Work Text:
As it is for most teenagers since about the 1980s, prom is everything and nothing like what Grantaire is expecting. There's more deodorant in the air than magic, more couples breaking up than leaving for suites upstairs. But it's prom. They all take pictures at Courfeyrac's house, and though they know they'll be back, it feels like their last time here as high schoolers.
Joly and Lesgles and Musichetta all go together, which confuses the parents but which makes them all seem incandescently happy, holding hands and taking stupid posed photographs. Cosette is allowed to come as Marius's date, and proceeds to talk far more than him and get stabbed by her corsage as he tries to pin it on. They all laugh. None of the rest of them really have dates, except of course that Courfeyrac and Grantaire are wearing matching bow ties and taking ironic couple photos together.
So for a while, it seems really, really normal. Bland food, bad music, water bottles full of vodka getting confiscated. They have an overcrowded limo (he's half in Enjolras's lap) and Bahorel beats his chest while hanging out of the sunroof and proclaims himself king of the world before being yanked back down by his friends. He realizes this is the only night like this--the last time they'll all be together this way.
There's a sick feeling building in the pit of his stomach when he realizes he had always expected to be blackout drunk for this particular rite of high school passage. He doesn't want to have to deal with missing everyone. He doesn't want to have to deal with knowing this is the last time they'll do this. He doesn't want to have to cry or wonder about the future or say goodbye to any of them because he knows it'll be final. It doesn't really matter what he's gained this year if he's going to lose all of it.
Enjolras nudges him with one shoulder and looks at him questioningly, something he's started doing when he sees Grantaire zoning out. Grantaire grins and responds to some joke someone's making because he doesn't know how to react to that. He never knows how to react to that, not now or in English class or even the first time over the summer. He doesn't know how to react to Enjolras anymore, because at least before he didn't have to think about it, didn't have to know.
The dance itself is at least distracting when they start filing into the hotel and taking date pictures on an awful cheesy glamor-shots background (he and Courfeyrac take one doing the arms-around-the-waist thing). They all claim a table and fling jackets over chairs and Lesgles has already lost a cufflink and Courfeyrac is dancing--he's always been that one kid who's on the floor first, the one who makes everyone else stop hovering around the edges nervously. Everyone sort of filters away from the table, talking in small groups or speaking with other members of their class. Grantaire is pulled out for a whirl with a friend from his art class, and every time he catches sight of Enjolras his heart seizes like it's going to turn into a miniaturized black hole and suck him in.
It's the worst he's felt in a long time, made all the worse by the fact that he knows he's supposed to be having fun. Jesus christ, he's enough of a burden on them without ruining their fucking prom. He starts taking inventory of people he knows are likely to have booze and ways to ask without his friends watching, and halfway through the thought he walks to the table and pulls out his phone to compulsively check it, just for something to do so he doesn't let his mind remember just how fucking disgusting he is.
A few minutes pass and he feels a manful clap on his shoulder. "Yo Grantaire, you're missing the Cha-Cha Slide, that's like a tradition since middle school--"
"I wasn't up for it," he says, snapping as little as possible. Bahorel frowns.
"Well… be ready for Sandstorm, man, not letting you miss your last Sandstorm!" He leaves. Grantaire's chest tightens when he hears the word 'last.' Last. This is the last time.
He's nothing without them, and they're going to be gone. Gone and happy.
Across the room Enjolras is smiling at someone, one of those tiny ones where he doesn't show his teeth. There's a growing part of Grantaire that's always tracking where Enjolras is, always attentive to how he's reacting to things, always cataloguing exactly which smile is used. For weeks Grantaire has been conscious of the fact that any progress he's made is all tied up in Enjolras, all wrapped up in the unexpected and undeserved support, the reserved overtures of friendship, the unforgiving patience, and it's the worst and most selfish thing in the world that he wants it to stay that way.
He's not going to miss Enjolras--he's not going to exist without him, and it's absolutely pathetic. Worst of all, there's a curling tendril of hope in his chest that wants to pretend the nudges are affection, that the hand touches and casual texts and really stupid jokes and shared class projects aren't just Enjolras being Enjolras, that there could be something else. Every single cell of him knows it's not, every single cell of him knows that there is no universe in which he could possibly be good enough, and it makes him want to claw his heart out of his chest. He's disgusting for even wanting to be good enough.
But he's in Enjolras's orbit now, and trying to wrench himself away is going to destroy him.
*
It is, perhaps predictably, Enjolras who next notices something's wrong. He comes and sits down and just sort of looks at Grantaire and Grantaire doesn't look up from his phone, which is a petulant sort of thing to do but Enjolras figures Grantaire might be in a petulant sort of mood. He continues looking elsewhere, drawing a "Grantaire?" from Enjolras.
His friend turns to look at him with a sour expression and responds, "you rang?"
Enjolras has never been particularly excited about prom. The event doesn't have any bearing on Enjolras's concern--more the fact that he knows Grantaire will be agonizing over it. He'll think he's Ruining Prom, when the only person's prom he's ruining is his own. It's upsetting to know that Grantaire is slipping back into these thought patterns, especially after seeing him come so far; furthermore, on an immediate interpersonal level, he's bothersome to speak to when he's this way.
"You seem withdrawn," is the best way he can phrase it without directly asking if Grantaire is upset, which will only get him a closed-off No. He's been edgy for days, and while everyone has the same sort of expected prom melancholy, he hadn't thought Grantaire was… sensitive enough to get this upset at the event itself. He's actually normally very good-humored, even if he's upset, which can make him hard to read, and which probably contributed to the fact that it took them all years to figure out that something was very seriously wrong.
