"I made you a very ugly cake." He corrected, his eyes gleaming. "And you came here a month after my first year had already ended, you know. Close enough, I think, for that to be considered something special."

He did not need to repeat the reasons, he thought, but Eponine's arrival had been when he had needed a friend the most, and then, as he'd fallen in love with her, he had discovered more about her that he cared for and about, but right then, well. In a lot of ways, she had saved him. Not physically, perhaps, but in other ways besides.

"I...am simply very glad that you are here. Enough to merit some kind of celebration, I think."