“You’ve got to be kidding me,” Nino grumbled as he twisted a dart between his fingertips. Alya let out a cruel laugh as she elbowed her husband.

    “How does it feel? You’re about to lose to a girl.”

     Luka and Marinette could only watch in amusement as Alya clearly beat Nino at hitting balloons with darts. Nino pouted and casted a glance towards the brunette.

    “Correction, I’m losing to a woman. There is a difference.”

     “Yeah.” Alya snorted. “The difference is I’m clearly the superior.”

   Nino threw the dart, and just barely hit a blue balloon. He threw his arms into the air over the small victory. Alya rolled her eyes but congratulated him.

    Marinette groaned and twisted her head to Luka. He wiggled his eyebrows as he offered her his hand.

   “Sometimes you just need to have a little bit of faith,” Luka remarked as if spewing some great life lesson.

    “I did have faith, just not in him,” Marinette replied with a huff. She took his hand and let the guitarist guide her away from the dart balloons.

      Marinette only bumped into a few shoulders, Luka cleared a path in front of her as he dragged her behind. His excitement was bursting at the seams. She couldn’t possibly fathom how he was so thrilled to win a bet.

      Underneath the tents, one table sat by itself with clear handmade signs leaning against it. Several little girls sat behind the table doing each other's hair. One looked up with big green eyes and smiled.

    “Hello, my name is Amelie. How can I help you?” She was the oldest of the group, but she didn’t look any older than nine or ten.

    Luka practically bounced in his spot as his eyes scanned the table. He pointed at a tin can and lifted his gaze to give a breathtaking smile.

   “I would like the can of popcorn, please.”

    Marinette had to reconvene for a second before she opened her purse, careful to angle it so that they couldn’t see Tikki. She pulled out a ten and passed it to Amelie.

     “Thank you so much!” Amelie beamed as she tucked the money into a box.
   
    “No, thank you.”  He nodded at her before guiding Marinette back to Luka. He playfully elbowed the bluenette. “And thank you for losing.”

     Marinette puffed her checks and elbowed him back. “I let you win.”

     “I’m sure you did.”

     You know those times when you're bored and time seems to still? Well, this wasn’t one of those times. It was kind of weird to Marinette because time seemed to stand still and rush past her all at once. And somehow, they didn’t cancel each other out. She barely had the chance to see the faces of the people she was passing as if they were rushing past her. But every little squeeze Luka’s hand gave around her caused her breath to catch and admire the feeling of their fingers intertwined.

       Alya and Nino both held a stuffed animal, but Alya’s orca was bigger than Nino’s wolf. But he honestly didn’t seem to be upset about it, he looked glad he one anything at all. 

    “I thought foxes were your favorite animal.” Marinette pointed out as she glanced back to see that there was in fact a fox stuffed animal hanging at the balloon darts stand.

    Alya shrugged as she patted the Orca’s head. “Yeah, but Ariana is going through an ocean animal phase.”

   Marinette’s amused gaze turned to Nino. “And what’s your story?”

    “It’s neither here nor there.” He tilted his head up like he had any spare pride. He cracked one of his eyes open and huffed.

Luka wiggled his fingers to catch Marinette’s attention. He leaned down to her ear, sending shivers down her spine as his cool breath fanned across the side of her face. “I don’t think there’s enough popcorn in here for us to watch them bicker all night long.”

     Marinette couldn’t hold back the very unladylike snort. She pressed a hand to her mouth, hiding her smile.

    It took some time, but finally the 4 of them agreed on something as a group. Alya bounced happily in her spot, one arm wrapped around Nino, and her free hand playing with strands of bluenette hair from Marinette’s loose ponytail.

  “Ladies first.” Luka smiled as he pulled back the black curtain of the photobooth.

    “Nino.” Marinette called.

   “You heard what the man said, ladies first.” Alya tagged in, holding back her laughter.

    Nino dramatically stepped past them to take a seat. The brunette looked up from his spot at Luka. “Pals before gals, am I right?”

    Before Luka had the chance to respond, Marinette had a hand over Nino’s mouth as Alya covered Luka’s ears. His icy blue eyes curiously watched the scene before him, not getting what the girls were trying to do.

   “Nino.” Alya hissed, struggling on her tippy-toes to keep her arms up. “Don’t ruin a perfectly fine guy. You can’t go teaching him these things, you’ll break him. Just like… well you had to be trained, but Luka is a prodigy from all men everywhere in a relationship to look up to! Don’t take that away from him.”

    Nino rolled his eyes as Alya entered the cramped room and sat on his lap. She patted the seat next to the and Marinette bit her lip. She adored Luka and any affection she could get from him, but no way was she going to sit in his lap. Nuh-uh.

     Marinette could feel his eyes on her as she stumbled past him to sit down. She looked up with innocent eyes, but he could see the spark of mischief behind them. She leaned back slightly and opened her arms.

   “Are you coming?”

    Luka could have sworn his heart stopped. This girl was going to kill him. She was just too amazing. He stared down at her, opening his mouth to speak, but she beat him to the chase.

   “Come on, I’m not fragile. I can take it.” The bluenette smiled as she jokingly flexed. Luka’s mouth went dry. Was it wrong to find her so alluring?

