Miraculous
The Tales Of Ladybug And CatNoir
Creation
Chapter Three
The Small Box
The dreaded chiming of the alarm clock went off as Mariette layed down on her bed, sticking her pillow in her face trying to keep the sun away. Mariette groaned as she began to get up from her slumber, hitting her head on the roof of her room and fling her pillow across the room, nearly hitting her alarm clock while doing so.
"Ugh, how can summer vacation be over already." she lamented to herself as she clumsily climbed down the stairs needed to reach her bed. Upon reaching the floor, being extra careful not to trip on thin air on her way down, she sat on the pink swirly chair that father bought her one year for her birthday along with the fancy smooth sewing table that had unorganised stacks of expensive fabric on top. Upon her wall was a slanted poster of a rockstar named Jagged Stone that was being held up by some old tape. To say that Mariette was an unorganised person would be an understatement, Mariette couldn't even remember that last time she saw the floor without it being obscured by some kind of paper from a scrape design for a graphic tee. The pink slanted walls of her room were covered in childhood drawings and photos, with shelves nailed into the sides holding some of her childhood toys such as the ponies that she and a classmate of hers named Rose would collect. To this day the two of them still found themselves adding more to that collection. Mariette opened her makeup box, a beautiful handcrafted round box that her Chinese uncle bought her, and pulled out a wooden hand mirror.
"I knew that I shouldn't have showered before bed last night." Mariette said to herself as she pulled out her hairbrush in an attempt to do damage control on her messy mop of hair that she had going on. After a bit of a fight Mariette managed to get all of her hair down into her signature pigtails, well all except for her at this point signature cowlick that always sat promptly on her head, no matter what she tried that piece of hair would never sit still. Mariette stood up and started heading towards the trap door that hid the entrance to her room. The ladder that led to her room was always one of her favourite things to play with as a child. Unlike normal stairs, a ladder felt like it could lead to anywhere you could want it to. Sometimes it would lead to the deck of a ship, other times it would be the secret entrance to a jungle tree house. But now, nearly ten years later, it was a normal ladder.
"Good morning, mom." Mariette said in a tired, yet cheery tone.
Mariettes mother was a thoughtful and elegant woman. unlike Mariette, who stumbles across the kitchen before, clumsily pulling towards the kitchen table. Her mother gracefully glides towards it with a heavy basket of laundry in her hands, like an olympic ice skater there is no signs of mistakes or weakness in her movements. Mariette had always aspired to be more like her mother. After all, if she could move with that same confidence and grace she had, Mariette knew that she would be able to handle the growing responsibilities of life that only seemed to be becoming more prominent as the days went on. That said, after spilling yet another glass of milk onto the floor again she knew that she had a long way to go.
As Mariette was pulling off some paper towels from the was dwelling roll they had by the stove, her father entered the room with his face covered in flour and a cheerful smile plastered to his face.
"Let me guess, the diverary man placed it on the high self again?" Mariette's mother asked.
The tall bulky man laughed and nodded. Despite looking like her mom, it was clear that Mariette inherited her dads more clumsy soul. And although Mariette loved her father very much the flaws were also very clear. Flour bags lay everywhere around the house, so much so that if you wanted to arrive anywhere clean you were better off changing using the restroom of the park across the street then you would be changing anywhere in this house. Mariette's father walked up to the two girls, putting one arm around Mariette and another arm around his wife, covering them both in the white flour that had already covered himself.
"So how are my two favourite ladies?" he asked, lovingly
Mariettes mother laughed cheekily, "Same as always honey."
"And how about you, Mariette? Are you ready for another year of school?"
Mariette pulled herself out of his arms and flunked herself onto the table, "No." she responded, "No I am not."
Mariette's parents laughed at her as she lifted her upper body up from the table.
"Well if it makes you feel better I never was all that fond of the day after summer vacation all that much either." Mariettes dad said chipperly
Mariette laughed, "And why would that make me feel better?" She asked sassily
Marette and her mother laughed while her father scrambled for words.
"Well, to make you feel less lonely, I guess." He stumbled.
Mariette's mother smiled, "And did you not hear the overly long conversation that Mariette had with Alya about dreading school?"
"And Neno." Mariette Added.
Mariette's father stared at the two ladies and shook his head. Mariette's mother shook her head.
