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He never seemed to learn. No matter how many times every single one of his PR assessors repeated it, no matter how many times his Father repeated it, it was not the first time (and surely not the last) he would make the same mistake.
A part of him wanted to pass the blame on to literally anybody else, but he couldn’t. Adrien could always say it was his PR team’s fault for writing such an elaborate story for him, or even his father’s, for making him learn it so shortly in advance.
Father’s, for making him model in the first place.
The thing was, he couldn’t. His PR team only worked under his father’s orders as the head of the company, and he only had to study the story as quickly as he did because he had not paid enough attention to the details the first time.
Father was only doing what was best for him. Securing his future. Making sure he would have a legacy to live off.
Adrien wasn’t entirely sure if he wanted that legacy.
While his brain was invaded with self-deprecating thoughts at his decision to only study it once before leaving for patrol, a bitter voice kept on insisting it was nearly impossible to slip up on at least one thing. How was he supposed to remember to announce his interest on bicolored striped patterns to begin subtly hinting at the next Gabriel collection?
For once, he had hoped Gabriel’s eyes would light up with, if not pride, at least any indication he was not as much of a disappointment as he felt at that moment. There was only one thing that motivated him to keep going with yet another interview, with yet another layer of fakeness to be shown to the world: the hope for a dinner with his father. Instead, the man set off to Japan for business, and with it, every ounce of faith he had in it had crumbled to dust that had been swept out by the wind that came in from his open window. He stared at the sky beyond in a futile search for his father’s plane, flying back to rescue him from the drowning ocean of his emotions.
Now, every ounce of faith he had in that had crumbled to dust, gone with the wind that came in from his open window in a futile attempt to make his emotions less drowning.
In an odd way, he couldn’t completely say he loathed the idea. Loneliness could get crushing, painful even, as he realized how trapped between the pristine walls and polished floors of the mansion he was, sure. But, at least with Gabriel gone, it meant he would have a few days of grace after his slip-up before he had to actually confront it. With a tiny bit of luck, Gabriel might not even remember it by the time he was back.
Of course, there was also the possibility of something going so terribly wrong with whatever project he was developing that the man needed to pocket a lot of anger so he could maintain his business relationships and would unleash it all when he returned home.
Adrien shivered slightly at the thought. Even though that was a potential outcome, the promise of a few days before the world crashed on him was enough to keep him from hyperventilating. With any luck, if his father returned home still consumed by rage, he would only take it out on his studio in a temper tantrum, like he had done a few times before.
With the refreshing wind of the night still coming in through the window, Plagg spoke for the first time since Adrien had gotten home from the interview earlier.
"Why don't you get some sleep? If cheese isn’t left to ripen for long enough in a nice, dark place, it will never mature!"
Gabriel was gone.
The interview was over.
Why was that sequence of thoughts so comforting?
Tomorrow would be a new day.
A new day that would start with an empty breakfast table, but no stern talking that made him want to crawl out of his skin either.
"Can you turn the lights off, Plagg?"
It was only after the Kwami had flicked the switch that Adrien realized he hadn't even changed into his pajamas yet.
He couldn't even prepare for bedtime on his own without making a mistake, huh?
He opened his mouth to call out for the Kwami again, and closed it right away before walking over to turn the lights on by himself. He really wasn't in the mood for his nightly skincare routine.
Surely missing a day wouldn't hurt.
~(X)~
Breakfast was, to no one's surprise, unfulfilling.
That morning it consisted of a single poached egg garnished with two baguette slices. Artfully arranged as always, Adrien stared at the plate as he fought to stay awake. His sleep had not exactly been repairing; after all, how could four hours of sleep plagued by faint echoes of past scoldings Adrien knew every word of ever be considered rest?
The chair that sat empty at the other side of the table felt more natural than ever. Empty.
Would the table be full someday?
Adrien mentally scolded himself. It was too early for brooding pointlessly like that. Nathalie had only gone up to talk to him to confirm the schedule for his evening classes.
No one was going to tell him what a deception his performance had been. At least not for another week.
No matter how grateful Adrien was for that, acknowledging so didn't do much for fully erasing the crushing weight of the empty chair in front of him and the way his eyelids felt like someone was pulling them together.
With a little heaviness, he made his way through breakfast. Just as he had predicted, it was not nearly enough for a full meal. He was not one to complain, but his stomach betrayed with a loud grumble as he went to grab his schoolbag.
"Kid, why don't you have some of my cheese?" Plagg offered with a weird grimace. If Adrien had to guess, it was something close to worry showing on the Kwami's face.
Adrien turned him down. He was not that desperate. At least not yet.
He was silent for the entire car ride to school. He was not feeling particularly excited at the prospect of paying attention, but at least class could be a distraction. It gave him the perfect opportunity to get out of the house. Suddenly, he found himself grateful it was Monday.
