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mc-lukanette · 3 days ago

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Marinette didn't know Luka's friends very well despite the years of the two of them knowing each other, so she tried to balance keeping herself "outside" of their friendly bubble while also chiming in whenever she was asked a question directly. It helped that she had her sketchpad with her, so she could mindlessly draw when she wasn't part of the conversation.

It was going well until Claudine spoke up, not at her specifically but it definitely got her attention.

"Hey, anyone know if Luka likes someone?"

Marinette's head snapped up, suddenly very aware of everyone in the room. "W-what?"

Roche acknowledged her with a glance, then raised a brow at Claudine. "Did he do anything to make you think that?"

Mito, who had made himself comfortable sitting on the backrest of the couch, tilted his head at her as well. "Why ask?"

"I'm curious!" Claudine raised a finger. "And because it's a crime! When you hear an amazing song, don't you hate when you learn it's not a hit?"

Roche nodded, but Mito and Marinette remained perplexed.

"That's Luka," Claudine clarified, arms spread. "The guy's soft as a marshmallow and so nice, but he's not dating anyone and can't hold a relationship to save his life!"

That, Marinette could understand. The whole being an adult thing had meant that they'd had to spend so much time getting their lives together, so she'd tried to ignore the pang in her chest when they met back up again, so certain that he would've been dating by then, but nothing. Luka always had so much love in his heart that it seemed like a shame that no one was on the receiving end of it.

Wait—

"Can't hold a relationship?" she repeated. "So he's been on dates?"

Roche answered rather than Claudine, "A few, when they ask."

They. So it wasn't Luka initiating, apparently. It was an oddly relieving feeling.

Claudine nodded at Roche. "And it usually ends after one or two dates."

"Isn't that because he's not interested?" Marinette figured.

"But he always lets them decide if they go on another, and you know how he is," Claudine argued. "He's a sweetheart. I bet he tends to their every need, shows them a good time... why wouldn't they follow up if they felt like they had a chance?"

"Hmmm," Mito hummed, tipping a hat he didn't have and miming smoking from a pipe. "A mystery."

"He might not be good at romance after all?" Roche suggested as an alternative theory. "He just seems like it."

Marinette raised a hand, adding on, "It doesn't sound very Luka to go on dates if he already likes someone."

"Maybe he wants to get over them?" Claudine shrugged. "Could be any reason."

"Who'd reject Luka?" Marinette countered. "Unless he never confessed?"

Mito adjusted his imaginary hat. "You know what they say: love is mute."

"That's—" Roche shook his head, deciding not to bother correcting him.

Marinette considered the information presented to her. The idea that Luka was in love with someone without her knowing sounded ridiculous, because while she'd been away from him for a while, he could've found time to say something to her if the crush had happened before then.

He could've brought it up when they'd watch romance movies together, like when they pressed against each other during one movie in particular where things were tense enough to feel like a horror movie. They'd turned to each other and pretended not to notice until the scene was over, so he could have made conversation then.

And he was so complimentary! He would call her "beautiful" when she was just in her pajamas, "cute" when all she'd done was make a little noise or wiggle excitedly, and constantly praised her intelligence. If he'd already been in love with someone, he would save such compliments for them, and what date of his would not ask for another one when he was like that?

It was as Mito said: a mystery, and one that was making her unconsciously draw Luka in her sketchpad, oops—

"Hey, I'm back," Luka called from the hallway, carrying a drink holder in his arm.

Marinette closed her sketchpad as casually yet quickly as possible, looking up at him with a beaming smile. "Oh! Hi!"

"Hey," he greeted, despite having already done so.

She bit her lower lip, eyeing Luka up and down. He was even more attractive than when they were teens and just as considerate, the size of drinks in the carrier varying depending on how much each person usually drank. She was so curious, wondering how such a man couldn't be dating anyone nor manage to keep his dates from coming back. She racked her brain, idly tapping on her sketchpad as she tried to figure out how she could resolve this for both her and his friends.

Then, something clicked, and the words came out before she could stop them.

"Luka, would you go on a test date with me?"

His smile faltered, shocked lips parting at the sudden request. She shifted anxiously in her seat while the eyes of his friends went to the both of them, and she wondered if it'd been too much. Was she so undateable that even calling it a test date was weird?

