The Birthday Trap

Chapter 3: Yes, No, Maybe...

"Shall we watch Alya's next instructions?" he asked as soon as they had regained some composure.

Marinette smiled and nodded, so he moved to the laptop, selected the next video and pressed 'play'.

"Hello there," said Alya's cheerful voice when her face appeared on the screen. "If you're watching this, I must say I'm impressed. I didn't expect both of you to live through the session of Twister."

As they heard Alya say that, they both blushed crimson and pursed their lips.

"But you must have done it, well done! I wonder who won." She tapped her index finger against her cheek, looking up thoughtfully. "If I must put my bets out, and knowing Marinette's signature clumsiness, I would say that Adrien won."

Adrien blinked. "Wow, she knows us so well."

"So she does," admitted Marinette.

He elbowed her gently in the ribs, causing her to glance at him and pause the video. "I won."

Marinette sighed. "So you did. Stop boasting, you're worse than Chat Noir."

"Uh," muttered Adrien. "How do you know?"

She rolled her eyes in a way that made Adrien blanch. "Trust me on this one."

He flashed his eyebrows at her and kept surprisingly quiet, so Marinette started playing the video again.

Alya's smirk looked a little eerie on the other side of the screen. She clapped her hands and started rubbing her palms. "Now...next game is gonna be...."

"Not again,'" groaned Marinette facepalming.

"But not just the normal yes, no, maybe," continued Alya.

"Hm?" Marinette's head snapped up.

"Since you got up to this point, we're going to go...sexy..." Alya's grin chilled Marinette on the spot as her friend on the video mimicked a move of samba. But when she shot a glance at Adrien, she noticed that he didn't look at all flustered. In fact, a cheeky grin was curling the edges of his mouth.

"Cool," said Adrien, and Marinette's soul briefly left her body. What did he mean, cool? What was cool? When Alya was going sexy, it was nothing to be cool about. Especially when he was concerned.

But poor Sunshine, Marinette thought, bless your innocent soul, you can't know.

Or can you?

Marinette wasn't sure of anything anymore. Her stomach was still full of the butterflies he had cast into it minutes before, when he purposely flushed his body against hers. Bittersweet torture! At that very moment, her innocent Adrien hadn't felt that innocent anymore. Maybe he had never been so!

"-ette? Marinette? Have you zoned out again?" The sudden movement of a hand passing in front of her eyes woke her up from her réverie and brought her back to reality.

"Uh, yeah. Sorry. Have I missed the end of the video again?"

He nodded. "Yeah, but all she said was that we need to open bag n3 and follow instructions." He leaned into her. "Not sure if you'll like what she said next. To be completely truthful, I have a nasty feeling about the 'sexy' part of this new game."

"What do you mean?"

He looked a bit tense now, and that worried Marinette.

"Uh." He rubbed his nape. No, Marinette definitely wasn't going to like it if he got so embarrassed. "I told you that Nino made me do some strange things after I lost the bet."