8-Gateway
She was cheerful and silly and beautiful. His only friend was Chloe, and she was dark and sullen and moody. He wanted to learn Chinese so he could speak to the pretty, happy girl that worked in the bakery. Maybe he'd make a new friend.
I've had this plot bunny for ages hehehe.
Adrien clutched his mothers' hand as she led him into the Dupain-Cheng bakery. As promised, he'd attended all his lessons for the week without complaint and now he was allowed to have an afternoon to himself. The door chimed when she pushed it open and the smell of warm pastries and chocolate made him sniff the air in delight.
"Agreste Tàitai! Madame Agreste!
He looked up at the mention of his name, followed by unfamiliar words and saw a very small dark-haired girl sitting on the counter, waving at his mother.
"Huānyíng guānglín!" Welcome!
She spoke very loudly, but not, he noted, in the obnoxious way that children he saw on the playground were. Her volume seemed to stem from excitement and pleasure as her face broke out into a wide grin at the sight of his mother
"Ah, Marinette." His mother smiled at the girl."Nǐ hǎo." Hello.
He supposed it was Chinese or Korean, he could never really tell the difference, but he knew that his mother could speak fluently in both. She'd tried to teach him but he'd never really wanted to learn and the only phrase he knew was zàijiàn. See you again.
Adrien watched as the girl smiled at his mother happily and took a very big bite out of her pastry, leaving a streak of icing sugar on her cheek.
A woman who looked like an older version of the girl picked her up off the counter and placed her on the floor. "Nǐ jīntiān guàngjiē?" Are you shopping today?
"Shì wǒ de érzi." Yes with my son.
"Bùyào zài guìtái shàng zuò." The woman said to her daughter. Don't sit on the counter. The girl laughed and stuffed the rest of the pastry in her mouth before jumping out of the way as a customer approached the counter to pay. Adrien watched her silently. Pretty. He thought as her long braid swung behind her, smacking her in the cheek.
"Look it's our best customer!" A large man entered the room, carrying a tray of buns. "Good morning Madame Agreste."
"Good morning Tom." Adrien sunk into his mother's side, the man was very big and looked like he could snap Adrien in half.
"Is this your son?" The man placed the buns on a counter and crouched down beside him.
"Yes, this is Adrien."
"He looks very much like you." Tom said. "Are you going to buy something sweet today Adrien? We have just started making a new kind of croissant if you'd like to try one?"
Adrien looked up at his mother who nodded encouragingly.
"Yes please Monsieur Baker."
The man laughed a deep belly laugh and Adrien stepped back, worried that the vibrations would make the shop cave in.
"You can call me Tom if you like." He stood up, still laughing. "Monsieur Baker indeed."
"Nǐ shì shuí?" Adrien turned to see the girl from before staring at him. Who are you? "Nǐ shì shuí?" She repeated what he assumed was a question. He shook his head and looked up at his mother for assistance but she was speaking with the girl's father about the possibility of regularly baking cheese bread. "Nǐ shuō zhōngguó huà?" Do you speak Chinese? Adiren flinched away from her and the girl's tilted her head to the side, considering him. "I'm Marinette." She said. Her French was perfect, to his surprise. But she didn't say anything else as she stood there watching him and he assumed that she didn't know how to say anything else in French.
"Here son." The girl's father was trying to hand him a small black and gold box and he tore his eyes away from hers. "My daughter baked these this morning. You'll have to come back and let her know what you think okay?" Adrien nodded and took the box in one hand.
"Thank you." He said quietly.
"You're very welcome young man."
"I'm afraid we must be going, we have a few more errands to run before we head home."
"Not at all Madame. Do come again soon."
His mother pulled out her purse and walked over to the counter, Marinette was balaence precariously on the strip of counter behind the till and Adrien was sure she would fall. But she didn't.
"Zhège duōshǎo qián?" How much is this?
The girl punched in some numbers with enthusiastic force. The till whined in protest and she frowned as it whirred loudly before stopping. She bit her lip and glanced over at her mother who was preoccupied with another customer. Adrien guessed that she had broken it.
