Bug Bites

Chapter | Thirty- Three

The seasons changed as fast as they came, at least that's how it felt in New York. In a blink of an eye five months had past since what the media named the blip. Life was different now, not as fast, not as busy. There was a weird normal, a calm that hadn't been there before. Chloe watched it all happened with her friends, felt it herself, watched it happen all unfold in the new normalcy the public was trying to balance.   

Yet the one person Chloe was the most worried about had surprised her. Marinette was trying her best, in the past five months she definitely had her highs and her lows. Some days she would be okay, happy. Others you wouldn't be able to get her to eat a single bite of food. Yet she was trying, and that was all she could really do.

Chloe would never know what caused the change, but Plagg and some of the other kwamis had been more there. They kept Marinette company when she decided that she would live at the Parker residence, Luka also moving in with her despite Marinette wanting to be alone. It took only a few weeks for Chloe to just cancel her lease, since a lot of apartments were letting tenants go out of contract due to the blip and understanding that people were just trying to get life back together. 

It made it easier for Marinette and the kwami's to be out fully, and she had dived head first into the books from the Sanctum and what was left by Master Fu. Chloe often watched with Nino, Luka and Adrien as the kwami's buzzed around Marinette, probably not even noticing the comfort they gave her while she read in Peter's room. It had been decided that Chloe would stay in May's room, with an air mattress for Adrien on the floor, and Luka with Nino slept in the living room where they bought a pull out bed and crashed there. 

Adrien had wanted Marinette to have her privacy, but they all knew the blonde was worried about her. Especially on the days it got bad where she would lay in the dark curled up on Peter's bed. Adrien got to see Marinette fall in love, got to see her at her best points in life and was currently helping her through hers. The roughest one had been graduation day, Adrien been the chosen one to go check on her when she hadn't gotten up to get ready. They had known it was coming when her energy started to get low, they had learned as a collective group to read Marinette like a book now that she wasn't pushing people away.

It's why it was today was a particular day that caused worry when Marinette didn't leave her room. Chloe and Luka were ready to go talk to her, but ultimately Adrien was the one who knocked softly on the door just to receive no response.

"Hey Mari." Adrien knocked on Peter's door softly once again, nudging it open slowly. The room was dark with bits of sunshine coming through the closed curtains. No one really came into this room, it was her last piece of Peter. Like something sacred for Marinette, and out of respect no one entered.

Yet Adrien noticed the dust collecting and how certain things remained untouched. Things that were probably the last items Peter ever touched, and it broke Adrien's heart for his friend who was currently trying to muffle her sobs in a way he used to with his father. Her face buried into a pillow, body curling into a fetal position. A emotional position Adrien would never wish on anyone.

Adrien didn't care then about slow movements, because he remembered wanting to be comforted. To want a hug and told everything would be okay, even when the world was falling apart around him. Today was one of those low days, where everything was feeling like it was falling apart and it was never going to get better for her.

Sitting on the bed, Adrien let her be for a few moments before bumping her elbow with his. It was their thing they did, she did it back to him when he was having a bad day too. He looked around for a second, green eyes landing of a framed photo of Peter and Marinette smiling in the Avenger's tower. 

He hadn't seen that same smile in the months since the blimp, and he wondered if he ever would again. Sure he was her black cat to her ladybug, the yin to her yang. Peter... he had been her soulmate in every terms. She seemed complete, and so uncaringly happy despite the loss she had faced. Peter had brought Marinette out of her Ladybug shell, but now she was in a shell no one had experienced from her before.