Marinette Dupain-Cheng was nice. She was so nice, in fact, that Adrien had taken it upon himself to help her.

He had noticed how special the girl was after they had managed to get over their little argument the first day of school; he had seen her confidence, her everlasting, kind smile and her will to always help out her friends, fighting for what she thought was right. Few people had Marinette's sensibility, and few had half the talent she displayed in her designs. Adrien was not lying when he said she could win his father's competition: Marinette was artistically skilled, and had certainly the right attitude to work in a creative but stressful environment such as fashion. Nevertheless, he was worried.

The girl was shy. Really, really shy.

He had gotten used to her stress-induced clumsiness, or her stuttering, and knew that those were things she quickly got rid of once she warmed up to someone. While it hurt Adrien that she still acted like that around him, as it meant that she did not feel comfortable with him yet, he knew that this was something that could well be the end of her. He had observed the girl as she talked with Penelope, the friend who had volunteered to help Marinette, and he had realised that searching for other female models was simply not going to work for Marinette. Forcing her to work with people that she did not know was only going to bring stress to the aspiring designer, and she did not have time to waste in her awkwardness because of the approaching deadline of the competition.

She needed a little push, and Adrien was more than happy to help her with that.

It was with that thought in mind that, the following Friday afternoon, he had hesitantly picked up his phone. His fingers circled around a name in his contact list, someone he knew would not leave him alone if he attempted to call him.

Plagg seemed to notice his uncertainty, and broke in from his desk with an annoyed sigh. "Listen kid, you already got enough on your plate. You don't have to do this."

"I kinda do, Plagg." Adrien frowned, hands playing with his phone. "She needs help and it was my fault for not telling Penelope about the money that she had to refuse her offer."

"Naaaah, it wasn't your fault if your friend Penelope had actually some brain and decided not to do something she could have been payed for for free." The kwami rolled lazily closer to a plate of cheese. "And it's too much trouble anyway. You have no time for this kind of stuff, the girl will be fine."

The teen eyed him. "Something tells me that you think that me not having enough time is going to affect your Camembert supply. Is that why you don't want me to do this?"

The black cat seemed to take offense to that, sitting now upright on the wooden desk. "Well, duh! You barely remember to get some from me now, just imagine if you decide to put an extra activity into your life!"

Adrien didn't mean to, but he rolled his eyes at him. He loved Plagg and thanked him daily for the powers he had given him, but he could be very selfish at times without even realising it. Even though he was a thousand years old deity, the kwami seemed to be clueless when it came to human emotions and interactions: he only understood cheese and his own tiredness.

"That's it, I'm calling him. Oh," he made sure to put a bit of venom in his words, staring at the cat with mischievous eyes. "And you are getting liquified cheddar for a week."

"WAIT, WHAT?" Plagg rose up to his feet, abandoning his beloved cheese. "You mean that liquid-ish mess that comes with that nachos crap?!"

Adrien's phone was up to his ear, and he was very focused on ignoring the small deity. "It's ringing."

"KID, YOU CAN'T BE SERIOUS!"

Plagg darted towards his chosen, but was stopped in his tracks as a pillow was suddenly thrown at him, crushing him underneath its weight and silencing the little god for good. Someone picked up on the phone's other end.

"Blond-puff? How the hell did you manage to get yourself in trouble at 5 in the afternoon?"

Adrien breathed in; this was happening, he was actually doing it. He was going to regret this whole thing sooner or later, he knew as much, but it was too late to back up now.

"Hello to you too, Cesare." There was a hint of sarcasm in Adrien's voice, just enough for the man on the other side of the phone to notice. "Why do I need to be 'in trouble' to call you?"

"Because I left you my number with the precise instruction of calling me only in case of emergency," Adrien heard slurping sounds, as if Cesare was eating something as he spoke. "I'm your make-up artist, not your teenage buddy. I'm not here to listen to your drama or love problems. I've been through that shit and I do not want to be part of it again, blond-puff."

"But this is an emergency! I mean, it's not a life-threatening one, but it's still really urgent!"

There was a moment of silence, probably because Cesare was thinking whether to give in to his request or not. Adrien knew he would, in the end; he was too pretty for him to say no.

"...I'm a busy person, Adrien. It's a Friday evening, I've got stuff to do."

