A Friendly Chat (Tag: Mylene)

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

For Christophe Feuilly, the ABC Cafe had become a sort of refuge and inspiration. There he had found a kind of friendship and stimulation of the mind he had once thought entirely out of reach for him, even though so many of his friends there lived lives so much different from his own. He enjoyed the differences, sometimes—found himself pulled not into discussions of the mundane everyday challenges of life and instead into talks of philosophy, of politics, of the history that he had become so fond of learning.

There were times, of course, that he felt horribly ill-informed. His friends knew of philosophers and theories he had never heard of, and sometimes they would make arguments completely beyond his range of understanding. But the things he knew, he knew well: these were where his confidence lay, and where he was willing to engage in debate with anyone and draw parallels to anything. The rest he still had time to learn.

He'd been released from his work slightly earlier than the norm, and although the possible affect this would have on his pay worried him in some distant corner of his mind, it was pleasant. The sky was not yet dark, the earlier than customary hour blending with the lengthening days to give him extra light. The only thing to mar the evening was the rain—dreary and apparently unending. If it hadn't been for the rain, he might have tried to find a place to sit outside for a time and read.

The cafe was rather quiet that evening. A glance around the room told him that none of his friends were there, at least not yet. Sometimes it was difficult to say when they would be in a given place, and some were more frequent visitors than others even outside of arranged meeting. It didn't surprise him that none of them were there, but it disappointed him a little. He was in a talkative mood, happy about the extra slice of free time, and would have liked someone to share that happiness with.

No matter how much he wanted company, it wasn't worth going home. Although he shared a rented room, the men he lived with were a different type of acquaintance. He didn't dislike them, was even friends with them at times—but they weren't the kind of people he could discuss his thoughts with. Besides, the roof leaked and he had no desire to deal with that, either.

He chose a table and sat down, lost for the moment in thought. Perhaps someone he knew would come in eventually. The low hum of conversation from another table gave him something to passively listen to while he thought.

[MYLÈNE LACOQUINE]

It was a quiet evening in the café. One might have thought more customers to come in, especially to shelter thenselves from the rain pouring outside, but this rain was not working FOR business but against it, since it had rained so long now today people didn’t even want to leave their house and weren’t in a mood for a quick drink. Not that Mylène was particularly complaining. Her feet were still hurting from last night, when the café had been overflowing with customers, and very drink-loving at that. Mylène had been running to and fro until way after midnight, and had literally fallen down unconscious on her bed, after pulling herself up the narrow and steep stairway that led to her tiny room. Today the aftermath was still palpable and she used every opportunity to just lean against the counter to get weight off her poor feet, which was not hard concerning the lack of customers.

But then someone walked in after all, looking around and seeming a little letdown to find no one he knew was there – and Mylène could understand him very well, since the young man was none other than Cristophe Feuilly, fanmaker and member of the brotherhood that called themselves the ABC Friends. And he was earlier than usual tonight, which made her curious. He wasn’t a student, he had grown up as a working man without any privileges and that alone sometimes made Mylène feel a closer connection to him than to most of the rest of them all. All he knew about history and politics, he had taught himself, even though he hardly had the leisure for it, having to work hours and hours for his daily bread. He knew exactly what life was like for the poor, he wasn’t lost in castles in the air about change and equality being a piece of cake if you only got the people to listen. Feuilly knew the minds of the working and the poor just like Mylène knew them… and that often had made for very amiable conversations with him.

Without further ado, Mylène tossed aside the towel with which she had just dried a few cups and precious glasses and sauntered over towards the table Feuilly had sat down at, leaning against it with a smile.
“Wha' wind blew ye out of ye store so early, Paonneau?” she quipped, calling him by a name she had thought up for him the first time they had met. He was not a peacock because he was vain, but on his clothes you could almost always find splots of paint, and then he was making a fan… which would fan out like the tail of a peacock. Sometimes she really wasn’t that imaginative. “Good te see ye though, whatcha wanna ‘ave?”

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

Feuilly smiled slightly when he noticed Mylene. He wondered if he should have expected her to be there; she did work at the cafe, after all. Still, it was a mild—if pleasant—surprise. He hadn't noticed her when he'd walked in. He enjoyed talking with her from time to time, and was glad to see her.

