When a liar gets you left behind

Chapter Forty-Two: Projects and Lack of Logic

The air was cooler than Marinette would have usually expected, making Marinette crinkle her nose slightly as she slipped into the Limo, automatically looking through her bag for a thin jacket, though she knew she did not have one there.

A nudge of a hand made her look up, Penny was holding a wad of clothing, a jacket, no doubt.

Marinette smiled and thanked her quickly, her face quickly growing serious.

"I have a study meeting in the park with my partner, today," she introduced in a light voice, staring at Penny carefully as she waited for her to respond.

"What time do you want to leave?" she asked after a quick moment of silence, her worry causing a crease to form between her eyebrows.

"Right after arriving home, if that's possible?" Marinette asked carefully, hoping that it did not intercept with any other plans for the afternoon.

Penny smiled at her softly before nodding her head. "I can make that work."

"Where will you be meeting?" Penny asked her quickly, her head turning to look out the window of the car.

"The garden I went to recently," she supplied, turning her head towards Penny's window, trying to look for what Penny saw.

When Marinette arrived at the entrance, she instantly searched through the small group of people around the vicinity for Damian.

She found him quickly—or rather, he found her.

"Where is a suitable place for us to begin our project?" he asked from behind her, making her spin around in slight surprise.

"The picnic area," she supplied after a moment, pointing her hand over to the direction of which it was. "There are some tables there."

Damian nodded and set off towards the area, not bothering for a moment to check to see if she was following.

Quickly, they arrived at the area, which was filled with all sorts of greenery. Marinette quickly sat down on the picnic table.

And so, they started to work on their project, neither or the two relaxing during this.

"I know I already have, but I want to apologize again," Marinette finally pushed out of her during another awkward silence that had settled between the two.

"I took out my anger on the situation I'm in on you, that was wrong of me," she repeated, that words on slightly changed from the last time she apologized, though the genuine sentiment still tugged into the lulls of her voice.

"Because of that, I want to make it up to you," she continued, her voice turning bright as she smiled at him, hoping to edge the awkwardness of the conversation away with being straight to the point.

"—why?" he interrupted, his voice holding a light amount of confusion, as if her logic did not make sense.

"Because— because it would make me happy to know that I've made it up to you," she replied, her voice soft while it sounded like she struggled to come up with the right words for explaining this to him. "I want to right my wrong."

"You have already apologized," he interjected, his voice monotone as he looked at her trying to understand her reasoning.

Marinette paused as she thought about what she wanted to say, it was right on the tip of her tongue, but she hesitated before finally replying with her genuine thought on the matter.

"You know," she explained to him, her voice wondering as she looked down back at the table, her hand gripping the edge of the wooden picnic table. "I've had many people apologize to me—but the amount of times that I know that they really meant it are few enough for me to count on my fingers."