"This is what happens when you overwork yourself." She said "And somehow despite you taking your required breaks you're always overworking yourself."
The family talked a bit as Mariette finished her breakfast. As Mariette grabbed her school bag the chimes of the door jingled from the bakery down stairs.
Mariettes mother looked confused. "That's odd," She said curiously, " We don't usually get customers this early in the morning."
"I'll handle it!" Mariette said, "I am already going down there anyway, Alya is going to drive me to school."
"Drive you to school? Why Alya isn't old enough to drive!" Mariette's mother said sternly
"She got a scooter buggy recently." Mariette answered happily, "She told me that we are going to test it out!"
Mariette's mother gave her a considered look, "Oh honey, are you sure that going to school on a scooter buggy is safe?" she asked softly, "I would hate for anything to happen to either of you two girls."
Mariette smiled, "Don't worry mom," she said cheerfully, "Neno and I saw her ride it over the summer. She is a natural! I am sure that I would be just fine with her."
"Oh, I don't know honey. It's one thing to practise on an empty road, but it's a whole nother thing to ride out on the busy streets like today." Mariettes mother said.
Mariette's father smiled, "Oh Sabine, she will be fine. I used to ride around with my friends on their actual motorbikes when I was her age."
Sabine looked over at her husband with a defeated glance, "But Tom," she started before looking at Mariette who was giving her a hopeful glance.
"Alright then," She said, "But you better wear a helmet!"
"Don't worry about it mom." Mariette said chipperly while picking up a light pink helmet from the rack. "I am already on it!"
Mariette gave both of her parents a swift kiss on the cheek before promptly running down towards the bakery.
"Oh yeah, Mariette! I baked some Macarons for you to share with your class this morning!" He shouted down towards her. "They are on the counter. Are you sure you dont need me to come down with you?" He asked
"No, I'm good!" Mariette confidently responded, "After all I am just as clumsy as you, aren't I?"
Mariettes parents rolled their eyes and laughed.
"She gets the sas from you." Her mother stated.
The two of them laughed some more as Mariette reached the bottom of the stairs and entered into the bakery.
The bakery was connected through the first floor of their house. There's something about waking up to the fresh smell of croissants in the morning that her family couldn't resist. The art of baking had flown through Mariettes father's side of the family for centres now. Her dad makes bread, her grandad makes bread, her great grandad makes bread, when you would look at her family tree the art of making bread was inescapable. Mariette walked up to the counter, wiping off the flour on her shoulder as she went.
"Welcome to the Dupain-Cheng Bakery! What can I get for you today?"
When she looked down she was surprised to find an oddly familiar looking old man with sunglasses covering his eyes. Mariette stared at him for a moment, pondering where she had seen him before. But ultimately, she was unable to come to any conclusion about this man.
"Excuse me miss."
Mariette jumped slightly, using the counter to stop herself from falling on the floor.
"I am so sorry about that." Mariette said sheepishly, "I zoned out there for a minute. Is there anything I can get you?"
"A bag of croissants please." The man answered.
Mariette nodded and began searching the counters for the paper bags, as she did this the old man started searching for something himself, eventually pulling out an oddly shaped wallet full of cash with a weird circleish shape seemingly inside of it.
Mariette used the tongs nearby to fish out croissants from the display case. Mariette began to turn back towards the man.
"That will be 15.00 Euros-"
When she turned around the old man was nowhere to be seen, Mariette stood there confused for a moment before coming around the counter to get a further look.
"Um, hello?" She asked curiously
The bakery was empty, outside of her own voice there wasn't a sound to be made.
"That's strange…" Mariette wondered out loud.
Mariette moved around the counter, the old man had truly vanished from the room with no trace to be found. Mariette's stomach flopped as she slowly moved around the room.
"Everything is fine," She said quietly,
Mariette continued chanting as she skipped around the bakery. Although Mariette wouldn't have admitted it to even her closest friends she definitely still believed in ghosts and such to some degree and what that strange old man did fell under that definition.
"This is all fine," Mariette continued chanting.
As Mariette began to finally start calming down she glanced over at the full bag of croissants on the counter.
"What am I going to do with these?" Mariette said "I can't just put them back, once the pastries are out of the display case you can't just put them back in. First rule of baking my dad taught me."
Mariette chuckled a bit before grabbing the bag, "More for me and Alya I guess.