“Have a seat, if you'd like.” He smiled again, gesturing to the empty chair across from him. He felt, frequently, that her job was in many regards much more difficult than his. She had to deal constantly with drunken men and seemed to be in almost constant motion. It reminded him a bit of the manual labor tasks of his childhood and early adolescence, but the only habitually drunken men he had ever had to deal with in that work were the owner of the shop and the other workers.

“He let me out early. Ran out of paint.” It was almost ridiculous, Feuilly thought. If he had been the one to discover the shortage and not the shop's owner, the expectation would have been that he find some way to remedy that. When it was the owner that noticed it, he and the other workers were given permission to leave for the evening a few hours early. “Not every color, but apparently enough.” His smile was rather merry.

He hoped that none of the newer workers would take it as a signal that they could get out of the work by stealing or otherwise hiding the paint and other materials. Long before he had come to Paris he had encountered that sort of behavior before; another boy, a few years older than him, had worked for the same man there in that first shop and made a habit of siphoning off supplies to resell. Nothing good had come of it, though Feuilly had refrained from seeking out the details. He had been afraid he might be incriminated as well.

“Said he'll pay us less this week because of it, but there's nothing I can do about that.” It was friendly workers' chatter, the sort of thing he knew Mylene would understand well enough. Not really a complaint, for he was grateful for the free time, but neither was it celebration.

“Some wine I suppose, and some bread if there's any left.” Basic food and basic drink, something he could both afford and enjoy. “But don't run yourself ragged on my account.” He felt a little bad placing orders with a friend, especially as he thought she looked rather tired.

[MYLÈNE LACOQUINE]

Mylène was taking a cautious glance about, as Feuilly voiced that gracious offer of taking a seat with him. She would love to have a moment of respite and of course a deeper conversation, but of course she couldn’t do that just like that while she was on duty – at least not when the landlord or –lady were around. But none of them was to be seen, since there really were not many customers, and also those who were there didn’t seem like they were seeking her attention at the moment. So she drew back the chair and sat down, suppressing a sigh as she stretched out her legs under the table, then leaned forward to listen to what Feuilly had to say.

It made her grin and chuckle, this easy explanation. Indeed, if a fanmaker ran out of paint, it was a grievous incident, but if it resulted in Feuilly getting out earlier, who was he to complain, and who was she to complain either? He seemed rather elated of the fact, and she could imagine why: even though some of his friends might joke that he was essentially dawdling as a painter, Mylène knew how the working class of Paris lived. She was even quite well off these days, having a little chamber all to herself, it was small, but it was essentially dry, because the owners of the ABC café earned enough to keep their house stable and neatly tiled. She was also never going hungry because the Madame made enough little treats for selling to her drinks and she let Mylène take some of the leftovers whenever she asked nicely. She was even able to give – like she had sometimes given food to Amir if he was particularly short of money.

Looking between him and his slightly spotted trousers, she gave a mocking laugh: “Out of paint you say… tell me again, are you painting fans or trousers? For then I could tell you were the paint for fans has gone off to.” Of course she was only friendly teasing him, and he was hopefully used to her sharp tongue by now. It was just not like her to keep her rather sassy and respectless thoughts bottled up. But then her face sobered up as he began to talk anout the woes and worries of his job. It was the same for many in Paris and probably also elsewhere. They were getting little money as it was, and if that was cut, they always wondered how they could possibly get by. “Easy for ‘im te say, eh? But maybe ye’ll make it up wi’ some extra nice fans nex’ week. Or ye could make a big one, without any paint an’ put it o’er the holes in yer roof”, she suggested, grinning as she imagined the odd construction on a Parisian rooftop.

Mylène nodded and stood back up, making a dismissive gesture. “Comin’ right up, no worries!” She vanished behind the counter and into the small room that served as a kitchen and preparation room, coming out a short time after with a wooden platter, on which there was a slice of bread, a small heel of cheese and a slice of stem cabbage. In her other hand she carried a cup of wine and put both before him. “Here… enjoy!”

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

Feuilly laughed at her tease regarding the fate of the paint—not a raucous laugh, but one of genuine amusement. “Both, perhaps?” He was completely aware of the paint spattering his trousers, though over the years had come to stop noticing it, and—though he had become neater as his skills improved—he clearly remembered being beaten as a boy after spilling an entire pot of paint onto himself. He grinned, his voice playful. “No one appreciates that half of my talent.”

