Disclaimer: I do not own Miraculous Ladybug at all. Anything you recognize is not mine.

The Bubbler

For once Adrien was not late. Recently there had been tons of akuma attacks before school, making it hard for him to get to school on time. Maybe Hawkmoth somehow knows it's my birthday so he decided to let up on the attacks? Adrien wondered. Nah, that would be just too weird. But maybe just this once I can have good luck.

"Sorry, but you're not going to have any good luck when you're around me, kid," Plagg said quite loudly, reading Adrien's mind. Adrien pushed Plagg back down into his bag.

"Stay quite Plagg. If you haven't noticed we're in PUBLIC" Adrien silently yelled to his kawami.

"Fine, I'll be quite, but just because it's your birthday" Plagg (finally) whispered.

"Thank you" Adrien whispered back as he vaulted up the stairs to his classroom.

At the moment, there was no one in the classroom. Practically no one ever arrived thirty minutes early, but Adrien wanted to get away from his gloomy house as soon as possible today. He pulled out his phone and connected to the school's Wi-Fi. He pulled up the web app, and the Ladyblog immediately popped up. There were no new posts since last night, but Adrien still scrolled to the latest article and read it for about the eighth time. "Maybe I can see my lady today," he murmured, finishing the article.

"What did you say Bro?"

Adrien looked up and an instant smile spread across his face. "Hey Nino. How are you?"

Nino threw his school bag onto the table and slid onto the bench beside Adrien. "Pretty fine. How about you, Birthday Boy?" Nino slapped Adrien on the back in a brotherly way and slid him a small wrapped present.

"Oh, Nino you didn't have to do that!" Adrien eagerly unwrapped the present and in his hands lay some Ladybug themed earphones. "They're awesome!" It was his first present that a friend had ever given him, and they were amazing.

"Yeah, I saw these in a store and I just knew you would like them. You can never stop talking about Ladybug, so I thought these would be perfect." Nino smiled as Adrien's face lit up like a kid's on Christmas morning

"Thank you." The two good friends fist bumped.

"Hey, did you understand our physics homework last night? I completely didn't understand it…" Nino pulled out his crumpled homework and started to ramble. Adrien tried to listen, but his eye caught a flicker by the door. Looking up he saw Marinette fall into the classroom with Alya close behind. Judging by both of their faces, Alya had been the one to playfully push Marinette inside.

Adrien's eyes focused on Marinette. Her face was in a scowl as she stuck her tongue out at Alya. She's kind of cute when she's angry, Adrien thought. Marinette turned, saw Adrien, and a sudden redness was splashed onto her face. She smiled weakly to Adrien and waved a little. Realizing he was staring, Adrien mentally shook himself and returned the smile and the wave.

When Adrien returned to helping Nino, he couldn't help but notice that Marinette was holding something behind her back. She looked like she hesitated by his seat when she made her way to hers, but it was kind of normal by now, so he dismissed it.

000

The morning continued, and Adrien noticed that Marinette was acting even more odd than normal around him. He even asked her if anything was wrong when they were working on their history project, but she just said that it was nothing, or what he judged was nothing. Adrien had found out early in their friendship that her words would always come out a jumbled mess, so it was his job to unscramble them. He thought that he was getting pretty good at it.

As school let out for lunch, Adrien again noticed her behavior, but his thoughts were soon answered.

He and Nino were waiting on the front steps of the school for his ride home when Marinette suddenly leaped out of nowhere.

"Um, hey!" Marinette squeaked and did the same wave that she had done earlier in the day. Adrien paused for a second, then copied her movements. "Hey." She stood there shifting from foot to foot then said "I uh….hehehe, I want to , um gift you a make! I mean, gift you a gift I made. I mean-" Chloe pushed Marinette down onto the ground and took her place.

"Adrikins!" Adrien inconspicuously took a deep breath and calmed his anger. As Chloe talked, he just nodded his head; his mind was somewhere else.

It's obvious that Marinette wanted to give me something for my birthday. Why did Chloe have to push her out of the way? She may be a childhood 'friend' but I can't let her do that. Adrien carefully pushed himself away from Chloe and waved to Nino. He got into his limo and thought to himself. I'll have to make it up to Marinette someday, but right now I think I need to worry about Nino. I really hope he won't do something stupid to get my father to listen.

000

As Adrien went to bed for the evening, he grabbed the scarf that he had gotten for his birthday and dove his nose into the soft, knit fabric. It was amazing that his father had given him this wonderful present. Although, in reality, Adrien knew that it was Nathalie who had arranged to get the present. His father had no doubt just told his assistant to get his son a present and give it to him, but Adrien still appreciated the thought.

One thing that Adrien loved about this year's present was that this present was so unlike the presents he had gotten in years passed. For the past few years he had gotten pen after pen, so it was amazing to get something different. Adrien fiddled with the tassels and his eye noticed a silvery thread on the inside of the scarf. He delicately turned the scarf over and stared closely at the silvery thread. A name was written in the silver thread, and it definitely was not his father's signature.

Hey readers! Here is the next chapter! I found it was really hard to find a story idea for this episode because there's not really any smut to read into. For the first few episodes the writers toned down the shipping a lot, but I eventually found something. Thank you so much for the support on the last chapter, I really appreciated it. I have a plan to publish a chapter everyday, but I don't know how that will work out. Again feel free to comment, follow, and favorite. And thank you for reading my story. TTFN