He Can't Forget | ✓

Epilogue

With a bouquet of yellow roses tucked underneath his arm, Adrien stood in front of two gravestones. One was engraved the proper way—the name properly written on the headstone, that person's role in his life, a loving message for them to be remembered by, and the dates of how long they lived on this earth.

The other headstone was Gabriel Agreste's and the dates of his lifespan—and that was all it said.

Adrien laid the bouquet in front of his mother's grave. The date of her written death had been when he decided to pull the plug. It hadn't been an easy decision considering he never got to say goodbye to her properly. He did, however, have a last moment with her alone, where he decided to forgive her for all that she had done.

Now, his mother was finally at rest. For so long, his father had kept her selfishly alive—if spending years inside of a life machine was even considered living. His mother's heart might have still been beating, but her mind had died a long time ago. She deserved to finally be at peace.

His father, on the other hand, Adrien felt no remorse for. The man didn't even have a proper funeral upon Adrien's request. His father didn't deserve one in Adrien's opinion. Unfortunately, the press not only discovered that Emilie had been underneath the Agreste mansion all along, but that Gabriel was Hawkmoth. This caused the press to be all over Adrien about his father's sudden death. In order to keep Adrien from being charged with murder, he and Marinette had concocted a story about how Gabriel Agreste had suffered from a heart attack when he discovered that Adrien had decided to pull his mother's plug.

And thankfully, the story was believed.

They avoided having an autopsy done as well to make sure that their story stuck as truth. Because Gabriel Agreste was a millionaire and so was his son, Adrien was easily able to find ways to bend the system to protect himself. They were able to get Gabriel buried privately, without a ceremony and without a viewing.

The only thing Adrien hated was having to bury his parents beside each other. It would have looked... strange had he not.

But his father didn't deserve to be next to his mother. Not now and not ever.

A gentle squeeze around his bicep forced him to snap out of his thoughts. When he turned his head to the right, Marinette was already looking up at him, a solemn expression on her face. "Are you ready to go?"

His eyes lingered on his mother's headstone for a moment longer before he nodded, "Yeah... let's go."

Marinette held onto his arm the entire way as she took the lead in guiding them out of the cemetery. He was grateful for her presence—in fact, he didn't like to come here alone. Adrien preferred Marinette's company, and he was glad that she was always willing to join him. They would have usually stayed longer, sitting together on the bench in front of his parents graves to talk about anything, really, especially what had happened over the last few weeks.

But today, they had somewhere important to be.

Today, they were meeting up with Alya and Nino (who were currently watching Emma) at a restaurant, and at that restaurant, Marinette and Adrien were finally going to tell Emma that Adrien was her father.

To say Adrien was nervous would be an understatement. He was actually terrified... which was ironic considering he had been waiting for this day for a long time. He truthfully couldn't wait to tell her, but he also worried she would be disappointed. Despite all that him and Marinette had talked about and gone through, he still had some doubts that he would be a terrible father.

Marinette nudged him with her hip as they walked down the sidewalk together. "I can hear you thinking." She said, and the corner of her lips quirked into a small smile when he looked down to catch her eyes.