Archive of Our Own ^beta

“You’ll like her, I’m sure of it!” Adrien exclaims excitedly, raising his hand to look at his watch in anticipation of the arrival of this mysteriously wonderful girl, and Felix can already feel something sickeningly sweet in his mouth, which is what this person will surely be like. After all, everything he’s heard so far about Adrien’s so-called best friend speaks of an angel incarnate, so much so that Felix is already sick of the over-sweetened goodness of this Marinette before he’s even met her.

“I mean, everyone likes her!” his cousin continues in joyful oblivion, not noticing the skepticism with which Felix looks at him. “She’s my best friend for a reason,” Adrien smiles, as if seeing an internal image of this wonderful friend in front of him, and Felix gets the impression that the model is in love with her, or something, so dreamy his face is.

“And why, if I may ask,” Felix finally speaks up, “Do I have to meet her?” Adrien opens his mouth and Felix can almost hear another tirade of praise that is about to burst from the model’s lips, trying to convince him of how wonderful she is and that Felix simply must know her—so he clarifies the question to spare himself this torture. “To meet her like this, separately from the rest of your friends. Now that I’ve moved to Paris, I’m sure I’ll meet them all sooner or later.” He concludes with a barely contained sigh, tired in advance of all this pointless socialization that he will have to go through if he wants to rebuild his relationship with Adrien.

His cousin smiles slightly embarrassedly, his hand nervously rubbing the back of his neck, and maybe Felix has correctly guessed the reason why the model singled out one of his friends in particular. Although, he wonders, why is she still just a friend then? Is Adrien still the same shy, socially awkward guy in his twenties that he was in his teens, when his father controlled his every move? Or is Felix wrong in his assumption?

“You see…” Adrien mutters, his cheeks burning with a slight blush, “Marinette is like the heart of our group, if she accepts you, then everyone else will too.” Felix has a moment to note to himself how indifferent he is to whether Adrien’s group of friends will accept him or not as long as his cousin is amenable to their reunion, when the model continues. “Plus, she’s a little, how should I put it… protective of me?” He says, more like a question. “She’s a little skeptical about the idea of ​​my cousin suddenly coming back into my life after cutting off all ties…”

Something must be reflected on Felix’s face, because Adrien begins to explain hastily. “Well, I didn’t tell her that! Mari came to this conclusion herself from my stories about our relationship!” he chatters, as if expecting Felix’s indignation, which, he must admit, would be entirely appropriate. Not because Adrien blamed him for the discord in their relationship, but because some girl thinks she has the right to interfere in this relationship as if it’s her business!

Felix feels a familiar anger starting to bubble up under his skin, and he already knows he’s going to say something nasty that he’ll later regret—his passive-aggressive outbursts always leave a bitter taste in his throat when he fails to vent in a more productive way.

He doesn’t know what came over him, honestly. While this family reunion had the potential to become emotional, years of therapy after his father’s death and his aunt’s disappearance had taught Felix to deal with his anger in constructive ways… and now it feels like it’s all gone out the window.

Wow, if his reaction to this girl before meeting her is so strong, then Felix doesn’t even want to think about what will happen when he can’t hide his disdain for this ‘best friend’ of Adrien’s to her face, because she thinks she has the right to interfere in his life.

What saves him is that Adrien jumps up from his chair before Felix has time to voice his displeasure out loud and announce that he is not going to tolerate such impudence from a stranger, with which he would probably immediately cross out improving connection with his cousin by expressing open disdain for someone whom Adrien clearly appreciates.

“Mari!” the model exclaims, disappearing somewhere behind him, and Felix restrains himself from looking back, because despite his indignation, he is slightly intrigued by who could impress Adrien so much as to be singled out in a separate, special category, even among his friends.

“You can sit here,” his cousin babbles thoughtfully, pulling out his own chair for the girl who has approached, as if deliberately placing her opposite Felix. “I’ll just put this here, there you go!” he mutters, moving his drink to the next seat, “So, Marinette, this is my cousin, Felix, Felix, this is my bestest friend, Marinette! While you guys are getting acquainted, I’m going to go order something for Mari!”

