The Darkest Night Will End

The Pontmercy-Coste Room in the Gorbeau Hovel, Paris, October 31, 1831

Jacquelyn sighed as they hurried up the stairs towards their shared room in the hovel. The work day had lasted longer than expected and now they was going to be late.

They flung the door open and stepped inside, already pulling off their hat and dropping it to the side. Their hair had been washed that morning so they figured it would be acceptable at the ball.

Jacquelyn was halfway through dragging the old trunk from under their bed when they heard a carriage stop in front of the hovel, "Oh, god." They groaned.

They turned and hurried to the window, leaning out as Enjolras climbed out of the carriage, looking very much out of place in the dirty street, dressed in a newly pressed shirt, waistcoat and breeches.

"Oh god." They muttered, quickly grabbing the empty bucket and hurrying out of the room and down the stairs.

"Jacquelyn? What-"

"De La Rue kept us late, I shouldn't be more than three quarters of an hour," They called from the side of the house, "Hopefully anyway."

"That- that means we're going to be late!" He exclaimed as they came back around the house, bucket now full.

"Well, don't think about the right now, think about how lucky you are, I'm even coming."

Upstairs Jacquelyn filled their wash basin and began to wash the grime off of their arms and face as Enjolras held an awkward conversation with Azelma out in the hallway.

Jacquelyn finished off cleaning their face and dried off, leaning out into the hallway, "Zelma, I'll give you five sous if you help me with something."

The young girl nodded eagerly, "Of course Mademoiselle Jack."

Enjolras stood in the hallway alone after they'd left, looking around at the cracked walls and peeling paint, wondering how anyone could live like this.

About fifteen minutes later Azelma left the room, "She'll be out soon."

He nodded as she leaned against the wall and looked up at him, "Why are you here?"

Enjolras blinked, surprised, "Um, mademoiselle, I'm here because I am friends with Mademoiselle Jacquelyn."

"Friends?" She asked quizzically, "You don't seem like friends."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

The girl laughed, "Well, I mean, hav-"

She was cut off by the door opening, and Enjolras froze for a moment as Jacquelyn stepped out, now wearing a lilac colored dress with small pink and blue flowers adorning the fabric at the puffy sleeves and the waist that came to rest just below their chest.

Jacquelyn tugged uncomfortably at the rounded neck and pulled their now mostly loose hair over their shoulder, "Well, let's get going then, yes?"

Enjolras could only nod as they moved past, and Azelma smirked, "Told you."

Another half hour carriage ride later, they had arrived at the Enjolras family manor and Enjolras sighed, "We are so late."

Jacquelyn glanced at their pocket watch, the scuffed one they'd been forced to buy after they turned up late to work too many times, "Only by a half hour. We'll be, uh, fashionably late."

"That's not a thing." He said, helping them out of the carriage.

"It could be, and look, we aren't the only late ones." They gestured to another carriage with people climbing out, "The Monsieur Du Pont it late as well."