Grantaire

"What, right now?" Edgar asked, Grantaire's words not actually registering before his mouth started running. Then his mind paused, rewound, and took a moment. "Oh, shit." Grantaire was serious, wasn't he?

Sitting up properly, he scanned Grantaire's face for any sign of jest and then Neil's, to see his reaction. No, as far as he could see, this was real. Casual, but real.

"Yeah," he finally said, tilting his head at them, not entirely sure if this was a proposal or a discussion. "That'd be cool."

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There was glitter in Edgar's hair.

It was on my palms, too, rubbed off from the package of cheap, plastic, shatterproof ornaments we bought to replace the nicer ones that the cats had their way with last year. There were ornaments on the floor, sprigs of fake holly on the couch, and I sat astride one of Edgar's thighs, the two of us laughing about something inconsequential when Grantaire opened his big fucking mouth.

I sat back, watching them both talk, my pulse thundering audibly inside my skull. They both looked so fucking casual. "You're fucking joking, right?" I let out a strangled laugh, waiting for R to crack a big fucking smile and for us to go on like nothing happened. But I knew he wasn't like that. He wouldn't joke like that.

This was real.

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Edgar’s response is immediate, laughing, and Grantaire almost involuntarily grins just a little — it is funny, after all — but then Edgar realizes, swearing, and Grantaire's pulse double-times. Neil does too, he thinks, the way he’s just sitting back and observing. They're both disheveled and gloriously lovely, glittering, but Neil is frozen in place from where he was grinning a moment ago.

Thank god for Edgar; the easy way he tilts his head and agrees, even if Grantaire’s not sure if he's answering what R's asking, makes his whole chest feel lighter. He wants to just kiss him, half takes a step forward, but it's not that easy.

And then Neil laughs like he might’ve been slapped in the face by it, and Grantaire really wishes he had a drink. Or at least the effects of one.

Maybe he should pretend he was joking. Maybe they should have had a long talk — haven’t they, a little bit, though, even if only in murmured alwayses and don’t go anywheres and I like thises?

What if they say no when he clarifies? What if Edgar says yes and Neil says no (if it’s just one of them, he thinks, that’s how it will go, but maybe not) -- what then? Is he being a fool to have even thought this?

He should have gotten the rings first. No— maybe this is better: he doesn’t want a yes because of something shiny.

“No," he begins, "I'm not." Grantaire looks at Edgar and back to Neil: his tone is almost curious, like he’s discovering something. Despite Neil's expression he steadies himself, his certainty about it, on both of them.

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If it were anyone but Neil, Edgar wouldn't have directed the faint changes in his expression that led up into nervous laughter. Grantaire was serious, obviously, but there also wasn't an immediacy to it that would've made Edgar panic. If Grantaire were demanding they do it right now and there was already a car waiting, Edgar would've insisted that their lover had lost his fucking mind.

"I still don't think we should do it tonight," Edgar said. "City Hall's closed, first of all. Plus who knows what fuckery is around the corner for New Year's." But as a not too distant prospect? He could be okay with that.

Edgar looked now to Neil, shrugging faintly. "We're all practically there and boring anyway. We might as well get a party out of it." The relationship was already closed to the three of them and they all brought in rent and spent time together. What would being married change except that they'd put a grand gesture to it?

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"Christ, Edgar, will you shut up?"

It was cruel, and I immediately regretted it, stumbling to feet and sucking in a sharp, pained gasp as I knocked my knee on the edge of the coffee table. Edgar was playing it off like it was nothing, just a party and an excuse for presents. In my mind, the few times I'd allowed myself to think about this, I was right there with him. We'd all shrug-- sure, it was a good idea. We'd go to City Hall, maybe, and that'd be that. An excuse for cake and a new microwave. No big deal.

But instead, it stretched out ahead of me, huge and looming, not because I didn't want it, but because I fucking did. With a humiliating twist in my gut, it hit me that I didn't want it to be a fucking joke. I didn't want it to be just a party and cake.