Felix forces himself to become an outside observer in this scene—it’s not dissociation as such, but one of the techniques his therapist has taught Felix to distance himself from his emotions in the moment. He looks at the blue-eyed brunette now sitting across from him at the cafe table, automatically cataloging his observations. Slightly petite, objectively attractive (average level maybe), a soft smile and a warm look in his cousin’s direction (expected and pathetic emotions), and not a hint that she has even noticed Felix’s presence at the table.

Finally, when Adrien leaves—which is suspicious because he could have just waited for the waiter, or called for one if his friend was so eager to drink something—the girl’s expression suddenly changes to something completely different.

When Marinette turns to him and focuses her calculating gaze on his face, a shiver runs across Felix’s skin, and he cannot yet determine whether it is pleasant or not. It’s just that her gaze seems so piercing that it completely changes the overall impression of her, so that now Felix feels like he is facing a completely different girl than the sweet and smiling one that Adrien has just introduced to him. And because he couldn’t grasp this duality in her right away, the sensation seems dangerous and at the same time excites him, like a long-forgotten favorite game in the midst of boring monotony.

When she speaks, there is something intense—almost dangerous—in her eyes. “You are the trickster, then,” she says with a smirk that doesn’t fit at all with either the stories his cousin has told him about her, or Felix’s own first impression. “Here to start a new life, I gathered,” she continues in a soft voice, and Felix almost feels like he’s in an interview (or is it an interrogation?), frantically thinking about how accurately she formulated the reason for his move to Paris, although he knows for a fact that he didn’t say anything like that to Adrien.

Felix gets the impression that somewhere under the table on her lap is his dossier, which she already knows by heart, although from only two phrases she told him, he shouldn’t even be that cautious.

Marinette reaches for Adrien’s glass, and Felix involuntarily frowns, wondering if she’s going to drink his cousin’s cocktail, and how close this friendship of theirs is, and what’s even going on, because she takes a straw out of the glass, not taking her eyes off Felix. “Let’s see how fast you get your bearings,” she mutters, licking her lips and lowering her voice so that the sound somehow immediately goes like a hot discharge straight into his pants.

The sensation is so unexpected and sharp, especially considering that she’s not even flirting with him (or at least he doesn’t think she is), that Felix doesn’t immediately understand what she’s up to when Marinette dabs the wet end of the straw on a napkin and opens her purse. Felix watches, mesmerized, as the girl takes a stapler out of her purse and, squeezing the end of the straw, pinches it with the stapler so that the staple blocks the entrance of the liquid into the straw.

“Hey, can you hold this for me for a moment?” She asks nonchalantly as she hands Felix a stapler across the table.

In a slight stupor, he accepts the object and automatically lowers his hands back to his lap, watching as the girl returns the straw to Adrien’s glass—untouched end of the straw up—putting the cocktail back in its original place.

Felix feels like he has no idea what just happened, but there’s something buzzing in the periphery of his mind, like a puzzle ready to come together. He looks up from his cousin’s drink and glances at Marinette, who is watching him with a knowing look, her eyebrows raised slightly, as if in mockery of him. The things she just said come to his head and Felix quickly looks at the drink and back to her, realization dawning on his stunned mind just as Adrien plops down in his new seat.

“Here, your favorite!” He states cheerfully, placing the drink down in front of Marinette, “They know how to do really cool stuff here, don’t they?” The model smiles, moving his own glass closer. He leans down and wraps his lips around the straw to take a sip.

“Thank you, Adrien,” his friend smiles softly, no trace of the sly, dangerous woman who decided to test the limits of Felix’s patience.

Meanwhile, the model frowns—because apparently, nothing comes into his mouth—and tries to suck again. Then he straightens up and pulls the straw out of his glass, examining the blocked end in confusion.

“Seriously, Fe?” He finally asks, turning to his cousin, his gaze slightly disapproving, as if he were scolding a child for a misbehavior. “We’re not twelve anymore, you know,” Adrien mutters with a sigh, putting his straw away on a napkin. “Gonna get another one,” he grumbles, standing up from the table.

“It wasn’t me!” Felix exclaims resentfully, his dignity momentarily forgotten, and the fact that the weapon of the crime is in his hand is also forgotten.

The model stops and looks at him skeptically. “Let me guess,” he drawls, “The waiters changed my straw while I was gone. Or no! I’ll give you a better one! It must have been Marinette, who just came, did it!” He sighs again and shakes his head disapprovingly. “At least I know you haven’t changed as much as you seem and there’s still something alive inside,” he mutters under his breath, walking towards the bar.

