Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“I Love You”

What is the meaning of such a brief sentence hovering over your lips? Why do I feel my stomach churn when I see affection others display outside of this all too familiar prison called "home?"

What is love? I can't quite grasp the concept.. let alone how others can properly communicate such vulnerabilities. Often times, I put up a farce in front of others. I do it so it won't hurt. I force into place this wall that I vow won't crumble but even so,  it still does.  

Why does it still hurt when I expect it? When I should be "ready?" (No one can be prepared for abuse- no matter how much it repeats. It always scars. ) Why does what I've always wished for never seem to measure up to what it I wanted? I thought this was freedom- finally getting to be separate of that prison I call "home." How is it I still feel alone? Why am I so different?  

Sometimes, I hate myself for it. I resent how if I let my walls crumble, people take the bricks and toss them right back at me. They love to crush any hope I have of ever really  being me. Why do they only like the image I've been forced to into? The one who isn't truly me? 

For the first time in my life, I finally have been allowed into a space outside of my father's grasp. People who don't know him even if they know of him. Teenagers! Ones with lives completely different than mine, people not directly connected to my father or how the media portrays me.  

I was so incredibly excited that first day. Finally, freedom. But of course, when I actually took my first step away from that car, fear became my noose. Natalie sent my father's voice over the phone as a "congratulations." A reminder of "trust".. a promised threat to make sure not to disappoint. Or else.

I've never been in a situation like this- entrusted to be on my own. I know (have had it beat into me) that I cannot afford to be hasty. I cannot shame the Agreste name. Must stay with those only my father deems acceptable.

The only reason I'm even here is probably due to how the public percieves my father- expects him to allow me to enter high school. Who knows what else. It's no sudden kindness. I gave up on that from my father long ago. 'But, what if?' A part of me still longs..  I can't think like that. I'd be an idiot if I were to let myself get hurt by him the same way again. If I don't expect better then there's no disappointment, right? Yet my heart still hopes whilst my mind speaks against it. 

I am awestruck at the interactions of "normal" teenagers. What is this language they speak? And no, I don't mean French, even if I suddenly forget how to speak my first language the moment I step foot in that institution.

I am amazed by how easy the students make it seem. How they excitedly bounce around each other and weave sentences and context clues that are by lines I've never known. They quote pop culture and whatever else a normal teenager would, had they grown up unlike me. I am lost within a sea of strangers and all I know is this will be the closest I'll ever get to someone who understands what it's like to be me.

When I saw Chloe in that class I felt disappointment. I mean, I knew she'd be there as she had so very enthusiastically made sure to point out to me time and time again. I hated how I felt comfort in a familiar presence when all it did was suffocate me in an already incredibly difficult situation.

This was supposed to be somewhere I can be free, or at least freer than I ever have been. I know I'm still chained by my father's grip here, but it's a trial allowing me to entertain thoughts I can't help but bubble up. I shove them down my throat before my father can. He must never know what I think. I was taught the consequence of expressing myself to him far before I stepped foot into this school. I will not fail him (learn the consequences of being a disappointment again).

I can't help the pit of discomfort and anger that bubbles up in my stomach when I see Chloe acting out. She has no excuse for her behavior and although I can't risk telling her off how I'd like to, I know she only takes a "no" from me to reconsider.

I don't get why I'm disappointed when even if I haven't seen her misdeeds directly they've been incredibly clear. Why'd I believe she'd change? Be better? She never has wanted to be.. Maybe it's just my wishful thinking and want of a real friend rather than connections. Or that I see myself and have the kind of willingness to change even when my situation doesn't allow it. 

I've always struggled when it comes to reading others. I don't have the same understanding everyone else seemingly does when other's interact with me. It's even more complicated when most are only there to go after someone I'm not- to serve their own greeds and wants related to my father and I. 

I wish I could throw all these feelings away. I wish I could "stomach" it and just suck it up, get on with the day. But, I'm just so tired. I'm so exhausted each and every day by being someone I'm not. I don't know what to do about it. There's nothing I can do. I'm stuck here and I don't think I'll ever get out. Three years of this school? No, even beyond this school I know I'll be in my father's grip. I can't leave his hold when he holds the power over every single aspect of my life. How can I leave when everyone knows my face? How can I ask for help when all will spit back at me that I'm just being an ungrateful, spoiled little rich brat? That someone as great as the Gabriel Agreste could never be so creative in cruelty? 

