Miraculous Fanfic Short Story

Part 1

Marinette was awoken by a thump from the roof. She checked her clock, it was late. She climbed up onto the roof to see Chat Noir sitting on the rail, his staff in his hand. He had just arrived.

 MARINETTE: Chat Noir? What are you doing here? It's late, shouldn't you be at your house?

Chat Noir said nothing. 

MARINETTE: What's wrong?

CHAT NOIR: I can't keep up this act. It's tiring to have to keep smiling, to have to keep pretending like everything's fine as I get my heart broken day after day, blindly doing whatever others tell me.

Marinette bent down and hugged Chat Noir who was trying to hide his face as tears trickled down. He hugged her back, burying his head in her shoulder as she tried to comfort him. She was shocked, day after day she worked with him to save Parisians from Hawkmoth and Mayura, fighting side by side and never once had he said anything. 

He tried so hard to hide it, the deepening pain that arose in his chest each time Ladybug rejected him. It felt like his heart was being compressed, crushed each time yet he remained silent. He thought it made things easier for others. To do what was expected of him without bothering them. He felt it was simply his purpose to meet those expectations, the ones his father, ladybug and so many others had set so high for him. 

Marinette stayed silent, what could she say? As a hero she knew how it felt to have to meet such high expectations; it wasn't something they could cast aside or avoid. She wanted to say something, she really did but no words came to mind. The sounds of crickets and Chat Noir's sobs as well as the quiet buzzing of flies as they flew confusedly around the lights was interrupted by a light from inside. Footsteps followed, going up the stairs into Marinette's room. Two heads popped up from the trapdoor connecting her room to the rooftop balcony, Marinette's parents. They stayed there for a while trying to make sense of what they saw. Chat Noir looked up from Marinette's shoulder and seeing her parents immediately got up, quickly wiping away his tears.

CHAT NOIR: I'm sorry for bothering the three of you, I'll leave now.

Marinette sat there, still on the floor. "I'm sorry..." Chat Noir's words repeated themselves in her head over and over again. She wanted to call out to him, to get him to stay a little longer. She didn't want to leave him the way he was but before she could call out to him, he had already left.

Adrien slept well that night, better than he had in a while. Perhaps saying it out loud to someone had helped lift some weight off his shoulders. He just hoped he hadn't managed to bother Marinette or her parents.