Adrien was a little disappointed. He had expected him to give out relatively easily, but it seemed that he would have to get mean with him. He didn't like that, but it was necessary; Cesare was not the kind of guy you could be nice to, he was lazy and sometimes needed more direct and tactless stuff like blackmail and humiliation to convince him to help out. Even if he didn't look like he would, Adrien had plenty of material to use to his advantage after 2 and a half years of working and getting acquainted with him.

"Is that the Game of Thrones' opening theme I hear in the background?" he raised an eyebrow. From underneath the pillow, Plagg blustered out laughing. "Is that your 'busy Friday evening'? Watching TV shows and eating ice cream?"

Adrien honestly didn't know if Cesare was actually watching the show, he couldn't hear anything apart from the slurping sounds, so he had merely guessed. He deduced he had been right by how the loud slurping suddenly stopped, accompanied by an outraged puff.

"Give me a break, kid! I am an adult, I do what I want!"

Plagg was still laughing his head off from beneath the pillow. Adrien guessed the thought of a 22 years-old gay man watching Game of Thrones while eating ice cream on a Friday afternoon had made his day.

"What do you want, anyway?"

Adrien figured that he had given in, and wanted to ask him immediately for Cesare's help before he changed his mind, but the words didn't come out of his mouth as easily as he had thought they would. His happiness was contrasted by a sudden feeling of uneasiness, almost fear. He was convinced that what he wanted to do was not wrong or weird, but saying it out loud to someone other than himself or Plagg was something that he hadn't given too much thought to and wasn't really ready for. He couldn't waste time, however: he needed to help Marinette. He had gotten her into this mess, and he would have taken her out of it.

"Um, I..." he breathed in, trying to gather up all the courage within him. He thought of Marinette's sad face as she watched Penelope leave the café on Wednesday.

He would not allow her to feel like that again.

"I need to turn into a woman by tomorrow afternoon! Please help me!"

There were many ways in which Marinette could have reacted to the cross-dressing, still very hot teenage-boy standing in front of her. She could have screamed at the top of her lungs, allowing her hands to reach up to her hair to pull it until it gave out, or maybe she could have ran upstairs, locking the door behind her as she called for someone to help her collect the last shards of her sanity.

She was not going to do any of those things. Marinette simply stayed still, her eyes taking in the unsettling sight of the familiar green eyes against the fake eyelashes and thickened brows, her lips sealed in a tight line.

This was not real. In no possible reality would the perfect, completely normal and definitely not into cross-dressing Adrien Agreste show up at her house while dressed up as a girl. It just wasn't possible; if it had been Nino or some other boy in her class she might have laughed while doubting her own perception of what was real and what wasn't, but with Adrien? No. Just no. He wasn't the type; he was kind, sweet, and cared deeply about keeping his masculine image up to the standards others wanted him to achieve due to his father's job. Marinette blamed stress and overwork for giving her this over the top and scarily realistic dream she was having right now, and cursed her wild imagination.

Dream-Adrien was still staring at her, however, now with his head slightly tilted to the side. He was still smiling, but seemed to be confused, or maybe waiting for Marinette to do something.

Wasn't Marinette supposed to wake up after having figured out that she was in a dream? Something like this had never happened to her, so she really wasn't sure. Her only reference were the silly TV shows she used to watch when she was bored when she was still attending middle school: there the characters would pinch their arm in order to understand whether they were still asleep or not. The outcome of their choice was easily something that could be classified as embarrassing, but Marinette was feeling confident and decided to do the same, slowly bringing her hand to her left arm.

It hurt.

Marinette gasped, a sense of dread slowly taking over her as she felt her head getting lighter and lighter. She wasn't dreaming: Adrien Agreste was right in front of her, dressed up as a really cute teenage girl. This was real.

How was she even supposed to react to this?

"Did you just… pinch your arm?"

Adrien's voice hit her like a bus, and suddenly she wasn't sure that her feet were standing still on the floor underneath her anymore. Adrien was in front of her, this was real and he was looking at her absurd reaction, which currently consisted in her slowly losing consciousness. Marinette didn't know how else to react: was she going to insult him if she reacted too wildly? But then again, how could she avoid screaming over the fact that the hottest model of Paris, the classmate she had a crush on, was wearing a dress and had probably waxed his legs?

