Work Text:
“Milady?”
“What?”
“You know how earlier today, you chose to have Carapace help us out?” Chat asked, leaning against the railing that Ladybug had just climbed on top of.
“Yeah, we were facing an akuma that was surrounded by a wall of enchanted hail. We needed a shield. Why? Were you disappointed?”
“Oh, no no no, I love working with Carapace, I just thought, maybe, y'know...”
Ladybug turned back to smirk at her partner, resting a hand on her hip, which was probably unwise while perched on such a tiny ledge atop a six-story building. “No, I don’t know, kitty, so you’re going to have to tell me.”
Chat Noir had turned bright red and was looking anywhere but her eyes. He muttered something unintelligible that ended in a squeak.
She had no clue what he was so embarrassed about, but couldn’t help feeling amused that her infuriatingly smooth partner was currently tripping over himself. Especially because he was also grinning so widely that it was contagious.
“I thought maybe... one of these days... we could... maybe...” he took a deep breath. “team up with Multimouse again?” The way his eyes were sparkling with hope would’ve been adorable if Marinette had been functioning properly anymore.
Marinette honestly had no idea what emotion it did spark inside of her, but she knew it wasn't the right one. She tried for a smile anyway, fighting nausea and the sudden exhaustion and trying to pretend like the ambient light of the sky hadn’t just become physically painful. She was pretty sure she failed at hiding it, though, based on Chat Noir’s guilty expression.
“Listen, I know you told me to just drop it, but-”
“She compromised her secret identity, you know the rules.” Ladybug could do this. She could have this conversation. She just had to stay professional. She was fine. She was totally way more than 15 seconds from throwing up. She was- oh God, Chat Noir was still talking and she had no idea what she had missed him say.
She caught onto his tone, rushed and desperate before she managed to tune into the actual words. “-and a couple of weeks ago you let Ryuuko come back even though actual Hawkmoth knows her identity, which is honestly so much worse, and then there was-”
“Chat!” she interrupted, wincing at how harsh she had sounded. She tried to lower her tone to something that resembled a rational human. “Please, just let it go.”
“OK, but-” he stopped short at her glare, and his ears twitched back in agitation, which would have made her feel worse if she had any further to go. “Okay, I’m not going to mention her if it bothers you that much, but can I ask a different question?”
“Go ahead.” Her voice sounded way more hollow than she intended. She desperately needed to get a grip.
“Why do we still need the secret identity rule at all?”
“What?” She jerked up to look at him, stumbling in the process, and he leaped to catch her before she fell off the roof, Chat Noir gently helped her sit down, hugging her close in the process, which felt unfairly good. And then he scooted back a meter, which she knew was just to be respectful. Despite her common sense, she desperately wanted to grab his arm and pull him back against her. She fought down that impulse and watched him chew on his lip as he tried to sort out his thoughts.
“Why does it matter if one of us finds out someone’s secret identity? Who’s going to stop us? Because I’m sure you’ve noticed that Master Fu isn’t going to be taking away anyone’s Miraculous anytime soon.”
“Kitty...” Seriously though, why was she so cold now? When had he gotten so warm? She had hugged him before, she would’ve noticed if he’d felt like a heated blanket.
More importantly, when had she gotten so terrible at paying attention to anything? She groaned, which Chat seemed to take as a sign that she was mad at him.
“I’m sorry, I’ll stop asking now, I promise I won’t ask again, I just-” His voice cracked and he took a shaky breath. “It’s fine,” he said. And then, of course, he immediately started sobbing.
She didn’t think. She didn’t even have conscious control over her limbs. All she knew was that Chat Noir was crying and it somehow made her feel even worse than the constant ickiness of the past few months, and then all of a sudden she found herself with Chat Noir in her lap, squeezing him more tightly than she probably should and pressing her face against his hair.
“Shhh... shhh... Minou... It’s okay, I’m not upset”
He was shaking with his sobs and hyperventilating and she had no idea what had caused this, except that it probably had something to do with her. Thankfully, he pulled himself together after less than a minute, before they had to deal with any purple butterflies. There was no way she would have been able to handle that. Still, whatever she felt when he caught his breath and faked a smile was less “relief” and more “filing away the image to a mental folder of reasons she was going to kill Hawkmoth.”
Marinette kept petting his hair and muttering nonsense until he was purring with his head on her shoulder. He smelled really nice, she noticed, and his hair was way softer than she had thought. Also, she was pretty sure that she was losing her mind.
"Such a pretty kitty," she cooed. "You're such a gorgeous little kitty, so sweet and precious." Her mouth refused to listen to her brain begging it to stop.
Chat Noir hummed. At least he looked a lot calmer now. "love you, milady," he finally said.
