Standard disclaimers apply

Prologue

"Adrien!" screamed a blonde haired, blue-eyed girl with a slightly nasal voice.

"Marinette!" screamed a red haired girl wearing a pair of black-rimmed glasses.

Moans could be heard coming from the back door of the high school close to the bakery Tom and Sabine Dupain-Cheng owned. Passing pedestrians barely took note of the strange noises, thinking it was just two teenagers making out in secret. In addition, there were not enough people who frequented that particular street to realize these noises had been going on for around three months.

If anyone had gone closer to the back door, past the trash cans and the huge dumpster, they would have been greeted with a shocking sight: seventeen-year-old Parisian fashion model Adrien Agreste kissing the life out of Marinette Dupain-Cheng. Upon closer inspection, the interloper would have realized that the girl in Adrien's arms was thoroughly enjoying the way he pushed up against her petite form. Marinette's arms were wrapped around the back of his neck as she played with the fine hairs at the nape. As breathing became difficult, both teens pulled apart gasping for some much-needed air.

"Oh brother," interrupted Plagg, Adrien's kwami, from the pocket of his hoodie, "I can't believe how long you sucked face this time!"

"Leave them alone!" exclaimed Tikki, Marinette's kwami, from the pouch of Marinette's purse, "They are secretly engaged after all; it's natural that they express their affection for one another!" Plagg huffed, obviously unable to refute his counterpart's accurate assertion.

How had all of this happened? To understand, we must go back six months, to the start of the second month of their last year of high school . . .

Chapter One

Adrien and Marinette internally sighed, wondering how they'd allowed their best friend to coerce them into these auditions for the leads of Alya's play, Summer Love. It was obvious to both superheroes that it was a poorly disguised attempt to get Adrien to date Marinette. While in the past Adrien and Marinette may have blushed at the idea of playing opposite each other as love interests, now they didn't even balk. They'd been through too much to be embarrassed by the common things a teenager would turn beet red and become flustered over. No; the reason they blushed now is because they were private people. They didn't like their love lives being the talk of the school. Then again, with Adrien being who he was, that was a de-facto part of life; people, no fans, were just too nosy.

In their senior literature class, Madam Renault had announced a contest at the end of September: the student with the best romance play would have their piece performed by the entire class for the Valentine's Day Festival. The only stipulations were: no superhero stories and the play had to have a seasonal theme weaved into the piece. Some examples the teacher had given were: a piece that took place in the summer; a piece that started in autumn and then ended in the same season a year later; or perhaps a holiday piece. It was important, emphasized Madam Renault, to be as original as possible for the school could not in good conscious put on a play in a student's name that wasn't their original work. If it were based on a famous play, all that was needed was an acknowledgment of the original author's work. Anything else, emphasized the teacher, was considered plagiarism and was illegal. They were given a month to complete their pieces. The deadline for their finished products was October 31st.

All the students were excited for the chance to have their names on a school play as the writer. Rose squealed about it being a chance for her boyfriend, Prince Ali, to see her creativity in action. Juleka shrugged, not caring either way, though internally she'd love the attention. Chloe bragged about how her play was going to win and that they were going to have the honor of bringing her play to life. This, of course, prompted Alya to point out that she'd have to write her own play and not copy from another play writer, again. Chloe screeched that she'd only made that mistake one time. Marinette scoffed before pointing out that their teacher wouldn't have warned about plagiarism if she hadn't tried it so many times. Chloe scowled before leaving the classroom in a huff, saying she was going to the library. The rest of the students, taking Chloe's actions as a cue, went to the library as well.

The senior class invaded the library, pouring over plays of various genres. English writers, French writers, translated works, modern and antiquated pieces; no story or play was spared as the senior class of College Françiose Dupont poured over them for inspiration. Romance plays were swiped up faster than brownies straight out of the oven. Reluctantly, other genres were explored although most of the students stayed away from horror stories due to the nature of the assignment. Only the truly creative reached out for the horror stories, knowing that a true romance story could be brought forth from the strangest of genres.

