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Oh, losing him was blue like I'd never known
Missing him was dark grey, all alone
Forgetting him was like trying to know somebody you never met
'Cause loving him was red.
“I want to keep loving you, but when I look at you… I-” he sighed, trudging on, ignoring the pain in his chest as he tried to articulate his words, too tired to keep the bitterness out of his voice. “I know I did the right thing, but my mother’s dead and my father’s in prison. And when I look at you that is all I can think about… How I chose you over my mother. And my father. How I don’t have a family anymore because I chose you .”
Her eyes had filled with tears, but she blinked them away, lips tight as she looked away. Looking back, he wished she had yelled at him for breaking all the promises he had made to her, the assurances he was sure seemed empty to her now, instead of the way her entire body deflated.
“Do you… Do you regret it?” she asked, voice small, the smallest hint of a quiver in it despite the ringing finality of her words. He knew her well enough to know that she was suppressing a sob. But he was too numb to feel his heart break at that. And so he was honest.
“I don’t know."
And just like that, she disappeared from his life.
In the first few feeks that followed, she made herself as scarce as she possibly could given the fact that their best friends were dating. He didn’t see much of her except the back of her head when she left the room upon his arrival.
“There’s nothing keeping me here anymore,” she had said, Alya had told him almost accusingly.
They remained friends - Alya and him - but there was a chasm of sympathy, bitterness and unvoiced accusations between them.
He knew he had consciously made the decision to look for love elsewhere - an idea he thinks he should have known was ridiculous, because really, nowhere was the way it had been with her.
It was definitely not for the lack of trying, though.
There was judgement and apprehension in their eyes.
There was lust. For his body, and for his money.
One rare occasion, there was an inkling - a fleeting, hopeful inkling - of love.
But there were secrets that both were and weren’t his to tell, and a part of him was so solely hers that it felt wrong to share it with anyone else. And it was hard to love fully if he couldn’t give it his all.
He tried to forget her, but she forgot him first.
He had woken up to an email from the prison ward that Gabriel Agreste had escaped prison, somehow. He was sure it would be on the news very soon, and it was only his power and money that stopped the news from leaking to the press for now .
He paced the room agitatedly, much to Plagg’s irritation but the kwami kept quiet as he observed his wielder before finally saying, “You should find Ladybug.”
Adrien stilled, looking at his kwami in disbelief. “I can’t see her, Plagg,” he said at last, looking away from the kwami who was floating right in front of him.
Plagg scowled for a moment before sighing softly. “I thought you said you… Did not feel that way anymore.”
“After what I said then... What would I even say to her?”
“That Gabriel escaped prison for starters,” Plagg snorted.
“She’ll find out soon enough,” muttered Adrien. “Besides, she’s… She’s all the way in New York now.”
“Kitten, that was three years ago. Chat Noir and Ladybug have been apart long enough.”
There were so many things he wished he had done differently. One of them was taking Plagg's advice immediately instead of deciding to sleep on it.
When he slept on it, he realised that over the years, his friends had stopped telling him what Marinette was upto and he had no idea where she really was. Which meant that she would need back up from him, because Gabriel would know where to find her, and the only wild card would be him. He supposed her owed her that much. He also supposed he'd rather be on the scene if something were to happen than have to add another regret to his long list of them. So he texted Nino his flight details, and took the earliest flight he could to Paris.
He was a bundle of nerves from the moment his flight took off. Plagg's soothing warmth in his pocket kept him grounded as he mentally tried to rehearse what he would say.
I'm sorry.
That was all he could think of, much to his frustration, but essentially, that was the crux of it all, wasn't it?
Because when he really thought about it, how would things have been if he had not chosen to save her, as she lay there unconscious, stripped off her earrings? If he had chosen his family, instead of trying to abide by what he thought was the right thing to do? He would have his mother back, and would probably never have been able to look his father in the eye. He would have had to pretend that he didn’t know his father had been terrorizing the city for years, hadn’t tried to kill him several times. Would his father have ever told him and his mother what he had done, or would he have pretended everything was hunky dory? He supposed the latter.
And the price...
The way his heart skipped a bit when he thought of that told him that nothing possibly could have been worth the price. Would it have been his life? Or worse, Marinette’s? If not life, he would’ve definitely paid the price of her love, wouldn’t he? Well, maybe not, because Marinette would have, in all probability, understood, but he would have lost her trust. Especially after she had asked him so many goddamn times before they went to confront Hawkmoth, whether or not he was okay with this, and that she would not blame him at all if he wanted no part of it. Maybe he should have. Maybe he should have kept his sense of righteousness and justice aside and been honest with her, and told her how he was not okay with sending his father to prison, even though he knew that was the right thing to do.
"You and me against the world, m'lady," he'd said ruefully instead.
He hated thinking about how he'd broken her heart mere hours after he'd said those words to her. The last thing he had told her was that he wasn't sure of his decision to save her, but he sure as hell hadn't meant that, because he doubted he would have been able to live with himself if he hadn't. He hadn’t been able to look her in the eye after he consciously, purposefully, chose to save her, so would she have been able to look him in the eye if he hadn’t chosen her? Maybe he would never have been forgiven for it, and maybe he would have, but he would have without a doubt lost her trust, and it made his throat close up to think that he had lost her trust anyway and he'd done it single-handedly, all by himself.
