#interview with the vampire#iwtv#the vampire armand#assad zaman
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Alright, so I ship both Enjoltaire and Enjonine (haters gonna hate 😎), but I need to know, who here ships Eppieferre? Because they are BAE together and I need people to talk to about this adorable couple.
Finding Quietude
He’ll be fine. He is fine. Until he’s not.
Words: 3709 Words
Warnings: Major Depression and Unhealthy Coping Methods. Please message me if I have portrayed either of these things as inaccurate.
A/N: Right...so another Les Miserables pairing I ship? Eponine and Combeferre- Eppieferre? I mean I like Eponine with Enjolras too, but in terms of personality, I personally believe she’d actually fit better with Combeferre. They’re opposites but they’re exactly what the other needs. Also, I may or may not have a soft spot for Combeferre, whose position I sometimes find myself in.
He’s fine, he tells himself or more accurately, he’ll be fine. It’s not like he hasn’t dealt with the voices before. It’s not like they haven’t spoken in sharp barbs to him, pointing out his every mistake, every mess-up, every missed opportunity he should’ve taken. It’s not like they haven’t told him before that he’s worthless, he’ll never amount up to anything more. He’ll never be anything like his friends, those bright lights who don’t have to be anything but themselves to shine because he’s the cowardly one. The one that sticks to the side, too afraid to put himself out there, forever doomed to trail behind his trailblazers of friends. He’s doesn’t deserve the friends and family he’s been blessed with.
There’s a reason they call him the guide of the group. A guide cannot exist without the presence of others. He helps others, that’s what he does, that’s what he does best, and even then, it’s not as fulfilling as it used to be.
The voices never shout or bellow the way Enjolras does in his speeches. No, they’re quieter. They’re whispers in his ear, cold breathes that tickle his skin with goose bumps and though they speak in soft tones, they only grow crueler when he’s alone. It doesn’t matter if he’s studying or in his bed, trying to sleep. Their whispers seem to grow louder until they’ve become something akin to shouting and he can’t drown the voices with the silence. He clamps his hands over his ears to block them out, but it’s no use. Nothing can stop them.
Courfeyrac is the only person who has a slight idea about them. Courf discovering the voice was an accident, really since he didn’t mean for Courf to catch him curled in a ball on his bed in an attempt to hide. They have a heartfelt one-on-one conversation right there and then, but after that, he never brings up the voices again to Courfeyrac again. He never mentions that they’re still there, whispering in his ears, sometimes louder than the sound of his beating heart.
But Combeferre is hardy. He doesn’t need anyone to chase the voices away. They’ve always been there and besides, compared everyone else’s problems, the voices are like mosquito bites- annoying but he can deal with them on his own. He’s the rock of the group and what kind of rock complains about its own problems?
He’ll be fine. He is fine.
Until he’s not.
*
Everyone has his own shit to deal with. Éponine Thenardier knows that for a fact; you just have to look at her and her friends.
Enjolras has a little more than a strained relationship with his bourgeoisie family. Courfeyrac has attachment issues; he does sex, but he doesn’t do love or relationships. At all. Jehan comes from a family who can’t accept him for the romantic lovable poet he is. Bahorel gets into street fights in his free time to relieve stress. Feuilly has both tuition fees and rent to worry about. Joly is a hypochondriac. Bousset is just very unlucky in general. Grantaire drinks too much- something to do with a drug addict of a mother and a nonexistent father.
Éponine supposes that’s why she and Grantaire understand each on the most basic level. After all, her childhood, while not quite exactly mirroring his crappy one, is marked by the same kind of horror: an abusive family (the father’s a con-man and a criminal, the mother’s his partner-in-crime). That and her tendency to pick the wrong men to hang with (i.e. a long string of bad boyfriends).
If there’s anyone who doesn’t seem to have problems, she’d point to Marius Pontmercy and Cosette Fauchelevent, the pair of sickening lovebirds that only a fairytale could come up with. But then Éponine remembers Marius struggles to focus on anything aside from his love life (Cosette) and Cosette has a father that hasn’t learned to let her fly the nest yet. So if those can be considered problems, then so be it.
