Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

As Cosette's feet strike the pavement, they beat a rhythm that says, Fool, fool, fool. She turns up her workout podcast, freshly downloaded from Cafe Musain, and pushes herself faster. See the tree with the strangely twisted branches up ahead. Sprint to it. Jog until the mix transitions to the next song. Pick a new target. Repeat until too exhausted to think.

Despite the burning in her lungs and the gelatinous sensation in her quads, Cosette does start thinking as soon as the workout mix hits a comparative lull. The thoughts begin with an innocent note to herself to download more podcasts by this DJ, because he (or she) has a real gift for remixes, building in swirling layers without overwhelming the original. Not that she recognizes most of the songs; she's still learning to distinguish between trance music and house music, let alone develop real familiarity with the genres. Somewhere in the process of recording her album, she went from the guitar girl who sometimes noodled around with a keyboard to Cosette Fauchelevent: Recording Artist Broadening Her Horizons.

Not that her new appreciation for electronic music, or the year she wasted recording her album, mean much of anything now.

Cosette dashes angry tears from her eyes, pretending to wipe away sweat for the benefit of her fellow pedestrians. Stupid. It was so profoundly stupid to sign her music away on a recording deal that sounded too good to be true. Her shelved album is like a blister on the ankle, rubbed raw with every motion. Justice Records, contender for most ironically named corporation, let her toil away at her album until she sent them the finished version six months ago. They responded by sending one of their people to explain to her in no uncertain terms that her music and her image "aren't commercial enough, dear," a scare tactic that doubtless works on most starving artists.

Cosette fought back. No lawyers, no support at all, just sheer dogged adherence to her artistic vision. Their surprise proves they never knew her at all.

The workout podcast revs up again with an unexpectedly loud burst of percussion. Cosette winces and turns the volume down. She fired off her usual e-mail this morning: I stand by my music. In the first few months, the e-mail was much longer, full of explanations about her choices and links to other artists, including commercially successful ones, as supporting evidence. When Justice Records continued responding with a form e-mail, hers got shorter and shorter. Eventually, it's just going to read, No.

Someone on the sidewalk lifts a hand to her in greeting. Cosette, now with actual sweat running into her eyes, nods a hello without stopping to look. (It's probably David, home from college.) Running reminds her of songwriting, in a way: pick a tempo, then pull out pieces of the world to observe. Her father tells her that she has a gift for seeing into the heart of things, so how could she have been so duped by empty promises couched in legalese? Against the advice of every running coach she's ever had, Cosette clenches her fists.

She hardly notices the change in song until her own voice sounds in her ears.

Cosette stops so abruptly that a biker, on the sidewalk despite the availability of the bike lane, almost plows into her. She taps in the security code on her phone, frantic, and drags the workout mix back thirty seconds or so. Annoyingly, since the podcast is all one track, it bears only the cryptic label "Electric Running #7." Cafe Musain promised a tracklist once the DJ passed it along.

With a few ethereal chimes, the previous song transitions to "6 Underground," a song she started writing next to her apartment's pool, half-finished Hamlet homework at her side. She got an A on the essay she turned in to her English teacher, but she considers that song her definitive musings on Hamlet and mortality. Cosette covers her mouth, but her hand falls after a few moments, her grin too broad to hide. This remix uses the demo she submitted to the label. The sound quality suffers a bit for it, but the DJ takes her song's dreamlike groove and adds a carnivalesque flair to it. The instrumental touches are eerie, subtle; the whole remix is the haunted house version of her song, a jester spinning sounds from beyond the grave. Cosette's hands shake as she rewinds to listen to her song again. This is her song made better by production instead of bowdlerized for the sake of sales. This is amazing.

Cosette listens to the remix three more times before she manages to let the podcast play on. She turns and heads back home, fingers tight around her iPod as she waits for the mix to reach its end. There's no tracklist yet, but there might be at least a mention of her name, some proof that she's more than a high schooler who once played coffee shops in the area and then faded into obscurity. "Come on," she urges, her voice more a sensation in her throat thanks to her noise-canceling headphones.

The end of the podcast thanks her for downloading it from Cafe Musain, then credits the mixing to DJ Enjolras. Silence follows. Cosette gives an exhale of frustration sharp enough to earn her a startled look from a passerby, then rewinds back to her song as she picks up her pace, a jogging move long ago perfected. As soon as she gets home, she's going to look up this DJ Enjolras and find out how the hell he found her music--and what he plans to do with the rest of it.

*

Cosette takes the elevator up to the apartment, since running up twelve flights of stairs seems excessive after a run. Unlocking the door, she calls out a hello in case her father's home. No one replies. Cosette opens the curtains, pours herself a glass of water, shifts a stack of various pamphlets by nonprofits from chair to table, and takes a seat.

A screen pops up on her iPod, reminding her she has 20% battery remaining. Cosette ignores it. She's going to finish her water, she's going to shower, she's going to get dressed, and only then will she open her laptop and go to Cafe Musain's website. It's been so long since anything good happened to her music-wise that she's going to make it last as long as possible. She hasn't even written a song since the first rejection letter. Cosette finishes her water and puts her glass in the dishwasher.

"Shower," she reminds herself after casting one longing glance at her desk, visible through her bedroom's open door.

She sings a little in the shower, Beatles songs mostly. Her father used to wake her up with "Here Comes the Sun" until she turned fourteen and begged him to let her sleep in a little. As usual with her father, he didn't reprimand, just went quiet and sad and made her feel almost guilty enough to ask him to continue. But she was fourteen and always up too late writing songs about the people she saw on the street and falling asleep during her tutoring sessions. There was guilt everywhere she turned, since she loved Mr. Myriel's lessons.

"Hey! You've got to hide your love away," she croons on the way to her bedroom. She spends an absurd amount of time selecting a sundress, half-laughing at the way her knees tremble more in anticipation than exhaustion. She's being foolish, but for once it's fun.

After donning a pink sundress, Cosette sits cross-legged in her chair and opens her laptop. She still has the Cafe Musain post open from downloading the podcast earlier, so she refreshes the site and scrolls, hoping for a tracklist. Hope blooms in her chest when she sees new lines of text. We at the cafe are pleased to offer you something different from our esteemed DJ Enjolras, known for mixing music and politics. A little side project, if you will, to get your blood moving and your legs pumping… Cosette skims, looking for her name on the tracklist. (32:30) Unnamed Artist - 6 Underground (The Umbrellas of Ladywell Mix #2) * is all her entry says. Cosette follows the asterisk to the bottom of the page, which proclaims, * Unnamed artist has been silenced by the industry's corruption.

That's it.

Shaking her head, Cosette clicks the DJ Enjolras tag. The rest of his mixes are a mishmash of protest songs and dance music, interspersed with guest posts from the DJ himself. Those posts are all long diatribes against the recording industry; eloquent, and certainly something for her to read later, but Cosette scrolls on. She uses two different search engines to search within the site, but still no mention of her name. She goes through page after page of Cafe Musain's archives, jabbing at her touchpad with rising irritation. The only mention of her music is on today's mix. She's hunting for an e-mail address when a banner catches her eye. Catch DJ Enjolras 7 nights a week at the ABC! it proclaims, then lists a Los Angeles address underneath.

Smile grim, Cosette gets out her phone and types in the address. She can even take the bus and have to walk only a few blocks. She's going to give this DJ Enjolras a piece of her mind, and then--then talk music with him for hours, in all likelihood. Maybe he'll have some idea of how to get her out of her contract, though most of his activism concerns rooting out unethical practices in the industry itself, not assisting artists who signed their creative rights away when they were eighteen and scared they would never make it.

"Cosette! I'm home!" her father calls.

Cosette shuts her laptop and closes the Google Maps app on her phone. "Hello!" she trills, walking back into the kitchen and hugging her father with genuine pleasure. "I'm going out later. There's a new musician I want to check out. Don't wait up for me, okay? It's bad for your back to sleep on the couch."

"Call when you leave the place," he says, kissing her cheek. "Will you be here for dinner? I brought Thai." He holds up a takeout bag.

Cosette blinks, noticing the angle of the sun for the first time in hours. During her research, mid-afternoon faded into evening, though the sun will still beat determinedly on through sunset. Her stomach growls at the smell of pad thai as her father pushes his collection of pamphlets to the side, making room on the table for the food. "Of course I have time for dinner! Let me get the plates," she says, and does.

Her father asks her about her day and she makes noncommittal noises, steering the conversation back to his charity work. It's not teenage rebellion or her father's disapproval that keeps her quiet about her music career; she's been singing with Jean Valjean since the day he adopted her. No, it's the look in his eyes during the rare moments he talks about the people he knew as a backup musician: the sellouts, the sycophants, the junkies. Cosette was born with her love of music, but her father nurtured it, cultivated it, and then listened in sad resignation when she told him she was going to make it to the big time. Even now, he knows little of her struggles, only that the label she signed with keeps delaying her album. He doesn't know she can't even play her own songs live and charge money for tickets.

"Do you still need me to make cookies tomorrow?" Cosette asks. Every Wednesday, her father supplies the food for the local chapter of Narcotics Anonymous. Membership has grown; for some people, it's the only guaranteed decent meal they'll have all week. Cosette's snickerdoodles are quite popular, although she doesn't have a particularly special recipe, just a tendency to dump in more vanilla than strictly necessary before baking.

He smiles. "If you're not too tired. I'll take care of the dishes tonight. Remember to call."

"Always," Cosette promises, throwing her arms around his neck. He laughs in surprise. She turns her face from his and vows that tonight, somehow, she'll find a way to win her freedom.

*

The moon is a fat wedge in the sky by the time Cosette arrives at the ABC, guided first by her mental map of the city and then by the strains of an acoustic set. The song's name is on the tip of her tongue when it ends, and she turns the corner to find a sign that proclaims ABC in red neon. The club looks unassuming enough, sandwiched between a laundromat and a cafe, but it's only Tuesday. The inside is probably half-full at most.

Cosette crosses the street, pushes open the door (also painted red), and discovers the club is packed wall-to-wall. "Excuse me!" she says, squirming her way through the crowd. It starts to disperse a little as the lights come up and someone onstage asks them to please be patient as they transition from the acoustic set. The bouncers look preoccupied lifting heavy things, so she makes her way to the bar. Or tries to.

"Ouch!"

"Sorry!"

Cosette shifts her weight onto her uninjured foot, wincing. "No harm done," she says, dredging up a smile for the boy who just stepped on her toes. The smile becomes a real one a second later. He's got a sweet face covered in freckles, and he looks wretchedly guilty. Even his ears are red. "Really, I'm fine," she says, patting his closest arm, which is holding up a guitar case.

"Oh!" He fumbles his grip on the handle but saves the instrument in time. "That's, um, that's great. Are you sure you're all right? You have a nice smile."

"So do you," Cosette says, laughing.

"Am I smiling?"

"No, but you look like you might."

Despite the boy's obvious embarrassment, he does. As expected, it's a nice smile, one that leaves endearing little crinkles around his eyes. Cosette reaches into her back pocket for her phone, ready to ask him for his phone number, when someone calls, "Marius! Stop flirting and get over here!"

"I have to go," Marius mumbles, red to his ears again. "It was nice to meet you."

"I'm Cosette! Look for me later!" she says, because she might be a woman on a mission, but she is also a woman who likes cute boys who compliment her. Marius lugs the guitar case over to his friends and she turns, elbowing her way into the thick of the crowd. People never suspect the tiny Asian girl of deploying her pointy elbows. It helps, too, that most of the crowd has drinks already.

"ID," the bartender says, not looking up from the glass he's polishing.

"Just a Coke, please, I'm my own DD," Cosette says, figuring it's best not to push her luck with the fake ID one of the NA members slipped her on her eighteenth birthday. She hands over a ten dollar bill. "Actually, I'm looking for your DJ."

"He'll be on in a bit," the bartender says, grabbing a glass and filling it with Coke. "Short set tonight because it's Tuesday. I take it this is your first time at the ABC?"

Cosette laughs. "Is it that obvious? I like it here." She takes a moment to survey the club's interior now that the lights are on. The bar takes up most of one wall, relieved on one side by an overstuffed coatrack and the doors to the kitchen on the other. On the opposite side of the room, the back corner leads to a small hallway promising bathrooms. The front corner holds the small stage, the former site of the acoustic set and now the subject of much bustling as the staff sets up for the next act. The tiling on the floor is black and there are paintings of famous paintings on most of the wall. Liberty Leading the People is the largest by far, except everyone is dressed like punk rockers.

"Our resident artist added a few touches of his own," her bartender says dryly, following her gaze. "Some might call it desecration."

"People say the same about remixes, but I say it's interpretation," Cosette replies, tilting her head for a better look. This DJ guy sounds better by the minute. "I'm actually here to talk to your DJ, though, not listen to his music."

Some of the friendliness fades from the bartender--Combeferre, his nametag says Combeferre. "Sorry to disappoint you, but Enjolras prefers to keep his own company. I'd offer you an autographed CD, but his posts are all online."

"No, no!" Cosette says, nearly knocking over her drink. Clumsiness might be catching from handsome strangers. "I'm not here as a groupie or anything. He remixed one of my songs, an old demo version, and it sounded amazing! I want to pump his brain!"

Her enthusiasm must convince, because Combeferre's shoulders relax. "What's your name?"

"Cosette Fauchelevent," she replies. "I'm not credited on the podcast, but I can sing the vocal part for you if you want, and maybe borrow a guitar--"

"Unnecessary," Combeferre says, waving a hand. "Take a seat until the music starts. Then I suggest you dance."

"You want me to stick around," Cosette says, and takes a sip of her Coke to rein in her expression, which must be desperate.

"I'll introduce you after the show," he promises.

Cosette claps her hands. "Really? Thank you so, so much!"

"No trouble at all. I liked the original."

"Now you have to tell me all about yourself," Cosette demands, waving a finger at him. "You talk like you're friends with Enjolras. Are you a musician bartending to pay your rent? You look like a violinist."

"Med student, though I'll take that as a compliment," says Combeferre, grinning wider by the second. "The ABC will have its hands full with you."

"And I will take that as a compliment," Cosette says grandly. A crowd of people choose that moment to come up to the bar, all of them clamoring for alcohol. Combeferre joins his other two fellow bartenders making drinks and Cosette sips her Coke, waiting for the music to begin.

*

When the lights drop, Cosette strains her eyes in the sudden dimness, trying to spot the DJ on the way to his equipment. All she can make out is a vague shadowy form climbing onstage and lifting the lid of his laptop. For a moment, the Apple logo is the only illumination on the dance floor, and the crowd draws its breath.

Cosette feels her own catch when the first electronic beats spill from the speakers, crystalline synths rippling over the thumping drum beats that join in seconds later. Now the clubbing lights are lit, flashing patterns to go along with the music. The song's hook works as intended, tugging her away from the bar as her cheeks flush and her adrenaline rushes. Cosette pounds the last of her Coke and abandons her empty glass for the dance floor.

Once upon a time, Cosette asked her father when he decided to devote his personal fortune to helping others. I was in church, he said, and the quiet seeped into my soul. Then I was walking outside in the cold, and the quiet filled my heart until there was no room left for any other decision. When there's music playing loud enough to drive out demons and feed hungry hearts, Cosette thinks she taps into the same sort of cosmic peace. She becomes the music: her hands the flare of the melody, her hips the pulse of the bass. Cosette's never had dancing lessons and there are plenty who could dance circles around her, but when she closes her eyes and throws her arms in the air, she's as much a part of the crowd as anyone else, a cell in the life of the party.

Someone asks her to dance and Cosette waves him away, preferring the anonymity of dancing by herself. She's gone to clubs before with the handful of friends she's made despite the years of homeschooling, and she swallows a sudden lump in her throat. How long has it been since they last texted? Wrote on her Facebook wall? Everyone else went to college and she--she stayed behind to work on a stalled out album.

At least DJ Enjolras lives up to his Internet fame thus far. He reads the room so well Cosette wonders why he doesn't tour more. The songs accelerate until the dancers spin themselves breathless, then slow to a more mellow tempo when Cosette is just on the verge of needing to sit down. She sways instead and pushes sweat-soaked hair out of her face. How long has she been out here? She should get a drink of water.

That's when the girl catches her eye, the girl with long black hair and a classic little black dress. Her face is beautiful, dark eyes sad despite the full lips parted in a laugh, and familiar somehow. Cosette squeezes past a couple making out for a closer look. She doesn't remember her from playing coffee shops, nor from the handful of high schoolers' parties she attended, but there's something--

--and then the girl puts her arms around Marius, the boy from before. Cosette blinks and starts to turn, but it's too late. Another member of their group, a guy with the most rakish grin she's ever seen, points to her and yells something that gets lost in the crowd but sounds friendly. Cosette lifts a hand in sheepish greeting, and then the the same guy grabs Marius by the arm and pushes him at her.

"Hello again!" she shouts over the music. She can't resist adding, "Come here often?"

"I work here!" Marius replies, stepping closer to make himself heard. "Sorry about Courfeyrac!"

"He seems nice!" Cosette waves to the guilty party, who waves back with an unrepentant look. "You should introduce me to the rest of your friends! I'm going to meet the DJ after close!" She peers past Marius's shoulder, but the dark-haired girl is talking to someone, her back turned.

"Okay!" The instant Marius turns from her to point out individual friends, his words get swallowed by the ambient noise.

Cosette smiles and nods hello, figuring she'll get a more thorough introduction later. When the pull of the music becomes too irresistible for foot-tapping, she taps Marius on the shoulder. "Would you like to dance?"

"What?"

"Dance!" Cosette steps closer and puts a hand on his shoulder for emphasis. "With me!"

As if on cue, the current song blurs into the opening chords of "Call Me Maybe." Marius, who looks slightly terrified of her sudden proximity, pumps a fist in the air. "I love this song!" he informs her, seizing her hands. Cosette squeezes his hands back, beaming.

Marius turns out to be a terrible dancer, but his endearing tendency to shout along with Top 40 songs makes up for it. Cosette is informed several times in no uncertain terms to call me maybe, complete with enthusiastic hand gestures. Still, Marius seems surprised when she steals his phone and programs in her number.

"Well, you told me!" she says, and hands him back his phone. One of his friends is trying to squeeze past, so she hooks an arm around Marius's neck and pulls herself close. Marius does have a lot of freckles, constellations of them. Heat rushes into Cosette's face, but luckily it's already flushed from dancing.

"Where's Eponine?" one of Marius's friends asks him. The name rings a bell in Cosette's memory, but it's muffled by the passage of time. How does she know that name?

Marius scans the crowd, shading his eyes from the flashing lights. "Behind the bar!" he answers, frowning. "Isn't it her night off?"

"Thought so!" the friend replies, then turns back to dance with Courfeyrac.

Cosette spends the rest of the night dancing with Marius, save for one trip to the bar, where Combeferre serves them both water. "Last call's in fifteen," Combeferre tells her, and Cosette's heart beats faster for reasons that have nothing to do with Marius or strange girls.

Her excitement doesn't stop her from dragging Marius back on the dance floor, though most of his friends have gone home. Their legs are tired enough by now that they just bounce up and down to the music, laughing and holding on to one another. When the lights come up and the bell clangs for last call, Cosette sways forward, her cheek resting a moment on Marius's shoulder before she registers that the last song is the "6 Underground" remix.

Cosette's not the only one who's been waiting all night for this meeting.

*

The ABC's most esteemed DJ has disappeared from the booth by the time enough people have left that Cosette can see over the crowd. Grinding her teeth a little, Cosette goes back to the bar and waits with Marius. Does this guy have to make a grand entrance or what?

"It's so awesome that you play the guitar. I've been playing since I was twelve," Marius is saying. "I'm not any good at writing songs, though."

"I wasn't when I started," Cosette answers, distracted.

With an amused smile, Combeferre slides another glass of Coke her way. "He's just avoiding the groupies. I'll apologize for him, since he won't."

"Won't even occur to him," Courfeyrac adds. "Have you come to join our glorious crusade?"

"We'll see how late he is," Cosette says, with a guilty look at her phone. Her father doesn't understand texting, and it's getting late. Pressing her phone to her ear, she says, "I'm just going to call my dad. He gets worried."

Cosette is halfway through telling her father that yes, there are boys here, and no, she doesn't need him to come pick her up when a ridiculously attractive guy appears out of nowhere and heads over to their little group. Between the head of perfect dark hair and the faintly haughty expression, he could be a model--maybe a shampoo model, she amends, taking in the eye-searing vest. He opens his mouth to say something, but Cosette makes an impatient shushing motion and says, "No, Daddy, I have enough money for a cab, you don't need to stay up. I'm just going to talk to this musician about his technique and then I'll leave right away. Love you, too. Bye!"

Courfeyrac coughs something that sounds suspiciously like, Good luck with that, Marius!

"Hi," Cosette says brightly, ignoring him. "I'm Cosette, as you probably already know."

"My name is Enjolras," the newcomer says, shaking her hand. "What brings you here?"

"Strange question to ask, since you're the one who remixed my song," Cosette says. "I had to come after that podcast! How did you get your hands on my demo? What equipment do you use, by the way? What made you decide to remix it? You really seem to understand the song's overall atmosphere, which I guess goes along with your job, but you'd be surprised how many people try to interpret things using just the lyrics or just the sound. But a carnival! It's like Hamlet meets Ray Bradbury!"

Enjolras at first looks bewildered by her stream of chatter, but a small smile forms at the phrase "understand the song's overall atmosphere" and continues to grow. "I was thinking of a carnival," he says. "You're well-read."

"Homeschooled," Cosette says, then steps forward with her index finger raised. "But you didn't even credit me on your tracklist! Why not identify me by name if you're all about sticking it to the recording industry? You didn't even shoot me an e-mail! If you managed to track down my demo, why not my e-mail, too? It seems silly to remix a local artist without so much as dropping her a note, especially since she loved it so much!"

"It worked," Enjolras says, unperturbed. "You're here."

Cosette stares at him. "That… seems like a very convoluted plan for getting me here."

"That's what I said," Combeferre says, giving up all pretense of wiping the countertops.

Enjolras crosses his arms, frowning. It makes him look younger than he probably is. "It worked and that's all that matters. To answer your question, Cosette, someone I know--" here, for some reason, Courfeyrac has a fit of coughing-- "passed on a CD he bought after hearing you play at a coffee shop. I enjoyed what I heard, so I attempted to track down more of your music and discovered you were a prisoner of the recording industry." At her startled expression, he adds, "Your website has been promising an officially released album for over a year. I have certain contacts and they confirmed my suspicions."

"Which I could have done if you had just asked me!" Cosette says, fighting the urge to laugh. She likes Enjolras, or at least how passionate he is about music, but it wouldn't do to let him off too easy. "You're a funny guy. Did you remix my song because you liked it or to make a statement?"

"Both," he answers promptly. "The subjective quality of your music notwithstanding, no artist should have to sign his or her soul away for the promise of perhaps earning enough to make a living. An artist's creation belongs to the artist who creates it and the audience who experiences it. The recording industry forces itself between the two and makes a profit at the expense of both."

"Absolutely," Cosette says when Enjolras pauses to draw breath. "I've read your blog entries on the subject. What is it that you want from me, exactly?"

"To set you free," Enjolras says.

Cosette rises out of her seat without consciously dictating the motion, tugged forward as if the music has started again. She's aware of the other three members of Enjolras's organization nearby, stacking chairs and wiping tables as they close the place down, but all of her focus is for one man, a man who speaks with such quiet ferocity. Then the memory of the last time she let herself by swayed by words bursts in her mind like an unpleasant bubble, slowing the wild beating of her heart. Cosette leans back against her stool and says, "I won't be your symbol. I want to succeed on my own merits." She folds her shaking hands behind her back, reminding herself that she signed a binding legal contract. She can't get her hopes up.

"I see," replies Enjolras, tone and expression neutral. He frowns, but as though in thought, not in displeasure. "People will make you a symbol with or without my help, once they hear your story."

"As long as they hear my music," Cosette says, and squeezes the palms of her hands tighter together.

Enjolras flashes her a smile of genuine pleasure, and Cosette adds toothpaste model to her mental list of alternate careers for him. "Of course. Forgive me for taking the liberty of looking at your contract, but I found something of a loophole. If you release new collaborative material, your label doesn't own it. You do. Or we would, rather. Work with me. We'll be the first act on the independent label I'm starting. When the people hear our music and our story, they'll pressure Justice Records to release you from your contract."

There are questions Cosette should ask. The primary one is, You "took a look" at my contract? What are you, in the secret music mafia? But her heart is drumming at her ribcage again, the echoes loud enough to drown out her doubts. The paralysis falls away for the first time in months, and so she rises, drawing herself up to her full height. "I'd like to think it over," she says, though her heart answers yes, yes, yes for her. "I'll come back with my decision tomorrow."

"Agreed," Enjolras says, and shakes her hand again.

Cosette takes her leave then, sparing Marius a wave as she departs. Her heart soars in spite of itself, in spite of new caution borne of old wounds. Come tomorrow, she knows how she'll answer. Cosette lifts her arm and hails a cab.

Chapter Text

Cosette expects to spend the night tossing and turning from the excitement, but instead she falls into such a deep sleep that she almost sleeps through her alarm. The first time it rings, she presses "snooze" out of habit, then shoves away her sheets with a groan, remembering her meeting. Morning grogginess gives way to excitement by the time she's out of the shower, and two messages await her.

I am reminding you of our meeting at 10:00 AM concerning our possible collaboration, says the first one. Enjolras, of course; Cosette doubts anyone else could make a text message sound so serious.

The second is from Marius, and all it says is, Good morning! I hope you have a nice day! :)

You too! :) she texts back to the latter. She answers Enjolras with a much more restrained, See you at 10.

Cosette spends the bus ride to the ABC listening to another of Enjolras's podcasts. (Before she went to bed, she took a few minutes to download all of them.) This one contains poetry mash-ups, a concept she's never even considered: a recording of a poem recitation paired with music. Every new track she hears from him convinces her that he has a gift for production as well as DJing. A record label would kill to have talent like that on its roster, cranking out hit after hit, yet Enjolras has chosen to remain independent. Cosette's common sense tells her not to consider working with another label, tells her that Justice Records can shelve her album forever and then sue her for not making two more per her contract. But what does she have to lose? Her first album belongs to the label anyway. If she's unpleasant enough, maybe the label will cut its losses and let her go. Besides, Enjolras never said she had to sign with his label.

When Cosette opens the door to the ABC for the second time in twelve hours, there's quite the crowd to greet her. "Oh!" she says, with a smile for Marius, who jerks to attention at her entrance. "Are all of you part of this project?"

"They want to meet the first artist to be released under Friends of the ABC," Courfeyrac says. He hands her a mug of coffee, then indicates packets of sugar and cream on the bar counter. "Also, I told them that you could hold your own with our favorite DJ."

"And I wanted all of you to meet to ascertain whether our respective philosophies of music are compatible," Enjolras says, stepping forward with a frown. "Not all of them are musicians, but they all respect the spirit of this endeavor."

"The incredibly naïve spirit of this endeavor," another of them says dryly. He's slouched against the bar, wearing a faded gray hoodie and a pair of massive sunglasses despite being indoors.

Enjolras turns to glare at the speaker. "That's Grantaire, whose faults do not include his bass guitar playing. You've already met Marius, who plays guitar; Courfeyrac, who runs the Cafe Musain website; and Combeferre, who's in class at the moment."

"He keeps us from killing each other," Courfeyrac adds, draping an arm around Enjolras's shoulder. Enjolras ignores him. "You won't see him much. Med student, you know how it is. Joly's a med student as well. Our friends are smarter than they look, except Marius."

"What?" Marius asks, turning to Courfeyrac with an expression of profoundest betrayal.

"Oh, you're all right," he replies, repenting. "Let me do the rest of the introducing, I'm better at it. Bahorel is good at hitting things, and sometimes they're drums. Jehan is a history PhD student who is here to, and I quote, 'see music history in the making.' Don't ask him about his thesis unless you have a lot of time. Feuilly's taught himself a ridiculous amount of instruments and Bossuet's our sound technician when he isn't blowing up equipment. Eponine is the mistress of all things bar and queen of the piano. No alcohol without proper homage."

"Hear, hear," Grantaire says, raising a flask despite the hour of the morning. He pours some of the contents into his coffee.

That must be the girl who reminds her of someone. Cosette looks around in the crowd, but it's just boys as far as the eye can see. "I hope I can meet her later," she says, disappointed.

"She lives in the apartments upstairs with her younger brother. I'm sure you'll see her at some point," Enjolras says. "I live upstairs as well, as does the recording studio."

"Are you and Eponine together?" Cosette asks, surprised. Eponine seemed awfully interested in Marius last night, but then again, Marius is awfully interested in Cosette. Reminded of this pleasant fact, she beams at Marius, who turns red again.

Grantaire, in the process of drinking his doctored coffee, chokes.

"No," Enjolras answers, not appearing to notice. "Back to the matter at hand, the concept of Friends of the ABC was born during a discussion of the state of the recording industry."

"And a series of puns in several languages," Bossuet adds, sotto voce.

Enjolras continues, "I use this club, which belonged to an uncle disinterested in the art of music, and the Cafe Musain website, which Courfeyrac and I began in college, as a vehicle for my own voice, but what of the voices of others? It is one thing to demand change of the recording industry, to highlight the numerous ways it promotes executive profit over the triumph of creativity, to galvanize consumers of music to question who truly profits whenever they lay their money down; but what of the artists who do not have my means? Therefore I have expanded my life's devotion to include running a record label that will sign musicians who otherwise have no means to make a living on their music."

Cosette takes a moment to digest this speech, then asks, "So… are you going to sign every musician in the world?"

Grantaire lets out a guffaw at that and slaps his knee; even Courfeyrac hides a smile behind his coffee. "I would, if possible," Enjolras says, unfazed by his friends' reactions. "Friends of the ABC will create a new precedent for existing labels and those that have yet to be."

"Yes, the execs are just dying for a leader to show them the error of their horrible, consumerist ways," says Grantaire.

"Change needs to start somewhere," Feuilly says.

"Why, so things can stay the same?"

"Justice Records lied to me," Cosette says, voice firm. Everyone turns to her and she takes a deep breath. "They deliberately misled an eighteen-year-old to get her--that's me, by the way--to sign over all rights to her intellectual property. They're technically within their rights because that's my name over all the papers. I was stupid enough to sign without consulting a lawyer, but that doesn't make what they did any less disgusting." Her voice trembles, and she has to lock her hands together behind her back again before she can continue. "They told me that I'll have to change my sound and my look before they'll release my album. They said I should consider plastic surgery. That's what I'm up against."

She meets the eye of every member of the ABC as Enjolras nods in quiet satisfaction. Jehan hands Cosette a tissue. As she's blowing her nose, Enjolras says, "I genuinely enjoy your sense of musicality and the unique properties of your voice. It would be a privilege to collaborate with you and fight for your rights as an artist."

The rest of the group nods, their expressions various shades of outrage on her behalf. Cosette finds herself able to smile once more.

"Shall we get started?" she asks, turning to Enjolras. "I think you said something about a recording studio."

*

Cosette leaves the ABC after several hours with some music samples Enjolras gave her to play with. He's no less intense about music inside the studio as he is out of it, but in the studio, he's quiet until a series of musical ideas spills out of him. Cosette does most of the talking, explaining her songwriting process, which is mostly "mess around with chords until there's something there." According to Enjolras, his process includes "hearing the space between sound and idea," so at least they're coming from similar levels of vagueness.

She also came clean and told Enjolras that she hasn't written anything new in months, that all her little scraps of songs from before feel juvenile after all she's been through. Enjolras took it all in stride and told her to start with his own song pieces. "I prefer remixing," he explained. "Building songs from scratch takes me years, and even then the songs have no words."

"Kind of wish he'd scolded me," Cosette sighs, giving GarageBand another sad poke with her finger. So far she's managed to make the samples sound like coming of the Antichrist. Mixing isn't really her deal except when it comes to baked goods, and she already made the cookies she promised her father.

"Am I scolding you now? What for?"

"For stuffing you full of sugar. I know most of the snickerdoodles were gone before that meeting," Cosette says, sliding her headphones to rest around her neck. She swivels around in her desk chair and makes a face at her father, who is leaning against her doorframe. "The musician I went to see is this awesome DJ who wants to work with me. It turns out I've forgotten how to write songs."

"Yes, because you were always able to complete your songs in a day," he says, coming in to sit on her bed. "I think the last one you finished in a day was a protest song about your bedtime."

"Other girls go to bed at eight," Cosette sings, but then she puts on her sternest frown, unwilling to rescind her bad mood. "The only thing that's sticking is this loop from some 70s song. Here." She pushes play and a burst of horns fills the room, sound determinedly dated. "This is so embarrassing. Disco is dead!"

Her father gives a long-suffering sigh. "That's not disco, that's soul. You're making me feel old."

"You are old."

"Well, can this old man offer a suggestion?"

Cosette leans back in her chair. "I suppose."

"Put the Internet away--" really, if anything dates her father, it's his quiet conviction that "the Internet" and "computer" are synonymous-- "and get out your guitar."

"I'm trying to do something different with the samples," Cosette says with a mournful glance at her laptop screen. The sample from the 70's continues looping until she stabs at the space bar with her index finger and casts a glance at her guitar case, propped up next to her desk as usual. Her guitar was the first thing she reached for when composing her other songs (including the anti-bedtime one). "I don't want to stagnate as a musician…"

"You already have what you need," her father says, sweeping a hand toward her laptop. "Play with it a little. No one says--"

"--it has to be perfect right away," Cosette finishes, smiling. That was her first lesson in music, long before her fingers could handle a guitar.

"I'll help you. Give me a moment." Her father gets up and leaves the room, presumably to get his guitar.

Cosette shakes her head, then kneels to open her guitar case. When she pops the tabs, dust stirs and makes her sneeze. She murmurs an apology for her neglect as she brushes a finger across the strings. Instrument in hand, she sits back in her chair, guitar a comforting weight on her lap. Cosette hums the E just above middle C and begins tuning. She doesn't have perfect pitch, nor the most precise grasp of musical notation, but her father taught her to tune a guitar by ear when she was ten years old.

"I thought there was an app for that," her father says, returning with his guitar. Cosette sticks out her tongue and makes a few final adjustments. "Now play me something based on what you were just listening to."

"Nah-nah-nahhhh," Cosette sings, getting the notes back in her head. She starts on the first note and plays a scale just because, then strums out the sample a few times. The rhythm is too slow, so she plays it faster, then peels it back, throwing out a scattering of notes more or less within the same key. She's not sure how long it takes before her musical meanderings become purposeful, settling into a groove. She looks up to find her father watching her, fingers poised on the strings. Cosette nods and he takes over.

