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-Adrien’s back from university for holidays-
Marinette stares at the message for the first twenty minutes of her thirty minute lunch break.
Okay- is all she manages for a response. She knows how the tone will come across, but she knows Nino understands. For the next hour and a half she ignores the phone in her purse, taking more comprehensive notes in lecture than she ever has before.
It’s not until she’s waiting at the bus stop, air’s chill working its way into her fingers, that she pulls her phone back out. A single message from Nino
-He mentioned wanting to see you-
One-hundred messages must get written and rewritten before she settles on the right answer.
I'm going to be spending most of the break at the bakery and with Nath and his family. Feel free to pass along my apologies.
She takes a shaky breath and sends the text. Two years after the fact, she shouldn't find herself so rattled at his name. What’s done is done.
…
Nathanael waits for her in the cozy kitchen of the small apartment the share. He abandons his tea and sketchbooks at the table the moment he sees her face. They find their way to each other with ease.
Pressed this close, Marinette can inhale the therapeutic air that is Nath: lemon, linseed oil, black tea made weak with milk. It is safety and warmth and security, as it has always been. It is not sandalwood and musk, not the windswept Summer air at night, and Marinette needs to remember that it is a good thing.
Nath is soft and safe, never reckless, only deliberately impulsive, and she loves him. She loves how he lets her settle into his embrace and get out a few dry sobs before he breaks the air with a whisper.
“What’s wrong?”
She shakes her head against his chest.
“Adrien?” he asks.
With a groan, Marinette looks up at him. His smile is soft.
“Is it that obvious?”
“Nah, Nino told me.”
Despite the clench in her chest, Marinette laughs. Her eyes hold on blue, not green. Sagging back against him, Marinette basks in the warmth of his embrace. His hands move from her back to her shoulders, and he guides her to the living room couch. The pile of blankets on the arm make a fine nest for them both. They curl against one another, shoulders and hips in line. The pressure of the rise and fall of his chest anchors her to the here and now.
“He wants to meet up,” she says.
Nathanael hums at her words.
“It’s okay, you know,” he says, “If you want to see him. You two were partners for so long, it’s understandable. “
If it’s possible to love him more, she does so in this moment. Marinette tucks in closer.
“He doesn't know that. All I am to him is an ex. Adrien shouldn't want to see me. I certainly don't want to see him.”
“But he’s not just an ex to you,” he says gently, “You two should talk it out.”
His next words go unsaid, but Marinette hears them anyway: Even if it means letting you go.
“Don't wanna,” she mutters. The awkward shifting is worth it once she’s able to bury her face in his shoulder. Her arms circle his waist, and she tucks herself into as much of a ball as she can. Nathanael chuckles.
“Alright, Snugglebug. I guess I can’t complain.”
…
Nathanael was never a rebound; he was a miracle. Six months after Adrien left her, Marinette found herself in a dim café, knee-to-knee with a boy she’d spoken to a handful of times since the end of lyceé. With words soft enough not to scrape against her still tear-reddened eyes, Nathanael laid her entire life out on the table before him.
“You were Ladybug,” he said. The pages of his sketchbook broached no room for a denial.
With Tikki gone, passed on to a new bearer, there were no more secrets to protect. She nodded.
“Please don’t be mad at me,” Nathanael said, “I’ll understand if you don’t want to talk to me ever again. But the last time I saw you, at Alya’s, I realized you didn’t know, and I just couldn’t-”
At the time, she’d thought she was ready. But then Nathanael flipped to a different section of his notebook. Dozens of sketches of the partner who had abandoned her without a word, side-by-side with the boy who had left with the dust of her ruined affection at his heels. Suited in black or sleek in some designer outfit, it was the same person.
“You deserved to know,” Nathanael said. He reached across the table, but did not take her hand. “The moment it clicked, that he’d never told you, that you’d never told each other, and he’d just left… You should have known. I’m sorry, Marinette. I can go…”
She shook her head.
He let her cry into his shoulder for the rest of the night.
And a few weeks later, he let her lead him to her bed.