And then there’s Combeferre, the quiet one, but certainly no less important. If everyone seems to have problems to deal with, then Combeferre is the one who does everything in his power to help them all. He never tries to fix his friends and their problems, but he does support them in any way possible.
Combeferre keeps Enjolras’ volatile temper in check, lest it gets unleashed on the others after an unsavory ‘conversation’ with a hostile father. Combeferre never judges Courfeyrac for his one-night stands and makes sure the perpetual heartbreaker doesn’t get too wild. Combeferre lets Jehan take the couch when it’s obvious the poet doesn’t want to be alone at night. Combeferre treats Bahorel’s wounds and soothes Feuilly’s cracked nerves. He assures Joly that the he is perfectly fine and proves to Boussett that bad luck is nothing more than coincidence. He gets Marius to focus on things aside his love life and helps Cosette show her father she’s more grown up. He switches Grantaire’s alcohol shots with water when he thinks the drunk student has had more than enough to drink.
And as for Éponine, she’s lost count of the number of times he’s roused her from nightmares, let her crash on his couch after another fight, another break-up, and helped her keep an eye on her brother. Actually all of her friends do that, but Combeferre goes above and beyond. Of all of her friends, Combeferre has babysat Gavroche on a short notice the most.
Combeferre takes care of them all, yet surprisingly, only a few things are known about the caretaker. Sometimes it’s difficult to even tell what he’s thinking. Yes, there are general details, provided by a former roommate (Courfeyrac and his loose lips), but can only make up so much of a person. Sometimes Combeferre reminds Éponine of a ghost. His presence is acknowledged, yet he remains distant, keeping a lid on any personal details.
He has a doctor for a father. His mother died when he was nine. He never mentions either of his parents. He reads on a daily basis. He’s a med student like Joly, but he likes philosophy and quoting philosophers and his favorite authors too. Overall, he sounds like a well-educated, generally benign gentleman and honestly, that’s what Éponine would’ve thought too. Would’ve.
Sometimes, when he thinks no one is looking, the soft expression he wears cracks. His shoulders slouch forward and the concern in his eyes fades, leaving something dead in its place.
She won’t say it aloud, but Éponine thinks an expression like that doesn’t suit him. She knows that expression all too well especially since she’s worn it herself before. That had been a time when she took custody of Gavroche and worked herself to the bone without telling anyone.
Take that from one caretaker watching another, but if that boy doesn’t tell someone whatever burdens his heart, he won’t look dead just in cracks of time.
*
He reaches a breaking point.
After all, there’s only so much of the voices he can take before they just become too much. Sometimes he just wants a break from them.
He picks his poison.
*
Before the first time he drinks himself to a stupor, his hands tremble, barely able to grasp the whiskey bottle. It’s a miracle that he hasn’t dropped it on the floor, shattering the glass and spilling its amber contents.
This is not him. This is not what he does. This is below him. He can’t stoop to this level.
Can’t or shouldn’t?
With shaky fingers, he uncorks the bottle, its weight like lead in his other hand. He sniffs it once, seated on the couch, taking in a bitter scent before placing the bottle on the coffee table. Perhaps he should drink in a glass-
A shiver runs down his back and he stiffens, feeling something cold against the back of his ear. It’s them again and this time they’re chanting. He’s a coward, he’s a weakling who can’t see through his promises, he’s just making up excuses, and he blanches because they’re all true, but he doesn’t want to listen to any of them right now-
He grabs the bottle by the neck and shoves it into his mouth.
The liquid is harsh and bitter to taste. It burns when it slides down his throat and his head reels. But when he takes the bottle out, a light-headed feeling takes over and the voices in his head sound fuzzy. He looks back at the bottle in his hand, eyes glazed.
Huh. Maybe this may not so bad after all.
*
“Did you go out last night?” Courfeyrac asks him the next morning. Despite having a killer headache, Combeferre gives his friend an incredulous look.
