It was Adrien's birthday, and Jeanne was assuming he'd be spending it in the same way he had for the past couple years. There would be no party, no celebration, and a stupid ballpoint pen from Father. She could already hear him moving around in his room, and Plagg's high pitched voice wishing him a happy birthday. She got out of bed and slipped on a robe. It was her duty to make his day good as well. On her way over, she took out the present she'd gotten, hiding it behind her back. She opened the door between their rooms to see her brother's kwami shoving a piece of camembert in his face.
"Well, you know what they say." She leaned on the doorframe. "It's the thought that counts."
"The thought isn't going to stop me from smelling this stupid cheese all day." Adrien glowered, holding his nose. Plagg shrugged and ate the camembert himself. The scent of the cheese did linger though, as Adrien had expected.
"Aw, I'm sorry." She ruffled his hair. "I'll lend you my perfume if you want."
"Which one?" Jeanne had a vast collection of perfumes in her closet, most of which she'd been given for various Agreste promotions. Some were amazing. Some were...less than stellar.
"Whichever one you want." She promised. "But first, your gift." She presented the box to him. She'd wrapped it in red paper with black polka dots.
"Did you do this on purpose?" He asked.
"I don't know. Have you been talking about a certain superhero nonstop for the past year or so?" She batted her eyelashes innocently. Adrien muttered something she was sure was very rude and grabbed the box from her.
"Oh come on, I'm your big sister! It's my job to tease you!"
"You're the worst." He said, but he was smiling.
"You always say that. Now open my gift." She bounced on the balls of her feet as he tore off the paper. He nearly dropped the box once he saw what it was.
"No way." Adrien's face lit up. "This is the limited edition Ladybug action figure! They only made like ten of these! How did you get this?!"
"I waited in line for an entire day." She said. "It wasn't easy, let me tell you that. But it was worth it to see you smile." He threw the box aside and hugged her, muttering multiple thank you's into her shoulder. She squeezed him, using one hand to ruffle his hair. It was always worth it to see him smile.
"Now, about that perfume." The two of them ended up trying a dozen perfumes until they found one that made Adrien smell less like cheese. It wasn't perfect, but it would do.
"Thanks." Adrien said.
"No problem." Jeanne shut the perfume closet. "Now, while you're here, help me pick out a dress."
"A dress? Why?"
"It's your birthday!" She said, grabbing his arm. "I want to look nice! Who knows, this might be the year you actually get a party!"
"You really think so?"
"Maybe." Jeanne forced herself to smile. That had not been a good decision she decided. She'd gotten his hopes up. The odds that Gabriel was finally going to throw his youngest child a party were very slim. Adrien would get the same goddamn pen and go to bed a year older and just as disappointed as always. She stood back and scratched her arm while Adrien rifled through her wardrobe.
"Jeanne!" She stopped and looked down at her arm. She'd drawn blood. Adrien dropped the dress he'd been holding and grabbed the box of bandages Jeanne kept on her bedside table.
"Sorry." She said.
"You don't need to apologize." He said, wrapping up her arm. "What's bothering you?"
"I shouldn't have gotten your hopes up."
"Hope isn't a bad thing, Jeannette."
"In our lives it is."
She put on the dress Adrien had picked out, along with some stylish pumps, and the two of them went down to the dining room. As expected, they were eating breakfast alone. The cook brought them their meals and Nathalie arrived to give them their schedules.
"Your schedules." She handed each of them a tablet.
"Thank you Nathalie." Jeanne said.
"Thanks." Adrien echoed. "Hey, um, did my father get back to you about my birthday party?" For the briefest moment Jeanne saw a glimmer a hope in her brother's eyes. Nathalie tensed up.
"Well, um- He..." She struggled to find an answer. "Doesn't think that would be a good idea."
"Course not..." Adrien's face fell. He finished his meal and got up to leave.
"Happy birthday Adrien." Nathalie said as he left. Then she and Jeanne were alone in the cavernous dining room.
"Father said what he always said, didn't he?" Jeanne asked, finger skimming over the tablet.
"As if we expecting anything less." Nathalie collected Adrien's plate and sighed heavily. "He gave me the pen and everything." She started to leave the room, stopping at the entrance. "Dr. Delacroix is coming today, don't forget that." Jeanne stared at her plate, listening to the sound of Nathalie's heels clicking on the marble floors, slowly getting farther away. How could she forget the weekly psychiatrist appointment? She got up, taking her dishes to the kitchen herself. She had at least an hour before Delacroix arrived and grilled her on all the usual things. Was she taking her meds, was she having any suicidal urges, the usual. She collapsed face first onto her bed. No makeup, so she didn't have to worry about smudging anything. Her schedule didn't involve going outside all day. Just like always.
