le premier nom gravé au marbre du monument d’espoir

• the friends of the abc meet every week in the back room of the musain. sometimes you invite friends to the meetings. they never pass the initiation, and you never see them again. your chairs are made from bones.
• enjolras is beautiful like a marble statue and an angel, and you cannot take your eyes off him. you cannot stop listening to the words that fall from his lips. you want to be close enough to touch him. you cannot stop looking, and your vision blurs into nothing. you cannot stop listening, and his voice joins together to form endless ringing. your hands blister when you go to touch him. you are not the first.
• bahorel says he is not training to be a lawyer, but blondeau always calls out his name, and he is never crossed off. you try to ask him where he has been, but he dismisses you. nobody else knows where he goes. you try to follow him one day, but you find suddenly you are trailing nothingness.
• bossuet goes by many names. every time you memorize one, others switch to calling him by a new pseudonym. one night, a young man leans over and whispers his real name in your ear. they find him in the seine the next evening. you guard the secret closely. nobody else must ever know. he is too powerful.
• the others tell you that feuilly is a fan maker, and that they respect him as a worker. they tell you he creates pieces of savage and terrible beauty. you catch his eye across the back room. his hands are always smeared with paint. the paint is always red. you hope it is just paint.
• “i’m ill’, says joly, and you nod in understanding. joly always thinks he is ill. his hair falls out. his mouth pours blood when he speaks. he drags his feet and his body rots before your eyes. joly always thinks he is ill.
• jehan prouvaire plays his flute, and you stop to listen for a moment. the music is ethereally beautiful. it permeates your soul. you go home, and you sleep for three days straight. when you wake up, you can still hear it.
• courfeyrac romances anything that moves. he moves on from the women and onto the men and then, slowly but surely, into the eldritch horrors that follow us all.
• grantaire follows enjolras like a shadow, reeking of drink and burnt out candles. everyone interacts with grantaire except enjolras, who never seems to notice. even you have been drawn into one of grantaire’s long-winded speeches, full of classical allusions. enjolras asks you who you are speaking to, and you realize he has never seen him. grantaire puts a finger to his lips.
• you see combeferre reading books on geology, and later on you hear that he has broken open a pebble to inspect it more thoroughly and personally. you see him reading a book on human biology one night. he looks up and meets your eyes. you are suddenly afraid.