Luka's grip on the drink carrier unconsciously loosened. Mito, speeding off the couch towards him, ducked down and placed himself just under the nearly fallen carrier. Standing up fully, he took it from Luka by perfectly balancing it on his head, taking it back to the others so Roche could put it on the table.

The action made Luka move again, eyes darting over to his trio of friends. "What were you guys talking about?"

Marinette pushed herself up, leaving her sketches behind as she approached him. "We were wondering why you can't keep dates with anyone. I thought..." She blushed, gesturing between the two of them and already feeling silly. "If we went out on a date, I'd know?"

"Ah." He covered his mouth, making it harder to know exactly what was going on his head. She tried to peer into his eyes, but he evaded, staring off at a corner of the ceiling.

Were his cheeks pink? Was he thinking about his mystery crush just at the mention of a date? Was Claudine right?

Just as Marinette started to get worried, the hand on his chin lowered to reveal a lopsided smile. He made eye contact with her again, voice full of amusement. "We could do it, but I don't think you'd be able to tell."

She tilted her head at the emphasis, which implied that she specifically wouldn't be able to tell. Was it because she didn't know who he liked, or he thought she wasn't perceptive enough, or...

Eyes narrowing, she asked directly, "Is that a challenge?"

Luka went wide-eyed, his hand dropping from his chin and hovering awkwardly at chest level. Roche, Mito, and Claudine had already whipped out their drinks, sipping from them and huddled together as they watched the two intently.

"What?" Luka blinked helplessly. "No—"

"I accept." Marinette straightened, poking him in the chest as her competitive side came out front and center. "I'm going to figure you out. Looking forward to our date, Luka Couffaine."

With a huff, she turned back around and went to her seat, plopping down and reopening her sketchpad. She blushed seeing the sketch she'd just drawn of him, then hurriedly flipped to another page and started drawing something else.

She could handle this, she thought. Worst case scenario, she'd still get a date with her multi-year one-sided crush.

#queuekanette #lukaneventte: No Context November #Flower Arrangement Shipping #Pro LukaMari #Lukanette

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mc-lukanette · 2 days ago

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Luka was still a child, far too young to worry about much of anything, yet he worried anyway because Marinette seemed worried. While she still engaged with him during their usual playtime and listened eagerly when he showed her the new toy he'd gotten, she felt distant and was more quiet than usual. It was a problem, not only because she was his friend and he cared, but he liked hearing her talk and ramble to him.

She wasn't doing any of that while she was so distracted.

He didn't ask about it - Juleka had told him once that girls were allowed to have their secrets, and he didn't know if this might be one of them - so he tried to find other things for them to do, hoping it might interest her more. They took a break to eat, went for a walk around the Liberty to see if the flowers needed watering, then searched for something to watch together.

He was starting to lose hope that he could cheer her up when she suddenly spoke partway through their movie search.

"Magic's not real."

He looked, seeing her hunched over with a movie in her hands. Not knowing why she'd say such a thing, he asked in reply, "Why?"

She pouted, fidgeting with the movie as she explained, "I had to write stuff for school about the story of someone we look up to. I was gonna do the tooth fairy, because Santa has a hard job too but the tooth fairy's tiny and works all year."

He nodded along silently to her story, agreeing with the logic. "Then what?"

"I wanted to know where they got all the money for kids' teeth, like a job, so I sneaked onto the computer when no one was around and..." She let out a groan, slumping and falling back onto the floor. "They're not real."

It was a shock to him too, though Marinette had been through it first without any support, so he can't imagine how it was for her. "But magic can still be real, right? Just not the tooth fairy."

"Santa's not real either!" she shouted to the empty space in the room.

Luka slowly realized how much she'd kept inside the whole time.

"I just wanted to give him the cookies I made last Christmas," she said, rubbing her face tiredly, "but then I caught Papa dressed up like Santa!"

"How'd you know it was him?" he asked with a tilt of his head.

"It's Papa! No one else looks like him."

That was fair.

"I thought maybe Santa was sick from the North Pole cold and sent Papa clothes so no one knew, but... the clothes were so cheap!" She threw her hands up, nearly sending the movie across the room in the process. "They just did it to trick me if I tried to meet 'Santa'!"

Marinette knew her fashion, so he believed her. He imagined that she'd let the Santa clothes go for all that time and it was only after yet another disappointment with the tooth fairy that she gave in.