“No. Any reason you’re asking?”
Courfeyrac shrugs. “Not really. Just that you look like a hangover and your breath smells like alcohol.”
“I didn’t,” Combeferre insists, insides brimming with anxiety. Oh god, has he figured it out? His secret-
“Right, right, you didn’t.” Courfeyrac waves his worries aside casually, only to grin, mischief twinkling in both eyes. “Next you do though, call me up. Lord knows you need a drinking buddy.”
Combeferre sighs exasperatedly yet he is relieved. He closes his book. “It was a one time thing, Courf. I probably won’t do it again, but if you’re that insistent, I will.”
*
“Hey, ‘Ferre?” He looks up from his textbook to find Éponine staring at him intently, her own book open, but forgotten. He was studying in the library when she joined him across the table.
A smile tugs at his lips. He has always liked the way she can connect with everyone in the group without really trying. With him, it’s a shared love of peace, quiet, and reading. “Yeah?”
Her eyes flicker towards his wrists before she looks back at her book and flips another page. “You know if you ever need help, I’m here.”
“I do, Éponine.”
“I know.” Éponine shoots back, her eyes suddenly boring into his. He gulps. “You help all of us all the time so it’s only fair that we do the same for you. Just wanted to make sure you knew that.”
Slowly he nods and returns to his textbooks. “Right.”
He feels haunted for the rest of the day.
*
Combeferre comes to Café Musain with a headache more frequently these days. It gets to the point where Enjolras suggests he buy himself some painkillers or he go the doctor.
Combeferre shakes his head. No he’ll be fine- he just needs to rest more, he says. It’s not going to interfere with the cause, he promises.
While Enjolras’ blue eyes look at him skeptically, a pair of dark eyes narrow in suspicion.
*
He unscrews the whiskey bottle cap before flopping down on the couch. It’s been another long day and now they’re back. In truth, they’re always hiding in the back of his mind, unless he’s alone. Then they’re in the light, holding back no claws or knives until it’s time to slink back into the recesses of his mind.
But now, he hears them loud and clear. He’s screwed up again, he’s nothing but a burden to his friends- the only reason he’s kept around is because of his convenience. Eventually, his friends will all find someone better and leave him behind.
He grits his teeth in an attempt to push them aside. When that doesn’t work though, impulse takes over and his hands work like clockwork.
He chugs a portion of the whiskey and the world spins. Dazed, he smiles rather drunkenly.
He’ll be better now.
*
He reaches half of the bottle sooner than he expects and frowns.
The voices haven’t abated at all.
*
He should’ve known better. Another item to add to the long list of failures he’s managed to commit in these past 26 years. He should’ve known the voices would’ve found a way around, but it’s too late now, isn’t it? It’s becoming a routine now and the whiskey’s already running through his veins, intoxicating his sinews and weighing his nerves down with lead.
His mind feels just as heavy. He’s in his bedroom, on his mattress with his head in his knees and his hands clenched around his ears when he realizes this truth. They’re laughing now, teeth and knives bared as they stab him relentlessly where they (he) knows it hurts the most.
He wants to scream. It hurts, it hurts too much for him to bear anymore- why can’t they just leave him alone? They’re crackling now, taking too much fun in cutting him to pieces and he can’t do anything but just take it. The whiskey has inhibited him. There is no point in fighting back now.
On the nightstand, his phone vibrates.
*
“Where is he?” Enjolras asks, agitated, pulling his phone from his ear. “He’s never late.”
“Who are you talking about?” Courfeyrac asks, curious.
Enjolras furrows his brow. “Combeferre.”
The entire group goes silent and exchange worried glances, realizing that yes, their guide is, in fact, missing. It goes unsaid that their guide almost never skips meetings. And when he is absent, he always texts Enjolras prior to the meeting.
“Maybe he’s sick?” Joly suggests. The way his fingers drum against the café table screams doubt in that possibility.
“If he was sick,” Grantaire points out from a table closer to the back of the cafe, “He would’ve told Apollo beforehand.” He takes a sip from the beer bottle in his hand.