Mariette walked up to the counter grabbing the bag of croissants as she straightened out her backpack.
"Ring! Ring! Ring!"
"Gah!"
Mariette jumped up in the air, it was clear that despite stopping her chanting she wasn't anywhere near calm yet. As she grabbed onto the counter in an attempt to ground herself back onto the ground her feet slid across the smooth tile floors until one of them hit an oddly sharp object. Mariettes grip began to fumble and as she bent over in an attempt to get a better look at the mysterious, sharp, object on the floor she stumbled over face first somehow launching both the bag of croissants and the small sharp object fifty feet in the air as well.
As Mariette fumbled onto the young girl with black glasses who had just entered from the door threw the red bike helmet that she was carrying aside and quickly jumped up with an athletic air of grace to catch the flying bag of croissants in the air before quickly putting it down to play with the glasses on her face.
"Nice catch!" Mariette said to the now smug girl who had finished playing with her glasses.
"Nice box!" She answered back
Mariette stared at her with a confused look on her face.
"What box?" She asked.
"Um, the one right beside your left hand?" She answered.
Mariette picked herself up off of the ground and grasped the small box before placing it up on the counter before getting a closer look at it.
"This isn't my box?" she said out loud.
"Did you steal it?" the glasses girl asked
"No! Of course I didn't steal it?" Mariette groned "Why would I steal a box?"
The glasses girl shrugged, "I don't know? But it looks cool!"
Mariette stared down the small wooden box, it seemed to be covered in a thick black paint and seemingly had a red, jewel infused, Chinese, design on the top.
"Did you make it?" the glasses girl asked.
"No, I just finished saying that this isn't my box, Alya." Mariette responded.
"Oh, right. Well, if this isn't your box then where did it come from?"
"Hmm…" Mariette started to think. "Well my guess would be that it must be that old man's box."
"Who is the old man?" Alya asked
"I don't know." Mariette responded, "You see, he ordered the bag of croissants that you are holding right now before vanishing without a trace."
"Wow, what a score!" Alya said excitedly, her wavy hair flew in the air as she jumped up in an almost victory pose like fashion. "That box itself must be worth a lot, I can easily see it being sold for a couple hundred in an antique shop. And don't even get me started on what may be inside of that box, probably some kind of fancy, expensive jewellery."
"We can't just open it Alya. We need to find the man that this box belongs to and return it."
Alya rolled her eyes, "I understand that you're a goody two shoes Mariette, but 2.15 million people live in Paris. And this guy that the box seems to belong to just disappeared out of nowhere, there is no realistic way that we can possibly find this guy and return his box to him."
"That's a fair point, I guess. Well then maybe we can give it to the police! Sabrina's father is the chief of police. Maybe we can catch them on the way to school."
"Ooo, now those are some cute earrings!" Alya exclaimed.
"What no! Alya, don't open that!" Mariette exclaimed.
"A bit too late for that," Alya joked, "Besides, they would look absolutely great on you! Why not wear them?"
Mariette rolled her eyes, "Because they aren't mine. I am not a thief! Now give those back!"
Alya closed the box and held it up in the air just out of Mariette's reach. Mariette jumped around Alya as she made the box dance around her, which really only humoured Alya and encouraged her to do it more.
Mariette groned at her best friend, giving her an easy to spot stink eye in the process, Alya realising that the game was done tossed the box towards Mariette who clumsily caught it in her hands. Alya then picked the box of baked goods, and the pink biking helmet to place it promptly on Mariettes head.
"Well since you're so desperate to give that box back we should probably get going to school so we don't end up missing Sabrina's dad."
Mariette strapped the buckle of her helmet and placed the box into her carefully crafted purse, and followed Alya outside towards the orange scooter buggy that was tipped out onto the sidewalk beside its lane.
Mariette's face palmed into her hands, "I am going to be in so much trouble if mom saw this." She groaned.
Alya playfully bumped her shoulder, "Oh come on, it's fine." she said cheerfully while picking the bike up into its proper position, playing the box of baked goods in its carrying holder. "Come on, let's ride already!"
Mariette cautiously got onto the scooter, which then proceeded to start bolting milliseconds after she got on.
"Woah-Oh-OH!" Mariette exclaimed, "Why are we going so fast? We aren't in that much of a rush!"
