Marinette watched as the black car drove away through the rain, the empty street lined with skyscrapers echoing the sound. She couldn't believe she was losing both of them on the same day. She heard Alya saying something to her, but didn't catch the words until Alya grabbed her by the arms and shook her.

"Marinette! You know you care about him, and you have to go tell him so! Do you want him to leave, or do you want him to stay?"

Marinette hesitated for no more than a moment before starting to run.

She found the bicycle a few hundred feet down the street. She grabbed it - she hoped the owner wouldn't mind - and started to pedal as hard as she could. Her heart was thundering in her ears. She felt her wheel start to slip and jerked it upright as quickly as she could. Rounding a corner, she saw the car up ahead and started shouting again, waving one hand, the other firmly on the handlebars. Suddenly, she hit a pothole, a puddle - something - and went flying. She rolled a few times, landing painfully on her arm and feeling her tears begin to fall.

A glow of light hit her. A red light.

A brake light?

Marinette raised her head and saw that the car had, astonishingly, stopped. And someone was running toward her.

"Marinette! Are you okay? What are you doing?!"

The breath had been knocked out of her by her fall, but her tears had to be unmistakable. Adrien dropped down by her and grabbed her, helping her to her feet.

"What were you thinking, Marinette?"

"I…"

At this pivotal moment, Marinette knew she couldn't hesitate. Throwing her arms around Adrien, she said, almost hysterically,

"I don't want you to go!"

He raised his arms in surprise, but quickly lowered them around her as she held onto him for dear life.

"I… I know it's not fair, but I have to. My father said-"

"That's not what I meant!" Marinette said in a rush, tears streaming down her face now. "I can't lose you, too - I just lost someone incredibly important to me, and you're so much like him, and I can't lose you, too, and if you leave then I might never see you again and it's all my fault!"

Adrien looked back at the car and then held onto Marinette tighter.

"Marinette, you couldn't lose me! You're my best friend, I love you!"

It took a few seconds for this to process in her brain, but when it finally did, she pulled herself away with a start.

"You… what?"

"I… err, sorry. That probably came out of nowhere, I just… I wanted you to know."

Marinette suddenly realized they were in the middle of the street, the car was still there, and there were voices coming from it. Angry voices.

"Adrien! I cannot believe you would do this, this kind of behavior is unacceptable!"

Marinette looked up at the boy in front of her, her hair now plastered all down her cheeks. He, too, was soaked to the skin, but more unbelievable than ever, he was smiling down at her. No confusion, no apprehension.

"Adrien… Did you ignore your dad to come save me?"

"Err…" Adrien stuttered, rubbing the back of his neck in embarrassment.

"You did! Adrien, you…"

She was speechless for a moment, then quickly reached for the blond boy and grabbed him. They were getting closer, closer to each other, nothing else mattered in the world, he was leaning down toward her-

And then her alarm went off, startling her so much that she almost jumped through her skylight.

Greetings and welcome, lovely reader! This is my submission for Adrienette April - I promise, I will finish it, it might just take a little longer than a month if I don't get my butt in gear and start writing! Hopefully you enjoyed this little story - it's not much, but it at least sets a bit of the stage for later emotional payoff. And also I wanted the New York special to be so much more than it actually was, so I'm salty and taking it out in this.

Having already made the claim that I will finish this story, I feel terrible saying this, but I won't be posting another tomorrow (Happy Good Friday, my Catholic and Christian peeps!). Instead, I will post both the second and third day on Saturday.

Throughout this story, constructive criticism is happily accepted - this isn't going to be the most professional work, especially if you've already read "Always and Forever", this is more of a writing exercise for me, so I'm happy to listen to any suggestions or thoughts you might have on how to improve my writing through the month.

That's all for now - see you all Saturday!