"Sweetie, you do have a home, right?" Her light green-blue eyes were wide with worry, "Are you a runaway?"
Marinette shivered as turned her attention to the woman, feeling Tikki's paw against her heart, reassuring her, and helping her know whether it really would be okay. Without Tikki, she wasn't sure what she'd do in this city so far from home.
"I-I'm not a runaway?" She tried to say it the way the woman had, rolling off the tongue, stumbling though not by too much, "I-I have no home here." Marinette hoped that sounded okay; she always felt less comfortable trying to speak English without Tikki with her, making the language roll off of her tongue easier. Tikki had been many places before, learned many languages, and never had Ladybug felt more grateful for that than now. What little she remembered from English class with no real confidence to speak was her lifeline when she wasn't transformed.
She knew the basics, but not by a whole lot.
"Where are you from?" The woman sat down by her side, and she could tell that the woman understood somehow that Marinette didn't belong in New York at all.
"France." She stammered, remembering the English word for her home country just barely, "Paris." They did say it the same way, right? If not, hopefully they understood the way, the almost affectionate way, that she'd just named her home city.
"Oh," The woman murmured, "You're lost." It's the simple way that she says it, and somehow Marinette likes that tone of voice, the slight inflection, the kind of deep pain that doesn't seem to need voiced too much, "I'm Edna-Naomi." When the woman smiles, Marinette can see the lines on her face with how often she must have smiled even younger.
"Yeah, I'm lost." Marinette tries out, and then tries to find just the right words to go on, "I-I am Marinette." She stammers and hopes that that says enough about her without saying much at all.
"Marinette." The woman says, and it's so simple and yet kind of sweet. "Here." Edna stands up as she goes back over to her husband, speaks to him for a moment, and comes back over with some bread that they must have baked from the bakery.
She's not quite sure exactly what the woman wants to give her until she comes back, "Bread." She smiled, "I can set you up a place to sleep at? I'd hate to see you freezing on that park bench."
Marinette isn't sure whether the woman's just an angel in disguise or if she's somehow a lot like her parents probably would have been. Her parents would have made sure that if someone was starving or really hungry, they'd feed them. It wasn't too much of a stretch for them to offer a place to stay if someone needed one, and they knew that the person wouldn't hurt them.
"Y-Yes, Edna." She can feel Tikki's reassuring presence near her heart, and it's enough to make her feel just a little bit more confident. Tikki would have let her know if she couldn't trust this woman.
"William's my husband." She smiled, and somehow Marinette could see the kindly face of a mother in her though she wasn't sure if that was her homesick heart speaking or not. Edna led the way, and Marinette with Tikki's reassuring warmth and the memory of when the woman and her husband had given her some sweets yesterday fresh on her mind, she followed.
Marinette still when she looked up saw her mother somewhere in Edna's light brown-blond hair that was quickly fading to gray, and her father in the tall-ish man that they were walking towards. Even though they didn't look quite like her parents, something about them reminded her strongly of Sabine and Tom.
The room upstairs would not be ready before tomorrow as they moved their daughter's stuff carefully away and tried to make room for Marinette to eventually sleep up there though for now they'd pulled down some old blankets and adjusted the pillows on the couch for Marinette to sleep on.
The whole house smelled like Marinette's bakery home with the rich smell of bread wafting through the air even to the apartment and the sweet smell of chocolate and sugar and the homey-familiar smell of flour. It was bittersweet, because even though it smelled so much like home, it wasn't at all her home.
Tikki only nestled closer to her chest until finally the lights were out with an early bedtime for the baking couple, so that they'd be up to open their bakery and start baking come morning time when tired men and women would swing by for a sweet boost to start their day off.
The couch felt heavenly compared to the bench that she'd already slept on twice, and as Tikki slipped out to properly speak to her, Marinette wasn't entirely sure if she'd started crying or just felt about ready to.
"Marinette, it will be okay." Tikki nuzzled up against her cheek and sent an encouraging smile her way, "They seem nice, and besides Cat Noir and Master Fu are working hard to bring you back home. I'm sure of it."
Marinette smiled at her Kwami though if it was a little wilted and a lot more sad than she'd intended, Tikki didn't say a word about it. The teenager felt tired from every inch of her bones and then some. She felt like she needed a long nap and a chance to finally feel well rested for once since she'd came here.
If she couldn't do a morning patrol tomorrow, hopefully Spiderman will be none the wiser. Marinette wasn't sure if she really wanted to get to know him any better when all that she could think about was wanting to get back home, of trying to find a way back, and of the Akuma that ended her halfway decent day back home and made everything feel like one, big, disappointing mess.
The Fictional Seer wasn't an easy Akuma by a long shot though she wished that her Lucky Charm would have given her some kind of clue before then and yet it hadn't, just kind of served as a warning that she hadn't heeded.
A small sign had fallen into her hand, and Marinette couldn't bother as the memory came to mind to try to read what it had said, something in English no doubt, that she hadn't really understood back then. She didn't feel like she had near enough energy to actually try to remember what those words meant on that sign, to remember every last detail of that dreadful Akuma fight that led her worlds and miles away from her home, her warm bed, her loving parents, her faithful partner, and her best friends.
New York felt nothing like Paris to her, not when she was lost, and all that she wanted was home.