Murmurs break out amongst the group Éponine, sitting across from Grantaire, stares worriedly out of the window of Café Musain.
*
There is a knock on the door. And then a familiar voice. “’Ferre? You in there?”
Buried beneath a heavy blanket, Combeferre burrowed further into himself, grasping at the sheets. The whiskey has made him rude. He should be shedding the blanket to greet whoever is at the door. He shouldn’t be hiding like the frightened child he is.
His heart beats erratically as he listens to his own labored breath. The lack of air is suffocating him and so is the darkness, but he can’t bring himself to open up. There is something alluring about the darkness he’s encased himself in. It’s there he can hide, yet it’s also there when the voices are their loudest. He supposes it makes no difference really because these days they’re loud in the light too.
“I’m coming in, ‘Ferre.” A far off voice says, which is followed by the sound of door hinges creaking.
And then the blankets cocooning him are flung off and he looks up, expecting to see damnation. The glare of the morning sunlight burns the edges of his vision.
The pair of eyes staring down on him now is familiar. Dark, just like ones he’s seen so often in the library and at meetings. As he squints, the face, once a blur, becomes a little more focused.
He blinks, owlishly, eyes and cheeks red from tears. “E-Ep?”
She chuckles softly. The mattress dips beneath her weight as she (he thinks) smiles noncommittally. “You’re very predictable, you know. You keep a spare key under your doormat.”
He sputters. “H-How’d you get here?“
She shushes him, her fingers combing through his mussed-up sandy hair. “You didn’t come to the meeting today. Enjolras was worried. We all were.” Her fingers pause in their motion for a moment and the smile on her face falls. An empty whiskey bottle sits on his nightstand next to his phone. “’Ferre,” She finally sighs, asking quietly. “What did you do?”
The blankets fall in a cascade around him. Again, the alcohol has thrown him off guard and has loosened his tongue. The general summary comes out easier than he expects. “I got…a bottle of whiskey and I think I…drank from it.”
“How much did you have?” He can’t help but frown. There’s a hint of disappointment in her voice and he imagines her frowning. A smile suits her better.
He lets out a breath of air, turning his head in the general direction of the bottle. “I can’t remember. I just wanted-” He tenses, his surroundings suddenly sharpening, his mind springing to life.
No. No. No. This can’t be happening.
“Oh god.” He utters, horrified, his breath hitching. His heart races as his knuckles turn white from clenching the sheets beneath him. “You shouldn’t be here, Éponine. The others can’t know about this. I’m their guide- what would they think if they saw me like this? I-“ He breaks eye contact and gulps, tears suddenly pricking the corners of his eyes. “I just wanted to get away from them; they wouldn’t stop. I know they’re telling the truth, but I just, I couldn’t-“ He breaks off, convulsing, his heart beat stuttering. He can’t breathe, he can’t breathe, he can hear them again, and they’re saying all the things he knows and getting to be all too much to handle-
“’Ferre!” Éponine has grasped him by both shoulders. Her grip and her raspy voice are firm, but when he looks at her through a sheen of tears, her eyes are gentle, lacking the judgment he imagined to see. “Calm down. I’m not mad.” She takes a pregnant pause. He dreads her next words and squeezes his eyes shut.
“Who are you talking about?”
It’s an open dam from there. She draws the truth out of him and little by little he pieces together for her the fragments of the man he sees in the mirror and of the shadowy beings that lurk in the recesses of his mind. He reveals to her his darkest thoughts, the monster he’s come to see himself as, and the thought that he’s not good enough, that he’s not worth anything, that he’ll never measure up to the person he wants to be. By the end of the ordeal, he’s trembling with heavy wracking sobs. He’s curled in on himself because he’s got nothing left now. He’s shown her everything, his shell cracked open, the walls broken down, the layers peeled away until all that is left is him, in its ugly raw form, laid bare for judgment.
