I know this chapter took a while to get out, and I apologize. I've started to struggle a little bit, so I'm going to be taking a two-week break so I can come back and look at it with fresh eyes. I promise that I'll have chapter twelve up two weeks from now!

Chapter Eleven: Juxtaposition

Marinette was laying on her bed, hands covering her face. "Agh, Tikki! Could today have gone any worse?" she moaned.

"You can't do anything about the fact that you were late, Marinette. You were only grounded for a couple days because of it," Tikki said.

She put her hands down, giving Tikki a look of disdain. "I don't mean just with my parents. But everything with Chat Noir. He was so kind today. He saved me twice. And what did I do? I broke his heart. Did you see the look on his face? What is he going to do on our next patrol? I can't even imagine what he might be thinking right now!"

The red kwami floated next to her, looking at her with worry. "Isn't it better this way? It could have been more delicate, but he would have to find out eventually. Letting him go on believing that you might love him would just hurt him even more. Now he can move on."

Marinette groaned. "I know, I know. But he just looked so hurt. He's one of my best friends, I hate that I was the one to make him feel that way. I've got to apologize somehow. Do something to make him feel better, you know?"

"Whatever you do, I would make it fast. You have a patrol in two days, and he's going to be hurting then," Tikki said.

Unhooking the necklace around her neck, Marinette stared at the expensive silver ladybug. It was such a beautiful piece of jewelry, and now she knew the true meaning behind it. He hadn't given it to her because they were friends and partners. He'd done it because he was in love with her. The necklace was like the scarf she had once made for Adrien, except that she knew who this was from, and she had actually turned him down.

It took her awhile to fall asleep, unable to stop thinking about the pained look on Chat Noir's face during the akuma attack.

When Adrien got home, he was immediately faced by a surprisingly mad Nathalie. His father's assistant showed more emotion than his father, but she was more apathetic than most people. She and his bodyguard were waiting for him in the foyer. They had taken him to his bedroom without saying a word.

"Where have you been, Adrien?" Nathalie asked the second the door was closed behind them.

Adrien looked down, quickly trying to think of some excuse to appease her. Obviously, she couldn't know he was out as Chat Noir, but why else would he have been gone for so long? He couldn't do anything that would involve his friends, Nathalie was far too efficient to be tricked by that. She would check up on anything he said.

The akuma! There's always so much chaos, there's no way she could check!

"I went to the Eiffel tower for a while and I lost track of time. An akuma attacked, and I started running home. My phone was on silent so I didn't get your calls until a few minutes ago. I"m so sorry, Nathalie. I just needed to get out for a while," he said. He looked up at her, praying that mixing some truth into his lie would help.

She stared down at him, then nodded. "You should have told us, and taken your bodyguard. Your father is busy tonight, and I did not want to bother him. Tomorrow morning he will be informed, and he will inform you of your punishment." Without another word, both of them left the room. They gave him a long look before closing the door, but Adrien was inevitably left alone.

Plagg flew out of his jacket with a whine. "They're so annoying. Why can't they just let you leave for once?"

Adrien groaned, sitting down at his desk. "Because my father will kill them, and me. You know that he's not exactly relaxed."

They sat in silence for a time, Plagg going to find cheese, and Adrien looking around at nothing.

"What are you doing to do about Ladybug?" Plagg finally asked around a mouthful of cheese.

At this, Adrien fell backward onto his bed. A pain shot through his head, making him lift his hand to where the car had hit him. However, he ignored it. The pain he felt from Ladybug's words was worse. "I don't know. I can't exactly force her to love me, can I?"

He got up, going over to his desk. Searching through one of the shelves next to it, he found the heart-shaped paper he had received last valentine's day. For the millionth time, he read the words written on it. He'd thought this had meant Ladybug liked him. But that was a year ago, and she had never done anything about it.

Plagg rolled his eyes, sitting on the desk next to him. The kwami ate his wedge of cheese while Adrien re-read and re-read the letter. Each time, he imagined his beloved Ladybug writing down the words. However, now that image was disintegrating. Had it even been from her at all?

"Yo, Adrien. You forgot your science book at school."

Adrien looked up quickly to see his best friend stepping into the room from behind the wall segregating his bed from the door. Plagg dropped his piece of cheese, hiding in Adrien's white shirt before Adrien could even process the sudden arrival of his friend. It was getting late, and after the trouble he was in, he never expected this.

He looked down at the card in his hand. Crap. No, he can't see this! Snapping it closed, Adrien shot into a standing position. He hid the paper under his keyboard as fast as he could, hoping that Nino didn't see it. For obvious reasons, he hadn't told his best friend about the note from Ladybug. To start, it would have involved telling him about why he was so in love that he was writing a letter that he planned to give to Ladybug personally. He couldn't exactly explain that he was Chat Noir.

