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It’s been almost two years, and he’s still kind of surprised every morning when he wakes up in Washington instead of Pittsburgh. He also has to fight the instinct to be surprised when he doesn’t wake up alone.
He’s adjusting his tie, thinking about all the meetings he has today, when he feels a heartbeat against his back, a pair of hands that don’t belong to him slide into his pockets, and a head come to rest against his shoulder.
“Good morning.”
Almost two years and that voice still sends a delicious chill down his spine and causes a sensation in his chest that had previously been activated only by discussions of the Fourteenth Amendment.
He leans back and exhales. “’Morning.”
Two years earlier
He made a phone call the morning after the election.
“’Ello?” The voice on the other line sounded tired. It was understandable, given that the election hadn’t been called until 11:30, and then there was a half-hour wait while the TV anchors blathered about how historic the results were, and then there were the three speeches—each between fifteen and thirty minutes long—and then he would have had to write his story and get it to his editor. No one got to bed before 1:30.
But Xavier Enjolras was a creature of habit and was up at seven anyway, and managed to gather the courtesy and self-control to wait an hour and a half before calling a certain journalist.
“I thought you might want to do a final interview, for old time’s sake. You know, now that the election is over, and…”
“…and you didn’t win.”
“Yeah, pretty much.”
“Are you still at the hotel?"
“No, I’ve decamped to my apartment to wallow in solitude. I do live in this town, you know.”
“Right. Of course. It’s just that…”
“We’ve talked in a lot of hotels and you forgot that either of us has a ‘home.’”
“That sounds about right.”
“Do you have the address?”
“No, I don’t think I do.”
Half an hour later, cursing both silently and aloud, Oscar Grantaire found himself standing outside an old factory building—of course Xavier Enjolras lived in one of those apartment buildings that used to be a factory—why hadn’t he thought of this months ago? He pressed the doorbell and was greeted promptly by an abrasive buzzing noise that signaled the unlocking of the building’s front door. He pulled it open and took the steps two at a time, up to the second floor. He didn’t even have to knock. The door swung open at the precise moment he arrived in front of it, and there was Xavier Enjolras, in jeans, slippers (fuzzy blue slippers!), and a Cornell sweatshirt, inviting him in.
He wasn’t sure exactly what he was expecting Xavier Enjolras’s apartment to look like, but this certainly wasn’t it. It was sunny and open, with large windows overlooking the river, which on a cold November Wednesday morning, wasn’t in much of a hurry.
The place was impeccably neat, of course, probably from a combination of the absence of its inhabitant for most of the last year and a half, and his natural tidiness and discipline. But it looked lived-in. There were family photos on the brick walls. There was a desk in the corner, set up so it faced out the window, and it looked like the most heavily used part of the apartment. Even there, the stacks of newspapers and letters and other random papers one collects seemed to have been organized into piles, no matter how haphazard.
“Can I get you anything?” The candidate—former candidate—asked. “Coffee? Tea? Water? Orange juice? I have a few cases of really fucking expensive champagne that need a new home after, well… they won’t be used for their intended purpose.”
“Coffee would be great, actually, if it’s not too much trouble.”
“Of course not. Already had the pot going.”
Grantaire glanced over at the counter top next to the sink, and saw that, indeed, the little red light on the coffee maker was glowing and a steady stream of tantalizing steaming liquid caffeine was dripping into the glass pot.
“Should be ready in a minute,” Enjolras said, filling the silence. “You take it black, right?”
“Yup.”
He nodded, and opened a cabinet, pulling down two identical mugs that Grantaire was sure were from IKEA.
Silence fell again. What more was there to say?
“You were surprisingly kind.”
“What?”
Enjolras motioned with his chin to the counter that Grantaire was leaning against. Moving sideways, Grantaire heard the telltale crinkling of newsprint, and turned to find a copy of that morning’s Times. His article about Enjolras’s unprecedented not-so-distant third place finish was in the top right hand corner of the front page, next to a huge photo of a very happy Senator Payne with her family, waving to the ecstatic crowd at her victory rally.
“No point beating a dead horse, right?”
