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Enjolras likes the cold. He likes it when he steps out to the unyielding mud-caked cobblestones in the near evening, especially after a downpour, when the city starts to cool and the stink of the gutter lifts itself up from its morning slumber. He likes pulling his cravat tighter around his neck, likes the chill that creeps up from the tips of his fingers to grip his knuckles, seeps deep into his bones. He likes that the cold forces him to move, to keep moving, keep walking, past well-light taverns and seedy side alleys, past the cavernous null of church arches. He likes that it forces him never to keep still.
Graintaire likes to keep warm. Likes finding a spot in whatever establishment was kind enough (or stupid enough, as Joly admits sometimes) to house the vagrants and their meetings, to sink into and hunker down for the evening. He has turned it into an art: it's the spot by the brazier, the second chair from the table in front of the fireplace. Never take a bench by a window or a wall (Enjolras would do the same for the reason of avoiding bullets and detection). He liked it especially when he uncorked his bottle of red, felt liquid fire likewise spread outward from his core as he gulped goblet after goblet through the long nights.
He's watching Enjolras now, as he always watches their dear leader, their golden prince (and wouldn't Enjolras flush an angry beet if he dared say that to his face!), pacing the small room of the inn Eponine had secured for them. His hands are flying, as furious as his words, but all Grantaire thinks is how they were lutist's fingers on a fine-boned wrist. Enjolras's eyes are flashing, and he pins them all down with his stare, but most of all Marius, who simply nods and squints a bit. Grantaire is watching Enjolras watch Marius, whose eyes move discreetly from the bright fireplace to the purple twilight beyond the window.
The revolution recedes from Marius's eyes and is replaced by a softer dream. Enjolras sees this, feels a cold shiver make its way down his spine: he knows he's lost a soldier. Eponine, from her perch near the balustrade, sees this, and her cheeks warm. She thinks he does not look at her simply because he is being discreet. Neither see Grantaire watch them, watch them all, from his corner by the hearth, vaguely hidden behind his Red.
He supposed Marius was fetching enough. But he was too much like watered ale, Grantaire thought. Nice on the table for intellectual prattle, strong enough for a light buzz, but never really taking that stiff knot of nerves off enough to unravel what was real and wild.
Enjolras though. Grantaire raises his glass. Red: the color of the inebriated. They were all drunk, all of them: drunk on ideals, drunk on promise, drunk on the heady call of revolution. Every evening in every meeting, they drank, to wake up sober and somber in the morning. Woke up to a throb in the temples, an empty bedside, cold feet, and the king smugly staring up at them from every franc and sous left in their pockets.
They are drunk on each other.
“I said, put that glass away, Grantaire.” That thin-lipped livid expression is now leveled on him, and he doesn't dare say it is unpleasant. Perhaps half of the time he rankles Enjolras is so he could get a shot, a thimble of that intensity. The shock of gold curls makes him look colder, a lovely contrast to the violent crimson of his overcoat.
“Red!” Grantaire crows instead, raising his glass higher. “The colour of revolution. Get some inside us to even it out.”
A wave of good-natured laughter breaks amongst the gathered, which had the effect of pulling Marius's mouth to a wider grin (this ale man, Grantaire thinks, he gets it), and darkening Enjolras's countenance. Some toast him, raise their glasses in camaraderie, others were shaking their heads with a smile.
“Pay attention,” is all he gets, a bite; then Enjorlas is turning away, leaning lightly towards Marius as they study the fresh sheets of propaganda someone had spirited up to them from the clandestine printers. Enjorlas turns away from him—his blind sailor, willing footman, stranded as this ship they were all in seemed—turns to the one he knows he is losing.
The Good Shepherd leaves the ninety-nine to search for the one lost sheep. Unbidden, the morning homily resounds in Grantaire's head, and he smiles.
All too soon they are being adjourned, and chairs scrape the old wood floors as people begin to stand, stretch. The candles flicker tiredly. The night deepens, and the room empties in pairs. A northern chill enters from the window, free to settle now that the fire is low and there are no warm bodies to impede its advance.
Grantaire dislikes the cold. He stands, his bones creak; yawning and stretching, the wine tilts the world sideways, so he stumbles, and Enjolras turns sharply to his direction from where they are discussing something with Marius by the banister. Eponine is in the landing, he can see her uncombed head bobbing beyond the stairs.
“Renault will return on Friday with the plans,” Marius was saying. “I will be here with him, and the two custodians we talked about earlier.”
A stiff nod. Enjolras hates standing around immobile. “Alright. Take lesser-known routes when you are with him, don't be seen when the Inspector and his men do rounds.” There is a soft thunder of footfalls down the stairs, Eponine's breathy affirmation, and then silence.
All too soon he is alone with his good captain, this angry red shepherd. But Enjolras is waiting, one foot down the stairs, fingers drumming on the wood of the banister. Grantaire raises an eyebrow in genuine inquiry.
“You can barely walk at all.” Enjolras gruffs, an annoyed hand gesture at the bottle he wasn't aware he was clutching.
Enjolras likes the cold. He pulls his overcoat tighter about himself, but his steps are measured and easy, and sometimes when the wind tunneled between the buildings in the Rue, he shivered minutely. Grantaire feels it, this close, where gold curls brush against his cheek. He is vaguely aware what a weight a mostly-drunk fellow hanging off one's arm could be, but Enjolras keeps walking, walking with him, clouds of breath white in the air as he breathes.
“Eh,” he begins foggily. “I can make my way.” It was true, Grantaire was ready to defend. Why, he was a professional sometimes-tippler, and he could navigate the infernal city smoother than any artful dodger even when he was crawling drunk.
“You should really do this in moderation,” Enjolras grumbles. The arm around Grantaire's shoulder tightens, reprimanding. They skirt two more side streets, and the hold doesn't slacken. He is rather warm despite the cold tickling his nose.
He thinks he may be drunk on his golden prince. Grantaire wonders if it would, like all addictions, kill him in the end. He laughs, and gets jostled. He wonders if they are lost, and on the tail of that thought, a wish that they should just get lost, the lights in the river were lovely that night. He wonders if boiled sausages and squeezed fruit worked to mull the smell and feel of Enjolras in the morning. He wonders then, vaguely, if he should bother.
He thinks he could give it a try.