"Why did you do that?" Ladybug bemoans, her hands press against the torn leather of Chat's left shoulder, trying to ignore the uncomfortable warmth spreading under her fingers.

The fight was won, but the bear-like Akuma had done its damage outside the abilities of the 'Miraculous Ladybug' cure-all. The second Ladybug had her yo-yo back in her hand, she whisked Chat off to a graveled rooftop and laid him out.

"We got her, didn't we?" Chat smiles, shrugging his unscathed shoulder, "You know I'm always ready to take one for the team." He winces at the pain but tries to hide it from her, failing to do so.

The corner of her mouth turns down as similar memories come to mind. "I know." She responds disapprovingly.

"I can feel it healing already, you know. You don't have to hold me together like that," he says truthfully, the throbbing he had felt upon the initial gash was much less intense now.

"It might help." She insists, readjusting herself so she's kneeling next to him, but she does notice less blood dripping from the wound.

Chat reaches his right hand towards hers, encircling her wrist and easing her off of him. He kisses the back of her hand before tugging on her arm invitingly.

She resists until she's satisfied with the scab forming under her other hand. They didn't have much time left until they de-transform, so Ladybug complies, laying down next to Chat under the crook of his right arm. Her head rests on his good shoulder while her one hand stays on his healing wound.

They breathe together, ignoring the sounds of the resumed traffic below, focusing on the birds and the sky above them.

"Miraculous Healing won't save you from all injuries, you know." She cautions in a low voice, her face tilts up towards his.

He can tell that all joking has left her tone, he knows he owes her a serious response, "I know." He swears softly, wrapping his right arm tighter around her shoulders. "I... the Akuma was heading for you, it was just instinct for me. You would have ended up worse than this- if you wanna talk about 'injuries that Miraculous Healing won't fix'." He says grimly, letting his mind take him to that imagined reality where he didn't intervene. He squeezes his eyes shut.

"I can handle myself. Who's to say what would have happened." She reminds him.

Chat sighs, kissing the top of her head, "Like I said, instinct." He banishes the dark alternate realities from his mind as best he can.

Ladybug struggles with similar images, more tragic than today's outcome. "I can't lose you, instinct or not." She practically whispers, just loud enough for Chat to hear. "I was hoping you'd be more careful once we started dating."

He smiles slightly sadistically, sitting both of them up, "I would have done anything to protect you when we were just friends, M'lady; now that we're dating..." he kisses her forehead, "heaven nor hell could stop me from saving you."

Ladybug trembles internally from the thought, but can also relate to the core of the sentiment.

Their Miraculous beep, making Ladybug smile half-heartedly, "Well, there's the one thing that can stop you." She kisses his cheek before sliding out from under his arm.

Chat sighs dramatically, "I guess." She stands and holds out her hand to help him to his feet, which he accepts. When he rises, he towers over her, leaving no space between them. "But, even in your civilian form, I will always find you, don't worry."

She tilts her head back and shakes her head, "How would you know who I am?" She scrunches her nose in mocking disbelief.

He dips down to capture her lips in his for a brief knee-buckling kiss, before he whispers "Instinct" into the warm space between them. He then vaults away with a wink.

It's dazed moments like this in which Ladybug regrets insisting that they remain nescient of their identities, one of the conditions she had made when she finally gave into Chat. He was elated when Ladybug admitted her feelings for him, he accepted the conditions without a second thought. Of course he wanted to know her identity and to tell her his real name, but for now he was happy to romance her as Chat. She was surprised he accepted her rules in the moment, but was glad of it. Was.

Her love was a flame that lived in her chest. It had shrunk and retreated after forcing her crush on Adrien far out of her mind. But upon killing her affections for Adrien, she found that a small, hopeful flame was still alive; a single lit candle in her heart, equally on the cusp of growing or extinguishing entirely. And it didn't burn for Adrien, but for her partner in black.

Chat was more than eager to tend to this flame upon her admission of its existence.

