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Chapter Text

Adrien slipped out of his bed and grabbed his robe. On slippered feet he exited his room and went down the stairs and down the long halls to the office. Pulling out the chair at his father’s desk he glanced at the frost covered window. He did not see the world outside, but rather the stern look on his face. No, not stern, exhausted. He refused to believe he was seeing echoes of his father.

Sitting down he opened up the laptop before dawn, to start the work he’d chosen to do himself instead of allowing others to do for him. For the longest time the only sounds in the large manor besides the humming of electronics and the furnace blowing warm air, was the tapping of the keyboard.

He didn’t hear her, but he recognized her presence just as she placed an arm around his shoulder. He didn’t look away from the screen but noticed it was lighter outside now, though perhaps not quite dawn.

“Hey Chlo.”

“Hey yourself. What’s got you up so early?” Chloé was leaning into his personal space looking at the screen.

“I thought I’d just get an early start on things.” Adrien finally looked up at her. “I could ask the same thing of you.”

Chloé laughed, a delighted expression. “Adri-honey, don’t you know how much work it takes to look this good?”

She stepped to the side and spread her arms out, showing off not a glamorous look but rather the over large pajama top she was wearing. Adrien couldn’t help but to snicker slightly. With a stuttered start he finally said. “You always look good Chlo.”

Grinning back she held out her finger. “It’s because I start early. Unlike some people. Now I’m off to get some coffee to start my day right like a rational person.” Chloé started to walk off then paused and turned back to the desk. “I’ll bring you a cup too. We don’t need you grumpy as that cat after all.”

Chloé was as good as her word, though it was several minutes later before she came back with a mug of coffee. Surprises were a plenty with the coffee. First, the mug wasn’t familiar to him at all. It looked far too casual, a blue mug with cartoonish snowflakes, and she actually got his coffee exactly how he liked it with sugar and nutmeg. By the time he’d taken this all into account she had already disappeared out of the office, probably to start on her morning beauty regimen.

Taking two more sips of his suspiciously perfect coffee, in the suspiciously adorable mug Adrien stood up and left the office. He could hear voices on the other side of the door into the kitchen before he opened it, but he was still surprised to see a very sleepy looking Marinette sitting atop of the kitchen island bundled in her fuzzy robe, with an equally sleepy looking Nino, with only pajama bottoms, leaning on the counter across from her. Each drinking coffee from similar, but not matching mugs.

“Since when did everyone in this house get up before dawn?” Adrien asked as the two turned to look at him.

Marinette slipped down from the counter and went over to wrap her arms around him. “Since your ‘longest friend from forever’ woke me up and told me I just had to make you coffee.”

Marinette didn’t look too put out, but he didn’t know why Chloé would wake Marinette up for that. He could make his own coffee. For that matter despite her spoiled upbringing Chloé could make coffee herself. Even if it wasn’t nearly as good as Marinette’s.

“And you?” Adrien asked Nino.

“Dude, you need someone to drink coffee with,” Nino told him with an attempt at a straight face. There were a multitude of reasons it wasn’t working.

Adrien sighed deeply. “She told you what I was working on.”

“We’ve told you before, do whatever you want to do with this place. If you want to sell it, that’s fine, but even if that’s the decision you’re happiest with we all know that’s still a hard pill to swallow,” Nino pointed out.

“There’s too much history here, and not enough of the good ones,” Adrien said though his gaze seemed to go passed Nino. It wasn’t the first time in the last several months that had happened. There was silence as Nino and Marinette waited for him to go on. His focus seemed to go back to his best friend. “You, all of you, have made it better and it’s given me time to focus on bigger loose ends.”

“We’ll always be here for you man,” Nino reminded Adrien. Marinette’s agreement was with a kiss on the cheek. He got now why Chloé woke them both. Even if she wasn’t down there with them in the moment she was also a part of this.

“Why don’t we continue this in the library. There’s a big picture window we can watch any snowflakes that pass by,” Adrien suggested.

“Snowflakes?” Marinette asked as Adrien turned them to the kitchen door, Nino having already pushed himself off the counter to head out with them.

“Snowflakes,” Adrien said with confidence as he clinked his mug lightly to hers. The winter scenery might only be on the ceramics for now, but Adrien wanted to add a few more good memories to this place before he let it go.

Chapter Text

Marinette looked up at the perpetual grey sky that had been hanging over Paris for the last several days and gave a shutter. The weather hadn’t been miserable but it was most definitely not Spring and she was eternally grateful for the invention of fleece. When she heard the distinct ring of her cellphone she turned away from the sky and grinned as she answered.

“Alya!”

“Cupcake!” Alya’s responded over the line. While Marinette had her phone to her ear, she could tell her best friend was on speaker phone. “How’s Paris?”

“Cold,” Marinette complained half jokingly. “How’s Munich?”

