#that line of not requited romantic love but still having been their closest confidant and it meaning something

[yuripira4e]

I think I’m funny

[angelofthequeers]

Hold Me By Both Hands: Chapter 21

Disclaimer: I don’t own ML.

Chapter 20 | Chapter 22 | AO3 link

At this point, Marinette could pick out the sound of Chat Noir landing on her balcony from the other side of a tornado, so she’s already poking her head out of the hatch before he’s even got a chance to knock.

“Are you really that keen for my ameowzing purresence?” Chat Noir grins. Marinette scolds him with a stern look for his pun before popping back down into her room so that Chat Noir can slip through to join her.

“Next time you make a horrible pun, I’m locking my door,” she says when she’s flopped on her chaise and Chat Noir’s dropping off her bed.

“Ah, but that will never happen,” Chat Noir says. “You see, princess, my puns are literary gold. I’ll never make a horrible one.”

“Some of us would beg to differ,” Marinette mumbles.

“Why are you so meeeean? If I wanted snarky insults, I’d go and see Ladybug.”

Ha. If only he knew. “I’m not the one who begged for scraps on a teenage girl’s balcony,” Marinette says. Chat Noir maturely pokes his tongue out and throws himself on the chaise next to her, and the warmth radiating from his dark leather suit is enough to set off a swarm of ladybugs in Marinette’s stomach. Whyyyyy?

“Marinette?” Black-gloved fingers snap in front of her face, jolting her out of her haze. “Everything okay up there?”

“Y-Yeah. Fine I am!”

Chat Noir’s cheeks pinken as he seems to realise that he’s essentially cuddling into her. “Sorry! Must be awkward – I know you’re still sorting yourself out –”

“Oh, don’t be such a martyr,” Marinette says and pulls him back down into her side so that she can run her fingers through his hair and turn him into purring putty. “Just because I’m not ready for a relationship doesn’t mean that I don’t want my kitty cuddles.”

“You’ve been blabbing to Ladybug,” Chat Noir says, letting out a particularly loud purr when Marinette scratches behind his fake ears. “I thought I could trust you, princess. Now she knows my weaknesses!”

“Tragic,” Marinette deadpans. After twirling a lock of golden hair around her finger, she says, “So…how’s that girl you saved today?”

“I didn’t know you cared about akuma victims,” Chat Noir says, then winces. “Not that I don’t think you care – stop melting my brain!”

Marinette snorts. “No, I get what you mean. I just…feel partly responsible for this one. If I hadn’t panicked and judged wrongly –”

“I’m sure Kagami understands,” Chat Noir says. Ah, Kagami. That’s her name. “Adrien would’ve talked to her, right? He would’ve made sure she understood that you didn’t mean to throw the decision.”

“I still could’ve abstained,” Marinette says.

“Yeah, and then it could’ve taken another two hours,” Chat Noir says. “From what I hear, Adrien and Kagami were pretty evenly matched when it comes to fencing. And I’m sure Kagami would’ve eventually come to terms with your decision without getting turned into Riposte if she was literally anywhere but Paris. It’s on Hawkmoth, not you, Marinette.”

Marinette smiles and snuggles further against Chat Noir, relishing how she’s not only allowed to cuddle with her crush, but she also knows that her crush is requited and that things will only change when she’s ready. It’s such a far cry from crushing afar and panicking over so much as seeing him on TV. “Thanks, kitty. You always know what to say.”

“Of course I do,” Chat Noir says, preening and purring when Marinette’s fingers slip under his chin and her fingernails rake across his skin. “I’m just –”

“Chat, no.”

“– purrmazing like that.”

“No. Bad kitty.” Marinette jabs his chest. “You can’t change puns up like that.”

“So, I can pun?’

Marinette purses her lips. “I’ll allow it, to spare Ladybug from having to endure them all.”

“Yes!”

.

“Are you sure about this?” Kagami Tsurugi whispers as Adrien ducks behind a wall and drags her with him. “Won’t we get in trouble?”

“It’s not our fault that Mr D’Argencourt was sick and didn’t think to tell us before class,” Adrien says. “So long as we’re back at Françoise Dupont by the time fencing class usually ends, no one will know.”

“Your bodyguard will,” Kagami says. She peeks around the corner, then darts back after a moment. “He’s been following us since we snuck out.”

“We’re not really trying to escape him,” Adrien says. “He’s just playing along. So long as he knows where I am and he can keep an eye on me, he lets me get away with a lot.”

