Hold On Tight (A Miraculous Ladybug Fanfiction)

Part 8: Behind The Scenes

Maybe Adrien had gone a bit far buying himself an entirely new phone and number just so he could text Marinette, but he couldn't text her with his current phone because she already had that number in her contacts. Also, Adrien was worried that Marinette liked Chat Noir, but hated his real self. She had every reason to, he was an awful friend to not have realized her feelings, he should have known. Not that he knew what he would've done with the knowledge, would he have returned the feelings before now? Still, he had broken her heart, if she hated him, he didn't blame her.

But as Chat Noir, he had done nothing wrong, as Chat Noir he could give Mari everything. Thank goodness he was a superhero.

At the moment, Adrien was trying his hardest to inconspicuously text Marinette in the middle of class as Chat Noir without her noticing it was him. Every time he heard her quiet giggle at something he said behind him, his heart fluttered in his chest. Alya whispered something to Mari about a mystery boy and Adrien couldn't help the smile that tugged at his mouth. So she hadn't even told Alya yet. For some reason, Adrien felt honored to be likely the only secret Mari kept from her best friend.

"Adrien," Ms. Bustier announced, noticing their phones out, "Marinette there are no phones in class. Please put them away before I have to take them."

The rest of the class snickered silently around them and they both slid their phones back into their bags reluctantly. Was it wrong for Adrien to use Chat Noir with Marinette? Was he lying to her?

He shook his head. It would do him no good to think about those things at the moment.

After class had finished, Mari said something to Alya about shopping for fabrics and headed for the door. Adrien reacted before she left the room.

"Marinette." He said.

She turned, a faint look of surprise on her face, "Adrien?"

"Oh, uh," he rubbed the back of his neck, not sure what he had been planning to say, "Do you have plans this afternoon."

"Oh," Marinette looked even more confused, "Adrien I—"

"I'm not asking you on a date Marinette, don't worry. I just don't really want to go home yet and we haven't talked in awhile. I thought maybe we could hang out."

"Oh," she said again, the puzzlement leaving her face, "I was planning on going shopping for materials for a project I'm working on, but you're welcome to come with." She looked up at him, Adrien had never seen her look at him like that, look at Adrien with nothing but confidence and a sort of friendship, "Is everything okay?"

Adrien shrugged, "Just need a break from staying inside all day, you know how my father is."

"Okay," Marinette backed towards the door, "Let's go then."

It was weird, Marinette thought, to have Adrien walking with her through the streets of Paris. It wasn't as if she still had feelings for him, she wasn't sure if she did, it was just the fact that she wasn't tripping over herself or spitting out stupid words. Marinette felt oddly comfortable in his presence, as if nothing from the past month had actually happened.