Green eyes narrowed, and Marinette felt Death coming to get her. She tried to talk, but all that she managed to produced were strangled weeps which only caused Adrien to look at her with more worry and confusion.

The crossdressing boy thought she was weird. Great. Absolutely fantastic.

She had to do something, she realised. Talking to him was out of the question, she had already understood she was going to self-combust if she ever tried to do that. She knew she had discarded the idea not so long ago, when her mind was still blissfully unaware of the reality of the situation, but running up to her room and hiding there for the rest of her life sounded amazing at the moment.

So she did. Without even thinking twice, Marinette had turned on her heels with a speed that envied Chat when he was on all fours. She ignored Adrien's attempt to call her, eyes closed as she literally dashed through the shop, going up the stairs to reach the living room and then went up the stairs to her room. She closed the trapdoor behind her and grabbed the armchair on the opposite side of the room as soon as she was inside, positioning it on top of the only entrance to her room to make sure that no one would come in.

"Marinette?"

Tikki's voice made Marinette jump out of her skin, and she fell on her butt. She noticed how her heart was beating too quickly for her comfort, and how she was ungracefully panting.

Die. She wanted to die die die die.

"Marinette, are you okay? What happened?" the kwami approached her, her little face now flying in front of Marinette's with eyes full of worry.

She tried to answer her, she really did, but she didn't even know where to begin and she was breathing too hard.

"Okay," Tikki continued. "Take deep breaths. You'll tell me everything after you've calmed down, so there's no rush."

Marinette followed her friend's advice, and tried to inhale as much air as she could with each breath. It took her a while, but she managed to get her breathing even again.

Then she exploded.

"OHMYGODTIKKI!" The kwami was so startled that she instinctively distanced herself from the girl. "AdrienjustcamehereandhewascrossdressingandIdidn'tthinkitwasrea-"

"Adrien what...? Marinette, I don't understand what you are saying!" Tikki interrupted.

The girl gulped down, starting over. "The friend that my mother came to tell me about… that was Adrien, but he was dressed up as a girl." She took a shaky breath. "I freaked out and I basically ran up here leaving him downstairs and… ugh, now he thinks I'm weird! And he probably hates me! And.. and I don't even know how to face him without freaking out, and -!"

"Okay, okay," Tikki put her little paw on her lips, hushing her. "I think I understood more or less what happened."

Marinette wanted to cry. She had ruined her relationship with Adrien forever now: she had ran away from him while he had greeted her with so much happiness and kindness, leaving him alone like an idiot in her own house even though he had come to visit her. There was no way of fixing things; she had destroyed the little closeness they had with her own two hands.

"Tikki," she pleaded behind her hushing paw. "Please help me! What do I do? He'll never forgive me!"

"What is there to do, Marinette?" the kwami asked as she freed her, allowing her to talk now.

The girl stared at her, not sure of what to say.

Tikki sighed. Marinette wondered whether she just seemed dense or whether she was actually really annoying to her. "You need to go downstairs and apologise to him."

"But I can't do that!" Marinette brought her hands to her face, despair written in her eyes. "I can't even look at him, Tikki! He.. he waxed his legs! They are shiny and soft and just… what am I even supposed to do?!"

"Marinette, there is absolutely nothing wrong with what Adrien did. You are shocked, and I understand that, but you are only thinking about how you feel," the little god sounded worried now. "Have you thought about how Adrien feels? About why he might have showed up at your house dressed up as a girl?"

The girl's eyes widened as she realised the implication of Tikki's words. She had been selfish, thinking only about herself and not taking into consideration the way Adrien could have felt at all. Drowned in her own self-pity and idiocy, she had seemed to ignore his excited expression, his adorable impatience for her to approve of what he was doing or simply comment back on it in a way a friend would have.

How would have she felt if anyone had treated the same way she had treated him?

"What.. what did I do?! I'm so stupid!" the girl clapped her cheeks in anger. "Stupid, stupid, stupid!"

She found that she couldn't stay still anymore. She stood up, now impatient to go and get Adrien from downstairs, and approached her trapdoor with exasperated haste. She had to hurry and apologise, fix what was eating her inside, if that was even still possible. There was a good chance, after all, that Adrien would not be willing to talk to her because of her extremely rude and just plain stupid behaviour, but she liked to believe in Adrien's perfect and kind nature. Of course, all of that would have been possible if he hadn't left already. Marinette wouldn't blame him if he had: she would have done the same if she had been in his position. But again, she was forgetting that the boy was literally an angel, someone who was impossible to anger, so there was still hope.

