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"Papa!" The voice which sounds through the opening front door is a young woman's, light and sweet and eager. The voice's owner follows in a billow of skirts, glancing back over her shoulder into a homey little hallway as she calls to someone unseen. "Papa, are you quite ready?"

She turns her head -- and falters in astonishment as she crosses the threshold, and her boots hit the Milliways floorboards.

"Papa...?" Her hand falls away from the doorknob, and it swings delicately closed behind her.

She's a young woman of perhaps sixteen or seventeen, her rosy face framed by delicate ringlets escaping from a silk-covered bonnet. Her dress is of blue wool, sloping down at the shoulders, puffed out wide at the sleeves and gathering again at the wrists, her skirts a bell over layers of petticoats, a warm shawl wrapped about her shoulders, gloves on her small hands, a basket over one arm, small boots just visible -- in other words, the height of dainty femininity for 1832, and doubtless extremely impractical and peculiar to the eyes of most of Milliways' patrons.

Welcome to Milliways, Cosette.

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She gasps, a hand going up to her mouth for a moment. "... my Cosette?"

A moment goes by in which she just stares. Absolutely nothing could have prepared her for this moment, this lovely woman in front of her who seems so peaceful, so removed from all of the pain and suffering that characterized her own life.

"If he says you are my Cosette, then I am." She bites back a few tears and turns to Valjean. "I never thought I would have this moment. Thank you, Monsieur."

To Cosette, she smiles through the tears that are now falling down her face. "It is so good to see you again. I..." She holds out a hand, hoping for a hug, not even knowing what to do.

"Oh!"

Tears have started in Cosette's own blue eyes, though none have fallen.

It seems so unfair that she cannot remember her mother at all, no matter how she tries -- except in this dream. Except now. Even if it's only a dream, she will have this.

Her heart is full; she doesn't know what to do, what to say, except as the swelling of bewildered love in her heart bids her. She reaches out, a swift darting gesture, and catches up her mother's needle-pricked hand in her own soft white fingers; she brings the hand to her rosy cheek.

Fantine would believe this to be a dream, if it had not been for everything she had experienced to get to this place.

Her tears are coming stronger now, but the grin on her face absolutely belies any actual sadness or negative emotion. For a long moment, she just stands there, smiling at her daughter, hand on her cheek.

Finally, she comes to her senses. "Would you come sit with me for a few moments? I would love to hear of your life, and anything else you would say to me."

She will apologize to Valjean later, however, in this moment, she only has eyes for her daughter.

There will be no need whatsoever to apologise; Valjean would not intrude on this moment for anything, and indeed, will not remain to eavesdrop on something so intimate.

'I will be seated at my table if you have need of me,' he murmurs to Cosette.

A last gentle squeeze on her arm, and he withdraws to allow them privacy in their reunion.

Cosette barely notices, though at any other time she would. Her father will always be there if she needs him; she knows this as a fact, just as the sun will rise in the morning.

She presses Fantine's hand in both her own, where their joined hands rest still against her tipped cheek.

"Mother!"

She has never known a mother to call by that name -- not since she was so young that she would barely remember even with a more placid childhood.

"Of course I will."

"My beautiful Cosette." Fantine is beaming through her tears, thanking a God that she thought had abandoned her that she had found this place, and that it had brought her darling daughter to her.

After a long moment, she breaks the touch, taking her daughter's hand and leading her back to the table. Two of the chairs are covered in various fabrics, from the practical to the ornate, but two are free. The table itself has a few yards of purple fabric, along with some various patterns.

"Let us get some tea. I wish to hear anything and everything."

Cosette sits as she's bid, clasping her mother's hand where it lies on the table.

She looks so young -- only a few years older than Cosette, too young to have a daughter old enough to marry, far younger than Cosette's white-haired father. Of course she does, because she died when Cosette was small, but it's so strange.

She laughs a little, looking down at their joined hands. "I hardly know what to say."

Fantine smiles, taking a scrap of material from the table to wipe her eyes with her free hand. The tears are fading now, into a bright smile that has only rarely seen the light of day in many many years.

"Tell me of your life. I have heard some, but I wish to hear it from you." She smiles, clinging to the scrap of fabric to steady herself.

She hardly knows what to say either, but she wants to know her daughter, wants to know absolutely everything there is to know about her darling girl.

"I grew up in the convent of Petit-Picpus -- do you know it? Papa's brother was a gardener there. He was old, his knees were bad, Papa came to help him. They both kept all the convent's gardens and trees, and I went to school there."

Fauchelevent was not Valjean's brother, of course, but Cosette doesn't know that. All her time there, it was the official story, and her father was named Ultime Fauchelevent.

"When my uncle died, we moved out. Papa has business as well. I don't know what sort, he doesn't say much, but we're comfortable. He gives me anything I want, always."

She ducks her head a little, flushing with what's still a private joy. "I am engaged to be married. His name is Marius -- Marius Pontmercy."