Work Text:
Grantaire sat in front of his easel, alone, the apartment silent save some quiet music in the background. He wasn’t even drinking, thank you very much. He had an art project to finish, so he -- ruefully, and with a lot of groaning -- did not join Les Amis at the club tonight. They were celebrating something, Grantaire knew that, but he couldn’t remember what exactly. Something to do with a rally that went, as Enjolras had said, “spectacularly well, R, I had two dozen people approach me afterwards!” (To which Grantaire had replied with a “Perhaps they were simply enraptured by your beauty.” And Enjolras had said something to the tune of, “Not everyone is driven by lust like you, Grantaire.”) When Grantaire elected to stay in for the night, Enjolras had started to say that he would stay in as well, but Grantaire would not allow it. The man was always working and hardly let himself have any fun, but now Grantaire could see how his boyfriend could get so sucked into his work. His mind was totally absorbed in his art; he hadn’t taken his eyes away from the canvas in hours.
But, since there is no rest for the wicked, Grantaire was finally interrupted by his cell phone chirping. He tried his hardest to ignore it and keep working, he really did, but when it went off again not fifteen seconds later he couldn’t not check it. What if Enjolras had started some riot and needed rescuing? That man was a magnet for trouble.
Grantaire sat his brush and palette on the floor and unlocked his phone.
Joly : R, stop working
Joly : seriously you need to get here NOW
Grantaire’s heart stopped, his thoughts immediately going to the worst case scenarios. Enjolras better not have landed himself in the hospital again.
Grantaire : what’s wrong? Is enj ok?
Joly : he’s better than ok, r
Grantaire : ?
Joly : he’s drunk off his ass
Joly : u gotta come see this
Grantaire’s lips quirked into a smile. Enjolras, drunk? Now that was a sight to see.
Grantaire : omw
*
Grantaire arrived to the club not thirty minutes after his conversation with Joly. Enjolras never drank, never , so Grantaire couldn’t miss out on an opportunity to witness history, project and due dates be damned.
His group of friends were easy enough to spot. Les Amis were clustered in a large group area with a table and some couches all facing each other. The friends had obviously scattered somewhat; the lighting was dim, but Grantaire could see well enough to count a few heads missing.
Then he saw Enjolras.
The man was out on the dance floor, his body writhing to the music, his blonde hair going wild as he moved. Grantaire had never witnessed a scene both so enticing and so hilarious at once. His boyfriend’s movements lacked their usual grace, his arms flying around in the air and his hips jerking around in what Grantaire could only assume was meant to be a sway. But somehow, impossibly, the bastard managed to still retain his sex appeal.
Deciding not to approach Hot Mess #1 -- the words “Hot” and “Mess” both being taken in all definitions--, Grantaire instead made his way to the corner of the club that Les Amis had secured. He sat down on the couch next to Courfeyrac, who nodded at him before glancing in Enjolras’s direction.
“That’s not something you see every day, is it?”
“It’s an experience,” Grantaire agreed, watching his boyfriend closely.
One of their friends was looming on the edge of the dance floor, also watching Enjolras closely. It was Combeferre, Grantaire realized, as Enjolras stumbled and Combeferre darted out to catch him. Enjolras’ mouth moved, but with the noise and the distance and the poor lighting Grantaire couldn’t make out what he was saying.
“I’m surprised Combeferre hasn’t taken Enjolras home yet.”
“He’s letting Enjolras celebrate even if it kills him.”
“He does look like he’s about to collapse, doesn’t he?”
“Oh, I wasn’t referring to Enjolras, but him too.”
The pair grinned at each other, both completely amused by their respective boyfriends’ behavior. Grantaire and Courfeyrac’s conversation was interrupted, however, when a certain fearless leader swaggered over to them.
“Hey there, sexy.”
Grantaire couldn’t help but laugh. It was the most un-Enjolras thing he’d ever said.
“Hey there yourself.”
“Say, you…” Enjolras paused to swallow thickly, and Grantaire wondered if the man was going to puke. His worries were quickly assuaged, however, when Enjolras continued on. “You come here often?”
