#I get it grantaire I really do

[koheletgirl]

my main goal with r's rant was for the people reading it to be like what the fuck is this man talking about. and i think it's been achieved

[ofpd]

one thing about exr as a phenomenon is that fandom culture's inclination towards character growth and healthy relationships over what would make more sense realistically or narratively/thematically could mean that people would be really into the idea of grantaire getting over his obsession with enjolras and self-actualizing but the thing is that fandom culture's inclination towards making men kiss each other is stronger

[incidentalblr]

it’s so funny how dead to me enjoltaire are now that i’m in the old man side of the fandom like. previously they were my ride or die favorite ship that i knew i could always keep coming back to and now i HATE them because valvert is so much better and it’s right there!!!!! and they’re literally the main characters!!!!! les amis de l’abc are side characters who literally get five seconds of screen time with grantaire being cut from most adaptations and yet?!&$???? all of the fucking fan content is about them?????? yet the valvert girlies are out here with NOTHING!!!!!!!!!!! WE GET NOTHING!!!!!

[depressedtheatrekiddo]

My teachers don't know I'm making all my projects about Enjolras

[crispyflowerblaze]

okay here is a more specific articulation of my thoughts, broken down into the five poles of (to me) the ideal frenemies ship dynamic (i just prefer enjoltaire to be something of a frenemies dynamic instead of enemies or rivals to lovers, but yknow), specifically related to enjoltaire:

really not getting along

yeah, self-explanatory, basically this is what i'm describing up there as what i feel like is a common enjoltaire trope (for good reason, and so many people do it excellently! just not my personal cup of tea in general, both as a writer and a reader) that isn't my favorite. an important element is that it really brings the mood down for everyone else. for me, i have this in small doses or as their backstory

not-so-nice awkwardness

this is what i'm saying up there with awkwardness of clashing with someone because you both misunderstand each other, just stuff like that. also, this isn't exactly the same thing, but what also fits here is them not getting along but about silly things and everyone else is amused. in general, this can kinda bring the mood down but mostly everyone either doesn't care or they're amused. i use this a lot in that specific au i mentioned up there

nice awkwardness

i mentioned this up there with the kind of awkwardness stemming from having a crush on someone, and well not just that but because yknow they just kind of have a connection with each other and that connection certainly isn't all romantic, it's really platonic too. this is a lot of what i have for them actually getting along. effect on everyone else ranges from amusement to confusion generally

getting along

honestly the most boring one lol, well to me that first one is usually boring too (or just like a bummer), but at least it creates conflict. yeah in my au, my thoughts are that most of the time enjolras and grantaire interact, they don't create a net positive impact on everyone else (whether they're getting along or not), but that every once in a while they do, and that's this category

getting along very very very chaotically and disruptively

the best one lol. basically in my au there's a lot of this lately and going forward and yeah they just rant to each other about things (things being capybaras and Scientology and green apple flavor vs grape flavor, mostly) in a very chaotic and fun way and they're always kinda playfighting and stuff and just laughing a bunch, basically in their own little world, and everyone else is amused and charmed by this, yes, but it also gets very disruptive

yeah so that's my thoughts on that! i think what leads to a lot of the ships i make feeling bland or predictable might be that i really only rely on the third and fourth poles, so nice awkwardness sometimes and getting along the rest of the time, but there's not-so-nice awkwardness in every relationship you have with anyone, and chaotic disruptive getting along just makes the characters feel more alive. but yeah honestly i can take or leave really not getting along. that's just something i include with enjoltaire because that's just a necessary part, but again i usually don't include too much of it. and these are just my opinions obviously lol (if anyone wants to talk about enjoltaire, please do. i have way too many thoughts about these two, it's a little weird)

oh and i emphasized the effect on everyone else for all of those poles because that's just an important part of their dynamic to me, like they can't ignore or be neutral towards each other and all of their friends suffer for it lmao. and i just love the duality of how sometimes they really don't get along but other times they get along so well that it's just really weird and disruptive. they're just perfect what can i say?

i don't know if this is an unpopular opinion or anything, but does anyone agree with me on this: i like enj and grantaire to be horribly awkward around each other more often than they're arguing and getting into fights. maybe it's cus i've read so many enjoltaire fics at this point but like, to no fault of the authors, if it starts out with arguing that feels like something i've seen before (not because they're being copycats or whatever, just because it's understandably a very common enjoltaire trope, and just because i've read so many enjoltaire fics), i'll usually click out just cus, again, i've read so many enjoltaire fics. gotta just use my own version of them for examples lol, hmm what are good examples for this hmm. so basically i don't mean awkward as in awkwardness from liking someone and trying to hide it, even though there's that too and that's great, but more like awkwardness cus they clash and get under each other's skin and they can't ignore each other. the kind of awkwardness where you misunderstand someone and they misunderstand you so it's just awkward and annoying, i guess. and obviously this is only one part of their dynamic of course. basically, it's the causes of how you'd see them arguing all the time, but just to me it feels more natural that more often the effect of that would be them just bringing out the weirdest things about each other, if that makes sense. also banter and bickering and stuff like that of course. basically, i just get bored of actual serious arguing all the time (or really just much at all, i dunno if they argue i want it to be about silly things lol), and plus it makes me like them less as characters lol and not think they're as cute together. oh man gotta think of examples cus i feel like this doesn't make very much sense. yknow what oh well who cares lol. but yeah let grantaire and enjolras just be really weird and awkward around each other, it's very funny

[secretmellowblog]

I saw Les Mis live for the first time the other weekend, and the surprising standout performance for me was Kyle Adams as Grantaire. He is a performer who has obviously read the Brick, and uses all of his stagetime to convey as many aspects of Brick Grantaire as possible; he also reads Grantaire’s love for Enjolras as explicitly gay and romantic (there’s a moment I’ll talk about later where he blows him a kiss.) I was actually surprised by how much he managed to convey in so little time!

