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From the first day he meets Ladybug, Adrien feels something growing inside his chest.
At first, it feels like a promise—a warm bud of light just waiting for its time to finally bloom.
Then one day, it bursts to life inside him like the first spark of a fire.
Adrien collapses to his knees, coughing and wheezing. Everything burns—his chest, his throat, his eyes. His lungs feel crowded, his throat swollen. He can barely breathe.
“What’s happening to me?” he rasps to Plagg. He falls into another fit of coughing.
That’s when the first petal appears.
He stares at it, blood red against his bedroom floor.
The rose in the vase on his empty dinner tray is pink, not red.
“Adrien?” Plagg asks, hovering anxiously over him. “You okay?”
His lungs squeeze and burn. He coughs again, and this time, he catches the petals in his hands.
They’re smooth as silk. Like the rose he offered Ladybug just an hour earlier.
The rose she turned away.
“I don’t understand,” he says. “Did the akuma do this? I don’t—I don’t remember being hit. And wouldn’t the miraculous ladybugs have fixed it?”
“I don’t think that’s it.”
“What else could it be? This is obviously some kind of magic.”
“Yeah.” Plagg looks grim. “And not the good kind.”
More coughing. More petals. “What do you mean?”
Plagg sighs. “I’ve been around a long time, kid. I’ve seen this before. I thought this kind of magic died out a long time ago, but I guess that was only because the miraculous were inactive for so long.”
“I don’t understand.”
“One of my holders was from Japan. She called it hanahaki. It’s the disease of unrequited love. When you love someone who doesn’t love you back, the flowers grow in your lungs. Sounds cheesy, I know. But … this really isn’t something to laugh about.”
Adrien freezes. Plagg thinks it’s serious? Plagg says it’s no laughing matter?
Oh no.
“Well, what do I do? Go to the doctor, I guess?” Adrien grimaces. He was not looking forward to that conversation with his father.
“Normal doctors can’t do anything,” Plagg says. “Not even the Guardian can do anything for you. There’s only one cure.”
Adrien coughs again. Red petals flutter to the floor. “And what’s that?”
For once, Plagg’s eyes look as old as he actually is.
“She has to love you back."
“You okay, dude?” Nino asks. “You’ve been hacking up a lung lately.”
“Fine.” Adrien sets down his lunch tray and tucks his face into his collar while he coughs, trying to catch the petals in his shirt.
“That doesn’t sound good,” Alya chimes in. “Got a cold or something?”
“Or something.” Adrien stands. “Be right back.”
He speed-walks to the bathroom, breaking into a run before he reaches the door. The walls of his chest burn, throat contracting as another coughing fit seizes him. He collapses in front of a toilet, wheezing, and watches the bowl fill up with red.
“You’ve got it bad, kid,” Plagg whispers.
When he finally makes it back, Marinette has joined Nino and Alya at the lunch table.
“H-hi, Adrien,” she says quickly. “How can I feel you? I mean—how are you feeling?”
“I’m okay. Thanks.” He offers a smile and slips into place beside Nino.
“Oh, um, great!” She looks kind of flushed—almost feverish—but she smiles back readily, ducking her head.
They finish their lunch, and Adrien manages to swallow down another burning urge to cough. Then Marinette falls into a fit of her own.
“Aw, Adrien, you infected my bestie!” Alya teases. “She’s been coughing all week too. Keep your fancy rich-people germs away from us peasantfolk.”
“Sorry,” he says automatically, but Marinette shakes her head, face still buried in her hands, until the coughing finally subsides.
“I’m fine.” Her lips curve, but Adrien has modeled long enough to tell a real smile from a fake one. She keeps her hands curled into tight fists in her lap for the rest of lunch.
When it’s time to go, he moves extra slowly, pretending to adjust the strap of his bag. Alya and Nino are already halfway across the room, but Marinette is crouched over her bag with her back to him.
“Um, Marinette?”
She straightens, another thin smile plastered on her face. “Yes?”
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
Her expression softens, somewhere between warm and wistful.
“Yeah. I’m okay,” she says. “Thanks.”
She turns to follow the others, and for a moment he just watches her leave while his stomach tightens and his throat burns.
There’s something small and bright on the floor where she’d been standing. He stoops to get a closer look. Pinches it between his fingers.
A flower petal, sunshine yellow.
