Chapter Text
She didn’t immediately scream, so that was something.
What Marinette also didn’t do at the oh-so-familiar sensation of lips brushing her neck was jump off the roof. Which was probably smart, considering the wide-eyed kwami hovering before her was in no place to stop her from becoming a smear on the pavement if she took a three story nosedive.
Tikki’s gaze darted over Marinette’s shoulder, taking in the sight Marinette herself was too petrified to brave, and the expression that came over the creature’s face was one of abject victory. She grinned (actually grinned!), holding in snickers as she dipped tiredly back into her designated pocket for the night, but Marinette was far too focused on the two arguing figures behind her back to pay heed to the conniving kwami.
Well, that, and having a full-fledged mental breakdown.
“I’m hungry,” came a snide, somewhat nasally voice.
“Christ, are you— not now, Plagg!”
“You know the deal. One wedge of cheese per transformation or I’ll die.”
“Ladybug’s kwami isn’t eating, and they aren’t dead.”
“Well I’m not Ladybug’s kwami, now, am I?”
“I’m in the middle of something,” Chat hissed, his voice sounding… softer somehow? More tempered without his transformation.
Familiar, despite the fact it was no longer distorted by the noise of the club around them.
“Fine,” the second speaker (Plagg?) replied. “But I expect to be fed once you’re done making googly eyes at your girlfriend.” He nearly retched the last word, as if it were some filthy thing, and Marinette felt her pocket vibrate with a telltale Tikki titter.
She idly wondered when the two kwamis last spent any quality time together.
She idly wondered if delivering a swift kick to Chat’s kneecaps and vaulting down the nearest fire escape was a viable option.
She turned instead.
“Oh, you’re kidding me!”
Chat Noir stood in patient wait with the same blonde hair, same glittering green eyes, and same giddy (shit-eating) grin from before. He waved the same hands that had wrapped around her waist, quirked the same lips that had brought her blood to a boil, and shifted the same body that—
“You’re… you’re kidding me,” Marinette repeated in a slightly softer tone, unwilling to continue that particular line of thought for fear of blushing over Chat Noir of all people.
Chat tweaked an eyebrow behind the mask that so often made a home upon her face, spreading his arms and inviting her to examine him with an unspoken ‘ta-da!’. “Nope!” he said, as if this entire situation were the most ordinary occurrence in the world. “No kitten around here!”
Though she’d usually have some sort of whip-smart reaction to his oh-so-clever quip, Marinette found she could only stare.
(A part of her felt a flutter of pride that Chat would choose to dress up like her. What a devoted crime-fighting partner she had on her hands!
Another, much larger part of her was currently experiencing a full-blown crisis over how very ~devoted~ of a dance partner he made. When she was on his hands, as it were.)
Not knowing how to fill the silence, Marinette let slip a giggle. Then a chuckle. Then a full-out bout of hysterical laughter. Chest-shaking, lung-depleting, body-wracking laughter.
She laughed because it was either that… or melt into a puddle of primordial goo in her size seven booties.
Fuck. This was really happening.
“You’re disappointed.”
Chat’s voice was soft, less jovial and definitely less confident as he drew her eyes to his. He looked hurt, obviously having taken her frantic laughter as a sign of rejection, and Marinette felt her titters instantly die in her throat.
“No! No, no, no, no!” she rushed to clarify, hands flying out to flutter nervously before her. “I’m not disappointed! I’m just…”
‘Trying to cope with the fact I more or less jumped CHAT NOIR in the middle of some club?’
‘Trying to cope with the fact I was prepared to drag him home with me?’
…
‘Trying to cope with the fact I might still be?'
A breath.
“I’m not disappointed,” Marinette said delicately, noting the way Chat’s shoulders seemed to ease just a bit at the reassurance. “Why would I be?”
He shrugged. “Maybe because the guy you—”
Neither of them had the words to fill the blank, but the meaning was mutually understood. Despite herself, Marinette managed to work up a flush at the unspoken insinuation.
“—ended up being the partner you have absolutely no interest in?” Chat ended vaguely, toe scuffing the roof.
“Says who?”
Her interjection met with a dry tilt of his head; a silent “Do I really have to say it?”.
‘Oh, right,’ Marinette thought, teeth sinking into her bottom lip as she recalled the last six or so years of side-stepping Chat’s every advance. ‘That was definitely me who said that.’
In her time since graduation, Marinette had often played the what-if game with herself.
What if she didn’t back down from her partner’s flirts? What if she’d just let her silly (and by the time her senior year had rolled around, exhausting) crush on Adrien Agreste go? What if she at least tried to be something with Chat Noir?
What if?
(It wasn’t exactly a fun game, but hell if it didn’t keep her brain occupied.)
And now there was a whole new element to that game. A whole new player, even.
Because standing before her was the man behind the mask. The man she’d picked out of the crowd. The man she’d been both silly and sultry with as they moved on the dance floor. The man who’d been so careful and considerate, even in the face of her… well… less-than-sophisticated conduct.
He was the same.
Her partner was the same gallant, geeky, and undeniably genuine person no matter the disguise, and he’d still treated her like a lady while having no clue of her identity. That trademark “Chat Noir Posturing” wasn’t posturing at all. All the gentlemanly airs and the grand declarations Chat had sprung on her over the years weren’t simply idle flirtations, they were his sincere behaviors.
