Dearly Despised, (I love you)

She's just a friend

A/N: mannn i have been in the trenches. My word 2023 was not nice to me but that's all good. I'm still alive so the fic is too. Here's your long-awaited treat for the start of the year

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"He's not here!"

"Don't panic, Marinette." Slam. "I'm sure he's in one of these stalls." Slam. "Or a safer place." Slam. "He's probably along the Seine looking for you!" Slam. "Marinette, you know don't have to kick down every door? You've already used the lucky charm. This is just the destruction of public property."

The last beach stall went down like a tree as Marinette caught her breath. "He's not here."

"I know," Tikki mumbled.

She faced every which way. "He's got to be! What if he's left?! What if he's mad?! Tikki, I had no idea I was so much of a jerk! What if he still hates me?!"

"I thought you wanted him to still hate you."

A gale spread across the river and flailed the face-framing of her hair. Her Chat clip would've been really useful to have back, but she'd never bothered to put it back in. "That was before I knew he never got my apology, or left the gum, or closed the umbrella." She held down the erratic hair. "Or before I realised him trying to make amends recently was genuine – even when he thought I did all those horrid things! Oh, no, Tikki, what have I done!?"

Her breath thinned. Her clarity withered. Something was pulsing behind her foggy eyes and different parts of her felt like they were burning. The panic whipped its vicious teeth and Marinette crumbled to the floor in a defeated heap.

She'd yelled at Chat Noir for rejecting her. And now she'd likely lost Adrien, too.

"Hey, Marinette, listen to me." Tikki's little paws held Marinette's cheek. "If Adrien was willing to take a chance on you when he thought you'd wronged him, why wouldn't he take a chance on you when he's learnt you never did?"

"But I did Tikki!"

"No, you were misinformed! You had silly fights! It's okay, just breathe. Just breathe."

Battling villains daily and remaining a top student couldn't compare to the difficulty of trying to think straight at that moment. Marinette cradled her kwami with tearful breaths and felt the tightness in her lungs cool down.

"I'm just..." she sighed, releasing what it was all really about. "I'm just struggling to let him go..."

"I know."

"He's such a great partner. And yet I can't even know him! It would've never worked! So why do I care so much!?" She buried her face in her hands. "Ugh, I can't believe I yelled at him... And then I yelled at Adrien tonight, too! After he set up this beautiful date and sounded... real about having feelings for me! Yet after all these weeks of his efforts I've been cold, and- and rude! And acting like I can't trust him! When he never even... he never even tried to hurt me the first time I saw him. Ugh, what is wrong with me?!"

Tikki sat with Marinette's long-winded torrent stirring the air between them. After enough silence, she said firmly, "Marinette."

"What?"

"You're only hanging onto Chat Noir because you're in denial about Adrien."

Her previously loud expression blanked. "Huh." She squinted. "In denial about what?"

"You know what." Tikki rolled her eyes.

Marinette blinked strangely.

Tikki sighed, body language turning solemn. With a serious voice she said, more as a statement than a question,