As the title suggests... this is the worst chapter. Adrien hits rock bottom. Trigger warning for depression and PTSD. The next chapter gets better.

Adrien was late getting home that day. He was looking forward to Marinette's cooking, and he wanted her to know that he didn't hold a grudge, so he picked up a bouquet of white tulips that the florist told him represented forgiveness. He had her tie them with a pink ribbon, Marinette's favorite color, and he was humming to himself as he opened the front door.

The first thing he noticed was Marinette's keys in the hallway. Adrien smiled to himself. She'd probably forgotten them in the door, and some kind neighbor dropped them through the mail slot. Three steps down the hallway, and he realized he didn't smell anything cooking.

A brief scan of the apartment showed no Marinette. Worried that something had happened to her, he grabbed his phone from his pocket and dialed her number. He heard a buzzing from the kitchen table, and found Marinette's phone, sitting on top of a folded piece of paper.

He smiled fondly at her forgetfulness, and reached for the paper underneath, expecting her to-do list or something like that. What he found was a letter that shook him to his very core.

He didn't know how long he sat there on the floor of the kitchen, his legs having buckled and he missed the chairs, but he didn't care. Marinette had left him. She was gone, just like everyone else in his life who had claimed to care about him. He thought Marinette had been different. The aching hole in his chest started to lap at the numbness that the rest of his body felt. Marinette.

He couldn't believe she'd left him just because he refused to go to therapy. He was happy that it had worked so well for her, but he couldn't relive those memories. It was too much of her to think that he could.

Pain. Pain and numbness. Both took turns washing over him. He couldn't move. He was barely aware of anything around him. Plagg tried talking to him, but eventually just took up residence in his hair, snuggling Adrien the best that he could; trying to provide comfort.

Marinette had spoken with Plagg before she'd left. Many times over many months. He saw the world weighing heavier on her shoulders; saw Adrien weighing heavier on her shoulders. He'd spoken with them both, trying to buoy Marinette, and reason with Adrien, but in the end, he didn't blame Mariette for leaving. She'd stuck around longer than most would.

He'd watched her tears the night before as she'd begged Adrien to let her breathe, to help take some of the weight, but Adrien kept his troubles wrapped around his shoulders like a blanket, wrapping them around Marinette to keep her safe. Plagg sighed. Now it was up to him.

He let Adrien cry for a while. He'd known the boy for almost a decade now and knew he needed time, but before the night was fully dark, Plagg had pulled Adrien's phone from his pocket and dialed Nino's number, knowing Marinette had asked him to check on Adrien.

Adrien was still curled on the floor when he heard the pounding on his door. He tried to ignore it, but his phone started ringing. Glancing at the screen, he saw it was Nino. He sent the call to voicemail, but then he heard Nino's voice coming through his front door. "I know you're in there, Dude. Adrien, come on, Man. Open up. I know what happened."

He knew what happened. Adrien pushed himself up on wobbly legs and staggered towards the door. He unlocked it, dragging the door open, before taking the few steps to collapse on the couch. Nino followed him in, shutting the door behind him. He sat down on the couch next to Adrien, twisting his cap in his hands, nervously.

"Marinette left. She told us. She wanted me to check on you . Man, I'm sorry. Is there anything I can do for you right now?"

Adrien turned hollow eyes on him. "Can you make her come back?"

Nino shook his head. "She's been telling you for months that she can't do it anymore. Hell, you've told me as much. She needs time." He paused, obviously considering his next words carefully. "And you need to get help."

Anger flared white-hot in Adrien. "Get. Out."

Staring at him in shock, Nino placed a hand on his shoulder. Before he could say anything, Adrien yanked his arm away, turning angry eyes towards his best friend. "How could you side with her? I thought our friendship meant something. You aren't welcome here anymore."

Tentatively reaching out, Nino was stopped by a glare from Adrien. He dropped his hand, but addressed his friend. "I know you're hurting right now, and this sucks… but I'm here for you. In an hour, a month or a year. Just reach out. I'll come." When Adrien's response was a growl, Nino left.

Over the next hour, Adrien called the bakery forty-seven times, each message getting progressively more desperate and angry. He begged Marinette to come home, to give him a second chance, but there was never any response. After that, he bombarded both his and her social media with pleas for her to come home, to not give up on him, to not abandon him.

Marinette's accounts started blowing up. Some called her insane for leaving Adrien. Others called her names for abandoning a hero of Paris. The verdict was swift, either way, and not in her favor.

The backlash of her actions over the next several days had her closing her social media accounts. She kept her business information, which had been under the name MDC Designs, and she had refused to let Adrien be a part of, not wanting to piggyback on his fame, and had been unaffected by her personal issues.

Over that first week, Marinette reached out to the couple of dozen clients that she had, assuring them that her personal life would not interfere with her work in any way, most of them ended up offering her words of reassurance, and only one left her, one that had been using her to get closer to Adrien despite her best efforts.

While public opinion came down heavily in Adrien's favor, those that knew them threw their support behind Marinette, not precisely turning their backs on Adrien, but very few trying to wade through the hurt and vitriol he was spewing to soothe the hurt and frightened young man underneath.

Seven months later, Adrien was alone. He hadn't left their apartment, his apartment, he corrected himself, in three weeks, when the date on his phone caught his eye. Ten years. It was ten years to the day since he'd met Plagg and received his miraculous, and been given the opportunity to work alongside the greatest woman he'd ever known.

That ring had been both a blessing and a curse, Adrien thought as he sat, unwashed, in his apartment. He would never exchange the chances he'd been given for anything, but he knew this was not what he was meant for. He broke down for the first time in days, crying until he was completely spent. Laying his cheek against the cool tile floor of the kitchen, he picked up his phone and made the hardest call of his life.

Nino picked up on the second ring, and after a brief conversation, promised he would be there within the hour. Adrien packed a bag, and sat on the couch, waiting for the man who was possibly the only friend he hadn't driven away to take him to a center where he could finally get the help that he needed.