milliways_bar | College AU Frenchmen!

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College AU Frenchmen!

...this isn't his bedroom. Jean Valjean - dressed in shorts and a muscle T, covered in sweat - rubs a towel over his face, and blinks quite a lot. Then he sticks his head back through the door, and yells, 'Javert!'

'What?'

'Come look.'

Javert - mussed hair, jeans, sullen expression, a scar around his neck - slopes through the door. He also blinks a lot, and doesn't stop the door closing behind them. While Valjean spends his time staring about, his eyes fall on the leaflets nearby. He picks one up, reads it, then touches Valjean's arm to get his attention.

'Here.'

A couple of minutes later, they're staring at each other. Javert shakes his head. Valjean nods, and stretches for the door handle...which won't open. His eyes go wide as he tugs on it, and Javert has to take his wrist to stop him trying to wrench his way out.

'It's OK. We'll just get a drink and wait for it to open. It says here that it will. OK?'

'...OK.'

And so there's two wary young guys at the bar, eyeing drinks suspiciously. Well, Valjean is. Javert is eyeing Valjean, because...well. Just because.

[OOC: AU guys, obviously! Write-up on their background here. You can pretty much do what you want with them, they're only here for a week. This is open until whenever, and they'll each get an independent EP at some point. \o/]

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He nods too - he's not one to judge - and then looks a little embarrassed.

'Uh, no.'

Javert pays attention again, then snorts.

'Well we're not fucking, so I guess you could say we're friends.'

...well. That helped clarify things. Sort of. Valjean looks pained, and finishes rather weakly, 'he stays in my guest room.'

Most of the time.

It's complicated.

Alice, whose lipreading requires considerable work, inconveniently picks up the word 'fucking', and signs asking what he said.

"Not sure I know the sign fer that honey." Bonnie says.

Javert turns on his stool to look at her. He's thin and wiry, with a scar around his neck and eyes that can skewer a person clean through. And he's pissed, because he doesn't like alcoholics, and hetero normative assumptions have just started to get on his nerves.

'Is this where you tell us we're going to hell?'

"Why would I need ter do that?" Bonnie asks. "Ain't like she knows any other deaf kids her age to teach the word 'fucking' to."

He rolls his eyes.

'Don't act dumb.'

Valjean scowls at him.

'Javert. Be nice.'

This causes the kid to scowl back. But then his face clears, and he turns back to his drink.

He tends to do what Valjean says. Like the man said, it's complicated.

"I'm from the 1930s." Bonnie points out. "But I come here, so I know more about bein' gay, and you can bang whoever you like far as I'm concerned."

Alice, not so sure about the scowly man, moves closer to her mom. Bonnie scoops her up and perches her on her hip.

'Gee. Thanks.'

He'd like to bang whomever he wants too, but Valjean has issues. It's a thing. A frustrating thing that keeps him in a bad mood whenever it comes up. So there's that.

Valjean just looks awkward about the whole conversation, and signs 'sorry' to both the females. He doesn't usually apologise for Javert, but he is being particularly rude right now. And in front of a kid.

'So, you come here a lot?' he asks, in an effort to change the subject.

'It's pretty weird, but it looks OK.'

Alice signs something that looks like 'donkey'.

"Sure thing." Bonnie says. "You want us to give you a tour?"

'Yeah, why not?'

He gets up, and decides it's easier just to not give Javert the option.

'C'mon, Javert.'

Cue a sullen dragging of heels, and a very reluctant young man standing with his hands in his jeans' pocket.

'Where to first?' says Valjean, with a grin at Alice.

Alice takes Valjean's hand, and leads him around.

In due deference to coming from a musical canon, Bonnie marks the occasion by bursting into song, because that is normal where she comes from.

In deference to the AUness, she gets to use an additional set of music, minus the cockney accent.

