Chapter Text
She woke to the sound of Tikki in her ear. “Marinette. Marinette, wake up!”
Marinette jerked upright at her desk, moving with all the speed of a person who was conscious of nothing else but the fact that they did not wake up on time. A blanket that had been draped over her shoulders during the night fluttered to the floor.
“Hmm, what is it?” she mumbled, aggressively rubbing her eyes to make them open faster. She unstuck a paper from her face that was likely glued there by drool. Gross. “Akuma?”
“No, it’s time for school. I tried to let you sleep as long as possible, but you’re really going to be late if you don’t start getting ready,” Tikki said apologetically.
Marinette pawed around at her desk until she found her phone to look at the time. Her eyes finally went wide then, seeing it was nearly an hour later than she normally woke up. Had she forgotten to set her alarm last night? No, she had fallen asleep at her desk. “I slept all night at my desk?” she wondered aloud, one hand instinctively going to massage the tense and cramping muscles in her neck. She glanced at Tikki who looked a little guilty at this point. “You let me fall asleep at my desk?” she whined. “I’m going to be sore all day…”
“I thought you would start working again if I woke you up to go to bed,” Tikki said, folding her tiny appendages.
“Well,” Marinette said, digging her thumb into her neck and pointedly not making eye contact with Tikki. That probably wasn’t wrong. “We can talk later. I need to not look like a garbage can for school.” Because she had caught a glimpse of herself in the dark screen of her monitor, and yikes. She definitely did look like she had slept all night at her desk, and she was still wearing the same clothes from yesterday.
Ten minutes and one extremely condensed morning routine later, Marinette was shoving papers into her backpack like nobody’s business and simultaneously trying to put her hair up, which wasn’t working well with one hand. She had been leaving it down more over the past year, but today it was much too wild to be an option.
On the way out of her room, she ran right into her mom. “Oh! Marinette, I was just about to make sure you were awake.” Her mom’s smile faltered when she looked up and down Marinette’s form. Marinette nearly winced herself, she didn’t think she looked that bad after changing her shirt and combing her hair with dry shampoo.
“Are you okay to go to school, honey? I know you’ve been staying up late a lot, and while I know it’s important for you to attend class, I don’t want you to make yourself sick. You won’t be productive like that.”
Marinette could almost hear Tikki agreeing in her bag. She could feel herself on the verge of sickness too, the aching in her body and cloudiness in her head. She also knew that it was just because she needed sleep and a few normal meals. “I’m fine, Mom, I promise. I’m just really busy. I’ll make sure to get some more sleep tonight.”
Marinette pumped her fist for emphasis, feeling a little guilty about it. She’d gotten way too good at lying to her mom’s face. But she never did it without a good reason!
Though her mom looked totally unimpressed, she gave her a fond look before stepping aside. Her dad caught her in the doorway downstairs and peppered her with kisses over the protests that she would be late, really, come on, papa, and shoved a bag of pastries in her hand for breakfast.
Encouraged by the sunny weather and the threat of another tardy—it would be her third one, which would equal out to one afterschool detention—Marinette set off for school at a run, trying not to jostle the food too much.
She barely made it this time. It was a slip-in-right before the teacher situation, where she grinned sheepishly as she jogged through the door before her teacher, but hey, that counted as being on time. She stuffed half a croissant into her mouth before sliding into her chair beside Adrien, ignoring the way he and Alya giggled at her chipmunk cheeks.
It was crazy to think that the Marinette from two or three years ago wouldn’t have been caught dead stuffing her face with food next to Adrien, nor would she have been able to sit next to him and pay attention to half of what was going on. As it was, though, Marinette had finally been able to overcome the jitters that had plagued her from the schoolgirl crush. It was partly because she and Adrien had become much closer friends, breaking down the pedestal she’d unintentionally put him on in her head, and partly because she was really too busy to obsess over Adrien like she had before.
Still, seeing Adrien laugh at her filled her with a more pleasant sort of warmth instead of sending her into the classic embarrassed-panic combo that was normally so entertaining for her best friend to watch. Getting to know Adrien more as a normal teenage boy than as the “perfect” brand his father had so painstakingly layered on top of his actual personality didn’t lessen her feelings for him—if anything, it made her fall even more deeply for him. She thought he was even more of a gentleman than his persona suggested and could be much more charmingly funny when given the chance. He was extremely considerate and—
“Marinette? I saw you pass me in the doorway, so I’m sure you’re here. Can you answer in roll call?” Ms. Bustier said, raising an eyebrow at her.
