Work Text:
Grantaire loves working at the haunted house. It’s probably the best job he’s ever had. He gets to dress up as an undead corpse and jump out at people – it’s brilliant. It’s gotten busier during the lead up to Halloween night, and now that it’s actually Halloween, Grantaire reckons that they’re going to have their work cut out for them.
He starts off on the ticket booth, which isn’t the best section to be, but at least you get a seat. All the people going in look excited, though there are the odd few clinging to partners, friends, family members, looking scared to the death just at the thought of going inside the haunted house. He always gives those people a smile, usually forgetting that in his undead corpse outfit, a smile is not the most reassuring thing in the world.
While he’s dealing with one group of rowdy teenage boys he sees a group of cars pull up and the group that gets out clearly are all together, laughing and linking arms and chatting to one another. The teenage boys he’s serving wander away, towards the doors of the house, and Grantaire, now without a queue, turns his attention to the group.
They’re quite a large group, and they all look to be having a great time – except one person. One of them looks to be the most nervous person that Grantaire has seen all season. They clearly don’t want to show it, though, smiling and laughing along with the jokes even as they cast nervous looks over towards the haunted house. Grantaire would find it quite amusing, if not for the fact that he’s been in that position. Not for a haunted house, exactly, but in a situation where he’s been scared but not wanted to tell anyone – forced to go along with something he doesn’t want to do.
The group are hanging around a little way off, and Grantaire sticks his head out of his booth to call over to them. “Are you guys going in?”
A few of them look his way. One calls back, “Yeah, sorry, give us a moment. We’re just trying to figure out money!”
He gives them a thumbs up and leans back in his chair, glancing up at the security camera of the car park for no other reason than boredom.
The group seems to get their act together just in time for the witch of the haunted house to appear and tell him they’re swapping. Grantaire thanks her profusely and slips out of the booth to give her the seat and, stretching, heads off to the back door where he can get into the house and get to his post.
He settles into the whole zombie thing easily, chasing people down corridors a little, grunting and moaning and dripping with blood. He jumps out at people from behind doors and lunges at people with outstretched hands like claws. Sometimes he’ll just stare at people with too-wide eyes and mouth hanging open, dropping his shoulder down so it looks dislocated. He loves scaring people.
He hears the next group coming a mile away, since they’re all still chatting and laughing. He hears one of them say, “I can’t believe how scared you are, Enj. You should have said something.” But they’re laughing as they say it, not sounding that concerned at all.
This ‘Enj’, Grantaire supposes replies, “I’m going to kill all of you.”
A few of them scream, then, and Grantaire reckons the ghost in the next room got them. The screams turn into hysterical laughter, though a few of them sound less entertained from the sound of running and, “Oh my fucking god, I hate this place!”
Amused, Grantaire gets into place, crouching down behind a ‘blood’-soaked piece of furniture. He can tell when the group are in the room – their footsteps get hesitant, and they clearly expect something to happen.
One of them calls, “Hello?” and Grantaire nearly cracks up. He forces himself to stay silent as they move through the room, and just when they think they’re about to make it to safety Grantaire springs to his feet and comes tearing after them, arms outstretched and eyes manic –
And he gets punched, square in the face.
He hits the ground solidly, shouting in pain as he curls in on himself, clutching his face. “Oh, my god, you maniac,” he groans. “You hit me!”
There’s a lot of shouting from the group, and he gets grabbed by one of them. “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry, oh my god, are you okay? I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to, I panicked, I’m sorry.”
Grantaire bats away the grabbing hands and forces himself into a sitting position. He glares at his assailant, who, it turns out, is the terrified blond from outside the house. “Am I bleeding?” he asks, pulling his hand away from his nose.
“Um,” the blond says, “I don’t know? You’re wearing a lot of make-up and-”
“Right,” Grantaire says. “Okay, fuck. That hurts.”
Someone else joins them on the floor, kneeling down next to him. “In what way?” they ask. “Dizziness? Nausea?”
“Um, no, just a lot of pain,” Grantaire says. “What are you? A doctor?”
“Nurse,” the stranger replies.
Grantaire laughs, and previously-scared blond frowns at him. “What’s so funny about that? Plenty of men are nurses-”
“I know!” Grantaire yells, because he assumes that the blond won’t stop unless they’re interrupted. “I wasn’t laughing at that, I didn’t even know he was a man. I was laughing at the irony that they almost made me be a creepy-but-still-sexy nurse here. Maybe I wouldn’t have gotten punched then.”
“Oh,” the blond says. “Well, can we help in any way? Where should we take you?”
“Um,” Grantaire says, thinking hard. “Well, I’m going to be honest, this is the first time this has happened, so… who knows, really? But there’s an emergency exit in the next room. You guys should carry on with the tour, though. Don’t want to lose your money.”
“I’m staying with you,” the blond says. “I hate this anyway.”
Grantaire chuckles. “I got that impression.”
The blond helps him to his feet, then, putting an arm around his waist. They manage to get into the next room, where Fantine is working and she drops her act when she sees Grantaire immediately. “Oh, sweetie,” she says, frowning. “What did you do?”
