Big, bold red letters stared at Marinette and Adrien.

CLOSED.

It's been three months since the two of them had become workout buddies. They knew a temporary closure was to be expected, but they didn't expect it to be so soon.

"Equipment checks and changes. Closed for a week, kids," said a man with a clipboard.

"No gym for a week?" Marinette repeated. She gestured to Adrien with a look of worry on her face. "But monsieur, my friend will get flabby if he doesn't go to gym at least once every three days. Look, it's already starting!"

Marinette turned to Adrien and began poking and pinching his arm to prove her point.

"For your information, I'm shredded," Adrien insisted, flexing his biceps with an exaggerated pose and puffing his cheeks, making Marinette laugh.

The man gave him an amused look and smiled at Marinette. "My colleagues and I will try to work as quickly as we can, miss."

Marinette and Adrien thanked the man, who chuckled at the two of them before saying goodbye and entering the gym, getting right to work.

"So what do we do now?" asked Marinette once the man was gone.

"We should go get some ice cream."

"The flabbiness begins."

Adrien laughed loudly and held Marinette's hand, pulling her along and chuckling at her attempts to come up with unrealistic reasons as to why he was the one who caused the closure of the gym.

Marinette, of course, was just doing that as a cover to hide her excitement and glee over being invited for ice cream and holding hands with Adrien. She wished Alya could see her now – that girl would be proud.

"I knew it."

Adrien and Marinette were walking to the park, ice cream in hand. "Knew what?" Marinette asked.

"That you liking strawberry flavoured ice cream was a myth."

Laughing, Marinette said, "It isn't a myth. I do like strawberry. I just happen to think that rocky road looks a lot more appetising today."

Adrien looked at her, nodding in agreement. Her ice cream did look incredibly delicious. But, his was better. He had bought chocolate flavour and asked for two flat biscuits. Then he stuck each biscuit to the ice cream so that the sides pointing out were triangular in shape, resembling cat ears. When it was done, he showed it to Marinette with pride.

She had burst out laughing in the ice cream shop at the sight of Adrien's ice cream and his excited face. Marinette thought it was both adorable and unfortunate that he had a thing for cats.

They sat on a bench once they got to the park and watched in quiet contentment at the younger children playing around them. Adrien sighed suddenly.

"What is it?" Marinette asked.

"Nothing," he shrugged. "Just thinking about an old memory."

Marinette inched closer to him and stared at him with a look of profound interest, a way of coaxing him to go on. He laughed at the look on her face and relented.

"When I was little," he began carefully, "my mum used to drag me and my dad out to the park. She was always complaining how we didn't get enough sun. Dad was always in the studio working, and I was always in my room, forever occupied with something new and different every day.

"So she would drag us out – literally grabbing our hands or shirts and pulling us out the door," he laughed at the memory. "We would always pretend that we couldn't move every time she dragged us. That made her laugh. I think we did that because we loved hearing her laugh."

He paused, smiling sadly. "When we got to the park, all we would do all day was laugh. My parents brought along a tiny radio sometimes, and they would dance to old songs while I ran around chasing cats and butterflies. It didn't seem like much, but those days were the best days of my life."

Marinette cautiously put a hand over Adrien's. "She must have been very lovely."

"She was," Adrien smiled. He looked at Marinette, into her deep blue eyes that spilled of comfort and friendship and something else… love? Has it always been there?

A few moments passed. Adrien blinked himself out of Marinette's gaze and laughed nervously. "I've never told anyone that before. I don't talk about my mum all that much. It still hurts. It hurts to think about her and what was lost, what could have been, and what had become."

"That's because you're associating her with negative thoughts. What you told me about her and your family just now, that came from a place of love. That's where you should keep and remember her. Her memory doesn't have to bring you pain," Marinette said gently. Adrien stared at her and considered it.

"You're right," he agreed, nodding with a smile. "Thank you, Marinette."

Marinette couldn't speak another word because of the way Adrien was looking at her, so she returned his gratitude with a nod. Adrien sensed her tensing up, something he was able to detect after a few weeks of spending time with her. He smiled warmly and nudged her, "Deep down inside, you're a wise old man aren't you?"

Marinette laughed, her nervousness dissipating as quickly as it came. "You finally figured out why I'm so much more mature than you!"

"Hey, I'm pretty mature too."

"Says the person who gave his ice cream cat ears."

"Is it just me or are you sparkling today?" Ladybug asked Chat Noir. Night had fallen, and her black cat had been beaming as brightly as the stars the entire time they were on patrol.

"Sparkling? That's one way to put it."

"You get what I mean. Now come on, tell me what it is that's got you smiling so much."

They were sitting on top of a rooftop, a tall but secluded one that gave them a good view of the streets below. Chat Noir sighed and stared up at the stars gleaming above them. "A friend brought me comfort today over something that I never thought I could ever be comforted about."

Ladybug smiled. "That must be a really special friend."

"Yeah," Chat Noir said after a moment. He smiled too. "She is."

She? Ladybug felt her stomach twist into knots. She tried swatting the feeling away, knowing exactly what it was and desperately wanting the green bug to leave her. In fact, she didn't even know why the green bug was here in the first place. She has never thought of Chat Noir in that way. They had their moments, especially when Chat Noir made jokes that genuinely made Ladybug laughed. Or when he comforts her when she cries and feels weak and vulnerable, and he still admires her and thinks of her as the strongest person he knows. Ladybug doesn't know what she would do without Chat Noir. He means a great deal to her.

She glanced over at him and watched how the moonbeams cast a soft glow on his features. He suddenly looked so distant from Ladybug, and she almost shifted closer to him to close the distance between them.

"Does she mean a lot to you?" Ladybug asked quietly. She didn't want to, but she desperately wanted to know.

Chat Noir stared at her oddly. "She's beginning to. But, she's putting me in a difficult place."

Ladybug felt her heart lighten. "Really? Why?"

"I don't know how to explain it because I don't quite understand it myself," Chat Noir admitted. He looked into Ladybug's eyes and saw nothing but confusion and warmth and… love. Strange, he thought, has it always been there?

He sighed, sadly this time, and tore his eyes away from hers. "I feel like I'm trapped in between the sky and the sea, and I don't know if I should fly or swim."

Ladybug stared at him. He knew she understood what he meant. That his feelings for Ladybug were clearly real and prevalent, and that he was beginning to have feelings for his friend.

Ladybug understood this feeling too.

There was a pause between them, and in the distance, Ladybug swore she could hear the sky and the sea beginning to weep.

"The sky," she whispered with a small smile suddenly. "Aren't cats afraid of water?"

Chat Noir chuckled quietly. "You're right. The problem is, which one is which? They are far too alike; I can't tell the difference."

Ladybug sighed. "I feel like you're speaking in riddles today."

Chat Noir leaned back and looked up again. "It must be because of the stars."

The rain started pouring when they parted. Ladybug slid into her room and shook wet droplets from her hair and clothes. Tikki stared at her friend worriedly and asked, "Chat Noir isn't the only one who can't choose between two people, is he?"

Marinette walked over to her bed and laid down, resting her arm over her eyes. She was tired and upset.

"He's stuck between the sky and the sea, I'm stranded between green, rolling hills."

"What are you going to do?"

"I don't know."

"I heard Chat Noir has an 8-pack. That he's shredded." … or something like that.