Chapter Text
Day 1
Marinette breathed in and out.
It had been a long day.
Everything had come out: Lila’s threat to take her friends away, her deal with Adrien's father. (Marinette was furious and bewildered with Gabriel for going behind Adrien's back to “protect him from bad influences” with someone who tricked their way into his home.) And Lila had willingly akumatized herself in front of everyone, but her true nature had been exposed. And she had been arrested after a very difficult battle.
The worst part was the look on her friends' faces when Lila made it clear she only ever saw them as sheep to follow her every whim.
“This is all my fault,” said a familiar voice. Marinette looked at her best friend sitting down in her room with the Kwamis watching them silently.
“You are not responsible for Lila’s actions.”
“But I’m the one who posted her interview on my blog; everyone trusted her because of me.”
Marinette shook her head.
"I'm pretty sure they were enamoured with her before that.”
“But I practically endorsed her,” Alya insisted, “I'm the holder of the Fox Miraculous, I’m supposed to see through illusions.”
“Many of my Foxes have trusted people who have taken advantage of them, but they learned from it and became wiser from the experience. You can too,” Trixx counselled his holder from her shoulder.
“Trixx is right, we can get through this,” Marinette hugged her friend as she started crying.
Day 3
Rose cried into Juleka’s shoulder.
“I trusted her, Jules, I trusted her so much,” she sobbed.
“What if I had ruined my friendship with Prince Ali by talking about Lila’s charities online? Or worse, ruined his reputation. I could have just called him at any time to confirm her stories, but I didn’t. He never would have forgiven me.”
“That's not true, Rose, he would not have blamed you for being lied to, and it's not as if he has a lot of free time, he is very busy, and has a lot of responsibilities,'' Juleka told her.
“There is something else,” Rose said quietly, “I know it's stupid, but a part of me keeps wondering, what did I do wrong? That if I had tried harder, Lila would still be my friend.”
“It's not stupid. It's just you being kinder than she deserves.”
Rose looked at her girlfriend.
She had noticed a change in her since she had stood up to her parents on her birthday.
She was more confident and spoke much more clearly than Rose could ever recall, and in this dark time, she was grateful for it.
“You're amazing, Juleka,” She said as she wiped her tears away.
“Not as much as you,'' Juleka replied as they took comfort in each other's company.
Day 6
Alix was hanging out with two of her oldest friends, Kim and Max, as well as her newer friend Markov, for the first time since everything happened, but it couldn't last before someone addressed the elephant in the room.
“How could I not see it? So much for being the logical one,” Max said in self-deprecation, as Markov put his arm on his shoulder for comfort.
“And I’m supposed to be the voice of reason,'' Alix replied.
She was always the one to try to tone down the girls' plans for getting Marinette and Adrien together and talk Nathaniel down when he gets anxious. Sure, she has her dares with Kim, but he asks for it!
Kim sighed and said, “Look, I may not be the smartest guy or the most level-headed, but one thing I do know is that after you make a mistake, all you can do is make sure you don’t make it again and then hopefully you will make less mistakes.”
Alix smiled. She knew there was a reason she hung around with this lug.
Day 10
Chloé could have kicked herself.
How could she have believed that utterly ridiculous story about the ladybug dance?
A shiver went down her spine. There was something disturbing about how she could make it sound so reasonable.
At least the only other person who knew anything about it was Jean-whatever his name is, and he would never say anything about it.
Sabrina, though, was taking discovering the liar's true colours hard. She had admired her as much as those losers in their class did (except for her Adrikins, of course, and Dupain-Cheng seemed to have been on to her from the start). Chloé, though, sad to say, was used to it, being the daughter of the mayor. She had a lot of experience with fakers.
Right now, she and Sabrina would go through the motions, with Sabrina doing their homework and her concentrating on more important things like her hair until this had all blown over and they could forget all about the liar.
Day 14
Zoé had not known Lila well, and for that, she was thankful.
She had just been another one of Marinette’s and Chloé’s classmates, who had apparently met a lot of famous people. But that seemed common in Mme. Bustier’s class.
