"Hey, Marinette, can I ask you something?"

Adrien's eye twitched.

"Sure, Luka. What is it?"

"Can you please go and get me one of the brownies?"

"Oh, sure thing-"

"A brownie, huh?" Adrien asked sarcastically. Nino, Alya, Marinette, and Luka froze, staring at him with wide eyes. "A brownie. One of her brownies."

It made sense. After all, this was out of character for Adrien.

But honestly, how close Marinette and Luka were getting so quickly made him green with envy.

He didn't even know that he was jealous until Nino and Plagg had both mentioned it. He had gotten enough teasing from the two of them this past week to last a lifetime.

Not to mention that the brownie they were talking about was one of Marinette's parents more famous deserts, only available one weekend every month, and they only had a limited amount.

After ditching school for the tenth time just to get one before the lunch rush, he had been banned from getting them.

So you could say that this was the final straw.

"Uh, yeah." Luka nodded slowly, looking at Adrien wearily.

"Yeah, yeah." Adrien continued sarcastically. "Luka wants his brownie! He wants it so badly! He can't get enough of Mari's precious baked goods! Oh no, what would he do without them?!"

Luka only gave him a weirder look. So did Marinette and Alya, but Nino seemed to know what was going on.

Adrien made a mental note to get Nino back with his crush on Alya later.

Plagg cackled from his pocket, and Adrien nearly growled.

No more after-bed Camembert for Plagg.

But for the moment, he was set on continuing with his rant.

Adrien didn't care how much teasing this got him, he had had enough of it.

"Well, maybe you should take your obsession with Marinette and her sweets and go somewhere else before you deprive the whole world from it!" He exclaimed, standing up. Luka opened his mouth to say something, but Adrien turned around and, flushing with embarrassment, walked away with his hands stuffed in his pockets.

What had he done?!

He had totally just blown up!

And in front of Marinette, of all people!

So what if he did have a crush on her or not- that doesn't mean that he should be jealous! He loved Ladybug!

But…

He frowned.

She had rejected him so many times, he doubted that he would ever be able to get together with her.

But it wasn't fair to Marinette if he liked someone else and couldn't like her completely.

Then again, dating was really just to get to know someone- courting was to see if you wanted to marry them, and then Engagement, and then Marriage…

He wanted to get to know Marinette. And so what if he might have a crush on her?

Although, a rather big one…

That had just sprung up on him out of literally nowhere, and had thrown his life into complete disarray.

He ran a hand through his hair, leaning on the side of a building a few buildings away.

He was such an idiot.

He couldn't beleive that he had actually acted out on his jealousy. He thought that he had a good control on his emotions! He had to- otherwise surviving home would be impossible.

Then again… there was the Copycat akuma…

…

… Which had been caused by his jealousy…

…

Yeah, he was screwed.

"...A-Adrien?" Adrien jumped, turning around to face Marinette.

"Oh…" He said, sighing a bit in relief just for show. On the inside, he was having a panic attack. "Hi Marinette. You scared me."

"O-Oh, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"It's okay." He said, chuckling a bit. Honestly, she was just so cute.

"I-I wanted to ask, ummm…." Marinette looked away before looking back up at him. "What that was about back there." When Adrien didn't answer right away, she continued. "It's just that, uh, Luka really wants to know what he did to you, a-and he wants to know if he can fix it because he says that you're a cool guy and he'd like to be friends with you-"

Him? Friends with Luka? Not while he was flirting with Marinette.

"-which you are! A great guy- a really great guy! One of the greatest guys I know! I'm not insinuating that you're not, and I really just want my two friends to get along, and in order to do that I need to know what's going on-"

"Marinette…" Adrien sighed. "Would you… believe me if I didn't really know why?" He glanced away, embarrassed. "I mean, I know why, but I don't know why I'm reacting like this… does that make sense?" When she didn't respond, he ran a hand down his face. "I must be really confusing right now…"

"W-Well…" Marinette took a step closer, looking up at him curiously with her wide, beautiful bluebell eyes.

