Lila One-Shots

Exposed

The day had come. The day Marinette had been looking forward to since Lila came through the doors of the school for the first time. Lila had been exposed. It happened differently than she had imagined. Lila slipped up on one of her lies, causing a chain reaction when everyone began Googling her stories. Her mother was then called and Lila was expelled. She moved back to Italy and was placed in a mental facility for compulsive lying. Marinette listened to Adrien. He wanted her to take the high road, so she did. But she had to listen to the horrible things her "friends" said about her and Lila's threats. She was hurt. The threats and words that came out of Lila's mouth still in her mind, what her classmates said to her, and how everyone turned against her like that. So when her so-called friends went back to her, expecting forgiveness, she didn't know what to do.

"Marinette, I'm so sorry girl. We didn't know she was lying and we should've listened to you"
"We shouldn't have blamed it on jealousy"
"That wasn't cool of us"
"We were awful friends"
"I can't believe we fell for her lies"
"Could you forgive us?"

That last one caused a conflict in her mind. "These are your friends," she thought. "They wouldn't intentionally hurt you. They should be forgiven". But their words and actions replayed in her head. How hurt she was. How isolated she felt. How she wanted to give up, but knew she couldn't let down Paris. Her everyday internal struggles remembered, and the awful things Lila said to her.
"You're worthless"
"Adrien will never love you"
"Who do your friends believe? Oh right, me"
"You shouldn't have any friends"
"You're just a failure"
"A poor, worthless baker's daughter"

Those words ringing in her head, all because they didn't believe her. So when asked for forgiveness, she couldn't. She had made up her mind.

"Thank you for the apologies. I'm glad you believe me now, but I don't think I can forgive any of you right now."
"What?? Why?"
"Lila...," she tried to pick her words carefully, "Lila hurt me a lot. Most of the stuff she said was a lie, but there's one thing I remember that wasn't."
The class listened quietly
"She always talked about how... quickly my friends turned on me. How they were my friends one day and hated me the next, even with no proof. Right now, I can't forget that, or anything she said to me. And Adrien..."
She turned to face the blond model, "Thank you for believing me when nobody else did. But when you gave me the advice to take the high road, there was one thing you were wrong about. You said her lies weren't hurting anybody. You were wrong. They hurt me."

Marinette saw his face, slightly shocked but mostly ashamed. But she didn't feel bad. She turned to face the group again.
"I'm glad you now know the truth. But forgiveness won't be easy. I thought you guys would have my back, but you all just turned on me. I need to go process everything that happened today so I'll see you on Monday."
With that, she turned and left the classroom with her stuff and went home.

oOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoOoO

Everyone in the class was quiet for a few minutes. Until Alya broke the silence.
"We really messed up, didn't we."
"I... I didn't know Lila hurt her. I regret telling her to take the high road.." Adrien replied
"Wait... YOU KNEW LILA WAS A LIAR??" Alix shouted
"Y-yeah" Adrien quietly said
"Why didn't you tell us??" Alya asked angrily
"Marinette tried but you didn't believe her. If I had tried, Lila could've ruined me too. My father could have taken me out of school or the brand could've been ruined. I wanted to help her, but I didn't know Lila hurt her..."
"Wow. We REALLY messed up" Kim retorted sadly

"We lost our everyday Ladybug"