Using a little more force than was necessary to place the keyboard over the letter, Adrien covered it as best he could. Adrien looked over at Nino, staying between his friend's line of sight and the letter.

"H-hey, Nino! What are you doing here?" Adrien asked nervously.

Nino looked behind Adrien, trying to see what he was hiding. "What was that?"

"Oh, uh, nothing. You said I left my textbook at school?" he said, changing the topic as fast as he could.

"Yeah," Nino said, holding up the book, "I stayed after class and noticed you left it. Sorry I couldn't come by earlier, but someone wanted me to do a DJ audition for their party."

Adrien walked over, not failing to notice that Nino was still trying to look at the heart-shaped letter haphazardly hidden under the keyboard. Nino handed him the textbook, finally taking his eyes off the keyboard behind him.

Nathalie showed up at the door, looking down at both boys. "You are going to have to leave now. Adrien is not allowed to hang out with friends at the moment."

"Thanks for the textbook, Nino. I'll see you at school tomorrow," Adrien sighed. His friend nodded, waving farewell before allowing Nathalie to usher him out of the room.

Adrien stood in front of the mirror, carefully moving his hair. After Nino had left, he'd discovered that there was still a pain in his head because there was still a wound. It had stopped bleeding, thankfully, and all of the blood had vanished with his transformation.

The only good thing that had happened was that only Nathalie and his bodyguard had known he was gone. However, that wasn't going to last. Adrien would be having a confrontation with his father before he left for school.

He carefully styled his hair to hide the injury. There were no photo shoots until just before the fashion show, so that meant no one but himself would be messing around with his hair for a while. But if his father saw any sign whatsoever of the cut sustained from the car, he'd be in more trouble than ever before. He'd be lucky to ever see his friends again if it came to light, let alone to go back to school.

"Agh!" Adrien winced, having accidentally jabbed the cut with his finger.

"You should just tell your father, then you won't have to go to school," Plagg said. "School is so much work."

"You don't even do anything but sleep and eat camembert while I'm at school," Adrien said. He examined the left side of his head, making sure there was no sign of the wound. Shaking his head experimentally, he checked again. His blonde hair still hid any sign of his exploits the previous day. He sighed in relief, stepping away from the mirror.

Plagg flew next to him lazily as he left the bathroom. "I may not do any of the work, but I still have to wake up at the crack of dawn like you do," he complained.

Adrien grabbed his bag, which was strewn across his bed ready for him to leave for breakfast. Taking a deep breath to prepare himself, he left his room to eat whatever his personal chef had prepared that morning. He half expected his father to be just outside the door, or waiting in the dining room, but he wasn't. In fact, it wasn't until Adrien was nearly done with his meal that Gabriel Agreste showed up.

He stood tall, giving away an aura of disapproval as he looked down at his son. That was the only look he seemed to have lately. Adrien felt riddled with guilt looking into that gaze.

"I've been informed that you left. Again," Gabriel said.

"I…" Adrien tried to think of a way to defend himself, but he couldn't think of anything. At least not anything that would remotely work against him. "I'm sorry, Father."

"You should be. Because you seem determined to remain disobedient, I am forced to use a stronger punishment. All of the windows in your room are going to be sealed, and somebody will be outside the door to your room at all times. You are not permitted to go anywhere outside of this house without your bodyguard or Nathalie. If you are so much as a minute late to any of your lessons I will pull you out of school immediately. Do you understand?" Gabriel said.

Adrien nodded, looking down at his plate.

"Good. This is all to keep you safe, Adrien. You might think the world is a safe place, but it is not."

He looked up again, surprised by the brief expression of worry in his father's voice. It did not last, however.

"Nathalie will give you your schedule before you leave," he said. His father turned and left the room, leaving Adrien alone with his assistant.

She walked up to him, handing him a tablet to show him his schedule for the day. He scanned it quickly, noting the few changes on it from his normal classes. He had fencing instead of study hall… he'd have to be careful with the headgear… And play practice after school… Oh no. They're measuring for costumes today.

He handed it back, but before he could just request that one of the designers for his father's company just give him the measurements, his bodyguard appeared in the doorway.

"It's time for you to leave for school. Your father will expect you back for lunch today. Is there something you would like to request?" Nathalie asked.

Adrien sighed, shaking his head. "Whatever he wants to make today. I'll see you then, Nathalie." He stood up and followed his bodyguard outside and to the silver car.

Marinette made sure to wake up early the next day - something she was rarely even capable of doing. However, today it was necessary. Her leg was still bruised from the brick that had hit it during the akuma attack, and she could only walk so far without a slight limp. Getting to school would take a little bit more time, and she intended to be in the classroom already when Alya arrived. Getting grilled about Chat Noir would be bad enough, there was no way she was answering questions about her mystery limp too.