She’s going to leave, he thinks. She’s seen everything now, she knows him at his worst. She seen the monster he is and is repulsed. She’ll leave and tell their friends about him and he’ll be alone like he fears he’d be-
But she doesn’t. Instead, Éponine pulls him out of his ball. She cups his face and leans in so close that their foreheads have collided against one another and their noses are barely touching. She’s crying too, silent tears running down both her cheeks.
“’Ferre,” She whispers almost reverently. “Listen to me for now, alright?”
He nods.
“I can’t say I know what you’re going through right now.” She murmurs first, closing her eyes in acquiescence. “But what you’re telling yourself- that’s not true. I know you think I’m lying, but I’m not. You say that compared to our friends, you’re nothing. I say that you have one of the biggest hearts of all the people I know. I mean, c’mon, you put up with all of our shit-“
“Because that’s what I do-“
She fixes a stern look, pulling back for a moment. “Let me finish. You put up with all of our shit on daily basis and you never complain about it and you deal with all of our problems with the patience of a Buddha. You never ask for anything in return and you never try to help half-heartedly. You give us everything and you never expect anything in return. I don’t know about you, but that’s makes a good man. You’re good, ‘Ferre.”
He sighs, leaning against her. As much as he’d like to believe that statement, he can’t accept it. “It’s not like that, Éponine. I don’t do that because I want to. I only help because that’s the only thing I can do.”
She snorted, opening her eyes. “I figured you’d say something like that. Sometimes, I think we get so caught up in our own problems we don’t take time to appreciate the things you do for us.” She rubs a thumb against the coarse skin of his chin, gaze averted. “Or that our guide might need our help too. I don’t…” She removes her hands from his face to take ahold his own. “Know what your voices tell you, but the next time they’re there, tell me.
“Actually,” Éponine corrects herself. “Tell any of us, if you’re comfortable enough. We’ll be there. We might not know how to beat them off, but we’ll do what we can. Until you can do it yourself. You don’t have to do this on your own, ‘Ferre.”
There’s strange mixture of emotions in his gut. His gaze, once adamantly fixed on his lap, turns to her eyes. They bear no hate, no anger, no judgment. There’s nothing but sympathy and a sincere promise in her eyes.
“Just promise me you won’t pull a stunt like this again, alright? For me?”
And he finds himself nodding, still staring. She smiles and leans in.
She kisses him chastely and his breath hitches, butterflies fluttering in his stomach. When she pulls back, Combeferre blinks, suddenly in a daze.
And it’s not because of the whiskey.
She snickers, laughing lightly. “C’mon. Let’s get you to bed. You look like you need some sleep.” After getting him to lie down, she pulls the covers over him, turning to leave. “Sleep tight, ‘Ferre.”
“Wait.” He speaks up, catching her free hand. She turns back to him in question and he flushes. “Stay?” His cheeks are burning now. “Until I fall asleep?”
A smile breaks out on her lips, which are bright red, he just realizes. “Of course. I’ll be right here when you wake up.” She pulls up his desk chair and doesn’t let go of his hand.
His eyes flutter shut as the last thing he sees is the sunlight trapped in her cascade of brown locks and a pair of warm dark eyes watching over him.
All is quiet. He is at peace.
.
.
Fin.
"I'm not scared of the dark and especially not thunder and lightning shut up you are" for epiferre 😬😬
Not gonna lie this took me a while to decide which one was scared of thunder because they’re both NERDS
So this got a little bit long haha, so it’s under the cut. Thank you, this was a super fun prompt to write :3
It was movie night at Combeferre’s; and of course movie night meant date night, so only Eponine was invited. As usual, Eponine had turned up late - this time she said it was because Courfeyrac was late in picking up Gavroche, but Combeferre took one look at Eponine’s winged eyeliner and knew that was the real reason she was late.
“Oh, and it’s raining,” Eponine said by way of a greeting, shaking out her umbrella.
“Don’t - shake - oh, never mind,” Combeferre said in an attempt to keep his carpet relatively dry. “Well, then, we’ll get a rainy day movie.”
“I’m thinking Little Miss Sunshine,” Eponine suggested, grinning.
