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“Father.” Adrien’s voice comes out cool and unwavering; he has no qualms about what he is intending to do.
“Son.” The reply is just as indifferent, if not even more scathing. “Why aren’t you in your room? You should be-”
“No.” He says it quietly, but there’s a dangerous edge to his voice that Gabriel hasn’t heard before, and it catches the steely man off guard, stopping him mid sentence. It doesn’t matter--Adrien knows what his father was going to say anyway. He was going to say that he should be practising his piano . Don’t get him wrong, he loves it, but now it’s just an excuse to get rid of him, so he could be doing anything other than socialising.
The man collects himself, pushing his glasses up his nose with a finger, then leans forward, raising an eyebrow. “No?”
“You heard me,” Adrien says stoutly, matching his father’s undertone. “ No. I’m never playing another piano note for you, never posing in front of a camera for you again. You hear that? Never! Next time you want a profit, work for your own goddamn hard-hearted self!”
Gabriel tries to speak but Adrien’s not having it--won’t give him the luxury of time.
“Don’t try to tell me that you want the best for me--I don’t believe any of your lies! And don’t think, even for one second , that I’d miss you if you were gone. What have you ever done for me, huh?”
Gabriel manages to shout over him, “What have I done for you? You ungrateful boy, I raised you! Gave you everything you needed and more! You are loved by the whole of Paris, the whole world! What more could you possibly have?”
“You didn’t raise me--Nathalie’s more of a parent than you ever were,” Adrien spits. “And do you think I care about riches, possessions? You wanted me to look the best, to be your poster child. But in the real world, that’s not how parents are supposed to act. So stop blaming me for slipping up, because it’s all you! You and your money , your profits , your business . Take them away! Take them away from me! I don’t care how many people idolise me--because that’s what it is. It isn’t genuine love . Love, like what I want, between true friends. Everyone else is just jealous--for what exactly, I really cannot fathom, because life here, with you , is a prison! And you don’t get it, do you? I don’t want more ; I don’t need more! I just want you to be out of my life, because I’m done .”
“Ad- Adrien, I’m-”
“Don’t you dare say that you’re sorry now, after everything!” He pokes Gabriel hard in the chest, almost making him stumble--the last straw. “Your words mean nothing, at all! ”
The slap comes cold and hard.
Adrien runs.
But not out of fear, oh no; Adrien runs for freedom. He runs to get away from what he knows he can’t live with. He’s said what he needed to, and now he’s done . Out of the room he sprints, leaving the door ajar; not hearing his father’s shout of outrage, he half-flies down the stairs. Bursting out into the downpour--the Gorilla either doesn’t notice him, or just doesn’t stop him--he continues to pump his arms and legs, and it’s exhilarating. The rain asks him vibrant questions, and he answers with the splashes of his feet and the wind rushing in his hair. An epiphany of chords: rain doesn’t fall systematically, but where likes, how it pleases, and whenever it wants.
Adrien wants to be free, free as the rain. Because no matter what, he will survive.
He smiles as he slips into an alleyway, lights it up with the green flash of his transformation, and springs onto the roof, energy having increased tenfold by the black leather now hugging his body and the green fire now instilled in his veins. With a new definition of the world, Chat Noir leaps across the canyons that are the gaps between buildings, climbs the spires of the brickwork chimneys, suspended in air as time goes forward. There’s a wicked smile on his face as he pivots and vaults, pushing his limbs to work harder, to run faster, and it feels good .
How wild it is, letting it be .