#lukanette angst

[eatingsomegreeneggos]

I can't compete with that boy, I can't make you feel like that

I can't make you feel like he does, I can only love you more

Sapphic transfem Luka angst inspired by my bestie 💙

[mintaka14]

Alright, here's the first chapter of my ML Hanahaki AU. There is angst, some slight mention of blood, and throwing up, so be warned.

Chrysanthemum White and Blood Red

A Miraculous Ladybug fanfiction

By Mintaka14

Chapter 1

Flowers grow in the sun

But love grows in the shadows

[Hush Now: Voila]

The girls’ bathroom in the eastern corridor of Francois DuPont was oddly empty for the end of lunchtime.

At this time of day, it was usually full of giggling, chattering girls waiting for an empty stall or crowding around the mirror over the basins, but without all those bodies to deaden the sound, it felt eerily cavernous and cold. The slightest noise echoed off the bare white tiles, and Alya’s footsteps sounded unnaturally loud in her ears as she came into the bathroom.

One of the cisterns made a grumbling sound before it settled again, and in an open stall beside the basins, Marinette was hunched over the toilet, shoulders shaking as she coughed and retched. Alya reached her as another cough tore through Marinette, and froze as she saw the wisps of petals tumble from Marinette’s lips to drift lazily down to settle in the toilet bowl.

With one awful, gagging sound, the coughing became throwing up.

Marinette’s face was chalk-white as she heaved again, vomiting up bile and crushed flower pieces to splatter in dirty patterns against the porcelain.

Alya gave a convulsive shudder. She’d never realised just how cold the school bathrooms could be, or that she’d nearly stumbled into the wall, until the tiles had pulled all the warmth from her hand where she’d flattened it against the smooth surface, leaving her fingers chilled and numb.

In the mirror beside the stall, she could see her own wide eyes reflected in the glass.

Alya had always prided herself on being the one who knew how to act in a crisis, the one who could think clearly, but she had nothing. Her gaze swivelled back to fix on the pattern that one petal made as it unhurriedly slid down the slope of the porcelain. One tiny part of her mind registered clinically that the flower was a chrysanthemum that would have been white if it hadn’t been speckled with Marinette’s blood. The air was thick with the heavy, too-sweet smell that she associated with graveside flowers and La Toussaint every year.

A solitary, intact, but crushed, chrysanthemum bud tumbled from Marinette’s mouth into the bowl, and its bruised knot of petals unfurled slightly as if it was still living. Alya’s stomach lurched in reaction.

The retching eased. Marinette reached up to wipe her mouth with the back of her hand, and slumped against the bathroom stall, still shaking. The movement jolted Alya out of her stupefaction.

“Girl, why didn’t you tell me?” she asked, trying to keep the words from sounding accusing, to keep her voice from trembling. Marinette just shook her head, and another racking cough sent more petals tumbling into the toilet.

Alya put her arms around Marinette until the fit of coughing subsided.

What had brought it on? Marinette had seemed fine, a little tired maybe, but then she always seemed a little tired, and she’d been giggling and blushing while they teased her about her crush, turning a fiery red that chased away the pallor in her cheeks when Alya had tried to get a rise out of her because Only you would end up going ice-skating on a double date with another guy so that the guy you really like could ask someone else out. Marinette had started to say something, to protest, and then she’d started to cough, a nasty, rasping sound.

Suddenly, the colour had drained out of Marinette’s cheeks and she’d bolted out of the cafeteria. Alya had followed, to make sure she was alright, and found… this.

“You have to tell Adrien now,” she said fiercely. “Marinette, this is killing you!”

“I can’t,” Marinette said hopelessly.

“You have hanahaki! You have flowers growing in your lungs because you won’t just admit what you really feel, and if it gets worse… People die from this, Marinette.”

“And some don’t. People live with long term chronic conditions and manage them all the time.”

“Oh, and that makes it better? Girl, living with a chronic disease is not better than just telling Adrien you love him!”

“What if…” Marinette started, then broke off, and Alya waited impatiently for her to finish her sentence. “Maybe… I’m not in love with Adrien anymore.”

“Are you kidding me?” Alya gripped her shoulders, giving her a little shake. “Girl, you are literally coughing up flowers. You can’t live in denial like this. You just have to face up to your feelings, and tell him how you feel.”

~~~~~

How she felt? Marinette could have laughed at that, if it didn’t set her lungs on fire. Marinette had no idea how she felt anymore, beyond being shaky and wrung out.

“He likes Kagami, not me,” she said with miserable finality, and lifted a hand to ward off Alya’s hold on her before her friend could shake her again. Unsteadily, she reached out to flush the toilet, and the flower petals spiralled away and out of sight. “We really need to get to class before Mlle Bustier thinks there’s something wrong.”

 “There is something wrong,” Alya muttered, as she followed Marinette out of the bathroom and back to the classroom. Marinette pretended she couldn’t hear her.

She dropped limply into her usual seat, and the teacher didn’t seem to notice anything wrong. Mlle Bustier began talking, and the lesson began to blur in Marinette’s ears into a meaningless buzz, punctuated by the whispering and giggling and rustling sounds of the classroom around her. Marinette’s chest felt too tight. Coughing up petals always left her drained, and the chrysanthemum bud had hurt. She hadn’t thrown up a whole blossom before.

As soon as Mlle Bustier turned away to write something on the board at the front of the classroom, Marinette put her head down on her desk, in spite of Alya’s narrowed, anxious eyes on her. Alya glanced away to frown at the back of Adrien’s head in the row of desks in front of them, and the insistent sound of her pencil taptaptapping on the desk was hammering in Marinette’s head.

She didn’t know when she’d felt that first prickle in her lungs, but she could remember vividly the day she’d realised that she had hanahaki. She’d been having such a good day, too, helping set up for a Kitty Section rehearsal and giggling with Luka as he’d tried to show her how to play his guitar.

And then Adrien had arrived.

She’d tried – she really had, with Alya nudging her along – to ask him out, to tell him she liked him, to say anything. Instead, all that she’d managed was a scrambled mess of words that died in her mouth while Alya had rolled her eyes and her friends had cringed in sympathy, and Adrien had stared at her with that polite, confused smile of his.

And Luka… she couldn’t even bring herself to look and see what he thought of it all.

Instead, she’d gone home and had a coughing fit that had left her vomiting the first, fragile, bone-white petals into her bathroom sink.

The bell rang without Mlle Bustier noticing anything amiss, and Marinette levered herself upright. She was conscious of a few curious glances cast her way as her classmates clattered down the tiers of desks and out the door, and Alya hovered in the aisle beside her as she slowly shifted her books and pens into her bag.

Marinette’s handbag started to slide off her shoulder as she moved sluggishly, and she barely caught it before it hit the floor, ignoring Tikki peering anxiously up at her from the depths of the bag.

Alya made an impatient sound as Marinette bent to gather up her school bag and nearly dropped her handbag again in the process. Alya snatched up the bag of books before Marinette could grasp it, and hooked her other hand through Marinette’s arm, towing her out of the classroom and into the noisy stream of students filling the corridors of the school.

“We’re going to miss him if you don’t move faster!” Alya told her.

Marinette opened her mouth to ask who? But realisation dawned on her before she could get the words out. Of course, him.

She caught a glimpse of Adrien moving through the crowd, his fencing bag slung over his shoulder, and there went that familiar sickening swoop in her chest, but Marinette was too tired to enjoy it. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d actually enjoyed the feeling of crushing on Adrien, and she tried to dig her heels in. But Alya was as relentless and inescapable as a landslide, and Marinette stumbled down the stairs in her wake.

“Adrien!” Alya bellowed over the noise in the courtyard below.

Marinette had tried to tell him before, and ended up unable to speak a coherent sentence, let alone get out an actual confession. Why should it be any different now, just because it was making her sick? Why should it be anything but more humiliation?

She resigned herself to coughing up flowers for the rest of her life.

~~~~~

Alya didn’t know if Marinette was deliberately resisting because she was nervous about the idea of talking to Adrien, or if she genuinely didn’t understand what Alya was trying to signal to her, but Alya didn’t let that stop her. Time was of the essence. She ignored the way Marinette protested and stumbled as she hauled Marinette with her through the noisy school corridors and down the staircase that led to the quadrangle. It was for her own good. Marinette would appreciate it when she’d confessed to Adrien and was free of hanahaki and alive. Tough love – that’s what Alya had to give her best friend now, and she tamped down the spike of fear.

She could see Adrien moving like a  mote of gold through the chattering crush of students.

“Adrien!” Alya called out again, and he stopped, looking back at them with a quizzical expression.

They reached Adrien, but Marinette hung back, and Alya gave her a reassuring nudge in his direction. She must have miscalculated the force of her push, because Marinette stumbled and fell into Adrien’s arms.

Adrien helped Marinette to right herself.

“Adrien, I… I…“ Marinette’s voice faded into a wheeze, and Alya willed her to keep going, to say something, to say anything that might fix this. 

“…I…” Marinette tried again, but the wheezing turned into a sputtering cough.

“Are you alright?” Adrien asked, and Marinette’s panic-stricken eyes shifted past him.

“Kagami!” she gasped out on a note that sounded oddly relieved, and Alya nearly screamed in frustration.

A cool, measured voice hailed them from the other side of the courtyard, and Kagami came towards them, her fencing gear in hand.

Alya glared at the unwelcome intrusion, even as Marinette lifted a shaky hand in greeting.

“Hello, Marinette,” Kagami said as she drew closer. “I’m sorry to interrupt, but fencing will begin soon.”

Alya nudged Marinette surreptitiously, trying to encourage her to say something, to put Kagami off, but she wasn’t surprised when Marinette stepped back. Alya was frustrated, furious at the interruption, and disappointed, but not surprised.

Marinette’s voice was still a little hoarse as she responded, “No, it’s fine, Kagami. It’s nothing important.”

“There is a competition coming up,” Kagami said abruptly to Marinette. “Will you be there?”

Alya snorted softly, but Marinette gave Kagami a small smile, in spite of the strain and exhaustion in her eyes. “I wouldn’t miss it.”

“When I win, perhaps we could celebrate with an orange juice.”

Alya side-eyed her best friend.

What was all that about orange juice? Since when was Marinette drinking juice with her love rival?

Marinette’s smile grew warmer. “That sounds great. I’ll be cheering for you, Kagami.”

Kagami gave a short nod, and turned away to say something to Adrien.

Alya muttered under her breath, “When she wins? Someone’s got a big opinion of themselves.”

“She’s earned it. You should see her compete some time,” Marinette whispered back, giving Alya a reproving glance. “Be nice.”

“Adrien, we shouldn’t keep Master D’Argencourt waiting,” Kagami was saying.

Alya said quickly, “You go on ahead, Kagami, we just need to ask Adrien something. We won’t keep him long, I promise.”

Kagami turned a cool, appraising look on her that left Alya irritated, but then she shot an unreadable glance in Adrien’s direction and all she said was, “I shall see you in class, Adrien. Don’t be late.”

There was still a hint of wariness in her farewell to Marinette, but it faded a little in the light of Marinette’s reassuring smile, and Kagami strode away in the direction of the school gym with her fencing gear gripped firmly in hand. The moment that Kagami was out of earshot, Alya nudged Marinette in the ribs, and sent a pointed, silent message with her eyes in Adrien’s direction.

Adrien was watching them with that polite smile of his that he gave when he didn’t want to let on that he was confused about something.

“You wanted to ask me something?” he prompted.

“Oh… I just wanted to make sure you got all the details for the class picnic next month,” Marinette said vaguely, and Alya silently rolled her eyes. Adrien had been right there when the notice had gone out that morning. Still, if it got Marinette actually talking to him…

And then Marinette added, “You should bring Kagami.”

Adrien’s smile brightened at that. “I’ll ask her. Thanks, Marinette. It’ll be great to all get a chance to hang out together again.” He glanced over his shoulder in the direction of the school gym, and his smile grew a little apologetic. “I’d better… training’s going to start soon, and I need to get changed. But thanks for checking up about the picnic.”

Marinette waved him away, and turned to walk in the opposite direction, towards the street. Alya shot a backwards glance at Adrien before she hurried after her friend.

“Girl, what are you doing?” she hissed. “That was your chance!”

“What chance?” Marinette said wearily. “He’s never going to see me like that.”

“You don’t know that. You’ve never actually asked him.”

“Even if I did, if I somehow actually managed to say something, it wouldn’t make any difference. He… he gave me a lift home after we went ice-skating with Kagami and Luka,” Marinette confessed a little hesitantly, and Alya’s brow puckered at the admission.

Adrien had driven her home after ice-skating? Marinette had kept that particular detail quiet whenever Alya had asked her about the double date.

“He spent the whole drive telling me all about the girl he loves, and it wasn’t me. He likes Kagami, not me.”

Alya shoved aside the prickle of hurt to focus on the more pressing problem.

“Okay, so maybe he’s into someone else right now. He doesn’t have to love you back,” she pointed out, although it was hard to understand how anyone in their right mind could pick Kagami the Insufferable over Marinette. “Hanahaki starts because you’re keeping the seeds of true love trapped inside you until they sprout in your lungs because they have nowhere else to go. It’s just going to get worse if you keep denying the truth, like how you feel about Adrien!”

Alya could see something closing off in Marinette’s eyes, and she changed tack before she could lose her friend completely.

“He can always say no,” she wheedled. “But you have to tell him, instead of keeping it in until it smothers you.”

Marinette tried to speak, but another bout of coughing cut off whatever she’d been trying to say. Alya patted her on the back until the fit had passed.

“He can always say no,” Alya repeated.

“When has Adrien ever been able to say no to anyone?” Marinette rasped. “It’s not fair to put him in that position.”

“Not fair?” Alya huffed in growing frustration. Not fair was Marinette coughing up a lungful of petals. If the world was fair, Adrien would be with Marinette, not making up to Kagami, of all people.

Alya had supported Marinette, and encouraged her, through all the schemes to get Adrien’s attention, even when Marinette’s conviction had wavered, and she knew… she knew they could be perfect together, if Adrien just… if he just…

“I don’t care if he’s in love with someone else, I’m not going to lose my best friend because you don’t want to make Adrien feel bad.”

There was a long silence. Marinette’s eyes grew troubled and distant, and finally she said, “It just… doesn’t feel right.”

“Because of Kagami?” Was that what was holding Marinette back? Some misplaced sense of honour?

“Not just because of her. You saw what happened when I tried -“

“So, what, you’re going to let this kill you, because you don’t want to upset Kagami? Because you know she wouldn’t hesitate if she was in your shoes.”

Alya was a little startled when Marinette gave a faint, pained giggle at that.

“She told me I should be direct, and fight for what I want, because she wasn’t going to go easy on me.”

“Well, see?” Alya said, biting back her first, hostile reaction – who did Miss Ice Queen think she was, anyway? She was going to get Marinette past this block if it killed her. Maybe all she needed was enough time and no interruptions from Kagami, or anyone else, until she could force it out past those damn flowers. “I’ll see if the girls are free tonight to brainstorm a plan to –“

“Don’t!” Marinette said sharply, and Alya looked at her in surprise, a little alarmed by the sudden, agitated hitch in Marinette’s breath.

“Why not? Alix and Rose and Juleka can help –“

“Don’t say anything to them. Promise me you won’t tell anyone else about this!”

