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Adrien Agreste did not have a lot of friends.
He did have some, of course. He had Nino, his best friend. But Nino had Alya. And Alya had Marinette.
Adrien wasn’t really as close to them.
And then there was Ladybug, who was supposed to be his… well, he wasn’t quite sure what she was supposed to be anymore. Ladybug seemed to be fed up with his mere presence nowadays.
It seemed like everyone around him already had someone else that they cared for more.
Except, for the other day when Marinette had spotted him from her rooftop balcony, clad in his black suit and triangle ears. She had called him over to her, and together they had spent the afternoon in pleasant company, filled with laughter and buckets of movie theater popcorn.
It had been so easy. So incredibly easy to be around her.
Marinette hadn’t known who he was, of course, beneath the black mask and altered eyes, but perhaps that was for the better because that day Marinette had seemed much less anxious than she normally was. She had seemed like she had enjoyed Chat Noir’s presence just as much as he had enjoyed hers.
He’d even gotten to know her a little bit better, she had let him in about her crush on ‘Buttercup.’
Adrien didn’t actually know who ‘Buttercup’ was yet. But he had a plan.
The only problem with all of this was that Marinette had opened up to Chat Noir, not Adrien Agreste. And Chat Noir was not the one who was in dire need of company or movie theater popcorn.
It was his true self. Just Adrien. The one and only prince charming, lonelier than ever.
If he could just get Marinette to open up to his normal-self, then they could hang out together all the time. He did get to see her some already, between school and their whole friend group going out to places together. But Adrien had had a great time when it was just the two of them for the whole afternoon.
He wanted to experience that again.
And again after that, if he could.
He just wanted to have a friend who didn’t have to have drama or billboards of them kissing or photographers for the Ladyblog breathing down their neck.
Just a friend. That was all he wanted.
So he had a plan.
Currently, their school lunch hour was just a few minutes away from its end, and Adrien had already watched Nino and Alya walk back to their classroom hand in hand. Marinette was still seated across from Adrien at their library table, and she was rubbing her tired eyes after having just woken up from a lunchtime nap. Her ability to fall asleep anywhere was something that Adrien found endlessly amusing.
He rubbed his fingers together beneath the table.
“So… did you have any good dreams?” he asked.
Marinette made a noise that sounded crossed somewhere between a squeak and a gulp. It was hard to tell exactly what it was from behind her hands. Slowly, she removed them from her face as her eyes settled on him, revealing her cheeks, pink from recent sleep.
“U-Um, yeah. I think so,” she answered, though she quickly looked down to her lap. “I can’t really remember… I think I was… No, nevermind.” Marinette shook her head and took a rapid glance around the table. “Hey, um, where did Alya and Nino glow— I-I mean go?”
This was the anxiety that Adrien had always seen disrupt Marinette whenever she was around him. If he hadn’t been privy to the second perspective of Chat Noir, he might’ve thought that it was how she acted all the time. But it wasn’t. There was something about Adrien that made her like this. He didn’t know what it was. But he was certain that he could fix it, he only had to show her that he could be her friend too like Chat Noir was.
“Alya and Nino have already headed back to class,” Adrien answered, keeping up a gentle smile. “The lunch period is going to end in a few minutes. Do you want to head back together?”
The color in Marinette’s cheeks instantly turned deeper red. Maybe she was feeling sick?
Adrien tried not to let his smile fall. “Marinette, are you feeling alright?”
“M-Me? Yeah! I’m great! Very great! Super great! No, I mean, not super. I’m not super at all. Why would I be super? I’m just great! Let’s go!” Without a pause in momentum, Marinette stood from her chair and flung her backpack onto her shoulders.
“Okay…” Adrien said, and he had to jog a little to catch up to Marinette’s side as she was already on her way out the door. Luckily, their next class was at the far end of the school from the library, granting Adrien at least some time to try and talk to her. It was his only chance left of the day, his father had him scheduled for a photoshoot directly after his final class. Adrien had to make these few minutes count.
“Hey, do you know what a cat’s favorite color is?” he asked playfully as he walked in tandem with Marinette who was staring at her shoes as though they’d fall off if she looked away.
Adrien watched her eyebrows muddle.
“What?” she asked.
“Purrple,” he answered with a grin.
That afternoon a few days ago, she had laughed and/or gagged at every joke and pun that had come out of his mouth. They would be the purrfect icebreaker now.
