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“I need your help,” isn’t a phrase Lila Rossi expects to hear from Marinette Dupain-Cheng of all people.
“Why?” She musters out, meeting the class president’s confident gaze.
The other girl seems to puff herself up, and Lila is reminded of a prey animal trying to look bigger than they are to scare off predators.
“I need you to,” Marinette tilts her head, “get something for me.”
Lila likes to imagine she’s an expert at reading minds, but she doesn’t need her experience to figure that her sweet, gentle, kind class president wants something stolen.
Her eyes narrow.
“What do I get out of it?” She asks, even though her instinctive response is a resolute ‘no’.
The thing with most thefts – yes, she’s done this before with other ex-classmates – is that if she’s ever caught, she can take her commissioner down with her.
But Marinette is the class president, and looks too nice, too innocent, too good to do such a thing.
And, most importantly, Lila has no credibility now, thanks to Volpina. Who would believe her word over Marinette’s?
“You…” Marinette’s face scrunches up in what Lila assumes is determination. “Well, what do you want?”
‘My reputation back,’ Lila doesn’t say. She puts on a thoughtful face for the other girl’s benefit. ‘But I doubt you do worldwide amnesia.’
Maybe the other girl sees the look on Lila’s face, because Marinette seizes Lila’s hands, looks into her eyes, and says, “Please, I need you to do this for me.”
‘I don’t care,’ Lila wants to say, because there’s too much for her to lose (what she has left to lose, at least), but Marinette holds her gaze, impossibly blue eyes gleaming in apparent desperation, so Lila asks:
“Why me?”
Marinette blinks, and answers without releasing her grasp.
“Well, Alya is an amazing friend, but she hates lying. Adrien is equally awesome, but he's also really bad at keeping secrets, plus I don't think he's one for this kind of thing. And Nino…” Her face scrunches up. “He can’t.”
Lila sighs, and pulls her hands back to cross her arms. She shuts her eyes, and scowls.
“Please,” Marinette tries again. “I swear it’s not as bad as it seems. It’s so I can get someone a gift.”
Lila’s eyes snap open. She raises an eyebrow.
“You’re going to… steal something so you can gift it to someone else?”
“What?!” Marinette’s face explodes into confusion, then denial. She waves her hands. “No, no! It’s nothing like that. It’s just…” Her hands fall, and she sighs, and explains her plan.
Lila listens, face falling neutral, and when Marinette finishes, she looks away from the girl, and up at the ceiling. She counts to ten, and lets out a final sigh.
“Fine,” she says, still staring at a ceiling tile, “I’ll do it.”
Lila doesn’t see Marinette’s face light up, but she certainly feels when Marinette throws herself at her.
“Thank you!” Marinette says, suffocating Lila with her uninvited hug. “Thank you so much!”
“Cool,” Lila manages into a headful of hair, “Can you let me go?”
Marinette pulls away, but holds Lila’s shoulders, apparently oblivious to the other girl’s bemusement. “So, what do you want?”
Lila purses her lips. Screw it.
“Ever heard of pan di stella?”
An hour later, Lila has Marinette’s number, clearer instructions on when to steal – Lila is almost, almost, surprised Marinette knows so much about her boyfriend – , and more nostalgia for Italian confectionery than she’s had since she first left the country.
She’s still a bit disappointed that when Marinette said ‘get’, she meant ‘retrieve and return’, but it’s less dangerous for her in the long run, so Lila doesn’t care.
She’s also still pretty disappointed that – rather than steal anything like Adrien or Kagami’s rings, or Chloé’s weird hair comb, or Alya’s necklace that no one ever sees because the pendant or locket or whatever is always stuffed under her shirt– Marinette only wants to borrow Nino’s headphones without permission.
But, Lila won’t pretend she knows how normal romantic relationships work.
Regardless of Marinette’s intentions, the lift itself is fairly simple. Lila is in and out of the boys’ locker room in under two minutes, and it only takes another two to drop the item off in Marinette’s possession.
She’s already blocks away from the school, heading home, when her phone buzzes with a text from the girl.
“So… Why did you need his headphones?” Tikki asks once they get home.
Marinette drops off her backpack and unfurls the brown paper Lila got from who-knows-where. She sets the headphones her work desk and begins taking measurements.
“It’s getting cold out,” Marinette says, “And Nino hates wearing earmuffs because he can’t listen to music.”
“I get it!” Tikki exclaims preemptively, zipping down onto the table. “You’re going to turn headphones into earmuffs!”
“Close,” Marinette replies, grinning. “I’m going to make a cover for his earphones. He can take them off and everything.”
“That’s really sweet of you, Marinette.” Tikki says. “But his birthday isn’t for another two months.”
“I mean, I’d rather have it done earlier than later. Besides,” Marinette sets down the headphones. “You never know if something’ll go wrong.”
