Work Text:
When Adrien says yes to Marinette and ultimately completely gives up on Ladybug he decides that his new fact of life to abide by is that you can’t love someone if you don't know their name. (He doesn’t know if he could live with himself if he didn’t think that.) It’s funny, he’s able to bring himself to be with Marinette because of something Ladybug told him herself. Of course, “can’t” can mean different things. “You can’t live without food” is objectively true. “You can’t leave the house tonight” might not be objectively completely true, but you still can’t. Adrien very much can leave the house tonight, if he wants, no matter what Natalie says. With those two definitions of can’t, Adrien applies the latter one to his statement. However, he still makes it. And makes his decisions based on it. You can’t love someone if you don't know their name.
Adrien hasn’t always believed he has to know someone’s name to love them. It’s stupid, but he made the argument to himself in his mind when he worried over it that he didn’t know his mother’s name when he was born and he still loved her. He didn’t know the real names of some of his favorite authors for years and he still loved them. If one of his friends told him a fake name, does that mean he can’t love them? But now he figures it’s not just about the name. He doesn’t know her face. Hell, he doesn’t know if her eyes are really blue. (He thinks they are though, because Misterbug’s eyes stay green.) He doesn’t know her friends, doesn’t know her favorite color, doesn’t know her parents, doesn’t know if she ever has had any pets. (He does, however, know what she’d like to name a hamster if she had one. But that doesn’t matter. You can’t love someone if you don’t know their name.) That’s why he stops loving her. Or rather, why he stops thinking he loves her—because he can’t have really loved her. He doesn’t know her name.
He remembers a conversation with Ladybug, the first time he considered the opinion that is his new bible. It was after she had rejected him, again.
“I’m sorry, you know I am. But Chat, please, think about it. How can you love me? You don’t even know my name.”
Adrien stops loving (stops thinking he loves?) Ladybug when he starts loving Marinette. He knows Marinette’s name. Her friends are his friends. He knows her favorite color. He knows her parents. He even knows she’s never had a pet, but she wants one someday. And that’s not all that makes him love her, obviously. He loves the color of her eyes. (Which is the color of Ladybug’s eyes as well. Irrelevant, but he looks into them and he thinks they are the color of Ladybug’s eyes too.) He loves how smart she is, how creative. (Lucky charm.) He loves how she helps him, how she helps everyone, how she cares so, so, so undeniably much. He loves how she loves him. And he loves how he can love her, because she knows his name.
She knows his name too. Adrien Agreste. That’s the thing, though. Once in a while, when he loved Ladybug (when he thought he loved her?) Adrien was glad she didn't know his name. Because Chat Noir feels like breathing, and wouldn’t it be better, if she ever loved him, for her to love the version of him that can breathe? But of course that wouldn’t be really loving him, if she didn’t know his name. Obviously. Sometimes he wishes Marinette loves the version of him that can breathe, but she wouldn’t be able to do that and know his name.
On the day of his one-year anniversary with Marinette, he sits on a rooftop with Ladybug. Her eyes are so blue, and honestly, he knows why he thought he loved her. She looks at him. He almost wants to look away (he doesn’t) from her, for Marinette’s sake, because in that movement, if he knew her name and was able to love her, he would.
“I really honestly shouldn’t be here,” she says.
He frowns. If either of the two of them shouldn’t be there, it’s him. He has an anniversary date with Marinette in 10 minutes.
“Why not?” he asks, laying down on the top of the building they sit on.
“I probably shouldn’t tell you.” She stays sitting, and she looks down, amused, at him.
“Don’t tell me if you think you shouldn’t, M’lady.” He closes his eyes, stretching his arms.
She sighs. “It’s probably fine to say, but I’d worry.”
“I wouldn’t want you to worry.”
“Can I ask you something?”
“Of course—always.”
“Do you remember when you loved me?”
He freezes and opens his eyes. She isn’t looking at him anymore; she’s looking at the skyline.
“Yes. I mean, I remember when I thought I did.”
She whips her head back around to look at him, and he sits up.
“What does that mean? ‘When you thought you did?’’”
“Well, I don’t know. It’s like you said, that one time. You never loved me anyway, and I guess I realized you can’t love someone if you don’t know their name.” The words taste like a lie in his mouth, but truths often do for him. It never means anything. In fact, it tastes like a lie when he talks about how his father dies a hero.
She frowns.
Adrien is confused, but he backtracks. “Not that you’re not wonderful, Ladybug. In fact, you’re purr-fect. I just don’t know your name. So you were right, and I was wrong.”
Ladybug stands up abruptly, crossing her arms and turning away from him.
“No, I was wrong. I have two names. Both of us have two names. You and my boyfriend, you both only know one. Opposite ones, but neither one is less me. And honestly, Chat, I’d let you know both of my names before I’d let him. You know me as Ladybug because that’s the name you met me under. I don’t see why that makes it so you never loved me. Especially with how you acted when you thought you loved me. I have to go.”
She leaves, and Adrien is flabbergasted. He sits in silence for a minute before realizing he has to meet Marinette. His heart falls slightly, like it’s wishing he’s still sitting with Ladybug, until he reminds it he loves Marinette. He catapults himself home and thinks about Ladybug.
Dinner with Marinette is much quieter than it usually is. She looks pretty. He looks at her, and he thinks about how she only knows him by one of his names. His real name, sure, but only one of his names. He has two. (His lady is always right, apparently. He has two.) Whenever something is bothering her, she’s jumpy. She’s dropped her fork against her plate at least four times. Halfway through the meal, she looks at him.
“You love me, right?”
He blinks. “Yes.”
“Would you still love me if you didn’t even know my name?”
He freezes, but manages to stutter out another yes. It seems like the right thing to say, and Marinette looks satisfied, but still bothered. Actually, he thinks she’s looking at him now, bothered. But he thinks about it. The question. If that’s true, that means it’s possible that he can love Ladybug. And suddenly he misses her immensely. He does love Marinette—maybe he would love her even if he doesn’t know her name—but God, if he could love someone without knowing their name, he would still love Ladybug. He suddenly doesn’t remember how he ever thought he didn’t. Marinette’s fork makes a clinking noise against her plate.
When he gets home, he looks at Plagg. Plagg is eating cheese.
“Plagg, do you remember when I loved Ladybug?”
“Yeah, kid, when you thought you loved her, it’d be hard not to remember. Why?”
Adrien looks at the floor. “Claws on.”
His habit of running across rooftops when he can’t sleep starts when he first gets the ring, and has only increased in frequency over the years. He stops at the Eiffel Tower and looks down at Paris. He misses Ladybug. He misses buying 14 roses from the florist every week, expecting (hoping for?) 1–2 akuma attacks a day just so he can see her. He misses her knowing he loved her. Knowing almost just how much he loved her. And now he’s gone and made her think he never loved her at all. He remembers when he and Marinette started going out—exactly a year ago. The first time he kisses her, he thinks of Ladybug. And God, he knows her name. What is he talking about? She’s right. Who is he kidding, she’s always right. Her name, at least one of her names, is Ladybug. Of course he loved her.