“The hot blond punched me in the face,” Grantaire relays, rolling his undead eyes. “Can I use your exit? My room doesn’t have one.”
She laughs. “Sure,” she then says, opening the door for them.
The rest of the group shuffle their feet, until the blond says, “You guys carry on. I’ll be fine.” They all give various responses of thanks, one of them making finger guns in their direction.
They stumble down the stairs and out the backdoor, over to where there are a bunch of picnic benches – for reasons Grantaire has never been able to work out. They get sat down, and the blond immediately crowds him, looking for injuries.
“My friends are never going to let me live this down,” the blond makes a sound of irritation. “Years will pass and it’ll still be ‘hey, Enj, remember the time you punched that girl in a haunted house?’”
Grantaire suddenly feels cold all over and shoves the blond away. “I’m not a girl, stop fucking touching me.”
The blond backs off instantly. “God, I’m sorry. That was… I didn’t mean to do that, I’m sorry. I wouldn’t normally assume, I swear, I’m just… Sorry. I’m Enjolras,” the blond offers. “He/him,” he then adds.
“Grantaire,” Grantaire grudgingly says. “Same for me.”
Enjolras nods. “I’m really sorry. Some of my friends are genderqueer, I really should know better.”
“It’s okay. People keep saying I should make more effort to look like a man.”
“No!” Enjolras says, quickly. “No, you look… fine. You look fine. It’s not about how you look.”
Grantaire looks down at his hands. “Yeah,” he says. “Not everyone agrees with that.”
“Well, fuck what those people think,” Enjolras says, looking furious. He then blushes and says, “Sorry about punching you. You scared me.”
“That’s what happens when you go to a haunted house,” Grantaire points out.
Enjolras only blushes harder at that. “I know,” he says. “I hate things like that; I don’t know why I went.”
“All your friends were there,” Grantaire says, shrugging. “I’d have done the same.”
“Yeah?” Enjolras asks. Grantaire nods, and Enjolras smiles a little then. “How’s your face?” Enjolras then asks.
Grantaire shrugs. “Fine. Not like anything you could do would make it much worse,” he adds with a laugh.
Enjolras only frowns at him. “What’s wrong with your face?” he asks, earnestly. “I like it.” He says it almost defiantly.
“You can barely see it under this make-up,” Grantaire points out.
“Well, I like your smile,” Enjolras shoots back. “You have a kind smile.”
Grantaire laughs. “Well, thanks. I like your smile too.”
Enjolras finally comes to sit down beside him. Grantaire can hear him breathing next to him. “Will they be much longer?” Enjolras asks.
“Depends on if any of them decide to punch a staff member,” Grantaire replies, just for the way it makes Enjolras blush and stutter out another apology. Grantaire laughs and shakes his head. “No, you were near the end,” he says.
“Oh,” Enjolras says. “Well, since we don’t have much time then. I was wondering… If you’d be able to get over the fact that I punched you, would you like to go for coffee with me sometime?” He asks it without any traces of embarrassment, no nerves showing, just straightforward reasonableness.
Grantaire raises an eyebrow. “Really?”
“Sure,” Enjolras says. “I mean you’re interesting – I’m sure you have plenty of stories from working here, though I doubt any as interesting as ours-”
“You’d be surprised,” Grantaire says, trying not to let the thrill of the man saying that it’s ‘their story’ show.
“-and I like your smile quite a lot.”
“Well, okay, then,” Grantaire says, with something of a laugh. “Wow. Yeah, sure.”
There’s silence for a second as what just happened sinks in for both of them, and then Grantaire suddenly turns to Enjolras. “My number- You should have it.”
“Oh!” Enjolras says, and nods, and quickly pulls out his phone. He unlocks it and opens it to a new contact and then hands his phone over. Grantaire makes quick work of putting his details in, and then sends a text from Enjolras’ phone to his own.
He saves Enjolras’ number and looks up, grinning. “Awesome,” he says. “So, when are you going to take me out?”
Enjolras opens his mouth to reply, but doesn’t manage to say anything, as suddenly they are swarmed by Enjolras’ friends. “You’re alive!” one of them cries.
Enjolras laughs. “I think I should say that to you guys, really. This is Grantaire, everyone. Grantaire, this is… well, everyone.”
Grantaire smiles round sheepishly at them all. “Hello, everyone,” he says, dutifully.
“Hello, Grantaire,” they chorus back at him. A few give him small waves. All of them are smiling.
“Apologies for this catastrophe on legs,” one of them says, grinning at Grantaire while nudging Enjolras with their elbow. Grantaire laughs, waving away the apology.
“Well, I guess I should get going,” Enjolras says, shifting awkwardly and getting to his feet.
“Yeah,” Grantaire says. “I should get back to work.”
Enjolras’ friends don’t seem to notice that anything’s going on between the two of them, and he gets dragged off far too soon for Grantaire’s liking. He watches them go, grinning as Enjolras turns back and waves at him from the car park.
Grantaire really hopes that they go on that date.
They do.