Marinette choked down the last swallows of her croissant and tried to appear contrite, blushing at the giggles of her peers. “Yes ma’am!” Despite her newfound maturity regarding her feelings for Adrien, he apparently still had the ability to send her into a daydreamy haze with one smirk.
“Classic Marinette,” Alya teased from behind her. Marinette didn’t acknowledge her best friend.
“At least you made it,” Adrien said to her under his breath, his smile just on the right side of teasing.
“I totally did,” Marinette said, giving him a triumphant grin in return. She pawed through the bag of food her father had given her, trying to calculate if she could finish another pastry before class officially started. She had worked through dinner then fallen asleep, so one of the major aches in her body was one of hunger.
“That smells really good,” Adrien sighed quietly.
“Jealous?” Marinette smirked.
Adrien made to reply when a gurgling noise came from his stomach. While it wasn’t loud enough to be heard by the entire class, it was definitely noticeable to those around them, and it made Marinette laugh a little.
“Don’t worry, the bag is meant for sharing,” she said, removing her hand from the bag and angling its opening toward her friend.
Something on his face made her smile falter, though. His cheeks had gone red, his face sporting an expression that seemed embarrassed and a little sad. “N-No, that’s fine,” he said.
That was a weird reaction to being offered fresh, warm pastries from a friend. Marinette plastered her smile back on, though, trying to push through the sudden tension that had appeared between them. “What, do you think I’m going to charge you?” she joked.
“Ha-ha,” Adrien said, seeming to relax a little. “Thanks, but I don’t want to start eating right before class is going to start.” He turned his body to the side a little and started going through his backpack in the way that people do when they’re trying to look busy, clearly ending their little conversation.
“That’s fair, I guess…” Maybe he was following a specific diet for a photoshoot again and felt guilty about turning down her offer of free food? It was possible, but that sounded like something old Adrien would do. Old Adrien was the picture of perfection and kindness; he couldn’t risk even appearing impolite or ungrateful. New Adrien recognized that his friends knew he was a human being that occasionally said no. If he didn’t want the pastry for a certain reason, he probably would have just said so.
Marinette glanced behind her for some confirmation that she wasn’t imagining the weirdness of the exchange. Alya shrugged, and Nino wasn’t looking at her. Marinette frowned and set the bag beside her desk.
They would start off in class by discussing the history reading that she didn’t do. Fortunately, Adrien had read the whole chapter thoroughly and was able to fill her in before they expanded to class discussion. Thank goodness for smart friends. Though as always, she felt a little guilty for leeching off her friends’ work. It wasn’t as if she had avoided the reading out of laziness, she reasoned with herself. She had just been busy with other things.
The morning passed in a tired but busy blur as Marinette forced herself to look super awake in every class period. After the excitement of the morning had worn off, the sleepiness returned and made these wooden seats feel like plush lounge chairs. It was so terribly comfortable, but Marinette couldn’t fall asleep in class. Sure, she was pretty decent at school, but she learned best by listening. If she fell asleep, she would have to do twice as much work later to learn the material herself. Falling asleep in class was also disrespectful.
Just get through this week, Marinette thought to herself each time she felt her focus slipping. Then you can sleep all weekend. She tried not to think about how that mantra was usually followed by “getting through today” only to be followed by a sudden assignment or more responsibilities in the bakery that prevented her from catching up on sleep as she promised.
Lunch was a welcome relief. Hopefully getting some real food in her stomach and standing up for a while would help her stay awake the rest of this afternoon. “Can we pick up something down the street?” Marinette yawned as she stood from her desk and stretched. Her joints popped, making Nino whistle appreciatively. “I didn’t have time to make lunch this morning.”
“Same, dude,” Nino said sympathetically, to which Marinette gave him a flat look. Nino hardly ever made his own lunch; either his mom doted, or Alya made two portions of her own lunch and he mooched. He grinned back at her.
