Thief | Lukadrien

Part 3 - Blushes and Crushes

(Adrien's POV)

After the battle, I met up with Ladybug and Viperion back in the sewer.

"Great job, Viperion," Ladybug congratulated. "You make a great superhero!"

"Thanks," he said. "You guys are great teammates."

He smiled at me, making me blush. Is this what it felt like to be intimidated? Yeah, that had to be it. Luka intimidated me. That's why I was so flustered.

My ring started beeping, so I waved and ran off. I didn't dare try to speak, because I was worried about saying something stupid in front of Luka. But why did I care so much about what he thought of me?

Plagg spiralled out of my ring before I could say the detransformation phrase. I caught him in my palm and handed him a wedge of cheese. As he devoured it, I sank to the floor with my back against the wall. I stared off into space for a minute or two, seeing a blur of emotion that I couldn't quite place.

"Yoo, hoo, Adrien, anyone home?" Plagg asked, waving his hand in front of my face. 

"Hmm? Oh, yeah. Sorry. What?"

"Can we get out of here? This place stinks."

...

Back at home, I was sitting next to the window, one hand propped up on my knee.

"What are you thinking about, Amity Blight?" Plagg asked in a teasing voice. 

"Who's that?"

"Some girl from a TV show I watched."

"When did you watch a TV show without me?"

"During class! You don't really expect me to sit around in your backpack all day doing nothing, do you? I've binged literally every series you can imagine."

"Oh, so that's why my phone is always dead by the end of the day."

"That battle today must have been a nightmare," Plagg said, abruptly changing the topic as he flew over to me. "I'm sure you had a hard time staying focused with your crush right beside you during the fight."

"What are you talking about? I always fight alongside Ladybug."

"I wasn't talking about her, I was talking about snake boy."

"What? No, Luka's not my crush. He's just a friend."

"HA!" Plagg shouted, clapping his hands together before pointing at my face. "Gotcha!"

"Huh?"

"You always used to say the same thing about Marinette! Oh, Marinette's just a friend. Marinette? she's a very good friend. I'm lucky to have such a great friend like you, Marinette. Ugh, blah. You so clearly had a crush on her."

"I did not!"

"Did too! I've literally been around forever. I know these things."

I sighed and turn away. "Okay, fine. Maybe I did like Mari at some point. And maybe I do like Luka! But it doesn't matter, anyway; he probably doesn't like guys. I didn't even know that I liked guys."

"Really? Seemed pretty obvious to me."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Plagg narrowed his eyes. "You wrote a fan fiction of Will Turner rescuing you from an evil pirate crew."

I froze. Yeah, okay. That does make sense. 

"Argh! I don't like this, Plagg. I never used to feel this way about Ladybug."

"How did you feel about Ladybug, then?"

"I don't know! She's just so amazing. I've always wanted to be as brave and smart as she is."

"Sounds more like you want to be her than be with her."

"So... that wasn't a crush?"

"No, it probably was. But this connection with Luka seems to be stronger than that."

"Great," I muttered sarcastically. I brought both my knees to my chest and wrapped my arms around them. "Why is this so confusing? I don't like feeling this way."

"Why not? It's better than what you normally feel like. You spend most of your time on the verge of a mental breakdown. This should be a welcome change."

"Fair enough," I grumbled. "But what am I supposed to do?"

"Ask him out, duh."

"I can't do that!" I exclaimed, standing up. "What if he says no? What if he's not okay with... you know... and he tells the whole school?"

Plagg looked annoyed. "Have you seen this guy? Luka isn't straight."

"Do you really expect me to trust your gaydar? You're a cat, for f*ck's sake."

"You can wallow in disbelief all you want, but when you two start dating, I'll be the first to say I told you so."