Ladynoir July Day 3: Tease.
Ladybug had always known Chat Noir would be impossible to study with.
As much as she tried to compartmentalize her civilian life and superhero life into neat little boxes (with varying degrees of success), she slipped sometimes. She was only human! Of course she wondered what her partner was like when he wasn't wearing the mask and her imagination had gone, against her will, through many scenarios where they met, bare of secret identities, and all her suspicions about him were true.
She always laughed at the idea that Chat Noir's secret identity would be a bad boy, a troublemaker. Her sweet kitty? She was sure he was a class clown, jokes silly and fun enough that the teacher was always fondly exasperated and let his interruptions slide when he interfered in class. He was always the life of the party and absolutely oblivious to the girls around him ("What do you mean wish-fulfillment? Tikki- stop laughing what do you mean?"). He has a loving family and a bunch of siblings. Chat Noir was a little bit of an endearing attention-seeker, like a middle child.
So of course he would be all over the place while studying. Her partner was rarely quiet when they were together, always a quip ready on his tongue, hands fidgeting with his belt. She imagined studying with Chat Noir (civilian him, all fluffy blond hair and soft green eyes that looked a touch too much like another boy that she knew for comfort) in her room, his notes messy and all in blue pen. He would sheepishly ask for a pencil, around a mouthful of croissant, because he forgot his case, and she would roll her eyes, call him irresponsible and still give him one of her prized gel pens.
Chat Noir not being like that at all threw her for a loop.
He was deathly quiet. Cat eyes carefully looked over the pictures and symbols on the grimoire before turning to the notes written in Alya's chicken scratch and highlighting a passage with her pastel pink highlighter ("Hum" He said when she handed it to him "Is this brand popular? A friend of mine has one too."). In the beginning, when they sat across each other on a covered rooftop and sat on the pillows she made just for this, he had been humming an unknown song.
"Oh, I'm sorry, my lady." He said when she mentioned it. She hadn't thought the way she said it was particularly mean, but he shrunk into himself. "I won't do it again."
"No, it's okay, I don't mind." She reassured. Chat Noir smiled prettily at that, even though he didn't start again.
Unfortunately, all of his mannerism, as endearing as they were, made it impossible to study with him. She just couldn't stop… looking. At the way his hair fell into his eyes and how much she wanted to tuck it back, how a clawed hand came up to scratch the creamy skin on his collarbone, how he stuck the tip of his tongue out when concentrating. Yes, Chat Noir studying made all her efforts to understand potion-making futile.
How did the girls in his school survive?
"Are you okay?" His voice snapped her out of her daze. His tone was almost too light, like he knew something she didn't. " You seem distracted."
That… that tease! He knew what he was doing, didn't he?! That damned cat!
"I'm just thinking about this potion for resistance to extreme heat!" She snapped, gesturing vaguely to a page in front of her.
"That's a page about healing kwami sickness." Chat said, voice triumphant.
She resisted the urge to curse.
"I-I know. I said I was just thinking about it, not that I was reading about it."
"Of course." His words were belied by his smirk. "Whatever you say, my lady."
Was that what he usually did when he studied? Did he actually learn something or did he spend all his time teasing his female classmates?
Maybe that WAS really what he did. His friends would invite him to a study session in the library and suddenly all the girls who couldn't make it before were eager to study trigonometry. He would ask the one closest to him, a girl with dark brown hair and skin and kinda looked like Lila, actually, for help with a problem and she would fall over herself to do it, batting her eyelashes at every pause in her lecture. He would thank her with a blinding smile and by giving her the pen he borrowed earlier from her. She would tell him to keep it, just so she could have an excuse to talk to him again.
Did he do that with all the girls he met?
Did he call any of them "my lady"?
Her pink pencil snapped in half.
"Hey." Chat Noir said, a little more subsided. His green eyes shined with genuine concern. "I know I was joking before, but are you really okay? You can tell me."
Her eyes softened. "I'm fine, really, just distracted." As his gaze persisted, she added: "Nothing serious or guardianship-ish, just silly stuff. Really."
Chat looked satisfied enough to turn back to his notes. She was being silly, his feelings for her were real and he didn't treat other girls like he did her. Except the over the top chivalrous way he treated Marinette, but she wasn't going to think about that either. It's not like she could date him. Sure, it would solve having to lie about a boyfriend about her duties as Ladybug, but… There was Adrien. She had come to accept, under that umbrella after Mr. Ramier's 72nd akumatization, that she hadn't gotten over him at all.
And they didn't know each other's names, dating as Ladybug and Chat Noir would be way too hard. Not that she wanted to, exactly. But she thought about it before, almost impossible to not to with the way Chat Noir flirted and asked her on dates so often (not as much these days, not that she was counting or anything). Bottom line was: dating as Ladybug and Chat Noir bad. No matter if he was single and she was single again and that he adored her and that maybe she… Yeah, no matter. It wasn't going to happen.
Looks like I'm my biggest tease. She thought, not noticing the pig-tailed and wild-haired stick figures she was drawing on the corner of her notebook.
They were holding hands.