For his own part, Luka had believed in Santa, but not that he was the one delivering gifts. According to his mom, Santa abandoned his wife, leaving her to do all the gifting, and she'd "throw him overboard" if he ever came back. He'd always wondered why the other kids told different versions, but if it was just a story, then it made sense.

A sympathetic, "Oh," was all he could say. It wasn't easy for him to grasp that magic wasn't real as, while he'd never seen people fly or cast spells, he always thought it was pretty magical that he and Marinette met and became best friends.

"And if magic's not real, fairytales aren't too," Marinette concluded, gently tossing the movie aside.

It landed in front of Luka and he finally got to see what she'd been holding that started all this: a typical princess movie with a prince, a fairy godmother, and a witch-y villainess. He frowned, picking it up and turning it around to look at the back as well.

He trusted Marinette, so it must've been true that magic and fairytales weren't real. He was torn, because while it was sad that he wouldn't be seeing "real" magic in his life, it was weirdly comforting that life didn't work out the way it did in fairytales.

He'd always thought that Marinette was cute enough to be a princess, or at least the girls in the movies who became princesses. At the same time, the only boys the princesses and those girls tended to be around were princes, and Luka wasn't a prince; he wasn't even close. He wasn't rich, he wasn't royalty, he couldn't do a ballroom dance, and he hadn't defeated any evil dragons.

But if fairytales weren't real, then he could stay with her. That was one good thing.

Marinette sat up, defeated, but not enough to ignore fixing her bangs and checking the tightness of the hairties holding her pigtails in place. Luka blinked, briefly distracted by the trail of freckles underneath her sad, half-lidded eyes.

He was sure they hadn't done any art or crafts that day, but she must've before she'd gotten there, as her freckles were sparkling like they'd gotten glitter onto them. His nose scrunched in thought, wondering how he could've missed that when she'd gotten there.

"I wanted to be the knitting fairy when I grew up. I wanted to make clothes for everyone that was super comfy and didn't go out of style," she mumbled, her hands tightened into fists against her chest. "A-and make it so bullies would have clothes that never fit and were always really itchy!"

Her eyes flashed with frustration, looking more blue than usual. Luka went closer to sit down next to her, wanting to comfort her but not sure how.

"You can still make clothes," he pointed out. "You'll be good at it."

"But—!" she began to protest, turning fully to him. "I had other stuff I wanted to do with my magic! Like—ah... nnn..."

"Marinette?" he called, alarmed as she started to shake. He knew intuitively that it wasn't from rage.

She shut her eyes tight like she had a headache, squeezing herself in a hug. She opened her mouth to respond to him—

Only to disappear spontaneously in a cloud of thick, pink mist. Luka recoiled, staring at what looked almost looked like cotton candy in cloud form that Marinette had been lost in.

Without a thought as to if it might hurt him or not, he thrust his hand inside desperately, hoping to pull her out. He tried to grasp at where her shoulder had been before, but couldn't feel anything except for the bizarre, almost fuzzy feeling mist. Still, he noticed that the movement had cleared some of it, so he waved his arm about rapidly to try and clear as much of it as he could.

A very Marinette-like cough sounded from below, her voice filling him with relief as she called out, "L-Luka?"

His arm pulled back, the mist separating and fading away into nothingness. He looked down towards the source of her voice, thinking that she might have collapsed despite him having not heard it, but that's not at all what he ended up seeing.

Sitting on the floor just as she'd been before was a wide-eyed Marinette, but small; small enough for him to carry around in both hands. Her pigtails had rounded and gained little hair accessories that reminded him of tiny pincushions, while her outfit had changed to a pink, fluffy minidress.

Most notable, however, were the glowing white fairy wings that were coming out of her back. He covered his mouth with both hands in shock.

"You're magic," he said, though it was muffled behind his palms. Even if Santa and the tooth fairy weren't real, at least his inclinations about their magical meeting still made sense.

"W-what?!"

She jumped to her feet, noticing how little she rose up, then turned and twisted every way possible to look at herself, which was when he noticed that she also had pointed ears. Even as tiny as she was, Luka was observant enough to catch the tidal waves of emotion passing over her face one after another. She was surprised by the change, but the wings and new clothes made her giddy, then she swapped to being horrified.