     With little hesitation, he sat on her lap and closed the curtain behind him. Alya tapped on the screen before them, and Marinette wrapped her arms around his waist.

    “Is this okay?” Her breath tickled his ear. Luka had to take a deep breath before offering a smile and a quiet yeah. Normally, he liked being the one to tease and give hugs from behind. He liked having control because that’s how he dealt with things. But Marinette had him wrapped around her finger, making him so desperately wish that she would be the big spoon some night. Weird, right? Just from a few little touches.

     “Okay, the screen will tell us the faces to make.” Alya pulled Luka out of his distressed but pleased train of thought.

    Only a minute or two later the four of them stumbled out from the booth. They had to do it twice to get 1 strip of pictures for everyone, but it was worth it. Marinette traced her fingers over hers as they walked around. She didn’t want to bend it by putting it in her purse, so she reached for her jacket that should have been wrapped around her waist.

    Key word: Should. She patted her hip for a second before it connected in her brain she didn’t have the jacket. Marinette looked down as if it would suddenly appear before sighing. She left it at Alya’s apartment.

   It was fine at first, it hadn’t been so cold to start with and the constant moving kept her blood pumping. But as the time passed, the sun began to settle under the horizon and her feet began to ache.

       Marinette tried her best to hide the fact she was cold. She fought back shivers and held one arm firmly at her side and the other twisted around Luka’s.  So why did Luka give her his jacket? She couldn’t determine if Luka had decided she was cold or if Alya had  stepped closer than she thought to whisper into her ear. Either way, she felt a little guilty that Luka was now exposed to chilly night air.

    It took Marinette a minute to realize that her friends had fallen silent and were whispering amongst themselves. Alya’s eyebrows were raised as she met bluebell eyes.

    “Come here, Mari.” Alya motioned for the bluenette, so she moved to her side. 

     Luka looked at the three of them. It was hard to understand what was going on in his head. He looked almost nervous, if his hands clenching and unclenching at his side meant anything. Which, in Marinette’s head, could just mean he was cold from losing an extra layer of clothing.

    “I have to go do something real quick.” Luka tried, but failed to speak normally. His words were rushed and the tips of his cheeks turned light shades of pink.

    “Are you feeling okay?” Marinette pondered, pressing the back of her hand to his forehead.

    A smile graced his lips as he moved her hand from his head, and pressed a kiss to her knuckled.

     “Never better.”

     Just those two words were enough to leave Marinette flustered. Alya wrapped their arms together, pulling Marinette away from Luka.

    “Come on girl, let’s go see what they’re playing.”

     Marinette narrowed her eyes at the smirk Alya wore. She didn’t trust it. Not even a little bit.

    But Nino coaxed Marinette into following his wife by pressing a hand to her shoulder and saying “Believe me, she doesn’t have anything bad planned.”

      Weaving their way through the gathering crowd the three managed to snatch a seat. There were at least a dozen rows of hay layed out, and they were quickly being filled. More people stood than sat at this point.

     “Psst.”

  Marienette looked up, pausing her complaints about the straw digging into her leggings. Wide brown eyes stared back at her.

   “Weylen?”

    The boy grinned, nodding enthusiastically. He jumped forward to hug her, causing the bluenette to throw a hand back to catch both of them. Laughing, Marinette patted his back. She pulled away to give him a questioning smile.

   “What are you doing here, buddy?”

  “Mama Rose wanted me to see-” Weylen was cut off as a hand slipped over his mouth. Slightly alarmed, Marinette’s head jerked up to see Captain Couffaine.

    “Hello, gurly. It’s nice to see you here. Mine if we sit next to ya?” She said, waving to the one spot open on Marinette’s right.

   “Please do.” Marinette moved her purse to between her feet, still holding onto Weylen. “So what brings you two here? Oh! Does Luka know you’re here? I’m sure he’s around here somewhere.” The bluenette looked around but didn’t see raven hair dyed blue anywhere.

     “Yeah, we ran into him earlier. We’re here to see Rose and Jueklea. They’re playing some songs tonight.”

      If Marinette’s attention wasn’t caught before, it sure was now. She couldn’t remember the last time she watched the said married couple perform. Gosh it had to have been at their graduation party.

    “That sounds exciting. Do you like music, Weylen?” Marinette focused her attention back on the over excited kid in her lap.

     “Yeah! I love singing with Mama Rose and Mama Juleka!”

     The lights darkened dramatically, causing the crowd to fall silent. Alya nudged Marinette and looked up to the stage with a smirk on her face.

     The bluenette followed her gaze. Her breath caught in her throat. Rose was bouncing her spot on the stage and beside her, Luka was staring back at the crowd.

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     Author's notes:
*awkward cough* so yeah, I'm still alive. I totally did't have this written two weeks ago and forget to post it.  Before you ask, idk why it took me so long to update. I totally didnt accidentally uninstall the app and forget about the story all together. However please do ask about Sk8 the Infinity. It's freaking amazing man.

   I kinda read through some of the begging chapters and dayum my writing style has changed a bit.

    Don't forget to comment and vote! I love hearing what you have to say! Have a great day/night!