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It had been one mistake. One. Leaving that gift, signing it. Something so innocent and done out of love had caused so much trouble. Marinette was lucky to have something as powerful as time travel on her side. Everything was repaired, it was as if it had never happened.
Except for the fact that she couldn’t forget. She had done her best, saving Chat and the whole world, and yet it continued to haunt her. She couldn’t get rid of the nightmares.
They were never the scary nightmares of him trying to hurt her. They had fought and it had been excruciating but it wasn’t what had struck her the most, apparently.
It was the pleading look in his eyes. The hope in his voice as he asked for her Miraculous so he could bring everything back to the way it had been. The pain in his voice when he told her how happy they had been.
It was that broken whisper of “Save me,” that made her heart ache. It was the way he’d called her by her real name, instinctively, lovingly. It was the evident power of pain to drive someone crazy.
None of this was fair. It also didn’t make any sense. How could them being together and in love cause so much trouble? Marinette couldn’t understand.
So she did the only possible thing - she made sure that it would never get to that. If she kept Chat away, if she repeated again and again that she couldn’t possibly fall in love with him, it had to work.
But it still didn’t keep the nightmares at bay. They were always back when she least expected it. With the empty promises of love and happiness. With the fake consolation that even if everything else failed and Hawk Moth won, they could at least be together because there was no need for secrets between them.
It was exhausting. It was driving her crazy. It was tearing apart everything she had built with Chat. There were times when she couldn’t look at him without seeing him in white instead of his signature black and it scared her to death.
She had to tell him. She saw no other way around it. It would destroy him, knowing that he’d been the one to cause so much destruction, so much pain. But if it helped him to understand, if it helped to put her mind at ease even a little bit, she had to do it. Maybe it would save both of them.
Hopefully, this time it wouldn’t be a mistake.