The thought of a giant fan to stop the leaking roof brought another chuckle. “If I made it from oilcloth, it might just work!” There was some element of brilliance to the joke—if he could get a sufficiently large piece of oilcloth, it would help with the roof. The problem would be getting the cloth, and finding a way to affix it in place effectively. He didn't like spending his free time trying to work on things like the roof.

More realistically, he thought he might try making a few extra fans to sell on his own. He did go to the market from time to time to sell extras the shop didn't handle on its own, and generally it was possible to make a little money if he was patient and, perhaps even more important, convincing regarding the quality of the fans and the good price he was selling them at. It was a careful balance, charming the young ladies who might want to buy a fan without making them feel he wanted more than simply to sell them a fan, or convincing their fathers that such a fan would make his daughter happy without implying that it would encourage the advances of unwelcome suitors.

Education had helped him there, too.

“There's always the market, even if the hours there aren't that good.” The work of making the fans meant that, even on those occasions when he did use the market with some success, he hardly had time to sell what he brought. And if they asked him to pay for his place, that too could become a problem if he didn't sell enough to make it worthwhile.

He thanked her when she came back with the food and drink. A good meal, more than he had thought he was getting, and he smiled slightly in recognition of this. It was another thing he liked about frequenting the cafe: it kept him away from the horrible concoctions that sometimes one of the others he lived with would try making.

“Quiet here today, isn't it?”

[MYLÈNE LACOQUINE]

Mylène gave a chuckle as Feuilly took the joke with good graces. That she liked about him as well: he was quite a handsome man and a gifted painter, and yet he was not in the least bit vain, but down-to-earth and not averse to making fun of his very own self and his quirks. If you asked Mylie, it was one of the best qualities a man even could have! “Oh I do!” she protested with a fake-hurt expression and tone of voice, giving him another size-up. “I’m your most ardent fan! I even do believe that one day your colorfully spotted trousers will be the dernier-crie and called Parisean ‘chic’. Mark my words, Feuilly!” Of course she was not believing half of the nonsense she sprouted herself, but then fashion had seen crazier things already, at least she had thought so many times. Who found it pretty after all to turn your hair into a tower on your head to make you seem twice as large? Or those puffed up sleeves you could see these days with the ladies… they were looking like balloons, seriously!

Nodding at his idea of oilcloth, she found herself intrigued by the sheer idea. So maybe she wasn’t only sprouting nonsense… maybe she could have a good idea come from it once in a while, that would be agreat merit indeed. And if it helped Feuilly to sleep in a halfway dry and not mouldering chamber, all the better! There were enough cases of cholera rumoured to be about… no need to start decimating Myléne’s own friends! “Ye know, if ye need someone to fix it o’er the hole… I’d do it, if I get an idea how. I dun mind balancing on roofs… it’s far easier than on tightropes”, she suggested, still grinning. Oh that would be an adventure indeed! She hadn’t been out and up somewhere in a while… oh those were the days! But of course, it all depended on what Feuilly wanted.

The market… she crinkled her nose a little at that suggestion, but not because she didn’t like the idea of selling something there… it was rather the accompanying possible circumstances that had her frown, since she knew who liked to pay his visit to the booths and ‘nicely’ ask them to give him money so they wouldn’t end up floating in the sewers with broken limbs. “As long as ye dun meet Thénardier there”, she murmured. “’E’s been at it again… threatenin’ people I know. Wish I could stop ‘im somehow… Devil knows I’ve known his tricks for years.” She leaned closer over the table, trying to lock his gaze. “Ye tell me when ‘e’s tryin’ anything, ouais? Ye’ve got enough on yer plate as it is!” Oh, one day… one day she’ll happily dance on his head, darn him and all his succesful times of getting her indepted to him at least morally by getting her out of trouble. She hated Louis for it… and yet could not fully hate him because of it.

But now was not the time for such worries. She let her gaze wander over the taproom with a faint smile. “’m glad for it, if I be honest. Last few days’ been crazy. Though ‘course the Madame’d like to see more of ye gars in here… she misses the laughter … and ‘course the ample consumption o’ wine!”

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

Feuilly enjoyed the banter. “Paris doesn't even know how long it's been ignoring its next fashion, then.” He grinned again, amused.

The idea of oilcloth, taken seriously, honestly wasn't a bad one as he thought about it more. Mylene's assistance would be valuable, too, if he ever found a way to get the materials and contrived a way to keep it from sliding back off the roof. She had more experience in climbing about high places than he did. “Your balance is a lot better than mine.” He smiled again, almost excited about the idea of fixing the roof after so many months. “If I get some oilcloth, then... I'd appreciate it.”