And today, a chorus of candles burned within her for Chat, a flame that occasionally scorched her for setting the rule against revealing their identities. She thought solely seeing each other as their alter-egos would be enough; she couldn't imagine wanting him more than she respected the ancient rules of the Miraculous.

She was proven wrong.

Admitting this to herself was hard enough, let alone how her pride would make it even harder for her to admit this to Chat. It would reveal her short-sightedness, her hubris, and, more importantly, how deep her love ran for him.

She imagines a faceless boy holding her hand -as Marinette- at the park, in her living room... when her Miraculous beeps.

She gasps, bringing herself back to the present.

~

Senior year was going as expected; the entire class took on a laid-back demeanor that would last the entire school year. Universities were chosen and the first cool breeze of autumn had settled around Paris like water through a stream.

Change was in the air.

Alya pulls up another prom dress on her phone, "-But I like this one because the neck isn't as swoopy as the other one, but the color isn't good, looks like a wedding dress" she tilts her screen towards Marinette as they sit waiting for class to start.

"Isn't it a bit early to be looking at prom dresses?" She smirks at her enthusiastic friend.

Alya rolls her eyes, "I've got to claim a dress early so I can't be blamed if someone else wears the same one as me."

Mari accepts this, looking at the dress again, "I can dye it for you if you really want that one, and you can pick whatever color you want." She offers, given she's dyed a couple store bought items of her own to make custom designs.

Alya gasps, "Really?! That would be so amazing, it really opens my search up." She opens a new tab as Nino slides into his seat, kneeling on the seat to face Alya.

"Good morning, Mon Coeur. Still looking for the perfect dress?" He eyes her phone, which she quickly tucks away.

"Yes, but you know I don't want you watching me look." She playfully flicks the rim of his hat.

He laughs, "I know, I'm just curious about what I have to look forward to in the Spring."

"You'll just have to wait." She chides. "Speaking of prom," she turns to Marinette, "you better start looking for a date now if you want one by Spring." She half-jokes, but Mari can sense a part of her is very serious.

The image of herself, dressed in a gown of her own design, swirling along the dance floor with Chat Noir flashes in her mind. She stops herself before the dreamy look in her eye becomes obvious to Alya. She clears her throat, "I... don't worry about me. I'll figure something out by then." She says assuredly.

"Figure what out?" Adrien cuts in as he finds his seat in their quad.

Alya gives a tight-lipped response, "Who are you going to take to prom, Adrien?" She asks, clearly pushing the subject on him and not answering his innocent inquiry. Marinette nudges her with her knee under the table, a signal Alya came to realize meant 'be nice'.

His eyes widen for a split second as the focus shifts to him, "Prom? Uh, I'm not sure I'll be able to go. My father usually packs my weekends in the spring with photo shoots." He shrugs half-heartedly, turning to face the front of the room.

"Bro, he has to let you go." Nino bumps his shoulder, "I know your dad isn't the most... accommodating dude, but come on."

He shrugs again, "I'll bring it up when the time comes."

"He has to let you go-" Marinette speaks up, causing Adrien to turn back around, "-if you want to go." She finishes less strong.

He cracks an appreciative smile, "I do want to go, but...things are complicated right now." His smile fades from the corners of his mouth.

"With your dad?" Alya infers.

He hesitantly nods, "There's other factors too, ones more out of my control." His gaze softens as his eyes fall into the negative space between his friends.

"Well you know me, I'll help ya the best I can." Nino offers energetically, bringing Adrien's focus back.

Mr. Panore then calls everyone's attention, starting class.

As the lesson drones on, Marinette's mind drifts back to Adrien; not in the way it would have a few years ago, but in general curiosity. 'What other factors would be keeping him from prom? Ones he can't control? A date?' Her eyebrows turn up at her notebook.

