Merry Christmas, niyes-lahiffe!
I'm your secret santa, surprise! xD
Thanks to the ml secret santa team for organizing this again, I had a ton of fun and I got really lucky with my giftee, I couldn't have been happier ;)
Anyways, here we go! I was so happy to have gotten this sweet giftee so I couldn't resist drawing and writing. I hope you have great holidays, niyes, and I really hope you like my gift!
The white, cold snow scrunched beneath her boots as Alya headed out of the university to walk home, lightly kicking the newly fallen 5 centimeters in front of her. The snowflakes danced around her as she buried her chin deeper in her scarf and her hands in her pockets.
The fresh snow wouldn't stay for long, she knew that.
But at least they'd have a white Christmas this year around, with the 23rd being today and the snowfall estimated to keep up for a few days.
She huffed, her breath coming out as a white cloud in front of her face, despite her scarf, and kept fogging up her glasses.
With an annoyed huff she lifted her chin out of her scarf again and instead pulled her jacket tighter around herself, trying to warm up by huddling herself in.
Beneath the snow the ground was a little slippery, she noticed. Her boots had a good profile yet she still felt her steps becoming a little more careful after one slip.
Paris was already ignited by thousands of street lamps as she walked down the street.
She had gotten into a journalism class for the winter semester right after her graduation and had thrown herself into the studies, glad to finally find motivation since school hadn't really been for her. Her grades had barely been good enough to get into this study program so she wouldn't give it up as easily.
Not everybody could be a whizz kid like Adrien, she grinned to herself.
Her friend had graduated with the best grades imaginable and had gotten into a study program of physics which allowed him to still pursue his model career. Even if his father had tried forbidding him to apply for this study program, Adrien had finally discovered and embraced his rebellious side, apparently with turning eighteen and graduating to decide for his own life from then on.
He had applied anyway and gotten the place, for him to confront his father with a fully paid semester and negotiate a compromise then. He would pursue his model career without a complaint if his father would let him study physics.
To his friends' surprise, he had gotten his way and Gabriel Agreste had agreed.
Alya chuckled, slightly shaking her head. Adrien drowned in physics homework, assignments and studies as well as model jobs and photoshoots, but at least he was happy.
Even more so since Marinette and he had finally found to each other.
Marinette had started a dual study program with an apprenticeship at Gabriel's, and Alya suspected that they had gotten closer to each other through her helping out at his photoshoots. Or because she spent a lot of time with Gabriel since he had specifically requested Marinette as his personal apprentice, so Adrien had spent more time with her through that.
Either way, one day it had all gone very fast. Somehow a switch had flipped and they had been a couple, all lovey-dovey and impossible to part any more.
Alya lovingly rolled her eyes at her dorks of friends.
But more importantly, something that had surprised Paris a lot after all these years, Ladybug and Chat Noir had been seen together about two months later. Of course, it wasn't that unusual that they were together but they had been seen… Together together.
As in, going out with each other.
Dating.
Alya hadn't believed her luck at first but it had been a big headline the next day and the internet had practically exploded with images of them kissing, holding hands, beaming down to the paparazzi with his arm around her waist and both of them waving.
Most of these snapped pictures had been Alya originals, of course.
Full of excitement, she had emailed them to Nino, her boyfriend since the tenth grade, and had called him, making him open the files and listen to her rants about the two super lovebirds.
Alya sighed and buried her gloved fists deeper in her pockets.
Nino had left Paris about three months after graduation, to visit his family in morocco. He had promised to stay there for about half a year, maybe longer.
It wasn't that Alya didn't wholeheartedly support his decision.
Seeing his family, helping them out, learning a bit more about his culture, this was important to him. He had a way closer bond to his home, to the land and the city he had been born in, than Alya had to Martinique. Sure, her grandparents spent most of the year across the ocean but he had actually been born in morocco, until his parents had moved to Paris when he had been a toddler.
She knew all of this was important to him, to his family. She knew he wanted to do this and it was only half a year, it wasn't the world.
Yet, she still missed him.
Especially after Adrien and Marinette had started dating, and when Ladybug and Chat Noir had been seen kissing, too, she had found herself longing for him. She missed his warm hugs in the cold season, she missed his smile and his laughter that didn't sound filtered from the phone, she missed seeing his golden eyes without the pixels from videocalls and even though he had only been gone 3 months by now, she already missed him way too much.
3 months, 14 days and 5 hours. And 21 minutes.
And 36 seconds, not that she was counting. 38, 39, 40 seconds…
Alya groaned as she walked faster, kicking the snow in front of her boots and blowing away some snowflakes wanting to settle on her glasses. She wasn't in the mood for sulking.