Some highlights:

When Enjolras is asking for a “report on the strength of the foe,” Grantaire enthusiastically raises his hand, posturing and gesturing wildly at himself to volunteer. Enjolras casts him a disdainful look like “anyone elSE?” And that’s when Javert jumps in with his “I can find out the truth.�� It’s like a small silent version of the Barrier du Maine scene; Grantaire was really giving that “je suis farouche.”

In general, there was this repeated Thing where Grantaire obnoxiously acts out in order to get Enjolras’s attention, and then flails around uselessly whenever he actually has it. Very in character.

Grantaire often goes on uproariously and jokingly about love; then, whenever he’s approached by Enjolras, he doesn’t seem to understand what to do about it.

Whenever Enjolras is singing dramatically about revolution— during Red and Black, Do You Hear the People Sing, and One Day More— Grantaire gazes at up at him with a amazed, awed, and overwhelmed look on his face, sometimes with his hand on his heart.

During Red and Black, there’s a moment where Grantaire “jokingly” caresses Enjolras’s face. Then during Do You Hear the People Sing, Enjolras passes Grantaire by and casually caresses his face; Grantaire acts a bit stunned, as if surprised Enjolras would deign to touch him. Finally, there’s a dramatic “reassuring face-caress” during the gay verse of Drink with Me.

There’s a repeated thing where Grantaire keeps offering Enjolras a bottle of wine, half-jokingly, only for Enjolras to reject it. In the last verse of Drink with Me, after Grantaire finishes his verse and walks away, Enjolras finally accepts a bottle of wine (though another character gives it to him.)

Iirc Grantaire doesn’t join in the fighting initially; he just stares at Enjolras in awe, and then mainly stands by Javert to “guard” him. I mainly mention this because I think Javert and Grantaire are a very funny duo, just as a concept. I think “being forced to listen to Grantaire monologues” is an excellent punishment for Javert.

During Marius’s verse of Drink with Me, Enjolras climbs to the top of the barricade, standing in the light. Grantaire is at the bottom in the shadows, attempting to sleep. As Marius sings about his love for Cosette, Grantaire raises his bottle to Enjolras, and then blows him a kiss. It’s very “let me sleep here until I die here.”

Finally, Grantaire has his "book death." After he spends the entire musical on the fringes being skeptical, he joins Enjolras in the final battle. He climbs up the barricade and says (I was close enough to hear) "Long live the Republic! I am one of them."

I'm genuinely impressed by how much of the Brick characterization he managed to convey with so little time-- some ad-libbing and lots of silent acting moments! It really gave me a greater appreciation of what a strong performer in a musical can do, and how they infuse even 'smaller' parts with lots of nuance and personality.

[retquits]

could you please tell us more about Cetus + maybe possibly give us a tour of your tattoos??? :D

i haven't played on cetus's account in a while (ended up going back to dallas since his farm is the most established) BUT i can certainly do a tattoo tour in the meantime!!

my neck tattoo is the newest - got it in april! it's a pair of brushstroke wings and a star at the center

i also have a pair of knives dissolving into petals on my collarbones, a reminder to be kinder to myself (comic about it here) (but also because i just really enjoy knives)

aaand these are the oldest two!! they represent an exchange in les miserables (""Be serious," said Enjolras. "I am wild," replied Grantaire.") i'll probably get the eye one covered though because everyone thinks it's a bill cipher reference LMAOOO

...and that's it for now! 🥰

[random-ikea-drawer]

ok so i love les miserables

AND I JUST GOT TO SEE IT FOR THE FIRST TIME IN THE NORTH AMERICA TOUR (more specifically Montreal! (yes i flew to an entirely different country to see it)) and i am incredibly attached to enjolras and grantaire so here are just things i saw that made my nails dig into my thighs <3 (not just enjoltaire)

oh my dear months old source of no big sad

this is 90% incoherent rambling (SPOILERS)

- Grantaire had long hair and a long coat i think that deserves its own point

- During Red and Black, Grantaire did the old “Don Juan” with the bottle right in Enjolras’ face (he was not impressed)

- In this same song, Enjolras got really close to R’s face during “don’t let the wine go to your brain”

- Again, in Red and Black, when they tossed Grantaire’s bottle to Enj, teasing him, Grantaire grabbed the bottle in a… way… when he was giving it back to him

- Same song 😭 Grantaire was bouncing on a guy’s lap during the first few verses

- In DYHTPS, Grantaire pulled Gavroche aside away from the students crowding Enjolras (this broke my heart, he clearly loves him and doesn’t want him to be in a war)

- “Glad to do a friend a favor” with a very suggestive hand gesture

- In the “dogs will bark flees will bite”, Grantaire pointed a finger at Enjolras, the former getting real close putting his weapon between them. They got REALLY close

- Gavroche pulled the middle finger at Javert lmao

-Eponine fucking died (i knew that already, seen every bootleg and version available, still hit hard)

- During Eponine’s death Gavroche ran onto the stage, closely followed by Grantaire being held onto by Enjolras

- Gavroche tried approaching Eponine (that’s his sister bro :()) but was stopped and held onto by Grantaire. When she died however, Grantaire quickly bent to hug Gavroche, man the grief was so clear with them both.