She had made a deal with herself last year, one that she also told her close girl friends about to hold her accountable. She decided that if nothing happened between Adrien and her by the end of their junior year, she would give up on him. Rose told her that she shouldn't give up; she was the most vocal, but everyone else agreed that Marinette should remain hopeful. As it was the summer before their senior year, Mari rationalized that if something were to happen between them romantically, it would happen before that summer. If nothing happened, then it wasn't meant to be.

They all had their points and arguments but Marinette put her foot down. "I want to be able to enjoy this summer, and our senior year, without constantly being distracted by the idea of Adrien. We don't have that much longer together, and I don't want to spend it on schemes and set ups and all that stuff. We can have some real fun."

The girls respected her wishes when the final school bell rang and her and Adrien were still just friends. It didn't hurt as much as Marinette thought it would, maybe because it was on her own terms that she decided it was the end.

She would lay in bed at night and will herself into only seeing Adrien as a friend, trying to focus on his kindness and how lucky she was to even have him as a friend. It wasn't without a few tears along the way, but the deed was accomplished within a week of tear stained pillows. On that last night, she discovered a fondness for Chat that had been buried under her infatuation for Adrien. It wasn't a rebound crush, it had been there all along, just unexplored, hidden.

And now she lays in bed, wishing Chat were there beside her.

She surprises herself as a small curious smile pulls on the corner of her lips. She genuinely hopes Adrien has a date in mind, even if 'it's complicated'. She wishes him the same happiness that she feels when she's with Chat.

The bell catches her off guard. Alya nudges her as an additional precaution to snap her from her daydream. Marinette nods appreciatively anyway, slowly gathering her things, not in a rush since she had a free period next; a perk of packing her schedule for three years so she could have an easy senior year.

Alya, Nino, and Adrien take their leave, "See ya at lunch" Mari promises her friends as they hurry off to their next class.

She stands and zips her backpack closed, but is startled by the sudden shattering of glass to her right. Her muscles contract as if bracing herself for the stray shards of glass that she feels graze across her arms and cheek.

The second the glass settles, she whirls to face the broken windows, but is instantly blindsided as a black band collides with her face. She's thrown back into her seat as the band constricts around the back of her head, covering her eyes and blindfolding her.

Screams from Mr. Panore and the other students in the classroom ring out in sequence. Mari claws at the thick vinyl band, struggling to at least get her fingers underneath it to pull it off, but quickly realizes it's impossible.

"There," A voice cackles to her right and slightly above her, "justice is blind and so are you. Now you won't see what I will do." She says in rhythm, laughing as she seemingly flies back out the broken window.

Marinette hears the growing commotion outside the room, people must have seen what happened through the open door. An announcement comes over the PA system, "Attention students, please find your way to your Akuma check-in stations in a calm and orderly fashion."

The students were used to this by now. After the first couple months of Akuma attacks the school created an evacuation and a lockdown system for students, much like how schools would practice fire drills.

Marinette leaves her backpack, as a growing anxiousness climbs up her throat, and carefully slides out of her seat, keeping her hands on the desk to feel her way around with the band still tight around her head and eyes. She hears the teacher and remaining students fumble their way towards the door, followed by the smash of glass echoing across the atrium, and a collective gasp and the sound of running. Obvious that the 'orderly fashion' has broken.

Marinette makes her way to the doorframe of the classroom; she takes a step out but is immediately spun around by the now frenzied crowds. A cheerful cackling is heard above the student body.

She skids and slides across the floor, bracing her head as people run around and over her. When the floor stops vibrating from hurried feet, she rises to her knees, reaching blindly along the floor, trying to at least find a wall or some landmark. But she's quickly trampled by straggling inattentive students or students who have also been blindfolded by the Akuma. She pulls her extremities in towards her center and starts crawling in the direction she's facing, hoping to at least get out of the middle of the walkway.

Sure enough, her head rams into a brick wall.

She clutches her head and scoots herself against the wall. She considers transforming into Ladybug, but she can't be sure if anyone is watching her, and she can't pinpoint her location accurately enough to find a vacant hiding place.