Now that she has her father as backup, Cosette returns to the sample, adjusting it to fit the new tempo. There's something there, some melody shivering on the strings, waiting to fall from her guitar. She fumbles a note, swears, and chases the mistake back around until a piece of melody reveals itself to her, a handful of notes that she knows have words to accompany them. She hums along just to be sure, then sings it out in nonsense syllables, too thrilled to smile. Her hand stills on the strings and her father looks up, the sound of his guitar fading.

"See? You just needed to give yourself a chance," he says. "So you've worked out a deal with your label?"

Any sense of triumph vanishes. "No," Cosette says, swallowing.

Her father looks so old as he stands and kisses her forehead. "Well. Things will be better in the morning."

If only it were so easy.

*

Cosette deposits her guitar case on the floor of the ABC and her laptop on a table, then wipes the sweat from her forehead and upper lip. "Ugh," she says to the empty room, "why is public transportation so hard?"

A door upstairs creaks open, then footfalls sound. "No car?" Enjolras asks, descending the staircase. He looks like he's never sweated in his life, except maybe to glisten attractively on a beach somewhere.

"No love of driving," Cosette admits. "My dad used to drop me off at my gigs, but I feel too old to ask him for a ride now. Anyway. If you give me a glass of water, I'll play what I came up with last night."

Enjolras walks behind the bar and fills a glass of water. When he comes over to hand it to her, he looks her up and down, then casts his assessing eye over the items she lugged from the apartment. "I've worked with people too far away to commute. We use Skype and e-mail recordings back and forth. I admit I prefer the more organic experience of in-person collaboration."

"Live jam sessions are better," Cosette agrees, and then drains half her glass in one go. Refreshed, she grins up at the punk rock version of Liberty Leading the People on the wall. "Love your paintings, by the way."

"Grantaire did them as a joke," Enjolras says, rolling his eyes. "Apparently he was listening when I said the name ABC was an homage to the CBGB, but not when I asked him to just touch up the walls."

Cosette finishes her water and resolves to give the artist a compliment herself, since she doubts Enjolras will pass it on. She thrusts her messenger bag at Enjolras, still glaring at the paintings on the wall, and hefts her guitar case once more. "Well, let's get to your studio. I don't have anything very electronic for you to work with. Just the beginnings of a melody."

"It's more than we had yesterday," Enjolras says. He shoulders her bag and beckons her upstairs.

The studio above the ABC is small but aggressively clean, and all of the equipment looks comparable to larger studios'--to Cosette's admittedly untrained eye, at least. As soon as she starts playing, Enjolras interrupts her to identify the sample she started with, his face lighting with excitement. When Cosette lifts an eyebrow, he presses a finger to his lips, one corner of his mouth lifting in a smile. Listening now, commentary later. Cosette leans into the music, singing the melody as a series of na na nas. Her hands are sure on her instrument; she transposes the key up a few steps just for fun, then spends a full five minutes improvising on the main riff. "Not that it's anywhere close to done," she says, stopping in the middle of a chord.

"I have some ideas for additional instrumental tracks," Enjolras says, already tapping away at one of the computers. "You'll have to come up with the lyrics on your own, I'm afraid. I write excellent essays and exceptionally poor lyrics, according to Combeferre and Courfeyrac."

Cosette grins and says, "It's hard to rhyme 'injustice.'"

"If there's anyone who can, it's Eponine." Enjolras continues typing, brow furrowed. When enough time has passed that Cosette feels sufficiently awkward, she clears her throat. "Sorry, trying out an idea," he says without looking up from the computer. "I think she's around if you want to try out some lyrics on her."

"Well, if she's not busy," Cosette says, knowing her sarcasm will be lost on Enjolras and indulging in the pleasure anyway. She's seen divas before, but Enjolras is something else, sort of Beyonce meets Bob Dylan. Maybe it's the perfect hair. Hands on her hips, she considers staying and attempting a mashup of "All Along the Watchtower" and "Run the World (Girls)" (working title: "Girls Run Along the Watchtower"), but then Enjolras plays the same three-second clip several times in a row, wearing a frown of fierce concentration.

Cosette shuts the door behind her and heads downstairs. Even if Eponine's not around, her throat is dry again from all the singing.

"No, you're absolutely finishing your homework before I let you do anything," says a voice, familiar from two days ago rather than some nebulous point in her past. Cosette pauses on the bottom stair to discover Eponine settled at one of the tables, her arm clamped none too gently around a teenage boy's shoulders. They're a matched pair in several ways: the same ink black hair, the same medium brown skin, the same nose, the same scowl trained on each other.

The boy says, "I got music to write! You know."

"I know you need to pass every year of middle school and four years of English to earn a high school diploma," Eponine says, implacable. "You can be the next Kanye West when you graduate."

"They're gonna call Kanye the old Gavroche!" declares the boy, but he settles down with pencil and notebook anyway. Eponine unclamps her fingers from around his shoulder and ruffles his hair, ignoring the resultant indignant squawks with a fond smile.

A smile that fades when she looks up to see Cosette.

Cosette's breath catches in her throat when their eyes make contact. Despite the way Eponine causes half-memories float just beyond her mind's grasp, she's still a beautiful girl. "Enjolras sent me out for lyric-writing advice," Cosette says, lightly as she dares. "It's been a long time and I'm rusty."

Eponine tilts her head, eyes narrowed. "He kicked you out to play with an idea."

"Well, yes, but he did mention your skill," Cosette says. Eponine's lips twitch; emboldened, Cosette crosses the room and pulls up a chair at the little table. "My name is Cosette," she adds, addressing the boy much more occupied with drawing in the margins than doing his homework.

"Gavroche," he replies, grabbing one of her hands and pumping it with enthusiasm. "You need help with your flow?"

"My flow's dried up," Cosette admits. "Got any tips?"

Gavroche puffs up, thrusting his skinny chest out as far as he can. "First thing you do is don't pay attention to what they taught you in school, 'cause lyrics don't have to rhyme, they just gotta move. Pull the sound straight out the ground. See what I did? Rhyming's all right but no cat sat on a mat crap."

"Got it," Cosette says, and refrains from mentioning that she first learned about internal rhyme in an English class. "But what about inspiration? That's my real trouble."

"Important stuff," Gavroche declares immediately. "The four f's: family, friends, freedom, food."

"All right, let me try. Hmm. Sugar in my coffee, make it taste like toffee," Cosette says, then accepts a high five from Gavroche. "Do you think Enjolras would ever talk to me again if I wrote a commercial for Starbucks?"

Eponine snorts. "Maybe. First he'd have to decide whether to condemn you for working within a corrupt system to make a living. People need to eat. Also, Enjolras loves to argue with himself."

"You sound like you've known each other for a long time," Cosette says.

Both siblings eye her, mouths set in identical lines. Cosette flushes. Just as she's wondering whether she should apologize for fishing, however unconsciously, Eponine says, "We moved in upstairs as soon as it was livable. Access to a real piano's nice. I start with words when it comes to songwriting, though--I'm guessing you're different?" At Cosette's nod, she continues, "I write poems that sometimes turn into songs. Which is why a certain little brother of mine should study hard, regardless of the career he wants."

"Yeah, whatever," Gavroche says, making a terrible face and scooching his chair over. "Tell her the pawn poem, 'Ponine, that one's awesome."

'Ponine sets off another series of memory-echoes where the name Gavroche didn't. Cosette leans forward, chin in her hands, and says, "I'd love to hear a poem! You have a beautiful speaking voice."

Eponine looks away, fiddling with a strand of her hair. "Well," she says, and clears her throat as she squares her shoulders. "When the pawn hits the conflicts he thinks like a king / What he knows throws the blows when he goes to the fight / And he'll win the whole thing 'fore he enters the ring / There's no body to batter when your mind is your might / So when you go solo you hold your own hand / And remember that depth is the greatest of heights / And if you know where you stand then you know where to land / And if you fall it won't matter 'cause you'll know that you're right." Her whole bearing changes as the recitation goes on, her eyes flashing and her voice strengthening as she spins her words.

Cosette gapes. Gavroche, no doubt used to his sister's genius, bursts into applause. Remembering herself, Cosette joins him, clapping hard enough that it stings. Eponine ducks her head, pleased.

It's then that Marius runs in, eyes wild and hair in disarray. "'Ponine, have you seen--"

"In the storage room," Eponine says. "Am I the only one who knows how to take care of books?"

"Yes," says Gavroche, with another ferocious glance at his schoolwork.

When Marius emerges, he's holding a large book of guitar sheet music that looks to be stuffed with additional papers. "Nice to see all of you again," he says to the group, though his words seem mainly for Cosette. "What are your plans for the evening?"

Cosette trades a smile for a smile, wishing she knew him well enough to hug him hello. "Trying to write a song about something, anything. Here's to hoping I can do it before Enjolras finishes with whatever he's doing to my melody."

"Ah." Marius fidgets, suddenly fascinated with one of the many papers sticking out of his sheet music. Just as Eponine opens her mouth to reply to his question, he blurts, "I'm hungry! I mean, um, I got hungry on the run over here. Are you hungry? Do you want to get something to eat? With me?"

"I'd love to," Cosette says. Heat rises in her cheeks, and she does her best not to look at anyone, especially Marius. "Sometimes I do my best work when I'm trying not to work."

"Great!" Then Marius, ever the gentleman, says, "You were saying, Eponine?"

"Oh, well," Eponine says, voice so dry Cosette turns to look at her. Her arms are folded, her mouth set, and her brother once again mirrors her expression. "Another lonely night. You know, one more and I'll die." She bites off the last syllable, all serrated sarcasm.

When Marius breaks into uncomfortable laughter, Cosette looks back and forth between them both. Gavroche, catching her, makes a face and nods. Oh, dear, Cosette thinks, sinking down into her chair.

*

Cosette leaves with Marius anyway, because she really should eat something besides the toast she had hours ago, and she wasn't lying about some of her best songs coming from not trying to write them. There's no reason for her to feel guilty, except it's so obvious that Eponine has a thing for Marius, who seems to have a thing for Cosette, and Cosette--

Cosette doesn't know what she wants, or who. A good meal can only help the situation.

"Are you a vegetarian or a vegan or anything?" Marius asks, leading her down the street.

"Kind of lactose intolerant," Cosette says. "I ignore it when it comes to ice cream."

"Makes sense. Do you like tacos?"

"Do you like your guitar?"

Marius leads her into a small Mexican place, where she orders a chicken and beef taco. She also learns the following about Marius: he's been obsessed with Mexican food ever since he moved out here from Indiana, he likes LA but wishes he didn't have to spend so much money on sunscreen, he started playing guitar when he was in middle school, his grandfather raised him, his favorite color is blue, and he loves any music that "feels right." Cosette peppers her responses with gentle teasing to see the width of his smile, the way he lowers his eyelashes when he blushes. He looks at her with uncomplicated delight as though she were a hand-carved guitar inlay or a fresh cherry tart, but better, capable of wonderful surprise. If Marius is a sweet spring day, Eponine is one set in autumn, equal promise of frost and fire. But why think of Eponine when she's on a date with Marius?

"This is fun," Cosette says, nudging his foot with hers under the table. "We should do this more often."

"I--yes, I'd like that."

"Good." Cosette takes a sip of her water bottle, beaming, then screws the cap back on. "Is it hard being so far away from your family? I've never been away from my father for more than a few days."

Her question dims Marius's sunny expression. He clears his throat and says, "We're really not on speaking terms anymore. Grandfather didn't approve of my reasoning for moving out here, and I, well, we had a falling out." Seeing her face fall in response, he reaches out and pats her hand. "I don't mind you asking. It helps to talk about things, and I think Courfeyrac gets tired of being the only one I tell things to. He's my roommate."

"How did that happen?"

"Well, I ran into him on the street… No, I literally ran into him. But he's Courfeyrac, so he made a joke instead of getting mad at me, and then all of a sudden I was drinking at the ABC and promising Eponine that I would come back to audition as her backup guitarist… They're all good people, you know. We're lucky to be adopted."

"Indeed," Cosette says softly. She opens her mouth, about to relate the tale of her own adoption--what little she remembers of her previous life, most of it the impression of a small child alone in dark places--when a gaggle of middle-aged women surrounds the table.

They don't say anything intelligible, just some whispering and a smothered giggle. After a few moments Cosette asks, "Can we help you…?" This doesn't seem like the kind of restaurant to do "Happy Birthday" for customers. Besides, it's neither of their birthday and all the women are wearing carnation pink polo shirts with PINK LADIES BOWLING LEAGUE written on the back.

"We were just wondering," one of the ladies says at last, clutching a pen and notepad to her chest as she gazes at Marius. "Are you Marius Pontmercy from American Idol?"

Cosette forces herself to turn back to Marius slowly, determined not to reveal anything until she knows what Marius wants her to do. She's never seen a full episode of American Idol, but she knows the concept behind the show and that there's always a mean judge. If Marius didn't say anything about the show, it's either a serious dedication to modesty or the desire to forget about the experience entirely.

Sure enough, Marius looks frozen with horror, all the color wiped from his face. He shakes his head, gesture made all the more unconvincing by the naked terror in his eyes. "I just… look like him," he says, voice strangled.

"Oh, I couldn't take him anywhere when that season was airing!" Cosette forces a hearty laugh and the ladies turn towards her. "You know, we've lived here our whole lives as complete nobodies, but then this one started getting 'recognized'--" here she makes the most sarcastic air quotes she can muster-- "and it was just staring and paparazzi everywhere we went. Got us into a club for free a few times, though."

"Oh," the lead lady says, deflating. "Well, would you like to sign our petition? We're trying to get him back on the show, let the producers see that lots of people love him and want him back. Such a shame that someone so talented left. He would have gone all the way."

"Sure," Cosette says, and manages to scrawl her name without bursting into hysterical laughter. She doesn't see who Marius signs as, but the ladies leave after that, bags of food in hand.

When Cosette's sure they're gone, she buries her face in her hands and allows herself a silent bout of laughter, shoulders shaking with mirth. Then she pulls in a deep breath, brushes her hair out her eyes, and sits back up.

Marius, face still sickly pale, eyes her as though she's about to bolt from the restaurant. "Aren't you even going to ask?"

Cosette shakes her head and then takes another careful sip of water. "You'll tell me in your own time." She does want to know, she wants to know everything about Marius, especially the ways he's connected to Eponine, but she's met enough people with painful pasts to know better than to pry.

At her words, Marius's face softens to an extent she didn't believe possible, and this time he places both hands over hers. His hands are warm, dry, so large compared to her own. "Thank you, Cosette," he says, voice achingly sincere. If he sings the same way, it's no surprise he inspired such a devoted following.

If Cosette leans forward, he will meet her halfway. This she can sense through where his skin touches hers. Still she hovers on the borderline between friendship and romance, unable to tip the balance as another lonely night sounds from her memory. Eponine's voice and the bitter twist of her mouth hold her back.

"I know the words to my song," Cosette says. "I need to go home."

*

Cosette's apologies to Marius for her hasty departure are absent-minded, secondhand to the song thrumming under her skin. She'll have to make better ones tomorrow, but for now she races home, Eponine's words falling scattershot across her thoughts. Another lonely night and one more and I'll die, and they're the words, the right words, but Cosette needs to make them her own, she needs to be in her own room on her own bed with her own guitar so the words can fall from her own lips.

The bus ride feels torturous, and Cosette is sure she's bruised her fingers keeping the beat against the pole.

Her father starts to greet her as she rushes through the door, but he must see the songwriting fervor in her eyes, because he nods and lets her pass. Cosette shuts her door and tunes her guitar as fast as she dares. Her fingers remember other impatient tunings from her more inspired days and fly over the tuning heads, leaving her with a ready-made guitar and the embryonic lyrics to her new song.

"It's gonna be another lonely night, one more and I'm gonna die," Cosette begins, and yes, this is how she'll say Eponine's words. "Wired out waiting for the sign, 'cause you're a risk and I'm borderline."

She pauses, head bowed over the body of her guitar. When she closes her eyes, she sees Marius and his soft looks, Eponine and her hard exterior. There's sweetness to them both, sweetness one wears on his sleeve and one plays close to her chest. Cosette wants to know them both, to discuss poetry and music, to hear Eponine's rich voice and Marius's gentle one, to slip one hand into Marius's and the other in Eponine's, to touch--

That's the risk. She wants them both in equal measure.

"All I know is I've been sitting with this fire that burns inside," she continues, picking up the song from the last note. "Man, if you want me to walk your line, don't stop at eight, no let's take it to the nines." She stops again, waiting for the next phrase to catch up with the music, her eyes still closed. Most songs require a longer improvisation before the lyrics settle in place, but these are tumbling out in final form. Maybe it's the welter of confusion in her heart, maybe it's the creativity bursting forth from the dam at last. Maybe it's just the simplicity of the words--this won't be a song that dazzles the intellect, but people will feel her restlessness when they hear it. Enjolras will tease it out and they'll make a song for dancefloor indecision.

The rest of the bridge is all frank sexuality: I think we should lay out and love because man, I really need it and later on I may be full but it's not enough, come show me how to feel it. Cosette's never done anything more than enthusiastic kissing after a third coffee date, but one of the organizations her father supports is the local Planned Parenthood. When she turned thirteen, one of the doctors there gave her an extraordinarily thorough runthrough of sex and sexuality, then passed along her home phone number if Cosette ever had any more questions. Her father resolutely did not ask about that doctor's appointment, all for the best.

The rest of the song is mostly a reprise of earlier lyrics, and it takes only another ten minutes before Cosette reaches the end. When she sings, sometimes she pictures her hands in Eponine's hair. Other times, it's her fingers tracing the freckled line of Marius's collarbone. Always it's sheer, confused longing.

She could break both of their hearts. With Eponine, the possibility seems inevitable. Cosette does another runthrough of the song with this in mind. Her voice goes breathy, stretched as if strung out on booze and hormones. The throb of club music is missing with just her guitar, of course. Luckily, she knows a good DJ.

Cosette does a few more takes, these in front of a recorder, then compresses the files enough to e-mail them to Enjolras. He'll lecture her about the loss of sound quality, but Courfeyrac has yet to deliver a written set of instructions for uploading files directly to Cafe Musain's server. I'm so happy to be writing again, Cosette types in the accompanying e-mail. Thanks for everything.

Just as she's leaning back in her chair to bask in the pure satisfaction of completing something, even just a first draft, Cosette notices she has a new message. Justice Records again. Groaning, she almost closes her browser window, but she might as well take care of refusing them while she's still riding the musical high.

Only the message is different this time. Amidst the usual jumble of legalese lurks a new threat: Justice Records might be forced to send legal representation to discuss the options available to her.

What options? You've left me with nothing, Cosette sends back before she can think better of it, and slams down the lid of her laptop. She'll consider this development later. Let the new song be enough. Let something, anything turn out all right.

Chapter Text

"So what do you think?" Cosette asks after Enjolras hits "replay," still expressionless.

"Yes," Enjolras says, answering precisely nothing. "Okay, good, let me--"

And then he disappears into his own musical world for the second time in two days, leaving Cosette wondering if this is why he's never successfully collaborated with anyone before and also sorely tempted to kick him in the shin. Enjolras is saved from her wrath by virtue of answering her 7 AM phone call and telling her to come to the club right away with her material.

"Coffee," Cosette sighs, and goes downstairs to brew a mediocre pot in the break room. Leaving the coffee maker to its tepid gurgles, Cosette hunts for something to mix with her coffee and comes up with a gallon of milk, one sad quarter inch sloshing on the bottom, and a mostly full bottle of Bailey's. Given some of the things Enjolras has posted about illegal downloading, he probably won't mind underage drinking…

The door swings open and Grantaire staggers in, guitar case in hand and a slight weave to his gait. "You are a saint," he says, sniffing the air. He sets down his guitar case with unusual care, considering his overall disheveled appearance, and uses a finger to slide his sunglasses down the bridge of his nose. "You're not Eponine."

"Cosette," she says, in case he's forgotten between now and yesterday. With a guilty start, she puts the Bailey's back and retrieves the milk.

Grantaire, evidently more awake than he looks, says, "It's all the same to me. I'll have mine black, though. Haven't slept. Gig last night. I come here for the coffee and the judgment. Before a pair of gimlet eyes, a man can choke down a considerable amount of bitterness. Including actual gimlets, though mixing is too much work at this hour."

"Good morning," Cosette manages. She removes two mugs from one of the many cabinets below the bar and hands one over.

He picks it up by the base rather than the handle, batting the mug from one hand to the other. "Don't mind me. I get punchy without sleep. Dear Cosette, unless the ABC has recently converted to a cafe, I suspect you're here on the music business. Are you married to the art too? Marius will be disappointed."

"Is there any musician who isn't?" she asks, fighting the heat suffusing her face at Marius's name.

"I'd say music won't have me, but she's fond of sorry cases. We see each other occasionally."

Cosette half-expects Grantaire to pass out in the break room, coffee pot untouched, but he returns with a full mug and slumps into a chair. His wrinkled flannel and stubble scream "hipster," but he reminds her more of the people at the NA meetings: the deep shadows under his eyes, the faint tremor in his hands. She quashes the urge to tell him to go to bed and finishes off her last dregs, grimacing at the grounds in her last mouthful. The ABC needs to invest in new filters as well as a new coffee maker.

Now the sun has climbed high enough to stream through the windows in earnest, and Cosette hums a little as she rinses out her mug in the sink behind the bar. She wrote a new song, a song Enjolras will turn into a club hit if he ever leaves his recording studio again. Complicated crushes and evil record labels don't compare to the joy of creation.

"You sound like the Sugarplum Fairy would if she sang instead of danced," Grantaire informs her from his table. "I don't mean that in the creepy 'oh, she's so elfin' way they talk about Joanna Newsom, either. You're more human than I am; your liver definitely more so. Perfect people are all the more perfect for their humanity. Don't look at me like that, you must be perfect for our fearless leader to make you part of the Cause. Me, I just liked your voice, so I passed on the demo. Now he's kicked you out of his studio, right? He does that. 'Given the existence of a personal god' and all. I hate it when people strip out the absurdity in that speech but it's true that Enjolras loves humanity dearly with some exceptions."

As he trails off, Cosette finishes drying her mug. He looks far too tired to be making fun of her, and his overt jabs he directs at himself. "If we're going to be friends, you should tell me where you're from," she says, smiling. "And thank you for passing along my demo. You must have had it for a while."

"I pick things up here and there." Grantaire rubs at his face with one hand. "I live on a couch. I used to go to school in Portland. Oregon, not Maine. State birthday: Valentine's Day; official fish: Chinook salmon. Oregon, not Portland. Portland's a state of mind, lots of ironically detached people who care deeply about their image as such. Powell's is great, though. More stores should be arranged by color." A sweep of his arm indicates the room. "I'm the one who desecrated the walls of this fair club. I think that's all you want to know about me."

His words shiver in the air, wineglasses that will crack if tapped too hard. "I'll give them a closer look," Cosette says. The closest wall features a parody of American Gothic; the man and the woman are dressed in Gothic fashion, complete with black hair dye and several facial piercings. "Cute."

"I didn't want to tax the intellect of the average clubgoer," Grantaire says, then finally rests his head on the table.

Cosette continues her tour of the room as quietly as she can, though Grantaire rests only long enough for her to admire the next mural, the Warhol soup cans adorned with Marilyn Monroe hair. There's an R swirled in the corner of each painting, applied in brushstrokes that appear hasty but are too uniform to be anything other than stylized. She traces the signature on the Mona Lisa mock-up, following the pun to its source--capital R--grand R--Grantaire. Clever. The entire room is a parody of parodies, a series of wandering references that traverse style and era. Behind her, Cosette hears the telltale snick of a guitar case being opened, then Grantaire picking out the bass line to "Money."

Cosette finds the last one tucked into an odd little recess created by the way wall meets door and her hand flies to her mouth, stifling a gasp. This one must reference another painting, but it's Eponine, Eponine clad in a flowing pink dress worn over a light green shirt, little white flowers in her hair. Her fingers rest on a keyboard strewn with multi-colored wildflowers, and her lips are parted as if beginning a song. Cosette's never seen Eponine wear anything besides black or deep purple, but she believes this softness so lovingly rendered. What complicated love triangles in Les Amis! But she's fallen into one herself, and certainly Eponine has a face to inspire artwork.

Colors and carousels, Cosette thinks, and then she has to find her own table as well as pen and paper, recording phrases that might become lyrics and sounds that might become songs. Most of it will be nonsense until three years later when she thinks of the other half of a song and goes tearing through her notebook collection.

Even hidden away with the portrait of Eponine, lost in the art of song, Cosette notices how often Grantaire tips the contents of his flask into his coffee. She says nothing, but when he finally falls asleep, she drapes his jacket around his shoulders.

*

Another cup of coffee later, Cosette hits the limits of her creativity and starts doodling flowers in the margins of her notebook. She would go upstairs to check on Enjolras's progress, but someone ought to stay downstairs and ensure Grantaire stays alive. His jacket rises and falls at regular intervals, so he seems all right, if unconscious.

At around nine in the morning, Eponine descends the staircase; at first slowly, arms stretched as she yawns, and then as fast as she can when she spots Grantaire. Her hair falls ink dark from her messy ponytail as she shakes him awake, voice climbing higher and more panicked with every word. "Hey! Wake up! Get up, Grantaire! I mean it! Wake up!"

"God," Grantaire groans, squinting at her. He lays his head on the table once more. "I had a bad night, Eponine. Leave me alone."

Terror fades to irritation. Hand on one hip, Eponine says, "You shouldn't have come here if you wanted to be left alone." With her other hand, she tucks one of Grantaire's curls behind his ear. Cosette smiles at the gesture. "What was so bad about last night's gig? You went to it, right?"

"Went to it, played in it, tolerated the whole thing with considerable spirit. Whiskey, mostly. Did you know that corn whiskey is the worst thing in the world? Scientific fact, proven with the evidence you see here before you. I've donated my body to science. Combeferre would be proud." Eponine must pull on his hair, because he yelps. "Ow! Last night I couldn't… it was a wedding, you know how I hate weddings. Shiny happy people holding hands. I don't even have a cat waiting at home for me because I'm incapable of taking care of a living creature." With a great effort, Grantaire props his chin up on one hand. "Myself included. Sorry to darken your door, but I couldn't think of another place to go."

Cosette's face burns. Her location shields her from Eponine's line of sight, and she suspects Grantaire doesn't care. Should she announce her presence or should she preserve Eponine's dignity by putting on her headphones until they leave? Indecision paralyzes her.

With quiet ferocity, Eponine says, "So you call me! You always call me! You sleep on my couch, you don't pass out in public where anyone can see you."

"He already knows."

"There's a difference between knowing and shoving it in his face."

"As if he would notice anything I shoved in his face," Grantaire says with a chuckle, then lets his head fall back on the table. "Let's toast this meeting of the Lonely Hearts Club. May all our beds be cold and all our efforts to remedy this be in vain."

"You can have water." Eponine gives Grantaire's hair a ruffle and then fills him a glass at the sink. Curiosity killed the cat, thinks Cosette, but the saying makes her hold her tongue rather than speak up. Who on earth are they talking about? "Drink the whole thing," Eponine commands. "You know I'll make you."

"Our lady of pain and piano," Grantaire says agreeably, and downs half the water in one gulp. He makes a terrible face and sips at the rest.

Eponine sighs and seats herself next to him, drawing her knees up against her chest. She looks younger when she does that, sadder, and again half-recognition stirs within Cosette. "It's not him, you know," she says softly. "He's an excuse. There's always something to forget."

Grantaire gives her a crooked smile, one that shows every exhausted line on his face. "It's just that he's impossible. In many senses of the word. Both of them are."

Oh, God, Cosette should leave now. She should have left the moment Eponine started talking about Grantaire's problems, which are none of her business. She jams her headphones in her ears and then shuffles her papers around as loudly as possible. Maybe she can convince them that she heard nothing, that she was listening to music the whole time and remains ignorant of the ABC's fraught romantic scene.

"Fairy sprite!" Grantaire calls, waving to her. Eponine blanches, her mouth tightening. Cosette lifts her hand in response to Grantaire and realizes too late that her headphones are still in; now there's no way she can pretend not to have heard everything. She takes her headphones out regardless and he continues, "'Ponine can be fairy Coke. She don't lie, she don't lie, she don't lie."

Despite the mortifying situation, Cosette laughs. "Did you call me a fairy just to set up a Clapton joke?"

"Actually--"

"No one cares who originally wrote the song," Eponine snaps. She stands, grabs Grantaire's now empty glass, and stalks to the sink to fill it once more. "If you're looking for Marius, his shift doesn't start for another ten hours and then he'll be working, so you might want to meet him elsewhere."

"I finished a song," Cosette says as Eponine sets the refilled glass in front of Grantaire with a glare. "I'm waiting for Enjolras to present me with some sort of mix. That's all." She gathers up notebook, pen, and messenger bag. "But he has my phone number. I can always--"

A door opens upstairs. A moment later, Enjolras comes down the staircase at a pace more dignified than a run but certainly faster than a walk. "I found something I want to try," he announces without so much as a good morning to the room's other two occupants. "Come upstairs with me. With your input, I think we can have the song ready for tonight."

"Tonight?" Cosette asks, barely keeping her voice below an elated squeal. "Tonight?"

"There's only you tonight," Grantaire mutters. Eponine punches him in the shoulder.

"Would you like to hear my song?" Cosette asks the surly pair, forgetting her embarrassment. There's nothing overtly about Eponine in there, and maybe she'll forgive Cosette for going on a date with Marius if she likes it, and maybe she'll invite Cosette to play a song with her on the next acoustic night, and maybe--

Enjolras directs a thoughtful frown at them, as if noticing them for the first time. "I hadn't thought to seek further musical opinion at this stage, but it could be useful."

"Usefulness! A terrible fate," Grantaire says, rising to his feet. He drains his glass of water in one go, then stoops to pick up his guitar case. "I'll be on my way. My couch calls to me; it commands me to laze."

"I'll walk you to the bus stop," Eponine says. "I should pick up some groceries."

Cosette wants to protest their departure, but Enjolras is already headed back upstairs after indicating with an impatient gesture that Cosette should follow. She turns on the stairs as the door closes after Grantaire and Eponine, the former walking with less of a sailor's list, the latter's shoulders an angry line. But Enjolras's body language sings excitement as he ascends the staircase, and so she follows the music.

*

Before the sun finishes setting, the line of people waiting for the ABC to open extends down the block. Cosette, out to stretch her legs and snatch an actually decent cup of coffee, loses count of all the people in line as she walks back to the club. A few angry mutters follow her when Bahorel, acting as a bouncer tonight, motions her inside; she's not dressed for clubbing, she looks like a little girl.

Well. They'll sing a different tune tonight, her tune. Cosette grins and wonders if puns are catching.

Inside bustles with preparation, as Eponine alluded to earlier today. Marius arrives with his roommate, the eternally cheerful Courfeyrac, and hardly has time to wave to Cosette before he's put to work moving tables and chairs to clear a space for the dance floor. Courfeyrac, despite not being on tonight, helps Feuilly, who seems to work every night of the week, move a crate of jingling liquor bottles. Someone has the radio blasting pop music, so Joly and Bossuet are treating everyone to their rendition of "Where Them Girls At" and doing very little work behind the bar. Combeferre directs a fond smile at them whenever he looks up from writing the evening's specials on the chalkboard that serves as a menu. Eponine oversees everything with an imperious eye; judging by her expression, Joly and Bossuet are not long for their musical stylings. Even Grantaire has made it back, though he occupies himself with constructing a small cabin out of toothpicks.

Enjolras, of course, is in the DJ booth, no doubt fiddling with his setlist. Cosette strictly forbade him from changing their song any more. His initial remix was brilliant with a few caveats that Cosette fought to get changed to a version they both liked. Hours ago, she was certain their collaboration was brilliant, a dance song that demands dancing, but now doubt tells her otherwise. It's 9:30 PM and her palms won't stop sweating.

"We were all quite moved by your plight, so we're all here," a voice says behind her. Cosette turns and it's Jehan, the only missing member of the group. He favors her with a sweet smile and adds, "You'll be fine. Everyone will love your song."

"I hope," Cosette says faintly. "I think I liked it. I must have liked it, right?" She's had stage fright before, she's had career-making-or-breaking performances before, but never like this. This is an act of rebellion, the difference between creative enslavement and freedom.

Before Jehan can reply, Eponine stalks toward them, a bottle of cleaning fluid in each hand. "Wipe down the bathrooms," she commands. "They'll be filthy by the end of the night, but they might as well start off spotless. Not a word about whether you're working tonight. Not. A. Word."

"Wouldn't dream of it," Jehan says cheerfully, heading off toward the men's room.

Cosette busies herself with the women's room, too preoccupied with opening one particularly stubborn paper towel dispenser to fret about her song debut. About five minutes after the epic quest for the dispenser key concludes, the first clubgoers stream in and the lights dim. Enjolras starts up the first song, a remix of the Scissor Sisters' "Fire With Fire," and even the patrons clamoring for alcohol at the bar raise up a ragged cheer. Those already encumbered with drinks fill the dance floor.

Jehan appears at her elbow once more and passes her a drink that tastes like a mostly virginal margarita. "You won't get in trouble?" she shouts over the throbbing music. She has her fake ID, as always, but going by an offhand comment Enjolras made earlier, the police visit the ABC more frequently than they would other clubs.

"There's a plan to hide you if the police start checking IDs!" Jehan informs her with an angelic smile. "Can't lose our rising musical star! Come on, let's dance."

The last time Cosette danced here, it was the music alone drawing her out, demanding that she move to its beat. This time, Courfeyrac awaits them on the dance floor, and he and Cosette and Jehan take turns spinning one another. Grantaire joins them after a few songs, eyes glassy and face split into a grin, and proceeds to lead Cosette in a perfect waltz when a song in 3/4 time begins. He's a shockingly excellent dancer, and soon Cosette is breathless with laughter, apologizing for her inferior ability.

"The pretty face makes up for it!" Grantaire hollers in her ear, and then the music winds down to a single thudding beat.

"Good evening, friends of liberty," Enjolras says over the sound system. If he adds anything after, it's lost in the sudden roar from the crowd. When Enjolras makes a quelling motion with his hand, the noise actually dies down. "Those of you who frequent this place know of our cause. For those new to the ABC, our organization dedicates itself to raising awareness of the music industry's chokehold on the creative and personal lives of the artists it claims to support. However, mere awareness is but the first step toward change."

"God, I love his speeches," Grantaire mutters above her head, one of the few sincere statements Cosette has ever heard from him.