"But don't you worry my dear," she put on an exaggerated male voice. "I'm here for you." She pulled out her sketchbook and turned to the drawing of the prince.
"Of course you are, Alban." She smiled softly.
"Who is Alban?" Her father's voice from the doorway startled her. Jeanne scrambled and tried to hide the portrait, but it was too late. Gabriel took the book from his daughter's hands.
"Ah, another one of your pictures." He put it on her desk. "You had me worried for a moment."
"I'm sorry, Father." She sat up, hands folded primly in her lap. "I was simply trying to amuse myself."
"So long as you behave, it's fine." He turned away, walking back to the door. "Dr. Delacroix has come early. He wanted my opinion on your current state." As though Gabriel actually paid attention to her mental state, she thought bitterly.
"Should I be expecting him in soon?"
"In a few minutes, yes."
"Thank you, father."
Gabriel walked to the door and she half expected him to just leave. But he didn't.
"This is...This is helping you, isn't it?" He asked, his back still to her. "Delacroix said that only you can determine that for yourself."
"It is helping, thank you." It was that occasional tenderness that made her even more conflicted. She wanted so badly to believe that her father no longer cared about her nor her brother, but those moments made her doubt her hatred.
"You should get back to work." She said. "I'm sure you're quite busy." He left just as quickly as she'd expected him to.
"Couldn't even look at me." Jeanne muttered.
The session with Delacroix went the way all her sessions with him went. The two discussed her medications levels, how she was feeling, did she think the meds were making a difference. It was alright, but not her favorite thing. The sessions with him were certainly better than with past psychiatrists though. The ones her father had hired were always too cold and clinical, like her father when he was working. When that was over, she had time to herself. Having exactly one friend, she decided to give him a call to kill time. She dialed his number and listened as the phone rang.
"Hello?"
"Hey Théo." She said, relaxing a little at his voice.
"Jeanne!" There was a clatter on the other end of the phone. "How are you? We haven't talked in forever!"
"I'm fine. Is this a good time? I heard a lot of loud noises."
"Everything's fine." Théo said. "The mayor just commissioned me to do a statue of Ladybug and Chat Noir and everything has been crazy lately with that. I knocked over a couple trays when I answered the phone. I'm...I'm gonna have to pick that up later."
"No way! The mayor commissioned you? That's great Théo!"
He laughed. "Yeah, it's a real honor. And he's paying me really well, so no crazy part time jobs for a little."
"Remember to sleep." She said, shifting effortlessly into mom mode, something she'd perfected in the past two years.
"Thanks, I needed the reminder." He yawned. "I should get back to work though. This is a pretty big project and all. Sorry to cut the conversation short."
"Don't worry about it." She said. Downstairs, she heard the front door slam shut. "I need to go too. Adrien's home."
"Say hi to him for me."
"I will." She hung up and put the phone on her bedside table. Slamming was not a good sign. Either Adrien was in a bad mood or Father was. The latter was arguably worse. She crept out of her room and down the stairs to the front entrance, careful to stay out of sight. There was Gabriel at the top of the foyer stairs, but it wasn't Adrien standing at the bottom of the stairs. It was his friend. Nino, wasn't it?
"Look, I know you don't want Adrien to have a party," Nino was saying. "But it's his birthday, dude- I mean, sir- it's all he wants." Jeanne nearly groaned out loud. That poor boy. She didn't want him to have to get dragged into the shitstorm that was their family, and she was sure Adrien felt the same. But it was sweet that her brother had finally found a friend who cared so much.
"No." Gabriel said. "That's final."
"That's messed up!" Nino said. "He never screws up in class, he always does whatever you tell him. Photoshoots, fencing, Chinese, piano-" While he spoke, Adrien entered silently through the front door, looking rather surprised to see Nino there.
"Nino? You're here." He couldn't help but smile a little.
"Anything for my best bud." Nino patted Adrien's shoulder then turned back to Gabriel. "Show some awesomeness, du- I mean, sir, please." It was almost painful to watch as her father glowered down at Nino. Jeanne began to step out, try to argue for Adrien finally having a real birthday, but her father's harsh voice drove her back to a place where none of them could see her.
"Listen, young man. I decide what's best for my son." He practically snarled. "In fact, I've just decided that you're a bad influence and you're not welcome in my house ever again. Leave now!"