A few days later, Lila's phone rings with a text from a certain girl.
Lila does a double take. Yes, that’s Lila’s unlocked locker with a notable brown bag, and a box with a doodled, flowery M on it.
She won’t admit it aloud, but it’s impressive.
With the transaction completed, Lila doesn’t expect to hear from Marinette in shady affairs again. The girl waves at her in hallways, and Lila is obligated to smile back and pretend not to see the dirty looks her classmates give her.
To her surprise – because her class president is ever full of them – Marinette texts her for a ‘favour’ three weeks later.
Lila sighs. There's something endearing about all of this.
“Are you sure you have everything?” Tikki queries.
“Yup!” Marinette fits the covering on the headphones. “I only need to test it out.”
Tikki frowns as Marinette plugs the jack into her phone, and opens her music app.
“Wow,” Marinette says, “the bass sounds ever better than – ow ow ow!”
Marinette flails and yanks the headset off. Strands of hair are floating over her head.
Tikki sighs.
Adrien is set to host Nino's surprise birthday at the Agreste house, much to Gabriel's chagrin. Adrien manages to win his father over, in the end. As with Marinette's party, Alya's the one to pick Nino up for a "movie night". The story is they'll meet at Adrien's (because Gabriel's an allegedly overbearing parent who won't let his son leave without vetting his friends for the 20th time). Marinette's fairly sure Nino's already figured it out, but she knows there's a fun in being proven right.
Everyone in the class has been invited, along with the older students from the tech and radio clubs. Nino's a pretty popular guy. Marinette manages to convince her friends to invite Lila too. The harder part is convincing Lila herself to go.
“I don't really want to go,” Lila says, when Marinette gives her the invite. The Italian crosses her arms and turns away, feigning indifference. “He's your boyfriend. I'm not even his friend.”
“But you're my friend,” Marinette says. She pushes the paper at her. “You helped me out a lot this month. I really owe it to you.”
“You already paid me in food,” Lila rebuts, “Our exchange is done. You owe me nothing.”
“Come on,” Marinette sighs, and takes Lila's hand. “Everyone else is going.”
Lila frowns, and meets Marinette's eyes.
“If I go, will you tell me how you keep getting into my locker?”
Marinette nods.
“All right,” Lila takes the invite. “I'll go then, and you can tell me.”
Marinette beams.
“Thank you!”
Marinette engulfs the girl in a hug, and Lila stumbles under Marinette's weight. Jeez, Marinette is strong.
“You'll love it,” Marinette says, pulling back. She gives Lila a bise farewell, and runs off.
Lila stares down at the invite.
Friend, huh?
She smiles.
She can do that.
“Come on,” Marinette says, taking Nino’s hand.
“Do you have to give me my gift outside?” He asks, letting his girlfriend guide him out into the cold. His words hang in the air as small of white. Winter has come sooner than Paris expected.
Marinette spins and claps her mittened hands together. She looks like a pink marshmallow, with her puffy pink winter coat, matching scarf, and cold-reddened cheeks. Despite all of that, she smiles so warmly it makes Nino feels a bit less chilly inside.
“Of course,” she says, and takes out the box from under her arm. She presents it to him, smile unwavering. Nino eyes it, and slowly, takes with his gloved hands. He pops off the lid. Inside are two knitted discs. His brain tries to understand what they are. It fails.
“Uh, Marinette,” he asks slowly, desperately trying to piece things together before he looks like a fool, “what are these?”
Marinette steps closer to him, body pressing the box against his winter coat. She pockets her mittens, and warm hands dip into the collar of his coat. He hears a click as the headphones are unplugged from the wire, and Marinette pulls them off. She doesn’t step back, and takes one of the knitted discs.
“You were always saying,” she says, wrapping one ear of the headphones with the knitted circle, and the gift’s utility clicks in Nino’s head, “that those earmuffs with built in headphones weren’t as good as your own.” She picks up the other cover and begins to fit it. “So I thought these would help.”
She shows off the covered headphones. The cases match the original ears of the headset, only knitted. She brings it up to his head, and he bows slightly so she can reach.
The set fits snugly over his chilled ears, and Marinette beams at him. There’s another click, and she reattaches the headphones.
“How are they?” She asks, her voice slightly muffled from the combination of earmuffs and headphones.
Nino’s heart beats warmly in his ears. He tucks the box under his arm, and takes Marinette’s bare hands in his gloved ones.
“Amazing, Marinette,” he says, a lump in his throat. “Thank you so much.”
Marinette laughs, her smile rivalling the fire in Nino’s heart, and leans in until their noses touch.
“Happy birthday, Nino.”
She squeezes his hands, and Nino’s voice cracks.
“I love you.”
Marinette beams, and chuckles softly.
“I love you, too.”