Summary: Chat Noir communes with Ladybug and learns something vitally important regarding Marinette and both of his partners' feelings about him, and other reasons for his reticence regarding allowing himself to reciprocate Marinette's feelings emerge.
Trigger Warnings: Rumination on death. Adrien recalls his mother and contemplates the effect of her death on his life and perception of others around him.
Ladybug's costume doesn't have any zippers.
It's only now, for the first time even though he'd customized her action figure, attending to the tiny details of her construction and passing off little idiosyncrasies in her depiction and impractical clothing as allowances made for the medium, that he realizes it.
No stitch-work, either.
Superhero attire sported by Ladybug and Marinette consists more of a body-stocking, skin-tight and absent any seams or creases or stitching lines at their joints. Why does he have a bell and zipper, a costume that can be peeled off?
It's odd the things that you think about when you have the time.
Patrol was thoroughly uneventful, though they did swoop down on a swaggering teen who was catcalling a passing pedestrian and generally making Chat Noir ashamed of his gender for its boorishness and lack of consideration. The young gentleman – and Chat used the term loosely – had not responded well to his chastisements and a thorough lecture on conduct befitting the presence of a lady, but at least he knocked off his harassment in favor of demeaning Chat Noir's own fashion choices, giving the grateful young woman time to power-walk away.
So many people in the world; so many less privileged and beset by trials that he'd never even think to imagine, let alone understand how to endure.
Now, he and his Lady are seated just off-center of the city that, on good nights, is their playground. Across a stretch of water, great tiers of scaffolding loom large, glistening dark in the Parisian lights that flood even this sacred ground, above flying buttresses and the great gaping chasm in the building's heart, crisscrossed by the exposed skeleton of wooden framework.
That's the strange thing about Notre Dame de Pari s in the reconstruction efforts – a commingling of ancient and modern built atop it, trying to shore up something whose purpose had, in many ways, been forgotten. Architectural monument, a tribute to history, an attraction for tourists to fawn over while they bought kitschy overpriced postcards and miniature models to collect dust on their shelves.
But even burnt out, half its heart carved out and maybe the rest dying, it's being rebuilt and it's still beautiful enough to leave Chat sniffling back tears as Ladybug hands him some pain au chocolate that he receives with grace and gratitude. Butter and only that, pure and fresh, fills his nose as he breathes, and then the crust flakes and tears under his fangs, fine dark chocolate an earthy counterpoint that cuts the richness.
This place is made holy by the little ceremony that he and his Lady are enjoying: breaking bread together, communing. There's something even more radiant about her in this light.
The time they've spent apart only makes his heart ache, and the love, love, love flood right back in, so that he understands how his father felt that day when he'd suggested that it was okay to give up on a memory and a dream of the woman that you adored, but couldn't love you back.
It's like he's seeing Ladybug for the first time, just because a few days between patrols make everything new again, like the parting of rain clouds after a storm that's left the world pressure-washed and glistening clean or the sun dropping below the horizon so that he can watch the stars emerge in all the constellations of Ladybug's freckles, all the twisting myths and mysteries that tantalize beneath her mask.
"You know," he mouths around the chocolate and flaky pastry on his tongue, giving his Ladybug heart eyes as he leans back on the roof. "Multimouse is really doing amazing."
That wasn't what he'd wanted to say, and it baffles him why he sounds like he's boasting.
"Oh, yeah?" Ladybug flops down next to him, settling her arm behind her head and then turning ever-so-slightly so that, when she breathes, he can feel in on his cheeks that are reddening just... just like hers for some reason. "I guess that you were right to suggest that we bring her out for training, Sensei."
She believed in him, trusted him, and he can't prove unworthy of that. Not when she's on the line.
"While she's blossomed under my keen tutelage, maestro of marital arts that I am-"
Ladybug rolls her eyes heavenward, which is where, as he'd already established, they belonged, right alongside all the starry host. Her scoffs is a guttural and honest sound that has his toes curling inside his boots.
