Don't Remember Me Like This

Chapter 2

A few hours earlier.
The morning in Paris was bright. The French birds had raised early and the Parisians could hear their singing entering through the windows. The air kept a fresh smell of life and spring and walking down the streets of the big city you could perceive the fragrance of new baked bread and pastries coming from the best bakers in Paris, Tom and Sabine's Boulangerie Patisserie. It was a Tuesday and and the streets were busy, all the citizens were awake owning the roads as they walked. The city was alive.
Our two characters were both getting ready for the day they had ahead of them. Ironic how two people so made for each other were each other contrasts if you just acknowledged them this time of the day.

Marinette woke up by an impulse, she was going to be late for school! Why didn't she wake up by the alarm? It was off? How could she be such a disaster?

"Marinette! Breakfast is ready!"

Breakfast! Yum! She ran down the stairs and a flash of lightning catched her as she entered the bright room of joy and constant sounds coming from every corner.

"Tom! You have to take out the bread out of the oven!"
"I just did!"
"Did you turn it off?"
"Good morning Marinette! Have you slept well?"
"Tom! The oven!"
"Yes! Yes! I will turn it off!"

"Aha! Slept almost as well as sleeping beauty!" Marinette had now entered the busy kitchen and gave her parents a kiss on their checks.

The apartment was filled by love, laughs and happiness. Marinette was never alone, she was constantly hugged by people who cared, by life. She was always cheerful, looking at the future with wide open eyes, living day by day with delight like a path of roses showing her the way to go. She never dared to question her reality, it seemed so obvious, so secure, so evident. The future was so crystal clear that she never imagined that it ever would change, or even end. Was it naive of her? To assume that the life she owned was set in stone?

Because a couple of hours from now, the world she so well knew would take a turn, an inevitable incident that would have no way back. A life would be lost, the life of her love, even though she was unaware of it by this time. Ignoring the doomed future that followed her, the young girl was about to continue ingeniously with her day, not knowing her world was about to end. Could you blame her for welcoming the day with open arms? To smile and laugh when her cat was about to die? If she just had known things may have been different, but she didn't, she didn't know and you couldn't blame her for that.

And while Marinette was hugged with love and compassion, beginning the bright day which soon would be tinted by the dark red colour of blood, Adrien was sitting alone on a cold designer chair welcoming the day with a well-made breakfast, him too not knowing that this would be his last. There was more food than he could ever manage to finish by himself, sitting by a table that was meant to be used by a bigger company than just a lonely teenage boy. The grey shades of the furniture around him felt cold and the silence made the most insignificant sounds perceptible. This painting of him would make any human who saw it feel empty. Not him though. He was so used to this experience. To be let down by his father, the loneliness, that he didn't even notice it anymore. This was his reality, the only one he knew. That didn't make it any easier though, even if he couldn't really address the reason for the coldness he experienced, the consequences of his father's actions grew inside him as an overwhelming darkness. 

"Adrien," a firm voice said while the big gates of the dining room opened. He first expected to find Nathalie standing there, but the voice of the speaker was darker, heavier. A suited man came in through the door with seriousness, cold as frozen ice. To his surprise, it was his father who narrated those words, it was unusual of him to approach him directly without arranging a time in beforehand. "I'm in a hurry so I will be quick. Mrs. Bustier sent me last night your latest grades as I asked her to. I was not expecting this type of disappointment from you."

"Father..."

"I haven't raised you to get pleased by something as disgraceful as an A-, have I?"

"I will do better"

"That's the least I expect from you. Besides, I've noticed various changes in your schedule the last couple of weeks. Since it seems you aren't able to fulfill your obligations, you are forcing me to take measures. I prohibit you from meeting your friends until the problem is solved."

"But father!"

"This conversation is over"

Without him being able to stop it, a tear ran down his cheek, yet unaware of what actually caused his sadness. Was it his pride? Was it the misery of not being able to get to see his friends? Or was it the shame of never being enough for his father? Trying, sacarafing all his willpower to be the son he knew he wished for, for him to be proud, to not be in the way, to not be a constant reminder of her, that his beloved wife was gone forever.

Trapped, that is how he felt. He was like a prisoner within the walls of his own house. The life his father had doomed him to live. Finally, since he started school, he had felt free, a sigh of relief where he no longer had a hand choking him and stopping him from breathing. Adrien had noticed a feeling he hadn't experienced in a long time since his mother had left them both, pure happiness. For once he was able to forget what was waiting for him at home.

Going to school, meeting true friends, joking around, to laugh, to smile... His and his father's mourning had forced him to forget how being alive warmed his heart, how good it felt. Being Chat Noir had let him run away from his prison and finally be his true self, run from the responsibilities and, above all, run towards the one and only person who actually knew him, Ladybug. He didn't know her real identity, but that didn't matter anymore. She was his best friend. His partner. Someone who accepted his true self. And even though his love was unrequited, that was enough for him.

He was sitting down in the room looking down not moving a muscle. Adrien felt shameful, embarrassed by himself seeing in his mind the cold eyes of his father staring at his soul with disgrace. "How can I make it right?" he asked himself with a tear running down his eyes. There was so much effort he had wasted trying to please this apathetic man of stone. "I just wish I was enough, for once" he thought for himself in almost a whisper.

"Adrien, time to go to school!", Nathalie's voice entered the room and interrupted his grieve.

He closed his eyes within seconds in an attempt to recompose himself, trying to hide the redness that coloured his green eyes, clearing his voice from the sobbing he had trapped inside. Could you blame a teenage boy to ask for love and compassion for just once?

"I'm coming!" he said faking a stable, normal or even slightly happy voice.

When he heard the door close with Nathalie having left the room he sighed. Breathing heavily he looked up, he was going to do it, he was going to be able to smile, he convinced himself. He was going to go to school and continue with his day as normally, he would laugh and he would joke around and everyone would believe that he was fine, maybe even himself.

He forced himself to not think about his father. Maybe, just maybe if he did so the problem would go away, at least for just a while and that would be enough. And so, he faked a smile and went out through the front door, ready to start this day, ready to start the last day of his life.