- After she died, everyone cleared to their positions but Enjolras and Grantaire, seemingly for Enjolras to try and comfort him, but decided against it quickly and pushed past him. Grantaire placed his hand on his chest in mock offense 😭

- When the attack was about to start, Grantaire mocked and toyed with tied up Javert. When Enjolras called for hold, Grantaire threw his arms around Javert with a “yep!” and cue the battle starting immediately when that happened

- During Grantaire’s verse during Drink With Me, it’s back to Enjolras and Grantaire being center stage. Enjolras approached him, held onto his arm and with the same hand moved up to brush R’s hair, which lead to him breaking off the contact and rushing to the other corner of the stage.

-He was followed by Gavroche, who hugged him from behind and then they both fell asleep next to each other :((

- Gavroche fucking died (i knew he did still heartbreaking) and was caught by Enj, who handed him to Grantaire

- During the Gavroche solo, Grantaire stood center stage looking to the crowd, not even flinching when the gun sounded, only turning around when Gavroche was already at the top of the barricade

- He tried shaking him awake :(( then set him down and stared at him :((

- That was until Marius fell, Enjolras rushing to check on him, making Grantaire rush to his side

- R grabbed onto Enj and they both held the back of each other’s necks,, from my angle it looked like their foreheads touched but idk if they would do that but MANNN

-Enjolras fucking died first (no wtf :(( )

- Grantaire fucking died last (BRO.)

- Everyone fucking died bro

- Except Marius and JVJ of course

- Mr Thenardier, instead of singing “This one’s a queer but what can you do”, sang “This one’s a queer, I’ll try it to!” and dipped a guy in the wedding 😭

- The “to love another person is to see the face of god” line always makes me emotional just :((

that’s it haha hopefully y’all enjoy the ramblings, ty for reading this far, i seriously recommend going to watch it if you can it’s truly the most amazing thing i’ve ever seen man 😭 may be biased but i’m serious

[kjack89]

Background Noise

It's been so long I almost don't remember how to do this.

Hiiiii sorry I've been MIA, it's an election year. You know how it goes. Anyway, here's a little something as proof of life. Love you all for sticking with me. I'll be back when I can.

E/R, modern AU, developing relationship. And all of the fluff.

Enjolras finished the sentence he was typing and sat back in his chair, reading through the paragraph he’d just written with a furrowed brow. Well, it wasn’t the best writing he’d ever done, but considering it was a filler paragraph in the middle of a letter to local elected officials that would almost certainly never be read by anyone other than some low level staffer or intern, it would have to do.

He sighed and scrubbed a hand across his face, his hand stilling when he caught what someone was saying nearby. “...Despite the immense popularity of the campaign, sales of Energizer batteries actually went down during the years that the ads ran. Duracell claimed—”

Enjolras lowered his hand to frown at Grantaire, seated at a nearby table in the back room of the Musain and still blithely rambling without looking up from his phone. “What are you doing?” he interrupted, equally parts confused and incredulous.

Grantaire broke off and glanced up at him, and Enjolras noted that he didn’t even have the good grace to look abashed. “Reading the Wikipedia entry for the Energizer Bunny.”

As if that was an even remotely normal thing to be doing. “Why?” Enjolras sighed, rubbing his forehead.

Grantaire shrugged. “Seemed appropriate,” he said cheerfully. “You know, because he—” He broke off, making a face. “It? They?”

“I don’t think the pronouns of a corporate marketing campaign are really relevant,” Enjolras said dryly.

Grantaire raised both eyebrows, amused. “Oh, so respect for pronouns is conditional now. I see how it is.”

Enjolras ground his teeth together. “I didn’t say that—”

“Anyway,” Grantaire continued, ignoring him, “like I said, seemed appropriate because the Energizer Bunny just keeps on going and going and going and going—”

“Yeah, I get the idea,” Enjolras said waspishly. “But why are you reading it out loud?”

Grantaire just shrugged again. “Why not?”

Honestly, Enjolras wasn’t even sure what answer he expected, and he sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Is this something that you do often?”

Grantaire scratched his cheek as he considered it. “Define ‘often’.”

Enjolras gave him a look. “Grantaire.”

Grantaire grinned, that slightly crooked grin that inevitably heralded him saying something that would piss Enjolras off. “Sometimes, when you’re otherwise occupied and slash or completely lost to the world, it’s a fun little thing I like to do.” His grin widened. “Or at least, it’s fun seeing how long it takes for you to notice.”

It spoke volumes that Enjolras wasn’t even remotely surprised. “Of course.”

“It’s a drinking game,” Grantaire added brightly. “Or at least, I drink while I play it, so that counts, right?”

“Of fucking course,” Enjolras sighed, even less surprised by that. “I should point out that by that logic, and I use the word as loosely as the English language allows, any game you drink while playing is a drinking game.”

Grantaire’s grin sharpened into a smirk. “This is exactly what I’ve been saying! I just think—”

But Enjolras cut him off, far too used to Grantaire’s ability to take a tangent and turn it into a diatribe until someone interrupted him or he otherwise got bored. “As fascinating as it always is to learn how you choose to spend your time, you’re going to have to knock it off.”

“Why?”

Enjolras bit back his immediate response that it was because it was annoying as hell. “Because it’s distracting,” he said instead.

“Of course,” Grantaire said, with a wry twist of his lips. “Heaven forbid I distract the Noble Leader from his all-important work.”

He doffed an invisible cap to Enjolras, who felt strangely tongue-tied and wrong-footed, the way only Grantaire ever seemed to be able to make him. “I didn’t mean—” he started, but Grantaire cut him off.

“I suppose it’s about time I head home, anyway.”

Enjolras glanced down at the time on his phone and then back at Grantaire, frowning. “You’re heading home before midnight?”

“Sorry, did I say head home?” Grantaire asked, draining his beer and setting it back down on the table with a thud to shrug his coat on. “I meant to another bar.”

