"Nathanael."

"…."

"… Nathanael."

"…."

"Nathanael!"

"Gah!" Nathanael Kurtzberg yelped, jumping abruptly in his seat and inadvertently ruining the sketch he was currently working on once he finally heard the voice that had been attempting to take him out of his artistic trance. He let out a disappointed sigh upon seeing his now ruined creation before slowly looking up to find Alix Kubdel with her hands on her hips and a mildly agitated look on her face. "O-Oh!" he said, unconsciously averting his eyes to escape from her more intense gaze. "Hey there, Alix."

"Hey," Alix said, greeting Nathanael with a disinterested nod before crossing her arms and nonchalantly holding out one of her hands. "You got an extra pencil on you? Mine's spent."

"O-Oh, um," Nathanael rummaged through his bag until he found what he was looking for, "here you go," he said, handing the pencil over to her.

Alix smiled. "Sweet." She took the pencil off of his hands before stealing a glance at what he had just been working on. She cocked a concerned eyebrow at what she saw. "Um, are you drawing Marinette again?"

Nathanael's eyes widened in surprise. "W-What?" He then followed Alix's gaze and let out a horrified gasp before making a futile attempt to cover all of it up. "No I'm not!" He quickly began to, as discreetly as he could manage despite the circumstances, pick up his sketches of Marinette and sneak them back into his bag. "W-What makes you think that?"

Alix simply shook her head and frowned at the pathetic display presented before her. "And I thought my brother was the lamest guy I knew."

"Hey!"

"What?" Alix asked as she nonchalantly shrugged. "It's true. At least he has the guts to talk to our old man about his crazy ideas." She gestured towards the sketches of Marinette still sticking out of Nathanael's bag. "You just draw them and keep them to yourself."

Nathanael sadly lowered his head upon hearing this. "Are you going to make fun of me too? Like Chloe?"

Alix's face scrunched up in disgust upon hearing Chloe's name. "Course not. For one," she pointed to herself with her thumb, "I'm not Chloe. And I'm definitely not a jerk, like Kim can be. All I'm saying is that this is the second time I've seen you draw Marinette and be all embarrassed about it. Either ask her out or stop being creepy about it."

Nathanael lowered his head and sighed. "Easier said than done," he said quietly.

"No it isn't," Alix scolded. "Here, I'll prove it." She then began to make her way to Marinette, who was busy talking to Alya back at their desks.

"W-What?!" Nathanael hissed, directing a panicked look between Marinette and a slowly proceeding Alix for a moment before getting up from his seat, quickly rushing after Alix, grabbing her shoulder, and stopping her in her tracks. "No! You can't!"

Alix forced Nathanael's hand off of her shoulder and looked him straight in the eye. "Watch me," she scoffed.

Nathanael stopped her again by grabbing her wrist and forcing her to turn her attention back to him. "Why are you doing this, Alix?" he asked pleadingly.

"Because I care," Alix answered matter-of-factly.

"Since when?" Nathanael argued.

"Since we became friends."

"Since when did we become friends?"

"Since we talked that one time and we were both cool with each other."

"That's not friendship, Alix!" Nathanael chided. "Friendship is actually spending time with each other and hanging out for lunch or something! And we don't do either of those things! We barely even know each other!"

Alix nonchalantly shrugged. "You've got your definition, I've got mine. We're cool, so we're friends. Not that hard to understand, right?"

"Okay, fine, but even then, why do you care? You never have before!"

"I do when I think someone's being majorly lame or uncool. Remember back when Kim was making all of those stupid dares? Someone had to put a stop to him, and I figured the only way to do that was to put him in his place, so I did. Simple as that." When Nathanael continued to look unconvinced of the whole thing, Alix sighed and explained, "Look, I know I'm not exactly the friendliest person in class, and I'm definitely not the most caring or compassionate. I do my own thing and don't care too much what other people want or feel and I'm woman enough to admit that, but when I see something going south, I speak my mind and take action, no excuses. Since the beginning of the school year, I've caught you looking all lovey-dovey at Marinette, and Chloe and I have caught you drawing her without her permission twice now. Like I said, either ask her out, stop being creepy and lame about it, or let me ask her out for you. Got it?"

Nathanael took a moment to contemplate over everything Alix had said before looking longingly at Marinette and quietly asking, "But what if she says no?"

"Then you've got to take it like a man and move on," Alix said. She once again let out an exasperated sigh upon seeing Nathanael lower his head at this. "Come on, Nate. Those are the only two ways this CAN go."

"Y-Yeah," Nathanael said with a nod. "I guess… you're right." He then took a deep breath before puffing up his chest and saying, "Okay then. I'm going in."

Alix smiled and gave him an approving nod. "That's the spirit."

Nathanael nodded and took another deep breath to calm his nerves and his quickly beating heart. "I can do this," he said to himself. He slowly began to make his way towards the girl of his dreams. "I can do this."

"Less talking, more doing," Alix instructed.

"R-Right."

Alix then watched as Nathanael politely interrupted Alya and Marinette's conversation and, after a lot of nervous fidgeting, little eye contact, and most likely a lot of stuttering and long drawn out pauses here and there, Nathanael looked like he had finally been able to ask Marinette out… only for it to end with him hanging his head and nod in disappointment before making the slow trek back to his desk.

Alix frowned a bit as he somberly sat back into his seat before walking up to him and asking, "So… how'd it go?"

Nathanael sighed. "She was nice about it, but she wasn't interested."

"Bummer," Alix said. "Well, at least you tried, right?"

"I guess," Nathanael sadly admitted.

After considering it for a moment, Alix placed a reassuring hand onto one of Nathanael's shoulders and gently said, "You'll be fine. If you were man enough to ask her out, then you're man enough to move on. Trust me. It's the same thing with rollerblading. And you know how good I am at rollerblading, right?"

Nathanael smiled a bit at this. "Yeah. You're the best skater I've ever seen."

Alix smirked and playfully pointed at him. "You know it." She then began to make her way back to her seat. "Smell you later, Nate."

"Y-Yeah," Nathanael said. Before Alix could get too far, however, Nathanael quickly stood up and said, "A-Alix?"

Alix stopped and looked at him. "Yeah?"

"Um, well…," Nathanael took a deep and nervous breath, before smiling and saying, "t-thanks."

Alix returned his smile with a small one of her own. "Hey," she said with a shrug, "what are barely friends for, right?"

Author's Note #1: The least sociable students in class. Neither of them have any official best friends, but they both do their own thing and I feel that they can respect and admire each other a little bit for that. Perhaps they hang around with each other every once and a while? Who knows?

Author's Note #2: My little belated Christmas gift to the Miraculous Ladybug fandom. I hope you liked it! Have a happy new year, guys!