Author's Note: Yeah about that Sunday update thing, I did it a little early. There's still going to be a chapter on Sunday but I got sick today and got sent home early from work and now I don't even know if I can make it in tomorrow so there might be another update tomorrow too. We'll see. Anyway, I curled up once I got home and comfortable and started writing. Two and half chapters later, here we are. This is my Marichat trash chapter. I've got some plans for these two in upcoming chapters so I hope everyone enjoys!
Chapter 8
"Marinette, this isn't going to work."
"But…."
"Did you even consider the consequences of doing something like this?"
"Yes but…."
"I mean seriously? You're going to break that boy's heart!"
Marinette reached up and cupped Tikki in her hands, pulling her down so that they were at eye level. The little kwami was glowing red, something she had learned some time ago meant that she was angry; it rarely happened but when it did, it was terrifying to witness. Tikki knew she was being contradictory. Yes, she wanted the two of them to get together for her own-selfish reasons but she really hadn't expected her chosen to do this! Falling in love with Chat Noir. She was setting herself up to have her heart broken or worse- doing it to him. Mari smiled softly at her.
"Can I please explain why I'm doing it?" Tikki buzzed red before flying off and hovering in the corner of the room. Mari shrugged and repeated something that at one time, helped her, "Okay, if that makes you feel better. You don't have to say anything, I- I just need to explain.
"I know you're not happy with my decision. I wouldn't be either in your place but please, look at it from my point of view. Chat Noir knows who I am. I have no idea who he is and I've got two possibilities. Now, I could inquire into both of them but that would take too long and I may never figure it out. Chat's… well, Chat's more straight forward." She snuggled down deeper into the mattress on her bed. Pulling her oversized cat pillow to her, she wrapped it around her middle and hugged it close. For warmth, comfort, an anchor point, whatever. "There's no guess work with Chat. Besides, if I hang out with him enough, maybe I'll figure out who is just like he figured out who I am. It'll all work out. I promise Tikki. I- I won't hurt him. I'll hurt myself first before I do anything to him." The little red fairy's shoulders dropped. She turned, her eyes slightly sad, but she forced out a smile. "I'm sorry Tikki. I know this isn't the most ideal way about doing this but I really don't want to have to chase down two boys, potentially get it wrong, and screw things up far worse." She flew back down and landed on the cat pillow.
"Oh Marinette. I'm sure whatever you decide to do, it'll all work out in the end. I have that much faith in you." She paused. "I'm sorry for getting mad at you. It just took me by surprise is all." Marinette smiled back and brought Tikki up to her face to gently kiss her forehead.
"It's alright. I could've done that a lot better." Both of them giggled. Mari sighed and stretched, placing Tikki on the bed next to her. She snuggled in for the night. "I'm going to go practice dancing."
"Don't stay up too late," she yawned.
The night was cooler than it had been in the previous week but the skies were clear and a large, pearl colored moon shone down on her balcony. She lit a couple of candles on the tiny table she'd placed up there for evenings of reading or studying with Alya when her room got too uncomfortable to be in. Now, everything was pushed kind of out of the way to make it a temporary practice room. The odd shape of her room made it difficult to practice there. She breathed in deeply and while she stood at the table, lighting the candles, she turned on her phone to play a waltz song from the Internet. It started softly. Mari closed her eyes a bit and swayed with it before raising her arms, remembering the lesson Adrien had given her several days ago, and the dance she'd shared with Chat only a day ago, before entering the box step. She kept her back straight, elbows raised, and she imagined staring up, not into the bright green of Adrien Agreste's eyes, but the black masked ones of Chat Noir. She didn't feel anything. No heat, no rush, no dizzying feeling of elation. Really, after the way she'd treated him as Ladybug, she was amazed the boy had any kind of feelings for her in the first place. She flinched. The motion though was enough to throw her off and send her tumbling down to the ground- again.