And suddenly Marinette couldn’t help but feel like she’d missed out on something really special.
Her head swam, just as her gut sank.
“Listen,” Chat began, drawing her from her revelation with the falsely casual interjection. His face was strung with a playful smile, one that didn’t quite reach his eyes, and his aloof posture was a tad too stiff to be real. “Whatever happened tonight, it doesn’t mean I think you owe me or anything. Not an explanation or a second chance. I don’t expect you to… uh… follow through with whatever we may or may not have started on the dance floor.”
The wistful shrug he gave nearly made her throat close up.
“I had fun, but I understand if you—“
“I’m glad it was you!” Marinette blurted, unable to stomach his melancholy a second more.
Chat blinked in surprise, the first hint of a real smile blooming across his face. He took a step towards her. “You are?”
“Well, yeah,” she said, blaming the way her heart jumped on the sudden reappearance of music from the club beneath their feet. (A logical explanation.) “I’m almost relieved, really. I don’t exactly make a habit of letting complete strangers…”
Again, there was no magical buzzword to describe the events of earlier, so Marinette’s hand flitted up to gesture meekly at her neck, hoping that would be clarification enough. Mercifully, Chat let her pass.
“What I’m trying to say is,” she continued, capturing his eyes from where they had glued themselves to her collarbone, “if I’m going to let anyone get all up in my personal space, I’d rather it be one of my best friends than some creepy stranger.”
The grin Chat gave was nothing if not glib, looking strangely at home on the masked civilian before her.
“You didn’t know I was me, though,” he pointed out wryly. “So technically you did just let a creepy stranger get all up in your personal space.”
Marinette scoffed, waving a hand. “Nonsense, you were a perfect gentleman.”
“Yeah?” he asked hopefully.
“Maybe a bit inexperienced with the dancing—" She winked to show she was just teasing. "—but nothing a little practice won’t fix.”
“Why, Bugaboo!” Chat gasped, hand pressed to his sternum in mock-shock. “Was that an offer to be my teacher? Because I heartily accept.”
He slid up beside her, white grin glinting in the street lights, and Marinette struggled to recall if he was always this tall and broad-shouldered. Surely the suit couldn’t hide that much?
She shook the thoughts off.
‘Down, girl.’
“You know… why not?” she answered flippantly, making what must have been her third or fourth spur-of-the-moment decision of the night by crooking her finger at him in invitation.
Chat stared at her outstretched hand as if it were an alien thing. "What?"
"I said, 'why not?'” she repeated, resisting the urge to laugh at his positively gobsmacked appearance. “Up for a midnight lesson, chaton?"
"H-here?"
"Correct me if I’m wrong, but we seem to be stuck on a roof. And I’m not sure about your kwami, but Tikki’s gonna need a quick nap before she can transform me without cookies.”
Marinette’s expression grew sly.
“Unless, of course, you have a hot date waiting for you downstairs? In which case I’m sure we could find a fire escape.”
Chat shook his head, amusement replacing wonder as a smile tore across his face. “Well, now that you mention it, there was this one girl…”
“Oh?” Marinette inched forward, her body falling into a subtle sway almost of its own accord. “Do tell. I might have seen her.”
With a look that seemed both eager and impossibly demure — as if he hadn’t had his tongue all over her neck not even an hour before — Chat stepped into rhythm beside her, shifting from foot to foot in time to the pulsing beat that vibrated under their heels. “Well,” he began, “she was gorgeous—“
“Relax your spine.”
“—and extremely demanding.”
In a grand show of maturity, Marinette stuck her tongue out at him. Chat responded with a snicker.
"Yeah, well, I'm pretty sure it says somewhere that you have to use a firm hand when training cats." Marinette tapped his foot to widen his stance. "Otherwise they won't listen to a word you say."
"Have I mentioned your hair looks lovely under the moonlight, my Lady?"
"Case in point."
"Or that your eyes shine like a thousand—"
"Chat," Marinette tsked, not a trace of actual venom in the glare she threw his way, "It's kind of hard for me to focus when you keep saying things like that."
Chat grinned in triumph. "I knew it! My wooing does affect you!"
"Nonsense," she lied smoothly (no point in letting him know she did, in fact, enjoy his flirting during most non-akuma encounters — it would only inflate his ego). "It's just impossible for me to give instructions when you won't stop talking."
She paused, brushing her fingertips along his chest.
"You do want me to teach you to dance... don't you, chaton?"
Years ago, Ladybug had discovered the only sure-fire way to shut her partner up was to flirt back at him. Though he acted debonair, Chat Noir was the very definition of "not able to take what he dished out", and a well placed eyelash flutter on her part was all it took to get him clamming up in an instant.
Predictable as ever, Chat's eyes widened, dropping down to the almost casual way she stroked his collar before soaring back up. "Y-yeah, of course!" he managed through a gulp, red racing up the sides of his neck and staining the high-set apples of his cheeks. "I'm yours to comman— e-educate!"
Marinette grinned. "Then let's get started."
Ten minutes and as many stepped-on toes later, Marinette sorely wished she had a squirt bottle at her disposal.