…
Sleep decides to hide from her that night, and she spends much of her time in bed tossing and turning. Even Nathanael, solid beside her, does little to calm a heart that can’t stop racing. Alya, too, had texted her about Adrien being in town, though dutifully, and with much more snark and condescension. He was staying with her and Nino, as it was. All the more difficult to avoid seeing him over Winter Break. Marinette knows Alya will understand if her gift is a few days late.
Two a.m. comes and goes, leaving Marinette half-delirious with a hurricane of thoughts and memories and ifs.
She almost doesn’t hear the knock.
At first she figures that she’s driven herself half-mad, that the sleep deprivation was finally getting to her. But then it echoes again, two knocks, short and firm.
Turning to Nathanael, Marinette considers waking him. Sure, he’d have to be up in four hours for his first studio session, but it could be anyone at the door. More than likely, he would be upset if she didn’t wake him. For some reason, the fact that she’d been a superhero, the protector of Paris, doesn’t seem to make him any less concerned for her safety.
The knocking persists.
With a sigh, Marinette sits up and slips on the robe pooled on the bedroom floor. The heater on the nearby wall chugs for dear life, but the cold of winter still licks at her heels as she shuffles through the living room and to the door. She leans up against the door and peeks through the peephole.
The world through the rounded glass is green and gold and Marinette bites back a sharp breath.
She could walk away. She should walk away, should ignore the man on the other side of the door who is still knocking. Because on this side of the door, Marinette has a life that hasn’t been swept out from under her, has a warm bed and someone she loves who waits for her, even in his sleep. To open the door is to take a touch of Cataclysm to the chest.
“Marinette,” he whispers, “Please open the door.”
Hadn’t his hearing always been unnaturally acute? How many times had he caught her, trying to sneak out of bed to patrol the city, only to kiss her back to bed? And how had he never made the connection - how had neither of them ever figured it out?
She takes a slow breath, and then another. Adrien is too polite to kick the door in or anything like that. If she walks away, all she has to do is figure out how to keep away until he has to go back to the States for school. They never have to meet again.
“My Lady, please.”
The door flies open under her hand with such force that it shocks her. Adrien seems startled, green eyes wide as the door clatters against the wall.
“I didn’t think you were ever going to come out,” he says by way of greeting.
Her hand is still on the doorknob - it’s not too late for her to take back her decision, to slam the thing in his face. But no. She’s Marinette. The spots may all be gone, the masks faded to nothing, but she can stand on her own.
“It’s late, Adrien. What do you want?”
How he could be more handsome than he was two years ago is a mystery the universe is going to have to figure out on its own. Decked in a sleek, gray suit, Adrien has no doubt just come from some formal event of his father’s. Her feet shift below her, stance readying for a fight.
“I wanted to see you,” he says, “Nino told me you were busy all break, so I thought-”
“So you thought you’d just pop in to say hello? In the middle of the night?”
His grin is as disarming as ever. Sheepish, Adrien rubs the back of his head and stares down at her with soft, emerald eyes.
“Yeah, sorry. I know it’s late. I just couldn’t wait. I had to see you.”
It’s not fair. Marinette has had a year of peace, a year of happiness, and suddenly the world around her is cascading, topsy-turvy, all in the span of five words. An entire Paris block seems to weigh down her gut; she’d throw it up, were it not for the tightness of her throat.
“That’s not how you felt the last time we spoke,” she says.
Maybe the words are cruel. Maybe Marinette is supposed to be the bigger person, is supposed to prove that she’s healed and moved on. But he was just a cruel back then, when he’d turned his back on her with little more than an apologetic, “I’m sorry, I just can’t. There’s someone else I haven’t been able to get over,” and “Maybe we shouldn’t hang out for a while.”
At least it’s clear that Adrien hasn’t forgotten. His face crumples, something like regret, and his eyes fall to the floor.
“I…” he starts, “I’m sorry. I didn’t know, you know? I thought I could get over her - you - Ladybug - and I was happy, I really was, but I was also such an idiot. I was such an idiot, Marinette, and I’m sorry I hurt you.”