However, a set of hands grabbed her around the waist and gently pulled her back. Instead of hitting the ground with a thud, she landed into a leather clad chest.
She blinked. Tilting her head back, she looked up into the smiling face of the boy she'd just been thinking about. "Chat Noir!"
"Hello purrincess," he smiled. He helped to steady her before releasing her. "I was out on patrol when I heard the lovely sound of music and I thought I'd come investigate and what do I find but a damsel in distress?" She narrowed her eyes at him.
"I was not in distress." She brushed her bangs out of her face. "Okay, maybe I was a little distressed."
"You did well until you stopped focusing."
"Uh? Oh, you-you saw that." He smiled, leaning back on her railing, his tail swishing back and forth. She came over to join him, only she faced out over the horizon. "I'm trying. You know about Dupont's Masquerade ball? It's not for another four weeks but I don't want to wait until the last minute to get it right considering I'm so uncoordinated and dangerous to everyone around me." He eyed her.
"You? Dangerous? With that size?" He laughed as she slugged him in the arm.
"Ha-ha. Thanks for pointing out I'm small." They fell silent. The longer it went, the more Marinette came to realize that not everything was alright. Chat fidgeted nervously. After a few moments, she sighed and asked, "Chat, what's wrong?" It was his turn to flinch only he wasn't dancing so there was no danger in falling.
"Purrincess?"
"I asked what's wrong." She smirked knowingly at him. "You're fidgeting quite a bit there." He waved her off.
"Nothing's wrong! I'm- I'm just a little sore is all." She eyed him, knew he was lying, but decided to let it go. It was a game after all and she couldn't reveal her hand just yet; it would be a horrible move to reveal that she knew that he knew who she really was and if she wanted operation Learn-to-love-Chat-Noir to go off without a hitch, she needed to first interact with him honestly as Marinette and not Ladybug.
Chat looked away as he contemplated what he should do. Marinette is Ladybug. He could easily reveal himself, drop to one knee, and confess his undying love for her right there before the moon and the night sky of Paris but for some reason, that didn't seem like a good idea. After all, Marinette didn't act, well, like Marinette around Chat Noir. For all he knew, the instant he revealed himself as Adrien Agreste, she would instantly throw him off this balcony and never have anything else to do with him. It was bad enough they had the gum incident as their greeting back at the beginning of the previous year. He was pretty sure she still hated him for that too. Then in the last three days, she'd been acting weird; colder than normal and distant. Very distant. He wasn't sure what had happen since their outing on Tuesday but he wanted it to go away so he could see the girl that had given him one of the happiest days he'd ever experienced.
Plagg was right. He was an idiot. Especially since it had taken him so long to realize that he truly did like her.
A gentle hand on his shoulder shook him and he blinked, coming out of his thoughts. He turned to face her. Marinette stared up at him, her brow furrowed. "Seriously Chat. What's wrong?"
He waved again. "Nothing. Just a little tired is all."
"You're not going to tell me are you?"
"There's nothing to tell."
She shrugged. "Suit yourself." She pushed back off of the railing and moved back into the middle of her balcony. A quick turn put her back to facing him and she smirked, reaching out a hand to him. "Want to practice with me then? It'll help… wake you up a bit." His heart started pounding. A shaky gloved hand reached out and gently took hers in I, pulling him closer to her than he knew how to handle. A fierce blush raged under his mask. He had to turn his head a bit. Marinette only continued to smile up at him as she put her hands in the proper positions. This time, there wasn't any hesitation. She was confident and knew where to place them and she trusted him inexplicably. A new song started on her phone. He instantly found the rhythm (waltzing was fun like that) and he pulled her into it. She started out counting under her breath but the longer they went, the quieter she got until she no longer was counting out loud. She looked up at him excitedly. "I-I'm doing it."
"Good job. You must have been practicing a lot. Trying to really become a princess?"
"Being a princess is overrated. I'm working towards not killing anyone. If you make another quip about me being small, I will throw you off this balcony." He chuckled.
