Chapter Text
Marinette Dupain-Cheng found herself tripping on air once again, sending her crash landing down the stairs. The blue carpet made her fall more gentle, but she still knew that there would definitely be a few bruises on her knee, where she had taken the most impact.
"Good morning sweetheart." A petite woman with grey eyes leveled herself down to Marinette's level. She had black hair like Marinette, but hers was in a short bob. Since it was morning, she had on pajamas, but she always acted perfectly rested somehow. It confused Marinette many times, and now, she just figured it was just the way her mother was.
"Morning Maman." She stood up, now being at eye level with Sabine. She took a second to make sure her outfit was clean. She had on a white cami top, her favorite jacket, and a pink skirt. She also wore leg warmers over her white and pink cat socks(with the tips sticking out) and her black sneakers, which were dirty. She didn't have time to wash them, but hopefully nobody would notice. After all, the rest of her looked presentable. Her mother placed a pink beanie on her head, one she recognized as her own creation a few years back, and smiled at her daughter.
"You've got one more year before your baccalauréat exam, you need to treasure this. Oh, and you left your backpack." She held out a pink and black polka dot backpack, and Marinette grimaced as she grabbed it from her mother's hands. Sabine gave her a kiss on the cheek as Marinette ran downstairs. She was going to be on time for once, and she didn't want to miss that. Especially not on her first day of school. She even was so focused that she only gave her father a small wave as she rushed out of her parents bakery. The wind flew past by her, it was good that it was going into the fall season now, especially because dressing for this kind of weather was the easiest. Luckily for her, her school, Lycée François Dupont, was right across the street, meaning it would be easy to get to school. She even wondered herself how she managed to be late every single day as she entered the building.
Her school had the most beautiful architecture, which made sense. It was a very prestigious school, and she had been lucky enough to get in through scholarship. She passed by groups of students talking to each other in the hallways, lined up by the brick walls, and was scanning the crowd for two people specifically. Unfortunately, she could not find them, but she was able to find her classroom. The desks were lined up, leaving two seats for each desk row. Marinette found a seat by the front and opened up a black notebook, her fashion sketchbook. Might as well find time to create a new design. The ideas she thought up in her head last night when she was restless, filled with anxiety about her first day back at school, came flooding back to her. Her pencil flew over the page as she quickly made fashion sketches, the way professional designers would do. She signed her name at the bottom when she felt someone sit next to her.
The boy had blonde hair, and was wearing a blue sweater, similar to the color of her eyes. He had a basic white backpack beside him, and she took note of his jeans and white sneakers. He looked like he was some sort of model, considering how stunning he looked.
Marinette. You can't even see his face. She thought to herself. Almost as if he read her mind, he turned towards him. His features were slightly sharp, but still had the softness of a teenage boy. His eyes were dazzling green, and she just wanted to frolic in them like she would frolic in grass. He could definitely be a model. He glanced at Marinette, giving a warm greeting, which was still just a smile. But she just wanted to melt right then and there as her cheeks flushed pink.
"What do you have there?' He asked, his eyes looking at the sketchbook that was being half covered by Marinette's arm. She saw what she was instinctually doing, and she looked like more of a tomato now.
"This? W-well, it's...umm. It's m-my sk-sketchbook." She finally managed to mutter the words out, and he took it from her hands and started looking in it. She was either too mesmerized by how he looked or too embarrassed to ask for it back, and she wasn't quite sure which one of her emotions it was.
"These are amazing! Do you want to be a fashion designer, because you definitely could." Marinette's eyes widened. It had been a while since someone new had complemented her sketches. The last time someone did that, they ended up being... a liar. A horrible person. A scheming mastermind. She remembered the hands that had ripped a page of her sketchbook as she heard laughter. But she was zoning out now, and there was a pretty boy waiting for an answer.
"Thank you. Y-yeah, I kinda do. A-a big one, like-"
"Like Gabriel Agreste?" He raised an eyebrow in amusement, flipping the bottom of his sweater to reveal the Gabriel logo underneath. Of course, it was a nice school, the people here were going to be rich. She nodded, already too ashamed of how she stuttered every time she talked to him, even though it had happened with many of her crushes before. He gave a small chuckle, before looking back in her eyes. "I don't blame you, his designs aren't too bad."
"Aren't too bad? They're great!" She felt slightly offended, but maybe she was just being weird. She had used some pieces of his designs as inspiration, but he typically made clothes for men. There was a women's clothing line, but it had been discontinued.
"Not when you have to wear them every day." She couldn't deny that logic. She continued to talk with pretty boy before the doors swung open. She saw the nervous girl first. She had short, copper hair, cyan eyes, and wore a very academic style. But it wasn't Sabrina Raincomprix that made Marinette nervous. It was the girl that came after her. She heard her platforms clicking on the ground first. Then she entered the room. Her honey blonde hair was held up in a high messy ponytail with pieces of face framing hair sticking out in the front. Her blue eyes were icy, glaring everyone in her path down(except Sabrina). She had on a white strapless dress with a yellow bolero, and had matching nails with it all.
Chloé Bourgeois, the mayor's daughter.
