Miraculous Ladybug: Short Stories

Confessions (Part 1)

Marinette aggressively slammed her head down against her desk in pure frustration. There was a designing contest that was being held that weekend and her mind was going completely blank. Anything even remotely related to fashion was Marinette's true passion. She always hoped to somehow end up as successful as her role model, the famous designer Gabriel Agreste.

"Mari, what is it now?" A gentle hand massaged the girl's back.

Without lifting her head, she mumbled, "Chat Noir, you are friends with a complete and utter failure." Adrien himself always thought of Marinette as a good friend. However, he felt as if he could be more of his true self when he was Chat Noir. Him and Marinette seemed to click more as friends when he was Chat rather than when he was Adrien. Perhaps it was because, for some reason, she seemed more comfortable around Chat than Adrien.

"I think you're being just a bit overly dramatic. Are you forgetting about your winning derby hat that the Agreste guy picked over everyone else's?" He poked her shoulder, "Or when you designed those glasses that Jagged Stone loved so much that he personally asked for you to design his next album cover?"

Marinette picked up her head to look at her wall that had her designs that were in newspapers (plus a few others) pasted on it. When her and Chat Noir became close friends, she had replaced all of the pictures of Adrien with pictures of her own designs. Marinette wasn't close with too many people and definitely did not want Chat thinking that she was insane. She even changed her computer's wallpaper to a beautiful picture of Paris.

Marinette turned to smile at her other best friend. "Thanks, but I still have no clue what to do." Since Chat Noir was sitting in another chair to her left, Mari leaned over to rest her head on this right shoulder.

Chat wrapped his left arm around the girl. He looked down at her, "Well, the theme is winter wear. What about maybe a knitted hat or a scarf? Then, you can pick something that nearly all of Paris loves and base it off of that."

Marinette sat in silence as she tried to think of an idea. It took her awhile to form an image of what she was thinking. Then, it hit her like a truck. A devious smile crept upon her face as she looked up at Chat, "How would you like to be the inspiration for my design?"

"Me?" Chat Noir asked in confusion as Marinette quickly sat up straight and began flipping through her sketchbook, ignoring all of his questions. She ended up on a page filled with several Ladybug and Chat Noir designs. Among the various designed objects were some hats and scarfs. Mari circled several things before picking the book up and shoving it in Chat's face. He took the book from her and looked at the Chat Noir designs that were circled in red. "Wouldn't you rather use the Ladybug ones? More Parisians look up to her than they do to me. Sometimes, people even cheer her on, not recognizing that I'm in the room with her." Chat Noir's ears fell. Marinette saw this and rubbed his arm to comfort him.

"I always see and hear about Ladybug. I think that there is another hero who could use some recognition for once." Marinette winked as the flicked Chat Noir's nose with her index finger. "Plus, your costume allows for so much more ideas! What do you think of these two?" Marinette turned Chat's attention to two particular designs. One was a black knitted hat with black ears on the top. The second was a black colored scarf and when worn correctly, a golden bell would be placed in the correct position around the neck.

"Marinette, you know that I think everything you design looks fantastic. Do you mind if I look through the rest of your sketches?"

Marinette smiled and nodded her head. She waited patiently for feedback as Chat looked through the pages of her sketchbook. Each page was filled with the most stunning designs. There was one in particular, though, that caught his eye. The blue scarf that Adrien had received as a birthday present was drawn quite clearly in Mari's notebook. He was told that it was a gift from his father, but now he wan't so sure, "I feel like I've seen this one somewhere before." Chat pointed to the sky blue scarf, "Did you ever make it?"

"Oh, that one? Uh...sort of." Marinette nervously twiddled her thumbs, hoping to avoid the topic. She never really talked about boys with Chat. Mainly because a small part of her liked him. Yes, he could be arrogant at times, but he did have his good qualities. For one, he would do anything to protect Paris. Also, even though the puns were repetitive, they never failed to make Marinette smile. Chat always knew the right things to say.

"What do you mean by sort of?" Clearly, Chat knew the answer. He just wanted to hear what Marinette had to say about it all.

"Well, I made it for this boy in my class, Adrien. It was a birthday gift, but he doesn't know that I was the one that made it." Chat was silent, allowing for her to continue. "I didn't give it to him directly, I knew I would probably just stutter like I did that morning. So, I decided to just drop it off at his house. I forgot to sign it, but ended up with a chance to sign a post-it-note and place it on the box. For some reason, he was told that his father got it for him." Marinette tried to fake a smile, clearly disappointed that Adrien would never know who truly gave him that gift.

"You should have just told him that you were the one who made it for him, Mari." Chat sympathized with her, "I can tell that it bothers you at least a small amount."

"I was going to until I saw how happy he was. He seemed so pleasantly surprised that his father got him the scarf...I couldn't just ruin that for him." Marinette looked up at Chat who was now grinning sheepishly at her, "What?"

Chat Noir let a small laugh escape his mouth, "You like him, don't you?"

Marinette's face turned into a rosy shade of pink. "I never said that!" She turned away from the boy, allowing her face to cool down a bit.

"Didn't have to." Chat shrugged his shoulders. "You're totally in to him!" He began teasing Mari in a mocking way, poking at her arm.

"You keep that mouth of yours shut, Noir!" She stuck her finger out at him, warning the boy. "I mean it!"

Chat shrugged once again before relaxing back in the chair at Marinette's desk, "Hey, you never know," He smiled quite cheerfully. "Maybe he likes you, too."