“I vote for that café with the great tomato basil,” Alya said, smiling like she was already envisioning the meal in front of her.
“Sounds great,” Marinette said. Nino nodded. They looked to Adrien, who hadn’t yet weighed in on the food decision.
When he gave them an apologetic smile, Nino immediately groaned while she and Alya sighed. “Sorry, I’ve got a—”
“—business lunch,” the three chorused.
“Actually, it’s just a preparatory photo shoot,” Adrien said, rolling his eyes at them. “We have to test the lighting for next week’s big spring shoot.”
Despite her best efforts to not focus too hard on her crush, Marinette felt herself deflating a little. She and Adrien were both so busy that lunch was one of the best chances she had to spend time with him. However, she could also usually count on him being taken for lunch at three times during the weekday: once or twice for lunch with the guys, and once or twice for whatever errand his father wanted him on, whether it be a photo shoot, “business lunch,” or PR activity to solidify his brand. He had already done both of those this week, which meant she hadn’t gotten to see him at lunch for over a week now.
“Do you have any time to join us afterwards?” Alya asked, saving Marinette from blurting out a potentially embarrassing question or statement about how she missed spending time with him.
You sit next to him in class all day, Marinette, get a grip!
Adrien shook his head. They passed other groups of friends on the way out of school, people who were already deep into conversation and lunch. It could have been her imagination, but Marinette swore she saw him glance wistfully at the food they were eating. “I wish, but my dad’s got my whole lunch blocked out. You know how efficient he is.” The bitterness that tinged his sentence definitely wasn’t her imagination.
They stopped on the steps, not far from where the gray car was waiting. Adrien gave them all a smile that was somewhat stressed but still genuine. “I have to go now. I’ll catch you guys later, okay?”
“Okay, well,” Alya said hastily, fumbling her phone out of her pocket, “we can bring you something back, just text us your order?”
“Nah, it’s fine, don’t worry about it,” Adrien said.
“Are you sure?” Alya said. “You know it’s really no trouble.”
That was another thing. Old Adrien hated to trouble people for even the smallest things, but New Adrien was a lot more comfortable speaking up for himself. When Adrien put on a smile and brushed off the offer for food, Marinette could see bits of Old Adrien peaking out, and not in a good way.
“I’m totally sure. I’ll be fine,” Adrien said.
Marinette thought of his stomach growling that morning and held out her bag of uneaten pastries. “At least take these,” she said. They would be cold now, but they were still good and definitely better than nothing.
“Sweets before a photo shoot? My dad would kill me,” Adrien said with a grin. Although he was joking, the grin seemed forced. Before anyone could make a comment, he gave them all a wave and started down the stairs.
“Text us if you change your mind!” Alya called after him as they waved back.
Marinette was frowning. She waited until the car had begun to pull out of its parking space before turning to her other two friends. “That was weird, right?”
“Yeah, I thought he would jump at the chance to get an order from the café,” Alya said, rubbing her chin thoughtfully. “Lord knows his dad probably never lets him pick his own food, what with all the photoshoot diets.”
“You think his father’s bringing him food?” Marinette worried aloud, half to herself and half to Alya. She wrung the rolled top of the bag in her hands. “It didn’t seem like he was planning to have lunch today.”
“I don’t know, maybe. He’s a busy guy,” Alya said with a shrug. “Haven’t you worked through a lunch or two yourself?”
“Yeah, but…” Marinette found she had no response to that. Alya didn’t even know Marinette had skipped dinner last night, and she still had a point. Marinette had spent her fair share of lunches in a quiet corner of the library studying or working on her designs. That didn’t feel like the same as Adrien’s father taking his lunch period for model work, though. Something about it rubbed her the wrong way. She just couldn’t articulate it in a way that would make sense to Alya without sounding dramatic. “Nino, what do you think?”
Nino was Adrien’s best friend. He knew Adrien perhaps better than anyone, so he would know if his friend’s behavior was weird or if Marinette was just obsessing over Adrien too much again. “I think we should get going to see if we can beat the lunch rush,” he said, avoiding her eyes. He put his hands in his pockets and headed in the direction of the café.
Marinette exchanged a look with Alya, who narrowed her eyes at her boyfriend’s dodgy behavior. Marinette recognized the look: it was one where she was calculating how best to ambush him later with her questions. She made a loud hmmm noise before following Nino, with Marinette trailing behind.
