A Lover of Words

Adrien Agreste was homeschooled for his entire life and therefore didn’t have any friends except for Chloé, who is the exact opposite of him in terms of personality (she’s rude, highly critical of everything, inconsiderate, etc.)

He was also deprived from any kind of parental love/care from his own father, Gabriel Agreste, who conciously sends villains after his OWN SON, who prioritizes his own villainous motives before him. Adrien has dealt with his mom, the only person who he probably has idolized and learned love & kindness from, leaving; without a caring father or even friends who were there for him for support. On top of these, his father wasn’t there for him on his first Christmas without his mom, which drove Adrien so sad to the point where he escaped from his home in the middle of the night to stalk his friends’ families and feel even more depressed upon seeing their healthy family atmospheres.

His father neglects him to the point that he actually goes missing upon feeling as if nobody would even care if he did so. To the point where he can’t even give a proper answer to Ladybug when she asks him “do you think he’d take it out on his own son?” in The Collector. To the point his friends have to feel as if they need to speak up against the unfairness of the way Gabriel treats Adrien, like in The Bubbler.

He’s been “locked away” in a huge mansion all by himself, without any friends or a parental figure other than his mom, who escapes, to give some love to him. He’s put on a busy schedule that includes him doing modeling, taking Chinese & fencing lessons AND saving Paris every single day? And he doesn’t ONCE tell his father to cut him some slack every now & then??

Even though he’s only known Chloé as a friend, he never once acts mean towards anyone in school & even tells Chloé to be nicer to everyone, or else they can no longer be friends. He openly tells people that he hasn’t had much experience with friendships his whole life, acts as kindly as he can & never once speaks against his father.

He even tries to establish a deeper bond with his father (by initiating hugs, feeling over-thankful for a scarf he thinks his father has bought for him, always waiting for him before meals etc).

I know Adrien is far from perfect, but it really impresses me that Adrien managed to turn out the way he did. His family background forms an ideal villain backstory, but no, the guy saves Paris every single day instead.

anybody who has seen even only one episode of miraculous ladybug can perfectly describe who chat noir is - he's brazen, he's fun, he's witty, he's flamboyant and overdramatic. he's the kind of hero who will preen confidently, give you a captivating wink and then he's off to save the world. but he's not chat noir all the time, or even half the time. most of the time, chat noir is adrien agreste - a quiet and exceedingly polite kid, who is likely to fade into the background despite his supermodel status. and sure, he knows how to be graceful and how to exude charisma, and he's still capable of being a drama queen (like slouching down a wall from being lovestruck).

but this post isn't about that.

because adrien is gabriel agreste's son all the time - a cold, careless, intimidating man, who will raise his voice to force others into submission, and who is depicted almost always with clenched fists.

what i've tried to do here is outline through images how gabriel's abuse has altered and influenced adrien's body language. because of tumblr's image limits (and the limits of my own patience), i have definitely missed some scenes, but i believe that i've managed to present with commentary the most important parts.

warning: image-heavy post.

what is his crime here? being born? being chat noir and doing his best to save paris and its citizens? being a good, warm-hearted person?

and, honestly, i know that ml has many problems, but i love how they depict abuse and the sheer banality of it. nobody deserves to be treated badly. but the funny thing is that adrien does everything right and he still can't earn unconditional love, or approval, or to be seen as a human being with his own desires, ideas and feelings.

the irony of 'wishmaker' was that adrien succeeded at his childhood dream - he turned into exactly what his parents wanted. and he's still not loved. he's still caught up in their games. he still has to keep himself in check. because it seemed like 'perfect golden child' was the destination, but reaching it only revealed a never-ending road of contempt and hostility. ah, the crime of being exactly what people desire you to be.

I liked his face, I liked his body, I liked his sense of humour and his personality and his energy. He annoyed me sometimes, but I wanted to be around him, and I enjoyed his attention.

I was not the only one who liked him. Everybody liked him. Every girl I ever knew liked him. A few guys, too. And he knew it.

