Work Text:
Adrien had barely dropped his transformation completely before falling on his bed face first with a groan.
“Already tired of being Chat Noir? That’s gotta be a new record, kid.”
Without turning his head an inch, Adrien grunted a non-response into his mattress. No matter the alter ego he chose, the routine was the same for his Kwami: get home from patrol, eat cheese, then sleep. Annoy Adrien was also scheduled in there at intervals, and it was apparently scheduled now.
How simple. Really, Adrien was envious of the little god, free to do as he pleased whenever with such little worry as to the minute changes in other people.
“We’re running low on Camembert. Just so you know.”
Adrien sucked in a mouthful of stale bedsheets then sighed until his whole chest decompressed and flattened.
How nice that would be, to only care about the next batch of cheese. To ignore other people’s suffering—hell, it didn’t even seem like his Kwami noticed that—
“By the way, I’m ignoring your dramatics."
Adrien flipped over in a rush, propping himself up on his elbow to shoot a deadly glare at Plagg. "I'm not being dramatic!" He carded a hand through his hair. “Dramatic is Loveybug’s—"
“Oh, here we go!” Plagg yelled, zipping to the farthest corner of the room. “Loveybug this, Loveybug that. Fifth day this week—this reeks!”
Flopping onto his back, Adrien linked his hands over his stomach, face set in deep thought. “I’m telling you, she’s been acting differently since I told her I was Chat Noir.” He nervously tapped his finger on the back of his hand. “Not different different, I guess—I mean she still gives me cheek kisses, but it’s three instead of eight. Three! That’s a significant difference mathematically!”
“Simply terrible,” Plagg said through chewing a whole slice in that way Adrien detested. How could he eat at a time like this?
“And what about the patrols? She’d feed Catwalker ice cream by the spoonful and then insist on sharing a second. But now she practically shoves the ice cream in my mouth like she can’t wait to get it over with. And then she runs off! Not even flies, so what gives? She literally jumped off of the bridge today and swam away.”
“Truly interesting.”
Adrien frowned, feeling so near to despair he could taste it over the faint film of ice cream that coated his mouth. “That’s weird, right? What changes if she knows Catwalker was me? What changed between us when I turned back to Chat Noir?”
He’d only dropped the Catwalker act as a move of vulnerability, wanting to let her know, in the only way he could, a little more about him. He’d even looked forward to flirting with her right back, matching her energy and seeing what buttons made her a flustered, blubbering mess instead of the other way around. But, with a depressed sigh, Adrien felt it had only had the opposite effect.
Worrying his bottom lip between his teeth, Adrien feared the worst: Catwalker was the more likable side of him, despite Loveybug insisting she liked Chat Noir, too.
In his peripheral, he noted Plagg flying up to the second story of his room. “See, I swear I’m hearing a broken record, but I can’t find a gramophone anywhere.”
“Do you think she likes Chat Noir less? She swore up and down that she cared for me in the same way, and she still crushes me into a hug after an Akuma, but I don’t know, it’s just different.” Then Adrien pouted, asking himself what always felt right to ask. “Do you think I did something wrong? Or made her feel bad?” Playing back the days in his mind, he seriously reviewed each one for something he must have been overlooking—an ill-timed pun, an insensitive joke, plain ol’ incompetence?
“I’m not sure she knows how to not be obsessed, Adrien. What did she say that day? ‘A rose by any other name’, or whatever it was that made you fall in love with her?”
Adrien swung his arm out, pointing accusingly above him. “I never said that, and you can’t prove it. I just miss how things used to be.” Adrien frowned, recalling the months of being Catwalker. “It was nice having someone to hold. It was nice that she always wanted to hang out—I mean, we haven’t even seen a movie together in weeks!” Then, Adrien screwed up his face as if he was finally processing something. “Wait—a gramophone? Plagg, how long has it been since you—”
Their argument was severed by a loud, clipped scream, and Adrien, shooting up to a catlike stance on his bed, barely caught a whirling pink mass falling into the hedges just below his bedroom windows.
“Speak of the devil,” Plagg yawned, scurrying off even before Adrien began waving his hands frantically to shoo him away.
Going to the window and throwing it open, Adrien leaned out so far his shoes were barely touching the carpet of his bedroom.
There, tangled in a thorny bramble of freshly-cut hedges, lay Loveybug, sprawled as if someone had spilled sugary Valentine’s Day candy right at his feet. Glimmering pink arms and knee length boots splayed at awkward angles, and her lips—usually supporting an ever-bright smile—pulled into a grimace. Like usual, her skirt which usually resembled a waterfall of cherry blossoms had lost a few due to her clumsiness. She groaned low, eyes fluttering open, then coughed and spit out a small leaf ungracefully onto the red, sweetheart necked top that lay over her iridescent suit.
“Loveybug? Are you alright?”
At once, her vibrant blue eyes shot open, the familiar shining glint of what he thought was a heart glowing over her pupil. “Mon soleil! ” She moved to prop herself up on one elbow, but it instead fell through a gap in the hedge so that she sloped down into the brambles, slowly sinking, as if she might be swallowed whole by the garden any second.
Adrien wanted to laugh though, because she, never deterred, raised her brows with a smirk.
“Did it hurt?” she asked.
He blinked. With one side of his lip curled into a grin he asked, “Did what hurt?”
Expression moue and eyelashes batting she cooed, “When you fell from heaven?”