For a brief second, he thought about how it would have been had he had to stay for an entire day alone and locked in his room. With his father gone, Nathalie might have taken some pity in him and allowed him to roam the house, but if he had stayed?
Adrien shook off the thought. That had not been the case, luckily. It was a new day, a new week even. He got to see his friends, and maybe Ladybug for patrol.
He could feel his mood easing into something less cloudy and gray, despite the somewhat numb feeling not leaving him entirely. A smile he hoped with all his might didn’t look as fake as it felt crept up his face automatically as soon as he stepped a foot outside the car.
“Have a good day, Adrien,” Nathalie waved off, uncharacteristically.
Adrien might have noticed that any other day. He didn’t.
One step at a time, he headed towards the locker room, eyes still fairly droopy.
“Is day hi, Adrien nice!”
Confused, he looked around, his reaction the fastest he had had since last night. As awake as his reflexes were now, the rest of his brain wasn’t so much.
“Huh?”
“I mean, nice hi day, Adrien!”
A faint ow. If his visual processing hadn’t been as slow as the rest of his cognitive functions, he would have noticed Alya elbowing Marientte in the ribs carefully.
He shook his head, trying to awaken himself.
“I MEAN, HI ADRIEN, NICE DAY!”
“Oh, hi Marinette!”
Finally, something coherent.
“Hey, are you feeling okay?” Marinette asked, worry filling her voice.
“I’m a little tired, to be honest,” he finished off with a soft chuckle. Perfect, just the way he had rehearsed for emergencies like today. It wasn’t necessarily a lie; he did want nothing more but to run home and sleep the day away, no matter how much the idea of staying home made his stomach churn. It gave a valid reason for any out of character behavior, explained his slowness, and usually tended to make people sympathetic towards him all in one. He had kept that card under his sleeve ever since he began doing live interviews. Anything that might affect his performance, he was tired. If he was tired from studying, the media loved it even more. A perfect, studious boy, who was tired for a valid reason-
"Hey, are you sure you're only tired?" Alya asked. "Can you have some coffee or something similar? Mari and I could bring you some when we're back from her house for lunch."
"Oh, would you like some? My parents have this wonderful coffee, just strong enough to wake you up but not enough to leave you jittery, I hate when coffee does that-"
"I'm okay, really," he replied with a nervous smile. If he recalled properly, it was the most animated expression he had made in the entire morning. "I'm not even sure I'm allowed to have coffee anyways."
“Sure, whatever you say… Marinette, why don’t you walk with him to the classroom? He looks so tired I think he could fall off the stairs.”
Marinette blushed heavily, as if a heat wave had suddenly struck the school. Adrien was a little confused. It was still early and chilly enough for him to have brought an extra sweater, just in case he got any colder. He did not want to have to sit in class feeling like he did, and cold on top of it. Had she had any coffee that morning?
In any case, now he thought about it… that simple exchange had cleared his mind. A little, but it was a considerable improvement when compared to how he had woken up.
“Sure, why not. Do you wanna come, Alya? We can wait for Nino upstairs.”
“Don’t worry, didn’t he tell you? Chris wasn’t feeling well today, so he’s staying home to take care of him.”
…Nino wasn’t coming?
He could feel another wave of nothing seeping over his brain.
“Are you okay?” Alya asked tentatively.
“Sure.”
Another of the bits he counted on for a hint of stability was not going to be at school. That was okay. Nino was his best friend, but he had responsibilities and he could manage perfectly fine. Completely.
He barely registered the walk to the classroom. And most of the first lesson of the day. And the second.
By the time the bell rang, he felt a little more like a person than he had that morning. Somewhere along the middle of the second lesson, the nonsensical wordflow turned into details about the different parts of a cell. Surprisingly, having something to put his mind into seemed to take it out of the dark pit it had been for most of the morning.
Sure, the prospect of going back home for lunch pushed down his newly-improved mood a little, but his brain no longer felt filled with thick gelatin out of tiredness and numbness.
"Hey, you still up for that coffee?" Alya asked while she picked up a pencil that had dropped from her table.
Adrien looked at the empty seat beside him.
"I think I'm going to say yes, thank you."
He cringed at how formal that sounded.
"B-black or with milk?" Marinette stuttered.
In all honesty, Adrien had never been a huge coffee drinker. According to his image assistant, coffee stained his teeth and often made models unable to keep one pose still for long. Besides, whenever he had needed the energy boost for an especially early or late photoshoot, it was often plain, unsweetened black coffee, straight from the machine. He didn’t particularly dislike it, but he wasn’t dying to have some soon either.
“How do you usually have it?”
“Me?” Marinette said in a tone that was easily an octave above her regular speaking voice.
“I think I could use some suggestions. What do you think, Aly-”
Adrien looked around for the girl, to no results. “Weren’t you leaving together? Should we wait for her downstairs?”
“With how fast she left, she probably went to the bathroom,” Marinette said with a pout. She finished stuffing one last sheet into her backpack and picked it up, heading for the exit. ”...knew what she was doing, leaving me-”
“Sorry?”
