Adrienette April 2021

Learning to Cook

Seeing as Adrien having a private chef is canon, I don't think this is much of a stretch. This almost reminds me of the baking one-shot I did for Marichat May. Ah, memories. Vote and comment if you've enjoyed!                                                                                                                                                     -Colorado

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The kitchen was a mess.

While normally, this would be no strange thing for the Dupain-Cheng bakery, there was a complication.

"In my defense," Adrien spoke up besides Marinette. "I did warn you that I was awful at cooking."

"And now I know you weren't just being hard on yourself." She sighed. "Well, we better get to cleaning, and then we can start again."

"You don't want to give up?" He looked shocked.

"You still need to cook for your father to be able to get an apartment, right?"

"Yeah."

"Then of course not."

Marinette handed Adrien a cloth as they got to work.

"Thanks again for agreeing to this, Marinette."

"It's not a problem. Hanging out with you is always a blast. Although, I wish the circumstances were a bit better." Marinette began to fill the sink up with water. "Is your father seriously forcing you to cook for him before you can move out?"

"It's not that bad." Adrien said as he started to clean out the oven. "He wants to make sure I can take proper care of myself. It makes sense when you think about it."

"Yeah but, have you ever cooked anything in your life? He was basically setting you up to fail." She shook her head.

"Can you really blame him, though? He already lost my mom and Nathalie is only now starting to recover from whatever illness she had, now he's about to lose me, too? I can't blame him for being protective."

"Yes, you can." Marinette walked over to place a hand on Adrien's back. "While a child moving out is always a hard thing, it's no excuse to keep you imprisoned there. He's still going to see you at work and he could always make the effort to visit you."

"He's a busy man, Marinette. I can't expect him to drop everything to come over to my apartment."

"He's your father. He can make time, right now he's just keeping you trapped and at a distance. You deserve to start living a normal life."

"Can we just go back to cleaning? I'd rather not talk about my father right now." Marinette pursed her lips to say something else, but his look stopped her.

She sighed. It wasn't her place to criticize their relationship, anyway.

"Yeah, okay. Just, know you're always welcome here, okay?"

"I know. Thank you."

"Not a problem, Adrien. Now, let's get this cleaned up."

"Okay."

The two of them worked in a comfortable silence, something that was becoming increasingly common since they started their second year of collége. It had all started when they had gone through their breakups at the same time. They were able to vent to each other and understand what the other was going through. Then when Marinette's friendships became even more strained because of Lila and her Guardian duties, she went to Adrien for help on how to balance daily and professional life.