Enjolras rolled his eyes and looked back down at his computer. “That sounds more like it,” he muttered, shaking his head. “Goodnight, Grantaire.”

But despite his rather pointed farewell, Grantaire didn’t leave, instead lingering for long enough that Enjolras glanced back up at him, his brow furrowing. Just when he was about to ask what was wrong, Grantaire gave him another smile, smaller and tighter this time. “Goodnight, Enjolras,” he said, finally turning and leaving, dropping his beer bottle in the recycling as he did.

Enjolras stared after him for a long moment before shaking his head to clear it and looking stubbornly back at the letter. Ten minutes of staring at it without adding a single word later, he sighed and shut his laptop with a snap. 

Typical Grantaire, he thought sourly to himself as he grabbed his bag to pack up all of his things, somehow finding a way to annoy him without even being physically present.

He’d just have to try to work on it again the following night, ideally without the dulcet sounds of the Energizer Bunny Wikipedia entry. 

Of course, knowing Grantaire, he’d find a new way to annoy him anyway.

— — — — —

Just as Enjolras suspected, the next night seemed like a repeat of a thousand nights that preceded it. After the Les Amis meeting wrapped up, Grantaire lingered while everyone else dispersed, leaning back in his chair to prop his feet on the chair next to him, sipping from his beer as he scrolled through his phone. 

But at least he was mercifully silent while doing so, which Enjolras would take as a win.

For his own part, Enjolras settled in to finish the letter, all too aware that it needed to go out sometime the next day. He worked better with a deadline, after all, so finishing it up should have been a breeze.

Unfortunately, Enjolras instead found himself unable to concentrate, glancing at his phone and clicking over to Twitter as if it would somehow have updated in the prior thirty seconds. He didn’t know what was wrong with him, and he rubbed his face vigorously with both hands as if that might somehow get him to concentrate.

It didn’t.

Instead, Enjolras sat back in his seat, scowling. He was in his favorite place to do work, he’d had the perfect amount of caffeine so he was alert but not jittery, and yet he couldn’t force himself to actually get anything done. It was almost like something was missing, something in the back of his mind that kept him on task, or—

His head snapped up, his eyes narrowing as he looked over at Grantaire, who was still conspicuously quiet. “That thing you do,” Enjolras said, and Grantaire glanced up at him. “Where you say stupid shit while I’m not paying attention?”

“Yeah?” Grantaire said cautiously.

“I realize I didn’t actually define often,” Enjolras said. “So, uh, would you say that this is a daily occurrence?”

Grantaire looked amused. “Would you say that you ignoring me is a daily occurrence?” he asked, saccharine sweet.

“Yes.”

Grantaire grinned. “Well, there’s your answer.”

Enjolras shook his head slowly. “Fucking Christ,” he muttered, running a hand across his face before straightening his shoulders. “Right. Well, you can do it again.”

Grantaire’s grin faded, just slightly. “Do what again?” he asked.

“Talk, or read out loud, or whatever other stupid shit you try to get away with without me noticing,” Enjolras said, something resigned in his tone.

Grantaire blinked. “Really?” he asked, equal parts amused and skeptical.

Enjolras shrugged helplessly. “What can I say,” he muttered, well aware he was blushing and equally aware that Grantaire would undoubtedly use this against him at some point in the future, “I’ve apparently gotten so good at tuning you out after all these years that you’ve essentially become a really effective white noise machine.”

He half-expected him to feign offense at that, but Grantaire just laughed, the sound bright and genuine. “Well, at least you can no longer say I’m completely useless,” he said, and Enjolras rolled his eyes, even if he couldn’t quite stop his answering smile.

“No, I guess I can’t,” he agreed. He hesitated before asking, “So will you read to me? Whatever nonsense you’ve been reading, or anything you like?”

Grantaire’s expression softened, just slightly. “For you?” he asked, with none of his usual sardonic sharpness. “I think I can manage that.”

He picked his phone up again and cleared his throat before reading out loud, “Neither Kamala Harris nor Donald Trump is campaigning on the coming ‘tax cliff,’ which is rarely mentioned in their paid messaging or stump speeches. In their only debate, Harris talked about taxes far more than Trump, who only mentioned them twice — once to deny that his tariffs amounted to a “tax” on consumers, and once to promise future tax cuts, without much detail.”

Enjolras had been expecting another stupid Wikipedia entry, or maybe something equally inane from Reddit. He hadn’t expected a news article, and even less a news article about politics, one of many things Grantaire always professed not to care about.

He was out of his chair before he even realized it, crossing over to Grantaire. “Let me see that,” he said, reaching for Grantaire’s phone. Grantaire raised both eyebrows but nonetheless handed it over, standing and crossing his arms in front of his chest as Enjolras scrolled through the article in question, his brow furrowing. He glanced back up at Grantaire. “You were really reading this?”

Grantaire shrugged and reached out for his phone. “How else am I supposed to be able to effectively argue with you?” he asked, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Maybe it was.

Maybe it was as obvious as Grantaire saying God only knew what while Enjolras tuned him out.

Enjolras felt a slow smile stretch across his face, and instead of handing Grantaire his phone back, he closed the space between them and kissed him.

For one long moment, Grantaire was perfectly still, but then he kissed Enjolras back, wrapping his arms around Enjolras waist and opening his mouth against Enjolras’s. 

Then, without warning, Grantaire pulled away. “What?” Enjolras asked, just this side of breathless.

“You need to finish that by tomorrow,” Grantaire said, nodding toward Enjolras’s laptop.

“Are you really trying to be the responsible one right now?” Enjolras asked, grinning.