She saw Tikki flutter towards her desk as she started to move the armchair away from her trapdoor, and saw her lean against the framed picture of Adrien she kept there. Tikki had seemed serene, probably because she had realised she had done a good deed in making her owner realise she was hurting one of her closest friends, but Marinette didn't keep her eyes on her for too long. She was too focused on the photo of the model, looking at his natural eyelashes and comparing them with the now long, fake ones he had chosen for meeting her, along with the subtle yet noticeable highlighter he had put on his eyelids and underneath his brows.

It was in this way that she realised that Adrien was beautiful in both ways, either while he was his natural self or… whatever he was supposed to be right now. Regardless, the model always managed to take her breath away because of how unfairly gorgeous he was.

Her hands finally lifted the trapdoor, and she descended quickly the stairs, only to stop in her tracks half-way down.

Sitting at the kitchen table, her mother was laughing along with Adrien Agreste, currently cross-dressing in high-heels and a blonde wig. Now, Marinette was happy that her host had found himself somewhere comfortable where to stay while she was having her little mental breakdown, and figured that it had probably been her mother who had invited him upstairs after having seen - or better, heard - her dashing for her room, but that did not mean that the scene would not give her an aneurism.

Had her mother noticed? Was she laughing because the thing amused her? And more importantly, how the hell was she going to explain to her why her friend had decided to show up to her house in a dress?

Marinette didn't have time to try to answer any of those questions, however, as Adrien quickly spotted her.

"Oh!" his green eyes lit up at her sight in delight. He didn't seem to be mad at Marinette, which was a relief. "See, Madame Cheng? She didn't take much after all!"

Her fingers digged in the railing of the staircase, shuddering at the realisation that Adrien's voice was inexplicably higher and weirdly feminine. He hadn't stopped pretending that he was a girl, then. Marinette didn't know whether to feel bothered or relaxed by that.

What troubled her most of all, however, was how good his girly voice was. In fact, it freaked her out how good his whole turning-into-a-woman deal was: the makeup, the dress, the wig and the voice had all a practiced feel to them, as if Adrien had prepared everything with care.

Had he done this before?

Sabine turned around to meet her, putting down a cup of tea. Her smile was the same as usual, but there was something severe in her eyes, almost as if she was slightly disappointed. "Marinette, sweetheart, I'm glad you finished whatever you needed to do quickly enough for your friend Aria to not get bored with me."

Her friend what, now?

"Madame," Adrien caught on, clasping his hands in concern. His movements were exaggerated, but decorated with noticeable elegance. It was almost as if he was trying to hide his own nervousness behind his fake femininity. "I was the one who talked the whole time. I was the one who was worried about boring you! And besides, you provided such delicious tea and pastries to me," he held a cookie up to prove his point. "How could I ever be bored?"

A sincere giggle escaped her mother's mouth. "Aria, I am glad that you enjoyed my pastries as much as I enjoyed your company. You are such a polite young girl, and I'm so very thankful that you are helping my daughter in this competition." Her glance left Adrien to fall on her. "But I do think that my daughter owes you an apology for leaving you so suddenly in the shop, especially with all these bags!"

Marinette hadn't noticed the bags that were at Adrien's feet. In her defense, she had been too busy gaping at her mother being charmed by the still very polite and cute Adrien Agreste, who had even re-named himself for the occasion. They weren't that many and had names of different brands of them, but didn't seem to be particularly heavy.

"Marinette?" her mother addressed her again. "We are waiting."

She gulped down, only to move her eyes onto Adrien. He was looking at her too, and hadn't commented on the situation. Perhaps he was actually expecting an apology from her, and Marinette knew full well that he deserved one. She put aside all of her messy thoughts, and proceeded to ignore the dress, the high-heels, the makeup, and anything that could threaten her brain to start malfunctioning again. Adrien needed to hear an apology, she couldn't be selfish and focus on her feelings again.

She looked at him straight into his green orbs. "I'm s-sorry." Courage was still not coming to her rescue her from her stuttering, but she did what she could to not sound too pathetic.

The boy seemed to be content with what he had gotten, however, and smiled in return. "No problem at all, hun."

