"Meet me somewhere?" said the text.

He was sitting with his homework when his phone buzzed and he almost didn't pick it up. He'd told everyone else to leave him alone but he hadn't sent that message to Ladybug. He sat with the phone in one hand and his pencil in the other. If he were responsible, he would have sent her something back asking if it was an emergency and put the phone away for anything but impending doom.

They - well, he - had declared that certain days were off for the project to clear out the jars. She'd set a pace that had worried him in that first week, leaving her exhausted every time. This was one of their break days. It should have been enough to know that he would see her that weekend but it wasn't. His responsibility to his studies couldn't outweigh the little thrill that she was inviting him someplace. It didn't matter where.

He sent, "Do you want to come here?"

"No, I want to run, come with me," she sent.

He dropped the pencil and flipped the book shut to go find Plagg.

Chat Noir met her not too far from his apartment. She was bouncing on her toes and flashed him just a hint of smile when he hopped up beside her in a crouch. She'd chosen one of the highest buildings in the district so Paris was spread out around them like a carpet of lights. He looked past her toward the Eiffel Tower and the lines of traffic, white and red running up the boulevards. She was still bouncing in the corner of his vision. He tilted his head back to look up at her.

"Race or chase?" he asked.

She gave him a real smile then. It hadn't been so long ago but it felt like a game they hadn't played since they were little children. It was like a pick-up game of soccer in one of the old cobblestone squares or brushing the dust off some box in a cupboard and opening it find treasures you had collected when you were small. They'd both been a little shorter then and she'd laughed more easily but just saying the words made him feel like not so much had changed.

"Chase," she said.

And then she was moving. She dropped and off the edge of the roof top and flung herself towards the street. He knew this neighbourhood better than she did so he let her get a little bit ahead of him. He hadn't been betting on her yo-yo giving her that much of an advantage and it took him three blocks to just catch up with her.

She swung in and out of patches of light. He barely heard her when she touched down on rooftops. He almost lost her more than once only to catch a flash of red out of the corner of his eye and have to scramble after her.

They were most of the way to Notre Dame before he caught up. He hit her out of the air as she made a jump from one rooftop to the next. He caught her around the middle but she didn't let go of the yo-yo string. They ended up hanging halfway down an alley, swinging wildly back and forth with him latched around her waist. He had a landing planned out but it had depended on her just jumping. The damned string had thrown everything off.

"Damn cat," she said looking down at him.

He cocked a grin at her. His arms were locked around her waist which put his face right at chest level and gave him very interesting things to look past as he met her gaze. With her free hand she cuffed him up the back of his head but it was gentle and made him wiggle an eyebrow at her.

She was laughing as she lowered them down behind a florist. He touched down first and took her weight rather than just letting her drop down beside him. He held her and waited for her to step back but she just stayed there in his arms with her hands on his shoulders and his around her waist.

"You're slower than you used to be," she said.

"You're fur-ster," he shot back.

"Fur-ster?" she repeated, "For that one I am going to make you chase again."

"I could chase you forever," he said and standing in the dark like this, with his arms around her, it felt a little too honest. She was all shadows, he couldn't see her expression but she had her head tilted up to look at him.

"Give me a head start then," she finally said.

"I'll count to nine. One for each life I'd spend with you," he said.

"You've gotten even sappier in your old age," she said.

"One," he said lowering his face to hers but by the time he got to, "Two," she was off and running again.

It took him longer to find her this time. They played it less as a game of tag and more of hide and seek. He'd flick open the communicator to make hers beep and then follow the sound. Like a complicated rooftop game of Hotter or Colder. He heard her swear once but she'd disappeared before he found her.

"Where are you, Bug?" he called out but he got no answer but he heard her footsteps down an alley. He used the baton to jump the building and landed in her way as she exited out into the square. She was glancing behind her when he caught her. He picked her up and spun her around. She struggled and kicked him hard in the leg before she realized it was him.

He dropped her back to the ground and glared down at her, rubbing his shin.

"Gentlemen don't grab ladies in the street," she said.

"You may be a Lady, I never made any such claims about myself," he said.

"Again? We can trade," she said.

"As much as I like chasing you around Paris, you're supposed to be taking the night off," he said.

"I'd rather run around Paris," she said with a sigh.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

She looked up at him. The square around the cathedral was well lit but not well traveled at this time of night. They would have been visible to anyone walking by but he would have taken that over not being able to see her. Her expression was accusatory. She had wanted to drown whatever it emotion it was and she wasn't happy to have him dragging it out into the open. He started to back peddle immediately, hands up and a big step back from her.