She'd tried everything she could think of to get Chat to relax, hoping to lure out the same sultry, easygoing man she'd danced with not an hour before, but it was no use. His movements were stiff, nervous, and it was obvious something was throwing him off.
“You gotta be smooth,” Marinette explained, planting her palms on Chat’s shoulders and shaking them as if to loosen him up. “Just relax into it.”
“I’m the literal personification of smooth,” he scoffed, stumbling as a particularly forceful shake knocked his feet into each other. Marinette grinned knowingly. “Well, I would be if you’d stop jostling me!”
“C’mon,” she coaxed, gesturing for him to space out his feet. “I’ve seen Chat Noir dance around with that staff of his nearly every day since we started akuma fighting. This isn’t any different.”
“Of course it’s different,” he grumbled back, voice tinged with more uncertainty than temper. “I’m not Chat Noir right now.”
Marinette slowed her roll, dumbstruck by the realization that he was right.
While she wasn’t naïve enough to believe she became an entirely different person when she was Ladybug, Marinette would be lying if she said the Miraculous had no effect on how she carried herself. It was like… like her transformation augmented her, not outright changing who she was as an individual, but instead amplifying the parts of herself she loved most.
Marinette was brave, but Ladybug was fearless.
Marinette was kind, but Ladybug was selfless.
Marinette was crafty, but Ladybug was creation personified.
And just like her spots and spandex acted as a conduit for some of her less obvious strengths, Chat’s ears and tail must have behaved the very same way.
“Turn around,” Marinette said suddenly, slipping from his grasp and twirling her fingers. Though startled, Chat acquiesced, turning on his heel until he faced away from her.
“Is this another weird relaxation exercise?” he asked, hooking his thumbs into the loops of his pants. “Or are you going to..."
His voice trailed off as two pale fingers extended a black mask over his shoulder.
“M-my Lady?”
“Put it on,” Marinette urged, trying not to squirm as the night air blew across her uncovered cheeks. Being unmasked, exposed, just inches away from her partner was oddly exhilarating. Almost as if she’d leapt from the building head first.
Chat shook himself from his reverie, slipping his own mask off his face before passing it behind him. Once he was certain she’d gotten her own disguise in order, he turned, and Marinette found the sight of his bright eyes ringed in black to be a welcome familiarity in this night of new explorations.
Upon further appraisal, however, her lips pursed. Something was missing.
‘Oh, right.’
Marinette plunged her hands through Chat’s carefully styled hair, dislodging the product-stiffened locks until they fell in wild wisps across his forehead. The sudden tousling earned her a crackling burst of laughter from her partner, one so endearingly familiar she couldn’t help but giggle along as she fished the black felted ears from her own hair and settled them atop his head.
‘Perfect.’
“There you are,” she said softly, surprised (but not entirely put off) by her own oddly sentimental tone. “There’s my Chat Noir.”
Chat (and she felt much more comfortable calling him that now that the mask matched the moniker) cracked a positively rakish grin, and the warm swell of recognition in her chest redoubled as the wild-child demeanor he wore so well settled over the man who was decidedly no longer a child.
“And there’s my Ladybug,” he crooned right back, eyes sparkling as they roved across her face. "Shall we?"
Marinette nodded, accepting his outstretched hand before nudging him into position.
Being back in all his feline splendor seemed to have a noticeable placebo effect on Chat, as his movements proceeded far less stiffly than they had before. Perhaps there was something to be said of the powers of black as a confidence booster, or perhaps the sight of her in her usual crimson was in some way soothing. Whatever the reason for it, their second (technically third) go at dancing progressed much more organically than their prior attempts, the duo’s actions guided by the muted beat that rumbled out from the building below, lit by the glow of the city around them, and honed by their years of fighting alongside one another.
Arms wound around the back of his neck and hips swaying gently beneath his palms, Marinette nodded her encouragement up at Chat. “There you go,” she said, delighting in the smile her praise conjured from him. “Now let’s just…”
Waiting until the next downtick in the music, Marinette did a 180, fingers sliding from the nape of his neck to twine with his hands as they ghosted across her rotating pelvis. Chat’s rhythm faltered at the sudden shift in position, but he was quick to adjust, tentatively stepping closer to her swaying form. Grinning, she carded their fingers together, pressing her back to his chest in just enough of a tease to get her own blood pumping a bit faster.
(Because of the physical exertion, obviously.)
Marinette wasn’t blind. She knew, objectively, that her partner was one handsome tomcat. Alya often teased her about her oddly specific taste in guys, and he certainly fit the profile. All solid frame and lean muscle, Chat Noir was 6-foot-something of pure masculine goodness, a source of thirst for the vast majority of Paris since the day puberty had first smacked him across the face.
‘And chest,’ Marinette’s mind tacked on, growing fuzzy from his heat bracketing her body. ‘And arms and thighs and stomach and as—‘
“I-I think you’ve got the hang of that,” Marinette stammered, wrenching herself away from him before her traitorous hips gave her less-than-innocent thoughts away. Chat nodded, looking equal part confused and (‘sexy…’) amused at her sudden outburst.
Jesus Christ, she needed to get laid.