He was always dating someone. As long as I knew him, he always had a girlfriend. Sometimes for a week, sometimes a couple months. One after another.

I thought about shooting my shot a few times, but always found a reason not to. When he was dating someone, it was because I wasn’t a homewrecker. When he wasn’t, it was because I didn’t want to be just one more name on his list. One more person he could cross off the parade of people lining up to be with him.

He was cocky. Still is, honestly, all these years later. I think it’s because he was handsome, and charming, and funny, and athletic, and even teachers and other kid’s parents could be swayed to let him off the hook if he got caught doing something stupid.

We were just kids, and poor kids on top of that, but I always sort of got the impression that people didn’t often say “no” to him. That he always- not maliciously, or selfishly, but perhaps in a naive and childlike sort of way- took it for granted that people could be persuaded to his side. If he was funny enough, or charming enough, they’d roll their eyes and let him carry on.

That became another reason to refrain. As much as I liked him, as good as being close to him felt, I felt like more than that- more than the compulsion to move closer- was the certainty that I shouldn’t. That as much as it may be what I wanted, he was the kind of person to push the envelope, and more than he needed one more person in the long long line of his admirers was the need for least one person in his life who could tell him “no”.

You can love someone and tell them No. I am aware of this. But knowing how I think, and knowing how I love, I would have devoted myself to that role. To being the person who looked out for him, doing what he needed, not just what made him happy.

I know that’s who I am. I’ve had friends and family both, and acquaintances, who fell in and out of addiction and mental health crises and pyramid schemes and bad relationships, and I know I can be obstinate. I know that if I see someone I love doing something to hurt themselves, I will get in their way, even if they end up hating me. Because I would rather they hate me than be dead.

I’ve let go of people I loved because they refused to stop trying to die. I’ve held people back from cliffs while they cursed me out trying to throw themselves off. I will leave before I enable. If I am to attend a funeral, I will not sit there knowing I helped put them in the ground.

But I am also tired. And I want more for myself than to be a caregiver for someone else, to follow along and watch after someone else’s needs at the expense of my own. And imagining a future together as we were, that was all I could see: him, living life half-cocked like he always had, and me, trailing after like a nanny, being what he needed and not what he wanted and slowly growing to resent him for my choice.

We would have grown to hate each other.

So I said nothing.

And years later, drinking sodas together over a bonfire in the dark, he told me he’d been a bit im love with me when we were kids.

And me, still a bit in love with him, said that I’d been a bit in love with him too.

We moved on as friends and never spoke of that again.

Years later once again, we meet by chance. He offers me a bottle, which I refuse. I don’t drink. I can’t start- not seeing what it’s done. He teases, the way he does before he gets his way. Goes through all his charming persuasions, the ones I’d seen him pull on others when we were kids, and I tell him flat out: I’m not drinking. I said no. And if you keep thinking you can twist my arm, think again- ‘cause I’m far more likely to kick your ass.

He did keep trying- disappointing but predictable- but eventually dropped it with a laugh. Gave me a funny sort of smile, then, that felt fond, and told me I’d always been the hardest son of a bitch he’s known.

Of all the things he’s ever said to me, that’s the line that makes me proudest. That’s the one that still makes me glow a little.

We’re both adults now. He’s got a kid, and a wife, and a house. I see him around, but I don’t know if he’s seen me. He’s scruffier than he was, but he still grins like he did when we were younger.

Sometimes I see him out and about with the beautiful woman he married and I remember drinks by a bonfire and a conversation we both pretended not to have, and I wonder if he remembers.

I don’t have a crush on him anymore. Can’t really even say I love him. It’s been too long, and I don’t know him well enough anymore to even say I know him. We’ve both changed. We’ve both grown different.

But I think about it a lot. Not what could have happened between us, but how it didn’t.

I know he’s still cocky. Still flies a bit too close to the sun.

And to be fair, I’m still a bit too rigid. Still have to resist the compulsion to mother people instead of experiencing life beside them.

