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1. Campus Map (glove box)
It’s his first week of classes and Marius just can’t get the hang of the campus layout. He’s been at least ten minutes late for all of his classes so far, and he’s almost late for this class (Political Economics), even though he left fifteen minutes early.
It’s that mural that’s the problem, he thinks sulkily, as he looks at the crumpled map printout and tries to figure out where the hell he is.
There’s a large mural of Greek mythology on one side of the history building, and Marius passes it to get to almost all of his classes. It’s enormous, the battle of Troy, Mount Olympus, and the underworld are all depicted in sprawling detail. The part that always catches Marius’ eye is off along the side of the wall. Sirens sit along a rocky shore, long fingers beckoning to the ships out at sea. They’re beautiful creatures, pale skin and dresses that blend into the ocean waves, but as you look further up, the faces of the sirens turn into something sinister. Not grotesque, just unsettling, their features changing subtly enough that it sticks with Marius.
Which is why he inevitably takes a wrong turn after it. And then when he doubles back, he somehow gets even more lost. He frowns at the map in his hand. He’s not entirely sure where he is right now. At this rate he’ll be lucky if he makes it to class at all, let alone being on time.
“Marius?”
Marius looks up, and Grantaire is waving at him.
“What are you doing here? I thought you had that Economics class today.”
“I do, and it starts in,” he checks his watch, “five minutes. But I have no idea where it is, and I have no idea where I am, and I can’t read this stupid map!”
Grantaire takes the map from him. “Where do you need to go? Like, what classroom?”
“Um, it said BH38a.”
“Oh, I know where that is. I’ll take you,” says Grantaire, folding up the map.
“Don’t you have class now?”
Grantaire grins at him. “Yeah, but I’m never on time anyway. If I came early the professor would probably die of shock.”
Grantaire leads him through a maze of stairs and walkways, with the quick pace of someone who is absolutely certain of their direction.
Marius tries to look for things he can use as landmarks. “I am never going to remember this route.”
“You’ll get the hang of it eventually! I only know it so well because I used to come with my sister when we were in high school. She used to come here to use the library, for her assignments and stuff.” They turn a corner, and Marius starts to finally recognise things. “Almost there! You might make it on time after all.”
They pass the mural. Marius’ eyes travel, as always, to the sirens, and he slows his pace a little.
“This is where I always lose track of things,” he tells Grantaire, “I always take a wrong turn. I keep getting distracted.”
“By the mural?” Marius nods. “I guess I should apologise then, on behalf of all the students involved.”
“Oh, you painted it?”
“Well, some of it,” they slow, and Grantaire points to part of the mural, “that bit.”
He’s pointing to the sirens.
“That’s my favourite part! I like the,” Marius waves a hand around, searching for the right word, “the colours, and how you did their faces.”
Grantaire smiles, quick and pleased. “Thanks. Come on, it’s this way.”
Marius makes it on time after all.
(He leaves the map in the glove compartment, but he never uses it. Grantaire walks with him to class after that, and he never gets lost again.)
2. Tissues (front side pocket)
“Fuck, ow! Marius!”
“Hold still then.”
Marius grabs another handful of tissues and hands them to Grantaire. His nose has slowed its bleeding a little, which is good. Marius had pulled off to the side of the road as soon as he’d noticed Grantaire was bleeding heavily onto his own shirt. Grantaire had protested that a blood nose was nothing serious, but in Marius’ experience it was always better to be safe than sorry.
He dabs at Grantaire’s face with a wet tissue, trying to clean up his forehead. “I really think you shouldn’t have head-butted him,” he says.
“Well, he punched me in the face. I kind of feel like he earnt it.”
“He punched you, because you punched him first,” says Marius, reminding him.
“Yeah, well,” says Grantaire, “I punched him because he shouldn’t have said that shit to you.”
Marius shrugs, and gets a fresh bunch of tissues. Grantaire’s going to have one hell of a bruise tomorrow.
“It’s okay; I’m kind of used to it. Besides,” he adds, voice quieter, “they’re just words.”
“Hey, no.” Marius looks up, and Grantaire is frowning at him. “You’re a good person, Marius. You don’t deserve to have people saying that shit to you, okay?”
Marius smiles a little at that (it kind of hurts where his lip is splitting). “And you don’t deserve to get punched in the face,” he says, because it seems like the right thing to say.
Grantaire smiles back at him.
(He keeps a mini box of tissues in the front pocket of the car after that. When anyone asks him why, he just tells them he keeps them in case someone has really bad allergies.
If Grantaire overhears, he always adds “yeah, I’m really allergic to being punched in the face.”)
3. Sunscreen (boot)
They’re handing out flyers on campus for Les Amis, telling people about the group and trying to get them to come to meetings. Well, most of them are, Grantaire has started to fold his up into origami and has been giving them out like that. Marius isn’t sure if Enjolras is more annoyed that Grantaire is folding them into origami, or because people are taking them because they’re origami.
“Hey, it’s still getting the word out!” Grantaire had said, grinning cheerfully in the face of Enjolras’ annoyance.
Enjolras had ignored Grantaire after that.
