The one thing Marinette hated about Valentine's Day was that it was too cold. She never had an issue with the excessive PDA of couples, never even had a problem that she never really got anything for Valentine's Day. Then again, she'd never been in a relationship on Valentine's Day before and usually was helping her parents anyway, since their bakery was very busy during the holiday. (Yes, she considered it a holiday.)
No, the worst thing about it was the timing. February was one of those months that just looked yucky. The weather could never decide what it was doing from day to day, leaving half-melted snow, slush, and cloudy skies in its wake. It would've been better for it to be in the spring, say around April or May, so the flowers could be fully bloomed and the sun could be shining. Maybe a little warm, at least warmer than it was now.
Honestly, though? Walking into school that day was one of the best feelings in the world. A lot of the couples were hanging out, exchanging gifts of chocolate and stuffed animals. Single people like her didn't stick around too much, not even with their friends, but nobody could pass through without a smile on their face. There was just something that felt amazing about seeing people so in love with each other.
She was almost glad she didn't have to stress about that this year. Between schoolwork, commissions, helping her parents, babysitting, and being Ladybug, she didn't have the time she wanted to have a relationship. It was better to not have one than to not be attentive in one, anyway. She could wait a bit longer.
Once school started, everything felt like a giant blur. Her parents told her to take the afternoon off from helping even though they were swamped. They probably thought she'd be hanging out with friends, and they weren't really wrong. It was more like... she was staying in with one friend. Technically on a date. But who was counting?
…She was. It counted.
There was no pressure with this one, though, which was why it was only technically a date. The understanding was that she would be a lot more anxious for it if it was a real date, so this was better. It was a date, but not, and what better way to spend a not-date than spending some time doing homework?
Okay, maybe it was a bit lame, but again, no pressure! And she was providing some treats anyway, ones she'd made specifically for this reason. They were basic cutouts with chocolate chips and a strawberry glaze, cut in the shape of hearts. Cute and delicious!
The doorbell rang, making her jump. "Coming!" she shouted, going to the door. Everything in her room was set- she barely needed to clean, Ultimate Mecha Strike III was loaded into her computer if they wanted to take a break, the cookies were already in her room, and her homework was laid out nice and neat so they would at least have the illusion of productivity.
"Thanks again for the homework date, Princess," Adrien said, coming in and reducing her to blushes with a wink. He knew exactly what he was doing, too. Oh, the smug kitten. "What better way to spend Valentine's Day than avoiding crazy crowds?"
"My thoughts exactly." She led him up to her room, where he'd only been a handful of times before. This time, she didn't need to move any pictures around like she once did. She preferred it much more. Tikki and Plagg immediately flew out of their hiding spots, stealing a couple of cookies and going to hang out together. Marinette dusted off her hands. "Now, we have to decide: are we going to actually get anything done, or leave it for the weekend?"
Adrien didn't answer for a moment. She turned back around to see him already munching on one of the cookies with a satisfied look on his face. She stifled a laugh as he finished it off, a little of the glaze's color and crumbs clinging to his lips.
"We should at least try," he said after a second more. He couldn't hide his sheepish smile. "After all, I think it'd be boring to do it on my own tomorrow when we have a perfectly good reason to do it today."
"I'm just glad Valentine's Day is a Friday this year." She took a cookie for herself, opening up her history textbook. Lucky for them, the majority of it came right from the text, so they didn't even need to spend much time on it. "Everyone usually comes into school the next day exhausted from staying up late and sick from eating too much chocolate. Everyone knows the best day to buy chocolate is the day after Valentine's Day."
"I don't know about that, I think the day after Halloween is a big contender." He jotted down one of the answers just a second before she spotted it. "Is it always a big deal in school?"
She thought about that for a second. "Depends on who you ask. If there are couples, sure, it's a big deal for them. Otherwise, not too much." They never had any Valentine's parties or anything like that, and there'd always been a larger focus on romantic love than platonic love, so if a person wasn't in a relationship, they'd just stick to the day-after discounts. "To people like Rose and Juleka? Valentine's Day was when they got together a couple years ago. Alya and Nino seem to enjoy it." She shrugged. "I never made a big deal out of it."
He nodded, scanning the text for the next answer. His hand crept over to grab another cookie. "That's cool. Chloe tried to get me to celebrate with her when we were younger, but that was only so we could pretend we were adults and could spend all our money on chocolate." A faint smile came to his face. "That never turned out well."