"- Only a poor teacher fails to acknowledge the contributions and talents of his pupil," he finishes while brandishing his baton like he's conducting traffic or delivering a lecture, pointing out diagrams and schematics of martial arts manoeuvres on a blackboard with a dozen miniature multi-Marinettes running through kata.
Actually, that's a great idea now that he thinks about it. Ten times the sparring experience for each of her miniature forms, and practice with her power to boot; that's a logical point of progress for her exercises now that all the fundamentals are so securely in place that she can probably (face)-plant him firmly in his without breaking a sweat.
While he mulls, Ladybug rolls onto her back and plucks her yo-yo from her hip, magical magnetic clasp giving way at the slight tug. A coiling web of thread and glistening line forms between her fingers as she plays. Cat's Cradle, weaved by her dainty red- gauntleted hands, and for some reason as he watches her brow pinch inward with concentration, tongue poking out of the side of her mouth as the skein grows more complex, he thinks of Marie and the knots of his brain and his father's pain that can never be unwound because he's too caught up in and within himself.
More than anything, though, he thinks of puppet strings, a marionette with his legs and arms wrapped up inside his own cords because he'd been tossed into a toybox haphazardly, and he hates himself for ruining something this beautiful.
"You're really taken with her, aren't you?" Ladybug's voice sounds like it's coming from far away, echoing down a tunnel that's being sealed up by a great stone.
He gives his head a shake, scooting closer to her so that he can watch the tangle of string flick from rectangle within a rectangle to a cross, and back again, a mess taking shape, and then a new one, and then being deformed once again.
But she asked about Marinette. Why, when he should talk about Ladybug, does he turn to that precious and generous girl from school who offered him forgiveness and a hug and a choice that neither Chat nor Adrien had done enough to earn? Why, when Ladybug asks about Marinette, does he flee back to his Lady love, his first love, bold and pure and inspiring?
"I don't know why you'd say that."
Her tongue sweeps over her lips, leaves them glistening in the lights from the city, from Notre Dame. "Just that you talk about her a lot."
There's something hypnotic about watching Ladybug, the way her hands move, the connections she has and that she forms.
"She deserves to be talked about," he says. "By everyone. She's brilliant like you wouldn't believe, and one day, everyone's going to know it. If you and she ever teamed up as civilians, you'd probably end up as president and vice president of France before you were done."
Much to his disappointment, though he doesn't know why when it's just a game, she lets the yo-yo sting collapse after pulling it taut with a twang that echoes across the rooftops like piano wire being plucked, and then looks up at him.
Her eyes wide and smile flowing like molten metal, languid and scalding but only in the best of ways, she says, "She'd be really happy to hear you say that, Kitty."
"Oh?"
She nods, and sucks in a quick breath that from anyone else, might seem a little worried. "Yeah. She wouldn't be a hero if not for you."
That much is obvious, considering the lobbying campaign that he'd orchestrated on her behalf to overcome Ladybug's reticence regarding a sequel to Multimouse. Multimouse II: Myriad Mischiefs.
"You'd have picked her out for another miraculous eventually, Milady," he assures, turning to pick out another croissant from the collection that she'd brought to share. Between Marinette and Ladybug, he's one seriously well-fed cat. Buttery pastry fills his mouth, but something itches inside of his throat, lodging there even as he swallows down that sweet and marvelously textured baked good.
"I don't think that I would have seen her potential, Chat." Inching towards the side of the roof, she rises to a seated position and twirls her yo-yo like she's knitting something in the air with her hands, and suddenly, she's walking the dog.
"But you've got such an eye for talent." The very thought that Ladybug could be blind to, rather than blinded by, Marinette's brilliance! The notion that the precious and courageous girl might not have been given this kind of opportunity because someone – anyone let alone a woman whom he trusted with... everything that he was: life, and heart, and soul – didn't believe in her is...