The day had been well, her study comrades had been cooperative and she had had a tasty lunch. The sky was filled with heavy snowflakes, the whole of Paris smelled like Christmas and she'd have a break for a few weeks. What else did she need?
Nino, was the answer. Nino, Nino is what you need.
She huffed and shook her head, stomping a few steps to warm up her legs again.
He'd be back in 2 and a half months, and then she'd be able to hug and kiss and embrace him again and she would tap his nose and listen to his cute laugh and she'd get lost in his golden eyes. Without pixels or a filtered sound accompanying his appearance.
As if he had read her thoughts, her phone rang through the ghostly silence of Paris streets, everything muffled by the newly fallen snow. She hurriedly pulled it out and was even quicker to press accept with her nose, since her gloves were in the way, and to press the phone against her ear with her hand buried in her sleeve, to keep some warmth at least.
"Nino?"
"Hey, beautiful.", the beautiful drumming bass voice of her boyfriend spoke through the phone and she couldn't suppress the wide grin from spreading on her lips.
"Hi! I love you!"
Nino laughed in response, his laugh sounding so much like she remembered it, deep and clear. Her heart skipped a beat.
"I love you, too.", he responded, his voice light, "So, how's the winter in Paris? Cold and grey?"
"Cold and white!", she corrected him while she stuck her tongue out for him to hear, "It's snowing right now, actually."
He sighed wistfully and she could hear him shuffling around, apparently to look out of a window.
"Well, for us it's pretty monotone. Warm during the day and cold during the night, pretty much a European Fall or even Late Summer. I wish we had snow."
She could hear a grin in his voice but didn't pay it any mind, too happy that she could hear him as the falling snow around her rustled and a small ice plate of a frozen puddle cracked beneath her boot when she walked over it.
They remained quiet for a little while before Alya began telling him about her studies and the rest of her day. He followed with his day and they spoke about his newest remix before getting silent again.
Silent night…
Alya looked up to watch the snow falling around a lantern, the rustling of the big snowflakes hitting the blanket of snow that had settled down to her feet almost deafening in the silence.
"… I miss you…", she finally got out, a small lump building up in her throat.
Nino took a while before answering, his voice clear and hiding a small sympathetic smile, she could hear it.
"I miss you, too."
She sighed as she realized she had stopped walking, watching the big snowflakes with watery eyes, and began trekking down the sidewalk again. She only had 5 more minutes left to Adrien's and her shared apartment but she decided to walk a longer way and visit the bakery beforehand. Marinette had stayed living at home since she occasionally helped out in the bakery and because her parents couldn't pay an apartment in the expensive renting hell that was Paris. Plus, she didn't want to take the money Adrien offered to her, not feeling like it was right to live on his expenses. But since Adrien had made use of his newfound confidence, he had moved out with his big allowance (that he didn't want and had managed to minimize but it was still a lot) and income as a professional model under contract.
And since Marinette didn't want Adrien to live alone because she didn't trust his cooking and cleaning abilities and since Alya also wanted to be undisturbed by the twins (as much as she loved them), she had agreed to move in with the blonde. It had been hard to teach him all the stuff she had gotten used to as a daughter in the Césaire household, but they had managed.
And maybe Nino would join their small shared apartment. They could use his twin sized bed in Alya's bedroom, after all it was big enough, and live with them without problems.
"… Still there?", Nino asked.
"Still here.", Alya responded, not without a certain sadness in her voice. She just wanted to be with him, nothing more.
"What're you doing at the moment?", he asked, a few noises and a lot of shuffling around telling her that he apparently put on some shoes.
"I'll just go see Marinette for a while, I've been a little lonely. And when I'm stuffed with hot cocoa and some baked goods, I'll go home. Probably to arrest the Agreste and watch a movie with him."
"Curl up in blankets?", Nino suggested.
"Hell yes.", she shot back with a laugh, the snow giving satisfying scrunches as she aimed for a few leaves and stepped on them.
"I'll have to be jealous of Adrien soon. He's been sending me way too many photos of you sleeping on his shoulder, you know?", Nino mocked her, trying to sound angry but really, he wasn't. She could hear the grin.
"Hey, I'm not at fault that he's so comfy and warm. It should be illegal to be that cuddly, you know?"
Nino laughed louder and she heard a door clicking.
"I'm glad he's so head over heels for Marinette, then. Otherwise I'd have to worry you could try and cheat on me."
"Also not at fault that you're not here to let me sleep on your shoulder…", she mumbled, then she raised her voice to distract him from what she had just said, "Anyway! Heading somewhere?"
Her boyfriend hummed as another door clicked and she heard him walking down some stairs with his shoes, his voice soft and warm.
"Yep. I got an important date today. I'm a little nervous but I'm sure she'll be overjoyed to see me."