Ultimately, when he really thought about it, yes it hurt when he’d had to choose her - the right thing to do, the love of his life - over his family, but he doubted it would have hurt any less if he had been a little selfish and lost Marinette in the process
The bitter truth of it all was that he hadn’t really thought she would leave. Maybe he had taken her for granted, after she'd become a constant presence in life, constant enough that he hadn't really taken into account what he would do if she left. Knowing her, she would have thought that that was what he wanted anyway. He knew he’d hurt her almost irreparably, because she always saw through him and anticipated his needs, but whatever she had seen on his face had made her believe him that he really wanted her gone. It was ironic in a cruel, sad sort of way.
He’d gathered himself over the years - after a lot of therapy and support from his friends - enough to admit to himself that while he had meant what he’d said - that looking at her hurt too much, he did regret saying the words. Being without her was hurting him a lot more. It was so easy back then to decide that he had lost everything because he’d chosen her. Because he couldn’t bring himself to not choose her, and in hindsight, that in itself should have meant something to him but back then, he had hated himself for it.
But blinded by grief as he mourned what he’d had to give up, he’d given up exactly what he had been trying to protect in the first place.
Her.
He was not going into this hoping she would take him back. He'd settle for having her in his life. Because though he'd had three years to prepare for this moment, he had managed to convince himself that it would never actually come. But now that it was almost here - technically, one hour, forty five minutes away from being here - he was willing to take anything she would give him.
About twenty minutes before he was due to land in Paris, Plagg had begun vibrating in his pocket with a consistent buzz.
He ignored the way his phone exploded with texts once he landed; that was quite normal anyway. The first hint of something going awry should have been when Adrien’s cabin bag felt heavier than he remembered. He frowned but didn’t think much of it, but tried to recollect what could possibly be making it that heavy as he made his way to the exit, eyes on the lookout for Nino.
He finally spotted Nino, looking anxious and fidgety as he stood waiting for him. A surprisingly curt greeting followed, and Adrien frowned at Nino’s uneasy demeanour as he followed him to his car.
“There was an accident… About an hour ago,” started Nino slowly, as he opened the car door, making Adrien freeze; Plagg’s buzzing grew even more agitated, and a feeling of dread finally seeped into Adrien.
His heart was thudding out of his chest as he watched Nino slide into the car and grip the wheel tightly, lips pursed as he stared straight ahead. Apprehensively, Adrien slid into the car, gripping the travel bag tightly in his lap.
“Nino?” he asked.
“Change of plans, sorry, mec. We need to go to the hospital first,” sighed Nino. “Sorry," he apologized again. "I left Alya there in a frenzied state and I-”
Adrien’s eyes widened in alarm, stilling in his seat, his hand frozen and hovering over the car handle. “Alya? What? Is she okay? What happened? You didn’t have to-”
“Adrien, it’s not Alya,” said Nino quietly as he reached across Adrien to pull the car door shut in a hurry before revving up the engine.
He started, already dreading the answer. “Not-?”
No. No. No. No.
The second the door shut, Plagg flew out of Adrien’s pocket. “It’s Marinette!” he said, in a tizzy. “Sugarcube. I felt…”
No. No. No.
“I was trying to tell you, but you didn’t answer your phone-” said Nino sorrowfully, as Wayzz appeared from under Nino’s collar to join Plagg’s frustrated fluttering.
Not now .
“I- I thought Marinette was in New York,” he said in a strangled voice, practically choking on his words, unable to breathe as the heaviness in his chest increased.
Nino shook his head, shooting Adrien a pitiful glance as they stopped at a red light. “She came back to Paris a year ago. When…” he trailed away with a shake of his head. “It doesn’t matter, we need to get to the hospital.”
“What happened?” he asked, voice hollow.
Nino pursed his lips and didn’t look at Adrien, his hands tightening around his steering wheel as he obstinately watched the red light turn amber.
Oh, god.
“If you’re worried about that, he’s already back in jail,” Nino added, voice gentle as he looked at Adrien. “We caught him just in time. It was Mayura who helped him. Still MIA.”
Adrien swallowed thickly, diverting his eyes to the traffic. He shuddered to think what ‘just in time’ could mean if it had ended with Marinette in the hospital anyway.
“Adrien, I have to warn you, Alya…” Nino sighed, revving up the engine again as the signal turned green. “She… Might not be most welcoming of you right now.”
Before Adrien could question that, Nino continued. “She didn’t have any major injuries on her when we arrived.”
“Then why did you have to take her to the hospital?”
“She was unconscious. Doctors said that there’s no significant physical damage,” he said before adding dolefully. “She’s just... Not waking up.”
Not waking up.
Not
Waking
Up.
His mind running a mile a minute, he missed Plagg’s eyes widening, before he phased through Adrien’s travel bag as Wayzz watched on. Realization seemed to have dawned on the little kwami, and he looked at Adrien with sad eyes.