"But don't you just love the feeling of wind in your hair!" Alya exclaimed, "It makes me feel so alive!"
"But you're breaking the speed limit!" Mariette replied, "Your monitor is over 150 miles per hour!"
"So? Were teenagers, Mariette! Double blazing, fast racing, excitement seeking teenagers?" Alya said coily
"While this, Double blazing, fast racing, excitement seeking teenager, would really like to survive until adulthood." Mariette said.
Alya looked over at Mariette, "Ha, ha, ha! Look at your face!"
Mariette stared at the open road ahead, around the corner a blue car was coming into view. A red haired boy sat in the shotgun seat.
"Alya…" Mariette said worriedly
"Oh come on Mariette, if you could see yourself you would be laughing too!"
"Alya!" Mariette shouted.
"What?" Alya exclaimed angrily
"CAR!" Mariette yelled
Alya looked over towards the front of the road, the blue car was now fully in view and they were heading quickly towards it. Alya quickly hit the breaks before making a sudden turn towards a local restaurant. Alya somehow managed to squirm the scooter up the restaurant's many stairs and started to drive up on its open air dining balcony where many fancy, rich, couples were enjoying an overpriced breakfast. Alya drove quickly, swerving through the tables and chairs as the rich customers of the restaurant began to start gathering away from their seats and out of the way of the scooter. While the chaos ensued a fat small chef guy entered the area. Upon seeing the scene, the little man jumped up several feet in the air, the many croissants that he was holding up proudly on a stainless silver plate went flying. Alya lifted her hand in the air and caught one before handing it over to Mariette who just stared at her in shock as Alya drove the two of them off the balcony and onto the road again.
Regaining herself from the state of fear and shock, Mariette began to yell.
"What the Hell was that!" She asked angrily.
"Your breakfast." Alya said in an innocent voice.
"Not the croissant!" Mariette exclaimed, "that entire scene you just made by driving your scooter on the balcony of one of the most expensive restaurants in Paris!"
"Oh that?" Alya said coily, "That was my plan to get you not to talk to the chief of police so you would be forced to keep those cute little earrings and let some unprofound miracle happen for once in your life."
Mariette rolled her eyes, "Oh please, Alya. We may be best friends but I am not the person who would let anybody get away with a stunt like that."
Alya laughed, "What are you? A superhero or something? Alya stopped laughing and put up a coy smile on her face. "If you told the police your mom would definitely be hearing about our little adventure. Do you even want to think about the punishment that you would have to face after being a part of such a stunt?"
Mariette gave Alya the stink eye as Alya stared back at her with a mischievous gleam that said it all.
"Good, I am glad that we are both in agreement." Alya said, "Now eat your croissant, we have got to get rid of the evidence somehow."
Alya pushd the croissant into Mariettes mouth who begrudgingly started eating it."
"Hay! This is just a three day old croissant from the bakery!" Mariette exclaimed.
Alya laughed, "Well I guess they had to put the quality in their overpriced meal somehow."
"Yeah right, they couldn't even be bothered to properly store them to make sure that they don't go stale."
The two girls laughed, "While you better eat your stale croissant fast, we're almost there."
Maritte quickly finished eating as a large sandstone building came into view. Alya drove the two of them over to the parking area and parked the scooter a lot more elegantly then she did back at Mariette's house.
"Alright then. Where's Sabrina…"
Alya stared at Mariette in shock, "Wow, you are actually about to rat me out to the police and face the wrath of your mother. You have completely lost it."
"What! No, of course I am not going to do that! I've had enough excitement for one day." Mariette said, "I am just going to give him the box to take to the police station, after all I don't really see how your plan was going to really stop me from giving it to the police to begin with, or how you could have planned for any of that to happen in the first place."
Alya crossed her arms, "Dangit she noticed." She whispered under her breath.
Mariette laughed sweetly, "Come on, let's go give this box to the police."
"Fine," Alya said sadly, "It is the right thing to do I guess."
The two girls walked towards the building, the outside of the school was oddly empty, usually there would be twenty or so kids arriving but this wasn't the case today.
"Well I'll be, little miss Dupain-Cheng is actually early for once."
