Additional info and tropes:
Adrienette fluff, Chloe redemption, Lila Salt
Yay! It is my first multi-chapter in the MLB fandom! I hope this nonsense makes someone smile!
Thank you to my sweet betas, Sierra and Yuki!
You can find Yuki's work here:
https/u/2469534/Yuki082
Listening to Vogue by Madonna
https/open./track/27QvYgBk0CHOVHthWnkuWt?si=FXAIuiNzSJqlTDTeAdoNUQ
Instagram Post by @STYLEQUEEN
We have exciting news for fashionable Parisian youth! Style Teen Paris, the newest magazine in the Style Queen brand (as well as the coolest ) is holding a contest to find our official youth style influencer. We are partnering with some amazing brands too! The challenge: style an outfit every day for a week and post it on Instagram with #styleteeninfluencer and items from our partner brands @dior, @yslbeauty, and @chanelofficial. We will be looking at the numbers of likes and comments on your posts and a panel of judges will be looking at your personal style. Judges will include teen editor Chloe Bourgeois, singer and style icon Clara Nightingale, and designer Gabriel Agreste! Show off your style and become our official influencer! Good luck and stay stylish!
Instagram post by @marinettedesigned
Marinette standing in front of the macaron case in the bakery, the macarons a beautiful pink ombré pattern. She is wearing a black bateau neck 3/4 sleeve shirt, tucked into a full whisper pink skirt with black polka dots. Her look is finished with a high bun, a string of pearls, a black patent belt, and sleek makeup. She has a vintage Dior Trotter Hand Bag with pink trim on her arm. She is smiling, one hand on her hip, the other hand holding a T Patisserie coffee cup.
Channeling Barbra Streisand when she sang, "There are no blue Mondays in your Sunday clothes!" It also helps when your breakfast is a strawberry macaron and a vanilla latte! Rocking the Dior New Look silhouette, using a vintage Chanel belt I found second hand to cinch in my waist, with a full retro style skirt by yours truly, Marinette Designed! Makeup look: YSL Touché Eclat Brightening Concealer on those dark circles, YSL all over glow powder to set it up, YSL The Shock mascara, and finishing the look with YSL Vinyl Cream Lip Stain in Rose Mix! Spritzed on my favorite Miss Dior Absolutely Blooming perfume and grabbed the vintage Dior Trotter that used to be my Nonna's! #T #dior #ysl #chanel #styleteeninfluencer #stylequeen
Instagram Post by @lilavitabella
Lila draped across a couch in front of a window, the picture in black and white. She is wearing a lace top with a dark blazer over it, and you can tell she has nothing under the top. Her legs are clad in sheer patterned hosiery, with scandalously short shorts over them and stiletto heels, the only color in the picture being the red bottoms. Her makeup look is heavy and dramatic. She also has a small Chanel Gabrielle Hobo bag.
Hello my beautiful people! Just trying a sultry look this Monday morning for a lovely start to the week! Remember to eat breakfast and be kind to the world today! My whole outfit today is Chanel, except for my shoes which are Louboutin's given to me by a secret admirer My makeup is all YSL today and I've swapped my usual signature scent of Prada Candy to Dior Perfect Poison! Have a lovely day, darlings! #chanel #dior #ysl #styleteeninfluencer
@~~,~~'~~~~~~
When Adrien walked into the classroom, he was mildly impressed with the level of chaos that his friends and classmates had reached this early in the morning. He was also impressed with the fact that everyone was already present, over 20 minutes early. Even Marinette had arrived already, sitting by herself at her desk as Alya and most of the class were up at Lila's desk.
Adrien could overhear Lila's cutting laugh as she said,"Oh, I couldn't possibly have worn my outfit to school, I don't want to be distracting! I look so grown up, you know, and I have been subject to street harassment before..." Adrien tuned her out, not wanting the headache that comes with listening to Lila's nonsense.