“Alright, alright, I won’t say anything. I promise,” Alya said soothingly. It wasn’t like it would stop her from enlisting their help, anyway. The girls were used to the Adrien schemes by now; she just wouldn’t tell them why it was so urgent all of a sudden, if it was just going to upset Marinette like that. “But you can’t let worrying about Kagami stop you from telling Adrien how you really feel. They’re not even dating yet. Not officially.”

“He asked her to go ice-skating,” Marinette pointed out.

“He asked you, too.”

“As a friend. He doesn’t think of me like that. He was there with Kagami.” Her voice trailed off, and Alya thought she was done, until she added in an odd tone, “And I was there with Luka.”

“Is that what you’re worried about? That Adrien thinks you’re with Luka? I’m pretty sure Adrien would understand if you explained that you and Luka are just friends.” Marinette was still looking troubled, and Alya gave an impatient little shrug. “Or I can get Nino to tell him it’s not like that. I mean, he’s Juleka’s brother, and he was just trying to help you out with the whole ice-skating thing. I know you’ve been spending a lot of time with him lately, but that was all for the battle of the bands stuff.”

“He said I was extraordinary,” Marinette almost whispered, and her gaze dropped to fix on her hands. Alya had to lean in to hear her. “He said I was clear as a music note, sincere as a melody…”

“Oh, Marinette,” Alya breathed in response, and one hand fluttered up to press against her chest. Suddenly she understood – no wonder Marinette was feeling confused. Alya loved Nino, she really did, but if someone as hot as Luka Couffaine had said something like that to her, she would have felt pretty confused too. “That’s so beautiful.”

She cleared her throat, shaking off the poetic fog to focus on what was important. This was her best friend’s life at stake, after all.

“But Luka’s not Adrien,” she pointed out gently. “I mean, I know I teased you about the whole compass thing when you first met him, but he doesn’t make you all tongue-tied now, does he?”

“No…” Marinette admitted reluctantly.

“See?” Alya said, and put a sympathetic arm around her best friend’s shoulders, giving her a gentle squeeze. “And I’m sure Luka will understand. I’m pretty sure he already knows you like Adrien.” She tried for a tiny chuckle to break the mood. “I’m pretty sure anyone who’s spent as much time around you as Luka has knows that you’re into Adrien.”

For one short second, Alya was sure that Marinette was going to throw up again, but then with a visible effort, Marinette pulled herself together and stepped out of Alya’s embrace. She gave Alya a tired, flickering smile.

“I really need to go. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Where are you going?” Alya asked as Marinette started to walk away. “The bakery’s in the other direction.”

The lurking fear in Alya stirred and grew sharper. Was Marinette so out of it that she didn’t know she was going the wrong way?

“There’s a rehearsal at the Liberty this afternoon, and I promised I’d be there.”

“I thought you were too exhausted,” Alya challenged her as Marinette kept walking. “You know they won’t mind if you miss it.”

“But I’ll mind,” Marinette said without turning around. Alya scowled at her friend’s stubbornness.

“It’s not like you’re part of the band,” she called after her.

Marinette’s footsteps faltered for a second, then she kept walking.

~~~~~

Alya was right – there was none of the gut-churning nerves with Luka. The soft flutter of butterflies that Luka set off in her was nothing like the palm-sweating rollercoaster of emotions that she got every time she tried to talk to Adrien.

Adrien was the only one who constantly sent her into a dizzying, horrifying spin.

But right now, she just needed a bit of the peace that she could only find on the Liberty. She could breathe easier on the Liberty.

For such a chaotic, noisy place, it never failed to amaze Marinette how restful it felt to settle on the boxes haphazardly stacked all over the deck, while the band ran through their songs or argued amiably about instrumentation. They all seemed to take it for granted that she was there and a part of it all, and they were all focused on the music, and not on Marinette’s failing love life.

And down below deck, she could retreat to Luka’s bedroom whenever it all got a bit much. She could listen to the sound of the drums and bass rumbling through the hull of the boat as she curled up on Luka’s bed while she sketched. The last time she’d apologised for taking over his space, Luka had just given her that easy, sweet smile of his and told her she was welcome to it any time.

That was where he found her when the rehearsal eventually wrapped up and gave way to the muffled sound of talk and the occasional laugh from up on deck. Marinette heard the steady squeak as someone came down the galley stairs from above, and Luka paused in the doorway of his bedroom, his guitar in his hand.

“Hey, Melody,” he said, and she gave him as much of a smile as she could muster when he came in and stretched out on the other end of his bed, his back propped up against the bulkhead. “Will it disturb you if I play?”

She didn’t bother to argue that it was his room, and that she was the interloper here – they’d had that discussion before. She just shook her head, and turned her attention back to her sketchbook as he settled his guitar in his lap and plucked out a soft melody that drifted into a rippling chord that became a familiar riff transposed into a slow, minor key.

He didn’t question it when she stayed where she was long after Ivan had gone home, and Rose and Juleka had vanished somewhere, leaving the Liberty uncharacteristically quiet except for the soft sound of Luka’s guitar and the desultory scratch of her pencil on paper. He might have glanced at her once or twice, but there were never any demands for answers she couldn’t give with Luka, just peace and music, and words when either of them had something they felt like saying.

There weren’t any questions that would force petals out of her mouth with Luka.

She was still making a pretence of sketching, but Marinette’s head felt fuzzy with unformulated ideas that refused to come together into anything useful, and her hand felt too heavy to draw them even if they did. She didn’t realise that she had dropped her pencil until Luka looked up at the sound.

“Are you alright?” he asked gently, and it sounded different to the way Adrien had asked. It sounded like he already saw half the problem, and was willing to give her whatever she needed.

“I’m fine,” she said wearily. A familiar feeling prickled in her lungs, and she pressed a hand to her chest to try and suppress the cough that was building up. “I mean, I’m not fine,” she amended, “but I’ll work it out.”

“I’m here if you need someone to work it out with,” Luka offered, his eyes still fixed on her with that look that saw right through any excuses she might make, and accepted whatever she chose to tell him anyway.

Rather than answering, she lay down and let herself sink into the warm comfort of Luka’s bed. “I wish I could just stay here,” she sighed into his pillow.

She could feel him shifting position at the other end of the bed, and he echoed her sigh as he idly played a soft chord on his guitar.

“I’d be okay with that,” he said.

I love you. The words hovered on her tongue, and she bit them back. They weren’t fair, not when she knew how Luka felt, and not when Adrien could still turn her into a churning mess of confusion and nerves. She clamped her mouth shut on the bile and petals that threatened to fill it.

As if he’d heard her thinking the name, Luka asked, “How’s Adrien?” without looking up from his guitar. “Have you seen much of him since we went ice-skating?”

“Not much. He’s been busy.”

“And Kagami… she seemed like an interesting girl.”

“She is, once you get to know her. She and Adrien make a lovely couple.”

“Are they dating?” he asked, and she could hear the gentle sympathy in his voice.

“Not yet,” she said, swallowing, and attempted a smile. “But they will be soon, I think.”

“Did you ever get to tell him?”

She knew what he was talking about. She had a sudden, vivid memory of standing on the steps of the ice rink and gazing up into Luka’s deep blue eyes, that same sympathetic, slightly rueful expression on his face that she could see now, as he suggested that she should go after Adrien and confess how she felt. And the moment of disorientation, that brief flash of Adrien who? before she’d stumbled into a run, leaving Luka behind.

Marinette refused to wonder, again, what might have happened if she’d stayed that day, if she’d walked home with Luka, if… if… if…

There was something thoughtful in the line of his jaw, and the way his eyes were focused on the guitar in his hands. She knew he was weighing up his next question, and her lungs hitched.

Marinette swung her legs off the bed, and got to her feet before he could say anything more. As bad as the thought of Alya telling the rest of the girls had been, and having to deal with their reactions, this would be so much worse. She didn’t think she could bear it if anyone else – if Luka – added to the pressure to confess to Adrien.

“I should head home,” she said abruptly, and the words stumbled off her tongue. “Homework to finish, things to do.” In spite of herself, a nervous little laugh escaped, and she scooped up her bag and sketchbook to try and cover the tell-tale reaction. Luka was watching her as if he wasn’t fooled for a second, but he didn’t say anything.

She managed a more genuine smile for him. “Thanks for letting me borrow your space.”

“You know it’s yours, anytime you want it,” he told her, his deep blue eyes soft, offering her whatever she needed as he always did.

Marinette fled, before she could crumble and spill everything to Luka. She knew… she knew he would encourage her again to confess to Adrien, and felt something in her chest unfurl repulsively at the thought.

She reached the dock, her breath catching in her throat, and put her hand to her chest to suppress the flowers swelling and filling her lungs.

Why did it feel like her heart would break? She pressed harder against her chest, her hand fisting in her shirt until she could feel her knuckles digging in.

~~~~~

Luka didn’t try to stop Marinette when she finally got up to leave, although the temptation to keep her there was overwhelming. He wished he could wrap her up in his arms, keep her safe, sing to her until the shadows were gone from her eyes. He wished he could give her everything her heart desired.

Marinette had looked… She had always been pale, with a translucent fineness to her, but now she seemed translucent to the point of fading away, except for the shadows as dark as bruises under her eyes. Something was wrong, and Luka had his suspicions about the cause.

She’d flinched when he’d casually mentioned Adrien. She’d scrambled to her feet with a sudden burst of energy to flee when he’d asked if she’d talked to Adrien, and Luka had drawn his own conclusions, even as he’d let her go.

Luka knew that the heart was an inexplicable thing, but he honestly couldn’t understand how anyone could know Marinette – her sweetness, her passion, her creative fire and giving spirit – and not love her.

He struck a sour note, and grimaced. The heart had its reasons, but Adrien Agreste was an idiot.

He was still sitting on the end of his bed, his guitar in his lap and a faint frown creasing his forehead, when he heard his sister’s voice in the doorway of their bedroom.

“Was that Marinette just leaving?” she asked. “I didn’t know she was still here.”

“Mmm,” he responded absently, and plucked a random chord that faded into silence.

Juleka turned to go, but before she could leave he said, “Hey, Jules…” His voice trailed off like the guitar chord as she turned back and leaned against the doorframe, waiting for him to say whatever it was that was on his mind.

“Is… do you know, is everything okay with Marinette?” he asked eventually, and Juleka straightened in surprise.

“You’d know better than me. Why?”

Luka shrugged helplessly. “She’s been looking… I get the feeling there’s something she’s not telling me. I just thought maybe you might know if there’s something bothering her at school.”

Juleka mirrored his shrug uneasily. “Nothing new.”

Luka fell silent, but as his fingers drifted over the guitar strings again, following the uneasy path of his idle thoughts, he could feel his sister watching him with troubled eyes. There was nothing he could tell her, though, without compromising Marinette’s confidences, and so the Liberty fell silent except for the soft, melancholy sound of his guitar.

[airi-p4]

🌙✨

💕💕💕

________________________________________

✨Fairy Misunderstood AU - Chapter Guide 🧚🏼‍♀️✨

________________________________________

[verfound]

FIC: A Thousand Words: Ch 1: A Picture (MLB; Lukanette, Julerose)

Charactes/Pairings: Juleka Couffaine, Luka Couffaine, Marinette Dupain-Cheng, Rose Lavillant; Juleka Couffaine/Rose Lavillant, Luka Couffaine/Marinette Dupain-Cheng

Rating: Teen and Up

Summary: They say a picture is worth a thousand words.  They also say there’s an old photobooth in Paris that takes that literally.  It’s said that if you take a picture in the booth with your true love, you’ll leave the booth with no memory of them until you’ve spoken a thousand words to each other.  Just a photo with a blurry visage as the only clue to your curse.

That’s what they say, at least, and most people don’t believe it — but Juleka Couffaine knows better.  She’s been in the booth.  She’s seen firsthand what it can do.

And now, it seems, so has her brother.

Author’s Notes/Warnings: I had this idea ages ago, jotted down some notes, and let it sit.  During the last few days of summer school, I made the mistake of opening the doc up and playing with it.  It was supposed to be a one shot, and within a day I had about 5,000 words and three chapters that quickly became four chapters the next day?  I don’t even know.  I also wasn’t going to post it yet, because I really don’t like posting fics until they’re done, but I have spent the past five days dying from some kind of intestinal parasite and I need to feel productive/alive again.  So…hey, have some angst.  Suffer with me.  😂

A Thousand Words

Part One: A Picture

“Jules.”

She looked up at the sound of her brother’s voice.  He sounded…odd.  For someone who could shred a guitar with the best of them — who had had multiple noise citations on his record before he’d even turned ten — Luka was usually soft-spoken.  Not as quiet as her, but even when he could be considered animated his voice was usually low with a calm tone to it.  That tone was missing now, though.  He sounded…off.  Quieter than usual.  Worried.  Weird.

He was standing in the doorway to their cabin, what looked like a bookmark in his hand.  He was still wearing his clothes from the night before, though considerably more rumpled, and there was a griminess to his face that made Juleka think he had done something crazy like cry himself to sleep.

But this was Luka.

Luka didn’t do things like that.

Luka was leaving with their famous rock legend father in a handful of hours to go on his first world tour.  As lead guitar.  He was even the opening act — what on earth did Luka have to cry over?

“I…I think I fucked up,” he said, and when he raised his eyes from the bookmark she was struck by how…haunted he looked.

[justminawrites]

there are no synonyms for half

AO3

Summary: For as long as Luka Couffaine could remember, he was a half. It was only when he turned fifteen, watching the dying sun set over the Seine, did he realise that the other half of him had only ever been other people’s secrets.

For as long as Luka Couffaine could remember, he was a half of something. 

It came with the territory of being a twin, his mother would tell him as much, but Luka’s melody sounded empty in a way Juleka’s never was. Every birthday, every anniversary, every time a neighbour cooed and fussed over how much of Anarka’s face her children had inherited, however infrequent that was. A houseboat rarely had anything resembling a neighbourhood, after all. 

‘Ma.. why didn’t Dad want us? 

At five, Luka had somehow gotten it into his head that his incompletion lied in the absence of a parent. His missing notes were hidden in the ever elusive tune of who his father was, and once his mother told him, he’d finally be able to complete his song. Anarka Couffaine only huffed in disbelief and switched off the Jagged Stone TV Special he’d been watching. 

Yer father was a real scallywag! Luka looked down at the acoustic guitar he’d held closer than any stuffed animal, and wondered if he too was half scallywag.

I don’t want to go.

His mother stiffened, one leg out the door of the gilded school gates. Juleka turned around in confusion as he dropped her hand and then slid off his backpack. Unzipping the blue-and-green printed fabric, Luka pulled out the ukulele he’d hidden and held it up triumphantly like it was some sort of prize. 

I want to go to music school. He panicked when Anarka crossed her arms in disbelief, and tried to find the words to promise how he’d learn every instrument and do all of his and Juleka’s chores everyday if she let him. 

Luka was only ten at the time, so he didn’t know how to tell his mother that he believed he was half music, that it was the one thing that made him feel whole. The tunes would echo off of the walls of his heart and fill up the empty parts of him until he could imagine them colliding, overflowing, and finally spilling out of him again.

His mother only sighed, ruffled his hair and picked up the discarded backpack, before turning to leave.

Luka ran after her, leaving his twin behind, a lone ship in the sea of melody. 

Jules, what’s wrong?

Even before Juleka rushed into his arms, her face already crumpled and stained with tears, Luka was half rage. 

She refused to tell him what exactly happened but clutched his fingers tightly all the way back to the Liberty. He could feel the anger bubbling under his skin as he took in her skinned knees and the bluntly chopped ends of hair she’d braided so carefully that very morning. The feeling was so all encompassing that when Anarka took his face in her hands, she pulled away almost immediately, claiming he’d contracted a fever.

