Something about Chloé going to a fashion show made you nervous. Maybe it was that Adrien was probably going to be there; or maybe it was that Adrien was going to model Marinette’s hat, and that would probably give her a relapse into her obsessive phase; or maybe it was going to be full of famous, bourgeoisie people.
Most likely a combination of all four of those things.
The entire ordeal made you sick to your stomach. Chloé had seemed ecstatic at her mother coming back, although it made you anxious; you’d done some research on Audrey Bourgeois, and came to the conclusion that she was an awful person, and the exact reason as to why capitalism was so bad.
Scary. Real, fucking scary shit right here, you’d rather be in The Shining, to be honest. You were sort of glad that you hadn’t been invited.
Oh, right — and Adrien. Oh, sweet, sweet Adrien, who’d revealed in the most chaotic way possible to you that he was the cat boy who had come into your room every night for the past three months.
You’d had a long conversation about it, so he was less worried about the entire ordeal, in which you swore you wouldn’t tell a soul that he was Chat Noir; and then he cried a little bit, and hugged you, blubbering something about you being the best friend he’d ever had.
You were still trying to process why he’d chosen you of all people to tell, but here you were. It wasn’t like you could just go back on it all now, was it?
In fact, ever since that incident, he'd become even more attached to you. Joining you at lunch, popping into your room more frequently during the evenings, and generally being more… touchy than usual.
He even managed to convince his bodyguard to let him stop off at the Starbucks you worked at after school, so he could have a drink made by you. And that was certainly a huge effort on his part, you'd give him that.
Also, you’d met Plagg, which was a weird type of creature that caused Adrien to transform, and gave him his powers. Now, you’d say it before anything else; Plagg was an entire mood. He valued cheese over everything else, and putting food first was something you respected very much, so you two got along quite well, much to Adrien’s annoyance. It was also the fact that Plagg would sometimes tell you, when Adrien wasn’t listening, about how much the blond boy talked about you.
It was embarrassing, but also sweet. Though, Plagg didn’t really specify whether it was platonic or romantic love, but you could live with that.
What you didn't expect was that the fashion show you’d mentioned previously would reveal some things you never thought you'd know.
Chloé; Chloé of all people, was Queen Bee; and then she attempted to impress her mother by knocking out a train driver, and trying to stop the vehicle from crashing. This then resulted in her getting akumatized, and then finally giving the miraculous back to Ladybug, and apologising on live television for what she’d done.
Reckless? Yes. Stupid? Yes. Awful? Yes.
But… could you blame her?
Chloé was a child, who didn't understand what the real world was like, and was more than willing to go to the farthest extents to get her mum's approval. She was hurt, very hurt, by how everyone around her seemed to just… hate her. Her actions had been terrible, but they had been understandable.
Which is why you agreed to help her do her documentary for class. It wasn’t anything too huge, since you only edited it, but you also came up with the premise about it being the comprehensive, short history of Ladybug as a superhero throughout the ages. Chloé was on board with the idea, so you filmed it, added some finishing touches, and then on Tuesday, it was presenting time.
What could possibly go wrong?
What went wrong was that the entire class was salty about the train ordeal, and understandably so; but it was still a rather cruel reception on the students’ part. First to get in on the hate-bandwagon was Alya, who called out, after the documentary was over, “I’m not surprised that Ladybug didn’t agree to do an interview with you.”
“She did agree!” Chloé exclaimed defensively, folding her arms, “it was just that the documentary was long enough, and adding on an interview would make it too long! Right, (Y/n)?!”
Instantly, all eyes were on you, as you sat at the back of the room, and you stiffened. “Uh, well, it is already thirty seconds over the time limit Miss Bustier set for us, so technically she’s right in that aspect…” you trailed off, trying to dance around the truth so that the class wouldn’t pick up on the fact that Ladybug had not shown up for an interview.
“Off topic, but your French has improved dramatically, (Y/n),” Miss Bustier cut in, with a supportive smile.
“Thank you!... I’ve had… private lessons,” you settled for, glancing over to Adrien for a split second; in response, he gave you a sly wink.
(He’d best be careful, his Chat Noir was showing.)
“Ok, but why did you choose a presentation about Ladybug of all people?! She clearly doesn’t like you!” Alya snapped, clearly enraged that Chloé had chosen her favourite superhero.
“Yes she does! We’re best friends, and she respects me for being a superhero, because I saved France!” Chloé retorted, flushing with rage. “You’re all ridiculous, utterly ridiculous! You don’t deserve to see my documentary!”
“Yours? No, it’s ours, comrade,” you murmured to yourself, which caused Juleka to hide a laugh.
“We might not deserve to see your documentary, but you don’t deserve to be called a superhero, Chloé.” Marinette stated, which earned a nod of approval from most people.
Chloé burned with indignation, her eyes filling with unnoticeable tears, and she stormed over to the door, proclaiming, “Ridiculous, utterly ridiculous!”
“Chloé, class isn’t over yet!” Miss Bustier gently reminded the girl, only to be shot a fierce look by the blonde, as she stalked out of the room.
You winced, stood up, and hurried down the steps. “Err, miss, could I go after her please?” you asked tentatively.
Your teacher sighed, and nodded in defeat, so you quickly exited, and ran after Chloé, managing to catch up to her as she strode towards the stairs; you called out to her, which caused her to pause, and turn around, with a scowl. “What do you want?” she snapped, her barriers coming up like it was second nature for her.
“Chloé, please don’t listen to them,” you carefully stepped towards her. “Your documentary was really good. You put a lot of work into that, and it’s certainly better than your first idea of pretending to be Ladybug in an interview. You’ve never let them get to you before, why are you reacting like this now?”
“You think they didn’t get to me before?” her broken voice caused you to wince. “Why do you think I hate everyone? Why do you think I did things that were awful? I did them because I hated them all — because they have everything I want. You’re all so lucky. You have parents who love you.”
You couldn’t bring yourself to speak, too upset by the revelation. Chloé wasn’t perfect, but she tried so very hard to be; her father was there for her too much, and gave her everything she wanted, resulting in no discipline, and her mother was never there at all. And the worst part was that you couldn’t do a single thing to fix it, because you were powerless in these types of situations.
“I don’t want to be in a place where I’m not wanted,” Chloé whispered, and continued down the steps, “so I’ll leave.”
Wait — wait, she couldn’t possibly mean—
But she did.
Chloé didn’t want to stay, so she wouldn’t. And where she would go, you didn’t have a single clue. All you knew was that you didn’t want her to go, every single part of you felt like it had been ripped to shreds, because you didn’t want her to leave — to leave you.
She paused, for a brief moment, at the bottom of the stairs, before glancing behind her, up to you; “I’m glad that I got to know you, though.”
And then, Chloé smiled; she smiled, genuinely, for the first time, and although it was a beautiful one, you felt your heart drop all the way to your stomach. It wasn’t just truthful, it was sad, it was desperate, desperate for some type of recognition. From who? Well, from everyone.
It was only when she finally walked out of the school, out of sight, that you realised she’d said goodbye to you.
So, you cried — you cried out of pure anger, not for yourself, for losing someone you never thought you’d care for, but for Chloé, who’d tried so hard to get people to like her, and it had amounted to nothing but hatred.
You should’ve tried harder, but you didn’t, and now she was gone. Hence, you blubbered like a baby at the top of the stairs, not caring if your face was covered with snot, or if your eyes were turning painfully red, because you’d lost her.
And the worst part was that nobody seemed to care.