Discordant Sonata

Chapter 22: Scherzo (Part 1 of 3)

(Thank you all for your patience. Life circumstances are still hard but I'm hanging in there. Your positive comments and love keep me going ❤️)

* Music glossary:

Scherzo - fast-moving humorous composition, from the Italian word meaning 'joke' or 'jest'

* French glossary:

La/ma princesse - the/my princess
Coucou - Hi/peekaboo
Ma Mignonette - My little sweetheart/cutie
Voilà- Here they are/here it is, used to call attention to something or someone

~*~*~*~

(Mood Music: "Patches of Light" - Child of Light OST)

Adrien Agreste did not show up for school the following day.

Or the next.

Or the one after that.

The only news from the Agreste family concerning the absences was that Adrien had switched back to homeschooling and would turn in his assignments remotely. In truth, Adrien had called on behalf of his father and apparently that had been good enough, because as far as he was aware, his father hadn't called the school to contradict the matter.

As far as his limited social life, Adrien still made sure to answer texts and calls from his friends to keep up appearances, even going so far as to set up a fake wall of his old bedroom for facetime calls. And thankfully, he was able to keep in daily contact with Ladybug via their secret emails. Even still, school days could get lonely at times.

Such was the case today.

A forlorn Plagg stretched out atop Adrien's head, staring at the schoolwork laid out before them. A cool breeze blew across the top of the Dupain Cheng bakery, idly turning the pages of one of the textbooks, and Adrien adjusted a paperweight to keep them from flapping.

The kwami sighed. "Are you sure this is what you want, kid?"

Adrien shook his head. "It's not about what I want, Plagg. It's about keeping everybody safe. No one else must be put in danger or get hurt because of me."

Plagg clicked his tongue in disapproval. "It just sucks 'cause you can't even explain to Ladybug that your father almost succeeded in kidnapping you. Not without revealing your identity, anyway."

Adrien winced. "Yeah, it's... not ideal. But it's what has to happen. Master Fu said so himself, and I trust him."

Plagg flew down to rest on his shoulder, peeking at the schoolwork on the laptop screen. "It must be hard not seeing your friends, just being stuck up here for hours. The days of the week just kinda blend together. How long has it been? Two weeks? Two months? Two years?!"

The young man chuckled. "It's not so bad," he replied as he shifted his legs on his seat on a balcony chair, clacking away on the keyboard. "Nobody comes up here during the day; and as long as we don't move around too much, people can't hear us downstairs, so it's nice and peaceful. You can't see us from the streets below if we stay behind these brick railings. And if it were to rain, I'm sure this little tarp would do a decent job keeping us dry."

"Why can't you just do schoolwork in your bedroom?"

"Because then the family would know that I'm home and they'd get suspicious. I can't start homeschool at the exact same time as Adrien Agreste."