Adrien surveys the rooftop. Everything is perfect: the candles, the pillows, the rose petals (which almost seemed like a waste to buy, but he was not about to decorate with flowers he coughed up).
Today is the day. The day it all ends. (The day it begins.) His lungs don’t even burn now. He sits down on a blanket and watches the horizon for a red silhouette.
Hours pass. Darkness settles over him as the sun sinks behind the rooftops. The candles blaze on resolutely, and soon the burning in his chest returns to match.
She’s not coming.
Slowly, he blows out each one, reciting as he goes. “She loves me a little. A lot. Madly. Not at …”
He stares down at the tiny flame of the last candle, and he can’t bring himself to snuff it out. At last, the burning in his throat is too much, and he doubles over while petals pour from his mouth to join the ones already strewn over the rooftop.
He lifts his head. There’s a light ahead of him. A lone figure, standing on a balcony. Marinette.
His chest still burns, and he can’t stand to be alone tonight. So he goes.
He hears coughing when he gets a little closer. He drops onto a chimney stack, and she whirls around.
“Chat Noir?”
“Sorry,” he says quickly. “I didn’t mean to frighten you. Would—”
He spots yellow flower petals scattered around her feet.
“Oh, sorry!” She tries to brush them away with her foot. “I was just, um, planting some—”
“—buttercups?” He looks around. “But where are the flowers? And the pot?”
“Oh, um, I—”
“You too?” he asks softly.
She blinks. “What?”
“You’re sick, aren’t you?” He drops down to the balcony. “You’re sick because you love someone and … they don’t love you back.”
She stares back at him breathlessly.
“You know?”
He nods. “It’s red roses for me.”
She looks down. “Oh. I’m sorry to hear that.”
An ache joins the burning in his chest, and he wishes there was something he could do to make her better. All this time, she’d been hurting just like he was.
He offers a hand. “Come with me.”
When they land, Marinette’s eyes widen at the sight of the rooftop, still adorned with hundreds of rose petals.
He sweeps into a bow. “It’s my pleasure to be your knight to the ball this evening. Would you do me the honor of a dance, princess?”
She giggles and offers a curtsy. He grabs her hand and draws her close, and then they’re turning in circles all over the roof, stirring the petals under their feet.
“Don’t worry,” he says. “These roses came from a shop.”
She smiles, but then it fades. “You did all this for the person you love?”
“Yeah. For Ladybug.” He swallows against the searing in his throat. “But she didn’t show up.”
She’s quiet for a minute. “I didn’t know. That you loved her. I mean, I’ve seen how you act around her. But I thought you were just being … I don’t know. Silly.”
He laughs softly. “I suppose I am pretty silly. But I really love her a lot.”
A roar splits the air. Akuma. He pulls Marinette out of the path of an incoming blast and then scoops her into his arms. When she’s safely back in her bedroom, he turns to leave, but she catches onto his belt tail.
“Thank you,” she says. “And … I’m really sorry she didn’t come.”
He smiles. “At least I got to share it with someone. And hey, if you ever need to commiserate about how much it sucks to cough up flowers all the time, I’ll be around, okay?”
“Okay,” she whispers.
After the battle, Ladybug follows him back to the rooftop, where the candles still glow against the deep blue night. He holds a rose in his hands—bright red, like her suit. Like his heart. Like the love inside his lungs, growing bigger and bigger every day.
“You’re more than a partner, Chat Noir,” she says softly. “You’re my friend. And I could never lie to a friend.” She closes her eyes. “There’s this boy …”
Adrien’s lungs squeeze painfully, and he can almost feel the roses inside him wilting along with the one in his hands.
Ladybug watches him, the light from the candles reflecting in her eyes like they’re floating on water. There’s a pull deep in his chest, a shooting pain that wraps around his lungs and sprouts between his ribs.
He takes a step closer. “I understand, Ladybug. You’re my best friend too.” Then he leaves her with a kiss on her cheek and a rose in her hands while his garden blooms on inside him.
There’s something about ridiculous magical diseases that makes friendship come very easily.
Adrien huddles under Marinette’s blankets with her on a Tuesday night, a plate of pastries between them. They start with a movie, but it’s way too romantic for either of them to stomach, so they abandon it twenty minutes in. Instead, he performs a dramatic reenactment of the latest akuma attack, including Hawkmoth’s inner monologue, which makes her laugh so hard that he thinks yellow petals might come out of her nose. She tells him about how she’d tripped and spilled her yogurt all over the lunch table and how her teacher had told her off for daydreaming in class. (He was there for both incidents, but he likes hearing about them anyway.)