I stood there, red-faced and my hands hanging helplessly at my sides, looking to Grantaire for... something. For proof, maybe. For him to make it real beyond just a flippant suggestion spoken over the shitty Christmas movie playing with the volume turned low.

"You're serious," I murmured flatly, like a fucking idiot.

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Grantaire huffed a soft laugh, somewhere between comforted and nonplussed, at Edgar's deadpan about doing it tonight. The joke was absolutely Edgar, and Grantaire was a connoisseur when it came to dry humor, but he's almost so nonchalant that Grantaire isn't sure what to say. Or how important it is or not to him, and either would be all right, but it makes the moment hard to read. He smiles a little, though, at the idea of getting a party out of it.

It's not a bad reason.

R winces just a touch at Neil's cut in, even though he's wanted him to speak for the last ...perhaps it's only been 30 seconds but it feels like an age, watching his reaction. He winces more visibly at the collision of Neil's knee and the table.

The way Neil looks at him catches Grantaire still, and he nods, eyes fixed back.

"I shouldn't care, should I? Marriage is ridiculous. At home, the three of us -- it'd be impossible. Not legal, I mean, but there'd be no point, because there'd be no reason for it. A social contract, and all that, families -- fucking -- consolidating wealth --

But I do, I want it. The ceremony and the rings and the goddamn piece of paper and to say you're my husbands." He looks between Edgar and Neil, and he can feel himself smiling, a little shy and a little embarrassed, and hopeful. "Dieu," he mumbles, "This whole thing was supposed to be more graceful."

R forges onward, because rambling is at least something he can manage. “This isn't something I ever thought I’d have, this sort of family. Even without the barricades, I didn't think I'd live to see it. With one person, much less two." He presses his lips together. “Back home, I don’t think I was even capable of trying to be good for anyone. And I’m not always, here." He rubs his neck. "But I want to be. And I wake up and I know someone loves me, and that's -- mad. And I want to say I'm yours in front of people, official, whether that lasts another three years or three days."

"If you'll have me," he finishes a little grandly, because at least something can be grand.

Edited Date: 2018-12-30 04:19 am (UTC)

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Edgar flinched at Neil's reaction, his face quickly morphing between confusion, hurt, annoyance, and then cycling back to one of the others. A part of him wanted to ask what the big deal was. Marriage wouldn't really change anything for any of them. They would wake up together and go to bed together and if there was some kind of declaration in between, would that really change how things ended? They'd already been through so many versions of hell that this seemed like the least dramatic part of it. Of course they should get married. They practically already were

Another part of him felt a little distanced, broken, at his lack of intense reaction. If he'd grown up normally, hadn't been penned into the Tail, maybe he would understand and be as excited and nervous as the others.

Grantaire launched into one of his explanations and it was sincere, slightly graceless, and made Edgar's heart squeezed. Putting it like that made it seem a little more important, making it a declaration. He liked the sound of it, the chance to show the world, but he still couldn't understand the alarm either.

"You've both already got me," he said, finding the thing he did understand and know to be completely true. "If you want to put that on paper, I don't see why I'd not want to. Not with the both of you."

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Husbands.

The blood rushed inside my skull, the sound of it like thunderous marching, with my knee throbbing in time. It should've been laughable. I couldn't really wrap my head around why I wasn't laughing and rolling my eyes at the whole idea. I never wanted to be a fucking husband. That shit was for straight people, for normal people, for boring people.

I hadn't known a single happily married couple, growing up. Marriages were fucking poison. But for all its faults and all its petty cruelties, Darrow had a way of making the impossible possible.

Funny thing was, it didn't even occur to me to question that I wanted them. That part was a given. But I couldn't really understand why they wanted me for something like this, with all my baggage and bullshit, already ruined for normal by the age of eight.