But I think about that negative space, mostly. How close we were as friends, as almost-more, moving together but still apart- like Icarus and gravity itself, him always flying higher and me the stubborn force fighting to stop him from flinging himself at the sun. How I knew that if I’d pushed too hard, I would have dragged him down to fall on the rocks instead. How he knew- maybe, maybe not- that the nature of gravity can’t be changed, that he had nothing to offer me that would turn me from my own stubborn march in my own stubborn way.

Want and need. Desire and require. Overthinking. Overstepping. Boundaries and persuasion. Opposites attracting, similarities that cause repulsion.

I think about that a lot.

prove that the abuse manifested in different ways for each of them because that’s how abuse works in real life. this is based on the fact that john saw dean as mary’s surrogate but once he found out about the deal and sam having demon blood he blamed sam for her death. ok let’s fucking go

dean as mary’s surrogate

there are loads of parallels made between dean and mary in early season spn and late season spn. in season 12 dean directly calls himself sam’s mother, but even earlier than that we see him doing the cooking and child rearing. compare that to all the parallels made between sam and john (both of them losing their blonde woman significant others in a ceiling fire) and it’s clear that dean was meant to more resemble mary. it’s not a stretch to say that if we can see it as viewers this is how john saw it in his actual life. i do think john loves dean for being dean but he loves him more for being mary.

sam as the reason behind mary’s death

i think once john learned that sam had demon blood, some part of him must have always been waiting for the other shoe to drop with sam, not ever fully believing this kid was human, and maybe not even knowing if this kid was HIS. a popular theory back in the day was that YED fathered sam (something they had to actually address in season 4 to stop the speculation), and if WE speculated that hard, surely john must have too. i’m sure he loves sam as an extension of mary, and keeps and raises and protects him BECAUSE he’s mary’s, but similarly (or maybe inverse) to dean, i don’t know if he ever fully gave himself permission to love sam for being sam. in fact, i imagine john harbors a lot of self-loathing for failing to save mary. if we directly parallel john and sam, that means by some extent he would also hate sam.

john trusted dean with far too much, and sam with far too little

dean knew about monsters; sam didn’t. dean had memories of their mother and the night she died, and shared that trauma of watching her die with john; sam didn’t. dean knew when john was supposed to be home and who to call if he wasn’t; sam didn’t. dean was given the money and the guns and the CAR ITSELF; sam wasn’t. dean was taught to drive; SAM WASN’T. 

dean was expected to do everything john was supposed to have been doing in his absence - he was to be a mother and father to sam, he was supposed to protect sam from evil, he was supposed to see to sam’s meals and homework and getting to school on time. and he was put under an EXTRAORDINARY amount of pressure not to screw this up even a little bit, despite the fact that he was only a kid. sam on the other hand was kept on a strict need-to-know basis for his entire life, right up until season 1 when they reunite at last. john didn’t trust sam with ANYTHING, and sam knew it. this contributed to his lifelong anger issues because he didn’t DO anything to warrant that kind of mistrust and probably got gaslit about it a lot of times either by john himself or dean (unknowingly, by parroting/believing the things john said). even in the pilot sam says very casually of his mother “she’s gone,” because her memory doesn’t hold the same place of reverence for him - best guess is that john didn’t talk about her much to sam because he didn’t trust sam with emotional stuff either. in s14 we learn that dean was the one who told sam stories about mary, including her terrible casserole - and their attempt at recreating it infuriated john to the point of him throwing the entire concoction in the trash.

john relied on dean for everything, and refused to rely on sam for anything

canonically dean was the one who comforted john after a bad hunt, looked after and fed his brother when john wasn’t around. dean knew how to use a shotgun; sam didn’t. dean knew who to call in an emergency; sam didn’t. dean knew about monsters; sam didn’t. this was done under the guise of “protection for sammy” but turn it around and it’s also protection FROM sammy. think of how angry john gets when he learns sam has been having psychic visions. he’s not just angry that dean didn’t report it to him, he’s angry that the demon’s plans for sam are coming to pass, and that sam is becoming less human. again, he can’t TRUST sam if sam’s not human, and it proves to john that he was right all along to keep sam in the dark as much as possible.