Enjolras scowled. “I’m not going to dignify that with a response.”
“I’d like to kind of hit the reset button, now that the election is over.”
“It’s technically not over. Not until the electors actually meet. Congress won’t certify the results until January, probably. I could still make a comeback.”
“You delivered a concession speech live on TV last night. People saw you, you know.”
The coffee had finished dripping. Enjolras poured it into the two mugs, and handed one to Grantaire.
He sighed. “Details.”
There was silence for a moment, both of them waiting for the other to speak. Grantaire watched Enjolras, his gaze steady and unflinching. Enjolras wrapped his hands around his mug, looking for meaning in his coffee.
“It just didn’t feel real, you know?” He said, slowly. “Everything that’s happened over the last year, year and a half. I knew going in to yesterday—hell, I think I knew from the beginning—that I wasn’t going to win. It was mathematically impossible. Odds don’t just flip like that. But there was still a part of me that kept thinking…”
The corner of Grantaire’s mouth twisted up. He knew that expression.
“A part of you kept thinking that the people would rise?”
Enjolras’ laugh was bitter. “Yeah. Kind of pathetic, right? I’m thirty-seven years old, I’d never run for office before, no one had ever heard of me, I didn’t have a party to back me up—“
“—and yet despite those odds, you won nine states, ninety-eight electoral votes, and came in second in the popular vote.”
“A distant second.”
“You beat a major party candidate in the popular vote.”
“By eight-tenths of a percentage point.”
“Which is a margin of roughly two million votes. There are thirty million people in America who wanted you to be their president. Yeah, you lost. But you did so much better than anyone thought you would, and now you have a platform. When you speak, people listen. They’ve always listened, but now you have a bigger audience. Speaking of which, what’s with these rumors that Payne offered you your pick of Cabinet positions?”
“I haven’t heard anything from Senator—President-elect Payne. Not only is California three time zones away, so it is currently—“ he lifted his wrist and shook back his sleeve, checking his watch, “—six-eighteen in the morning, but I imagine she’s enjoying a well-earned few extra hours of sleep this morning. Where’s your notebook, by the way?”
Grantaire shrugged. “Didn’t bring it.”
“Why not?”
“I only bring it to on-the-record meetings. When I intend on publishing the contents of interviews.”
“Are you going to keep showing up and drinking my coffee just to start arguments about the Constitution with me?”
“Depends. Are you going to keep calling me at eight-thirty in the morning when you need your ego stroked?”
“That is not what this is—“ Enjolras tried to protest.
“That’s exactly what this is.”
A few months ago, Enjolras found himself thinking, Grantaire would have spat the words out, almost vitriolic. Now he sounded almost… fond? Possibly? Or was that just the eternal optimist in him talking?
Enjolras set his mug down and stretched his shoulders out a bit. He got that look in his eyes that was both far-away and incredibly close at the same time, and in Grantaire’s view, these things shouldn’t be allowed. It shouldn’t be legal to be this intense over coffee on a Wednesday morning in November while wearing fuzzy slippers. It’s just not fair.
“Alright.” Enjolras began.
Here comes a speech. Brace yourself. He’s probably going to tell you to fuck off and disappear, but wait, he was the one who called you, and covering a presidential race is always complicated but it shouldn’t be this complicated.
“I know everyone thinks I’m into really complicated metaphors and shit, and sometimes I am, because imagery works, and helps people visualize abstract ideas—fuck.”
Grantaire didn’t move. Whatever Enjolras wanted to say, he was going to have to get out without any help.
“I just—I don’t know. I don’t like not feeling sure of myself. I like to have all the relevant information, and I feel like I don’t.”
“We’re not talking about the election anymore, are we?”
“We stopped talking about the election a long time ago. This is about more than politics, and it has been for a long time.” He paused for breath, and to run a hand through his hair. “Look, there’s no way to say this without it being awkward or downright uncomfortable, so just try not to get offended, okay? What did you mean by hitting the reset button?”
Grantaire’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh, that’s convenient. Put it on me to bring up the uncomfortable stuff, so you can feel justified when I say something awkward that you want to avoid saying. Very political of you.”
