A Step at a Time

‘Adrien? I’m leaving now,’ Gabriel called. He had dressed up for the evening in a formal, dark blue dinner suit. Adrien thought he looked like a funeral director.

‘Are you sure about this?’ Adrien asked.

‘Of course I am,’ Gabriel answered as he adjusted his cuff links. 

‘But you’re so old,’ Adrien exclaimed. ‘Positively ancient. Miss Bustier is, what, half your age?’

Gabriel leveled a glare at him.’I’m thirty-nine and Caline is twenty-seven.’

‘But that’s,’ Adrien counted on his fingers, ‘twelve years difference,’ he almost shouted.

Gabriel sighed. ‘The older you get, the less such a gap means. We’re both consenting adults - ‘ 

‘Ew,’ Adrien shouted, sticking his tongue out and putting his fingers in his ears. ‘We’re not talking about sex stuff.’

Gabriel raised an eyebrow. ‘I never mentioned sex,’ he pointed out. ‘This is just two adults going out for dinner. Nothing more.’

‘Does she know that?’ Adrien asked. He recalled Caline’s smiling, blushing and hair-twirling.

‘Of course she does. Caline isn’t the type of person who makes assumptions or jumps head first into a relationship. She knows these things have to be felt out first.’

Adrien winced at Gabriel’s choice of words, then tilted his head. That made no sense. “Feel out what, exactly?’

‘That both parties are in agreement about what they expect to get out of a meeting such as this,’ Gabriel explained. ‘If something more develops, then that too will be discussed.’

Adrien made a non-committal noise in his throat. ‘Well then, good luck,’ Adrien wished, dubiously.

‘Thank you, Adrien. Don’t wait up,’ Gabriel smirked as he walked out the door.

Adrien stared ah his father’s back, dumbstruck. Who was this man and what had he done with Gabriel Agreste?

Adrien put his head in his hands and sank to the floor, morose thoughts about what school will be like on Monday circling in his mind. Adrien decided then that absolutely no one could know about father and Miss Bustier.