Ow..

Luka was half fire the night he pierced his own ears. Juleka looked at him with wide eyes as he ran his bloody fingers under the faucet, and gave her a reassuring smile. Doesn’t it hurt?, she asked him unable to do much more than look at the black studs that would forever adorn his ears. 

Luka didn’t know how to tell her that he could simply pour whatever pain was left into the empty parts of himself until it fell so far down that he didn’t hear it anymore. So he shook his head instead. 

When he insisted on walking Juleka to François Dupont Elementary the next morning, Anarka sharply took his face in her hands again, so quickly that Luka winced. Her eyes grazed the new, round black dots on his ears that definitely hadn’t been there yesterday and met her son’s defiant blue eyes. Yer not burnin’ up anymore, was all she had to say about the matter.

Is that Juleka’s brother? He looks really scary!

Luka was half pride as he pushed through the crowd of fifth graders that had gathered around him despite themselves, their faces shining with admiration and envy, gold and green. 

It was a mixture of pride and justice, he would realise much later, that made him exaggeratedly stomp his way over to Juleka’s bullies and wave a threatening finger at their ringleader, a blonde Bourgeois who was so startled, she fell backwards into a puddle of sludge. He didn’t say anything but he hardly needed to open his mouth amidst the cruel laughter of forty kids to know his job was done. Relief shone in the corners of his sister’s eyes when she rushed out of school that evening.

Nice to meet you ma-ma-marinette.

Luka was half shame when he saw the girl’s face fall, her dollish blue eyes crinkling with tears. He hadn’t expected to feel something stirring in the empty parts of him when one of Juleka’s friends stumbled into his room, every emotion under the sun flickering on her face, and he’d been just as startled by her presence, as she was by his.

Sorry.. I tend to make more sense with this. 

Luka clutched his guitar closer even though he was the one that asked her to sit beside him, and braced himself. Sure enough, the hollowness inside him steadily filled with the flutter of a thousand beating, insect wings as Marinette carefully acquiesced, the ends of her ballet flats hovering inches above the ground. Ladybug wings. 

For once, it was the outside world that held its breath as Luka’s insides roared with a harmony he didn’t know how to play. He forced himself to remain composed as she blinked her secretive blue eyes up at him, concealing a question and a challenge of her own. 

How do you do that?

He’d hardly strummed a tune, but her face betrayed wonder as his fingers echoed the chords that clanged around in her own empty spaces, whatever he could hear over the clamour of newness in his own heart, anyway. She slipped away in the midst of his explanation, taking the white noise with her, to admire the Jagged Stone poster he’d spent hours gluing down, and the collection of guitar picks right below it. 

The silence in him returned, somehow louder than before now that he knew it could be filled.

You can have it if you like. 

He was beside her before he knew it, eyes glued to the guitar pick between her slender, calloused fingers. Marinette gasped in delight and the flutter-buzz returned, rising a notch, arresting Luka’s heart, as though the ladybugs that had overflowed his empty half had now begun to crawl into his lungs. But there, under all the white noise, when they were standing this close, he could almost taste it– one unmistakable beat, and then another and another; the morse code of her heart song.

You’re a funny girl, Marinette.

He didn’t want to go but Luka was afraid he’d completely lose his wits if he listened to the full force of the ladybug wings any longer. 

It was only when he was halfway up the stairs did he realise there was a lone buzzing bouncing off the walls of the vacant half of his heart. She’d left something behind.

Personally, I think a girl like you deserves to feel more like.. this.

Luka slipped off the deck chair to sit beside Marinette, guitar in hand. 

It had only been a week since they’d met but he’d found himself unable to enjoy sleep in its entirety. The lone ladybug she’d forgotten haunted his nights, humming a tune too faint for him to hear, and he would stay up, straining his ears to grasp a single note, as the light of dawn flooded through the portholes of the ship.

Luka liked the way Marinette always closed her eyes while she listened to him play. He pretended not to notice the slump of her shoulders, as she relaxed into the chords he strummed specially to catch her. He’d long since stopped wondering if people experienced the world the same way he did. He simply brought her peace, in exchange for a bit of her chaos.

And whoever made you feel this way, is nothing but a–

He played a slightly funky tune and she giggled, filling his chest with so much fluttering (an applause of wings) that he hardly dared to open his mouth for fear a ladybug might escape. And then how would he explain himself?

Say, are you free tomorrow..

For her? Luka was free for the rest of his life.

You should probably go over and talk to him.

The cavernous silence returned in the subway. 

Luka was half regret as he shifted on the blue polyester seat, trying his best to stare out of the window, to concentrate on something, anything, besides the bittersweet silence in his lungs. The ladybugs in his chest must’ve frozen to death hours ago, in the skating rink, where he’d watched Marinette watch Adrien with the unwavering focus of a musician bent on mastering an instrument. 

He told himself he didn’t mind, not really. Adrien filled her with wings of her own (butterflies maybe?) and he’d be too busy piecing together his new melody to do the same. It would be best to let her go, now, when the feelings were fresh enough that they’d wilt under the slightest pressure. 

It would be best to forget about the kiss. 

The quick peck. The obligatory press of Marinette’s soft lips to his cheek before she was whisked away, by the wind, by the universe. He breathed out slowly, catching a glimpse of himself on the dark glass of the of the subway car. Oh no. 

It could’ve been from the from the sudden drop in temperature in the skating rink, but the nape of his neck, the tips of his ears, and quite damningly, his cheeks– were a bright, unmistakable scarlet.

The ladybugs had found a new home.

Are ye blushing?

Luka was half mortification when he finally made it home and buried himself under ice packs and blankets, determined to be rid of the crimson flush if it killed him. 

Anarka didn’t need to take his face in her hands this time to know something was bothering him. He watched her quietly slip into his room and rob it of anything with sharp points, before gently closing the door. 

Still no news about the contest?

Luka meant it to be encouraging but when Marinette’s face fell he wished he could take it back immediately. He wished he could take everything back and never say another word again. While the blue-eyed girl fretted about wether her costumes influenced the reception Kitty Section’s audition tape received, he put an arm on her shoulder to stop her train of thought and remind her about the wonders of real-life paperwork. 

She smiled up at him gratefully but before the ladybugs under skin (he still hadn’t managed to get rid of them) sensed this opportunity, Ivan’s outraged yell from across the room, scared them back into hiding.

You’ll never have a future in this business, you’ll never make another costume, because as far as everyone’s concerned– you’ll be the ripoff artists!

Luka was half fury, a cold fire this time, as he watched Bob Roth’s sleazy grin drip with venom as he held Marinette’s hand in his vice-like grip. She shook him off quickly but his words hung in the air like a promise, threatening to choke them both permanently if they didn’t leave immediately like the good little children they were.

Hello Silencer..

He would’ve appreciated the irony if it were any other situation. Hawk moth couldn’t begin to imagine just how much the power of silence was befitting of someone like him. Luka put on the akumatised mask obediently as the supervillain’s monologue came to an end. 

He stopped fighting the darkness and for a while, Luka was half nothing.

Did you really mean those things you said when you were akumatised?

Luka knit his eyebrows in frustration, wracking his memory for some kind of indication of what he could’ve said to fluster Marinette so much. Had he said something about the ice-rink? Had he said something about the kiss? 

He took a deep breath and decided it was time for the speech he’d rehearsed over and over again in front of the mirror, since he’d returned from their not-date weeks ago. Clear as a musical note, Sincere as a melody, Luka couldn’t tear his gaze away from the pools of blue in her eyes, even as he had the sinking sensation that he’d already passed the threshold of no return. 

Luckily, the lights were so erratic, he was sure she couldn’t see the ladybugs huddled beneath his mask, but the buzzing was deafening, pop rocks in the back of his throat, leaving him so light-headed he’d promptly run from Marinette before she could figure out how to respond.

He hoped he hadn’t ruined everything by telling her.

Luka Couffaine, this is the Miraculous of the Snake.

He was half fear when The Hero of Paris held out a palm sized miracle box in her red and black-spotted hand. 

The emptiness in him leaned into the idea of using the superhero persona to fill the void but the other part of him, the only part of him worth listening to, quaked under the pressure. But Paris wasn’t his priority, saving his mother and Juleka was. So he took it. 

When the Kwami of Intuition, Sass, appeared, bowing his head formally, Luka wondered if those snake-like eyes could see right through him. From his cheeks filled with ladybugs, all the way through to his bottomless pit of emptiness that now held the aftermath of an affection, a wreckage of insect wings, wrong chords, and crumpled speeches.

The Kwami only smiled knowingly, and he felt a shiver of anticipation run down his spine. Still he said the words, and then Luka was half Viperion. 

What do you think?

Luka looked up from strumming the tune trying to gauge Marinette’s reaction from behind a tower of macaron boxes. Her eyes softened, but stayed open, and he immediately knew it was nowhere close to being good enough.

She was quick to praise his skill though, and he offered her a ride to Le Grand Paris for the Bourgeois’ 20th wedding Anniversary, on the back of his delivery bike. 

The ladybugs from Luka’s face swarmed back into his chest with vengeance as Marinette hugged his torso, her fingers clutching his jacket for dear life as he pedalled through Parisian traffic as quickly as he dared. 

This time, when she thanked him with a kiss, Luka was able to pinpoint the exact moment the crimson menaces overran his flushed cheeks. 

He turned away quickly, (hiding his face in her spare helmet), so quickly that he couldn’t hear the last thing she said to him over the sound of a million ladybugs taking flight.

Are you sure you want to hear it?

She knew what he was really asking her, of course. Are you sure this is what you want– that I am what you want? 

Marinette nodded, leaning into him and Luka held his breath, plucking out the perfect rhythm as the watery sunshine glinted off the slick, cobblestoned pavement across from them.

He’d listened carefully for the chords in her heart every time they’d talked, and painstakingly pieced together its melody but even though he’d double checked, triple-checked even, Luka felt the inescapable presence of doubt slither from out his stomach, curling its wicked tail around his half-empty heart. 

Marinette’s tune sounded just as incomplete as his.

Under the moonlight, by the sea– KISS ME!

He rubbed the back of his neck (where the ladybugs were gathered), embarrassed. It was the easiest question he knew, so he hadn’t counted on Marinette’s ridiculously competitive spirit when she’d yelled out the answer with her whole heart.

I mean, if you want to.

She did want to, and so did he. But even as Luka leaned in to press his lips to hers, to pray his kiss would somehow wake the sleeping butterflies in her chest, strain to hear the final note in her shrouded melody– he felt the interruption before it came.

The ceiling shook and Marinette ran off to get them something to drink, forgetting the white linoleum cup that she’d left beside him, filled to the brim with orange juice and disappointment.

He watched her go, like he’d done so often. Taking her secrets and her chaos with her.

The truth, Luka, is the only thing I can’t tell you.

He had never been half pain before, not like this. Not poisonous, acidic agony  that filled the empty parts of him so throughly that it flooded his lungs, burning the ladybugs, drowning the music out completely. 

It hurt to think, it hurt to breathe. 

Luka wasn’t surprised that the akuma found him so quickly, but he curled into himself as Marinette’s voice scrabbled for purchase in his mind, begging him to fight the temptation, fight the evil that would undoubtedly lead to more suffering. 

He couldn’t blame her. She didn’t understand how her voice was the thing that hurt him the most.

Why did you abandon me?

Jagged Stone’s lips were painted white with Truth’s compulsion power but Luka knew that whatever came out of his former hero's mouth now wouldn’t matter at all. 

The damage had already been done. He’d seen the scars it’d left on his mother’s broken melody, his sister’s quiet song.

His own silent, silent heart.

It was hard to tell which part was him and which was the akuma, when he hurled his would-be father from the terrace of a several-story building and set off towards the Dupain-Cheng Bakery. 

You know, not seeing you is a hundred times worse than seeing you, Marinette.

The familiar rush of ladybugs filled his chest when she put her forgiving hand on his shoulder, as though they were flowing out of her and into him through the lightest of touches.

Luka swallowed the confession in his throat when she asked to be friends, much to the chagrin of a hundred scarlet wings beating in his ears, and pulled her in for a hug so she wouldn’t see it on his face, plain-as-day.

The milky white moonlight caressed his cheek fondly, like a mother would, as he breathed in Marinette’s rose perfume. He knew had to let her go, it was just a matter of time. 

Foolishly, he wished he’d kept the snake miraculous he’d borrowed weeks ago, just so he could have a second chance with her. A chance to do it again, do it right this time. A chance to sweep her off her feet; to put the butterflies under her skin before Adrien, before anyone.

But Luka understood with a sinking feeling that even that wouldn’t be enough. He’d watched the way his parents clawed at one another’s sanity mere hours ago, unable to see that their fighting was turning down Juleka’s quiet symphony even further into herself.

People like them, like him, didn’t get second chances. Not when it mattered, anyway.

Awesome! I always wanted to be the Knitting Fairy in real life!

Luka was half terror when he watched Paris’ bravest superhero transform into the love of his life. 

It transcended panic, surpassed horror. The worst thing in the world that could’ve happened just happened and he had no idea what to do about it.

Marinette? He said her name like a prayer, like a wish that hovered on his tongue ever so delicately, ready to disappear into the wind. But as the girl turned around and beamed at him, the happiest smile on her face, Luka finally felt the final piece of of her melody click into place.

Second chance!

He took the dread and stuffed it down, deep, deep down inside of him; somewhere under the graveyard of ladybugs, shredded posters and scales. The shock would have to wait, he could only be one thing at a time and right now he had to be Viperion.

When I was a kid, I always wanted to be what my parents wanted me to be!

Luka wished he hadn’t turned around. 

Where Chat Noir once stood, now Adrien Agreste took his place, looking vaguely cheery despite what he’d just said moments before. He didn’t even need to use his powers to know Chat Noir had gotten hit by the akuma on purpose. 

Marinette hadn’t noticed yet, too busy talking to a man whose childhood dream was to become a stuffed animal, and the anxiety rose up like bile in the back of his throat. He’d been half pain before but this was something new.

Luka was half pity, half hope. Half defeat. 

His heart seemed to be breaking over and over in his chest, the muscle spasming so violently that everything in him was instantly ground to dust. The walls, the silence, the ladybugs. All the pain he’d carried around with him since his very first akumatisation.  

Because nothing he was going through could ever compare to Marinette and Adrien being... to them being..

Second chance!

Viperion was wholly conviction when he reassured Ladybug that he’d make sure no one would discover their secret identities. If he were still Luka he’d wonder how he hadn’t seen it before– her strength, her determination, the way Marinette’s nose crinkled when she was focused on something, all of it matched the red and black-spotted superhero to a T. 

But he, much like the rest of Paris, had only ever seen what they wanted to see. And Luka hadn’t wanted to see her in pain.

Not even me- luckily Wishmaker never hit you or Chat Noir.

He expected the lie to sour his tongue, turn his skin blue with irony, but it came easily, almost too easily for his comfort. But Marinette (because she would only ever be Marinette to him) smiled like his word was more than enough for her to trust him forever and turned to leave, like she’d done so many times before.

Now he knew why. 

The ladybugs in chest (ha!) swarmed against his rib cage as she left, tiny wings beating furiously as though they were trying to break right through his skin and follow her back home. 

Before Luka could think to question why, he was already running after her, reading the fluttering inside him like a compass, leading him further and further away from the street, down the sidewalk, all the way to the only thing that ever made him whole. All the way to her– 

Luka! Thank you for hiding me in here!