He snickered, then, unable to control himself, laughed so hard he leaned back into his room as he felt he really would fall forward and find himself in her same predicament.
It wouldn’t be so bad, falling alongside her. I bet it wouldn’t even hurt all that bad.
Adrien cleared his throat harshly.
“I think I’m supposed to ask you that, Lovey.” Bending at the waist over the window, he extended his hand out as an offering.
“Me? Oh, pff.” She slung out her arm and with a grunt, pulled herself up, letting out an adorable squeak when one leg fell between two bushes. “No, I was just doing my trust falls.”
Adrien leaned back with effort, pulling her close to the window so she could scramble up and over. After a war of her gossamer caplet wings stuck on a branch, she landed on her feet and gave a victorious hop, throwing up her hands as if she stuck the landing quite perfectly.
“Your trust falls,” he teased, reaching out to pull a stray twig from her hair and presenting it to her with a smug look. Now pleasantly content with how the day was playing out, Adrien sank back into his couch, radiating mirth. “Into my hedges, huh?”
Loveybug snapped her bare fingers, painted lacquer red. “Uh, yeah! Trusting fate and all that?” She sat on the arm of the couch, throwing her legs across his lap. Peering down at him with the smile she always had, warm and soft and glazed with the same pink that dusted her whole body, she brushed back his hair from his eyes. “And it led me straight to you, so I know it’s never wrong.”
Trapped between the tent of her legs and the couch, Adrien melted under her touch, eyes fluttering closed. His mind stuck on her words, especially fate.
It’d been months now since their first meeting, and technically two weeks since their second, when he debuted (re-debuted?) as Chat Noir; shortly after the first incident however, he had spotted her pacing the rooftop parallel with his windows. Noticing that she stopped every few minutes to look at the mansion, then continued her pacing, he’d opened the window and waved to her. Thinking back on it, she’d fallen then too, right off the face of the building. When she leapt over to his window, a smattering of pebbles and rocks still being brushed off her cheeks, she’d greeted him with an exuberant: You’re just that easy to fall for, am I right?
When she’d left that first night, Adrien had thought about the word fate. Ladybug used to visit, and that had made sense to him because she’d saved him a handful of times. She never had stayed long, always fidgeting with her hands in that way that made him want to scoop them up into his, and bolting for the window when she made what he thought was a minor mistake—spilling her drink for example, or that time he glanced over at her during a movie and she was watching him, not the screen.
Ladybug used to visit, and Loveybug, for whatever reason, hadn’t felt all that different. It was strange: sometimes he wanted Loveybug to visit so bad, but at the end, was left oddly missing Ladybug. But then thinking of Ladybug replacing Loveybug made his chest tight, and he didn’t ever bother taking those thoughts further. It felt like hedging too close to something he both wanted and definitely did not want.
So, Adrien left it at this: Loveybug was a good friend to him. He didn’t want to lose her either. Especially not due to his own carelessness.
He opened his eyes and smiled up at her, stalling his train of thought. “I think you’d say that to any pretty boy in town.”
“Not true!” She poked his nose in staccato. “Between you, Catwalker, and Chat Noir, you think I have time for any more beautiful, loveable boys?” She cupped his face, like it was imperative he hear his next words. “Besides, you’re more than a pretty face—what did we just talk about!”
After her last visit a couple of weeks ago, they’d talked for hours, mainly about identities. Not in the way he was used to, not at first, but she had confessed quite boldly that she owned nearly every magazine that featured him. Even then, it hadn’t felt like she was just a run of the mill fangirl; she’d only confessed in the first place to apologize, as he had quietly confessed that he didn’t want to model at all, and never had cared for it. He’d said he felt it’d been a long time since he felt like himself, and his heart alighted when she asked him seriously what would make him feel like that again.
Adrien thought that had been fate, too; a sign to reveal himself as Chat Noir.
“I burned all my magazines, by the way. Asked Ladybug to Bon Voyage them into the sun, actually, because the garbage doesn’t deserve to pollute the air of Paris.”
Adrien furrowed his brow, curious at her tone. “Whoa, those are some pretty harsh words, especially coming from you, Lovey.”
“I love Paris; I don’t want it ruined by all that junk.”
He felt his face heating up. “Still,” he said, smaller than he meant to. Burning it was one thing, but asking Ladybug? Did that mean Ladybug knew she visited him?
Loveybug fiddled with his earlobe. “Mm, you’re right. I loved destroying those magazines and I loved going on the Gabriel Instagram page and saying how awful they are.”
Adrien’s mouth dropped open. “Loveybug!” He righted himself, glancing quickly at the door, then whispered as if they were being watched somehow, “You didn’t have to do that.” He sheepishly ducked his head into his shoulders. “I’m sure you already have so much to do.” Laughing weakly under his blush, he added, “like help an old person across the road o-or matchmaking citizens again.”
“I have all the time in the world for you!”
Before he could respond, she pressed a light kiss on his temple. “Plus I’m so good at matchmaking, it only takes me like two minutes now.”
“Worrying about me though, it’s… isn’t it…”
A burden, he wanted to say, but that was difficult.
She ran her hands through his hair. “Not to me. Not if it’s you.”
