That Night

Chapter 24

The couple made the trek up the large staircase and Adrien led his girlfriend into his room. She slowly began to sit down on his couch, cradling her stomach gently. But before she made it all the way down, out zoomed a small black blur. The thing circled around Adrien's head before it stopped, floating in front of his face.

"Cheese now," Marinette heard a little voice command.

Adrien rolled his eyes then glared.

"What?" the little being demanded. "I gave you three days, seven hours, and..." he paused, pretending to look at a watch that was not on his miniscule wrist, "twenty-three minutes to "show" her how you feel. Well, I'm done hiding and I want my camembert now."

Marinette chuckled at their antics and the thought of Adrien asking for privacy in order to spend time with her, and then her eyes widened in understanding. But before she could ask Adrien if her theory was correct, he huffed off to get the cheese.

Adrien came back in the room and tossed the triangle of cheese to the black creature. It threw the cheese in its mouth and swallowed loudly.

Marinette looked to Adrien. "Is this your kwami?" she asked excitedly.

He sighed, "yes... This is my troublemaker kwami, Plagg."

Marinette grinned at the kwami. "Nice to meet you Plagg."

Plagg stuck his little tongue out at Adrien. "At least she's nice to me."

"It's because she hasn't had to deal with you as long as I have," Adrien complained.

Marinette grinned at the pair who were obviously very close despite their fighting. "How about I introduce you to my kwami?" Adrien nodded. "Meet Tiki."

From Marinette's purse, resting against her hip, out popped little Tiki. She flew up towards Adrien. "Hello, it's nice to officially meet you." She grabbed Adrien's index finger with both of her little hands and shook.

Adrien grinned widely. "She's definitely more well-mannered than Plagg is." Plagg glared and Marinette just grinned.

Soon enough the two kwamis flew off together to reminisce. Adrien wrapped an arm around Marinette's shoulder and looked down to ask, "what do you want to do?" He spread both of his arms wide to gesture to his huge room. "I've got lots of movies and games, I've got foosball, basketball... Or we could play Dance Dance Revolution." He lifted an eyebrow at her in challenge.

Marinette narrowed her eyes. "You're on!" She ran to his machine and began to set up their game.

Once Adrien made it to her, at a slower pace, he gave her a faux-worried look. "Are you sure you can take on all this?" He positioned himself into a dramatic pose, his chest out and looking to the side.

She pushed his shoulder, making him lose his balance. "Whatever."

"Come on baby, this bod was made for dancing." He wiggled his eyebrows at her and rubbed a hand starting at his hip and down to his thigh.

Marinette quirked a single eyebrow. "Is that so?" She spoke slowly as she took a couple steps toward him, where he had righted himself after stubling. "It must be those calves." She quickly leaned down and lightly slapped the back of his leg. She straightened and looked him in the eye; he looked back with mirrored intensity. "Or maybe its your biceps." She leaned forward as if going in for a kiss before turning her head and looking at his arm as she squeezed his firm muscles. "Mmm," she exclaimed, approving. "Oh, I know," she concluded, "it has got to be your abs." She took a final step closer to him, leaving their bodies inches apart from each other as she gently slid her hands under his shirt and began to caress his stomach with her fingers.

Mariette slowly looked up at him and she saw that he was standing there, perfectly still, with his eyes closed and a look of pure ecstasy on his face. She chuckled and reached up to give him a kiss on the cheek. "Come on Kitty, let's play." But Adrien took a moment to collect himself. "Look, don't you think this was made for dancing too?" She raised her eyebrows as she gestured to herself, moving her arms down and then back up, stopping to frame her stomach.

Adrien did look, but once his eyes rested on her stomach his smile faltered. "On second thought... Why don't we play something else?" At that Marinette's teasing also dropped. Adrien sighed. "I'm pretty sure that any other time your body would be perfect for this." He smiled sadly and glanced at her perfect figure. "But right now..." He wrapped an arm around her shoulders and rested his other on her stomach, "I think we better do an activity that will give me confidence that the two most important people in my life will be safe."

Marinette relaxed and gave in. "Fine, what do you want to do?"

Adrien leaned over and gave her a soft kiss on her forehead. "Hmmm, how about we play..."

They spent the next several minutes deciding what game they wanted to play. Most of the hesitation came from Adrien as he knew that Marinette would beat him at all the games he could think of and he wasn't sure his pride could handle that. Once he finally realized that he wouldn't be able to show off his gaming skills to the master gamer he gave in and they finally picked a simple strategy game,

They sat down on the couch together, legs, hips, and shoulders touching. Tiki and Plagg flew over and sat on the cushion next to the other couple. Then the competition began.

Hours later Adrien dropped his controller in defeat and theatrically slumped over onto his girlfriend, moaning. "I just can't compete with you." He looked up at her from where his head was resting on her chest and gave her a pouty face, complete with his bottom lip sticking out.

She patted his head condescendingly. "Oh, poor little thing."

"That's ok though." Adrien's face broke into a grin. "Because I love you anyways."

"Aww, I love you too Kitty Cat."

Adrien sat up. "I'm serious. You have no idea how much I love you or how long I have loved you."

"Me too," she said softly, as she ran her finger along his jawbone.

He kissed her for several long seconds before he pulled away and looked her in the eyes. "There's something I want to show you." He pulled her up from the couch and led her to his desk and his computer. He sat down on his rolling office chair and she sat on his lap.

"Now don't freak out. I promise I'm not a stalker."

"Okay." Marinette just shrugged in confusion.

Adrien moved his mouse and, on his screens, appeared several internet browsers. Open on those browsers were countless tabs and rows and rows of bookmarks, all about Ladybug. There were questions about her, fan theories, fanarts, fanfiction - everything. But to Adrien's surprise Marinette just laughed.

He looked at her with a question in his eyes. "Oh Adrien." She chuckled again. "You should have seen my room before I took all my pictures down and tried to make it presentable for you. Same idea, but a lot less subtle." She looked at him with a serious face for a moment, then they both broke into laughter.

Once they had collected themselves and stopped laughing Marinette whispered into Adrien's ear. "But unlike you, I did exhibit some stalker-ish tendencies. I still have a full-sized, pull-out, graphic organizer with your schedule for lands sakes." She looked at him without any guilt, just with a confident grin.

He chuckled. "That's ok, I was totally lying. If Ladybug wasn't so hard to track down, I would definitely have been a stalker." They just grinned stupidly at each other.

They were continuing to discover more and more reasons why they were perfect for each other.

A/N: I apologize for all the confusion regarding Marinette's reveal to Alya. I believe that I have fixed the problem, but feel free to comment if you see more mistakes.