"To incite change, one must transform awareness into action," Enjolras continues. "The matrices of oppression constrict us all, forcing compromise between artistic integrity and bread in our mouths. It is only together that we will win freedom; awakened to injustice, those with power must distribute it to the powerless, already too aware of injustice. As an established independent artist, I wish to announce the inception of an ABC record label." Gasps and murmurs run through the audience as well as a smattering of applause. "This label exists not for the aggrandizement of my organization but to provide a haven for artists seeking to create for creation's sake. Our first album is a collaboration between myself and one preyed upon by a corrupt industry. Her record label deliberately obfuscated the terms of her contract. Because she resists pressure to become more commercial, the label delays her debut album and refuses to allow her to make a living off her own songs. Yet this woman still sings, for her artist's soul is untarnished. This song is called 'Borderline.'"

The single drum beat segues into her song. Cosette grips Grantaire's arms, frozen.

"He did mention he was doing this, right?" Courfeyrac asks, noticing her expression. "Oh my God, he didn't. He actually--no, I'm sure he forgot. I'm sorry my friend is an idiot. Let's dance to your song."

"At least it was all true," Cosette says, though she kind of wants to slap Enjolras. "And he didn't use my name without permission. Wait, he didn't even say my name! All that and still no one will know who I am!"

"Maybe he realized he didn't have your permission," Jehan says. "Now let's stop talking. I want to hear this."

Her song is an odd match for Enjolras's fiery rhetoric, Cosette knows, the personal and political colliding in ways that might not make sense on the surface. She looks for Eponine in the crowd at the first It's gonna be another lonely night but can't see over the crush of clubgoers, most of whom have paired off for this song. She'll never get over the oddity of hearing her own voice played back to her, her words used as inspiration for people to rub up against one another--and yet that's what the song is about, her conflicting feelings distilled into pure want. This throng of people has entirely the right idea, all thanks to Enjolras and her. (Mostly her--she remembers the editing process, how Enjolras matched backing tracks to the atmosphere of her song without any indication that he had ever experienced such a thing himself. But he must have, surely, with a face like that.)

Jehan has found himself a partner, someone androgynous and wearing a great deal of glitter. Courfeyrac has two girls, one arm of his arms around each waist. Grantaire loosens his grip on Cosette, keeping hold of her hands as they sway to the song. He's still staring at the DJ booth, the lyrics to "Borderline" writ large over his face, and Cosette squeezes his hands in sudden, sympathetic understanding. Of course that's how it is.

The applause after the song concludes rings in Cosette's ears for the rest of the night. The rest of it is a blur of congratulations thanks to sheer nervous energy and the full-strength drink Grantaire passes her with no sign of scruple. Eventually, her three dance partners bundle her to sit exhausted in a corner while the ABC closes around her. She opens her eyes to find herself surrounded by people with shining faces.

"That was amazing!"

"Incredible!"

"Perfect club music!"

"Your lyrics still need work," Eponine says, but her tiny smile softens her words.

Marius, after several minutes of staring hard enough to make her blush, says, "You sing like an angel."

On impulse, Cosette launches herself forward into a series of hugs. Enjolras doesn't seem to know what to do with his arms, awkwardly patting her elbows. Joly and Bossuet hug her at the same time and with such enthusiasm that Cosette steps on both of Bossuet's feet. Several of Les Amis mob her in a group hug; laughing, she extracts herself moments before they knock themselves over. Then she hugs Marius, which makes her heart beat too fast for her thoughts to keep up, and then Eponine, which makes her heart beat faster still. If Cosette meant to exorcise any emotions with the song, it didn't work.

But though confusion reigns as far as her love life is concerned, people still heard her sing. Cosette can have that much, at least, and so she smiles.

*

"Downloads from the site have exploded," Courfeyrac informs Cosette the following morning, and then he updates her with new statistics every hour or so as she and Enjolras try to twist her brief, scattershot ideas into something resembling another song. The numbers climb higher the next day, though no music blogs have really picked up their story. Several of the Amis, hanging out during daylight for one reason or another, offer their congratulations. (Cosette suspects them all of being curious, except Marius, who keeps hovering near her table like an indecisive puppy.)

"They will after our next song," Enjolras says. "About your draft of the second song idea. I like it transposed into G minor."

"But I don't know if it wants to be a sad song yet," Cosette replies, and thus sparks a debate over whether songs in minor keys are inherently more depressing than songs in major keys, and what factors might influence such an interpretation.

"It's cultural," Courfeyrac asserts. "So many of the West's happy songs are in major keys that we associate them with happiness from the womb. 'Happy Birthday' is ubiquitous. Think of all those nursery rhymes set to music. Jack and Jill remain quite cheerful no matter their failure to fetch a pail of water."

"But why did those songs become popular?" Combeferre counters. In a rare break between classes and shifts at the bar, he's seated at the bar, though more interested in the ongoing discussion than balancing the ABC's budget with Eponine. "Patterns establish themselves through natural inclination. A triad in a minor key incites more sensory dissonance; it's a matter of the space between frequencies."

"Music a matter of frequencies! Since Jehan is in class and not here to speak for the soul of the art, I will." Courfeyrac gives the bar counter a single pound to emphasize his point. "Sound and memory form strong associations. We are remembering the sound of our own mortality. If the devil has his own interval, why not the angels?"

Eponine, with an exaggerated look at the calendar posted on the wall, starts humming "Gloomy Sunday" as she marks a spreadsheet with a highlighter. Cosette cuts herself off mid-giggle; Eponine's voice is really too lovely to laugh over. Despite the California sunshine flooding the room, the idle chatter dies away into melancholy as Eponine continues humming, lips pursed in a frown as she checks figures. Marius lets out a heavy sigh after the second bridge.

"That's my argument," Eponine says. "Let's figure out where this entire case of seltzer water disappeared to. I know Gavroche likes it for some unearthly reason, but he limits his stealing to no more than half a case…" Then she and Combeferre attempt to work through the logistics, and conversation fills the room once more.

"I have 'Gloomy Sunday' stuck in my head now," Cosette says to Enjolras, passing his laptop back to him. "Consider the key transposed. How are you going to remix songs that aren't written yet, though? I'm such a slow writer. Some of those songs on my album go back six years."

"I find your cause inspiring," Enjolras says. Then he adds, deadpan, "I suspect you do as well."

"Could be," Cosette replies, and dares to give his shoulder a playful shove. He waves her off without annoyance, attention fixed on the alterations she made to the melodic line. "Is the title 'Fuck the Music Industry' too derivative?"

"It does give the listener a misleading impression."

At some point in the afternoon, Cosette takes pity on Marius and invites him to sit with her. "I don't really write my own material," he confesses. "I did the, um, the show partly because I like to play other people's songs. It's like karaoke, only terrible." From the next table over, Courfeyrac casts them a sharp look in the midst of his trading increasingly elaborate jokes with Bossuet and Joly. Marius, catching the look, lifts his shoulders in a shrug.

"It must have been terrible for you to quit," Cosette says. "The industry will suck you dry. I was almost ready to give up before Enjolras remixed my song."

"Not you," Marius says, smiling for the first time since her song's debut. "You're one of the bravest people I know."

And what can she say to that, really?

The next 24 hours pass in a happy blur of music and camaraderie, the dam over Cosette's inspiration broken at last. She rejects most of the material, of course, and then Enjolras turns away still more of it, but there's something where before there was only an aching, silent void. More and more people download "Borderline," to the point where Combeferre speculates about setting a price on their next release. When Cosette falls asleep in the recording studio at 3 AM and awakens to a blanket draped over her and several missed calls from her father, not even the guilt and sleep deprivation dampen her spirits.

"I'm sorry, Daddy," she says, with a glance at Enjolras, oblivious to the world in his headphones. "I'm writing music. This is the best stuff I've ever done. I couldn't stop."

She knows her father well enough to picture the expression on this face, all of its lines sinking into deeper, sadder ones. "I understand," he says, tired for reasons that have nothing to do with the hour. "Are you sure these people can be trusted?"

"They're the only people I trust besides you," Cosette answers. "They're not interested in making money, Daddy, they want to make music."

"I'll look into it for you." A pause. "I miss you. Come home soon."

"I will," Cosette promises. "When I'm done."

*

Cosette falls asleep in the studio again midmorning on Tuesday and wakes up with her cheek pillowed on Enjolras's thigh. With an undignified yelp, she rolls off the couch.

"You two are like the multi-ethnic children I never had," Bossuet says, wiping away an invisible tear. Joly follows him into the room, along with a pretty girl with close-cropped hair and deep dimples. "Come on, Enjolras, wake up. The sound system isn't talking to any of our laptops again and we need whatever witchcraft you did last week."

"If by witchcraft you mean pressing a few keys," Enjolras says, but gets up without so much as a yawn, dragging a hand through his mussed hair. "Hello, Musichetta, it's good to see you."

"Likewise," the girl says, kissing his cheek before he heads downstairs with Bossuet. She holds out a hand to Cosette and helps her up. "Almost time for acoustic night, my dear. If I know Enjolras, neither of you have eaten a thing all day, so we ordered Chinese. There's something of everything. We were going to get pizza, but Marius said something about you being lactose intolerant?"

"Yes, though I think I have some Lactaid on me," Cosette says, trying to smooth the wrinkles out of her dress. "That was sweet of him."

"He's a sweetheart, our Marius," Musichetta agrees, then directs a significant eyebrow raise at Joly.

"Oh, right, yes! A good egg," Joly adds. "Despite his terror of the spotlight. You'll see later tonight."

Cosette finds a truly ridiculous amount of Chinese food in the break room as well as several Amis stuffing their faces. She snags an egg roll before Bahorel's terrible rampage consumes them all and chews it, listening to the cheerful hum of the room as she finishes waking up. She needs a hairbrush and a generous helping of General Tso's chicken, not necessarily in that order. Cosette feels emptied but not empty, creative drive satiated for the time being. Now she has time for other cravings, chief among them food. Then there's Marius, frowning at sheet music on one side of the room, and Eponine, deep in conversation with Grantaire, on the opposite side.

More food must be the answer. Cosette grabs a paper plate and piles it high. Right, it's acoustic night, that's why Bossuet is changing so many sound settings and Marius is fussing over music. She'll get to hear her friends' music in a little while.

"You do so remember how it all goes," Eponine says, voice slicing through the other conversations. Cosette turns her head to look. Eponine's beautiful tonight in another variation on the little black dress, this one with a complicated number of zippers. "I understand why Marius doesn't want to sing in front of people, but what's your excuse?"

"There are enough mediocre broken hearts on the scene as it is and you're much, much more talented than me?" Grantaire says, laughing as he ducks the swing she takes. Unlike the past few days of flannel and more flannel, he's wearing a well-fitted gray-blue shirt, no doubt in deference to the day's heat. "Fine, fine, you can have one duet. If I had a spotlight and a voice like yours, I'd never share it."

"We open with the duet," Eponine informs him. When Grantaire groans, she stuffs an egg roll in his mouth.

Well-fed, Les Amis finish opening the club for the evening. The crowds are as thick as ever, despite Enjolras's absence from the stage. He disappears back upstairs after fixing the sound system and grabbing a bite to eat. Marius tells her that Enjolras goes to great lengths to avoid recognition, though he always watches the acoustic set before it's his turn to go on. "I can't blame him," he says, and pulls his hat lower over his face. "Usually people don't know who I am, but the guitar makes them think of, well, me. They light the stage to hide my face, it's pretty cool."

"But you have such a nice face," Cosette says in mock-protest, and is rewarded by Marius going a brilliant shade of red. It matches the Angels baseball cap.

The acoustic set opens with some instrumental surf rock featuring Marius on lead guitar, Bahorel on drums, Grantaire on bass, and Feuilly on a series of increasingly unlikely instruments. Cosette's met a few multi-instrumentalists among her father's acquaintances, but very few capable of playing so many with such facility. Who knew the didgeridoo had such a place in rock and roll? The other three acquit themselves respectably, and Marius's love of playing guitar is visible even in shadow.

"Thank you, that was us," Feuilly says when their part is over. "We're not really a band, so we don't have a name, but we do love to play for you guys. But stay put, because the girl you've really been waiting for is on her way!"

The crowd applauds at the announcement; there are even a few whistles. Cosette beams as Feuilly departs the stage and Eponine walks on, hand lifted in a wave as she takes a seat at the keyboard. "Hello, everybody," she says, and smiles at the cheers that follow. "We've got a bit of a treat for you tonight. Our dear bass player has agreed to duet with me on 'This Mess We're In' by PJ Harvey and Thom Yorke. Here we go."

The song features Grantaire more heavily than Eponine, which would disappoint Cosette, except from the first Can you hear them, the helicopters? it's clear why Eponine demanded that Grantaire sing. His voice has a pure quality that's still very much of the earth, cloudy yet clear like quartz, or tinted glass. When Eponine joins in, her voice is even earthier, a rich alto that fills the large space of the club. Their voices blend beautifully, the same shade of messy yearning, and Marius underscores them quietly with one bare guitar line. Cosette joins the deafening applause when they conclude. Eponine grins and makes Grantaire take an awkward bow.

Then Eponine begins her original material.

This is the girl Enjolras should have chosen, Cosette thinks after the first song. Not me.

Eponine draws the audience in with a well-placed smirk and a flutter of long lashes. Then she takes them all by their collective heartstrings and pulls, naked emotion audible in every note, augmented by her keyboard and the others' instrumental parts. The poetry is evident in her lyrics, and her face tells the rest of the story: stories of desire, of heartbreak, of disillusionment. "Is that why they call me a sullen girl, sullen girl?" Eponine pleads with the audience, voice at once world weary and so very young. "They don't know I used to sail the deep and tranquil sea. But he washed my shore and he took my pearl, and left an empty shell of me."

By the end of "Sullen Girl," there are tears on Cosette's cheeks. She makes no move to wipe them away as the audience follows the song with quiet applause, too transfixed by Eponine's bowed head to make much noise. Then Eponine straightens, smiling with just one corner of her mouth. "Thank you. I've got one more for you. Get back in front of the mic, R, you know it's our song. This one is 'Shadowboxer.'"

Even more cheers at that; evidently it's a fan favorite. Cosette can hear why when Eponine nods to Bahorel and begins playing; the opening piano line is a bluesy, attention-demanding hook. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Enjolras leaning against the wall closest to the stairs, arms folded.

Eponine looks out into the audience and sings, straight at Cosette, "Once my lover, now my friend, what a cruel thing to pretend."

The song is mostly Eponine's, of course, glorious voice falling from her lips like honey as she sings of love and loss. Grantaire joins her for the chorus, his voice holding the same self-mockery as his speaking voice, and the bitterness would be too much were it not for how beautiful they make it sound. Cosette can't bear to look at the stage for too long lest she catch Eponine's eye again, so she casts about for other things to focus on: Courfeyrac and Combeferre behind the bar, making no pretense of working as they watch the stage; Musichetta leaning against Joly, who leans against Bossuet; Feuilly and Jehan swaying to the music; and Enjolras--Enjolras staring, in most intent and un-Enjolras-like fashion, at Grantaire.

"So I'll be sure to stay wary of you, love, to save the pain of once my flame and twice my burn," Eponine wails, fingers crashing against the keys as she leads them all into the final chorus. "So I'm a shadowboxer, baby, I wanna be ready for what you do--" and when Grantaire joins in, it's with his gaze fixed on Enjolras, who's now looking up at the ceiling, and Cosette could laugh if her heart weren't breaking-- "And I been swinging around at nothin', I don't know when you're gonna make your move."

They rip through the chorus one more time, Bahorel's drums crashing and Grantaire's bass line chasing the piano, song the amber shade of whiskey. The crowd goes wild as the vocals conclude, and the instrumental ending is lost to the thunder of its applause.

Cosette, too, is gone, caught between delight and despair.

Chapter Text

Cosette dries her face in the post-concert chaos. Makeup streaks her fingertips but she rushes forward anyway, pushing through the crowds to get to her friends just stepping off the stage. "That was amazing!" she shouts, but there are too many people around talking too loudly. "That was amazing!" she attempts again, this time with more breath support.

Bahorel grins from his drum kit and flashes her a thumbs up. Grantaire, closest to her, reaches out and ruffles her hair. Marius has already disappeared to prevent anyone recognizing him. And Eponine--Eponine is sheened with sweat, eyes and cheeks glowing, and she has a smile even for Cosette. Or maybe it's for the adoring throng calling her name; Eponine waves to them all and then saunters down the stairs.

"Come on!" Grantaire yells into Cosette's ear. "Follow us, you know you want to!"

Most of Les Amis are hard at work either behind the bar or setting up for Enjolras's set, but Marius, Feuilly, Musichetta, and Joly await them in the break room, full of cheer and, happily, desserts. "Don't tell the others, but I made cupcakes for tonight's musicians," Feuilly says, uncovering a box of beautifully frosted cupcakes. "The ones with the cream cheese frosting are red velvet and the others are chocolate with espresso frosting."

"Oh my God," Grantaire says, and puts his face in a chocolate espresso o ne. He makes muffled, appreciative noises that might be "thank you." The others dig in with slightly more grace but equal enthusiasm.

Cosette stares longingly at one of the red velvet cupcakes. Feuilly must notice, because he hands her one. "Tonight's artists got first pick, but I'm not a cruel man."

"Thank you," she says and bites into the cupcake. The subsequent wonder on her face causes the rest of the room to burst into laughter. The cupcake is a tiny pocket of perfection: the red velvet soft and bittersweet and the cream cheese frosting a light, sweet complement.

"I dabble a little," Feuilly says with a shrug. He sets the cupcake box on the table.

"Yeah, we're waiting for him to open his own cupcakery," says Joly.

"I would go there every day," Marius promises, licking frosting off his fingers. Someone calls him from inside the club and he sighs, pulling the baseball cap back on. "I'm needed. Save me a red velvet!"

Cosette and Eponine reach for a red velvet at the same time. Their hands brush. Cosette, reddening, snatches her hand back. Eponine arches one perfect eyebrow and takes the cupcake, depositing it on a plate for safekeeping, then leans back against the wall with her arms crossed. The others, loudly speculating over the menu in Feuilly's hypothetical cupcakery, don't appear to have noticed Cosette's venture into Disney cliche, only with baked goods instead of spaghetti.

"You were really amazing tonight," Cosette says. When in doubt, compliment an artist on her art. "You're a true alto, aren't you? Stupid question after those low notes you were hitting, sorry. I'm just--it's so affecting, the way you can belt like that but still get all soft and delicate in certain parts." Cosette stops herself from further gushing by taking another enormous bite of cupcake.

"I don't think anyone's ever referred to me as 'soft and delicate' before," Eponine says. She jabs a finger at a grinning Grantaire, his chin still sporting a dab of frosting. "Say nothing. Why don't you go watch Enjolras's set?"

"I am going to hang out with my friend Joly," Grantaire announces with great dignity, but as soon as he walks over to Joly and Musichetta, they head out towards the bar. Eponine watches them depart, smile all fond amusement as she polishes off the last of her cupcake. She crumples up the cupcake liner and tosses it in the trash can next to the door, clenching her fist in silent triumph when it sails in. It's adorable, another word Cosette suspects Eponine has never heard applied to her person.

"It's not as though you have to be one or the other," Cosette says at last. Eponine turns her head back to her, dark eyes widening slightly under heavy lashes. "Soft or hard or whatever. Record labels always want you to fulfill this image, I mean, it's literally their job to label you. But music is so much more than this little box and you're the dancing ballerina that pops up whenever the public wants you to do something."

"Now that's poetry," Eponine says, crossing her arms again as she looks Cosette up and down. Her gaze is frank, appraising, and Cosette blushes even though Eponine probably doesn't mean it that way. "You can do much better than the lyrics to 'Borderline.' I did like some of the cuts off your demo."

"That's my point exactly! Well, not about the lyrics, I was thinking more of the sound of dulled down desire, not that I mean to make excuses for myself because you're right." Cosette leans forward, hand gestures expounding on her words, as is her wont when excited. "But anyway, I know that I sound like an ingenue but half of the songs I wrote for that album were about death. What else is a teenager going to think about?"

Eponine laughs. "The pain of unrequited love. Sex, of course. I don't know why your label ever thought they should sign you as the next pop sensation, since you're clearly a weirdo underneath all the pastel sundresses."

"You mean like you're secretly a romantic underneath all the black and dark makeup?"

"Tell no one," Eponine commands with a mock glare. "Technically I don't have a label yet, but I still have an image to maintain."

"We should get brunch sometime," Cosette blurts, the impulse translating itself to speech before she even has time to process it. Eponine shoots her a puzzled look and Cosette, having gone this far, forges on ahead. "Because you work nights and breakfast food is delicious."

"It is delicious," Eponine says slowly, as if measuring each word before speaking it. She glances at the lone cupcake on the table, then back to Cosette. "All right. Enjolras definitely isn't going to help you with your lyrics."

"Awesome!" Cosette says, pulling her phone out of her pocket and handing it over to Eponine. "And true about Enjolras. I tried showing him this chorus I've been working on. He stared at the words for fifteen minutes, pointed to a random line, and said maybe I could lose that one. Keep in mind that it contained the song's working title."

"He's really impressive until you realize that deep down he's a total loser like the rest of us," Eponine agrees. Finished entering her number on Cosette's phone, she hits "call" and her pocket starts vibrating. "Just, you know, also a musical genius and totally committed to his ideals."

"Just those little things," Cosette says.

Eponine hands her back her phone, saying, "You just got a message."

"Oh, it's my dad. He's picking me up because I haven't really been home in the past 36 hours. And apparently he's been waiting for five minutes. I'm a terrible daughter." Cosette sighs, tapping out a reply to her father. "Sorry to cut the conversation short."

"Don't worry about it." Eponine hesitates a moment, lips parted as if to say something else. "We can get brunch tomorrow if you want. If you meet me here around ten, I know a diner. If you already have plans--"

"I have no plans whatsoever!" Cosette says. "I've been living in the studio, Enjolras can deal. I should eat some actual food anyway."

"Okay," Eponine says, now smiling in earnest. "Bring that notebook you're always writing in."

"Will do!"

Of course, on her way out of the break room, Cosette runs into Marius in the doorway. "Combeferre gave me five minutes to eat my cupcake on the condition I bring one out for him," he explains, and then hugs Cosette. "Thank you for saving me one!"

"Actually, it was Eponine," Cosette manages despite her sudden proximity to all of Marius's freckles. He gives good hugs. He also has lovely eyes.

"Then thank you," Marius says, releasing Cosette to walk over and hug Eponine, who immediately stiffens in his embrace. Despite Eponine's grimace, which combines panic and wistfulness in one truly uncomfortable facial expression, they make a beautiful couple. Eponine is the perfect height for Marius to kiss her forehead, which he does in thanks. She closes her eyes.

Cosette turns, fleeing from the ABC without bothering to wave to anyone behind the bar. If she were a better person, she would leave them both alone, but she's not, she's not, and her father is waiting for her at the curb.

*

Cosette's crisis of conscience lasts only as far as Eponine texting her the following morning. Still on for brunch? stares at her from the screen of her phone for only a moment before Cosette replies in the affirmative. Just for fun, she digs up some black skinny jeans, though she's forced to pair them with a neon green tank top. Unlike some people, she can't make black on black work, and her few neutral tops are in the laundry anyway.

When Cosette gets to the ABC, she gives a peal of laughter. Eponine's waiting for her outside clad in actual color, her dress a short, clingy affair in scarlet. "If we invite someone else along, we could make a traffic light," Cosette says.

"We can work with Christmas in June," Eponine says. "Follow me."

Eponine leads her to a diner called Voltaire's, a little hole in the wall far off any kind of main drag. "I recommend a savory breakfast. Anything with chicken here is especially amazing," she says, handing Cosette a menu. "Grantaire found this place a couple months back. He called me after he ordered a sandwich and told me to come here if I valued my taste buds. I thought I was getting a mid-morning drunk dial, but he was just excited."

"Well then," Cosette says, and orders the Breakfast Barnyard Scramble along with a coffee. "So, um," she says, awkward once the waitress heads off to put their orders in. "Did you end up working last night, or did you get a break for once?"

"Hard to sleep when you live above a dance floor, despite fancy soundproofing." The waitress returns with glasses of water and Eponine tears the wrapper off a straw. "No, I worked. I always do. For the rent Enjolras charges me, I should be working seven days a week. He has no business sense whatsoever."

"You're both such hard workers," Cosette says. "I'm happy to write music 24/7, but I don't have to worry about running a club or taking care of my little brother. I like to help out my dad with all of his work with nonprofits, but he looks after me, so it's a mutual thing." Who looks after you? she wants to ask Eponine, but she's not sure they know each other well enough for that. Eponine wouldn't be a ballerina in a music box, she'd be the box itself, with all sorts of secret compartments accessible only if you know the hidden parts to press.

"Gavroche looks after himself, mostly. Makes his own meals out of the food I buy, washes his dishes, does his own laundry. I have to make him do his homework because he thinks school is stupid, but he doesn't skip or anything."

"Still." The waitress passes by again, this time with coffee: iced for Eponine, hot for Cosette. Cosette pours a packet of sugar into her coffee and stirs. If she offers up some of her own past, will Eponine offer hers? "It wasn't always my dad and me. He's not my dad biologically, he was a friend of my mother's. She died when I was little and I ended up in foster care. I don't remember much from back then, but…" She trails off. Sometimes the memories come in fragments: the floral scent of her mother's perfume, a handmade rag doll, her name spoken in various jeering tones. She asked once about "that place I was in" years ago and then never again; it made her father unhappy and gave her a week of nightmares she could never piece together upon waking.

"The Lark," Eponine says, and Cosette's head snaps up to look at her. Eponine has her fingers clenched around her iced coffee, fingertips pale around her black nails. Eponine swallows, eyes suddenly bright with tears. "You're the little girl my parents took in, aren't you? I thought I'd seen you before. I--I'm sorry."

Ugly! exclaims the voice of a child from eleven years ago, and it matches the blurred face of a girl with beautiful dark hair and eyes. "There was a little girl and a baby," Cosette murmurs, then shakes her head. "I really don't remember much of it. If you teased me, don't worry."

"My parents were always after you." Eponine's voice is thick, and she takes a shaky breath before continuing. "Parents, I shouldn't call them that. They were terrible. It took forever, but I'm Gavroche's legal guardian now. We can take care of ourselves because we had to. God, I can't believe you and I ran into each other after all these years! I'm glad you made it out of the system."

"We both did," Cosette says, gripping Eponine's hands because it looks like she might cry at any moment. For once, she hates her inability to recall the time she spent in foster care. Maybe then she could truly empathize with Eponine instead of offering her the paltry comfort of hand-holding. Her hands look inadequate in Eponine's slightly larger ones, her calluses from playing guitar rough against hands that coax music from pianos. No wonder Eponine's songs sound so sad.

Their food arrives and Cosette lets go in favor of finding her fork. She digs in. The chicken is as excellent as promised, the scrambled eggs cooked just right, the bacon crispy. "I'm going to eat breakfast here forever," Cosette says after sampling a forkful.

Eponine stares down at her plate, turning her fork over and over in one hand. She doesn't seem to have heard.

"Does Grantaire know any other hidden restaurants of Los Angeles?" Cosette tries. Eponine at least nods in response to that one. "And he's the one who passed on my demo. Huh, I guess he's the hidden treasures expert in general. Yes, I just called myself a treasure. A girl has to be her own best friend first." No response to that pitiful attempt at a joke. "Why are he and Enjolras so weird about each other, anyway?"

That gets a laugh. In fact, it gets way more than a laugh. Cosette watches, bewildered, as Eponine literally rests her forehead on the table, her shoulders shaking with laughter. A full five minutes pass before Eponine calms herself and sits back up, dabbing at her eyes with a napkin. "Courfeyrac and I have a running bet on how long it takes people to notice," she says at last. "You're quicker than most. A couple years ago, Enjolras did a show in Portland and they hooked up. A little while later, Grantaire just happens to show up at the ABC. Courfeyrac was the first one to make friends with him because that's just what he does, but in a couple months we were all friends, groupie or no. All Grantaire does is start fights with Enjolras and pine in anti-secrecy."

"And no one knows what Enjolras thinks," Cosette guesses as Eponine finally tucks into her food. This is like high school on television, full of gossip about complicated love lives.

Eponine nods, swallowing her food. "Maybe Combeferre and Courfeyrac know. I don't even know if he remembers their one-night stand. We live together, but all we do is talk shop. He does play 'We R Who We R' whenever Grantaire puts it on the request list as a joke. You know, because Ke$ha spells it with just the letter R--anyway. Grantaire is the one who crashes on my couch whenever one of us is having a rough night. Boys can be so oblivious--"

And Eponine cuts herself off in the middle of her sentence, a look of horror crossing her face. Cosette's breakfast tastes like sawdust in her mouth, and she takes a gulp of coffee to wash it down. She and Eponine were almost friends just then, but a certain guitar player stands in between them. She could cry at the unfairness of it all, but it's not unfair, she just wants them both.

"I brought my lyrics notebook," Cosette says at last. She pushes it across the table and Eponine starts flipping through, mouth set in a hard line.

*

After a lyrics writing session more awkward than helpful, Cosette returns to two unpleasant e-mails. One is from Justice Records, of course, promising that some legal representative will be hammering down her door any day now. The second e-mail drains her of any will to write a snarky reply to the first; it's from one of the coffee shops she used to play, asking whether she can fill in for an act that canceled at the last minute. She would in a heartbeat, but there's only one song of her own she's legally allowed to play, and doing a night of covers would just be admitting defeat. I'm still quite busy with recording, she writes back, and lets herself cry as she types. Please give Jesse and the girls my love. Next time!

She spends the rest of the day lying on her bed and watching old American Idol YouTube videos. It's definitely Marius on there, a little younger and twice as bashful. He auditions with a selection from "Honey and the Moon," a pretty indie song. His version of "Free Fallin'" is what propelled him to serious contender status, though the cover of Britney Spears' "3" he did with two other contestants had the judges buzzing long before. There are some interview clips with MARIUS PONTMERCY DISCUSSES ESTRANGED FATHER'S DEATH splashed all over the titles, so Cosette avoids them. It doesn't seem right, watching strangers find out personal things about someone she knows. She does watch his last Idol performance, a cover of Joshua Radin's "Someone Else's Life." She cries before the Marius on her screen does, every word he sings full of sorrow for someone he never knew.

Eponine's videos are harder to find, most of them minute-long clips captured with someone's shaky cell phone. There's a full version of "Shadowboxer" sans Grantaire on YouTube as well as another song called "The Child Is Gone." An unlabeled upload turns out to be a gorgeous cover of "Across the Universe." Cosette has to smile at that despite the tears filling her eyes yet again. What a disaster she's made of her love life, such a disaster that all she can do is mope in her room to the music of the people she wants to date.

When her father calls her to dinner, Cosette broods at the table, picking at the salad on her plate. She doesn't even notice the chicken until her father asks whether she'd like some.

"I already had chicken once today," Cosette says, and sighs.

Her father wipes his hands on his napkin. "It must have been extremely depressing chicken." His voice is gentle, without rebuke, but Cosette bursts into tears anyway.

"I can't even play at Cafe Lemblin," she sobs, covering her face with her hands. She can't tell her father about Marius and Eponine yet, but she has to tell someone something to alleviate the weight on her shoulders. "My label owns everything, Daddy, everything but the one song I wrote with Enjolras. What if they never let me go? What if I never get my songs back?"

Her father's chair makes a scraping noise as he pushes it out. Moments later, Cosette feels a warm hand rubbing her back, movements betraying a slight hesitancy. As long as she's known him, her father has been a bit odd about physical contact. "Let me help you," he says. "We can seek legal advice."

"Don't waste your money. Give it to charity," Cosette says, but her tears have stopped. She wipes her eyes. So much crying, it's like fourteen all over again. "I signed everything over. Everything. As strange as it sounds, I think the ABC is my best bet. Public shaming trumps legal technicality."

"That it does," her father says, still stroking her back. He sounds far away, though, filtered through time. "The lawyers are the only ones who know the ins and outs of legal technicalities. God knows I saw enough of that in the industry."

"Did you meet anyone as stupid as me?"

"It's not stupid to trust people. The difficulty lies in others being unworthy of your trust."

Cosette sniffs, lifts her head, and pushes her hair out of her face. She must look a mess; her face feels hot and her skin itches where her tear tracks have dried. "The people I'm working with sound like you back in the old days. Out of the spotlight, helping struggling musicians. You must have helped people, right? You've always done so much for others."

"Because you've made me a better man, Cosette," her father says, voice soft. He presses a hand to his face and closes his eyes briefly. "You and Mr. Myriel and your mother. No, I was a selfish man back then. The only musician I've ever truly helped was your mother, who had legal troubles of her own. It pains me to see you relive them."

"My mother?"

Her father's hand on her back stills.

Cosette knows little about her mother, small facts strung together by faint memory like beads on a rosary. Her mother's name was Fantine, she loved all kinds of music, she lived with Cosette's biological father for a little while but never married him, she loved desserts but was hopeless at baking, she was Catholic like Jean Valjean, her father met her years after Cosette was born, and she grew up on the West Coast but not in Los Angeles. Cosette remembers her mother singing her an old French lullaby, all but the melody lost to the passage of time. Cosette has never longed for Fantine, precisely--her father has always been family enough--but she likes that music ties all three of them together.

"She was signed to a label?" Cosette asks, shock dulling sadness. "Did she make any albums? Can I listen to them? Why didn't you tell me?" The last question bursts from her before she can think better of it, modulate it to sound less accusatory.

Jean Valjean says, "I can't tell you." His hands fall into his lap, worn and veined.

"Can't? Or won't?"

But her father doesn't answer, only shakes his head. Cosette's stomach churns and she shoves her chair away from the dinner table, away from more questions that have no answer.

*

Cosette cries herself into a post-dinner nap, which proves neither dignified nor restful. She wakes in the middle of the night to a ceiling patterned black and orange with shadow and streetlight, one of her own songs stuck in her head. Go on girls - solo, go on girls - take a chance loops cruelly around the inside of her skull. Cosette rolls over and pushes herself upright, balling her fists around the soft fabric of her pillow. She exhales and the music stops.

The only musician I've ever truly helped was your mother, who had legal troubles of her own.

You're the little girl my parents took in, aren't you?

You're one of the bravest people I know.

She lets go of the pillow to press her hands over her eyes. No tears fall, though the heaviness sitting on her lungs makes it hard for her to draw breath. Ghost voices clamor in her head, scraps of melody and conversation, but not one of them belongs to her mother. Would she know what to do in Cosette's situation? Would she keep secrets from her daughter? Would she be alarmed by Cosette's growing infatuation with two people, or would she understand?

"No more," Cosette whispers, and gets out of bed. The floorboards are cool against her feet as she dresses: sports bra, underwear, shorts, tank top, neon yellow running shirt, socks. She pulls her hair back into a ponytail while squeezing into her running shoes, then throws her wallet, notebook, phone, and keys into her drawstring backpack. Armband, iPod, headphones. The ritual of preparation is almost as soothing as running itself.

