Chapter Text
Marinette unlocked her locker, a small, bashful smile fluttering across her lips as she spotted precisely what she had been looking for. A card shaped like a pink heart was resting on the very top of her locker. Marinette eagerly stretched onto her tiptoes to grasp the card, already anticipating the poem this one held.
The messages started appearing a few weeks ago. Each one more adorable than the last. At first, she had been confused. Surely they couldn’t have been intended for her. Perhaps the intended sender had mistaken her locker for another’s.
So, Marinette had shrugged it off. After all, there was only one boy she had her heart set on and he was certainly not writing her little love letters. But the messages kept coming and every day Marinette found herself racing to school just a little bit quicker. They had secretly become the highlight of her day, eager to read the latest poem.
One day Alya had taken notice, though, plucking the letter from her hands as her eyes excitedly scanned the contents.
“Hey!” she frowned, scrambling to grab the letter back from her best friend. “I wasn’t finished reading that!”
Clutching the letter to her chest protectively, Marinette glared over at Alya who was gaping down at her. After a few seconds, her mouth closed and she hesitantly, as though afraid to spook her, said, “That was a love letter.”
“I know,” she murmured, slowly bringing the letter out from its protective hold on her chest. A slow smile spread across her lips as she resumed reading. “Sweet, isn’t it?”
“Marinette... you know who that’s from... don’t you?”
She brought her head back up, looking into Alya’s wide, almost disbelieving eyes. Carefully, she shook her head. Did Alya know who it was from then?
“No, I don’t. Do you?” Marinette asked, a small furrow forming between her brows.
Practically as soon as she finished speaking, the disbelief on Alya’s face vanished. A smirk settled across her lips instead as her eyes glittered playfully. “I’m afraid it’s not my secret to tell,” she said, shaking her head. “I’m sure he’ll tell you when he’s ready.”
Alya had then patted her on the shoulder before breezing out of the room as though she hadn’t just set Marinette aflame with curiosity. She had carefully tucked the letter away in her bag before chasing after her, shouting, “So it’s a guy, then?”
That had been a few days ago now and she still refused to tell her who the mysterious admirer was. She’d wear her down eventually, though. She could already tell that it was practically killing Alya to not spill the secret.
With a quiet, happy sigh after reading the latest letter for the fifth time, Marinette began to close her locker door.
“Hey, Marinette,” a familiar voice said, startling her from her daydreams.
She shrieked, jumping about a foot in the air and slamming her locker closed. Her heart thundered in her chest as she saw the boy she should be daydreaming about.
There, looking at her rather sheepishly was a grinning Adrien. He scratched the back of his neck as he peered up at her from beneath his lashes with a pair of apologetic green eyes. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“Pfft,” she said, waving her hand that still had the letter tightly grasped in it around. Realizing what she was holding, Marinette quickly stopped, holding it behind her back as her face lit up in a tomato-red blush. “You didn’t care for me. I mean scare me! I-I was just too busy thinking about you. Something else! I was too busy thinking about something else to, um, hear you come in?”
Great, now she was turning even more red. What was it about Adrien that caused all of her words to stumble out of her mouth in a tangled mess of confusion?
He clucked his tongue as he shook his head teasingly. God, could he get any more attractive?
“Well, that’s too bad.”
Marinette blinked, tilting her head in confusion. “What’s too bad?”
Adrien shrugged, an all too familiar smirk settling on his face as he said, “I’d have preferred if you were thinking about me.”
She squeaked, her entire body stiffening as his words registered in her brain. Was she dead? Did she get run over on the way over to school and was dreaming this whole time? She pinched herself with her free arm, wondering if that would wake her up.
Wait, if she really was dead would pinching even work? Pondering over that for a few more minutes, she didn’t notice Adrien shift on his feet.
He cleared his throat, finally snapping her out of her imagination as he nodded at the hand that was hidden behind her back. “What have you got there?”
Marinette gulped, trying to shove her hand even further behind her back as though that would look less conspicuous. “N-nothing,” she stuttered, feeling the paper crunch as she tightened her fist around it.
