Adrien is surprised when he wakes up laying on the floor, but what shocks him the most is the sight of Marinette cuddled into his chest. Plagg rests beside her, curled into her chin. Adrien notes that he forgot to detransform before falling asleep and his kwami will be particularly demanding when he wakes.
She reaches up, grabbing a fistful of his shirt and he's sure that if anyone can see his cheeks, they would rival the hue of a tomato. He starts to look around the room, trying not to glance at her sleeping face. He desperately wants to find something to take his attention off of the funny feeling in his stomach.
He does a good job of scanning the papers on the floor and inspecting her furniture until she breathes, "Chat…". His eyes attempt to bulge right out of his head. Is she awake?
"Put me down." She mumbles, turning to bury her face into his shirt. He chuckles softly as he realizes that not only is she asleep, but she's dreaming about him. "Stop calling me that." She whines, a bit louder.
He frowns. Does she not like it when he calls her 'princess'? Or maybe it's one from her mothers arsenal, which he'll surely be borrowing from in the future. Suddenly, he lets out a breath he didn't realize he was holding. The tension leaves his body as he fully takes in the sight of her. Her pigtails are disheveled and her hair is ratty. He smiles at her and gently slips her hair ties off of them and onto his wrist. He begins to comb through her hair with his fingers. It's so soft.
His dreamy gaze shifts to one of concern as she starts whimpering. He debates on waking her up when her eyes shoot open, "No!" She yells as she jolts up. Plagg remains comfortably asleep. He's suddenly embarrassed by his hands in her hair and the way she's laying on top of him. However, she doesn't seem to care. She stares at him for a few moments before dropping her face back to his chest. He waits a few seconds, but when he realizes she's sniffling he decides to continue running his hands through her hair.
"It's alright, Mari. You're alright." He says quietly.
"You're alright." She corrects him.
His hands freeze. "What?"
"In my dream… you were… you…" She can't bring herself to say the words.
"Hey," He continues brushing her hair, "I've got nine lives, remember? Nothing's going to happen to me."
"That's a pretty big promise for a superhero to make." She whispers, worried if she raises her volume that her voice will crack.
"Well I intend on keeping it. Nothing bad will happen to me…. that Ladybug can't fix, anyway." He means it to be comforting, but decides he must have worded it wrong because he feels Marinette flinch before holding him tighter. He wraps one arm around her and plays with her hair with the other. He sighs, "I don't like you worrying about me, princess."
She takes a breath in and out as she finally stops crying. "You're important to me. Of course I'm going to worry about you."
It feels so nice to hear her say it, but he feels guilty when his first thought is about what it would be like to hear Ladybug say those words to him instead. He sighs, willing the thought away as his hand slides out of her hair, down her neck, and onto her shoulder, where it stays to rub gentle circles in her shirt with his thumb. "Hey, Bitsy-boo," He starts,
"I told you not to call me that," She groans. Adrien stiffens. If he weren't looking at Marinette, he would swear that Ladybug had said it. He really needs to stop comparing the two; it's messing with his head.
When he doesn't respond, she lifts her head to look at him. "Adrien?"
He blinks a few times before focussing his eyes on hers. "Sorry, Mar, you're right."
"I can't believe we fell asleep doing homework." She muses, taking a glance at the papers strewn over her floor.
"Arguing about homework." He corrects. She groans and rolls off of him in response. He shudders at the loss of her warmth. After taking a moment to stretch, she stands. He scoops his kwami into his hands and moves to do the same, but she stops him with a hand on his shoulder.
"We need to redress your wounds." She explains.
"Oh." He sits down, setting Plagg in his lap and slipping off his shirt. The motion wakes him up, but he doesn't move. Marinette grabs the bandages and walks back over to him, watching her hands very intently. She quickly gets to work, removing the wrappings from his arm. Once she does, she pauses and stares at it for a minute before unwrapping the rest. Again she pauses to stare for a moment. This time, she lifts her hands and runs her fingers over the skin where his wounds should be, though Adrien realizes it doesn't hurt. She jerks her hand away and looks at the ground.
"S-sorry! I d-didn't mean to.. I just… Your wounds are g-gone." she stammers. Adrien furrows his eyebrows and looks down at his stomach. Sure enough, the skin is completely unmarred. There's not even a sign of his friend's stitchwork.