“But…why? He must not be a very efficient bodyguard.”

“Because he’d get in trouble every time I snuck away if he didn’t,” Adrien says. “And…I think he knows this is the only freedom I get. He’s always been on my side.”

“Oh,” Kagami says softly. “That must be nice.”

Adrien frowns at her. “You don’t have a bodyguard? What about your driver?”

“We don’t have a driver. Our car is self-driving and responds to Mother’s voice, since she can’t drive herself.”

“Huh.” Adrien takes a moment to thank the heavens for Gorilla. God knows what he’d do if he was stuck with a self-driving car that wouldn’t be programmed with a shred of compassion. “Come on! While he’s not looking!”

Kagami lets out a giggle as Adrien grabs her hand and bolts down the street, weaving between the bustling Parisians who are thankfully so wrapped up in their own lives that they don’t notice who he is. Wow. Is that the first time Kagami’s laughed? It’s so…weird being able to empathise with someone, to actually know what it’s like to be in their situation rather than just sympathising from afar. And she’s so…radiant when she laughs like that, just like when Marinette laughs.

“We should go and see Marinette!” Adrien says when they skid to a halt against the front of a bakery, panting. “You said you wanted to get to know her, right?”

“Are you sure she’ll be okay with us just stopping in?” Kagami says. “Shouldn’t we call her first?”

“It’ll be a surprise!” The image of Marinette’s beaming face swims before Adrien’s eyes, tying his stomach in knots, and he desperately tries to push that picture away before his face starts flaming and Kagami realises that he’s hopelessly crushing on one of his best friends. Too late; Kagami’s narrowed her eyes at him before he’s able to banish the thought of Marinette.

“You like her,” Kagami says.

“Of course!” Adrien tries to sound more confident than he really is. “I love – she’s a girl – I mean, she’s one of my closest friends!”

Kagami rolls her eyes. “Don’t insult my intelligence, Adrien. You have romantic feelings for Marinette. Otherwise, your face wouldn’t be as red as my family car.”

Adrien groans and lets his shoulders slump. “Doesn’t matter. She doesn’t want to be with me.”

“So, you’re just going to pine from afar and never tell her?” Kagami says.

“Trust me, she’s said to my face that she wants to focus on being friends first. Especially after someone outed her crush to me in front of her.”

Kagami winces. “Ouch. My sympathies. Why don’t you try and move on, then?”

“Because…” How does Adrien explain this mess of a situation without incriminating himself as Chat Noir or making up a lie that could get back to her? “Part of me doesn’t want to. I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Adrien –”

“Kagami.”

Kagami sighs. “Fine. I’ll drop it. I just think –”

“Oh my god!” someone shrieks. “It’s Adrien Agreste!”

“Shit, gotta go!” Adrien grabs Kagami’s wrist and takes off once more.

“Is life always this interesting for you?” Kagami says as they round the corner and nearly collide with a middle-aged man. They shout apologies back at him over their shoulders.

“Interesting? This is just a normal day!” Adrien says. “At least you’ve only got the crushing weight of parental expectations without getting mobbed on the streets!”

“That’s…true. Is it that obvious that my mother’s like that?”

“Considering your speech to me before you were akumatised? Kinda, yeah.”

Turning another corner takes them to the Pont des Arts bridge. Great. How the hell are they supposed to hide in such an open space? Still, Adrien and Kagami leap down to the concrete bank of the Seine, with only a few people on that level, and duck under the bridge, and Adrien sends up a feverish prayer that their pursuers don’t think to look down here.

“Where’d he go?” someone cries from above them.

“Come back, Adrien! Have my babies!”

“Maybe he went down there!”

Adrien’s heart leaps into his dry mouth. But just before he can suggest to Kagami that they keep running or even just jump into the Seine –

“It’s him! It’s Adrien!” The speaker is one of the people down at the edge of the Seine, who’s looking right at Adrien and Kagami as he speaks. Adrien’s about to start planning a slow, painful demise for this arse, but the guy looks up over his shoulder and adds, “He just doubled back!”

“Oh my god!”

“Quick, before we lose him!”

The adrenaline still coursing through Adrien’s body as the sounds of his pursuers grow fainter is probably the only thing keeping him upright at this point. Next to him, Kagami looks far less stressed than he feels; although to be fair, she hadn’t been the target of those people.

