Work Text:
Chat Noir was watching the beautiful lights of Paris from his spot on the Eiffel.
Even after years of seeing this sight, he still finds it mesmerizing. Paris was beautiful, awe-inspiring, timeless.
“Wish I could have Mari see this with me, too.” He whispers, smiling at the thought of his girlfriend. She’d take the sights in with amazement, sit down and pull out her sketchbook and pencils, try to recreate the beauty of Paris as best as she can. And she’d smile at him, heart on her sleeve, love in her eyes. In his mind’s eye, she knows his identity already and accepts him for who he is, flaws and all. “You get to see this sight all the time, Adrien?” She’d ask, leaning her head against his shoulder. “Yeah, but its beauty doesn’t compare to yours, ma princesse.” He’d say, placing a kiss on her head. And she’d blush so prettily that he can’t help but pull her closer and press kisses against what ever part of her he can reach—
“Hm?” His thoughts are broken when his baton beeps behind him. He raises an eyebrow as he reads the message Ladybug sent him. “Chaton, I need your help. Could you come over to the Le Grand Paris Hotel?” Huh, what could that be about? They haven’t had an Akuma attack in years since his father’s arrest, and Ladybug still had the butterfly miraculous.
Ah, well. It can’t be anything too bad. Still, he’ll always answer to his Lady’s beck and call. She is his partner, after all. Even if his feelings for her have changed, he still loves her a lot and owes her so much.
“On my way!” He sends back before extending his baton.
He reaches Chloé’s hotel, seeing Ladybug on the roof, pacing around nervously.
“What’s up, Milady?” He asks, following her steps as she paces around.
“Chaton!” She exclaims, rushing to hug him.
“Woah, woah. What’s up, Buginette?” He asks, but wraps his arms around her as well.
“Well, I’m, uh, I need your help.” She says, pulling away from him and worrying her bottom lip.
“Yeah, you said so on your message. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing’s wrong.” She shakes her head, “I just, I need help with my… my guy,” at that, she smiles so fondly. “I have a surprise for him, and I wanna see if it’s going to work so…”
“So you need a practice buddy for what you’re about to do and want a second opinion from the one other guy in the world whose opinion matters to you?” He asks, grinning at her, hoping to ease her nerves.
She laughs, punching him gently on the arm and rolling her eyes. “Yes, Chaton. That’s exactly what I need.”
“Then I’ll help, Buginette. You know I will. He makes you very happy and I’m forever thankful to him for that.” Which was a true statement, really. When he finally let go of Ladybug and seriously considered his feelings for Marinette, his Lady had opened up to him about how the boy she liked was starting to notice her. She had sounded so happy when she told him about her guy, grinning fondly all the while, with rosy cheeks and stars in her eyes. He had felt nothing but happiness for her, not an ounce of jealousy ever hit him. They had both grown at that moment, and he had wished her all the best from the bottom of his heart.
Ladybug had been his most trusted friend and number one confidante, the one who had to ‘suffer’ when he was in the mood to wax poetic about his girlfriend and how beautiful and amazing she was, the one who gave him advice whenever he and Marinette had arguments.
“You’re the best, Chaton.” She said, hugging him again.
“Oh I do love it when you praise me, Milady,” he chuckles. “Um, you’re not going to try and kiss me or anything, are you? Because my girlfriend isn’t going to like that, and I can’t keep secrets from her.”
“Oh?” Ladybug asks, eyebrow raised.
“Well, obviously, except for the whole ‘I’m Chat Noir’ thing. That’s the only secret I have, but I’ll tell her when we’re both ready. Everything else, I’ll tell her without fail. She hates liars, kinda like you, Milady.” He shakes his head fondly at a memory of Marinette ripping Lila a new one after one too many lies. Of course, back then it wasn’t a moment worth being fond of, afraid as he was that his girlfriend might get Akumatized with how upset she was, or that Lila might let herself get willingly Akumatized and attack Marinette out of anger. Still, it had ended well, kind of. Lila never came back to Françoise Dupont after that.
“Sounds like a girl after my own heart,” Ladybug said, a grin on her face.
“True, but she’s mine, and you’ve got a boy, so lay off,” he says, jokingly.