“That is not at all what I meant to do. Fuck. It’s just that I kind of changed the subject earlier and I was wondering if you wanted to elaborate on what you were saying before I interrupted.”
“Well then I suppose that now is as good a time as any to tell you that I submitted a letter of resignation along with today’s story.”
Enjolras had picked up his mug again, and nearly spat coffee all over his lovely stainless steel appliances.
“You what?”
“I resigned. Well, I don’t know if it’s been accepted yet because I haven’t checked my email since, and I’ve ignored all seven calls and five voicemails from my editor. It’s really funny—his voice gets really high and squeaky when he’s mad, so he’s probably warbling Tosca by the third or fourth.”
“But you took my call.”
Grantaire tried to hide his sardonic grin in the edge of his mug. “I have my priorities. I do need material for the book, after all.”
“Right. Gathering material for the book, when you left your notebook at home. As if you haven’t already written enough about me.”
“You’re a compelling subject.”
Breathe, Enjolras, remember to breathe.
"So are you going to go back to New York and finish your book and crow about how you were right all along?" Enjolras asked as he sipped his coffee, desperately trying to look casual.
"Something like that. If you had run as a Democrat, you’d be president-elect right now.”
“Wounds. Salt. It’s been less than twelve hours.”
“But you're wrong about one thing."
"Am I?"
Well that came out way flirtier than intended.
"I wasn't right about everything. I'm usually not, you'll find. Often the shit I say is just because I enjoy playing Devil's Advocate in the most obnoxious manner possible."
"There's the understatement of the year."
Grantaire rolled his eyes. Enjolras tried to hold back the self-satisfied smirk, hiding it behind the edge of his mug.
"What were you wrong about? Specifically? I want citations. Because I'm going to find those articles, have you write out your corrections, and frame them."
"It's still too early to say this with any certainty, because it’s only been thirteen hours since the first states were called, but I think you may have altered the party system. You proved that someone running outside the two party structure could be competitive."
"Competitive isn't the same thing as winning."
"Of course not. But fifteen months ago, no one had ever heard of you, and yesterday, thirty million Americans picked you to be their president. Like I said, if you had run as a Dem, you would have won, but that wasn’t really what you set out to do, was it? You wanted to prove that the system could change—that the system consists of people making decisions, and you proved that. You earned their trust, they have confidence in you, they believe in you. And so do I."
Enjolras almost choked on his coffee. Again. “What?”
Grantaire took a step back. He had blood pounding in his ears, his chest felt like it was going to explode and he knew it was a mistake but he didn’t have the self-control to stop himself or he just didn’t care and he couldn’t decide which was worse.
“You heard me,” he said, staring into his mug, almost shy.
Enjolras regarded him with confusion. Oscar Grantaire, shy? Where was the cocky, mocking journalist who cut through all his talking points, stripped his most cherished beliefs down to rusty studs, and somehow managed to write articles that both tore him down and made him seem like the second coming of someone—Lincoln? Kennedy? Jesus?
How could Grantaire simultaneously make him seem like the world’s most foolishly naïve dreamer and its savior?
“Whatever happened to your journalistic impartiality?” was the only response Enjolras could choke out.
“My journalistic impartiality went out the window the first time you smirked at me. And now I’m jumping out the window after it and finding that I really don’t care.”
Oscar Grantaire had seen Xavier Enjolras in a lot of moods over the last fifteen months, and bore responsibility for a lot of the episodes that involved the end of the spectrum that went from mild annoyance to blind rage. But Oscar Grantaire couldn’t remember a time when he had seen Xavier Enjolras stunned into silence.
“You… but… but you…”
“I spent the majority of the campaign unsuccessfully trying to fight off a hopeless crush on you? Yes.”
“You… but the… the thing…”
Oh, Enjolras. The very definition of eloquence in front of a crowd or a camera, but complete shit at one-to-one conversations.
Grantaire did not, in fact, go back to New York that day as he had originally planned.
