Chapter Text
“Is this the flute?”
Marinette looked up, eyes widening a bit. The woman on the other side of the counter was looking at the loaf of bread she had been handed with more than a little suspicion. Her question was polite, really, as it was immediately apparent that her order had been filled incorrectly.
“Oh! I am so sorry.” She hurried to stuff one of the much thicker baguettes into a bag, and handed it across to the customer. “My apologies. Please, keep the other, as well.”
It wasn’t the first time she’d messed up, that day: she was unable to count change, unable to remember which flavors of macaron someone requested. She’d go into the back to replace sold-out stock, and return with the wrong thing. Like, over and over. And this was basic stuff. Walking and talking at the same time was probably beyond her.
Then again, Adrien Agreste had sort of always put her in that space.
It wasn’t bad things distracting her, very much the opposite. It was a non-stop cascade of incredible memories of the night before, all starting with the look on his face when the Ladybug suit dissolved: confusion, doubt, amazement. His fingers had been trembling, as they’d touched her face; as if he wasn’t certain she was real. Those green eyes, forever-entrancing, had shimmered with a thousand thoughts at once. There should have been a damn swell of music, the moment had been so perfect!
“Marinette?”
She looked up at her father’s voice, having seemingly gone right back into dreamland immediately after realizing she really needed to stop going back to dreamland.
“Is everything alright, mon chou?”
“Yes, of course! Absolutely. No problem, at all!”
He smiled in his doting way, the heavy moustache doing a sort of grin all its own. More gray than brown, now. “We can do fine without you, if you have other things to focus on.”
“No, of course not! I’m fine, I’m fine.”
She was saved by another customer entering the shop, thank goodness. Not that it actually focused her.
“Can we go back?” Adrien had asked, lips still brushing hers, hands still shaking as they cupped her cheeks after she had revealed herself. And she’d transformed again, the pink glow illuminating his wide eyes, and gotten them into his apartment in moments.
He’d watched the suit come off of her, this time able to catch every detail in the light of his home, and his lips parted once more in amazement. And once more he had touched her hesitantly, seeming to expect her to vanish any moment.
“How?” he’d whispered, searching her face. “All this time, how has it always been you? I was always so certain I’d be able to sense Ladybug, if I met her in real life, because I felt so strongly… how did I never realize you were right there?”
“That’s the way it has to be.”
And then, without extinguishing the lights, he’d undressed her, kissed her, made love to her, every movement full of reverence. She’d finally been able to see that unbelievable body of his, all the smooth centimeters she had coveted. She’d been able to see them. And the sight in that mirror that had once so intimidated her, he on top, her leg wrapped around him, writhing against each other….
“Putain!” Marinette yelped as she fumbled the bow on a box of macarons, sending it to the floor, and then squeaked in horror at her profane outburst in front of a customer. She dropped behind the counter to clean up the mess and wished she could just hide down there for the next hour or so, but her father was beside her, chuckling with the customer and fulfilling their order as if nothing had happened.
Focus focus focus focus focus!
A gigantic mit of a hand reached down, offering her assistance off her knees, and as she stood, Marinette already had a deeply apologetic expression etched onto her face.
“Papa, I—“
“You’re quite distracted this morning, Marinette. By something good, I hope?”
Her mouth opened to continue her apology, but her father’s smile stopped it.
“We’re beyond the rush for the morning, I can manage until Johann gets here later. Why don’t you go focus on whatever has you so unfocused?”
She forced out a laugh, hoping that her cheeks hadn’t turned too bright. How desperately would she love to focus on exactly that, but if she wasn’t at the bakery, she very much needed to be working on a commission whose delivery date was fast approaching. There wouldn’t be the time to devote to that particular distraction until much later in the day. And Adrien’s afternoon was going to be taken up by his duties to Agreste, anyway.
“Really, I… if you’re sure.”
“I’m sure. Have a good day, mon chou sous chef.”
She smiled. “Merci, papa.”
Marinette grabbed her purse from the back room and jogged out into fantastically beautiful day. The sky was blue and dotted with perfectly white, puffy clouds, but it probably could have been storming and she would still find beauty in it.
Freedom. Real, true freedom, that’s what she had now! Someone she loved, someone who loved her, from whom she didn’t have to hide her identity or her vocation. For the first time in her life, she felt free.
It felt silly, now, to have been so terrified to reveal herself to Adrien. She had been so scared that their history would be a weakness, when it was actually a strength. She should’ve had more faith in him.