Her hands start to shake as she sits with her back against the cool brick. The school has settled, most people hiding or blindfolded. "Try to look at me, lose your ability to see." The Akuma warns, seemingly floating around the atrium menacingly. She stops, something catching her attention, "Up in the rafters like a bat, but all I see is a cat!"

There's the sound of an impact and a familiar grunt, followed by a thud only a few feet away from Marinette. She jumps, feeling the force of the landing through the floor, not expecting it so close to her.

She crawls hastily towards the source, her fingers brushing against someone in leather. "Chat?" She whispers, but is already certain, wrapping her hand around his wrist worryingly.

He groans, propping himself up on his elbows, "Ladybug?" He asks, disoriented.

She hesitates, "A-are you blindfolded too?" She replies in a whisper, not sure who's close by, listening.

"Yeah. Is it you?" He pushes, needing confirmation.

Marinette bites her lip, unsure. After a moment of panic, she lifts his hand to her face and nods 'yes' in response.

Chat feels her response but keeps his hand there. His touch relaxes and caresses her cheek. She finds herself automatically leaning into his palm. "It is you." He says even quieter, but Marinette can tell he's closed most of the distance between them. His thumb traces just under her eye, "You're not transformed," he realizes, breathless at the thought of being so close to Ladybug in her civilian form.

She nods again, then in the same low voice, barely audible to Chat who is now inches from her, "I can't see if we're being watched, if someone will see me change."

His hand lingers thoughtfully. "I'll be right back." He promises, touching his forehead to her before suddenly leaving her side.

Her arms reflexively reach out for him, meeting only air and the cold tile floor. Mari reels herself back in, sitting back on her heels.

A scream peels out from below, the Akuma probably running into a few students she missed. Marinette feels the urge to go help, to stop this Akuma in her tracks, but she knows it will be fruitless at this moment.

"Ch-" she starts but cuts herself off, not wanting to draw unwanted attention. Biting her tongue she waits, listening to the scuffling around her, wondering which is coming from Chat.

A hand touches her shoulder, causing her to jump. The hand soothes her, "M'lady, it's me." He scoots closer so their knees are touching. "I found the staircase over there, meaning we're on the north east wall of the school." He lifts her hand and points it in the direction of the staircase he scouted.

With this information she's quickly able to picture her relative location. Her heart slows, "There's a closet on the north wall, I can change in there." She moves her arm to point in the direction that should lead to the hiding place.

"I'll make sure you get there then I'll distract the Akuma." Chat internalizes the direction she's pointing. "We should stay low for now." He reaches back and places the tip of his tail in her hand. "Let's go."

Mari grips the leather of his tail and starts crawling according to the map in her head. Chat follows and occasionally takes the lead to ensure a wide berth around the stairs descending somewhere to their left.

Other students also block their way, she whispers a quick "Sorry" before crawling around them, trying to stay on track.

Her fingers finally bump the edge of the north wall. She extends her reach in both directions; her lean to the left exposing the recess of a doorframe. She scoots in that direction, Chat following behind. She kneels in front of the door, feeling both sides of the frame, confirming its thinner width that she knew the closet was. "This is it." She drops Chat's tail and slides her hand up the wooden door until her knuckles hit the cold metal handle.

She pulls the door open to the wafting scent of cleaning supplies, and slips inside. But Chat grabs the door's edge before she can close it. "Wait, how are we going to beat this Akuma? Should we have a plan?" He asks, halfway in the cupboard with her.

"I'm hoping my Lucky Charm will kinda show me what to do." She admits, slightly ashamed for not having thought of anything else.

"Good enough for me." He trusts. His hand fumbles for her shoulder again before following her collarbone back to her cheek. Marinette can feel the warmth of his hand through his glove. His thumb swipes under her eye again, sighing thoughtfully at the absence of her mask. His voice comes out smoothly, despite the whisper, "And you... whoever you really are, are more than enough."