One of Adrien’s eyebrows rose as he glanced down knowingly at her hidden arm. “Doesn’t look like nothing.”
She giggled nervously, feeling a wave of butterflies swarm in her stomach. She couldn’t exactly tell Adrien it was a love letter... could she? Maybe... just maybe he’d get jealous and sweep her into his arms before her admirer could have a chance to.
She hastily shoved that daydream aside. Marinette couldn’t be daydreaming about Adrien when he was standing right in front of her.
With an awkward, forced chuckle she brought the letter out in front of her, praying he wouldn’t notice the pink paper. “Just Physics notes,” she said before hastily stuffing the crumpled-up letter into her bag. She’d restore the poor thing after she had escaped an inexplicably curious Adrien.
“Anyway, I um, think we should probably head over to class now. I-It was nice talking to you.”
Slinging the bag over her shoulder as quickly as she could, Marinette practically threw herself over to the door. She breathed out a quiet exhale as her hand closed around the knob and opened the door.
Before she could fully finish her hasty retreat, though, Adrien said something that caused her blood to freeze in her veins.
“In the quiet of the night as stars twinkle with delight, my thoughts turn to you, my dear, and my heart fills with love sincere.”
Marinette’s whole body stiffened before she slowly turned back around to him. “C-could you repeat that please?”
A slow smile stretched across Adrien’s lips before he continued reciting a poem that she had practically memorized just a few moments ago. “I've watched you from afar and wished upon a shooting star, that someday you might see the way you light up the world for me.”
Carefully, she retrieved the crumpled up piece of paper from her bag, reading it once again as though expecting it to be different from what she had seen mere minutes ago.
“I-I don’t understand,” she choked out, feeling her heart beat wildly in her chest.
Adrien took a slow step towards her, looking at Marinette as though he was afraid that she would bolt out of the locker room.
“It was me, Marinette,” he said, reaching up to scratch the hairs on the nape of his neck. “I’ve been the one writing you letters for the past couple of weeks.”
“W-what?!” she choked out, feeling dizzy with this new information. Adrien was the guy she had been fantasizing about instead of... well, Adrien?!
“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I guess I was just afraid that you would reject me.” He glanced up at her sheepishly, giving her a crooked grin that caused her heart to stumble.
He was afraid that she would reject him? Was he being serious?
Marinette blinked, at a complete loss for words with this newfound realization.
“Honestly,” Adrien chuckled. “I’m probably only telling you now because Alya figured it out and kept pestering me to tell you before she told you herself.”
Alya had known for days that it was Adrien and she still didn’t tell her. Oh, she was so going to kill her best friend after this. Or squeal to her about this entire conversation. Whichever urge struck her first, really.
“S-so it’s really you, then? I’m not just dreaming this whole thing right now.” Marinette finally spoke after a long, stretched-out pause.
Adrien’s head whipped up to look at her with a pair of wide eyes. “W-would that be a good dream or a nightmare?”
She sputtered out a laugh, still unconvinced that she wasn’t dreaming even though she had pinched herself earlier. “Definitely a good dream because I’ve had a crush on you ever since you handed me your umbrella that day in the rain.”
In the next second Marinette was in Adrien’s arms and suddenly, she just knew she wasn’t dreaming. Standing up on her tip-toes, she connected their lips together, feeling a shiver race down her spine as a feeling of complete and utter joy settled around her.
Okay, so maybe she wasn’t going to kill Alya the next time they saw each other. More likely Marinette was going to be so completely and utterly happy that all she’d want to do was squeal to her best friend about how Adrien wrote all those notes to her. How Adrien kissed her, even!
The bell to their next class rang and the two finally parted, their foreheads resting on each other’s as they caught their breaths.
“I should have told you sooner,” Adrien murmured, planting another quick kiss on her lips.
“I’m kinda glad you didn’t.” Marinette giggled. “After all, I got a few more wonderful, lovely letters from my secret admirer.”
Adrien laughed with her before reaching down to take her hand and guiding her out of the locker room and towards their homeroom.