"You do not look like you're older than twenty, and I'm thirty-four," he retorts easily, the lie coming naturally from years of practise. "And-- and anyway, there's nothing you can give me, you know? Not here, I can make anything I want just like you can."

He looks away as he thinks, and his eyes land on the table with his tape recorder. "...actually, if you want to pay me something, how about you tell me stories about yourself? Real ones, stuff that's happened to you. So I can write them down for... safekeeping, I suppose." He looks back at Eponine with a smile. "How's that sound? A story for a story."