I resent him. I hate him. I hate my father for all he does to me. However, what I hate most is how I still look for him. I still seek his approval and his praise... his "love." Deep down, I know he doesn't know what love is. Maybe he once did, maybe he saw it in my mother.. or maybe he just wanted a predecessor he could control, but, he does not know the love of a parent. He does not know the love of a child. He does not know love. And I know all he has taught me is what love is not because I will never "love" someone the same he has to me.  

It takes too much energy to hold on to hatred. I still feel it, but, what can I do? Nothing is within my control. So why try? 

I take a step forward. And yet, even if it feels like a step off a cliff, I relish in the taste of it. I won't back down. I want to live. I want to feel alive. I want to be me. To finally know who me is. And my father? He'll never have a part of that.

Cat Noir? Being him? He means taking that risk- jumping and knowing that even if it is gravity that catches my fall, cats have far more than one life. That, even when if I have no life at all, Plagg will lend one to me. He breathes it into me. Has given me this opportunity to be reborn as who I choose to be.. and I think for the first time.. I'm starting to actually like me.

Chapter Text

When my alarm blares in the morning, it is always accompanied with an announcement from Natalie through the speaker placed in my room by my father. She outlines my schedule, letting me know down to the very last second what is required of me. It’s not often the expectations change, only the coldness and rigidity stand in place and force me to leave behind my dreams.

It feels violating, the constant, ever present voice. It always is accompanied by a single sentence from my father, pre-recorded and played ever since my mom’s passing. At the end of each announcement, my father’s voice says to, “make the Agreste name proud.” I know it is both a threat and a promise. At one point in my life, I foolishly believed it to be faith, but I know now how wrong I was.

I think it haunts me how the only time I ever find my father’s voice familiar are times where he himself is never present. It makes me question if I’ll one day forget it, if I never will. Some part of me thinks I never will.

Everything is timed. I never feel like I have enough of it. The shower stops hot water at the five minute mark automatically, a waterproof timer marking the countdown. I have gotten used to cold showers and quick, brief relief. I wonder what it is to be both clean and refreshed. I don’t think I remember ever feeling that way. Maybe it’s just been so long that it’s nothing I can long for. How can I want something I don’t know?

I look myself in the mirror, marking the small signs of stress and meticulously drying myself off. I comb my hair in its usual part and style it with gel. It is a “proper” look. A selected and chosen choice of my father’s that I had no say in. I wonder how normal it is to never know what your own self should look like.

The over shirt has been steamed the past night by natalie and lacks a wrinkled appearance. It’s not the only shirt or outfit I own. Yet, much like charlie brown, I am a cut and copy of the same clothing line. Perfectly designed for other’s entertainment. 

I tuck cheese into my pocket for Plagg, noting his somehow sleepy and now wakeful behavior. He yawns and gives a little smirk, “You know you could wear something else for once. Live a little! Your father wouldn’t know if you change at school.”

I sigh, repressing the urge to run my hands through my hair. “You know I can’t do that Plagg. It’d be on the headlines by the time I’m done with classes. Someone snaps a quick picture at school and suddenly my style defines my entire modeling career and how my father would question me.”

“I think you’re sneaky enough. And so what? You deserve to express yourself. Get out of the same boring outfit.”

“I wish that was true…”

Plagg rests on his head, patting it with his tiny paw in comfort.

“I’ll always support whatever choice you make. For now, you can be the cat’s meow as Chat Noir.”

I sigh, face flushing in embarrassment. ‘God. Whenever someone else engages in puns (other than my lady and I, I feel so self conscious.’

Natalie’s message rings through the room, interrupting our conversation and signaling that I have less than three minutes to make it to the dining table for breakfast.

“Guess it’s time to eat… wonder how appetizing the wonderful food will be,” I drawl sarcastically. It feels like the whole world is dragging in it’s spin. I hand Plagg some cheese. At least he can enjoy food to his heart’s content. I wish I didn’t see everything I eat as calories— numbers, instead of sustenance. I’m so tired of counting the minutes. The days. The akumatizations. I don’t get nearly enough food to account for the energy I spend.

The taste of eggs unsalted is bland and unpleasant, but it’s something I’m used to. I swallow each bite with a practiced ease, despite feeling it slide down my throat like something of a slime. I want to choke. I want to rid myself of the ruin of consumption. I want to eat as ravenously as what I hunger for. I do none of it. Instead using a cloth to clean my lips and taking a small sup of water from my glass. I do not rush, but I also do not remain slow. My pace has to be timed in a manner not sloppy, but still accounting for the appropriate time management and rhythm.

