After making an ass of himself in front of Marinette, Adrien retreated to the library. His father could yell later about whatever scheduled activity he missed that afternoon. He needed to be alone. If he were alone, perhaps he could temporarily avoid embarrassing himself or anyone else.

He opened his backpack and fished out a notebook at random. Chinese homework. That was manageable. He had started taking Chinese classes when he was seven. It had been fun for awhile. Games and songs and his mother asking him to translate things around the house for her and being so impressed when he did it right. It had stopped being fun when he hadn't had her to share it with anymore. Most things had stopped being fun without her.

While his university Chinese courses were harder, they were also less stressful than the enrichment tutors his father had hired. Still he had a paper to write and he had made such a mess of the grammar on the last one that he was going to go through this one sentence by sentence. It would be time consume and keep all other thoughts at bay and that was all he really needed.

When he reached the end, he considered going back to the top and starting again because the other choices were go home and listen to akuma wings beat against glass jars or go visit his father and listen to him talk.

Or call Liam or Nino or Alya. He had friends. He could call a friend. He sometimes forgot he had friends. It wasn't so novel anymore. He had been friends with Nino for years. His phone was quiet but he scrolled through his contacts just to remind himself that these people where there.

He still somehow ended up alone when he left the library.

He walked out into the streets of Paris with his thoughts full of apologies he could make to Marinette that would erase how far over the line he had stepped. He let his mind wander until he was imagining conversations with other people. Things he would say to his father if he was very brave or maybe very drunk. He had never tried getting very drunk before talking to Gabriel and maybe that warranted some exploration.

And then there were things he would say to Ladybug.

There were so many things to say to Ladybug that he hadn't had a chance to get out. They had had years of being partners, of being friends and he'd filled up every conversation with jokes. Now all he wanted was a chance to say everything else. Apologies and promises and declarations. Accusations and jokes and questions. So many questions.

And as though his thoughts had summoned her, he rounded a corner and she was there.

He froze.

And stared.

Her back was to him and she stood outside the streetlamps on a patch of grass between the two lanes of traffic. Not hiding but still almost invisible in the shadows. The dark made the red of her suit a little duller and her hair was swept back in one long ponytail that hung down between her shoulder blades. He stepped out into traffic, some blew a horn at him and he swore back but didn't stop.

He did it without taking his eyes off of her.

If he did, maybe she'd disappear all over again.

Once he was standing on the same patch of grass as she was - close enough to see her earrings gleam in the flash of a car's headlamps - he realized where they were. They were standing in the middle of the rebuilt neighbourhood that had burned down the day of the last Akuma attack. It was pristine now but Adrien had watched it burn to the ground and watched the months of reconstruction as they'd cleared and rebuilt each house and each building.

"It wasn't your fault," he said cutting off the My Lady he almost tacked onto the end of the sentence because he wasn't Chat Noir. He'd been too distracted by seeing her to even consider transforming. Now he stood behind her as Adrien.

She spun on him, her yo-yo dropping so she was ready for an attack. He took another step back so he stood on the curb, right at the edge of the grass. He held up both hands and tried to look non-threatening. She didn't put the yo-yo away but she also didn't immediately swing away. She was frowning as she looked at him.

"Um, hi?" he said.

She took a step towards him and into the light and he took a second to just stare at her face.

"I realize you don't know who I am and I probably shouldn't say things like that but it wasn't and anyone who says that it was is an idiot," he rushed out.

People had said it. She was the Miraculous Ladybug and her miracle had fallen short that day. He was already cursing himself for bringing it up but it had always made him angry. Since the first day at school when someone had asked, not even accused, just wondered aloud why she hadn't been able to fix everything like she usually did. It had made him furiously angry then and every times since.

"It was my fault, people died here, right here, in the buildings around us, people died and I didn't help them," she said.

"And hundreds lived," he said stepping in closer, he wanted her to be able to see that he meant it. Maybe it was better that he was Adrien, he could make her believe it. He was just a citizen, not her friend, "I remember that day, it was the worst attack Paris has ever seen before or since. People were candles, they were candles and they were melting and it was terrifying. All those people are still alive."

"And because I wasn't strong enough, other people aren't," she said turning to look across the square at a four story building with blue shutters and a light on in a kitchen. It was one of the new ones. A little clothing shop on the first floor and then apartments above and a pair of garret windows. It looked like a hundred other buildings in Paris but she was watching it like it held answers.

"You lost someone," he said and the words hit him like a fist. He felt a little queasy at the realization. Only six people had died. Six. Out of the entire city, out of all the buildings that had burned, only six had died. He'd always thought of that as a sort of triumph. He'd counted all the wins and never considered the losses. Six people had seemed like such a small number but it wasn't to the people who had known them.

She had known them.

"My father," she said turning back to him.

"Oh," he said.

"He got out, he was fine but there were three boys who lived in that building, back when it had the bookshop in the first floor. They were all little and only two of them were there when everyone gathered here. Everyone was out on the street waiting for the fire brigade, or for me, to come and save them. So my father went into the building alone to find Leon," she said.

She turned and looked at the light in the window again. The streetlamp cast heavy shadows on her face so she didn't quite look the way he remembered her. The mask did little to hide her expression. There were tears in her eyes, making them shine even in the dark.

"Your father is a hero, like you are," he said taking a step towards her.

He stopped short of touching her. He wasn't Chat Noir, he wasn't her friend, he was a stranger. Chat could have put a hand on her back or pulled her in for a hug but Adrien was nobody to her. Still he couldn't leave her alone on the street with her eyes half full of tears.

"People always say that, that he was a hero and that makes it better," she said.

"When I lost my mother, people liked to remind me of how much she loved me, that didn't make it better either," he said. "I don't think anything makes it better. Loss isn't something that can be bandaged up and fixed. It just is."

"At least your mother's death wasn't your fault," she said.

Adrien did touch her then, reached out and took her hand as though he had known her for years. He had known her for years. She just didn't know it. Still, she let him hold onto her hand without moving and then, rather than pulling away, squeezed his fingers. He took a step closer. He knew she was shorter than he was but somehow it still surprised him. To be Adrien and be looking down at her like this.

"This was not your fault," he said.

"If I had been stronger," she started.

"If I had been older, if I had been there that night," he countered and she met his eyes but didn't say anything. He asked her, in the softest voice he could, "How many people have you told?"

"There are people who know that Ladybug failed that day and there are people who know that a girl's father died that day. Right now, you are the only person who knows how they go together," she said.

"You need someone to tell your secrets to. Too many secrets just make you miserable," he said.

"Are you volunteering?" she asked.

"If you want me to," he said.

Her expression softened and she reached towards him but stopped before she touched his face or his hair. They hung frozen for a moment. He leaned in. It was such a cat-like gesture that he would have kicked himself for it if she hadn't smiled at him. It was a sad smile but it was a smile. She had one hand curled around his palm and the other against his cheek and he could have stayed there for the rest of his life.

"At least one person doesn't hold it against me," she said.

"I'm sure it isn't true but at the very least you'll always have me and Chat Noir," Adrien said with a smile at his own joke.

"I don't think Chat wants to see me," she sighed, "But thank you."

She pulled his face down and pressed a kiss to his cheek. He was too startled by it to argue with what she had said. She was close and her lips were soft and then she was gone. She let go of him and bounded off into the night before he had even collected his thoughts enough to spin around.