𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐒𝐀𝐕𝐈𝐎𝐑, miraculous au

Chapter 16

"Thank you...?" I trailed off, biting my lip. "I'm... oh, I don't know... how is Kai?"

Charlene smiled a bit in sympathy. "He's fine. Great, actually."

I smiled and nodded as I glanced around at the rest of the house and sure enough, nobody but the two of us were home. It was the perfect time for a talk, right? Probably not, but it was now or never.

"I really liked the rest of the family," I started, hopping up to sit on the counter.

"Good," Charlene said, her voice sounding a little weary. "I'm glad." This was clearly going nowhere.

I fell silent for a few moments, watching Charlene as she went about cleaning the living room.

"Hey, uh, so is Adrien staying with his dad again, like, full time?" I asked, suddenly.

Charlene looked up at me in surprise, her eyes widening. "What?"

I flushed bright red and immediately fixed my gaze on my shoes, but kept talking. "Adrien told me what happened. I don't feel... I don't like that he is safe there."

Charlene sat at the kitchen bar with a baffled look on her face, as if she couldn't really believe what I'd just said. I figured that Charlene wasn't very public about what had happened to her sister-in-law, or that she couldn't do anything about her nephew being abused. Sure, I'd gotten the jist of everything from Adrien, but a lot of these were assumptions I made on my own. I highly doubted they were wrong, however.

"I see," She finally said, sounding very weary. I didn't know what to say to that. Was there anything I could say to comfort her?

"I'm sorry..."

Charlene let out a laugh, her eyes bright and shining with unshed tears. "Don't apologize, Marinette. What happens, happens. It's in the past and there's not anything we can do about it."

No, I thought suddenly at her words. No, that's not true at all. What was in the past was in the past, she was right about that. But there was nothing there that said we couldn't move on from those horrible things, change our opinons of them, to try and make life worth living. Life was always worth living, even if it didn't seem like it.

"Yes," She said hesitantly, leaving me confused.
"Adrien is back with my horrible brother this month." She added, I frowned and took a collective breath of air.

"Why was he over here before he left with Félix?" I asked, feeling clueless.

"He skipped fencing today because you were coming over, but left with Félix because of some fencing gear he found online." Charlene answered, giving a laugh, wiping at her eyes with her shirt sleeve.

"I'm not trying to act like I know everything," I said with a sudden upsurge of confidence. I slid on to the counter and sat beside Charlene, folding my hands in my lap. "It's just that... I don't know. I just want to see all of you guys be happy and be successful. You all deserve if after everything you've been through. I'm probably messing this up right now and I don't think I'm making much sense here because I'm rambling like an idiot, but- -"

Charlene burst out laughing and held up a hand to stop my random string of babbling. "I know, sweetie. I know what you're getting at. And I'm honored that you'd tell me something like that. We... we don't really let people get close to this family, if you know what I mean."

I frowned, thinking about what she said. "Why not? If you don't mind my asking."

Charlene sighed, her eyes glistening over with tears as she looked up at me. "Well, half of Paris believes that Emilie's disappearance had been caused by Gabriel. Why do you think Adrien doesn't have any friends?"