Ladybug laughs, cheeks red. “Okay, okay. So um, the thing I have prepared for him is at the restaurant. I have it reserved,” she says, waggling her eyebrows. “Mayor Bourgeois can’t really say no to me, after all we’ve done for Paris.”
Chat Noir shakes his head, an exasperated smile on his face. “This boy must be really lucky, Milady.”
“Of course.” She grins, “I am his girlfriend, after all.”
He laughs at that, “True, true.”
They make their way to the restaurant, which had only one table at the center. Everything else was cleared. There were rose petals on the floor, the carpets plush and red. The only table had a tiered tray with red, black, and green macarons (he was betting they came from the Dupain-Cheng boulangerie, he and Ladybug both agree that it’s the best in Paris), a bottle of red wine (which he notes, pleased, comes from his favorite brand; Ladybug’s guy had great taste), and two glasses.
“Wow, this is amazing, Milady.” He said in awe.
“Oh, it gets better.” She giggles.
“Really? How?”
“Like this.” She says, going to one of the chairs and grabbing a remote, pressing a button.
Music starts playing from the speakers somewhere. “Oh, okay, wow.”
“Chaton,” Ladybug says, making her way to the center of the room, “May I have this dance?”
He smiles, shaking his head in amazement and amusement, “But of course, My Lady.”
He approaches her, bowing at the waist. She smiles cutely, curtsying with an invisible skirt.
He places one hand on her waist, the other holding a hand. She places her other hand on his shoulder, and together, they dance.
The day we met
Frozen, I held my breath.
Right from the start,
I knew that I’d found a home for my heart…
“You know,” Ladybug grins, “The first time I met him, I yelled at him, and absolutely despised him.” She giggles to herself as they go around in circles.
“Seriously?” He asks, laughing. “I can’t imagine. You’ve always sounded so smitten whenever you talked about him.”
Beats fast, colors and promises
How to be brave
How can I love when I’m afraid to fall?
“Oh yeah, I thought he was just like this other bully in my class. Turns out I was completely wrong about him!” Ladybug shakes her head. “You know me, quick to jump to conclusions.”
“Oh I know. You’re the type who acts first, and asks questions later.” He teased.
“Don’t make me step on your toes, minou.” She jokingly threatened.
“I have steel-covered toes, Buginette.”
“Drat.”
But watching you stand alone
All of my doubt
Suddenly goes away somehow.
“What happened that made you change your opinion of him?” He asked. “Uh, if you’re okay to answer that.”
“Yeah, I can answer.” She sighs happily. “You see, it was raining. A summer storm just as summer was ending.” Her eyes looked faraway, going down a trip to memory lane. He twirled her around, the music all but compelling him to.
One step closer.
“I didn’t have an umbrella on me. And I didn’t want to go home drenched.” She recalled.
“Then, he stepped out from the school grounds, greeting me.” She giggled, “I snubbed him.” She shakes her head. “Then he walked a bit away from me, before turning back. He had his umbrella open by then, and he told me that he was just trying to take the chewing gum off from my seat, that was all.”
Chat Noir paused, surprised. He looked at Ladybug, but it seems she’s ignored him in favor of reminiscing.
I have died everyday waiting for you
Darling don’t be afraid
I have loved you for a thousand years
I’ll love you for a thousand more.
“He offered me his umbrella, and he looked so… so angelic.” Ladybug smiled softly. “There I was, a girl that had yelled at him, made him feel unwelcome when all he ever wanted was a friend. Yet, he was still kind enough to offer me his umbrella.” She closed her eyes, still smiling.
Chat Noir was looking at Ladybug as if he were seeing her, meeting her for the first time, all over again. He looked at her hair, her face, her height, the lines of her body… yes, yes, yes. They all matched Marinette’s.
Ladybug was his Marinette.
“It was his kindness that made me fall in love with him.”
“It felt like a clap of thunder.”
Time stands still
Beauty in all she is
I will be brave
“I was obsessed with him after that.”
Chat Noir stayed silent, throat dry.
Marinette was in front of him, his beloved, talking about him without knowing that he was there. He wanted to stop. He wanted her to stop. This whole surprise, whatever this was, was for him. He’d spoil his own surprise. Was it their anniversary yet? No, that was still two months from now. It wasn’t his birthday, hers had passed three weeks ago. What was this? Oh God, he was ruining it already.