She lets the words hang. They’re band-aids at this point, trying to cover up the scars of a wound she’d been well on her way to healing. But there’s a delight in watching him squirm. Marinette will allow herself these few petty moments.
“I appreciate the apology,” Marinette says. He frowns at this, face dropping prettily. Like he hadn’t been expecting her to take his words in such flat stride.
“When did you figure it out?” she asks.
“Six, maybe seven months ago. I was in Jerusalem for a conference, and I’d started hearing about a hero in a red mask. Of course, it wasn’t you. But when I found the newest Ladybug, he pointed me in your direction - I don’t think he realized I’d pick up on your identity quite so quickly.”
Adrien scuffs the toe of his dress shoe along the floor outside her door. It looks like he’s readying himself, at any moment, to step inside. He’s going to be disappointed.
“I passed Plagg along,” he continues.
“I’m sorry,” she murmurs. And Marinette means it - parting with Tikki had been like losing a limb.
“It seemed like they needed a hero more than I did,” he says. She nods. She’d felt the same way.
“But then it was you. All of this time, you were Ladybug.”
“I was.”
Emphasis was. Marinette is far from weak, even now, but she feels more fatigued in the span of one conversation than she ever did fighting akuma for hours on end. She’d like nothing more than to lean against the door frame and let herself rest. Nonetheless, she has an image to maintain.
“You don’t seem surprised,” he says. He sounds surprised.
“I’m not.”
His brows raise, wrinkling his forehead. There’s a difference from before: more fine lines dust his face, age starting to show. Over a year of intimacy and attachment had allowed her to memorize each detail of his expression. Without a doubt, Adrien is tired. Has been tired. She almost feels bad, knowing how swiftly she will have to extinguish the spark of hope that glows behind his eyes.
“When did you find out?”
“Over a year and a half ago,” she says, “As it turns out, you and Chat Noir look pretty similar if one looks long enough.”
His chuckle is warm and familiar and hits her like it’s been injected straight into her bloodstream. Marinette closes her eyes and takes another long breath, steadying herself. Not after all of this, not after this long.
“I suppose that makes me even more the fool for not seeing you clearly,” he says, voice still rich with his laugh.
It’s too much.
“What do you want, Adrien?” she asks again.
Adrien squirms on the spot. Fiddles with his hands. Sways a bit, back and forth. Finally, he meets her eye.
“I want, first and foremost, to apologize. I was awful, an ass, and I treated you with none of the care and consideration or respect that you deserved. Beyond that, I want to see… if you’ll give me another chance?”
He looks so vulnerable as the words come out. Eyes kitten-wide, Adrien stares down at her. The silence is left untended, sprouting and growing in tendrils between them. He takes a step forward, and then another. She lets the distance narrow, but doesn’t expect him to close it so suddenly: his arms encircle her. Awash in sandalwood and the dark heat of summer nights, Marinette freezes.
It takes every scrap of nerve she’s rebuilt these last two years to stay ice in his arms. Like that, she’s eighteen again, up to her neck in the dizzying swirl of fireworks and crescendos and the thousand different sensations of feeling loved by the boy she’d wanted for so long.
Marinette places two hands on his chest and pushes Adrien away.
To his credit, he doesn’t resist. He even takes another step back. Adrien Agreste was clueless, a soft, inconsiderate idiot who never meant her any harm and still managed to tear her to shreds - but he wasn’t actually stupid. Adrien waits.
On the inside she is trapped in a vortex of shrieking winds, debris of years kicked up from unseen corners to batter her relentlessly. On the outside, she goes still, calm, quiet.
“They didn’t tell you,” Marinette says evenly.
His brow furrows. “Tell me what?”
But it’s an ugly kind of funny, this setup. Maybe it was unintentional, but Marinette thinks she has Alya to thank.
“Oh my god, they didn’t tell you.” Her voice rises, starting to swing out of her control, but it’s okay because it is so funny.
“What?”
“Alya and Nino didn’t tell you. I’m with someone else, Adrien. I’ve been with someone else for over a year.”
It’s jarring, for one to recognize the exact moment that a person crumbles before them. When Adrien falls apart, his face goes smooth and his body rigid.
