Thunderstorms Series: Part 1

Chapter 1: Heartache

What to do? She never would have thought he would be so reckless as to reveal his identity to her. They always joked about it but she never thought he would take her seriously. Though... he didn't know she knew. Was that even fair? She tried to get home before her transformation and saw him detransform in an alley near the bakery. Why was he near her house anyways? She was so careful that he wouldn't figure out her identity but never would have thought that he was Adrien Agreste, famous fashion designer Gabriel Agreste's son, her classmate, her friend....her crush.

This was too much to handle! She could feel her heartbeat in her chest as her throat started to tighten. She was holding her breath, she forgot to breathe.

Marinette inhaled and exhaled, trying to clear her thoughts but... every time she tried to clear her thoughts, Adrien and Chat noir popped into her head. Was she the one that was reckless? She was the one who found out, not him.

Wait.

How was she supposed to act around Chat noir now?! She could barely muster a sentence around Adrien, let alone have a full-out Akuma fight and focus on the pressure of saving Paris. This was bad. She sat down on her chair on top of the balcony and huffed, throwing her arm over her eyes to shield them from the summer sun.

"Marinette?" she heard a voice from her bedroom.

She leaped up and walked down the ladder to find...

ADRIEN?!

What was he doing... in her bedroom?! How did he get inside? Why was he here? Why did he look calm about it? Did he not know that he had the biggest crush of the century on her...well... not her... he had a crush on Ladybug.

Her heart ached. He didn't love her. He loved the ideal confident image of her. The superheroine side of her, that she couldn't be in her everyday life. Marinette collected her thoughts and smiled, making sure he didn't see any hints of heartache or sadness.

"Hey, Marinette!"

"Hey! Adrien... What are... you... doing here?" Marinette said, eyes darting to not make eye contact.

"Alya said you needed help with homework? She said she would text you after school to let you know I was coming." Adrien smiled.

Alya? Text? There was an Akuma fight right after school. She couldn't get to her phone in time. The timing was awful but... she would admit, Alya did always come through for her.

"Oh. Yeah. Homework. Wait... I left my bag at school!" Marinette cried out, noticing that her phone and her bag were still in school.

She was in such a rush with the Akuma fight that she must have forgotten it.

"I'm sorry you came all the way over here, but I can't do homework without my bag." Marinette sighed.

Adrien stood silent while rubbing the back of his neck.

"Well... we have that design competition coming up. We don't have any written assignments on that. Just a topic. I could help you with that if you'd like. Have you started on it yet?" Adrien smiled.

Marinette's eyes darted toward him and shook her head. She walked over to her desk and picked up her sketchbook and sat down at the chaise. He followed her and sat down beside her.

Marinette darted her eyes down toward the sketchbook, knowing that Adrien, the boy she loved was in her bedroom. Not only that but... he was her partner... who loved Ladybug. The recurring thoughts kept repeating and with each repeat dug into her heart like a dagger.

"These are really cool Marinette. What topic did you choose to do your design on?" He asked, looking at the current page.

Marinette sat there in silence, still processing the thoughts that ran a mess in her mind. She quickly snapped out of it when he touched her hand. She jumped at his touch and looked over at him.