"Ah, but—but there's no tooth fairy!" She put her hands to her cheeks in distress, so fast that they made a slapping sound. "If I was gonna be a fairy, I wanted someone to teach me! Does that—" She gasped. "—Does that mean I'm the only real tooth fairy? All by myself?! I don't have any money to give to other kids!"

Luka fretted as she paced in a tiny circle on the floor, two children entirely lost without direction.

"Or do I have to be a fairy godmother? Do I have to go find a girl to godmother to? What if I pick the wrong girl?!" She whined, the pacing picking up as she threw her arms about. "And I don't know anything about being a god, or a mother!"

He didn't know anything about what was going on, but he didn't want her to worry so much. Perhaps impulsively, he put a hand out to block the path she'd been pacing.

Marinette nearly bumped into it, but stopped just in time. She stared up at him with her wide eyes pleading and confused.

"Maybe you don't have to be anything?" He shrugged helplessly with one arm, hoping for the same as her. "Did it come with rules? Like a board game or a toy you build?"

She perked, realizing that he meant an instruction manual, and immediately started patting herself down. There weren't many places for a guide to be put on her, though he noticed that pockets seemed to magically form when Marinette tried to search for some.

"...No," she concluded when she'd run out of spots to check. "I-I don't think so?"

"Then it's gotta be okay," he said; more decided, really. He might not have fought off dragons, but he would hide and defend her if any sort of fairy police came to scold her for rules they didn't know about. His mom had always been a rule breaker and encouraged him to break them in cases like these.

Well, she didn't describe a situation like his best friend transforming into a fairy, but it fell within the category, he was sure.

As Luka tilted his head to fully take in Marinette, he saw her glancing over her shoulder at her wings. She arched her back, shoulders tensing as she closed her eyes, but the wings only fluttered briefly before she gave up.

"You wanna fly?" he wondered aloud.

"Yeah? No—yeah?" She blushed, getting up on her tip toes to try and make herself seem taller. "You'll hurt your neck if you keep looking down."

He unconsciously touched the back of his neck, having not given an ounce of thought to that. She was the one who suddenly changed, so why was she thinking about him? He looked around, trying to get a gauge on how the room must've looked to her, then suggested, "I can pick you up?"

"Mm?" She hadn't considered the possibility.

He laid his hands on the floor, palms facing up, and raised a brow as if to ask, 'is this okay?' Marinette stared at his hands, taking a few steps closer and looking them over like they were a puzzle, then slowly raised a leg and started to get on. He kept perfectly still, not wanting to jostle her, though she still fell forward due to his hands being a more uneven surface than the floor.

He would've helped had his hands not been preoccupied for obvious reasons. He was vaguely upset at them for being uneven in the first place, as if he'd had any control over that.

He waited for her to sit up and get her bearings, then started to stand up. He kept his eyes on her all the way to the coffee table, walking carefully so as to not trip or bump into anything. When they did reach it, he lowered his hands and she jumped off a couple inches away from the table, falling down slowly like a feather to both of their surprise.

"Oh." Marinette glanced at her wings again, as if she could belatedly check if they had fluttered automatically during the fall. Luka had been watching, so he knew it was just how her new body worked.

He sat himself down on the floor, his arms on the table for support so he could lean towards her. "Do you wanna change back?"

She pursed her lips at him, rubbing her chin, then cheek, and finally the back of her neck. "...I dunno? How?"

He racked his brain, tilting his head from side to side like it might help the thoughts move around more quickly. He recalled their conversation and tried to piece together any connection to her changing. "You were thinking about being a fairy? And magic?"

He didn't know how saying that helped, but she picked it up from there. "So... I have to think about being a not fairy? A not fairy without magic?"

He shrugged.

Since they didn't have any other alternatives, she went with it. Putting her teeny tiny hands on her teeny tiny hips, she shut her eyes and tried to focus. It did feel like a shame to try and change her back when she'd just turned into a fairy, but it was just as important to know what she could and couldn't do.

Nothing was happening though. Her brow twitched, her feet shifting in place impatiently. She swayed from side to side, not unlike he'd done earlier while thinking, then she opened her eyes to look up at him. Letting out a whine from her throat, she turned her back to him and tried again. He didn't know how that was supposed to make it easier on her.

Nothing again. She was still a fairy, still just as tiny, and she turned back to him with the same gleaming blue eyes, pointy ears, and glittery freckles.