Combeferre raised an eyebrow when Enjolras walked in to headquarters for the post-election debrief and farewell trailed by a certain journalist.
A slight shake of his head told her that he would fill her in later.
Combeferre gathered everyone in a circle, and gently pushed Enjolras so they were gathered around him.
Grantaire hung back, leaning against a desk maybe ten feet away from the gathered staff.
Enjolras looked around the circle, at these incredible people who gave up so much and worked so hard, and for what?
He cleared his throat and just let the words flow out.
“I just wanted to say a few things, now that… now that it’s all over. Despite what just about everyone outside this room, and a few people in it, have said and are saying,” his eyes darted up to Grantaire, who shrugged and rolled his eyes with a self-deprecating smile, “this was never about me. It’s not about any of us, really. It’s about making this a better place for every American, for making sure that everyone’s voices are heard and given equal weight, for sharing important ideas about how to carry out the ideals we all believe in. The last year and a half have been such a learning experience, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who found this campaign difficult and challenging and so, so rewarding. So before we all head off in our separate directions, I just want to thank all of you for everything you’ve done. I know it was a real leap of faith to come to work on a campaign that everyone was writing off—if they even did us the courtesy of mentioning us in the same sentence as the other candidates. It’s thanks to all of you that we made the incredible progress we did, we outperformed everyone’s expectations, and the issues and policies that were the centerpieces of our platform are now being talked about in ways they weren’t before. It’s up to us, now, to keep the conversation going, because as important as they are, elections themselves don’t create and pass legislation, or change our overall cultural norms and values. That’s done by people—people getting together and figuring out what’s important, and coming up with visions of what they want their society to look like, and working to make it happen. I’m so incredibly grateful to all of you for your vision, your determination, your hard work, and your trust. This is an incredible team, and I’m so honored to have been able to work with all of you. You folks have done wonderful things already, and I’m sure you’ll all go on to do even bigger and better things.”
He stopped to take a breath, overwhelmed by the daunting task of trying to express everything he was feeling.
“I’m so proud of all of you. I’m so proud to be a part of this team. And while I’m completely exhausted, and I’m sure all of you are too, there is still so much work to do, and I have so much faith in this team to make it happen. I love you all. Thank you for everything.”
Despite the fact that he lost the election, it turned out to be a pretty damn good week.
President-elect Payne did, in fact, call him on Thursday and offer him his pick of Cabinet positions. It took him all of five seconds to decide.
“I thought that’s what you would say,” she laughed when he told her. “I won’t be announcing my Cabinet picks for a few more weeks, so your press conference will probably be in mid-December. Meanwhile, I can certainly recommend some real estate agents to help you find a place in DC, and I’ll have my staff set up some meetings to go through some things.”
Enjolras moving to Washington was not up for negotiation—when you’re a Cabinet secretary, you live in DC. The real question was whether Grantaire would stay in New York or move to DC as well.
On their second actual date (but is it a date if you’re sprawled across the couch with Chinese takeout, catching up on a week’s worth of episodes of The Rachel Maddow Show?), Enjolras may or may not have presented Grantaire with a flowchart detailing what he saw as the options for how their relationship could develop.
Grantaire may or may not have burst out laughing, and then attempted to suppress it when he saw the mock disappointment on his boyfriend’s (boyfriend? Could he really call him that?) face. He resolved to kiss it away. The secondhand taste of soy sauce had never been so delicious.
They were sure that Rachel Maddow could understand and would forgive them if their attention wandered after that.
Their practical sides agreed, eventually, that moving into the same apartment in a new city (well, new to Enjolras—Grantaire had lived there for a few years, a decade ago, when he wrote that one story that made him famous) was a bit too much too soon.
However, within six months, they would be spending enough time at each other’s places that they would just give up and find a place together.
President Payne gave Enjolras almost complete freedom in how he would run the Labor Department and what policies and programs he would pursue.
“Really?” he had asked her before the press conference where she would introduce him as the nominee.
“Look Xavier, if I didn’t like the way you think, you wouldn’t be here.” She gave him a pat on the back. “Welcome to the big time.”
