|MIRACULOUS| Flipped

19- Talking

I pedaled home so hard; I thought my lungs would burst. 

The moment Mari reached her yard, she jumped off her bike and ran to her front door, letting the bike fall onto the pavement of their driveway. She quickly ran inside, throwing the door behind her as she hurried to her room. 

"Marinette?" Mari heard her mom call after her, probably confused because she should still be at school, but she didn't reply. She shut the door to her room behind her and fell onto her bed.

"Marinette!" Sabine called again and walked to Mari's door. She knocked a few times before opening it when there was no answer. "Honey?"

Mari was laying on her bed, hugging her pillow as she cried quietly. "What's wrong?" Sabine asked, closing the door behind her.

"I can't," Mari replied, and it broke Sabine's heart to see her so distressed. Her mother walked close and sat on the edge of her bed. 

"Sweetheart," she said in a gentle tone. "You can tell me."

Mari took a shaky breath. "Adrien tried to kiss me."

"He did?" Sabine asked, completely surprised. She didn't know which was more shocking: the fact that Adrien had tried to kiss her, or that she was upset over it.

"In school," Mari started to explain, detecting the shock in her mother's voice, and turned to look at her. "In front of everybody."

Sabine understood now that Mari was upset because, whatever the reason Adrien had tried to kiss her, the way he had gone about it had been too embarrassing. Before she could try saying anything or ask another question, the doorbell rang, and she stood to go answer it. 

"Mom," Mari begged quickly. "Please don't get it. It's probably him."

There was a knock at the door, which had Sabine convinced that it was probably him. "Sweetheart..." She started. "Maybe you should talk to him."

Mari shook her head as there was more knocking at the door. "I can't..." She said miserably. "I can't."

Adrien wouldn't leave me alone. He kept calling on the phone. And knocking on the door. He even snuck around the house and tapped on my window. Why didn't he understand that I just wanted to be left alone?

"Mari! Please, I got to see you!" He called, but Mari scowled and ignored him. "Come on out, just for a minute!" More knocking at the window. "Mari, please!"

After two days, Adrien stopped, and I thought it was finally over. Then, one afternoon, I was coming into the front room to read...

Mari walked out of her room, book in hand as she took a seat on a chair facing the front window. Her dad was there in another chair and watched her walk by without a word.

When I heard a noise in the yard.

It was scraping. Mari looked up as she opened her book, but instantly closed it while her mouth fell open in shock. Adrien Agreste was out there with a shovel, digging into her front lawn.

"Hey, what's he doing?!" Mari exclaimed to her father as she threw her book to the side and stood up, marching to the window.

"Mari," Tom said sternly when she turned and started to the front door. "Calm down. I gave him permission."

Mari stopped in her tracks and faced her father. "Permission?" She asked, exasperated. "Permission for what? He's digging a hole."

"I told him he could," Tom replied evasively while Mari went back to the window. 

"But why?"

"I told him he could."

It was torture seeing him dig up my grass. How could my father let him do this? Adrien knew I was there too.

Adrien glanced up, seeming to sense her eyes on him, and he gave her a small nod and smile. Mari rolled her eyes in annoyance, then watched as Adrien stuck the shovel upright in the ground next to the hole and walk away out of sight.

"He's gone," Mari said, now feeling more confused than angry. She glanced back to see her dad giving her a knowing look and a smile before she looked out the window again.

Adrien came back into Mari's view, but this time he held a tree sapling. He set it down into the hole he had dug, and without glancing up at Mari, began to push the dug-up dirt back into the hole, covering the sack of tree roots and soil with his foot.

"A tree?" Mari wondered aloud. "He's planting a tree?"

Mari found herself smiling despite her annoyance towards him. "Is it a...?" she started, but trailed off as she watched Adrien move to the shovel and lean against it as he looked at her hopefully.

I didn't really need to ask. I could tell from the shape of the leaves and the texture of the trunk. It was a sycamore tree.

Adrien: When she walked out of the door, I thought back to the first time I saw her. How could anybody, ever, have wanted to run away from Mari Dupain?

Mari: He looked at me with those eyes. Those once again dazzling eyes. And I knew that Adrien Agreste was still walking around with my first kiss. But he wouldn't be for long.

Mari stopped just a few feet away from him, unable to keep herself from smiling warmly. He returned her smile, and it seemed his worries had gone away now that she was with him.

Mari: As we stood there, I realized that all these years, we never really talked.

Mari finally realized that she'd become lost in his eyes and looked down awkwardly, and he did the same. "Do you need some help?" she asked when her eyes fell on the new tree in her yard.

Adrien looked at her, and his smile grew. "Yeah," he said, gratefully taking her up on her offer. Both knelt down and got to work, patting the soil.

Mari: But that day, we started.

Adrien: And I knew we'd be talking for a long time.

Adrien looked at her as they worked at the soil. She was concentrating maybe a little too hard on the task, and it made him smile. He felt a bit nervous too, unsure exactly where to go from here. He lifted his hand and only hesitated for a moment before he placed it over Mari's.

Slowly, he looked up and smiled, and she did the same. Both knew that however awkward it felt now, things would get better. They were realizing this budding new relationship that was forming, and they knew they were in it for the long haul together.

End