"I can't," she said. "Not yet."

Yet? "What's wrong?"

"I'm still thinking about magic." She hesitated, then stepped closer and reached both of her hands up. "Come down."

The words alone were a demand, but the tone made it a shy request. He obeyed, bending over and letting his chin rest on his forearms.

Going close enough to his face that he had to cross his eyes to watch her, she stepped off to the side next to his head, putting a knee on his forearm as she leaned forward. While he couldn't see where she was reaching, he felt her fingertips against his cheek, at the hair in front of his ear.

"If I just have to think about it hard..." she murmured to herself.

He was really curious, but resisted asking in case it broke her focus. Was she performing magic on him? Was that why it felt so warm where she touched?

"Ah!" she yelped, startled, but what came out as shock quickly turned to delight. "It...it works! It works!"

"Marinette," he protested with a whine of his own, unable to stand the suspense.

"Sorry! Here, here..."

She was excited now, a far cry from the anxiety she'd shown when she first transformed. She moved back to where he could see her better, and this time he could watch as she slipped her fingertips through his bangs.

Like, well, magic, his hair changed from black to blue where she touched. He sucked in a breath, watching it spread further until she was satisfied, then she moved onto another lock of his hair. He had to grip his arms, forcing herself to stay still and not spring upwards from her contagious excitement.

She continued until his hair was dyed blue at the tips all along the front, then stepped back and jumped, limps spread in joy as she fell slowly back down. "Ta-dah! I'll do the back later too!"

He popped back up immediately, running his hand through his bangs to feel her work. Mesmerized by how simple the process had been and how perfect the magic dye job was, he let out a long, quiet, "ohhh."

She bounced up and down, then pointed at one of his hands. "Those next, those next!"

He followed the pointing to stare at it, not sure what she meant, but he wanted to know with action, not words. He leaned over once more to watch as close as he could, resting his hand flat on the table.

Marinette knelt down in front of it, placing her hands under his. With a small, "huph," she pulled it atop her lap as much as she could, then reached out towards his fingertips.

He realized what was happening before she'd started, based on where she'd touched: one of his black fingernails. She traced her hand around the outline of his nail, fixing the tiny mistakes and spreading the nail polish further in places he'd missed when he'd done it himself.

She tried to move over to reach the next fingernail when she was done with the first, but he moved his hand for her, offering her each finger at a time and then his thumb. She was elated, which he could understand for the sheer coolness factor of it all, but something in the back of his mind reminded him of everything she'd been saying, as well as what she was cut off from saying due to the transformation.

When she was done with his hand, he swapped it out for the other and asked, "What was it?"

"Mmm~?" she hummed, half of her attention on his nail polish.

"The other stuff? The magic that wasn't for the clothes," he clarified.

She stopped tending to his nails for a moment, beaming at him and answering with her full chest, "Stuff for you!" She waved her whole arm to gesture at his hand, then up at his bangs. "You kept talking about dyeing your hair, and how long it took to do your nails. I knew if I had magic, then I could do it for you!"

And that's exactly what she was doing: she couldn't have even thought about being human again until she knew that she could use magic to cure him of what was essentially a mild inconvenience. He could only stare at her, speechless, at how a big part of her wanting to be a fairy involved him.

She was amazing. The best possible friend he could've asked for. Human or fairy, she was just as magical.

"Done!" she declared as she finished the nails on his other hand, standing up to look it over one more time. "And it'll be our little secret!"

She didn't even want credit for it, another shock to his system.

"Thanks," he managed, finding his voice again. He admired his nails and bangs one last time, reminding himself to look in a mirror later to see the latter in full. "It's so cool. Really cool."

Her smile would put the sun to shame; him being happy never failed to make her happy too, which only heightened the effect this was having on him.

It occurred to him then that, if magic being real meant that fairytales might still be real too, he didn't have to worry anymore. Marinette was a fairy, not a princess, so the rules he'd imagined didn't apply to them, and she'd made it clear that he was important to her.

He might not've been a prince, but he felt like a king.

#queuekanette #lukaneventte: No Context November #Flower Arrangement Shipping #Pro LukaMari #Lukanette #Fairy Marinette Dupain Cheng #trope: Pocket Lukanette #trope: Mininette #((''Clarity you always write kids like they're marshmallows that have taken human form--'' ''Shhhh let me have this.''))

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