The smile on Adrien's face was even bigger if that was possible and she took the smile as confirmation that he heard her confession. She blushed brightly, but his smile managed to convince her that she hadn't just made a huge mistake. He wanted her to hear him when he said he was in love with her, so he had to choose whether to wait through the rest of the fireworks or go back inside while the fireworks were still going on.
He felt his heart pounding in his chest as he looked at Marinette. He wanted to tell her he was in love with her and he wanted to kiss her. He had never been happier than he was in that moment and he could feel his heartbreak as Marinette's face started to fall despite how small the change was.
He didn't know how long he just stared at her after she admitted her feelings, but he hadn't said anything in reaction to the confession. He felt like a terrible person for not responding and he watched Marinette start to turn away from him. She stared off at the fireworks and he watched her eyes start to fill with tears because of him.
He practically lunged toward her and reached up to take her face in his hand. He met her eyes and was immediately awestruck by her, but he couldn't let himself get distracted from his goal. He placed his other hand on the other side of her face. He ran one thumb gently across her bottom lip, silently pleading for permission to kiss her.
Marinette's face brightened up and she started to lean toward him, closing her eyes in the process. Adrien leaned in to meet her in the middle and the two of them shared their first intentional kiss. Marinette wrapped her arms around Adrien's neck as they kissed and neither of them could tell which fireworks were real and which ones came from their contact.
Adrien moved his hands to Marientte's waist as the two of them kissed, wrapped in a world that was just the two of them. Neither of them knew how much time had passed when they pulled away from each other. Marinette looked up at Adrien with a bright spark in her eyes and Adrien was certain he never wanted to let Marinette go.
The two of them admired the rest of the firework show together, Adrien's arm wrapped around Marinette and Marinette resting her head onto Adrien's shoulder area. When the firework show was over, Marinette turned back to face Adrien. He barely let any time pass before he said, "I'm in love with you, too, Marinette."
Marinette felt her heart pounding in her chest at Adrien's statement and she thought she was going to cry from joy. His arms were encircling her waist and her arms were wrapped around his neck as they stood in the cool air of the night. She raised up on her tiptoes again to give Adrien another kiss and he was happy to meet her in the middle.
"Please say you'll go out with me," Adrien pleaded when their kiss ended, "for real this time. I want to take you out." He placed another kiss on her lips. "Call you my girlfriend." Another kiss. "Tell everyone who will listen just how much you mean to me." She smiled brightly and nodded, wanting to date him just as much as he wanted to date her.
"Of course I'll go out with you, Adrien," Marinette whispered. Now that the fireworks were done, the chill of the night became more of a focus for Marinette, so Adrien led her back inside. As an outsider, it would have been impossible to tell that anything had changed between Marinette and Adrien while they were outside.
They were just as tactile, just as happy, and just as affectionate with each other as they had been for the past 7ish months of their 'relationship'. They shared an occasional kiss that night, but no one thought anything of it. The two of them were the only ones who knew that anything had changed between them and neither of them were going to share that information at that point. Adrien took Marinette back onto the dance floor and the two of them danced the night away together.
The next morning, the couple was surprised to find that a gossip magazine was running a spread that was a conspiracy theory about 'Adrinette's Fake Relationship.' Adrien stopped their walk to the bakery so that he could point it out to Marinette. She was intrigued and decided to buy a copy so that they could look through it later.
Once they got back to Adrien's apartment after brunch with her parents, Marinette took the magazine out of her bag and sat down on the couch next to her now very real boyfriend. "So, tell me the juicy gossip about our fake relationship, princess." Adrien was smirking at her and her heart melted as she looked into his eyes.
Adrien watched as Marinette's eyes scanned across the article after that. Her eyes stopped moving and she smiled widely. "Okay, the Top 5 Pieces of Evidence That the Adrinette Ship Never Set Sail," she read out loud from the page. "Starting with Number Five."
Adrien did a drumroll on the side of the couch next to him. She giggled at his action. "I have never spent any quality time with Gabriel Agreste, which of course means that our relationship is fake and not that your father terrifies literally everyone in the fashion industry."
"Naturally," Adrien responded with a chuckle and a smile on his face. "Number four?"
"Of course. Number four is broken down into a few pieces of evidence. Obviously, our relationship is fake because I used to go to parties with Nino and Alya when you couldn't come with us. Not to mention that you did a photoshoot with a girl who wasn't me, and you fenced with Kagami in the park that one time."
"Oh, for sure," he agreed, "if we're dating, why am I doing my job or spending time with a friend who has been in a public relationship with a woman for years? I'm obviously dating other people and you had to go to parties without me to recover from the fact that I wasn't dating you."
"Oh, number three might be my favorite," she announced excitedly. He did a drumroll again in preparation. "We're fake dating to cover up our romantic trysts with the heroes of Paris. Apparently, I've been secretly dating Chat Noir since the day you walked me home from the party and you've been dating Carapace since at least your birthday."
Adrien cracked up at the information and Marinette found herself hoping the smile would never leave his face. "Okay, what's number two, princess?"
"We don't post on social media together," she told him, "the Official Adrien Agreste Twitter and Instagram never tag me, a different fashion brand, in their posts. Who could have seen that coming? It's almost like you have to go through a PR team to make posts on those accounts and you have your separate accounts for your own person."
"No, that would never happen," Adrien said sarcastically. "Obviously, I don't post about you because this entire relationship is a ruse. I would never make dozens of posts on my unofficial Twitter and Instagram pages whenever we go out and do something because I like spending time with you."
"Ready for number one?" Marinette asked. Adrien did the final drumroll. "We have never publicly kissed," she told him, "you know, except for that time on your birthday and at the Gala last night."
"Duh, no one in a real relationship would ever want to keep intimate moments with their significant other private, especially if their significant other is famous. What a ridiculous idea," he told her. She rolled her eyes at Adrien's dramatics and giggled.
They both knew their relationship had only been real for about a day, but it was still funny for them to see what tabloids had 'noticed' about their relationship. Technically, until last night, they had a point about the fact that they hadn't kissed in public, but it isn't valid anymore. Marinette was happy about that and gave her boyfriend another kiss.