Chapter 2
"This is the Worst. Trip. Ever." Alya folds her arms and sinks even lower into her seat, propping her feet up on the dashboard as she does so. They've been stuck in traffic for around two hours now and she's willing to bet that they've moved about three feet at most.
"Hey, hey, hey! Feet off the dash, Al!" Nino exclaims a little too loudly. "I had the car cleaned last week, there's no way I'm paying for another clean this week!"
"Calm down, Lahiffe. They're just socks, they're not gonna leave footprints or marks or anything." Alya brushes him off and grabs her phone. She might as well scroll through Instagram for the dozenth time, even if it ends up being the same posts that she scrolled through not even twenty minutes ago.
As expected, nothing new has happened since she last checked. She scrolls through the same pictures of Chloé's sushi (artfully taken by Sabrina, of course), Rose and Juleka in Amsterdam, Nathaniel's latest half-completed painting for his upcoming gallery show. Everyone is doing awesome things (apart from Chloé because, in Alya's opinion, there is nothing particularly interesting about raw fish) and Alya is stuck in traffic. She's about to check Snapchat when Adrien suggests that they play 'I Spy'.
"Not that I have anything against 'I Spy', but we're not seven, Adrien." Alya glances at him in the rear-view mirror and it takes all her willpower to look away because he's making that face. That face is the face he pulls whenever he really wants someone to agree with him and it's so, so much more powerful than his pouty face. His eyes widen and this childlike grin splits across his face and he looks so much like a stupid baby kitten that Alya just wants to squish him and boop his nose.
Damn her maternal instincts.
"Please, Alya? Pretty pretty please with sprinkles and a cherry on top?"
She resists pointing out that she actually hates cherries and, against her better judgement, agrees. "Fine. We'll play 'I Spy'. But be warned, Agreste. I will end you." If she's gonna play, she's gonna play right.
Adrien does a little happy dance before declaring that he'll go first. "I Spy with my little eye…something beginning with...T?"
"Really, Agreste? T?" Alya throws him a disbelieving look over her shoulder. "It's a tree. You can see trees." She facepalms as he nods sheepishly. "Look, Adrien. I know you didn't really play this game that much as a kid, but come on! You gotta be more original and inventive than that."
Adrien huffs and has a quiet strop while Alya begins her turn.
"…something beginning with…S."
Adrien looks around. "Sky?" Alya shakes her head. "Seat?" Alya shakes her head again. This is turning out to be a lot more difficult than Adrien anticipated. Whenever he had played with Chloé when they were kids she'd always use the same thing: M for 'Me'! I'm the only thing worth looking at around here, Adrikins.
After fifteen minutes, Alya's already shot down 'seatbelt', 'steering wheel', and 'stereo' and at this point Adrien is losing the will to continue. On the plus side, traffic has started moving so he'll try to focus on the positives.
"Signpost?"
"Nope." Alya responds, popping the 'p' smugly. Adrien scowls as she sticks her tongue out at him.
"Scarecrow?"
"Sun?" Marinette has woken up from her nap at this point. Adrien glances at her and chuckles at the indent on her cheek from the door. She's completely oblivious to this, however, as she rubs her bleary eyes and stretches her arms out, yawning languidly and almost whacking Adrien in the face as she does so.
"You guys are the absolute worst at this, how have you not guessed –"
"Socks." Nino cuts Alya off mid-sentence, smirking at her as he watches all previous satisfaction drain from her face. He shoots her a wink and she squeaks in indignation.
"How –"
"Psychic, babe. C'mon, you know this already, Al." He watches with a sly grin as Alya huffs and crosses her arms, muttering about how her stupid boyfriend is an idiot and never lets me win anything I should just break up with him now.
"You know you love me, Al. You're contractually obligated to love me forever and ever and ever."
"And I regret that decision more and more each day."
"Liar." Nino leans over and kisses Alya's cheek, smiling widely as her cheeks flush slightly.
Adrien shakes his head fondly at his two idiot friends in the front seats. They're good for each other, no matter how much they annoy each other, and they fit together so well in a way that Adrien has never really seen before. Healthy relationships haven't exactly been a big part of his life and watching Nino and Alya together gives him just the slightest sliver of hope that maybe, one day, he'll have something just as special. If his eyes happen to flick towards Marinette for even just a couple of seconds, Adrien doesn't dwell on it.
He's so caught up in his thoughts that he doesn't notice Marinette's eyes lingering on him, the same sentiment of hope reflecting in them. By the time he shakes off his reverie and looks over at her properly, the shining look from moments ago has passed and he finds her instead sketching diligently what appears to be a new coat design.
"So, do I get a turn at this game or have we all stopped playing?" Nino asks. "Because I think I could be really good at this, y'know?" He drums his fingers lightly on the steering wheel in a weirdly complex rhythm.
Alya nods begrudgingly, still mumbling under her breath.