Joly was right. Enjolras wasn’t just drunk, he was captial-I Intoxicated, and it was the most fascinating thing Grantaire had ever seen. This must be some kind of parallel universe, Grantaire thought, in which the drunkard was sober and the goody-two-shoes was plastered. Then he wondered, absently, if he was this abysmal at flirting while drunk.
“Pretty often, yeah,” he said.
The reply seemed to embolden Enjolras, who narrowed his eyes at Grantaire, an action which the man more often did sober while trying to determine how to approach a heckler’s argument. “You and me, we, us,” Enjolras said, motioning between the two of them, trying to get his bearings. “We should dance.”
Grantaire smirked over at Courfeyrac, who for his part seemed to be hiding his amusement. “Okay, let’s dance.”
Enjolras gave a sloppy wink to Courfeyrac and shouted, “We’re gonna go dance!” Courfeyrac gave a thumbs up in encouragement, and Enjolras took Grantaire’s hand and dragged him out onto the crowded dance floor.
Enjolras positioned Grantaire behind him and wasted no time in shamelessly grinding against him. He was dragging Grantaire’s hands all along his body, moaning obscenely in a way that really should’ve made Grantaire laugh, but he was ashamed to say that it turned him on, just a little. Enjolras leaned his head back to speak into Grantaire’s ear. “You’re very HAND” -- Enjolras hiccupped -- “handsome.”
This simply would not do. Enjolras, unknowingly making puns -- and terrible ones at that? Grantaire needed to get his boyfriend drunk more often.
“You’re not so bad yourself, Apollo.”
“No, I’m not Apollo, I’m Enjolras!”
Grantaire laughed. “Enjolras, it’s a pleasure.”
Enjolras turned around to face him then, moving Grantaire’s hands down to his ass. His eyes weren’t focusing very well, but he tried -- relatively unsuccessfully, Grantaire may add -- to send some sultry bedroom eyes Grantaire’s way. “I’ll show you pleasure.”
But damn, somehow Enjolras was still unbearably sexy. Maybe it was because he was being so wanton, or maybe it was because he had been rubbing against Grantaire’s crotch for the past five minutes, but Grantaire was definitely turned on.
He never claimed to be particularly strong-willed.
And then Enjolras was making out with him. Sloppily, Grantaire would admit, but hell if Enjolras couldn’t fire him up even when his skills were inhibited to that of a first-time teenager. Grantaire pulled them off the dance floor, back towards the corner crowded with their friends. They plopped down onto a couch, but Enjolras detached himself from Grantaire’s mouth when they landed.
“Are you single?” Enjolras asked.
Grantaire laughed at the absurdity of it all. Here was his boyfriend, drunk , making out with him in the middle of a club, asking him if he was single.
“Pardon?”
He could see the cogs turning in Enjolras’ brain. He was trying to focus himself, and not with much success. “We should go somewhere.”
Grantaire raised his eyebrows. “Somewhere?”
“Yeah. Yeah, y’know, to do stuff. To do,” Enjolras, at a loss for words and obviously frustrated about it, vaguely humped Grantaire’s lap. “Y’know, sex stuff.”
Grantaire was not going to have sex with Enjolras this drunk, but it was definitely time to take his poor boyfriend home. He gave a flirtatious smile. “C’mon, I’ll take you to my place.”
Enjolras beamed and flew out of Grantaire’s lap, almost tumbling over before he could land solidly on his feet. He found Courfeyrac a few feet away and shouted to him. “I’m gonna have sex with--” He looked back to Grantaire. “What’s your name again?”
Yeah, Enjolras was never living this down. “Grantaire.”
Enjolras turned to Courfeyrac’s direction again. “I’m having sex with 'taire!”
Courfeyrac laughed and winked at Grantaire. “All right!”
Enjolras grabbed Grantaire and dragged him out of the club.
*
Enjolras, as it turned out, was a horny drunk. He had stopped Grantaire innumerable times during their walk home to make out with him. Things got a tad heated a few times, Enjolras grabbing at Grantaire’s ass, his dick, his belt. Enjolras was doing a pretty thorough job of it a block or so away from their apartment, even going so far as to unbuckle Grantaire’s belt, when a passerby wolf-whistled at the two men making out against a wall. It brought Grantaire screeching back into reality. He peeled Enjolras off of him, who whined in protest.