“What were you daydreaming about?” he asks. “Buuuuttercup?”
She lets out a huff. “Well, yes. If you must know. He is pretty dreamy.”
“And I’m not?” He leans in close, grinning, and she pushes him back by the nose.
“You wish.”
“If he’s so dreamy,” Adrien says, “why don’t you tell him?”
“What? I can’t just do that.”
“Why not?”
“It’s—it’s complicated!”
“Is it?” He lifts a hand, counting on his fingers. “One, girl loves boy. Two, girl tells boy. Three, boy loves her back. Four, girl lives happily ever after and does not have to sleep with a flower-cough bucket anymore. Simple.”
Marinette fiddles with a loose thread on her bedspread. “I really don’t have any control over anything after step two.”
“Yeah, but you’ll never know unless you say something, right? You could be resigning yourself to a life full of buttercup salad for no reason.”
She sighs. “He doesn’t see me like that. I’m just a friend.”
“But how do you know that?”
“Because. I just do.”
“Okay, well, you might as well check. Just to be sure. I mean, what’s the worst-case scenario?”
She grips the blanket in her fist. “That he doesn’t love me back.”
“Well, right. He rejects you, and the flowers stay, and you’re in the same situation as before. I mean … that’s what happened to me, and I’m still here, right?”
She keeps her eyes glued to the blanket. “Right.”
“Actually, there is another option,” he says.
“What’s that?”
He shrugs. “We just forget Ladybug and Buttercup and fall in love with each other instead. Easy.”
A smile tugs at her lips. “Great plan. Let’s get on it right now.”
“After you,” he says.
He holds her gaze, smiling politely, until she breaks down with a snort. Then they’re laughing and laughing and laughing, and for a minute, his lungs don’t even burn.
notchatnoir
hey there purrrrrrrrincess 😌
marinettedesigned
ugh. don’t make me block you right after we set this up
notchatnoir
how can you block me when we go together like ketchup and mustard
marinettedesigned
gross. i hate ketchup
notchatnoir
obviously im the ketchup. you’re mustard
red and yellow. roses and buttercups
yknow
marinettedesigned
i still dont want to be associated with ketchup. it makes me gag
wait actually, maybe that’s the perfect thing to represent you<3
notchatnoir
meowch
ok fine we can be tomatoes and cheese
marinettedesigned
no!!! the reason i don’t like ketchup is that i hate tomatoes!!!
notchatnoir
ok ok i have the perfect one
blood and urine
marinettedesigned
fJLSDLKJFDSJLKF GROSS??????
why are you the way that you are
notchatnoir
what, devilishly handsome and irresistibly charming
marinettedesigned
why cant we be strawberry and banana
raspberry and lemon
like. a red apple and a yellow apple
literally anything but the things you just said
notchatnoir
you’re just naming fruits. where’s your creativity
marinettedesigned
i coughed it up with the last batch of buttercups
besides youre just naming all the most disgusting liquids ever how is that more creative
notchatnoir
i have a lot more disgusting liquids i can name
marinettedesigned
please do not
notchatnoir
armpit sweat
snot
stagnant pond water
chloe bourgeois’ ego
marinettedesigned
FLKJSDKJLFS
how is that a liquid
notchatnoir
flows freely but is of constant volume
fits the shape of its container
(the container being her swollen head)
marinettedesigned
hahahahahahaha
are u sure its not a gas
expanding freely with no limit
notchatnoir
you are absolutely correct
you are so smart, marinato
marinettedesigned
:///
notchatnoir
mustardnette
marinettedesigned
fine i’ll be mustard but only if i get to be dijon
notchatnoir
but dijon doesnt go with ketchup
marinettedesigned
tragic
notchatnoir
i thought we were friends 😞
princess you rule with such a cruel and iron fist
marinettedesigned
that’s right and ur the court jester jingling around for my entertainment
notchatnoir
so you admit i entertain you
marinettedesigned
..
notchatnoir
GOTCHA
maybe i could come over and amuse you with some clever jokes and magic tricks
marinettedesigned
haha maybe later
it’s late and i need my royal beauty sleep
notchatnoir
ok
tomorrow?