He wanted it to be a dream, a really bad dream; a really awful, terrible dream he’d wake up from any second, but when she’d opened the door, a nanosecond before he’d knocked and smiled up at him, her shoulders slumped over with the weight of the world; all he could think was how lucky he was.

Lucky to have known her, lucky to have loved her. Lucky to be empty enough to carry her secret for now, for forever.

You guys are okay!

“We’re all okay,” Luka smiled, looking between his two friends, “Thanks to Ladybug and Chat Noir.”

He’d almost meant it this time, but as he watched the Ladybug and Chat Noir in front of him look into each other’s eyes, completely unaware of all the forces of the universe that had conspired to bring them both to this moment, Luka knew he would never be whole.

For as long as Luka Couffaine could remember, he was a half. It was only when he turned fifteen, watching the dying sun set over the Seine, did he realise that the other half of him had only ever been other people’s secrets. 

-fin-

[karin848]

Lukanette piece I’ve drawn for the @mlbigbang !!!

In the Heat of the Moment by @inkmousey

[nixthelapin]

Turning Out pt. II by AJR but it’s Lukanette and Adrigami at the beginning of s4

[mintaka14]

Welcome to Chapter 2 of Chrysanthemum White and Blood Red, my ML Lukanette Hanahaki fic. There is angst ahead, lots of angst. Also, check the warnings and tags.

Chrysanthemum White and Blood Red

A Miraculous Ladybug fanfiction

By Mintaka14

Chapter 2

What I wanted was to fall asleep

Close my eyes and drift away

[Flowers (Hadestown): Anais Mitchell]

The flowers in her lungs were not the first secret Marinette had kept to herself. They weren’t even the biggest one.

Marinette had more than her share of secrets. They came with the territory as Ladybug, and one of them was hovering anxiously at her shoulder, watching her with huge, worried eyes as the akuma alert came in.

Marinette hated the lies and evasions that went with being Ladybug, but for all the damage Ladybug’s secrets did to her, they left simple, clean wounds. She knew exactly what she was keeping from the friends and family who cared about her, and what sparked the annoyance and disappointment in their eyes.

Ladybug’s secrets weren’t the ones that seeded stealthily within her and tangled their roots through her lungs and heart, ripping pieces out of her with every breath because she couldn’t even tell what the truth was anymore, let alone speak it.

“Marinette –“ Tikki said apprehensively “- are you sure you’re alright to transform?”

In truth, it was taking everything she had to come to her feet and reach for the miraculous. But really, what other choice was there? She was the only one who could cleanse the akumatised butterfly and fix whatever damage the akuma did, and Paris needed her. And as weary as she was, it was almost a relief to put aside worrying about the rattle of her lungs to focus on the uncomplicated problem of saving the city.

She could see the trail of destruction the akuma had left through the city as she swung out over Paris, and she followed the path until she found Chat perched on a rooftop, surveying the damage.

He perked up as she landed heavily beside him.

“M’lady! What took you so long? I missed your purrfect purresence.”

She couldn’t summon the energy to even scoff at the terrible puns.

“What are we dealing with?”

He kept shooting her odd looks as he filled her in on the akuma, and when she stood to go after it, he blocked her path.

“Is everything alright?”

She opened her mouth to say I’m fine, and felt the familiar acid taste of bile. She lifted a hand to wave him away instead.

“We’ve got an akuma to deal with,” she said, and stepped up onto the edge of the roof as he reluctantly moved aside.

For once there were no jokes as they fought the akuma, and she could feel Chat glancing her way. She couldn’t be anything but grateful when he finally pinned the akuma under his staff and cataclysmed the object, releasing the black and purple butterfly to flutter upwards into the sky.

Ladybug mustered the energy to cast up her yoyo and cleanse the butterfly, but almost fumbled the catch as her yoyo fell back into her hand. As the storm of healing ladybugs swirled around them, she reached out to bump fists with Chat, and found him eyeing her in concern.

He caught at her wrist before she could escape.

“M’lady, what’s going on?”

Her earrings chimed a soft warning, and she tried to tug her arm free, but she was too exhausted to break his hold. She could have cried with the need to get home and collapse.

“Chat, I have to go.”

“Meet me tonight, then,” he insisted, his face still creased with concern under his mask. Her earrings chimed again. With her transformation getting close to wearing off, with her legs just about ready to give out under her and her skin feeling clammy, it was easier to nod than to work her way around an explanation she couldn’t give.

“Tonight,” she promised reluctantly, and staggered as he finally released her. She stepped back out of reach. Before he could say anything else, she launched her yoyo and swung away out of sight.

She managed to reach an empty side street before her transformation gave out, and she dropped clumsily into the shadows, slumping back against the graffitied wall as Tikki hovered in front of her.

“Marinette?” the tiny god asked anxiously, and Marinette held up a hand to deflect the inevitable questions. The movement felt far too heavy, and Tikki didn’t look at all convinced, but at least she stayed silent as Marinette crept back into the house and past the family doorway into the bakery without drawing her mother’s watchful eye.

Tikki wasn’t any less anxious when Marinette reached out later that night to transform back into Ladybug, but she’d told Chat that she would be there.

She thought guiltily of the bigger things she’d had to refuse her partner – her true identity, the identity of the temporary miraculous holders, and her heart when he’d asked her to love him. The least she could do was turn up when she’d promised him she’d be there.

He was already there, and pacing, when she landed.

“M’lady, what’s going on? Or is this another secret you can’t tell me?” he asked, and it sounded like an accusation. “Are you sick?”

“I’m fine,” she tried to say, but the truth she’d refused to admit caught in her lungs and left her coughing. Ladybug pressed a hand to her mouth, but petals fell between her fingers, drifting down to the rooftop, and she heard Chat’s breath catch in horror.

“Hanahaki,” he whispered.

Of course he knew what it was when he saw the symptoms. He would have read up on all the rare accounts of hanahaki avidly. He would have read the fairy tales, and seen the anime and movies that painted it in melancholy and moving colours of romantic tragedy. Her partner believed with every beat of his heart in true love and courtly devotion.

To die for love, wasting away while flowers fell from silent lips… oh yes, Chat knew the significance of the blood-soaked blossoms she’d just coughed up.

“So now you know,” she said, her voice made scratchy by the lingering irritation of the petals. “But it won’t stop me from being here when Ladybug’s needed, I promise.”

“That’s not what I’m worried about!”

She had to be imagining the light of hope in his green eyes. She must be more out of it than she’d thought.

“It’s been a rough day. I’d better get home.” She turned to go, and he grabbed her wrist, as he had after the akuma, keeping her in place.

“You can’t just leave like that,” he protested.

“Chat…”

“I won’t even say I told you so,” he promised, hitting her with a roguish and charming grin that she was too exhausted to be charmed by. Her brain felt too sluggish to work out what he meant. When she didn’t respond, his grin faded into something closer to desperation. He still had a hold on her wrist.

“I���ve tried to be patient. I’ve respected that you wanted to wait, but don’t you think it’s time you admitted it? M’lady, this denial is killing you.”

Marinette could have laughed at the thought of Chat and patience, if she’d had any breath left for it. Instead, she shook her head, pressing her free hand to her aching throat.

“Admit what?” she rasped. What could she possibly have to say to Chat that would take away the flowers filling her lungs?

“You know!” He shifted his grasp to clutch at her hands, holding them fast against his chest. “You know how much I love you, M’lady. Why can’t you just tell me how you feel?”

“I have told you.” Her voice was harsh and raw. Marinette tried to tug her hands free, but there was no strength left in her. “Chat, you know exactly how I feel about you.”

“Then why do you have hanahaki?” he said stubbornly.

“Don’t make me do this, Chat.”

She was too tired. Too tired, and he was hurting her. Her wrists felt bruised under his hands.

“Just try it,” he pleaded.

He was so persistent. And she was too tired to argue anymore, too tired to be gentle in turning him down when he was so determined to only see her gentleness as not yet instead of never, so she forced out the words he’d always longed to hear and let the hanahaki show him the brutal truth.

“Chat Noir, you’re the one I love,” she sighed resignedly, already feeling the warning prickle in her chest. “There’s no… no one else…” Her lungs seized up, fighting to breathe through the words in her mouth as she hacked and coughed, and then her stomach twisted and heaved in reaction, vomiting up the lies he’d been desperate to hear until they splashed in gouts of white blossoms flecked with red around her feet.

She sagged against Chat, her hands still caught against his chest as she heaved again, shaking, with the taste of flowers and bile on her tongue. More crushed blossoms tore at her throat and spilled from her mouth onto the rooftop between them until there was nothing left to vomit up and her stomach clenched painfully.

There was a long, silent moment while Marinette stared down at the mess of flowers, still shaking. When she finally mustered the energy to raise her head, she found herself looking into Chat’s face blanched behind the mask, wide-eyed and devastated.

She could see the realisation in his eyes, as the hanahaki drove home the truth of what she had been trying to tell him for so long. Chat believed, finally, painfully, that she truly didn’t love him in the way he wanted. It tore at Marinette in ways that hurt almost more than the flowers in her lungs that he would believe a handful of chrysanthemum buds when he had refused to accept anything she’d said.

As if he couldn’t bear to meet her gaze, his eyes fell slowly to the petals and bone white blossoms marred with faint red spots scattered across his boots.

She could hear the rough inhale and release of his breath, and it sounded loud in the still night air above Paris. His hands tightened on hers for a moment, pressing them to his heart, and then he let them go and stepped back.

“Whoever he is,” Chat said gently, “you should tell him.”

He tried to smile at her.

“Go home and rest, Ladybug.”

~~~~~

Marinette had no idea how she managed to make it home. By grace, or whatever scraps of luck Tikki granted her, she somehow made it to the alleyway behind the bakery and let her transformation go. She slumped against the brick wall while Tikki hid in her handbag again.

Marinette could hear her father humming tunelessly in the back room, getting everything ready for the next morning, and she was grateful that her mother was too busy closing up the bakery for the night to do more than call out a quick, distracted greeting over her shoulder as she heard Marinette come in through the family entrance. Her maman wouldn’t be put off by assurances that everything was okay.

It was all she could do to make it up the stairs. When she stumbled into her bedroom, and collapsed on the couch, Tikki zipped out of the bag to hover over her anxiously.

“Marinette, you have to tell your parents,” the tiny kwami piped. “You’re sick.”

“You know what will happen,” Marinette mumbled into the cushions, wishing that she could just sleep. “Tests, doctors, hospital. And they’ll be watching me all the time. I can’t be Ladybug if they’re watching me.”

“But, Marinette…”

“I’ll tell them once Hawkmoth’s defeated,” she promised, exhaustion pulling her down into couch.

Let go, and sink into the heavy darkness of sleep, she thought hazily. To sleep, perchance to dream…

“You’re not going to defeat Hawkmoth in this condition,” Tikki said, and the sharp concern in her voice reached through the fog.

“Hopefully,” Marinette murmured distantly, “your next Ladybug will do a better job of dealing with him.”

They couldn’t do worse… The miserable thought followed her down into uneasy dreams of falling flowers and Paris in ruins.

~~~~~

Alya was starting to get worried when Marinette finally turned up for school in the morning. She was used to Marinette arriving at the last minute, but there was no sign of Marinette’s customary panicked fluster in the girl with tired shadows under her eyes who dropped heavily into the seat beside Alya and slumped until her forehead was resting on the desk. Alya tried to talk to her before class started, but Marinette just muttered something about bad dreams and bad sleep.

And then she’d vanished just before lunch. Alya was left scrambling to make excuses to a confused Adrien, who had been lured into the art room instead of the lunch he was supposed to be having with Nino. Rose, who’d been tasked with getting Marinette to the art room, reported that she couldn’t find her, so Alya abandoned Rose and Adrien and the ruins of her latest plan to search the school for her best friend.

There was no sign of Marinette in the girls’ bathroom, or the library, or the locker room. And the seat beside Alya in class remained frustratingly, worryingly empty for the rest of the afternoon, until the bell rang to dismiss them all.

“Really, what’s the point if she’s not even going to be here?” Alya fumed under her breath as she stalked down the school steps towards Marinette’s bakery. She let the irritation distract her from the apprehension churning in her stomach, and pushed the bakery door open with a wild jangling of bells.

The customers queued up at the counter glanced around at the noise. Marinette’s mother looked up from the loaf of bread she was sliding into a bag.

“Alya, dear.” Sabine’s face was her usual smiling calm, but Alya could see the creases of worry in the corners of her eyes as her gaze moved past Alya as if she was looking for something. “Is school finished already? Did Marinette have to stay behind today?”

Alya froze for a heartbeat.

“She… I… we’re meeting here…” she stuttered, and was profoundly relieved when Sabine’s attention was claimed by the customer holding out payment for the bread before Alya could dig herself in too deep. Sabine waved Alya through the private door without any further questions, and Alya almost ran up the stairs towards Marinette’s bedroom.

She couldn’t hear any sounds coming from the other side of the door. There was always sound and movement and chaos in Marinette’s room, and Alya wondered, with a rising sense of panic, if Marinette had even come home from school. Sabine obviously hadn’t seen her come in. Where would she have gone if not here?

The knock Alya gave on Marinette’s bedroom door was sharp and perfunctory, and she shoved the door open before the sound had even faded away.

The sewing machine was silent, and Marinette’s latest project was a puddle of silky fabric on the floor. It looked as though it had just spilled from her hand and lain untouched where it had fallen. It was disturbing just how long it took Alya to realise that the room wasn’t actually empty, without that boundless, restless energy and whirl of Marinette’s creativity that usually filled it.

Marinette was curled up on her couch, staring blankly at nothing.

Alya knew that she’d made enough noise to be heard as she climbed the steps into Marinette’s room, but it wasn’t until Alya came to stand at the edge of the chaise that Marinette tilted her head with a pale shadow of a smile. She looked as if every movement hurt, and her face was alarmingly washed out against the couch’s bright pink cushions.

“Sabine didn’t see you come in?” Alya started, idly picking up a reel of cotton thread from the floor and putting it back on Marinette’s desk. “She thought you were staying late at school. I was starting to think maybe you’d gone to the Liberty or something instead of coming home.”

“Maman was busy when I came home at lunchtime, and I just didn’t have the energy to pretend I was okay, so I came in the back way,” Marinette said without lifting her head from the cushions.

“You haven’t told your parents?” Alya asked quietly, and Marinette shrugged listlessly.

“What can they even do? They’ll just want to know why I can’t say something and get the hanahaki out of my system.”

“I don’t even understand why you can’t just say something,” Alya said, trying so hard to speak calmly. Why couldn’t Marinette just say something? All she had to do was open her mouth and speak, and everything would be all better, and Alya wouldn’t have to be so scared. “I had Adrien all lined up this afternoon, and I had to call in a lot of favours to get him to show up in the art room. I even had Alix running interference just in case Kagami showed up, but you weren’t there.”

“I had to go home. I wasn’t feeling well.”

“Well, you’re not going to get better if you don’t say something to Adrien.”

“You think I haven’t tried?” Marinette snapped back with a sudden burst of more animation than Alya had seen from her in weeks. She tried to sit up, two spots of hectic colour burning in her cheeks. “It’s not going to work. It’s never going to work! I’ve tried -!”

“Not hard enough when you’re still coughing up those damn flowers!” Alya shouted back, fighting the urge to reach out and shake her best friend.

From somewhere in the apartment below them, Sabine’s voice called out, “Marinette? Is that you? Is everything alright?”