His Senate confirmation hearings were fun (read: not fun at all), but with a margin well clear of the simple majority needed, and a Cheshire cat-like grin from his former running mate as he cast his vote, he became Secretary of Labor.
And he loved it.
He and the Attorney General set up a joint task force between the Labor Department and the Justice Department to investigate and prosecute wage theft. He lobbied, hard, for an increase in the minimum wage and stronger regulations on executive compensation. He formed his own pseudo-Cabinet of union leaders and labor activists to advise on policy.
Grantaire had sort of freelanced since resigning from the New York Times. However, once word got out that he was moving back to DC (although not why, or who he was moving with), he got a series of emails, several phone calls, and a letter offering him a position as a professor at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland.
“I have no idea why they’re pushing so hard,” Grantaire mused as he showed the letter to Enjolras.
“They want you. Is it so hard to believe that they want you enough to pursue you?”
“Do they want me, or the Pulitzer I got a decade ago for a terrible article about something I found by accident?”
“They want you. They want your experience, they want your wisdom and your insights and your biting wit. They think you have something important to say to help shape the future of American journalism.”
“If I’m shaping the future of American journalism, then journalism as we know it is indeed fucked.”
“Hey. You’re brilliant.”
“You’re only saying that to get in my pants.”
“Lies and slander,” Enjolras replied with a smirk, reaching for Grantaire’s belt buckle.
Grantaire started teaching the following fall, and quickly came to love it. He could sit on the desk at the front of the class, fielding questions from his students, telling his war stories, ranting about the state of twenty-first century journalism and telling his students not to contribute to a culture of mediocrity.
Fuck, he thought after his third class, I’m starting to sound like someone else I know.
His students loved to ask about Enjolras, and somehow he managed to talk about covering the campaign without letting it slip that he was now living with the guy, and that morning, knowing that Enjolras had some seriously stressful meetings coming up that day, they decided to…
His students definitely didn’t need to know about that.
He was pretty jovial overall those days, but if his students noticed how his mood instantly lifted even further when someone asked about the campaign and he tried to pass off how incredibly smitten he was as enthusiasm for the democratic process, well, they didn’t say anything.
Grantaire had kind of expected that with his fanatical devotion to justice and freedom and everything, and the new job as a cabinet secretary in a new administration, and the move to a new city, Enjolras wouldn’t really have time or energy to devote to his new relationship.
He kind of expected to be the one doing all the work in the relationship.
Well, it wasn’t the first time that Grantaire was wrong, and it wouldn’t be the last.
Enjolras loved Grantaire with the same intention and devotion with which he did everything else.
News of their relationship finally broke when Cosette and Marius Pontmercy got married. The press gathered outside the church photographed them arriving hand-in-hand, and one of the photos Cosette and Marius released from the reception had them in the background, sitting next to each other at dinner, leaning in to each other, foreheads almost touching.
The talking heads on cable news had a field day. How long had they been together? Were they sleeping together when Grantaire was covering his campaign?
Grantaire thought it was hilarious. “Oh my God,” he wheezed as he channel-surfed the day after the photos surfaced. “They’re pissing themselves. This is the most fun CNN has had since they role-played how the House of Representatives would decide the election if no one got a majority in the electoral college.”
His students, however, responded with good-natured fury. “Why didn’t you tell us? We ask about him all the time!” one junior practically wailed.
“Let it be a lesson to you about the importance of asking the right questions!” He responded, not even trying to conceal his glee.
“But everyone always says that the personal life is off-limits unless there’s a legitimate scandal that’s germane to the public interest.”
“Ah, yes,” he was just fucking with them now, “it’s a delicate balance. Figure it out.”
He comes through the door just after seven, drops his briefcase, and kisses Grantaire.
“How was your day?” Grantaire asks, his teeth gently gripping Enjolras’ lower lip.
“I ordered another study on a potential minimum wage increase, had a two hour meeting with HHS, talked to Canada…yeah… How was yours?”
“My students all wanted to talk about you. I happily obliged.”
“What did they say?”
“They’re all in love with you and want you on the Daily Show every night. Can’t say I blame them, really.”