Or so he’d thought.
But Marinette wasn’t laughing this time.
She stopped walking, half way through the school’s open courtyard, and she blinked. “That was terrible.”
Adrien stopped his pacing along with her and nodded his head in acceptance. “I try.”
Suddenly Marinette seemed to have forgotten all about her shoes as she searched at his face in utter confusion. “I-I didn’t know you like puns,” she said carefully.
Adrien shrugged. “Who doesn’t?” The tightness in his chest was relieved as the smallest smile broke through her stiff lips, warming her face.
“I guess you’re right,” she said.
“Actually, there is something I wanted to talk to you about,” Adrien admitted, scratching the back of his neck before wringing his hands together, unsure of where to place them.
The pinkness in Marinette’s cheeks returned. The color suited her features.
“R-Really?”
“Yeah,” Adrien nodded, too quickly. “You see, um, a little birdy told me that there’s a guy who’s not your boyfriend, but could be your boyfriend. But you don’t know how to talk to him. You know, ‘Buttercup?’”
Now the pink was gone entirely from Marinette’s skin, like color drained from a fragile porcelain doll. But she wasn’t saying anything, so Adrien continued, “I don’t know who it is, but I thought I could help you out. As a friend. We’re friends, right?”
Marinette’s mouth was open, but still no sound was coming out. It was beginning to become uncomfortable. Right before Adrien could try and say something else, Marinette finally spoke up in a croaky whisper, asking, “Is this a joke?”
Adrien swiftly shook his head. “Of course not. I’d be happy to help you out.”
Just like that afternoon. That perfect afternoon.
A thousand different thoughts that Adrien couldn’t read flashed across Marinette’s darting eyes. They didn’t exactly seem positive.
“D-Did Alya tell you about this?” she asked, hurt coating every word. “I can’t believe she would tell—”
“No,” Adrien jumped in quickly. “It wasn’t Alya, she didn’t tell me.”
“But, then who did?” Marinette was gaping up to him. Adrien didn’t like this panic on her face at all.
His heart twinged. Maybe this wasn’t the best idea after all. But he couldn’t sell Alya short, because it really hadn’t been her who’d told him about Buttercup. It had been Marinette herself. And now she was standing right here waiting for an impossible answer, looking like she was about to burst.
Adrien cleared his throat. “It, um…it was…Chat Noir…?” He squinted one eye shut as he squeaked out his alter ego’s name in a pitch much too high to be considered manly, and immediately afterwards he clamped his mouth shut. He had no idea where he was going with this.
Marinette’s face fell, her lips parted in disturbed awe. “Chat Noir told you about Buttercup…?”
Adrien clasped his hands together. “…Yeah.”
“What? Why? Do you even know Chat Noir?”
“Of course I know Chat Noir,” Adrien defended. “He and I are… friends.”
Marinette’s eyebrows shot up to her forehead. “No, you’re not. I’m friends with Chat.”
“Yes, and so am I.”
“But he never told me that!”
Adrien could feel his own eyebrows quirking. “Why would Chat Noir tell you that he and I are friends?”
Marinette’s arms were beginning to fumble about herself. “I don’t know, he seems to be telling you all of my secrets, apparently.”
“Good point.” Adrien bit down on his lower lip.
For a moment, Marinette walked in a frantic circle, covering her face with her hands.
Adrien let her take her time.
It wasn’t long before she pulled her hands away and looked back up to him with a new fire blazing in her blue eyes. “So, what,” she asked, “you and Chat just have secret meetings to talk about me behind my back? That’s so mean.”
“What?” Adrien replied, flabbergasted. “It’s not mean at all! He adores you!”
“I know!” Marinette shot right back.
Adrien’s eyes widened. He hadn’t meant to say it, because he hadn’t thought ‘adore’ was the right word for what he felt. But it was the word that had come out of his mouth. And Marinette had already accepted it to be true.
“I know Chat adores me,” she said again, bringing her voice down to an acceptable level for the school courtyard. “B-But I already like…”
“…Buttercup,” Adrien supplied for her.
Marinette couldn’t seem to meet his eyes anymore. “Yeah.”
“Then I can help you,” Adrien tried to suggest as calmly as he could. “Because we’re friends.”
Marinette only gulped. “D-Did Chat Noir actually tell you who Buttercup is?”
She seemed terrified to know the answer. Adrien could only tell her the truth.