“About the same, but I’m too busy to notice it and when I do I get myself some hot cocoa,” Alya told her. Marinette could hear the rustling of papers on the other end atesting to Alya’s claim of being busy. “Oh, I did see Rose and her partners the other night. Met them for dinner.”

Marinette, who’d been absently pacing as she talked sat down in the chair closest to her, excited to hear what Alya had to say. “You met her mysterious new girlfriend? What’s she like?”

“Well, she’s pretty.”

Marinette rolled her eyes to the ceiling. “I know that! I’ve seen the pictures.”

“Well, I never know,” Alya teased. “You’ve never seemed to notice anyone!”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Marinette tried to sound annoyed, but honestly she missed Alya’s teasing.

“Okay okay, but she was nice. A bit shy so I didn’t get much of a gadge on her personality.”

“And Fredrick never shut up I’m sure,” Marinette added remembering more than one dinner party with Rose’s other longtime partner.

“You know it. I’ll probably get to see them once more for lunch while they’re in town. It will be a nice break from working. I knew an internship was going to be rough, but I feel like I only eat, breathe, and drink the news right now.”

Marinette wasn’t convinced her friend wasn’t enjoying every minute of the high paced life she was currently living. “And loving it!”

Alya laughed. “Yup. Speaking of love. How the Manor of Romance!”

“Being sold,” Marinette said bluntly. She head Alya gasped and felt a bit of triumph surprising her friend.

“You guys…?”

“Nope, Adrien chose to do it all on his own. We were all a bit surprised. I mean, we all knew eventually he probably wouldn’t want to live here, but it was a very quick decision.”

It was an open secret among their special friends group that no one thought Adrien would want to spend any time at all at the mansion once the dust settled. When instead Nino, then Chloé and Marinette moved in many thought it was just to convince him to leave. That hadn’t been their reason. They just wanted to be there to support their friend. That it had turned into an enjoyable living arrangement had been a pleasant surprise.

“Well I think it’s a good thing and you can tell him that,” Alya said to Marinette, then in the background an alarm of some sort started going off. “Dammit. Sorry, I’m going to have to cut this short but you can tell me all about your guys’s plans later this week, okay? I’ve got a virtual conference I need to be in attendance for.”

“I’ll call you the normal time. Miss you!”

“Miss you too babe.”

After hanging up with Alya, Marinette looked around the large library, where she’d just spent her time on the phone with Alya. Like much of the mansion, it’s design gave an air of coldness, which did not couple well with the weather outside. She needed something warm and cozy. She wondered if Adrien and Chloé would be back soon from the meeting with the real estate agent. She sent off a text to them, and Nino, as she headed for the kitchen. Alya had the right idea, if you can’t be too busy to not notice the weather, hot cocoa would do the trick and she was sure her little family would like some too.

Chapter Text

Long before Adrien had a decision on what to do with his childhood home. Before his best friends came to live with him. Before there was a chance to clean out the wine cellar. Long before all that a horrible battle was won.

Ladybug hadn’t so much suggested, as outright told everyone else to leave them alone. She might have left him alone too, if she didn’t think someone other than a kwami ought to be with him. While the others were elsewhere in the manor still, either celebrating or trying to figure out how to murder Gabriel multiple times without powers, Marinette watched Adrien pace in the North Wing sitting room.

There hadn’t been much chance to talk before and now that it was over it seemed like there was no words. Even without words though she would be there for her partner, her friend. Even as the adrenaline faded, exhaustion started to take over, and the cold started seeping into her bones.

Marinette absently started to rub her arms.

Adrien turned and looked at her. He blinked, as though he was surprised she was there, and maybe he was. Despite his world tumbling down his first words to her since they’d detransformed sounded like too much an apology. “You’re cold. Do you want a fire?”

Marinette was a bit confused by the statement, somewhere in the very unherolike part of her brain she wondered if roasting their former nemesis on an open fire was being offered. Then she realized, “oh you mean in the fireplace? You don’t need to go to the trouble.”

“It’s not really any trouble,” he told her, walking over to the side of the fireplace and flipping a small switch she hadn't noticed. With a swoosh, the fireplace was alive with a crackling fire. He looked over at her with a sarcastic grin, and she couldn’t help feeling a bit silly.

The grin slowly died and the moment passed.

“Let’s get a couple of pillows and just sit in front of the fire,” she suggested, hoping to keep him from getting completely lost in his thoughts for a bit longer.

“I.. I guess we could?” Adrien didn’t sound sure and Marinette doubted it had anything to do with if he did or didn’t want to do it and more with moving things in the pristine room. A room that looked like something in a magazine, not lived in.