Now shy, Adrien hid his smile against the side of his knee, flicking his gaze up at her through his lashes. “Still, Father…”
Loveybug scrunched up her face, mask bunching up over her button nose. “What’s he gonna do, argue with the savior of Paris? I’d like to see him try!” She covered her hand over her heart—her signature trait—and sighed, at peace with something. “Plus, Chat Noir would never let him, or anyone for that matter, touch a single hair on my head.”
Hearing his alter ego’s name slip from her lips with such trust and adoration made him instantly relax again, sinking back into the couch. “Well, thank you. That’s nice of you, really.” Adrien reached up to grab a strand of his hair, longer than it had ever been, now nearly tickling the lower nape of his neck. “But Father did let me grow out my hair finally.”
“I know, look at it!” She threaded her hands through his hair and rabidly tousled the new mane. “It’s so you! It’s almost exactly what you wanted!”
Adrien laughed, letting his head be aggressively tossed from side to side. During their last talk, he had revealed he’d been wanting to sport longer hair, break away a little from the supposed image Paris had of him, and Loveybug gave him some talking points for his Father: it was fashionable now with teenagers, and the ‘too-clean’ look made the brand feel impersonal.
(If Loveybug asked, he’d tell her that his Father hadn’t even needed convincing, that the meeting lasted all of one minute and Adrien was pretty sure Father hadn’t even noticed the change in the previous weeks. The only thing he wouldn’t confess is that he, after months of being Catwalker, missed having long hair.)
“Speaking of things you want,” she started, drawing her hands away much to his dismay, “I almost forgot! One second.”
He watched her spin around on the couch’s arm and leap off, then heave herself out of the window again into the bushes and reach into them for something. He lifted himself off the couch, ready to offer her another helping hand, when she reemerged with a mischievous grin, a plastic bag secured in her hand. Before he could help her in, she grabbed the lip of the window and pulled herself in, though her free hand slipped and she tumbled in completely, rolling ungracefully on the floor.
Helping herself onto one knee, she offered the bag to him with an air of importance, much like a knight offering a rose in some fairytale. “Last time I was over, you said you’d never had calissons and I thought that was absolutely criminal, so I made these for you.”
Adrien accepted his gift and looked into the bag with wonder. It was nearly filled to the brim with large almond-shaped candies, some of them sadly broken in half from her fall, all wrapped in cellophane groups of what seemed to be different flavors, tied with delicate bows that matched her own.
“You made these? For me?”
So touched, he hadn’t even registered her getting up. Looking to where he’d thought she’d be on the ground, he almost stumbled backwards over the couch when he looked up and Loveybug was beaming at him, just a few inches from his face.
“Of course! Why not you?”
He hoped his face wasn’t as red hot as it felt. “O-oh, I don’t know…”
She’d brought over these pastries before for Catwalker, but that had stopped for Chat Noir, and he hadn’t realized just how much he’d missed it until that moment. He had told her he’d never had them, and that had technically been the truth since Adrien never had.
His stomach growled; he suddenly felt like he could eat ten, twenty of them right now, hunger absolving him of his minor guilt at his lie.
Loveybug’s cheeks rounded out her eyes when she smiled and she took one of his hands and led him to his bed. She grabbed the bag from the bottom and tipped it over, spilling the contents into a heap, and picked out the four different flavors, pointing to each one when she sat down beside them. “This one’s traditional melon, and this one’s pistachio—”
Adrien sat opposite of her, his heart warming as he fondly remembered Loveybug saying the green reminded her of Catwalker’s hair.
“And this is passionfruit, for my one and only soleil,” she concluded. She leaned over the candies, her glossy smile making his heart do funny things in his chest. She tilted her head, eyes glazing over with that romantic haze that overcame her often. “You know, there’s a legend about these candies.”
He found himself mirroring her actions, leaning his weight on his hand and his head on his shoulder. “Oh yeah?” He knew the story, of course—she’d told the very same one to Catwalker, and he’d known it then, too. But Loveybug always had a strange pull, like it was important down to a molecular level that he heard anything that she wanted to say. “Enlighten me.”
“There used to be a king—”
“Not a little prince?” he teased, recalling her nickname for Catwalker.
“Hey!” Loveybug, much like a cat, swayed towards him to headbutt his cheek. “I thought I said to forget about that,” she muttered.
Adrien didn’t think there was any way he’d ever forget it.
Clearing her throat, Loveybug continued. “Anyway, King René left his wife alone a lot, and she ended up falling for this pastry chef who was madly in love with her.” She walked her fingers across his bed, trailed them up his arm and linked hers with his, hugging it tightly. With her head nestled below his, she looked sweetly up at him. “The legend has it that she said ‘Di calin soun’.”
Adrien’s lips curled at one side. “These are like cuddles?”
“Yup!” She used her free hand so she could pick up one of the passionfruit packages, dropping it into his lap. “Minor adultery aside, I thought the story was sweet.” She lingered her hand on his thigh, drawing little hearts on his pants. “So, I hope they taste that way to you, too.”
“Like adultery?”
He couldn’t help himself.
She playfully shoved him, sending them both into laughing fits. “Only if you're in love with someone else, then I guess yes.”
His chest went tight again, his mind briefly thinking of Ladybug, but he swallowed it down, chastising himself for ruining a good moment.
Right here—this was something good.
She was here.
Excited to eat one of her homemade treats again, Adrien reached for the bag in his lap, only hesitating when his mind picked up on an irregularity in her counting: she’d only listed three flavors. Looking back at the pile, Adrien pointed to a package of candies with vibrant pinkish-red icing. “What about this one? What flavor is it?”