“No, I don’t know who it is. Chat Noir doesn’t know either. He just wants to help you out because he liked hanging out with you. That’s what he said.”
Marinette nodded in understanding. “Okay.” But her voice was meek and quiet. Suddenly, the school bell rang loudly around them, startling them both, signaling the end of the lunch period.
“I’m sorry,” said Marinette. “I-I have to go.” Already she was taking off again, eyes glued to shoes.
“Wait,” Adrien called after her, “we have the same class.”
But Marinette was already far ahead of him, and then she was lost in the crowd of hundreds of heads zooming in every possible direction.
He let her go.
☼☼☼☼
meet at our third rendezvous spot. asap.
Ladybug sent the message off through her yo-yo and took a deep breath of the crisp night air. It wasn’t a patrol night tonight, but she knew that Chat Noir would come anyway if she requested him. Even if he wasn’t transformed, the text should be re-routed to his cell phone with the new magic they’d unlocked over time as they’d grown with their powers. He’d be here soon.
Carefully, Ladybug sat down on the flat rooftop beneath her feet, her legs dangling over the edge, and she watched how the sparkling lights across the city glowed against the late night sky peacefully.
At that moment, peaceful was just about the last thing Ladybug felt.
“Spots off.”
Pink light flashed over her body, disguised with the rest of the lights surrounding her, and when it was gone again, Marinette Dupain-Cheng was left in the heroine’s place, sitting all alone on a rooftop that only Ladybug should’ve known about.
It probably would have been wiser to have at least worn a jacket.
But Marinette was too stubborn to leave for a jacket now. She sat through the shivers, rubbing her hands on her arms as she waited for that stupid cat to show his face already. If Ladybug had asked Chat to go to her own bedroom balcony—that she was certain he would not do. This was the only way.
Not too many minutes more passed before she heard the familiar patter of footsteps landing behind her, soon followed by a confused, “Marinette?”
She didn’t turn to look at him. She stared ahead at the lights. Her nose was getting cold.
“Marinette, is everything okay?” he asked more urgently. “Where’s Ladybug? What are you doing here?”
“There’s no akuma,” Marinette answered dully. “Ladybug dropped me off here.”
“…She did?”
Marinette finally turned her head up to take in Chat’s flashing green eyes. Her stomach twisted.
Of course ‘Ladybug’ had dropped her off. How else could she have gotten up here? This rooftop didn’t have a door.
Marinette took a deep, cold breath. “Why did you tell Adrien about Buttercup?” she asked, cutting right to the point. “I trusted you with my secret. You betrayed me.”
Chat’s jaw hung open, clearly at a loss for words. Marinette could see the superhuman canines poking just past his lip. She wondered if he had those in real life. Logically, he didn’t, because no one had teeth that sharp naturally, but she still couldn’t imagine him without them.
Without offering any words of defense or explanation, Chat Noir seated himself next to Marinette on the rooftop, putting only about a foot of space between them, his feet dangling off the edge next to hers.
“It’s dangerous for you up here,” he said quietly. He looked at her only for a moment and then looked away again. Back and forth. Nervously.
Good. He should be nervous.
“I don’t care,” Marinette said in return.
“Really,” Chat urged. “We should go somewhere else that’s safer for you. At least to a building with rails. We can talk there.”
Marinette sharpened her gaze. “Are you saying you won’t catch me if I fall?”
“Wh— Of course I’ll catch you!”
“Then I’m staying right here,” Marinette huffed. “And you can tell me why you would betray me like that.”
After another series of conflicted sighs, Chat ultimately deflated in resignation. “I’m sorry that I hurt your feelings, Marinette. I never meant to betray you.”
“But you did.”
“Because I… I can’t be around all the time in your life,” he said. A glint of sorrow sparked in his eyes, only for a second, but Marinette still caught it and suddenly the anger in her chest lessened. A little.
“I had a great time the other day,” he went on. “It was actually the most fun afternoon I’ve had in a really long time. But, I’m not real. I mean, I am, but I’m a superhero. I can’t be around to be your friend all the time, it’s not safe for either of us.”
An icy breeze blew against them. Marinette shivered. “I know.”
Chat Noir didn’t even seem to notice the breeze. “You were really excited to be able to tell Buttercup how you feel about him, and I wanted to make sure you got that support. So…”
Marinette asked slowly, “So, you told Adrien about it to take your place in helping me?”
