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Something was wrong.
Adrien saw Marinette in all possible moods – from excitement, nervousness, determination to sadness… But she had never been so broken as recently. Like someone turned off the lights or the sun was gone forever. He noticed these eyes filled with tears and red marks underneath – the visible proof that she’d been crying. A lot…
He was worried because all that suggested that she had some problems. He wanted to help her but had no clue how to do it. He was hopeless when it came to help girls. Like yesterday… He’d thought it was a brilliant idea to invite Ladybug for a movie to the cinema. Just to comfort her… The result? She gave him a lecture why rom-coms are such nonsense! And when he tried to talk about feelings and being heartbroken, she told him she was perfectly fine and went to swim… So, if he was so terrible in helping Ladybug, how could he manage to help Marinette?
But this morning he noticed that Marinette looked like she felt much better. Alya left the company of Nino and Adrien and focused only on her best friend. When Nino asked his girlfriend why they couldn’t spend time altogether, she answered that Marinette needed girl’s support after breaking-up with Luka. And she left them for the rest of the day. The girls kept sitting in a corner chatting all the time in whisper. That was the moment when Adrien realised he would never understand girls.
Yet… In the evening, all his doubts came back to him. Maybe because of a message he got from Luka, who cancelled another rehearsal… He suffered as much as Marinette… So why had they split up? Why so many relationships didn’t work? Why couldn’t he, Adrien, date Kagami? Why couldn’t he date Ladybug? Why, why, why! Go to hell with all that!
“I miss adult holders, really…”, Plagg muttered when he got enough of Adrien’s dilemmas. “You, teenagers, can make saint’s blood boil. You can say anything about me but not that I’m a saint…”
“I cannot disagree to that…”
“Well, well, well… Some Cat is showing, I see…”
“Cat?”, Adrien repeated. “What would you say for an evening walk?” He smirked.
“What?! No!”, kwami objected. “No way! Night air is deadly for me!”
“Right… Sure… Plagg, claws out!”
A few minutes later he landed on the rooftop of Marinette’s house. He had no rational explanation why he could visit her. Thankfully, Plagg had had no chance to ask him about his plans, because Adrien couldn’t find a reason why he came here. He had no idea what to tell Marinette either if she asked him what he was doing there. He just wanted to see if everything was OK with her. Most likely…
So, why was he hiding behind a chimney, instead of showing his presence? What a fool!
And then he heard a whisper:
“I don’t know what to do anymore, Tikki…”
Cat Noir froze.
Did Marinette say “Tikki”? That Tikki?!
His heart stopped, and he forgot about breathing for a moment. That was impossible! And yet… So obvious at the same time… His brain suddenly matched all the dots and all puzzles found their place. Just like that.
“Marinette?”, he whispered, landing right next to her.
Maybe it was an optical illusion or just wishful thinking but he could swear he noticed a red flash as if a red kwami ran away in a rush.
“C-Cat N-Noir?”, Marinette stuttered.
He saw panic in her eyes. He guessed she was trying to remember last seconds on the balcony and probably realised already what he could have heard. That was kind of amusing watching her figuring out an excuse. He had been there so many times before!
“Is it bad that I know?”, he interrupted her efforts.
“Nobody taught you that you shouldn’t eavesdrop?!”
“How could I predict you’d be chatting with your kwami on the balcony? You should be more careful!”
“So, maybe I’ll just announce my secret to the world!”, she was mad at herself. “If I don’t stop revealing, soon a half of Paris will know who I am! Hawkmoth will be happy…”
“You have told someone already?”
“Alya…”, she mumbled.
“You’ve told Alya?!”
At first, he felt disappointment that she had chosen her friend, not him. He was her partner! They trusted each other! But then he remembered what Alya had done today at school, how she took care of Marinette… He couldn’t do the same being Adrien… That was painful to realise that couldn’t offer the support that this girl needed.
“I couldn’t stand it anymore, Cat…”, she whisper like she wanted to justify herself. “I was so tired… You can’t even imagine how hard it was to keep everything secret… I had no one…”
“You always have me, M’Lady…”
“I don’t even know who you are, Kitty… I know you so well as my partner and I can trust you with my life… But… I don’t know who you are as the civilian…”
“We know each other, Marinette… We’re…”, he began, but she stopped him putting her hand on his mouth.
“No! No more secrets revealed. I don’t want to know… I can’t… Not today… It’s too much… I don’t want to start thinking who you are… No!”, she began blabbing, and that reminded him yesterday Ladybug’s lecture in the cinema. “It’s enough that you learnt about me…That’s a catastrophe!”
“CAT-astrophe?”, he smirked, and she rolled her eyes.
“You couldn’t resist, could you?”
“That’s stronger than my will, Bugaboo…”
She blinked twice in surprise. Well, he just call her by Ladybug’s nickname. Now, she’d probably kill him for that pun… Instead, she looked at him, as if the situation was too serious for fighting against puns.
“What now, Cat?”, she whispered.
“Everything will be OK…”, he assured her and hugged her to his chest.
“How do you know that?”, she asked somewhere around his heart, and he felt the warmth spreading through his body.
“Don’t worry, Marinette. I’ll take care of you…”, he whispered in her hair.