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i.
After meetings they tend to curl together on a sofa in the corner. This way, Jehan can stay near a radiator and Pietro can see the whole room, or, more specifically, Wanda, wherever she happens to be sat with Eponine (and sometimes Gavroche). Jehan’s head will rest gently on Pietro’s collarbones and he’ll comb his fingers through his boyfriend’s hair, gently working out the knots and plaiting it back, tucking the loosening flowers back in.
Sometimes, since the castle, Jehan will make the flowers bloom around his fingers, as though trying to make sure he never lets go.
“Jehan,” Pietro says softly, and Jehan blinks and sighs, and the flowers loosen around his fingers, weaving instead into the plait.
“Y’r good with your fingers,” Jehan mumbles. “Practice with Wanda’s hair?”
Pietro hums an affirmative, and lets Jehan tuck close and doze.
He’s been far too on-edge since the castle, and it’s good to see him rest properly again.
ii.
Cosette watches him as Wanda does - the watching of more than just the physical, the watching of minds.
Sometimes, when the two are together they call over Musichetta and chat softly about how they all now see the world - Wanda’s scarlet sight, Cosette’s hearing of minds, Musichetta’s ability to feel the emotions of others. Beside them, dumb as a brick, Marius sits, completely immune to all of the tips and tricks they can play with their new powers.
Sometimes, Pietro wonders what it must be like to be so immune, so unaffected, so invisible to those who can see past whatever confidence is projected to see the beating heart and churning mind beneath.
Then Wanda glances at him, scarlet in her gaze and he’s glad he isn’t.
iii.
Since the castle trusting any of the original three has been... odd. Eponine trusted Wanda for helping with getting Gavroche and Lorna out, trusted Pietro because to trust Wanda is to trust Pietro, so far as Jehan can tell, the twins so intertwined and interlinked that they are almost one being in so many ways, two vines so grown together that to prune one would be to stunt the other.
(Jehan wonders if, with his gift, he could nurture so stunted a vine.)
It is easy to trust the twins, Cosette’s mind raking through both of theirs like shining icy needles, but Enjolras...
Just as Wanda had said, “his mind is too bright,” Cosette had whispered, fingers pressed to her forehead. “I can barely see anything, barely hear a word.”
Enjolras’ mind remains a mystery, remains unknown.
iv.
“Enjolras won’t hurt you, you know,” Pietro whispers to Jehan as he watches Enjolras in the Musain. Enjolras is stumping around the group, uncertain now as he’s never been before, only Grantaire close at his elbow. “R trusts him and-”
Grantaire trusts Enjolras because... because Enjolras is Enjolras, R’s Apollo, and R is R, dedicated to the person and not the ideal Enjolras espoused.
R seems quite certain that Enjolras hasn’t changed, that he is still as idealistic -“flawed in his thinking, Jehan”- as ever. Jehan is pretty certain that if anyone knows Enjolras best of all, after ‘ferre and Courf, it's R. Even if Enjolras seems to barely understand R’s dedication to him in turn.
“R’s in love with him, you know,” Jehan replies. “I don’t think he’s the best judge.”
Pietro quiets, tucks his chin atop Jehan’s head and lets Jehan send a coiling vine of primrose curling around his ear.
v.
The Amis have nightmares now. Pietro... he isn’t surprised. He and Wanda had had plenty after their time at the castle, and Wanda had told him the morning of the day after the castle, how Eponine had woken screaming, yelling for her brother.
(Gavroche had woken him, clambering through his window from the fire escape to get to his sister. Pietro did not judge him. He understood.)
It still surprises him when he gets a text at 4am from Jehan:
Wilting. Bring me water?
vi.
Pietro has two bottles of water for Jehan, a whole litre carton of Tropicana for himself, and a bag of mixed cans of Rubicons for ‘ferre and Courf who share Jehan’s house. The cans go into the fridge, two cheap, tough plastic children’s cups were retrieved from the drying rack, and Pietro heads upstairs.
Jehan’s on his bed, covers pooled around his waist, and Pietro’s reminded just how beautiful his boyfriend is when free to be open with his flowers.
They coil around him, embrace him like he's some kind of forest spirit, flower faces turning to him like he’s the sun.
“Night-blooming morning glories,” Jehan whispered. “Remember the pack of exotic seeds you stole from the University for me?”
They’re beautiful, anyway, pale like the moon, like milk against Jehan’s tanned and freckled skin.
“Nightmare?” Pietro asks, setting the water, juice and cups on the shelf by the window. There’s just enough space once he moves the watering can. Jehan nods, stretches one hand out towards him.
He sighs softly, sits down on the bed beside his boyfriend, and lets Jehan choke out sobs as he tucks against him.
“I’ll stay here,” he whispers into the sleep-mussed strands of Jehan’s hair, “as long as you need me.”
vii.
Jehan stays curled against him until the small of the morning, soft light peeking around the edges of the curtains. He stirs, just slightly, as the light touches the flowers wrapped around his hand - forget-me-nots and and particular variety of wildflower found only in the fields around Sokovia - and nuzzles against Pietro’s belly, one of his arms still slung over Pietro’s hips. Pietro doesn’t move apart from breathing, stays half-sat-up against the wall, fingers gently combing through Jehan’s hair and the flowers coiled there.
“Mmm,” Jehan mumbles, lips mouthing gently at Pietro’s skin through his thin shirt. “Love you.”
Pietro fucking bolts.
viii.
“You what?”
Wanda is... very displeased.
“Pietro you can’t just bolt when someone says that to you!”
“Try’n fuckin’ stop me,” he mumbles, but his heart’s not really in it. Besides, he knows Wanda could. More than that, he knows that, for Wanda, he would stop and she wouldn’t have to try at all.
“Are you avoiding him?” Wanda asks. Pietro glances about warily.
“Maybe.”
At the door Eponine is watching, leaning against the doorframe. About a foot beneath her elbow, Gavroche’s head butts in.
“Did you have a fight with Jehan?” Gav asks. “’Cause if you did I’ll shiv you.”
ix.
Days later, Jehan finally manages to corner him. He does this by waiting for Pietro to sprint past him and then tripping him up with tree roots.
“Pietro,” he says gently, and Pietro can see just how tired Jehan is, deep bags beneath his eyes, skin fading and almost wrinkled like a flowers when lacking water. “Please. Talk to me.”
Pietro is stock still in the coil of the tree roots, heart hammering.
Jehan frowns. “Are you... are you afraid?”
x.
He is. He is in so many ways because love is a weakness, is a risk, is a vulnerability. Wanda, Wanda is allowed to be that to him because she has always been that to him, he has always been that to her, since their very first days. Wanda he protects so she can love, so she can care about others but he...
For anyone to come that close to him, to make themselves so vulnerable to him, to implicitly ask the same vulnerability back - it terrifies him.
“Pietro-”
“How can anyone not be afraid of love?” His throat is tight, he barely wants to talk, he wants to run and Jehan sets him down, coils the root back under the earth where it’s meant to be.
He doesn’t run.
“Pietro,” Jehan says, soft and gentle, almost coaxing. “It’s very easy.”
Jehan’s hand reaches out, warm skin touches Pietro’s. After a moment a soft flower stem follows, forget-me-nots, poppies, tight-shut night-blooming morning glories over his skin.
“I trust you,” Jehan says. “It’s ok for you to take time to trust me.”