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wildandbraveCosette trusted her father absolutely, and had from the moment she met him in the woods outside Montfermeil that Christmas Eve years ago, even though if pressed she would not be able to say for sure what the date had been, only that it had been dark and cold and lonely. Then he came along to take her away from all that, so she forgave his eccentricities readily -- and there were many, from his fondness for going away for two or three days at a time to the way he went about his business so quietly as to seem almost furtive. So when he came home from one of those little jaunts in an anxious mood and told her to pack up all her things as quickly as possible, Cosette had not hesitated to do just as he said.
It was not long since they had taken their leave from the convent of the Petit Picpus, only a few weeks since Père Fauchelevent died, and Cosette had scarcely begun to get settled into the house on the Rue Plumet anyhow. (She reflected, as the fiacre jolted along the road to Calais, that she would miss that lovely overgrown garden. As for the rest, she was going with Papa, so wherever they ended up barely mattered at all.)
"It will be very different there," he warned her, though he would not say a word to explain how he had come to learn about 'there' in the first place.
Cosette had only laughed. "As if America could help being anything but different!"
True, it turned out to be much more different than expected, and as to how they contrived to pass from the year 1829 into 2014 by merely crossing the ocean Papa would only say that the means were beyond his ability to grasp, let alone explain. The house he had managed to procure for them was tiny, perhaps a bit run down, but Cosette -- who had thought the old Gorbeau tenement lovely upon first arriving in Paris and who had spent the last five years in a cloister, to say nothing of the years with the Thénardiers -- thought it was by far the nicest place she had ever been, and spent a full day exploring it from top to bottom just to see how things worked. (Imagine, lighting entire rooms with just the touch of a switch, and having all the water one could want indoors without ever having to lift a bucket!) It would suffice, and be comfortable enough for Papa; already he seemed less preoccupied and careworn. As for herself, she had the prospect of a new school to attend, new places to explore, new adventures to undertake. Her father promised it would be fully furnished soon but they hardly had any things in the house yet; still, Cosette knew without having to look that there would be a small, locked valise in his room. It was never far away from him, even though he refused to discuss its contents.
"Now, Father," she said to him once the breakfast dishes were cleared away and she could set her bags by the door, ready for the short walk toward the causeway and from there her new school, "remember that you're close enough by that I can come visit every day if I so choose, and I shall know if you're being so silly as to live on nothing but dreadful coarse bread, and carry on with no heat in the house besides. I'll be displeased with you, see if I won't." She might have also told him that constant concern for his well-being was likely to distract her from her studies, but she knew him and knew that he would try to deny himself even the tiniest luxuries anyway, and so she held back the threat as a weapon to be used at a later date. She fully intended on visiting every day if she could possibly manage it, too, as even in the convent she was allowed an hour a day to spend with him and it had not escaped her how much less melancholy and more free he became during those visitations.
He merely favored her with an indulgent look and rose from the dining table to put on his overcoat. "I can build a fire; that is simple enough. But --" and a knowing smile crossed his face for the briefest moment as he bent to pick up her bags -- "we have no fireplace here."
Cosette saw the ploy for what it was; Papa was far more clever than he liked to let on. She laughed and stretched up to kiss him on the cheek. "Then I shall have to learn how to work the furnace, and pay a visit just to make sure you do, too."
[OOC: Liiiiiiittle bit on the late side but establishy. Also not that wordy because go figure, the spot where Cosette is coming from in canon is a point in time where Victor Hugo was literally like "Aaaaaaand then stuff happened."]
It was not long since they had taken their leave from the convent of the Petit Picpus, only a few weeks since Père Fauchelevent died, and Cosette had scarcely begun to get settled into the house on the Rue Plumet anyhow. (She reflected, as the fiacre jolted along the road to Calais, that she would miss that lovely overgrown garden. As for the rest, she was going with Papa, so wherever they ended up barely mattered at all.)
"It will be very different there," he warned her, though he would not say a word to explain how he had come to learn about 'there' in the first place.
Cosette had only laughed. "As if America could help being anything but different!"
True, it turned out to be much more different than expected, and as to how they contrived to pass from the year 1829 into 2014 by merely crossing the ocean Papa would only say that the means were beyond his ability to grasp, let alone explain. The house he had managed to procure for them was tiny, perhaps a bit run down, but Cosette -- who had thought the old Gorbeau tenement lovely upon first arriving in Paris and who had spent the last five years in a cloister, to say nothing of the years with the Thénardiers -- thought it was by far the nicest place she had ever been, and spent a full day exploring it from top to bottom just to see how things worked. (Imagine, lighting entire rooms with just the touch of a switch, and having all the water one could want indoors without ever having to lift a bucket!) It would suffice, and be comfortable enough for Papa; already he seemed less preoccupied and careworn. As for herself, she had the prospect of a new school to attend, new places to explore, new adventures to undertake. Her father promised it would be fully furnished soon but they hardly had any things in the house yet; still, Cosette knew without having to look that there would be a small, locked valise in his room. It was never far away from him, even though he refused to discuss its contents.
"Now, Father," she said to him once the breakfast dishes were cleared away and she could set her bags by the door, ready for the short walk toward the causeway and from there her new school, "remember that you're close enough by that I can come visit every day if I so choose, and I shall know if you're being so silly as to live on nothing but dreadful coarse bread, and carry on with no heat in the house besides. I'll be displeased with you, see if I won't." She might have also told him that constant concern for his well-being was likely to distract her from her studies, but she knew him and knew that he would try to deny himself even the tiniest luxuries anyway, and so she held back the threat as a weapon to be used at a later date. She fully intended on visiting every day if she could possibly manage it, too, as even in the convent she was allowed an hour a day to spend with him and it had not escaped her how much less melancholy and more free he became during those visitations.
He merely favored her with an indulgent look and rose from the dining table to put on his overcoat. "I can build a fire; that is simple enough. But --" and a knowing smile crossed his face for the briefest moment as he bent to pick up her bags -- "we have no fireplace here."
Cosette saw the ploy for what it was; Papa was far more clever than he liked to let on. She laughed and stretched up to kiss him on the cheek. "Then I shall have to learn how to work the furnace, and pay a visit just to make sure you do, too."
[OOC: Liiiiiiittle bit on the late side but establishy. Also not that wordy because go figure, the spot where Cosette is coming from in canon is a point in time where Victor Hugo was literally like "Aaaaaaand then stuff happened."]