“And I’m not leaving him for someone who didn’t see me as I was. As I am”
From behind her, a soft sigh prickles her ears. She doesn’t turn to confirm that Nathanael has woken - it seems like she can feel the calm of him even from across the room. How long he’s been awake doesn’t matter. It doesn’t make her words any less true, whether he hears them or not. Adrien’s eyes flick to the dark room behind her, perhaps picking up on the barest shift of the man on the other side.
“I was wrong,” Adrien says, “I loved you, Marinette, I’ve loved you for years, and I still love you now. I was wrong to leave.”
She shakes her head.
“You loved Ladybug, not Marinette. The fact that you know now doesn’t change anything, Adrien. I’m not Ladybug now, just Marinette.”
By now he must hear the soft thump of Nathanael’s feet against the wood floor. Adrien’s eyes take on a desperate edge - he doesn’t stop.
“I am in love with you, Marinette.”
Just because she’d heard it for almost a year when they were together doesn’t make it any easier to hear now. Her lips draw into a tight line.
“Maybe,” Marinette concedes, “What we had, when we had it, was great. Amazing. And so maybe love me now, and maybe you loved me then. But you never figured out how to love me. And when you left, you left me feeling like I would never be enough, as Marinette or Ladybug.” She fights to keep her voice in check, to swallow the waver that threatens to rise. “I know you didn’t mean it. I know you didn’t mean to hurt me, but by not considering how you chose to end what we had, you did.”
Adrien won’t meet her eyes, not anymore. Shoulders slumped, he looks years more dejected than he had when he’d bowled her over with his calm, light words.
“Everything alright, Bug?”
Nathanael steps into the stretch of light that spreads from the hallway outside their door. One hand plants itself on her hip. His chest, bare, pressed to her back. Were it not for the situation, she might giggle: Nathanael slept fully clothed through most of the winter. It was only now that he had a point to prove that the shirt disappeared. She stretches her neck up to look at him and smile.
“Yeah, it’s fine. Sorry for waking you.”
He levels a stare at Adrien, who hasn’t figured out how to reattach his jaw to his skull yet. Adrien slouches, drawing himself further in and looking more and more like an alley cat.
“Adrien,” Nath says, voice soft.
“Nathanael. Good to- I didn’t realize- I’m-” Adrien fumbles over his words as his eyes dart between the two of them. It seems like he does the calculations in his head, over and over again, but the mental math never quite adds up. Now Marinette really wants to giggle.
“You should go,” she says instead.
“I’m sorry,” Adrien manages. “It’s late.”
“Yeah,” she says.
“And I shouldn’t have come straight here.”
“No.”
He tugs a hand through his hair, and when it settles, it toes the painful line between Adrien and Chat. Marinette takes Nathanael’s free hand and squeezes it tightly. Adrien ducks his head, breaking eye contact; his shoulders shudder with an emotion Marinette knows all too well.
“Goodnight, Adrien.”
His response is muffled, but she understands. Adrien straightens and turns, schooling his rapidly blotching face the best he can.
“Goodnight, Marinette.”
His steps fall heavy as he retreats down the hall. They watch him walk. Nathanael leans down and settles his chin on her shoulder, drawing her flush with him. It’s like a stream of honey down her spine, filling her with slow sunshine. It catches heavy on her heart, but the sweetness is worth it.
“Adrien,” she calls. He’s almost to the stairwell, but he stops in an instant.
“I’ll… maybe I’ll text Alya in a few days about meeting up. We should… we should probably talk again. Not in the middle of the night.”
Stubble scrapes against her shoulder as Nathanael nods with her words, approving. Adrien straightens a hair.
“I would like that.”
He turns the corner for the stairs and slips out of view.
Marinette sighs into Nathanael, boneless as the tension fizzles from her form.
“You okay?”
Her eyes flutter shut. He keeps her standing.
“Mmm. Maybe. I think. Eventually.”
And perhaps the storm raging in the space below her ribs will never fully die out. But as Nathanael bends to ghost his lips over hers, she knows that she’ll make it out just fine.