She really wanted to be able to gush to someone about it all: his incredible reaction, the beautiful night they’d spent together. That his first words had been ones of love, and that the way he’d looked at her since hadn’t changed, other than to grow. The awe and affection she had seen so clearly for Ladybug was still there, but had joined by so much more.
The two people she could tell, however, and the two people who really should know, were also the two people she was most scared to tell. Now that Ladybug’s identity was known to someone else, a civilian— the first civilian to know— they needed to know it was that out there, a frayed strand in the tight weave of secrecy they’d maintained for so many years. A danger. A target.
Alya should be relieved in a way, though, right? No more sneaking around? She’d gone absolutely apoplectic when Ladybug had appeared in a packed cinema. It could’ve very easily marked Adrien as Catwalker, Marinette had been reminded, and make him a new favorite target for Hawkmoth.
Yes, she had to tell her. But she wanted to bask in this sense of relief for a while, first. And Luka… there wasn’t so much fear of him being angry as….
She did love him as much as she was allowed to, as she’d told him. As she’d not told him, she loved him a little more than that. Over the years, when allowing herself to think about the world after Hawkmoth, she had even thought that— maybe hoped that— they might be able to, finally….
With all of his dating, though, she hadn’t really believed he’d be interested, and sort of wished she hadn’t learned otherwise. She knew, now, that he was also still holding out hope for her— for them— and that meant seeing her with someone else could hurt. Even if he had encouraged her, her having entrusted Adrien with her biggest secret marked him as truly special. Just as she chided Luka playfully about his lovers and was perfectly friendly with each when they met, while her guts trembled with jealousy.
And Adrien, of all people! The guy she’d been obsessed with when she was younger, when she and Luka had met, when he fell in love with her. Why would he encourage—?
Marinette remembered, suddenly, his strange reaction to the information of whom Catwalker turned out to be. He had played it off as having received a disturbing text at the same moment, but her lifelong anxiety didn’t allow coincidences. Merde!
How could she tell him, now? That sort of horror on his face, one that seemed to freeze his entire existence for a few endless moments, she had never seen it before, and she had seen a lot. He had been at her side through hundreds of horrors, only even one of which could scar a person. But he’d never looked like that.
She paused what had been such a carefree walk just a moment before, feeling blanketed by discomfort and doubt. She weighed twice the usual, no one would be able to convince her otherwise.
He was a good friend. One of the absolute best. He wanted her to be happy, just as she wanted happiness for him. And they couldn’t be together, anyway, so, even if it was uncomfortable, what was the alternative? Actively dodge romance, just to keep things more… plausible? It wasn’t as if Luka—
Though, maybe he was. Keeping so many people rotating through his bed certainly didn’t allow any illusion of commitment.
Marinette blew out a long breath and forced herself to continue her path.
No, she was happy. So happy! So happy to be just a normal damn girl, able to live her life like every other damn girl in Paris was. Didn’t she deserve that? Hadn’t she fucking earned that? She’d sacrificed so much for so long, finally having a true, actual relationship with someone she could have a relationship with, not to mention someone she had adored since they met!
She wouldn’t feel guilty. She wouldn’t.
She did.
“Oh my god!”
Adrien chuckled, attempting to diffuse Ladybug’s concern as she rushed across the salon to him, becoming Marinette in the process. “It looks much worse than it is,” he lied, and refused to wince when she touched the echo of a strong fucking right hook on his cheek. Despite the ice he had been holding to it for the half hour, his eye was swollen half-shut and the skin around it a deep purple.
“What happened?”
His admission and apology to Luka hadn’t gone as well as planned. Or, actually, had gone just about as well as he had suspected it would. And he hadn’t even gotten to the admission, all the guy had needed to hear was his somewhat desperate plea for forgiveness to figure out what had happened, and act upon his resulting feelings.
To be fair, he had warned Adrien that he sort of wanted to punch him for a few things.
“I’m an idiot who jogged straight into a post when avoiding a stroller,” he chuckled lightly. “I can’t say I haven’t been a little distracted, all day.” Looping his arms around her waist, he hoped that she would allow him to distract them both from his injury, because he could really use the diversion. From a lot of things.
“I have absolutely been distracted,” she laughed, pressing herself against his chest, “but somehow I managed to avoid injury.”
“That’s a first.”
She looked up at him in her— Ladybug’s— pinched way, making him grin. “You realize, my clumsiness was only present when you were, as well.” His brows raised.