Felix watches his cousin go, his mouth open to deny his involvement in this absurd prank again, but no sound comes out, because there is nothing he could say. This impudent girl has thought of everything in advance, hasn’t she?

He turns sharply to Marinette, who watches him with amusement, one eyebrow slightly raised, and this ‘alive’ thing inside him that Adrien mentioned is ​​ready to break out and pounce on her, although Felix isn’t entirely sure if what he feels is even actual aggression. It’s just that having the audacity to prank him on their first meeting, and in front of his cousin at that, and then get away with it, is... it is... It’s kind of hot…

Marinette smirks, her eyes shine with some kind of triumph, as if she knows exactly what he’s thinking. “Take a breath, toothy,” she purrs, leaning slightly towards him across the table, “So far, you’ve only passed the test of being able to feel something behind this icy wall you’ve built between you and Adrien.” She says, and after that one phrase, her previous actions make so much sense that Felix is ​​almost no longer angry that his cousin’s friend tricked him into such emotions on their very first meeting.

“Adrien worked very hard to rebuild the self-esteem that his fa… that was destroyed by the people he trusted,” Marinette says, her tone serious now, without a hint of playfulness or cunning. “We worked on it together, and I promised myself that I would never let my friend’s family hurt him again.” She concludes, looking at Felix pointedly. And there she is—the overprotective friend his cousin was talking about, a fatal woman, hiding under the mask of a sweet, friendly girl. “Therefore, I warn you right away that you have no right to make a mistake.”

Felix kind of feels her almost-threat turn him on… And what the hell?! because that just doesn’t happen to him with girls he barely knows… And the fact that she wants to protect Adrien so much somehow doesn’t seem as stupid to him now as it seemed when his cousin mentioned it. It even somehow… warms his heart? in a way he isn’t sure he felt before. Felix isn’t sure what he’s feeling right now at all, but so far everything this girl has said and done has been drawing him in like a magnet—a feeling he’s definitely never felt with such force.

He suddenly realizes that he still hasn’t said a single word to her, and with the way she’s taken him by surprise, Marinette probably thinks he’s a complete idiot for staring at her stupidly and not even responding to her threats. In another situation like this, Felix wouldn’t have even thought twice about telling the person to go to hell, and so cleverly and politely that they would think it was their own idea to go there. But now…

Now he feels a thrill he hasn’t felt in years, as if a long-dormant life has awakened within him. He doesn’t feel the need to prove who’s boss... not yet, anyway. He’s interested in this game, and in this directness, too… Felix is very, very interested in this woman, and he’s eager to see how far this can go if he plays along with her rules.

“Adrien is very dear to me,” he says slowly, choosing his words carefully, because whatever interview it is, he feels that he wants to pass it. “We both went through painful things that separated us,” Felix admits, surprised at himself, but somehow admitting his weaknesses seems like a victory at the moment. “And the last thing I want to do is hurt him.”

Marinette looks into his eyes for a long time, as if she had a lie detector built into her mind and she was actively using it now, then she nods with satisfaction and her face lights up with a soft smile, although Felix can’t help but see behind this lightness the depth and danger that his new acquaintance conceals in herself.

“Good,” Marinette says, her tone indicating the end of the conversation, and Felix almost regrets that Adrien chooses this moment to return to the table with a new strow. Even though he intended to communicate mainly with his cousin in his free time when he moved to Paris, Felix feels like he didn’t have enough alone-time with this mysterious girl, who is now smiling harmlessly at the model again, making light conversation about his week.

Felix watches them, no longer experiencing even artificial dissociation.

He wants to be included in the conversation, to feel, to experience, to participate…

He wants to know more about her, wants to meet the people she considered worthy of being hers and his cousin’s friends.

He finds moments to insert a few words, and he wants to do it again and again, because each time Marinette rewards him with an approving smile. And soon, Felix is ​​so immersed in the conversation that he loses himself in a pleasant banter, not noticing how his own lips curve into a smile—the stapler is forgotten in the corner of the table.

It feels like he has found something important, something close to  him... his cup of tea. And socializing with Adrien’s friends doesn’t seem like such a pointless activity anymore.