Upon noticing which he was pointing to, Loveybug’s happy countenance dropped and she untangled herself from him.
His body went cold without her and he wished he could take his question back. Was it just his superpower to unintentionally say something stupid?
She retreated back to her solemn sitting position, arms stiffly outstretched to rest her palms on her knees. “I d-don’t—Bad. They’re bad, is what they are. Dry and tasteless and I probably accidentally put poison in them or something.”
“Perfectly reasonable fear,” he said, trying to lighten her fears.
Hurriedly, she began scooping them into her lap. “Actually, don’t eat these. C-Chat Noir—they’re for him, but—”
She’d made them for Chat Noir? His heart and mind raced in different speeds, each trying to figure out why she hadn’t given them to him before.
“You made these for him? Have you given them to him?”
Frowning, she wilted like a flower, shoulders drooping heavily. “No. I don’t think he’d like them.”
Adrien glimpsed this side of her, only once as Catwalker, when a veil seemingly lifted and allowed him to see that Loveybug’s affections were brave, tenacious for sure, but it struck him then that her grandiose acts of love were something she was actively fighting for, and that resonated with him, opening up his previously guarded heart involuntarily. It’d felt like fate then, too, just before the veil closed again and she smiled through her tears.
He reached out to cradle her arm, rubbing his thumb reassuringly into the inside of her elbow. “I’m sure he’d love to try them.” Loveybug stopped cold, and he took the initiative to slide his fingers down her forearm to her hand. To his amusement, she almost looked a little mortified as he brought the sachet in her hand to his side of the pile. “Can I try them? I can test them for you, if you’d like.”
Maybe if he showed her that they were actually delicious and convinced her that Chat Noir would be ecstatic to receive them, she would go back to the persuasive, confident Loveybug he’d met all those months ago. Adrien was sure of it now: Chat Noir had done something that made her feel like she wasn’t good enough.
That had to be it, right?
“O-okay,” she stammered, eyes bouncing all around his room. “But I’d really like you to try the passionfruit, too, if you don’t mind.”
“Oh, I was planning on eating at least half of these tonight.”
Loveybug giggled behind the back of her hand, and motioned with the other. “Knock yourself out then.”
Adrien picked up a small group of dark pink calissons and unwrapped them. He took one out and broke it in half, offering the other to her. Expecting her to take it from him with her hands, he flushed from head to toe when she leaned down to take it between her teeth instead.
Yeah, he should have seen that coming.
From the color, he was expecting raspberry or maybe strawberry, but he barely made it two blissful chews before he was sure he knew the flavor.
“Cherry? It’s fantastic!”
She nodded her head, sending her ribbons bouncing. “Y-yeah. It’s what he always gets at André’s.” Lovebug turned to him, eyes inquisitive. “Have you ever been?”
“A few times, with friends.”
“The whole thing is kind of cryptic sometimes. Like André’s riddles or whatever don’t even make sense.” She perked up, making a checkmark pose with her thumb and forefinger. “Makes you wonder if it’s cherries or cherry blossoms.”
Truthfully, Adrien hadn’t even given them much thought other than the taste. He swallowed, already reaching for another one. “What do you mean?”
She tapped her lips in thought. “I mean, one is red and one is pink. Totally different. But he told Chat that it was ‘cherry flavored like the fruit, sweet like the blossoms in spring!’” She scrunched up her nose. “Well, it can’t be both, André!”
“Why not?” asked Adrien, breaking another in half to share.
But she waved him off, her eyes cast down at her boots. “I don’t know. It just can’t, in my experience.”
“I think you’re overthinking, Lovey.”
She rolled her eyes. “I’m never wrong when it comes to matters of love.”
While she was still focused on her shoes, he quickly grabbed a full array of the assorted flavors and opened them, grabbing one of each and promptly stuffing them all in his mouth, coughing with both a laugh at the absurdity and the crumbly dough, which made her snap out of her thoughts and whip her head to look at him.
“Hey!” she gasped, flying towards him and grabbing his wrists to stop him as though his cheeks weren’t already stuffed. “Spit those out!”
Her fervor only spurned on his choked laughter, which in turn made her shake him by his arms; then, when this proved to be pointless because he was still chewing and decidedly not spitting it out, she slid her knees onto the bed and nearly tackled him—and, in his effort to not crush the remaining baked goods, Adrien shifted uncertainly to the side and fell backward, her move effectively pinning him to his bed.
“It’s going to taste awful jumbled together like that! You deserve better!”
Adrien made a thoughtful expression, finally chewing and swallowing the last few bites. He shrugged, smiling up at her. “I think it tasted wonderful, Lovey. And,” he started, heart stuttering a bit, “I think I’m feeling very cuddled right now.”
She hummed, but the sound was too sweet to make his heart skip the way it did. Her eyes became half-lidded, some plan obviously forming in her mind. “I think we can do better than this.” She released her hold on her arms and moved to wrap her own under his back, nuzzling her face into his chest and flattening out her body so she lay halfway down his body.
She was right—this was a hundred times better. Adrien thought he might actually be floating. Though, even with their close friendship, Adrien stalled for a moment, unsure of where to put his hands. In the end, he linked his hands behind her back, resting his thumbs on her neck.
Amused, he watched her legs behind her swing up and down in alternating motions. It reminded him of his tail swishing behind him when he was Chat Noir.