Her father will worry that she's running in the middle of the night, but he'll worry more if she doesn't leave a note. Cosette scribbles Running! -C on a scrap of paper and pins it on the fridge with a magnet.

Los Angeles, much like any other large city, doesn't really sleep, but running in the dead of night gives you a different perspective of the city. Los Angeles is dark, the sky bruised with clouds and the air chilly. Cosette spends an extra five minutes in a slow jog, warming up her muscles before she cuts loose into her natural stride. The latest draft of one of her new songs scores her run; if she has to have her own material stuck in her head, it can at least be material that has a chance of seeing the light of day.

Her neighborhood is too familiar to distract from inner turmoil, so Cosette turns to one of her longer jogging routes, infrequently used because of the series of hills, each one steeper than the last. How many miles is it? Five? If she keeps her pace easy, that's a good hour of running. Her song draft is three minutes long. Twenty times through might give her some idea of what words in her notebook match the melody. Cosette doesn't write music on the run often, too focused on pacing herself, but sometimes she can force the words through sheer repetition. Some distant day, God willing, a journalist will ask her about her songwriting process and then have to turn "running around trying to get the right words stuck in my head" into some sort of deep insight into the creative process. Cosette, on the second repeat of the song and speeding down the first hill, almost manages a smile at the thought.

The third hill burns all the way, so of course Cosette pushes herself harder, gearing up for a seven-minute mile pace. Running is a masochist's sport, much like performing. She should do her next song live at the ABC. She do acoustic night, should get Marius to play guitar and Eponine on piano, leaving her free to focus on the vocals. And of course, the song playing now is one piano and one guitar when you strip it down. Enjolras was right about changing it to a minor key; it does want to be a melancholy song. Cosette grits her teeth, focusing on the ground as she descends the third hill lest she trip over her own feet. Her calves hurt. It's too hard after all to push on; she slows without stopping.

If she were more literary, perhaps she could write the great American novel about joggers who never seem to get anywhere, some Kerouackian affair where the point might be the journey but the futility of the destination informs every step of the way. A car approaches, music blaring and high beams blinding. Cosette's pulse quickens further, reminded of the time of night. The car passes but the rush of adrenalin remains, fuel for the last few hills. Blinking the spots from her eyes, Cosette thinks, Lights, lights, lights, lights.

The words stick in her head.

Halfway up the last hill, her lungs as well as her legs begin to burn and her shoulders begin to ache. Cosette shifts the swing of her arms into the proper back-and-forth motion, the tension in her collarbone easing. Funny how the body gravitates toward imperfect form when it tires. She wrote something the other day, something about the industry wearing her down. Her fingers twitch, searching the pages of an imaginary notebook. And I'm not sleeping now, the dark is too hard to beat; and I'm not keeping now the strength I need.

Cosette stops at the top of the last hill, sweat sheening her face and heart pumping. Obedient to both muscle memory and the rules of running, she sits on the pavement and folds her legs into a stretch, reaching for her toes. Her legs will be unhappy with her tomorrow, or rather, later today. (And tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow, but that's wrong for the song still playing in her ears. Lights, lights, lights, lights.)

Down below, pieces of the city sleep, but even the darkened buildings have windows that reflect the streetlights. Clouds still frown over the horizon, promising more June gloom, but the sky has lightened in a precursor to sunrise. Cosette leans against a tree to stretch her quads. Somewhere beyond the wash of fluorescent and neon light, her father sleeps, waiting for her to come home.

'Cause they're calling, calling, calling me home, calling, calling, calling home.

Cosette lets her foot go and fumbles for her notebook. There's the other piece of the chorus. It waited for her up here, where she's close enough to the sky to remember freedom. She scribbles in the half-light, a messy scrawl she prays she'll be able to read when she gets to the studio. The words flow from her pen, already scattered through her notebook in a hundred places, fitted together at last. She writes the last word and clicks her pen off, transferring it to her other hand to ease her cramped fingers. It's done. She can record it.

She'll go home before heading to the ABC, though. Whatever Jean Valjean is keeping from her, he's still her father, and the thought of him quietly trying to go about his day thinking she's too angry to speak to him--well, it doesn't bear thinking about.

*

Cosette leaves her father his favorite type of scone from their neighborhood bakery, a fresh pot of coffee, and a new note explaining that she finished writing another song. The note itself is rather more terse than what she would normally leave, but the excitement of songwriting leaves little room for anger.

Partway through the bus ride, she realizes she hasn't showered or even changed out of her running clothes. Well, Enjolras won't care and she can just avoid Eponine until she hops into the shower. Cosette hums the new words to her song under her breath.

She has to switch on the studio lights and power up the computer when she arrives. Even Enjolras, who works seven days a week and doesn't seem to need sleep, must be in his bed. Cosette resists the temptation to peek into bedrooms; bad enough that she's developing a reputation as a shameless eavesdropper. While the equipment powers on, Cosette writes out a slightly neater copy of the lyrics, scratching out a few words here and there to better fit the song's tempo. These are lyrics she wouldn't mind showing Eponine. But later, when they're no longer raw with feeling. After a look at the guitar in the corner, Cosette decides to go with her imagination and use the already-laid tracks for guitar and piano, leaving the vocals to her. Enjolras will remix the song later, but this recording session is all for her.

Unlike her first attempt at the lyrics, her first runthrough of the song is terrible. After Cosette comes in at the wrong time for the second verse, she stops the recording and deletes the resulting file. Enjolras likes to keep everything in the off-chance he'll be able to mine it for a clip, but Cosette refuses to keep any takes except the ones that come after the first time she gets everything right. It's about the spirit of the song, Cosette tried to explain. I know a recording doesn't have to be perfect, but it shouldn't have obvious mistakes.

Deleting the first five takes provides an odd sort of relief. The lyrics came together with such unusual ease--heartbroken, on top of a hill, running on practically no sleep. An hour ago, Cosette felt as though she didn't earn "Lights," but effort elevates it from an entry in her diary to music.

Enjolras has a mirror set in the opposite wall so musicians can check their form. As she begins the sixth take, Cosette looks across the room at her tired face, the makeup long since cried and sweated off, and sings to the girl she was six months ago, just facing the terrible reality of her recording contract. "I had a way then, losing it all on my own," she sings into the mic, tapping her foot to keep her in time. "I had a heart then, but the queen has been overthrown."

When Cosette closes her eyes, pinpricks of light await her, little globes of translucent red that float over the darkness. There's one for her father, one for her mother, one for Eponine, one for Marius, one for Enjolras, one for every other Ami, one for every Justice Records representative she's met. One by one by one by one, repeating. They blur together after a few moments, a representative mess connected in one person, one piece of music. "You show the lights that stop me turn to stone and shine it when I'm alone," she sings, and years of practice keep her voice from breaking. "And so I tell myself that I'll be strong and dreaming when they're gone, 'cause they're calling, calling, calling me home, calling, calling, calling home."

Cosette stops the recording after she finishes and saves the file as "Lights Take 01." It's only then that applause sounds from the doorway.

"Beautiful," Enjolras says, a rare smile softening his impressive face. "Now let's take it from the top."

Time passes. Cosette loses count of the takes, forgets to look at her watch when they move on to mixing the song. "Lights" won't be ready to debut tonight, but neither she nor Enjolras likes leaving a thing half-finished. At some point Courfeyrac brings them a tray containing two sandwiches and two glasses of water. Cosette can hear Eponine through the open door, holding an animated conversation with someone in Spanish, and the last dregs of adrenalin trickle away. She sits and chews on her sandwich without tasting it, though she does notice that Courfeyrac remembered to leave off the cheese. Everyone here is so sweet.

She must look especially morose, because after Enjolras finishes half of his sandwich (with cheese), he clears his throat and says, "Your newest song sounds like you're trying to work through something big."

"Some of it's label stuff. They're going to send someone to 'talk' to me soon," Cosette says, swinging her legs back and forth. Her knees pop. Then, because Enjolras is making an effort, she adds, "My love life's a mess, too."

"...oh," Enjolras says with an uncomfortable look, then takes a sip from his glass.

"Do you have anyone special in your life?" Cosette asks, batting her eyelashes. Enjolras chokes on his water and she covers her mouth to hide her smile. "Just asking. You seem pretty married to your job, but you also know a lot of great people." Not that she knows much of Grantaire besides his beautiful voice, constant quipping, and probable alcoholism, but he and Eponine love each other. That counts for a lot, in Cosette's opinion.

"I admire my friends for their commitment to a better and more just world, even beyond the music community," Enjolras says, recovering. "They are also excellent, loyal companions, capable of great wit, artistry, and kindness. I am married to my work, as you say, but I am not indifferent to humanity. Music is one of the ultimate forms of human expression, after all; it is why I fight to preserve its purity. I know that marketing is always a consideration when trying to live off one's art, but I know that it is possible to create first, then edit with a view to sell a coherent artistic vision. You have never once broached the subject of pop stardom, though fame can only help our cause. The music itself is your true goal." Then, quieter: "Do not lose sight of that. The temptations of fame are many. Whatever your romantic troubles, they will only be compounded by abuse of your acclaim."

During his speech, Cosette finishes her sandwich, made more palatable by Enjolras's obvious love for his companions. She glows a little at his praise, then listens with increasing fondness as he attempts to give her advice. "Are you talking about my situation or yours?" she asks.

Enjolras runs a hand through his hair, then attempts to smooth it back down. "Are you comfortable with leaving off for today? I need to make some revisions to tonight's setlist. It's getting late."

"Okay," Cosette says, because Enjolras seems like the last person who would welcome a push in the direction of emotional honesty, no matter how gentle. She gives him a brief hug before she collects their empty plates and glasses. "Some things don't wait forever. People, too."

Before she closes the door to the studio, she looks back over her shoulder. Enjolras is staring straight ahead at his computer, but his headphones are still around his neck, the music stopped for now. Her throat aches with sympathy.

Chapter Text

As predicted, "Lights" isn't ready to debut that night. Cosette, rubbing at gritty-feeling eyes, vetoes the possibility of Enjolras using one of her takes in a mix of his own creation. "It doesn't feel collaborative enough," she says. "Tell your following that it'll be ready tomorrow. If we bust our butts, we can make it happen."

More and more, she's learning to read Enjolras: the way he tilts his head when giving a person his full attention, which nod indicates agreement and which merely recognition of words addressed to him, the slight smile he reserves for his friends. Enjolras always looks serious unless you know him; he's wearing the last expression now. "As ever, I appreciate your dedication," he says. "I thought I might unveil another remix from your demo album tonight to build anticipation for tomorrow. It's a more dancefloor-oriented piece. I might make a brief speech over a portion of it, since it clocks in at over eight minutes."

"When do I get to make a speech?" Cosette asks, wry, and then has to spend several minutes reassuring Enjolras that yes, she feels like an equal partner in this endeavor, and no, she has zero desire to make an intensely personal speech tonight on about two hours of sleep. "I looked at some reviews when I was supposed to be napping," she admits. Those reviews were flattering, a welcome balm over the still-stinging memory of someone criticizing her breath control after one of her cafe concerts. It was accurate criticism, but still. "I think the air of mystery actually helps. Maybe one more week of anonymity, then I can get up and sing."

Cosette feels strangely reluctant to listen to Enjolras's latest remix, and the reason surfaces when he debuts the song in the ABC. As promised, his version of "Post Modern Sleaze" sounds radically different from the original, but it's still her voice over all his electronic touches, singing about the life she imagined for a girl she used to see at one of her coffee shop venues. In retrospect, Cosette had a bit of a crush on the grinning barista who spent more time gossiping than making drinks.

"Borderline" and "Lights" are both good, great even. The real issue, the source of the lump in Cosette's throat as she excuses herself from the sweat-soaked haze of the club, is that those two songs are the only songs she owns. Entire pieces of her past are missing, including the one stupid song she wrote as a joke and recorded for the end of the album anyway, and she's tired of fighting for what rightfully belongs to her already, just tired beyond belief as Enjolras begins another fiery speech to an enraptured crowd. Outside the ABC is cool in comparison, and she leans against the wall, trying to stay downwind from the smokers.

At least she's not crying. That would make the count at least ten times in the past 48 hours, and Cosette hasn't done that since the flu three years ago, when she learned that cold meds and Lilo and Stitch do not mix.

The door to the ABC swings open. Music spills out, music and the sound of Enjolras's voice, still going strong. Marius follows after, head turning as he scans up and down the street. When his gaze lights on Cosette, she wipes her face despite the lack of tears. The impulse to smile for him sputters and dies; Marius knows there's something wrong. She doesn't have to pretend.

"Hey," he says, and presses a styrofoam coffee cup into her hands. "There's definitely not a margarita in here and Joly definitely did not prescribe it."

"Thanks," Cosette says, sipping. It goes down tart with an alcohol afterburn, the way a margarita should. "Sorry for being a drama queen."

Marius shakes his head and leans against the wall next to her. "I've seen lots of drama queens. You're not one of them. One of the contestants on my season was the worst one I've ever seen. She wasn't even good, but they kept her around to add narrative tension." He sighs. "I just wanted to play guitar for lots of people."

Cosette would pass him her margarita, but that would definitely attract the attention of the scowling cop across the street. She rests her head on his shoulder instead, ignoring the wash of guilt. She's not dating either of them, so what does it matter where she gets comfort? "I just wanted to share my music with people, but look how that turned out."

They stand in silence for a few minutes. Out here, faint, booming bass sounds are all that remain of Enjolras's setlist. Cars crawl by on the street, caught in a knot of traffic. The breeze picks up and Cosette has to brush a strand of hair away from her nose.

"I thought I could never love music again," Marius says, so soft he's barely audible. "It took a lot of therapy to get me back to zero. I never really knew my father, you know. He died suddenly while I was competing, and it was then I found out--" He draws a shaky breath. "I found out that he'd been trying to get in touch with me. I don't know if it was just because my face was everywhere, or if he really wanted to know me. And the show was awful, I never really wanted to be famous, and I was waking up every day too tired to even listen to the song I was supposed to learn so--I dropped out. I slept for a month. And then I started seeing a therapist."

Cosette presses closer, one arm stealing around his waist as he takes another shuddering gulp of air. "I'm amazed you're able to play at all after that," she says. "As much as it hurts to think of you never playing guitar again. Even with the baseball cap on, I can see how much you love it." She's surprised no one has recognized Marius outside of a taco place, actually, but she's not going to tell him that.

"Like how I can see how much you love singing," Marius says, and Cosette makes the mistake of looking up into his smiling face. "Even when you're just listening to something Enjolras has added to the mix, you're always making music. You haven't lost that. Sometimes it just goes to sleep for a while."

Again. Cosette could almost kiss him again, feels the temptation shiver on her lips. She licks them, tasting sour-sweet margarita, and Marius's gaze drops to her mouth. His lips part, and he begins to lean forward--

"Eponine!" Cosette half-screams, and almost drops her drink.

Marius looks over his shoulder, as if expecting to see her in the doorway. "What about her?" he asks with a puzzled frown, turning back to Cosette.

Boys can be so oblivious, says the memory of Eponine, the weight of all her sad songs and longing glances contained in five words and a wistful smile. Cosette sways away from Marius, the tequila an abrupt surge across her nerve endings, and shouts, "She's in love with you!"

Even the nearby smokers fall silent. Marius stares at her, his mouth a perfect O of shock.

"I--I have to go home," Cosette says as he continues gaping. "Forget I said anything. Bye."

Torching any possibility of dating either of them is one way of solving her romantic problems.

*

Someone must have told Eponine, because she and Gavroche turn up their noses at the apology muffins Cosette brings to the ABC the next morning. "We're allergic to chocolate chips," Gavroche claims, somehow managing to look down on her from a sitting position. Eponine sweeps by without a word or even a look, beautiful face frozen in disdain. She doesn't even speak to Marius, hovering halfway between the bar and Cosette. The rest of Les Amis present look varying shades of uncomfortable.

Cosette places the enormous tray of muffins dead center on the counter, shame a hot weight in her throat. Good thing she isn't planning to sing tonight. If anyone says a single kind word to her, she'll fall to pieces, so she just nods to the boys. Jehan gives her a sympathetic smile, Courfeyrac shrugs as if to say what can you do, and Combeferre continues highlighting passages in a large textbook. Marius mumbles something and then flees to the break room.

All three of them might as well head in different directions. Continue the pattern. Cosette squares her shoulders and marches upstairs to the studio. Without a word, she takes a seat next to Enjolras, already plugged into his equipment, and slides a pair of headphones on. "Lights" has morphed since Cosette listened to it last, all sorts of synths overlaying the guitar, bass, and keyboard sections.

"The lights are streetlights," Cosette says when it finishes. "The spaceship noises make it too science fiction."

"The whirring effect?" Enjolras asks. At her nod, he continues, "Let me bury it deeper in the mix. My intent was to suggest electronics and augment the changes in your voice, not transport the audience to Star Trek." His mouth quirks into a smile at the last phrase, as though he's told a terribly funny joke.

"I didn't know you were a fan," Cosette says, trying to keep a straight face. When Enjolras turns back to the computer screen to adjust the sound levels, a little bubble of hysteria forms underneath her collarbone. It expands during its rapid ascent. Seconds later, she has to bury her face in her hands, shaking with silent laughter. She shouldn't encourage terrible jokes, but the leader of the free music movement is such a nerd.

Tapping her shoulder, Enjolras says, "It's done."

Cosette puts her headphones back on and Enjolras hits "play." The spaceship noises perform as intended when lowered, increasing the pull of her voice as the song moves into the second section of the chorus. She closes her eyes and the instrumentation flickers and flashes underneath her eyelids, a stutter of electricity. The song sounds like loneliness in a crowded club, like impossible promises unkept, like a soul trapped at the crossroads. "You mean it's done done," Cosette says when it finishes, pulling her headphones down to her shoulders. "It's finished. It can debut tonight."

As soon as she pronounces the song complete, her sense of shame returns, its heaviness already too familiar. Cosette looks at her watch. It's only ten in the morning, and it's around this time on Fridays that Marius likes to practice in the break room, fine-turning any new song arrangements scheduled for Tuesday. Were the studio not soundproofed, she could doubtless hear him tuning now. Plus going downstairs means possibly running into Eponine, into anyone rightfully angry at Cosette for spilling a secret that wasn't hers. "Can we play a getting to know you game?" Cosette asks, seizing on the first idea to cross her mind.

Enjolras stares at her. Cosette gives herself a mental slap on the forehead. Why doesn't she ever wait for the best idea to cross her mind? "So we can bond more as musicians," Cosette says weakly. "I thought it would be nice. Just don't tell me any deep dark secrets."

Now his stare shifts focus: less incredulous, more thoughtful. "If you're referring to what you told Marius yesterday, it needed saying. It distracts all three of you from your work."

"They were the inspiration for both of the songs I've finished!" Cosette says, stung. "What inspires you, Enjolras? Do you even care about specific people, or does it only matter whether they're being oppressed?"

In the ensuing crystal moment of silence, Enjolras visibly draws in a breath. He offers no other reaction other than a slight widening of his eyes. God, what kind of accusation was that to make? Voice choked with horror, Cosette says, "I'm so sorry, that wasn't fair."

"It's a fair question," Enjolras says quietly. "I've had this conversation before with Combeferre and Courfeyrac, together and separately. They tell me when I start to forget that people are people, not causes. I'm not a kind person. I am grateful to have friends who are."

You are, Cosette wants to say, but the words die on her tongue. Her father is kind, kind to a fault, and he raised her the same way. Enjolras's principles are etched in stone, absolute and unbending. Justice may resemble kindness at times but it is not the same. "You do care about particular people, though," Cosette says, thinking of Enjolras's face as he watched Grantaire sing.

He interprets her words differently. "Eponine is the reason we decided to start our own label," Enjolras says. "She's a brilliant musician who would never get signed, not while having to prove to the state that she's capable of caring for Gavroche. I'm sure you're unsurprised to hear the Department of Child Protective Services has certain biases. They moved in when it became clear her previous apartment was unacceptable to the state." He pauses to take a sip from a glass of water, carefully positioned away from delicate equipment. "It took us a few years to gather the funds for Friends of the ABC, despite the wealth in some of our families, mine included. We assumed Eponine would be our first artist in another year or so, but then we found you."

"Great, another reason for her to hate me," Cosette sighs. She swallows past the lump in her throat. "I don't want to talk about my problems. We have opposite problems, let's talk about yours."

Enjolras, jiggling the mouse to keep the computer from going into sleep mode, stills. "What problems?"

"My love life distracts me from my work sometimes." Cosette summons all her courage to look Enjolras in the eye as she adds, "Your work is your life, but you also use it to distract yourself from your feelings."

"My feelings," he repeats, and he actually sounds confused.

Now it's Cosette's turn to stare in disbelief. Gaze lifted heavenward, she asks, "Why is it that no one here dares speak the name of any love? Is it something in the water? Are we trapped in a romance novel? Your face when you listen to him play. I don't know how anyone could think you don't care."

Enjolras turns back to the computer screen, but he closes his eyes. In profile, he looks like a classical sculpture entitled Man Struggling With Conflicting Emotions. He opens his eyes after a few moments. Clearing his throat, he says, "That's not pertinent to the cause. My--if you must know the truth of this matter, my greatest failure to the cause was with--him." His expression tightens, wiping any trace of hesitation, and his voice grows harsh, accusatory. "I used my personal fame for sexual congress, when it was only ever meant to raise awareness. Just once, I wanted to rebel against my self-imposed restrictions. There were no finer feelings involved at the time. That those developed later is a fitting punishment. He admires a person who does not exist."

Cosette spins his chair around so he faces her. Gently, she says, "You're an idiot."

"I am atoning in the only way I know how," he replies, equally gentle. He pats her hand as though she's the one in need of intervention. "You should talk to someone else about your problems. Clearly there are many reasons why I'm unfit to give advice."

"Then let's talk music," Cosette says. Tears fill her eyes. For once, they're not for herself. She blinks them away. "Walk me through how you make a setlist. I want to know."

*

A week makes quite the difference, she finds herself thinking throughout the day. Cosette, refusing to think about the happy if somewhat terrified anticipation of last week, hides in the studio long after Enjolras heads downstairs to prepare for a night of DJing. She leaves the door open a crack so that she can hear when her song starts, because her musician's ego demands she at least be present for that. In the meantime, she occupies herself with listening to Enjolras's array of playlists.

Someone pushes the door open and Grantaire appears in the doorway, sporting his usual weather-defying flannel. Cosette's heart sinks. Maybe Eponine sent him to yell at her. "Don't let our fearless leader catch you listening to 90's music," he drawls, weaving his way over to her. "He's dismissed an entire decade, done away with a whole era. We nearly came to blows when I requested 'Inside Out.'" Leaning over her shoulder, he smells like a combination of various liquors.

Cosette rubs her nose so she doesn't sneeze. Grantaire seems his usual affable self. Maybe it's the booze. "He listened to a Third Eye Blind song for an entire hour today. You must be mistaken."

"I am never mistaken," Grantaire informs her, then ruins his serious expression by winking. "Our dear Courfeyrac has requested your presence. Usually he spends his evenings entertaining several ladies, so it's an honor just to be considered. Let's go, Miss America."

She bites her lower lip, not moving from her chair. "You're not angry with me?"

"For Eponine? Have you met the lady? Her rage does more than merely tower, it Mount Everests. I, being of uncertain conviction in every aspect of my life, cannot muster the energy." Grantaire flicks her forehead. "And as a man who makes a frequent fool of himself, it would be hypocritical. Don't break her heart, though, or then we'll have to talk."

"No danger of that," Cosette says with a wan smile, but accepts his hand anyway. He's surprisingly steady as he leads her to the top of the stairs. Courfeyrac waits at the bottom like some kind of Prince Charming, beaming up at her.

"By way way," Grantaire says, scratching behind one ear. "Which Third Eye Blind song?"

"I think it's called 'God of Wine,'" she replies, blinking innocently, and descends into the pounding club music to meet Courfeyrac.

Courfeyrac pulls her into a tight hug as soon as she's close enough. The air whooshes from her lungs in a squeak of surprise. "Combeferre and I have been putting our heads together about your little problem!" he informs her directly in her ear. "You're our baby genius! All three of you, actually, though Marius mostly has a genius for awkwardness. Also languages. And now we dance!"

Despite the silent protestation of Cosette's lungs, Courfeyrac continues holding her close for the entire song, only letting go long enough to spin her and then reel her back again. "How is this helping?" she manages to shout during a spin.

He grins. "Jealousy! I hear it drives one mad!" On the next pass, he dips her so far back she has the dizzy impression of an upside down dance floor, one that contains Marius watching them with a hurt expression. Her heart constricts. "But wait!" Courfeyrac says, pulling her back up again and whirling them in another direction. "There's more than one!"

And this time, when he dips her deep, she can see Eponine directing a dark glare at Courfeyrac. Not Cosette.

Courfeyrac pulls her back upright, and her mouth falls open unbidden, gasp of surprise dissolving in the warm clamor of the club. Courfeyrac lifts a significant eyebrow and Cosette shakes her head, despite the tingle of hope running down her spine. "There's no way," she says. "She doesn't--I can't--are you saying I should date both of them? That's impossible!"

Now he's holding her at a reasonable distance, but he has to lean in to make himself audible without shouting. "You've met Musichetta, right?"

"Right!"

"All three of them are dating, you know. Joly and Bossuet and Musichetta."

And now her mouth forms a capital O, her head strangely weightless, as though it might float up toward the ceiling at any moment. "How--?"

"Musichetta told me to give you her number," Courfeyrac admits. "Well, she asked Combeferre if he thought it was a good idea first. But I promise you that I am a member of Les Amis Feelings Braintrust, and that those three have one of the best relationships I've ever seen. You're an infinitely lovable girl. You'll make it work."

"Thank you," Cosette says, though the words are too soft and lost to the pulsing bass. Courfeyrac, programming Musichetta's number into her phone, seems to hear her anyway, because he looks up with another of his warm smiles. No wonder all of the girls love him, though he must surely have a reputation by now.

Courfeyrac remains her companion for the rest of the evening, though before long Jehan and Feuilly join them. (Grantaire, whatever his personal views of Cosette, sticks to Eponine's side and even goes to work behind the bar when more and more people pour in.) Her song will debut at the end of the set; Courfeyrac posted the information on Cafe Musain and then Enjolras informed the audience when the club opened.

"They'll stick around!" Courfeyrac reassures her, catching her watching a group of six or seven leave. "Those guys are all going out for a smoke!" Sure enough, they return after a few songs. One song more, and then Enjolras launches into a speech, incandescent in his fury.

Yes, Cosette thinks, raising her fist high when the first sparkling notes of "Lights" fill the club. If her first debut was a mess of nerves and exhilaration, her second is the sudden, elated realization that she has a choice. What Courfeyrac is suggesting lets her have it all: music, Marius, Eponine. This time when she listens to her song, she can hear the lights calling her home, as promised by the lyrics. Home. All she has to do is take a few days at home.

The last of the shame dissolves and she's light, not flyaway and bird-winged but full of colors glowing in the dark. The music draws to a close. Cosette darts through the throng of applause, pulse still in time with her song. Curious whispers begin as soon as Bahorel lets her up to the DJ booth and she has to laugh. If only they knew! There's Grantaire down below, separated from Eponine, all the longing in the world on his face.

I can do anything, Cosette thinks, and tells Enjolras, "I'm taking a couple of days to sort things out."

"Which is your right," Enjolras says. He frowns down at the crowd; several people are pointing at the booth.

"Come on," Cosette says, and pulls him out by the hand. It's her turn to lead someone.

She takes him over to Grantaire, who gives her a sharp look unlike any of his lazy, self-deprecating smiles. "Talk," she commands. Then, in a flash of inspiration: "Talk about your love of 90's music." She doesn't stick around to hear what they say next, but she does shove Enjolras a few inches forward.

As Cosette leaves them to converse, she catches Eponine watching her from the bar. Her heart lurches, but Marius, there's no Marius to be seen anywhere, and the lack aches like new papercut over an old bruise. In a way, there is no choice, because the sore muscle of her heart demands both of them.

*

Cosette calls Musichetta the next morning and has a long, heartening conversation about dating two people at once. Musichetta starts off by telling her it's adorable she can't even say the word threesome, that she herself prefers the term ménage à trois because it sounds more romantic and it literally means "household of three."

"The boys aren't ready for a real household yet, but someday we're going to move somewhere with a lovely garden," Musichetta says, voice fond. "I spend most of my time at theirs, but I still need my own space. It's an energy thing."

"Okay," Cosette says, shrugging, though Musichetta can't see her over the phone. She's definitely heard weirder. It's California. "But… do you ever get jealous? Because they live together? Were they dating first?"

"I wouldn't call friends with benefits dating. No, they always do everything together. They're a complete package, so why would I ever choose between them? It's like in the Knight, Lady, Squire series. I know that's not the most interesting title, but believe me, the writing is brilliant. I'd be happy to lend the first book to you." Cosette can hear rustling on the other end of the phone, like pages being turned. "Yours is more the stuff of a romantic comedy gone slightly twisted. The jealous rival is so overdone! I think it's beautiful that she wants to date you as well, and you her. Oh, you three will be so sweet once you sort things out. You seem so nice, and of course Marius is so nice, and Eponine deserves to have her niceness brought out. We're fairly certain it exists."

Cosette heaves a sigh, deciding that Musichetta won't mind a bit of theatricality. "She is nice, deep down, and Marius is nice all over, but they're more than that. They're the degree of special that you can't put into words, so all you can do is put it into music. Should I tell them that my new songs are about them? Would that work?"

"Sweetheart," Musichetta says, and it's all in the tone of voice that makes the word sympathetic rather than condescending. She has a pretty speaking voice, warm and laughing, always inviting you in on the joke. Rather like a female Courfeyrac, and Cosette experiences a sudden flash of gratitude that those two will never have terrifyingly charismatic babies. "I don't think Eponine's quite ready for that yet, but put it on the back burner. I'd advise telling Marius first. He took to you right away and was all but oblivious to Eponine's feelings, but I've always thought they could make a lovely couple if they could ever get over all their personal hangups. You're good for them both, you know. They're mopers."

"All I've been doing is moping!"

"Because you're in the middle act of an alternative romantic comedy, my dear," Musichetta says, cheerful. "Plan what you're going to say to Marius. Write some more songs. Cry. Drink fine wine. Oh, bother, you're under twenty-one. Forget I said the last one. Substitute chocolate." Sympathy creeping back into her voice, she adds, "Don't forget that you've got this. You're extraordinary for standing up to your record label, you know. Joly and Bossuet couldn't stop talking about you after they met you."

Musichetta's words linger for the next few days; fitting, because Cosette takes her advice. The songs are coming faster now, whole melodies with complementary harmonies, entire choruses. She doesn't finish anything, allowing herself to jump from one new idea to the next, but she jumps certain there's a whole album there, like she and Enjolras planned. The first songs are about Marius and Eponine, but her struggle with Justice Records sneaks in, and her new friends, and even pieces of her father, who still refuses to tell her anything more about her mother.

Googling "Asian American musicians" yields nothing useful, mostly pages of links about Bruno Mars and Vienna Teng. The only musician Cosette can find who conceivably fits the timeline is the lead singer of a 90's grunge band called Lovely Ladies. She's hardly more than a footnote on Wikipedia, known only by her stage name Grisette and notoriously shy around the press. Tabloid reporters made up several theories about her and then attempted to confirm the rumors as true: she was addicted to cocaine, she lip synched, she was a lesbian, she was a prostitute. The sole Grisette photo on Wikipedia features a thin woman wielding a guitar like a shield, her hair a choppy mess of bleached blonde and her makeup an illegible scrawl across her face. She looks nothing like Cosette, and Cosette closes the window with a pang of empathy. A record company hurt her mother, but it looks like fame hurt this Grisette girl most.

Her browser pings, telling her she has mail.

"'...no choice to send legal representation by such-and-such a date...'" Cosette mutters, skimming the e-mail, because of course it's from Justice Records. So far her label has been all bark and no bite, though this e-mail features an ominous line about assembling the best possible legal team. Her fingers hover over the keyboard as she prepares to write her usual one-line reply. Is there anything left to be said?

Frowning, Cosette searches her inbox for any mention of Justice Records. She starts off rereading her punchier replies, which draw upon a depth of sarcasm she never knew she possessed. Then she gets into reading the actual text of the e-mails, the endless dry legalese that all proclaim her album not commercially viable at present and suggests significant sonic changes as well as some cosmetic changes to your image. When Justice Records sent that e-mail, she was still going to the studio, where some man in a suit cupped both his hands over his chest and pointed at her, leaving no doubt what cosmetic changes entailed. Justice Records is prepared to invest in marketing you as a pop icon, which translates to, We'll pay for your boob job, you unsexy little girl.

Her hands are shaking enough that they make a soft jiggling sound on her keyboard. Cosette tabs back to the latest e-mail, teeth gritted and the image of a scribbled notebook page in her mind. I am not your pretty thing, she writes, and hits "Send." It won't make sense to them now, but they'll see.

The rest of the words to the song come in a lava rush of anger. The words spark on the screen as Cosette types, fingers flying. The beginnings of a headache throb in her temples like a faraway pulse of thunder, but she can't unclench her jaw, can't do anything besides let her rage spill over into lyrics at last. This is her final word with her label, whatever their legal representation might say. They manipulated a child into letting them steal what was hers; the child is gone, and for the first time Cosette understands Eponine's song. Whatever woman Cosette will become, for now she's nothing more than fury and a sudden lack of naivete. Most of this song is for her record label, but a tiny, traitorous part of her anger diverts course and finds her father, still treating her like the frightened child he rescued all those years ago. That's insane, that's insane, that's insane, Cosette types, and then the chorus once more, and then her hands fall to either side of the keyboard. It's finished. The anger, once written, steams against the screen and cools; the volcano simmers back into inactivity but refuses to lie dormant.

Tomorrow, she'll add music to words.

*

Her new song wants a piano.

How are your keyboard skills? Cosette texts Enjolras.

Technically proficient but lacking sufficient emotion, is the prompt reply. My last formal evaluation was at age fourteen, but Eponine says that I overthink when it's just one instrument. I still remember some Berlioz if you would like to form your own opinion. Then, unbidden: Thank you for your advice.

Well, now she has to go back to the ABC, no matter how terrifying the prospect of talking to Marius is. She has two songs about the situation half-finished, but neither of them come out and ask how the two objects of the singer's affection would feel about all of them dating each other. So far, Cosette's planned speech includes the opening line, "Want to reprise your cover of '3' by Britney Spears?" Musichetta would laugh, then tell her to screw her courage to the sticking place, possibly with more romance novel metaphors.