john gave dean too much freedom, and sam no freedom at all

“watch out for sammy.” sam was under constant supervision by either dean or john; john made sure of it. again, it’s protection FOR sam but also protection FROM him, in case he did something inhuman or evil. dean on the other hand was left alone without any supervision at all for days or even weeks at a time - he resorts to stealing bread and peanut butter and (according to jackles) turning tricks for money. he had to make it work and got up to whatever the fuck he wanted when john wasn’t looking. sam had to LITERALLY run away from home before he got the simple pleasure of eating pizza and having a dog by himself, independently. dean was given too much independence and freedom but sam was kept on such a short leash he had none at all.

john made dean feel unworthy, and he made sam feel unclean

when dean fails to protect sam from the shtriga in the season 1 flashbacks, he says his dad looked at him differently after. he also implies that john physically beat him when sam ran away in flagstaff. whether he meant to or not, john made it abundantly clear that his love for dean was not unconditional; it depended very much on how well dean performed the multitude of tasks john assigned him. dean grew up believing that his only worth was in what he could do for other people. he demonstrates this an an adult over and over and over, from letting his possessed family members beat him up to refusing to take care of his own needs, emotional and otherwise, and snapping at people who try to talk to him about his own feelings.

on the other hand, sam talks in season 8 about how even at a very young age he felt impure and unclean, even before he knew that he had demon blood, even before he knew that there was any such thing as monsters. kids aren’t stupid, and sam picked up on the vibes john was putting off - that john didn’t trust him, might not have loved him, and might not have considered him human or even his own child. without even knowing why, he spent his entire life feeling unclean and inhuman, not worth of being loved by his own family. even dean, who we all know loves sam unconditionally, admits in season 14 that he often took dad’s side on arguments because he had “his own stuff,” further leading to the alienation that was sam’s constant companion growing up. 

AND, MOST IMPORTANTLY:

JOHN’S ABUSE PITTED SAM AND DEAN AGAINST EACH OTHER

john saved dean after their shared trauma of mary’s death. dean says in season 1 that the reason he stopped talking was that he was scared. iirc john’s journal implies he was mute for over a year, and dean in season 2 says that when he was 6 or 7 his dad took him shooting for the first time. if mary died just before dean’s fifth birthday, the timeline works out to dean talking again because john took him shooting. i believe that dean hero worships his father because after mary’s death, and dealing with the terror that something like that could come in and take his family away by killing them horribly at any time without any warning, john learning to fight back against the darkness - and teaching dean to do the same - is what gave dean his voice again. BOTH of them saw and carried the memory of mary burning on the ceiling for the rest of their lives. “watch out for sammy” and “get the thing that killed mom” were dean’s reasons to get up in the morning, because they were john’s reasons to get up in the morning. these things were LITERALLY his reasons for living. john gave dean a way to fight back against fear and gave him a cause to keep him going. abuse or not, dean never stopped being grateful for that, and he was the only other person in the whole world who understood the unique horror of what john went through that night. even all the way into season 10, he tells other people that john did right by him. it’s borderline brainwashing. part of dean’s self-worth will always be based on how good of a son he was to john.

on the other hand, knowingly or not, john did everything possible to alienate sam. he kept him on a short leash while also keeping him at arm’s distance. he didn’t trust sam with emotional things like the memory of mary, he didn’t trust sam with the truth about monsters and what they did for a living, he didn’t trust sam with his plans, he didn’t trust sam with the truth about demon blood. canon STRONGLY suggests john knew YED bled in sam’s mouth as a baby, but instead of telling sam or even dean about that, sam had to learn about it in a horrible flashback recreated by YED himself. when sam wanted to go to school, john told him no, and when he left anyway, john told him not to come back.

this is an equal but opposite kind of abuse. john totally fucked up BOTH his kids in complete inversions to each other.