“How about we try something different?” Marinette babbled, switching their positions so that he stood in front of her. “Just to mix it…”
Finding her eyes exactly level with his shoulder blades, she trailed off with a sigh.
“What?” Chat said, craning his neck to peer down at her.
“You’re too tall, you know that?”
“Or you’re too short.” Marinette jabbed at his spine in retribution.
“I could squat down if you’d like?” Chat offered, dropping into a ridiculous half-crouch that had her grinning despite herself. “What’s that one dance move you did earlier? The one where you basically sat on the floor, threw me a sultry pout, then attempted to murder me with your hips? I could totally do that.”
Before Marinette could react (most likely by whacking him across the back of his head) Chat suddenly plunged into a full squat, hands planted dramatically atop his hips as they wiggled in a mockery of what she’d done an hour ago. He then straightened his legs, shooting up with his butt thrust out and his lips pursed into what must have been his definition of a “sultry pout” as he ground into her.
“Chat!” Marinette exclaimed, trying her best to sound stern despite the fact she was giggling like a maniac. It probably didn’t help that she'd placed her hands on his waist, effectively aiding his charade. “I do not dance like that!”
If he heard her objection at all, Chat didn’t react, instead fluttering his lashes as he spoke in a ridiculous falsetto. “Oh hello beautiful blonde man dressed up as Ladybug, have I introduced you to my ass—“ Another violent pop of his hips back into hers. “—yet?”
“S-stop!” Marinette begged, now nearly hysterical as she watched him try and fail to emulate her earlier dance move. “I’m gonna cry.”
“Man,” Chat continued, barely holding in his own giggles as he shimmied beneath her hands, “I’m so glad I finally get the chance to seduce my alter ego. This is a dream come true!”
Marinette’s laughter morphed into full-on snorting, her eyes rolling at his theatrics. “Oh please,” she said, hardly thinking about her actions as she pressed a quick kiss in the exact same place he’d marked her. “Don’t try and tell me you weren’t equally excited to bang someone dressed as Chat Noir.”
Silence ruled as Chat’s movements slowed to a halt, her words echoing across the roof and throughout her suddenly burning ears.
“I-I mean,” Marinette stammered, hands dropping from his waist as he turned to face her. “Not that I meant to imply anything, but you… y-you seemed pretty into it at the time and…”
Marinette felt it best to tap out there.
In a scant few seconds at least half of the blood in her body had rushed to her face, no doubt illuminating the proof of just how “into it” he’d been, and she only flushed hotter as green eyes snapped hungrily to her neck.
“W-were you…?”
Chat took a deep breath, shaking his head, and Marinette felt the strangest thrill run up her spine to see his own cheeks were coloring.
“Were you really trying to pick me up?” he asked.
‘Trap!’ her brain screamed. ‘You are walking straight into a trap!!!’
“Is it really so much of a surprise?” Marinette shot back, ignoring every alarm in her head that said to just shut up. “You’re a handsome guy, Chat. You can’t tell me you aren’t used to people throwing themselves at you.”
...Come to think of it, that whole “kick to the kneecaps” escape plan was looking better and better.
Marinette bit her lip, cursing her lack of a filter. Chat just looked stunned.
“Well…” he began, clearing his throat, “…you sure were throwing something at me.”
…
Marinette groaned on pure instinct when the trademark “Bad Joke Smile” broke across Chat’s face, the mounting tension between them dissolving as he shot her double finger guns.
“Oh, so we’re back to that again, are we?” she asked, conjuring as much sass as she possibly could in her semi-mortified state.
“Seriously, Bug? Back? You make this too easy.” Chat crossed his arms, looking so casual and comfortable and just him that Marinette felt herself instinctively relax alongside him. She shook her head as her blush died down, affecting chagrin despite the fact she was secretly relieved at the change of topic. “And yes, we are back to that. You should know by now I could spend hours waxing poetic about your Lucky Charm.”
Without warning, Marinette exploded into a laugh, one that was more shriek than anything.
“Are you...?! You seriously named my ass ‘Lucky Charm’?!”
“Yup,” Chat responded brightly.
“Why?”
“Because…” He made sure she was paying due attention before winking broadly. “…You always know just what to do with it.”
Marinette fell into hysterics for the second time that night, eventually forced to brace her hands on her knees to keep from collapsing. It certainly didn’t help that Chat felt the need to list off all the other possible names he’d come up with to describe her derrière, looking entirely too thrilled to have gotten her giggling again.
It was at some point between “Ladybutt” and “The Spotted Spectacle” that two groggy kwami roused from their naps, retreating from their makeshift beds only to find their chosen hanging off one another and positively howling on an empty rooftop.
“You two done acting like children?” Plagg grumbled as their laughter died down, resisting the urge to yawn after Tikki did so loudly.
Thoroughly chastised, both humans nodded, chewing their lips to keep from losing it again.
(Which worked spectacularly up until Chat whispered “Miraculass” beneath his breath.)
“That’s it,” griped Tikki, who got just as grumpy as her other half when deprived of cookies. “We’re getting them off this roof. Come on, Plagg.”
Consumed by her now almost painful laughter, Marinette hardly registered her transformation as it washed over her body. She looked up just in time to see Chat’s mask and cat ears get replaced by the real deal, tears spilling over her own mask as it fused to her cheeks.