Cosette dawdles in her preparations for her return, changing her outfit three times because it's too cool outside for this shirt, which means she can't wear any of her original outfit, and then the second outfit just seems hasty, so she reprises a favorite outfit that predates her time at the ABC: a softly clinging dress in a shade of bright tangerine, delicate white sandals, a brown braided belt, and a set of thin gold bangles that chime whenever she moves her wrist. It's a typical Cosette outfit save for the cut of the dress, which makes her look sexier, more sophisticated. She paints her eyelids gold and her lips a shade of pink that verges on red. Say it in song, shout it in appearance. I'm all grown up.

Despite her dawdling, a glance at her watch as she approaches the ABC tells her she's made it just in time for acoustic night. She shakes her head as she approaches, walking around the already long line to get into the club. Bahorel will be playing drums tonight, so the bouncer is--Feuilly? Cosette blinks and forgets to say hello in her confusion.

"Would you like to sign this--oh, hello," Feuilly says, beaming. "Enjolras wrote a petition to free y--his mysterious collaborator's music. We're up to four hundred signatures in person and thousands more online!"

"Thousands," Cosette echoes, voice faint. That explains the clipboard in his hands. Two names written up near the top leap out at her: Marius and Eponine. "And you're a bouncer?"

"I dabble. Nah, Bahorel's just running late." Feuilly grins. "Eponine did request a completely solo act tonight, and collecting signatures is fun. People really believe in y--the cause. Haven't you been checking the website?"

"No," Cosette says slowly. "I told Enjolras I was taking a little time off. He actually listened to me." First a thank you, and now a petition sent out without breathing a word to her? She remembers to thank Feuilly for his dedication, but curiosity propels her inside, past the fear of seeing Marius and Eponine again.

Onstage, a single keyboard waits, washed in a cool violet spotlight. Bossuet sits behind it pressing the keys, not Eponine, wearing a frown as he presses unresponsive keys. Then Eponine joins him, taking the stairs two at a time, followed by Enjolras. The three of them poke and prod at various keys and wires, then a clear middle C rings out through the speakers, cutting through the low murmur of the crowd. Eponine, clenching her fist in triumph, manages to punch Bossuet's high five instead of return it. Her faraway laughter still sounds apologetic. Cosette, feeling like a beacon in her bright dress, looks away.

"Hello," Enjolras says as he passes her. "Good to see you here. I have to go."

"The petition--" Cosette starts, but when Enjolras arrives at his usual remote corner, he looks anything but remote. There's the suggestion of an actual smile on his face as he leans back against the wall, and it transforms into a real one when Grantaire joins him. They don't touch, don't do anything but exchange a few words, but Cosette's mouth tastes sour and unpleasant with jealousy. She should be happy for them.

Marius is tending bar, she realizes, but this isn't a conversation for two minutes before the show. Cosette manages to catch Courfeyrac's eye, who in turn elbows Marius none too gently in the side. Both of them wave hello, one with considerable more aplomb than the other. Cosette gives a single wave and turns away just as the spotlight goes white.

"Hello, everybody," Eponine says over the applause. Her lips are scarlet this evening, bold where Cosette's only attempt. "It's just me tonight, no boys to distract you from my glory." Laughter from the audience. "You know what they say. Buckle your seatbelts, it's gonna be a bumpy ride."

Eponine begins with a blistering piano-only cover of "Whole Lotta Love," her voice a throaty growl that leaves Cosette feeling like a little girl playing dress-up. The relentless pace continues with a faster rendition of "Shadowboxer," then a snarling sucker punch of a song called "Sleep to Dream." With a toss of her hair, Eponine segues into another cover song, this one a rapidfire number called "Girl Anachronism," and then plays the role of contrite girl in her song "Criminal," punctuated by eyerolls to undercut any suggestion of sincerity. The audience finally gets time to breathe when she slows it down with "The Child Is Gone." Upon hearing the first notes, Cosette clasps her hands against her chest without thinking. Her heart slows to match the song's tempo, and she closes her eyes, cherishing even the illusion of being in sync with Eponine. Has Marius ever felt this way? Can Marius feel this way about Eponine?

With a few ominous staccato notes, Eponine crashes into the next song. Cosette's eyes fly open. "This isn't new," Eponine says over the frantic beat. "I just don't play it a lot because I fuck it up. Let's hear it for the fuck-ups!" The crowd cheers obediently, and then Eponine leans into the mic to spit, "I let the beast in too soon, I don't know how to live without my hand on his throat, I fight him always and still," and she's off into another soundscape, one that slides with shifting tempos, furious but honest down to the marrow. Eponine, fingers flying over the keyboard, brings more passion to her performance than Cosette has ever seen except from professionals. If Cosette could take one-tenth that fire, filter it through her own voice and send it out to the world…

And just as her thoughts take a wistful cant, Eponine pauses, fingers flexed over the keyboard. Her lips are still stained red, but softer now, melted under the heat. "I'd like to dedicate this last song," she says, smile anything but coy. "No names named. You know who you are. This is called 'I Know.'"

Eponine's quiet songs are her most devastating. Cosette learned this on YouTube, but this one still catches her by the heart in just the introduction, a wistful fall of notes. "So be it, I'm your crowbar, if that's what I am so far, until you get out of this mess," Eponine croons, her eyelashes a dark fan against her cheeks. "And I will pretend that I don't know of your sins until you are ready to confess--but all the time, all the time, I'll know, I'll know." She looks across the room to the bar on the first "I'll know;" searches the crowd on the second, though if she sees Cosette, she makes no overt sign. Cosette's knees tremble, but there is nothing to steady her, nothing to save her from Eponine's voice stripping her bare.

The next words quiver on Eponine's lips, fragile as glass figurines: "And you can use my skin to bury secrets in, and I will settle you down…" The richness returns for the next few lines, culminating in a husky, "Baby, I can't help you out while she's still around."

Cosette realizes she's backing through the crowd when she feels the smooth press of the bar counter against her shoulderblades. She can't look away from the stage, can't hide away from Eponine's gaze. Under a spotlight gone moody blue, Eponine muses further on love and loyalty: "And when the crowd becomes your burden and you've early closed your curtains, I'll wait by the backstage door--" she tilts her head, cheek pressing briefly against one shoulder-- "while you try to find the lines to speak your mind, and pry open hopin' for an encore--" and now softer-- "and if it gets too late for me to wait for you to find you love me and tell me so, it's okay, don't need to say it…"

Eponine trails off and her smile is a window for her pain to shine through, even under stage lights. She plays an outro that colors the club in every imaginable shade of longing, the final chord the close of catharsis. Blindly, Cosette reaches behind her. A larger hand covers hers, and Cosette closes her eyes. It must be Marius. She prays it's Marius.

"Thank you," Eponine says, when it's clear the audience needs a cue. A furor of clapping and cheering bursts forth. Eponine waves once more to the adoring crowd, and Cosette can't tell whether she's wiping sweat or tears off her face.

Cosette turns around at last. It's Marius after all, Marius still staring at the stage, expression awash in all too recognizable confusion. "We need to talk," Cosette says, voice firmer than it has any right to be after that performance. Raising her voice, she calls, "Combeferre, Marius is taking a break!"

Eyeing the now-stirring crowd, Combeferre does nothing more than quirk an eyebrow. "Tap Courfeyrac on your way to the break room," is all he says.

Background music starts up as some of Les Amis take the stage to set up for Enjolras. They're playing "Lights." Cosette leads Marius through the crowd to the sound of her own voice, urging whoever listens to be strong. She taps Courfeyrac as requested, then marches on. She can't let her brain go soft and cotton candy the way it does around either of them, so she digs the nails on her free hand into her palm.

Cosette shuts the break room door and then turns, positioning herself a foot away from Marius. He's wearing a teal polo shirt, in flagrant defiance of the ABC's admittedly lax employee dress code, and Cosette fights the urge to run her hands through his ridiculously gelled hair. "I have feelings for you and Eponine," she says, and the words aren't so hard after all. "I want to date both of you."

Marius, for all his flabbergasted expression, manages to follow her train of thought. His brow creases. "I--I have feelings for you, Cosette, but I've never thought about Eponine that way before, and I just--" He opens both his hands in a gesture of helplessness. "I don't know what I want."

This time, the nails on both of her hands scrape against her palms. "Then I suggest you figure it out," Cosette says, and the anger in her voice doesn't surprise her, but Marius's face falls further. "That girl just sang her heart out for both of us. We're going to win her over--once you figure out how amazing she is."

Head held high, Cosette marches back out. Before she can claim to have done Musichetta proud, she has to find Eponine, has to hope that she'll take it any better than Marius. Time to face the music, whatever it may be.

Chapter Text

Cosette reenters the club prepared to do battle with Combeferre for yet another bartender, but Eponine has yet to take her usual post-show position behind the bar. Instead, she's glaring after Grantaire, who is just walking over to help out a beleaguered Combeferre and Courfeyrac. A cluster of girls approach Eponine--fans, since they're holding out pens and paper. Eponine smiles and signs, but it's her bartender's smile, the one that invites you to tell her all your woes and never lets on that she has any of her own. The girls take no notice and beat a delighted retreat.

Taking advantage of Eponine's distraction, Cosette comes up behind her before Eponine can shoulder past her again. "Hi," she says, tapping Eponine on the shoulder. "I'm an idiot and I'm sorry. Can we talk outside?"

When Eponine's expression darkens once more, Cosette's heart clenches. Does Eponine want a speech instead of plain truth? She has nothing planned, no words beyond simple, sharp longing.

"Fine," Eponine says, flat, her expression still stony. "Lead the way."

The combination of crowd and deja vu gives Cosette a nauseating case of double vision, so she takes an odd, meandering route to the door without once looking back to see if Eponine is following. The door to the ABC is faintly sticky under her fingers and smells of beer; Cosette holds it open so that Eponine won't run off for a sponge. Eponine sweeps through the door, chin lifted proudly, and tucks herself into a darkened space near one of the windows. Shadows fall across her face as she crosses her arms.

If Eponine wants to intimidate her, it's working. Cosette wipes the palms of her hands on her dress and says, "I shouldn't have said what I did to Marius. It was wrong and I know it doesn't make it better, but I'm sorry."

Cheers erupt from the inside of the club as white lights flash from under the doors. Making out the words from this far away is impossible, but Enjolras's unmistakable cadence sounds from just behind the walls. It's beginning, Cosette almost says, but that feels at once like stating the obvious and presuming too much. Everything could end right here. Could she come back to the ABC if Eponine or Marius rejects her? Is she like Enjolras, whose politics are so personal that what little else there is gets absorbed by his ideals, or is she made from weaker material, vulnerable to heartbreak?

But as Cosette watches the shadows play across Eponine's face, so terribly still, she has to wonder where any art comes from, if not a place of love.

"Why do you even care?" Eponine asks at last, tone mild enough to mitigate some of the harshness in the question. "It's none of your business. I'm none of your business."

"I care about you. I know that I've just met you, but I--I admire you." Cosette takes both of Eponine's hands, emphasizing her point with a soft squeeze. Eponine's hands are softer than hers, less calloused from guitar strings. The gentle motion draws Eponine forward. Close enough to kiss, Cosette realizes, and her traitorous head tips back, lips betraying her by parting.

"You--" Eponine starts, ripping her hands away and crossing them across her chest once more. She backs up until she's braced against the wall, face twisting. "Well, forgive the lack of receptivity, but it's impossible to care about a girl who can't make up her mind! First you drag Marius off for a private conversation, and now you're out here putting the moves on me! What the hell is wrong with you?"

Head swimming but somehow perfectly clear, Cosette says, "I want to date both of you."

Eponine's eyes go wide, shock replacing anger. "You what," she says, bewilderment robbing her words of the cadence of a question.

"All of us should date each other," Cosette clarifies. "I talked to Musichetta--"

"Of course Musichetta said it was a good idea! She thinks everyone's a story waiting to be told!" Eponine cries, so bitterly that Cosette flinches. "Is that what you were talking to Marius about? Don't you dare lie to me about this." Eponine's hands ball into fists.

"Yes," Cosette replies, helpless. There is no kind way to phrase this, nothing she can say to give Eponine any hope. "He's… he needs some time to think it over."

"Because he wants you and not me."

Cosette looks away. Eponine's face is a raw wound, too painful to take in. "He doesn't know about you, Eponine, it's not that he doesn't--"

"He knew about you right away! Everyone could see it!" Eponine's voice is ragged, bereft of its honey-toned glory. Cosette forces herself to meet Eponine's eyes, to confront a pain she helped create, however inadvertently. Tears stand in Eponine's eyes, caught in the shine of the streetlight. Slowly, horribly, they drip down her face.

She can't touch Eponine. The glue Eponine uses to hold herself together would dissolve. Cosette bites her lip. Her own vision swims before her.

"You came along and you changed everything, everything about this place." Eponine resumes speaking in a whisper, but her voice whip-cracks on the second everything, lashing out until she's shouting again. "Marius knows! I never told him because it let me keep one tiny bit of hope, one little hope to send me to sleep after another day of keeping my brother in school and Enjolras in business! Enjolras and Grantaire have decided to start sleeping together! What's next, are you going to take over the club? The label? Did you know Enjolras and I have been trying to agree for years on producing an album together? Why do you think you can have everything you want--including me?"

At that last question, screamed out over a sob, Eponine shoves past her, fleeing for whatever safety the ABC can offer her.

Numbly, Cosette stumbles forward until she's pressing against the wall where Eponine just stood. The stone scrapes her cheeks, her forehead, her nose. Cosette slams her two fists into the wall and then begins to weep in great, shuddering waves. If there is safety beyond the red door, none of it is for her. She's the stranger here, trying to make something of her life and shattering it instead.

*

It's Combeferre who finds her later, who dabs at the scrapes on her face with a cotton ball soaked in rubbing alcohol. He says nothing as he works, but his hands are gentle, as is his expression. Cosette, too exhausted to cry at being treated so kindly, relaxes under his ministrations.

"Come in through the kitchen," Combeferre says at last. "You must be dehydrated. Do you have your phone charger? Good. Get in touch with your father; tell him to pick you up or that you're sleeping on Enjolras's couch. Your choice."

"My choice," Cosette echoes, rubbing at her salt-rimmed eyes. They sting worse than the cotton ball. "The album. I have to pick the album."

"Water, then sleep," Combeferre says, and that's exactly what happens next.

The next few days are a bleak blur, colorless and soundless. The rest of Les Amis pass through her field of vision as ghosts, or it could be she's the ghost. No sadness Cosette has ever experienced compares to this dullness, an absence of feeling that muffles the world's song. She does not go home except to collect a few changes of clothes; she avoids her father, who gives up asking after receiving the fourth monosyllabic answer. Cosette drifts through the ABC without bothering to hide from Eponine or Marius. If they speak to her, the sluggish flow of blood to her head drowns them out. The other Amis remain as sweet as ever to her, especially Courfeyrac, who fills the air with bright cheerful jokes without once demanding she actually laugh at them. Joly and Bossuet, under strict orders from Musichetta, drop off a stack of romance novels she has no interest in reading.

"This new material is good," is all Enjolras says when she passes over the latest fruits of her labors. However, the silence following his words suggests a sympathetic pause, or would if Enjolras were the type to let his statements trail off.

Cosette sits in the studio and picks at the piano, making no further progress. Enjolras says nothing about her decline in productivity, but works the same inhuman hours as ever. On the morning of the fourth day, Cosette gives up all pretense of songwriting and watches him instead, knees drawn up against her chest. He reminds her of a surgeon, all precision as he stitches together songs. Some tension has fled his frame, though, leaving only craftsmanship in his wake.

It's a pleasure to watch him work, and that small stirring of emotion puts a pinprick in Cosette's numbness, a pinprick for sorrow to leak through. If her gifts are all wrapped up in her emotions, what good is she to herself, to the ABC's cause? She should be like Enjolras, who can work through pain and turmoil. Cosette tucks her chin over her knees and lets her eyes fall closed. Tears brim once more, but she swallows them down. She has not slept well on the couch; crying will wear away what little energy she has.

The door swings open and Cosette opens an eye. "I come bearing only slightly singed toast!" Grantaire announces, padding in with three plates on his arm, waiter-style. He's barefoot, clad in sweatpants and a T-shirt slung on in afterthought, obviously sleep-rumpled. It's the happiest Cosette has ever seen him, and she lets out a pathetic hiccup of jealousy.

"Please don't get crumbs on the equipment," Enjolras says, but he accepts the toast.

"For you, our lady of sorrows," Grantaire says, waving one of the remaining two plates under her nose. "Only the finest fake butter for you. The strawberry jam is all real."

Cosette lets her legs fall into a cross-legged position on the piano bench. She's not hungry, but she'll manage a few bites. "Thank you." Then, after forcing down half a piece of toast: "I'm sorry."

"No need to apologize to the toast; it knows it was made to be eaten," Grantaire says through a mouthful of his own breakfast (more like brunch, considering the hour). "It's already suffered the slings and dollops of outrageously priced jam; you might as well enjoy it."

"If you're referring to the drop in your output, your apology is unnecessary." Enjolras, toast already finished, is carefully sweeping invisible crumbs from his desk onto his plate. He gives her a nod. "Whenever I feel uninspired on a song, I write a blog post instead. Then I finish the song while Courfeyrac edits my post. It's a good system."

"You're recommending a change of pace?" Cosette asks. It sounds like something her father would say, and her father and Enjolras are startlingly dissimilar people, to say the least.

"Yes." Enjolras tilts his head, considering, then casts a long look at Grantaire before returning to Cosette. "Our music is on the intricate side. Go downstairs and play a few covers with Grantaire. He has a gift for stripping songs down to their essentials."

"Well, if I have a gift, I guess there's no need to ask if I'm busy," Grantaire says, rolling his eyes but looking ridiculously pleased all the same.

"Then it's settled," Enjolras says, rising. "I'll collect the dishes." When he holds out a hand for Grantaire's plate, Grantaire gives his fingers a lingering caress, expression so openly adoring that Cosette averts her eyes. It reminds her of the way Marius looks at her, or used to look at her.

"Well, your life has gone to hell and you're having a lot of feelings about it," Grantaire states as they descend the staircase. "No offense meant, just stating facts. Your feelings have been way less alcohol-fueled, so my usual oeuvre won't suit. Do you know Death Cab for Cutie? You must know some Death Cab; you're a nice, sensitive girl."

That earns him a wan smile. "I'm glad you picked a band that started releasing material after I was born. Yes, I know their mainstream hits."

"I'm a mainstream kind of guy," Grantaire says with an exaggerated roll of his shoulders and waggling of eyebrows. "I don't understand the constant hipster accusations. I like what I like."

"Maybe it's the flannel?" Cosette suggests, following him onto the stage.

"Legitimate lifestyle choice!"

Grantaire spends a few minutes tuning one of the spare acoustic guitars, keeping up a stream of good-natured chatter all the while. He doesn't ask Cosette to keep up her end of the conversation, so she finds a stool and situates herself next to him. Maybe happiness is infectious. Maybe hard-won love is, too. "I've been working on an arrangement of 'Soul Meets Body,' so the suggestion wasn't entirely altruistic," Grantaire confesses with a grin. "Let me play it for you. There's a secondary guitar line I have in my head, but it only comes in at certain parts. I can make adjustments or you can get yours from upstairs."

"We'll figure it out," Cosette says.

When Grantaire picks out a bare bones version of the melody, Cosette lets out a shaky breath. For all its simplicity, it's a good arrangement, one that cuts straight to the core of the song and exposes its heartbeat. Of course he would be talented; Enjolras is never liberal with his praise. "That's beautiful," she says to Grantaire's questioning look.

"I haven't even gotten to the good part yet," he says with a grin, and keeps playing. His face goes serious after a moment, lost in the song. Cosette can hear where the secondary guitar part comes in--he abandons the main melodic line for a riff poignant enough to make her eyes water.

On his next take, Cosette hums along, fitting the lyrics to the new arrangement. She still remembers the jist of them, though she's been known to forget precise wording. She used to play this album while lying on her bed, piecing together the lyrics and wondering why so many people connected love with death.

"I'm ready," she says at last. Grantaire nods and starts the song anew.

"I wanna live where soul meets body, and let the sun wrap its arms around me," she sings, and yes, this is the shape the words want to take for this arrangement. "And bathe my skin in water cool and cleansing and feel, feel what it's like to be new. 'Cause in my head there's a Greyhound station; I send my thoughts to far-off destinations, so they may have a chance of finding a place that is far more suited than here."

If the original song is a declaration, this version is a confession, a love letter left in shy ink. Grantaire breaks into the riff, giving away the song's heart before the words do, and then it's left to Cosette to carry on the theme.

"And I can't guess what we'll discover as we turn the dirt with our palms cupped like shovels," Cosette continues, letting her voice shiver in the air. "Our filthy hands will wash one another's and not one speck will remain."

Her voice swells into the chorus, and this time, instead of the riff, Grantaire's voice joins her in soft harmony. "I do believe it's true there are roads left in both of our shoes; if the silence takes you then I hope it takes me, too." Cosette's eyes meet Grantaire's and the corner of his mouth lifts in a sympathetic smile. "Brown eyes, I'll hold you near; you're the only one I want to hear, a melody softly soaring through my atmosphere."

It could be that love and death don't share any special connection; that love simply is, much like the inevitability of death.

"Where soul meets body…" Cosette and Grantaire sing the line in perfect harmony, fading with the guitar line.

One song can't heal a heartbreak. Cosette is a long way from happy, but a small piece of her heart feels not broken but open, the warmth of the song trickling in to soothe the aching places. She presses a hand to her chest and meets Grantaire's eyes once more. "Thank you. Really, thank you."

"Any time." Grantaire shrugs as if embarrassed. The reason for the emotion becomes clear when Cosette takes a look around: the usual crew has arrived for the evening shift, though they've all stopped work to listen. Bossuet bursts into unrepentant applause, followed by Joly, Jehan, Bahorel, and Feuilly. Enjolras, Combeferre, and Courfeyrac add theirs with slightly more restraint; Marius, standing with the three of them, looks stunned. Gavroche, tugging at an unsmiling Eponine's sleeve, puts two fingers in his mouth and whistles.

"I'm in love with them both," Cosette admits as everyone turns back to what they were doing, the moment over. "I'm not--I know this sounds naive, but it's more than a crush."

"You're talking to the guy who moved states for a one-night stand," Grantaire drawls, but when he sets his guitar down, he pulls her into a hug. "Give it time."

*

After a few more run-throughs, Grantaire demands they have celebratory drinks, then hops behind the bar to make them himself. Cosette tries two different versions of the kamikaze shot and lets Grantaire persuade her to stay for the dancing. "Law of the universe states that people like you should be much happier than people like me," he says, sliding her a glass of water to chase down all the alcohol. "Be my date tonight. Judging by the length of the speech draft I saw earlier, my other option plans to spend the evening with his rhetoric. Which is no different from any other night, really, only this time I get to spend it drinking with a pretty girl instead of Joly and Bossuet."

Cosette's lips twitch. "Are you even interested in girls?"

"As a species, they also excel at looking down upon me as a lion gazes at an ant, so one can therefore conclude the affirmative…" Grantaire keeps up a steady stream of nonsense even after the lights dim and he pulls Cosette onto the dance floor. Joly sways his way over to join them, claiming gin and tonic is the prescribed method of dealing with post-exam anxiety. Courfeyrac makes a brief stop on his way to collect empty drink glasses, stealing Cosette from Grantaire.

"How is Marius doing?" Cosette asks, then has to swallow. He still came to work. That's good, right?

"Moping, mostly," Courfeyrac replies. At her crestfallen expression, he kisses her forehead and adds, "Don't count him out yet. He likes to overthink things, but he does the right thing in the end."

Every night of the week, Enjolras whips the crowds into frenzied hordes more thirsty for justice than alcohol. On a typical night, his speeches get as many cheers as his music, if not more. On a night one of his speeches took a more international turn, Cosette once saw various members of a bachelor party tear their matching shirts off and leave the club with FREE PUSSY RIOT scrawled on their chests in Sharpie. Cosette still laughs every time she pictures the bridegroom explaining his sudden passion for Russian bands to his unamused bride.

Tonight, though, Enjolras makes some odd choices: a slower song early into the evening, when the dancing has barely begun, followed by a song that does little more than limp along to a thumping beat. "He's playing the bathroom break song now?" Cosette wonders aloud, frowning up at Grantaire. "Is there something wrong? He didn't seem sick earlier…"

"Our fearless leader has the immune system of a god," Grantaire replies, eyebrows drawing together. "The only unusual thing that happened today was him giving me a compliment. Perhaps I've worn down his righteous edges." He makes the last joke easily enough, but his lips press together afterward, creating the impression of a wince rather than a smile.

"This is not your fault," Cosette says into the sudden absence of sound.

As the first unhappy murmurs roll through the crowd, Enjolras holds up a hand, the fingers of the other steady over the channel mixers. The glow of his laptop casts bluish light over the proud arch of his nose and cheekbones while his eyes remain in shadow. He looks every inch the remote god of Grantaire's half-ironic remarks, indifferent to the state of his worshippers. "Welcome, friends of the ABC," he says, voice ringing already over the single stuttering synth beat playing. "You have come here as more than mere listeners of music, but as lovers of music. Some of you are musicians yourselves, others listeners; all of you do more than idly consume, which is the lens with which the recording industry views you. The industry has no ear for the music of the people; the machine possesses neither the heart nor soul nor brain to comprehend it."

The speech continues on that theme, but though Enjolras sometimes gestures to take in the whole room, he appears ignorant of the growing buzz of displeasure. "He's losing them," Cosette hisses to Grantaire. "Has this ever happened before?" Grantaire shakes his head, eyes trained on the lone figure raising a fist before his DJ equipment.

When Enjolras revisits the phrase "you have come here for [X]" for the third time, someone in the back issues a drunken shout: "We came here to dance, dumbass!"

Cosette springs forward, leaving Grantaire caught between abject horror and what looks like the overwhelming desire to laugh, and rushes the stage to snatch the mic from Enjolras before he can respond.

"Hello!" she says brightly. "I'm the mystery artist DJ Enjolras has been collaborating with! Name's Cosette!" Bossuet, bless his heart, turns a spotlight on her. This is not her preferred debut image, since she last washed her hair yesterday and her outfit, a translucent floral sundress worn over a short blue one, was assembled this morning based on the few clean articles of clothing she brought to the ABC.

Novelty must win her lots of points, because the crowd's rumbling turns into whispers. "Pretty long speech, huh?" Cosette tries, and gets a brief smattering of laughter in return. Good, good, not as tough as her first few audiences, when she had no public speaking experience. "It's all been worth it, though, because it's the lead-in for our new single!"

What? Enjolras mouths when Cosette turns to give him a manic smile. "I've written a few songs in fifteen minutes," she says, covering the mic. "I like the stuttering synths. Let's see what happens when the pressure's on!"

That wins her the unexpected: a smile from Enjolras. "I offer my skills in your service," he says. He waves to the audience, indicates Cosette with a generous flourish, and then raises his hands high above his head to clap along with the beat. Most of the audience follows suit. Whatever rare misstep Enjolras committed, his following is still here to see him.

"I'd say let's get this party started, but really, I just came to say hello!" Cosette says, then pulls her face into an exaggerated frown when the audience groans in disappointment. "I could stick around and get along with you, hello," she sings, resting her hand on Enjolras's shoulder. "It doesn't really mean that I'm into you, hello!" When she pulls her hand away and saunters to the other side of the table, a few cheers sound. In the crowd, she can make out Grantaire starting up the hand claps again.

"You're all right, but I'm here darlin' to enjoy the party," Cosette continues, unable to control the grin stretching across her face. "Don't get too excited, 'cause that's all you'll get from me, hey! Yeah, I think you're cute but really you should know, I just came to say hello!"

Additional instrumentation accompanies Cosette as she sings a second and third hello. She turns her grin on Enjolras, who gives her a quick nod before he goes back to the turntable, long fingers moving with quick surety over various knobs and switches. Cosette bounces on her heels and waves to the audience again to buy herself some time, mind racing ahead of the music to fit words together. This is the opposite of her earlier exercise with Grantaire: rather than strip down a song to its emotional essentials, she's crafting pure party pop pleasure on the fly. Enjolras spins out synth beats as Cosette sings phrases like It's all right, I'm getting dizzy, just enjoy the party!

And the audience eats it up, moving to the music like cheerful, tipsy puppets. Tiny flashes burst from smart phones. Cosette blows kisses, giddy with creation. Enjolras is smiling in earnest as he mixes along with her, responding to her movements and expression as well as her words. For however long this song lasts, Cosette needs nothing else.

In the leadup to the final chorus, Enjolras mixes samples of her voice over crashing drums. Cosette spins onstage, laughter bubbling, and catches her breath just in time to repeat, "I just came to say hello!"

*

Cosette wakes with the distinct impression that her head is full of bees.

"No," she mumbles, rolling away from her phone. It continues vibrating under her pillow. "No," she groans again, louder, and fumbles with the phone to turn off her alarm. Since Enjolras refused to stay up all hours celebrating the birth of their new song, Les Amis claimed she had to drink for both of them. Squinting at her phone screen produces no feelings of vertigo, so at least she can't be too hungover. Cosette pushes her hair out of her face and struggles upright in a cocoon of blankets. She has text messages from multiple people, because apparently the impromptu "Hello" performance is all over YouTube, and a text from Marius.

Can we talk?

A cold surge of adrenaline washes any last trace of alcohol from her system. Cosette shoves her phone back under her pillow and tucks the blankets more firmly around herself. "No," she says again, but under her breath.

Her father knocks on the door. "Cosette? Do you want breakfast?"

"I'll get some on the way out!" Cosette calls. "It's another recording day!"

"Oh." She imagines her father outside, debating whether to open the door. "Well. I'll see you later on, I hope."

"Tomorrow?" Cosette asks. "It's just that we have to make a studio recording of the song we did last night. You know how it is."

"Tomorrow, then."

When Cosette hears the door to the apartment shut, she slumps her way into the shower, which leaves her feeling mostly human once more. She composes several replies to Marius's text message as she dresses. She could go with a simple yes, or maybe I would be pleased to discuss our current circumstances to sound more mature. Current circumstances sounds ominous, though. I would be happy to meet you at the ABC… But should she say happy when Marius might have unhappy news for her?

Cosette makes it through a single waffle and halfway out the door before she remembers to actually respond to Marius. Sure! she writes, opting for brevity and therefore clarity. I'm heading over to the ABC now! After a moment's consideration, she adds a few smiley faces. Words in a text message always seem stiff without a smiley.

See you there! comes while she's on the bus. Cosette settles her sunglasses more firmly on her nose and continues sipping from her water bottle.

She walks through the red door half-hoping to barricade herself in the studio before Marius finds her, but walks in to see a suspicious lack of Les Amis. Marius is sitting at the table closest to the door, drumming his fingers on the table. Though his face is pale, he smiles at her.

"Hello," Cosette says. A wild impulse to sing rushes through her and passes in the same instant.

Marius rises and pulls out a chair for her. "Please sit down. Or stand, if you like that better."

"I'll sit," Cosette assures him, and does. She pushes her sunglasses up her forehead and rubs at her face. "No more celebrations, ever. I had to pass up breakfast with my father! I haven't really seen him in days, what with all the--the happenings."

"That's what I wanted to talk to you about."

Hope, cruel enough in its own way, keeps Cosette from looking away. Marius's cheeks are pink under all his freckles, and his ears have gone pink as well. "I thought it over," he continues. "I'm not very--you must have realized I'm not very good when it comes to girls. Courfeyrac and Bossuet used to tease me about it until I met you. I never knew about Eponine's feelings. I never paid much attention to girls at all until you."

Cosette nods. Her hands are clasped in her lap, the pads of her fingers pressed into her knuckles. Marius clears his throat and says, "But Eponine has been a friend to me since before I knew you. I think--I think we can all learn to love each other if we can all just come to the same place."

"Oh!" bursts from her lips, and she pushes her way out of the chair to throw her arms around Marius. "Oh, Marius, I'm so happy!"

"I don't think we should kiss each other without Eponine," Marius says, muffled by her shoulder. "Joly and Bossuet kiss each other all the time without Musichetta, but they all know where they stand."

"I wasn't going to kiss you yet," Cosette laughs, and hugs him again for good measure. "This is just so wonderful! I know that we can win Eponine over. She already likes you, and we've had our moments."

"Of course she likes you." Marius smiles at her, open and sweet, and perhaps the kissing warning was necessary.

"Well, we should make a list of ideas for wooing Eponine," Cosette says to make herself look away from his face. She ducks down to retrieve a pencil and her songwriting notebook from her bag. "If Enjolras will let me have half an hour before we record. Where is he, anyway?"

"Another argument with Combeferre, I think. You can never tell when you're fighting with Combeferre because he just lets you talk until you've tied yourself in knots, then he pulls the knots apart." Marius shudders. "I argued with him once. It was awful."

Cosette frowns. "Best friends fighting? That's not good."

"I think it's about, um, Grantaire." Marius rubs the back of his neck. "No one is quite sure what they're doing."

"I'm sure it will all work out," Cosette says with determined optimism. "If we can muddle through, so can those two. Now. Ideas. I always like to start with foot massages, those are always nice, especially with the long hours Eponine works. I don't know if she would let either of us close enough, though…"

"Chocolate?" Marius tries. Cosette arches an eyebrow. "No, she really does love chocolate, I'm not saying that because she's a girl. I always share mine with her. One of the other contestants on the show got me hooked on fancy chocolate."

"Okay," Cosette says, adding fancy chocolate to the list. "That's nice. We don't want to focus too much on material things, though, because then it will seem like we're trying to buy her love. Too bad, I love jewelry shopping…"

"A surprise piano tuning! I know she plays keyboard a lot, but she has an old piano upstairs she loves to play."

"You romantic." Cosette beams and writes that down. "What else can we do for Eponine's music? I think that's our way of showing her we're serious about this. Music is such a personal thing, and she's so brilliant."

They toss ideas back and forth without quite achieving the heights of the first musical suggestion. ("Guitar picks! But… she doesn't play…") It isn't until Marius makes an offhand remark about supporting Gavroche's musical career that inspiration strikes a loud chord in Cosette's mind.

"She's always taking care of Gavroche!" Cosette says. "If we pitch in to help with Gavroche's homework, Eponine would have hours more time to spend on her music. She could finish an album by the time Gavroche is done with school!"

Marius nods, excitement shining from his face. "Now we just have to tell her."

"'Just,'" Cosette sighs. "And we have to make her believe us."