“Yes,” Grantaire said, suddenly serious. “I’m not giving you any excuse to blame me, or this, for fucking things up.”

Enjolras scowled. “I wouldn’t—” he started, and when Grantaire just gave him a look, he held his hands up and laughed. “Fine, I probably would.”

Grantaire nodded. “And I definitely don’t want to give you a reason not to do that again,” he said, smiling that crooked smile again, and it took everything in Enjolras not to kiss him again. 

“Fine,” he sighed instead, tearing his eyes away. “But I still need you to keep reading something.” He paused and made a face. “Not that article, though, I really don’t need to hear about fucking Trump right now.”

“Fine by me,” Grantaire said, taking his phone back from Enjolras. His thumbs flashed across the keyboard as he typed something and then he settled back down into a chair, one conspicuously closer to Enjolras and farther from his beer. 

Again he cleared his throat, only this time, he read, “The Constitution promises liberty to all within its reach, a liberty that includes certain specific rights that allow persons, within a lawful realm, to define and express their identity. The petitioners in these cases seek to find that liberty by marrying someone of the same sex and having their marriages deemed lawful on the same terms and conditions as marriages between persons of the opposite sex.”

Enjolras would’ve recognized those words anywhere. "Obergefell v. Hodges?” he asked, amused, shaking his head fondly. “God, you’re such a nerd."

Grantaire glanced up at him. “Takes one to know one,” he said, sticking his tongue out, and Enjolras barked a laugh and shook his head once more before finally returning to his work as Grantaire continued reading, his voice a soothing background to the sound of Enjolras’s typing, the way it had been for years now without him ever noticing.

But he noticed now.

And since he did notice, he had a brand new motivation to get through his work in a timely manner. 

And judging by the grin that Grantaire still wore, he knew it, too.

[idiopath-fic-smile]

If you are still taking Halloween fic requests:

Member of a monster-themed novelty band Grantaire x Actual Vampire Enjolras

oh HELL YEAHHHHHH

i'd apologize for the ensuing silliness but you can probably gather that is a hallmark of the fledgling "monster-themed novelty band x actual literal monster" genre. this is part one; i may write more tomorrow

“Grantaire,” Joly panted, “come quick, it’s a party emergency!”

Grantaire, who might as well have lived inside a glass case labeled BREAK IN CASE OF PARTY EMERGENCY, flipped himself right side up from where he’d been about to attempt a keg stand, and nodded solemnly, clapping his hands together. The blood rushed back to his head in a giddy wave.

“What do you need?” he asked.

Joly nodded at Bossuet to explain as the three of them barreled down the hallway.

“Here’s the thing,” said Bossuet, “we hired a band tonight, but the lead singer got way too high and now he thinks he needs to liberate all the notes from his guitar.”

Grantaire cocked his head to one side. “Does that explain why someone’s spent the past hour loudly and determinedly playing scales?”

“I don’t pretend to understand the inebriate’s mind!” Joly shouted, gesticulating wildly. The effect was slightly undercut by the bottle of gin in his hand.

“Point is,” said Bossuet, still walking at an almost-run, “we already rounded up Eponine and Bahorel. We need you guys to take the stage and salvage what’s left of tonight. C’mon, Bahorel says your sound is really getting there.”

“We’re not a band,” Grantaire insisted. “We’re a support group that keeps getting noise violations. We’ve never even played a gig.” He knew he probably sounded whiny but it had been a long week. His minimum possible math requirement was kicking his ass. “Besides, I had plans for tonight. I was gonna get laid.” Or at least, he was going to do his damnedest. Believe in yourself. Manifest your dreams. No I in team.

Bossuet simultaneously peered at Grantaire and pulled him through a door. “Is that why you’re dressed as…god, I don’t know, what do you call all this?”

“I thought he was an Animorph,” announced Joly. “Like, at a midpoint in the transformation to some kind of hairy animal.”

Grantaire coughed.

“Sorry,” said Joly easily. “A Sexy Mid-Transformation Animorph.”

“Shit, take in some culture once in a while, this is embarrassing,” said Grantaire. He gestured at the wolf ears on his headband, the fur glued to the cuffs of his shirtsleeves, the canine nose he’d drawn over his own with Eponine’s eyeliner pencil, the strategically ripped shirt and jeans. “I’m a Sexy Wolfman,” he said. “Obviously.”

He and Eponine, who had watched Ginger Snaps every day for the past month, had agreed to go as a pair of werewolves, but then Eponine had abandoned their pack of two to go make out with Cosette, which he really should’ve seen coming. He couldn’t even hold it against her; Eponine had been “casually” memorizing Cosette’s general weekly schedule for the past couple of semesters, when she wasn’t watching Cosette moony-eyed from the other side of the Quad. It was all probably very cute.

“Well, Wolfman,” said Bossuet, nudging Grantaire in the direction of the makeshift stage, where Bahorel was taking a seat behind the drums and Eponine was—reluctantly, by the look of it—re-tuning her borrowed bass. “You three have about thirty seconds to think of a band name.”

Grantaire picked up the electric guitar and raised his eyebrows at Eponine, whose lupine makeup was now marred by bright red lip marks, like something from a cartoon. Her own lips were smeared crimson, which was to be expected, but.

“She stopped to kiss you multiple times on the cheek?” he muttered.

“Shut up,” said Eponine, visibly blushing. “How’s your quest for a meaningless hookup?”

Grantaire let out a long breath. “Not even the furries are biting,” he admitted as Eponine snickered.

“Band names, people,” said Bahorel. He adjusted a cymbal. “I don’t have all night.”

