Chapter Text
Her favorite color is pink.
Her favorite color is pink.
There’s a skip to Adrien’s step as he vaults across chimneys on his way home from the night’s akuma battles. Dieu, he feels like such an idiot for it, but knowing something as simple as Ladybug’s favorite color has sent a rush of giddiness through every fiber of his being, pulling him up, up, up until he’s practically sitting among the stars, buoyed by elation.
“Pink’s my favorite, but even I can’t approve of this much of it.”
She’s been ribbing on Hawkmoth’s questionable akuma fashions a lot recently, come to think of it, which is nice given how stressed she’s been otherwise, but never before has Chat walked away with such precious information in his palms. And now he can’t stop smiling, because Ladybug has a favorite color and it’s pink and he knows it and she told him and—
And she would almost certainly make fun of him for weeks if she found out the way he’s reacting to such a small, really near meaningless piece of information, but that would almost make it better because Ladybug gets this look in her eyes when the two of them get to bantering, this dazzling sort of magnetism that dares him to respond, pulls him in further and sends his heart pounding and his stomach on a rollercoaster course of flips, and it’s without a doubt one of his favorite looks on her (not that that’s a short list, but still).
She’s incredible. And her favorite color, he now knows, is pink.
“Pink!” he shouts into the night, laughing with glee as he feels the brisk autumn air rush into his lungs and surround him on another running leap, as free and unrestrained as a bird in the sky. It takes him a beat to realize that Chat Noir, superhero of Paris, should not be screaming at the top of his lungs in the middle of the night, just as everyone in the city is trying to go back to sleep, but by then it’s too late and he’s too happy to properly care.
Of course, the holidays are coming up. They agreed that they couldn’t share their birthdays, so New Year’s seemed as good a day as any to trade the birthday gifts they’d want to if theirs was a normal friendship, but that means that he has to find something soon if he wants to work this new discovery into his gift for her. Rational thinking would remind him that he’s got a small treasure troves of presents for Ladybug stored away in the back of his closet, but being in love with one’s best friend without knowing so much as their name (or, until now, their favorite color) was not quite a rational situation either.
It could be, though. Some time down the line, when all the miraculous are in good hands once again, they could learn to be normal together. Go grocery shopping together. Pick out an apartment and decorate it just for themselves. Go on dinner dates and skip others in favor of endless hours curled up together at home, hands locked together without the suits in between. They could know everything that the other loved and fill their home with all of it, bursting from all of the nooks and crannies.
For now, though, he just has pink. But pink is Ladybug’s favorite color, and what a magical thing to know that is.
~
He feels his heart pounding a rapid percussion, rising crescendo with the edges of her lips. His hands are too sweaty. His shoes are suddenly too tight, pinching at the toes, and the shirt clashes awfully with them come to think of it, and he would spend more time hating himself but all of a sudden she's kissing him, and so he must be bearable enough after all.
Ladybug’s hands are still gloved, lovely little unbearable polka dots, but the shape of them, the gentle curves and divots, shows through anyhow. A few of her nails are the smallest bit shorter than the others in an odd, uneven pattern, like she bites her fingernails when she's worried. She bites her fingernails when she's worried. It’s a silly thing to be excited about, but every new thing Adrien learns about Ladybug, that she shares with him so willingly for some reason, tints his world achingly pink.
~
Adrien felt his lips smile against Ladybug’s as she went back in for another kiss. Her lip balm was strawberry-flavored. She liked to run her hands through his hair, tug on it just a little. She'd let out a laugh, free and disbelieving and almost a bit breathless, when he pressed his lips along her jawline and into the soft curve of her ear. He hadn't known any of these things before, had barely even let himself wonder, but Ladybug had handed the knowledge out openly, with enthusiasm. And all from another one of his father's stupid galas, as impossible as it might've been.
“Trying to get away?” she'd asked Adrien sympathetically earlier that night, walking up to him like an old friend as he was standing somewhere in the corner taking his careful time munching on a small cake. He smiled at her then—even unintentionally, she knew him inside and out of the mask it seemed.
“Promise not to tell?” He felt embarrassed talking to her like this, because too much familiarity really was a risk and altogether quite foolhardy of him, so best to keep his mouth shut, lock and key. But it was impossible to be a stranger to her.
“Bug’s honor.” Ladybug was holding her pinky out to him now, smiling playfully, and of course he took it. Adrien was positive he couldn't have done anything else. “Your secret’s safe with me.” Dieu, she was cute.