“I memorized his schedule, followed his magazine features religiously, I would stammer and act like an idiot in front of him, it was dreadful.”
He paused, looking at Ladybug, who was smiling self-deprecatingly.
I will not let anything take away
What’s standing in front of me
Every breath, every hour has come to this.
“I had my entire future with him planned.”
He gasped.
She opened her eyes, laughing at his reaction. “Yeah! It’s true. I wanted three kids and a hamster. Our little babies Emma, Louis, and Hugo. A hamster named Loneliness, who would be the most spoiled hamster in the world.”
All the breath in his lungs almost got knocked out by that statement. Children. Marinette wanted children with him. Did he want to be a father? Yes. Oh gods, yes. He wants that future. He wants Emma, Louis, and Hugo. He wants Loneliness the Hamster, too.
One step closer.
“Of course, all that changed.”
He swallowed, lips dry. He had a feeling he knew what she was about to say.
“I thought he had fallen for this mutual friend of ours. I mean, she was gorgeous. So serious and mature, so cool and level-headed. I’ll admit even I had a small crush on her.” She giggled. “And well, they definitely got into something that resembled a relationship.” Ladybug smiled wryly. “But, I don’t know what happened.”
‘I couldn’t really get over you, Ladybug-you,’ he wants to say. He knows what was going through his head at the time. He could answer her. He wanted to answer her, because she’s never asked him about his short almost-relationship with Kagami.
I have died everyday waiting for you
Darling don’t be afraid
I have loved you for a thousand years
I’ll love you for a thousand more.
“And I thought to myself, at the time, that I’d let go of him, let go of my feelings for him.” She sighed deeply, shaking her head. “I couldn’t.”
Chat Noir spun her in a slow twirl, then stopped, placing his hands on her hips. She had her hands placed on his shoulders, reminiscent of their dance in that party Chloé hosted years ago.
“But, instead of acting out on my feelings, I decided to just be the friend he needed.” Ladybug smiled, looking up at him, as if to check if he was still following her tale.
He nodded silently at her, asking her to continue.
“I got to know him. Really know him. Not the fake him with fake answers given during magazine interviews because his father wanted him to keep an image.”
And all along, I believed I would find you
Time has brought your heart to me
I have loved you for a thousand years
I’ll love you for a thousand more.
“He loves cats, puns, science, video games. He wants to pursue a career as a physicist, he’s got the brains for it. But he’s always been afraid that all he’ll ever be is a model for his father’s company.” She frowns at that. “Of course that’s impossible now, seeing as the man is in prison.”
He nods minutely.
“I finally took down the posters of him I had in my room. I stopped being such a disgustingly obsessed stalker. I played video games with him when no one else could because it was a week before final exams and everyone wanted to cram as much information in their heads as possible.”
“He became human in my eyes.”
She looked at Chat Noir, in his eyes, and stopped his heart with her next words.
“It made me fall even deeper in love with him.”
I’ll love you for a thousand more.
“He was radiant, his smile, his personality. He was beautiful. He saw the good in everyone, no matter how badly they may have wronged him.”
To his surprise, and horror, Ladybug’s eyes started to well up with tears. “Gods, I love him.” She lets go of him, wiping the tears from her eyes.
He wants to reach out himself, wants to wipe her tears away, wants to tell her that he loves her a lot, too. Marinette, Marinette, Marinette.
“Sorry, just give me a moment.” Her voice wobbles.
“Of course.” He replies, voice hoarse.
One step closer.
“The day we got together was a day I’ll never forget.” Ladybug says, after she calmed down. “It was a normal day, like any other.”
He knows this. They were partnered to do Chemistry sheets together by Mme. Mendeleiev because they were always absent or tardy for her class.
“We went to his place to do the activities, because our teacher was such a hag and probably hated the both of us, so she made sure we did activities harder than the class was required to do, or something.”
They went at it for 2 hours, he knows this. She complained a lot but helped him out with calculations. He remembers that her hair was out of their signature pigtails. He remembers because at the time, he was always acutely aware of her and everything about her. It had been his turn to crush on her. (And oh, it was such a deep crush. Deeper than the one he felt for her alter-ego.)