They still had a lovely time at lunch, even though they didn’t beat the lunch rush and even though Adrien couldn’t join them. These lunches with her friends really were bright spots in Marinette’s days. For a little which each day, she could forget the pressures of school and hero work and just listen to her friends ramble on about their respective days.
Then the topic of weekend plans came up and Marinette shrugged at her availability. “I don’t know, besides catching up on sleep, I think I’m free.”
“Great,” Nino said, bouncing excitedly in his seat. Out of the corner of her eye, Marinette could see Alya giving her an alarmed look. “I want to have a get-together. Nothing too big, you know, but obviously I want to invite you and a few others!”
“Uh, suuure,” Marinette said, her eyes jumping between Nino and Alya, trying to parse out what her best friend was trying to not-so-subtly signal with her twitching facial expressions. It was really hard to be subtle in a silent conversation with your best friend when the only other person at the table was said best friend’s boyfriend. “What… did you have… in mind?”
“I was thinking we could just do the whole thing at my place, maybe order some pizza—”
Marinette must have interpreted the frenzied blinks wrong, because Alya cut in tensely with a wave of her fork, “—actually, I was hoping it could be just you and me this Friday!”
Alya stared at her hard.
Marinette glanced briefly to the side before meeting Alya’s eyes again as if to say What? What do you want from me?
Alya’s mouth twitched in response.
Nino’s excited look faltered as he looked between Marinette and Alya. Marinette schooled her expression into a super normal smile. “I know it’s a little selfish of me to want to keep you to myself all Friday, but we haven’t spent some time alone in a while, and we can always do something with our friend’s later, right?” Alya ranted, waving her fork in a circle all the while.
Now Marinette was thoroughly confused. What was happening tomorrow? Why was it selfish for a girlfriend to want to spend time with her boyfriend? She had to be missing something.
“I guess,” Nino said slowly, poking at the half slice of chocolate cake that was sitting on the small platter between them. He seemed less than enthusiastic at the thought of spending time with Alya…
“Okay glad we got that settled, I’m going to go to the bathroom before we leave.” Alya put her fork down loudly on the plate and gave Marinette a look that implied she better have to go too.
“Er, me too?” Marinette said. That was the first right answer she’d given yet, because Alya stood up quickly and stalked towards the bathroom in the back of the café, leaving Nino to poke dejectedly at the cake.
The second Marinette stepped into the bathroom, Alya rounded on her with an exasperated look. “Really, girl?” she demanded. “You were killing me out there!”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know what you wanted from that conversation!” Marinette cried, throwing her hands up.
“I know we talked about it last week, but don’t tell me that you forgot about the plans we made for Nino’s birthday.”
Marinette blinked. Realization hit her first, then guilt. She slapped a hand to her forehead. “Crap.”
“Marinette, it’s tomorrow!”
“I totally forgot,” Marinette said, aghast.
“Uh huh,” Alya said, folding her arms and looking more than a little peeved. “And just a minute ago, you were supposed to say that you were busy so he would go with the idea of spending his birthday alone with me. Now that I’m trying to shoot his group idea down, I look like a selfish bitch,” she complained.
“Crap, crap, Alya, I am so sorry,” Marinette said genuinely, dragging her hands down her face. She had totally forgotten about the plans they had made previously to surprise Nino on his birthday. She, along with Adrien and their other friends, were supposed to say that they were busy Friday. Alya would invite Nino to spend time with her instead, where she would spend some time keeping him occupied so Marinette and the others could plan set up a huge surprise party in the park for him.
They had concocted the plan because they knew that he wanted to have a big party but would never say so because a) couldn’t afford it on his own and b) didn’t want to bother them with the logistics of throwing a big party. As chill as Nino was, he hated asking for things for himself. Alya couldn’t let that stand by. It was his eighteenth, for heavens sakes, she had exclaimed to all their friends in their discussion last week. They needed to throw him a proper party! But so many of them were so terrible at keeping secrets that they needed to do it carefully.
Thus, they would all pretend to be busy Friday and make fake plans to hang out as a group on Satu rday. This way, they all made sure to acknowledge his birthday. This whole process spared Nino’s feelings while keeping the surprise party a total secret.