"Consider yerself, at home
Consider yerself one of the family
We've taken to you, so strong,
It's clear, we're going to get along.
In here is the bar, our base
Up there is a bra, don't know what's up with that
In here you're not meant to fight
Or they, stick, you in the cells tonight.

Now if by chance you'd be, in the mood for nudity
There are rooms still free, upstairs
Out the back door there is, gardens that are real pretty
At full moon watch out fer wares

Consider yourself, quite safe
We don't want to have, no fuss
Fer after some consideration we can state
Consider yerself, one of us.

Consider yerself, at home
Outside is a lake, and a great mountain range
You'll settle before too long
At first, it's, natural to all feel wrong.
Consider yerself, well in
Down that corridor, is an infirmary
There's fishes inside the flames
There's folk of all races, creeds and names

You can have gluttony, cupcakes or a cup of tea
And a tasty meal, why grouse?
And while quite usually, food and drink are seldom free
Your first drink is on the house..."

Valjean applauds when this is over, loving it.

Javert slopes along behind, rolling his eyes where no one can see. And wondering about paying for things if they're not free.

'Your mom can sing!' Valjean signs to Alice. And to Bonnie, 'did you just make that up then?'

"Yeah, people kinda do that where I'm from." Bonnie says. "It's just a thing."

The mun used to think bursting into song was a thing people did in real life too.

'Music!' Alice signs back.

"Alice isn't able to hear me sing." Bonnie says. "She cain't hear anythin' much quieter than an aeroplane. She can feel vibrations though."

Sadly they are from the wrong year to teach Alice this.

'That's a shame.'

He doesn't know what to say to that. Bad enough being that deaf in the 21st century, let alone the 1930s.

'Does she talk at all? they have a way to teach deaf people to talk, but I don't know what it is.'

"No." Bonnie shakes her head. "She lost her hearing very early. Children like Alice..." she makes sure she's not in lipreading angle before continuing. "Are usually put in institutions when they get much older. We don't got access to any therapy fer her and we try not to draw attention to her in case they try to take her."

His face falls, and he looks at the little girl.

'They can't take her without your permission though, right?'

Surely.

"They can if she's 'trouble'." Bonnie says. "But over my dead body. Most it means we don't get any help."

'But she's obviously not any trouble.'

Valjean's frowning now.

'What sort of help do you need?'

If he hears the quiet 'here we go' muttered from Javert behind them, he ignores it.

"I think it would be nice fer her if she could talk, or at least lip read, but I don't really know how to teach her." Bonnie admits. "She won't be allowed to go to school, but I'd like her to be able to play with other children."

He chews his lip. How to make this happen?

'How long do you think it takes to learn?' he asks.

'Because the Bar can provide a lot of stuff with modern technology. I'll pay for any of it, you don't need to worry about that. You can take it back with you, and as long as no one sees it, she can learn what she needs.'

There has to be DVD's, or something. Everything is on DVD these days.

Bonnie looks touched, so much so that she just reaches out and gives him a hug.

"I don't know how long, but thank you." she says quietly. "It's certainly worth a try."

He freezes up at the touch, though he doesn't mean to. Doesn't even want to, but it's reflex when something like that happens unexpectedly.

But he still smiles afterwards, and briefly touches her hand.

'It's no problem at all. C'mon, lets go see what they've got. Anything you want.'

Bonnie lets him go.

"I'm sorry, I was... I was touched. Thank you."

It's true they aren't well off; Bill earns a decent salary but Alice generates an awful lot of medical bills.

'It's OK.'

He doesn't offer an explanation because, well, no one needs that and it's just not what he does. But he can pretend like it never happened, and so he does.

And he's figured that she's not well off - if she were, none of this stuff would be a problem. Rich parents aren't made to give up their kids. So he'll find a way to make sure she takes a lot of things back home with her for Alice.

It's amazing how a moment of kindness can change a life.

Alice slips her hand into his as they go up to the bar.

[ooc: Fade? Thanks for the thread <3]