*

Someone must have been watching upstairs, because shortly after Cosette and Marius decide honesty remains the best policy with Eponine, Courfeyrac pounds down the staircase shouting about the number of views on the YouTube footage. Enjolras and Combeferre follow at a more sedate pace, deep in the throes of discussion. Cosette catches Grantaire's name in the quiet rise and fall of their words; she and Marius share a sympathetic wince.

"Almost five hundred thousand views on this one already," Courfeyrac says, waving his laptop in the air. "The full video is on its way to going viral. I'm going to be answering e-mails for days. Enjolras wrote a 15-page blog post at some terrible hour this morning. This is amazing!"

"Over one silly little song about going to a party." Cosette shakes her head, her incredulity too large to laugh over. She needs to finish her actual song about her record label. She should check her account to see if Justice Records has contacted her again, though a new e-mail on a Sunday would display some impressive commitment to legal wrangling.

"I also transcribed the new song in musical notation," Enjolras says. He pushes some sheet music across the table. "I already recreated the instrumentals, so all I really require is your vocals. And your approval on the instrumentals, of course."

Cosette picks up the music and rifles through, her answering "Of course" too preoccupied to be teasing. The look of music on the page fascinates her; somehow these inky notes scattered across snow white paper translate to layers of sound. Marius rests his chin on her shoulder, humming absently as he reads along. "You're better at sight singing than me," Cosette accuses, scrunching up her nose.

"Not everyone can make up a song on the spot," Courfeyrac says. He's somehow carrying on two conversations while typing away at his laptop. "Don't get scared if Justice Records gets extra intimidating, Cosette. All it means is that we finally have a bargaining chip."

"Great, now I'm terrified," Cosette says with a nervous laugh. "Can I record my vocals now? I would like to get away from the scary man who says scary things."

"I am but the messenger!" Courfeyrac exclaims, clutching his chest, but he fixes her a coffee in apology before she goes upstairs.

It takes all of two hours to finish recording "Hello." Singing focuses Cosette, her voice the instrument by which she navigates the sonic landscape. She emerges calmer about the eventual contact with her record label but with the new and uneasy conviction that this whole thing is too easy. Revolutions, even musical ones, require careful planning. All she did was make an impulsive leap onstage to help out a friend, and now the YouTube footage is up to 750,000 views. People will want to interview her. Cosette turns her phone back on and finds dozens of missed calls from numbers she doesn't recognize.

In her inbox, a new e-mail from Justice Record awaits. A representative from our legal team will contact you tomorrow, is all it says.

"Never mind, it's not too easy," Cosette says, pressing a shaking hand to her forehead. "I'm just not prepared." She pushes the button at the top of her phone and the screen goes dark. "I need to talk to Eponine. We're done for the day?"

Enjolras frowns. "I suppose. Cosette--"

"Good. I'll be downstairs if you need me."

Cosette descends to the now-crowded lower level. Most of Les Amis have Sunday off and arrived to "assist with the cause," though it looks to Cosette like a lot of friends drinking free coffee. Courfeyrac and Combeferre, to their credit, sit hunched over their computers, still answering e-mails. Bossuet and Feuilly have the components of some complicated piece of sound equipment spread over an entire table, though Bossuet seems much more interested in flirting with Musichetta, making a rare appearance at the ABC this morning. Joly and Jehan are slicing oranges while Joly expounds on the miraculous properties of some odd-sounding juice cleanse, Jehan nodding along politely all the while. Gavroche and Bahorel form a suspicious huddle in the corner; a second look reveals Bahorel pointing to different parts of a Swiss army knife and then making sinister motions as Gavroche grins. Marius sits with his guitar, playing bits and pieces of Cat Stevens songs.

Grantaire and Eponine are behind the bar, so Cosette takes a deep breath and approaches.

"I don't care if an Amber Moon is 'technically breakfast,' it's still disgusting," Eponine says, making a face.

"Disgusting!" Grantaire exclaims, cracking an egg on the side of a tumbler. "It's just raw egg, Tabasco sauce, and whiskey. Who could find fault with such a beverage? It gives me everything I need."

"Ew," Cosette says, and then: "Good morning, Eponine. Marius and I have decided to woo you. Our services include babysitting and inspirational jam sessions."

Marius fumbles his next note. The abrupt twang resounds in the sudden silence. Eponine's face twitches with something that might be laughter; Musichetta covers her mouth to suppress what is definitely laughter.

"Since everyone is going to know everything about everything anyway," Cosette says, hands going to her hips as she turns to glare at the rest of them. "Eavesdrop a little more delicately. Marius, come here, you're part of this conversation."

"And I am not," Grantaire says, and knocks back his drink in one go. "I'll just wash this in the kitchen."

"Good idea," Eponine sighs, patting Grantaire's shoulder. She looks Cosette up and down as she leans back against the counter; her faint frown suggests that what she sees makes her skeptical. As Marius walks behind the bar, she adds, voice dry, "You two have unique ideas about romance."

"Would you believe anything traditional?" Cosette replies. Eponine arches her eyebrows, conceding the point. "We're not trying to--to buy you off. But we are serious about you, and we do support your music. Also, Gavroche and Bahorel probably shouldn't spend too much time together for the good of humanity."

At the mention of Gavroche, Eponine's mouth hardens. "I want to accept the free babysitting," she says. "I might be able to finish a song, or start a new one, God forbid. But Gavroche is not some instrument you pick up to woo me. He's just a little boy, I don't care how tough he pretends to be. If this doesn't work out, it will hurt him."

"We would never," Marius says, and presses one of Eponine's hands between his. "We would never abandon Gavroche. You and I were friends first. I like to think we always will be, no matter what happens."

There's nothing particularly convincing about what Marius's words themselves, but he accompanies them with a slow earnest smile, a smile large enough to draw you in and let you stand inside its warmth. Eponine softens. Cosette has to smile, too, watching them smile at each other.

"I don't really believe you, but I want to," Eponine says, hushed, as she gazes up at Marius. She looks like one of her sad love songs embodied, all aching, open-eyed longing. Her expression shifts when she turns to Cosette, but it's no less sad. "I can't promise anything. This will be a trial run because I hate quizzing Gavroche on his history homework. Who can remember all the revolutions in Europe?"

"I can," Marius says.

Cosette gives him a fond smile, echoed by Eponine. "Rhetorical question, I think," Cosette says. "It wouldn't be fair for us to expect anything from you. The whole point is to show you we're serious."

"Sure you are," Eponine says with an ironic twist of her mouth. "At least until you have to deal with Gavroche in one of his 'we don't need no education' moods. I'll go get him, because he definitely hasn't done any work yet this weekend."

Eponine takes a pot of coffee with her in a gesture she probably doesn't even realize is automatic, refilling everyone's coffee cups on her way to Gavroche. Bahorel puts his knife away with an apologetic grin; Gavroche stomps upstairs to get his schoolwork, tossing an evil look Marius and Cosette's way as he goes. Cosette blows him a kiss.

"Never let them see your fear," Cosette explains when Marius looks at her in confusion. "This won't be easy, but--"

"--but it's for Eponine," he says. They watch Eponine take a seat in front of the keyboard, expression bright as she rests her fingers on the keys. "I never thought to wonder when she had time to write her songs. I thought we didn't practice much because we repeat so much material." Marius shakes his head. "How could I have been so ignorant?"

"We're trying now," Cosette says, as Gavroche comes back downstairs, dragging his backpack behind him. "It's all we can do." Eponine warms up with the familiar undulation of "Sullen Girl," but the notes sound new to Cosette--if they're sad at all, it's with the sorrow that comes of starting something new, some fragile thing that might take flight.

Chapter Text

The knock on the door comes when Cosette and Jean Valjean are washing the lunch dishes. "Can you get that?" Jean Valjean asks, indicating his arms, sunk up to the elbows in soapy water.

Cosette puts the dish towel down. A representative from our legal team will contact you tomorrow. "Don't have all the fun without me!" she says to cover the sudden, cold lurch of her heart. She pushed the fear away for the sake of writing more music and settling the confusion of her love life; now it floods back to drown her fragile hopes. The doorknob feels slippery in her hand.

Standing in her doorway is a man so nondescript he fades into his suit, neatly pressed but dull in every other sense. If asked, Cosette couldn't pick him out of a crowd of businessmen. His jacket and trousers are an unrelenting slate gray, his tie is matte black, and his shirt is stark white. Even the polish on his shoes seems less a product of vanity and more a necessary conformity to uniform.

She's staring at his feet rather than looking him in the eye. "May I help you?" Cosette asks, lifting her chin and wishing she had on shoes. Her heart quivers at the look on his face. It's a non-expression, a study in perfect blankness. He's like something out of science fiction.

"I am a representative of Justice Records," the man says, and hands her a business card. Cosette glances down at it (any excuse to avoid his eyes) and one word leaps out in bold black letters: JAVERT.

She almost drops the card.

This unassuming businessman, this gray person who looks as though he belongs in some boardroom on the East Coast, is one of those most infamous names in the music industry. Cosette's fingers tighten around the card, crumpling its neat logo. Javert's name appears again and again in music documentaries, a young lawyer who made a career for himself fining concert bootleggers, most of them college students without much money to their names. His name cropped up in the news again when the RIAA began suing children and little old ladies for downloading music. The only media clip of him went viral within minutes of it airing on television. It features Javert directing a steady not-quite-frown at the cameras and proclaiming, "I don't care for music. It allows me to be impartial when selecting my cases." Cosette still remembers the noise of disgust her father made after seeing that, remembers laughing over the Daily Show parody. Surely the man himself was a parody.

And now the man himself is standing in her doorway, working for Justice Records. Javert gives a slight nod in response to the recognition on her face. "I see you know the name. This document outlines your legal responsibilities to your label. If you do not comply with the terms of your contract, your label will sell your songs to the highest bidder."

Cosette gasps. Javert pauses for a moment, then continues unperturbed, "You will owe your label a significant sum of money, named in the document provided. Finally, although this is not in the document provided, I have been instructed to relay the message that Justice Records will take an interest in your friend's semi-legal operation. You have one week. Should you decide to break your contract, your fines will be due in another week."

Javert even speaks in black and white, like a newsprint on fresh paper. Cosette almost nods at the end of his speech, the tone of his voice is so reasonable. She catches herself mid-nod, and the resulting wave of horror sweeps down her arm, culminating in a slammed door before she has time to think. The doorbell rings again before her hand even falls from the knob.

"He won't stop," her father says. Cosette turns. Her father stands only a few feet away, drying his hands on a dish towel. He looks a thousand times more tired than he did twenty minutes ago, the circles under his eyes like bruises.

"Do you know him?" Cosette asks. Behind her, a manila envelope slides under the door, then footsteps recede.

"I heard a lot about him in my industry days. The man is like a dog with a bone." Jean Valjean covers his face with one hand, drawing it slowly down his face. "I followed his cases. I'm sure you remember when his name was all over the news."

Something jogs in Cosette's memory. She remembers her father's outraged channel-changing and his muttering whenever he saw her reading about any of the latest industry lawsuits, but never him doing any research on his own. Maybe he did it out of her sight. "So you think I should do what he wants," Cosette says, tongue heavy in her mouth.

"He's a terrible man to contend with. I want you to ask yourself whether fighting him is worth it." Her father's eyes are liquid with pleading, his voice rough with sorrow. Cosette wavers.

"Well, thank you for your advice," she says at last. "I'm going to think it over." Everything feels heavy, not just her tongue. Cosette picks up the envelope on the floor, then trudges past her father towards her bedroom. He reaches for her, but she shrugs away. She's annoyed--no, she's furious with her father, in a sudden rush that leaves her dizzy. If she had time, she would tease out the feeling, make herself understand her newfound suspicion of his past. But in two weeks, her life is over.

"Cosette--" her father starts to say, but she closes the door. She has songs to write and a terrible decision to make.

*

"So I have a week to choose between selling my soulless music or listening to someone else sell my soulless music," Cosette finishes with a glance at the ABC's clock. Good. She has at least an hour to cry in someone's arms before Gavroche gets home from school and needs homework help.

As though he just read her mind, Marius draws her into his arms, pressing her close against his heart. After a moment, he reaches out to Eponine as well, who doesn't quite lean into Marius but does settle an arm around Cosette's shoulders. Tears well up in Cosette's eyes at the sympathy. She made it through the telling without much emotion, but the heavy numbness of earlier gave out after fifteen minutes alone with her guitar. I am not your pretty thing, she wrote to her label in a fit of naivete, as though it were that simple. Justice Records can do whatever it wants with her music. "If someone has to desecrate my music, I would rather it be me," Cosette says, sniffling. "But that's not a solution. That's not even living."

Marius's arms tighten around her as Eponine takes a step back. One of her hands lingers on Cosette's back. "Can you buy out your contract?" Eponine asks. "You're an unknown and your father is rich. In a situation like this, you need all the handouts you can get."

There's no shame in needing help, her father has said countless times, but his recent dishonesty undercuts the kindly glow of the memory. "It's a huge lump sum," Cosette says, stiffening. "I don't think he has that kind of money just lying around. Plus no one else is going to lend me that kind of money so I can shirk my legal responsibilities, especially not a bank."

"I would," Marius says, his face lighting up. "I get a little money whenever anyone buys my Idol recordings. What I have saved is more than I need."

"Despite his claims, he's still paying off the fines for dropping out of the show early," Eponine says, her voice as gentle as the hand on Cosette's back. She rubs her thumb in a soothing circle, perhaps in apology for her previous suggestion. "Is there some reason you don't want to ask your father? Is he one of those 'pull yourself up by your bootstraps' people?"

"No, no, the opposite of that." Cosette pulls away from them both, wrapping her arms around herself. "There's been so much happening that I haven't had much time to think. My mother died when I was young. I just found out that she was in the music industry, but my father says he can't tell me anything else." She laughs and wipes at her eyes. "I know it's stupid to worry about the past when I have so much to worry about in my future."

"It's family," Marius says. "Of course you care."

"Which is how it's supposed to work," Eponine adds, smiling as though it pains her. "If you're still up in the air overall this, I assume you don't want to tell Enjolras yet. He would organize international protests in your honor."

Cosette shudders, thinking of cameras thrust in her face as she flounders completely unprepared. "You assume correctly. Ugh, can we just avoid this with work? I don't want to think about anything but music for the next hour. I've been almost done with a song for a week and a half because of everything else going on." She pauses, struck by sudden inspiration. "Want to have a jam session? Mostly what I need help with is the piano part, but there's a guitar part Marius can take and I think I can loop the bass line and the percussion on my laptop..."

"Happy to help however I can," Marius says, already heading onstage. As he kneels to open his guitar case, he adds, "Um, as long as someone tells me what key we're in."

"I might if you're nice," Cosette says, then turns to Eponine. "Are you in?"

All she means is for the jam session. Cosette's teasing smile fades at the look on Eponine's face. Eponine's lips are turned down in thought, and she spends long moments contemplating Cosette, then Marius, then the piano. The three of them have never made music together before. It takes trust just to play with someone, even more to have a jam session, when you never know what kind of sound you'll create, where the song might end. Cosette holds her breath as Eponine walks over to the piano, flexing her fingers to warm them up.

Right. Laptop. Cosette cues up the appropriate tracks, then unfolds the latest draft of her lyrics. Crossed out words and numerous arrows mar the paper like notes out of tune. You work best on deadlines, Cosette reminds herself over the sudden flutter of nerves. "Let's play around and see what happens," she suggests. Marius and Eponine nod.

The percussion is first, followed by the low thrum of the bass line. Cosette closes her eyes and Javert's face swims before her, vague against the details of his suit but no less menacing. He would destroy them all: the Friends of the ABC for their advocacy, Marius and Cosette for their contract breaches. Like a dog with a bone, her father said. "Am I treading in your flow? Well, maybe I don't want to know that we are gone before we go, and you are upside down," she sings, voice pure and sure and, to those who know her, furious.

Marius, with a quick glance at her, comes in with a complementary guitar line just as she starts her next verse. "Waiting in the sweet debris to shock you into loving me, I'm not the way I used to be, and I am still alive, and I am still alive." Cosette's voice swells on the last repetition and Eponine smiles, dark eyes glittering.

They slam into the chorus, Eponine adding a chilly piano line to underscore Cosette's words: "I am not your pretty thing, I am not your pretty thing, I am not your pretty thing, your seventeen or prom queen anymore."

The rest of the song flows out just as cold and perfect, a three-minute snowfall that will trigger an avalanche. "And what you're sowing you will reap," Cosette promises in the song, her mind already flashing ahead. More viral video, more press, more petition signatures, more of a fight in the face of hopelessness. She'll lead a one girl army; maybe then no one else will get caught in the crossfire.

But even as she thinks it, Cosette lowers her head, knowing the hope for a vain one. The silence after the song says that things are never that easy.

Gavroche chooses that moment to arrive, sparing Cosette any questions from Marius and Eponine. "That was amazing," she says, because it's true, and then, "Hello, Gavroche."

"Yo," Gavroche says with an unreadable glance at his sister. "Ready for a guest artist with real talent?"

"That's why she chose me," Eponine says. "You are headed to homework paradise." Without blinking, Gavroche pivots on his heel, preparing to flee. Eponine reaches out and snags him by the collar. "Homework paradise is not optional. What are we starting with today?"

After a cursory attempt to twist free, Gavroche grumbles, "History of Europe. My teacher says Napoleon wasn't even that short."

Marius lights up. "But he did so many interesting things! Come on, let's see this textbook..." He leads a surprisingly unresisting Gavroche away, still chattering happily about the Napoleonic era.

"Our boys," Eponine says, expression one of unfiltered affection.

A little thrill runs through Cosette at her choice of words. "Ours," she agrees.

At least something is going well.

*

"I want to do an interview to go with the release of 'Pretty Thing,'" Cosette says at the end of a recording session. Since the jam session with Eponine and Marius, the songs have come thick and fast, as though songwriting were no more difficult than sitting down with her guitar. "Pretty Thing" is recorded and four more songs are in various stages of draft. They'll have enough music for an album, not an EP.

Enjolras blinks. "Of course." His reaction time has slowed by a hair, thanks to his punishing work schedule and the shouts Cosette tries not to hear him exchanging with Grantaire. "I haven't offered because I thought you wanted to remain under the radar, but I suppose the cat is out the bag. Over the radar." He frowns, probably trying to unmix the metaphor in his head. "I should sleep."

"We're very proud of you for figuring that out," Cosette says with great solemnity, then cracks a grin. "I'll go ask Courfeyrac."

She finds Courfeyrac with Combeferre, both of them picking at Chinese takeout remains as they work on Cafe Musain business. "Of course, let's do a whole interview instead of the post I had edited and ready to go for tomorrow," Courfeyrac moans, sliding down in his seat. "So much work this one has caused me."

"It's your job," Combeferre replies, unsympathetic. He eats a piece of broccoli, then adds, "How many interview requests have you gotten?"

"Lots," Courfeyrac admits. He beams at Cosette, the picture of good-natured industry once more. "Give me a few minutes to write down some questions. We'll only do five. People like it short and sweet, otherwise they'll skim all the way to the download link at the bottom."

"Who else wants to interview me?" Cosette asks. "When were you going to tell me?"

"Closer to when the album drops," he answers, scribbling away. "You have a good chance of getting on TV if we play our instruments right, so to speak. You know, I think being friends with Enjolras was just training for being a music manager."

Cosette chews on the last egg roll, awaiting her interview questions. She studies Courfeyrac, whose tongue is actually poking out of his mouth as he writes. He does manage Enjolras as much as he does the website. Manager. Strange to associate that word with a friend rather than someone who views her as a money-making machine.

"Ready?" Courfeyrac asks, fingers poised above his keyboard as though he were the one waiting all this time.

"Ready."

"Great." Courfeyrac clears his throat. None of the friendliness leaves his face, but his demeanor shifts to a more professional joviality. "Pardon the mundane question, but how long have you been making music?"

Start with the soft questions, thinks Cosette, recognizing his tactic. Her manager at Justice Records ran her through a few sessions of interview prep before it became clear she would be giving no interviews. "Since childhood," she answers, settling back in her seat and folding her hands in her lap. She catches Courfeyrac's approving wink before continuing, "My father taught me how to play guitar and then the songs kept coming. They weren't any good for a long time. I'm not much of an acoustic musician, so working with a DJ has been wonderful." Sometimes Cosette wonders how she got her first recording contract. She was still learning to think in layers, to build the songs she heard in her head.

Courfeyrac types for a few seconds more, then looks up. "So you went from a girl with a guitar to an electronica queen. You must have some eclectic influences."

Cosette snorts. "You wrote down that exact phrasing before you asked me." Courfeyrac presses a hand to his chest, the picture of aggrieved innocence. "Um, let me think. My father loves classic rock. He taught me how to play a lot of the standards. I loved the stuff with weird sound effects, you know, Yellow Submarine and a ton of Pink Floyd. When Internet radio became a big thing, I would put on a random genre and listen for hours." She frowns, trying to think. "I honestly don't remember my first electronica song. I remember what I was doing--making dinner--and then there was this music that kind of... expanded out and then circled back in. Like the Big Bang." She almost let the pasta boil over.

"Off the record, I understand what they see in you." Courfeyrac ruffles her hair, then reverts to professional mode. "Our audience is dying to know: how did you discover our illustrious DJ Enjolras?"

"He remixed one of my demos. It sounded so much better than the original that I had to track him down. I'm a local, so it wasn't too far out of my way."

Courfeyrac leans forward as if to say, Now for the tough questions. She's ready. "DJ Enjolras has written and spoken eloquently of your struggles with your record label. The petition to free your music grows every day. Can you speak to that?"

She nods, though there's no visual component to this interview. "First of all, I need to thank everyone who has signed so far. It means a lot to know I have so many supporters." Breathe in, breathe out. "I'm a victim of the industry's predatory business tactics, but I'm determined to be a survivor. I won't let my label kill my career because I refuse to let them exploit a deal I made when I was barely eighteen. I signed over the rights to my music because I was too naive to ask a lawyer to review my contract. Just because my contract is legal doesn't make it right." Angry tears prickle for a moment, then subside. She's told this story enough times to lessen the sting. "All I want is to make music that comes from me, instead of what executives think will sell."

Courfeyrac flashes her a thumbs up. "Speaking of your music, your newest song is a slightly different sound from what your fans have come to expect. Can you tell us a little about it?"

"Well, I've just shared how many different genres of music I listen to," Cosette says with a laugh. She pauses to think, now out of material she's at least rehearsed in her head. "I'm surrounded by talented musicians who have also struggled with the industry one way or another. One of the musicians playing wants to remain anonymous." Marius, of course, even though he essentially wrote the guitar riff. "Their struggles inspired me. And you might say the chorus is a personal message. I'm tired of feeling helpless."

Fingers flying across the keyboard, Courfeyrac says, "Great. I have what I need." He punctuates this with a final keystroke. "Off the record again, do you know anyone who could help us help you? Someone who knows the industry from the inside? Enjolras has his mystery sources, but it never hurts to ask for more information."

I want you to ask yourself whether fighting with him is worth it.

"I might have someone," Cosette says. There's something too complicated about her father's sadness, and several things too mysterious about his past--and her own.

*

When she gets home, Cosette grounds herself in the familiar: the dishes in the dishwasher, waiting to be placed on the correct shelves; the analog clock on the kitchen wall, prone to slowing down by five minutes; the faded day-of-the-week dish towels that her father never remembers to change on the correct day. How bright the wooden kitchen table, how cheerful their little pile of mail. She puts the dishes away, the slight tremble in her hands the only indication of her thoughts.

There's a nice way to ask her father about her mother's past. Then there's a cruel one, a manipulative one. Which is more shameful, that she's considering the latter or that she even thought of it at all?

"Cosette!" Jean Valjean looks delighted to see her. Guilt lances her core. "I wasn't expecting you today. Have you already finished your songs?"

"Still working on them." Cosette stacks the last glass on the shelf, almost out of reach. Her father used to put away the drinking glasses until she was tall enough to climb on the counter, then tall enough on her feet. She turns. "I want to know about my mother. I want to know who she was. What kind of music she made. I'm nineteen; I think I'm old enough to know."

Jean Valjean drops his gaze to the floor as he shrugs off his jacket, worn despite the summer heat. He hangs it on its hook. The motions are routine, but his face is lined with pain, older than Cosette's seen him look in quite some time. "The truth is painful. You must believe me when I say it's better not to know."

Anger flares, not the cool ire of "Pretty Thing" but something hot and ugly. Words erupt from Cosette's mouth: "Then why don't I just write Justice Records and tell them that I'll agree to their terms after all? Why don't I just call up Javert and tell him I want a five-album contract? How can I know what's right when my own father won't let me make informed decisions?!"

Her voice deepens on the last question, savage as a punk rocker's, a child's anger bound up in a woman's voice. Her father's eyes widen for just a moment, then his face falls back into its familiar sadness. He never manages to get angry with her. The beginning of a headache pulses in Cosette's temples. Her ears hurt from shouting.

"Your mother never wanted you to know what she suffered," Jean Valjean says at last. "She was ashamed of many things she did. I think she was terribly brave. She loved you more than anything. You could see it in her eyes when she talked about you. When I met her, she couldn't stop telling stories about her little Cosette. She wasn't allowed to for so long."

Cosette's heart beats wildly, out of time with her headache. In the instant before her father speaks, she feels his words in her bones.

"Your mother's stage name was Grisette," says Jean Valjean. Each word drags, as though drawn from the deepest part of himself. "She was the lead singer of the Lovely Ladies. They were one of the most famous 90's grunge bands. They changed the way music sounded."

"I've heard of them," Cosette says. Her voice sounds far away, as if coming from another room.

Jean Valjean crosses the kitchen, reaching past her for a glass. He fills it with water. His hands, always so strong and capable, are shaking. "Fantine signed with her label when you were a year old. Your biological father had already deserted you. She thought, This is my only chance." Cosette pictures the woman in the photograph, blurred face streaked with tears. "The label didn't want to market a single mother. They wanted a sexy punk rebel. For Fantine to make enough money to support you, she had to change her image, even her name. She had to hide her past."

Cosette steadies herself on the kitchen counter. She isn't crying yet. Why isn't she crying? "She left me."

"To provide for you. She had no idea it would kill her." Her father takes a sip of his water. After, he stares into his glass, swirling his water around a few times. "Fantine was an honest woman. She hated selling a lie, selling a false impression. The more vague she was about her past, the crazier the press was to know it. She lived in fear of people finding out. She missed you all the time."

A lullaby. Gentle fingers on a rosary. How much of it memory, and how much of it fantasy?

"She started drinking too much," Jean Valjean says, and his voice falters. "When some of her bandmates got into cocaine--well, it fit so perfectly with the image her label wanted her to have."

There are the tears. All those foggy memories of maternal tenderness, melted away like so much haze. Cosette presses her palms against her eyes, tight enough to hurt. "She did drugs. She was a druggie. My mother." That bleached blonde woman in the Wikipedia picture, cocaine thin, hiding behind her guitar.

"Fantine was an addict, yes." Ferocity and compassion color her father's voice, mixing together. Cosette lets her hands fall, recognizing the tone of voice he uses to speak at NA meetings. "She used drugs as a coping mechanism. But I met her through a rehabilitation program. She told me that she was so high she lost a week of touring. She couldn't remember hearing your first words over the phone. She checked herself into rehab because nothing was worth losing that."

Cosette chokes on a sob. Her father abandons his glass of water to pull her into an abrupt hug. He feels solid, real. Cosette presses her wet cheek to his chest, senses the vibration as he picks up his story. Her mother's story. "She was doing well. I told her that I could help her, get her some gigs writing for other bands. Work she could do from home. She wanted to go back to you. Then a certain lawyer paid her a visit. Reminded her of her obligations, since she cut the tour short to save her life."

Those eyes, dead above a perfectly pressed suit.

"Javert worked for your mother's label before Justice Records absorbed it, and him with it. Back then, Javert made damn sure Fantine knew that she was trapped. She picked up touring again. She was using again by the end. Addiction is a disease. It changes your brain. You've heard this before."

"And she died," Cosette says. She sounds young even to herself, like a lost little girl.

"Of an overdose. A few weeks after the tour ended." Her father's hands tighten around her, then resume tracing reassuring patterns over her back. "She wanted you to remember her as someone who loved her, not as a junkie. There were a few good days in between two tour gigs. She visited me and I helped her record a song for you. I think she knew that she--she might not make it. I kept the CD for her."

And as suddenly as he began the embrace, her father ends it, pulling away. Cosette's knees buckle for a moment before muscle memory forces them straight. She trails after her father as he rushes into his room and pulls a locked chest from underneath his bed. It's a treasure chest, he told her when she asked about it years ago. One day we'll find a good spot to bury it.

"Here it is!" Jean Valjean exclaims, and then there is a small plastic square in Cosette's hands. She looks down at it without comprehension. Why is it shining?

"I want to be alone, I think," she says over the roaring in her ears. Her voice is even farther away than before, separated from her body by time as well as distance.

*

No matter where she puts the CD, it still glares at Cosette from its case. At last she stuffs it under her pillow, only to look over at her mother's picture on her nightstand.

Her mother. Fantine, stage name Grisette, lead singer of the Lovely Ladies.

Cosette fights the impulse as long as she can, clinging to the familiar agony of the unknown. Her mother has always been a ghost, someone Cosette imagined watching over her but never speaking. To know that she made music was revelation enough, but that she was famous, a revolutionary riot grrrl musician, a drug addict--

In one furtive bound, Cosette moves from bed to desk chair and pushes open her laptop. She plugs her headphones into the wrong jack at first, fingers fumbling their way through correcting the error. Then comes the labor of untangling the earbuds; despite Cosette's love of music, she is careless with her headphones. Every little task becomes a ritual, a pleasant buzz of distraction. Don't think about what you're about to do. Just do it.

A YouTube search returns over 30,000 results for the term Lovely Ladies. A quick scroll down the list makes her flinch--her mother's drug abuse was a matter of public spectacle, enough to provide the public with video footage even before the age of smartphones. Cosette scrolls back up and clicks on the first result from the official YouTube channel, a music video for a song called "Asking for It."

An old-fashioned movie countdown cycles from 4 to 1. After a beep, a small female figure appears in a bare white room. She walks closer to the camera. Her dress is white where it isn't stained, Empire waistline evident despite the numerous tatters. Her bleach blonde hair is a mess of tangles, her mascara runs down her cheeks, and her red lipstick is smeared into a clown's mouth. She looks every inch the druggie rock star, and Cosette's heart sinks.

At the first note, Fantine picks up a towel. The bass line carries her through blotting away some of the makeup, and then she opens her mouth.

Every time that I sell myself to you, I feel a little bit cheaper than I need to...

Cosette sits up straighter in her chair, heart pounding. In the music video, Fantine sings on, her voice rasping like salt over lime, the lyrics tequila burning all the way down. The camera follows her into a huge dressing room, where androgynous figures in theater masks are making up the rest of the band for a burlesque. A closeup on the makeup reveals that all the pots bear the brand name SEX APPEAL. As the songs crashes into the chorus, the video cuts to the band onstage, playing with frozen smiles as disembodied hands reach up from beneath the stage, locking them in place.

Back in the dressing room, Fantine asks, Was she asking for it? Was she asking nice? She meets the camera's gaze, jaw clenched. She was asking for it; did she ask you twice?

The music picks up; the twisted burlesque continues. It's too grotesque to be beautiful, which Cosette suspects is the point. When Fantine reaches for one of her bandmates during a show, the disembodied hands drag her offstage. Hand stretched out still, Fantine promises, If you live through this with me I swear that I will die for you…

It sounds almost--maternal. Cosette lets herself pause for an instant to catch her breath.

The video closes with Fantine back in the same bare room, this time tied to a chair, now roaring the same questions she sang earlier in the chorus. Was she asking for it? Did she ask you nice? She was asking for it! Did she ask you twice?

Cosette clicks "next" without even looking at the title, her hands shaking. The next video is from MTV Unplugged. Her mother stands alone onstage, guitar in hand. Her hair is exactly as messy as it was in the video, no doubt the work of a stylist. "You all know what's next," Fantine tells the audience, eliciting loud whoops. "We pretend to be so tough, but put three chords and a broken heart together, and we're all suckers."

No wonder Grantaire knows her music, Cosette thinks, and almost laughs through her tightening throat.

"I've loved one man one in my whole life," Fantine says. "He called me his china doll." Then, deadpan: "I'm Filipina." The audience titters as Fantine smirks. "So here's 'Doll Parts.'"

Fantine's smirk falls away when she begins to play. The song is as simple as her three chords comment implies, a wrenching litany of all the parts of Fantine that hurt. I am doll eyes, doll mouth, doll legs…

So much naked pain makes Cosette want to look away from the screen, but her mother's sheer presence pulls her in. Even years later, even on grainy YouTube footage, even after her death, her mother is a star. I love him so much it just turns to hate, she sings, stark as a winter landscape. The camera zooms in close enough that viewers at home can see the tears standing in Fantine's eyes, the overly dilated pupils that imply she's not entirely sober.

The camera cuts to the audience a few times for reaction shots. They are enthralled. Some are crying. The song holds them all in its bleeding palm, fragile bones showing through as the song continues. Towards the end, Fantine's voice grows more and more raw as drums crash and she proclaims, over and over, Someday you will ache like I ache. The instrumentals decrescendo and, impossibly, Fantine's voice sweetens for one final repetition.

Someday you will ache like I ache.

Cosette stabs the space bar with her finger. The image freezes on Fantine bowing her head before the audience's applause. Cosette curls in on herself, weeping.

Her mother was a junkie who died of an overdose. Her mother was a rock star who sold herself for the sake of her daughter. Her mother succumbed to her record label, to her addiction, but she fought like hell every step of the way. As Grisette, she strutted in front of the camera and demanded why she had to sell herself to sell her music. As Fantine, she cradled her guitar and let her fans glimpse the woman she might have been, wounded but a survivor at the core.

"I wish I could talk to you," Cosette says to her laptop screen. "I don't think you'd know what to do, but still. Javert ruined your life. If I take back my life, he gets to ruin Friends of the ABC. Enjolras would do it, he'd make the sacrifice--but Eponine. It's her livelihood."

She touches the screen. Fantine remains frozen, her legacy left to live in memory and video clips. And me, Cosette reminds herself, then pushes away a wild impulse to listen to the CD lurking under her pillow.

"I'll tell them tomorrow," she promises, and shuts her laptop.

Chapter Text

"He came to my home," is how Cosette finishes her story, hands knotting around fistfuls of her dress. After a sleepless night, she called an emergency meeting of Les Amis to finally tell them everything--the legal threats, Javert's involvement, even her mother's history. She didn't mean to let the latter slip, but nowadays her head's a mess and her heart is in worse shape. These people are her friends; these people have been far more honest with her than her own father. Eponine and Marius, despite the confusing status of their relationship, each have an arm around her.

