Chapter Text
Joly had not died of any of the cancers he'd feared, none of the infections, none of the pulmonary embolisms, or parasites he'd imagined crawling through his veins. At twenty three, he was almost painfully healthy.
He was standing at a bus station in his home town. The familiar smells that he'd somehow forgotten since the last time he stood there at the age of sixteen came filtering back into his senses, settled in his bones like dread and sat there in his marrow. He was back from visiting his boyfriend who was dying in a hospital bed.
Bossuet was blind now, robbed completely of his eyes by the cancer that had taken a lung, the cancer that was everywhere now in little white tumours that filled up his insides, the cancer that was taking his life.
“My other senses are heightened now.” Bossuet had assured him, optimistically. “I can hear things in your voice that I've never heard before.” He'd reached out intuitively and taken Joly's wrist, pulling him down so that they were face to face. “Don't cry, Jolllly.”
Joly had not even realized that he had been crying. “I love you.” He said for the thousandth time, wondering how long this lucidity would last. When Bossuet was lucid, his mind was far clearer than Joly's. When he was not... he was much the same as when he was lucid, mostly telling Joly and any of the others who had come to visit (and to keep Joly from doing anything stupid) how much he loved them all.
“And you know I love you too. That is why I can't bear to hear you this way. You'll make yourself ill.”
The thought of being ill had a strange appeal to Joly at that moment, but still he would cover himself in hand sanitiser after leaving the hospice just to be safe. He had nothing to lose, but still little germs frightened him. It was pathetic.
Five months. Six at most. But, he could go at any time.
Joly's eyes burnt and his head ached. “I'm not ill.” He whispered.
“That's good news.” Bossuet chuckled. “I think this is the first time I've heard you say so. Do you remember when we first met? You thought you had---”
“I had bronchitis.”
“You had a cold. And you wouldn't let anyone near you because you were afraid you would spread the contagion.”
“And I didn't want a secondary infection.”
“You didn't want to speak to anyone. You were nervous. Joly, I know you. Better than anyone else in the world, I know you. I know the way your mind works. You can kiss me now, if you'd like. Cancer isn't catching.”
Joly winced at the word. Cancer. He kissed Bossuet gently upon the lips. They were chapped and colourless.
“Do you find me repulsive now, Joly? Do I remind you of sickness?”
The world is sick. Joly thought. “I love you.” He lay his lips upon Bossuet's again.
When the kiss ended, Bossuet was wearing a queer smile. “You did not answer my question.”
“I find you beautiful.” Joly said. “As beautiful as the day we met.”
Bossuet chuckled. “Surely not that beautiful.”
“Just so.”
“Ten minutes!” A nurse called. “Visiting hours will be over in ten minutes.”
Bossuet's hold on Joly's wrist tightened. “You'll come see me again soon?”
“I'm only visiting home for the week-end. I'll be back after that.” Wait for me.
They sat there in silence, contemplating their entwined fingers.
“Go back to school, Joly.”
“No.”
“You owe it to yourself. Please, go back for me. As a favour.” Bossuet's unseeing eyes seemed to lock with Joly's. They were full of that final intensity, of a dying man's wishes.
“I don't want to be a doctor. I can't.” Joly's voice caught in his throat and strangled him.
“I do not blame you for this.”
“Musichetta does.”
“How is our sweet mistress doing?” Bossuet said, his eyes lighting up but also growing diffuse as he heard her name.
“Wasn't she here to visit you this morning?”
“Oh, yes. So she was. She was looking well...” Bossuet's voice disappeared and he seemed to shrink.
Joly did not ask how it was Bossuet knew that she was looking well, when he had not seen anything in months. He only squeezed his hand tighter, even as Bossuet's grip went slack. “I'm glad to hear it.” Joly sighed. “I wish she would speak to me.”
There was no comprehension in Bossuet's expression. His brow, his naked, hairless brow was creased in confusion. “I think you had better leave now, Joly. I don't want you to flunk out of University on my account.”
“Okay.” Joly said, pressing his lips to Bossuet's hand and then his brow. It was September. He had dropped out of school in November of the previous year. “I love you.”
Bossuet was silent. He had fallen asleep. Joly wondered whether he would be alive when he returned. A nurse was already waiting for him by the door, waiting to close the door and draw the curtains. Blinded by tears, Joly clutched her soft brown hand and begged her, “Please, don't let him go until I come back.”
He'd come alone and not told the others he was going. He could see now why they insisted on coming with him when he visited. The walk to the bus was the loneliest thing he had ever experienced. Shivering though it was not cold, he boarded the last bus out of the city and left the rest of his fate in the hands of a bored looking bus driver.
Joly hadn't driven a car since the day Bossuet had a seizure and the world ended. They'd been on their way to see some stupid film that Courfeyrac or Marius had picked out. One of those comedies of errors filled with characters who were not entirely sympathetic. Idiots. How could one sympathize with an idiot? Joly had not wanted to go because exams would be upon them soon and he never felt ready.
The signs had been there: jaundiced skin, the strange colour in his eyes, how tired he'd been, the pain in his chest. Joly had ignored it, worrying instead about keeping himself from becoming ill before exams. He'd not allowed Bossuet near him in bed for fear of contracting whatever bug had him feeling 'under the weather'. He'd been such an idiot.
They'd been talking about exams in the car. Joly was panicking, per usual, and Bossuet was telling him that he hadn't failed any exams yet, that he'd be fine. “You'll be fine. You'll---I--” And then sounds that were like hiccups and whimpers and Bossuet had begun shaking. Joly nearly crashed the car.
In the hospital, Bossuet had shouted at Joly. He was frightened. That's what he said when he apologized even as Joly was apologizing. Musichetta simply stopped speaking to Joly. They held hands when the results of the blood work came back. Some of the others were there too: Feuilly had taken off work, Enjolras was there too, strangely silent. And Jehan and Courfeyrac. Others came in and out of the room at different times, though only two were allowed in at a time. Joly didn't leave once. And then they said they were keeping Bossuet over night and everyone had to leave because visiting hours had ended.
Grantaire had gotten the bright idea to get Joly drunk in order to remove some of the strain. Instead, Joly jumped off the balcony and broke his ribs. He said it was an accident, because he didn't like the questions. That was when his friends began escorting him on his visits and sleeping on his couch so that the silence didn't consume him.
With these thoughts, on the bus with a humming engine, Joly drifted off to sleep.