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“Was it all a game to you?”
Lila’s fists kept clenching and unclenching by her sides. She could feel tears blurring her vision as she stared at her girlfriend.
Ladybug remained in silent shock until the first tear spilled onto Lila’s cheek. “Was it?!” Lila shouted, a sob tearing its way from her throat as she cried.
The heroine reached a hand for her, but Lila smacked it away. “Lila…” Ladybug- no…that was Marinette under there- looked so pained that Lila only cried harder.
“I know it’s you, Mari. I know. But why?” Lila wrapped an arm around herself, shaking in the night breeze. “How could you? I trusted you….I-I loved you!”
Ladybug’s transformation fell, leaving Marinette Dupain-Cheng standing there in her pink dress; black cardigan still draped over her shoulders from their movie date. “Lila, please. I love you too.”
“Then why are you Ladybug?!” Lila hissed, hating the look of heartbreak on Mari’s face, but too wrapped up in her own to stop. “You humiliated me! And then you seduced me?” Accusation dripped from the words.
Marinette was clearly fighting back her own tears. “I screwed up, Lila. I was jealous when you first showed up.”
Lila scoffed and rolled her eyes.
“Your life was exciting. You were the talk of the school, and I thought that you were going to win Adrien’s affection, which, at the time, was all I wanted.”
Lila gave a derisive laugh. “Yeah, ‘cause being dragged all around the globe by parents who barely remember that you exist is sooo exciting.”
Marinette gave her a disapproving look, but said nothing. “I saw you telling Adrien that you were Volpina, and my- Ladybug’s- best friend, so I snapped. I snapped and I screwed up. I wasn’t thinking, and that’s entirely my fault.”
“I’ll say,” Lila muttered, her anger not yet assuaged but her tears drying.
Marinette shrugged uncomfortably. “I felt so bad following the incident that I wanted to try and make it up to you as myself. It was selfish and entirely to ease my conscience, but I didn’t count on getting to meet the real you.”
The fashion designer shifted, her flats squeaking slightly against the pavement of the alley. “At first, you still had your walls up, but when you started to show me the real you, I kind of freaked out.”
Lila gave her a look. “Wow, Mari, way to flatter a girl.”
Marinette stomped her foot and pouted in the way that always made Lila’s heart skip a beat. Despite Lila’s anger, it still had the same effect. “I wasn’t done! I freaked out because I was falling out of love with Adrien, and falling in love with you.”
Lila considered saying something, but waited to see where this was going.
“I-I had never considered myself as anything but straight prior to meeting you. Sure, Alya and I have joked, but we never meant anything by it. But then I learned that you like romance novels, and you hate the beach, and your nose crinkles when you laugh, and you have a birthmark behind your knee, and you always smell like camellias. I, um, started memorizing and adoring these little tidbits of you. I began looking forward to seeing you. My heart started racing when we brushed shoulders or hands in passing, and I didn’t want it to be by accident anymore, and then I wanted to…to kiss you,” Marinette squeaked, burying her red face in her hands.
Lila was blushing as red as her girlfriend at this point, her anger rapidly deflating as her sheer affection for Marinette bubbled back to the surface.
Finally composing herself again, Marinette added, “I’m so, so sorry, Lila. I never meant to hurt you. I was selfish; I should have just stayed away. I knew you hated me, but I still did that.”
Lila took a step forward, placing one hand on her girlfriend’s shoulder. “Hey, it’s okay,” she said, her voice still rough from crying, but infinitely softer. Marinette wouldn’t make eye contact. “Marinette, look at me, please.”
Worried blue eyes slowly glanced up, meeting the forest green just above. “I’m still mad- don’t get me wrong; you’re gonna have to make this up to me somehow,” Lila winked, her hand wrapping around Marinette’s waist and trailing a light circle with her thumb. “However, I believe you. And, honestly, I had my suspicions going into this relationship, so I shouldn’t have been so surprised when they were confirmed.”
“I’m sorry,” Marinette mumbled, burying her nose in Lila’s neck, clutching at the sunset-colored fabric of her girlfriend’s blouse.
Lila wrapped both arms around the girl, breathing in the ever-present aroma of croissants and home. “I promise, Mari, I still love you. It doesn’t matter what you did last year; not anymore. I would follow you anywhere, and I would love you even if you took my heart and crushed it under your heel. I have it bad, and based on your babbling, I’d like to think you do too.”
Marinette laughed lightly, but nodded, breathing a sigh of relief against her girlfriend’s neck.
Lila shivered at the sensation. “Well then, now that this is sorted, why don’t we move on to the kiss-and-make-up part, Bella,” Lila whispered, throwing in the Italian pet name in hopes of eliciting another blush.
It worked.