Her father, Andre Bourgeois, had been mayor for an extremely long time now. In fact, in a year, he would most likely be rerunning for his fourth term. So, as long as any of the girls had remembered, she had that status. However, that gave her a superiority complex, and her mother, the well known Audrey Bourgeois', had vicious nature that seemed to run in the family. She was able to pretend to be sweet, but hide her sour personality from her victims until they were too deep in the friendship and they would be left heartbroken.
After all, that's exactly what had happened with Marinette Dupain-Cheng.
Chloé's eyes had locked in on the model boy next to her, and they lit up in that way that Marinette had fallen for so many times. But this time, her face seemed genuine instead of the cold calculation she hadn't even observed at the time.
"Adrikins!" She squealed, leaving Sabrina to follow her trail as she went to hug the boy. He stood up, clearly excited to see her, and reciprocated the gesture. That's when Marinette's heart dropped, because she knew it wasn't good if he was a friend of Chloé, and unfortunately, they seemed like very good friends.
"Hi Chlo," he ruffled his hair, clearly nervous, which was strange for seeing his friend. But then she spotted the crowd of students observing them, watching closely just like her. No wonder he was so unnerved right now. "I didn't think we'd have class together."
She rolled her eyes in fake annoyance. "Please, I asked Principal Damocles to edit our classes so that we would be together in every single one," she squealed in excitement, but then paused for a second. Her eyes landed on Marinette, and her face darkened. "But he didn't seem to want to avoid making me suffer this year as well. Right, Dupain-Cheng." The boy, who Chloé had called Adrikins, looked at Marinette in confusion, but Chloé turned him back around.
"Don't worry about her, Adrien. She's just some baker's daughter. No one important." Marinette frowned, looking away from Chloé. "Now, if you don't mind, could you move so that I could sit next to him? He's a new student, and I would like to be able to properly help him." She gave a fake smile as Marinette packed her sketchbook in her bag, moving herself to the back row. She found herself sitting by... another blonde boy. He looked similar enough to Adrien, except his hair was more neat, his face was sharper, and his eyes were framed by glasses. He ignored Marinette, instead focusing on whatever he was writing. She decided to do the same thing.
A woman finally entered the room, and she honestly looked like she could be Sabrina's mom. She had similar copper hair and eyes, but her hair was tied back in a neat bun. She wore a light cerulean jacket, a white undershirt, and pants that matched her jacket. She was dressed awfully nice for an educational environment.
"Good morning class, I'm so excited to have you all as my students this year. I'm Ms. Bustier, and I will be teaching you French this year." She gave a warm smile to everyone in the classroom, but it was crickets. Yet, her smile did not falter as she explained what the class would be going over. It was the same boring stuff, and Marinette zoned out as she wasn't going to be doing any work today. It was just the first day of classes. She handed out a textbook, and Marinette kept it on her desk. In the corner of her eye, she spotted Chloé and Adrien together, talking happily. She hadn't seen her this happy to talk to anyone in a while.
She cracked open the textbook without anyone noticing and flipped to a random page. The text in it was marked as fantasy, and she started to read it. It was about mysterious magical jewels that were used to bestow its beholder with great abilities. Creation, Destruction, Transmission, Illusion, Protection, Subjection, and Emotion. The story seemed more like a fantasy than anything else, but the way that the author was writing it felt too real. Too raw. She looked at the name under it, Wang Fu, and quickly closed the book as she heard the bell ring. As she left the classroom, she continued to see the pair talking, but made her way to second period, where she finally found her two friends.
"Wait, Chloé has friends? Like, actual friends?" Alya pulled her short dark copper hair away from her glasses, looking at her boyfriend, Nino, who was listening to music. She snatched the headphones from his ears, despite the visible annoyance he had from the action. He put his cap back on his head and stared at Alya.
"Adrien doesn't seem too bad." He muttered. They all turned to see him, who was smiling quite fondly as Chloé. That boy was always smiling, it was insane.
"He's an Agreste, of course he'd be with Chloé, they're both extremely rich, and he's probably extremely rude like her." Marinette looked at her best friend in confusion.
"Wait, what do you mean he's an Agreste." Both Alya and Nino stared at Marinette in shock, bewildered by what she had just said. Then, they started laughing. Marinette got annoyed. "Hello, what do you mean?"
"Dudette," Marinette sighed at Nino's nickname. "You don't know? That's Adrien Agreste. The model boy of the century. Gabriel Agreste's son." Mariette spit out the water she was sipping in shock, glancing between both of her friends, and then Adrien.
"HE IS?" She screamed, and was immediately shushed. She piped down a bit before saying, "The son of Gabriel Agreste, my favorite fashion designer, is now attending our school?"
"Yes." Alya said, "How come you didn't know?"
"I don't know, Alya. I wasn't focusing on that when we first talked, I was more or so focusing on-"
"Wait, you talked to him?" Nino asked.
"Yeah. He complimented my designs. I should've given him a compliment, seeing his gorgeous face and all." She admitted.
"See Alya, he seems nice enough."
"Yeah, but Chloé also did that same thing before she learned about her true nature. But did you just call him gorgeous." Her cheeks flushed red just like it did in first period, and Marinette nodded shamefully. "Marinette Dupain-Cheng. We are not going through this again. You're too much of a hopeless romantic-"
"A hopeless romantic all my life~" Marinette sang, and seeing Alya's annoyed face, started laughing. Sadly, the bell rang, cutting their conversation short, but the trio headed to their next class, which they all happened to share.