"Well, I mean, this is doing something for Valentine's Day, right, Kitty?" she asked, trying to seem nonchalant. But really, it was still eating away at her whether or not this really counted as a date and whether or not they really counted as a couple and-
"I can't think of a better way to spend it." His smile was so sweet and sincere, she just felt a thousand butterflies dancing in her stomach. This was one of those times where she was glad they found out each other's identities behind the masks. It had been a complete accident- they somehow managed to choose the same place to detransform after defeating an akuma- and after processing what they'd learned, it had been a real gray area on whether or not they were dating. But that was actually fine, because she knew she could be herself around Adrien because he was Chat Noir, and she was just fine around him as Ladybug. It wasn't as difficult as she thought to be normal around someone she really liked, but it definitely helped that the girls didn't know about this. "You wouldn't believe this, but I was a bit nervous about this."
She looked at him, a bit dumbfounded. She knew that lots of people got nervous before dates or not-dates, but Adrien? Even as Chat Noir, he was never the nervous type. "I bet you weren't more nervous than me," she said without thinking, a slightly competitive edge to her voice. He knew she could be a nervous wreck. "But there's really no reason to be, right? I mean, we're close."
"Really close," he agreed. "And there's no pressure to be a couple if we're not ready for it."
"Right." She was glad they'd had the forethought to talk about that beforehand. Otherwise, they'd both be even more of a disaster. "And there's nobody here to put that pressure on us. We can do whatever we want."
"Whatever we want." She knew she was in for something when that sly smirk came to his face, trademark of the Chat Noir she knew. "It is Valentine's Day, and I think we should take a break from homework. Let's play Ultimate Mecha Strike III, but with a spin. If I win...can I give you a kiss?"
She pretended to think about it for a minute. "I suppose," she said, as lightly as she could without giving away that the butterflies were back. She may or may not have been considering losing on purpose. "But you're going to have to model something for me if I win, okay?"
"Deal," he readily agreed, grabbing one of the controllers she'd set out. She wasn't worried about her chances at all, not against Adrien. He was good, but he wasn't Max, who was quite possibly the only person who could beat her on occasion. This would be an open-and-shut game.
Her eyes were trained solely on the screen once the match started, her character's movements perfectly timed to deplete Adrien's character's health. She wasn't going to be showing him any mercy. That was just how she played. Nobody could-
She froze as she felt Adrien lean a bit closer before pressing a quick kiss to her cheek. Of course he'd timed it perfectly, wiping out her character before she could even think about functioning properly again. "No fair, that's cheating!" she said as the WINNER! lit up over his character. He looked awfully pleased with himself.
"You never said it had to be fair," he pointed out with that same cheeky grin. Absolutely unapologetic. "Now, I do believe you owe me something?"
She hummed and hawed a bit before leaning into him and giving him a quick kiss, this time before he could react. "There."
It wasn't like she hadn't kissed him before- she had, even though he didn't remember it- but her face still lit up like a Christmas tree. It felt nice to know that she could just do that without overthinking because it was him, her best friend and her partner in (stopping) crime. She knew him as well as she knew herself. "I'd like to change my bet for the next round. How about if I win, we go out on a date?"
His eyebrows rose a touch in surprise, but he couldn't look happier. "Maybe I'll just have to let you win this one, huh?"
She stuck her tongue out at him. "Yeah, let's pretend that's what happened this time. Start thinking about where you want to go, Kitty." She was ready for a real date, since this one was going perfectly well. The only thing that could go wrong would be-
The akuma alert buzzed on their phones right before she could start the next round, because of course Hawkmoth was bitter enough to send out another akuma on Valentine's Day. "Looks like we have to take a raincheck on the next round," Adrien said, already setting down his controller as he stood up. Tikki and Plagg flew out from their hiding spot, already ready thanks to the snacks. "Are you ready, My Lady?"
She was a bit disappointed, but… "Let's get this over with so we can keep playing." She grinned at him, glad she had something to look forward to when they got back. "Tikki, spots on!"
It feels good to finally write a Miraculous fic again! The last one (besides one BTHB oneshot) was, what, 2017? Maybe 2018? It's been a long time, but I swear I've tried drafting stuff in all that time. I just never got around to finishing them,,,
Oh, well! Hope you enjoyed, and have an amazing Valentine's Day!