"Adrien Agreste. How in the hell did you get up here?" There was no bitterness in her tone, no anger, mostly just naked shock. He took that as a good sign and tried one of his classic self deprecating smiles.

"The doorman knew me from TV. This face opens some doors." he paused and asked with his stomach oddly in his throat,"Does it still open this one?"

Chloé Bourgeois regarded him. That was the first real sign of how much she'd changed. The last time they'd met face to face she would have slammed the door or thrown herself at him by now. Of course she'd changed. It'd been about twelve years.

"Come in." she said finally, stepping aside. "Just keep your voice down please."

Adrien stepped into the darkened suite. It was night, but in New York that didn't mean much. Light blocking curtains kept the city's glare at bay. A diffuse light came from a dimmed nightlight in the hall and then from a landing above when they stepped into the living room.

The darkness kept Adrien's ability to really absorb the changes in his long ago friend to a minimum, but some things stood out. The ponytail remained, if anything longer and fuller. He knew she'd kept it for a while but news had been sparse lately. She also kept her trim physique, having added height but almost no width in the years since he had seen her. She was dressed in sweats, a previously unthinkable thing, and padded barefoot across the carpeting.

Adrien followed her distractedly. His own thoughts mingling with all the new information. He dropped himself almost mechanically into an overstuffed chair while Chloé folded herself up on the couch opposite with a weary slouch to her shoulders. Then she leaned down to peer into a bassinet on the floor and all previous concerns fled his mind.

"Chloé is that-" his voice rose in shock.

She waved a hand at him, emitting a soft 'shhhh' without looking up. "Audrey only just fell asleep." She looked up and gave him a harried grin,"If you had woken her up, you wouldn't leave alive."

Adrien perched on the edge of his chair, then driving curiosity pushed him to advance in a crouch the last few feet to look down at the cherubic face in repose. The infant was swaddled inexpertly amid a nest of blankets. She was small, newborn small with a mat of dark hair on her head. Questions tumbled over each other trying to be the first one out. They caused a pileup until only a single word squeezed itself between his lips.

"How?"

Chloé snorted softly and picked up a mug from the end table. She fished a teabag out and eyed the liquid dubiously. A quick sip and she made a face. "The usual way I suppose."

Adrien scooted around to sit on the couch too, no point in talking across a sleeping infant. "I guessed that much but… who?" Adrien craned to look around the suite. "Should I not be here?"

Chloé risked her tea again, wincing but pushing through. "The only people you'll offend with your presence are right here," she assured him.

Adrien moved his eyes from the baby back to Chloé. Closer he could see the colors of her makeup even in the dim lighting, a full face despite her clothing. Her profile had narrowed since he last saw her. Pictures on websites and in papers didn't really do it justice. Her tone was soft, almost sleepy. Then again, he could guess why that might be. "She's yours right?" The idea seemed so alien.

She made another face at him that had nothing to do with her tea and set the mug down. "You didn't know? I figured that's why you were here. I knew it would only be a matter of time before some tabloid ferreted it out. You're not here to find out the truth behind some salacious rumor?" Without the cup she didn't seem to know what to do with her hands so she tucked them between her knees.

Adrien shook his head, turning his gaze back to the baby. Without thinking he reached down to gently adjust the swaddle. "Nothing. This- was not at all what I was expecting." Adrien tried to wrack his mind for headlines. He'd been busy lately, but had also been finding himself drawn to them more. Nothing he could remember would hint at this. He was unsure about prying, but curiosity was killing him. "Should I not ask who the father is?"

Chloé glanced down at the baby, rocked once then asked,"Do you want something to drink?"

Without waiting for an answer she stood, picking up a small monitor from the table and turning it on. She oriented a little camera on the end table to face Audrey and walked with the monitor into the kitchen.

Adrien was left to follow her again. In the kitchen she turned on a light above the stove which cast them in a proper twilight. Adrien sat on a stool at an island table while Chloé bustled in mostly empty cabinets.

"It will have to be a mug, you've caught me in transition. I've got water, juices, teas, I can make coffee if you want to split a pot."

Adrien was still just watching her move and trying to overlay this image, this body language, with the girl he had last seen just before the end of Collége. "Have anything stronger?" he ventured.

She shook her head without looking at him. "Not since." She gestured to the monitor. "I don't keep it in the apartment. You can doordash anything from the bar down across the street 24/7 though if you want."

"Then just some water."

She poured out some orange juice in one mug and water from a filtered pitcher in another. He noticed her eyes flitting back to the monitor at nearly every pause. The newborn, like so many of its kind, wasn't budging. Chloé brought the mugs and monitor over. She set Adrien's in front of him and leaned on the high island rather than sitting, manicured nails tapping the ceramic of her mug in a protracted silence.

Adrien prompted gently,"How old is she?"

"Five weeks." Chloé glanced at the monitor again then sipped her juice.

Adrien followed suit. He wasn't sure how to proceed. His original reasons for coming here started to press back into his mind even though that same question was on the tip of his tongue.

Chloé turned her mug on the counter. "He was nice."

"Nice?"

