Chapter Text
This one was bad.
To be fair, they were never good. But some were easier than others. The words would be less sharp, or it’d be over more quickly. Adrien tried to imagine he was in the middle of a better one as he trained his eyes on the floor of his father’s study. The falling sun’s orange light leaked between the nearby buildings of Paris and through his house’s towering windows, pooling onto the checkered floor. Adrien’s eyes were locked onto a streak of sunlight at his feet. He studied how it laid across the black and white tiles as he struggled to block out his father’s voice.
“You can’t know the effort I make to give you opportunities like this,” Gabriel said, moving around pages on his monitor that Adrien couldn’t see. The light from the screen suddenly changed against his face, and by his expression Adrien knew whatever he had pulled up had not been good news. The man exhaled sharply through his nose, scowling. Neither of them looked at each other as he said, “I just don’t understand how you can be so careless. Weeks of planning, all down the drain because of one boy’s selfishness.”
I told you I didn’t want to do it a month ago, Adrien thought, but didn’t say. He barely whispered it in his own mind.
Gabriel placed his glasses on top of the monitor and pinched the bridge of his nose. Adrien glanced up at him, seeing the lines of his face grow more severe in his anger. His father sighed before continuing to run his hands across the monitor screen.
“Fortunately for the both of us, I’ve had years to learn how to make up for your shortcomings.”
As resilient as he’d become to his father’s words, Adrien couldn’t help but wince. Gabriel either didn’t notice or didn’t have the time to care.
“I only hope that one day you’ll know better than to make such childish decisions, and maybe we won’t all be stuck picking up your messes.”
Adrien felt a familiar shame settle on his shoulders. But then, why should he? He’d told his father ages ago that he didn’t want to be part of his events promoting Alliance. Plus, he told him exactly when Alya’s magazine release party would be and how important it was to his friends. To him. How was it fair that the Alliance showcase was scheduled for the same day and that he’d be forced to go?
For once, he made a choice. He wasn’t going to let his father convince him to regret it.
“It wasn’t childish,” he muttered under his breath without thought.
In the instant the words left him, it was like his heart stopped beating. Blood rushed from his face and sent the hairs on his neck standing upright while every muscle in his body tensed like cannons primed to burst.
Gabriel’s hands went from swiping fiercely across the screen to a sudden, cold stop. There was silence, and in the silence Adrien found himself scared even to blink. Slowly, his father reached for his glasses, put them on, and turned off the monitor. Adrien stared at the floor.
For the first time since his son walked into his study, Gabriel Agreste looked him in the eye. “I think we are having a misunderstanding,” he said. “I did not ask you a question, I made a statement. You, and your actions, were childish. Irresponsible. You think that your time is important to you? I promise, it is infinitely more so to the people relying on you to do something as easy as to show up, smile, and wave. Yet you can’t even manage that.”
He towered over his son as he tore into him. “You want to stop modeling? Fine. It might have cost us some, but I agreed and gave you a simple solution with Alliance. All I asked was that you attend a few events.” He scowled. “And what do I get in return? You skip a critical showcase to surround yourself with other children, because that is what you are: childish.”
Every word hit like a brick before Adrien went limp to their harshness. Standing in front of his father, he tried his best to be anywhere else. His mind hid in the furthest place it could reach as he gazed deeply into the checkered floor. Black and white tiles were spread in all directions, fixed next to each other on the same plane but never able to overlap. His reflection looked back at him in every square.
Gabriel sighed and placed a hand on his son’s shoulder. It felt too tight.
“I don’t enjoy this, Adrien,” he said with a voice at some level of regret. “I do it because I want you to be better. For your family.”
The boy said nothing.
After a moment of silence, his father let go and called for Nathalie to take him to his room with a plate of dinner. Adrien quickly followed her into the hallway without looking back. When they reached his room, Nathalie handed him a meal he didn’t care enough to glance at. There was concern on her face, and he could tell she wanted to say something. But all she gave was a brief “Good night” as he crossed the doorframe, then shut the door behind him.
The dinner plate clattered as Adrien dumped it haphazardly onto his desk. He wouldn’t bother with it tonight, just like he wouldn’t bother with staying in his room.
Plagg lay curled up on the couch, surrounded by a dusting of crumbs Adrien assumed to be the remains of a slice of cheese. He nudged the furniture with his foot and watched the kwami’s eyes slowly peel open.
“Hm? Did you bring back some more food for dinner?” Plagg yawned, covering his mouth. As he turned around Adrien knew he’d done a poor job of hiding his feelings. Plagg shot into alertness at the sight of him. “Whoa, you look terrible! What happened?”
What didn’t happen? the boy thought. He swallowed hard to clear his throat.
“I need to leave,” he said. He fiddled with the ring on his finger, eager to be gone already.
The kwami paused, seeming like he wanted to pry more, but the look on his friend’s face must have been enough to stop him. He closed his mouth and gave a short nod. It was all Adrien needed.
“Plagg, claws out.”
There was a flash of light that bathed the room in green before it vanished as quickly as it had come. Then, in the stillness, Chat Noir took a deep breath.
When he let it out things felt just slightly more right in his life, and he leapt from the room that could no longer hold him. The window was silent as he cracked it open and slipped out into the coming night, bounding over streets he knew by heart, hoping that a girl in a certain bakery was still awake.