“We’re almost there,” Grantaire said.
“ Now, ” Enjolras keened, and it took all of Grantaire’s willpower to not kiss his boyfriend again.
Enjolras is drunk, he reminded himself. In fact, the man was starting to get drowsy fast, but for the moment he still had the concentrated bravado of a drunkard. Grantaire took a deep breath and held both of Enjolras’ hands in his own. “Come on, Enj.”
Grantaire and Enjolras made the rest of the walk home in record time. Grantaire hardly had time to drop his keys in the bowl when they entered the apartment before Enjolras had latched onto him again, this time especially eager to get clothes off of Grantaire as quickly as possible. Enjolras’ cheeks were flushed, his lips full and plump, his hair completely disheveled. He loosed Grantaire’s belt from his waist and now he was sinking to his knees, a positively wicked smirk across his lips and--
Focus, Grantaire!
“Hey, no, wait, let’s not do that,” Grantaire said, flustered and feeling very betrayed by his sinful body that was reacting very positively to Enjolras’ nose pressing against his fly.
“Shh, ’s okay,” Enjolras said, fumbling to get Grantaire’s jeans off.
This simply wasn’t fair, Grantaire thought. He had tried so hard to be good today, staying in to finish a project instead of going out, but he must be cursed, because this was definitely the hardest thing for Grantaire to ignore -- pun, unfortunately, intended.
“No, Enjolras, stop,” Grantaire said, trying to sound firm.
Enjolras did indeed stop, his core principles kicking in past the alcohol. He stayed on his knees but looked up at Grantaire. “Wha’s wrong?”
Grantaire coaxed Enjolras back up onto his feet. “You need to sleep now, Enjolras,” he said, guiding the man to their bedroom.
“Need to sleep with you ,” Enjolras said, but his drunken confidence was waning irreversibly into exhaustion.
“I think you’ll do just fine on your own,” Grantaire replied. He didn’t dare undress Enjolras, lest he try to pounce on Grantaire again, so instead he tucked the blonde in fully clothed, making sure to lay him on his side on the edge of the bed. Enjolras would not be choking on his own vomit on Grantaire’s watch, no sir.
“Where are you going ?” Enjolras whined when Grantaire moved out of his line of sight.
“Go to sleep, Apollo,” Grantaire said, turning off the light.
“It’s Enjolras ,” the man mumbled, almost instantly passing out with a light snore.
*
Enjolras woke up in his bed the next morning with no recollection of how he’d gotten there. He rolled onto his side to pull Grantaire closer to him but found the bed empty. He frowned and sat up, immediately regretting it when his head throbbed and vomit threatened to force its way up his throat. He tried to summon any memory of the night before but it was useless. Surely he had walked home himself, or maybe someone had escorted him. He hadn’t had that much to drink, had he?
But where was Grantaire? Hopefully he had completed his assignment the night before; maybe he had gone to turn in the painting to his professor. Enjolras was proud of Grantaire for staying in and working while everyone else was out. He hoped that he hadn’t gotten too lonely. Enjolras picked his phone up from the bedside table to see if Grantaire had left him a message about his whereabouts.
He didn’t have a text from his boyfriend, but he did have one from Courfeyrac.
Courfeyrac : Good morning, how are we doing?
Enjolras had to squint at his phone. It was much too bright.
Enjolras : Fine, why wouldn’t I be?
Courfeyrac : You’re kidding? You were super drunk last night. Just wanted to make sure you’re not puking your brains out or anything
Enjolras frowned. He didn’t remember how he had gotten home, sure, but that didn’t necessarily mean he had blacked out, right?
Enjolras : I was not drunk.
Courfeyrac : Dude…
Courfeyrac : You asked your boyfriend if he was single...
A medley of emotions bubbled to the surface of Enjolras’s mind. Confusion: why had Grantaire been at the club? Alarm: he hadn’t realized he’d had that many drinks. Embarrassment: what had he done the night before? Cautiously, not sure if he really wanted to know the answer, Enjolras sent a message in reply.
Enjolras : What did I say?