It wasn't that he was clumsy, even if his hands had always been more nimble than his feet. More just that he was and always had been a bit afraid of that kind of heights. Nothing in his life had ever encouraged him not to be—he could climb ladders without fear, of course, and had lived in places that required that of him. But to walk about on roofs... he was glad to not be any sort of construction worker.

Mylene's grin, on the other hand, suggested that she relished the idea of crawling about on his roof. He wasn't sure if it was even technically allowed—he'd never seen the owner of the building, though, and he couldn't imagine that the police didn't have better things to occupy their time with than catching people climbing about on roofs. There were plenty of people in the city who worked up on rooftops, and clearly it was allowed for them.

The talk of Thenardier made him go momentarily quiet. Rarely had he ever had a run in with the man—he supposed he didn't see the fanmaker as much possible threat, and Feuilly had learned to keep away from neighborhood bullies from a very young age. Of course, such luck could only last for so long. If he went to the market, he would have to deal with him.

The idea of having to go to the girl for help against Thenardier was an odd one, but sensible. He knew Mylene well enough to know that she had skills he did not and never would—and he knew, also, that whatever middle-class pretensions others might have on what women could and could not do, most of it was more a matter of what they were willing to do and had learned to do. He supposed it couldn't be that much different from his own struggle, and that of any of the poor captive nations he loved to read so much about. “I'll let you know.”

He grinned again as the mood of the conversation swung back upwards. “Like missing paint.” He smirked. “Gives us less work to do, but the business could be better.”

[MYLÈNE LACOQUINE]

Oh indeed they would be completely unawares… Mylène chuckled once again, imagining the new haute-couture of Paris being paint-splotted and garments in rainbow colours… Maybe Boucher had been right after all: If every man would be a king, and the jugglers were the kings of the world anyway, every man would end up a juggler. And jugglers were known for their colorful clothing after all, since they sowed them together from whatever patches they were gracefully given as alms or as payment. “It might take some time to get accepted though… you’d need someone of influence setting the trend.”

Getting the oilcloth might be the trickiest part of the deal, and Mylène hadn’t wanted to get Feuilly’s hopes up to high, but the offer still stood. If he indeed managed to get something for his roof, then she would fix it up there, both to help him and have a little supraterranean adventure. Therefore she gave a mocking salute, clicking her heels under the table, even though he probably wouldn’t even see that. “Always at yer command, Monsieur, just say when!”
Well, not ALWAYS of course and not with everything. Mylène wasn’t really the kind to be at anyone’s command but her own, having grown up in freedom and more or less forced independence. If no one cared for you, you at least were not accountable to anyone either. There was also a slightly flirtatious reading to her words, and she wondered whether he would take it up or not. It was a fun game, and sometimes Mylène wasn’t even sure herself what her words all entailed.

That he would come to her once Thénardier started bullying him ws probably the farthest she would get in this subject. It didn’t even occur to her he might find it peculiar to ask help from a girl, since in the world she had grown up in, her gender often had not mattered at all. Boys and girls alike had to steal, to fight, and as they lived the same, they also died the same. There might have been slight lenience from a few good souls here and there, but Mylène and other girls around her had never been treated with kid gloves. Therefore she had been slow to learn to accept any kind of special treatment or surprise, but amongst men of finer forms like she dealt with here in the café, she had to expect it. Then again, at least Feuilly and her were not the farthest apart in mindset, since he had not been born with a silver spoon in his mouth either.

“There ye see it!” she exclaimed boldly, making a grand gesture around the room. “Never knew serving drinks and makin’ fans’d be so alike. We should swap traits for a day or so…” That probably was a silly idea, but at leas it was amusing. “I’d like te see them guys faces, if ye suddenly were the one gettin’ them their cups.”

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

“When revolution comes, perhaps,” Feuilly grinned again. If the revolution came, with all its ideals of equality and brotherhood... then perhaps anyone's sense of fashion would be as influential as another. Realistically, he knew this likely was not true and couldn't imagine really wanting to set fashion anyway—but the fantasy amused him just the same.