Marinette chose action not words, and grabbed a couple of pillows from a couch that looked very pretty but not the least comfortable. Placing the pillows close to the fire she looked for a few more. Her actions spurred Adrien as he found an afgan to go with the small pile of pillows forming. The worked in silence, but as a team. Tikki and Plagg, who had been a pair of silent observers on the fireplace mantel for quite some time even did their small bit to help until they had a nice little nest in front of the fire for themselves.

Marinette settled into the pillows and the warmth and comfort was heaven sent, she felt she could sleep then and there. In front of her she saw the kwamis cuddling into each other on one small pillow, half under a tea doily, already looking asleep. Sleep would be welcomed, but only after the lump of sadness that was leaning heavily next to her was able to rest. She still didn’t have the words. Absent of words she put her arm around Adrien.

At first they just sat there but then she noticed him shaking. She looked over worried, was he going into shock? But no, it was him trying to hold back from crying.

Finally she had her first set of words for him. “It’s alright Adrien. You can let it all out. I’m here for you. We all are.”

In the overly stylish North Wing sitting room, with a crackling fire in the fireplace, Adrien got his first chance to grieve his losses, wrapped in the arms of loving second chances.

Chapter Text

The large dining table was full of life. While there were only four at the table, one look at Adrien declared that it was the happiest he’d been during a meal there in quite some time. It was not the first meal they’d all shared together since moving in, but it was the first in the dining room. Something the girls had been aiming towards since Marinette’s official move in a week prior if Nino was to guess.

Not that there was anything wrong with eating in the kitchen, or in front of the tv watching a movie together, but there was a normalness about sitting at a dining room table eating dinner together. The bread was of course fresh from Tom & Sabine’s and each of them had a hand in the preparation, even if the majority was done by Marinette.

Just as Nino was reaching to get himself a second helping of green beans, their dinner was interrupted by a ringtone. Chloé glanced at her phone on the table, and then had the gall to pick it up!

“Daddy!” She called into it.

Nino resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Growing up it was considered improper at best to talk on your phone at dinner, and given that as long as you used your ‘pleases’ and ‘thank yous’ his mothers didn’t fuss much about table etiquette he was surprised and maybe even flabbergasted that someone that had been probably taught table manners he’d never even dreamed up would break such a cardinal rule. Yet there Chloé was having a conversation with her father. Something about a party and a date. Nino was too distracted by green beans and Marinette explaining the logo design she was currently working on to follow.

Eventually Chloé’s conversation ended. At this point Adrien was trying to tell a joke about a seasick crocodile, which Marinette must have heard at one time because she kept trying to get him to stop.

“Nino, do you want to be my date for the opening in Reims,” Chloé asked suddenly as Adrien attempted his joke for the third time. Adrien gave her a pout, but Nino just found himself staring at her with his jaw hanging down slightly. “Oh, nevermind!”

Nino shook himself out of his shock. “No, no, wait a minute. I want to know what you mean by date.”

“Okay, not date, arm ornament,” Chloé said dismissively.

“Still not an explanation Chloé,” Marinette said in a sing song voice. Nino thought she looked a bit smug too, but her turned his attention to the blonde who just asked him out and then downgraded the request.

“Fine,” Chloé groaned. “Daddy as the date for the opening of the new hotel in Reims. He’s had this in the works for a few years now, but it’s finally finished and staffing has been completed for the most part so now it’s time for the big grand opening.”

“And you need a date,” Nino started.

“Arm ornament,” Chloé corrected quickly.

Nino wasn’t sure why but he was enjoying this who idea more and more. “And you need an escort because you’re the owner’s daughter?”

Chloé nodded, “Basically. Daddy will probably have some young actress as his arm ornament during the weekend as well. It’s just how these events go.”

Nino sat back in thought. “Okay, I’m in, but I got to ask, why are you taking me and not some hot minor celebrity yourself?”

Chloé covered her face with both hands, which Nino was sure was also not good table etiquette. Adrien chuckled slightly and that seemed to catch Chloé’s attention. “You would be a much better date. I’ve changed my mind!”

“No, nah-uh. Not happening Chlo! Besides Nino already said yes!” Adrien used exaggerated hand gestures to help put his point across.

“But Adrikins! You’re hot! You’re a celebrity! And we have fun at these events!” Chloé listed off her reasons on her finger while batting her eyes in a fashion that Nino just wasn’t buying.

“Nino’s hotter, he’s an up and coming music sensation, and we both know you’d rather him go up to Champagne with you.” Adrien listed on his finger right back.

There was a slight blush over Chloé’s cheeks as she crossed her arms. “Hmph, you just want to be home alone with Marinette so you have an excuse to eat at her parents’ place for dinner all week.”

“That is a perk,” Adrien grinned, purposely not looking in Marinette’s direction.

“Fine, I reinstate my request for you to come up with me to Reims,” Chloé looked directly at Nino. Sure she was just playing around, but she could be intense at times, and Nino felt his heart speed up at bit.

“I’ll pencil you in.”