There are moods like this, though, where the response to concern is a grumpy, "astute observation" and a crossing of the arms.
It's a game Enjolras has had to learn: find a way around the defense mechanisms to get to the problem. Here's where he has to ask it outright. "Is something wrong?"
"It's whatever, Enjolras."
Enjolras tries not to look exasperated, because this game is old and tired and Grantaire has only ever played it when he's back in a very dark place, one Enjolras doesn't like to see him in. "No, it's not whatever, Gran--"
"Oh, are you my psychiatrist now?" Enjolras is fairly certain he's just pushing back to push back, that he's in an awful mood and lashing out because of it. Enjolras puts a hand on his shoulder, and Grantaire shrugs it off.
"No, I'm your friend, and I'm concerned because you don't appear to be enjoying yourself," he says, only a little bit tersely. Grantaire rolls his eyes.
"I told you, it's whatever, I'll be fine."
"Everyone's upset, you know--"
"Oh, awesome, like I didn't know I was fucking prom up for everyone, thanks." Enjolras's suspicions regarding at least one facet of this funk are confirmed in the most obnoxious way, though he still doesn't know where this mood is coming from.
"You didn't let me finish, Grantaire. I meant it's normal to be upset--we're graduating soon and things are changing."
"You sound like a character in a John Hughes movie."
"Okay, so is that what's upsetting you?" He's really trying his best to be helpful, but it's difficult when Grantaire has so clearly made up his mind not to be helped.
"I told you, it's not a big deal."
"Grantaire, you've been irritable or uncommunicative for the better part of a week and now you're in a corner at prom; I don't think it's ridiculous that I am concerned."
"It's not your place to be concerned, Enjolras, you shouldn't have to be my fucking keeper." Enjolras knows it has something to do with his history of self-loathing but he has no idea how to deal with this, as much as he's tried to be understanding for the past few months. It's infuriating, at this point, the fact that the more Grantaire seems to pushes away, the more Enjolras wants to see him pull himself forward, the more he wants to see him succeed.
"How many more times do I have to tell you that I'm your friend and I care about your well-being before you believe me?" Enjolras doesn't mean to get angry. He knows it's counterproductive, but he's just so sick of these baby steps forward followed by immature, skittish jumps back.
"You were never supposed to care about me," Grantaire says, sharp and desperate and trying so hard not to call attention to them, and Enjolras stops himself from responding when he realizes Grantaire isn't finished, brows furrowed. "I wouldn't have survived this year without you, do you know how pathetic that is? I don't even know how to exist without you and I don't want to--I don't know how to try for myself, so it's you, I try for your sake, because you are literally the only thing I believe in." Enjolras feels his eyebrows sink apart and hears the emotion in Grantaire's voice and can barely process. He knows his eyes have gone wide already and Grantaire takes a steadying breath and continues: "I'm incapable of even trying to be less of a complete shitstain without you, and here you are, caring when you have no fucking reason, about to go off and change the world or do whatever insane, incredible thing with the rest of your life, and you won't have any idea what it's like to need someone so badly you don't know how to be a person without them, what it's like to know that needing them is the worst and most selfish thing you've ever done and to keep doing it because they don't even have the decency not to care. It'd be easier, Enjolras, if you had never cared at all, because I don't deserve it and it hurts to wish I could, to remember that I have the fucking audacity not to want you to stop."
He stands and suddenly he's gone, and Enjolras is still staring at the place where he was sitting, shell-shocked. His heart is twisted into a knot and his mind won't stop racing, and he doesn't have any idea what to do now. The only thought that slows down enough for him to process is, "of course it was on prom night."
*
It's not even relieving. It's not cathartic. The only thing keeping Grantaire from shoving Montparnasse against a wall and demanding whatever he's smuggled in is the fact that he starts crying and can't show his face back in the reception hall until he's not snot-covered and red-faced. He's glad he owns his tux and won't have to pay a rental place for damages incurred while wiping his disgusting face off.
Any friendship they might have built, any carefully-constructed bond, is over now. He should probably be glad, because it's not like there's any possibility they'll be close for college, any way that telling Enjolras all of that was a good idea, any possible permutation of any world where they could ever have been equals. He's no less lost for this magnificent golden boy than he was earlier, but at least now he's driven him far enough away that he won't dirty him by association--which is why it comes as a surprise when that boy comes and sits down beside him fifteen minutes later and takes his hand without a word.
He's so dumbstruck that he doesn't stop Enjolras from saying, voice heart-achingly gentle, "you're capable of much more than you know, and I wouldn't care for you if you weren't. If you believe in me, trust me." He looks over and he smiles just a little and Grantaire almost passes out. He stands and tugs on Grantaire's hand. "Stand up, Grantaire," and it's more than he can bear, not to listen when Enjolras asks something of him.
Enjolras pulls him up and into his arms, hand on the back of his head and heartbeat thrumming against Grantaire's chest. Grantaire squeezes his eyes shut and falls into the embrace like he's falling off a cliff, and he's hardly remembered how to breathe before he feels two kisses pressed to his cheek, the second shorter than the first, unbearably tender and insistent. A blinding hope bursts in his chest and lights the dark places, and for the first time, it doesn't hurt.
There's a long moment of eye contact, Enjolras's hand still pressed to his cheek, before Enjolras turns to go inside, and suddenly Grantaire thinks to himself, head spinning: it'll be alright. Explanations can wait.
He'll be alright.