Adrien gulped and opened the bag. His heart jumped to his throat as he saw a familiar box, but the last time he had seen it, it was red with black dots on it. It was all black now, with little neon green paw prints.
No.
Nino snuck a peek and cursed, while Adrien felt his eyes mist over.
Oh, Marinette.
He touched the box delicately, grazing it with his finger tips. A flash of green light, and the box opened. Sat right on top, was the box he was sure contained the Ladybug miraculous, because Plagg was hovering over it anxiously. Adrien stared at it, frozen in shock because he did not at all want to think about what this could mean. It was only when Plagg decisively picked up the box and shoved it against Adrien's nose that he held his hands out so the box could be dropped in it. Distantly, he realized Nino had started to pull over to the side of the road, noting in a detached manner that that was probably a good idea.
Adrien opened the box carefully, his heartbeat roaring in his ears, to see a pair familiar looking black cabochon earrings. God, he hadn’t seen them in forever . The last time he saw them were in his father’s hands before he had ripped them out and gingerly pinned them back to Marinette’s ears a couple of hours later. He remembered the way he used to tuck her jet black hair behind her ears, fingers gently grazing the earrings as she blushed, looking up at him through her lashes. How right behind her ear was a sensitive spot that almost always made her collapse when he as much as grazed his lips against it.
The tears spilled over as he gingerly removed the earrings to put them in his own ears, pierced initially for the sole purpose of being able to don the earrings if ever need be. He didn't think it would be like this.
A flash of pink and Tikki appeared in front of him, big blue eyes wide, watery and worried as she looped around the car in a single flutter. “Marinette!”
Nino’s eyes watered as the realisation washed over both of them at Tikki’s soft whimper. “Oh, no.”
Plagg and Wayzz were already comforting her as she sank down onto the dashboard of the car. Her tired eyes finally found Adrien's.
“Do you, Adrien Agreste, accept the responsibility of being the guardian of the miraculous and treat it with the same honour and sanctity as the previous guardian?”
"I- I do," he said, "But wh-Why me?"
Tikki smiled sadly. "Her identity had been compromised, so it would've been easier to track it to Nino and Alya. You've been away long enough that..."
"...It wouldn't lead to me," Adrien muttered, voice breaking.
"She wanted you to know she was sorry," said Tikki after a beat. "For dragging you into this again. She said she was sorry, and that she had no other choice. That she couldn't trust anyone else."
"I... I should've been there."
"You're here now," Tikki replied gently.
"She won't remember, will she?" he asked quietly.
"I'm sorry, Adrien," was all the kwami could say.
Adrien had always been a romantic at heart, and a part of him still believed in the whole Their Love Saved the World concept. It helped that he was one half of a whole, and over the few hours it took Marinette to finally wake, a small but firmly hopeful part of him was hoping for a miracle.
Maybe she'd see him and remember.
Maybe when he touched her hand, she'd feel a tingle and she'd look up at him in wonder.
Maybe she'd remember if he kissed her.
When he finally got to see her, a couple of hours after she woke up, her eyes were bloodshot and puffy; she’d clearly been crying. Her watery blue eyes shimmered in the flat white light of the hospital, as she looked up at him, anxiety written clearly over her face.
“Hey, Mari,” he said gently, eyes searching her face for even the slightest sign of recognition.
She sniffled in response, as she drew into herself, sinking into the bed, arms wrapping around her middle as she watched him nervously. “A-Are you another important person I forgot?” she asked, worrying her lower lip, not a flash of recognition on her face.
“Yeah,” he replied, voice cracking, just as her face crumpled and she buried her face in her hands, shoulders shaking slightly, her apologies muffled against her palm.
"I'm sorry," she cried. "I'm so sorry. I don't know what is wrong with me!"
He walked over to her slowly, schooling his expression to hide all the doubts, pain and guilt. Fear. He sat down next to her, a careful arm wrapping around her shoulder as he pulled her into his side. She stiffened, but she didn’t resist his touch. He liked to think that maybe deep down, his touch still comforted him the way they did back then. Muscle memory.
“It’s okay,” he said softly, and she shook her head, her sobs growing louder.
"No, it's not," she wailed miserably, her head against his shoulder. "I don't remember anything. I don't remember my parents, I didn't even remember my name. What is wrong with me!"
"You're perfect, my lady," he said, pressing a hesitant kiss to the crown of her lady.
She stilled before drawing back. "Y-Your lady?" she breathed, cheeks colouring a heartbreakingly familiar rose.
He only smiled sadly in response, because that was a lie, wasn't it? He wrapped his fingers around her wrists and gently pulled them up to press a kiss onto the inside of her wrists. “We’ll get through this, okay?”
She was staring at him wide eyes, face flushed, lips parted in surprise as she kept her gaze locked onto his.
“W- We will?”
“Yes. You and I,” he promised. “You and me against the world, my lady. I won't ever leave your side."
Remembering him comes in flashbacks
And echoes
Tell myself it's time now
Gotta let go
But moving on from him is impossible
When I still see it all in my head
In burning red
Burning it was red.