The little revolutionary dream affected his mood, mixing with his existing levity. The effect warmed him, far more than the little cup of wine could—but the sensation was similar to the first flush of intoxication. He didn't know if he would ever get the materials for the roof, but if he did—it would be good. “Fraternité, Mylène.” He grinned slightly again. “Let neither of us take orders from the other.” Whether it was friendly banter or a rather innocent sort of flirtation, Feuilly himself wasn't sure. He felt a bit like Enjolras, talking like that, though he lacked the magnetic charisma of his friend.

Feuilly wondered sometimes if it was odd for a woman who had grown up as she had to deal with the wealthy students and other patrons of the little cafe and their social norms. Though the only nights he had spent on the street were incidental, he was from a world where men and women alike worked, just as Mylène was—but he knew that even among his friends that rarely was the case. He envied their educations, perhaps, and sometimes imagined what it would be like to be a student—but there was much they could learn from the working class, too.

He was glad that he had never been forced to live on the streets. However much more exciting her life sounded, based on the snatches of her history that he had heard, his childhood had been about as secure as an orphaned boy could hope. There were times when he was beaten, and he had spent years sleeping on a workshop's dusty floor—but he had always been fairly safe, and he had never had to learn to steal.

Of that, he was glad. Though his fingers were nimble, they were more suited to painting than pickpocketing. He had tried a few times as a small boy, underfed despite his work and hopeful that it might provide him with an escape. Every time he had been caught and punished, luckily never so harshly as to cripple him. Still, a beating and a meal withheld was enough deterrent for him as a small child.

“Probably wouldn't give me many tips,” his voice and expression both showed his amusement. “I think they like you better.” He smirked again. He had no doubt that if he started to wait on his friends when they were in the cafe, they would start to pay him tips mostly as a joke—though some of them might do it partially in seriousness, knowing his circumstances. But the other patrons? He laughed again, pleasantly.

[MYLÈNE LACOQUINE]

Come the revolution... it had become a little winged word for the people around Mylène had it not? Everything seemed to be ordered around this possibly and really inevitable uprising, and everyone was directing his life after it. After the revolution, everything would be better, and certainly everything would be different. They had high hopes for the changes, and even down-to-earth Feuilly apparently wasn’t immune against that sentiment. Mylène was hoping of course, she would appreciate the changes the students were painting in your mind with their incentive words, but she knew that a LOT of factors would have to happen correctly so that everything they dreamed of would come to pass. The change of fashion would be the easiest obstacle to overcome, it would be way harder to convince those above that those below were their equals. The poor were always for equality, since for them it only could get better.

She laughed as he twisted her words back at her like that, it was one of the reasons she felt so at home in the ABC café: Here, her insatiable hunger for banters and word battles would always be answered, and in the most challenging way. “And what about Liberté then, my friend?” she asked, feigning innocence. “Don’t I get the liberty to take some orders… if I like them? Though, too much liberty could of course turn to being libertine… and we don’t want that, right?” Oh, don’t let Enjolras hear her happily slandering one of his sacred principles! It was not like Mylène was looking down on them with her speech, but the uncanny resemblance of two words like that, and the fun of it, who would blame her for not being able to pass it up?!

Feuilly was probably right in believing he would get less tips, but then it was again proof of how the world worked, which made her chuckle inwardly. Some might say women had it easier in this world, with men appreciating their looks and therefore giving more readily because they liked what they saw, but few knew how it ended for them once these looks were gone. If the only asset they could count on was beauty, they would be all the poorer once it was gone. “I think they’re givin’ me tips so I shut up!” she told him, lowering her voice as if she was betraying a grave and dangerous secret. “’tis not about a lil swayin’ o’the hips here an’ there… ‘tis all about not bein’ picked on!” Though she still would like to see that… Feuilly doing her work for one evening, if only to see the looks on the other ABC friend’s faces. “Roi d’Enfer, why am I likin’ tha’ idea so much!” she murmured and gave him a sassy wink.

Then her face sobered up a little and she leaned back again, throwing a quick glance out of the window, where the rain was still pouring. “Hope the sewers dun get flooded again”, she murmured. “Ye know… people up here hate it ‘cause everything nasty’s spillin’ on the streets. But… those DOWN there drown or get caged in.”

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

“Then it's only a request, not an order.” Feuilly's smile still had not faded. He was by nature a fairly peaceful man, but he enjoyed these friendly, playful battles of words. The stimulated his mind, gave it wings it was hardly allowed during his working hours if he wanted to produce any consistency in his work. “And if you want to be a libertine... who am I to forbid it? Even if I disapprove. As long as you're not hurting everyone else...” He did his best to speak properly, the way he saw things written in what books he could find. He felt it made him sound more serious, better educated. He didn't always succeed.