"I could imagine the Ladyblog post now. Local girl destroys superhero by throwing him off her balcony."
"I thought cats always landed on their feet." She bit her lip, realizing she probably just goofed. How very Ladybug of her to say. Chat eyed her. They moved to her left in their dance but he didn't say anything about it.
They stayed silent after that. All she could hear was the sound of their feet landing on the wood. Her eyes started to wander but he coughed, reminding her to not remove them from him. She jerked her head back up and wanted to faint at the sight. There was no way he didn't know she was Ladybug. He eyed her so tenderly that she wondered if this was a dream. She bit her bottom lip, her heart fluttering for the first time towards him, but she didn't even think of removing her eyes again.
His face twisted then into something mischievous. The sparkle in his eyes was not good and Marinette tensed, bracing herself for whatever he had planned. She had a tiny inkling to what it was going to be and she was one hundred percent correct as he pulled his arm out, held it higher, and essentially forced her to spin. She braced for the fall but surprisingly, since she actually had a second to prepare for it, she managed it, coming back in with a goofy grin on her face. "I-I spun." He nodded. She blinked and got even more excited, "I spun!" She jumped up suddenly, wrapping her arms around his neck. Chat Noir was coordinated but this took him by surprise. He fell to the ground with an –oomph- but wrapped his arms around her waist so she wouldn't get injured in the process. Marinette pulled back. She was in between Chat's legs, her face awfully close to his, and her arms still around his neck. Both of them turned the same shade of red. He wanted nothing more than to kiss her right then and there but knew that wasn't alright. They instantly jerked away, mumbling apologies. Marinette cleared her throat. "Thank-you Chat. I finally managed to spin. I've been trying to figure it out since a couple of days ago when my-my friend first showed it to me."
"I'm glad you got it." Now it was her turn to fidget before looking back at him, "Um Chat? C-can I ask you to do me a favor?"
"For you princess, anything." She reached up, stroking her left pigtail, eyes averted again. Her heart was pounding even louder now. But she was determined to make her plan work, so she asked, "Couldyouhelpmepracticefortheball?" Chat blinked. He reached up and rubbed his ears.
"Sorry but I don't think I heard you right. You want me to what?"
She turned away this time, her face completely red, "I asked if you couldhelpmepracticefortheball." Chat moved forward so that his face was close to her neck even though she continued to face away.
"You're going to have to speak slower," His breath was hot on her neck and she tensed, the red spreading all the way down. She squeaked. He found it to be absolutely adorable. "I know I'm a superhero but even I have a hard time understanding when you speak so quickly." She took a steadying breath. Ladybug. Channel Ladybug. This is Chat, the kind, goofy, sweet boy who happens to know you're Ladybug and has a crush on you. How would Ladybug handle this?
Marinette turned so that they were essentially nose to nose and she smirked alluringly at him. Chat's eyes went wide again. He swallowed painfully, realizing that she was accelerating their little game, if that's what you could call it, and pulling out the stops on him. "I asked if you could help me practice for the ball," she repeated slowly, her voice barely more than a husky whisper. He nodded dumbly. She reached up and playfully poked his nose with a finger before backing up and standing. "Thank-you Chat." They heard movement below followed by her mother calling out, "Marinette?" She motioned for him to be quiet before going to the hatch.
"Yes Mama!"
"Marinette, what in the world are you still doing up? Just because it's the weekend doesn't mean you need to stay up late."
"I-I was practicing for the ball and lost track of time," she quickly waved to him to go. He smirked and nodded before pulling off his baton, ready. "I'm going to bed now. Night!"
"Good night." They waited until they heard the other hatch close.
"Guess that's my cue to go," he mumbled. She nodded.
"Yes." He paused before facing her one more time.
"Marinette? When do you want me to come back?"
She thought for a second, "Can you come back on Monday?"
"It's a date then," he confirmed before leaping off. Both of their faces were scarlet. A date?!
