Chapter Text
It starts with such small things.
It starts with things Nino does without thinking about it, because they’re just the sort of thing you do for friends, and he’s never had to think about them before. Nino hasn’t had that many friends himself, at least not outside of their class, but the ones he does have are good friends- he doesn’t need more than what he has.
Adrien needs more than what he has, though. Adrien needs friends like Nino needs music.
It starts with a nudge as Adrien starts to look distracted in class, with a shared look when Kim and Alix try to yell out an answer at the same time, with an arm slung around Adrien’s shoulder when he slumps into his seat.
The more he notices, the more careful he is not to draw Adrien’s attention to it.
Those small things don’t seem so small when Adrien turns such bright looks of gratitude to him for them.
It leaves Nino uneasy, even as he grins back.
(So much of what he’s done is only paying attention to Adrien. He doesn’t like the conclusions he’s drawing from that).
“Hey, you dropped your pen,” Nino tells him, and Adrien beams like the sun. Nino needs shades if he’s going to keep doing that. “Super nice pen, dude, don’t want you to lose it.“ Nino almost says something like ‘it must have cost a lot,’ but he stops himself in time.
“Oh-” Adrien’s sunny smile dims, clouds creeping into that bright sky. “It wouldn’t matter. I have two more, Father keeps forgetting he’s gotten them for my birthday.” Seeming to catch himself, he adds, “But thank you for grabbing it! You’re right, I should keep a better eye on it.”
That’s not something that Nino ever said, but he doesn’t know how to reply.
He gets Adrien a twelve pack of ballpoint pens the next chance he gets.
“So you don’t have to keep using your fancy ones,” Nino says when he hands them over, and hopes like hell Adrien doesn’t hear the so you don’t have to keep being reminded that your dad sucks underlying his words.
“Thank you!” Adrien’s eyes alone could light the room. “These are way more practical."
That first birthday party goes disastrously, because Adrien’s dad seriously sucks, but Adrien looks so overwhelmingly happy at the classroom party that Nino starts plotting to celebrate Adrien’s- half birthday, or something. That’s a thing somewhere, right? Even if it’s not he can probably rope some of their classmates into making it a thing.
Nino does and doesn’t want to keep giving Adrien things. Adrien’s so surprised and so thankful every time but it doesn’t take Nino long to start picking up on a quiet anxiety that threads through Adrien with every gift. It takes him longer to figure out why (because Adrien’s dad sucks so much and it takes a long time for Nino to ever see Adrien’s room) but once he has he-
Nino’s been trying to invite Adrien to hang out since they met, but he starts trying harder. He asks Adrien for advice even when he doesn’t think Adrien’s likely to have any advice. He gets Adrien on video chat whenever Adrien can’t manage to sneak out to meet them. With some help from Alya he gets Adrien on several different messaging systems and friends him on all of them, so that he can talk to him any time.
That turns out to be the one that’s quickly, obviously not a small thing at all.
It takes a while for Adrien to really believe Nino’s insistence that he can use it any time, but once he does he takes full advantage of it. Nino’s suddenly getting messages at all hours, night and day, and while there are definitely nights Nino’s tempted to switch his phone over to Do Not Disturb (sometimes Nino would really like to sleep instead of being bombarded with cat memes) he never quite brings himself to do it.
Nino tells Alya, eventually, and she looks thoughtful for a moment and then changes the subject before leaving abruptly and Nino’s frustrated and upset by her dismissal until he checks the Ladyblog later that night.
There hadn’t been a chat function before. There’d been forums, but nothing this complicated, and after a few minutes of navigating the chat Nino thinks he recognises Max’s hand in it. After a few more minutes, he thinks Markov probably got involved, too.
Adrien’s thrilled. Nino wishes sometimes that less of his own life seemed to revolve around the Ladyblog, but he doesn’t feel that way at all when Adrien’s talking his ear off about how cool the new chat feature is, hands waving expressively as he tries to put his happiness into words.
"It’s really customizable,” Adrien says, listing sideways in their bench seat and sneaking glances at Nino until Nino edges close enough for his side and shoulder to take some of Adrien’s weight. Immediately Adrien leans on him even more heavily, and now Nino really has to watch for stray arms and elbows, but a stiffness he’d only been half aware of leeches out of Adrien immediately. “And it’s got this huge gif library!"
Nino sighs as Max loudly announces, "See, Kim? I told you that was the correct pronunciation."
"Nah, it’s gif,” Alix says, though from the gleam in her eye she probably just wants to start trouble.
“I thought it was gif?” Marinette says, mostly to herself. She’s pronouncing it the same as Adrien did.
Adrien’s shrinking against Nino now, clearly not having meant to start an argument.
“It’s definitely gif." Alya sounds more certain than anyone else.
"I think you can pronounce it either way,” Rose offers. No one answers her except Juleka, who hugs her from the side and shakes her head.
“I think Rose is right." Nino’s louder than he meant to be. Loud enough that Adrien flinches.
(Nino’s never hated anyone like he does Adrien’s dad).
Mme. Bustier only entered the room partway through the argument, so she hasn’t said anything yet, but Nino forces himself to look straight at her until she intervenes.
"Class, I’m not sure it matters,” she says dryly. “But if it’s that important to you, perhaps you can discuss it on your own time?"
Alya leans dangerously far over her desk when Mme. Bustier turns away and whispers, "I have no idea who’s right, but now everyone’ll be in the chat later. You’re stuck at home tonight, right Adrien? You can still hang out with everyone online.”
They never do resolve that argument. They do all end up forming a separate class chat through the Ladyblog, which turns out to be incredibly convenient for akuma information.
Adrien never logs out.
He sends Nino messages even when he knows Nino can’t answer right away. Adrien doesn’t seem to care when Nino answers, as long as he does answer.
It turns out what Adrien wanted more than anything was someone to talk to.
He’d wanted someone who’d listen.