He knew as well as anyone that the revolution might not, in the end, bring their salvation. The government had changed before during his lifetime, and the difference for him—if there ever was one at all—was only ever slight. The price of fans changed as they came in and out of fashion, the price of materials changed. These two factors, combined with his age and skill, caused his wages to change. But the essential features of his life remained much the same, differentiated far more by his present line of thought than by his day-to-day activities.

Without a revolution of some kind, though, any change at all was unlikely. He could not claim to know the king's mind, but every reading from history that he could find suggested that a monarchy would not improve the status of justice in the world. A system where one man, by virtue of his birth alone, could do whatever he wished with a country was inherently unfair—and for every king, there would be hundreds, thousands of people like him, like Mylene, like so many others, born into a status that would trap them among the nameless, dirt-streaked (or for him, perhaps paint-streaked) faces of the workers, the orphans, the beggars, the thieves.

Feuilly laughed at the suggestion of why she got the tips, and at the image of himself trying to earn them. They both knew the truth, but he had no doubt that it would be a better world for the women too if they were paid for something other than their looks. It was more amusing to pretend it was otherwise. He knew the culprits, perhaps not in this cafe so much but in any number of other places, were often men of his own class. One of the men with whom he shared a room, even, a burly man with greying hair, talked constantly of his attempts at every pretty girl he saw. Once, quite drunk, he had told Feuilly that he had been married once, but that he had beaten her.

With education perhaps they would see otherwise and their minds would be elevated; perhaps then they would understand that just because the tyrant was a workingman and his slave a woman, there still was nothing fair about it. If it was unfair that a man's place in life be determined by his birth, he supposed it was equally unfair for that to be true of a woman. A person didn't, after all, pick his sex any more than his parentage or even something as meaningless as the color of his eyes. Some said women were naturally feeble-minded, but many of those same men—affluent men—said the same of their male workers. It made Feuilly think, though he didn't say much about it. They would probably laugh at him.

Maybe he just had a weakness for it, this concept of justice and making life fair. Maybe it was silly and would get him nowhere. And nobody else, either. But even countries were so often personified as women, and if he had it in him to weep for the fates of those victims of other countries' aggression...

He became more serious at her remark on the sewers. What could serve as a welcome—if foul-smelling—shelter in good weather was able to become a deathtrap in bad. “Maybe it's possible to find a way to help them get out...” Short of something that would require him to be an actual engineer of such things. It was more important than his leaking roof, for no one there was going to drown. It was one thing to wake up damp and irritable, another to be swept away in a flood...

[MYLÈNE LACOQUINE]

A request… a request for what? What had they be talking about when this banter had started? It was not like Mylène to lose the thread along the way, but what Feuilly had said about her libertine comment had occupied her mind so much, the former train of arguments completely slipped her mind. Oh she should have known he would turn it back on her, but it amused her still. She didn’t exactly view herself as that kind of girl, but she also wasn’t the one to be offended by such words. Mylène might have her pride and she made it known whenever someone she did not like came too close, but she surely didn’t have such high moral standards like those ladies of the upper class, portraying themselves as well-nigh pure and untouchable.

“So so, ye’d disapprove of me being libertine, then?” she teased and gave him a challenging wink. “That is the first thing I hear, Paonneau, the guardian of a girl’s virtue.” Not that she had heard many stories concerning Feuilly and girls – he was by no means as known for it as was for example Courfeyrac, that flirt – since he hardly had time for them beside his work probably, but it was still fun to tease him that way, waiting for his reaction. “And rest assured… I shall not strive te hurt anyone… though te be hurt ye have te feel strongly fer someone, so strong it matters… dun think that’ll ever happen concernin’ me.” For in the life Mylène was leading, most everything was about not caring too much, or else you got hurt. She might have ‘risen’ from the slums, but she would probably remain a gamine for the rest of her life. And gamines were either used and wasted, or they were strong enough to stand alone. For now, she gladly belonged to the latter category.