“I think,” she gasped, wiping the moisture away and sucking some much-needed air into her oxygen deprived lungs, “our kwami are trying to tell us something.”
"Agreed."
It took the pair a solid minute to compose themselves enough to descend from the roof, then another two to stop giggling as they milled about a dark corner behind the club. Even then, every time they looked at each other it was with a barely hidden grin, eyes of blue and green still glimmering with residual mirth.
Tikki and Plagg both got resounding apologies when they popped from their Miraculous, plus promises for all the food their hearts desired once they got home, and that seemed to be enough to coax them back into their respective hiding places. With his kwami tucked safely in his lapel, Chat presented his Lady with a customary hand kiss, offering to let her return to the club first while he waited outside.
“Best we avoid the suspicion,” he explained, his jovial expression tinged by only the smallest hint of sorrow. “As much as it’d be my honor to show up on your arm, it probably wouldn’t be smart for us to be seen together this soon after Ladybug and Chat Noir saved the day.”
“Smart kitty,” Marinette replied, equally bummed that their night had to end here.
Despite the bumps along the way, she could genuinely say she’d had a blast this evening. Dancing with Chat, laughing and joking and just simply spending time with him out of costume had turned out to be quite the eye-opener, helping to put a number of things in perspective.
Whether he was playing the "debonair sidekick" (his words, not hers), or the sweet shy stranger on the dance floor, Chat Noir was a man like no other. He was an enigma, as goofy as he was handsome, and Marinette knew how rare that was to find.
He was warm and witty, fun and unexpected, with the kindest eyes and the most dazzling smile. She realized she wanted to always see that smile, wanted to be the cause of that smile, wanted to feel that smile melt into a sigh against her...
Oh.
Oh.
Marinette blinked hard, turning to Chat with an expression akin to bewilderment.
"I'd like to kiss you," her mouth declared, entirely without hesitation or any permission from upstairs.
He looked as if she'd struck him.
"I... r-really?" Chat asked, his lips rhythmically parting and pressing as if that weren't at all what they'd meant to say. He shook his head, mentally rebooting, and tried again. "Really?"
Even knowing that what she planned to do next was most likely insane, Marinette had to giggle at how positively shocked he looked. Almost scandalized, but in the very best of ways.
She took two steps forward, closed the distance between them. "Really."
Though she'd done it countless times before that night, Chat's breath still stuttered when her hands found his chest, her fingers inching over the tops of his shoulders to help her roll onto her toes. Her head rose, lips poised just inches from his own, but they didn't breach the gap. Not yet.
Not until he broke first.
Marinette needed something, anything to help her process what she was feeling in this moment. Something to tell her whether this fluttering in her stomach was merely a product of the night, brought on by the music and the dancing and the sheer clandestineness of their encounter, or if it was something deeper. The culmination of years spent in denial. She needed to know what — if anything — existed between Ladybug and Chat Noir, and she needed him to be the one to show her.
Two, then three more seconds passed...
Then she got her answer.
With one last breath, Chat descended, replacing the cold night air between them with oh-so-soft warmth. The kiss itself was quick, more a peck than anything, but somehow it didn’t matter how brief their contact was.
Because the second his lips found hers (not clumsily per se, but eager in the way they formed to her mouth) was the second Marinette knew.
She cared for Chat.
She cared for Chat much more than her previous self would admit to.
Marinette cared for Chat in a way that extended far beyond partnership. In a way that extended far beyond friendship. She wanted him, for all that he was, and she probably had for quite some time.
She wanted his corny jokes and his nicknames for her ass. She wanted his blushing cheeks and heartfelt sighs. She wanted every flirt he’d thrown her way over the years, but this time she wanted to listen, armed with the knowledge that he meant every word.
This kiss (so soft and tentative but at the same time aching in the way he stroked her cheek) was the tangible proof of his feelings. The confirmation of something she should have noticed long ago.
Chat loved her. Chat really truly sincerely loved her.
...And Marinette was swiftly coming to the realization she just might love him back.
(But that was a conversation for another night.)
She broke their kiss far before she wanted to, afraid that if she lingered any longer she might never want to stop. Leaning back, her lips tingled as the sudden night air hit their slick surface, her stomach flipping at the way Chat briefly chased her retreating mouth, whimpering as if she were taking something precious away from him.
They hovered so close that their lips lightly brushed every time one of them took a deep inhalation, twin breaths hitching and stuttering and mixing with one another.
(How was it possible they each stole the air from the other’s lungs? Shouldn’t at least one of them be able to breathe?)
“Thanks,” she said, voice thin yet surprisingly flirty for someone struggling to recall their own name.
She knew it started with an L, or… perhaps an M? Marguerite, maybe? Marisol?
Marin—
Chat swallowed, and whatever-her-name-was lost track of that train of thought.
“F-for what?” he asked, and oh god the deep, kiss-roughened timbre of his voice paired with that underlying quiver was just the most distracting thing.
What was she thanking him for again? Letting her kiss him? Being so much more than she deserved?
(Her lipstick sat smeared across his mouth, looking far too erotic to have come from such a chaste kiss.
She needed to go.)
