❛love letters ❜ (finished)

꒰ ׂ ۪three ⪩⪨

'Dear Marinette, you're beautiful. In an intimidating way. I love it. From Cat Noir.'

"Look!"

Adrien peers up tiredly from his textbook. He's been trying to figure out his chemistry homework for the past hour, but it's not set in as well as he'd hoped. Then again, staring at the paper without lifting his pen probably had something to do with it.

Marinette shoves something in his face, and it takes Adrien no longer than three seconds to recognize it. In her hand was an only slightly ruffled piece of paper with bolded font typed out. His letter. "What's that? The letter?" he asks, running his hands through his hair repeatedly so that his hands aren't idle.

"Listen!" Marinette exclaims, plopping down in the seat next to him. He's in one of the common rooms around the dorms on campus, and there's an unsurprising lack of people there.

"'Dear Ladybug, you're beautiful, My Lady. In an intimidating way. I love it.'" She slams the paper down into Adrien's lap, dislodging his textbook. He catches it before it falls. "He loves it. I'm 'intimidating'."

"You're beautiful, also, if my eyes don't deceive me," he adds, squinting his eyes at the paper and glancing back at her. "I don't see it, personally, but—"

Marinette shoves his shoulder and yanks the paper out of his hand. "That's so—"

"Kidding," Adrien says, rolling his eyes and wrapping his arm around her shoulder. "You are beautiful. This guy seems to know what he's talking about. Any clue who it is?"

"He doesn't really drop any hints, what with the 'From Cat Noir' thing. What does that even mean? And he never references any classes or common interests we may have." She fiddles with one corner of the letter idly, and Adrien lets his gaze rest on her face—on the tiny shadow her eyelashes create on her high cheekbones, which are that adorable shade of red"Don't stare at me like I'm a science experiment!" Marinette shoulders him, rolling her eyes. "Just because I'm showing interest in someone, or whatever."

"You're interested?" Adrien asks, definitely too quickly.

Marinette raises an eyebrow and shrugs one shoulder. "Why not? He is."

"Plenty of people are," Adrien mutters. "Everyone likes you."

"Apparently not you, at this present moment," Marinette says, leaning down so she can get a better look at him. "Everything alright?" There is was. That genuine and heartfelt concern for others.

"Fine," he answers, trying not to make the answer as short as it is. Marinette narrows her eyes and gives him a once-over. "Look, I'm sorry. Just stressed about chemistry."

Marinette looks down at the work in his lap, like she hadn't noticed it before. Maybe she hadn't. "I'll help."

"You don't have to," Adrien tells her, but it would be nice. Marinette's the perfect teacher for him—one that he didn't require and wouldn't notice him pretending to not understand the Periodic Table.

"I want to," Marinette responds earnestly, smiling at him. Adrien turns away first and tries to act like his mouth hasn't gone cotton dry.

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