When Alya Cesaire ignored all the books in the library, everyone was confused and surprised. Instead of frantically searching for inspiration among professional authors, the aspiring journalist took out an empty notebook and began writing. Nino gave Alya a knowing look, realizing she was going to use this as an opportunity to try to get Adrien and Marinette to act on their obvious feelings for one another; considering they'd been dancing around the issue since freshman year, it was about time! Adrien and Marinette rolled their eyes at Alya's actions, knowing she was probably going to base the leads on Ladybug and Cat Noir's personalities. While both heroes in disguise had gotten more comfortable in their own skins since the defeat of Hawkmoth and the revelation of their identities to each other, they were still private by nature and were both uncomfortable with so many people idolizing them; unfortunately, they were too polite and kind to hold it against their fans. The only thing that had them curious was how she was going incorporate their personas without connecting the play to their superhero alter-egos.

Alya poured her heart and soul into her play, even neglecting her Ladyblog for a week to finish its' rough draft. This play has to be perfect was the thought repeating in Alya's subconscious. Marinette and Adrien's love life were at stake here! That, and the sanity of the class; everyone in their class, and even some outside their homeroom, had been placing bets on when Adrien and Marinette would start dating. People were becoming fed up with the wait.

During the week she was writing her rough draft, it became a common sight to see Alya tear out pages from her notebook, mumble to herself about plot points and generally display the common symptoms of a young writer wrapped up in a world of her own making. Needless to say, some of her classmates kept their distance from the genius at work, not wanting to get caught in the crossfire if Alya suddenly lost her cool. Fortunately, Hawkmoth was no longer a threat, as Nino would often have to pull Alya from her work when she'd growl in frustration over a particular plot point. After all, Alya was a reporter, not a fiction writer; she was learning the hard way that writing about reality versus a world of your own creation requires more than just imagination.

After the initial rough draft, Alya spent a week ignoring her finished play. This confused her fellow students to no end, except Marinette and Adrien (though Marinette had to explain it to him). Marinette, being a designer, understood what her friend's intentions were for ignoring her manuscript. Alya wanted to refresh her perspective on what she'd written in the play so she'd better catch the grammatical errors.

At the start of the third week, Alya grabbed her red pen and viciously edited her manuscript. Spelling, grammar, style and phrasing; nothing escaped her notice. It became a common occurrence in the girls' bathroom to see Alya scrubbing the red ink she'd accidentally smudge on her hand off, the water draining into the sink turning a bright pink from the gel ink. This went on for four days before Alya began typing up her work. Using her laptop during her breaks, Alya chipped away at her play. Then finally, after snatching time during three school days from her breaks, Alya saved her play on a flash drive and paid the fee to print from the school library. She consoled herself with the knowledge that her best friend's happiness was worth any price, no matter how exorbitant.

The entire senior literature class buzzed with excitement on October 31st. While each student internally hoped they'd be picked, Marinette and Adrien only hoped that Alya's play would not be chosen. This was because they both knew that Alya was the most knowledgeable person concerning their alter-egos in the school. If anyone could write a play based off Lady and Cat Noir that would match their personalities while at the same time not be about the superheroes, it was Alya.

Two days after the assignments were turned in, Madam Renault as well as the head of the school's theater department, Monsieur Louie, spent their time going over the manuscripts. Their frustration mounted as they were confronted with their students' complete lack of originality and inspiration. Miss Bourgeois had practically copied Shakespeare's play of Romeo and Juliet without giving credit to the original author; as if changing their names to Ronald and Julie made it any less obvious! The only reason she couldn't face criminal charges is because Shakespeare had been dead for centuries. Juleka's play was far too bland and full of death; it barely qualified as a romance due to the main characters' lack of involvement in each other's lives. Rose's play was far too peppy; the romance was so obvious that there was nothing left to discover, no intrigue. None of the plays written by their senior classes stood out!

Just as the teachers were about to call off the contest and go with a professionally written play, Monsieur Louie picked up Alya's play. As Monsieur Louie read over the manuscript, a great excitement began to flame in his heart. While the play had some overused themes, it was unique, bold and daring.

"Madam Renault!" exclaimed the drama teacher, joy filling his tenor voice; "I have found our winner!" As the literature teacher read the play, energy returned to her previously dull eyes.

"I do believe you are correct, Monsieur Louie." Madam Renault, with a grin on her face, left to announce the winner to her class, whom were returning from their lunch break.