“Thanks for the dance,” Marinette replied at last, judging it to be the easiest answer she could give him right now.
After the night they’d had, suffice it to say she and Chat had a lot to talk about. All of which she fully intended to discuss with him, but none of which she wanted to even begin conferring about with sore feet and a group of drunk girls waiting for—
“Shit!” Marinette cursed, digging her phone out from her pocket and wincing at the dozens of missed calls. “My friends— I didn’t—”
Chat’s eyes went from pleasure-glazed to confused to panicked in an instant, echoing her curse as he produced his own phone.
“Listen,” Marinette said, dancing on the balls of her feet as she glanced anxiously towards the lit-up night club, “I hate to just kiss and dash but—“
“No, go,” Chat interjected, his face awash in the glow of his screen. “I didn’t check in with my friend either and…”
He glanced up, smiling crookedly.
“Is it just me, or does this happen to you a lot too?”
Marinette relaxed a fraction, huffing out a short laugh. “All the time.”
The pair exchanged knowing smiles, eyes lingering on each other’s mouths. Chat's tongue darted along his lips. Marinette's teeth nibbled down on hers.
She really, really needed to leave.
And she was going to leave, she really was! Marinette was about to be a responsible D.D., turn on her heel, and return to her group of friends, but it was just so hard to do when Chat kept looking at her like... like she was everything.
It was so hard to leave when the moon kept shining down, club music kept saturating the night, and the Eiffel tower kept glimmering on horizon, reminding Marinette that no matter how long she lived in Paris she would never grow immune to the city's trademark romantic aura.
It was so hard to flee when she could still feel the warm imprint of Chat's hand against her cheek, still taste the slightly sweet ('ginger ale?') flavor of his lips.
And it was downright impossible to move when he (her partner, her best friend, her maybe-love) slipped his phone back into his pocket, gliding forward with an expression so impossibly hopeful and raw that Marinette knew she'd agree to whatever came out of his mouth next even if it were straight-up murder.
"I'd like to kiss you back," Chat said, whispering like it was a long-kept secret. Like it was some desperate, snowball's-chance-in-hell desire that she'd never indulge.
Like Marinette wasn't already twining her arms around the back of his neck, meeting his lips the second they stopped moving.
If their last kiss had been a peck, then this one could be classified as the opposite, because with her hands tangling in his hair and his hands tugging her waist-first against his body, there was nothing "chaste" about it.
There was no fluttering curiosity in the way Marinette licked past Chat's lips, no question of what she felt that needed to be answered. There was no fumbling unpreparedness to Chat's exploration of her mouth, nor hint of hesitation when he answered her goading hip thrust with a body roll of his own.
This was, quite simply, an encore. A continuation of the dance they'd been weaving together not just tonight but for God knows how long.
And it was every bit hot as it was overdue.
Marinette plastered her breasts against the hard plane of Chat's chest, attempting to get as close as humanly possible to the man she was pretty sure had snuck his way into her heart, and it eventually reached the point where she was practically climbing him in her quest for contact. Balancing on tiptoes, she hitched one leg around his hip, Chat fortunately caught the hint before she resorted to full-on scaling.
He reached down to cup her ass, hoisting her up so she straddled his hips, and Marinette showed her appreciation by softy scraping her teeth along his bottom lip. Chat rumbled against her mouth when their centers met, sending the most wonderful vibrations skittering across their lips, and when he bucked, just slightly, Marinette got a better feel of the... *ahem*... excitement she'd first felt brushing against her backside when they'd found each other on the dancefloor.
(Nothing indecent, mind you. Just enough to let her know her actions weren't going unappreciated.)
Strong arms wrapped around her back, equally strong legs wound around his waist... turns out superhero athleticism led to some downright explosive kissing. Through their combined strength, the two heroes had no problem sustaining their very physical position, even as Chat latched back onto his Lady's throat with the same nipping kisses she'd quickly grown addicted to.
"Okay?" he asked belatedly, releasing her skin just long enough to catch her nod.
"Yeeeees," Marinette hissed, head tilting back in ecstasy as Chat wasted no time in returning his attentions to her neck.
When he'd said he wanted to "kiss her back", he had not been lying.
Now that his initial surprise was over, Chat was relentlessness in the way he kissed her, hot and wet and oh-so-eager. He used his whole body, from his tongue and his teeth to his hands and his hips, to keep Marinette suspended in a haze of pleasure till she could hardly remember why they'd never done this before. She felt more than heard him whisper into her collarbone, lips dragging like a match against her goosebump-ridden skin, but it was impossible to make out exactly what he said over the muted music and her own soft pants.
She distinctly heard the word "perfect", then perhaps the phrase "my lady", but it was right around the time Chat pressed her into the adjacent wall, murmuring something that sounded a whole hell of a lot like "love" that she gave in to sensation competently.
Marinette surfaced from her fog after what could have been any number of minutes, dialing down their intensity until she found her ability to speak
"My friends..." she murmured, a Herculean feat considering Chat was still peppering kisses along her jaw. "They're drunk... I'm..."
"Beautiful?" he supplied. His voice was low.
"Beautiful and sober," Marinette corrected, lips tugging up at the corners from his compliment. With only the utmost reluctance, she dismounted his hips, wobbling just the slightest bit as she stood.
