Scooping out tabouleh and arranging grape leaves put one in mind of summer, and for a few minutes, Grantaire had felt almost healthy - never mind that it was the first thing he'd eaten with any nutrients in days, and never mind that he'd probably top it off with a six pack and some of the cookies in the cabinet. It was light, and Enjolras lent a certain wholesomeness to everything in his vicinity, and Grantaire allowed himself briefly to fantasize about having a glass of wine and foregoing dessert in favor of chickpeas and generally being correct and restrained. It was pleasant, in the mildly aspirational way everything was in Enjolras' company, and all the better as Grantaire had long since stopped being upset with himself when he failed to measure up. He never expected success; he only enjoyed the ride, the short-lived view of possibility that Enjolras always opened for him.
Of course, talk of jobs wasn't calculated to make anyone feel accomplished, and he did his best to nip the subject in the bud as he waited for his glass of wine. "I might suggest," he said, with a poorly contained smile that had quite a lot to do with the pressure at his knee he could hardly even pretend to ignore, "that you give it a rest. You've been here only a hair over a month, and you're talking about work. Get your feet wet, why don't you." He himself was a testament to how long a man could go without doing a damn thing; he was managing it here only a little worse than he'd managed it in Paris. But if he occasionally took a few dollars to pass out flyers or haul things around or help pass out plates, he did it with the most honorable of intentions - thoroughly dedicated, as always, to doing as little as possible. "Honestly - school, indeed. If you didn't learn to keep the hell away from it, you wasted your last stint there. But I expect you're hopeless."
He draped his arm over the back of the sofa with a little thrill, a sensation almost embarrassingly sharp - more befitting a schoolboy than a grown man. The ridiculousness of it drove his mind momentarily to Stephen, but there would be time enough to deal with that later - and after more than the glass or three he was going to behave himself with this evening. "I suggest you sleep in." He turned his face to him to smile, sheepish but as ever unabashed. "I suggest you loaf around the city for a few more weeks, at least. I suggest you concede to the necessity of labor only when you literally can't scrape breakfast together - but we can only ever recommend our own experience, and I have a hunch you'll have your school and work for it, too."