Discordant Sonata

Chapter 5: Fermata

Glossary:

Clochette = little bell

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(Mood Music: Hallelujah - Brian Crain cover)

It was just another Monday morning in the life of Nathalie Sancoeur.  While she wouldn't necessarily categorize herself as a morning person,  she did prefer to wake up extra early to quietly watch the sun rise, her  beloved cat Clochette lounging lazily on her lap, as well as enjoy the  luxury of being able to get ready for the day at a leisurely pace.

Her  daily routine of scrolling through the trending news on her tablet  while sluggishly sipping on black coffee was uneventful as usual... until  she began going through the Adrien Agreste hashtag, as she always did.

Clochette did not   appreciate being violently sprayed with coffee. Nathalie coughed and  sputtered, wiping her dripping mouth and nose. She grabbed the nearest  available towel (which, as she discovered later, turned out to be not   a towel but a pricy dry-clean only sweater) to clean her face and  tablet with. Hopping off and looking back with what was surely the cat  version of a sneer, Clochette walked away from a very confused Nathalie,  who continued to gawk and sputter at the blurry photos of her charge,  hand-in-hand with the one and only Ladybug.

Inhaling sharply and  leaping out of her chair, Nathalie snatched her phone, first to dial  Nadja Chamack's number, followed by the Agrestes' lawyer, hoping they  could help her minimize the potential damage of this situation.

"Gabriel cannot find out about this," she muttered to no one in particular, clutching the countertop with a white-knuckle grip.

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A couple of hours later, Adrien sat at the Agrestes' titanic dining  room table anxiously poking at his breakfast, waiting for the other shoe  to drop. Sleep-deprivation from a night full of bad dreams (chronic  nightmares were an unfortunate side effect of using his miraculous  against its intended use) only amplified the maddening suspense.

Last  night he'd been terrified to check the news, fretting that the photos  from his date with Ladybug would undoubtedly be leaked onto the  internet. There was no way he'd be lucky enough to escape that. He did,  however, recall that none of the phones pointed at them had had their  flash turned on, and therefore, there was a tiny possibility that the  photos hadn't turned out clear enough to confirm that it really was   Ladybug and Adrien in the photos, and not some attention-seeking  lookalikes. It was that tiny ray of hope which allowed him to fall into a  fitful sleep.

A hope that was dashed when he checked his phone at  3am (having been jolted awake by a particularly vivid night terror). As  a result, he spent the next few hours searching for more photos, filing  claims and reports all over social media, hoping they would get taken  down sometime before anyone he knew could find out, and had gotten no  more sleep.

"Good morning, Adrien," a stern female voice rang suddenly from the other side of the large dining hall.

Adrien suppressed a grimace. "Good morning, Nathalie."

Nathalie  paused, chewed on her lip as she stared at him without blinking, and  then continued, "You have Chinese lessons at 6pm tonight as always. You  also have an early morning photo shoot tomorrow with a 5am wake-up call,  so be sure to set your alarm for the correct time. Your piano recital  is this Saturday so don't forget to get in some extra practice this  week."

Adrien stared back expectantly, wondering when the warning  about his behavior and consequences would come. A weighty pause and an  air of tension hovered over the two of them, and the lack of  conversation turned awkward, so Adrien forced himself to say, "Sure."