As we return to the present day, we see Monsieur Louie and Madam Renault seated in the school auditorium, watching the auditions for their leads: Adam "Tiger Stalker" Lemoux and Maria "Queen Bee" Dumon. Due to the nature of the play, it was essential that the leads have a good dynamic. Alya's play was written in such a way that the emotions and actions of the leads fed off each other in a symbiotic manner. In order to make sure no potentials pairs were missed, the leads were auditioned as a couple at random.

The teachers sighed, so far disappointed in the random pairings they'd seen. Juleka and Nathaniel were okay, but their dynamic was too muted for the flamboyant leads. Rose and Max had . . . strong personalities that would be better served as part of the stage crew instead of as actors. Kim and Alix were good for the antagonists of the play and Alya and Nino refused to participate as they wished to narrate or DJ, respectively. Ivan and Mylene were the best so far, though not for the leads. Adrien with Chloe proved disastrous as the girl was only using it as an excuse to attempt to lock lips with the young model. Adrien and Rose were a bit better but still lacked that spark needed to make the leads come to life due to Rose's cheery personality. Finally announcing a ten-minute break, Madam Renault allowed the remaining auditions' to prepare while the ones that needed rest could do so.

"None of these young people have the spark needed to play the leads!" bemoaned the drama teacher.

"Don't worry Monsieur Louie. We haven't tried out all of them yet. In addition, we have most of the supporting characters decided on."

"But without the leads, we can't put on the play!"

"We must have hope that we will find our leads." Madam Renault answered as they returned to the auditorium coming upon Miss Dupain-Cheng scolding Miss Bourgeoisie while Nino restrained Alya who looked ready to strangle Miss Bourgeois. Both teachers, knowing their presence hadn't been noticed yet, remained quiet in order to discover what was happening between the two girls.

"All I'm saying is that it is obvious they chose Alya's play instead of mine because they pitied her!" Both teachers frowned from disapproval; neither had known how horrible Miss Bourgeoisie treated her fellow students as she had hidden it in her later teen years from the teachers. How could anyone be so cruel as to assume a student's teachers would chose to honor them out of pity!

"That's enough Chloe! Alya worked really hard on her play! She deserved to win unlike you; did you honestly think out literature teacher wouldn't notice you tried to pass off Romeo and Juliet as your own work?" Chloe gasped as the other seniors started tittering, Kim's echo of 'burn!' reaching their ears. The teachers had to admit that Miss Dupain-Cheng had a point; of all the ways to cheat, using a well-known play like Romeo and Juliet wasn't the best.

Suddenly, Chloe raised her hand, preparing to smack Marinette across the face when Mr. Agreste snuck up behind her like a cat on the prowl and grabbed her wrist before her hand met its' mark. The giggling abruptly stopped at both the action and the anger splattered over the normally calm and even-tempered young man. The teachers watching could only think of that American saying about the quiet ones.

"I will only say this once, Chloe, so pay attention. If you ever try to hit anyone in our class ever again, we are no longer friends. Your pettiness is no excuse for violence toward a fellow classmate. If you can't handle the truth, next time don't cheat. Got it?" Chloe nodded, knowing from experience how scary Adrien could become if he lost his temper. As Madam Renault watched Adrien, she was pulled into a memory of how her husband had nearly beaten up a man for slapping her on the butt as a sexual innuendo. It had taken her all she had to get him to walk away with creating even more of a scene.

Marinette, seeing the slight fear radiating from those around Adrien, quietly approached him and gently pried his hand away from its' grip on Chloe's own hand. The effect was instantaneous. Adrien's anger dissipated as his body relaxed. Marinette held his hand in both of hers, stroking it in order to help him calm down. A slight smile came to Adrien's face as Marinette continued to stroke his hand in loving, gentle circles.

"Thank you for protecting me Adrien," murmured the shy young woman, "Next time though, try to do it without scaring our fellow classmates, okay?" Adrien nodded, knowing from his father that he'd inherited his mother's explosive temper.

"Brava! Brava!" Monsieur Louie yelled out beside a clapping Madam Renault, "That was superb, stupendous! I've never met such a natural pair in all my years!" The class quietly giggled as Adrien and Marinette turned red from the embarrassment of being singled out publically.

"I quite agree," Madam Renault stated, "I can see no way around it; Mr. Agreste, Miss Dupain-Cheng, you two are our leads in Summer Love!" Adrien and Marinette had the same thought: this is not good.