Yes, right. Hun. That would get some time to get used to.

Her mother seemed to have forgiven her as well, and her expression had relaxed. "Would you like to join us?" she gestured to the teacups and the pastries on the table. "We were having a nice tea-party here."

Marinette wanted to scream. No, she did not want to join them; every second she spent thinking about the fact that her cross-dressing friend was having tea and chit-chatting with her mother made her go a little more insane. She needed Adrien to leave and come somewhere with her so they could talk.

"No! I mean... My room?" God, she couldn't even talk. She just smiled nervously, hoping that someone would eventually decipher whatever nonsense she was blurting out. "Upstairs, please?"

Adrien, as the saint that he was, understood what she wanted to say, and stood up, collecting his bags as he thanked her mother with his usual politeness. Marinette waited for him to come up to her room before shutting the trapdoor behind him.

There was a moment of silence in the room: Marinette stared at him, and he stared at her. No one of the two knew what to say, she realised. Marinette was personally trying to figure out a way of distracting herself from how shiny and soft his legs' skin looked, and Adrien.. he was probably embarrassed.

"I can explain," he offered as he brought up his hands defensively. His voice was normal now, and he had dropped the bags down.

Marinette found that she wasn't okay with that. She wanted him to explain himself of course, but she needed him to provide every piece of information little by little, giving her time to take everything in and process it.

"No. I ask, you answer."

She wanted to die on the spot as she realised that she had resorted to having the vocabulary of a caveman, but managed to keep herself from collapsing on the floor of her room.

Adrien interpreted once again her poorly constructed sentence, and raised his hands in sign of understanding and possibly defeat.

There were many questions that were racing through her mind as she looked at her friend, some of them powerful enough to find their way to her tongue, making it tingle as if it desperately wanted to move and to make Marinette ask away. She couldn't make sense of her own thoughts just like usual, but one question managed to push its way through.

"Aria?"

Okay, maybe it more of a single word than a question, but Marinette accepted it regardless, and so did Adrien. He probably understood why she had asked that first: it wasn't everyday that your classmate decided to give themselves a new name.

"Your mother asked my name when she came to check on me after you were gone. I… I had to come up with something, and a friend suggested that one to me and..." his hands were still raised in the air, as if he was trying to put a certain distance between himself and Marinette. His previous joy was gone, and he sounded quite nervous. "I don't know. Aria, Adrien… they're kinda similar in a way?"

No, no they weren't. Not at all.

Marinette knew that she didn't have the luxury of questioning logic anymore; if she did, she would have gone insane a long time ago. And besides, there were more important matters at hand.

"Your… friend?"

The word seemed to get a reaction from Adrien. His shoulder tensed, and his expression shifted to annoyance for a split second, something that Marinette had never seen coming from him.

"Um.. yeah. I asked my friend for some help. I…" he gestured to his whole outfit. "This is the first time I do this. It's actually pretty comfortable to be in and… I like it, I guess? I know that I need to still work on some parts of it, but it's not too bad of a start."

She was not going to tell him that his cross-dressing was so good that it had nearly fooled her, and that she wouldn't have recognised him if she didn't have the chance to see him at school every day. Marinette didn't feel it was appropriate to encourage him just yet.

"I didn't need his help for everything, though. After a couple of YouTube videos I understood the whole makeup thing, and I got the clothes on my own. And… I practiced walking on heels, too!"

A smile escaped his lips, and Marinette realised that, despite his own attempts to hide it, Adrien was actually really proud of what he had accomplished. It must have required some work and planning, and a whole lot of good force of will, especially to get in those heels.

And she was still treating him like dirt.

It was unacceptable. She had to stop being so freaked out, she had to stop acting in a way that made the blond feel bad to the point that he was making excuses for himself. Tikki was right, there was nothing wrong with what Adrien was doing. Yes, it was unusual, and so? She put on a skin-tight, polka suit and threw herself off buildings on her spare time, she really wasn't in the place to judge someone whose "weird" activity was harmless if compared to hers.

She tried to chuckle, trying to pretend that she had found his joke funny. It had to sound forced, because Adrien was looking at her with a puzzled expression.

She cleared her throat, unsure of what to say. She figured that asking more about his outfit was probably a way to put the boy more at ease.

"You the shoes got too?" screw her stuttering, honestly. "I mean, you got the shoes too?"