She looked at the monitor again as she spoke. "I was in Munich, celebrating another season in the books by myself. He sat down next to me at the bar. He was nice." She glanced up then away again quickly. "Don't look at me like that. I'm allowed to be lonely."

Adrien winced,"I wasn't. I didn't mean-" He fumbled then redirected. "Does he know?"

Chloé shook her head, ponytail swishing. "I won't lie if he ever comes looking. I couldn't tell you his name though, so it's all on him." She took a long drink from her mug and glanced up at Adrien again. "Please stop that." there was a sincere pleading in her voice.

Adrien was genuinely confused. "Stop what?" He tried to read her expression, but there was a lot going on there. He'd come expecting… he didn't really know what he expected, not this.

"Looking at me like I strangled a puppy." Her eyes went back to the monitor and stayed there again. "I don't know if he actually cared, thought I was pretty, or just wanted a story about scoring with the Style Queen. It doesn't matter really." Chloé raised her gaze to Adrien again, propping her chin on one hand. There was a melancholy purr to her words as she explained. "I learned a long time ago that for people like me the price for the warmth of being held when the sun comes up is the night before."

Adrien suddenly missed Marinette more deeply than he had in a long time. It seemed cruel that anyone should be denied that warmth. Still, a little part of his mind prompted him. "But, a baby? You didn't use-?" he couldn't even finish the question.

Chloé's head fell onto her arm and she mumbled from the counter,"God, you sound like a father." She raised her chin enough to fix him with a look from where her head lay. "Of course I did, do, have since even before I left." She turned her head to look at the monitor. "Audrey is a true one percenter. Lucky me."

Adrien's mind was playing catchup, but unfortunately his mouth was connected to his thought processes and kept venting extra words into the air. "Why did you keep it then?"

Chloé pushed herself up and leaned further across the counter. She fixed him with a look that burned with a shocking hatred. The hatred wasn't directed at him, it just roiled inside of her and found the easiest exit through those sapphire eyes. "I may not have wanted to be a mother, but my baby will never *ever* feel unwanted." As quickly as it came, the fire fled leaving exhaustion and ash behind. Chloé sank to one of the stools finally and drank her juice, eyes slipping back to the monitor.

"I'm sorry." Adrien spoke into the quiet. Then hurriedly,"Not for the baby, but for being insensitive. It's just a shock. You were fifteen last I knew you. I came just to talk and now-" Adrien gestured vaguely.

It earned him a soft laugh. "I think I've always," she mimicked his gesture, "you, haven't I?"

He returned the laugh, a slight slipping of the stress. "Yeah. I guess." He looked out into the gloom surrounding the kitchen "You're raising her all alone?"

"I've got a maid who comes every other day. Though that's about to change. You were lucky to catch me Adrien. I'm moving soon."

"Moving?"

"North Shore. Downtown isn't exactly the best place to raise a child." Chloé smirked at him and added,"They'll let anyone into an apartment building these days."

Adrien let out an unguarded whistle, as one they both looked at the monitor. Audrey hadn't budged. He winced,"Sorry. So, will I have to hunt you down again or can I just have the address this time?"

Her eyes narrowed suspiciously,"Hunt me down? If you weren't here because of the baby, why did you show up at my doorstep, Adrien Agreste?"

Adrien tensed, it all came rushing back. The stress that brought him to a person so far removed from any of it. Back to a simpler time. He had been prepared but now felt awash with this new revelation. "I uh- maybe another time? It's a long story and late, and you've just," Adrien flailed again, "my entire world."

Her expression cleared, "Well I-"

A squawk from the monitor, followed immediately by a protest against a cruel world. Chloé stiffened and bolted, one hand snagging the monitor as she went. She was back in the living room by the time Adrien had risen, and by the time he got there she had Audrey up in her arms and was pacing a small circle whispering. "Shhh shhh mommy's got you. Mommy's here. It's okay, it's okay."

It wasn't okay though. Chloé's voice was distraught, she cast around in the darkness for something. She still held the now pointless monitor in one hand while cradling the baby to her chest. Finding her target she snatched up a bag with the back three fingers of that hand, still not leaving the monitor behind, and swept back down the hall past Adrien without a second glance.

He found her in an almost empty room, with a changing mat down and a diaper bin at hand, kneeling over little Audrey and working frantically to get to the baby's diaper. Little Audrey was displeased at this state of affairs and voicing her opinion one lungful of air at a time. Each new protest sent a flinch through Chloé, making her fumble with the snaps on Audrey's onesie.

"Chloé, do you need a hand?" Adrien stepped into the room, lit only by the light of the monitor.

A sniffle accompanied success in opening the onsie but a fresh diaper betrayed her by curling and sticking to itself, her sleeve, doing anything but lay flat. "Like you know anything about babies."

Adrien put a hand on her forearm, she was trembling. "My eight year old seems to do okay."

He plucked the offending diaper from suddenly nerveless fingers and scooted the changing pad around to face him. Muscle memory and long practice kicked in. New diaper down, wipes out of the bag. Unwrap, clean, pitch, and cinch up the baby. "Can you do her up? I need to wash. Umm.. bathroom?"