“Exactly,” Chat nodded with hopeful eyes. “You guys are in the same school, and I’ve seen you around together. I thought you were friends. I know he wants to be your friend. So I thought he could help you.”
Marinette felt like her heart was shattering and repairing at the same time. She placed her elbows in her lap and rested her face into her hands.
Adrien wanted to be her friend.
She didn’t know if that was great news or terrible news anymore.
“Why didn’t you just ask me, Chat?” she grumbled, the sound of her voice melting into her fingers.
“W-Well, I did stop by your room once, but you weren’t there.”
“So you immediately went to Adrien instead?”
“Yeah.”
Marinette looked up from her hands to smack Chat’s bicep lightly with the back of her hand. “God, you idiot. Adrien is Buttercup.”
Chat Noir’s eyes rounded into wide circles, and against his dark suit, through the small crack on his neck where his zipper remained undone, Marinette could see a deep blush working its way rapidly down his skin.
For a minute, neither of them could figure out what to say—until finally Chat choked out, “I fucked up.”
Marinette stared at him in disbelief. She tried not to stare at his neck. “Yes. You did. Now Adrien thinks that he’s supposed to help me get together with himself!”
“Ohhh, I fucked up,” Chat repeated. He seemed to be looking right through her, lost in a daze of clarity.
Marinette groaned. “This is exactly why I didn’t tell you who Buttercup was in the first place. Because I know you don’t even like him. You always grimace at his posters around the city, and every time he’s brought up or we have to rescue him, you always act like it’s such a nuisance. But he’s a nice boy! He’s not just some model. He doesn’t even like modeling that much. I don’t know why you hate him.”
Chat’s pained expression suddenly dissolved as he looked upon Marinette quizzically. “Wait—”
“And now you’re all buddy-buddy with him?” Marinette exclaimed in exasperation. “Seriously, what is your problem!”
“No, wait a minute,” Chat said louder. “What makes you say that I don’t like Adrien Agreste?”
“I-I don’t know. The way you talk about him?”
Chat was staring at her intensively now. Perched on the rooftop, eyes ablaze. “When have I ever talked about him with you, Marinette?”
Marinette hesitated and sat back. All of a sudden Chat Noir had taken a turn too close to a completely different secret. And this was one that he could not tread into. She hunched further in on herself, rubbing her arms to keep warm while she spat out, “Geez, are you both set on interrogating me today?”
“You’re the one who brought me here, Marinette,” Chat countered smoothly. The faintest smirk was beginning to creep onto his lips as the blaze in his eyes only grew. “How did you get all the way up here, anyway?”
“I told you,” said Marinette. “Ladybug dropped me off.”
Without missing a beat, Chat asked, “Then where is she?”
“I don’t know? Not here?”
Chat Noir chuckled. Marinette’s chest tightened.
“You said that you and I rescue Adrien Agreste,” Chat said, his smirk widening. “Why would you say that?”
Marinette’s blood went cold. Colder than the icy wind on the rooftop or the frozen goosebumps on her arms.
Slowly, she whispered, “I didn’t say that.”
“Yes, you did.”
“No, I didn’t!”
“Mind if I give Ladybug a quick call, then?” Chat asked, already pulling out his baton. “To find out where she is?”
“Go ahead!”
Though the call was already dialed.
And Marinette remembered too late about the recent upgrade to their powers.
“No, wait—!”
The purse across Marinette’s shoulders vibrated, cutting her off with the sound of a muffled ringtone playing into night.
Chat was flat out grinning now. “Are you gonna answer that?”
“Chat!” Marinette shouted. Her heartbeat was spiraling too high. This wasn’t supposed to happen. “This is serious! You’re not supposed to know anything!”
Chat put his baton away behind his back and held up both of his hands to portray harmlessness. “It’s okay. We’ll figure this out. Maybe this is better. I mean, we were going to find out eventually, right?”
Marinette couldn’t breathe. “Not like this! What the hell!”
“Just relax, it’ll be okay.”
He really didn’t seem that alarmed at all with uncovering what had to have been the biggest secret the city was hiding.
Marinette clenched her fists. “I was already mad at you, and now I’m double mad at you! Not only do you know who I am, but now you’re going to Adrien behind my back and ruining any chance I had with him! How am I supposed to trust you!” Abruptly, she stood up to pace the rooftop, her blood pounding in her ears.
She heard the sound of her name being called but she was too upset for it to truly register.