She blushed, tucking a bit of hair behind her right ear. “I would always seem to just… short out when you were around.”
He grinned, easily recalling the overtly ungraceful girl, and how adorable he had found her. She couldn’t walk and chew gum at the same time, sometimes she could barely get a sentence out. How was she also Ladybug?
“I am able to speak and walk with you around, obviously. I just couldn’t when we were younger and I was, you know, completely starry-eyed.”
His grin blossomed into a radient smile. “Wait, you did that because of me?”
She blushed so deeply it almost looked as if she was wearing her mask. “You were just, sort of… blinding.”
Adrien slipped his hand around the back of her neck and pulled her lips to his. “I know exactly how that feels.”
“Mmmmm.” She nuzzled against him, and it felt as if everything was right with the world.
“I just can’t believe Ladybug felt that way about me.”
Her body parted from his; she sagged down onto the soles of her feet, sagged backwards a bit. The blush was gone, and those stars in her eyes were, as well. “Marinette,” she said quietly.
Adrien’s heart plummeted, and his expression changed so quickly it literally hurt, thanks to Luka. “Yeah,” he stammered. “Of course. I just mean—“
She nodded, but only became more distant. Her arms wrapped around herself in a form of self-comfort, and she was an entire universe away from where she’d been a moment before. Her shoulders shrugged. “Like you said,” she forced a laugh, “you have no romantic interest in Marinette.”
All of him collapsed inward by a few centimeters. Clearly, he hadn’t been as successful in putting his mindfuck to bed as he’d hoped.
Adrien stepped forward, loosely embracing her again. “Marinette,” he said, “is one of my best friends, Ladybug was my crush. Even if you did have a bit of a crush on Catwalker, you can’t tell me that finding out he was your major crush didn’t take over.”
She was quiet, still in his arms, and his heart thumped ever harder. He couldn’t exactly point out that she, also, had not— still did not— have any romantic feelings towards his other side. He knew how that hurt, and he’d slipped.
“You said you loved me,” she whispered. “Me, Marinette. Do you? Or is it just loving Ladybug in a Marinette costume?”
He blew out a long sigh, and was carefully condensing his thoughts to be able to answer honestly, in a way she would be able to comprehend his dilemma and hopefully accept it.
But he didn’t get to answer.
Marinette sighed, stepping back out of his arms again. “It’s okay,” she muttered, “don’t worry about it. I need to go, there’s an Akuma. Spots on.”
He frowned. “But—“
She forced a smile that was hardly convincing. “Hawkmoth rarely has good timing. It’s alright, don’t worry.”
“Be careful,” Adrien implored, kissing her forehead. “Will you come back, after?”
Ladybug shrugged as she walked towards a window in the direction that he was, likewise, being pulled. “We’ll see how exhausting this is.”
“It’s okay to come back exhausted. You could—“
She nodded, swinging the window outwards. “I know.”
He sagged as she was absorbed by the gathering darkness of night, but forced his focus to something of more immediate concern. “Plagg? You can cover this mess up, right?” He motioned to the entire left side of his face.
The little monster, who had appeared from the direction of the kitchen, crossed his arms beneath a look of not-empathy. “For Chat,” he affirmed. “Adrien is going to have to deal with it.”
He sighed. “I know.”
Fortunately, there were no public requirements of him for a few days. Hopefully, long enough for the swelling to go down and the discoloration to fade into a state that would allow concealer to be effective. He’d learned in the past that the greens and yellows were much easier to hide than the purples and blues— and that there were certain things you did not say to Kagami, when dating her.
“Claws out,” he uttered, in much the same unenthusiastic tone that Ladybug had requested her own transformation, and checked his reflection in the window before exiting it. He still felt the pain and the swelling, but could no longer see it. With a careful pat, he found that it was still there, physically, and wondered if this type Kwami fuckery worked on the skin or the brain.
As he made his way towards the Akuma, Chat Noir recalled the thousands of times that he had done just that. Sometimes he was tired, sometimes he was annoyed, a few times he had even been drunk, but each and every time he had known that the Lady he would find when he got there, powerful and majestic and mysterious, would inspire him to be the best version of himself he could possibly be.
And she was Marinette?
She’d left his apartment, this time, but, before, she would’ve left the one she shared with Alya. And, before that….