(Marinette told herself it was because of her shoes.
Marinette was also a compulsive fibber.)
"Thanks," Chat said breathlessly, echoing her earlier words as his palm lingered against her waist. His other hand came up to tuck a loose stand of hair behind her ear, his touch endlessly tender despite his earlier fervor.
"For what?" Marinette asked, dumbstruck by the sheer versatility of Chat's affections. She'd never met someone who could so easily go from bodice-ripping passion to (dare she say?) romantic sweetness. The change was practically instantaneous, leaving her reeling in the best of ways.
Chat licked his lips (red from overuse and the traces of her lipstick), and Marinette was beginning to think her kitten was now intentionally trying to test her resolve.
"Thanks for the dance."
He didn't say which dance.
(He didn't have to.)
This time is was Marinette who kissed Chat's hand, causing his pupils to blow wide in surprise. "Anytime," she spoke against his knuckles, delighting in the way he flushed a pleased pink.
Chat opened his mouth as if to say more, but he seemed to think better of it, and instead simply beamed as she dropped his hand. When another chirp emitted from Marinette's pocket, followed by a ring from his, the two winced in tandem, murmuring apologies as they stepped away from one another.
"I'll... see you later?" Chat asked, with an air of forced aloofness belied by the joy in his eyes. Marinette swallowed a smile.
She knew there would likely be ramifications from tonight, discussions regarding identity and safety and “we met each other once, why not again?”, but she couldn’t find it within herself to fret over it now. Chat seemed (in this moment) content to let their chance encounter remain just that: Chance. A flitting occurrence in which they could tease at the boundary between hero and civilian without too much thought on what this meant for the future.
Their future.
"I'll see you later," Marinette confirmed, equal parts giddy and terrified at the possibility of there being a "them" sometime in the future.
(It was a good kind of terrifying, though. An exhilarating kind.)
The pair exchanged heartfelt goodnights, Marinette giggling as Chat (grinning from ear to ear) caught and pocketed the kiss she blew over her shoulder. Floating through the parking lot, she booked it back towards the entrance of the club, each step seeming to compound the mix of exhaustion and elation brewing in her stomach until she felt almost drunk in it.
In the span of just five short hours, she’d: Completed an entire jacket for her Construction II class, ferried a car full of drunk girls to a nightclub across the city, danced her Lucky Charm off, taken down an akuma, almost had her identity revealed-
K I S S E D C H A T N O I R.
(Twice.)
-and realized her friends probably presumed her dead by now.
It was difficult, being tired, worried, and giddy all at the same time, but Marinette was a hell of a multi-tasker.
It didn’t take her long to find her group on the dancefloor, thanks in no small part to the mass of red curls bobbing amidst the sea of people. “Oh thank God,” Alya said upon spotting her, pulling Marinette into a smothering hug. “Where were you? I thought maybe-“
She broke off suddenly, a wicked grin splitting her face.
“What?” Marinette questioned, squirming under the appraising gaze of her best friend. ‘Oh fuck. I don’t look like I’ve been kissing someone do I?’
“You’re wearing a different mask,” Alya sing-songed, expression endlessly smug.
Marinette Spat a curse, fingers flying up to find her cheap plastic mask had been replaced with one of much higher quality.
(Of course Chat had sprung for the luxury Ladybug mask, the fuckin nerd.)
“Ha…” Marinette laughed nervously, “a-about that…”
“And are those hickies I spy? Why Marinette, I’m not going to find a very happy Chat Noir walking around am I?” Alya continued, her earlier worry (as well as her momentary sobriety) all but forgotten. She wiggled her eyebrows, and Marinette sighed in defeat, knowing a drunk Alya was still a startlingly perceptive Alya.
“If you do,” she muttered, “tell him I want my ears back.”
Her group broke out into a chorus of catcalls and wolf-whistles, which Marinette took with a good natured bow, but luckily everyone was either too tired or too tipsy to really dig for dirt, so she managed to dodge the second degree. Deciding they’d had their fill of fun for then night, the gaggle of girls migrated to the club entrance, hanging off one another as they recounted their dancefloor conquests. They stumbled and giggled, gay as could be, and had made it about halfway to the car before-
“Alya?”
Alya turned, narrowing her eyes behind her mask to identify the shadow approaching their group. Marinette turned as well, one hand gripping the pepper spray affixed to the car keys while the other balled into a fist.
God help whatever wasted frat boy or skeevy mugger that dared corner Ladybug’s girls. He’d live (barely) to regret it.
The figure stepped into the light of a streetlamp, illuminating his features for the first time. With dark hair, rimmed glasses, and no coat despite the chilly weather, it took only a moment for Marinette to place him in her mind, and instead of throwing a punch, she grinned.
“Oh my god no way!” Alya squealed, sprinting as much as one could in heels to tackle Nino in a bear hug. Despite the fact they’d broken up years ago (amicably and mutually) she reared back to plant a sloppy kiss to his check, to which Nino responded by planting one right back.
They always had been an obnoxious pair.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were going out tonight?!” Alya exclaimed, jabbing her ex in the ribs.