He flashes her a bright smile. "See? I told you. Nothing that Ladybug can't fix."
It takes her a few seconds to register the implication of his words, but when she does she looks like she might start crying again. "You mean I- I mean, she could've just done the cure that night and you would've been all better?"
He laughs but the sound is cut short when she slaps him. "Ow! What was that for." He whines as he rubs his cheek.
She sniffs, "For all of the times I wanted to hit you, but couldn't. Especially yesterday because you were apparently fine."
Adrien is about to respond when the blaring of Marinette's alarm clock interrupts him. She groans and rushes to turn it off. "I forgot about school."
"That is the reason you were doing homework last night."
"Actually, it's not due until next week. I did homework last night to make you happy and you betrayed me by questioning my knowledge." She crosses her arms.
He snorts. "I'm only trying to help you. You can keep refusing to listen to me, though, it's your grade, not mine."
"You're fully healed. Are you sure you want to test me right now, Agreste?" She glares at him, but upon realizing he's still not wearing a shirt, blushes and turns her head. He notices this reaction and quickly slips his shirt back on.
"I can get away with it since you have to get ready for school. You don't have time to murder me." He smirks.
Just as Marinette is about to respond, there's a knock at her door. "Claws out!" Adrien calls. Sabine pokes her head through the trapdoor.
"Alya called. Apparently Lila Rossi managed to convince the school to cancel today and tomorrow to give students time to recover from the trauma of the akuma attack."
She called my mom? Well, I guess at this point I'm usually still asleep so that makes sense but why wouldn't the school call themselves?
"Two days off of school for an akuma when we literally went back to class that day? And you said this was Lila's doing? There's no way." She huffs, "I'm going to school, Maman."
"Are you sure?"
Marinette is surprised when she walks up the stairs of Francois Dupont and finds that there are no students or teachers on campus. Even when she opens the door and peeks inside, nobody is around. Marinette slowly walks back down the stairs, wondering whether a staff member decided to cancel school and Lila took the credit or if she really did convince them to cancel with one of her lies. As she starts on her path back home, she spots Kagami heading towards the school with her fencing bag.
"Marinette? What are you doing here? I thought school was cancelled for you." She walks over to her.
"Ugh," Marinette groans, "it is but I didn't believe it because my mom said that Lila told her."
"Yeah, I wouldn't have either. Well, now that you're here, I haven't had a fencing partner since Adrien went… missing." Kagami starts, looking away when she fails to word the sentence clearly.
Marinette nods, "And because I know how to fence, you want me to fill in for him?"
Kagami turns back to her and nods, "If you can."
Marinette bites her lip, considering. She should probably get back to Adrien soon, but she misses hanging out with Kagami. It's kinda my fault that she doesn't have a partner and Adrien has my parents watching after him now so, "I'll do it."
"That spare uniform fits you pretty well." Kagami notes as she emerges from the locker room.
"I guess I'm just lucky." Marinette presses her lips, feeling a bit out of her comfort zone.
"Are you ready to spar?" Kagami fastens her helmet.
"It's been a while since I actually fenced, so it might take me a bit to warm up again." Marinette lowers her helmet and steps into a protective stance.
She's prepared when her friend lunges at her and quickly side steps out of the way. She attempts to strike her but she misses. The two go on like that, nearly touching each other with their swords but effectively blocking every hit until, finally, their blades collide with the fabric of their uniforms, simultaneously. The first match is a draw.
"I thought you said you were out of practice." Kagami says between breaths.
"Oh, uh…" Well I can't exactly explain that I'm used to dodging hits as Ladybug... "I guess I'm better than I remembered?"
Kagami raises her eyebrow at that but readies her saber again anyway. They continue wordlessly for some time, though Kagami appears a bit more aggressive in her movements.
"I'm sorry about Adrien, I know he liked fencing with you." Marinette says as she blocks another hit.
"Maybe he didn't. He went missing." Clang, "He just left and didn't tell me." Clang, "What kind of person does that?"
"I don't know…" As the match goes on, her attacks get stronger and harder to defend against but Marinette feels so guilty about lying that she stops trying.
"No one even told me, he just stopped showing up. My mom and I have been trying to contact Gabriel and Nathalie, but we've only been ignored." Kagami knocks Marinette's saber out of her hand and she falls, keeping her eyes on the floor.
