The silence was nearly unbearable, but Adrien didn't exactly know what to say, so he let the silence stay. He walked next to Marinette, that girl who sat behind him in class, with his duffle bag slung over his shoulder. They walked next to eat other. Marinette lead the way to her place, the little bakery that was just across the street from their school.
The surprise of Marinette offering up her place for the night still hadn't quite settled in. From what Adrien knew of this girl, which albeit wasn't a whole lot, she was pretty shy and pretty clumsy, and a fairly reserved. He definitely would not have expected her to invite a guy into her home this late at night. Sure, Adrien was a classmate, so it wasn't too weird, but they weren't exactly close friends. Their best friend's were dating, so they hung out a few times as a result. That was as far as their relationship had gone though. Of course, Adrien hoped that they could become good friends. Marinette was a really nice girl.
It wasn't more than a five minutes of walking before the pair stood outside of the bakery. There was only one problem at this point; getting Adrien inside without her parents noticing. It was late, and chances are they were both asleep, but Marinette made it clear that she didn't want to risk walking through the front door, and marching right up to her room, with a teenage boy following behind her.
Adrien remembered the last, and only time he had been over at Marinette's. It was to practice playing video games before that tournament a while back. He met her parent's then, and while they were very hospitable, and seemed like really good people, they checked in on the two quite often. It made sense that they wouldn't exactly be too happy having a guy sneak into their beloved daughter's room in the middle of the night. Plus her father was a really big guy. Adrien did not want to get on his bad side.
The blonde teen turned to face the girl standing next to him. She looked towards the buildings around them, specifically the one that shared a wall with her family's bakery and home. Her eyes focused in on the fire escape hanging on the wall of her neighbors. "Um… How…. How good are you at climbing ladders?" Marinette must have seen the puzzled expression on Adrien's face. "There's a l-lad-ladder next door that goes to the roof, a-and fr-from there you can, um, you can get to the balcony, well, terrace...thing…on my house…" Her face still had its regular pink coloring.
Adrien's mouth formed an 'oh' as he realized the plan. "I'm pretty good at climbing." He smiled.
Marinette let out a shaking sigh, perhaps out of relief. Her plan would probably work. She led Adrien to the fire escape. The boy grabbed hold of one of the metal bars, and pulled himself up high enough to get his feet on the lowest bar. He looked up the stone wall and ladder, then back down at Marinette. "Looks good to me."
Marinette's gaze shifted down to her own feet. She kicked at the sidewalk a few times, then suddenly, in almost a scramble, she grabbed the handle of the duffle bag Adrien was carrying. "I-I'll take this and go m-make sure the unlocked is balcony. I mean! The balcony is unlocked! The door, th-the door on the balcony, th-that goes to my room. I-I'll go unlock it."
Adrien watched pigtails bounce as his classmate ran off and disappeared inside the bakery. "Well, that's that then." He began climbing the ladder, as he did, Plagg floated out from inside his shirt.
"Sure, make you climb while she takes the stairs." Th kwami lazily lingered in the air around Adrien's shoulders.
"Don't be rude Plagg." Adrien said as he reached to pull himself up to the next bar. It didn't take him all the long to get to the top of the building, he thanked his inner cat for that one. Being a superhero certainly did pay off when it came to physical abilities. When he finally did make it to the top, he swung his leg over the slight wall, until he stood fully on the roof top. "Marinette is really helping us out here. She didn't need to offer her place to us."
"And you didn't need to run away."
"Tais-toi." Adrien shot an angry glare at the small, black kwami. Plagg knew very well why Adrien left home. He had helped make the final decision.
Adrien forced the creature's words out of his mind and focused on walking across the roof. There was a small space, only about two feet wide, that connected where he currently was to the corner apartment. "I can do this. It's not like I don't climb Notre Dame or jump off le Tour d'Eiffel all the time." The teenaged model talked himself through it as he crossed the small space. He avoided looking down at the ground, which was a solid three stories down from him. This would have been a no-brainer as Chat Noir. He would have backflipped over to the terrace in his alternate form, not even thinking about falling because he would catch himself with his staff before making contact with the ground. But right now he wasn't Chat, he was Adrien, and that certainly changed a lot. If he fell now, he was screwed.