Marinette’s chest was heaving with the effort to breathe.

“I can’t do this,” she wheezed, and Alya watched helplessly as she fought to get her reaction under control. “I can’t – I can’t -”

Alya stretched out a tentative hand to her friend, and Marinette shook her head.

“Not now,” Marinette rasped. “Just go –“

Alya spun on her heel and marched to the door before she could say something she’d regret. She clenched her hands to stop them from shaking.

Alya passed Sabine on the stairs, but was too caught up in her own thoughts to notice the look of concern that followed her down.

If Marinette was going to keep ducking Adrien at school, then Alya would just have to bring Adrien to the one thing that she knew Marinette wouldn’t miss, even if she was on her deathbed.

Tough love, she reminded herself.

~~~~~

Alya surveyed the group of girls sitting around her bedroom. They gazed back at her with varying degrees of wariness.

“Where’s Marinette? Shouldn’t she be here for this?” Rose asked.

“Not this time. She keeps dodging me.”

It looked like Juleka was frowning behind the fall of her purple and black hair when Alya shot her a surreptitious look, but it was hard to be sure. It was always hard to be sure what was going on with Juleka.

“What do you mean, she’s dodging you?” Alix asked suspiciously. “Doesn’t she want to do this?”

“She will, once we help her. She’s just feeling nervous – you know how Marinette gets,” Alya reassured them impatiently.

Alix flopped backwards onto Alya’s bed with a put-upon sigh. “This is such a waste of time.”

“Wait, am I Tulip again this time?” Rose asked.

“No! No flowers!” Alya snapped out harshly. They all stared at her, and she tried again, a little calmer this time. “No code names, and definitely no flowers. We’re going to keep this simple – we’re going to invite Adrien to the Kitty Section rehearsal this weekend,” she announced.

There was a long silence. Mylène exchanged an uneasy glance with Rose.

“Are… you sure that’s a good idea?” Mylène said slowly. “I mean, remember what happened last time, and Ivan’s been really stressing about the music festival coming up…”

“And Alya’s turning it into another Adrien scheme,” Alix groaned. “Must be a day ending in ‘y’. Were you even going to ask the band if they’re okay with that?”

“I’m asking,” Alya protested, and ignored Alix’s muttered Didn’t sound like a question to me.

“It’s only supposed to be a band rehearsal with a small audience to get ready for the gig,” Mylène persisted.

“We’re all going to be there,” Alya pointed out impatiently. “And Nino would have been there if he didn’t have his family thing on Saturday. What’s one more person?”

“But… it’s Adrien…”

Alya frowned at Mylène as she trailed off.

Alix raised her hands. “Don’t look at me. It’s not my show, not my decision. I’m not getting involved.”

Alya turned to Rose, who could always be counted on to back her up in any romantic plans, but Rose was looking at Juleka, her expression worried.

“Jules?” Rose said softly. “What do you think? It’s going to be at your place, so it’s your call.”

Behind the curtain of her hair, Juleka looked like a deer caught in the headlights.

“Juleka?” Alya prodded, and Juleka’s eyes met Alya’s, the panic changing into an unmistakable anger that Alya had never seen from the quiet girl before.

She could understand that Juleka was feeling conflicted, but this wasn’t just about Juleka’s brother being in love with Marinette anymore.

“Juleka?” Alya repeated more insistently, refusing to be intimidated. “I need you to invite Adrien to the rehearsal.”

Juleka mumbled something that Alya couldn’t make out, and pushed herself to her feet. She was gone before anyone could stop her.

“Jules!” Rose called after her in distress, and shot a distracted glance at Alya. “Sorry, Alya, I have to…”

And Rose left to follow Juleka.

In the awkward silence after the door closed behind Rose, Mylène gathered up her bag and her coat, and edged out of the room with a murmured farewell. Alya turned back to find Alix still there with her arms crossed and an unimpressed expression on her face.

“What?” Alya asked, a touch belligerently, but Alix just shook her head and sauntered out.

Alya was left alone in her room, frowning into space. She had to admit that Adrien would probably brush it off if she tried to talk him into coming to the rehearsal – she’d kind of cried wolf a few too many times lately with ‘emergencies’ or things Adrien just had to turn up for, only for Marinette to bail on her. It wasn’t like it was easy for Adrien to find the time in his schedule in the first place, and Nino was starting to balk whenever she tried to get him involved. So as far as she could see, there was only one other course of action left.

With a decisive nod, Alya girded her loins and headed for the Liberty. If she was lucky, Juleka hadn’t gone straight home.

It wouldn’t have stopped her if Juleka had been there – Alya was not one to put off an unpleasant task, especially when her best friend’s life was on the line – but she was rather relieved that there was no sign of Juleka when she reached the docks along the river.

She followed the soft, electric sound of guitar music up the gangplank and towards the back of the Liberty, and found Luka perched on top of a pile  of boxes that cluttered the deck. The blue tips of his hair hid his face as he bent over his electric guitar, until some sound alerted him to her presence, and he looked up. His fingers paused on the strings.

“Hey, Alya,” he greeted her easily. “Jules is down below, if you’re looking for her.”

“Actually, I wanted to talk to you.” She trailed off, trying to find the tactful way to say what she’d come there for. Luka waited, watching her, with no hint of what he was really thinking on his face. She opened her mouth, and closed it again.

Finally, she blurted out baldly, “I want you to invite Adrien to the rehearsal on Saturday.”

His eyebrow lifted a little. Alya watched him closely for some other reaction, but his expression remained serene and mildly interested. Surely there would be some hint of jealousy at Adrien’s name, if Luka was really as into Marinette as all that. No one had a poker face that good if they were seriously in love. She knew Nino would have been frothing at the mouth by now, if he’d been in Luka’s shoes.

Alya started to feel a little better about asking him. Luka was a musician; he probably said things like that line about sincere melodies to all the girls.

“Is there a reason you particularly want Adrien there?” Luka asked. “There’s no guarantee he’ll be able to come even if we ask him.”

“I’m pretty sure he’ll come if you invite him.” If he didn’t, there was always chloroform and kidnapping, as a last resort. Alya was getting desperate.

She braced herself for the inevitable objections. She’d prepared the counter-arguments in her head on the way there - after all, why would Luka invite his love rival? But Luka regarded her silently for a long, uncomfortable moment.

“I’ll see what I can do,” he said eventually, and when Luka stood, his guitar held loosely in his hand, Alya took it as the end of the conversation. It felt slightly anticlimactic, but she murmured her thanks, and strode back the way she came in what was definitely not a retreat. In her haste, Alya nearly ran into Juleka coming out of the companionway onto the deck.

Juleka raised her head. Half her face was shadowed by the fall of her purple and black hair, her expression unchanging, but there was a hard look in the eye that Alya could see. Alya had to fight the urge to back away.

Alya understood, she really did - Juleka was Luka’s sister, and Luka liked Marinette. But this was to save Marinette’s life. Even Juleka couldn’t argue with that, if she knew the whole story.

~~~~~

Juleka watched as Alya crossed the gangplank. Alya didn’t turn back to look in her direction, but her shoulders were set as if she half-expected a knife in the back. The idea was awfully tempting.

Once Alya had reached the dock and hurried away into the city streets, Juleka stared after her for a long minute, and then she pivoted to go in search of her brother.

She found him near the aft of the deck. His guitar hung silent in one hand, and he was fiddling aimlessly with his phone. But the look on his face…

“I’m going to kill Alya,” Juleka growled.

Luka said wearily, “She’s only trying to help Marinette.”

“But she doesn’t have to hurt you to do it. And you’re just going to let Alya do it. I can’t believe you’re going along with whatever scheme Alya’s come up with.”

“If it’s what Marinette wants –“

“Yeah, I know you’re an idiot when it comes to anything to do with her, but that doesn’t mean you have to watch it happen. On our boat, in your home.”

Luka shrugged, and tucked his phone into his pocket. “It doesn’t matter. It’s done.”

“What?”

“I’ve asked Adrien to come on Saturday. Whether he shows up or not, whatever happens, it’s out of my hands now.”

Juleka huffed out a furious breath, and turned away. “Why can’t Marinette put us all out of our misery and just ask him herself?” she muttered under her breath, but Luka heard her.

“Jules,” he said warningly, and she glanced back. “You of all people should know how hard it can be to tell someone how you feel.”

It was as close as he ever came to rebuking her. She could feel her face scrunch up, and he met her eyes, holding them until he saw the silent contrition in her. When Luka let her go and turned his attention back to his guitar, Juleka let out another ragged breath and headed down to her bedroom.

She was pretending to be asleep when she eventually heard him come downstairs and move around on his side of the curtain that divided their bedroom. She listened to the soft thump as he dropped onto his bed, and she waited for him to plug the headphones into his guitar, as he always did.

The Liberty was a noisy place to grow up. Living on the Seine there was always noise, and people along the banks of the river, boats knocking against the docks and the constant lap of waves against the hull. Machinery vibrated and clanked in the engine room, rumbling through the bulkheads and the floor underfoot. Sounds echoed and travelled in the confines below deck, and filtered through the makeshift walls and curtains that divided up the close space. Juleka was used to being surrounded by noise.

Her mother’s voice carried over everything whenever she was on board. Anarka Couffaine was a woman who didn’t seem to know the meaning of the word quiet, not as it applied to her. Sometimes, Juleka wondered if she’d become so quiet herself as a way to rebel against her mother’s loud anarchy. But the most constant sound that Juleka associated with the Liberty and home was music.

There was always music on the Liberty, some instrument playing or someone singing or humming along. There was always Kitty Section filling the deck with sound, or Anarka belting out a protest song at full volume with a bottle in her hand, or Luka playing whatever tune was wandering through his head and fingers. Juleka couldn’t remember a night when she hadn’t fallen asleep to the muted sound of guitar strings from her brother on the other side of the curtain, his headphones on as he worked through something on his favourite guitar.

Tonight, though, Juleka listened in vain for the sound of strings.

She knew Luka was awake. He was too silent to be asleep, her brother who played music like he breathed air. Her sweet, stupid brother who would have ripped his heart out and offered it up on a plate if he’d thought it would do Marinette any good.

The sound of the river slapping against the hull of the Liberty, and the soft, rumbling chug of boats passing them, felt too loud without the music that usually played a counterpoint to the uneven rhythm of the ship’s constant noises.

Her phone chimed with an incongruously cheerful little melody, startling her in the darkness. Rose’s tune. She knew Rose was just worried about her after everything that had happened at Alya’s place, but she couldn’t deal with Rose’s relentlessly romantic sensibilities just then, not in that moment when romance and love sucked so bad.

She shut her phone off without looking at it, and everything fell silent again. Juleka turned her face into her pillow so that her brother wouldn’t hear her crying, and she wished that he’d never met Marinette.

~~~~~

Marinette was absent from school for the rest of the week, and wasn’t answering any of the texts or messages Alya sent her. Alya tried to reassure herself that she would have heard if the worst had happened. Marinette was… not fine, but she would come to the Kitty Section rehearsal, and Alya would fix everything.

Alya took less than her usual satisfaction in being proved right when Marinette turned up at the Liberty for the rehearsal, every movement lacking her usual frenetic energy. A casual observer might not have noticed, but Alya took one look at her best friend’s face, and shoved aside the morbid thought that her prediction about Marinette rising from her deathbed to be there had been a little too close to home.

Judging from the way Luka’s eyes kept cutting towards her as he played, Alya wasn’t the only one aware that Marinette was far too pale and quiet, and that she was surreptitiously leaning against the boat rail for support. There was a tiny crease between Luka’s brows that didn’t leave even when Marinette met his gaze and managed a ghost of a smile in response.

She was avoiding Alya, though, and hadn’t spoken a word to her since she’d arrived.

There was no sign of Adrien yet, but Alya kept turning to glance anxiously at the dock.

This had to work.

And then Adrien arrived. With Kagami.

Marinette stayed where she was. She didn’t take part in the backslaps and chorus of greetings as Adrien and Kagami stepped off the gangplank onto the boat, but she did straighten and let go of the rail as they drew closer. Alya could see what the effort cost her in the drawn lines around her eyes, and for a second she was tempted to just shove Kagami over the side into the river.

“I didn’t think you’d all mind - I brought Kagami,” Adrien beamed at the group gathered around them.

“The more the merrier,” Marinette told him, with a soft smile for the girl at Adrien’s side.

The band launched into another song, but it couldn’t be said that Alya was paying much attention. At some point, Mylène appeared at her elbow, and handed her a cup. Alya downed the contents without really noting what she was drinking.

“They’re sounding good, aren’t they?” Mylène said doubtfully, her eyes on the stage.

If Alya had been thinking about it, she might have said that they seemed a bit flat. Rose kept hitting her cues late, and Luka was acting like he was sleepwalking through the whole performance. It was a testament to his skill with a guitar that no one would have noticed that his mind wasn’t on the music if they couldn’t see the way that his attention kept drifting to where Marinette was standing with Kagami and Adrien.

But the band could have been playing The Muppets’ Greatest Hits for all Alya was aware, or cared.

Alya could see the way Marinette was fading by the second even as she talked softly with Kagami, while Adrien smiled at them both. Alya’s gaze gravitated to the hand Kagami had tucked through Adrien’s arm. She could feel herself glaring, and tried to smooth out the expression before anyone could notice.

Now, if only Alya could get Kagami away from them for just a moment…

Kagami was laughing at something Marinette was saying. Alya didn’t think she’d ever seen Kagami smile, let alone laugh.

Kagami shot Marinette an oddly light-hearted glance. “You haven’t taken your eyes off the stage, Marinette,” she said, and it sounded almost teasing in spite of her overly stiff phrasing. “Isn’t the guitarist the young man who came ice-skating with us – Luka Couffaine? How is your relationship with him progressing?”

“We’re not –” Marinette protested. “I don’t –“ Her denial broke off with a gasp as her face grew paler. “I –“

She doubled over as a wrenching, hacking cough shook her.

“Marinette?” Kagami was saying in alarm.

Luka stopped playing with a sharp screech of discordant notes. The band stumbled to a halt in confusion, but he was already ripping his precious guitar over his head, shoving it at Juleka as he jumped from the stage.

Blood-soaked petals tumbled from Marinette’s mouth, splattering violently across the deck as she coughed up more crushed flowers. And they just kept falling, and falling… Alya could see the stricken, terrified look on Marinette’s face, and her own heart clutched in response.

“Tell him!” Alya screamed at her. “Tell Adrien, or I will!”

Adrien’s face was a study in bewilderment and dawning horror, his green eyes fixed on Marinette, but at that they shifted from Marinette to Alya and back again. “Tell me what?”

“Adrien, I … have feelings for you,” Marinette managed to choke out, and her tone was hopeless. “I – I –“

She swayed again, and all the remaining colour bleached from her face. That was all the warning they had. When she crumpled, Adrien lunged to catch her.

Luka moved faster.

He caught her before she could hit the deck, and Alya screamed as Marinette convulsed in a paroxysm of coughing. Flowers and blood covered Luka’s shirt as he held Marinette, but he didn’t seem to notice. Marinette’s eyes closed, her lashes a dark smear against the pallor of her cheeks.

“Nononono,” he was repeating under his breath, Marinette bundled tight in his arms. “Marinette, sweetheart, wake up. Wake up.”

Kagami’s sharp cry broke through the startled silence from everyone watching, as she took a distracted step towards Marinette, and pulled up short as her eyes flicked back to Adrien.

Alya stared in horror at Marinette’s limp form. “It didn’t work,” she breathed. She turned wide eyes on Adrien. “Why didn’t it work?”

But Adrien’s attention was fixed on Marinette cradled in Luka’s arms, and he didn’t seem to hear when Kagami said his name, or notice her hand touch his arm uncertainly. There was a look of devastated realisation in his eyes that Alya didn’t have the capacity to analyse in the middle of her own frozen nightmare.

Then Marinette stirred, and everything jolted back into motion.

“Marinette,” Luka breathed.

Marinette’s eyes opened, dazed and unfocused. She stared up at Luka as if she was in a dream.

“Luka.” Marinette’s hand came up to brush his cheek, and she sighed, “I love you.”

Her eyes closed again. Alya realised that Luka was shaking with sobs, and that the ragged rise and fall of Marinette’s breath was evening out now.

No more flowers fell from her lips.