Kagami puts her saber under Marinette's chin and lifts her to meet her gaze, "Why did you hesitate?"
Marinette's face grows red and she starts stuttering, "W-what? I- umm. I mean." Kagami picks up her saber and throws it to Marinette, neither of them breaking eye contact.
"You should never hesitate."
After they finish fencing, Kagami decides to walk her home. They talk for a bit before quickly arriving at the bakery and saying their goodbyes.
When Marinette enters the bakery, she doesn't know what to make of the sight before her. She finds Chat Noir and her father trying to balance stacks of macarons on their noses while her mother watches. She approaches them slowly and at the sound of her footsteps, they both snap their gazes to her, dropping all of the macarons in the process.
"What are you guys doing?" She finally asks after a moment of silence.
"Just having some fun with the remnants." Chat Noir beams, gesturing to the cookies on the floor.
"Rejects." Sabine corrects, placing a gentle hand on his shoulder.
"Did you leave any to donate?" She asks with a raised eyebrow.
"Of course!" Tom assures her.
Marinette shakes her head, but flashes them a smile. "You're both huge dorks, y'know that?"
"So," Sabine starts, "I take it school is cancelled, like I told you it was?"
"Maybe." She hums.
"That's perfect! Now we'll have everyone here for Mega Family Game Night!" Tom raises his fists into the air triumphantly.
Marinette blinks. "What?"
"Your father and I thought it would be fun if we all played games together tonight, like we used to do when you were little. We just figured it would be a nice way for us to get to know Chat Noir better, since you two are so close."
Marinette can feel the blood rushing to her cheeks in response to the implication of her mother's words. "O-oh… That does sound like fun."
Chat runs up to Marinette; she notices the sound of faint purring as he approaches and wraps his arms around her. She tries to hold back the soft giggle that's itching to escape her vocal chords. "Are you excited?"
"Yes! I've never done something like this before!" His body is practically buzzing with excitement. She smiles at him, but it doesn't reach her eyes. He's used to being all alone in that big, cold house. Of course his father never had game nights with him. That's not fair. I need to make sure tonight is amazing. He deserves it.
"Come on, Kitty Cat, let's go watch some anime while we wait for them to close up shop." She grabs his hand and leads him up the stairs. He follows after her with a wide smile, still purring the whole way.
"Who would win in a fight? Meliodas: a literal demon, or Killua: An assassin with nen powers who is basically a demon."
"Easy. Meliodas."
"Wha-" He shakes his head, "Okay first of all, you're wrong. Second of all, no supporting arguments?"
"What is there to argue? He is an immortal being. The only part of him you can actually kill is his soul."
Adrien throws his arms in the air, "I said who would win in a fight, not who would die first."
"Oh," She pretends to contemplate for a second, "Well then, I'd still be right."
"Wait though," He counts on his fingers, "Killua has been trained his entire life to be an assassin, he can open that giant ass door that 100 men can't open together, and he has the nen yo-yo's."
"Full counter."
"Yeah but how is he going to full counter a mentally powered yo-yo."
Marinette raises her eyebrow, "What is it with you and yo-yo's?"
"They're a cool weapon, now answer the question. Your distraction tactics won't work."
"I don't know the technical ways he would do it but he's Meliodas so obviously he would win."
He points at her, "Killua has godspeed though."
"Adrien, Meliodas caught a nuke and destroyed it without batting an eye in his normal form. Killua doesn't stand a chance against his demon form."
"But Mariiiii-"
A voice calls from downstairs, "Dinners ready!"
Marinette expects a "We'll get back to this" or a "This isn't over" but he just jumps up, grabs her hand, and runs downstairs without another word.
When Chat Noir sees the large charcuterie platter on the table, he can hardly contain his excitement. He and Marinette quickly sit down. Sabine sets a small plate in front of each of them, including Tom who's seated across from Chat, and tells them to go ahead and start eating. He's confused when she makes her way back into the kitchen, rather than sitting down with them, but ultimately he assumes she's not eating with them. Afterall, his father skipped out on nearly every meal they were meant to have together.
He's so engrossed in the food, he doesn't notice her return with more. She sets a plate of cassoulet in front of him before pouring a few drops of vinegar on it. He stares at the food dreamily for a moment before shifting his gaze to Sabine. "Is this all for me?"