marinettedesigned
sure
notchatnoir
good night, princess mustardnette
marinettedesigned
good night, cat-chup noir
and thanks
notchatnoir
for what
marinettedesigned
well honestly i was having a pretty rough night
but talking to you made me feel a lot better
you always make me feel better
notchatnoir
i’m glad
you always make me feel better too
marinettedesigned
❤️💛
ok, good night!
notchatnoir
wait
i just want you to know that you’re a wonderful person
you’re kind and smart and brave
and also pretty
i mean not that i
like objectively youre
as a friend youre pretty
marinettedesigned
um thank you? hahaha
notchatnoir
ugh im not flirting im just trying to say that youre worth it, ok?
like, this boy, whoever he is, he’s gonna love you
whenever you’re ready to tell him, im so sure he’s gonna love you back
and until then i’ll be here for you, ok?
you’re gonna be okay
marinettedesigned
thanks, chat noir
that means a lot
and
im sorry
notchatnoir
why?
marinettedesigned
im sorry that ladybug doesn’t love you the way that you love her
notchatnoir
it’s ok
marinettedesigned
no it’s not
you’re hurting every day because of it
i wish she could love you back
notchatnoir
maybe she still can
marinettedesigned
yeah
maybe.
but what if she can’t?
notchatnoir
then
i guess that’s it
marinettedesigned
it cant be
chat please cant you just love someone else
notchatnoir
you know i cant just do that
i love ladybug, and i always will
marinettedesigned
would you change it, if you could?
notchatnoir
honestly?
no
i don’t think i would.
“Pound it!”
Ladybug is already poised to toss out her yo-yo, but Adrien catches her by the shoulder.
“The night is still young, milady. Want to hang around for a bit?”
“Um, I’m about to transform back!”
“Well, you could just recharge your kwami,” he says hopefully. “And then maybe we could catch a movie?”
She freezes. “That sounds like a date.”
Adrien ducks his head. “I mean, well, it doesn’t have to—”
“Chat Noir, I already told you. I’m in love with someone else.”
He can almost feel the flowers pressed against the walls of his chest, making his ribcage groan.
“Yes, I know, but if—”
She shakes her head. “There’s no if. I’m sorry.”
He swallows down the urge to cough. “Okay, so we go as friends. We’re friends, right? You said so.”
“Of course we are.”
“Then … will you come?”
Her earrings beep. She turns away, head bowed. “I don’t think so. Maybe next time.”
He watches her swing away, lamplight bouncing off her suit. Flames lick at his chest.
“Fine!” he shouts after her. “I’ll just watch a movie with some other friend. I have a lot of friends, you know! And I can watch movies with any of them whenever I want.”
He extends his baton, coughing into the crook of his elbow. Petals spill out from beneath his arm, but he doesn’t care. Let her see, if she even bothers to look back. He’s tired of hiding. Tired of waiting. Maybe if she knew she’d change her mind. Maybe if she knew he was literally lovesick over her, she’d finally give him a chance.
But the thought just makes him feel sicker. He doesn’t want her pity. Or her worry. Or her guilt. He doesn’t want her to feel trapped into giving what she doesn’t have, selling an empty heart to a boy she doesn’t love.
He takes to the rooftops, scattering petals in his wake like teardrops. Without even meaning to, he ends up on Marinette’s balcony.
He raps on the window, still coughing into his arm.
“Chat?” she asks cautiously. “You okay?”
“Fine.”
He slips through the window and hops over the side of her bed onto the floor. She follows him down the stairs, perching on the edge of the chaise while he sits stiffly against its back.
“You don’t seem okay. Do you need to …” She hesitates. “Do you need to talk about it?”
“Nothing to talk about.” He snatches a pillow and clutches it to his chest. “Just same old, same old. Ladybug won’t even give me a chance. She says we’re friends, but she never wants to hang out. I swear she barely even looks at me anymore.”
Marinette’s eyes find the floor. “It can’t be easy for her. Knowing you’re in love with her.”
Adrien’s scoff turns into another fit of coughing, shedding petals down his suit. “Easy for her? What about me? I mean, look at me!”
She doesn’t look. Just keeps her eyes glued to her pink rug while he coughs again and again.
“Whose side are you on, anyway?” he chokes.