Her heart aches, feeling his candor dripping from his words. Even blindfolded she can picture his expression, his eyes. If eyes were the windows to the soul, then Chat's were the unlatched windows of a cottage on the edge of a sprawling meadow. She breathed easier when gazing into their depths. But her imagination didn't hold a candle compared to seeing them in person. The ever shifting, unique, landscape of the meadow behind his eyes is impossible to replicate in memory or otherwise. Every single blade of grass dancing behind his eyelids brings a nuance to his face every time she looks at him.

She then drifts to the inevitable thought of his lips. The air between them has grown heavy in the seconds since Chat's admission. She follows the sound of his voice to perfectly line her lips up to his. He doesn't seem surprised by this advancement despite his own lack of sight. She can feel his smile as he kisses her back, lingering and letting himself forget everything outside this cupboard for a few blissful moments.

Mari notices she's impulsively pulling Chat deeper into the closet with her, with Chat willingly following. She breaks away, taking a deep breath and is suddenly aware of how fast her heart is beating. "Chat..." she exhales.

"I know," He resigns, but she can hear the smile in his voice. "Duty calls." He jokes, kissing her nose before backing out of the closet and shutting the door for her.

She hears him take quick steps away from the closet. "Hey! Dr. Seuss!" He chides, already on the west side of the school.

Marinette exhales sharply, as if resetting her system after that brief lapse. "Spots on." She whispers, standing up in the tight closet space. The flash of her transformation lights the shelf of spray bottles briefly before leaving her in the dark again, not that she notices anything besides the blindfold still firmly adhered to her face.

She sighs, half hoping it would come off with her transformation. Not letting that thought bother her, she tosses her yo-yo up to where it hits the ceiling. It bounces back with her lucky charm, a box with something rattling inside.

She pops the lid and reaches in, her fingers sifting through quarter-sized plastic confetti? No, something about this has a nostalgic feeling to it. She picks up one of the pieces and holds it between her thumb and forefinger. Smooth plastic, thin but with a rounded face and a flat one. She shakes it, its hollow, something rattling inside.

Then it clicks, "Googly eyes?" she says aloud in astonishment, though she was sure of it. She dips her hand back into the box, which is about 8 inches square, no doubt filled with hundreds of this child's craft supply.

Would the Akuma really fall for this? Her lucky charm never steered her wrong before.

She pulls the backing off of a pair and adheres them on the blindfold, hoping the eyes don't look as goofy as she figured they would.

With the box under her arm, she presses her ear to the door, hearing Chat on the first floor, running back and forth.

She cracks her door open and steps out. She closes the door and flattens her back against it, orienting her mental map of the second floor. Logically, she knew if she walked straight ahead, she would run into the railing and not down tumble down the stairs, but it still was a possibility.

Chat grunts in surprise and Ladybug hears him hit the floor. "Your chances of winning are as thin as cloth; I will take your Miraculous and hand it to Hawkmoth!" The Akuma cackles.

"Hey!" Ladybug rushes forward until relief sweeps over her as her hand grasps the railing in front of her. "Up here!"

She can hear the air move, the Akuma's voice coming from much closer ahead of her. "I see that you can see, let me take care of that for free."

"I'm not the only one keeping my eye on you." Ladybug warns before emptying the box of googly eyes in a sweeping motion in front of her. The light tapping of hundreds of eyes falling to the first floor almost sounds like rain.

The Akuma gasps, "Look away! Look away! No one must watch me play!" The air moves and Ladybug hears the clattering of the googly eyes being impacted.

After a moment there's another impact, this time between two bodies, followed by the Akuma squealing, "Noooo!"

Chat grunts and something snaps.

Luckily her yo-yo knows where to go and snatches the butterfly from the air, cleansing it. "Miraculous Ladybug!" She throws the box into the air, and the blindfolds evaporate off everyone's face.

