Admissions

"I'm not so sure if this was such a good idea after all," Marinette said as she waited upstairs for her parents to finish the clean-up in the bakery for the night.

"It's better than the alternative," Tikki advised her as she flitted about her chosen's shoulder, a large cookie crumb in her arms, "Do you want to tell them that you're Ladybug? Or tell them who Chat is?"

"Of course not. That would be...no. I'm just not sure how happy they'll be with this excuse of ours."

The two of them both glanced up at the door as they heard footsteps approaching and Tikki dashed back into the purse hanging at Marinette's hip as the door to the living room opened.

"Marinette!" her father cried at the sight of her, "I didn't expect you to be waiting for us. No Chat yet?"

"No Papa," she told him, shuffling her feet awkwardly and avoiding his gaze as much as possible, "He's not coming over tonight unless I call him."

She could see both of her parents sharing a quizzical look out of her peripheral vision and let go of a breath she hadn't realised was sitting in her lungs growing stale until now.

"Marinette, is everything alright?" her mother asked quietly.

"I'd like to talk to you both about something," she said quickly. She knew that if she didn't jump right in she'd stretch this out and build it up until it became unbearable to discuss. Without waiting for any kind of answer she stiffly walked to the couch before dropping down in an awkwardly rigid position. Hands locked in front of her and resting on her knees she gently rocked back and forth slightly as her parents perched on the edge on either side of her, throwing concerned glances between one another and at her blank face. Her complete lack of expression actually told them more about her current state of anxiety than it did to conceal it.

"Sweetie-" her father began but Marinette was quick to cut off anything he might have said.

"Chat and I have already talked about this," she started, "A lot. And he's t-talked to Ladybug and I've spoken with...A-Adrien."

She gulped in a lot of air in sudden desperation. Her chest still felt tight however and she didn't feel any better for it. All she got for her effort was a sudden bout of hiccups.

"Marinette, dear," Sabine said as she brushed a strand out of Marinette's face while she continued to rock in place, "I'm not sure I understand." Marinette found that the movement and concern lacing the words drew her attention more than she wanted it to and she hesitantly looked up through her lashes at her mother's face. Sabine's expression was crumpled in worry at her daughter's anxious state and her grey eyes seemed to pierce her chest, making her hold back a sob.

"Mama, Papa," she said, screwing her eyes shut and gulping audibly, "I'm not just dating one boy anymore, I'm dating two."

Neither parent seemed to react. She slowly opened her eyes and glanced up at her mother first, then her father, and was amazed to find them simply watching her, waiting for her to continue. She hiccuped again.

"Um..." She was unsure where to go from there. She'd been expecting confusion, possibly outrage. Maybe even on the extreme end of things treating her like she was confused, but not this complete silence.

"You see, uh, Adrien came to see me not too long ago. He told me he'd made a mistake telling me he didn't like me all those months ago because ever since he'd gotten sort of fixated on it and realised he actually...does...like me...after all."

Her mother's face had smoothed out from confusion and concern to a blank canvas, Marinette's words a brush waiting to colour her a new expression. She just wished she knew what it was she wanted to paint onto that canvas.

"I was telling Chat because...well, I was thinking, are you kidding me? And turns out he had the same sort of thing happen with Ladybug and the more we talked about it and joked about how ridiculous a situation we were in, the more we...we..."

"Marinette are you really trying to tell us you're seeing both Chat and Adrien at the same time?" her father interjected, a strange sort of smile playing about his lips when she turned to look at him. She nodded in stunned silence.

"And that Chat is dating both you and Ladybug now?" her mother added, a similarly amused smirk tugging one half of her mouth upwards.

"Y-Yes," she said in a hoarse whisper.

"Oh dear," Sabine chuckled as she leant in and stroked her daughter's hair comfortingly, "Did you two really decide that this was easier than telling us who you both are?"

…

Marinette just stared in disbelief for a beat, the butterflies in her chest no longer due to her confession but the realisation of what her mother's words meant instead.