“Thank you,” Kagami says to the boy when Adrien says nothing.

“Y-Yeah. Thanks,” Adrien adds shakily. “I know I should be used to it, but it’s still terrifying.”

The boy snickers behind his hand. Adrien idly notes that his nails are painted deep black and his dark hair is dip-dyed teal and that Gabriel would have an aneurysm if Adrien ever painted his nails and dyed his hair like that. He’s the antithesis of everything that Gabriel holds dear. Dear lord, this boy is just perfect.

“I could feel your fear before you even jumped down here,” the boy says. “And you shouldn’t have to be used to it. Chasing anyone through the city and shouting for them to have babies with you is way over the line.”

“Thank god someone else thinks that,” Adrien mutters. “Uh…I’m Adrien Agreste. Not that you don’t know that – great, now I sound up myself –”

The boy snorts. His teal eyes, alight with amusement, draw Adrien in like a magnet, scrambling his brain and leaving his mind momentarily blank. “That’s okay. You’re just socially awkward.” He strums a note on his guitar, something both off and yet perfect, something that punches Adrien in the chest and leaves him momentarily fumbling for breath.

“H-How did you do that?” Adrien finally forces out when he’s able to speak. The boy smiles.

“I can hear people’s heart songs,” he says. “Yours sounds delightfully perfect but if you stop to listen to it, there are little flaws.” The boy strums a few more notes that are both the same and yet so different to what he’d played before, in a way that Adrien can’t even begin to articulate. “Small imperfections. Ones that you wouldn’t see on the surface.”

“Holy –”

“That, and Juleka also talks a lot about her classmates to me,” the boy says with a small smirk. Adrien blinks.

“Juleka? You know Juleka?”

“Of course I do. She’s my little sister.” The boy holds out a hand. “Luka Couffaine. Glad our first meeting could be so memorable.”

“I didn’t know Juleka had a brother,” is all Adrien can say. Luka’s hand is warm as he shakes it, warm and tingly, and it’s like the sun has gone behind a cloud when Adrien finally has to let go.

“I’m not surprised,” Luka says. “She’s pretty quiet until you push a guitar into her hands. And you are?”

Kagami immediately straightens and bows slightly. “Kagami Tsurugi,” she says, shaking his hand. “I’m a friend of Adrien’s, though I don’t attend Françoise Dupont.”

“We have fencing classes together,” Adrien says. “Which is where we technically should be but hey, it’s not our fault our teacher didn’t tell us he was sick.”

“I’m never sneaking out with you again,” Kagami says. “The last thing I need is for your fans to think that I’m your girlfriend. They’d tear me to shreds.”

Adrien winces. “Sorry, by the way. I didn’t think about that when I was rushing to be a rebellious teenager.”

“I don’t see why you should apologise,” Kagami says. “You didn’t ask for your fans to behave like that. But we should probably start making our way back so we’re not late.”

“Thanks again for saving our butts,” Adrien says to Luka.

“My pleasure. Any friend of Juleka’s is a friend of mine.”

Warmth pools in Adrien’s gut. “Friends? Really?”

“Of course, if you want,” Luka smiles. “And I promise I’ll never ask you to have my babies.”

Kagami makes a strange sound between a choked snort and a strangled laugh. Adrien flips her off with a sunny smile.

“I appreciate that,” he says, pulling out his phone so he can exchange numbers with Luka. “I’m too young to be a father.”

“Glad to see that you’re so responsible about it,” Luka says as he punches his number into Adrien’s phone. Adrien does the same with Luka’s phone and although he’s tempted to add Kagami’s number too, there’s no point in risking the wrath of Tomoe Tsurugi; it had been enough of a battle to get himself added to Kagami’s phone, and Tomoe wholeheartedly approves of him. “Your future wife will be lucky to have you.”

“Or husband,” Adrien blurts out. Why did he say that? It’s not like he’s ever really shown an interest in boys before, and he’s in love with Marinette…but the way Luka isn’t even fazed by that and instead just smiles is making Adrien question a lot of things about himself right now.

“Or husband,” Luka agrees. “But you won’t have either if you don’t get back in time.”

“He’s right.” Kagami grabs Adrien’s hand. “Come on, Adrien!”

“Thank you!” Adrien calls over his shoulder as Kagami tugs him towards the stone stairs leading back up to the street. Luka just waves back, still smiling, for a moment even brighter than the sun in the sky behind him.

Well, shit.