Author's Note: After goodness knows how long I am finally posting the final chapter of this story! Apologies for the long wait (if anyone is even still reading it!) but I hope the ending satisfies :) Thanks for sticking with it. :)

In these first few days of March, the world remains a Christmas card, coated in a thick blanket of snow. The woods are unusually quiet, the chirping birds tucked safely into hedges and herds of cattle huddled snugly together for warmth in corners of fields.

The long winter is finally coming to an end, and the smell of spring is already in the air; green buds and pink petals appearing on branches even as soft flakes of snow continue to drift lightly down upon them.

The little robin cocks his head to one side as he watches the couple walk slowly down the winding lane. Flitting to and fro between the hedgerows that line the snowy path, he occasionally chirrups out a warning, but they pay no heed, and he titters with laughter to himself as they slip and slide upon the invisible patch of ice (more than once the girl nearly chokes the young man with his own scarf as she clings to him for safety).

A layer of snow falls with a soft flump from the metal gate as the pair swing it open and pass through into a large sloping field, welly boots trudging through the deep drifts of white.

For the past couple of months Éponine has persuaded Enjolras to visit his childhood home more often, and each visit has proved more successful than the last.

The Christmas dinner with his parents had gone surprisingly well, albeit rather chaotically.

Leaving Enjolras to supervise the turkey as she took a phone call, his mother had returned a short while later to find her son in the midst of a heated rant about the evils of consumerism at this time of year, the turkey forgotten and burning to a crisp in the oven. Éponine had saved the situation by whipping up a delicious casserole with the vegetables and any pieces of turkey they could salvage, earning her the pride of place at the dinner table when Enjolras' mother patted the seat next to her with an inviting smile.

His parents had stood at the porch and waved goodbye at the end of the night; and as they drove away Éponine felt sure that it was more than the cold nip in the air, more than the mulled wine, that had set a rosy glow in Enjolras' cheeks, his eyes beaming even as he fought to keep his face straight and nonchalant.

It was on this fourth visit to his parents' house that Enjolras had dug out his childhood toboggan from the attic, and the pair had set off through the countryside, wrapped up in thick layers of coats scarves and gloves at his mother's insistence.

"I feel like a bloody Christmas turkey wrapped up in this." Enjolras huffs, tugging at the scarf wrapped tightly around his neck.

Éponine fixes her hat with a tinkling laugh, answered by the chirrup of a little robin who has made his perch on the gate post, watching them intently.

"You look good enough to eat, darling."

Enjolras merely hmphs, but she can tell that beneath the many layers of wool his ears have turned scarlet.

Sitting down and tucking herself between his legs, she snuggles back into his chest.

"Come on then."

The little robin watches in amusement as the young man reaches around the girl to grab hold of the reins.

"Get ready -"

Enjolras' heart races as Éponine wriggles in front of him, ready to kick the toboggan (and them) into oblivion.

"- and… lift off!"

...*...

After a few seconds, Éponine opens her eyes.

"Was something supposed to happen?" she asks innocently, a smile tugging at the corners of her lips.

With a frustrated growl, Enjolras stretches his feet out at either side of them and kicks impatiently at the snow with his feet, sending flurries of white everywhere, and suddenly, before Robin Redbreast can call a warning –

Whoooosh.

Trudging back towards the lane, Éponine is rather startled to see Enjolras' father leaning casually against the iron gate.

He triumphantly hands each of them a blanket as they emerge onto the lane, and chuckles at Éponine's baffled expression.

"Hit ice?" he grins knowingly.

"And then a tree." Enjolras grumbles.

Éponine raises her eyebrows, staring from father to son.

"How did you…?"

"Éponine dear, we've been digging Enjolras out of snowdrifts every winter for the past fifteen years, this year won't be any different. It's about time he got the hang of it though."

He takes a photo with a whirr and a click.