“The cherry ones, they really tasted alright?”
“They were perfect.”
She hummed again, lower lip protruding in a pout.
Adrien felt a sense of helplessness creep over him, everywhere on him in the shape of her body on his. Had he as Chat Noir really done something so terrible, so thoughtless, that her usual optimism was knocked down so much?
“So, Chat Noir,” he started, dragging in an unsteady breath, “why do you think he wouldn’t like them?”
“It’s really not that,” she sighed. “I’m sure he’d love them. Especially from me.”
Relief washed over him, but her tone had him still tense.
“Well sure, don’t all the tabloids say you two are a couple?”
She groaned, turning her head and burying it in his shirt. He tried not to chuckle at how her warm breath tickled his belly, even over his shirt. “That’s what they said about me and Catwalker, so what do they really know?”
“So, what’s the problem?” Feeling like he wasn’t getting anywhere but still desperately wanting to comfort her, he moved to rub her head. Tried not to think about how silly her hair was. “Did he do something to hurt you somehow?”
The words had just left his mouth when she shot up, her lip quivering. “No, of course not! He couldn’t even hurt a fly if I asked him to.” She scrambled to settle at the edge of his bed, hugging herself slightly. “It’s me.”
The helplessness Adrien felt was sharply overtaken by fear. He followed her, but she curled further in on herself.
“What do you mean?”
She cast her gaze out his windows at the setting sun. “It’s hard to explain,” she sighed. “Trust me, I’ve tried.”
Adrien racked his brain again, trying to find a moment she might have tried to tell him something, but came up frustratingly empty. “Well, I’m here, if you’d like to try to explain to me.”
Still looking out the windows, she tapped the heels of her boots against his carpet like she was mulling it over. Then, when he thought she might tell him to forget the whole thing, she huffed, throwing up her hands.
“Ugh, I mean, who needs to practice what to say, right? Like, just say it! It’s easy!” Then she laughed, too loud and discordant to be her normal laugh, the one he’d missed when he was alone. “I’m Loveybug! I say what I want all the time and what’s so hard about telling the truth?”
Adrien shifted uncomfortably, getting a sense that her explanation wouldn’t be something he liked. He scraped his fingernail against his jeans, right where it thinned over his knee. Her laugh was the same kind of laugh Marinette had before running away from him, or when Ladybug would wave off something she said—something he felt must be important—and implore him to not bring it up again.
“It’s important, so I should say it, but that’s kinda the funny thing—it’s so important, I feel like I can’t at all, or what if I mess it up? God, what if—,” she groaned, looking so distraught that the ribbon tied at the back of her hair seemed to wilt, “what if they don’t understand so I have to repeat it? That’s the absolute worst! It’s torture!” She pressed the heel of her palms into her eyes, dramatically bending backwards. “I think I’d—I don’t know. Give up the earrings forever.”
Adrien felt as if he’d been struck so hard he split into two entities: one watching the scene unfold from above them, and one pitiful one watching her twist her mind into knots beside him. He didn’t want that to happen—couldn’t even imagine her leaving without a trace. Adrien could ignore the elation that welled in his chest when he saw Loveybug and could pack away the idea that he might actually love her, too, but one idea that already had him slipping down into that desperate, shaky feeling was the idea that she might leave him, too.
So, gently moving the treats away, he scooted towards her, knocking his knee against hers in the process. This only made her jump back, her eyes snapping back up to his. He grabbed her hands and pressed his thumbs reassuringly against her fingers. “No, not at all! It’s not embarrassing, I promise. Not to me.” He tilted his head, sweetly saying, “Not if it’s you.”
Loveybug’s eyes went wide, and her blush bloomed out from under her mask. Averting her eyes again, she gave another breathy giggle. “H-hey, look who rubbed off on who!”
She squeezed his hands tighter, however, and he felt the two entities that split converge back again.
“What can I say?” He leaned forward, just enough to catch her eyes again, so she was sure to see his smile. “I learned from the best.”
As she sat up a little straighter, he swiped his thumbs across her knuckles. “So, can I help? With the confession?”
Her brows shot up, stretching the hearts on her mask. “H-help? How so?”
Adrien paused, pouting and thinking for only a split second before the perfect idea came to him. “What about roleplaying? I can pretend to be the receiver of whatever it is that you want to say.”
She made an absolutely disgusted sound, like when he was little and Maman forced him to drink cough syrup to cure his cold, and she even shuddered, too. “I love your idea, but—” Then she sighed, shaking her head. “No, no. It’s a great idea, I’m just scared.”
“You’re Loveybug! You said so yourself!” Adrien sat up straight, putting on a serious face he’d practiced to perfection, if he did say so himself. “I promise not to laugh.”
She dropped her hands to her lap, and following her movement, he noticed that she too fidgeted with the skin of her thumbs. “It’s not that, I know you wouldn’t. It’s just…” She sucked in a breath. “Well, it’s something else I have to say. To Chat Noir.” Then, in an unsure voice, she added, “Something that would change things between us.” Then, even smaller, “Again.”
Suddenly, Adrien couldn’t breathe. Didn’t want to.
Again? Again?
Feeling lightheaded, he used the last threads of sanity to weave together a story, the only one that made sense: the only thing that had changed was that he revealed Catwalker to actually be Chat Noir.