“Oh, ha ha,” Combeferre said sarcastically. “I’ve got Pacific Rim on Netflix.”
“Nothing says date night like an apocalypse movie,” Eponine agreed cheerfully as she went to Combeferre’s cupboard. She rifled through all the boxes of tea before exclaiming, “Where’s your chamomile tea?”
“Enjolras drank it all,” Combeferre said nonchalantly as he gathered the blankets. “He had a date with Grantaire.”
“Nerds,” Eponine sighed. “They’ve gone on what, ten dates now? I swear Enjolras eats more of your stuff than I do.”
“Actually, I think the two of you are breaking even,” Combeferre replied mildly.
BAM.
Combeferre jumped.
“That’s thunder, ‘Ferre,” Eponine said calmly. “That’s what we call that noise that storms make when it’s raining outside.”
“I know,” he said irritably. “I’m fine. It just surprised me a bit, that’s all.”
Eponine smiled to herself and made the two of them chai instead.
The rain started pouring down even harder as Eponine threw the blankets over the two of them and they started the movie. (Eponine took the controls and, after a little scuffle, made the executive decision to watch National Lampoon’s Vacation.) “This will fit the atmosphere nicely when that one old lady dies,” Eponine said cheerfully, getting up to turn off the lights.
“Can you keep the lights on?” Combeferre said in a very small voice.
BAM.
Combeferre jumped again.
“Oh my gosh,” Eponine exclaimed, looking at her boyfriend, her hand still on the light switch. “You’re scared of thunder.”
“No I’m not,” Combeferre insisted. “I just wasn’t prepared for that! It was louder than I expected.” He paused, then added, “Can we still keep the lights on?”
“Whatever you say,” Eponine said in a sing-song voice, practically prancing back to the couch. “Combeferre’s scared of thunder, Combeferre’s scared of thunder...”
“Shush!” Combeferre said indignantly, his ears flaming red.
The rain pounded even harder at the windows, rattling the entire apartment while lightning flashed outside. Combeferre was definitely trying very hard not to jump, much to Eponine’s amusement, but when the lights flickered he really started to lose it. He threw the blanket over his head and wrapped himself up completely so only his face was showing.
“I can’t believe it,” Eponine laughed, pausing the movie and turning to Combeferre. “Literally nothing phases you and then suddenly there’s an itty bitty storm outside and you turn into a bundle of nerves.”
“I’m not frightened of some stupid thunderstorm!” Combeferre insisted.
“Mm-hmm,” Eponine hummed.
The lights flickered and went out completely just as lightning flashed outside. Combeferre dived under the blanket.
“Oh, come here,” Eponine laughed, pulling Combeferre to her chest. “I’ve got you.”
“I’m not scared,” Combeferre repeated, his voice very muffled.
BAM.
“Okay, maybe a little bit scared,” he admitted. “But definitely not scared of thunder.”
DOES ANYONE WANNA SEND ME RAOULSTINE OR EPPIEFERRE PROMPTS
celestialtitanslayer replied to your post “Help, I need fluffy headcanons :((”
Hm, laughing and making jokes during sex, boy wants to kiss girl while their in the movies but she's too busy eating popcorn (which she uses as an excuse to tease him), that's all I got
eeee someone write this into a full-pledged enjonine or eppieferre or e/c/é fic
And yet, if there was something Combeferre didn't truly believe in was love at first sight. Was it really possible to meet someone's gaze and realize that that person, only that person, would be able to make you happy for the rest of your life? Was it really possible that just one smile could make the world seem brighter? {Movieverse CombeferrexEponine}
i am in desperate need of some eponine/montparnasse and eponine/combeferre fanficS HELP
Enough For Always (ao3)
She's only a few months shy of her eighteenth birthday when she meets him. Until then she'd been focused on just staying alive, daring to dream of the day that her and Gavroche might get out. He's a warm calm to her cold fire, but she can't afford to want him. It'll only end badly for all of them.
A Combeferre/Éponine Modern!AU
Extensive notes (& spoilers) under the cut.