Natalie sits across from me, her constant companion of a tablet sat at the table as she scans through my assigned itinerary and she ensures I have completed my work and preparations. Last minute changes aren’t unfamiliar when it comes to my time being ever so available to the media. I am fifteen, yet children, teenagers, and even adults look at me in ways I can never reconcile with. It disgusts me. It scares me. It’s normal. “Normal.”

I set my fork down on my plate and turn to Natalie. “Will father be joining me for dinner?”

“I’m afraid Mr. Agreste has a booked schedule this evening.”

It’s nothing unexpected. The answer as it always is, yet it still leaves a pit in my stomach food can’t ever fill. His love has faded into a void I cannot reach, forever drifting apart. ‘I just wish for once I was worth his time..’

I’m such a fool. Still so naive and hopeful. I should know by now that things will never change. I should know I'll never be enough. Instead, I speak before I think and ask Natalie, "Will he ever have time?"

Natalie looks down. She always has some kind of distance, an apathetic attitude for all that she can at times show care. And with her shoulder slumped the slightest bit she lets out a small smile of reassurance and a glance to my eyes. "I can't answer that Adrien, just be grateful for the time he does have. He's a very busy man. You know this." She doesn't reach out. Contact has never been something she has allowed herself to do, always occupied by the rules set by my father. It would be too familiar to presume her role as anything motherly.

I push away the feelings of frustration and hurt, knowing that in the end, Natalie is just doing her job. "I know. Thanks anyways, Natalie."

"You're welcome. Now, I believe it's best we get you to the car so that you'll be on time. Make sure to prepare for your science lab adequately." 

"I've got all I need."

I follow the familiar path, shoes already on and knowing that as I slip into the car, this will only be the start to a very long day. It's nothing out of the ordinary. However, ordinary is something that my life will never be.

Chapter Text

I think love has always been a pedestal I have stood behind. Maybe it started from a young age, ducking out of the way of onlookers and clinging to my mother’s legs.

I was so small back then, too small to see the details which hinted at her sickness. She never got to see me reach a height taller than her and I was too young to ever hope of being able to. 

I wanted so desperately to grow. To stand beside her, instead of ducking behind. I wanted to stand tall enough to look my father in the eyes and ask why he was never around. Why did he leave? At least, that’s how I would have thought if not for my age. I was too childish and naive to consider the presence of my “papa” as temporary. I didn’t know that I would be losing my papa too. 

I wonder if I’m doing it now, if I am falling for something that I know will never be in my grasp, raising a pedestal I’ll never reach the height of. Will I ever look ladybug in the eye? Ever see her real face and my own bared soul reflected back in her eyes?

This is just temporary. It has to be. This harm to Paris— to the world cannot sustain itself. We either perish from the evil or we thrive on in the aftermath of survival and fight.

 I’m just barely fifteen. I’m only a boy who’s never felt real. I pull helplessly at the strings, tangling them in my struggle to move myself. I am tied down. I am being puppeted. I am a puppet; a marionette fighting in a game I’m unsure I’ll ever know the meaning of. What has fighting for love ever gotten me? Except hurt.

What I do know above all else is this; even if temporary, even when fleeting, I have never been one to let go of my own desperate grasp. There is so much  I want to hold on to that I don’t think I’ll ever really have. 

So, I’ll be the best I can be, falling back into a role I can play. I don’t know how to do romance and I’m still learning how to be a friend, but a partnership?
I believe that with my lady and I, I can trust that together we will fight stronger. Even if I never reach the pedestal I’ve placed her on, I know she’ll always offer a hand to help me up. Our ending will always come in the form of a fist; a “pound it.”

Chapter Text

I know that I miss you, but I don't know if Gabriel Agreste was really someone I knew. Not as my father, not as an admired public figure, and especially not as this hero everyone believes him to be. To have been. 

All my life has been dictated by his decisions, his wants, and expectations of me. What am I supposed to so now that he's gone? How is it that I miss even the parts of him that made me want to abandon the idea of this man ever being my family? The painful, grotesque, abusive way he would treat his own son?

I think a lot now about how the meaning of a word can vary in both denotation and connotation. Put into context, you are given clues to understand what is said. And yet, it is as silent as ever as I attempt to reach across from this chasm between who my father was and who I hoped him to be. Now, he will never become anything other than the meaning that all others interpret him to be. 

I think what hurts the most is the pity, the misplaced sympathy. They expect me to have been close to him— to still be searching for comfort over his loss, but instead of grief, I mostly feel relieved. He can't hurt me anymore, even if I am his legacy.