Her head snaps up. “Look, if you’re in such a bad mood, why did you even come?”
The coughing finally subsides, and he takes in an aching breath, massaging his chest. “You’re right. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to take this out on you.”
“It’s not like she wants to hurt you, you know. She just doesn’t want to play with your feelings.”
“I know, I know.” He sighs. “It’s just that … I know I could love her so well. If she’d just … let me. If she actually gave me a chance. I think she could love me back.”
Marinette goes quiet. “It’s not her fault she loves someone else,” she says finally. “She can’t help it.”
“I get that. I’m not actually mad at her. I just …”
Suddenly his eyes are burning along with his lungs, and a hot tear dribbles down his mask.
“It hurts, Marinette,” he whispers.
She looks at him, eyes full of something he can’t quite name. Then she opens her arms, and he collapses into them with a shaky breath. She holds him tight, stroking his hair, until the burning gives way to a quiet glow that blooms through his whole chest, soothing every smoldering edge.
“I know, kitty,” she whispers back. “I know.”
“Hey, Plagg.”
Plagg does not look up from the latest issue of Gentlemen’s Camembert. “What.”
“You know your other holder, the one who got sick like me? What happened to her?”
Plagg flips the page. “Eventually her lover admitted that she loved her back. They lived happily ever after. Blah, blah, blah.”
“What would’ve happened if she never did?”
Plagg pauses. “Like, if she never loved her back?”
“Yeah.” Adrien plucks a stray rose petal from his pillow, smoothing it between his fingers. “Would the flowers have eventually gone away?”
“No. Only if she’d stopped loving her.”
“So … as long as she was in love, the flowers would keep growing? Forever?”
“I mean, yeah. Until …”
Adrien’s fingers go still. “Until?”
Plagg doesn’t answer. Adrien imagines untamable roses filling up his lungs, crawling up his throat till there’s no room left for air, and his blood runs cold.
“Plagg,” he whispers, “am I dying?”
Adrien can’t sleep. He rolls onto his side and coughs and coughs, his body convulsing as petals spill from his mouth.
“Kid, you okay?” Plagg’s tiny paw presses to his cheek. “Breathe. It’s gonna be alright.”
“She has to tell him,” Adrien rasps.
“What are you talking about?”
“That boy. Marinette has to tell him. Or she … she could …”
He falls into another fit, tears streaming from his eyes as his lungs squeeze again.
A rose blossom lands among the petals, full and open and red as blood.
notchatnoir
are you awake
it’s important
notchatnoir started a call that lasted a few seconds.
notchatnoir
marinette?
please answer
marinettedesigned
oml chat it’s 2 in the morning what could possibly be so important
notchatnoir
is it still just petals
marinettedesigned
what?
notchatnoir
your buttercups
are they still just petals or are there like full flowers now too
marinettedesigned
i mean, mostly petals
but flowers sometimes
notchatnoir
nononono
marinettedesigned
what’s wrong?
notchatnoir
was it always like that?
marinettedesigned
no, it started a few days ago i think
chat what’s going on you’re scaring me
notchatnoir
my kwami told me
if it goes on long enough
the flowers
they could
i mean
marinettedesigned
kill us?
notchatnoir
yeah
marinette you have to tell him
i know it’s scary but you have to take your chances
promise me you’ll tell him how you feel as soon as possible
marinettedesigned
ok
i promise
but what about you?
notchatnoir
don’t worry about me
marinettedesigned
how can i not worry about you
notchatnoir
i’ll be ok
i’ve got nine lives right haha
marinettedesigned
chat this is serious
i dont want to lose you
notchatnoir
you wont
marinettedesigned
promise?
notchatnoir
promise
Nino and Alya wave goodbye, thanking André as they pass him on their way out of the park.
It’s a beautiful day, sunny and warm, and Adrien is grateful Father let him out for once. It won’t be long now before Gorilla comes to pick him up, but at least for a few more minutes, he can stay with Marinette. They stroll down the path, sampling spoonfuls of ice cream, and he turns questions over in his mind, wondering how to ask them without giving himself away. Had she told that boy she loved him yet? Was she finally going to be okay?
“Adrien!” she says suddenly. “I—I have to tell you something.”
His head snaps toward her. Is she going to tell him about the buttercups? No one else knows about them—not even her parents. Not even Alya.