"Father, he was just trying to do something cool for me." Even Adrien's protests were no use though. Gabriel disappeared and Nathalie stepped in to try and control the situation. Jeanne's hands were in fists by her side. When Adrien's friend was shown out she went after him.
Nino hunched his shoulders and stormed away from the Agreste mansion. Well, it was settled, Adrien's father was seriously uncool. It just wasn't fair! Adrien was just a kid, he deserved to have a party.
"Hey." Someone caught Nino's arm and pulled him back. He recognized the person holding his arm as Adrien's sister. He'd seen her in tons of magazines. She was a lot shorter in person.
"I'm sorry about Father." She said, offering an apologetic smile as she conveyed the same message her brother had a moment before. "He's very set in his ways. I think throwing a party would be great. Do you want to plan it with me? We can hold it somewhere else. The park maybe?" She had an eager enthusiasm behind her words that just made Nino even more upset.
"He doesn't let you have parties either, does he?"
Jeanne's smile faltered and went out completely. "We've never had a birthday party. Neither of us." She let go of Nino's arm. "I'm sorry. You don't deserve to be drawn into our family drama."
"Adults ruin everything." Nino muttered, pulling his arm from Jeanne's grip. She sighed and headed back inside. Wonderful. Fan-fucking-tastic. Well, time to do damage control. Adrien was in the dining room, picking at his lunch.
"Hi Jeanne." He said, not even looking up.
"Hey." She sat down next to him where another plate was set for her. "Sorry about the thing with Nino."
"It's no big deal." He pushed his food around the plate. "I should be used to it by now, right?"
"Don't talk like that." She said. "I'm not allowed to spiral into depression so neither are you. We'll throw you a party. And I will sneak that boy back into this house."
"You'll get in trouble."
"What's he going to do, yell at me?" Jeanne asked, smiling tightly. "He's too afraid I'll shatter like glass to do that. Worst case scenario, I just get grounded. It won't be that different from normal."
"Jeanne, you don't need to do that. I can handle disappointment." He insisted.
"Look, my life's already in shambles, Adrien." She stuffed a forkful of salad in her mouth. "The least I can do is make sure you get out alright."
"Your life isn't in shambles."
"Just eat your lunch."
Both of them knew they weren't going to get anywhere with this conversation. Both were in foul moods and if they tried to talk while like this it ended with anger and/or tears. Jeanne offered to walk him back to school once they'd finished their lunch and were feeling better.
"Sure. I guess." He shrugged.
"Nathalie! I'm taking Adrien back to school!" Jeanne yelled up the foyer stairs. She frowned when there wasn't an immediate answer. "Nathalie? Father?"
"They're probably busy." Adrien said.
"Probably." Nathalie really needed to get paid more for all the shit that woman put up with. The siblings opened the mansion doors...And found a crowd of Adrien's classmates.
"Happy birthday!" The crowd chanted. Jeanne blinked. Oookay. This was new. Not a bad development, but new.
"Looks like you're getting your party after all." Jeanne said, smiling and nudging him in the ribs. But Adrien wasn't smiling. She followed his gaze and stopped smiling as well.
"Hey, hey, hey, birthday boy. Guess what? Daddy's gone. While the cat's away, the mice will play." It wasn't hard for the two of them to figure out that the ridiculously dressed person standing on top of the bubble was Nino. It still sounded like him, and with Jeanne's artistic predisposition to memorize the anatomy and facial features of everyone around her she knew instantly who it was.
"The Bubbler's brought all yo homies together for one single-sole purpose, to ce-le-brate!" The Bubbler hopped down, landing in a DJ booth neither of them had even noticed was there. Of course there was a DJ booth. "Let's get this party started!" The other teeneagers were screaming and cheering.
"This is actually kind of nice." Jeanne said, mostly to herself. It sucked that Adrien was going to have to go transform right now. Using his sister as cover, Adrien ran back inside. This caused some of the excitement to die down.
"Come on everybody. I brought you here to party!" The Bubbler said, the lack of happiness not going unnoticed. "So dance or you'll join the adults up in the sky!" That...That was not good. Jeanne backed into the mansion and ran to find Adrienn. He was in his room, having an intense debate with Plagg about whether or not to actually join the party.
"Okay, just...Just a heads up." She said in between gasping breaths. "If we don't look like we're having fun he's apparently going to bubble us like he did the adults. So...That's something to consider."
"But this might actually be fun." Adrien said. "I can actually have a party for once!" As bad of an idea as Jeanne thought this was, Adrien looked so happy, so excited. She bit her tongue and smiled.
"Let's go then."