Marinette reaches over and grabs his hand before giving it a light squeeze. He interlocks his fingers with hers and squeezes back.
"Of course it is sweetheart." Sabine smiles as she puts vinegar on Marinette's plate. She does the same for Tom before leaving and reentering the room with her own plate and taking a seat at the table. When Adrien realizes the whole family is going to eat together, he has to fight back happy tears.
"Sabine tells me you two are quite close." Tom's voice shakes Chat from his realization and he's able to hold the tears back.
"Yeah, we've always been pretty close and especially after everything happened, it's nice to be around her so much."
"You remind me of Tom and I at that age." Sabine places a hand on his shoulder.
"Maman!"
Adrien watches Marinette's parents with surprise. I thought parents were only like this in movies. They're so happy. That's the kind of love I want to have someday. "How did you two meet?"
"Well, I came to Paris as a foriegn exchange student. I had been studying French for years and I thought it was the perfect excuse to visit another country. It took a bit of pestering but I finally got my parents to agree. I was so excited that I wasn't really thinking about anything else." Sabine explains, smiling fondly at the memory.
"Meanwhile, I'm here in Paris excited that I would have a new friend staying with us." Tom laughs.
"Wait," Adrien gasps, "You were her host family?"
"Yeah, him and his parents." She smiles
"After a whole bunch of excitement, she arrived. I ran downstairs and saw this girl," He puts his hand on the side of his mouth and pretends to whisper, "Who was super cute by the way." Sabine laughs and swats his arm playfully. "She was standing in the doorway with her hair in pigtails and a suitcase in her hands."
"And with probably the biggest smile I had ever seen, he walked over and we introduced ourselves. For some reason, the goof turned red the second I started talking." She laughs.
"No I didn't!" He huffs. She raises her eyebrow at him, "Okay fine, I definitely did. You couldn't let me keep a bit of my dignity intact?"
Sabine pats his cheek before turning back to the teens, both with matching grins. "That's where you get it from, in case you were wondering." She locks eyes with her daughter as she speaks.
"Wait, what?" Adrien blinks a few times before tilting his head at Marinette, who's now sporting a deep blush. Is Marinette the nervous type? Sure, she fumbles her words sometimes and she can be pretty clumsy, but I didn't think she was shy in love. I mean, she was pretty bold when she confessed to Chat… Oh, yeah. She confessed to me. I bet she finds it funny, now.
She looks at Adrien from the corner of her eyes and then quickly fixes her gaze back on her mother. "You didn't finish the story, tell him what happens next!" She rushes out.
Her mother stifles a laugh before continuing, "After that, we became friends rather quickly. We started talking all of the time, we were always hanging out in some way."
"We just liked being around each other. Over the time that she was here, I fell in love with her. So, the second to last day she was here, I pushed all of my nerves away and asked her out for Andre's ice cream." Tom grabs her hand and begins rubbing his thumb gently over her skin.
"And I said yes because I had already fallen in love with him, too. After I left, we wrote letters back and forth until we could see eachother again." The couple looks at each other as they speak.
"I started working extra hard to save up a bunch of money and apparently-"
"I was doing the same thing and once we had saved up enough, I moved to Paris." Sabine finishes his sentence.
"And I proposed within a month." He adds.
"We got married." Sabine gives his hand a squeeze.
"We gathered every penny we had."
"And we bought the bakery." Sabine smiles, "Two years later, I got pregnant with Marinette, and here we are."
Adrien finishes his plate of food and looks around sheepishly when he realizes everyone else is still eating.
"Do you want another plate?" Sabine asks, meeting his gaze.
"I can have more?" Adrien stares back at her in awe.
"You can have as much as you want," Sabine smiles at him warmly, "Though I do hope you save room for dessert; we made palmier cookies."
He stares at her in wonder for several moments. Finally, Marinette answers for him, "Yes, he wants another plate." When Sabine actually gets up to get him one, tears threaten to roll down his cheeks. He looks to Marinette as he tries to make sense of everything. Her eyes widen and she places a hand on his shoulder.
"I thought you were the only one." Is all he manages to get out before the salt water comes rushing down his face.