“What is it?” he asks.
“Well, um, the cream is—I mean, the thing is, that—oh!”
She drops her ice cream cone, which splatters his shoes in pink and green.
“Sorry!” she squeaks. “Let me—I’ll get—”
“No, no—don’t worry about it!” he says quickly.
She looks like she’s about to faint, and the last thing he wants is for her to start coughing up flowers and feeling even more humiliated. Maybe he can play it off like a joke to put her at ease.
He flexes the toe of his sneaker. “You know what? I like it better this way. Pink and green go surprisingly well with orange, don’t they?”
She lets out a nervous laugh. “I guess so.”
“Much better than red and blue would. Which is a real shame. I’d always hoped I’d go well together with the girl I love.”
Marinette blinks. “What?”
“You know, like …” He gestures to his Ladybug-colored ice cream. “If I’d dropped mine instead of you dropping yours.”
Her mouth falls open into a little O. “You mean … those colors … are for the girl you’re in love with?”
“Well, yeah.” His brow furrows. “That’s what André always does, right?”
Marinette stares down at her ruined ice cream cone, pink and green leaking through the cracks in the stone.
“Marinette, are you okay?”
“Yeah.”
“Do you want me to get you another cone?”
She shakes her head slowly, head still bowed. “I think … it’s done.”
“What?”
She lifts her head, and for a moment he’s almost relieved that she looks so calm (normally, it takes her much longer to regain herself after a blunder like that).
But then he sees her eyes. Flat. Blank. Empty. She gazes at him steadily, but it’s like she’s looking through him. Like she’s not even home behind the blue.
“I’m going to go home now,” Marinette says. Her voice is flat too—something pressed paper thin under a heavy weight until nothing was left but a shadow. “See you later.”
For the first time since the petals appeared, Adrien’s chest feels cold.
adrienagrestebrand
hey marinette, just wanted to check in
you didn’t seem like yourself earlier
is everything ok?
if you’re worried about the shoes, please don’t! i have so many shoes haha
marinette?
notchatnoir
have you had a chance to tell him yet?
how are you feeling?
marinettedesigned
bad
notchatnoir
what happened?
are you ok
marinettedesigned
no
notchatnoir
im coming over right now
marinettedesigned
you don’t have to do that
notchatnoir
i’ll be there in 5
marinettedesigned
ok
When he arrives, she’s lying in a bed of buttercups. She looks like something from a fairytale, the bright flowers trailing across her body, glowing against her skin, some of them scattered around her head like a halo.
It would be beautiful if it weren’t so terrifying.
He throws open the skylight. “Marinette, are you okay?”
She blinks up at him slowly. “I’m fine.” Her voice is weak and hoarse. “I think I’m done now.”
She stirs, causing buttercups to tumble around her blankets.
“No, don’t move,” Adrien says. “You need to rest.”
“I’m making room for you.” She moves to the edge of the bed and scoops the buttercups aside. “Sorry, I’ll clean these up later.”
“Don’t—don’t worry about it. I can take care of it.”
She scrunches her nose. “But I coughed them up. That’s gross.”
“I don’t care,” Adrien says, carefully lowering himself onto the bed. “It could be, like, actual vomit and I would clean it up for you.”
She makes another face. “Ew. I wouldn’t make you do that.”
“You wouldn’t have to. It’s my knightly duty. And I’d be glad to.”
He sinks back onto her pillows and shifts so they’re face to face. Her eyes are sad and searching.
“You’re too good to me,” she whispers.
“No, I’m not.” He reaches out and tucks a few loose hairs behind her ear. “I’m not nearly as good to you as you deserve.”
At that, her face crumples. Tears swim in her eyes and she buries her face in her hands. “I’m sorry, Chat. I’m so, so sorry.”
“What are you talking about? You don’t need to be sorry.” He tries to pull her hands away, but she just tucks her chin further into her chest.
“Marinette, what happened today? This …” He swallows as he looks around at the dozens of buttercups scattered over the bed. She must have been coughing them up for hours. “This isn’t normal.”
She hiccups a laugh through her tears. “I’m pretty sure coughing up flowers is never normal.”
“You know what I mean. This is a lot more than usual. Did … did something happen?”
She lowers her hands and nods.
“Did you tell him how you feel?”
If she did, this can’t be a good sign.
She shakes her head. “And I never will.”