Adrien thought the weird echo around words had left, but oh well.
“Oh? Me? Nah, you know me, muttering nonsense everywhere! Just… nonsense,” Marinette quickly rushed to speak. “Anyways, heh…”
“Coffee?” Adrien hoped he was recalling the conversation correctly.
“Oh right, coffee! I usually have it with a little milk, plain black is too bitter for me, yuck. I like it with five teaspoons of sugar, though. Maman says it’s too sweet like that, but how is that too sweet? I think it’s perfect.”
Adrien laughed. “I think five might be a little sugary for me, but three could be fine? If you like it better sweet, it must be good that way.”
“You’re sweet… WAIT, NO! I mean,uh, you like sweet! Sweet is good, sweet is noted! Sweet for Adrien!”
“Oh, I don’t think I’ve had anything sweet today yet, now that I think about it.”
For a brief second, he really hoped there was something sweet in his lunch.
Suddenly, his phone vibrated in his pocket.
“Sorry, Marinette, Nathalie’s here to pick me up! See you after lunch!” he waved at her as he rushed down the stairs.
Having a little bit of extra food in his system felt nice. In fact, it only contributed to his improving mood, if not to his tiredness. The gloomy halls of the mansion didn’t completely lose their eerie feeling, but felt considerably less trapping now that he had been outside for a while and his stomach felt less empty. In fact, the meal had been much better than breakfast. If he had to guess, Adrien would even dare say it felt much more filling, even more than his usual lunch, and counting the spare bits he fed Plagg.
Stern as ever, the familiar clicking of Nathalie’s heels approached the dining table right as an alarm rang in her pocket.
“It’s time to go back to school, Adrien. Have you finished yet?”
He nodded at her, cleaning his mouth with a napkin.
“Let 's go.”
Was that the corner of her mouth tugging her ice-cold look into something slightly more amiable...? The tiredness sure wasn’t yet from Adrien’s brain, he thought on the walk outside.
The ride back was slow, dreamlike even. Adrien allowed his mind to wander as he looked outside of the window, finding it to stay at nothing for the entire time. The morning sun had already warmed up the interior of the vehicle in the brief period since he left home that morning.
“Take it easy, Adrien. Have a good day of learning.”
The words awakened him suddenly. Just a few minutes more, and he would have been sleeping, Adrien realized. He quickly grabbed his backpack and made his way to the entrance.
“Bye, Nathalie!”
He heard the car engine start and leave.
Someone crashed against his shoulder.
“Oh my- Alya, I’m telling you, we are going to be SO LATE-”
“Marinette?”
“ADRIEN! I’m so sorry, I think I dropped someth- OH NO DON’T TELL ME I SPILLED YOUR COFFEE-”
Alya grabbed the girl’s shoulder, stopping her spiral.
“Hey girl, relax. I have it, remember?”
She handed Marinette a thermos and a paper bag with a wink, placing each item on each of her hands.
Marinette blinked, face blank.
“Now, what were you going to do with these?”
“OH, RIGHT! A-adrien, have these!”
She handed him the thermos first. “The coffee I mentioned earlier!”
Then, the brown bag. “And this as a side snack! Look inside! I wasn’t sure what to bring you because the coffee was already sweet so it had to be something not as sweet so I thought of a plain croissant but I bet you probably have had so many of those- And then I thought about something with a filling but most of the pastries with fillings we have are quite sweet, so I thought of this one, TA-DA!”
He opened the bag as if on cue. Inside, there was a croissant that smelled as if it had been pulled right out of the oven, along with a fruity smell he couldn’t quite place.
“Passionfruit-filled croissant!”
“That’s my- Passionfruit is my favorite flavor, how did you know?”
“Uh- hadn’t you mentioned it one time in an interview? I could bet it was an interview- Not that I watch your interviews of course! My parents were watching TV once and I happened to catch it, caught it in a very normal way, you know.”
“I can’t remember if I’m honest,” he replied with a nervous laugh and an awkward expression. Was he so tired he couldn’t even remember his own interviews? But…
“Thank you, Marinette. I really- the croissant smells really good.”
He was so lucky Plagg didn’t love pastries as much as cheese. If the Kwami held any similar love for bread, he would have been practically squirming in his pocket.
“Go ahead, take a bite! Not that you have to do it right now, of course, only if you want to!”
Actually, he did want to. He broke off a piece, making sure to catch some of the filling.
Adrien had eaten many fancy foods, but nothing like this in his entire life.
“Marinette, I love it!”
“Really?”
“Told you,” Alya whispered into Marinette’s ear.
He could only nod, already having another bite. This time, he also had a sip of coffee.
Adrien’s eyes widened as he felt life flowing through his veins, or something very similar. Was this what coffee could taste like when it was not cold and straight from a machine?
A smile adorned his features.
“Thank you, Marinette.”