Courfeyrac : Not much. There was a lot of nonverbal communication ;)
Heat rose to Enjolras’s ears. PDA was not his thing at all. He didn’t want to think about how drunk he must have been, what else he must have done. Not wanting to endure any teasing at the moment, he placed his phone back on the bedside table. He closed his eyes and tried to think, but he couldn’t recall anything past his ninth shot.
Nine shots, was that right? Or was it more?
God, his head hurt. How did Grantaire deal with this so often?
Well, he had to face the day at some point, Enjolras acknowledged somewhere in the back of his throbbing mind. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed and stood up, white spots blinding his vision for a minute. He blinked through the discomfort until it cleared, and then he slowly padded out into the living room.
Grantaire was sitting on the couch, coffee in hand, looking the most chipper Enjolras had ever seen him in the morning.
“‘Morning,” Enjolras mumbled, the words catching in his stale mouth.
“Good morning, Apollo!” Grantaire said, a grin lighting up his entire face. “Not that I'm judging you, but going home with a complete stranger? Very naughty.”
Enjolras plopped onto the couch, putting his legs up to tangle in Grantaire’s. He stole the coffee from his boyfriend’s hands. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about how you asked me if I was single and -- without waiting for an answer, I might add -- asked me to take you home to ‘do sex stuff.’”
Enjolras looked up at that, an odd, frightening sensation coming over him, but Grantaire answered his question before he could ask it.
“I didn’t let you take advantage of me, don’t worry.” Grantaire was still grinning, and Enjolras, now relieved, had the decency to feel embarrassed.
“I apologize for whatever I did or said last night,” he said, not quite looking at Grantaire. “I guess I had more to drink than I planned.”
“Are you kidding? I had a great time.”
Enjolras frowned and chugged half of Grantaire’s coffee.
Before Enjolras could react, the mug was snatched out of his hand. “Easy there. A little bit of coffee is okay since it’s practically half of your body composition at this point, but too much will just make your hangover worse.”
Enjolras groaned and covered his eyes. “Drinking isn’t worth all of this.”
“So dramatic,” Grantaire teased, knocking back the little remains of his coffee.
Neither of them said anything after that, Grantaire leaving Enjolras alone to brood. They sat there for a long while. At some point Grantaire sat the empty mug on the ground and started to rub Enjolras’s feet. Enjolras opened his eyes and looked to where Grantaire’s painting sat on its easel, decidedly not in his professor’s office. Worry creeped up into Enjolras’s chest.
“Grantaire, wasn’t that due earlier today?”
Grantaire glanced at the painting. “Yeah. I stayed up all night finishing it, but of course my professor extended the due date this morning to Wednesday, so I could've spent more time on it.”
Enjolras studied the painting. It was another in Grantaire's “Living Marble” series, a depiction of vaguely-Enjolras-looking statues across multiple scenes. The setting of this particular piece appeared to be in the Musain, and the not-Enjolras-statue stood where Enjolras normally stood during their meetings. A crowd stood around him, but it seemed ambiguous as to if the onlookers were listening to his pretend speech or if they were admiring the artwork.
“It's stunning, Grantaire,” Enjolras said, and meant it, as he did every time he saw one of Grantaire’s finished works.
Grantaire merely shrugged. “I wish I'd known about the extension. I could've made it better.”
“R,” Enjolras said, taking Grantaire's hand. They locked eyes. “It's breathtaking.”
Grantaire shrugged again, always one to doubt himself. “My muse is the one that's breathtaking.” He kissed Enjolras’s hand.
Enjolras smiled. “Your depiction is flattering.”
Grantaire swooned dramatically. “Enjolras, your praises are enough to knock a man to his knees.”
Enjolras laughed, and the action sent a fresh wave of pain across his skull. He must’ve grimaced, because Grantaire’s tone went from jocular to concerned in an instant.
“That’s enough consciousness for you right now. Let’s get you back to bed.”
For once, Enjolras didn’t feel like debating Grantaire. He allowed himself to be carried by his boyfriend to their bed. Grantaire tucked him carefully into bed and made to leave, but Enjolras reached out and grabbed his wrist. “Grantaire.”
Grantaire turned back around and smiled. “Enjolras.”
“Stay with me.”
Grantaire smiled and slipped into bed next to him.