My Fault - Adrienette FF

The Restaurant

MARINETTE

What a damn idiot! As I climbed the stairs, stomping as loud as I could, I couldn't stop thinking about the ten minutes I'd spent with my new idiot stepbrother.

How could he be such a dickhead, a stuck-up psycho?

God, I couldn't stand him, and there was no way I could deal with living with him.

It was bad enough that he was my mother's new husband's son, but after what had happened, my annoyance had reached stratospheric levels. This was supposed to be the perfect adorable little boy my mother had told me about?

I hated how he talked to me, how he looked at me. As if he were better than me just because he had money.

He had looked me up and down and then laughed...laughed right in my face. I slammed the door behind me as I walked into my room, but the place was so big no one would hear me. It was night out, and barely any light entered my window. In the darkness, the sea was black, and I couldn't see the dividing line between it and the sky.

Nervous, I hurriedly turned on the light. I went straight to the bed and jumped on it, staring up at the beams in the ceiling. To top it off, I was supposed to have dinner with them. Did my mother not realize that the last thing I felt like doing right now was being surrounded by people? I needed to be alone, to rest, to take stock of all the changes happening in my life, to accept them and learn to live with them, even if deep down I knew that was impossible.

I grabbed my phone, not sure whether to call my boyfriend, Jake.

I didn't want him to worry when he heard the bitterness in my voice. I'd only been in Paris an hour, and already his absence stung.

Ten minutes after I went up, my mother came in. At least she bothered knocking, but then she walked right in when I didn't answer.

"Marinette, in fifteen minutes we need to be downstairs," she said patiently.

"You say that like it takes an hour and a half just to walk down the steps," I responded, sitting up in bed.

My mother had let her black hair down and combed it.

She looked elegant. We hadn't even been here two hours, and already she looked like a different person.

"I'm saying this because you need to change clothes first." She ignored my tone. Not understanding, I looked down at my outfit.

"What's wrong with how I'm dressed?" I asked defensively.

"You're wearing sneakers, Marinette. We have to dress up tonight. You don't think you're going to go out in shorts and a T-shirt, do you?" she asked, exasperated.

I stood up and faced her. My patience with this day was at an end.

"Let's see if you can get this through your head, Mom. I don't want to go to dinner with you and your husband, I have no interest in getting to know his spoiled demon of a son, and I'm certainly not getting dressed up for it." I tried to control my overwhelming urge to take her car and drive off into town.

"Stop acting like a five-year-old, put on your clothes, and come to dinner with me and your new family."

Her tone was harsh. But when she saw my expression, her face relaxed, and she said, "I'm not asking you to do this every day. Just tonight. Please. For me." I took a few deep breaths, swallowed down all the things I wanted to say, and nodded.

"Just tonight."

When my mother left, I walked into the closet. Disgusted with everything and everyone, I looked for an outfit that would be comfortable and that I wouldn't hate. I wanted to show them I could be an adult, too.