"And Marinette only accepted her miraculous when she heard that you believed in her, Chat," Ladybug explains. Her eyes are focused on the gentle sway of her yo-yo, studiously fixated, and for that he's glad. He doesn't think that he could stand it if she looked at him now as he bites down on the inside of his cheek and claws prick at the palms of his gloves.
"I, uh-" he clears his throat, but it doesn't help. Maybe that's beyond his power to dislodge the ache. Maybe some things need help. Partners. A team. He's a mess. "I didn't realize that she thought so much of me."
Ladybug's yo-yo falls into a tangle, catching around her fingers, but she doesn't even bother trying to tug them loose as her weapon betrays her. Leaving her dexterous fingers bound up, she turns her face towards him, without even a hint of aggravation visible across her creamy, just-slightly-olive skin. No frustration at the mess of wire and twine that's his fault for disrupting her concentration.
"Chat." With the wire dwarfed only by the even worse snarl around his heart, she cups his thigh with both her hands, a gentle stroke leaving every muscle in his body tense and relaxed at once as he melts and soars with her gaze, heart kicking into overdrive at the unbridled softness of her expression and her voice. "We think the world of you. I've told you before that there is no Ladybug without Chat Noir, and I meant it. You made me who I am, and there's nothing that I could ever do to repay you for that, Minou."
He blinks back tears that leap out to threaten him without any warning. She can't say things like that. Can't believe things like that. She can't, and neither can Marinette. It's just not fair to him.
Practice and propriety and the need not to worry Ladybug far exceeding his yearning to avoid embarrassing himself and the fear that clenches so far down in his guts, he thinks for a moment that he's going to vomit.
Those are the only things that keep him from really crying.
Instead, he places his hands over Ladybug's knuckles and spends the next few minutes plucking away at the yo-yo line that's coiled around her fingers. It's painstaking and meticulous work, gentle brushes sending sequels of mystical-latex and leather echoing into the darkness before the Cathedral.
He hates the tremor in his voice. His father would hate it. "You don't know how much that means to me."
"Maybe." She smiles, and her hands are free, one of them cool against his flushed cheek as she speaks. "But I do know how much it means to me."
As is so often the case now, that night, he lays awake in bed, just thinking, the soft silken sheets pushed down to his navel so that his bare chest is slightly chilled while his lower body basks in the comfortable, toasty warmth. It makes for an interesting disparity that he finds soothing for reasons that he can't understand.
It's getting easier to think, now, the more that he does it. Everything gets easier with practice, and practice, in turn, comes easily when you're striving to hone a vital new skill. When you yearn to be able to play the piano so that you can reproduce all the resplendent melodies of others' songs that have touched you and transformed you, and find some way to amalgamate their influences into a new piece, just for yourself. Adrien had wanted to play the piano, just like his mother and father, when he was a boy.
Plagg is snoozing on his second pillow, the slow rise and fall of his chest punctuated by the nasally whistle of his snores, and that little white noise, the comfort of even the tiniest of bodies right there next to him, lets Adrien sink down into his thoughts without becoming mired. Once, he delighted in distractions when in bed, indulging until he was so exhausted that his eyes ached: thumbing through the Ladyblog to review articles and scrolling their twitter feed rife with speculations and fantasies so much like his own that it made him feel like he wasn't alone; checking for sales on hobby sites for new anime merch, even though he had the money to pay full price, questing after prospective future purchases; or just staring at that blank-white ceiling in the distance, evacuating his mind and allowing snippets of songs and memories never-fully-coalesced to consume him.
Now he thinks.
It's not fun.
But it is good.
At the forefront of his mind, odd though it is to him after he'd just spent the evening with Ladybug, is Marinette. All of the time that he's spent with her has been revelatory, not just because she unveiled her feelings for Adrien Agreste, a match for those she apparently still harbours for Chat Noir, but also because he had been graced with the opportunity to know her, plucking out all those little details of her life and character and charm that he can never replicate with paint and plastic.