Trigger warnings: Minor violence, hints at neglect, mentions of Grantaire's drinking.
There is a scene in which Éponine's father and other members of Patron-Minette beat her. It is not graphically described but the action is made explicit; furthermore the after effects of this scene (Éponine being knocked unconscious, and her broken arm + resulting injuries) continue to be referred to for much of the second half of the fic.
Character wise, I guess I might expand on this at some point? There's a lot in my head about how the boys ended up helping at the rec centre, and I feel that I ought to deal with Azelma too - something I never had time to do in this story, and I feel bad about. So I guess there might be more of this at some point? I really like writing for Combeferre/Éponine so it might happen,
Enjolras & Cosette as siblings is a horrible awful trope I know but I couldn't resist it I apologise. The other major thing that I might be interested in writing for the Les Mis fandom is reincarnation!aus, where this trope crosses the slightly ridiculous into downright weird territory. I chose to get it out my system.
Okay, onwards to try and explain some of the britishisms + literary references in the fic. Forewarned this gets like stupidly long!
UCAS - central application point for British Universties. It's awful. Like filling in that form remains one of my least favourite things I've ever done. Applications are due January, most people have heard back by March. Éponine did not bother applying, unsurprisingly.
GCSEs / A-Levels - GCSEs (general certificate of secondary education) are sat at sixteen. You usually sit somewhere between 9-12 of them. English Maths and Science is standard (all together they can make up 4-6 of the total), other subjects are optional. A-Levels are sat at 18 but technically comprise of one year at AS level and one year at A2. That is now on course to change (because the government are idiots). The standard A-Level sitting is to do three (often with an additional AS). Éponine takes four because everyone I know did four and I forgot that the rest of the country didn't attend colleges full of over achievers. I know a couple of people who took six.
To any of you who think that the essay title "Portrayal and exploration of the themes home/roots within Friel's Translations Achebe's Things Fall Apart and the poetry of Derek Walcott" is ridiculous you would a) be right and b) it's too bad because I wrote that essay and handed it in as part of my English Lit A Level. I may be borrowing heavily from my own experience in this fic.
Brian Friel's an Irish dramatist, and Translations is a play primarily about irish colonisation, but specifically about the renaming of Irish place names by the English ordanance survey. Things Fall Apart is about the life of Okonkwo, who lives in Umuofia, a fictional village that is inhabited by the Igbo, their traditions, way of life, and how it changes when missionaries come in the late nineteenth century. Derek Walcott is a Carribean writer who is largely concerned with re-presenting the Carribean to the world, and his struggles with that. (If you are interested, please look these people and their work up, I cannot do them justice and the fic skirts over them.)
I make two specific references to Walcott's work. The first is to Love After Love - I quote Take down the love letters from the bookshelf the photographs, the desparate notes Peel your own image from the mirror. in the fic. Combeferre knows this because it's part of the English Lit GCSE syllabus (AQA's anthology, Cluster Two) and Combeferre is the sort of person who memorised the poems. It is notable for making no fricking sense in the context the examiners have placed it in. It's not included in Selected Poems (I don't know why it was left out.) You may also recognise it because Audrey Niffenegger used it as the preface to The Time Travellers Wife.
The second is to Veranda, which is the poem Jehan gives to Combeferre to give to Éponine. Grey apparitions at veranda ends like smoke, divisble, but one your age in ashes, its coherence gone I'd like to point out that this was included in our set poems, but I really wanted this scene to form a connection between Éponine, Combeferre and the rest of his friends. Walcott isn't quite Jehan's thing, I don't think, but Veranda is one of my favourites and I think it would have a certain appeal to the barricade boys.
The NHS is obviously the National Health Service, if you hadn't worked that out? I imagine Combeferre to actually be rather pissed about how it's being slowly dismantled (the rest of the amis as well, but again, I never quite made it into that.)
The con that Éponine is asked to run by Patron-Minnette is supposed to be absolutely utterly ridiculous, if anyone's wondering. (though you probably could make a pretty penny ransoming Enjolras and Cosette, seeing as how Enjolras hasn't gotten himself disowned quite yet.)