~~~~~

Alya stared blankly at her friend as Luka gathered Marinette up carefully, and stood.

How had she missed this?

Howhowhow?

Marinette’s face was so pale and still, her lashes a black fringe on colourless cheeks as Luka cradled her close, but she was still breathing, her chest rising and falling softly.

Stillbreathingstillbreathing –

And Luka… Alya had never seen anything like the look in his dark blue eyes as he carried Marinette away from them. She gave an involuntary shudder.

There was a hushed silence across the deck. And Adrien –

Adrien was leaving. Alya caught the disjointed bits of his whispered conversation with Kagami, and then, Kagami’s voice slightly louder, “But we can’t go now. What if Marinette -?”

“Luka’s looking after her. She doesn’t need… me.”

Alya caught herself as she took the first step to stop him. It wasn’t like it mattered now. This wasn’t some romantic plan gone awry anymore, and there were bigger things to worry about. She watched Adrien leave the Liberty, with a stricken look on his face and a murmured, disjointed excuse about his driver waiting for him.

“Is this what all the Adrien schemes this week were all about?” a sharp voice said, and Alya spun around to face Alix. “Why didn’t you tell us Marinette has hanahaki?”

Because Marinette had told her not to tell, and best friends kept secrets for each other, didn’t they? She’d been doing the right thing. Best friends knew best…

“Adrien schemes?” Kagami’s clear, cold voice chimed in, and Alya startled. She hadn’t even noticed that Kagami had remained behind when Adrien left.

Alya glanced around, and became aware that Juleka and Rose had disappeared at some point. They reappeared from below deck, and Rose shook her head when Mylène murmured something to her and tilted an anxious look in the direction Luka had carried Marinette. Juleka was holding a mop and bucket, and started cleaning the vomit and blood still spattered across the deck.

“Was this all a part of some scheme to bring Marinette and Adrien together?” Kagami asked.

“Did you miss the part where Marinette has hanahaki?” Alya said incredulously, turning back to face down Kagami. “You do know what that means, right?”

“I did not miss Marinette’s illness and collapse. Nor did I miss that you were the one shouting at Marinette to confess, in spite of the fact that Marinette has told me that she no longer has feelings for Adrien.”

“Well, of course she’d say that!” Wasn’t it obvious? “She didn’t want to upset you.”

“Except she clearly told me the truth about how she feels.” Kagami indicated the mess beside them on the deck that Juleka was mopping up. “Didn’t Marinette tell you the same thing?”

Kagami just didn’t understand Marinette like Alya did. Marinette always got so caught up in overthinking everything, she just needed a bit of a push sometimes.

“Yet you encouraged her to pursue Adrien,” Kagami went on. “How could you do that to Marinette, and to Adrien?”

“To Adrien? Marinette’s the one who was going to die! I was trying to save her life!”

“But confessing to Adrien didn’t save her at all, and put him through the pain in that moment of blaming himself for Marinette’s suffering, and believing he would have to reject a good friend who cared about him enough to develop hanahaki.”

Kagami’s air of righteous judgement was too much to take.

“Are you so sure he would have turned her down?” Alya pushed back, her arms folded in front of her. “I mean, you’ve been on a few dates, but you’re not officially his girlfriend yet, are you? And I saw his face when he realised what the hanahaki meant.”

There was a silence, fragile and sharp as glass, and a small, mean part of Alya felt a bit of satisfaction at the look on Kagami’s face.

Kagami took a trembling breath. “Yet you failed to see how Marinette looks at Luka, for all you pride yourself on your powers of observation.”

Alya opened her mouth to refute the attack, to point out all the times she’d teased Marinette about Luka distracting her from her crush on Adrien, and then she closed her mouth again.

Juleka had been mopping the flowers from the deck, but she lifted her head at that, and the look in her eyes was hard.

“Maybe if you hadn’t been so caught up in pushing all those stupid plans to get her together with Adrien, it wouldn’t have got to the point where Marinette’s throwing up flowers and my brother’s tearing his heart out,” Juleka muttered, and Alya was stung into reaction.

“Oh, don’t pretend you weren’t involved in all those plans, Rose,” Alya snapped the flower codename at Juleka as a reminder of one of their convoluted plots. Rose glanced up in confusion at the sound of her name. “And you still would be, if your brother wasn’t the other guy.”

“And if Marinette didn’t have hanahaki because she doesn’t love Adrien!” Juleka almost shouted, startling everyone with her uncharacteristic volume.

“You didn’t realise she was into Luka either!” Alya shouted back, the accusation made sharper with her own fear and guilt. Her gaze flicked away to take in the circle of girls around them. “None of you did. You were all on board with those stupid plans, remember? Operation Secret Garden? You were all coming up with ideas and flower codenames and stuff for that – “

“Yeah, when it was Marinette’s idea in the first place,” Alix interjected.

Alya’s eyes narrowed at Alix, and shifted to skim over Mylène, with Ivan hovering uncertainly in the background. She glanced at Rose, and Juleka, who had come to her feet with the bucket forgotten beside her and her fingers going white with tension where they gripped the mop handle. Alya came back to Alix again.

“You all thought she was in love with Adrien, too. She’s always said she’s in love with Adrien. If she’d just told the truth, none of this would be happening,” Alya said, and Alix snorted.

“When she did, you didn’t listen.”

“I –“

“It wasn’t a clue when she kept dodging you hard every time you tried to push her and Adrien together?” Alix threw up her hands. “Not my fault you didn’t listen to any of us.”

“Yeah, not your problem, not your show,” Alya mimicked savagely. “At least I was doing my best to help Marinette!”

“And look how well that worked out for her,” Juleka said under her breath, and Alya rounded on her.

“At least I was trying to do something!” Alya repeated sharply. “It’s only because it’s your brother who’s involved that you’re blaming me for not figuring it out, but you just sat there and said nothing, every time we talked about how to get Marinette and Adrien together, so what does that say about you, if you knew Marinette liked Luka and didn’t say anything? And if you thought Marinette was into Adrien, like the rest of us did, then you’re even worse for blaming me when I was just trying to help her get the guy she’d said she wanted!”

Alya hated herself for the tears that were welling up in Juleka’s eyes, but she was in too deep to stop.

Rose had seen Juleka’s reaction too, and her eyes narrowed. She planted herself protectively in front of Juleka, tiny and fierce and bristling at Alya. Alya would have laughed, if she wasn’t such a roiling, defensive mess.

“That’s not fair!” Rose said furiously. “We didn’t know about the hanahaki. You and Marinette didn’t tell any of us. And no one knew she was in love with Luka, not even you, and you’re supposed to be her best friend! You’re the one who keeps saying you know her better than anyone else – if anyone should have known, it was you!”

“How was I supposed to know, when Marinette’s been keeping all these secrets from me?” Alya cried bitterly.

On the outskirts of the circle, Kagami said quietly, “Except Marinette told you that she was no longer in love with Adrien. Why didn’t you believe her?”

And Alya didn’t have an answer.

Alya glanced around the wreckage, the petals still stuck to the deck, and the abandoned instruments on the stage. And she replayed in her head all the times Marinette had insisted she didn’t love Adrien anymore. She counted over all the times she’d teased Marinette about Luka, how she’d thought it was so funny when Marinette would blush at the mention of his name, and all the time Marinette had been spending on the Liberty with the band, and Luka.

Luka, who looked at Marinette as if she was everything in the world to him.

Luka, soaked in Marinette’s blood as he held her, her face as pale as death.

It had been too quiet down below deck for too long now, and Alya was gripped with a sudden fear for her best friend.

Everyone had fallen silent, their eyes on Alya.