"Right, here we go, my dudes. I spy with my little eye something beginning with…"
"HOLY SHIT NINO WATCH WHERE YOU'RE GOING!" Alya screams as the car careers close to the central reservation of the motorway and jolts suddenly as Nino suddenly swerves back onto the lane, away from the metal dividing strip.
"I don't think that's a letter, babe. Did you forget the rules of the game?" Nino jokes weakly, trying to cover the situation with some questionable humour.
Alya raises an eyebrow at him, evidently unimpressed. "That's it. Switch with me, there's a service station in ten minutes and I don't want any arguments from you. You've been driving for four hours and you've only had three hours sleep." She pats his knee softly in reassurance.
Nino sighs and agrees, albeit reluctantly.
"Hey, if you want you can switch seats with me so you have more room to nap in the back here?" Marinette suggests. She knows only too well the struggle of staying awake with a sleeping pattern like Nino's. It's part of the reason she naps so much in car journeys; any rest she can get is valuable.
"Thanks, Maribro, I think I'll take you up on that." Nino shoots her a grateful look.
Thirteen kilometres later, they pull into the service station and get out of the car in order to look for food. The road trip snacks have been helpful in keeping them mostly satisfied, but after four hours it's a unanimous decision that they need some real food right about now.
The service station is, to be quite honest, a bit of a dump. Sure, it's got good parking but, other than that, there really isn't anything positive to say about it. Nino sighs. When they had agreed on 'real food', they'd been hoping for more options than just a hotdog stand, a McDonald's, and a Starbucks. And not even a good Starbucks, for that matter.
"I guess there's only really one option then." Nino says as he locks the car, unlocks it, and then locks it again. "What? I do that for security reasons, Mari. Don't look at me like that."
"Remind me again why we decided against packing our own lunch?"
"We didn't decide against packing lunch, Agreste. You just decided against waking up early enough to do so." Alya pokes Adrien in the side.
Adrien gives a long-suffering sigh. "I regret that. I regret that very much."
"I guess now would be a good time to say that I packed lunch for everyone anyway, right?." Marinette chirps, snatching Nino's keys and unlocking the car again in order to grab her picnic basket from the boot. "Impromptu picnic, anyone?"
The looks on her friends' faces are perhaps the funniest Marinette has seen in a while. Alya's face is a mix of relief and 'why-didn't-I-think-of-this', Nino is staring at the picnic basket with what can only be described as adoration (she thinks that he may be drooling slightly), and Adrien- well. Adrien's face has lit up with possibly every happy emotion and he's looking at her in such awe that she thinks she might burst (although she's pretty sure that he is just very hungry and he's really thinking about food).
"Marinette you're a genius! I could just kiss you!" Adrien shouts, racing over to her and throwing his arms around her. Yep. He's definitely just really hungry. There's no way on earth he'd say something like that to her in any normal situation.
Nevertheless, Marinette's face turns a million different shades of red. "Uh, it was – I mean, and well…you know – I – um – no problem, it was – not deal big – Wait! I mean, not a dig beal- big deal! Uh, yeah." Out of the corner of her eye she can see Alya facepalming and Nino laughing hysterically, but she decides to ignore them as she always does when she makes a fool out of herself in front of Adrien. "What I meant to say was, it's not a big deal and, to be honest, I kinda saw this coming." Marinette breathes a sigh of relief, having finally managed to complete her sentence like an actual functioning human being.
The end up sitting inside of the car, passing food around and chatting about nothing in particular. Maybe 'picnic' wasn't exactly the right word for…whatever this is. But, Marinette reasons to herself, they're happy and relaxed and more awake with all the food.
"Bro, chill out with the cheese there, would you?" Nino laughs, slapping Adrien on the back and causing him to almost choke. "Get some variation in your diet!"
"What? I like cheese, okay?" Adrien says, mouth still full. Nobody really knows why Adrien loves cheese so much but it's always been a thing. He says that it's his cat's fault because Plagg just really loves cheese and I end up buying so much of it that it's all I have in my fridge.
Marinette has always found this explanation slightly suspicious, since she's pretty sure that she read somewhere that cats are lactose intolerant but, then again, she knows Plagg only too well.
Nino has stopped questioning the Cheese Thing because he has, for a fact, seen that cat devour half a wheel of camembert. It was slightly unnerving the first time it happened but he has since gotten used to Plagg's strange eating habits.
Alya is the only one to make sure that Plagg gets actual cat food. It's not that Adrien doesn't ever buy actual cat food, it's just that he forgets. A lot. But Alya makes sure to buy the massive bags so that Adrien rarely runs out.
Nino, from where he is now seated in the back seat, reaches forward to grab his phone. He clicks onto a playlist and grins to himself. It's a playlist that Marinette doesn't recognise and now she's certain that he's broken Rule Number 1 of the Road Trip Playlist Committee Rulebook. She has reason to believe that this is, in fact, the second time Nino has done so. This has yet to be confirmed. He winks at her and Marinette suddenly has the feeling that Nino knows something she doesn't. She scowls and watches as he grins at her, all his annoyingly perfect teeth on display. Yep. He definitely knows something.