He remembered finding Marinette up on the little rooftop patio above her childhood bedroom many times, as Chat Noir. He could never resist the pull of that little island of peace above the city. He’d spent time with her there, both as Adrien and as Chat. But now all he could think of was how Ladybug must’ve emerged and returned there, for years and years and years.
Marinette.
He should’ve been slower to respond. Being the unwanted filling in a Ladybug and Viperion sandwich was less than optimal.
The battle was to be at the Écluse de l’Arsenal, a lock between the Seine and the bassin where, he saw, Luka’s mother still moored her houseboat. Perhaps a small blessing, in that he’d be more focused on the emotion of the location than his low-grade urge to kill Chat Noir.
With a flick of gaze his way he saw that, no, Viperion was still looking towards him with an expression that suggested, at the very least, a mid-grade urge to kill him. And looking to Ladybug didn’t make him feel any better: she looked to be turned down to half of her usual energy.
Marinette.
How had he managed to fuck up so much in such a small amount of time?
Come on, Carapace, he projected a wish that his teammates would be hurried to the location. Rena, Bunnyx, Pegasus, please.
A battle was what he needed, he told himself. He couldn’t make things worse here, his days of letting Ladybug down were long behind him. He’d bolster her mood and help his team to victory. This was perfect timing, really!
“What’s happening, beloved teammates of mine?” he asked, twirling his staff in an attempt to look casual. In addition to being a respirator, communication device, pole vault, pogo stick, telescope, and umbrella, it was also a wonderful fidget object.
“I’ll let you know when I figure it out, kitty,” said Ladybug, observing the scene with a keen eye.
Said Marinette.
He stared at her, back mostly to him, and tried to overlay another woman atop her. But it didn’t work. Even though he knew, without any possible doubt, that it was Marinette, Chat Noir still couldn’t comprehend it.
Really, how was the baker and seamstress also the strongest person he knew? How was the clumsiest also the most nimble? Her attempt to try out for the fencing team in school had been beyond comical. Even if the bulk of her bumbling was supposedly connected to crush-related nerves, what was the rest of it? Marinette was amazing, in a whole lot of ways, but… Ladybug was someone else.
He tried to frame it a different way:to her, Chat Noir was (hopefully) amazing, but he wasn’t Adrien, and vice versa. Would she be able to look at Chat and see him?
If she had just been someone, a girl he had never seen or only knew in passing, would there be an issue?
It was an adjustment, that’s all. Once he got used to the idea, it would almost certainly seem like a no-brainer. It wasn’t bad, it was just weird.
He wondered how Luka had dealt with the revelation that Ladybug was his ex, and how long it had taken him to get used to knowing it was Marinette beneath the red mask.
Unfortunately, he wasn’t pretty sure they weren’t on talking terms, at the moment.
“Chat!”
He blinked, to find an irate partner glaring at him from several meters away. Hands on her hips, eyes narrowed, chin jutted just slightly forward. He’d seen that posture before, usually directed towards Chloe.
“What are you smirking at? Can you please focus?”
“I’m focused!” And he was incredibly relieved, to spot Carapace and Rena Rouge sprinting towards them along the bassin. Now, he just had to manage to not get killed, because, for the first time, he wasn’t completely certain that Viperion would do anything about it.
“What’s going on, bugaboo?” Chat asked gently, once they had successfully dispersed with the threat and all of their teammates had disappeared back into the night. “You seem… off.”
“Nothing’s going on, kitty,” she sighed. “I’m fine. Just have a lot on my mind.”
They were on one of the small pedestrian bridges that crossed the bassin, deserted and dappled in shadow. When Ladybug hadn’t immediately taken off as had the others, he couldn’t help but take the opportunity to gauge her headspace. And, already, he was wondering if she hadn’t been lingering simply so she didn’t return to Adrien Agreste’s apartment.
“Nah, something’s definitely going on. Because you’re too smart to be this distracted by just having stuff on your mind.”
A small smirk touched the corners of her lips. “Well, one of us has to be.”
He let his mouth fall open, one hand raised to his chest in offense. “I’m incredibly smart, thank you!”
She walked casually towards the center of the bridge. “Smartass,” she teased as she leaned against the railing, “is not exactly the same thing.”
Chat grinned, following. “I just happen to be incredible enough to be both.”
“Of course you are,” she allowed before turning, her arms going onto the railing as she looked out at the now-quiet scene. “I once had a breakup right here,” she sighed. “It was a terrible time in my life. It broke my heart, leaving him. I loved him.”