And Alya turned and fled below in search of reassurance.

~~~~~

Down in the bowels of the Liberty, Alya pushed her way past the galley kitchen to a door standing open on the cabin Luka shared with Juleka. Through the open doorway, she could make out Marinette’s unconscious form in the rumpled mess of blankets on Luka’s bed. Luka was huddled on the floor beside her, his forehead pressed to his knees and one hand stretched up awkwardly to hold Marinette’s hand where it dangled over the edge of the mattress. His phone lay face up on the floor next to him.

Alya shifted uncomfortably in the hallway, and Luka looked up at the sound. His face was still ashy pale under his tan, and streaked with tears. Before she could come in, he got to his feet and gently tucked Marinette’s hand back under the blanket, then moved to meet Alya in the doorway. She could see the way his hands shook before he closed them tightly at his sides. He had the look in his eyes of a man who didn’t yet dare trust in a gallows reprieve.

“Is she going to be alright?” she asked abruptly, afraid.

“She’s okay. She’s going to be okay,” he repeated, more to himself than to Alya, and scrubbed a hand across his face, smearing the tear tracks. It sounded like he was trying to convince himself.

“Is she awake yet?” Alya asked. He shook his head.

“She’s still unconscious. I called the ambulance. They’ll be here in a minute, and her parents are on their way to the hospital,” he said distantly. “Quicker to meet her there than coming here.”

They could hear the wail of an ambulance siren getting closer now. Over the soft lap of the waves against the hull Alya could hear the approaching siren give one final whoop, and then cut out as the ambulance pulled up to the dock.

“I didn’t know it was you,” she said in a small voice. “She didn’t tell me.”

“Do you wonder why?” Luka said, and the tone of his voice was the closest to anger that Alya had ever heard from him. There was a long beat of silence, and then Luka let out a heavy breath. “She didn’t tell me either,” he said more softly. “She didn’t feel like she could talk to any of us, and that’s how the hanahaki took root in the first place.”

There were voices and firm footsteps on the deck above them, and then the cabin was full of paramedics and bags of equipment. Alya flattened herself out of the way against the wall as they tested Marinette’s vitals and held low-voiced consultations that were broken by the occasional request for information.

In response to one question about how long ago the first symptoms had shown up, Luka said, “I’m not sure. About three weeks?”

He glanced at Alya for confirmation, and she nodded, her head feeling wobbly with the effort.

“She seemed even more exhausted than usual back around then,” Luka went on, “and had a bit of a cough right after… what day was it when Adrien first turned up here?” he asked Alya. “I noticed she seemed a bit off right after that, but I thought… I thought…”

Alya knew what he’d thought. She’d thought the same thing, but they were both wrong.

Marinette stirred, but didn’t wake up, as the paramedics briskly shifted her from the bed to a narrow gurney and manoeuvred her through the doorway. Alya could hear the firm, quiet voices receding down the length of the boat, and the muted thump of feet and equipment easing their way up the steps and onto the deck.

Alya was a little startled when Luka scooped up a backpack and moved to follow them.

“Luka, what are you going to do?”

“Go with her. In the ambulance if they’ll let me. Or follow on my bike if they won’t. I don’t want her to be alone when she wakes up.” The muscles in his jaw clenched. There was something fierce and immovable in his eyes that Alya would never have expected to see in the easy-going guitarist, and another shiver ran through her.

“Tell her… tell her…” Alya trailed off, unsure of what she wanted to say. There was too much she wanted to tell Marinette, and Luka was watching her with those eyes that saw far more than Alya was comfortable with.

“Maybe this time,” he said, “we listen to Marinette instead.”

And then he was gone, leaving Alya alone in the bowels of the boat with her thoughts.

[airi-p4]

[verfound]

FIC: "She Didn't Want That Day" (MLB; Lukanette; LBSC Lukanette Month 2024)

@lovebugs-and-snakecharmers is doing a Lukanette Month for September 2024, and we all just kinda tossed some prompts in the disco to compile a list?  We ended up with 71 prompts, so I decided I’d roll some dice to pick a prompt, do a twenty minute (ish, bc we all know sometimes they run away from me) sprint, and try to get some short fics out this month?

For Better or Worse AU - Whump, No Happy Ending, Mind the Tags, etc.

Read on Ao3

Prompt 60: “Love is a choice, and I’ve made mine.”

She didn’t remember the building looking so…normal before.

But then again, it had been a long time since she’d bothered paying it any mind.  She could barely…no.  Not barely.  She could remember all too well the last time she had been there – the last time her papa had let her be there.

His hand had been so big around hers, back then.  So much bigger than it had felt a few weeks before, when…

She still remembered the screaming woman inside, too.  Much as she wished she didn’t.

Still.

She had no choice now, did she?  She had made a promise, and Couffaines kept their promises.

It was a good day.  One of his last good days.

Looking at him now, you’d never know…but she did know.  And that was the problem, wasn’t it?  She couldn’t not know.  He hadn’t wanted to tell her at first – hadn’t known how – but now that the whole ugly truth was out there…she saw it every time she looked at him.

He was dying, and a large part of her…a mean, hard part of her that was only natural, growing up the way she had…she wished he would just get on with it.

“I need you to promise me something,” he said, his voice quieter than she ever remembered it being before.  Quieter even than Aunt Juleka’s.  He was looking out the window, his fingers moving idly over the old guitar in his lap as he watched the cherry blossom branches move with the early spring wind.

He had told her once this had been her mother’s favorite time of year.  Her mother had supposedly planted that tree, back when they’d first moved in to the old house.  Back before everything had ‘fallen apart’ – when they had planned on actually filling the place with a family, one that would have had a swing hanging from one of the branches some day.

She didn’t remember that.

She had never met that Marinette Couffaine.

She’d been told she would have loved her.

“Of course, Papa,” she said, though she wasn’t sure if she meant it.  His lips quirked in a small, knowing smile – like he already knew she wouldn’t be keeping her promise.

“Make sure you visit your maman every now and then, all right?” he asked.  He had started playing that old song he always seemed to slip into, the one he had once told her was for happier times.  She had always hated the stupid thing – every time he played it he just sounded…stuck.  “She’ll need someone.  It should be you.”

“…I’ll try,” she said, though they both knew she hated the idea.  She didn’t understand why it needed to be her.  It’s not like her moth…it’s not like Marinette had any idea who she was, anyway.

“Harmony…” he sighed, his fingers stilling as he looked up at her.  He looked so…tired.  Worn.  “Please, sweetheart.  For me.”

She swallowed, her throat feeling too tight, and nodded.  She would.  For him.  Because she did love him, against her better wisdom.

…he had always tried.  She knew fathers who hadn’t even done that much.  Marinette was how she was because of one such father, if the stories – the ‘legends’ – of the great Ladybug were to be believed.

She had never put much stock in them, herself.  Sure, New York had its heroes, but magical jewelry?

It was a fairytale, and when you grew up with a mother who was batshit crazy…well.

Harmonika Couffaine had never put much stock in fairytales.

“Papa?” she asked after a long moment had passed.  After he had started playing again.  He hummed, and she sighed.  “Why…why do you keep going?  Why didn’t you just…you could have divorced her.  Found someone else.”

Given me a real mother, she thought bitterly.

“No one would have blamed you,” she said.  “It couldn’t have been that hard, given…everything.”

He stopped playing again, his gaze turning back to the tree.  That little smile was back on his face.  The one he got when he was thinking about her mother, of the way she used to be.  Back before she had been born.

“…no,” he finally said, leaning his head back against his chair.  “I suppose it wouldn’t have been.”

“But you didn’t,” she said, frowning.  “You stayed married to her.  You go visit her almost every single day.  You…Papa.  You put your entire life on hold for someone who doesn’t even remember you.”

“She remembers me, sweetheart,” he said, closing his eyes.  Harmony frowned, unconvinced.  After another moment, he took a deep breath and opened his eyes again.  “It’s not that simple, baby.  I couldn’t just…walk away from her.”

“You could have,” Harmony insisted, but he shook his head and turned back towards her.

“No, Harmony, I couldn’t have,” he said, his voice firm.  Stronger than she had heard in a while.  “Love is a choice, Harmonika Couffaine, and I made mine a long time ago.”

She looked away, and for a moment…it was so strange, but the heat creeping up her neck almost felt like shame.

“…of course, Papa,” she said, and the smile he gave her almost looked relieved.  He sank back into his chair, his fingers returning to his guitar.  Playing that same damn song again.

“Thank you, Harmony.”

…that was what had decided it, in the end.  The look on her papa’s face as he made her promise to check in on her mother.  Not every day, but…every now and then.  Just to make sure someone was.

Because that’s what he had worried about, in the end.  Making sure Marinette Couffaine knew she hadn’t been forgotten, even when Marinette Couffaine didn’t know anything else.

He hadn’t worried about his own daughter.

Of course he hadn’t – because love was a choice, and he had always chosen Marinette first.

…her aunts would tell her she wasn’t being fair.  They had been reminding her of that a lot the past few weeks, but she didn’t think that was very fair of them, either.  After all, they had known Luka and Marinette Before.  She supposed it was easier to forgive someone of their present when you could still be comforted by memories of their past.

Her Granarchy would just remind her it wasn’t right to speak ill of the dead, things being what they were.

…she would be kinder later.  When the hurt wasn’t as fresh.  When the grave dirt had given way to grass.  When she could remember their own good times without anger and resentment.

When the words Luka Couffaine is dead didn’t make her chest burn and ache like a fresh wound.

The breeze was warmer when it blew past her, tossing her bleached hair into her face.  She pushed it back with a frown, swallowing as she looked back up at the building.

It looked so…innocent.  Like any other house in Paris.

She remembered it looking…bigger.  More intimidating.

Scarier.

“All right, Papa,” she said, taking a deep breath of warm, late spring air.  She looked down at the flowers in her hands, her stomach twisting unpleasantly.  Cherry blossoms, because they had always been her favorite.  Her signature.  In pink, because she used to be pink.  And white, because…well.  Mamie used to say it was a funeral color, in her home country.

It had seemed fitting, when Auntie Rose had helped her arrange it in the shop.

“She’ll love them,” she had promised, squeezing her hand.  “She’ll be so glad to see you, Harmony.”

Harmony couldn’t believe that.

Marinette had never been glad to see her before.

Marinette had never known her before.

She took another deep breath and steeled herself.

“Ok, Couffaine,” she said, glaring up at the building.  “You made a promise.”

She took a step.

[justminawrites]

Of Ribbons and Other Lost Things - Chapter 2: Help Wanted

AO3

1 | 2 | 3 | TBC

Luka Couffaine hadn’t meant to end up at the Dupain-Cheng Bakery on purpose.

He’d bombed his first three interviews, for a bartender (too young), beekeeper (they seemed to be allergic to him) and bassist (he took one look at the bloodstained chipmunk costume and refused to get in), and found himself with a some time to kill before the final one at Le Grand Paris hotel. 

So he aimlessly cycled around the cobblestoned pathways of Paris instead, following musical notes scattered all around city like a giant melodic puzzle, before traitorous muscle memory kicked in, taking him to the one place he was sure he’d be turned away from. 

The bakery was right in the heart of the city; a beautiful, five-story building fortified with an eggshell-white composite of brick and wood, the delicious aroma of bread weaving in and around the neighbouring streets. 

Luka felt his insides curl, the twang! of a broken guitar string, as he stopped his bike outside its freshly-painted doors, and tried to pedal back the way he came.

But his legs stalled as he caught sight of a girl on the rooftop balcony of the building, pacing back and forth in her trademark pink jeans and grey blazer, exaggeratedly waving her arms as though she was in an argument with herself. 

Luka bit his lip to keep from smiling at the sight.

Now, it was no secret Marinette Dupain-Cheng was avoiding him. 

He’d deduced as much when she noticeably stopped coming to Kitty Section’s rehearsals, started pitching her new designs on the group chat instead of actually showing up to their meetings, and even having The Girl Squad deliver the first draft of the clothes she’d sewn. 

But what was a secret was that he’d been avoiding her just as much. 

No one knew besides Jule (because no one knew anything about him besides Juleka), but Luka had found himself taking every precaution to avoid the Dupain-Chengs, from cancelling inner-city deliveries to pulling admittedly dangerous 180s on a busy Parisian street, just because the light hit just right and the girl walking his way could’ve been Marinette with extensions (it was not).

He knew the strain of avoiding both his father and his ex-girlfriend was bound to put him in a tight spot eventually, and karma reared its head one fine day when Luka heard the inevitable click of a door opening and found himself face-to-chest with the broad-shouldered Tom Dupain. 

“Luka,” if Tom noticed how he’d turned three shades whiter, he didn’t say anything, “You must be here for Marinette. Marine–”

“NO!” He yelled hastily, before clamping his mouth shut, much to Tom’s bewilderment.

“Uhm, I mean–” Luka held up his hands in surrender, resisting the urge to glance up at the balcony, “This isn’t.. about Marinette.. at all.”

“Then, did you come to buy a croissant?” Tom asked, arms crossed, curiously casting a glance at the several HELP WANTED flyers filling up his bike’s wicker-basket.

“Uh,” He swallowed, uncomfortable with lying to this hulk of a man, “You wouldn’t happen to be hiring?”

It was a deliberate trap. Luka already knew that the Dupain-Cheng’s bakery was a family-owned business, and as a result they almost never outsourced any work, not even for national holidays like Galette’s Day. So it was a pretty safe bet that the next few moves would proceed like this: they’d kindly (they did everything kindly) offer him a rejection, he would graciously accept it, promise to return for a galette in a few weeks, and cycle away, never to show his face here again. 

“Oh no, we’re not–“ Tom looked ready to refuse, but a strange look came over his face, “–actually, hold on, Sabine’s going to be busy for a few weeks and Marinette’s always drowning in schoolwork these days..”

But it seemed like karma wasn’t done with him quite yet.

“Riiight,” Luka leaned back, not liking where this train of thought was going, “I’ll get out of your hair then, sir.”

Tom opened the door wider with one arm, placing the other on Luka’s shoulder before giving him a vaguely threatening smile.

“Why don’t you come in for a bit, son?”

He paled.

...

“That was way too close, Marinette!”

“I know, Tikki.”

“You know no one can find out about you being Ladybug!”

“I know, Tikki.”

“Were you actually going to tell Alya?”

“I don’t know, Tikki.”

“What do you know, Marinette?”

Marinette Dupain-Cheng stopped her pacing to raise an eyebrow at the red and black-spotted bug’s uncharacteristically hostile tone, which she quickly felt guilty for. 

Tikki was just being cautious; losing Master Fu had a visceral effect on all the kwamis; some more intense than others (Wayzz hadn’t come out of the box once), and she could hardly fault her closest companion for being stiff with her when she didn’t exactly tell her what she was planning on doing.

“I’m sorry,” Tikki said first, flying up from her perch on the balcony railing to nuzzle Marinette’s face, “If you think Alya can be trusted with this kind of secret, I won’t stop you.”

“I know it was hard for you to lose Master Fu,” Marinette sighed accepting the apology with a gentle poke between her antennae, “And I’m nowhere ready to being as good of a Guardian he was, but I need you to trust me, okay?”

“I can’t do this alone, and I can’t tell Chat Noir, in case one of us gets akumatised. I can’t be a full-time Guardian and Ladybug, Tikki. We need a new permanent hero, and Alya is my only choice.”

“But didn’t she reveal her secret identity to you a little too quickly?” 

Marinette pursed her lips at that; her kwami had a point. 

Alya had told her she was Rena Rouge not just with excitement and some air of false pride– like she was a veteran in a field that Marinette had only just been exposed to, but also with resignation. Like she’d given up on Ladybug visiting her at all.

“Well I guess.. if she can’t be Rena Rouge anymore, I’ll just have to give her another miraculous!”

“Won’t she be just as likely to rely on you as before, Marinette?”

“Hmm..” Marinette narrowed her eyes. When she and Chat Noir had first gotten their miraculouses, it was without the safety net of being a ‘temporary holder’. They were forced to make their own decisions, learn their own lessons, and keep their own secrets close to their hearts; from friends, even from family. Master Fu had only joined them when it was clear that they’d fallen into their own rhythm of doing things, and once he was sure they weren’t going to quit on him anytime soon.

“You know, Marinette,” Tikki began, catching onto the idea that was already forming in her holder’s mind, “Nobody knows that Ladybug is the new Guardian of the Miracle Box... or that there is a guardian in the first place.”

It was true; thanks to Queen Wasp’s city-wide akumatisation a month ago, no one had been spared to cover the highlights of Master Fu’s sacrifice in HD clarity. It was as close to a blackout as the city’d gotten to since.. its last mind-wiping akuma?

“You’re right Tikki.. but what if she just tries to return the miraculous to me when she’s done with it?”

“You can always fib a little.”

Marinette gasped exaggeratedly, and the kwami rolled her round, blue eyes. 

“I don’t mean lie, Marinette. You can just tell Alya that if and when the Guardian of the Miraculous decides to hand out a new one to a permanent hero, it’s not your business to interfere in the matter.. or to know their identity.”

“You’re a genius, Tikki!” She said with a smile, “That way, Alya can decide wether or not to accept the miraculous on her own terms, but if she chooses to quit, I’ll still be able to get it back from her!”

As Marinette reached into her sling bag to give her kwami a macaron as a reward, she heard a sudden shout come from below her. Before she could reach over to see who was making a fuss at the bakery so early in the day, Tikki flew into her line of sight to give her a strict look.

“But ShadowMoth knows Alya’s identity now. What if he’s tailing her to see if you give her the miraculous again?”

Marinette felt the grimace before it twisted her mouth. Of course. She’d been so focused on keeping the miraculous safe, that she’d forgotten to consider keeping their temporary holders safe too. And for all she knew, ShadowMoth might just be hiding more information he’d stolen from Master Fu and waiting it out to surprise her in some way. She couldn’t take any unnecessary risks.

“You’ll have to find some way to slip it into her bag in your civilian form,” Tikki continued, “But Marinette, are you really, really sure she can be–“

A buzz interrupted the kwami’s heartfelt warning, and she looked down to see her phone flash with a new message from her bff:

@alya.ladyblogger: guess who’s already waiting for u downstairs??

@alya.ladyblogger: (totally not trying to get u to come faster or anything)

@alya.ladyblogger: hint - he’s vv hot and vv into superheroes (like u!!!)

Marinette ignored the twist of dread in her stomach as she headed down to her room to grab the bee miraculous from a black, egg-shaped slot in the miracle box. 

She wasn’t making a mistake.. right?

...

“You couldn’t have picked a better place! This is the best bakery in Paris– my kids adore their croissants!”

Zoé Lee stepped out of the hired cab, letting the doe-eyed look she’d given the driver, slip off her face to reveal a sly smile. 

The best bakery in Paris, huh? Of course, anything less for the newest Bourgeois princess would be ridiculous.. utterly ridiculous, to quote the saying her mother and Chloé often butchered. 

She knelt down, adjusting the laces on her colourful sneakers so they’d conveniently trip her up when the time came, running a finger over the slightly smudged red-and-black letters she’d scribbled onto the left one last minute. 

I ♥ U. 

What a joke.