"Do you want to talk about it?" she asked, and his expression was immediately added to her "reasons to murder Hawkmoth" list.
"I- I want to, but I don't think I can. I really don't want to get myself akumatized, and besides, I don't think I can explain anything without compromising my secret identity. It's not your fault though, it's just civilian stuff."
Except it kind of was her fault, because she was the one who refused to let him talk about his civilian life ever.
"Okay, um, what about if you just kept it really vague, and left out the parts that would give up your identity? Or you could change some details so it can't be traced back to civilian you?"
Chat Noir nodded, and she could feel him tense up as he prepared to speak.
"My-" Adrien stopped, searching for an explanation that would be close enough to reality. How was he supposed to explain that he hadn't seen Natalie since the day that they had fought Hearthunter and Miracle Queen, and that everyone was dodging questions about it? Where could even begin to explain the craziness that lead up to this being his life?
"My, um, my stepmom is really sick," okay, good start, "and I'm scared, and I-"
He realized, with what was definitely an unhealthy amount of numbness, that he was hyperventilating again. He couldn't get akumatized; he couldn't do that to Ladybug. He buried his face in Ladybug's shoulder and focused on the way she was tracing abstract patterns across his back with her fingertips. "My dad won't tell me anything, but he's gotten really tense, and he's snapping at me even more than usual." He didn't even realize how stressed he had become until he realized that he could hear the scratchy sound of his tail whipping back and forth across the pavement. "And," he whispered, "this is the same thing that happened with my mom, before she-"
Back to the breathing exercises: breathe in for four counts, hold for eight counts, breathe out for eight counts. He was strong. He could say what he needed to without causing the end of the world. He wasn't going to let a little something like his body's reactions to unbearable stress get in the way.
"My friends are all avoiding me, not on purpose I don't think, but they're all busy studying for finals or working on projects or whatever they do, and my dad is refusing to let me out of the house anyway; it's gotten even harder to sneak out for akuma battles, and I-" another few deep breaths. "I don't want to go home, but I'm also so scared to leave ever because I think she got a lot worse during an akuma attack a few weeks ago and I'm so scared that I'll miss something."
He was expecting to feel terrible and hopeless. He was absolutely not expecting to feel calmer than he had in weeks. But with Ladybug petting his hair while he listened to her heartbeat and the wind swirling against him, and his worries finally out in the open, he felt almost content. Whatever the opposite of claustrophobia was, this moment was flooded with it.
"I'm so sorry," Ladybug said. "I had no idea..."
"You couldn't have, I never told you."
"Still, I'm really sorry. You don't deserve-"
"Life isn't really about what people 'deserve' though, is it?"
She fidgeted with her fingers, avoiding eye contact with him. "I'm not trying to pry, but if money is an issue in your family, my family would always be willing to help out."
Adrien burst out laughing. "Don't worry, that's not a problem."
"But really," he said "I am okay, I feel much better already just because we talked." He didn't even attempt to fight the urge to sweep one of Ladybug's flyaway hairs behind her ear, and he may have actually swooned when she leaned into his touch.
"I really should've talked to you sooner, we have to do this more often." Ladybug tilted her head up to look straight into Chat Noir's eyes. "Next time something big happens, you can tell me, okay? Even if it's the middle of the night, I'll be there as soon as you call." Her eyes were shiny. "You're always there for me and I want to be there for you too."
She was looking at him so intensely and seriously that Chat Noir didn't have any other choice but to nod his head just as solemnly.
And then they were back to cuddling in silence. Adrien was brimming with restless energy and needed to do something with his hands, so he found himself braiding Ladybug's hair without any memory of starting. She closed her eyes and they leaned against each other and let the conversation hang in the air. Church bells started ringing across the street, announcing that it was already 5 o'clock.
"I'm really sorry," Adrien pulled himself to his feet, discovering in the process that his legs had fallen asleep, "but I really have to go now. Thank you so much for-" he gestured wildly in the air "-everything."
"Thank you, too, for everything that you always do for me."
Marinette could see the light coming back into her partner's eyes and it made her heart flutter.
"It was really CAThartic, don't you think?" he smirked.
"Oh my God." She rolled her eyes, but she was giggling uncontrollably and her hands still rested on his hips.
"It's nice to take a PAWS every once in a while"
"You're so dumb, I love you"
She only realized what she had said after it was out of her mouth, and then resolved to wait for another day to figure out her emotions. Now was really not the time.
"We're definitely meeting up like this again, though, right?" he asked
"Oh, absolutely"
"Next time, are you going to tell me what drama happened between you and Marinette that made you hate her?"
She smiled slyly. "I guess you'll have to wait and see."
And then, with one last hug goodbye, they swung off into different directions, ready to face their everyday lives.