"On the right." Her voice was tiny, tired, but her hands were steadier as she snapped up and re-swaddled a much more content Audrey.

Adrien cleaned up, noticing as he did how the bathroom was a dichotomy of perfectly ordered cosmetics and haphazard soaps and hygiene products. Returning to the kitchen he found her with Audrey over one shoulder fighting but managing to make some formula with one hand. It popped into his head how many things you could take for granted having two people to raise a baby.

"Here, let me borrow this." he murmured, gently plucking Audrey from Chloé's grip and snuggling the bundle onto his own shoulder.

Chloé didn't protest this time. With an expression that mixed disappointment and relief she set about finishing the formula and bottling it up. They went back to the living room where she sat with a waist pillow and took Audrey back. With the baby nestled in and feeding contentedly the last of the panic seemed to ebb from Chloé. Adrien sat quietly, watching mother and child for a moment. Memories drifted up from years ago watching Marinette with Emma, but then that only sent him back into why he'd shown up in the first place. He pushed his mind away from all that until he could focus on a frazzled but still glamorous Chloé and her infant. He mused that it would make one heck of a cover for one of Style Queen's magazines.

The bottle was forsaken for sleep. A very brief and gentle burping session later Audrey was back in her bassinet with blankets tucked in and tiny dreams of being bigger brewing in her head. Chloé sat back on the couch with a long low breath. She gave Adrien a forced smile,"Sorry you had to see that."

Adrien shook his head,"New mother jitters, it's fine."

She narrowed her eyes,"Did Marinette fall to pieces? I'm guessing that's the mother of your little Agreste."

Adrien corrected,"Little Dupain-Cheng. No, we were lucky, she slipped right into motherhood."

Chloé's eyes shifted at the correction, showing she'd picked it up but she went on anyway. "See? It's not just new mother, it's no mother. When it comes to caring for someone I'm useless, utterly useless." She touched a hand to her forehead wearily. "At least I don't cry when she does anymore, most of the time."

Adrien moved to the couch again, Chloé had curled herself back up on it so his hand found a foot and he gave a squeeze,"Hey, that was a mother I saw smiling at her baby just now. You can't fake a mother's smile."

She gave him a grateful but disbelieving one for his words.

"I'm serious Chloé. You'll do fine. I can't imagine what it must be like trying to do it yourself though." he gave another foot-squeeze. "You've got money, why don't you hire yourself a nanny?"

Her head snapped up suddenly and that fire blazed in her eyes,"I am not dumping my daughter in someone else's hands. If they want a kid they can have their own. This one is mine and I'll raise her if it kills me." Chloé's voice was a willful growl, and the ferocity was yet one more thing that seemed to have materialized in the decade they'd been apart. She didn't have the energy to sustain it though, the fires died and she tilted her head against the back of the couch. "That's why I'm resigning from Style Queen."

The shock must have shown on his face because she added with a soft lilt, "Juicy exclusive, keep it a secret will you?"

"But that's your mother's-"

"-WAS my mother's. Then it was my little obsession. Now I've got a better obsession, a better way to get back at her." Chloé looked fondly down at her baby. "I don't need it anymore."

Adrien processed that, but it was taking him back to public faces; Chloé Bourgeois, Style Queen and Adrien Agreste, head of the Agreste Foundation. That wasn't what he needed, or wanted. "Sorry, it's just going to hit the fashion world like a ton of bricks. No more Style Queen?"

Chloé shrugged and dropped her cheek to her knee, leaving a touch of rouge behind when she shifted it. "I'm sure someone will step up, maybe even a Style King. It's just a fancy name for a CEO, just another one of mom's conceits."

There was a quiet pause before Adrien asked, "Mind if I drop by tomorrow?"

"Why would you want to?"

"To help maybe? If nothing else I can give you some time for a nap. You look like you could use one. Hell I KNOW you could use one. Every parent could use one." An idea occurred to him. "You know I could just grab a day bag and come back."

"No." That was definitive. She sat herself upright, hugging her knees to her chest. "You've just shown up at my doorstep after half a life."

Adrien rolled his eyes. "As a friend Chloé."

She looked him in the eyes,"Exactly Adrien. Friends don't stay the night here, only strangers do."

That hit harder than expected. Adrien nodded after the sudden burning subsided. "I gotcha."

From nearly a statue to sudden but controlled motion. Chloé twisted to the end table and opened a drawer. Out came a keychain which she passed over to him while pulling him to his feet. "This will let you in, just hold it up to the lock. No more knocking that might disturb Audrey."

Adrien protested as he was escorted back down the hall, "I- but- I can't just waltz into your apartment."

Chloé huffed and that Style Queen chin lift returned,"Adrien, I'm the one letting you in. No one else has any business complaining."

She's right. She is, and they don't. "Okay, I'll be back in the morning with coffee?"

She nodded and leaned up, almost going for a cheek kiss but stopped herself. She patted his arm,"Good to see you Adrien. You can regale me with what drove you to this last resort over breakfast."

He smiled at that and as he stepped out of the apartment. "Goodnight Chloé."

"Goodnight Adrien."