Letting out a wavering breath, I looked to Edgar, shamefully apologetic as I reached out to take his hand. He looked confused more than anything, and I couldn't help but feel guilty when I thought of how he grew up and why he wouldn't have thought it was much of a big deal.

"Yeah," I said, quiet and strangled, shoulders lifting in a helpless shrug. "Yeah, okay."

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Grantaire takes a step forward as he's speaking, bridging the distance between them. This whole thing seems just as disastrous -- beautifully he has yet to find out -- as the three of them, and maybe he should have expected that. But he doesn't want it to be a bad memory for anyone, no matter what happens.

Edgar's expression warms, though, as he's rambling on, and Neil takes his hand, and he looks like he's been knocked over by a wave, a little, but not like he's going to laugh.

The hell of it is, he'd never wanted to be a husband, either. He'd assumed it would happen, stand in front of a priest and have the whole Mass and the vows, because agnostic as he is about everything, he still grew up Catholic and besides, that's just what happened. But before the island he'd never lived in a place where he'd thought that such promises had room for someone as broken and skeptical of society and not normal as he was, either. Or realized why he'd want the party and the announcement. Somehow in a place like this, where they might disappear at any moment, it seems even more important.

He looks at Edgar, warm and grateful, and his eyes shift sharply when Neil says okay. Somehow it seems incredibly unlikely; some part of him, the part that whispers all the worst things, had been sure at least one of them would point out that he's not exactly marriagable material or that he wants something that's ridiculous.

"Yeah?" He lets out a breath, stepping closer and feels a bit like he's going to cry, which is going to make this whole thing even less graceful. It's also impossible to kiss both of them, which he really would like to do, so instead he just reaches for them both.

"I -- Christ, I was sure no one wanted me to be serious. I know it's not very different, you're absolutely right," he aims that at Edgar with a very loving laugh, "I just --"

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There was something beautiful about the way he didn't have to explain those moments anymore, much though he hated that they still happened. Neil looked toward him in a way that wasn't quite an apology but that showed he knew why Edgar was making a face, feeling lost. Their joined hands helped and Edgar reminded himself that there was still a lot for him to learn but he wouldn't lose those two for not knowing it.

Neil's words were as casual as Edgar's but there was still tension in his voice that Edgar didn't feel. But he was still saying yes, still willing to stick with this.

Finally, finally, the three of them were enveloped into one another's arms and Edgar wrapped an arm around Grantaire to drag him closer. "Why wouldn't you be serious?" he asked Grantaire. "I'm pretty sure the three of us are the only things we're serious about."

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I hovered in close to Edgar, nudging an apologetic kiss to his cheek. Then, there was Grantaire, and all three of us were tangled up together. Somehow, it never felt awkward, despite there being too many hands and knobby knees and elbows. We just fit, and I was more than willing to make a promise to keep what we had for as long as we could.

My arm around Grantaire's neck, I had a hard time catching my breath, but it wasn't panic. It just felt so fucking big, swelling up in my chest, warm and real and impossible. I choked out a hiccuping laugh, the sound of it a little too close to tears. "It feels kind of different," I admitted, my forehead butting against Grantaire's. If it wasn't different, if didn't matter, no one would bother. If it wasn't a big deal, I sure as hell wouldn't have felt so bitter about the whole thing, a queer kid in nineteen eighties middle America with a single mother, watching a revolving door of men coming and going out of her life without staying.

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The three of us are the only things we're serious about. Grantaire isn't sure he's ever been described so aptly, and he leans to kiss Edgar, happy and relieved and understood.

Even sober, and older, and with that a little less aggressive and loud than when he arrived here, he doesn't need drink to bolster him into joking, singing, wild declarations or admitting to fears with Edgar and Neil. His honest side comes out around his boyfriends.

Fiances. Isn't that a thing.

When he lifts his head back up, Neil wraps an arm around his neck and leans his head in, his laugh tremulous, and this close he can't tell if he can feel Neil's heart pounding or if it's just his own hammering against his ribs. But he understands, suddenly, that it's not just fear of promising.

