A Delicate Balance of Flavors

Finding the Right Combination

How could she have failed to realize that this weird, heady day spent between Adrien and Kagami, both of them brilliant, caring friends, would end in pain? The temptation to surrender to the beautiful illusion the pair had helped her to create had simply been too much to resist, a siren song that seduced her down into the depths to drown in cloying happiness.

How could all that joy end with so ridiculous and innocent a question: "What ice cream flavors do you want?"

There really was no choice – not for the ice cream, of course. The real choice had been made all those weeks ago when she had resolved to play "wing-woman" to Adrien on his date with his perfectly-matched fencing partner, who was just as intelligent, beautiful, and poised as him. She deserved him, could empathize with him in a way that Marinette herself never could. Because she was everything that Marinette was not. Marinette was just a third wheel, desperate to cling on to the last vestiges of her childish crush, holding back the burgeoning couple. Even as the strange flavour combinations proposed by Andre rattled about in her head, she knew that this kind of selfishness did not befit a superhero.

For all her vaunted tactical genius, her ability to orchestrate the impossible with the most improbable of tools, she couldn't force any of the ice cream flavours to fit. Mint, and orange, and... she couldn't even remember any longer as the tastes blurred and mangled one another, even inside her mind. There really was no choice. In that moment of resolve, of determination to once again put Adrien's happiness ahead of her own desires, she was interrupted.

***

"Wait." Kagami's voice rang out. "What about..." Her gaze fell upon the lopsided, trusting smile on Adrien's face, honest, unlike the majority of his perfect, reserved grins that she knew so well, having practiced them in the mirror herself, trying to make them look natural. They graced his modelling shots, enthralling his fans, and never reached his eyes. Those damnable photo shoots. Magazine editors and their teams of photoshop experts always seemed to digitally alter his pictures to add an unnatural golden sheen to his... hair...

"-lemon," Kagami concluded. "Lemon drizzle." Andre responded with a somewhat dubious look before delving into his ice cream cart, shifting through its contents.

Much as she loved ice cream, and savoured it on those rare occasions that she was able to break her stringent diet, which consisted mostly of lean chicken breast, eggs, and broccoli when she was not allowed to partake of traditional Japanese cuisine, Kagami knew precious little about the exotic combinations offered by the supposedly mystical Andre. The stall sported several unidentifiable vials – why were there vials on an ice cream cart? - and bristled with tubs, unorthodox labels ranging from "Burnt Coconut" to "Pickled Mango" and ... "Foie Gras?!" Devilry. Disgusting, and disgustingly inhumane at that.

The generally genial Andre, brow pinched, the pudge around his cheeks and neck folding into a doughy mass that all but obliterated his bone structure, leaned slightly closer to her. "Do you really think that you can find flavours that work together? Too many, and they may start to clash. Simple and clean. That's the best for ice cream."

"He – he's right, guys," Marinette muttered, stepping forward and interposing herself between Andre's cart and her two friends as she waved them off almost frantically. "Who are we to tell Andre how to do his job? He's the ice cream expert."

"We, Marinette, are paying customers," Kagami began, the withering gaze she so often leveled at her fencing opponents - Adrien excluded - directed over the other girl's shoulder to fix on the lightly-smiling man behind her, "capable of making our own choices about what we like and what we want to eat."

"Yeah, Marinette," Adrien said, placing a comforting hand on her shoulder. Although Kagami herself had been well aware of the pair's shared affection, however stubbornly unrecognized the feelings went on Adrien's part, that moment of intimacy, the few seconds of warmth that they shared, felt... wholesome - inspiring a feeling that was nothing at all like the unreasoning rage that she experienced when Lila photographed herself alongside the model, posing as his girlfriend.