"You'll look back and laugh," he promises as his muttering son attempts to stride haughtily through the gate, slips, and falls flat on his backside.

The countryside echoes with hooting laughter as Enjolras blinks up at his father and girlfriend, both bent double at the sight of his wide-eyed shock.

Three weeks later, a parcel arrives on the doorstep of Éponine's apartment.

Their attempts to rekindle the magic of a first date have dwindled since the disastrous tobogganing attempt, and to be frank, both Éponine and Enjolras are relieved.

They had both arrived home drenched in melting snow and shivering; huddling by the fire at Enjolras' parents' house, they had mutually agreed that first dates were overrated anyhow.

("We made a good try of it," Enjolras says cheerfully, determinedly, and Éponine nods fervently in agreement.)

When the little package lands with a soft thlump upon the hall rug, Enjolras pokes his head around the kitchen door into the living room.

"Was that the front door?"

Laying aside her magazine, Éponine grudgingly slips off the sofa and into the hallway. Enjolras emerges from the kitchen as she returns, dripping bubbles from the rubber gloves he is peeling from his hands. He mirrors her frown.

"What is it?"

"Got me."

Sinking back onto the sofa, Éponine sets about ripping the packaging from the parcel. When the little book falls into her lap at an open page, she gives an audible gasp which brings Enjolras running back into the room.

"I don't believe it…"

Falling back onto the couch to take a closer look, Enjolras' eyes narrow.

"You have got to be kidding me."

Together they sit and flick through the photo album that Courfeyrac has assembled, a mismatch collection of boating trips and wine tasting excursions, restaurant fires, snowy fields, riverside group selfies and karaoke nights.

"He's been watching us the whole time, the freak!" Enjolras howls.

Turning the page, Éponine winces.

"Why the hell did you tell me I looked good in that dress and those shoes?"

"Never mind you, look at this." He holds up a picture of a snowman, but on closer inspection Éponine glimpses fluffy golden curls beneath the fluffy white snow; a souvenir of their tobogganing trip.

"Ha!" Éponine nudges his side.

"It looks like a Christmas card!" she exclaims happily, "Look, there's a little robin and everything!"

"Hang on, this means my father must have been in on this." Enjolras gives a loud tut, then peers closer at the little photograph. "I think Cosette was right when she said I needed a haircut –"

"Maybe we could singe it off to match your eyebrows," she mutters under her breath, waving another photo under his nose.

He snatches it from her grasp and stuffs the pictures into his shirt pocket.

"Funny."

They sit and flick through the pages, tutting and sniggering, and gasping with indignation.

"Oh, look, there's the before, during and after shots of you getting punched on the nose by that guy at the cinema!"

"Give me those!" he takes the photographs from her and groans in horror. "So he was behind us the whole time? I'm going to kill Courfeyrac."

"Come on, it's funny! It's rather nice to have the memories, don't you think?"

"Does this look like a moment I want to remember?"

He holds up a picture of the exact moment the stranger's fist had collided with his face, Éponine's eyes wide with terror in the background.

She bites her lip and even Enjolras can't help but smirk as he defiantly exclaims, "it's not funny!"

But Éponine is soon past the point of no return, gasping with mirth, and it isn't long before the pair are falling over each other with laughter, wiping tears from their eyes.

"We're fu- fucking ridiculous!"

And when their laughter dies down, they simply sit side by side, letting the quiet of the afternoon wash over them once more.

"Well," Enjolras asserts, after several minutes of silence, occasionally punctuated by Éponine's hiccups. "I'll certainly be speaking to Courfeyrac after this. And writing my father a long letter."

"Don't be too hard on them."

"Hmm. We'll see."

Éponine smiles and affectionately buries her face into his shoulder, as Enjolras leafs through the photographs once more, tutting and muttering under his breath. He's right, of course. Courfeyrac had no business following them around all this time. Absolutely no business taking photographs without their knowledge.

(She'll thank him later.)

The End.