Monday was the sixth day without a single text from Ladybug.

It was also the fourth since Marinette had stormed out of their office slamming the door behind her, leaving Adrien on his own to feel like a complete jerk.

Of course, she had been completely right. He had been so wrapped into his wild worries for his virtual friend that he treated poor Marinette rather unfairly. To be honest, a huge part of him wanted to chase after her the second she had walked out the door, apologize and make it up to her right away. But her very unlike her sudden burst of anger had startled him, making him freeze in his chair until she was long gone. He instead reluctantly set on letting her cool down in peace over the weekend, fully expecting her to show up understandably still upset with him, but maybe willing to listen to his apologies with a little luck.

But as the hours ticked by without her freckles coming through the door, it became more and more clear that she wasn't going to come to work.

At all.

As the clock struck noon, Adrien sighed in defeat and retrieved his jacket. He wasn't getting any work done anyway, his thoughts rambling at full speed. There was way too much on his mind to bother with numbers, statistics and probabilities. Screw the price/quality rate of Italian manufactured satin, he had more pressing matters to handle for the time being. The blond tried to keep his growing anxiety in check as he reached his car in the underground parking and scrolled up the data history of his GPS. Selecting Marinette's address he put the car into motion, he willed himself to stop thinking about Ladybug's sudden disappearance and focus on patching things up with Marinette.

He was worried sick about his SMS correspondent, as she had never gone MIA for more than twenty-four hours at a time without forewarning. The fact that she disappeared the same week she almost drunk dialed him and found out her new boss was her long lost love seemed too big of a coincidence to him, and it made an uneasy feeling pooling into his stomach. Could he have done something wrong to warrant that unexplained silence? Did he say anything too forward? Did she figure out who he was and was so disgusted by his identity she instead decided to vanish from his life without an explanation? Was she currently eloping with her boss, all memories of a SMS friendship long forgotten?

It made him painfully aware of just how fragile their relationship was. They fully depended on their phones to be in each other lives. Since his lady had been ignoring his text for the best part of the last week, he had no other means to reach her, to make sure she was okay. No address to show up at her place, no email to contact her in case something was wrong with her phone, not even a company or a place of work to quickly check on her. He didn't even have a name to look for. He had half a mind to hire someone to track her down with her phone number, or to go to every animal shelter in Paris asking if a young lady had adopted a ginger kitten in the last few weeks. But that would be disrespectful toward her and her desire to keep her identity to herself.

And if he was to be entirely honest with himself, all this secrecy was beginning to take its toll on him.

It was because of this nonsense he had jeopardized his friendship and his work relation with Marinette. He loved his virtual princess dearly, but he was painfully conscious the weird dysfunctional one-way relationship they had built together wasn't going to bud into something more anytime soon. Although he was a very patient man more than willing to wait for the right girl to be the first and hopefully the last in his life, seeing a close friend hurt because of a strictly virtual relationship was way too much of a price to pay, no matter how much Ladybug meant to him.

As he drove toward his upset colleague's place, he tried to figure out what he could even say to Marinette to help his case. Truth be told, she had every right to be mad at him, and he wanted nothing more than going back to the way things were the previous Tuesday. He should never have let his worries cloud his judgment and badly taint his relationship with the young designer.

He pulled over in front of Marinette's building, still trying to reign in his emotions that were all over the place. For a moment, he wished Nino wasn't away on his honeymoon. His best friend would've helped him to sort his feelings out, would've suggested ways to redeem himself in Marinette's eyes. After all, he knew her way better than he did. Alya probably would've chewed his head out for carelessly hurting her best friend, but would've helped him out fix things between them in the end. Still, he couldn't bring himself to bother either of them on their honeymoon. He was on his own, and probably had only one shot to make things right. Should he fail, he'd have to explain to his father that his very promising intern had fled the premises because of his own son's incompetence and unprofessionalism. Definitely a task he wasn't looking forward too.

He stood in front of her door almost twenty minutes, staring at the wooden panel as he tried to summon enough courage to knock on it. When Adrien finally managed to will his hand to ball up and knock three dry hits on the door, he heard a heavy sigh followed by her soft voice announcing:
"Coming!"
Paper ruffling sounds came to his ears before the door loudly creaked open. Adrien found himself speechless as he took in the dreamy sight before him. Marinette was barefoot, clad in only black yoga pants and a pink tank top. Her hair had been tied up into a messy bun, her bluebell eyes widening in astonishment as she saw him standing on her doorstep.
"Adrien? What are you doing here?"
He ignored her question, instead analyzing the scene behind her. A few Manilas folders were laying open all over her living room, with copies of her portfolio carefully stacked beside her couch. Panic taking over him, he gestured to the mess in her apartment:
"What were you doing?"