"It does," he nods, and slides his hand into Neil's hair, rubbing at the back of his neck. "Nothing changes, day to day, but it feels very big, for me."

"Hey," he says softly, trying to read Neil's mind, and he tips his head up to kiss him, a question or an answer. Right now all he wants, more than anything, is the two of them close to him. "It's all right, if this is -- a lot."

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Edgar reveled in this kisses, moving so he could wrap an arm around each of them with equal intensity, equal stability. It was only the truth, he figured. Sure, there were other things he worried and cared about, other things he took seriously, but none of them came close to matching Neil and Grantaire.

They talked over and around him and Edgar searched into himself, wondering if it would come with the flip of a switch. He couldn't find any state change within himself but he felt warm, down in his chest, like someone was blowing on an ember. It had already been there, already been hot, but every new breath made its glow stronger, brighter. Except with them, it didn't fade. It just grew.

"It's important," he said. He knew as much, could feel that growing understanding. Maybe he wasn't a mess of tears or heart palpitations, but he knew it was important and that felt different. "It's still us, but it's important." He glanced between the others and thought that was right at the core of it.

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I nodded, wordless and embarrassingly choked up. A tear spilled over my cheek and I hastily wiped it away with the back of my hand, letting out a rough laugh and rolling my eyes at my own bullshit.

Christ, I'd always hated those simpering bitches in movies, sobbing and falling all over themselves over an engagement. It always seemed so stupid. But now I was an overwhelmed mess of emotions I couldn't quite sort through, sick to my stomach and half ready to run out the door before I could say or do anything else stupid, but underneath all of it, I thought I might've been... happy. Just happy.

And wasn't it just fuckin' pathetic that I still wasn't familiar enough with the feeling to be completely sure.

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R's not sure if he's ever seen Neil cry before. Well: yes, he has, but only under much, much different circumstances. The collision of memories, the vulnerability of it and the pure strangeness of someone being that overwhelmed to be asked by him -- it all tugs hard at his chest. "Stop that," he says in a tender faux-order, "or we'll both be at it," and leans in to kiss him again, a little more fiercely.

"I love you," he says, when they part, looking between both of them and feeling a little overwhelmed. They tease each other sometimes, joking about who's talking to who exactly when that gets called through a hallway. But they both know. They all three know.

They're different, Edgar's ready-as-ever attitude toward this as with so many things, and Neil all reaction, but as he looks at them, it makes such perfect sense, and both right for them, and that's the amazing bit of it, isn't it? They're all three so strangely alike and different at the same time, broken pieces of other things that fit.

"Anyway, there's a part I haven't got to yet," he says, and puts a hand to each of their jaws, then steps back a little to encourage them to come with him. "In the room."

It sounds like a line, a little bit, but ah well.

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"And if you start then I'm going to sit here like an idiot until I have to join in," Edgar added, though his voice was even less stern than Grantaire. He let out a calm, easy breath and relaxed, making a faint noise of protest when Grantaire moved away and then suggested they stand up.

The joke was too easy and he needed some lightness after all of their serious talk, so Edgar put on an exaggerated leer. "Yeah, we know what's in the room," he said, though he found he actually didn't. Edgar knew that rings were a thing with engagement but for some reason, it hadn't connected that it would feature with them now.

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Rolling my eyes at Edgar, I snorted out a wet laugh, scrubbing a hand across my face and trying to hide how fucking embarrassed I was.

"Yeah, but he could show us that in any room," I pointed out, reaching for Edgar's hand and shuffling towards the steps leading into the loft. It was an ungainly trip, three of us trying to walk up the stairs while keeping hold of each other and staring into each other's eyes like a couple of dicks.

On the landing, I brushed past them both, moving to sit on the edge of the bed, because I really fucking needed to sit down.

