She didn't talk much after the Volpina incident.

For a few days straight, she barely said a word in class, hardly looked up from her desk, but to answer her teachers when they asked questions.

She was fuming and no one knew why, but they never really cared enough to find out. Her classmates were content to leave her to simmer on her own. Well, all except one.

The bell shrilly rang through the halls of the school, and kids began to pour out of their classrooms, the hush of the building giving away to the loud chatter of people discussing weekend plans. The young Italian girl gathered her notebooks and tablet together, slipping them neatly into the bag that lay nestled at her feet. She had just started to look up when she felt a light tap on her shoulder, presumably from another student or teacher. She glanced up with startled olive eyes, though the rest of her face was cloaked with a mask of calm, only to see Marinette Dupain-Cheng standing over her. A sheepish smile lingered on the girl's face, but before she could speak a word, Lila quickly cut her off with a sneer of her own.

"What do you want?" She huffed, and felt only a slight pang of remorse as Marinette's cheery demeanor fell.

"I ah.. I was wondering if you'd like to come over today." Ah, she surprised Lila Rossi once again. Her eyes flashed with shock, but then quickly narrowed in suspicion. No one had ever talked to her since she was proven to be a liar a few days ago, she immediately suspected that this girl wanted something from her. Being the daughter of diplomats, Miss Rossi was not unused to people acting nice to get what they want. Hey, she'd even done the same. That was the kind of world they lived in, and Lila would never forget it.

"Why?" She questioned her, soon standing up to look down at the slightly smaller girl. She knew she could be intimidating. She'd been intimidating as Volpina, and she could be intimidating again. It was in her, somewhere. So she glared down at the girl, and only felt somewhat surprised at this point when she realized that this girl would not easily back down. Marinette still stood tall, despite her shorter stature, and stuck out her chin defiantly with burning azure eyes that seemed to blaze right through her.

"I don't know you." The designer replied, only to have Lila look at her skeptically, waiting for an explanation for the odd statement. Marinette seemed to soften once again, her pout melting into that warm smile once more. Lila was almost taken aback by such a simple genuine gesture. It was never difficult to tell what Marinette was thinking, she figured, she wore her expressions too openly.

"But, I would like to."

Lila didn't speak for a moment, olive green eyes seeming to search and analyze every inch of that blue, looking for some evidence of a lie in her features.

Lila noticed then, that Marinette was not like Lila Rossi. She did not lie.

She was shockingly honest with her feelings.

"Alright." Lila said simply, reaching down to pick up her bag, slinging it over her shoulder. The other girl positively lit up with the quick affirmation, a grin splitting her features.

"Great! Let's go, I live right across the street!" She hooked her arm around Lila's, tugging the surprised girl along without a care in the world. She didn't mind the looks she got from other classmates along the way, even Alya and Nino, who Lila had learned to be some of her closest friends. She did not understand how someone could be so carefree. Lila knew that not many people, well, nobody really liked her. But she'd been standing tall, keeping up appearances. Marinette must know that being seen with someone like her, it could ruin the girl's reputation?

But as she was pulled along, Marinette's chatter buzzing in her ears, she slowly came to a realization.

Marinette Dupain-Cheng didn't care about appearances, did she?

A ghost of a smile danced on the Italian girl's lips, and Marinette clearly noticed, because she responded with a startling grin of her own.

"Do you like macarons?" The girl asked her excitedly, and Lila managed a small shy nod. This was clearly the right thing to do, because her chatter grew brighter as she pushed open the door to the small corner bakery. It wasn't too busy inside, but Lila was immediately enraptured by the soft sweet scent of pastries and bread, something which she noticed Marinette carried around with her wherever she went.

Her parents were rather similar to Marinette, in the fact that they were just as loud and friendly. Lila assumed that's where their daughter got it from.

They loaded down the two girls with a plethora of goodies. Cookies, macarons, croissants, anything you could possibly think of. Lila wasn't even sure if she knew all the names of the pastries her parents had passed off to them.

Hanging out with Marinette was just as she expected it to be. The girl was rather bubbly, she never stopped talking. And she asked questions to, hell, Lila almost felt like she was being interrogated. At least it came with snacks. Biting into a pistachio macaron, she looked up from her homework just as the girl asked another question.

"Are you okay?" Lila seemed confused by this. Why wouldn't she be okay? She was eating, she was listening, she'd answered all of Marinette's questions…

"I…" She fully intended to tell her that yes, she was perfectly fine. But she couldn't get the words out, they refused to slip past her lips. She hesitated, and that was all Marinette needed. The girl offered her a smile, not asking anything further.

"When you're ready to talk, I'm here, okay?" Olive green eyes widened ever so slightly, her heart fluttering in her chest at the sight of those bluebell eyes shining with concern, genuine concern, something that not even her parents gave her any longer. A blush rose, unbidden, to the Italian girl's cheeks, and she forced herself to look back down at her work, a small smile still on her lips.

"Okay."