And Marinette had just ruined the first step. “Jeez, Alya. I’m sorry,” she apologized again, running a hand through her already-messy hair. “I’ll fix it when we sit down again. There’s just been a lot on my mind lately. I swear I have everything ready,” she said. The crazy part was that she had already done most of the planning over the weekend, it had just gotten swept away in a haze of everything else she’d had to do. A few quick calls to caterers and technicians and an hour of checking over the schedule they’d agreed upon was already pushed far to the back of her find to make room for everything else.
Alya put a hand on her shoulder, expression softening. The stress must have been written too clearly on her face. “I trust you,” she said simply. “Besides, I might be getting a little carried away myself. It’s not as if you ruined the whole surprise.”
Marinette heaved a sigh, feeling some of the tension bleed out of her. “Right. Right, I didn’t ruin everything.”
“Of course not,” Alya said, looking at her strangely. “Sorry if I made you feel like you did.”
“No, it’s okay.” Marinette shook her head. Getting a little pissed off for not following the plan they had painstakingly discussed was a reasonable thing to do. “You didn’t. I’m just a little stressed out today.” She hesitated, then admitted, “It’s been a long week.”
“You seem like you’re always having a long week,” Alya said with half a smile, her tone betraying her true concern. Marinette didn’t have the energy to even try protesting or making a joke about it. She simply smiled back and shrugged. Alya had always been able to see straight through her, that part of their friendship had never changed. The only thing she could hide from Alya was her secret alter-identity as Ladybug, and even that had been getting harder these days as she spent more time as Ladybug.
Some days she wanted to just spill all her worries to her friend, even though Alya couldn’t keep a secret to save her life (and this was a secret that could literally save her life.) The sudden, occasional urge to tell Alya she was Ladybug was different than her desire to share her identity with Chat Noir. She wanted to tell Alya to be comforted, to know that someone had her back both as Ladybug and Marinette, but it was never a serious thought. Just wishful thinking.
She only wanted to share her identity with Chat out of practicality. To be prideful while handling the Miraculous was dangerous, so Marinette had gotten good at recognizing when she was out of her element and couldn’t handle a situation on her own. That feeling had been cropping up more and more lately, and to be entirely honest, it was difficult to tell how much of it was reason and how much of it was her own insecurities. She needed another opinion on this. But how could she find an unbiased party with enough information to understand the situation?
Marinette came out of her thoughts to see that Alya was still watching her worriedly. She spoke before her friend could, stammering a little, “W-well, we’d better get back to Nino before he starts wondering what’s keeping us.”
“He can mind his own business,” Alya said, grinning. “We’re bonding.”
Marinette smiled and decided to play along. “Oh, Alya. I’m so sorry, but I just don’t think I like you like that. I can only hope you don’t hate me for not returning your affections.”
Alya snorted and shoved her in the shoulder. “Don’t flirt with me while we’re at lunch with my boyfriend! Shame on you!”
“You started it!”
They both left the bathroom giggling, which made Nino look at them weirdly when they returned to the table. Their infectious laughter caught on, though, putting a smile on his face as he asked, “Are you gals doing okay?”
“Marvelous,” Alya said.
“Just dandy,” Marinette said. “Gonna have to take a raincheck for Friday though, sorry pal! I just realized that I have—um.” It really shouldn’t have been so hard to come up with an excuse considering all the things she was legitimately busy with, but she was tired and bad at excuses, okay? “—I have to help my parents in the bakery. You know, to prep for Saturday morning rush. Everybody and their mom wants pastries for brunch on Saturday mornings! And Saturday nights. I mean, people don’t want brunch on Saturday nights, they want cakes and cupcakes for parties and stuff. Say, speaking of parties, what if we just hang out Saturday night instead of Friday nigh? I’m totally free Saturday night. I can bring a cake!”
Blessedly, Marinette ran out of breath to sustain her word-vomit, so she stopped there to take a breath and spare a glance toward Alya. Her best friend was rolling her eyes fondly at her, and Nino looked a little confused. At least he was smiling.
“Uh, okay, sounds good,” he said.
Marinette glanced between both of her friends, a big grin threatening to overtake her face.
Nailed it.