He continued looking around. Several girls looked very dressed up actually and he started to suspect that maybe he had missed some event or announcement. He placed his bag down and looked at the girl behind him. She was staring down at her phone with a little frown on her face. His eyes lingered over her longer than usual, her appearance quite distracting. She looked very pretty with her hair up and makeup lightly done, her shoulders almost exposed by the wide neck of her blouse. His breath caught in his throat as he was reminded of another head of hair so black it looked blue in the sun, the graceful curve of a different neck and shoulders, other eyes so blue... Adrien shook his head. Marinette was a sweet girl and a great friend. He couldn't project his feelings for another girl onto her, that was unfair.
Marinette seemed to suddenly notice Adrien and jumped a little, her big blue eyes meeting his. She seemed shyly alarmed like always, but a little more subdued than usual. He was slightly disappointed she didn't squeak as she was predisposed to do.
"Good morning, Marinette! Is something special happening today that I didn't know about? Everyone seems to be excited for some reason!" Marinette smiled a little too brightly, clearly trying to hide some discomfort.
"O-o-oh, A-Adrien! Morn gooding!" Adrien smiled even brighter and thought, 'There's my girl.' Marinette grimaced as she realized her verbal gaffe and looked down. "It... it's just this contest on Instagram." She turned her phone around and handed it to him.
He quickly read through the post by Style Queen magazine and couldn't help but mutter under his breath,"Gee thanks Dad for telling me you're doing something cool for once..." He looked over at Chloe, who was sitting sideways in her seat, scrolling through her phone and sending surreptitious glances back at the crowd eating out of Lila's hand in the back of the room. "It's awesome that you get to be the youth editor, Chloe. I'm glad your mom is giving you a little responsibility. Think she'd explain to my dad how that works?" Chloe looked up at Adrien, her trademark smirk lacking some of its usual sass.
"Sure Adrikins, I'll get right on that. Let me know how it works out for you," she said. Her sarcastic tone lacked its usual bite. What was wrong with his girls this morning? He looked back down at Marinette's phone and tapped her profile to look at her last post.
Marinette stammered out, standing up to reach for her phone. "Wait Adrien, what are you doin..." She trailed off as his eyes widened and he let out a breath.
"Wow..." Adrien looked up at her eyes and blurted, "Marinette, your post is so amazing. You have a good shot at winning this." As Marinette's eyes managed to widen even further, Adrien's heightened senses quickly took in several things. First, he could practically hear Chloe's eyes roll as she scoffed, having overheard Adrien's emphatic declaration. Second, he could see Lila's hateful and angry eyes burning a hole in Marinette's back over the blue-haired girl's shoulders. Third, all the attention in the room had turned to them, with most people staring, but Kim and Alix snickering with a look of mischief about them. Adrien's thoughts turned sardonic, 'Oh and look, no one is noticing Lila because they're all staring at us. Great, between Marinette's shyness and Lila's hatred I can see this week being tense and problematic. I just hope this whole thing doesn't turn into Akuma fodder. But first things, first...'
Adrien smiled and handed Marinette's phone back to her.
"Sorry Marinette. Didn't mean to overstep by looking at your account like that, if you'll excuse me," he murmured quietly to the girl, as he executed a patented Gabriel Agreste conversation exit maneuver perfectly and walked up the steps of the classroom towards the third problem he had noticed.
He stopped in front of the desk where Kim and Alix sat snickering, placing his hands in his pockets and leaning into the desk behind him, his face schooled in another expression that also proved that Gabriel did indeed pass on his share of genetics. "So...what are you two doing? Because I would hate to think that you two are up here making fun of Marinette. Especially after all she has done to help the class and especially you two personally."
Alix, unfazed, chuckled at Adrien.
Kim, on the other hand, sputtered out, "Whoa, stop the races."
Alix snorted and interjected, "Dude, the saying is 'stop the presses.'"
Kim tried again,"Whoa, stop the bench presses."
Alix facepalmed. "You are a freaking idiot," though she was smiling even as she insulted him.
Kim ignored her and continued. "Look we aren't making fun of Marinette... we just have a bet going."
Adrien surveyed them with a deadpan look. "I thought you weren't betting anymore."