In all honesty, Mylène knew that if anyone was truly close to the problems of the ‘little people’, the mass of workers and those below in Paris, it would be Feuilly. But then there were things even he had not experienced, simply because he was a man. She had argued about this with Courfeyrac as well, and she really wondered how much or if anything at all would change for women in the coming days. Egailité… how far would it really go? Already the men were excluding the women from most of their decisions and the fighting, saying it was too dangerous. Yes, that might be, but why should only the men fight for their rights? Mylène had no desire to use a gun on anyone, but she wanted to do her share, not just sit back at home and wait for the outcome.

She was surprised by Feuilly’s words, his thoughts on helping those in the sewers. Not that she would not have thought him capable of compassion, but those down on the lowest low were used to fend for themselves, and they were nothing if not fatalistic. Even if Mylène was concerned for them, the idea of actually going down there and doing something to help hadn’t occurred to her. There was probably little you could do anyway.
“They’ll have flood watches I guess”, she mused, cocking her head. “But sometimes they fall asleep or get out to save themselves first without a warning. If it happens at night and you are asleep… there’s not much you can do.” Mylène suppressed a shudder, as unbidden memories started to flood her mind – in the very meaning of the word. Even years after this one time she had been trapped in the flooded sewers with her little band of friends, she couldn’t go down there without a queasy feeling. “What they’d need is a different place to sleep… but there is none.”

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

“If you want to be a libertine, go right ahead.” He found the challenge in her voice and expression amusing. His disapproval of the idea derived far less from any idea that he should be protecting feminine virtue—and he wasn't a particular prude himself, either, though certainly not the flagrant flirt Courfeyrac and some of the others could be—than from having watched it happen to girls before. “You'd just have to be careful. Some men beat their women.”

Of course, whether she was libertine or not likely wouldn't change that much. The most demure of upper class housewives probably were beaten from time to time, even if Feuilly had never been around such a household long enough to see that happen. Even if she was a libertine, it was unlikely that she would hurt anyone—he hadn't even meant through getting attached, but simply that he supposed that was much better than if she decided to start killing or something of the sort.

“I could've had a sister,” he shrugged. “Or at least that's what was written on the paper. Advantage to learning to read.” It was a strange feeling, and without really thinking he let his careful attempts to speak correctly—like something other than a working-class orphan from southern France—fade away. Otherwise, illiterate, he never would have known about her—he'd forgotten, he'd been only a small child and she had been nothing but an infant. “And I've seen things happen to girls sometimes.”

He supposed he didn't have to explain any further to Mylene. Surely she knew about the kind of things he meant, and for all he knew had faced them. It was hard to guess. He was glad to be a man, he decided. He could work without anyone expecting anything more from him.

There had been one at that first shop, a quiet, blonde-haired girl a year or so older than him. She swept the floors, sometimes helped him clean the brushes or pick up discarded scraps of materials. He had found her beautiful in the way small children might ever be attracted to one another, though in his childhood mind the best expression of this had been to try to get the paint already perpetually staining his hands and clothing onto her. She had seemed almost shockingly immune to it—probably because her tasks tended to be nowhere near the actual workbenches, or perhaps that was just how he remembered it. She, after all, would never be trained to make the fans herself.

By the time he had been old enough to understand his own interest in her, she was gone. Something had happened with the owner of the shop. He had thought of her again when he had first come to Paris, wondered at what would happen if he should sometime meet her on the Rue Saint-Denis or a similar place... but he knew that, far more likely, she was dead. Even if she wasn't, it was unlikely she'd ever left the place they were born.

He nodded somewhat sadly at her observation that there was nowhere else for the people in the sewers to go. He felt bad for them; he could easily have been a gamin himself, he'd certainly been a poor enough orphan. But for better or worse, he'd fallen into work instead of homelessness. Other boys who had been with him in the orphans' home itself had gone that way. They'd cornered him from time to time, his small pay in his tattered pockets, and stolen it from him—many of them had a ferocity, a desperate, wiry strength that Feuilly seemed to lack. For a time he'd almost been jealous of them, imagined them as free even if they starved and froze.

“Maybe someday the republic can build a place for them.” His voice was soft, and he felt as if he sounded like a naïve child. He wondered if she would laugh; sometimes—perhaps more than sometimes-- he could be as much of a dreamer as the students, and just as caught up in the dream of revolution. It was strange, how the banter had taken such a more serious turn. He glanced at Mylene almost apologetically.