Enjolras is already on his feet, of course. If he were a cat, his ears would be flattened against his head, his eyes narrowed to slits. As soon as the purpose of Cosette's meeting became clear, he began stalking up and down the same five feet of space. "We can't let this stand," he says, and Cosette's heart swells with love at the word we. "We'll have to prepare a statement for the website to get the word out. I doubt legal counsel will be of assistance at this point, but if we can bring the full force of public attention to your case, we can shame Justice Records into letting your contract go. They already have enough negative publicity, and once we reveal Javert's involvement, well. There's a reason they waited to deploy him."

Cosette shudders. Marius and Eponine, sensing the movement, squeeze her tighter. Their accidental synchronicity finally brings a smile to Cosette's face. "But it isn't fair for you to come under fire," Cosette says around the tightness in her throat. "Thank you, thank you with all my heart, but the ABC doesn't deserve to be shut down."

"Neither do you," Enjolras says, all blazing eyes and righteous fury, so intense that Cosette actually draws a sudden, sharp breath. "I did not build a following to cultivate an empire. My purpose is justice. Anyone who aids your cause aids the cause of artistic freedom."

Courfeyrac and Combeferre have been engaged in quiet discussion for the past few minutes. They've known Enjolras long enough to have mastered the art of talking to each other while simultaneously listening to their leader. "The law is on Justice Records' side," Combeferre says. His eyes are sorrowful, apologetic as he speaks, but his voice never wavers.

"But--" Marius says, face flushing. Combeferre stops him with a raised hand.

"We will help Cosette. That was never a question. I am merely warning you that Cosette has no solid legal foundation from which to build a case. She is right to fear Justice Records' disregard for public opinion because the people holding her contract know the law cannot touch them. We cannot rely on the public eye, even with the full force of Enjolras's following."

Sentence pronounced, Combeferre lets his shoulders slump.

Cosette breaks away from Marius and Eponine to take Combeferre's hands in hers. "Thank you," she says. She closes her eyes on all the grim faces surrounding her, willing the heartbreak to leave her face. Sing a happy song, Cosette. "I can--I can let my music go, if it means we're free to create more afterward. The contract isn't forever. Eponine can be the one to launch your label. She's been here all along, she's--"

"No," Eponine says, terribly calm despite the unshed tears in her eyes. "I won't be the rope you use to hang yourself."

Cosette feels her mouth falling open, words of protest rising to her lips, but then Marius settles a firm hand on Eponine's shoulder. They're beautiful together, silk and steel. "Let Eponine make her own choice. It's her career on the line." Eponine turns her head, chin tilting up to gaze wide-eyed at Marius, and oh, the hope in her eyes. Cosette could kiss them both.

"Gamble everything for love," Grantaire half-sings over the flask he brought to the meeting. He's been uncharacteristically quiet save for a "The Grisette?" when Cosette told them about her mother. "'S a good song, by the way. One of us should cover it."

"Be quiet," Enjolras says, voice tight with fury. It sounds different from his normal blaze; colder, played closer to the chest.

Before the meeting can dissolve into chaotic relationship tensions, Jehan taps his glass of water with a fork. "What about Kickstarter?" he asks. "Or any other online funding options? If we can buy out Cosette's contract, we win everything. The music, any potential legal battles, the publicity game, you name it."

"Genius!" Courfeyrac exclaims, and plants a smacking kiss in Jehan's cheek. "I don't know why I didn't think of it myself. I should be the history student and you the face of public relations. But we're in the business of music--don't look at me like that, Enjolras, you know it's a business--and we should offer a musical incentive. Signed copies of your new album, Cosette, free downloads of Eponine's first single--don't look at me like that, ladies, you've got some work to do."

"Oh, volunteer me for hours of recording," Eponine says, rolling her eyes. She ruins the effect by leaning over and giving Cosette's shoulder and insistent tug. Cosette gives Combeferre's hands one last squeeze to show she bears no ill will for his honesty, then lets Eponine and Marius wrap her up again.

Enjolras gives a thin, triumphant smile over folded arms. "A benefit concert," he says. "We'll organize it for two Saturdays from now. That will give us time to raise the money. We'll host the concert here and do a live webcast for those who can't come. Joly, do you still have the friend who works on the vegan food truck?"

"I--yeah," Joly says, beginning to grin. "I can make the catering arrangements."

"Already working on the press release," Courfeyrac says. True to his word, his laptop is open and his fingers tap away at the keys. "We might be able to score a few minutes on the news. I think we should just name the concert after the hashtag--#FreeCosette has a nice ring to it."

Marius takes a deep breath. He's slightly paler than usual, only noticeable to the people who know him well. "Use my name in the advertising. Let people know I'll be one of the acts."

Courfeyrac, who does know his friend that well, goes perfectly still. Cosette breathes, "Marius," as Eponine covers her mouth with one hand. Seeing their reactions, even the Amis less familiar with Marius's American Idol history turn to him with varying degrees of shock. Only Enjolras appears unruffled, nodding once at Marius.

Marius shifts his weight under the sudden onslaught of attention. "Everyone I care about is risking their careers," he mumbles, flushing. "I want to do what I can."

"Then all of you want to help me," Cosette says, eyes welling up. "Are you sure? There's no guarantee we'll be able to raise so much money."

"I pledged myself to your cause before we even met," Enjolras says.

Courfeyrac pauses typing again to grin at her. "We all did. It's just a side benefit you turned out to be kind and beautiful as well as talented." The rest of the Amis nod or make murmurs of assent, faith shining on their faces. Even if they don't know Cosette well, they believe in her cause, they believe in the ABC, and that's enough for them.

"I just have one condition," Eponine says, and she's smiling too, even her cynical heart won by all the hope in the room. "Do a duet with me tomorrow night. Call it practice for the concert."

"Okay," Cosette says, and then, "I don't know who to hug first! Come here, all of you!"

She can't fit her arms around all of these dear, wonderful people, but she can try.

*

Cosette e-mails NO DEAL to Javert, and then they get to work.

Feuilly has to run to another gig as soon as the meeting concludes, but he promises to have all his parts memorized as soon as they get him the music. Joly gets on the phone with what sounds like three different restaurants at once, shamelessly flattering the owners for their delicious, health-conscious food and progressive ways. Bossuet fusses with the sound equipment in a way that mostly doesn't producing flashing sparks. Jehan has work to do on his PhD thesis, but he does it while quietly refilling Grantaire's flask with water whenever he gets up to poke at his guitar.

The #FreeCosette fundraiser page and press release go live three hours later, thanks to Courfeyrac's tireless efforts and Combeferre's input. Enjolras keeps pausing his mixing work to read over their shoulder and offer his own suggestions. Shortly after the site launch, Bahorel relieves Courfeyrac from answering comments, chuckling evilly whenever he gets to answer a particularly stupid one. Gavroche, greatly insulted at being left out of the planning process, helps Bahorel think of choice insults.

Cosette and Eponine dive back into their music, now faced with a looming seven-day deadline. ("The band will need time to rehearse," Enjolras warned them once the meeting broke up. "We can't be producing until the last minute.") Cosette has approximately six songs ready to go; she's shooting for at least ten for the full album. Eponine just needs a finished single, but she's a slower songwriter and claims that real singles offer one or two other songs as well.

"Besides, the heartbreak songs are all going on the album," Eponine says. "I want to sing some new material for a change."

That more than anything makes Cosette's heart soar, though she hardly sees Eponine, driven into the studio by necessity. Marius flits back and forth between the two of them, offering guitar and vocals assistance where he can. They have to talk about the taut, electric tension running between the three of them, but they have to put together an album and a concert in an absurd amount of time. Cosette sings, "It's time to come clean and make sense of everything," in the studio, pouring herself into the song, and has to content herself with that. So much for her and Marius's plan to woo Eponine.

Cosette composes and sings, sings and composes, long into the night. She calls home once and thankfully gets the answering machine. She's not ready to talk to her father, not ready to think about the CD tucked into her purse in case she's ever strong enough to listen to it. She sleeps on the couch, isn't surprised to find she has a change of clothes here from all the other times she's stayed the night to work. She fills her morning with songwriting, only pausing for updates from Courfeyrac on the fundraiser. Donations are slow to start but they're picking up as the word gets out around the Internet. "I'll have you trending by the end of the week," is Courfeyrac's somewhat alarming promise.

It isn't until a very late lunch that Cosette remembers she's supposed to do a duet with Eponine tonight. Even if she knows the song, they should probably practice.

"I just need you to be cute and have fun with the song," Eponine says when Cosette asks her about it. She slides off her large headphones with a grin, leaning back on the piano bench. "Every fourth Tuesday is Covers Night. Enjolras and I have been trying to figure out how to cover 'Land' on and off for a year. You know, the Patti Smith song?"

"No," Cosette says, and doesn't think about the bright flash of Eponine's smile, or how it would look against Marius's pale, freckled chest.

"Think nine minutes of spoken word poetry mashed up with rock and roll," Eponine replies. "It would make great advertising for the concert. Patti Smith was one of the original punk rockers and you're breaking your concert. Pretty anti-establishment if you ask me."

Well, if Eponine wants to do a self-indulgent cover in exchange for putting her entire livelihood on the line, it's the least Cosette can do. Her father owns the Patti Smith album in question, but it's been a while since she's heard it. "I'll print out the lyrics and give it a few listens," Cosette says. "You're sure you don't want to practice?"

"I want it to be natural," Eponine says, already sliding her headphones back on. She shoots Cosette a look through lowered lashes. "Did you know she structured the song to mimic the female orgasm? Something to think about."

Cosette has several incredibly vivid things to think about until the club opens for the night.

The crowd is abuzz with talk of new music on the ABC's brand new label, the upcoming benefit concert, and how did they get Marius Pontmercy to come out of hiding and perform? Bahorel takes advantage, passing around a hat for donations and glaring at anyone who doesn't immediately reach for their wallet. Enjolras gives them a long welcoming speech that somehow doesn't feel long at all, and Cosette claps and cheers until it hurts. She can't really process that this is all for her, and so she extends her thoughts to the larger music community, the one that keeps leaving the kindest comments on the press release in between heartbreaking stories of their own losses. She'll pay them all back, every single one.

She and Eponine are slated to do their duet last, when anticipation will be highest and hopefully everyone will be drunk enough not to mind when Cosette inevitably comes in at the wrong time. Grantaire and Eponine open with a fantastic cover of "Mr. Jones," which segues into a heartrending Grantaire solo on "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction." He is the only fly in the ointment, drunker and more belligerent with every passing hour. Cosette is worried about him, has tried to talk to him in between recording sessions, but he keeps brushing her aside, telling her she needs to work on the album.

"Please," Cosette says, trying again over Bahorel and Feuilly's instrumental cover of "Can't Buy Me Love." The only break Enjolras took last night was the vicious fight with Grantaire all of them tried not to overhear.

"Just leave it," Grantaire says, and his voice is so tired. "I'm on again after. Let me get a drink."

Bossuet tries to stop Grantaire at the bar, but has equally little success. He stares after Grantaire, concern written across his face, then catches Cosette's eye and shrugs. What is there to do besides watch him take another drink, and another, and another?

There's something deeply wrong with that statement, but Cosette gets pulled away again to check the donation numbers with Courfeyrac. Too much going on, too much to think about. After the check-in (the money is still coming in, but the pace needs to step up a little or they'll have raised enough money the day after it's due), Marius needs a hug after being recognized by two guys in the audience, and then Enjolras has a sample he wants her to work into one of her song drafts, and then it's time for her to hit the stage with Eponine, barely read lyrics in hand.

"I hope this doesn't go viral," Cosette moans as she climbs onto the stage.

Eponine smirks over her shoulder at Cosette. "Bet you it does." Then Eponine shifts into her stage persona, waving to the crowd, greeting them with a yell of, "Hope you're good and drunk, because I'm going to subject you to poetry!" That grants her an appreciative laugh.

Marius is backing them on guitar, Bahorel on drums, and Grantaire on bass guitar--the usual crowd, but Eponine has surrendered the keyboard to Feuilly rather than play it herself or even leave it to Cosette. It makes sense for Eponine to be out from the piano once she launches into the spoken word beginning--"The boy was in a hallway drinkin' a glass of tea"--upright, she's commanding despite her small stature, voice and eyes gone velvet as she incants, "From the other end of the hallway a rhythm was generating."

But the reason for Cosette standing there, in the awkward position of a backup singer who doesn't come in for at least another three minutes, doesn't become clear until Eponine launches into the second part of the song, twining a supple arm around Cosette's waist as she sings, "Do you know how to twist? Well it goes like this, it goes like this!" Eponine is gleeful, incandescent, wearing her stage face but the brush of her skin achingly sincere. She twirls Cosette without even pausing for a breath, singing her way through the first verse of "Land of a Thousand Dances" before dropping it in favor of poetry.

Cosette gets to surprise Eponine, leaning close to join her on the line, "Oh, pretty boy, can't you show me nothing but surrender?" Eponine drops back a little, still grinning, but a shade deeper into her stage face, gaze darting from Cosette to Marius and back to the audience. "Life is full of pain," she wails, holding them all in the palm of her hand until they're shouting Go Rimbaud! along with her.

The music drops a little lower and Eponine beckons Cosette forward only to press a finger against Cosette's lips. "There's a little place, a place called space," Eponine croons, and Cosette takes a breath. The music swells again, though, leveled out for only a few seconds, and oh yes, this is the you like it like that part, and Eponine slides a knee between Cosette's legs and dips her back.

"Baby calm down," Eponine sings, low and cool, and this must be what she was talking about with the song structure, because this pace is circular and relentless and everything Cosette wants, and she isn't even singing yet. It's not fair for Eponine to be doing this, but it's completely wonderful, and then there's Marius on guitar, hands so sure and strong over his guitar strings, but his eyes, his eyes are fixed on the two of them.

The third part of the song is all stream of consciousness lyricism set to music. Eponine steadies herself in the center of the stage, dark eyes ecstatic and fixated on a point beyond the audience. "I put my fingers through her silken hair and found a stair," she says, foot tapping to Bahorel's beat.

Cosette takes her mic off the stand and drapes herself around Marius when her part finally starts. "Up there is just a sea of possibilities," she says, underneath and inside Eponine declaring, "There is no land but the land, there is no sea but the sea." Cosette trails her forefinger down the side of Marius's neck, feels his pulse jumping beneath. She presses a kiss to his cheek before she walks away, trading places with Eponine just in time for Eponine to smirk out the line, "It started hardening in my hand and I felt the arrows of desire."

Nothing about this song should work--too old, too long, too experimental--but the audience loves it, loves the interplay between the three of them onstage, the howling glee of Eponine throwing her head back and shouting, "Our lives are now entwined, we will fall yes we're together twirling!" and Cosette spins between both of them, calling, "Feel it! Feel it! Feel it! Feel it!"

It's too easy, in the midst of this contract chaos, to forget the pure artistry of music. Not even leaping onstage with Enjolras compares to this, and Cosette sags to her knees when the song begins its long denouement, instruments dropping out one by one as Eponine narrates them through the last few moments of Johnny the boy in the hallway, fingers outstretched to the heavens, his vocal cords shot up like mad pituitary glands. In the end, there's just a man dancing around to a simple rock 'n' roll song, and the band and the audience let out a long last breath as Eponine lets her hands fall.

Then the applause breaks out, and it lasts, and lasts, and someone throws an actual bra onstage before Enjolras announces that they have to close for the night, last call was fifteen minutes ago, no really.

Giggling, more or less secluded behind a speaker, Cosette kisses Marius full on the mouth, giving his hair one firm tug before she lets him go and turns to Eponine. Eponine is panting as though she's just run a marathon or sung an aria, the ends of her hair slick with sweat and sticking to her skin. She licks her lips once, then wipes at her mouth, leaving a trail of lipstick red as blood. Her eyes lock on Cosette and Marius, flick down to where their hands are joined.

"Not tonight," Eponine says, and the last of the show adrenaline leaves her body. She folds back into herself, larger than life no more. "Not tonight. I--I'm still not sure what you want with me."

And like Grantaire's drinking, Cosette has to leave it, has to watch Eponine go, because there's still more work to do and there are some things that cannot be forced.

*

After that night, Cosette goes home to shower, sleep, and pick up a few more clothes.

Her father doesn't ask whether she's listened to the CD, or where she's been, or what's going on with her contract, or even whether she's forgiven him. He makes one of her favorite breakfasts, baked French toast with raspberries tucked in between the layers, and asks if she wants to play a little music.

"Okay," Cosette surprises herself by saying. "Okay."

They play with "Lights" for a while, reworking it until Cosette wonders whether her next project should be an acoustic album, in spite of her electronica influences. Then Cosette plucks her way through a song she's titled "Guns and Horses," her father offering a quiet suggestion every now and again. After that, she's had enough of work and they play a few Rolling Stones songs, a little Pete Seeger, all of the music that her father loves and so she loves, too.

Jamming with her father is very different from last night's performance, but the end result is the same--Cosette loses herself in the music, walking the tightrope of guitar chords with her father's backup to act as a safety net should she fumble. For all his secrets, Jean Valjean has always been obvious about his love for her, always been there to kiss her bruises and soothe her fears. Cosette smiles over her guitar at her father, tentative, and when he smiles back, a few of the shadows fall from his face.

Then the doorbell rings, and Cosette doesn't have to answer to know who will be behind it. "Let me get it. You keep playing," Cosette says, forcing cheer into her tone. "I probably left something at the studio."

There is no friend behind the door, of course. Cosette keeps the door latched, opens it just wide enough for her to see Javert, staring down at her with that cold, neutral gaze. She's just a lawbreaker to him, no different from a purse snatcher. Cosette shivers.

"As promised, your music will go on sale in two weeks, concurrent with the due date of your fines," he intones. There is no paper in his hands, but he sounds as though he's reciting something written down. Unsurprisingly, he presses an envelope through the crack between doorway and door. "If you do not pay, Justice Records will involve the police."

Cosette snatches the envelope from his hands. Fine, so at least she'll have something to show to the Amis later. "Fine. I'll have the money by then. Goodbye." In the distance, her father finally starts playing guitar again, which means he's been listening in on the conversation. Wonderful.

Before she can shut the door, Javert frowns. "What's that?"

"Just listening to some bootlegs," Cosette lies, and shuts the door in his face. It's just as satisfying as it was the first time--pity she'll have to see him again to do it a third time.

When Cosette returns to her father's side, he averts his eyes and says, "I'm sorry. Javert is still the same man he was. There are terrible people in the world, people who can justify any cruelty if it falls in line with their own moral code."

So much for not talking about any of their troubles. "The ABC is doing a fundraiser for me. We're hoping to buy out my contract. I'll get my songs back, pay my fines, everything. I just hope that we keep getting donations." Cosette sighs, leaning against her father rather than pick up her guitar again. "You should come see us play."

"My daughter, fallen in with the revolutionaries." Jean Valjean smiles and tucks a fallen strand of hair behind her ear, as though she's still a child. "They must be good people if they're helping you."

"They're the best people. Especially Eponine and Marius." Cosette turns her head so she can look at the wall instead of her father. "I, um, I don't want any more secrets between us." Her father flinches, which is odd, but she can't think about that, has to push through the tangle of nerves and just say it: "I might be dating Marius. And Eponine. We're trying to work something out."

There is a long, terrible silence. Cosette stares at the wall until her vision blurs, until her eyes hurt. "Oh," her father says at last. "Well. They--they must be good people, if they love you."

And somehow, that's exactly the thing Cosette needs to hear, exactly the blessing she needs. "I love you," she declares, throwing her arms around her father. "And now I need to go back to work."

*

Cosette writes.

Her first album was different. Then, the songs had been worked and reworked over the years, honed from her absolute raw beginnings as a songwriter to something slightly sharper. But if her first album was a knife, it would be for cutting butter; this second album is a letter opener, sure and precise, opening up to reveal. Cosette writes another song about her struggles with Justice Records, then another one. She writes about her tangled, terrifying, thrilling relationship with Eponine and Marius, the confusing sway between ups and downs. She writes about the dead mother and the abusive childhood she can barely remember. She writes about her father, whose love she does remember. All of her songs are barely more than a month old, yet it feels as though she's been working on this album for her entire life.

Eponine has retreated into her own songwriting. She's been sitting on some original gems for years and only has to write a single, not a whole album, but Eponine is a perfectionist. She also claims that no artist releases a single without having a few other tracks on the album. That sets off a heated debate with Courfeyrac about the need to follow old-fashioned methods when hardly anyone buys singles on vinyl anymore. In the end, Eponine has her way: she's working on three songs at once, and has the perfect excuse to avoid Cosette and Marius.

"It'll all turn out fine," Marius assures her, but he keeps practicing and practicing for his first public appearance in over a year. He's avoiding them in his own quiet, Marius-like way, hiding behind his guitar.

Enjolras has more work to do than anyone else between producing Cosette's album, Eponine's singles, and his unceasing commitment to opening every night. The crowds grow larger and more intense with each passing night, the donations larger, the comments on Cafe Musain too numerous for Cosette to read. Courfeyrac reads her the best ones, most from musicians recounting their own struggles. I've been waiting for someone to beat Javert since he took out Johnny Rocker and the Jailbirds, a retiree writes along with a generous donation. Give 'em hell. #FreeCosette!

It's still not enough, but more and more, Cosette hopes. Her professional career can succeed, at least, as her personal life dissolves into something just this side of painful. It would be agony if they weren't all so busy.

Even the kindest of the Amis grow snappish after days upon nights of long hours and too few breaks. Combeferre and Courfeyrac have a debate too edged with sarcasm to be called friendly. Joly and Bossuet have an outright argument over what kind of takeout to bring home to Musichetta; the lady herself has to settle the argument on speaker phone, yelling at them both to quit acting like idiots and please bring home the good Indian takeout, they don't have to live like animals. Bahorel gets into at least one argument with everybody, but that's not that much different from usual. Feuilly adds peacemaker to his long list of jobs; Jehan has all but abandoned his thesis for the week.

Grantaire remains the biggest cause for worry. He shows up for gigs and not much else, drunk and combative. Cosette can't tell if the drinking is causing the fights with Enjolras, or if Grantaire is drinking to deal with the fights with Enjolras. They tear each other apart over the smallest things, Grantaire's lips curled in a perpetual sneer and Enjolras's pale with contempt. No one knows what's caused the latest falling out, nor if they're still together. They don't have time for personal disasters. All they can do is keep an eye on Grantaire's flask and the contents of the bar.

"Can I play you something? It's another piano-based song--" Cosette starts, but Eponine brushes past her every time. She actually looks apologetic, which is the worst part.

"Deadlines," Eponine says. She moves away when Cosette tries to touch her hand. "You know how they are. Just play it from the heart. You're not a bad pianist, and your voice is so pure it makes up for any sparseness in the arrangement."

It's the longest conversation they've had since the Patti Smith cover. Cosette stomps her way into the recording room, where she records the main piano line, jabbing the keys with more force than necessary. She has to change the line I was waiting in the room for you to care to I was waiting by the phone for you to care because the original is too pointed, comes out so angry she can't even sing it.

"That was sloppy," Enjolras says, listening to the take.

Cosette rises from the bench, hands on her hips. "It was passionate. I don't care if it wasn't technically perfect. We don't exactly have time for technically perfect! We just need a record, and if it doesn't come out the way we want it, we can re-record and release it again later. Or do a live album. Or just work on a whole new one if I can just get out of my contract, which is the whole reason for this album!"

Enjolras listens to all of this without a reaction, not even a raise of his eyebrows to register the agitation in Cosette's voice, the way her voice breaks on the word "contract." When Cosette trails off into silence, shocked at herself for blowing up, Enjolras closes his eyes and heaves a deep, heartfelt sigh.

"I can't help but seek perfection," he murmurs, almost to himself. "Somehow it's all entwined in my head--the artistry and the cause for freedom in artistry. I suppose it's entwined in the real world. You're right. Passion makes all the difference. Passion, which I have for this project, for the rights of artists everywhere." He hesitates, and Cosette turns back toward her sheet music. "How are things with you and Marius and Eponine?"

"What?" Cosette asks. She can feel her mouth hanging open, so she shuts it. "I, they're--they're not what I want them to be, but they're fine, if that's what you're asking." Fine, in the sense that they can be in the same room together.

"Good." That deadly neutrality is back on Enjolras's face. He leans back in his chair. "The three of you are more professional than Grantaire and me. I am uncertain how this happened, since we were never dating."

Her mouth falls open again, wider this time, but it's justified. "Grantaire is in love with you. What, did you think you were friends with benefits? You were never friends!"

Enjolras bows his head. "I suppose not," he says, and turns back to his computer screen.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that," Cosette says. She would hug anyone else in this situation, but nothing about Enjolras's posture invites touch.

"Yes, you did," Enjolras says without turning around. There is no inflection in his voice. "I believe we both have work to do."

"I won't be your excuse for throwing your relationship away," Cosette says, low and fierce, but this time Enjolras gives no indication he's heard anything at all.

*

Tensions boil over after a particularly rotten Wednesday. Something goes awry with the website, so Courfeyrac has code running across his laptop while frantically checking donations on his phone. They have to close early for the night because a sudden swarm of paparazzi descends upon Marius, and it's only Bahorel's creative threats against their cameras that give Marius time to escape into the upstairs apartment. Despite the early close, they still have time to run out of a particular kind of whiskey, and someone--afterward, no one can remember who--accuses Grantaire of drinking the entire bottle.

"I'll poison myself on my own fucking dime," he spits. He reminds Cosette of a rabid dog, every tooth bared as he's backed into a corner. Grantaire is leaning against a table because he's too drunk to stand up straight, and he almost knocks the table and himself over as he snatches up his coat. "I'll be in my trailer."

"And wake up in the gutter?" Joly, smiling Joly, is white with fury. "Come home with Bossuet and me, we can help you--"

"Into my bed, perhaps, but with no one to warm it, there's not much appeal in sleep. I think it was Hamlet that compared sleep to death, or was it death to sleep? To sleep no more, ay, there's the rub, and you can quote me on that!" Grantaire barks a horrifying laugh at his own misquotation and begins to weave his way to the door.

Before he can go, Eponine's hand cracks across his face.

"If you ever get this drunk here again," she says, biting off each word, "you will be banned from the premises." One corner of her mouth trembles after this pronouncement, but her gaze holds steady.

"God damn this server!" Courfeyrac cries, slamming his hand down on the bar before Grantaire can speak the thoughts behind his terrible smile. "If we can't get Cafe Musain back up, I don't know how we're going to raise the money in time."

Pandemonium breaks out after that, everyone offering suggestions or lapsing into paranoia, depending on personality. Then the fighting starts up again, on and on and on about what to do and where else can they get the money and this is never going to work and what if Marius chokes onstage when the paparazzi shows up and no Grantaire you can't have a parting drink and no Grantaire we're not kicking you out you just can't drink like this and the music and the money and--

Cosette snaps.

"Shut up! I'm putting on the song!"

No one asks Cosette what she means. Even in a room full of musicians, when Cosette says the song, it can only refer to one. In Cosette's bag is her mother's last gift to her, one final expression of motherly love engraved on CD. But the CD case doesn't feel like love; it's a slight but cold weight in Cosette's hands as she pulls it out. She can't even relish the silence in the wake of her words. Now she has to follow through on her promise.

"Are you sure?" Eponine asks. She touches Cosette's forearm with just her fingertips. Marius's eyes are liquid with concern.

Better to fulfill a promise. "I'm sure," Cosette says. Motioning for Enjolras to step aside, she slides the CD into the drive on his laptop. "And we're live," she says, soft. She kneels before the speakers, a supplicant at the altar.

The first shuffling, wistful notes leave Cosette with her fingers knotted together, hands pressed over her heart. "In my platforms I hit the floor," sings her mother, and she sounds lovely, beautiful even, unlike the raw pain and power of her Grisette voice. "Then my baby came before I found the magic how to keep her happy..."

The tears come at, "Don't judge me so harsh, little girl, so you got a Playboy mommy." Cosette's shoulders tremble as though she's cold, but she's crying, only crying. "From here to Birmingham, I got a few friends," Fantine sings, pitiful in her recount of just who those friends are, all the liars and the pimps of the music industry. There's something noble in her suffering, some inextinguishable piece of her heart in the music.

Every word is a kiss of salt on wounds Cosette never even knew she had. "I never was there, was there when it counts," sings Fantine, sending her apology fifteen years too late, but still. Still. "You seemed ashamed, ashamed that I was a good friend of American soldiers." Fantine's pain is tangible, matched only by Cosette's, falling from her eyes in a steady stream. If Fantine were here, Cosette would hold her, would tell her she's proud to be the daughter of a mother who loved her so much, but that won't happen, not ever.

This song is a love letter to which Cosette can never respond, reaching for Cosette's hands through death and time.

"You'll cross that bridge all on your own," her mother's ghost sings from long ago, as though she knew everything, even the pieces of her past that Cosette can no longer remember. Cosette presses her knuckles against her teeth, muffling the sobs that want to come, because she has to listen, she has to make it to the end, she has to hear.

And the last thing Fantine has to offer her daughter, the last promise, is this: "I'll be here, I'll be here to take you in my arms."

Her voice fades. Cosette closes her eyes and pulls in shuddering breath after shuddering breath.

Fantine loved her. She loved her. She loved her, and she was the kind of person Cosette could have loved, too.

Someone kneels in front of her. Someone presses a soft handkerchief against her cheek. Cosette opens her eyes and is surprised but not surprised at all to see Courfeyrac. "We're still with you all the way," he promises. "You've been through enough."

"Thank you," Cosette says, voice tiny, and that's when everyone else rushes forward. Marius gets there first, wrapping a protective arm around her waist, and Cosette rests her head on his shoulder, looking for Eponine.

Eponine has fresh tear tracks on her cheeks, and she casts Cosette one soulful glance before turning back to Grantaire, pressing a glass of water into his hands. He takes it, thank God he takes it, and Cosette lets her eyes fall shut again, tumbling into her first real sleep in days.

Chapter Text

Things aren't perfect after they hear Fantine's song, but there is a shift in attitude, a tempo changed for the fast instead of the frantic. Enjolras mixes Cosette's new songs, and somehow he finds the time to come up with at least two versions of each one. Cosette listens to what's on offer, then makes her own suggestions. Most of the time, each version of the song is brilliant--the man has a gift, it isn't fair how gifted he is and how little the world knows of him--and Cosette tells him to file a few songs away for a remix album. They produce music, and they don't kiss the people they want to kiss, and that has to be fine until the concert is over.

Other things have to be fine, too. Cosette overhears Bossuet and Joly quietly planning an intervention for Grantaire as soon as the concert furor dies down, and she shakes with guilt, knowing that she is the reason that they're putting it off. But they know Grantaire better than she does, and if they think it can wait a few more days, she has to defer to their judgment. There isn't time for Cosette to do more than notice the shadows under Grantaire's eyes, deep and dark like bruises. She sees through a haze of countermelody, has to shut her eyes so that she can hear better. His pain, all of their pain, is so loud.

And then miraculously, in the middle of the day on Thursday, Cosette and Enjolras have produced a complete album.

"Unless you have something else for me," Enjolras says, but Cosette interrupts him by squealing, seizing his hands, and jumping up and down.

"It's done! Oh my God, I have a second album! It's done and it's amazing and thank you so much, oh my God!" This is what the poets were talking about, Cosette thinks, the spontaneous outpouring of joy. There's the initial rush when the art passes through you, and then there's the sensation of being complete, of having shaped your art into the form it was always meant to possess.

"Tell the viewers at home how it feels," Courfeyrac says. He's holding his cell phone, grinning. "A local TV station hinted that it was interested in this footage, so make it good."

Ordinarily, Cosette would care about her unkempt hair and days-old makeup, but ordinary Cosette would still be at home, suffering writer's block and trying not to think of Justice Records. Enjolras, on the other hand, looks as perfect as always through some mysterious trick of genetics.

Cosette flashes a smile she's sure must look as crazed as it does thrilled. "We're so ready for the concert on Saturday! We invite everyone to strike a blow for creative freedom and either attend the concert or watch the livestream! I know I'm biased, but this album is so, so good."

The album is good. Most of it is electronica-influenced, but there are a few sparer songs where the guitar and piano lines peek through; the influence of her loved ones, Fantine and Jean Valjean and Marius and Eponine. The album is done, and Cosette has to perform select songs tomorrow. The enormity of the task should crush her, but the word done keeps floating to the surface of her thoughts, and that alone is enough to buoy her spirits.

Courfeyrac is mouthing something while Cosette speaks. She finally deciphers it and yells it so loud Enjolras actually starts in his seat: "I want to see you there, even if you just came to say hello!"

"Perfect," Courfeyrac says, already rewatching the footage on his phone. "Great soundbite. You look adorable with your braids all mussed like that. I can definitely get you on the five o'clock news tomorrow." He makes a face in response to Enjolras', which looks as though someone just waved sour milk under his nose. "Don't look at me like that, Enjolras. Just because I can play the political game doesn't mean I don't care about the artistry, or the cause."

"No one is doubting you care," Cosette says, still bouncing slightly back and forth on her heels. God. No matter what happens, she knows she can write music again, and that's worth everything in the world. She holds out her hand, because of course Enjolras has been working on the computer this whole time, loading the album on thumb drives to send to their backing band. Everyone will get copies via Soundcloud. It's all so last minute. This kind of thing would never fly at Justice Records, and Cosette loves it.

She bounds in the direction of the stairs, leaving Courfeyrac and Enjolras to chat. On the way down, she passes Combeferre. He reads the excitement on her face and says, "Congratulations." To his credit, he remains unruffled by the great smacking kiss Cosette plants on his cheek.

"It's finished!" Cosette cries, and starts tossing out thumb drives like she's Miss America throwing candy from a parade float. "Rehearsal tomorrow! Rehearsal forever!"

Gavroche is the first to hug her, surprising them all, including himself. "You're nice," he mutters, going brick red. "My sister thinks so, too, even if she won't say it. Bye."

Eponine doesn't overhear, engaged in quiet conversation with Marius by the keyboard. They look to be in their own world: Marius's hand on Eponine's shoulder, a warm smile on Eponine's face, so unlike her usual guarded look. Cosette wavers at the bottom of the staircase, uncertain. Perhaps those two have made up their differences, but will it ever work between the three of them?

The still moment between them dissolves as more people rush toward Cosette on the stairs, shouting their glee. Cosette keeps smiling and throwing thumb drives on autopilot, but she feels the moment Eponine and Marius turn their attention toward her. It's the same look in their eyes, tender and mild as a Christmas song, perhaps the start of what they've been searching for all along.

*

Cosette runs home on Friday, or perhaps she flies, or--she's not entirely sure how she gets home, just that she feels as though she could take wing. They completed the album in time! The public is on their side! Now the concert seems less a fundraising event and more like a celebration. Surely, surely everything will turn out fine.