Perhaps the fact that Marinette and Adrien seemed to avoid her should have been a sign, but no one else had commented on it, so she had not wanted to rock the boat with her new friends. Now she wished she had said something which might have prevented what had happened, or at least made it less bad than it had been.
But there was no use in thinking about what-ifs; she just hoped her friends would be able to recover from this.
Day 16
Caline was distraught.
She should have seen the signs. She should have been more observant.
Her class had been silent since the incident, their energy muted by the shock.
Being betrayed by someone they had thought was a friend had shaken them to the core.
Some of them still wouldn't talk about that day.
But she had faith they would bounce back from this; they were good kids who had been taken advantage of by a bad apple.
All Caline could do was learn from this and be a better teacher.
Day 20
Adrien could not bring himself to look Nino in the eye.
“Dude, keeping quiet about Lila was not okay, but you started to make up for it when you made her get Marinette back into school.”
That little deal had come out in the open, along with everything else that day.
“However, that doesn't mean you should have let her force you into doing those shoots with her. Was that supposed to be some sort of penance?”
Adrien was silent.
“Dude,” Nino says wearily, “That is not how you are supposed to make it up to people."
Adrien sighed, “It just seemed the easiest way.”
“Easy? What was easy about being around her when you knew exactly what she was?”
“I just didn't want to make a scene.”
Nino put his hand on his shoulder, “Adrien, my friend, you really need to learn to stand up for yourself.”
Adrien sighed, “But my father–"
“Exactly, he's your father, not your jailer. No one should have that much control over your life but you.”
Day 23
Nathaniel was working with Marc on their comic when a voice asked, “You are from Marinette and Adrien’s class?”
He and Marc jumped and looked up to see that Kagami had walked up to them without them noticing.
She had joined their art lessons recently, and he couldn't understand why her mother had tried to discourage her. She was a very talented artist, but her social skills could use some work and coming from him, that was saying something.
“Umm, yes, I am.”
“I hear things have been difficult since you all found out about her. I hope you are all doing well.”
“Well, yeah, we…” he paused, “you say that like you already knew.”
she shrugged, “I have had experience with people falsely claiming to know my family for attention, so when I saw her interview claiming to be Ladybug’s best friend, I knew her for what she was, plus I got sent a picture of her invading Adrien’s personal space and giving him a kiss while he has an uncomfortable look on his face am I really the only one to notice that?”
He groaned internally. Everyone had been looking at Lila and Adrien’s interactions in a new light ever since that day, and wondered how no one had noticed Adrien was always uncomfortable around her.
Marc answered, “I think Marinette might have, but everyone thought she was just jealous, though in our defence, she was a little extra Adrian crazy that day.”
Kagami smiled softly, “That's Marinette, alright. I will let you get back to your work now,” she bowed and then left.
“I can see why Marinette hangs out with her,” Marc said. Nathaniel nodded in agreement.
Day 27
Ivan was waiting with Mylène and Luka for Juleka and Rose to get back, so they could continue band practice. When Mylène asked, “Do you think we could invite our friends next time? I think we all could do with letting off some steam.”
Ivan smiled. That was his girlfriend, always thinking of others.
It was one of the reasons he loved her.
“I think that’s a great idea. Would your mother be okay with it, Luka?”
Luka smiled, “You know the captain, she's always up for an excuse to have a party.”
Ivan felt some of the tension he had been feeling begin to disappear.
It had been a long month, and they all could do with something to take their minds off what had happened.
Day 31
Luka could almost see the funk dissolve away.
Everyone had managed to make it, not just Juleka’s classmates but their other friends too, even Adrien was there.
His father had been uncharacteristically lenient recently; perhaps he felt guilty for forcing his son to be around a girl whom it was now clear he was uncomfortable with.
Luka could feel everyone's songs had begun to lighten since they had started to play their instruments.
They had been filled with sadness and the pain of betrayal for too long. Even those who had not directly interacted with Lila had been affected.
Her song had been the foulest he had ever encountered, even after she was de-akumatized.
He regretted that they had not met before, so he could warn his friends. But there was no use in thinking about what could have been; everyone was starting to recover, and soon Lila Rossi would just be a distant memory.