Alya felt a tiny twinge of jealousy but she had learned to handle that. Nino was loyal, she knew he loved her and he had reassured her quite a few times already that she had nothing to fear. So, she just grinned, assuming it was one of his cousins, and giggled.
"Well then, have a lot of fun! I'm almost at Marinette's, so I'll call you later, okay?"
The voice on the other end chuckled and she felt her heart jump once again.
"Alright. We'll talk later. I love you, beautiful."
"I love you, too, dork. Maybe we can video-chat a little?"
She could practically hear the grin through the phone.
"We can certainly see each other later, yeah."
With a grin, Alya told him she loved him once more, awaited his response and then hung up with the promise to see each other later this evening. She put her phone away and laughed to herself, once again hiding her cold chin in her scarf to warm up just a little bit before stepping into the sweet warmth of the Dupain-Cheng household.
She could already see the bakery with its ignited windows from afar, but that was pretty much it. The light and the silhouette, but not much more, since there was a thick wall of snowflakes between her and the familiar building.
Suddenly, something let her eyebrows furrow. A figure stepped out of the private entrance of the Dupain-Chengs, the door that was located behind the bakery which led up to the living area of the family.
It was only a few more meters and still, she couldn't identify the visitor who just left.
Was it Adrien?
Impossible, the blonde had a photoshoot for an hour, still.
From the physique she'd place this young man around Adrien's age and height, though.
Was it an old classmate?
She squinted her eyes as she came closer, now seeing more of the person's features but still not enough to recognize anyone, especially since they were wearing a red woolen beanie and a familiar green scarf that Alya swore she had seen before.
She stepped closer and suddenly stopped dead in the snow, her eyes wide open and her jaw falling as the person turned towards her, now merely 5 meters away from where she stood.
Instead of the 2.399 kilometers that should've been between them.
"… Nino?"
The figure in front of her spread their arms open wide and she finally recognized the bright smile of her boyfriend, his white teeth shining against his even darker skin since he apparently got a tan in morocco.
Tears formed in her eyes as she took the last quick steps to jump, throw her arms around his neck and to bury her nose in his hat, greedily breathing in his wonderful scent that she had missed so dearly over the past few months.
He lifted her up with a tight grip around her waist, his arms locked around her in a wonderful, warm embrace. Her legs went up as he leant back and she sniffled lightly, feeling tears building up in her eyes.
She didn't even notice how he gently pulled her inside, past a grinning Marinette and into the warm stairwell. She also wasn't aware of him pulling the snowed in scarf aside or him beginning to open her jacket to warm up.
All she felt were his arms around her once again and his lips pressing to her forehead, as well as his gentle voice drumming against her ear. She sighed against his scarf, letting her tears flow freely as she tightly hugged him, never letting go.
At some point he gently pried her arms off, to get her and himself out of the jacket, but she didn't leave him a lot of time before already wrapping her arms around his waist again, sniffling in his embrace and cherishing the warmth that his chest emanated.
He was here again, he was with her and she was hugging him and she wouldn't let him go as easily as she had let him go back in summer.
Nino was hers now.
"… Alya?", he finally spoke to her, softly cradling her head and making her blink her tears away to look at him. He grinned brightly, "Hey, beautiful."
"Dork… Idiot… Dingus…", she accused him, softly pushing against his chest with every insult that they both knew she didn't mean, "… Not telling me… Just flying over… Bad, bad boyfriend…"
He laughed brightly, without anything filtering his voice, and she fought against a new surge of tears.
"I love you.", he said warmly, his golden eyes capturing hers in a steady, amused gaze. Entirely without pixels.
"… I love you, too.", she replied, and finally pulled him down for a desperate and long-awaited kiss, her lips pressing against his with an urgent need that was reflected in her whole body as she melted against him.
Nino chuckled against her and his warm breath brushed over her chin. She pulled him closer and nudged his nose to animate him to kiss her back, which he did, chastely but still.
"… Adrien's gonna sleep here tonight…", Nino slowly mumbled past their kisses, "We're gonna have the apartment to us."
Alya grinned.
"Good… I've got some plans…"
Finally, after a long embrace and a few more kisses, Alya parted from Nino.
"Wait! Since when are you here? And did everyone know except for me?! How long was this planned?! And… How long will you stay…?"
Nino merely laughed at her flood of questions, leaning his forehead against hers and stealing another little peck.
"It's pretty hard to surprise you so Adrien offered to me to try anyway. He paid the flights as a Christmas gift to us."
Alya giggled, still feeling tears in her eyes.
"Bet that he just wants you to fall asleep on his shoulder now?"
Adrien's protest drowned in the laughter of the others.