Marinette didn't answer right away. She carefully closed the door behind her, casually resting her back against it and crossing her arms over her chest. Her gaze on him was full of iciness, and her voice as she spoke was bland, deprived of any emotion:
"I'm filling out internships applications. I asked you first: what are you doing here?"
The young man scratched the back of his neck out of nervousness:
"Well… you didn't show up for work today so…"
The way Marinette raised her eyebrows as she looked him down made him feel like he was a three-year-old being scolded by his babysitter:
"Why in the world would've I showed up at Agreste today? I quit on Friday, remember?"
Adrien's mouth went dry as he scrambled to find a suitable answer:
"Well I… Mari, I thought that… maybe… you would… change your mind?"
She smirked, an expression that looked strangely out of place on her otherwise sweet face:
"Explain me why I should change my mind, Adrien? You've been nothing but a real jerk to me for more than half of my first week in your father's company."

The blond felt himself blush to the roots:
"You're right about that, and I'm sorry, okay? I've really been a huge idiot to you, and it was truly uncalled for, but I'm more than ready to make it up to you in any way you'd want me to."
Adrien had never seen such a guarded expression on Marinette's features ever since he had met her. Even when she had thought he had put gum on her seat back in high school she hadn't looked that distrustful toward him.
"Why should I even care?"
Adrien sighed:
"Come on, Mari. I'll do anything you want to make amends. It was wrong of me to take my emotions out on you and it won't happen ever again."
Sneering, Marinette sustained the green gaze:
"And?"
Ignoring her foul mood, Adrien went on:
"And, I would understand it you want nothing to do with me anymore. I can request my father to give you another project manager, move me to another building altogether if it helps. Just don't give up on your dreams because of me. I'm not anywhere worth it."

Marinette was still leaning on her door, her arms crossed defensively in front of her chest. Her Caribbean blue eyes were full of doubts:
"Stop playing around, Adrien. I've quit. Find yourself another intern to bully around."
The blond sighed:
"I'm not playing any game, Mari. I wronged you badly only because I was too stupid to realize my poor mood was affecting you. Let me fix it. Please?"
She didn't answer, sustaining his gaze which prompted him to push further:
"I'll do whatever I need to patch things up between us. I'll treat you to lunch, to a fancy dinner, I'll bring you a nice latte every morning, please forgive me and come back, Mari?"
Her silence was sheer torture to him. When she finally spoke, it was music to his ears:
"Okay."

Adrien felt like an overwhelming weight just had been lifted from his shoulders. He grinned widely and pulled her into a bone-crushing hug.
"Thank you. Thank you so much. So, state your price?"
Pulling back from him, Marinette's features softened and her lips twitched into a smirk:
"I think I'll take all three suggestions…"
His eyes glistened mischievously as he gasped loudly:
"My, you're getting greedy miss Dupain-Cheng!"
Her smile reached her bluebell eyes as it became obvious she had picked up on the friendly jab:
"Well, excuse me for actually enjoying myself!"
Recognizing the answer he had given her on their date-spree, Adrien knew that they were good, that she was willing to put the fight behind them.
"Just to be clear, the blackette added, I'm agreeing on both the lunch and the dinner because I happen to enjoy your company when you're not busy sulking like an emo teenager. However, I'm coming back to Agreste only because you bribed me with caffeine, which is really low for you since you're aware of my level of addiction to the thing. And I don't want another project manager, Adrien. I'm either doing this with you or not at all."
He sighed in relief, grinning so much his cheeks were beginning to hurt.
"But, Marinette punctuated with a finger playfully poking his chest, you have to promise me that the next time something bothers you, you either talk about it or leave it in your car."

Adrien felt elated and sheepish at the same time, a weird combo of emotions he had never felt together before then.
"I promise this won't ever again be a problem between us. Now, do you wanna change and put shoes on?"
Startled, Marinette looked at him quizzically:
"What? Why?"
Chuckling, Adrien gestured to her feet:
"Well, people might look at you funny if you walk into a restaurant barefooted. Not to mention I'm pretty sure it's against the dress code at Agreste."
"You wanna go right now?"
"Well, I'm hungry and I owe you a lunch, right? As well as a fancy dinner, but I'll have to make reservations for that one. Would Wednesday night be okay with you?"
Her laugh made his heart twitch in his chest.
"Alright then, I'll meet you downstairs. Give me five?"
Adrien nodded at her and watched the young lady retreat back to her apartment. As he went back to his car waiting for her, he found himself thinking that being with a girl like Marinette would be so much easier and pleasant than entertaining unrealistic fantasies about a faceless woman. These thoughts took him by surprise, and he wasn't really sure about what prompted them.

Five minutes later though, as Marinette exited her building he couldn't help but stare at her as she strolled casually toward his car. She had traded the yoga pants for black capris and had thrown a short sleeved jean jacket over her pink tank top. Pink ballerinas in her feet, she smiled widely at him as she slid on the passenger seat.

At that precise moment, Adrien realized just how much Marinette had a strong grip on his heart.