“Why?”
“Because … because …”
Her body convulses with fresh sobs and she manages to turn her back to him right before the flowers start pouring from her mouth.
He scoots forward and gently gathers her hair with his claws, holding it back from her face. With his other hand he rubs soothing circles on her back.
“I’m sorry,” she chokes between buttercups.
“Nothing to be sorry about,” he says. “I’m here, okay?”
He doesn’t know how much time passes—only that with every new tremor of her body, his chest gets tighter and tighter.
Please be okay. Please be okay.
Finally, Marinette draws a shaking breath, rolling onto her back and closing her eyes.
“Thanks,” she whispers.
“What happened?” he dares to ask.
She shrugs, staring up at the ceiling. “He doesn’t love me.”
“He said that?”
“Yeah.”
Adrien swallows. “I thought you didn’t confess to him.”
“I was going to. I was finally going to do it. But then I screwed things up, as usual. And before I got the chance, he said he loved someone else.”
Something cold leaches through him, making his limbs feel heavy on her mattress.
“I’m so sorry,” he says softly.
Marinette blinks, gaze still fixed upward, and a tear leaks out of the corner of her eye. “I wish I had something to be angry about. That we’d dated and he dumped me. Or we got into a horrible fight. Something. But there’s nothing. He’s wonderful, and kind, and selfless, and the truth is … he just doesn’t love me. That’s it.”
He wants to hold her, wants to squeeze her tight and give her every bit of warmth he has, as if just that could heal her heart. But all he can do is lie there, trying in vain to swallow down the lump in his throat.
“He’s not good enough for you,” he says at last.
“Yes, he is.” She turns her head to him, eyes shining. “He’s so good. That’s what made me fall for him.”
There’s movement deep in his chest, a familiar swelling in the space behind his ribs.
“On the first day we met, I was horrible to him,” she goes on. “I thought he was stuck up and rude. But I had him all wrong. He was so patient with me. So gentle. He even gave me his umbrella.”
He blinks. “What?”
“I guess this is it, then.” She sighs. “I’m never going to fall out of love with Adrien Agreste.”
His breath hitches in his throat, and then his lungs explode.
Marinette sits bolt upright. “Chat! Are you okay?”
He tries to speak, but he’s choking on roses, full-blossomed and wine dark. He gets to his feet and pushes open the skylight.
“What are you doing?” Marinette asks. “You can’t leave. Not like this. Stay until it passes. Stay with me. Chat. Please.”
Something rips open inside him, and he’s almost surprised the flowers aren’t bleeding from his open chest now. He registers vaguely that some of the petals are paler than usual, but he doesn’t have the energy to think about what that means.
He heaves himself through the window, but Marinette grabs onto his belt, just like she did that first night, and he can’t stop himself from looking back.
She stares up at him from a pool of yellow and red and pink, kneeling in the heart of their joint garden.
“I’m sorry,” he whispers, and then he jumps from the roof while another blossom lodges in his throat.
Marinette sits on a bench, head bowed over her sketchbook.
Adrien watches her from the opposite end of the courtyard. Part of him wants to leave before she notices him. Disappear from her life forever. But part of him wants to hold her tight and never let go.
(He can’t decide which would hurt worse. Which would hurt her worse.)
She catches his eye and offers a little wave. He tells himself to just wave back and leave, but his feet move against his will, and then he’s standing right in front of her.
“Hi,” he says. “Can I sit?”
“Sure.” She smiles, and he aches.
If he loved Marinette, he could save her. But his love for Ladybug isn’t going anywhere—he loves her so much that it’s literally killing him. Even now, he can feel it, a wild garden bursting in his lungs.
I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
“That looks really good,” he says, nodding at her sketch as he sits down. It’s a formal gown with blossoms cascading down the bodice and onto the skirt. On the side of the page is a flowering tree branch. “Are those cherry blossoms?”
“Plum blossoms, actually,” she says. “I was named after them.”
His brows scrunch. “Marinette?”
“No, Mei Hua. My Chinese name.” She looks down at the paper. “My mom told me that in China, they bloom in the middle of winter. They symbolize hope and perseverance, because even in the bleakest, coldest time of year, they thrive and bring beauty to everyone around them.”
She looks up with another smile. “I always liked that idea. I even made a design with meihua, to remind me that good things are possible even when it seems hopeless.” She gestures to the flowers on her little pink bag.
