Jerk in Sheep's Clothing

The Plot Thickens

Adrien swung his sword about absentmindedly, his thoughts on something other than fencing strategies for practice in ten minutes. It had been two whole weeks since Henri had arrived at school, and nothing had gotten better. In fact, if Adrien was being completely honest with himself, things were kind of worse.

Marinette was spending all her time with Henri. She walked to class with him, sat in the back row with him, ate her lunch with him, and even hung out afterschool and on weekends with him. They barely spent a moment apart. Which wouldn't have been so bad, except that it seemed as if the more time she spent with Henri, the less time she spent with everyone else.

Marinette had not spoken with Adrien very often before, that was true. But now she scarcely even said hi to him when she walked past him in the halls with Henri. It seemed as of whenever the brunette boy was around, he somehow triggered a force of some sort that made Adrien invisible. Mari hardly even responded to his texts anymore.

Adrien had been expecting, or rather hoping, that the sick feeling Henri gave him would simply fade away over time. But the results were quite opposite. The longer Henri stayed, the more the sickly sensation inside of Adrien grew and grew, until just looking at Henri would make him dizzy and nauseous.

Adrien sighed, pushing his bad feelings to the bottom for now, and went off to the yard to begin.
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Plop! Adrien fell on his rear end once more. Getting back up for the fifth time that afternoon, he wielded his sword.

"Engarde!"

He waited for his fencing partner to strike back. Instead, the opponent in the red suit stood still. Adrien repeated the phrase.

In response, Kagami lifted away her mask, and Adrien saw the concern on her face. "You seem off today.", she said in her usual monotone. "Is something bothering you?"

Adrien was quick to shake his head. "No! Of course not!"

Kagami narrowed her dark eyes at him. The blond relented. He knew he could not hide anything from her. She could see through anyone's phoniness almost instantly.

"Fine.", he moaned. "Its...Its my friend, Marinette. We haven't talked in a while."

A soft gasp escaped Kagami's lips. Not talked? How was this possible? She had known from the start that Marinette was absolutely head over heels for Adrien.

"Did you have a disagreement?"

Adrien shook his head. "No...there's this new guy in school. Ever since he showed up, she's kinda been ignoring me. I know I should be happy that she has a new friend and all, but..." He didn't finish.

Kagami pursed her lips. "But?", she pushed him to go further.

Adrien braced himself. "I can't explain why...but something about him rubs me the wrong way. Ever time I look at him, I get this really bad feeling, like I'm gonna throw up or something. Which is totally weird because he's never said a word to me, but he gave me this weird look and...I just don't feel like I can trust him. And its driving me crazy that I don't know why I feel this way about him!"

Kagami puckered her lips, pondering Adrien's words. Finally, she said, "Perhaps you don't like him because you're jealous."

She looked at him, waiting for a reply.  He lifted his mask, and Kagami saw the annoyed look at his face.

"Jealousy? Why would I be jealous of him?" First Plagg, now Kagami?

The fencer paused. From where she stood, it seemed like the most logical explanation. This new boy shows up and steals all of Marinette's attention, and Adrien had already admitted to feeling ignored by her. To support her thesis, Adrien had always been rather dense. He had to have been, to not recognize that Marinette had a crush on him, even though it was quite clear to literally everyone else. Perhaps he just never experienced jealousy before and therefore, could not identify it.