Alix scoffed, leaning back in her seat and kicking her legs onto the desk. "Look Sunshine, unless you find him a Gamblers Anonymous group, that ain't happening."
Kim ignored them both and continued, "It is more like a game anyways. Look at this." Kim reverently reached under the desk and pulled out some kind of wheel made of layered card stock with a metal brad through the middle. It resembled a roulette wheel or a color wheel, but all of the colors were shades of pink. Each shade was labeled and there was a window cut out of the top layer that isolated each shade. Adrien raised an eyebrow.
"What am I looking at?"
Kim lifted his hands in a sweeping gesture. "It's called the Marinette Blush-o-Meter 5001!"
Alix snickered, as Adrien said incredulously, "You had 5000 prototypes to get to this point?"
Kim shook his head as Alix muttered, "He doesn't know what prototype means..."
Kim ignored her, "What? No, it's just a cool name!"
Adrien crossed his arms and winced at the taller boy. "Is it though?"
Kim pouted, while Alix badly hid her laughter.
Adrien sighed and relented. "Okay... it looks neato, but what does it do? And why is it named after Marinette?"
Kim rolled his eyes. "Okay, you can't judge me when you use terms like 'neato'. Anyhoot, you just hold this up and line it up with Marinette's face."
Adrien looked through the window on the wheel, from this angle seeing Marinette's ear and the graceful curve of her neck and jaw. He softly smiled in her direction and glanced at the color currently in the window. It was a pale, whisper pink color.
"Cotton Candy?" The blonde kept reading, "Ballerina Tutu, Unicorn Fur, Bubble Gum, Pepto Bismal, and...Alix's Hair?" Adrien held the wheel up to Alix and noted that the color labeled Alix's hair was indeed the bright shade of ostentatious pink on the wheel. "So these colors are supposed to be..."
"The colors that Marinette blushes! So the game is that you have to make Marinette blush all the colors on this wheel. Extra points if you do it in order from lightest to brightest!" Kim finished his thought. Adrien held up his hands, trying to grasp what the two mischief-makers were getting at.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa...me? I have to make her blush. You guys made the thing, you make her blush!" Kim and Alix looked at each other and burst into howls of laughter. Marinette and Chloe looked back at the trio and a few of the classmates gathered around Lila glanced over as well. Alix leaned in conspiratorially and Kim moved with her.
"Look, you were always the one who was going to make her blush. We were just watching from afar, betting on how pink Marinette got and how soon she blushed and stuff like that," Alix explained, lowering her voice. "Now that you're in on it, we can play a little game. One week. You get her to blush every color on this wheel from lightest to darkest and we'll let you dare us anything." Kim gulped and looked nervous at this assertion, but Alix maintained eye contact with Adrien, a smug grin daring him to take her challenge.
Adrien smirked back at her and thought it over. Channel his Chat Noir a bit, throw in some flirting, and he could do this in his sleep. It would be fun to fluster Marinette and see all those cute expressions and hear all her adorable noises. He thrust his hand out for a shake.
"You've got yourself a deal." Kim whooped and fist-pumped as Alix took Adrien's hand and shook it firmly, her grip deceptively strong for such a small girl. Adrien grabbed her hand tighter and pulled Alix forward, the smaller girl's eyes widening as he whispered in her ear, "Now watch the master at work." Adrien released her with a grin, already showing off his Chat Noir confidence, and walked down the stairs to Marinette.
Upon reaching her desk, Adrien stopped and when she looked up at him, he gave her a bright model smile. "Marinette, your outfit is really great today. You are posed to win!" Marinette smiled the first real smile he had seen on her today and he felt a rush of victory as a faint blush bloomed into her cheeks.
Chloe muttered from behind him, "Don't you mean poised to win?"
Adrien sighed and said without turning around, "It's a pun, Chlo, because I am a model. Always posed?" Marinette giggled and her blush deepened to the perfect shade of cotton candy.
Kim jumped up and yelled, "Woo, Cotton Candy baby!"
The blonde winked cheekily at Alix and mouthed, "Too easy."
Alix just smirked at him.