"Okay, man. Get on with it," I said, going to flippancy, but there was a crooked smile on my face that I just couldn't shake.

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Grantaire snorts a laugh and turns around on the stairs to pull Edgar into a kiss by the front of his shirt. "It's always a possibility."

He grins, unable to keep himself deadpan right now, though he finds himself glad that Neil sits. It makes this feel less expectant. "This was all supposed to happen together," he says, half apologetic, finding himself a little nervous as though he hadn't just done the asking part, or more practically, as though the ring choices are going to be all wrong.

Grantaire opens the wardrobe. Deeming the sock drawer too obvious a hiding place, the two little ring boxes -- a soft bluish grey for Neil, and a dark red for Edgar -- are hidden away in the back of the drawer where Grantaire's trousers are folded (and sometimes messily not-quite-refolded).

He turns, drawing each out in the hand nearest that lover, and flips them both open. "I hadn't quite worked out this part."

Grantaire sits down on his knees in front of them. It's not dropping to one knee, exactly: that part's cheesy, and done with, too. But it puts him in front of where they sit on the bed, so he's not hovering. Besides, it feels right to be looking up at them right now, and he does, assessing, soft. "They're fossil, old Darrow hardwoods, metal that rode here from space on a comet. Things that shouldn't be but only exist here anyway."

Trust him to get sentimental about the materials.

"And I thought they suited you both," he adds, with a little self-conscious smile.

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Edgar started to sit and then paused, like he wasn't sure he ought to, leaving him in an awkward crouch until he decided to just follow Neil's example. So much of this was beyond what he'd ever been supposed to have. The Tail hadn't had rings and marriages. Hell, the Tail had been too fucking poor to even have traditions, really, of any kind. Now here he was, enjoying Christmas, getting proposed to, feeling cherished and so fucking alive.

The rings were beautiful and Edgar leaned forward but couldn't quite reach out for them, like they'd vanish if he touched them. Stupid, when one of them had been purchased exactly for him, but Edgar was hard pressed to imagine that he'd ever own something so beautiful.

"You would get something poetic and fucking impossible," he said, finally daring to run a finger along the curve of his ring.

He leaned forward and gave Grantaire a proper return for that kiss on the stairs and then sat back up, turning to look at Neil, watching for his reaction.

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"Jesus fuckin'--" I cut myself off, scrubbing a hand across my eyes, my mouth drawn into a pained wince. He'd really been planning this, for a while. It was ridiculous, the thought of me wearing a goddamn engagement ring. I had jewelry-- a few pieces here or there, things given to me by men, things I'd bought myself, but a ring was different.

The one meant for me was a dark wood, nearly black, with a single stripe of silvery grey. Edgar's was more golden, with a copper and silver stripe. They did, somehow, suit us perfectly.

"You gonna, um--" I put my hand out awkwardly, knowing that if I'd been the type to blush, now might've been the time for it. Luckily, I wasn't.

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Grantaire can't tell, exactly, if that wince is about the rings, his studious assigning metaphors to objects, or Neil's own exclamation. He isn't expecting either of them to be some gasping, showing-off debutante about it, especially after the living room, but it does make him hold his breath for a moment.

Then Edgar speaks, and it's his turn to flush, leaning into the kiss with feeling, gentle and lingering. Poetic is something Grantaire likes to think of himself as, but usually doesn't. Impossible, well, that's usually been applied to him in negative ways. But they are, aren't they, the three of them? Impossible.

His smile turns into something just simply pleased, boyish almost, when Neil puts his hand out, and he nods, setting down Edgar's for just a moment to pluck Neil's ring off and put it on his finger, chewing on the inside of his lip as he does.

He does the same in turn to Edgar with a little private smile just his. It's strange, the ways that he loves them both, the things that they bring to his life: so similar and so very different.

Right now, though, he's feeling happy and ridiculous about all of it, and wishing very much that all the amis were here to mock him later for all of this sentiment.

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