“Marinette—”
“We’re not supposed to know anything about each other, Chat, don’t you know that! We could lose our miraculous over this! Don’t you understand what’s at stake here? You’re ruining my whole life!”
“Marinette, please, hear me out—”
“Seriously, Chat!” she shouted to the sky.
“My Lady…”
Suddenly his voice had changed.
Marinette froze. She closed her eyes. The world felt like it was spinning around her, a windstorm that didn’t seem like it would let up any time soon.
She felt his familiar clawed hands land on her shoulders but she refused to open her eyes. She kept her head down.
Barely above a whisper, she said, “Ever since I became the Guardian, everything has felt like too much. I hate doing this alone. Alya helps me, but it’s not enough. She’s not you. And if I can’t trust you, then— I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I just wanted to have one normal thing in my life and I can’t even have that. ‘Operation Buttercup’ felt like the only thing still grounding me to… me.”
Maybe a tear or two fell from her lashes. But she could blame it on the wind.
“I think everything is going to work out, Bug,” Chat said in his beautifully gentle voice, and his arms enclosed around her for a snuggling hug, hanging onto her like a needy kitten.
Marinette didn’t stop him.
But her own arms remained at her side.
“I hate you sometimes,” she whispered, lacking any true cruelty in her tone.
“I know,” he whispered back. “I messed up. And I really didn’t mean to learn your identity this way. You just kind of… told me.”
“I know.” Marinette flicked the side of his arm that was wrapped around her. “You don’t have to keep saying it.”
“Okay. But, I think I can fix this.”
Marinette let out a long sigh. Everything was going to change now. At the very least she didn’t have to worry about handling this with Master Fu anymore, but the Celestial Guardian would find out eventually. Although, he’d actually been wanting them to know each other’s identities for a while now…
“How can you fix it?” she asked.
Chat took a step back from her, now that she’d stopped screaming. He really did know just how to calm her down sometimes.
A new giddiness flowed through his energy now, Marinette could see it in the way he was fidgeting with his fingers. She doubted it would go away any time soon. He’d wanted to know her real face since the moment he’d met her.
“What if I told you that ‘Buttercup’ likes you back,” Chat said. Then he gulped. “Like, a lot.”
Marinette stammered. “I-I don’t think that’s true. He thinks I’m just a friend.”
“No, he doesn’t,” Chat breathed.
“Okay, now you’re starting to weird me out.” Marinette took to rubbing her arms together again, trying to retain the body heat she’d just lost when he’d stopped hugging her.
Now Chat was just watching her. Like he couldn’t take his eyes off of her. “I told you I could fix this,” he said. “You just have to promise to not get mad at me.”
“I’m already mad at you,” she barked.
“Great, so then this won’t be as bad. Probably.”
“Just fix it already!”
“Okay, okay.” He took a deep breath in, and looked… scared. There were very few times Marinette could ever recall Chat Noir appearing genuinely scared.
“Claws in.”
Her heart stopped.
“Wait, Chat—!”
But it was too late. The green magic she’d only seen glimpses of from behind underground walls before, the light she’d only seen from behind her eyelids, it was right there in front of her.
And when it went away, Adrien was standing where Chat had stood.
Adrien.
Marinette didn’t know if her heart ever actually started again. But the thought was already far from her mind.
Adrien swallowed hard and Marinette watched his throat move against the redness that she could now see creeping further down his neck. Down to the top of his chest exposed by his mere t-shirt.
He really should have worn a jacket.
“You see?” he breathed.
Marinette closed her gaping mouth and nodded, attempting to speak. “We… W-We…” Feebly, she lifted her hands and pointed in some sort of criss-crossing opposite directions.
The corners of Adrien’s lips curved upwards. “Yeah, a little bit.”
Marinette was taken aback. It was perhaps the most gorgeous smile she’d ever seen. It didn’t belong to Adrien or to Chat. It lied somewhere in between. Somewhere new.
For once, this must have been the real him.
With his new smile, Adrien chuckled. “So, does this make up for it? It was just a little misunderstanding. We’ll figure this out. You and me, like always. My Lady.”
As soon as the nickname left Adrien’s lips, Marinette’s heart slammed back into action and she nodded eagerly. Because he was right, everything was going to be just fine now, someway or another.
Adrien reached out a hand towards her in invitation and Marinette didn’t know where it was he planned to take her.
But she trusted him.
And so she gladly placed her hand into his.