Stuck

Chapter Eleven: In Which There's A Late Night Gas Station Run

'You - you're, you're Marinette?' Chat stammers, blushing.

'Yeah?'

'This isn't how I imagined finding out who you are, mi'lady.'

'No, not really.' We're both quiet for a few minutes, processing what's just happened.

'Do you - do you want to know who I am? Now that, I know.'

'Sure, Chat.' I say, expecting to hear a name I don't recognise.

'I'm -' he bites his lip, 'I'm Adrien. Agreste.' I sit there stunned for a moment.

'As in Adrien in my class?'

'One and only.' I start laughing.

'So all those times you didn't show up when Adrien was involved, or you were late, it was because you were already there?'

'Well, yeah.'

'I was beginning to think you hated him or something.'

'Why yes, of course, I absolutely hate Adrien's dumbass model face; I just can't stand it.' I start laughing even harder and punch him lightly on the shoulder.

'No, but really Chat, you are Adrien?' I say seriously.

'Yeah. Why? Don't you believe me?'

'No! It's just that, well, you act so different when you're Chat.'

'I don't have to worry about what my father thinks, I guess. He's pretty strict about how I act in public and all that.'

'Yeah. And your hair's different, you know, messier.' Chat grins and ruffles his hair.

'This better?'

'Well, you look more like Adrien now, but it looks kinda weird with your mask and everything.' He rearrai=nges it back to its messy self.

'Hey, remember when there were those auditions for that music video with Clara Nightingale?'

'Oh, and we wore our suits?'

'Yeah, I can't believe we didn't recognise each other!'

'And we both tried to hide our masks?'

'Yeah, under the towels, right? I remember Plagg saying that people are blind. I suppose he was right.'

'Plagg?' I say confused, 'Oh, your kwami.'

'Yeah, he's lazy as. He hardly ever does anything unless he's bribed with camembert.'

'Oh, I don't know about that. When you lost your Miraculous, wait, no, you were turned into glitter by Style Queen, he seemed pretty eager to get out and about.'

'Huh. Usually, he hides in my rubbish bin wearing a dirty sock eating cheese.'

'Really?'

'Yeah.'

'Well, he also wiped out the dinosaurs, did he tell you that?'

'What?! You're kidding!'

'Nope.'

The next few hours pass with us chattering about almost everything - excuses, near-misses, villains, food, family, anime and even the uses of duct tape. Once it's about half twelve, we decide that we should probably get some sleep, so I use my Lucky Charm to summon some bedrolls again, but it seems to have upgraded us slightly to a double mattress with a duvet and pillows.

'This is better than last night I guess.' I say, plopping down on it.

'Yeah. At least there's a proper blanket. Last night I was a bit cold.' Chat says sitting down.