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Grantaire sat cross-legged on the living room carpet, marking out a rough sketch of the Lebanon Circle from the reference photograph on the floor in front of him. He was pleased with how the photographs from his trip to Highgate Cemetery had come out; he had more than enough material from which to create a semi-decent series. If only he could drag himself out of this funk.
He was by no means as bad as when Feuilly had found him two days before; almost catatonic in bed, with no inclination to do anything beyond breathing. He still felt as though he was being crushed by concrete and that oxygen currently had the density of sand; but he was up and about. He had showered and had laundered his bed clothes; he was functioning.
Grantaire was jolted back to reality by a soft hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see Jehan who had the most apologetic expression on his face.
“I’m sorry, I did call out.”
Grantaire didn’t doubt it. He wondered vaguely how long he had been staring into space. It could have been minutes, it could have been hours; he wouldn’t know. He managed a small apologetic smile but uneasy guilt settled upon him heavily. His poor flatmates deserved better than this, better than him.
Jehan had his head on one side, considering.
“Come on,” he said at last, pulling at Grantaire’s arm insistently. Grantaire had little choice but to allow it, stumbling as he gracelessly got to his feet. He permitted Jehan to drag him from the living room.
“I’m going to take a bath,” he announced, “and you are going to join me.”
Grantaire finally dug his heels in.
“Hang on, Jehan, what?” he spluttered. Jehan turned around, his gorgeous green eyes looking up at Grantaire in vague annoyance. “I can’t join you in a bath!”
“Why not?” Jehan looked completely bewildered.
“Because,” Grantaire tried again, knowing that there were perfectly good reasons in his head somewhere, he just had to find them. “Because… what would Courfeyrac say?”
Jehan pulled a face.
“Courfeyrac would say it’s a shame the tub isn’t big enough for him too,” he replied dismissively, turning back towards the bathroom, leaving the door ajar as a clear invitation for Grantaire to follow him.
“Look, Jehan,” Grantaire tried to be reasonable about this because you didn’t go around getting into baths with other people’s boyfriends. “Seriously, you don’t think he might find it odd to come home to find his boyfriend and his flatmate in a bath together?”
Jehan was already running hot water into the tub, reaching up to his shelf of bath creams and salts. He turned around, looking thoroughly unimpressed.
“Feuilly and I used to share baths all the time,” he shrugged, gently sprinkling a few drops of bergamot and ylang ylang into the tub. “Also, Courfeyrac trusts me and respects me as my own person. What’s more,” Jehan’s look lost a little of its severity. “He trusts you too.”
Five minutes later found Grantaire sitting in the bath in his boxers and t-shirt, enjoying how the hot water seemed to relax every muscle. He had briefly considered stripping his t-shirt as well as his jogging bottoms. After all, Jehan knew all about what had happened to him. They were just scars; they didn’t hurt him or anybody else. But he wasn’t quite ready just yet. When he’d shown Bahorel in the gym he had been filled with adrenaline fuelled by anger and frustration. This was different, somehow.
Besides, Jehan hadn’t even bothered stripping out of his work clothes before climbing into the water, socks and all. Grantaire hoped he had at least checked his pockets for his phone before sitting down.
The bathroom was hazy with steam and opposite him Jehan, who had graciously offered to take the tap end, was lighting up a gauloises. His hair had been unknotted from its bun and hung in a damp curtain about the boy’s shoulders. He blew a lazy smoke ring before offering the gauloises to Grantaire who accepted it gratefully. It was strange but he didn’t feel awkward at all. He was sitting in a bath with his flatmate in clothes but it was the most relaxed he had felt in weeks. Jehan smiled at him.
“This is like that swimming lesson at school where you had to retrieve the brick from the bottom of the pool in your pyjamas,” Grantaire said at last, just to break the silence. Jehan leant back between the taps, lighting up a second gauloises.
“There are no bricks in this bath, I can promise you that,” he murmured, exhaling as his eyes fell shut. It was an intimate atmosphere but Jehan didn’t seem to want anything from him. He took a leaf from the other boy’s book, letting his eyes fall closed while his mind wandered.