He frowned, heart sinking. He hadn’t known the details of the end of her adolescent relationship with Luka, but he couldn’t imagine she was speaking of anyone else. Not here. “Then why did you?” His voice was soft, gentle.
Ladybug shrugged. “Because of… this. Me. And not just me, I mean, but becoming the Guardian… there was too much I had to focus on, and too much I had to lie to him about. And that, the lying, all the responsibilities that I had to juggle without being able to tell him what and why, it was destroying him. He even….” She trailed off, but he finished her thought in his head.
Was akumatized.
He remembered that battle. He remembered all the battles against his friends, and this one against Luka— Truth— had been especially difficult. It was a Megakuma, the very first, and aimed at drawing out the secrets of everyone it hit. Chat had to be on the top of all his various toes to keep Ladybug from revealing her secret.
Now, he knew, that secret was the same as Marinette’s.
How horrible that must’ve been for her, having to watch someone she loved be so deeply hurt by her, and then having to battle the monster she, herself, had created.
All because she couldn’t tell him what she had just told Adrien.
“He was the first person to really love me. Maybe… maybe he’s been the only one.”
Chat Noir drew a deep but quiet breath. He had to manage and moderate the emotions that she was unaware were swirling within him. Were compounding.
He owed her so much. Her, Marinette. She was the most incredible person— the reason Ladybug was all that she was. Marinette was the superhero, Ladybug was only the mask. He owed her so much, and also could never live up to all that she was.
He should have listened to Luka, no matter how much it would’ve hurt. But he hadn’t understood— couldn’t understand— just how much and how well he knew Ladybug’s struggles.
Yeah, he deserved that punch. And worse.
Shhhhhhhhh he urged himself. Stop, or Hawkmoth will feel it.
Maybe he should let Marinette be as disappointed in him as she had every right to be, and not fight it. Not try to save himself in her eyes, not try to save them. Even if it meant losing his love and his friend, maybe he owed her that.
Or maybe he should tell her.
He closed his eyes. Tight, against burgeoning tears.
“You’ve suffered so much,” Chat said, struggling to keep his voice steady. “Not just as Ladybug, but because of Ladybug. I’ve never truly realized the depth of that, m’Lady, and I am so very sorry.”
Ladybug was examining him, he could feel her attention on the side of his face. He kept his eyes closed, though, because no matter how much acting he had done and how much of his life he had spent hiding so much from so many, he was too overcome with emotion for her to not see it all. No, he couldn’t tell her. Not ever.
A boat glided beneath them, small and quiet, the water of its wake breaking making more noise than the craft did. Chat Noir watched it, envying those aboard. People who were also affected by Hawkmoth and his chaos, but only for the moments of battle. Not always, not forever.
“It’s not any different from you,” she offered. “The secrecy, the commitments.”
“It is,” he insisted, observing the way the lights of the city were made to dance by the churning of the water. “Because I’ve never really had to hold anything back from someone I really cared about.”
“Your family—“
His head shook. “I don’t have that sort of family. And I’ve only ever truly loved you.”
Ladybug frowned, but it wasn’t an angry expression. Not even a frustrated one. It was… accepting. Understanding, even. “You’ve had sort of a lonely life, haven’t you?”
He shrugged, then hopped up onto the railing. He balanced there for a moment before sitting down. “If I hadn’t become Chat Noir, I think I would’ve had a really lonely life. But this, and you, saved me. Showed me I was more than just… I was more than what was wanted, for me.”
“You are more,” she told him. “Whatever that was, you’re so much more. Maybe too much!”
Chat chuckled. It was nice to see her cheeky smile. Any of her smiles. “I’ve gotten a lot, from doing this. And the things I give, they’re things I want to give. You, my Lady, it seems as if a lot has been taken.”
Her lips pursed. She turned again, leaning back against the railing once more. Leaning back farther, bending over it to look up at the sky. “It’s a big job.”
“That guy, the one you had to end things with, here. Was that… you always said your heart belonged to—“
“No,” she said, abruptly, standing straight again. That was… that was a crush I had on someone.”
It was me.
Ladybug blew out a long breath. “Life is stupid, Chat.”
He sighed. “You’re not wrong, bugaboo.”
Things were quiet, for a few minutes. He was looking out, towards the Seine and the city at large, and she was looking back into the bassin, into shadows. Into the past, he was certain.