"Yeah, chose them on my own," Adrien nodded, his eyes clear from his previous uncertainty. "I love them."

"H-huh, I see. Nice."

"And I absolutely love the dress, too. Kinda a shame that I couldn't show you how pretty the embroidery of the decolté is right away," his hands reached down, playing with the edges of the white skirt. "But I couldn't remember how to put a bra on, so I had to to wear a jacket over it, and I'm too ashamed to take it off because it looks kinda weird without it. I'm flat after all."

Marinette felt what was left of her self-control shatter like glass.

"A bra?!"

The word had left her mouth before she could think of the consequences of her sudden outburst. She wanted to punch herself in the face as she saw Adrien suddenly becoming embarrassed, head now hiding between his shoulders as he struggled to keep his gaze in line with her own.

"Yeah, I, uh, I kinda have to wear one. Or at least I should if I want to be credible. I don't have boobs," his hands started to travel towards his chest area, but he decided against it while they were halfway there. "I have to.. aah, fake them if I want to look like a girl."

She didn't know how to answer to that. What he was saying made perfect sense, but it just… didn't sound right, and she was terrified that he would understand that she thought that if she tried to speak. Why couldn't she help but be a heartless jerk all of a sudden? Was it the shock?

"I'll just... show you," Adrien continued. He reached for one of his bags, pulling out two strange-looking objects after a quick search.

She couldn't quite understand what they were: they were crescent-shaped, transparent, and quite thick, but also elastic, as they had molded into the shape of Adrien's hands.

"These are regular size. C cups, I think?" he explained.

Oh.

Those were silicon cups.

Those were silicon cups, those things you were supposed to put in your bra to make your boobs look bigger, or, in Adrien's case, to make them up completely.

Marinette was speechless. She couldn't even think of how he had found such a thing, let alone how he had figured out how they worked. Well, it did seem that the boy was at least a little confused, since he had already admitted that he hadn't been able to put on a bra and that he believed that a C cup was a regular cup size. Seriously, Marinette had recently reached the B cup status, she was not going to let some clueless guy intimidate her, even if that clueless guy was Adrien Agreste.

She told herself to be positive and take a deep breath, not for herself, but for her friend's sake.

She had to get to the bottom of this. As of now, Adrien was just blurting out random things that did not help her make sense of the situation. She knew she had to ask him directly his reasoning if she wanted to be at peace with herself and calm down, being in this way able to talk with her friend without being involuntarily rude.

"Adrien," she started almost in a whisper. "Why are you doing this?"

He stared at her.

"I just… This must have taken a lot of work. D-did you just want to show it to me?"

"Wait," the blond seemed surprised, and Marinette had the impression that he had almost made the silicon cups slip from his grasp. "You mean that you didn't know?"

Should she?

"Know what?"

Relief washed over Adrien's face. "Then you were confused, not mad?" he sighed, relaxing his shoulders. "I thought you heard what your mother said and figured it out, you honestly had me so worried for a moment there..."

Marinette still couldn't follow. He seemed to get that.

"Nevermind, that doesn't matter anymore. I'm here to help you, Marinette."

That really hadn't helped her understanding any better. "Help me…?"

"Yeah!" the boy nodded, now sounding more enthusiastic. "I'm going to help you win the competition!"

She felt really dumb, all she could do was stare back at him with clueless eyes.

He tilted his head back, allowing his hand to run through his fake, long hair before resting confidently on his chest. He gave her a grin that Marinette found strangely familiar. "I'm your brand new female model, willing to work for free and to do my best to be worthy of wearing your awesome designs!"

Marinette choked on thin air. Her eyes widened in absolute surprise, and she was at loss regarding how to react. Not like she could have, anyway; her body was completely still, and the only signals of life were coming from the involuntary twitching of her eyelid or mouth.

It made sense, now. Sweet, caring Adrien had decided to put himself into a dress and wear a wig to help her because he felt guilty of the fact that he hadn't found her a female model to work with. He had put himself through all that work, teaching himself how to put on makeup and walking on high heels, just for her. It was so sweet, but also just so… stupid.

She loved him so much.

Hence why she could not let him do this to himself.

"A-a-a-a-drien!" her stuttering was back, stronger than ever. "This is really nice, but it's not necessary! You don't have to do this!"