which means that, no matter what john did, it caused sam and dean to fight. this isn’t an interpretation. this is straight up canon.

again, dean says in s14 that he frequently took dad’s side in arguments because he had his own stuff to deal with, and he was trying to keep the peace. dean, a victim of emotional (and implied sometimes physical) abuse himself, was not able to shield sam from all of john’s bullshit. he could stop sam from getting hit and having to see john during the worst of his drunken rages, but he couldn’t trick sam into thinking john loved him unconditionally, because john didn’t love either of his kids unconditionally.

when john acted in a way that was not befitting of a parent, sam rightfully took exception, which forced dean (who was ALSO BEING ABUSED, almost brainwashed) to jump to his defense. that led to john getting to do whatever the hell he wanted and sam and dean arguing about the effects. when sam ran away in flagstaff, DEAN was punished, leading dean to resenting sam for that incursion, even though sam was perfectly right to want to get away from an abusive household. when sam did a normal thing wanting to leave for college at age 18, he left, and dean resented him for that because that meant he was alone to bear the brunt of john’s anger. 

sam repeatedly made logical, emotionally healthy choices in attempting to break the family dynamic, but because of JOHN’S BEHAVIOR, not sam’s, those choices wound up causing dean harm. JOHN HIMSELF was the ultimate wedge between sam and dean growing up and beyond.

and let’s not forget the biggest sin - john spent 22 years impressing upon dean that taking care of sammy was EVERYTHING, and then without any explanation at all, he asked dean to kill him, and then he DIED, which meant dean had to carry that weight by himself (because again, he’s been trained not to trust sam with things). like of COURSE sam got angry when he found out - that’s fucking fucked up! once again sam is being treated like a ticking time bomb for absolutely no reason - he didn’t ask to have demon blood or psychic visions or a dead mom or an abusive father. nor did dean ask to be saddled with the upbringing of an entire human at four years old who he then might have to kill. because dean will always feel gratitude towards john, and sam will always feel resentment, and because based on john’s treatment of them BOTH OF THESE FEELINGS ARE JUSTIFIED, john continues to cause fights between sam and dean long after he’s dead and gone, and that will never change.

on a final note: i’d like to bring this around to season 13.

after cas, mary, kelly, and crowley all die (or are presumed dead in mary’s case) in the season 12 finale, season 13 opens with nobody but sam and dean and jack. dean directly blames jack for these deaths. he says so multiple times. he says where jack can hear him that he knows jack is evil and impure and cannot be saved and calls jack a freak. when jack tries repeatedly to kill himself dean says to jack’s face not to bother, because WHEN jack does go bad, dean will be the one to kill him. dean does NOT see jack as castiel’s child - he sees jack as someone who brainwashed cas and kelly both and got them killed. dean does not even see jack as a human person worthy of life. from the get-go, all he wants is to put jack down. jack is born into a world shaped by pain and grief and anger, where people hate him simply for what he is and who died to get him here. 

and again, sam identifies hard with jack. he justifiably protests dean’s treatment of him. jack is a kid and didn’t ask for any of this. jack is terrified of dean. sam reminds dean that john said all these things about sam that dean is saying about jack. john is still causing a rift between his sons over a decade after his death.

eventually, after jack uses his powers and brings back cas from the empty, dean pulls his head out of his ass and admits that he was wrong. he calls jack his kid more than once, and jack refers to dean as one of his dads. but the damage has already been done. jack struggles multiple times with his powers, accidentally hurting people and then wishing himself dead after. he also struggles without them; even when using his powers means using up pieces of his soul, he does it, because dean taught him that he’s only worthy of being loved and trusted if he’s “good.” even when he has NO SOUL, when jack does something bad he panics about it and seeks to undo it at any cost. that’s how deep the damage runs.

i see a lot of people remarking that in the arc of 13.01-13.05, dean became john, and i agree that he did. but dean didn’t do to jack what john did to him. dean did to jack what john did to SAM.