She unlocks the door, pushing sweaty strands of hair out of her face, and finds her father in the living room watching the evening news. Cosette catches a glimpse of her own face on the screen and smiles. Courfeyrac got them on the news after all.

"By the way, you're invited to the concert tomorrow!" Cosette says gaily, throwing her arms around her father's neck. There is nothing like the high of finishing an album; she'd almost forgotten. "I know you don't like being onstage, but you're welcome to play. Marius and Eponine are beside themselves with nerves, so you might need to. It's my concert, but I don't feel nervous at all. Is that strange? Am I going crazy?"

"Too much coffee, I think," Jean Valjean says, kissing her cheek. "I was just watching your interview, but I think they've wrapped things up." He holds up the remote control, about to turn the television off, when Javert's face fills the screen.

Cosette wrinkles her nose. "Ugh. I can't wait to see him tomorrow when we write a check for all of that money. Then I can't wait to never see him again."

"We were startled to hear this accusation from Javert, a member of the legal team at Justice Records," the news anchor says. The screen changes to a quotation. "'I have reason to believe that Les Amis are consorting with another notorious criminal in the music world. I refer to the lead guitarist of the Jailbirds, a man best known as Johnny Rocker.' When pressed for further details, Javert said that he had no comment."

Her father drops the remote control.

"What's wrong?" Alarm doesn't creep into Cosette's voice: it rushes in, sirens wailing. Her father is so pale he looks gray. She reaches into her pocket for her phone. "I'll call a doctor! Should I call an ambulance? Would that be better?"

"No," Jean Valjean says. He leans forward, resting his forehead on his cupped hands. "It's quite a long story, Cosette. I would--after the past few weeks, I would rather not."

When Cosette presses the home button on her phone, the screen lights up, revealing her mother's song still on pause. Quietly, she asks, "Remember what happened the last time you kept secrets?"

Jean Valjean sighs as though some great force has knocked the last breath of air from his lungs. The lines on his face stand out in sharp shadows of exhaustion, and Cosette has to push down her guilt. There are no more secrets between them but this, the last obstacle to overcome before they can go back to being a little girl and her father, hand-in-hand. Or… whatever the adult version of that might be.

"Some water, please. Just give me a moment."

Cosette fetches the water, pouring a glass for herself as well, and settles down beside her father on the couch. His color is better, better still after he takes a generous gulp of water. Cosette waits him out, her mother's song running through her head. Strange to have someone else's words always on the brain when finishing her own album, but it worked--the Lovely Ladies pulse in the bassline of "Pretty Thing," speak in "I Need Your Love" and "Something Like a Hero." Her songs are better for her mother's influence.

"I was Johnny Rocker," Jean Valjean says at last, and Cosette almost chokes on her water.

Everyone with even a passing interest in rock and roll has heard of Johnny Rocker and the Jailbirds. They're a huge part of music history, made all the more exciting by the controversy surrounding their concert bootlegs--and their frontman's well-known struggles with substance abuse and subsequent disappearance from the public eye. Cosette has never watched any of the documentaries out of respect for her father, who leaves the room whenever people on television are drunk or using drugs. But she's read books and countless articles, and suddenly, so many things have fallen into place.

"The broken nose. The broken concert," Cosette says, touching her father's well-loved face, which looks nothing like young Johnny Rocker's face at all. It's the face of a man who has seen too much of the world's hurt; now, she sees it's the face of a man who's also caused too much of the world's hurt, and has dedicated his life to eradicating some small measure of others' sorrow.

Jean Valjean closes his eyes in acknowledgment. "I wanted to play that show with a broken nose still trailing blood and whiskey. My bandmates, my manager, they were all big drinkers themselves. The only reason they saved me was because they wanted to keep the band together, keep playing, keep making money, but they still saved me."

She leans in toward her father, touching her forehead to his. Johnny Rocker, face bloodied after a bar fight, tried to play a concert. His bandmates had to wrestle him off the stage and still couldn't avoid police involvement. Johnny Rocker in handcuffs, blood-streaked teeth bared to the paparazzi, is a photograph so iconic that a punk band recreated it for a single cover a few years ago, to great controversy. And that broken man was her father, her kind, gentle father.

"But while I was in rehab, getting clean for the first time since I was twelve, Javert saw the opportunity to prosecute us for allowing fans to bootleg our shows and trade them with each other," Jean Valjean continues. He turns away, breaking contact. "We lost so much money. The band broke up anyway. I still owe some fines, technically, but I hid from the authorities. I put any money I make in royalties to better use. Charity. Raising you. I owe those record companies nothing."

"Of course not," Cosette says, fierce. "Let me guess, they encouraged your rebel image." Her mother, now her father, how dare they.

"To a point. I'd come in with it. You must understand, my sweet girl, I'd been drinking for a long, long time. My father drank. My grandfather drank. I would have needed rehab regardless of whether the public turned its eye on me." Her father's smile is so pained it can scarcely be called one at all. He still won't look at her, as though she could ever be ashamed of him. "I went through rehab four times before it finally took. With the band dissolved and drinking changing my appearance so completely, I found a little peace working as a counselor. Music had soured for me. Helping people, people whose stories I knew, was what mattered to me."

Cosette inches closer and lays her head on her father's shoulder.

"When your mother came in for rehab, she was so lost. Very few people know that Jean Valjean was once Johnny Rocker, but the facility director knew. She assigned me to your mother. It was--painful, knowing almost exactly where Fantine was coming from. But I could help her because I know what it's like to have your excesses, your disease, photographed for the tabloids' entertainment. I told her who I was, and she never told a soul."

Jean Valjean bows his head. This time, at least, he doesn't pull away.

"Because music helped her, we would play a little together every day. We would sing old songs, or made up songs. Never any songs we had released. We never wrote any new songs together, but she did tell me about the song she was writing for you. I think that somehow she knew that she wasn't long for the world, that the addiction would come screaming back after rehab. I helped her record the song, and she helped me love music again. Music should always be like that, played for the sheer love of it." Jean Valjean smiles at Cosette through the tears in his eyes. "I already owed your mother a debt I could never repay, and then she mailed me the CD along with your address and told me to find you if anything ever happened to her. She gave me a daughter. I had no one, and then I had you."

Cosette is crying again. How many tears shed in the past few weeks, in the past few months? These tears feel cool and clean, like rain over a freshly turned garden. There's nothing growing in the soil yet, but the rain brings a promise of green. "You finally told me the truth," she says. The blood is whirling in her brain, through every part of her body. "I--I'm happy you did. I'm not angry. I just, I need to go back to the studio." She laughs, wiping away the tears. "I just came back to get some things. Will you be all right?"

"I'll be at the concert tomorrow," her father says, soft. "Don't worry about me." And then he lets her go, lets her find her own way at last.

*

Cosette returns to the ABC after another run to clear her head. Her heart feels like it's breaking, but in a clean way. She keeps coming back to the idea of a garden as her feet pound the pavement. Her next album will have to be about growing instead of surviving, new loves and new stages of being. God. Her next album.

Once inside, she passes Enjolras in quiet, tense-looking conversation with Combeferre, but they wave her on before she can say hello. That's fine--she's here for Eponine and Marius, to lay their issues to rest, one way or another. This is the plan she built on the run back, sweat trickling down her back in the heat of summer. The plan is that there is no plan, no set of instructions to follow. Emotions don't work like that. Cosette just has to ask for an answer, a plea she sang in one of the songs on the album. I need your love, I need your time.

Her father told her the truth, the last of the truth. Her album is finished. Cosette can do anything, including fix her love life.

"Come with me," Cosette says to Eponine and Marius, who are sitting by the keyboard again, laughing like old friends. Again, she has the peculiar flash of emotion that means hurt but not hurt; it's lovely, seeing her two favorite people get along, but painful, because everything is so fragile that a single push could send it tumbling to pieces.

But push it Cosette will. She has to know if this thing between them is strong enough.

Eponine gives her a strange look. "You got our text message?"

"What?" Cosette's phone beeped in the middle of her run, but she didn't pull it out to look, too busy building her inner reserves of courage for this conversation. She looks at her phone now, bearing a text from Marius that reads: hey we just finished ponine's 1st single come listen. "Oh," she says, flushing. "Sorry. Of course I want to hear the single."

Cosette follows them into the studio, telling herself that it's not avoidance if it's Eponine, who shares so few pieces of herself, letting her listen to her new song. The room with its myriad of computer screens and sound equipment has become familiar, but it feels entirely different with just the three of them inside, no Enjolras to look over their shoulders.

"We will die if we ruin this equipment," Eponine says, as if reading Cosette's mind. She taps Marius's hand as he reaches for a knob. "Enjolras is worried because R isn't here. Not that he's willing to talk about him with me. I have to believe those two idiots can figure it out." She smiles at that, a small, secretive smile that she looks up to share with Cosette and Marius.

Marius leans over and whispers, "I think she means us, too." His breath is warm against Cosette's ear.

"But I haven't done enough wooing," Cosette says, because her mouth is racing far ahead of her brain. "Maybe Marius has, I don't know, but--"

"Just listen to the song. I listened to every lovelorn lyric you wrote about us." Irritation makes Eponine sound the same as she always does when talking to Cosette; paradoxically, it makes Cosette feel better.

Eponine presses play and the song that follows is nothing short of charming, which is never a word Cosette has associated with Eponine's music before. Smoky, sultry, lovelorn, jazzy--if asked, Cosette would name all of those as descriptors. This song starts off with a tinkling crash of percussion ("Enjolras," Eponine says by way of explanation), and then launches into the clever wordplay Cosette has always admired in Eponine's work. The internal rhyme alone in the nickel dropped when I was on my way beyond the rubicon is astonishing.

Cosette meant what she said, though. She's given longing glances to Eponine, and she's watched Marius talk to Eponine, but this past week, she's been too busy for wooing. It's understandable, it's perfectly understandable, but is it right for things to just fall into place like this without some final gesture on her part? She thought things were going somewhere after the "Land" performance, but then Eponine backed away. Over the speakers, Eponine's voice asks, Ooh, after all the folderol and hauling over coals stops, what can I do?

The little song story unfolds in Cosette's ears. The narrator can't take a good day without a bad one, don't feel just to smile until I've had one, and it's all Eponine, her cynicism and her guarded nature and her fierce dignity. Their shared past is lost somewhere to Cosette's memory, but she knows Eponine's past is not a happy one. All of them have survived more than their fair share of sorrow, and yet they've all made lives for themselves, turned pain and pleasure into music. I don't want a home, I'd ruin that, Eponine sings on the single, but Cosette feels at home in the studio, Marius and Eponine on either side. She takes both of their hands, giving them a firm squeeze.

I got a plan and a demand and it just began, and if you're right, you'll agree, says the track, and Cosette feels the smile grow and grow in her chest until it rises to her face. Here it's coming, a better version of me. The Eponine in the studio with them repeats the declaration twice more, singing softly along with the track until it twirls its way to a merry-go-round stop.

"That was beautiful," Marius says at the same time Cosette says, "You don't have to change." They smile at each other, and Cosette giggles, foolishly fond. Marius is so sweet.

Eponine tilts her head, watching the two of them. "I did have to change," she says. Her smile is more visible in the dark of her eyes than the curl of her lips. "I had to become the kind of person who would date someone instead of just pine for them from afar, never getting to know them." Marius opens his mouth as if to protest, but she raises a hand. "I had to write new music instead of the same old themes I've been working and reworking to death."

"But you can write music," Marius says, shy. "Both of you, you have no idea--I can't believe you associate with me, sometimes."

"Your lyrics will always be better than mine, Eponine," Cosette says, wrapping her fingers more firmly through theirs. "And you're a great cover artist, Marius, that's why you have thousands of middle-aged fans in the first place."

Eponine coughs out something that sounds like damning with faint praise.

"I'll admit I'm more comfortable with changing up my sound," Cosette continues, making a face at her. Marius strokes his thumb over Cosette's, telling her that he knows what she meant.

"You're more comfortable with changing up everything," Eponine says, and that's when she kisses Cosette, right there over the sound board.

Cosette can't move for a moment, fearful that this is all some sort of fever dream brought on by too much work. Eponine's lips are warm but the press of them is uncertain, hesitant. Marius makes a small sound and lets go of Cosette's hand to wrap his arm around her waist. That's what convinces Cosette this is real at last, and she leans in, tongue sliding into Eponine's mouth, which is also warm, and comfortable, and somehow familiar. Cosette tugs Marius closer, so he can put an arm around Eponine as well, and the three of them trade kisses for a few minutes. It's not Cosette in the middle anymore, or Marius, but just the three of them, an equilateral triangle at last.

"When did it change?" Cosette asks at last, breaking the cycle.

Eponine snorts. "That ridiculously sexy cover of 'Land,' of course. Why do you think it scared me so badly? We were all so in sync, and it was all coming together so perfectly, so I had to go and ruin it."

"You didn't," Marius says, voice uncharacteristically firm. "You could never. You just needed more time."

"More time to lead you on, I think." Eponine squirms a little. "I don't know if I could have said anything if you hadn't listened to the song."

"Solving disagreements through music is a time-honored tradition," Cosette says. "Also having disagreements. Let's not turn into Fleetwood Mac."

"Oh, no, I would give my left arm to write 'Landslide,'" Eponine disagrees immediately. "And I don't even like the rest of their music."

"My father--" Cosette starts, and then she realizes, They don't know. Her voice falters and her eyes fill with tears. "There's something I have to tell you," she manages to get out despite the tightness in her throat.

She pours the whole long story into their listening silence. Neither Eponine nor Marius make a sound, though they both must have heard of Johnny Rocker. All they do is stroke her hair and brush away her tears, hold her hands and kiss her salt-stained cheeks. Somehow, without her having to say anything, they know to let her finish telling the story of Jean Valjean, who is no longer Johnny Rocker. Another day, perhaps, they can talk about her father's incredible musicianship, his amazing recovery. An addict is never truly cured, she can hear her father saying years ago, when she was wondering why one of her favorite NA members left the group. An addict has to make the same choice every day. Some days, the choice is harder.

Her. He's been choosing her for years, and she never knew until now. When she's done, Cosette rains kisses down on Marius and Eponine, and all she can say is, "Thank you."

There's the concert tomorrow, but sleep can wait.

*

"There are people camped out on the sidewalks chanting Free Cosette," Joly says, looking unperturbed to find Cosette curled up with Eponine and Marius. Given his own relationship with Bossuet and Musichetta, that's no surprise. "Also, well, we sort of can't find Grantaire, but since his last text to Bossuet and me was at 2 AM instead of 5 AM, we have reason to believe he'll be rested enough to come play."

In quick succession, Cosette finds out that news of the concert has gone viral, donations are flooding in at a rate that just about guarantees they'll have enough money by the end of the concert, and that sleeping on the floor on the night before a concert is extremely ill-advised. She's going to have a stiff neck for days.

"I know some yoga stretches," Joly says, seeing her rubbing her neck. "Combeferre made breakfast. Well, Bossuet broke some eggs in the carton and then Combeferre made breakfast out of what could be salvaged. I made enough energy smoothie to power everyone through the concert, I hope."

"Combeferre was in my kitchen," Eponine says, voice growing more deadly and quiet with every word. At that point, Joly flees down the stairs for the questionable safety of Bossuet's arms. (Bossuet would do everything in his power for Joly, of course, but Bossuet has knocked Joly into heavy equipment before in similar situations.

"I can rub both of your necks," Marius offers, restoring peace to the recording room again. "And maybe you could rub mine. Why didn't we sleep in Eponine's room?"

"Because Gavroche should probably find out some other way," Eponine says with a sigh. "I'll go talk to him. And shower. Make sure that my kitchen is all right, okay?"

"Mm," Cosette says, because Marius is massaging her neck as promised and she is now incapable of speech. Guitarist's hands. And Eponine has pianist's hands, and Cosette herself can play both instruments, and they are going to have the best post-concert celebration in the world. As long as Grantaire makes it in and Les Amis aren't worrying about him all night, but Joly said he would come in. Things will be okay.

After breakfast, Cosette is brave enough to take a glimpse outside. There's a ridiculously long line of people trailing from the club doors and down the sidewalk. She makes an undignified noise (a squeak, to be honest) and turns away from the door. She needs to rehearse with the band, she needs to hear a million updates from Courfeyrac, she needs to check on Gavroche and Eponine, and she needs to not think about how thousands or possibly millions of people are going to be watching her in just a few hours.

"Steady," Combeferre says, appearing out of nowhere with a full glass of water. He presses it into her hands with a kind smile. Cosette squares her shoulders and nods before she takes a sip. He's right. She has to be steady for this concert to go off.

Hours pass in a blur of rehearsal and donations flooding in and cheers from the crowd outside. Gavroche spends most of the day trying to con the people in line out of their cash, so Cosette assumes his discussion with Eponine went fine. Eponine keeps smiling at both of them over the keyboard, and Marius keeps smiling at both of them over his guitar, and Cosette just keeps smiling until Enjolras favors the three of them with one of his glares and tells them they better not be distracted tonight.

They're anything but distracted, though. The band sounds so good that Cosette's pulse keeps fluttering, halfway between the joy of music and the terror that they'll never have a good performance if the rehearsal isn't an utter disaster.

And then it is tonight, the setting sun throwing brilliant colors across the horizon. Mercifully, a breeze picks up, though Cosette can still taste the heat as she opens the back door for her father's arrival. "Good night for a show," is all Jean Valjean says before he takes a seat of honor.

(None of the Amis say anything to her father, though by now they've all heard about who he used to be. Cosette will always love them for that.)

Grantaire stumbles in at the last possible second, when Bossuet has convinced himself he's blown out the sound system again and Enjolras looks to be on the verge of ripping all his glorious hair out. Marius, looking faintly green, has already promised that he can do an acoustic opening set with no microphones or speakers.

"And if he forgets the words, I'll take over," Grantaire offers, draping an arm around Marius. He looks underslept, as usual, but he smells like soap rather than alcohol. Cosette makes a face when he pinches her cheek. "Didn't think I would miss your show, did you?"

Enjolras says nothing, deliberately not looking up from the crisscrossing wires of their sound system. Grantaire's smile fades when Enjolras won't even look at him, but all he does is mutter something and retreat to tune his bass guitar. Cosette tries to ask him if he's all right, or at least thank him, but he waves her off. "Go kiss Marius. He needs the encouragement more than I do right now."

Bossuet, Courfeyrac, and Enjolras finally repair the sound system and set everything up for the live broadcast. They even manage to get a sign to flash the amount of money they've raised every five minutes or so. They're fifteen minutes late opening the doors for the crowd, but that's standard for concerts, in Cosette's experience.

In her experience. God, she's going to get to perform again. The club is packed with a ridiculous amount of people, though she knows Combeferre kept careful count at the door, knowing Javert would seize the opportunity if they violated the fire code. There are at least a hundred people on the sidewalk outside. Horns honk and cameras flash like the ABC is a celebrity nightclub. God, she's going to perform for an audience of millions, counting all the people watching the livestream. Cosette can't keep the grin off her face, and she cheers as loud as the crowd when the lights dim, signaling the show's start.

"Welcome," Enjolras says into the mic, and a hush falls over the crowd. He isn't even dressed up for the occasion, but his good looks and perfect hair remain unmarred by sleepless nights and a diet consisting mostly of coffee. "Today, all of you are gathered in support of artists' rights. I thank you for your support as we have fought for Cosette--" the crowd roars at her name, and Cosette shivers next to her father and her friends backstage-- "and other artists in similar circumstances. This event is proof that artistry is not dependent upon the recording industry!" He raises a fist to punctuate his point. "This event is proof that creativity can triumph over capitalism!" The cheering is deafening at this point, and Cosette's heart pounds. "This event, my friends, is proof that the people will be heard!"

Enjolras looks out into the crowd as though making eye contact with every single person, thanking them personally for their devotion to the cause. Cosette isn't entirely certain who's on live feed duty at the moment, but the projector screen cuts away from Enjolras's face to the cheering crowd. Enjolras gives a final, satisfied nod and then leaves the stage, making way for Marius to perform the first opening act.

Cosette clutches her father's hand, both of them tucked safely out of sight, and listens to Marius do a lovely, charming cover of Regina Spektor's "Better." He doesn't look nervous in the slightest, despite the joyful shouts of recognition from the crowd. Marius actually smiles under the stage lights, a real smile that crinkles the corners of his eyes. "Thank you," is all he says when he finishes the song. He follows with a cover of "Something" that brings tears to Cosette's eyes, because Marius doesn't even hide a little that it's for her and Eponine.

"This is the boy you're dating?" her father asks. "He's not butchering the song."

For Jean Valjean, "not butchering" a George Harrison number is one of the highest compliments he can possibly give. Cosette preens a little bit, and preens still more when it's Eponine's turn to play a set, turning on the full power of her voice for a properly sized audience at last. The crowd eats it up, as it always does whenever Eponine gets behind a piano, her voice prowling across the stage like a panther. Jean Valjean doesn't say anything at all for Eponine's set, just leans back with his eyes closed and his head nodding along to the music, also a high compliment. Her father will still need more than a breathless, five-second introduction before a performance, but at least he can see their talents on display.

Then it's time for Cosette to go onstage.

*

Cosette leaves her father's comforting embrace and takes the stage, beaming at her audience. She's not even sure where to look for the live feed--by the time they realized they had never practiced, it was far too late to worry about--so she focuses on connecting with the crowd before her. Since they're all chanting Free Co-SETTE! Free Co-SETTE! it doesn't feel terribly difficult.

"Thank you all for coming out tonight, or staying in with your computers!" she shouts. The audience is still chanting. "DJ Enjolras and I have put together an awesome show for you to thank you for your support!" Here she has to pause, because the crowd loses its collective mind when Enjolras returns to the stage. "I promise not to talk too much, so let's bring on the music!"

Everyone in the club roars in response, and roars still louder when Cosette and Enjolras open with "Hello." Cosette bounces around stage, still smiling and waving, and it's better than their first performance, the frantic improvisation in the club. She'll never be a performer like Eponine or Grantaire, who consider it an artistic challenge to play songs on the fly. Cosette likes a little more preparation in her sets. She and Enjolras are well-matched in that regard, and they trade pleased smiles throughout the song.

They follow up "Hello" with "Lights," because according to Courfeyrac, it's such a popular song that people are requesting it on mainstream radio stations. Singing it takes Cosette back to the night she composed it. When she closes her eyes, she can see the lights of distant houses; when she opens them, it's the brilliant lights of the stage, so bright she can hardly see the teeming crowd beyond them. There are more people in the ABC than she's ever seen. Most of the staff is working on the show itself or at the bar, not as bouncers, and Cosette bites her lower lip, nerves showing on her face for a moment. They're in trouble if things go wrong.

Every song in Cosette's set segues perfectly into the next one. No voices crack. No notes are dropped. Eponine rejoins them for "Pretty Thing," waving to the crowd and pecking Marius on the cheek as she walks up to her keyboard, and Cosette's heart is so full that she's certain everyone watching can see it on her sleeve.

Then, during the transition between "Pretty Thing" and "Guns and Horses," Enjolras makes a few choice comments about Justice Records. It's an excerpt from one of his blog posts, a normal thing for Enjolras to do between songs. But then someone in the crowd shouts, "Fuck the police!" Toward the back of the audience, there's a small but growing knot of brawlers. Bahorel leaps offstage, swearing, but there are at least forty people between him and the fighters, and oh God, are the actual police here? What are they doing?

Cosette steals the mic and covers for the growing tension. She's getting good at it. "Hello, everyone! Thank you again for turning out! As you can see, we've almost reached our donation goal, and we've still got twenty minutes to go! It's unbelievable how many of you care about artistic freedom." Here Cosette tears up, and not for the cameras. The number that flashes by on the donation marquee is unreal. "From an ex-American Idol star to a brand new artist to an independent DJ to me, legally troubled me, it's all of you who have made all the difference."

The people paying attention to her speech are in the palm of her hand. Cosette can see that even through the stage lights. Unfortunately, most people are concerned about the few people throwing punches, and they don't care about teary-eyed speeches from musicians. Police officers are moving through the crowd as well, handcuffs flashing. Cosette falters at the mic, unable to summon a smile. What if the club gets trashed? What if her friends go to jail?

Then her father strides out from backstage, guitar in hand. "Cosette left off one last guest artist," Jean Valjean says into the microphone. By some miracle, the audience hushes, confused by the sudden appearance of an old man. "It's been some time since I've played. You might recognize me better with 24601 in my hand."

Whispers ripple through the audience. Cosette hides a smile at her father's flair for the dramatic. 24601 is the name of the guitar that Johnny Rocker famously broke the same night he broke his nose, and she's guessing he has more than a few fans in the audience. Bahorel is already climbing back onstage, a definite sign that the fighting is over.

Cosette's heart stops when her father begins playing the first gentle chords of Cosette's favorite Jailbirds song, one she loved so much she would play it in her room despite how much she thought her father disliked the song. "Childhood living is easy to do," he sings, and his voice is a little pitchy with the years and the inevitable nerves, but Jean Valjean is a musician to the bone, and he corrects himself. "The things that you wanted, well, I bought them for you."

This song was written long before Cosette was born, but she knows her father is singing this for her. Not just to save this concert, but for her, to tell her he loves her, to lend his voice to her cause. "Wild horses couldn't drag me away," Jean Valjean promises, shooting a crooked smile her way. Through her tears, Cosette smiles back.

She raises the mic to her lips, nodding to her father, and takes the next verse. "I've watched you suffer a dull aching pain, and now you've decided to show me the same," Cosette sings, thinking of her father's face every time she asked about her mother, or his life as a musician. Eponine joins in with a delicate piano accompaniment as Cosette's voice swells with emotion. "No sweeping exits or offstage lines could make me feel bitter or treat you unkind."

Wild horses couldn't drag Cosette away, either. Not Javert, not the ghost of her mother, not all of the secrets in the world. If Cosette closes her eyes, she can almost hear her mother's voice singing along, roughened by cigarettes but still tender with love. She can't close her eyes for very long, though, because every member of her band has picked up the song, lending their music to an old man and his daughter. These are the moments that Cosette loves best in a music performance, moments when the whole band is in sync, when the audience is swaying back and forth with phones and lighters lifted in the air. They're singing along, Cosette realizes, and then she has to hold out her mic toward the crowd, singing with them.

"Wild, wild horses, we'll ride them someday."

The crowd stays perfectly still for the last few notes. The few audience members Cosette can see look as near to tears as Cosette feels. It's not their father singing onstage, but Jean Valjean is a beloved musician, a man who for all his mistakes still touched millions of lives with his music. The applause is deafening when the spell finally breaks, and then there's an even louder roar.

Cosette turns around, looking at the marquee. The number that flashes by makes her drop her mic, completely unprofessional. Enjolras retrieves it before he can roll offstage, looking a little flustered himself. "We have struck a blow for freedom!" he shouts, to the crowd's loudly expressed approval. "Justice Records, Cosette is yours no more!"

Someone is hugging her from behind--Marius, and then that's Eponine, rushing from the keyboard. Cosette steals the mic back from Enjolras. "I own my music again," she says, voice oddly normal in the furor of excitement. Then it sinks in. "I own my music! Everyone! Get ready to hear a track off the old album, the one that belongs to me again, and then we'll treat you to some more tracks off the new album! I'm calling for my own encore! Encore!"

Marius and Eponine each kiss Cosette's cheek before resuming their places. The press and the fans will probably have a lot of questions about that, no doubt. Everyone will just have to get used to Cosette doing things her way. Cosette throws back her head and laughs, reveling in the moment and the music.

*

Several months later

The last show of Cosette's tour takes her to Los Angeles.

Her ticket sales don't compare with Taylor Swift's or Katy Perry's, but Cosette has a growing following, and not just drawn from fans of DJ Enjolras. She can hear her own songs on the radio now, and it never fails to make her smile. Marius accompanied Cosette on the first leg of her tour and would always turn the radio as high as it could go when "Lights," still her most popular song, came on. Cosette cries whenever a station plays the live cut of her duet of "Wild Horses" during an acoustic hour. She called her father every day while out on tour, and she'll finally see him again tonight. She'll see Eponine tonight, too, still putting the finishing touches on her album, and Marius, who rejoined Eponine in Los Angeles for the last half of Cosette's tour. She's missed them both dearly, and all of her friends at the ABC.

Her last concert is tomorrow, but Cosette pushed to come back a day early, sacrificing an extra Oakland concert date to come back for a particularly special event.

Today, after a months-long stint in rehab, Grantaire returns to the ABC.

After the concert, after Cosette slammed down a check that covered her contract and her fines right before Javert's no longer smug face, she found out that Grantaire asked Joly and Bossuet to drive him to a rehabilitation center after the concert. A few of Les Amis actually cried in relief, hearing the news. Jean Valjean immediately volunteered to be Grantaire's sponsor, because even after all he's done for Cosette, the ABC, and countless others, he's still determined to do good.

And make good he did, because today Grantaire is coming home, and so is Cosette.

A shortish blur crashes into Cosette as she opens the door to the ABC. It's Gavroche, who hugs her ferociously before running off again. Too much emotion for a middle schooler to display in such a short span of time, Cosette theorizes. "See you later!" she calls after his retreating form. "You better have more raps to share!"

Bahorel ruffles her hair as she walks in the door, not even teasing her about a password. "Good to see you, too," she says, and pecks him on the cheek.

Jean Valjean is the first to greet her, scooping her up into his arms. He laughs a little louder than he normally does, smiles a little more. Cosette's heart aches at the change, but the good kind of ache, the kind that means she's happier than words can ever express. "I missed you so much," Cosette says. Then: "Oh! I left the cupcakes in the car!"

"I'll go get them," her father says, casting a discreet glance at Eponine and Marius, who are walking down the stairs hand in hand, faces equally alight at the sight of Cosette.

The press and her father still aren't sure what to make of their relationship, though her father has a better idea of what's actually going on. The press is convinced that Marius is two-timing Cosette with Eponine. Sometimes Eponine will text her the most hilarious headlines, and Cosette is fairly certain Eponine has all of the tabloids saved in a box somewhere. Whatever the press tries to sell, though, they're together and they're happy, in spite of the distance, in spite of all the difficulties in getting together. Cosette runs to them, laughing, and tries to kiss both of them at once. It doesn't work out, but none of them mind.

"Stealing my sponsor, stealing my friends, stealing my spotlight, when will it end?" Grantaire asks, planting a kiss of his own square in the middle of Cosette's forehead. "Take, take, take, that's all you stars do. How long until you're forgetting the little people who pushed you to astronomical heights in the first place? O, to be a secondary sun within your constellation!"

Combeferre, on a miraculous four-day weekend from his medical studies, says, "I don't think you know much about astronomy."

"Nonsense," Grantaire says, and proceeds to make up scientific jargon so ridiculous that Cosette, Eponine, and Marius laugh until they're nearly crying.

Nearly everyone is here, milling around eating the cupcakes Cosette brought and the countless hors d'oeuvres already set out. Cosette twists her head in one direction and then the other, searching for Enjolras. "He's hiding in the studio until he feels more ready to face R," Eponine says, noticing her searching. "When Grantaire left, they were on better terms, but things are still very much a question mark."

"Ah." Cosette makes a face. "Well, I'm allowed to push him out. I'm a guest, and I won't be here for that long."

Out of mercy, though, Cosette drags Enjolras downstairs to DJ the party rather than mingle with the guests, or one particular guest. "Your title is literally DJ Enjolras," is her argument, and Enjolras can't very well refuse that. He plays a few background tracks, all while grilling Cosette for details of the tour--what are the other acts like, is her sound evolving on the road, has she written any new songs. Cosette answers all of his questions happily, but she doesn't stay at his table for long. Her father and Marius and Eponine are here, after all, and they have first claim to her heart and to her time.

"Welcome back," Eponine says, looping an arm around Cosette's waist. Marius takes the other side. It's an awkward way to walk around the party, but it's entirely wonderful. They can't bear to stop touching each other.

"It's nauseating," Bossuet informs them. "Not even we were that bad when we started dating."

"You all got to stay in the same zip code," Eponine sniffs, turning her nose up in the air.

Completely deadpan, Joly offers, "I've got a cure for cuteness. How does the recipe go, again? Eye of newt, toe of frog…"

Musichetta gives each of her boyfriends a swat on the shoulder, laughing. "Congratulations for finding a way to make it work, you three. Really, well done."

Speaking of a way to make it work, Enjolras finally abandons the turntable in favor of quiet conversation with Grantaire in a corner. They're oblivious to the rest of the world, and Cosette can't hide her smile. Grantaire looks much healthier, his skin no longer sallow with alcohol and insomnia, and Enjolras looks just as happy as when they raised the full amount of money at the concert. That's worth something, Cosette thinks, and hopes that Grantaire can see it now that he's no longer drowning in self-hatred.

The party music, now on shuffle without anyone at the helm, pulls up one of Cosette's songs, the one that she wrote about all of Les Amis.

"Singalong! Singalong!" Courfeyrac demands, pumping his fist. The others join in, and they actually lift Cosette on their shoulders to carry her onstage.

"You can see this tomorrow night!" Cosette protests, but only in token; she's laughing too hard to be convincing. "Fine. Start the track over!"

She wrote "Burn" thinking of Les Amis passion, their conviction. "We, we don't have to worry about nothing," she sings to everyone, including Enjolras and Grantaire, still engrossed in each other. She's not insulted; she knows how that goes. "'Cause we got the fire and we're burning one hell of a something."

Enjolras does look over for the riff he helped Cosette write: "Strike a match, play it loud, giving love to the world. We'll be raising our hands, shining up to the sky, 'cause we got the fire, fire, fire." His face splits into a grin, an actual grin, and Cosette points to him on the next few lines: "And we gonna let it burn, burn, burn, burn!"

This song is a favorite with Cosette's audience, and with Cosette herself. Secretly, it might be her favorite on the album. It's as defiant as her other songs against the music industry, but it's more hopeful than it is angry, a celebration of all her friends did to help her. It feels only right to sing it tonight, celebrating all her friends did to help Grantaire. And in the end, it was Grantaire who helped himself. An addict has to make the same choice every day, as her father says, and Grantaire chose his friends. He chose to live in the world, to give himself a chance. The last of the lost causes found himself at last, then came home.

Cosette pumps her fist in the air. "Sing it with me! We can light it up, up, up, so they can't put it out, out, out!" Whooping, everyone at the party raises a fist, some replete with a glass of sparkling non-alcoholic cider, and joins Cosette's triumphant crescendo.

There is a flame that never dies, and it is here, burning within her friends and loved ones, burning within Cosette's own heart. The song ends. Cosette keeps her fist raised. The song has ended, but the music never will.