A blonde girl sat on the stairs above Mariette and Alya, a bright red head with glasses sat beside her. Mariette's eyes rolled, there was nobody who she could recognize better than Chole Bourgeois. The two girls have always had a complicated relationship, when they were little it was common for them to compete for Adriens attention, as he was Choles only real friend at the time and she was worried about being replaced. But as the years went on the two of them mellowed out and their rivalry over Adrien did too. It was shortly after Chole befriended Sabrina, the redhead sitting next to her on the stairs, that the pranks and stuff that they would play on to each other turned more into a fun and game then active bullying like it used to be. The two girls would currently not call each other friends, no matter how many years go by Mariette still hated Chole's gut and superiority attitude, and Chole still thought that Mariette was only half as talented as herself, but the two of them currently wouldn't call each other enemies either.
"I guess that Mariette must've forgotten how to be late." Chole said smugly.
"No more than you have learned to be early." Mariette replied.
"I overheard something about you wanting to talk to Sabrina's father, are you finally going to turn yourself in."
Mariette laughed, "No, I just had a lost box that I wanted to turn in."
Sabrina shook her head, "Sorry Mariette, daddy didn't drop me off at school today. He said that he had an extremely important meeting today that he just couldn't miss."
"Oh," Mariette said.
"YES!" Alya exclaimed, "Now you get to actually accept that great things can randomly happen to you and keep the really cute earrings!"
"Cute earrings!" The two girls exclaimed.
"Yeah, check them out!"
Alya grabbed Mariettes bag.
"Hay cut that out!" Mariette said loudly
and took the box out and opened it presenting it to the two girls.
"Wow those are cute!" Sabrina exclaimed.
"No kidding! Why would anyone ever want to give such beauties back?" Chole asked.
"Because it's the right thing to do?" Sabrina said sheepishly.
Chole and Alya stared at her before laughing their heads off.
"You poor thing, has your father intimated you so much that you can't even appreciate when a ripe opportunity is right in front of you?"
Sabrina gave her an intimated smile, Chole laughed again.
"Tell you what, I am going to take the two of us shopping next weekend! We'll get some nice cute jewellery as well as some clothes, hopefully something with a little less stripes. Really though, what does my father think I am? A wasp?"
The three girls laughed, Mariette chuckled a bit from the melody of their sounds alone.
Upon hearing Mariettes laugh, Chole was suddenly reminded of something serious she needed to talk to her about.
"Hay, Mariette. Do you mind coming here for a moment?"
Mariette walks over to Chole, Sabrina and Alya look at each other.
"First prank of the year?"
"I don't know, she didn't say anything about it on the way here."
"Why would she say anything on the way here?"
"She usually tells me everything on our way here."
Chole rolled her eyes and led Mariette down towards the sides of the stairs. As they jumped down cars started to arrive and students started to flood the nearby area.
"Well it looks like this is as private as we're getting." Chole said "Have you seen Adriekins in person recently?"
Mariette chuckled, "Your still calling him Adriekins-"
"Shut up baker's girl, and answer my question." Chole Whispered harshly
"I haven't seen him since the funeral, Gabriel temporarily postponed my lessons and the only time I have talked to him recently was a quick conversation over the phone."
"I See," Chole said sadly, "Well I can't say that I have gotten hold of him any better. I had tried video calling him several times since that day and he has only responded to one of them."
The two girls stared at each other in metaphorical silence, a loud and childish chatty kind of silence.
"I think we should make a temporary truth." Chole said, "You know the way he stresses out during our prank wars. I think it's best not to put him through that at the moment."
Mariette nodded, "Definitely, Adrian is so perfect that he wouldn't want to let us in on his emotional crisis he is likely having now."
Chole smiled, "Adriekins being perfect is probably the only thing we can both agree on."
As the two girls finished talking a black Limo pulled up towards the front of the school, inside was the blonde boy of the hour that the two of them had finished talking about.
"ADRIEKINS!" Chole exclaimed, as she ran off to give him a big hug.
Mariette smiled and pulled herself back onto the staircase.
"She didn't give you any trouble, did she?" Alya asked.
"No, of course not! We have both matured a lot since those days." Mariette said
"How about we head to class then, start off the year with an early start."
Mariette smiled, "I would like that, Alya."
As the early bell began to ring, the two girls went into the school building hand in hand. Neither girl truly was able to realise the effects that this day would have on their futures, but they were confident that as long as they all cared for one another their future would remain bright.