He thought about his grandmother; how nice it had been to see her again and how she and Jehan had gotten on like a house on fire. He thought about Highgate and Feuilly, which in turn led him to think of Bahorel and their boxing session at the gym. He thought of how much all these people knew about him, about his being an artist and about his past. It occurred to him that he didn’t really mind. He thought having so many people knowing would bother him but it really didn’t. They didn’t treat him any differently. They were a good bunch; Grantaire was glad Enjolras had found them.
Enjolras.
Well there was a whole mess right there. His fingers moved unconsciously in the water, the memory of the movie night at Bahorel and Feuilly’s flat fresh in his mind. Enjolras leaning against him in the dark and the feel of those glorious golden curls between his fingers, something he never thought he would experience again. He sighed.
“Penny for your thoughts?” He opened his eyes to find Jehan regarding him pensively.
“Enjolras hates me,” he muttered. Jehan snorted, reaching over the side of the bath to retrieve one of his pens.
“I find that hard to believe.”
Grantaire wasn’t quite sure how to respond to that. He watched as Jehan removed the cap from the pen with his teeth. With the pen lid in his mouth, Jehan began to scribble on the nearest tile. As he was normally at the other end of the bath, the tiles by the taps were mostly untouched.
“Memories should cost more,” Grantaire read out loud over his flatmate’s shoulder. Jehan gave him a sweet smile as he recapped the pen before offering it to Grantaire.
“Oh I couldn’t,” Grantaire held up a hand defensively. He remembered all too clearly the questions that had been handed to him when he had first met Jehan and Courfeyrac. He knew the bathroom wall was sacred.
“Please, R,” Jehan pouted slightly. “The wall is far too empty these days. It took me three years to build it up and it was washed away in an afternoon. I’m slowly filling it up again but I don’t want to force it and it would mean a lot to me if you would commemorate this day somewhere.”
Well, how could Grantaire refuse such a request? He leaned forward, accepting the pen from Jehan’s fingers. He pondered for a moment, considering what to write, before penning a quick phrase.
There is but one certainty; my full bath.
Above it, he drew a quick doodle of two figures in a bath, smoking and smiling.
“Is that us?” Jehan leaned forward to get a better look, his sopping shirt clinging to his chest. Grantaire grinned, signing an elaborate R in the corner of the tile.
“Well that just increased the value of this bathroom by about £4000!”
Grantaire jumped, sloshing water everywhere as Courfeyrac strode into the bathroom. Grantaire could feel the heat in his cheeks, his previous insecurities about what Courfeyrac would have to say about coming home to such an intimate display returning worse than ever. But the guy patted his shoulder on his way to Jehan who practically squeaked with joy, reaching up to hug his boyfriend.
“Don’t pull me in, love, this is my last shirt,” Courfeyrac protested, laughing as Jehan released him.
“Grantaire was sad so I ran us a bath,” Jehan confided, eyes sparkling. “I thought it might cheer him up.”
“Did it work?” Courfeyrac gave Grantaire an easy smile and something about it struck him very deep inside because Jehan was right; Courfeyrac did trust him. More than that, he actually liked him and was worried about him. What had he done to ever deserve such friendship?
“Yeah,” he answered, honestly but somewhat gruffly, feeling his face colour. “Yeah, I do feel better.”
Courfeyrac was practically beaming at him. He turned to kiss Jehan on the cheek, a small and intimate gesture of affection, before he stood back up.
“I’m going to see about dinner. This Big Case will be the death of me, you know that?”
And with that, he strode out of the bathroom without waiting for an answer.
Jehan’s eyes were sparkling like stars. Slowly, he pulled himself into a standing position before stepping out of the bath.
“I’m going to leave you here to enjoy the rest of your bath in peace,” he smiled benevolently at Grantaire, before leaning down to press a kiss to the man’s cheek.
“Come join us when you’re ready.”
The bathroom door clicked shut behind him, leaving Grantaire alone with his thoughts. He was so bloody lucky to have Jehan and Courfeyrac and Feuilly and everyone else looking out for him. His heart swelled just thinking about it. They couldn’t fix him, they weren’t trying to fix him. But they were there for him. And that, in itself, was enough.