She blinks roughly at the sudden light, rubbing her eyes to ease them into focusing. When the image finally clears, she watches dozens of students slowly get to their feet, also waiting for their eyes to adjust.

She looks below her and sees Chat helping a child to her feet, the Akuma victim. She only seems to be about five years old.

Ladybug leaps off the railing and lands next to her partner. He smiles warmly at her appearance, "I'm going to help Alexis here find her parents; she says she was playing in the park across the street."

She nods, "I'll make sure everyone here is okay."

He takes the little girl's hand, but turns back to whisper to Ladybug, "Will I see you tonight? For patrol, I mean." He corrects, not wanting to sound out of line.

But Ladybug hangs on his first statement, imagining an emphasis where there wasn't one, at least intentionally: 'Will I see you tonight?' The real you. She could see it in his eyes, a pleading honesty just waiting to be trusted. It had always been there, the single constant in the meadow, whether or not Chat himself knows about it.

The kid pulls on Chat's hand, breaking his gaze on Ladybug. He follows the kid's lead, shooting back a sympathetic smile which Ladybug returns. "Yes" She mouths.

He turns and does a half skip as he walks the child out of the school.

~

The sun has set over Paris, a chill has been brought from its disappearance. Adrien transforms in his bedroom and is just about to leap out his window when he gets a message from Ladybug on his communicator. "'Meet me here'" He reads aloud, touching the coordinates sent below. A waypoint superimposes itself on his map, and he raises an eyebrow. He recognizes the street corner.

It doesn't take long till he arrives, balancing on the corner of the railing of Ladybug's rooftop meeting place. "Why the change in venue, M'lady?" He crouches, watching her stand at the opposite corner of the balcony. This isn't Chat's first time here, but he's not sure Ladybug knows that. He has visited Marinette on this rooftop on more than one occasion, and has played video games with her in her bedroom below as Adrien.

Ladybug turns slowly to gaze at him, as if she hadn't noticed his arrival. Her tiny innocent smile is enough to ease Chat's curiosity on its own. "No one's home and I like the view from here." She shrugs, technically not lying to him.

He rises and walks along the railing like a tightrope. Jumping down, he lands right in front of her. Running his knuckle under her chin, his face inches from hers, "I like this view more" he breathes, eyes locked with hers.

Ladybug's mind struggles to stay on the path she mentally prepared for since this afternoon. She had planned to recite a loose script of sorts, to ensure she gets to say everything on her mind; but being here with Chat makes all her planning fly out the window.

She blushes, dropping her head and taking his hands in hers, focusing her eyes there instead. "T-thanks for helping me during that attack earlier. I couldn't... I was so disoriented."

He squeezes her hands, "I'm just glad I could help."

She shakes her head as if he's missing the point. "Then... you said I was enough, whoever I am under this mask" she chokes out, tight lipped.

"I've always felt that way, ever since I met you" he professes, lightly kissing the top of her head. "Is something wrong?" He infers from her form and motionless stance.

Her eyes stay locked on their hands, "No, I don't think so. The whole situation just got me thinking, but honestly it was stuff I already had on my mind the past couple weeks, but it reinforced it, so that's why I called you here, is what I'm trying to say-" She catches her breath, realizing she was rambling.

"And what exactly has been on your mind, M'lady?" He asks in a non-judgmental way, patient.

She swallows the lump in her throat, "J-just how much I trust you, how much you mean to me..." she rests her cheek on his shoulder, knowing if she looks him in the eye she'll fall apart. "I know we couldn't see each other during the Akuma attack, but in that closet, being that close to you as my civilian self, it just felt different."

Chat wraps his arms behind her waist, his brows furrowing slightly, "Different how?" A hint of worry shadowing his words.

She keeps her eyes down, "Different in that it was more real. Like, when I was younger, I never imagined my first kiss to happen with me and the guy both wearing masks and spandex" she smirks, "So even if you didn't see me as my civilian self, that kiss felt closer to what I imagined as a kid, because I was myself, and I could almost picture you the same way. Does that make sense?"