“You know,” he said, when he became desperate to break the silence and her thoughts, “I don’t want you to think I’ve been sitting around all these years twiddling my thumbs. This whole thing was a big change for me, a lot of excitement, a huge rush. And you were all tangled up in it. Everything smacked me in the face at once.”
She boosted herself up onto the railing beside him, facing the other way. Arms brushing. “I didn’t think you had. You’re far too big a catch to have been able to successfully fend the girls off this long.”
He chuckled, giving her the touch of snark without comment. “Well, it hasn’t been easy.”
“Have you ever wanted to tell someone who you are?”
Chat drew a slow breath, considering the reason behind her question more than how he would respond to it. Would she admit that she had? Would she admit regret from doing so? “I… I have. But, I know—“
“Don’t. Don’t do it.”
His brow furrowed. “I know, bug. We have to—“
She shook her head. “Not because of that. I mean, yes, of course, secrecy, but I mean, don’t. Don’t want to. Don’t think it would be a good thing.”
Fuck.
“We’re too big to be anyone else. Too… ugh, too impressive.” Ladybug rubbed her eyes, as to ward off sleepiness. “We can’t just be human, not when someone knows that we’re this.”
Chat Noir didn’t have to fake his slow consideration of her words. Though, his thoughts couldn’t have been what she would have expected. “You told him,” he observed. “Catwalker.”
Her shoulders dropped as she sighed. “I shouldn’t have. It’s wrong to let anyone know our identities, I just… I felt like there were two options, and neither were great. I thought I owed him honesty, because…. But I shouldn’t have.”
“Well, if you were trying to have more than a fling, you’d sort of have to at some point, right? Be a little weird to be with someone for any amount of time that only ever got to see you in a mask.”
“It was a mistake. All of it. Trying to have a relationship, as Ladybug.”
He frowned. And wondered, in passing, if Luka was hiding out somewhere close by, having a silent celebration. “It would be a mistake to deprive yourself of something that could make you happy, because of Ladybug.”
“I—“
“I can’t imagine it wouldn’t be a really wild experience for someone to have to adjust from a superhero to a person, or the other way around, even if he was one of us for a night. I’m sure you didn’t tell him on a whim, Ladybug, you’ve never been the least bit careless.”
She let out a humorless laugh. “I had to become the Guardian because I was wildly careless.”
“Well, fine, but you’ve never made a mistake twice. Your judgement is ironclad. Give the guy a little while to get his bearings.”
Ladybug was considering his words, and he almost felt worse for it. He may be buying himself a momentary reprieve, but was a deeper hole he dug in order to do it. Lying, manipulation, all because he had been selfish. And, then, not even been a big enough person to accept the outcome.
“You think… just, his safety. You think he’ll be okay?”
Another sigh. “I do. That’s actually the least of my worries. Maybe I’m too busy feeling sorry for myself to even bother focusing on what matters.”
He bumped her shoulder with his. “Hey, stop it. Be fucking human for a minute. We’ve been doing this for half of our lives, I hope you haven’t spent all that time denying that you have a life outside of that suit.”
She shrugged.
“Yeah, of course you have.” He shook his head in lighthearted disgust. “Bug, you’re the most headstrong person I know, for better or worse, and that’s proven by the fact you’ve fought so hard for so long. You’re going to give up after a minor bump in the road? Because you didn’t get an immediate, perfect fairytale? Get the hell out of here. Go be with your guy.”
Ladybug was scowling.
“I get it, with all the fucking struggling we are forever dealing with, it would be nice to have something easy and perfect for once. But guess what, no one gets that. You wish he could just see you as a normal person? Normal people have to deal with stupid things. Stupid, silly, annoying little things. You can’t have everything be big and black and white just because this is: we’re good, Hawkmoth is evil. But there is a lot of gray and a lot of little fluctuations in life at large. You’ve rolled with literal punches, so I know you can roll with metaphorical ones.”
Her head was shaking, but it was with a pinched smirk. “You’re a jerk.”
“Only when you need it.”
“Yeah.” She huffed, and jumped back down to the surface of the bridge. “That doesn’t mean you’re right.”
“You don’t have to admit that I’m right. I know I am.”
“You’re smarter than all of us by orders of magnitude, Chat.”
“Yes, I am.”
A shove at his back had been expected, but he allowed himself to fall a meter or two for her entertainment, grasping onto the under structure of the bridge as Ladybug laughed.
And then, once her footsteps faded, he bolted back to his apartment, to wait and hope she would return.
She didn’t.