“Well, they don’t exactly let me bring an entourage up into the sound booth.” Nino doubled over as Alya full-on elbowed him, his gasp morphing into a laugh as she sputtered.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were dj-ing tonight?!” Alya more or less screamed, the alcohol in her system apparently robbing her of her volume control. “We could have been hyping you up!”
“Or schmoozing discount drinks,” Marinette cut in. She butted between the two with a fond roll of her eyes, sweetly tapping her own cheek until Nino (and Alya, the slut) dove down with a kiss. Giggling, she took her double dose of affection with joy, snuggling beneath Nino’s arm as he wrapped the two girls up in a friendly embrace.
“Im sorry,” he stressed, pulling them in tight to erase their fake frowns. “Had I known the two most lovely ladies in Paris would be attending tonight, I would have given a shout-out. But alas, I did not.” Alya grumbled her displeasure, nuzzling into his side, while Marinette took the opportunity to introduce Nino to the rest of their group.
“Well I’d introduce you to my date for the evening, but guess who ended up disappearing during the akuma attack.” Two female heads whipped around, smacking Nino in the face with a mass of red and black hair.
“No. Way.” Alya spoke first, her eyes dancing with glee. “There is no way you snuck the incredible twink out from under his father. I reject this reality.”
“Believe it,” Nino said, idly spitting out an errant stand of hair that had made its way into his mouth. “Adrien is a big boy now, with his own place and everything. It didn’t take much to get him here.”
“W-where…”
Marinette cleared her throat, hating herself for letting the mere mention of her forgotten (somewhat) middle school crush get to her. “Where is he now?”
Nino sighed. “He told me his cell phone died during the evacuation, so he walked to the nearest gas station to buy a new charger.”
“Rich kids,” Alya said drolly. “With their money and whatnot.”
"Right?"
“Well is he okay now?” Marinette pestered, telling herself she was not obsessing and rather being a good DD to all. “Was he drunk? Does he need someone to-“
“Whoa there,” Nino soothed, flashing her his phone screen with it’s blinking 1:58 am. “Adrien said he’d meet me right here at two. I think we can hold off on the search party.” Marinette exhaled in relief, pinching Alya when she started slur-singing the “Adrien and Marinette sitting in a tree” song.
She was not in middle school. She was not k-i-s-s-i-n-g anyone.
‘At least I’m not right now…’ Marinette thought slyly, glancing to the corner of the parking lot she and Chat had inhabited maybe fifteen minutes ago.
“You know it’s funny,” Nino began, his arms still thrown around the girl’s neck as they sapped his seemingly endless body heat.
(He’d been notoriously hot-blooded in high school, forgoing a coat on even the coldest of days.)
“What’s funny?” Alya asked, slipping one hand down into his back pocket. Nino’s eyes widened, then narrowed in mock affront, his own hand reaching back to stop her unabashed groping with a tut.
“Naughty.”
“You know you like it.”
“Ew,” Marinette offered, though she grinned at their banter. “Alya, behave. Nino, tell me what’s funny.”
“Well actually, it’s less funny and more a coincid- ekk!” Nino squeaked as Alya pressed her tongue to his ear, thanking Marinette as she batted her mischievous bestie away.
“As I was saying,” he began again, giving his ex-girlfriend a playful glower, “it’s such a coincidence that you dressed like Ladybug -great costume by the way -because Adrien’s also dressed like her tonight.
“What a shock,” Alya snorted. “The boy with the Ladybug fetish owns a Ladybug mask.”
“Don’t kinkshame him!” Marinette admonished, secretly pleased to hear Adrien’s love for her alter ego hadn’t waned in the years since middle school. “He’s an innocent boy!”
“Yeah?” Alya said, wiggling her brows. “Well his Ladybug body pillow was far from innocent…”
The trio broke out in stuttering laughter, snorting and shoving one another until-
“Seriously? I’ve told you guys a million times, the correct term is dakimakura, and it was purely for decoration!”
“There he is!” Alya exclaimed, forcefully twisting her friends around as she swiveled towards the sound of Adrien’s voice. “I was just telling Mari here that…”
Alya trailed off, drunkenly trying to process what she was seeing. She squinted at Adrien's face, as if all the pieces to some grand puzzle were laid out before her, and it was only a second more before realization dawned hard.
“Holy shit,” Alya gasped, face breaking out into a wicked, victorious smile. “Holy fucking shit.”
“Holy shit is right,’ Marinette’s brain echoed, before all coherent thought was instead replaced by an overlapping cacophony of Windows xp error sounds.
It was only the hands wrapped around her shoulders that kept her from dropping to the pavement.
“What?” Adrien questioned, looking as handsome and puzzled and familiar as ever. His brows perked beneath his borrowed black mask, soft breeze further mussing the blonde hair adorned with two felted cat ears. “Do I have something in my teeth?”
Marinette (who at this point was less a human and more a formless conglomeration of shock and awe) watched his eyes travel as if in slow motion, sliding from Alya to Nino and then finally landing on her.
Or, more specifically, landing on the spots he’d left stamped across her neck.
Chat Noir choked, Ladybug buried her face in her hands, and their biggest fan simply beamed.
“Hey Adrien!” Alya crowed, oblivious to the twin disasters occurring before her very eyes, “Marinette wants her ears back!”