Nino is squealing on the inside as he looks down at his phone. His newest playlist, the 'omg-adrien-is-looking-at-mari-like-/that/-again-and-it's-so-FRICKING CUTE' one, is currently blasting in the car and, honestly, he never thought he'd see the day. Both Marinette and Adrien are completely oblivious. Which, he supposes, isn't necessarily new with them because he's been trying to get them together for forever and they're too caught up in pining for each other to realise. Maybe Marinette more so than Adrien.
From: the idiot I'm in love with
To: the light of my life
AL
AL
AL
AL
AL
GUESS WHAT
From: the light of my life
To: the idiot I'm in love with
Babe, I'm sitting directly in front of you.
Why are you texting me?
From: the idiot I'm in love with
To: the light of my life
LOOK
FRICKING_CUTE_
From: the light of my life
To: the idiot I'm in love with
Are you telling me you made a playlist especially for when Adrien looks at Mari?
From: the idiot I'm in love with
To: the light of my life
affirmative
that is exactly what I'm telling you
From: the light of my life
To: the idiot I'm in love with
This is genius.
But you're still an idiot.
From: the idiot I'm in love with
To: the light of my life
go on…say it!11!
From: the light of my life
To: the idiot I'm in love with
fine.
You're my idiot.
Alya groans audibly at the sound of Nino's satisfied laugh. Nevertheless, she smiles and glances back down at her phone. Nino is always so incredibly sweet and she wonders how on earth she managed to get this lucky. Sure, he may cause her to roll her eyes more times in a day than is strictly necessary, but she loves him. It took her a long time to admit that, to both herself and Nino. Far longer than it should have, if she's being honest with herself.
When they first started dating, it wasn't actually on purpose. It was the week after Alya's 16th birthday. The plan had been for all four of them to go to the cinema to see some horror film that she no longer remembers the name of. It was supposed to be a pretty standard hangout, which it was, until Adrien and Marinette both found reasons to back out. Adrien supposedly had a photoshoot and Marinette was apparently given a last-minute shift at the bakery. It was all rather fishy to Alya at the time, but she didn't think anything of it.
She and Nino had never really hung out without either Marinette or Adrien present. It wasn't that they didn't want to hang out without the others, but they'd just never really found occasion to. Of course, it was a little awkward at the start but, they soon found that they had a natural rhythm and that they clicked in a way that they never had before. It wasn't necessarily in a romantic sense, but there was something there.
After the movie, food seemed like the logical option. Nino suggested that they pay for each other's food. "I have a very logical reason for this so we're gonna run this like a lab experiment." He had said as they headed in the direction of the pizza place opposite the cinema. "Here's the hypothesis: by paying for each other's meals, rather than our own, we still have the option to split the bill but we can also still do something nice for the other person. That way I can afford bubble gum tomorrow morning, you can afford coffee tomorrow morning, and we'll still have paid for something that isn't for us."
Alya had readily agreed, as coffee always took priority in her life, and that was that. Nino had walked her home from the bus stop, they'd deliberated over whether or not to hug before eventually settling on a high-five, and then the not-quite-a-date was over. Neither of them really expected anything to happen between them. They were just friends.
The next morning Alya, in what is perhaps still recognised as her most uncharacteristic act, decided to forego her morning coffee from the small café three streets over in favour of buying bubble gum. It was just meant to be something small and nice, to let Nino know that she would be up for hanging out again, if he wanted.
Nino texted her to meet him by the Trocadero. She eventually found him, small-café-three-streets-over-coffee in hand, and the rest was history. She may have fallen a little bit in love with him in that moment. But he is never allowed to know.
"What are you thinking about?" Marinette pokes Alya sharply in the ribs, causing her to jump.
"Nothing important," Alya hisses in pain, rubbing her side and shooting a glare at Marinette. "Just thinking about the not-quite-date."
Marinette giggles. "You are so sappy, you know that, right? You get this weird dreamy look in your eye and I swear I heard you sigh at least twice."
"No way! I'm not sappy, Nino's the sappy one!" Alya huffs. It's true; she is the sappy one. Marinette knows it, Alya knows it, they all know it.
"Oh yeah? Well when is you guys' anniversary, huh?"
"Six days, four hours, and twenty-seven minutes." Alya mumbles, somewhat embarrassed.
"Wait, you seriously remember –"
"I have a countdown on my phone."
Marinette raises an amused eyebrow as Alya turns an even brighter shade of red. She leans over and envelops Alya in a hug.
"You don't need to be embarrassed about it, Al. I think it's cute."
Alya laughs. "Thanks, Mari. I just – it's coming up to five years, you know? And I guess it's just – I don't know. I wanna make it more special this year."
"It'll be great, Alya. Don't worry about it. I will do everything in my power to make sure everything goes perfectly. Scout's honour!" Marinette raises her hand to her head in an overdramatic salute.
"Mari, you were never a Scout."
"It's the thought that counts, right?"