There’s a tug inside his chest. He remembers every moment he’s spent with her—laughing over nothing, dropping petals on her mattress, wearing his heart on his sleeve with the only friend who ever knew what it was like to hurt this way. A sanctuary for the secret he could share with no one else.
She’s like a plum blossom, he decides. The way she opened slowly to show him all her layers, all the beautiful things hidden in her heart. The way she can brighten a bad day just by being there. The way she makes him feel so warm inside when the world outside feels cold.
He doesn’t realize that he’s staring until pink dusts her cheeks.
“What?” she asks.
Warmth blooms inside him. “I just think … that’s the perfect name for you.”
marinettedesigned
you okay?
notchatnoir
yeah
marinettedesigned
you didnt look good last time
i’ve been worried
notchatnoir
im doing better now
thanks
marinettedesigned
did i do something wrong?
notchatnoir
what?
no, why would you think that?
marinettedesigned
idk, i thought you were mad at me for some reason
and that’s why you haven’t been coming over
notchatnoir
no no, i’ve just had some stuff going on
sorry i havent messaged
marinettedesigned
i miss you
notchatnoir
i miss you too
marinettedesigned
are we ok?
notchatnoir
yeah
we’re gonna be ok
In the light of the dying sun, the whole world is the color of buttercups.
He sits on a roof by the girl he loves, breathing its gold into lungs that burn and burn.
“Chat Noir,” she says, “I have to tell you something.”
Ladybug’s red is stark against the yellow sky. She turns toward him, eyes full of something he can’t quite name.
“What is it, milady?”
She takes a breath. “I love you.”
A jolt runs through him. “What?” he croaks.
“I’m in love with you.”
“You—you are?”
She nods, watching him closely behind her mask.
She’d said it. She’d finally said it. After all this time. All this waiting. All this pain. She loves him back. He waits for his lungs to finally clear, for the pressure in his chest to lift, for his heart to feel light for the first time since they met.
He feels it rise inside him—the joy, the freedom—but there’s something still holding him down, blocking him up. A balloon tied to an anchor.
“How do you feel?” she says quickly. “Are they gone?”
“Are they … wait, you know? You know about—”
His chest squeezes, and he can’t hold back the petals that pour from his mouth—a delicate pink, like the inside of a seashell.
“No, no!” Ladybug clutches her head in her hands. “You’re still sick, and it’s all because of me, and—”
“Ladybug,” he says hoarsely. He grips her shoulders, forcing her to meet his eyes. “This isn’t your fault.”
“Yes, it is.” Tears are spilling from her eyes now, over her mask and down her cheeks. “This is because of my—because … because …”
She doubles over, coughing into her hands, and he catches a flash of something bright. She tries to hide it, but he gently pulls her hands down to see what’s resting in her palms.
A flower, sunshine yellow.
He stares. The petals go fuzzy before his eyes, and then he looks up, blinking her back into focus.
“Marinette?” he breathes.
She bites her lip, mask scrunched over her eyes. “You weren’t … you’re not supposed to know! But—but you deserve to know. You have to know why I can’t heal you. It’s not enough that I love you. Because I still love—”
“—Adrien,” he says.
She nods, wiping at her mask. “I’m sorry.”
Just like that, the weight in his lungs disappears, and he can breathe.
“Marinette.” He grabs her hands. “You’re the pink petals.”
“What?”
“Look. They’re plum blossoms. Meihua. Your name.”
She stares down at the petals strewn around them. Then she lifts her head, eyes wide.
He squeezes her hands. “You’re the pink petals. And I’m the buttercups.”
Her lips part, and he hears the breath catch in her throat. “You’re …”
“Adrien,” he whispers. “I’m Adrien.”
The yellow-gold light kisses her face, and he wants to do the same. He brings a hand up to cradle her cheek.
“All this time,” she says breathlessly. “All this time it was you?”
“It was me. And it was you.” He grins, lowering his hand. “Turns out you were the ketchup after all, huh?”
She laughs softly. “Shut up.”
“Well, Ladymato—”
She stops him with a kiss, holding his face in both her hands.
“I’m serious,” she murmurs. “Just shut up.”
Then her lips are back on his, and he forgets whatever joke he was about to make.
Something blooms inside his chest, and this time, it doesn’t burn.