"Or I shut up," he said.

"I had a fight with my mother," she admitted after a drawn out silence in which he was sure he'd made her angry.

"I will listen or I will knock you off another building with an ill-timed pounce, your choice," he said.

"Come on," she said and then she was off across the square. He followed her, she wasn't moving fast enough for it to be another chase. She led him up to the church but not inside. Instead she climbed up the side of the Cathedral. They helped each other up, yo-yo and baton out so the could swinging along to hand holds until they had made it to the belfry. She dropped down on the ledge and when he sat beside her, she leaned over and put her head on his shoulder.

"Talking then?" he said.

"In a minute," she said.

She took his hand and played with his fingers and his claws. Her fingers traced the outline of them. It was shattering and he couldn't quite figure out why. It made him jumpy and nervous. They were sharp and he'd never been quite so aware of them before. He watched her fingers on his and kept his attention on breathing and trying not to do something unwelcome. Like kiss her. He was trying really hard not to pull her in and kiss her until neither of them could breathe.

"My father died," she said without looking up at him. His attention snapped back to her. Her fingers were still on his, fiddling with his ring and his claws like it was a nervous tic, like he was an extension of her instead of something separate.

"I-" he started but he didn't know. Adrien knew. Chat Noir didn't, "I'm so sorry."

"In the fires on that day," she spit the word day out like it was an insult. He gently pulled his nearer hand away from her and wrapped it around her back. He gave her his other hand instead and she took it without pause and fiddled with his cuffs as she kept talking.

"My mother thinks Paris is dangerous. Terribly dangerous. It's why we left. She wouldn't stay in the city. She wouldn't even stay in the country. We lost our business. She didn't think we had any reasons to stay in Paris. She decided that we would go to live with my aunt. I argued and fought and I think I broke her heart a little more with it. So I apologized and tried to make the best of it. I couldn't stay in France alone and I couldn't leave her," she said.

"She wants you to come home," he said.

"I had her convinced that for my career, I needed to be in Europe and I didn't want to leave her behind. I had talked her into Milan. I thought maybe, with time, I could convince her to move to Cannes and then maybe Lyon, someplace that's just a train ride away," she said.

That didn't seem like it would get her upset enough to be calling him up in the middle of the night. He rubbed her shoulder and waited for her to assemble the next part of the story.

"There were three Akuma attacks this week and she's sure that means that the city is about to fall into riots and horrors and I will die if I stay here. That isn't new. But she reminded me in detail today about how I can't rely on superheroes to protect me. 'We both know that Ladybug is no guarantee,' and even though I have heard her say it a hundred times before, it's a reminder every time. She's right and I hate it," she had trailed off to a whisper.

"You're not perfect," he said and he swung around on the ledge so he was straddling the stone and could take her face in his hands. She flinched hard as though hearing him say it was a betrayal all on its own. He was an idiot but he shook his head and slid a little closer and whispered, "Look at me."

"I know, trust me, I know," she said meeting his eyes and looking at him with wary eyes. She was annoyed or maybe that expression was betrayal and his mind was spinning to try and fix it. He loosened his hold so she could pull away and while she had tensed, she let him touch her. He took a deep breath and stroked her cheek right below the mask before he started to speak.

"You were just a kid, all the super powers in the world don't change that. You were in high school and you have saved hundreds of lives. Hundreds. Maybe thousands. You are not perfect, there are limits to everything even your powers, but you are incredible," he said.

"Miraculous?" she said with a wry little smile that didn't make it to her eyes.

"That too," he said leaning in and touching his forehead to hers before he drew back and kept talking. Now that he started he wasn't sure where the words were going to stop. "You got up after a tragedy like that and you keep fighting. There's a monster of a man out there who wants to steal your miracle stone, who's willing to burn a city to the ground to steal that power and you don't give up. That's incredible. You're very impressive. Grief makes people angry and so does worry. She loves you and she's worried about you but no matter what she says, it doesn't make any of this your fault."

"You got through all of that without a single pun," she said.

"I am capable of restraining them," he said.

"Thank you," she said, "For all of that, for coming out with me, not just for the lack of puns."

She surprised him again by curling back in close. Her arm around his waist, her knees tossed over his so she was halfway into his lap. She looked out at the city and rested her cheek on his shoulder again. His hands fluttered because he didn't know where to put them. She reached out and took one of them back and linked her fingers with his. He held on and wrapped his other arm around her back, exactly the way she was holding onto him because if she had started it, he could be sure that it was something she was comfortable with.