But self-deprecating enough to tug at the heartstrings of anyone who had a semblance of sympathy– and there were a few people in particular Zoé planned on tugging. Into her own orbit, or out of Chloé’s, she wasn’t really picky. But her plans began with these sneakers and one delightfully oblivious baker girl. 

Marinette Dupain-Cheng. 

Zoé Lee-Bourgeois pushed open the bakery door with a soft chime. Her half-of-a-sister couldn’t even begin to guess what was coming her way.

______________________________________________________________

END NOTES:

Luka: The risk i took was calculated, but man.. am i bad at math.

NEXT CHAPTER ->

[nullsleepy]

An Open(Shut) Secret

Warning to read the tags cuz I should’ve read them in my mind before writing this.

Kinda cried writing this actually

[writer-rider-flirty-thirties]

After their breakup, Luka figured it would be best to give Marinette her space. He's not quite sure when 'space' became 'avoiding'. 6/? of Bre's Tumblr Drabbles and Prompted Fics

[mercedesleeloveletter]

I am making my debut! I don't write graphic violence (that includes during sex scenes), watersports, or lolicon! Other than that, please make requests, and I'll do my best to deliver! I'll shortly be putting out my first fic! (Hint: angsty!Marinette.)

[mintaka14]

Here's the third and final chapter of my Lukanette hanahaki fic. Please check the AO3 tags if you're uncertain - there are a few potential triggers in this fic.

Chrysanthemum White and Blood Red

A Miraculous Ladybug fanfiction

By Mintaka14

Chapter 3

One bright morning changes all things

Soft and easy as your breathing, you wake

[First Light: Hozier]

Marinette heard Luka’s voice in the hospital hallway, thanking one of the staff. She sat up a little straighter, and put aside the sketchbook that had been lying untouched in her lap for the last hour. She’d only had it out because her mother had suggested it rather than from any fit of inspiration anyway.

The pillows propping her up were making it a little awkward, and she shuffled them into place, then tugged down the hospital gown that had got caught up in the process. At least she’d finally managed to navigate a shower earlier, even if it had left her more exhausted than she’d expected, and her hair was clean if not tidy.

She sighed, and gave up the attempt to make herself look more presentable when her hands started shaking with the effort. Luka had seen her looking worse, anyway.

Her mother leaned down to collect a handbag from under the chair next to the bed, and stood up purposefully. She dropped a quick kiss on Marinette’s forehead.

“I think we need to go get a coffee,” she said, and directed a pointed look at Marinette’s father when he started to protest.

“But we just had some,” he rumbled, with a confused glance at the empty mugs on Marinette’s bedside table. “You go, and I’ll stay here to keep Marinette company. I don’t… ah…” he trailed off, his eyes growing wide with dawning enlightenment as Luka came into view and knocked gently on the doorframe. “Yes, yes. Coffee sounds like a very good idea.”

Tom reached out and patted Marinette’s knee, giving her a very unsubtle wink.

“And look, Luka’s here to look after you.”

“Papa,” she sighed, but he just chuckled and got to his feet. Marinette ignored him to beam at Luka as he came further into the private room, and he grinned back at her. “Luka, it’s been forever!”

“We texted less than an hour ago,” he teased gently.

“Yes, but I haven’t seen you since…” Since she’d been admitted to the hospital. She had hazy memories of Luka being there when they wheeled her into emergency, and of clutching his hand and crying with relief as someone in blue scrubs reassured her that she was in good hands, but the psychiatric assessor had restricted Marinette’s visitors to family only until they could make sure her mental state was stable enough that the hanahaki was unlikely to flare up again.

“I’m here now,” he said simply, shifting closer to the bed.

Marinette’s mother gave a tiny cough, and Luka straightened abruptly as if he’d only just realised anyone else was in the room. His cheeks seemed to grow warm under Sabine’s amused gaze.

“Uh, hi, Mme Cheng –“

“Sabine, please, dear,” her mother corrected him. “Tom and I were just on our way to get a cup of coffee. We’ll leave you two to catch up.”

Luka’s face seemed to heat further at Tom’s rumbling chuckle.

Sabine paused as they passed him. “Oh, don’t let me forget, Luka dear. I’ve washed your shirt. I’ll bring it in for you next time you visit Marinette.”

Marinette frowned in surprise at the look that crossed Luka’s face, as if he was going to throw up. Her mother, however, reached out to put a hand on his arm.

“Or I can put it away for you,” Sabine told him gently.

“I’m never going to wear it again,” he said a little shamefacedly, but Sabine gave his arm an understanding squeeze before she let him go.

“What was all that about?” Marinette asked as he drew closer. Her parents had paused in the hallway, just out of earshot, to talk to one of the nurses. Luka glanced over his shoulder at them.

“The shirt I was wearing when we got to the hospital was a bit of a mess, and your ma washed it for me,” he explained, his voice still sounding a little off. “Your dad gave me something to wear instead.”

“And you’re still wearing it?” Marinette teased gently to try and lighten his mood, reaching up to tweak the oversized blue shirt he had on. “Luka, it’s miles too big for you.”

“But I think it suits me,” he teased back, the odd twist of his mouth turning into a wry smile as his gaze came back to her again. “And your dad gave it to me. It’s got better memories than the other one.”

When Luka moved to sit in the chair next to the bed, she tugged on the handful of shirt she was still holding and pulled him onto the bed beside her. He hesitated, then gave in and fitted himself into the narrow space, settling back against the pillows.

“You’re looking a lot better today,” he said.

“I could hardly look worse. At least I’m not out of it on painkillers and antibiotics anymore.” Marinette held up her hands to demonstrate that the cannulas were gone, although there were still obvious marks where they’d been under the rainbow of bruises. She let herself lean against his shoulder with a tiny sigh that was half release and half frustration.

“It feels like I’ve been in here forever.”

Luka looked like he agreed with her, but all he said was, “How much longer are they going to keep you here?”

“The pulmonologist wanted to run some more tests, and make sure the swabs come back clear, but she thinks I should be ready to go home in a day or two. It's still going to be another few months before I get my energy back, and I'll always have to be a bit careful of my lungs. They're referring me to a psychologist, too, to help me work through stuff so the hanahaki doesn't come back. But I'm just looking forward to going home.”

A week ago, she’d just been grateful to be there, and to know that the medical staff were taking care of her. Now, she was starting to feel worn down by the noise and light, and being woken up by the constant blood pressure tests and temperature checks every time she managed to fall asleep. And the stream of surgeons and specialists and psychiatrists who all asked the same questions about the hanahaki and her symptoms again and again.

“How are you feeling now?”

How did she feel? That was the question that she’d been trying to answer since the first signs of hanahaki had bloomed in her lungs. It felt like a complicated question.

“Tired, but getting better. I managed to get to the bathroom on my own this morning,” Marinette told him a little wryly, and Luka gave a soft chuckle. “I’m still feeling too wiped out to do much, or concentrate on anything, but at least they’re letting me have visiting hours now, and it’s been nice to get to see people.” Marinette glanced up at Luka, and then dropped her gaze as she felt a blush creep up her cheeks. The one she was happiest to see was him. She hurried on, “Mylène and Ivan came earlier to see how I was doing, and Alix. And Kagami.”

There had been no word from Adrien, but then she wouldn’t have expected any. The thought of Adrien drew her eyes to the untouched stack of fashion magazines that Alya had left for her that morning, and the teddy bear clutching a Get Well Soon! balloon. No one had brought flowers for her.

“Looks like Alya’s been in to visit, too,” Luka said, his gaze following hers.

“She’s still trying to make it up to me that she didn’t believe me when I said I was over Adrien.”

Alya had been trying so hard, but a contrite Alya was almost more exhausting than Alya in full flight, and Marinette had found it hard to walk the line between tact and honesty. She hadn’t realised just how much of their conversation had revolved around  either Alya’s plans to catch Ladybug on camera, or Marinette’s love life, until Alya had exhausted her speculations on why Ladybug had been missing from the last akuma fight (Tikki was still adamantly refusing to even consider the question of a replacement Ladybug while Marinette was recovering) and moved on to trying to awkwardly tease Marinette about asking Luka on a real date. A prickle in her lungs had scared Marinette into a bluntness that had left Alya rearing back with a hurt look, until Sabine had intervened and kindly but firmly suggested that this was a conversation that could wait until Marinette was recovered.

“Maybe I was a little bit too honest with her,” Marinette admitted, and Luka shifted his position.

“She’ll cope,” he said flatly.

“I just hate feeling as if I’m under some kind of truth spell and I can’t hide anything,” Marinette said a little grumpily.

Luka laughed sympathetically, but he reached up to tap one finger gently on her forehead. “I’m betting there are still more than a few secrets lurking up there.”

He had no idea how right he was. Marinette couldn’t help the quick, flickering look she threw in the direction of her handbag and the kwami who was lurking patiently inside it.

Her parents probably felt the same way, judging by the careful questions they’d been asking her since she’d come out of the medical fog.

Marinette glanced at the doorway, and the quiet conversation still going on between her parents and the nurse. Sabine had half-turned to watch Marinette, an anxious little crease in her forehead, but she gave her a sheepish little wave and turned away when she met her daughter’s eyes.

“It’s going to be a while before Maman really trusts me again,” Marinette said guiltily. “And I get it, I spent three weeks hiding just how sick I was from them, until they got the call that I was being taken to hospital. Maman apologised for not realising how serious it was. Everyone’s acting so guilty, and treating me like they think I’ll break.”

“We nearly lost you. It’s going to be a while before any of us get over what happened.”

“I know, I know, but… Everyone’s been apologising.” She pulled a face.

“You don’t think they have anything to apologise for?” Luka asked.

And Marinette weighed her answer. She’d been doing that a lot more since she’d woken up after her collapse.

“Honestly? I’m mostly angry at myself.”

She saw Luka check his first, instinctive response, and was grateful that he didn’t rush to reassure her. Instead, he tipped his head to give her a thoughtful look, and asked, “Why?”

“Because maybe I would have figured it out sooner if I hadn’t been such a coward about speaking to Adrien when Alya tried to get me to talk to him.”

But Luka frowned at that. “Seriously? Marinette, you’re one of the bravest people I know, and the most decisive.”

“All I had to do was say ‘Adrien, I like you’ ...”

“When you weren’t sure about your own feelings, and he was dating Kagami?” Luka said with a trace of harshness that was unusual in him. “Maybe you would have figured out how you really felt sooner if we hadn’t all been shoving you at Adrien all the time.”

“You never shoved me at Adrien,” Marinette protested, and he raised an eyebrow at her.

“I pushed you to go tell him how you felt when we went ice skating,” he pointed out. “And I was the one who invited Adrien to the rehearsal, without even asking you about it first.”

“You were just trying to help. And if you hadn’t invited him to the rehearsal, then I might never have got rid of the hanahaki.”

A shadow passed across Luka’s face at that.

“And now I have everyone telling me to just be honest about how I feel,” Marinette went on. “Like it’s that easy.”

“Isn’t it?”

“Maybe for you,” she muttered. She sometimes felt a little envious of how easy Luka seemed to find it to just say what he felt, no matter how often he claimed that he wasn’t good with words. “It’d help if I wasn’t feeling a million entirely contradictory things all at the same time. How do I tell the truth about what I feel when I don’t even know myself?”

The smile he gave her was sympathetic and oddly wistful. “You’ll figure it out.”

“I’m not so sure about that. You know what I’m like – my head’s always all over the place and I flake out all the time. No wonder Alya gets so frustrated with me sometimes.”

“You don’t hesitate when you feel it’s right,” Luka told her a little more forcefully, “and that’s what we should have remembered. Remember the first time we met?”

“Are you kidding? I was such a mess. I could barely string two words together. That’s not exactly an argument for me being decisive and clear-thinking.”

The look he gave her was amused, but he shook his head. “I remember a girl who worked out in a split second how to get us out of those chains, and climbed out the window of a boat, no less, to go get help, and then came back because we were all in danger when Ma got akumatised. I remember a girl who was sweet and funny before I even knew just how amazing she could be.”

“Luka…” she whined softly.

“And you didn’t hesitate to take on Chloe Bourgeois when she bullied Juleka. You talked the school photographer into redoing the whole shoot because Jules had been left out and it wasn’t fair.”

“Anyone would have done that.”

“Anyone didn’t. You did.”

Marinette pressed her hands to the heat climbing her cheeks.

“The problem was,” Luka went on thoughtfully, “you didn’t know what you really felt, and none of us were letting you just talk it through until you figured it out. If you’d really felt sure of your feelings for Adrien, you would have got there in your own time. That’s what we should have remembered, instead of pushing you into something you weren’t ready for. You’re fine with being honest about how you feel, and acting on it, as long as know what that is.”

“That’s what really scares me,” Marinette admitted. “I’d be a lot less worried about the hanahaki coming back if my mind wasn’t such a mess and I knew what I actually felt from one second to the next.”

She fell silent, thinking of the look in Adrien’s eyes in that split second when she’d confessed to him, and the pressure of Chat’s hands on hers before he’d let her go. And the way Alya had reared back from Marinette with a hurt look on her face before she’d covered it up with a wobbly smile.

“And whatever I do or say, it feels like I’m hurting someone, no matter how hard I try not to.” She glanced up at him, and chewed her lip for a moment before adding, “I know I hurt you, and the last thing I ever want to do is hurt you again, Luka.”

“You can tell me anything, Marinette. There’s nothing you can say to me that would hurt more than feeling like you can’t talk to me about something,” Luka said quietly. “I’m here for you, and I’ll always be your friend, no matter what.”

His hand clenched where it was resting on his thigh, and he deliberately relaxed it. It looked like he was bracing himself for something, and Marinette frowned, trying to work out what was wrong.

It slowly dawned on her that for all Luka was so sure of how he felt about her, he might think she was still uncertain about him, and she stared at him in astonishment.

No one had really talked to her about what had happened when she’d collapsed, and her own memories were a pain-soaked blur at best, but she knew she must have said something to release the hanahaki’s hold on her. She’d expelled the last withered wisps of her tangled feelings, and the chrysanthemum roots had given up their hold on her lungs before she’d even reached the hospital, and she was pretty sure she knew what she must have said to make that happen.

But of course Luka wasn’t going to take her feelings for granted on the evidence of a handful of flowers and a few words that she couldn’t even remember speaking.

She touched her palm to her chest, feeling the clear rise and fall of her breath, and his eyes followed the movement.

“Are you feeling okay?” he asked quickly. He glanced away from her to the nurses bustling past in the hallway, and started to shift his weight on the bed beside her as if he was going to get to his feet. “Should I get –?”

She cut him off with a shake of her head. And maybe he was right about how she didn’t hold back when she knew her own mind, because she felt no hesitation when she lifted her hand and drew him down to press a quick kiss to his mouth, giggling a little at the dumbfounded look on his face.

Her giggle faded into a soft smile as he kept staring at her with wide eyes.

“Are you sure?” he almost whispered, and her smile grew bigger.

“I’ve never been more sure of anything,” she told him, and put a hand to her chest again. “This time I’m fully conscious, and there aren’t any more flowers, remember? I love you, Luka Couffaine.” She sank back into the pillows. “Just thought you should know–“

Luka cut her off with a sudden kiss of his own.

Marinette squeaked in surprise, and he drew back in alarm.

“Marinette? Did I hurt –“

Before he could finish, she flung her arms around him and tugged him down into the pillows. Luka didn’t resist. He kissed her again, leaving her breathless in ways that had nothing to do with flowers or scarred lungs, and Marinette responded with a fervour that drew a sound from Luka that was half groan, half awe. That she could make him sound like that… The hospital walls and beeping machines and the constant noise and footsteps in the corridor outside all faded away into the feel and taste and thrill of kissing Luka…

The sound of Tom’s rumbling voice coming back down the hall broke them apart eventually, and Luka sat up hastily. He dragged a hand through his rumpled hair, and Marinette suppressed a giggle. By the time her parents came into the room they were both sitting upright on the bed, an innocent handspan of space between them, but Marinette could feel Luka stealing glances her way.

Sabine smiled serenely at them, but her smile faded into a frown as she took in her daughter’s flushed face and uneven breathing.

“Marinette, sweetheart, you’re sounding a bit wheezy again,” Sabine said in concern.  “Are you feeling alright?”

Marinette’s hand found Luka’s in the mess of blankets, out of sight of her parents. Her eyes met his.

“I’ve never felt better,” Marinette said, and felt her smile bloom bright and clear.

[airi-p4]

Guarded and protected - Chapter 2

-----------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 1 | Ch 2 | Ch 3 | Ch 4 | Ch 5 | Ch 6 | Epilogue

-----------------------------------------------------------

Summary:

Marinette forces Luka to become the new Guardian of the Miraculous after confessing her mutual feelings to him. Seeing her healthier with her memories erased, Luka decides to keep his distance so she doesn't get involved with the Miraculous again.

Tw: Amnesia, Angst with a happy Ending

AO3

_____________________________

Chapter 2: Before and after

Earlier that day, before the event that changed everything, Marinette had come to see him, agitated and troubled. After he helped her cool down a bit, she started talking; it was then when she told him about her secret identity, which he already knew. She had also told him how she had taken care of the Black Cat Miraculous and designated a new wielder for it. Luka didn't question it; he completely trusted her judgment. 

And then, she told him he would be a great Guardian and the best partner she could ever wish for. 

He imagined she meant it as a shared Guardianship—but her last words proved him wrong.

Before she renounced Guardianship, she  confessed that she had never stopped loving him—and everybody (except her, maybe) knew he hadn't either.

Probably—no, most likely— the reason it took him so much to realize what was actually happening was because he had lost himself in the contact of her lips on his. 

She kissed him. And he kissed her back, as he had longed to for so long…

He had no idea that joy would be so brief (yet unforgettable and everlasting in his memories).

A low and soft "I love you," exchange followed. A shy smile, and a bittersweet look projected in her eyes the next moment, when she finished saying the Guardianship renouncing words she had once learned from the previous Guardian and her mentor.

He hadn't known. He had no way to know. He couldn't have anticipated it. Not until Tikki told—yelled—at him.

Her memories were gone…

What about her feelings…? 

His heart dropped with her simple question: "Who are you?"

It hurt. A lot. 

Like the worst of his nightmares. 

Worse than those he had already been suffering lately—with failed or possible gone wrongs and heart-wrecking second chances crystal clear in his mind, restlessly tormenting him in his sleep, making him wake up agitated and dizzy and covered in shivering cold sweat almost daily. 

At least the bad dreams ended when he woke up—unlike what was going on now: cruel reality.

If he had known about her memory loss… would he have accepted the magical box? 

Probably not, but he wasn't sure. 

Because, looking at her, there, in front of him, the bags on her eyes gone, as well as with the gloomy air that had surrounded her for years and just until a minute ago, added to how she wasn't tense or anxious either anymore…

She looked healthier and, despite his pain, he couldn't not be happy for her.