Work Text:
Adrien was no stranger to make up. You couldn’t work in front of a camera without it. Most of the time the makeup used during his shots were suppose to be so called natural, so that it wasn’t obvious to the untrained eye he was wearing anything. The illusions of modeling.
Today though was not a normal shoot. It was to say the least, artsy. Adrien was a little surprised his father agreed to the theme of a romantic fairytale, but as he’d been getting older the elder Agreste was loosening the strict control on his son’s image. If Adrien had to guess it was a ‘control fall’ for his father. There would come a time where Adrien could make his own call and when the press would not be as restricted to him because of being a minor. He’d over heard enough conversations to understand, yet he did still appreciate the little freedoms he got more and more.
Freedom seemed to be the theme of the day. Adrien had only gotten out of the makeup tent, cheeks rosy with blush, lips a plum purple that matched the eyeshadow and hair literally glittering in the sunlight, to head to where the camera and lights were set up when they heard the symphony of chaotic sounds. It was obvious that the sirens, bells, and other various alarms were caused by an akuma and Adrien, with practice steps, got himself conveniently lost.
When Chat Noir reached the scene, he still did not know what to make of the chaos. Traffic lights were flashing green in all directions, automatic doors stayed open in businesses, an ATM was unloading all of it’s money.
“Did the akuma hit you too?” A confused voice asked behind him. Turning, Chat Noir saw Ladybug hanging from her yo-yo almost directly behind him, looking ready to take off if he moved the wrong way.
“I don’t think so,” Chat Noir said. He was decently sure he was in a state of mind to have known, but hesitant enough when his lady questioned it.
Ladybug made a thoughtful face. “You just look… different.”
Adrien didn’t usually go around checking out how he looked when he transformed, but assumed Chat Noir always looked the same. Apparently he’s just never taken into account that transformed or not he would be wearing any makeup he had been before. “Oh that!” And he gave her a roguish (in his mind at least) grin. “Do you like?”
Ladybug’s answer was a roll of the eyes, with a grin. “We’ve got work to do. It seems Liberator wants to break all restrictions, even rules that are good.”
“That explains the traffic lights and everything,” Chat Noir said looking back down at the street before. “Sounds like we’re going to have to break it to them that there’s no such thing as a free lunch.”
Liberator desire for freedom made them a very difficult foe to fight. While their powers were not as corrosive as Chat Noir’s cataclysm, their recklessness made them difficult to pin down. At one point during the battle, Chat Noir had to grab Ladybug before she was ‘freed’ from her transformation when she got distracted by others freed from their own clothing. In the need to get her out of range, he brought Ladybug close to his body. Close enough that his lips smacked into her cheek. There wasn’t even time for a polite sorry, though he barely even registered that he accidently gave her a kiss. It was probably not the first time and in battle without intent it would never have counted to him anyways.
For as difficult as fighting the akumatized victim was, everything was resolved very quickly, the sun still high in the sky. The Lucky Charm that saved the day was a lunchbox, Ladybug themed of course, and soon enough the two heroes were giving their traditional fist pump. “But seriously, why are you all glittery?”
Trying to think of what to say to her without revealing too much, no matter how much he’d really really like to, he noticed something. “You’ve got some…” He pointed to his own cheek for explanation.
“Hu?” She asked in confusion, rubbing her cheek, which only smeared the lipstick mark. He was going to tell her to rub a little more when her Miraculous beeped, reminding them both they needed to go. “See you around.”
Chat Noir watched her quickly swing away and sighed. Wouldn’t it be nice to give her a real kiss? To leave a lipstick mark not in battle but just because? With those dreamy ideas he returned to the park where the photoshoot was taking place, an excuse of trying to hide ready.
While his bodyguard was less than happy, but by this point way too familiar with no one being where they should when an akuma happened, the photographer was just glad to have him back. “We’ll be ready in fifteen minutes.”
Figuring he could relax, Adrien went to sit on a bench, when he saw a familiar girl in pigtails dressed in pink. With a wave he called out, “Marinette!”
She looked surprised, but she waved back and walked in his direction. His bodyguard only huffed slightly as she got closer. Marinette grinned broadly as she sat down beside him. “H-hi Adrien.”
“Hey, what are you up to?” He asked then noticed the sketchbook in her hand. “Trying to find inspiration?”
For some reason this caused her to blush and stammer, even as she nodded her head. Adrien was watching her face when he noticed something. “You’ve got some…” He pointed to the spot on his own cheek.
“Still?” She sounded exasperated as she rubbed her cheek. It was the same spot where he’d accidently kissed Ladybug. But that was coincidence, right? Though the shade sure looked about the same.
He must have been staring, because she turned beet red. “Oh, um, sorry.”
For some reason though his apology didn’t mollify her. Instead she kept looking at his lips and then his hair. She probably wasn’t use to seeing him this styled up. When he was just about to try to explain away why he was made up as much as he was she finally spoke. “You’re all glittery.”
“Yeah, um, it’s a photoshoot and…,” Adrien rubbed the back of his neck.
“That explains why you looked different,” she said slowly as though putting pieces together in her mind. Had she said that before? He thought she had said he looked differently early. No that hadn’t been Marinette.
Adrien really didn’t think out what he said next. He just grinned and asked. “Do you like it?”
The photographer didn’t get an explanation as to why his model or the girl with him started screaming. He would have kicked the girl out of the shoot area, but his model wouldn’t let him. It still was not the worse photo shoot he’d done and he didn’t care where the two kids ran off to when he was done, because honestly, for a romantic fairytale setting, Adrien had pulled off the look.