'I like Ladybug.'

He told himself.

'But I also really like Marinette…'

"W- If you want, w-we could talk about it." She nodded, almost to herself. "Y-yeah, talk a-about what you know. Th-Then we can find out what's going on. I-If you want to, of course."

"I don't mind." Adrien admitted, and he couldn't stop the chuckle from coming out. "But wouldn't we want to go somewhere more private?"

"Huh?" Marinette blinked, looking around. She laughed sheepishly, rubbing her arm nervously. "Y-Yeah, we-we should go somewhere else."

"I think that I know a place." Adrien reached down and grabbed her hand, enjoying the blush that appeared on her face when he did so, and then lead them around the street and away from their friends.

'You know that this could count as a date, right?' The annoying side of his thoughts that sounded like Plagg said treacherously.

'Date? No way, Marinette doesn't like me like that.' He replied.

'You sure? You did see her blush.'

'Because she's MARINETTE!'

'She likes you~!'

'Only as a friend!'

'She loves you as lovers, then.' They reached their destination, and Adrien opened up the door then. 'Admit it, she likes you too.'

'Shut up, Plagg.'

'I'm not Plagg. I'm you.'

'Well you sound like him, so shut up.'

"U-Uh, Adrien…" Marinette looked around, eyes wide. She held one of her hands to her chest, the other one hanging by her side. "Do-Do you know how expensive it is here?!"

"Yes, I do." Adrien nodded, leading Marinette to a table to sit down in. "Is that a problem?"

"I-I can't afford anything here!" She hissed in a whisper, still looking around. Adrien smirked and winked at her.

"That's why I'm paying."

"But-" He held a finger up to her lips, enjoying the blush that made itself more prominent on her face.

"I'm paying."

"O-O-O-Oka-Okay." She stuttered, and then they sat down in a corner boothe. A Waitress came over and professionally handed them some menus.

"I'll be back in a few moments." She said.

"Thank you." The waitress nodded, bowed slightly, and left. Marinette was still blushing when they picked up the menus to order…

From a coffee shop.

'What if this is too much?' The thought hit Adrien suddenly, and he froze. 'No, she would tell me if she was uncomfortable… right? yeah , she would… but what if she won't?'

"Uh… Are you comfortable with this?" He asked after a moment. She made a small noise of surprise before looking up.

"Y-Yeah! Absolutely comfortable, i-it's just that…" Marinette blushed, shrinking in on herself as she looked back down at the menu. "...Well, i-it's new. I don't normally go to fancy restaurants with Maman and Papa, and if we do, they're not… c-coffee shops." She said lamely. "N-Not that this place isn't amazing, or that I don't like coffee shops- coffee shops are great! I just didn't expect to find one so…"

"Expensive?" Adrien offered.

"Y-Yeah."

"That's okay." Adrien put the menu down, already knowing what he wanted to order. "This is the only good place that I know besides your parents bakery, and while seeing them would be nice, I-I just figured that we wouldn't want our friends to spring up on us…" He practically collapsed into his chair and ran his hands through his hair, looking out the window on his right. "This is such a mess…"

"W-Well…" Marinette placed her menu on the table, having also ordered. "W-We can start s-sorting through it whenever you'd l-like."

Adrien nodded just as the Waitress came back. They ordered, and she left to go and get their food.

"Well…" Adrien leaned on the table. Marinette did as well, staring at him worriedly. "I… I think I'm jealous."

Marinette blinked, shock written all over her face. He blushed, not meeting her eye as he looked back towards the window.

"That's what Nino says, anyway. I just… I don't know what I'm jealous about…? No, that's not right, I know what I'm jealous about, but I don't know why I'm acting this way." He placed his head on his arms, which were folded across the table.

"W-Well, what are you jealous about?" Marinette probed.