[MYLÈNE LACOQUINE]

Mylène had by no means been serious in really becoming a libertine, a girl that didn’t care who she got hooked up with as long as the money was enough, she just couldn’t resist a challenge to oppose and tease, no matter how she truly thought about the issue of opposition. It was all in good fun – or at least it had been, until Feuilly brought up the subject of beating. In a flash, Mylène’s good mood was visible replaced by anger, by bitterness even, and her eyes flickered with suppressed emotions. It was long in the past, and the wounds on both her skin and her soul had long since turned to scars, but it was one of the few subjects Mylie could not make light of. Never. She hardly heard the comment of Feuilly concerning a possible sister and that being a reason why he would think different of girls. So he had seen girls being beaten an mistreated? Well, there was a difference between seeing and experiencing!

“No one would dare to beat me nowadays and live to tell…” she muttered, her voice although low thick with hatred. Then she blinked and forced a smile on her face, her voice suddenly too loud and cheery to really be convincing. “So I guess as much as it would be a challenge, no libertine… I’ll rather stay behind me counter and follow you lads every whim concernin’ food and drink.” She knew she had to be thankful for the stroke of luck that had given her this task of barmaid in this very café. Without it, how would her life look now? Probably similar to Eponine’s, or much much worse. Since Mylène had no powerful father that would make sure no one would push her down a certain road of no return.

A place for the poor in the republic?! What kind of dream was that now? Mylène chuckled, shaking her head at so much idealism. “Now that’ll have to be some castle in the clouds, my dear Paronneau!” she commented, but then an idea occurred to her, more a joke, because it surely would never work or be considered, but as many poor and homeless as there were in Paris alone (they populated the catacombs and quarries under Paris in a way you could think it was a city of its own) this would have to be a large place. And what was the largest, most useless place in the whole Île de France?! “A castle... yeah! How ‘bout we make somethin’ useful of Versailles then? There’s a spot you can readily crowd wi’ people! ‘Nough rooms for an army. For tha’s wha’ they are. An army to sick and impoverished te fight.”

[CHRISTOPHE FEUILLY]

Seeing the fire in her eyes, Feuilly regretted having mentioned beatings at all. It stood to reason, of course, that she had experienced more than her share—even he had been beaten now and then as a child, whether he had done something to earn such treatment or not. But from the heat of anger, he suspected there was far more to the story Mylene might have been able to tell than a handful of beatings.

It saddened him. It wasn't fair, it wasn't just, it was scarcely even human that someone should ever have caused her to suffer so that such a snarl could be contained in her voice at the apparent recollection. Someday soon, they would have to direct such feelings toward the revolution--on the scale of all of Paris. The people, far more than half of France, had every reason to be angry.

His voice remained quiet, hoping he could contain in his tone alone that he was sorry for having said anything to remind her of whatever horrors there were behind her. It was all the more evidence for how the world needed to change, but he could amply sense that it was unwise to speak much further on the subject. They both knew it was unfair, and clearly her experiences pained her.

Unsettled, he did not bother trying to return to the more bookish style of speech he had tried to teach himself or to raise his voice above a tone closer to a whisper even now that the chain of conversation had shifted. He wanted to apologize, but she had changed the thread of talk effectively enough on her own and he wasn't about to cause it to revert. The prospect of correcting his voice back to what it had been earlier in the conversation felt uncomfortable, and he bit his lip nervously. "And I thank you for the food and drink."

He relaxed again slightly at her mention of Versailles, grinning at the suggestion. “If anybody deserves it, it's them.” After all, he didn't know much of the history of the place, but he imagined it had to have been built by people who never thereafter would have gotten to enjoy it. “It was prob'ly them that built it.” Their ancestors, really—he knew enough to know that Versailles had been there longer than the average man or woman on the street had been alive.

At the talk of the poor as an army, his hopes flew skyward again. This was the kind of message he hoped the Friends of the ABC could spread, the ideas they could plant in the minds of people whose illiteracy had meant they had never learned it was possible to fight for freedom. Weapons would have to come later, but how could the system hold if all the people were to rise up against the injustices that forced them to remain an army too poor and impoverished to fight? They were an army with numbers on their side, and so little to lose...

“They'll join us for the revolution.” He sounded, even to himself, very much the boy who had first decided that Paris would give him all his dreams. So far it hadn't, but he felt optimistic that, with the help of revolution, it could come closer than Marseille ever had. “Most don't have much of anything to lose.” His voice, still almost a whisper, held an excitement it hadn't a few moments before, most of his discomfort dissipated.