"Tài duō." The girl sighed. Too much. Adrien's mother laughed.
"Madame." Tom called from the other side of the room. "It is our gift to you and your son. For your continued patronage."
"Thank you Tom. We will be sure to visit again. Right sweetheart?"
He nodded and looked up at the girl. Her eyes were bright and intelligent and he felt like she could see straight through him.
As they left he heard her call out behind him.
"Zàijiàn!"
It wasn't until dinner that he broached the subject with his mother.
"You want to learn Mandarin?"
"Yes."
He waited for her to ask why. His mother was always asking questions about things like that. She would probably start planning a wedding for him and the girl in the bakery if she knew why. The girl with the bright blue eyes that stared into his soul was a type of girl he didn't know. She was cheerful and silly and beautiful. His only friend was Chloe, and she was dark and sullen and moody. He wanted to learn Chinese so he could speak to the pretty, happy girl that worked in the bakery. Maybe he'd make a new friend.
"Can I?"
"Of course Adrien." His mother smiled at him. She would definitely have to tell Sabine about this.
He liked his Chinese teacher. Hao was quite a bit older than he was, 17, an older student looking to make some extra money. His mother had employed him, his father had wanted a real teacher, but his mother had insisted that a younger teacher would benefit Adrien. He wouldn't just learn the language but the modern culture too. Hao also knew the reason why Adrien had wanted to learn to speak Mandarin and often spoke about the baker's daughter, though he'd never actually met her. He often took Adrien outside, sometimes to the park, the Seine River and sometimes they went shopping.
Today they visited a bakery and with a start, Adrien recognized the bakery that had started his passion for the language. He wondered if she was here. She usually was not though he suspected that it was because she attended school. The bell chimed and his eyes were drawn to her immediately. Her hair was in the same braid that touched the small of her back, tied with a red ribbon. She was chatting to her mother in rapid Chinese and Adrien suddenly felt insecure. His own Chinese was certainly not coherent enough to have a conversation like that.
"Go on Adrien." Hao nudged his student in the side. "It's fine."
Adrien walked over to the girl and he felt his legs shaking. Why was he so nervous? The girl spotted him and smiled and he wondered if she recognized him.
"Wǔān." He said, before she could greet him. Good Afternoon
Her eyes widened in surprise but she recovered quickly and smiled at him, her eyes dancing. "Wǔān. Wǒ néng bāng nǐ ma?"
He paused and ran the translation through his head. Can I help you? "Shì." Yes.
She stood and her eyebrow twitched as his pronunciation but she didn't comment on it. "Qízhōng zhī yī, qǐng." He finished lamely, pointing at the box of macaroons. One of those please.
She smiled and nodded. "Nǐ de pǔtōnghuà fēicháng hǎo." She paused, considering something before tacking on, "Duìyú yīgè fàguó nánhái." at the end. Adrien began to panic. He recognized the first part of her sentence as praise for his language skills, but the second part had him stumped. He looked over at Hao for assistance, but when none was forthcoming he just smiled.
"20 euros." She said. In that moment he realized that she had a French accent. He thought about the way her voice sounded as she processed the payment. Unlike Hao, whose French words were marred by a thick Chinese accent, hers were clean and crisp; she had very obviously grown up in France. Her Chinese too, had that French flair and he wondered if she could, in fact speak French.
"Xièxiè nín de huìgù." Thank you for your patronage.
"Wǒ ài nǐ." He said, taking the box from her hands. She froze and her mouth opened in shock.
"What?" She exclaimed in French. Adrien heard Hao laughing hysterically behind him and he saw the girl's mother stare at him in amusement.
"My daughter is only 7, she's too young for dating." Adrien saw Tom step out of the back room hands over his chest. "Even for you." He would have been more threatening but the time Adrien had spent in the bakery and the flour that covered Tom's face made him seem infinitely less terrifying than the first time they'd met. His eyes were dancing, Tom was laughing. Laughing at him.