"Yes I do," he argued back. "The competition is in what, two months? You need all the help that you can get, Marinette, and I want to help!"

"I'm only going to do male designs, you don't need to-"

"I told you already, you should have both female and male designs if you want to leave a good impression on the judges, please don't throw away that option!"

The fact that he had interrupted her had hit a nerve on Marinette. She suddenly felt frustrated at his willingness to help, almost as if he believed that she was a lost cause and couldn't hope to win without him.

"Let me explain what I have in mind," he continued. "I just want to help."

"I don't want you to help, okay?" she snapped. "I will be fine on my own and you don't need to do this at all!"

Even through her anger, Marinette could see the impact her words had on Adrien. The boy shifted, hurt by her sudden outburst. His eyes narrowed as he thought of something to say back to her, but found himself at a loss for words.

Marinette had realised her mistake, but was too angry to apologise at the moment. She knew that Adrien's suggestions were heartfelt and had been spoken in a soft, caring way if compared to how she had shouted at him, but she needed to calm down before being able to recognise her own mistake. She still felt sorry of course, but couldn't do anything about it.

The boy's eyes traveled towards the bags scattered across the floor, and her eyes did the same.

"You should have told me that 500 euros ago," he said in a derogatory laugh directed at nobody in particular.

That managed to land a blow on her. Surprise made its way again in her turmoil of emotions, and she found herself wondering with what idea in mind the boy had selected every piece of clothing in those bags. She imagined him picking them with care, a silly smile on his lips, excitement and wonder in his eyes.

He started gathering his belongings, probably convinced to leave her apartment, but stopped in the middle of his task. He faced her again, determined.

"You know what?" there wasn't anger in his voice, just.. disappointment. "Even if you had told me sooner, nothing would have changed. I would have still bought everything, because I promised that I would help you. So go ahead, scream at me all you want. I'm not getting out of here until you let me help you in some sort of way. And after that... you are free to do whatever you want."

Her anger dissipated, and she realised just how much of a jerk she had been. Even after her inexcusable behaviour, Adrien was still willing to help her. He was able to put aside his feelings and do what he had promised because he cared and did not want to leave without knowing that he had done everything in his power to see her succeed. He believed in her so much that he wanted to see her win.

Marinette's cheeks reddened, and her eyes got watery. She wanted to scream.

How could one boy be so nice? How was it humanly possible?

"I'm… I'm sorry," it was the second time that she apologised in the span of an afternoon. Marinette felt awful. "I shouldn't have shouted at you like that. I was just… overwhelmed. I didn't think about what I was saying."

Adrien reaffirmed his godly patience as he sighed, only to smile reassuringly at her shortly after. "It's okay. I know you didn't mean it, and it's also my fault. There are a couple of things I could have said better, and I could have warned about all of this in a different way."

He shouldn't apologise! He hadn't done anything wrong and he made Marinette feel miserable for that.

There was only a way she could fix things.

"Are you…" she began, still embarrassed by her own behaviour. "Are you still willing to talk to me about what you had in mind?"

"Only if you are willing to listen," he said with a wink.

That sent her straight to paradise. "O-of course I am!"

"Okay then," he approached his bags again, gesturing for her to get closer to him.

Marinette eyed with amusement the differently sized silicon cups that Adrien held in his arms.

"What size do you want me to be?"

A/N: GEEZ THESE TWO KIDS ARE SHY AND SHOULD MAYBE CHILL A LITTLE. Don't worry, they will warm up to each other pretty quickly, but one is a dork who believes that Marinette hates him and is terrified of her judgement even though he wants to help her so badly, and the other is just too focused on not fucking everything up because pretty model boy makes her go insane.

The only reason why I introduced Cesare is because Adrien needs someone to help him, and that can't be Nino as it usually is in this kind of story. Cesare will be a minor character, hence why I didn't even bother putting the OC tag, even though I will make some more OCs appear later on since we'll meet some more people from the fashion world. But I gotta say, his interaction with Adrien was pretty fun to write!

While this story can be considered a Princess Jellyfish AU, it will follow independent plotlines. I only called it an AU because I was inspired heavily by Princess Jellyfish and giving it credit is only fair, so expect a lot of new stuff happening here!

Be afraid of what this will become, because I'm NOT holding back. My inner weeb is going all out, so expect some anime crap to happen here.

Thank you for reading!