Despair gave way to anger towards himself. They’d been good, great even as Catwalker and Loveybug. Why did he ruin that by being Chat Noir? Did he think she’d actually like that side of him, showboating and reciprocating her love—she hadn’t asked for that. All the nice things she said about Chat Noir, it was just who she was. She loved everyone, but…
She’d wanted Catwalker.
He forced himself to ask through his dry throat, “Do you miss Catwalker?”
“Yeah. I do.”
He didn’t have time to process the numbness that arose before she shot up to her feet and began pacing, running her hands through her hair nervously. “But no! That’s not exactly it, either. With Chat Noir, it’s hard—”
Adrien looked bleakly at the broken candies by his lap. Would he always be the problem? Ladybug had left certainly because of him, and he tried— god , he tried—to be better as Catwalker. Was it his fault it was unbearable to be so separated from Loveybug? He thought revealing his identity would bring them closer, but it seemed to him then to be just another confirmation that what he wanted would inevitably be taken further away from him, because of him.
Adrien suddenly wanted to do nothing, forever. Maybe then he’d stop making mistakes.
“He makes things difficult?”
“No, he’s perfect!” She stomped her foot. “See what I mean? I’m not explaining this well at all.” She started counting off her fingers. “Chat Noir is kind, brave, perfect, and always, always knows what to say.”
Fears still not fully assuaged, Adrien only half-listened as she continued.
“He’s romantic and funny—charming even if it’s something extremely stupid, and he gets this look in his eyes that I can’t stand! It’s so—!” Loveybug motioned wildly with her hands before she slumped back down on his bed, dropping her head in her hands. She turned to him, pouting adorably. “This might not make sense either but… have you ever been scared that maybe revealing another side of yourself would, I don’t know, backfire?”
In spite of himself, Adrien found himself nodding before he had the right words. He still felt like he might be sick, but—
“Like maybe I words my mix-up sometimes actually. I don’t even notice it! Or maybe I’m really, horribly anxious all the time and what if he—he—” Her chest heaved in another breath and she rubbed the back of her neck, “he doesn’t like me for me, actually? What if I change and he hates me?”
Finding the only words that made sense, he said with his unsteady breath, “I don’t think it’s possible to not love you, Loveybug.” Adrien reached out his hands again, but, realizing that they were trembling, stopped before he touched hers and rested them on the bed instead, bunching the duvet between his numbing fingers. “I think Chat Noir would love to know about you. If you’d let him.”
“We can’t be so sure since, you know, neither one of us is him!”
Both their heads bowed and spirits diminished to low flames, their minds waded through silence before he spoke up again.
“A rose by any other name, right? What could be such a big change?”
Although it was weak, she glanced back at him with a shy smile, and he felt emboldened to continue.
“I don’t…” He shook his head. “I didn’t have a lot of friends. Not before last year.” Looking up, his breath caught in his throat—she was already looking at him with that adoration that felt so incredibly real. “It’s hard—really hard sometimes, wondering where you stand with people. And opening up is so vulnerable it hurts sometimes.”
Adrien rolled his lip between his teeth, thinking of Ladybug. How scared he was initially to renounce being Catwalker in front of Loveybug.
He lifted his hand again, but she was quicker: she gathered his hand in hers and held it tight.
Feeling almost near to tears, he smiled. “But you, Lovey—you inspired me to do it even at my lowest.”
Her mouth dropped open. “Really?” she gasped, leaning closer towards him. “How?”
He blanched; he’d said too much. Now it was his turn to rub the back of his neck, using his free hand. “Let’s just say I have my secrets.”
She scrunched her nose again, frowning. “I hate secrets.”
He laughed, placing his hand over hers. “Then why keep one from Chat Noir? He’s your partner, right?”
Her eyes wandered around his room again for a moment, her lips pouting in thought.
“Yeah. He is.”
Then she scooted closer to him, still holding his hands, even tighter still.
“And it’s not really a secret, per se, but more like… a surprise? A confession? All of the above?” she giggled. “I planned I would tell him first,” she tipped her head and her loose locks fell off her shimmering pink shoulder, “But I think it’s nice if you know, too.”
In mock surprise, Adrien put on his best touched expression. “You trust me that much?”
Loveybug giggled, letting go of his hands. “It can be our secret as well.” She pressed her index finger against her lips, winking. “I get the feeling you’re good at keeping those.”
Fighting the guilt that arose was becoming easier, because he’d fully formed the thought to himself, is it bad if I want to replace her finger with my lips right now?, before he reminded himself that Adrien Agreste had safely put her as a good friend.
“Secrets? Yeah,” he laughed hoarsely, “No. I mean, well, I can’t tell you if I am or am not, because that would ruin the point of secrets.” He cleared his throat harshly, “So, what’s the surprise for Chat Noir?”
“Well,” she said, taking in a big breath. “Let’s just say Loveybug is taking a break.”
Adrien panicked. “You’re leaving?”
“No!” she waved her hands in front of her. “Not really, but this…This might be the last time you see me.”
“But you’re…”
He didn’t get the chance to finish his sentence before she put her index finger to his lips. His heart hammered in his chest, so fast he felt queasy. Mentally, he tried to ingrain the feeling of her fingers, the warmth they held and the drag of it across his bottom lip. She moved in so close, he could smell her familiar sugar cookie perfume.
“Do you trust me?”
And maybe he was truly losing his mind, or maybe he actually missed Ladybug more than he realized, but that single simple sentence reverberated in harmony with every time Ladybug had asked him that as Chat Noir.