She carefully got out of bed and got ready quickly, then went downstairs to grab breakfast from the kitchen. Both of her parents were down in the bakery this morning, so she didn't run into any trouble while she rushed through her meal.

The walk to school wasn't as bad as she thought it might be. She still had a limp, but she made better time than she had imagined. There were only a few students milling about when she arrived. Her leg throbbed with each step, but even going up the stairs to the class was much easier than she had anticipated.

When she got to the classroom, it was completely empty. Smiling contently, she sat in her seat and pulled out her sketchpad. She was eventually taken out of her thoughts when her classmates started filing in. Nino and Adrien found their seats in front of her after Adrien extricated himself from Chloe, Max and Kim walked in, and Alya sat next to her.

"Okay, you have to let me interview you for the Ladyblog!" Alya said. "The video of you and Chat Noir is blowing up!"

"Uh, what? Really? People care that much?" Marinette asked worriedly.

Alya nodded, showing Marinette her phone. She scrolled through a list of comments so long that Marinette could barely comprehend how many people were freaking out over it. Marinette looked up at her friend, her mouth hanging open in shock.

"Did you hang out with Chat Noir?" Adrien asked, turning to look at Marinette with curious eyes.

Her eyes widened, and she felt herself start to panic. Yes, I did. But it didn't mean anything! Please don't think that I like Chat Noir in that way!

"Y-yeah! He showed up while I was in the park, and he ended up taking me home," Marinette said. She rubbed the back of her neck, smiling down at him.

"Whoa, really?" Nino asked.

"Is he cool? I'd love to have met him," Adrien said. "I can't believe that he and Ladybug save us almost every other day."

Marinette nodded, thinking back to just the other day when she had seen Chat Noir. He'd seemed happy while they were hanging out. "I thought he was really cool. His jokes are terrible, but I think that underneath that he's a really good person."

This sentence shocked Marinette. She hadn't thought about when she'd seen him as Marinette, just when she crushed him as Ladybug. However, she realized that what she said was true. Chat Noir didn't really show a sensitive side much in front of Ladybug, but for a minute there he had in front of Marinette. Now she felt even worse for crushing his heart.

Adrien seemed stunned, but happy, at her response. He opened his mouth to say something when Ms. Bustier walked in, and the bell for classes rang.

When the class was dismissed at the end of the day, everyone took a short break. They were running through a scene with Storyteller today, so Marinette spent that time going over the script again. She had it pretty much memorized, but she had to make sure. Especially since she'd be working with Adrien.

Most everyone else was chatting excitedly about the first big practice as a group. The only other one who sat alone was Adrien, who seemed too deep in thought to do anything regarding the play. He didn't have his script out, but he was leaning back in his seat, just staring at the ceiling. Marinette found her gaze drawn away from her script and to the back of his head. His golden hair was styled differently than he normally had it.

Before she could start thinking of why, Alya showed up next to her. "You might want to stop staring, people are gonna notice. You should go talk to him," she whispered.

Marinette started, looking quickly over to Alya. Her friend gave her a knowing smile, then walked to the front of the room where Nino was standing. They started talking together with Max, looking over the script.

Gulping, the young bluenette stood up and moved to where Nino normally sat. "M-mind if here I sit? I mean, mind if I sit here?" she stammered out.

Adrien looked up, clearly surprised to be shaken out of his thoughts. "Sure, go ahead. Are you ready for the scene today?"

She nodded, sitting down and setting the script on the table. "I think so. I still can't believe that they were able to make me do this, though. I can barely act in front of you three, let alone in front of the entire class."

This brought a smile to the boy's face. "Are you kidding? You did amazing the other day! You just need to get into character again, and you'll be just as great."

Marinette smiled as well. "Not as good as you. You seem to be a natural at pretending to be Chat Noir. If I didn't know better, I'd say that you were him," she joked.

He laughed, rubbing the back of his head awkwardly. "It must be my modeling. I obviously can't be Chat Noir, so it's got to be that."

The two talked for a few minutes, mostly keeping the topic on the play. Once the break was over, Alya got the entire class's attention so Nino could speak.

"Okay, dudes! We're going to start today by having Rose and Juleka take measurements for costumes. If we want to have them all ready in time with all of our schoolwork, we need to get started on them now," Nino said. "We'll start with Marinette, Adrien, and Nathaniel since their costumes will require the most work, and therefore the most measurements."

Marinette stood up, going to the front of the room along with Adrien and Nathaniel. Juleka started on Adrien, Rose on Nathaniel, and Mylene helped out by taking Marinette's measurements. She had done this for herself before, but having someone else wrap the measuring tape around her own arms, waist, legs, and everything else was a strange experience.

She looked over at Adrien, who looked perfectly at ease with the whole situation like it was no different than breathing. It took her a minute to realize that it must have been because of his time as a model. People were probably doing this all the time.