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you." He mumbled. They sat in silence for a moment, and then a hand reached out and grabbed his softly. He looked up and saw Marinette blushing again, but the look of determination in her eyes was enough to astound him.

"W-Would you believe me if-if I said that I was jealous too?"

"Jealous?" Adrien repeated, and Marinette nodded. "Of who?"

"A dear friend of mine." She admitted. He opened his mouth, but she shook her head, cutting him off. "No, you don't really know him. He's one of the bravest, kindest, and funniest guys I know. I get jealous of him easily, because he almost always has this attitude of 'nothing can stop me' and 'I don't care what the world thinks'. That's an impressive feat." She blushed, glancing at their hands that were touching before looking back up at him again. "A-And he's not afraid to pursue his dreams, and the girl that he likes."

"He sounds pretty amazing." Adrien admitted.

"Yeah, he is." Marinette smiled at him and squeezed his hand. "But I assure you that I will believe you, whatever you decide to say that you're jealous of."

Adrien swallowed, shifting their hands so that he could squeeze hers back. For some reason, he couldn't look her directly in the eye when he spoke, instead looking down at the table between them.

"I-I'm jealous of how much time he's spending with you." He admitted hastily. "And with how close you two have been getting lately… Is that stupid?"

"No, heavens- that's not stupid at all!" Marinette exclaimed in a small voice. She moved her other hand to grab his other one, and he glanced back up at her. "I-I have a really hard time with managing hanging out with friends- you can ask Alya, she'll tell you just how many hangouts I've had to cancel." Adrien almost scoffed at that, and Marinette's smile grew a bit bigger.

"If you want to spend more time together, I'd love to do that! And I know how busy your schedule can be, s-so whenever you need me, I'll do my best to be open then, okay?"

"That-That sounds amazing!" Adrien said, excitement rising in his voice. "That would be amazing, Marinette!"

"Great!" She giggled, and he felt his heart beat faster.

'I have time.' He thought as the waitress came back with their orders. 'I can figure things out with Marinette and My Lady. It'll take a while, and I have time, so there's no real need to rush anything.'

What he didn't know, was that things were going to change rapidly. And soon.

After all, if you get close to two different versions of a person, you're bound to find out that they're one in the same.

92657365962375697236597

The next day, Adrien knew that he was screwed.

"Dude, what happened yesterday? You and Marinette just disappeared on us!" Nino exclaimed.

"You owe me an explanation, Agreste." Alya said, pointing her phone at him threateningly. He waved her off, instead choosing to walk to the back of the classroom. There, Luka and Nathaniel sat, talking. Adrien cleared his throat.

"Luka." The said boy blinked, looking up at him.

"Adrien?"

"I-I wanted to say that I'm sorry." He said sheepishly. "For yesterday. I… I was banned from eating half of Marinette's family's best baked goods, see, and I took my frustration out on you when you asked for the legendary brownies." Adrien hung his head, ashamed, but not really. "I hope that you can forgive me."

It was silent before Luka laughed. It wasn't a cold laugh though- it was warm.

"Now I see why Alya calls you 'sunshine child'." He said with a smirk. "I forgive you, bro. And if you ever need a secret cheat snak, I'm your dude." Adrien looked up at Luka and smiled.

"Thanks, Luka. I hope that we can be friends." He held his hand out for Luka to shake, and Luka didn't hesitate before grabbing it, shaking Adrien's hand.

"I do too. Oh, and one other thing…" Luka tugged Adrien closer to him to whisper what he said next into his ear.

"If you hurt Marinette's feelings, it won't just be Alya hunting you down. My dad is known for his hunting skills, after all."

Adrien blushed, his eyes wide as he nodded frantically. Luka nodded, satisfied.

"Good talk- now go and get her, Agreste." Luka pushed Adrien away, and as Adrien sat down in his seat, he thought over his conversation with Luka.

'What… What just happened?'