Things had been pretty tense in Bustier’s class for a bit. Marinette had been very busy working on a commission for Jagged. He wanted a wardrobe for the upcoming concert from Marinette. He also asked her to help design some posters and t-shirts to sell at the concert. Clara Nightingale was opening the concert and had also asked for a new outfit to wear onstage. All of this work meant that Marinette had very little time for anything else lately. Lila had used this as an opportunity to start turning the class against Marinette. When the class wanted to get together to hang out, Lila would volunteer to ‘invite’ Marinette and then tell the class that Marinette had rudely declined the invitation. The class was definitely getting irritated with the bluenette, except for the few people that knew Lila was lying and what Marinette was doing. Nino, Adrien, Juleka, and Chloe all knew what was going on, and weren’t irritated with Marinette. They were getting irritated with Lila though. Marinette did not realize what was happening in the class, she was never paying much attention to it while at school and all her free time was devoted to these concert designs. Then one day, when Marinette missed school for Jagged’s final fitting, Lila dropped the bomb on the class. She told the whole class that Marinette had been bullying her and wouldn’t leave her alone. The class was hesitant to believe this, but the liar had come prepared with ‘proof’ in the form of mean text messages from an unknown number. That was enough to trick the class into believing Lila’s tricks.
Marinette had realized that things were rocky with her friends. She knew this concert had taken up a lot of time and she wasn’t able to go to any events. She did wonder why she hadn’t heard of some of these events before, but she just assumed that the class had mentioned and she had forgot, or that they thought she would be busy. She did not realize the damage Lila had been doing to her friendships while she was busy. After doing some last-minute details for Jagged, Jagged gave her tickets and back stage passes for the concert the next night for her whole class. Marinette went home excited to tell everyone the good news the next day.
Marinette got to school early for once and saw Nino, and Juleka waiting outside the building. Marinette was so excited about the news; she was practically buzzing. She rushed up to the two and said, “Guess what?” The two students looked on curiously and asked, “What?” Marinette grinned and replied, “You know how I was working on some stuff for Jagged’s concert tonight? Well, he gave me tickets and backstage passes for the whole class!” Nino and Juleka also looked really excited upon hearing the news. While the three friends talked excitedly about the concert, they did not notice Lila hiding in the shadows, listening to every word. Lila immediately thought up a plan to ruin the stupid bluenette for good. She rushed up to the class room before the trio could spot her. When she got there, she peeked into the classroom to see who was her audience this time. She saw that Alya, Alix, Kim, and Mylene were already sitting in the class room. Lila took a deep breath and turned on the waterworks and rushed in. Alya immediately jumped up and asked, “What’s wrong girl? Why are you crying?” Lila almost grinned and broke the illusion, but she caught herself and sobbed, “Well, I talked with Jagged yesterday and managed to get us all tickets and backstage passes for the concert tonight. I even got one for Marinette, even though she has been bullying me. I thought this would be a good peace offering. But when I got here this morning and told Marinette the news, she stole the tickets from me!” Lila could see it did the trick and the students in the room were furious. As the rest of the class trickled in, they were told the story too and they became just as furious with Marinette. By this point the only people who hadn’t heard the story were Nino, Adrien, Juleka and Chloe. But Lila knew they wouldn’t believe her. Those four had realized or already known that Lila was a liar, but they hadn’t said anything to the rest of the class. Lila wasn’t sure why they hadn’t, but it didn’t matter now. Her hold on the class was so strong, Lila doubted that those four would make a difference.