“Hello,” Grantaire intoned into the microphone. “We are Not Even the Furries Are Biting! This first song—”

“Gonna kill you and make it look like an accident,” Eponine crooned low in his ear. “The embarrassing kind. Toilet-related.”

The thing was, in their capacity as a very loud sort-of group therapy session, with October 31st on the horizon, they had actually been talking about the appeal of wolves as a metaphor for the parts of oneself that felt wild or lonely or unlovable. To that effect, they’d been toying with a couple songs.

Maybe, thought Grantaire, this would not be a complete and total clusterfuck.

They played “I was a Teenage Werewolf” by The Cramps. They played “I’m The Wolf Man” by Round Robin. They played “Werewolf” by The Frantics. Any time he, Bahorel, or Eponine ran into a snag—a fumbled note, a missed beat, a patch that wasn’t perfectly memorized—Grantaire attempted to cover for them by throwing back his head and wailing, as if he was losing more and more of his grip on his humanity.

They were just finishing the first verse of The Black Keys’ “Howling for You” when Grantaire saw him: a tall, handsome stranger lingering at the back edge of the room, with intense eyes and an even more intense air of stone-cold sobriety. He wasn’t smiling, wasn’t frowning, just—looking. Disapprovingly? Apathetically? Saddled with a bad case of heartburn? It was hard to tell.

The chorus started up, and Grantaire sang along with Eponine and Bahorel:

“Da da da da da, da da da da da da—”

Grantaire grinned as more and more of the crowd joined in—pulled along less by the band’s general prowess or charisma and more by a drunk college student’s inherent love of an easy earworm, but Grantaire wasn’t splitting hairs at this point.

“Da da da da da, da da da da da—”

A sea of bobbing, singing partygoers, and there on the fringes, Offensively Sober Guy stood perfectly still, watching Grantaire so intently that Grantaire almost forgot the words to the refrain.

Or rather, the word.

Or rather, the single repeating syllable.

To Offensively Sober’s left, two guys attempted to clink their beer bottles together and somehow lost their balance, careening into him. He maintained his impeccable posture as if they weren’t even in the room, never breaking his stare. It was honestly a little creepy.

For reasons Grantaire would later not be able to fully reconstruct, he decided the funniest thing to do would be to wink and smirk and generally pretend like Sober was really, really into him.

[ofpd]

what was with the dads exr thing they were trying to do at the show last night. very silly

[pilferingapples]

See if I were Legle I could make a joke about how people liking this but not reblogging it are like some sort of Very General Experience but also the words that meant that Very General Experience would be a pun about how the Restoration was trying to undo the social gains of the Revolution, plus also it would be an unflattering comment about one of the professors at the law school, plus also it would be a fairly lewd comment about my extremely thriving love life, which--if I were Laigle-- I would have, despite being broke,bald, homeless, and the object of apparently some kind of curse, because I would be an absolute goddamned genius and all the 1830s hotties love a genius

the line would be ten words long and no translator in a hundred years would get it right

no one can write this guy

Lesgle doesn't get the appreciation he deserves because he is just operating on a level beyond everyone and people can't capture his brilliance and are afraid to try

(puns. I'm talking about the puns. )

[asexualenjolras]

It's been a few days since I went to see the current Les Misérables London cast at the Sondheim Theatre, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about Djavan Van De Fliert's Enjolras and Tom Hext's Grantaire. Here is an overview of their portrayals:

Grantaire isn't overly present during Paris/Look Down, as usual, but he can be seen at the back of the stage reading a leaflet that Enjolras and Marius drop on the street - and he watches as Enjolras runs off of the stage.

During ABC Café/Red & Black, Grantaire is separate to the rest of Les Amis. He sit with his drink in his hand, watching as his fellow students listen to Enjolras speak. Tom Hext portrayed Grantaire as drunker than most other Grantaires I've seen on stage: he had slurred speech and really did stumble around the Musain.

As Marius comes on the stage, Grantaire's focus is entirely on Enjolras' reaction and you can see the cogs start to get to work in his brain; he thinks deeply about how he can gain Enjolras' attention. As he does, Djavan's Enjolras looks so defeated and frustrated, but there's a softness in the way he directs Grantaire back onto their cause. Initially, Grantaire laughs off Enjolras' words and continues joking around, desperately looking to see if Enjolras was watching him.

When he realises he isn't, he walks right up to Enjolras (who had returned to his table) and grabs his face, turning him to look at him with a laugh. He only starts to be serious when Enjolras raises his eyebrows and silently pleads for him to stop.

After Gavroche announces that Lamarque is dead, Grantaire's whole body drops. As everyone else rallies around Enjolras, he grabs Gavroche and moves to the side of the group, watching in horror as the realisation sinks in that this was really happening. Enjolras notices that Grantaire is standing away from everyone else, cradling Gavroche, and stands by him during Do You Hear the People Sing? Grantaire offers him a smile in response, and Enjolras smiles back, believing he's won Grantaire round.

BUT the moment Enjolras looks away, Grantaire's smile drops again. And he looks on the verge of tears as he joins in with the marching.

During One Day More, Enjolras looks back to Grantaire and Gavroche and offers them a nod, which they both reciprocate.

When the barricade is built, Grantaire stumbles around the stage following Enjolras and making sure Gavroche is safe. When Éponine is shot, he runs onto the stage with the rest of the students and stands in utter disbelief, cradling Gavroche and staring at Enjolras with the saddest expression on his face. Enjolras walks in from being with Javert wiping his hands of the Inspector's blood. Grantaire looks at him with such a bland look on his face. After Éponine dies in Marius' arms, you can really see that Grantaire has accepted this is going to be their fate. Enjolras tries to reach out for him, grabbing at his arm to try and explain and console him, but Grantaire pulls away from him and leads Gavroche away.