After a while, he’d had to move under the shade, and Cosette had followed. The midday sun was beating down, and he had a tendency to like a lobster (and he really doesn’t need any help turning bright red around Cosette, thank you).
“I wish I could stand out in the sun a bit longer,” says Cosette, while there’s a lull between passerbys, “but I just burn so easily, and I forgot sunscreen today.”
“I think I have some in my car? I could go and get it,” he says.
She smiles at him. “That would be brilliant, thank you! You don’t mind?”
“Not at all,” he says.
Grantaire comes with him to the car, having apparently given up his quest to annoy Enjolras into some sort of fit, and he jokes about Marius being Cosette’s errand boy.
Marius responds with a few remarks about pulling pigtails.
“Enjolras doesn’t have pigtails,” says Grantaire.
Cosette looks at him gratefully when he returns, and Marius blushes a little when she rubs it into the back of her neck.
“You should ask her if she wants help getting it on her back,” says Grantaire, thankfully talking low enough so only Marius can hear. Marius still flushes pink at the thought though.
“Maybe,” he says back, “you should ask Enjolras if he needs some on his.”
It’s Grantaire’s turn to blush a little at that, and shoves Marius’ shoulder a little. They grin at each other.
(Months later, they go to the beach with Grantaire’s sister. Jenny accidentally tips all of Claire’s sunscreen over onto Grantaire's t-shirt once they get to the beach, so it’s lucky Marius keeps some in his car.
He sends Cosette the video of their day, and she puts it up on facebook for him. She also sends him a message to tell Grantaire that Enjolras really liked his green bathers.)
4. Ballet Flats (under the passenger seat)
Cosette is late for a Les Amis meeting, which is very unusual. Normally she’s there at least ten minutes before Enjolras starts talking, but it’s been fifteen minutes since he started his speech. Grantaire hasn’t arrived yet either, but that wasn’t unusual (and he’d sent a text saying his bus was late).
The door opens as Enjolras is building into a call to arms. It’s Grantaire and Cosette, and Marius laughs at the sight of them (it earns a glare from Enjolras). Grantaire is giving Cosette a piggy back into the meeting.
“Sorry we’re late!” says Grantaire, not looking sorry at all as he drops off Cosette by her usual chair next to Marius and sits down on Marius’ other side, “there was a shoe emergency.”
Cosette laughs. “I wore my new heels to that meeting I had today with the Dean, and the elevator was out. I had to walk up and down five flights of stairs. If Grantaire hadn’t come along, I think my feet would be a total mess right now.”
Grantaire grins (but not at Cosette, at Enjolras, and Marius wants to tell him to stop goading Enjolras.). “Any time, my lady.”
“What have we missed?” asks Cosette, effectively distracting Enjolras.
(The next time Cosette wears heels, she puts a pair of ballet flats under the passenger seat of his car. They’re just shoes, but it makes Marius feel very dependable.)
5. Grantaire’s T-Shirt (back window)
It is a fact that Grantaire cannot paint, draw, or sketch anything without getting some of the supplies on himself. He started keeping an extra shirt in Marius’ car early on in the year, but usually he just stays paint-splattered until they go home. So when he asks Marius to get it out of his car in the middle of the day, Marius is curious.
“I have to do a thing after class today,” says Grantaire, “and I need to be wearing something not covered in paint for it.”
“A thing,” says Marius.
“Yes. A thing.” Marius stares at him a little longer, and Grantaire sighs, “a date thing. With Enjolras. I need the clean shirt for my date with Enjolras, happy now?”
Marius grins and hands him the keys. “Very. Bring them back when you’re done?”
“I’ll be right back.”
When Grantaire comes back, Marius laughs. He’s obviously tried to tame his hair a little by wetting it, but all that’s done is get the paint on his neck and arms wet.
Grantaire glares at him, dropping into the seat.
“At least the shirt is cleaner than the other one?” suggest Marius
Grantaire groans and rests face-down on the table. “He’s going to think I’m such a slob. Which, you know, I am, but I’d like to hold off on him finding out until after our first date.”
“He’s seen you with paint on you before and it didn’t seem to bother him,” says Marius, trying for comforting, “and I’m sure he’ll appreciate the effort.”
Grantaire looks up at him. “I don’t think his standards are that low.”
Marius frowns a little. “You are not a low standard, you just come with extra paint. It’s like a bonus.”
Grantaire huffs a laugh. “If you say so.”
They sit together until Grantaire has to leave. As he stands, Marius tugs at the hem of his shirt.
“Hey, listen,” he says, and he’s no good at rallying confidence like this, this is normally Grantaire’s job, “good luck tonight okay? And remember, Enjolras agreed, he wants to be there with you.”
Grantaire lets out a shaky breath. “Yeah, okay. With me and my bonus paint.”
Marius smiles. “Exactly!”
He tugs on the shirt again for good measure and it makes Grantaire smile.
“I’ll see you at home later.”
(Grantaire replaces the shirt the next day. The spare shirt goes through a couple of changes throughout the year. Marius notices that one of the spare shirts in rotation belongs to Enjolras. When he mentions it to Grantaire, Grantaire grins sheepishly and tells him it’s on loan. Marius grins back.
He’s pretty sure Enjolras never minded the paint, anyway.)