He nodded his head simply, and internally mourned greatly when she lifted her finger away.
“Okay,” she smiled. “Close your eyes.”
He did as instructed, but felt anxious when nothing happened immediately. Sitting with his eyes closed, the sound was almost deafening, but there was nothing else in his bedroom but them, no other sound but their breathing.
“Like I said,” she started suddenly, her voice making his nerves feel like live wires. “Our little secret, got it?”
He swallowed, still fighting with the nervous feeling in his gut. “Got it.” Then blindly, he reached out to her, suddenly fearful. “Wait.”
“Yes?”
“Me and you, we’ll still be friends, right?” He swallowed even though his throat seemed to be incredibly parched. Without her, without Ladybug—he shuddered to think of what would become of afternoons like this. Caged and alone. “No matter what?”
For what Adrien felt like was the last time, she grabbed his hand. And waiting in that endless dark, he felt the press of her lips against his knuckles.
“Of course.”
Then she dropped his hand and he chewed his lip, still worried up until he felt her wrap her arms around him, crushing him into a hug. Immediately he drew his arms around her, thumbs rubbing circles between her shoulder blades and his face buried in the crook of her neck.
Into his ear she whispered, “I don’t think anything could change that, Adrien. ”
And that to him had sounded like the most comforting words: he slumped into her like a wordless thank-you, and he nearly forgot her intentions until she heard her whisper just above her breath, just low enough he felt he’d hallucinated it—
“Cœur brisé.”
By the time he’d registered it, it was too late. Static blew his hair like the breeze and frisson sprinkled down his arms, buzzing his fingertips and despite all its lightness, Adrien’s heart turned to a hot stone dropping to his stomach. He felt immobilized, one wrong move might break this illusion, good or bad.
“Loveybug?!”
Adrien could picture her smile, clear as the first day he’d met her. “Try again?”
He tried to arrange the thoughts racing through his head, but all that oscillated back and forth was her name—and there was still a body against his chest, one that rose and fell to meet his, and when he spoke and it only fluttered, her shoulders shaking.
“Are you okay? Why did you detransform?”
His own heart was embarrassingly loud, pulsing hot blood warming his ears, and then he heard her giggle and he moved without thinking, arms aching as he untangled himself and pushed her away, eyes still firmly shut.
“L-Lovey?”
Now she was laughing, still with the sweetest lilt and yet nothing was making enough sense to make him laugh. He squeezed her shoulders, then instantly released them, unsure of what to do. His ring felt heavy on his hand, and he could transform in a second if need be, but that would mean—
“You—You’re de-transformed?!”
On the sigh of a laugh, she said too loud and too close and too soothingly and too everything , “You can open your eyes now.”
“I can’t do that!” Adrien hissed, pulling his hands back to his lap—maybe to his face instead to push his fingertips into his eyelids. Turning away from her, he squished and pressed hard, until he saw only spots swimming.
What a cruel dream come true. How many times had he daydreamed of this exact scenario with Ladybug? And now his stomach churned bitterly. If he knew, what would Ladybug think? Would she find out? Take back the miraculous from Loveybug, or from him, or both?
“You can!”
Adrien shook his head. “You’re de-transformed!” he repeated, like it wasn’t obvious. But it was and yet still extremely confusing. “You can’t—Chat can’t…”
“No, I’m not de-transformed, I promise! Here.”
Adrien jumped, feeling a cool glove touch his palm. He flattened his fingers against his eyes. “But you said your phrase!”
“Not exactly.”
“But the magic!”
“Open your eyes!”
“No!”
“It’s part of the secret, I promise!”
Familiar grooves soothed his nerves but he steeled against it, feeling he might just open his eyes if he fed into it. She still sounded like Loveybug, and it wasn’t as if someone could have switched places with her while he’d had his eyes closed, right?
“I’m sorry, we—we can’t, okay? I know we’re friends, but we…we can’t,” he croaked out.
“Aw,” she cooed, still like it was merely a joke, “I thought you said you trusted me.”
He flew around to face her again, brows furrowed. “I do!”
It would probably be okay if he just focused on his jeans or his hands, right? Just to make sure she was still wearing a suit, or a disguise or anything? He could open them and shut them immediately if he spotted clothes.
And then against the back of his knuckle he felt the unmistakable hex leather slip of a mask, the slight honeycomb ridges, the little bit of skin he was allowed to see, to feel.
“Then open your eyes. Please?”
Adrien’s heart leapt at the thought, and to him it almost scared him—maybe the problem wasn’t trusting her, but trusting himself to close his eyes again if she wasn’t disguised. He traced the line that rode the hill of her cheek, the valley before the bridge of her nose. Was it his fingertips or her skin that burned?
Mentally counting to three, Adrien opened one eye with the intention of only, and devoutly, looking down at the bed. It’d be okay if he saw her legs, or her painted red nails—anything, he would be able to move on from. He’d have done what she asked and she could clear up what she was actually trying to tell Chat Noir, what she was really practicing.
Instead, his second eye pops open the instant he sees black dots against red: one on her thigh, one above her knee. Following them up, there was the one at her navel, two above her chest and one that covered her heart, and her hair! Pulled back into pigtails, tied with ribbons like her treats. When he suddenly, reluctantly, hesitantly found her eyes, she seemed to be asking him a question.
“So?”