"Dating?" He said in French. "What?" He looked back at the girl, her blue eyes were wide and bright and a small smile tugged at her lips. He had the distinct impression that she was trying not to laugh at him. She retracted her hands, and his fingertips tingled.
Hao tugged his shirt. "Let's go."
They made their way out of the shop; bell ringing behind them and Hao started laughing again.
Adrien complained. "That doesn't mean 'you're welcome' does it?"
"Oh man her face was priceless!" Hao chortled. "That was the funniest thing I've ever seen!"
"What did you make me say? And why was he talking about dating?"
Hao just shook his head and continued to laugh.
"Hao!"
Six years later Adrien transferred into a real school. To say he was excited was an understatement. Even though he'd still have to deal with Chloe and he wasn't exactly great in social situations, he'd be able to make friends. Hopefully he'd have better luck here than with the girl in the bakery. He sighed; he hadn't been back since, both the mortification being laughed at by her and her parents for saying something he didn't know the translation for, and the death of his mother made it too hard to go back. The bakery had too many memories. He stood in front of the class as he introduced himself, Chloe winked and wiggled her fingers at him, but he ignored her. As he made to go and sit down, the classroom door was flung open and a flash of blue and pink plowed into him.
"Āiyō." The girl hissed before looking up at him with bright blue eyes. With a jolt Adrien recognized them. They belonged to the girl in the bakery. Her hair was shorter and in twin tails instead of a braid. But it was she. Her eyes showed no recognition but her face flushed as the class snickered at their compromising position and she pushed herself off him apologizing. His eyes found a streak of white powder that decorated her cheek and he wondered if it was flour or icing sugar.
"I'm so sorry." She speaks French after all he thought dizzyingly.
"Marinette Dupain-Cheng!" The teacher snapped. "You're late again!"
The Bakery Girl. Marinette.
"Sorry!" She hurried to her seat; face bright red and her friend wiped the powder off her cheek, shaking her head.
She was a big stuttering mess, he realized. She was so different to the girl he remembered, that there were times he wondered if they were actually two different people. But then he'd catch her giving half her lunch to a younger student who'd forgotten theirs, or speaking out against Chloe's bullying. He'd spot her on the other side of the yard, laughing so hard she couldn't breathe or concentrating on something, her tongue poking out between her teeth and he'd know that they were in fact the same. It was only around him that she was shy he finally realized. And maybe he was wrong and she did recognize him and that's why she couldn't talk to him. She was remembering the stupid situation that happened when they were seven and was consequentially terrified of him.
Chat ran across the roof, chasing the red and black blur. They were racing around Paris again, 'training' she called it but he thought it was just a more exciting game of tag.
"Ladybug!" He yelled. She stopped and he skidded to try and avoid a collision, but he wasn't used to his body after his sudden growth spurts and he crashed into her, causing them to both lose their balance and tumble into the alley below.
"Sorry." He said, their limbs were entangled and he tried to sit up. She glared up at him and his breath hitched. Beautiful blue eyes glared up at him from behind the mask and then he felt sick. He knew those eyes. He kicked himself internally, how had he not seen it before? The way they moved, their laughter, the way they smiled, teased, spoke. The Bakery Girl was Marinette. Marinette was his Princess and His Princess was His Lady. They were one and the same.
Adrien was more than grateful that the third time Sabine and Tom heard him say it, they did not in fact, laugh at him as they had the first time in the bakery or threaten to kill him and make it look like an accident like they did the second time when he was in Marinette's room.
"Wǒ ài nǐ."
"Je t'aime."
"I love you."
The thing Marinette said that Adrien didn't understand was; "For a French boy." So she had said; "Your Mandarin is very good. For a French boy."
Sings dramatically "I WILL GO DOWN WITH THIS SHIP."
But srs, I do not remember ordering a never ending wave of feels for French magical-girl superheroes, a love square and boys with cat ears.
Prompt 9-Death (This prompt will absolutely destroy me)