He pulls her closer, leaving no space between them, "I think I felt that too." He chuckles to himself, "For me, it was like confirming that you really do exist outside being Ladybug. Which is almost unbelievable; that you're real and I get to hold you in my arms."

His steady heartbeat tempers hers as she attempts to breathe evenly. "I am real. And real people make mistakes" she admits softly.

She feels his breathing falter for a split second. "Mistakes?" The worry is more plain in his tone.

She holds him tighter as if to reassure him before she can get the words out. "Yes. Mistakes. I... when I said I was ready to date you, I gave conditions. One being that we wouldn't reveal our identities to each other-"

"I swear I was blindfolded this afternoon," Chat defends himself, "I didn't see you until the very end, I don't know your identity." He swears, worried that Ladybug believes there was some breach in their agreement after this afternoon.

She reaches up and tucks her hand in his hair along the nape of his neck, "I know I know," she calms him, "I'm the one who made the mistake, back at the start of summer."

He pulls back from her, trying to catch her eye. "I don't understand." He replies anxiously, starting to think this is the end of their relationship.

She hears the slight panic in his voice; finally meeting his eyes she shakes her head, "I take it back, my condition, my rule, whatever we called it, I take it back." She says earnestly, watching the frantic look in Chat's eyes change to confusion then to hope.

His eyebrow quirks up, "So... what you're saying is..." his lips slowly turn into a smirk, wanting her to say it.

Ladybug rolls her eyes out of habit. She says the words slowly and carefully, "I'm saying... I want to show you who I am, and I want to know who you are because..."

"Yes...?" Chat prompts her to continue, pulling their bodies flush again, hands on her hips.

She bites her lip, realizing what she's about to say and do, and wanting to do it before she thinks about it too hard. All or nothing. She takes a breath, keeping her eyes on him, "Because-" she drops her transformation, "-I love you, Chat Noir".

Chat's mind struggles to process everything that just happened, as if the flash of light stunned him but it's really everything else that has put him into a frozen state. His mouth hangs agape, twitching as he tries to form a sentence, let alone coherent thought.

Marinette wants to shift under his stare but forces herself to hold her ground, not letting herself react until Chat responds.

He takes a shaky breath, manually reminding himself to breathe as he too realizes what he's about to do.

He whispers in a clear voice, "I love you too-" he de-transforms, "-Marinette."

It's then Marinette's turn to go into shock.

She breaks her gaze to examine their bodies still wound together, his arms around her waist, her hand still tucked in his blond hair, Chat's hair. It then drops to his left shoulder.

The vault in her mind where she shut all her feelings away for Adrien sprung open, lighter fluid for the flame she held for Chat; a flame she didn't know could burn brighter, but is happily mistaken as she stands on her toes to kiss Adrien Agreste.

Their lips touch briefly before Adrien lifts her onto the railing, sitting her down there while keeping his arms securely around her. Her arms drape around his shoulders to continue what she started.

The urgency that usually accompanied their kisses was gone, replaced with a tenderness that felt like coming home. No one was running off to fight an Akuma, no one was in fear of revealing a secret identity, no one was going anywhere.

Adrien presses his forehead to hers as they catch their breath, whispering, "I think I understand why you had me meet you here now." He smirks, a smirk that used to remind Marinette of Chat, and now she understands why.

Her heart thrums in her chest like a hummingbird. A tear slips from her eye, "You're everything I've ever wanted."

He slides her off the railing, carefully setting her down, "You're everything I'll ever need." He vows, his own heart pounding, wondering if it will ever come back down to a natural pace. "So-" he clears his throat, "about prom..."

Marinette laughs, the idea of prom seems so trivial and mundane compared to this moment. "Yes." She replies to the unasked question, "A thousand times yes" she swears, kissing his cheek softly.

He chuckles, gazing at her incredulously, "I guess that wasn't so complicated after all."