“We played the games in his room, just the two of us.”
Laughing together, limbs tangled after she tripped and fell on him after he almost crushed her score on DDR. (She definitely did that on purpose.)
“He looked at me like I held all the secrets of the universe.”
He gently held her face in his hands, and smiled at her. Whispered her name so sweetly, and pulled her down to kiss her on the lips.
“It was the best kiss I ever had.”
It was the best kiss he ever had, too.
I have died everyday waiting for you
Darling don’t be afraid
“Months later, we finally got a breakthrough with our investigations regarding Papillon’s identity.”
He had wanted to deny it for so long. But the clues were all there. At the time, when the truth wasn’t something he could hide from anymore, he had wondered if his father ever loved him. Had wondered if everyone that ever loved him would leave him in the end, including her.
“After his father’s arrest, Adrien pretty much shut down.”
He closed his eyes. There it is. Undeniable proof that Ladybug was Marinette. He’d know the way she said his name, memorized her voice, her inflections, when she said his name.
“It took awhile for him to heal. It took awhile for him to learn to trust people again.”
Yet still, she stood by his side. Even when he asked her to leave him alone. She never once judged him, never once gave up on him.
“He finally decided to go through therapy a month after his father’s and Nathalie’s trial.”
It had felt good to know that what he was going through didn’t make him weird. He had professional help, he also had help in the form of his girlfriend, his girlfriend’s parents, his best friends, and the Gorilla, Grigori.
I have loved you for a thousand years
I’ll love you for a thousand more.
“When he finally smiled the same smile he had all those years ago, before his father tainted it, I almost cried.”
“Really?” He asked.
“Yeah,” she snorted. “It was the smile I fell in love with, Chaton.” She looked up at him, cheeks red, “To see him smile at me like that? My heart almost burst from how happy I was. I fell for him all over again.”
Chat Noir smiled.
“At that moment, I finally thought to myself, ‘I want to marry him.’ That was the first time I ever thought that. We were 18.” (And now, they were 25.)
His eyes widened at that. Oh. Oh.
And all along, I believed I would find you
“Back then, I swore to myself that I wouldn’t imagine myself with another man, not anymore.” She said, placing her hands on his shoulders again. His hands automatically sat on her waist, and they swayed together once more.
“He was the only one I wanted, the only one that I knew was for me. He was my soulmate.”
She looked into his eyes.
“He’s my other half.”
Time has brought your heart to me
Chat Noir bit his lip, eyes pricking with unshed tears. He wasn’t going to cry. He wasn’t going to cry. He wasn’t going to cry.
Ladybug reached up and wiped his tears away, as if she knew they were going to be there.
“So, I want to ask him to marry me. That’s what all this is for. I’m going to ask for his hand in marriage. Because, I love him. And I know he loves me.”
She pulls away from him, pulling out her bandalore. Opening it, she pulls something out. A velvet box—
She gets down on one knee in front of him. The box is open, and he sees a silver band inside.
She looks at him, loving smile on her face.
“So, Chat Noir… Adrien Agreste,” her voice wobbles. “Will you marry me?”
His hands come up to cover his mouth. He’s crying really hard right now. This was happening, this was actually happening.
Was it alright for him to experience this much happiness? Was it alright for this beautiful woman to love him with all her heart? Was it alright for him to love her with all his heart in return?
“Yes!”
Yes, it was alright.
Yes, he would marry her.
Yes, yes, yes.
He kneels down in front of her, detransforming, to hold her in his arms, to feel her heat.
She gently pulls away, and she’s detransformed too. They’re both crying in each other’s arms. She takes his left hand, her skin is cold and her hand is shaking, but she places the ring on his finger.
I have loved you for a thousand years
He pulls her in for a kiss, salty with their tears, but full of his happiness.
Here was a woman whom he had loved before he even knew what it really meant. Here was a woman that had carried the weight of the world on her back. Here was a woman so talented, so beautiful, so popular that she could have chosen any suitor she had to be the one she’d want to spend her life with forever.
Yet, she chose him.
She’d chosen him, and would keep choosing him.
“I love you,” he whispers into her mouth.
“I love you too, ma moitié,” she says, kissing him harder.
I’ll love you for a thousand more.