He buries his laugh in Grantaire’s hair. “Have you eaten yet?”
“Nah. We’ve got leftovers.”
“Good. Less prep. Less cleanup.”
“We’ll be able to turn in early tonight?”
Enjolras rests his forehead against Grantaire’s. “Exactly.”
It’s a little after seven when he opens his eyes, takes a deep breath, and begins to roll out of bed. A hand curling around his wrist, gentle but firm, stops him.
“Don’t you dare.”
“I have things I need to do,” he practically whines.
“What could possibly be so urgent that it needs your attention at seven a.m. on Saturday? You know, the labor movement of a century ago worked to ensure that you wouldn’t have to work all weekend.”
“I’m going on Meet the Press tomorrow. I need to be ready.”
“You could go on Meet the Press in thirty seconds and still be overprepared. You know your stuff. You’ll be fine.”
“…says the one journalist that has ever managed to truly rattle me.” He sighs, sliding back in between the covers, nuzzling up next to Grantaire.
“It’s a point of great pride. I want that on my gravestone one day. ‘Here lies Oscar Thomas Grantaire, the one journalist who ever managed to rattle Xavier Enjolras.’”
“Just as long as I end up next to you.”
“What?”
“Marry me.”
“What?”
“What’s with the sudden monosyllabic-ness? Are you alright? Have you been diagnosed with a medical condition I should know about?”
“Aren’t you supposed to ask nicely?”
With a good-natured groan, he sits up, and digs Oscar’s hand out of the covers. “Oscar,” he says softly, gazing down at him, “will you please marry me?”
“Are you sure?”
“Of course I’m sure. I wouldn’t be asking if I weren’t.”
“It’s just… this seems rather spur of the moment, which isn’t really your style.”
“Okay, so the exact moment isn’t exactly what I had planned, but I’ve been thinking about this for a long time.”
“How long?”
“Seriously?”
“How long, X?”
“A very long time. I kind of found myself thinking after that first interview that I wanted to talk to you, well, every day. You were the first one I wanted to talk to about policy and about stuff that was happening. It just took me a while to figure out what that meant. When I found myself realizing one morning that I wanted to be waking up next to you, well, I was fucked. And it’s been what, two years now? We haven’t argued each other to death yet, and I always hoped to have kids before my mid-life crisis, and I’m getting uncomfortably close. And I want to raise those kids with you. Also, I’m kind of madly in love with you. Happy?”
Grantaire pushes himself up and presses a soft kiss to Enjolras’ shoulder.
“Yes.”
“Yes you’re happy?”
“Yes I’ll marry you.”
Enjolras kisses Grantaire, hard. It’s an urgent, needy kiss, desperate to show Grantaire exactly how sure he is.
Xavier Enjolras does not make decisions lightly.
“I would write stump speeches about how I feel about you,” he murmurs against Grantaire’s cheek.
“That has got to be the most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me. I was starting to think I’d die alone with my Pulitzer and my cold, bitter, cynical heart, but then you happened.”
“You should write romantic comedies.”
“Maybe I’ll write one about you.”
“I mean, you’ve been telling me for years that you were writing a book about me, but you still haven’t finished it.”
“I still haven’t started it. And it’s not like I can write it now that I’m sleeping with the subject.”
“Is that all I am to you?” Enjolras asks with mock hurt.
“That book is the most elaborate attempt at flirting I’ve ever made.”
“And look where it got you.”
“Mmm-hmm, look where it got me. I could still use the working title, though. Did I ever tell you what I used for the name on the folder with all the material on you?”
“Not that I remember. And I think I’d remember.”
“You definitely would. You’re not going to believe me, but I swear it’s the truth.”
“I’ll believe you. Out with it.”
“The X-Files: I Want to Believe.”
There’s a moment of silence as Grantaire tries to hold in his laughter, waiting for Enjolras’ reaction.
“That is…” Enjolras says slowly.
“Absurd? Probably a trademark violation if I intend to publish?”
“Amazing, and I love it.”
Enjolras’ smile has barely begun to appear when he’s pulled down into the covers.