He didn't pull away until she did. It was a long time, but it didn't feel long enough. The traffic had dwindled down to almost nothing as most people had gone home to bed. He could have stayed there until dawn but instead she untangled herself slowly. Before she had moved out of his reach, while her hand was still on his back and her fingers were still tangled with his, she paused to meet his eyes.

The moment was a soap bubble and he wasn't thinking. She was so close. He leaned his head down, his nose bumped hers before he realized what he was doing but by then she'd taken over. Her mouth came up to touch his. The bubble held, it wasn't really a kiss yet, neither of them quite sure enough to change it.

"This is a bad idea," she whispered.

"I like bad ideas," he said.

They hadn't pulled away, she was still breathing against his mouth. He felt her form each word but it was a feather light near touch and he wanted so much more than that. He also wanted to pour out promises and reassurances and declarations of every possible kind. He wanted the kiss.

"I'm using you," she said.

"Well, I'm taking advantage," he shot back.

"Bad idea," she said.

"So are rooftop chases and breaking and entering into religious landmarks. We're full of bad ideas tonight," Chat told her and that she was still there, so close. She wasn't pushing back or pulling away made him bolder and he managed to whisper, "Kiss me?" even if it did come out like a question. She answered him without words.

She didn't kiss him gently this time.

Her hand slid up his back and wrapped around his neck and she pulled him in close. He liked the taste of her mouth and pushed back into every touch. He still had enough of a hold on her to swing her into his arms. He was sitting on the parapet and hadn't considered what pulling her closer meant. She didn't seem to mind. She settled onto his lap without breaking the kiss and he grabbed hold of her waist.

It felt precarious and he was struck by the fear of dropping her. She and loosely wrapped her legs around him and he could imagine her crossing her ankles somewhere behind his back. He kept one arm locked around her but the other slid up her back until he could play with her hair. He stopped there because she'd opened her mouth and pulled him into a deeper kiss and he temporarily lost the ability for all other thought. Her tongue against his made him smile so much it was hard to kiss her back. She gave up on him with a giggle and kissed his cheek, his jaw, his neck instead.

"I need to go home," she said when she'd kissed her way back up to his ear and was resting with her cheek against his and her whole body wrapped around him.

"But you're coming back tomorrow," he said.

"No, you told me you had some sort of event tomorrow," she said.

"Damn it," he muttered. Gala. Stupid awful charity gala. That's why he was supposed to spend tonight doing homework because he would have to spend all of Friday night with his father and the fashion industry. He buried his face in her shoulder and made an annoyed sound.

"Day after," she said.

"That is barely tolerable," he said.

"You're the one with the event," she said.

"Rub it in, why don't you?" he said and even with his mounting annoyance at the prospect of twenty four hours without seeing her, he was giddy. The Gala would be fine, he'd have Marinette to distract him from all the awful people and provide excuses for him to duck out of networking opportunities. Everything would be fine. He had his arms full of reasons that everything would be fine.

He tilted her chin up and pulling her into place so he could kiss her again, quick and smiling.

"Shall I walk you home?" he asked.

"So chivalrous! No, but I'll race you back to yours," she said with a mischievous grin. She wormed her way out of his grip and dropped over the edge of their perch. Of course she landed on a lower level without even wavering. His worry over dropping her had been completely unfounded. She leaned her elbow on a gargoyle's head and looked up at him to be sure he was following then she was off and running again.

He stared after her for too long before he realized he was going to lose any chance of catching up. He scrambled after her with an unshakable smile plastered across his face.


Author Notes because I am a chatty dork:

This chapter was no where in my outline. I was having a conversation with Gidge about Mari leaving and realized I hadn't really laid it out so I started writing a conversation that went into that a little more. There will eventually be another one where we get into what she told him in that letter and what she's been thinking for the last 5 years.

But still, this was all a surprise when I actually started writing it. ANGST, fluffy idiots playing tag, I got to look at so many pictures of Notre Dame to get this situated in my head and then I had no intention of there being kissing. I was planning on drawing out Adrien's angsty pining and wondering if the kiss was a one time thing but then I was writing and the kissing happened so I left it in because it made me happy and it's been like five chapters since there was any kissing, that's too long.

I would say we're about two thirds done at this point for those of you keeping score at home.

Also I am aware that updating on a Thursday morning while everyone is at work or school is probably not best but it's when I had the time. [Hi to the people who clicked through that alert email anyways, love you. Also to people who aren't in the Americas and live in mythical other time zones. I love you too.]