"H-how often do they do this for you? A-a-as a model, I mean," Marinette asked.

Adrien looked over at her, smiling. "They always do it when Father comes out with a new line. They've got to make sure everything fits before I do a photo shoot. What about you? You don't seem too uncomfortable with this."

"Oh! I make a lot of my own clothes," Marinette said.

"Really? I knew your designs were great, but I didn't know you actually made them!"

A deep blush covered her face. "Y-yeah. I love clothes making. I love making clothes!"

They sat in silence for a minute until Marinette and Nathaniel had to sit down so they could measure their heads for the masks. The two of them obeyed dutifully. Juleka was tall enough to reach Adrien effectively, so he didn't have to sit down. She wrapped the tape around his head, and he jerked out of the way. His hand reached up to the left side of his head, and he laughed nervously.

"I can actually get you those measurements from my father. I'll be sure to have them ready for you tomorrow," he said.

"Uh, okay," Juleka replied. When all three girls were done measuring, they hurried and moved on to get the measurements of Chloe and Kim. Chloe took longer from complaining about being touched by people she deemed lesser than herself, but eventually, all of the measurements were taken.

Alya stepped up in front of the class to address everyone. "Alright people! We are now going to start our first official run-through of a scene. Right now we're going to focus on when Ladybug and Chat Noir fight Storyteller, but next practice we're going to be doing more than one scene. We're going to start from where Ladybug and Chat Noir meet up to beat Storyteller. Let's all get into our places!"

Marinette gulped, going to stand just outside the door, while Adrien went to stand a few feet away. Nathaniel stood near the outside window, along with those playing background characters.

"And action!" Nino called from the back where he sat with Alya, along with those working backstage.

Marinette walked into the room, and Adrien came up next to her. Both of them were looking towards Nathaniel. It was apparent by their stances that the two of them were ready to fight.

"What's the story of this akuma?" Adrien asked, using the exact same tone Chat Noir would have. Marinette couldn't help but feel that he even had the way Chat Noir stood down perfectly. The thought made herself conscious of how she was standing. It felt like she was standing with too straight a back and too little confidence. That was good. It would keep her just different enough from herself as Ladybug.

"He makes people into characters from a book, and he controls them. He makes changes in that collection of pages, and it's almost like their story changes. They will do whatever he wants them to," Marinette said.

Adrien nodded. Together, they moved towards Nathaniel.

Right when practice ended, Adrien got a text from his bodyguard saying he was in front of the school. The model sighed. He'd hoped that he would have been at least a few minutes late.

Adrien waved goodbye to Nino and headed for the door with his stuff. At the entrance, however, he turned back to look at all of his friends. His eyes caught sight of Marinette talking to Alya, who was speaking very animatedly. Realizing what he was doing, Adrien hurried out of the class and to the silver vehicle.

He got home and went directly to his room, not at all surprised that his father didn't greet him. Adrien did his best to work on his homework, but ended up stopping halfway through. He went to sit on his couch and played a little bit of Ultimate Mecha Strike III. After the first game, he stopped that as well.

His mind was too busy thinking about Ladybug and, for some reason, Marinette. She'd seemed more confident today. More like she was around Chat. And what she had said about him… Even Ladybug didn't tend to see what was underneath his exterior as Chat.

"She's an interesting girl…" he whispered, still deep in thought.

Marinette spent the entire walk home from school trying to tell Alya she would be terrible in an interview. The blogger persisted, however, until Marinette consented.

"Okay, I'll do it! I'll let you interview me for the Ladyblog," Marinette sighed. "But can we do it another day? I lost track of time yesterday and came home really late. I'm grounded, so I'd rather get inside before I end up in even more trouble."

Alya nodded. "Of course, Girl. Maybe we can do the interview during lunch tomorrow or something. Good luck with the parents."

They parted ways. Alya took the path to her own house, and Marinette entered through the bakery. Her parents greeted her with smiles, but Marinette went right through so she could get started on her homework.

When she finished, she once again found herself taking off the ladybug necklace. She had been wearing it underneath her shirt so she didn't risk anybody finding it in her room.

"Tikki, do you think there's something about Chat Noir that I'm missing? I spend so much time with him as Ladybug, but I've never seen anything as genuine as when he was looking at the view from the top of the school"

The red kwami flew over to Marinette, looking at the necklace with her. "I think there is a side to everyone that we don't see. No one knows who you are as Marinette when you're Ladybug, after all."

Marinette sighed. "I guess. I just wish I could see what I'm missing. He's my best friend aside from Alya, and now I feel like I barely know who he is."

"You'll just have to try getting to know him some more," Tikki said.

"You're right. Worrying isn't going to help. I need to make an effort to get to know Chat better if I want to do anything to fix this," Marinette said, nodding.