I don't quite know what happened with the whole Feuilly/Montparnasse thing I only meant it to be a little hint and it got away from me just a bit. I tried to throw in some background stuff that I like, some of it more successfully than others. (I don't know how well platoniclifepartners-practicallymarried-combeferreandenjolras came across, but yeah... I took a couple of lines out regarding those two because it was becoming ridiculous.)
I'd like to make clear that I have absolutely no idea how the foster system works or the criteria for taking a child into it. Willing suspension of disbelief people, pretend that Valjean pulled a lot of strings.
GBH (grievous bodily harm) is the charge which I believe would be levied against Éponine's assaulters. It carries a pretty harsh sentence if they could be convicted of it (15-20 years), but there isn't much in the way of evidence. Javert probably put it in the growing file of things we think Patron-Minette did.
Scribes and extra time are both things the English exam system provides. There also provisions made for extenuating circumstances, from minor illnesses to bereavement. If there was a serious incident in the exam hall (someone having a seizure etc) your grades would also be adjusted.
Aston Villa is an English Premier League football team. They're from Birmingham, and somehow have managed to stay up for a good long while. I think the last time they won anything was the eighties?? I can't say I'm much of an expert. If anyone is a fan, I apologise. I mock them only because my mother supports them and it is therefore my natural state of being.
Okay so we should probably talk about Pope. I got carried away with Pope. I can't remember the specific name of the English Unit I took (I think it was pre-nineteenth century poetry and drama or something to that effect), but it comprised of studying Othello, Sheridan's School for Scandal and Pope's The Rape of the Lock. School for Scandal is a georgian farce comedy of which I cannot remember a lot of details, and we all know about Othello, so Pope.
The Rape of the Lock is a five-canto poem detailing the (true!) incident in which a women went out for the day, played cards, met a suitor, suitor cut off a lock of her hair and she threw a bitch fit. Pope makes it out to be a dramatic epic, weaving in allusions of grandeur and greek myths, of sylphs and magic. It seemed like the sort of thing Grantaire would like. And then my brain had a moment of stupidity and connected Enjolras with Belinda, the women who lost the aforementioned lock of hair.
(When I say he'd be pissed at the comparison, I'm not kidding. If you feel up to reading eighteenth century poem, check out the full version because it's a hoot.) Éponine's "To arms, to arms, our fierce Virago cries" is from "To Arms, to Arms! the fierce Virago cries." Grantaire's answer of "And swift as lightening to the combate flies" is a direct quote. Jehan's line "I see our Enjolras burns with more than mortal ire." borrows from "Belinda burns with more than mortal Ire". Grantaire's last line "I wonder, if like Belinda, I can be Ariel and spy an earthly lover lurking at his heart?" draws from the moment when Ariel "view'd, in spite of all her Art, / An Earthly Lover lurking at her Heart".
Having not taken a language at A-Level I can't say I'm an expert in the process, but I can assure you that places still do call them Oral Exams when we should all just switch to the term Speaking Exam to avoid the hilarity. I considered changing it, but left it in.
Combeferre and Éponine's history revision session - does anyone really want me to explain the ins and outs of this? I mean I'll talk at length about it if you want me to, my ask box is open. While we're at it though, I went digging through the past papers to work out which questions she'd have answered - there's a choice of two for each, but I think she'd have gone for a)'The transformations in the fortunes of the Nazi Party in the years 1930-33 was largely because of Hitler's remarkable talents as a politician,' How far do you agree with this opinion? and b)'The First World War did not arise primarily as a result of planned German aggression,' How far do you agree with this opinion?
There was actually a fall in the unemployment statistic in May 2012. This fic is tentatively set within 2012 but it doesn't really matter as few references are made to it. (While we're at it, Éponine's '12% of the credit' Avengers reference is a little anachronistic, because while the movie was just about out, I doubt she'd actually seen it. She probably saw a gif on the internet though.)
