Work Text:
Chat landed on Marinette’s balcony with a cat’s gracefulness, and was surprised to see her hatch open. There was a chill in the air as dusk was quickly approaching on this spring evening. He had been surprisingly lucky today; finishing the modelling shoot early, eating his dinner with speed, and then claiming he had homework to do, enabling him to lock his bedroom door for privacy before leaping out of his window with ease. After a quick patrol on his own, he eagerly scampered across the Parisian rooftops towards the Dupain-Cheng bakery. He slowly peered over the hatch into her room. He couldn’t see her on her bed below, but judging by the music that was playing from below, he knew she was in the room.
Slowly lowering himself onto her bed, as to not make it creak, he stayed alert to make sure he had arrived unannounced. When he was happy that Marinette had not realised a black cat had entered her room, he slowly crept forward to peer over the edge of the bed around the room. Yup, she wasn’t in eyeshot, but Chat could hear the soft pricks of what he guessed to be a needle going in and out of fabric. He smirked as wicked thoughts of scaring her flitted through his mind. He gently placed his hands on the railing in front of him, leant back in order to get some spring, and with one fluid motion leapt over the railing, flipping around to land beside Marinette, who was seated at her desk.
His plan worked perfectly and Marinette jumped out of her chair and onto the floor. Chat burst over laughing, doubling over and using her desk to hold himself up. Marinette, on the other hand, was shooting daggers at Chat, fury plastered over her face.
“Are you okay Marinette? That was quite a loud thump…”
A soft voice said, the question floating up through the trapdoor to the rest of the house, which Chat could now see was open tonight - it normally wasn’t by this time.
“Yes everything’s okay Mama. I just fell off my chair.”
Marinette called out. Still glaring at Chat, she motioned to him to come closer. He took one long stride and then offered a hand to Marinette to pull her up.
“I’m so sorry Princess, but I couldn’t resist.”
He whispered, raising Marinette’s hand to his lips and softly kissing it. Marinette rolled her eyes, and pushed his face away with her other hand.
“Whatever Kitty. Now be quiet, I need to finish this embroidery for Alya’s present.”
She motioned to the work, the pale blue material showing a mostly finished design of a ladybug sitting atop a golden marigold, trapped between the wooden embroidery hoops. Chat nodded at her remark.
“I shall leave you to it then.”
As he took a step to the right, out of the way of the desk, a glossy poster on the wall caught his attention. Reaching a hand out to pull it off the wall to take a closer look, Chat caught a glimpse of a teen with blonde hair leaning against a wall, hand above his head in order to show off the t-shirt he was wearing. Before his gloved hand touched the paper, Marinette grabbed his arm. Turning slowly to look at her, a smug grin appeared on his face.
“Well, well, Marinette. Do you have a crush on Adrien Agreste?”
Marinette blushed at his words, mumbling something like ‘dumb, annoying cat’ under her breath. Chat’s tail flicked about. She liked him! Well, not him as in Chat, but his civilian self. Her stuttering made so much sense now; it was nervousness.
Before Chat was able to give a smart-arse reply to tease her with, footsteps began to get louder as someone climbed up the stairway. Chat leapt up the ladder onto her bed, and out of the hatch at once, cursing himself for being reckless and making too much noise. He sat crouched, listening to Marinette reassure her Mum that she was okay, before leaping off back towards the Agreste mansion. She liked him! For once, he was glad to see the finished products of his modelling shoots.