open: don't let the wine go to your brains

[untamedantinous]

It shouldn’t be this hard to prepare for a meeting. He’s done it countless times before. However, this time, it somehow is difficult. He’s never really had to set things up at times like this; and he knows as well as anyone else that he is not the best at social niceties. Granted, this meeting is in a much more well-appointed cafe than any he had ever been accustomed to holding space in in Paris. At least they have the benefit of a larger space. Consequently, Enjolras has spent much of the day of the eighth of Menestheus preparing, a little uncertain of how to plan a social gathering that is not immediately centered around planning a revolution. He is trying his best, at least.

Most of the tables and chairs have been pushed a bit more to the center of the room; the couch is arranged off to the opposite side. There are even various pillows scattered about, should anyone choose to sit on the floor. Arranged on a few of the larger tables and the counter there is a modest spread of food: of course, some of Laertes and Galahad’s pastries; but Enjolras has also procured what amounts to a few charcuterie platters: sliced sausages and meats, a selection of (mostly French) cheese, and various sliced loaves of bread and crackers are laid out for perusal, and spreads to go along with them. In an effort to provide multiple options of entertainment, Grantaire has set up a table somewhat near the food, with an assortment of wines and liqueurs. Off to one side, there are a few pots of brewed coffee, cream, sugar, and whatever else anyone might like to add to their beverage of choice. If anyone is drawn to the liquor cabinet, they will find three cups filled with various pieces of paper sitting atop it.

Enjolras himself is lingering on the couch with a glass of wine and some bread. He’s not sure how many people were even informed about this gathering, though he had done his best to advertise. If no one arrives then perhaps he will try again another time; but at least a few in attendance other than himself and Grantaire would certainly be welcome.

Comments

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"But what of the thankless tasks no one wishes to do?"

[timebethine]

Laertes sits back in his chair, taking a long drink of his lemon water. "Dost feel thy tasks are thankless?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan certainly doesn't see anyone else lining up to do them! The fact that she does genuinely enjoy them seems to be a mark in favor of Laertes's argument, though, so she raises her eyebrows at him. "Would you like to take them over?"

[timebethine]

"I know not what they are," he says.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Resource management," Susan says, immediately, ticking items off on her hands as she goes. "Inventory, infrastructure, organization, cataloguing supplies and changes in supplies, making an accounting of the shifts in this world... conducting and interpreting censuses, identifying skills, interests, and strengths, narrowing down the possible and impossible, seeking to understand the gaps in all of the above." She stops there, though she could keep going, because she has run out of fingers.

[timebethine]

"I knew none of this," says Laertes, marveling. "Where hast thou shared thy findings?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"In conversation, mostly," Susan admits. She'd spoken of it a little with Laertes at his wedding dance - or at least hinted at it - but he shall be forgiven for not remembering the particularities that night. "I've documented it all, of course." She's on her third notebook now. "But I've not yet collated a final report."

[timebethine]

"Perhaps, were thy labors shared with the house at large, thine efforts would be better rewarded," says Laertes. "I remember thou hadst said thou wert working on a project a little like that, but had no idea of its breadth of scope. Thy work is to the benefit of all; let all see it, that all can benefit and praise thee as thou deservest."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Oh, I'm not doing it for recognition or praise," Susan says, clearly a little startled at the very idea. "I'm doing it because it needs doing." This has always been the way: in Narnia and in England, her siblings would do the awesome, eye-catching sorts of deeds, and Susan was there to do the supporting work that they didn't realize was needed. Some (as she is beginning to think) was perhaps a little misguided - the ferocious fights over whether Narnia was real come to mind, for example - but she's used to being paid primarily by internal satisfaction.

[timebethine]

"Then it seems thou hast answered thine own question--the thankless tasks are thine, because thou needst not thanks for them."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"And so if more necessary but undesirable tasks emerge, they become mine simply because I've already taken on the few that I am committed to?" Susan asks. "If tasks must be delegated, then surely there must be someone to do the delegating."

[timebethine]

"No one delegated these tasks to thee," Laertes points out. "No one else even thought them tasks. Thou didst make and seize them willingly."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan gives Laertes a long look. She inclines her head, willing to accept that she did create her own set of chores as part of a means to claw her way out of the hole she'd been nesting in when she first arrived. "How many here have true leadership experience?" she asks. "Say - at least several years, in a position of power and governance, who must make truly impactful decisions on behalf of a people?"

[timebethine]

"Some few," says Laertes. "Claudius, Janet, Luo Binghe, Aleksandr; Tress, for a lesser time. But my lady, the question is not which of us should rule. It's whether rule is needed. And I contend that, in a place where all is provided for us, it is not."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan has her own opinions about whose experience counts, but she keeps it to herself; Laertes needn't know she only truly trusts herself and Janet with this sort of thing. "And if the provided resources here are finite, and we've just not yet discovered the limit?" she asks.

[timebethine]

"Then what would a singular leader offer that could not be done equally well collectively?"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"And who said the leader must be singular?" Susan might have more leadership experience than most here, but it's not as if she was ever alone in her efforts for more than a month or two, whilst her siblings dealt with issues abroad. "Are you suggesting a form of libertarian socialism?"

[timebethine]

"I know not what that means," Laertes admits.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Ah. Ah! Very well. Susan reminds herself, sternly, that these discussions are meant to be in fun, though it's rather startling to consider that men who think to debate political theory mightn't be familiar with the most basic forms of it. She wouldn't consider herself an expert on the subject, by any means, but at least she's taken a few classes delving into such things. She takes a deep breath. "What school of thought do you draw from, then?"

[timebethine]

"I think that school of thought comes from after my time, and my researches have not yet uncovered it," says Laertes.¹ "There is something of the republican in my thoughts--I have learned of a republicanism in France and in America that builds upon the Roman model--but the efficiencies of a republic seem best suited to a much larger scale than ours. There is something, too, to be said for Athenian democracy, but again, I know not that it would suit our purposes to be ruled utterly by majority. I know only this: I have witnessed a court ruined by a bad king. I have no desire to live under one again."

¹ Laertes desperately needs to read some Hannah Arendt.

[quote_gentle_unquote]

Susan takes another deep breath and releases it slowly, urging her hackles to go down. "And what, in your estimation, makes a leader good or bad?"

[timebethine]

"King Hamlet was a warlike king," says Laertes, "and more than that, his wars were meant to swell Denmark's territories, and to end rebellions. Dost thou see how such a project pits a king against his people? He must always see them as both subjects and foes, and any act that he did not authorize must thus be answered as an uprising. If thou hast read Machiavelli, thou wilt recognize his type--a man who preferred to be feared rather than to be loved.

"But it does not end there," continues Laertes, and his voice is beginning to shake. "If thy subjects must always be treated as foes in waiting, then it is the duty of those with subtler craft to find out where rebellion lurks ere it can be fanned to a blaze. It is their duty to descry every secret, and thus they must listen at every arras, spy through every peephole, read every missive passed between friends--for in any of those, the spark of rebellion may be burning. Or perhaps not even rebellion! Perhaps only imperfection. Perhaps only thought that there might be a fucking place on Earth where the world might be different, and better--because the thought that things might be better is in fact the seed and fount of rebellion--"

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Laertes," says Susan, sharply, not worrying one whit about interrupting him. "Stop. Breathe."

[timebethine]

He inhales through his nose. "What I mean to say," he finishes carefully, "is that I am sure King Hamlet thought himself a paragon of leadership."

[quote_gentle_unquote]

"Many men do," says Susan. "Few men are." She wants to ask, again, what Laertes might imagine a good leader should be like, but she doesn't want him to work himself into a lather about it.