"Wh-what?" After searching his face for a moment, Marinette gets up out of her seat and walks over to Chat before wrapping her arms around him. He returns the embrace and buries his face in her chest. He tries to respond, but he chokes on his own voice. Before Marinette, nobody had ever asked him if he wanted more food. No one had ever let him eat until he was full. No one had ever cared if he was hungry. There were a few times where he'd gotten lucky and snuck extra food without anyone noticing, but he never thought it was strange. Now, he realizes that this is normal for her and her family. It's probably normal for most people. He doesn't know how to put it into words, but he wants to try.
He pulls his head back and opens his mouth to speak again, but doesn't get any words out before Sabine sets down the plate of food and joins in the hug. After a moment, she gestures to Tom, who stands before joining as well.
"Wanna play UMS?" Marinette asks once both are finished with their plates.
"YES!" Chat looks up at her with a huge grin.
Marinette sprints to the living room and jumps over the couch, leaving her dirty plate on the table behind her. Chat looks back at her parents expecting them to yell but they're both just smiling at them warmly.
"Go on hun, we'll be in there soon."
Chat's mouth opens in surprise and he reminds himself that Marinette's parents are nice. That's where she gets it from. He breaks out into a smile and chases after her.
"You are so going down!" Chat calls to her before plopping down next to her on the couch.
"You wish." She snorts.
"Okay fine but I will go down trying!" He dramatically waves his controller in the air.
The battle goes on for longer than usual. Since Adrien has been practicing with Marinette, it's easier than usual to predict what strategies and combos she's going to use.
Marinette shoots up and points her finger at Adrien, "Yes! I told you I would crush you!"
He gives her a lopsided smile, "I knew you would."
Her victorious smile falters for a moment when she's hit with another wave of guilt, but she forces the corners of her mouth to stay up.
This is way too unfair. Now that I know he's Chat, I don't even need to try. I know exactly what he'll do before he does it.
Tom runs in and grabs a remote before throwing himself onto the couch beside Chat Noir and Sabine walks in with a tray of cookies that she sits on the table before she grabs her own remote.
"Chat's on my team!" Tom shouts hurriedly, as if he were afraid someone would beat him to it.
"What?! No he's mine!" His daughter whines.
"I'll take Marinette on my team." Sabine states, calmly.
Marinette looks at her parents with a pouty expression. "Do I not get any say in this?"
"You and Chat together would beat us in seconds, this way it'll be more even." Her father laughs.
"Okay fine," she turns to her mom, "but we're going to crush them."
She smiles, "Obviously."
Marinette presses a few buttons to set up the game and then smirks at Chat. "Best of 3 wins."
After a few minutes of fighting, Tom and Sabine are both out. Chat Noir only lasts another few hits.
"Yes!" Marinette and her mother high five and after their mini celebration, Tom leans over and whispers something to Chat Noir. He nods excitedly.
They start the next round and they target Sabine immediately. She's taken out within seconds. Now that it's down to just Marinette, it's still a struggle but they at least stand a chance of winning.
They somehow manage to back their opponent into a corner and take her out by each rapidly using their main attack over and over again. Marinette groans, unable to move her character. When the screen flashes to show their victory, Tom jumps up and pulls Chat into a tight hug. "We did it!"
Chat stares at him with wide eyes. Even after what happened with Weredad he's still like this with me?
They sit back down and Tom ruffles Chat's hair. "We got this."
After I broke his daughter's heart and he hated me, he still cares about me more than my father did. He never actually cared about me; he just kept me around for my mother. A nice gift with a bow on top for the only person he ever wanted around.
He starts crying again and Tom pulls him back into a hug but after a few seconds, Marinette taps on his arm and he lets go. She wraps her arms around him and he buries his face into her neck as he cries. She murmurs to him comfortingly.
After a moment Sabine walks over and places a hand on Marinette's shoulder, "Honey, it's really late, your father and I need to go to sleep, so we can be up to open the shop tomorrow morning."
Marinette nods, but she doesn't stop speaking softly in Chat's ear. They exit the room and head off to bed.
"Do you want to talk about it?" She asks, keeping her voice low.
"I'm sorry." Is all he can manage to get out.
"Oh, kitty, no. You have nothing to be sorry for." She begins running her fingers through his hair.
"I just started thinking about my dad and…" He trails off as more quiet sobs escape his mouth.
"It's okay, I understand. Do you want to take the cookies upstairs? We can put on a movie and cuddle for a bit, if that would help. How does that sound?"
He grabs a fistful of her shirt as he leans back to look at her. "Yes, please."