thumb in small, comforting circles. “I don’t know that you have a choice,” he told him. “Besides, believe me, there is no one who wants you to pass more than I do.”
“I don’t know—”
“I do,” Grantaire interrupted, still with that same firm tone. “Because I think having to listen to you study for this thing a second time may actually break me.”
Despite himself, Enjolras barked a laugh and shook his head. “And here I was wondering when you were going to make it all about you,” he sighed without any real heat.
Grantaire smirked again, drawing Enjolras in to kiss him once more. “Look, I’m not discounting the fact that you’ve given up the majority of your life over the past few months to study for this, but you’re ignoring the fact that so have I.” He didn’t say it pointedly but Enjolras still winced. “I want my boyfriend back, and I want my life back. Preferably in that order.”
“You just want to get laid,” Enjolras said, just this side of breathless.
“Yes,” Grantaire said, as if it was obvious. “Absolutely yes. I expect the dicking down of a lifetime when you finish this fucking thing. You and I are going to go at it like they do in the Olypmic fucking Village, do you understand me?”
Enjolras cleared his throat. “Did you see that they’re once again trying to make it harder for the athletes to have as much sex—”
Grantaire half-laughed, half-groaned as he leaned forward to rest his forehead against Enjolras’s chest. “How on God’s green Earth is that what you’re choosing to focus on right now?”
Enjolras laughed lightly as he bent down to kiss the top of Grantaire’s head. “Because if I focus on the other thing, I’m afraid I’ll lose every piece of knowledge I’ve tried to cram in my brain over the past two months.”
Grantaire muttered something that sounded suspiciously like ‘worth it’ before sitting upright. “All the more reason why you need to pass this fucking thing.”
Enjolras nodded. “So that I can get laid.”
“Yeah, and then go save democracy or whatever it is that you lawyers do.”
Enjolras pursed his lips. “Your lack of understanding about the American legal system concerns me.”
Grantaire grinned. “Babe, that ain’t even the tip of the iceberg of things about me that concern you, but we really will be here all day if we start down that path.”
Enjolras grinned as well. “Fair enough.”
He turned to grab his bag but Grantaire grabbed his hand, holding him in place. “Look at me,” he said softly, and Enjolras looked back at him. “I love you. I will love you when you pass the bar, and when you get sworn in as an attorney, and when you inevitably end up getting disbarred for doing something fucking stupid.”
Enjolras rolled his eyes. “I can see my future so clearly, it’s like you’re painting a picture for me,” he said dryly.
Grantaire ignored him. “And if, for some reason, you don’t pass on your first try, I will still love you.”
Enjolras let out a deep, shuddering sigh and squeezed Grantaire’s hand. “I know.”
“I will need to rent my own place is that happens,” Grantaire added, “but we’ll cross that bridge when we get to it.”
Enjolras swallowed, hard, and nodded. “Ok,” he said simply.
But Grantaire still didn’t let him go, searching his expression for a moment before adding, “And for the record, I don’t believe we will get to that bridge.”
Enjolras arched an eyebrow. “I thought you didn’t believe in anything,” he teased.
Grantaire half-smiled. “Just one thing.”
“Yeah?”
Grantaire nodded. “Yeah. You.”
It would never matter how many times Grantaire said it, Enjolras would always feel it like the first time, something warm curling in his chest as he looked down at him. He closed the space between them once more to kiss him, one last open-mouthed, heady kiss that hopefully said everything he couldn’t bring himself to. Grantaire sighed against his lips, his fingers digging into Enjolras’s hips as if he never wanted to let go.
“I love you,” Enjolras murmured finally, and Grantaire smiled crookedly, kissing him one last time.
“I love you, too,” he said. “Now go dismantle the American justice system or whatever you’re planning on doing.”
Enjolras sighed heavily. “Again, the tentative grasp you have on what a lawyer does—”
“Just fucking go,” Grantaire sighed, swatting him lightly on the butt.
Enjolras laughed before finally turning and picking up his backpack, feeling both lighter and more determined than he had in weeks, knowing that no matter what happened, he had this to come home to.
He was ready.