"No." She replied simply. "Sabrina's busy, and apparently, so is mom." She then explained.
"Huh. Well, I'm not busy anymore, why don't we hang out?" He suggested.
Chloe stood dumbfounded, processing the information. He asked to hang out with her. Not the other way around.
"Chloe?" Her mind wandered back to when he said he couldn't be friends with her anymore. "You have to be nice to people. It's not that hard." Since, she had learnt that it was too much effort for almost nothing when she was mean and making plans to ruin people's lives. Her mom had taught her that.
"Oh, uh, yeah why not?" She finally answered. "Where?"
"Well, I don't think my dad will let me go out, but I've had a foosball table for two years and never anyone to play with. Wanna see if you're better at foosball than piano?" He joked.
She was never really sporty, but he had been lonely for so long. "Okay. But just know, I'm not used to losing." She tried to tease.
It must have worked, because he raised his eyebrow, and shot back, "You will be."
For a girl who had never even heard of foosball before today, she was quite good at it. Her eyes were quicker than she had expected. "Wow, I got another goal!" She squealed in excitement.
"I.. I let you win that one." He stuttered.
"Yeah right, you just don't want to admit I'm better than you."
Adrien laughed. He would admit it, at first, he was letting her win, but then realized she actually could be quite competitive. He had always known she could easily achieve something if she really wanted it, even if it was the wrong thing sometimes. But he knew she had changed recently.
"I'm proud of you, Chloe." He thought out loud.
"I mean..." her cheeks went light pink. "It's not really a big deal to win a game of table football."
He held out his hand to hi-five, and she followed. "I don't mean that, well I mean that, but also I'm proud of you for being... being so mature now. You've changed a lot." He tried to phrase it without insulting her.
He half expected her to have a sarcastic remark about how she wasn't immature before, but she just smiled the most genuine smile he had seen on the girl for a long time. "Thank you, Adrien. I knew I was changing, but hearing that, especially from you of all people..." she paused, looking up at the high ceiling. "It means more to me than you know."
She had been trying hard to avoid the emerald eyes across from hers, for fear of melting straight into them.
"Chloe, I always knew you had the capacity to be the girl you are now." He reached out his hand and touched hers, causing her to look up at him. It happened, her face softened and body weakened, and she found herself biting the inside of her cheek.
"Thanks." She replied through clenched teeth after a few seconds, suddenly freezing her whole body. "Hey, I'm tired, how about we take a break." She suggested, not wanting to falter in the game.
He smiled and pulled his hand away to scratch the back of his head, eyes wandering to the floor. "Sure, why don't we go get a snack? We can ask the personal chef to make something?"
They once again sat at the large table, except now more relaxed, without pressures of parents or impressions. The chef hadn't been there, so they had simply taken a tub of ice cream from the giant fridge, and were now using spoons to scoop it out of the tub.
"I miss ice cream, I haven't had it in so long." Adrien licked the melted ice cream off his lips.
"Doesn't your dad let you have ice cream because you're a model?" Chloe gasped.
"I mean, he let me, I just always worried that if I did have it, he might disapprove. When it was his decision, salad always won, even if he never stopped me."
"That makes sense." Chloe tried to be understanding, and shoved a large spoon in her mouth without looking, only realizing the freezing sensation a few seconds later. "Aaah! Cold! Brain Freeze!" She scream as she attempted to swallow it.
Adrien burst into laughter. "You're hilarious." He took his spoon and shoved it into the ice cream, then proceeded to wipe a small blob of pink on Chloe's nose.
"Aah!" She laughed, and stuck her tongue out. When that didn't work, she used her finger to guide the ice cream into her mouth. "It would have been great to have this for the past 10 years." She sighed.
"I've been your friend for longer than that." Adrien tilted his head to the side.
"Yeah, But our friendship was so forced..." she looked at the ground. "Both our fathers having reputations, the only real thing was when Mom left, and were like 5."
"I'll always be here for you, Chloe." Adrien placed his hand on her shoulder to comfort her. "It may not have been the comfiest of friendships, but I don't hate you for how you acted before. You were going through a lot." She looked up at him, and he looked so sincere.
"Nobody cared enough to say that before." She whispered. It was true. Not her mom, nor her dad. Not even Sabrina. Without thinking, she moved forward and kissed him. Lips sticky but sweet from the ice cream, she only realized how big of a mistake she was making when she had gone too far.
For a second, he would be okay with it. For a moment in frozen time, they had a moment. Then that moment ended, and he found himself dropping the tub of ice cream and his spoon out of shock, and using his sticky hands to gently push her away.
Her eyes looked betrayed, but understanding. "I.. I shouldn't have done that. That was, that was really dumb." Her voice cracked.
"I-I'm gonna clean up this mess..." he gestured to the puddle of pink ice cream on the floor under his chair. She nodded. Something in the back of her mind was telling her he may have liked it, that for a millisecond, he might have kissed her back. She pushed the feeling away, and replied finally "I'll, um, get some towels." She turned away before any tears had the chance to escape her eyes.