The party was...nice. Neither sibling really had a level to judge parties, but they thought it was a good party. Even if the presence of Chloé made them a little uncomfortable. They'd known her for years, sure, and she was practically their only friend, but she could be a real bitch sometimes. Chloé may have been 5 years younger than Jeanne, but the older girl constantly worried that if she tried to set Chloé straight, she'd become a victim herself. People in power had a tendency to do that if you disagreed with them. But she had to stand up to her fears at some point. One of the worst parts of Chloé was the fact that she never took no for an answer. Multiple times during the party, Jeanne tried to discreetly tell Chloé that Adrien did not in fact like her in that way. Subtlety apparently wasn't the way to go, as it went right over the younger girl's head. Jeanne moved to the edge of the party and got herself some punch. Aside from the adults being whisked away, this really wasn't so bad as far as Akuma attacks went. Adrien was happy at least. Although...No one else looked very happy. Adrien's classmates all looked sad, going through the motions in fear of being bubbled. Suddenly the music changed and Jeanne saw Chloé saunter up to Adrien, obviously intent of getting a slow dance in. The two did dance, but Jeanne broke it up before Chloé could get any action.
"Adrien's obviously getting very tired, I think he should take a rest." She said, forced smile firmly in place.
"Oh, okay." She was always surprised how easily Chloé believed her.
"You need to learn to tell that girl no." Jeanne hissed, steering Adrien off to the side. "Otherwise she'll be trying this shit for the rest of our lives."
"Why can't you tell her?" Adrien asked.
"Because..." Jeanne trailed off, shifting uncomfortably.
"What makes you think she's even going to listen to me?" Adrien settled down on a bench, folding his arms. "If anything, she'd listen to you. You're the older one." Before the argument could continue further, Ladybug appeared, chucked a record at the Bubbler, and promptly disappeared.
"Was that-?"
"Yeah."
"Do you think she's coming back?"
"Eventually." Out of the corner of her eye she saw Marinette appear on the outskirts of the party with her friend Alya. Huh. So she'd finally showed up.
"I'm gonna get back to enjoying my party now." Adrien got up and stretched. "You good here?"
"Yeah." She waved her brother away, going back to people watching. One of Adrien's classmates wasn't dancing. This time, the Bubbler had noticed.
"Hey, you." The villain jumped down. "Why aren't you having fun?"
In typical sulky teenage fashion, the boy replied, "None of your business."
"Then I'm going to make it my business." The Bubbled pulled out what Jeanne assumed was supposed to be a sword from a sheath on his back. Except...it looked more like a bubble wand. Before any of them knew what was happening, the boy was in a bubble and floating away. The anxiety began to set in again. This party was for Adrien, she knew that, but what if her brother did something to piss off the villain? The Bubbler had returned to the stage now, with Adrien joining him.
"Hey Paris! How you doing?" He crowed into the mike. Jeanne chewed on her thumbnail as the crowd of teenagers was threatened into cheering by the Bubbler's sword. She couldn't take it anymore, running inside. She hid herself in her room, wrapping herself in a cocoon of blankets. She blocked out all the sound around her, focusing only on her breathing.
When she opened her eyes again, it was because Adrien was shaking her shoulder.
"Look at what Father gave me!" He said, shoving an item in her face. No mention of the akuma incident, thankfully. She took the item from him, turning it over in her hands. It was a blue scarf, handmade from what she could tell. Gabriel had finally decided to give Adrien a decent gift it seemed. She smiled a little, then caught sight of the name stitched in one of the seams. She quickly folded it up again and handed it back to Adrien.
"It's lovely."
It was a few days before Jeanne could finally thank the true giver of the scarf. She was at school to pick Adrien up when she saw her target walking her friend away.
"Marinette!" Jeanne's voice stopped the younger girl cold in her tracks. She turned around slowly, forcing herself to smile. What could Jeanne possible want with her?
"H-Hey Jeanne." She stammered. "What's up?"
"I wanted to say thank you."
Marinette blinked. "For what?"
"I know you made the scarf Adrien's so crazy about." Jeanne said, smiling. "Father always gives him the same stupid ballpoint pen every year, so there's no way he'd suddenly have Nathalie get such a nice scarf. Not to mention, Marinette is stitched on one of the seams. He hasn't seen it yet, so I thought I'd just let him live the dream for a little longer." She glanced back at her brother. "This is the first time I've seen him so happy since..." She shook her head. "It's been awhile since he's gotten this excited over anything. So thank you." She kissed Marinette's cheek and was suddenly gone, running back to the limousine, back to her glass cage.