The way that she scrunched her nose when annoyed by his antics.
The way she twiddled of her fingers, pencil twirling to and fro between her index, middle, ring, and pinkie.
The way she dipped her French fries and then swirled the ketchup in the little paper cup before salting them. Salt over the ketchup; not on the fries before ketchup.
The way she loosed a sputtering snort alongside her laughs when she was embarrassed and it mattered because it was over him.
The way she wiggled her hips, folds rippling out across her tight pink jeans, when she was preparing for that trip to Andre's cart, or a ride on a Ferris wheel, or any of the other thousand things that delighted and excited and drew out all that brilliant joy.
The way that her upper teeth flashed into view as her dainty lips curled while handing over a pastry, just like his mother "trading" action figures with him on one of their playdates when he was almost too young for the memories to form, leaving her face a haze save for that indulgent smile.
The way she meeped and jammed a fingertip into her mouth after pricking herself with a needle, slicking a droplet of blood over the smooth flesh of her pink and pouting lips.
The way Marinette could die.
Oh, God – he kicks off his comforter and clasps his chin and cheeks with bruising fingers - he doesn't want her to die.
He doesn't want her to leave him.
He's crying again, and there's no one there to tell Adrien Agreste that it's alright, so he tells himself and even though he doesn't mean it, that makes him feel better.
People die. They leave him.
He tried with his father - tries so hard, and he kept leaving.
That's why he won't let it happen to Ladybug; he can't lose other people, and it's different for Adrien. There's only one mask to hide behind.
If she's hurt, or dies, it's his fault.
If he tries, and hurts her, and Marinette leaves him, it's his fault.
But she said that it wasn't.
That hadn't been the subject on their minds. It was Ladybug and Marie and the fear that his over-investment in that precious little girl's life and trauma and a scalper's cruel exploitation, trying to abscond with one more of the figures that he had commissioned, had enraged his partner.
That was it.
Wasn't that it?
Just that.
Not everything is his fault, she'd said.
Does he make it that way?
Day after day; month after month; and, now, year after year, he's tried to tease out the specific combinations of behaviours that are necessary to unlock his father's attentions, break down the dividing wall to his office so that the mansion can be flooded with his presence in Adrien's life again.
Maybe the fact that he's a failure isn't his fault. Not entirely.
In a cacophonous blend of different colours, Marinette and Nino and the Gorilla and Plagg, and even Nathalie in her own way as she hacked and wiped blood from her lips while trying to hide it behind her forearm after the tablet fell from her hands, are all blurring together, their words a discordant chorus.
He doesn't want to think that the things that his father does are for himself, rather than Adrien: the gifts, the extracurricular activities, the painting lessons, the fencing, the modelling. He wants to believe that they're all there to make him better, to make him stronger, refining him into a keen-minded man of culture like Gabriel Agreste himself.
Giving up on trying was one thing.
Giving up on all of that - all those years – is another thing entirely.
And, like that, Marinette's voice cuts through the maelstrom.
He'd still be him and that's why I'd still care.
Though he'd deny it if ever asked, and it's really weird and awkward, he rolls to his side, careful not to disturb the little feline beside his head, and feathers a kiss to the top of Plagg's head before turning over, shifting his pillow into his arms and holding it like it's another person. With his head flat to his mattress, he'll wake with a crick in his neck.
He'd said it himself. It wasn't a question of emotional attachment or reciprocation, and it still isn't.
It's a choice.
You deserve to be loved, Adrien.
But to be loved in all the ways that actually make it vital and meaningful, no longer simply a passive experience of distant adoration forever unreciprocated, he actually has to take a risk.
Multimouse on rooftops and friendship and fear simply aren't enough anymore.
Maybe that's selfish and unhealthy and a rush and dangerous and possibly disastrous and painful, but as the thought flutters through his mind, ragged edges just slipping the clasp of his slippery mental fingers, he doesn't care.