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André Glacier had been working in Paris for as long as many could remember. One could say, without a degree of dishonesty, that he was an institution to the great and wonderful city. It is said, among the people where no tourist can hear, that the man can identify one's true love in an instant, expressing the warmest of romances in the form of his art. For some, this art would be music or poetry or even criticism. But for André, his chosen medium was the scooper and the cream. Of course, the stories people tell and the complete and honest truth are not always the same thing.
The evening he saw Marinette Dupain-Cheng was, all things considered, a rather typical one. There had been seven lovers meeting for the first time, three relationships destroyed due to their incompatibility, and one closeted woman discovering her truth. André smiled whenever people saw themselves for who they truly are. He knew himself quite well, and would fight the world if he couldn't be who he was. Perhaps that's why he called Marinette over to his humble cart with a warm smile and a heavy heart.
"Oh, bonjour Monsieur Glacier," the young girl said with a smile that ached from secrets. "I was hoping to run into you with Adrien, but..." André smiled his most practiced smile. He knew the story of Marinette and Adrien all too well. Two lovers dancing around each other under the moonlit gaze of obscurity. It took him a bit longer to figure out the best flavors for the pair, which ones would set their hearts alight with love and perfection. André could admit that he had made a few mistakes along the way and he was not the one to push them towards their near-completed selves. But he nevertheless had a helping hand in the matter. A minor role, but a role nonetheless.
"Ah, I'm sure we'll run into him at some point in the day. But I have just been inspired to create a new pallet just for you. On the house." Marinette raised an eyebrow. It wasn't often that André would be so liberal in changing the flavors. There were times, years ago, when he would be insistent that only two flavors can be together. That one cannot have three flavors at once. Which was a rather awkward experience when she and Adrien were with Kagami. She would've loved to share an ice cream with both of them. But perhaps some things simply aren't meant to be.
Nevertheless, Marinette approached the cart with the lackadaisical pace of a Sunday afternoon in the summer. She tried to peer within the cart, but the ice cream man covered it rather quickly. He was still smiling that practiced mannequin smile. And his attention was on creating this new design.
"How does it work exactly?" Marinette asked with idle curiosity, "Your matchmaking skills."
A warm breeze came from André's nose as he continued his work. "It's magic. As any professional will tell you, the explanations often make things dull and miserable. The mechanics of things limit them to mere science and mathematics."
"Oh come on André," Marinette teased, "Surely there must be something you can tell me."
The ice cream man paused, if only for a moment. Dare he risk this balance with the truth. Dare he tell her everything. He knew she could keep a secret and keep it well. It took him a long time to discover her secrets. Embarrassingly so, if he was being perfectly honest. Perhaps the worst of it could've been avoided if he had figured it out sooner. If he was a cleverer man, he might have even figured out who Hawkmoth was. That could've saved lives. Instead, he was a humble ice cream man with a modest ability to understand the world around him.
But these are not things to speak of with a child, even one as weighed down by the world as Marinette Dupain-Cheng. So instead, he said, "Well, I suppose I can explain the philosophy without dampening the magic." This made Marinette smile, especially as the man motioned her to see inside his cart.
Moving to hide his newest creation while still showing the insides, André presented a wide array of flavors. From classic standbys like Vanilla and Chocolate to fantastical flavors like Chunky Cream or Rainbow Sorbet to more daring flavors like Melatonin or Heartbreak. "The skill I have," He says to the young baker familiar with the artistry of culinary, "is one that cannot be learned. I don't think it can be inherited either. It comes to me in waves. But here is the canvas of the future. I can see a number of possibilities, of romances gone by and yet to come.
"I can't see the whole future. The magic doesn't work like that. But I can see love. It's hard, you know. Choosing the right moment to tell someone who their soulmate is. Not everyone's ready to meet the person they're gonna love for the rest of their lives. Sometimes... you have to break their hearts in order to mend them for when the time was right. Once, there was a trio of lovers meant to be. I could see the ocean of yearning within them. But I could see a darkness lingering around them. Parents, most likely. Parents who would use their love for cruel ambitions. Who would break the world and, more importantly, their children. And they would abuse this love into something cruel and pointless. So I lied to them. I made Ice Cream that told them they weren't meant to be.
"I see them, every now and then. And they're happy. The three aren't together, but they're happy with the people they're with now." A light dab of water, imperceivable to the naked eye crawled out of André's eye. No one saw, the ice cream man barely even noticed. And then, he smiled the kind of genuine smile you simply can't fake. When you think of the day when everything will be ok and the magic of love will triumph over cruel reality. "But in my heart, I know. I know they'll find each other again."
Marinette, not fully grasping what she has just been told, feels a great chill down her spine. She should probably leave, see Adrien and hold him tight. Never leave his presence, never venture into the streets. Just be together forever. Instead, she placed her hand on the ice cream man's shoulder, and smiled her warmest smile. Marinette was terrible at faking smiles, almost as bad as she was at lying to everyone but herself.
"You should tell him." André looked at Marinette with a serious expression. It was cold and hostile and most of all wrong. It did not belong on this man's face. It belonged on a crueler's man's face. One who would took no delight in telling children bad news, but did so anyways.
She paused, if only for a moment, before asking "I should tell who?"
Instead of explaining, André showed Marinette his newest creation and said, "You should tell him everything." She shuddered in horror before fleeing. She didn't take the time to taste it. For many, it would appear that André Glacier was doing a rush job. Taking the most simple of flavors and adding no variety to them. Just presenting them flat to the world. For the body, he chose a plain vanilla. The same was true for the head, scooped perfectly onto the body. For the hair--which seemed to be where the majority of the work was focused on--was whip cream, sculpted to look like an organized mess of contradictions and cruelty. For the ears, two pieces of white chocolate kisses were placed on the upper portion of the head, a few centimeters from where ears are normally placed. And for the eyes were two of the shiniest blueberries André had in his cart.
For anyone else, this would be laziness.