"If this was true, all we would have done is told you to be careful not to get hurt or to let anyone take advantage of your...what would you call that? An open relationship?" Sabine looked over her to make eye contact with Tom, asking his opinion.

"Not sure," he said before looking back down at Marinette fondly, "But there was certainly no need for you to get yourself so worked up with worry over telling us this my little bug, we already know how things really are."

"You-you know!?" she squeaked, suddenly sans hiccups, "For how long!?"

"That you're Ladybug? About a year, a bit longer. About Adrien being Chat? Only a few weeks now."

Marinette's gaze flicked back and forth between them rapidly as she struggled to process the new information her parents had dropped on her like a bombshell while acting like everything was perfectly normal.

"You knew who he was before I did," she whispered, her jaw going slack with disbelief.

"Wait," her father said suddenly, "You didn't know he was Adrien? I mean, I guessed you didn't know when he first started to visit because you were still upset over what happened at school but, you've been dating for around half a year and didn't know?"

"Papa, I literally found out yesterday," she told him, placing her head in her hands in an effort to calm her racing thoughts, "Wait, how did you know?"

"Oh honey," her mother said as she continued to stroke back strands of Marinette's hair from her face soothingly, "When he came over to study for schoolwork he was clearly besotted with you. It's like it was killing him not to hold your hand in front of us. We just assumed you were the better disciplined of the two of you and you were just pretending he wasn't Chat. But you really didn't know?"

"No," she said as other snippets of information started to filter through her mind and she processed the ramifications, "And you...know about...me?"

"Sweetheart," her father said "you're nowhere near as good at sneaking out as you think you are. And you go through an awful lot of food, even for a teenager. You were clearly using up a lot more energy than it looked like."

"Plus," her mother added, "we can hear you talking to someone constantly. Once we figured out there was someone else around it became obvious where all the extra cookies were going and it got easier to catch glimpses of them trying to hide."

She stared pointedly at Marinette's purse.

Gulping deeply, Marinette slowly glanced down at the little bag hanging against her hip, staring for a moment before finally, she said, "I guess that means you can come out now Tikki."

Once the clasp was opened, Tikki's head popped out gingerly as she looked up at the three humans from beneath her long lashes.

"Hello," said Sabine, her eyes closing as she smiled at the little Kwami.

Slowly, Tikki floated into the air in front of Marinette as she looked from person to person, her expression still guarded and unsure.

"This is Tikki," Marinette told her parents as she cupped the little God in her outstretched hands and allowed her to rest there.

"Nice to finally meet you," Tom said, offering his pinkie finger to her.

Tikki smiled shyly at him for a moment until suddenly, her folded antennae stood upright and she shook the offered finger enthusiastically.

"And nice to meet you both! Marinette is a wonderful girl, you've both done such a good job raising her! It will be nice to have more people to talk with and I can finally tell you how much I love your Madeleines! And now Marinette can bring- Marinette, are you alright?"

Marinette almost didn't hear the sound of Tikki's voice over her loud sobs of relief.

No more fear of how her parents would react to the idea of her being in a poly relationship. No more hiding that Chat was Adrien. No more stress over sneaking out without being caught. No more keeping Tikki cooped up in her purse.

No more lying to her parents.

The emotional whiplash of her evening had finally caught up to her and she couldn't hold back any longer. Her mother immediately wrapped her arms around her, pulling her to her chest and cradling her head like she was still a young child. In turn, her father placed his arms around them both and made gentle shushing noises to soothe her as Tikki attached her tiny body to Marinette's cheek in as big a hug as she could offer.

All four of them stayed like that for a while as Marinette's emotions recalibrated and she revelled in just how accepting and supportive her nearest and dearest were.

Hi, sorry for the wait. I've had the rough draft of this written for some time but I never seemed happy enough with it to publish. Well tonight I decided I was sick of feeling it wasn't good enough and decided to leave it up to the rest of you to decide what you think. So here it is!