Thankfully enough, the blonde had very good balance. He crossed it without a hitch, then climbed a small three foot wall, and landed right on the terrace. It felt good to have railings to keep him from falling. Adrien tried the little trap door that lead would lead inside, but it was locked. So, he stopped and took a moment to look around.
This was a new view for Adrien. He had thought that he had seen every sight this city had to offer. Whether it was the view from the top of a national landmark, or something as simple as a flower growing through the cracks of the sidewalk. Paris was a beautiful place. Still, Adrien had never seen it from this spot before. From the front of the balcony, he could see the Seine, which reflected the lights from the street lamps. If he looked to the side, he could see into the park that he had just been sitting in, and if he looked up, he was able to see overtop all the neighboring buildings, and see the Parisian landscape stretch for miles. It was rather breathtaking. For a moment, he was a little jealous that Marinette had something this nice to look at each day, but then he remembered that he often took cat naps on top of the Arc de Triomphe.
The sound of the hatch opening up was what made Adrien turn around. He made brief eye contact with Marinette, before the girl looked away. "Y-you made it."
A smile grew across Adrien's face. "Did you think I wouldn't?"
Marinette just shook her head. "C-c-come, come on i-in."
Adrien took the invitation quickly. The second Marinette was out of the way, he was climbing through the hole and into the building. The second he was inside he noticed that he was directly inside Marinette's bedroom. The door opened up right over her bed, which was lofted over a much larger room space. "Oh. Sorry." He apologized when he realized he had stepped right onto his friend's comforter with his shoes. He immediately climbed down the loft ladder. It felt a little awkward standing right over her bed.
Just like the last time he had been there, the walls were very pink. The furniture matched the pink, white, and black color scheme. Several desks were arranged under the loft, one looked like it was set up for school work, while the others were covered in a chaos of crafting supplies and pieces of fabric. The rest of the room was rather empty in comparison. The only other pieces of furniture were a set of drawers, with mirror, and a light pink, polkadotted chaise. From looking around the girl's room, you could find some of the most important things about her; she loved sewing, and polkadots were her favorite accents.
"M-make yourself comfortable?" Marinette said. Her voice was low and almost inaudible. It was then that Adrien remembered the dangers of waking up her parents.
"Thank you." He replied. His voice was barely above a whisper. Over by the chaise was his duffle bag. He walked over to it, sitting down on the chaise and pulling the bag closer to him. The nervousness inside of him started to rear it's ugly head. He found himself bouncing his knee up and down and drumming his fingers against his thighs rapidly. Drumming turned into rubbing sweaty palms on the denim of his jeans. "Is it ok if I sleep here?" He asked. Mostly he was just asking to break the awkward silence.
"Wh-where? Oh… There." The blue-black haired girl pulled at one of her pigtails, then brushed some of the hair out of her face. Her eyes kept looking everywhere but the boy in her room. "That's fine. I'll…. I'll go find a blanket…"
Adrien watched the girl scurry down the hatch in her floor to the living area of the apartment. While she was gone, Adrien just sat in silence. Plagg flew out from his shirt pocket and disappeared into his duffle bag for the night. It wasn't too long before Marinette came back into her room carrying a folded up blanket, with a pillow stacked on top. She placed it down on the cushion next to the blonde boy. "Do…. do you thi-think that'll be ok?"
"Of course it will be." Adrien gave his classmate the most sincere smile he could. Anything to make the situation less awkward and nerve wracking for her. "I really can't thank you enough for this Marinette."
There was a small pause as his classmate just stared at him, then at the floorboards they stood on, then back up at him. "You're welcome." The silence grew between them once more. "We… We should go to bed."
"Right. Yeah it is really late isn't it?" Marinette just nodded in response before turning to walk towards the ladder to the loft her bed was on.
"Um…. G-g-good n-night." The girl's voice came out as a squeak before she scurried up the ladder. There must have been a light switch up there, because the lights in the room soon flicked off. In the darkness of the room, Adrien managed to lay down on the cushioned furniture, and cover himself with the provided blanket. It was quite comfortable actually, even though it was nowhere near the size of his bed at home.
"Good night." He said just loud enough that Marinette should have been able to hear him.