His mouth popped open. “That’s a good imitation,” he nodded dumbly. “Very good.”
Her lips, newly bare, sloped into a sarcastic smile, like what he’d said was a joke. “It’s not an imitation! Or a costume!” She leaned toward him, placing her hand on his thigh to shake it. “I’m Ladybug! You didn’t forget what she looked like, did you?” Then she shrugged. “Well, by ‘she’, I mean ‘me’, but still!”
Adrien only stared. He had thoughts, sure, but they passed too quickly for him to focus on a single one.
Then she had the audacity to laugh at him. “Okay, okay! I get it, you’re a good actor. But you’re making me feel like this was a mistake!”
Ladybug sounded so different—which was to say, she sounded exactly the same. So much the same, he felt like the world’s biggest idiot for not connecting it before. Before he knew his next move, he reached out and touched her pigtails, twiddling with the ends of her hair.
“You…”
“I’ll kinda miss having my hair down,” she said, eyes following his hands. “But it’s not quite Ladybug’s style.”
“But you’re Ladybug,” he countered, like she was the one that needed reminding.
“One and only!” she giggled. “Did you—”
He’s already crushing her into another hug before she can finish, hands roaming over her shoulders, her back, the glossy expanse of her suit everywhere he can touch, confirming it’s really her. Ladybug.
“You’ve been Lovey the whole time?”
She wrapped her arms around him again. “You think I switched just now or something?”
“I missed you so much,” Adrien rushed out. “I thought—you were gone, and Loveybug—you, I mean, were here.” Adrien squeezed her against him. “I thought I wouldn’t see you again! Scared I wouldn’t, really.”
“You missed me that much?”
Adrien only nodded against her shoulder.
“So you’re not…disappointed?”
Adrien pulled away from her again, just far enough to look at her, surprised to find she had said that earnestly. “Disappointed?!”
“Well,” she said, shifting in her seat, “you missed Ladybug. Will you miss Loveybug?”
Adrien cupped her head. “You’re Loveybug!” he smiled, repeating the words like he was the one that needed convincing.
No wonder he loved her. No wonder everything she did reminded him, in the end, of Ladybug. No wonder he’d driven himself half-mad trying to figure her out. No wonder the only thing that made sense was the most implausible, the only connection he hadn’t made.
She flashed a wide smile, eyes still soft. “I hope Chat Noir has this same reaction.”
Adrien bristled, pursing his lips before he said too much. “Well, I’m only Adrien Agreste, and I don’t know Chat Noir as much as you—”
“You mean he doesn’t come here and drop off snacks?” she teased.
“Not yet,” he countered, chuckling. “But I’m confident he feels the same.” Heart still pounding in his chest, he asked, “When are you going to tell him?”
“I p-planned on tomorrow, but…”
“Tonight,” said Adrien, brushing back a strand of hair and tucking it behind her ear. “You should do it tonight.”
“Tonight? What if he’s busy!” she floundered, breaking away from him and fidgeting with her hands.
“You should try.”
Without looking at him, she muttered another phrase he didn’t catch. Light pink swirls illuminated them both, and she was Loveybug again. She jumped to her feet and made for the window, stopping short of it suddenly. “What if it goes wrong?”
Adrien followed her, watching the cusp colors of afternoon and evening ignite her in red, worsening his double vision of Loveybug and his lady. “You can come back here and we can eat so many calissons that our stomachs hurt.”
She hoisted herself up to the window to sit on it, then she smiled back at him. “Thank you. For everything, mon soleil.”
He wanted to ask her to stay, to hold her again and talk until the next morning’s alarm went off, but that was Chat Noir’s right, not his.
Feeling nervous himself for the impending conversation, Adrien asked, “But why did you leave? Why Loveybug? A-and Chat Noir—what did you, or are you, going to tell him? Why now?” He looked at her from head to toe and back again. “You’re Ladybug!”
“That’s our secret, remember?” Twisting around now to hop up and balance herself on her feet, she leaned inside his bedroom. Using one arm outside to support her, she placed a finger on his lips. “Let’s talk about it on my next visit, okay?”
Adrien couldn’t begin to imagine the look on his face—he hoped he was hiding his fear well. His excitement mixed with dread. The absolute and certain love he had for her. The thin ice he was treading now, scared at any moment he’d fall through too early and kiss her, confess there was no one else for him.
Because the next time, he’d be Chat Noir. Him. Not him, Catwalker, and not him, Adrien.
Right.
Lightheaded, he nodded, sorely missing the slight drag of her bare finger over his cupid’s bow, the faint smell of nail polish. “Right. Next time.”
Dropping her hand, Ladybug cocked her head, eyes now sheepishly focused on the floor. “Only if you still want to, I mean.”
Feeling all out of words, Adrien stepped forward and cupped her cheek. Even when her eyes met his, calculated and ocean blue threatening to drown him, he only felt more sure of it: he grazed his lips against her cheek, relishing the way her breath hitched, how her stuttered breath tickled his ear.
“You know how the saying goes.”
She turned to him, closing the distance between his smile and her. “Remind me?” she said low into his ear, too easy, like it didn’t roll a shiver down his spine.
For the first time that day, his chest felt clear, free. For the first time, fate to him seemed to be cemented as something real. Feeling that the ice broke through beneath his feet, Adrien pressed a kiss to her cheek, slow and close to the dimpled corner of her lips.
“I’ll tell you next time.”