In Drink With Me, he's physically shaking. The moment Grantaire starts to sing, Enjolras turns around and walks towards him with the most solemn look on his face. He pulls him into an embrace but Grantaire pulls out of it and walks towards Gavroche, who hugs him this time. He sinks down onto the floor and looks so heartbroken.

Because Grantaire does believe in Enjolras, but he's cynical. And he knows how this is going to end. And he's trying desperately to be there for Gavroche and make sure he's safe.

When Gavroche is killed, he breaks down completely and Enjolras tries to comfort him but Grantaire shakes him away. It's a really haunting scene. During their final battle, Grantaire doesn't pick up a weapon once. He watches from the sidelines, and offers Enjolras a small nod when Enjolras smiles at him from the top of the barricade.

And when Enjolras is shot dead, falling off of the barricade, Grantaire races to the top to be with him, screaming the most blood-curdling "you bastards!" I've ever heard. He dies running to the man he loves because, although he doesn't believe in the cause, he believes in Enjolras.

During Empty Chairs at Empty Tables, Grantaire and Enjolras are stood side by side - which has been the staging since they changed it in 2019.

Djavan's Enjolras is so passionate about everything he believes in. But he's also the softest Enjolras I've seen: you can see his confusion about why Grantaire hangs around, but he's empathetic and kind to him even through his frustration.

And Tom's Grantaire cares so deeply for Enjolras, and he's so desperate for him to see him. It's all so beautiful. The relationship between Enjolras and Grantaire is so poetically, and delicately, portrayed. And Djavan and Tom both understand their characters on such deep, personal levels. They're the perfect ExR combination. And I will never, ever get over them.

[autumnalmess]

BUT CONSIDER THIS: Grantaire forcing Enjolras to sit down listen to decent music because he can not let this guy be 'austere in his enjoyments' if he's gonna say shit like "yeah, of course I know about the Beatles. They're the ones that cross the street."

Grantaire gently putting his headphones over Enjolras' hair. He should resist letting his fingers brush against soft curls. They do, slightly. He thinks Enjolras does not notice.

Grantaire trying not to laugh at the way Enjolras' hair springs up wildly around the headband. Enjolras glowering like a wet cat.

Enjolras grumbling as he's made to sit through the 'classics', reluctant to admit that some of them are really rather good. Grantaire watching the "this is stupid"s melt into silent understanding. Enjolras realizing what it is to do things just because you want to.

Grantaire unable to stop himself from smiling like an idiot for the entire time.

Grantaire thrilled to witness Enjolras' first ever reaction to Fleetwood Mac (Enjolras can't stop saying 'oh, wow').

Enjolras listening to Jeff Buckley.

Grantaire nervously putting on 'Lover, you should've come over', glancing at Enjolras pointedly, and knowing this the closest he will ever get to confessing.

Enjolras listening, and staring at him.

[theladyragnell]

Exchanging gifts for the first time: E/R

(This one Fought Me for no reason I can discern, but hopefully it does the trick!)

It’s taken them several years to invent what Joly dramatically calls The Birthday Party, with the capital letters every time even though he’s a slow texter anyway. Five of them have birthdays in the baking-hot months of June and July, and there was a year or two full of bar crawls and restaurant meals and rooftop parties where they all reached August exhausted and a little sick of each other’s company, so when Jehan, whose birthday is last in the sequence, suggested they just have a joint party in July, everyone was relieved to agree.

And then everybody wanted to give gifts and it felt weird for half of them to be opening gifts and the other half not, and then they all looked at each other at their half-hearted Christmas gathering, a holiday none of them feels quite easy celebrating, and then The Birthday Party became what it is, a chance for everyone to pass things around. Nobody gets special gifts for everyone, with that many to buy, but they pass around fancy chocolate bars and bottles of craft cider and handmade cards and it’s good. It’s better than awkward parties focused around one person.

Grantaire loves The Birthday Party. It’s one of his favorite nights of the year, and he spends the weeks before it closeted in his apartment, soberer and happier than he usually is, making matched sets of little paintings of the Musain or caricatures of everyone or handcarved soap dishes.

It’s just that this year, he and Enjolras are dating.

He’s very happy about that, to be clear, happy enough that he feels a little drugged most days, happy enough to embarrass himself if he examines it too closely, but it means he doesn’t have to restrain his foolish desires to give Enjolras lavish personal gifts anymore, and the consequence of that is that he no longer has any ideas for lavish personal gifts.

And Enjolras won’t care about that, obviously he won’t. Enjolras’s gift to The Birthday Party every year is a pot of something delicious to eat and a handwritten card each about how much he loves them, something Grantaire was unable to deal with when the notes for him were grudging and doesn’t know how he’s going to deal with now that they’re sincere. Enjolras doesn’t care about gifts and lives in a tragically spartan apartment largely because he’s too lazy to hang anything, and Grantaire isn’t expecting anything out of the ordinary at The Birthday Party except maybe a kiss.

But he still wants to, and his friends are not helpful when he tries to subtly ask them what to do, so he finally caves in, makes a terrible choice, and asks Enjolras.

“I could tell you what I’m giving you,” Enjolras suggests in a meditative tone, propping his chin up on his hands where he’s laying on his stomach in Grantaire’s bed. Grantaire gets the urge to paint him in lush oils, but he gets that urge at least once a day, so it’s pretty easy to ignore. “If that would be easier.”

Grantaire doesn’t particularly care about surprises, but he has his pride. “Don’t do that, that’s one of those things that nobody says is bad luck but which really ought to be bad luck. Shaking one’s presents, of course, is a time-honored tradition, but hearing what they are from the giver? Unthinkable.”

“I’ll like anything,” says Enjolras. “It doesn’t matter to me what you give me, or if you give me anything at all. I’ll still be here.” And then, after some silence and one of his penetrating stares, “I made yours.”

“Noted, I’ll leave the diamonds at home and will only do a string of pearls if I dive for them myself.”

Enjolras rolls his eyes and encourages Grantaire to go to sleep, but it does, much as Grantaire hates to admit it, help.

He doesn’t wake the next morning overcome with inspiration, but he finds his way to it, taking time away from his gifts for everyone else to work on Enjolras’s.

The Birthday Party is as rowdy as ever, when it comes. Grantaire’s block prints impress everyone, and Enjolras’s curry is, as ever, delicious. As the night starts breaking apart, people admitting they have to go home, the more personal gifts come out, the ones they all put off so nobody feels left out or pressured. Grantaire, who finds sharing his feelings with Enjolras more embarrassing now that they’re reciprocated than he did before, waits until Enjolras is finished with Combeferre and Courfeyrac, until Joly has draped a new scarf far too hot for the season around Grantaire’s shoulders, to take Enjolras aside.

“You settled on something,” Enjolras says, and smiles.

Grantaire, flustered more than he cares to admit that he is by the smile and the situation and his stupid idea, produces the envelope that’s been weighting down his pocket all day, four pages densely written in his horrible handwriting that alternates between crabbed and flourishing, his own version of Enjolras’s yearly letters, only he’s never said in one paragraph what he could say in twenty. “I’ll do better next year, when I’m less nervous, but I thought—people give gifts they’d appreciate themselves, right? So this is me trying that out.”

Enjolras takes the envelope and opens it, breaking the wax seal Grantaire put on because he does have some standards, and only makes it a sentence or two again before he stops, which is good, because Grantaire might combust if he’s forced to watch Enjolras read that letter. “I do appreciate it, and I’ll read it when I won’t embarrass both of us,” he says, and produces a small package. “And we had the same thought, I think.”

Inside the package, of course, is a small canvas, maybe ten centimeters on a side if Grantaire were to care to measure it, with a very careful painting of Grantaire’s couch painted on it, every bit as earnest and every bit as unskilled as Grantaire’s letter. “Definitely the same thought,” says Grantaire, and has to swallow several times before he can say anything else. Even then, he has to seize on poor Feuilly as he walks by, knowing Enjolras will have something for him to give them both a break.

They both go back to Grantaire’s apartment when The Birthday Party is over and Grantaire puts his new canvas in pride of place next to his bed while Enjolras is brushing his teeth and then falls asleep before Enjolras ever makes it to bed.

When he wakes up in the morning, Enjolras is still in bed, a rare late morning, with all the pages of Grantaire’s letter arrayed on his lap and his stupidly beautiful nose a little red with leftover tears. “I love you too,” he says when he sees Grantaire is awake.

Grantaire didn’t write the words in the letter, they felt too soon, but of course Enjolras knew what he meant. He’s made a study of getting to the heart of Grantaire’s torrents of words. “I love you,” he says, belated but no less true, and lets Enjolras carefully fold the pages of the letter up and put them to the side before he presses him back into the pillows.

[eleancrvances]

les mis arena tour two-show-day notes

killian sounded like he had a sore throat, but he was still very good, a sweet but determined valjean, expecially at the evening show

bradley's javert is still wild, but vocally i think he's been working on his control and modulation a lot, there were a lot more quiet and nuanced moments and i loved it, i hope he continues like this

but yeah he remains unhinged and does things like grab one one of the students by the shirt and spit "shoot me now or shoot me later" right in his face

he also lunged at valjean at the end of "we meet again", but killian just held him back and quietly said "no. no. go."🫠

and before that he raised voice at "yes, valjean", so killian shushed him, and he very sarcastically whispered "you want a deal"

CHANNAH FANTINE CHANNAH FANTINE MY BELOVED so heartbreaking but a very strong voice

nathania ong too, her on my own was so clear at the matinée, the silence during the pause was so complete you could tell the whole audience was right there with her

caleb botched a couple of notes, but his empty chairs delivered (his voice cracked at "sacrifice" during the evening show and it hurt me)

also for those few that, like me, love adam robert lewis: he was there. he sounds absolutely lovely. i'm almost positive he covered combeferre which i don't think he's really supposed to do?? maybe there's some sickness going around the company

a part of me wishes he'll cover javert next week when i'll see them again in milan

james's enjolras is STRESSED. he delivered "do we have the guns we need?" massaging his temples, like "god help me i'm surrounded by children..." - but he's also hopeful. he has some hesitations and insecurities (he seemed almost angry at himself for trusting javert, and thanked gavroche with a couple pats on the shoulder), but he truly thinks they can do it

(he's also VERY pretty up close. i met him. he smiled at me. i'm totally fine.)

raymond's grantaire remains lovely

obligatory exr notes: james sarcastically clapped along with the others after the "opera" line. then in drink with me he steps up to tell grantaire "enough!" as he sings his verse, but he turns and delivers "just one more lie?" to his face, which seems to genuinely trouble him for a moment

on to the heartbreaking things: in the final battle, grantaire gets shot with dead gavroche in his arms </3

killian booped little cosette on the nose, and did it again in the finale </3

in the evening show right before the suicide bradley sort of ushered valjean and marius out saying "go, go, go" </3

the bishop entered at the end, reached valjean and tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention as he'd done in the prologue, and they hugged </3

the audience was super enthusiastic and there was a standing ovation at the end of both shows. at the evening one before leaving killian stepped forward and raised his arms, like a conductor, then laughed when everyone whooed even harder