Truth and Lies Rewritten

Truth

It's been a few weeks since Marinette became the Guardian of the Miraculous. She had also gotten together with Luka. After several dates, Marinette decided to take off Adrien's photos on her wall, change her computer screen saver, and stop making plans to win Adrien's heart. It wasn't fair to Luka to still harbor feelings for Adrien even though she would never stop loving him completely. It had been hard letting go of her crush on Adrien, but she didn't regret it. Marinette had less stress from creating complicated schemes to make him fall in with her and generally obsessing about him. There had always been a barrier between them, Adrien and her. Because of her crush, Marinette had always been too shy or scared to approach Adrien. Marinette's crush on Adrien had lessened; talking to and hanging out with him was more comfortable. And getting to know him made Marinette realize how little she'd known him before. Yes, she'd known his favorite foods, the brand of toothpaste he used, his schedule, and a multitude of things, but she hadn't really known Adrien. Marinette had fallen in love with the Adrien who'd given her his umbrella: the Adrien who was so kind and sincere, and Model Adrien who always seemed so perfectly handsome, but those were only some parts of Adrien. Now, she was slowly discovering other parts of Adrien. The goofy pun lover(seriously, he made almost as many puns as Chat Noir; he was so adorkable), the enthusiastic anime fan, and the sad, lonely boy who hid behind all the other Adriens, only appearing briefly. Of course, a couple weeks weren't enough to know all of the Adriens. Still, Marinette was getting closer to understanding the whole. And that was what mattered.

And then there was Chat Noir. Breaking the news about her boyfriend to Chat had been hard, but he took it much better than she expected. Then he said that he got a girlfriend a day or so ago and promised to stop flirting with her. He had kept his word and stopped calling her "M'Lady '' and "Bugaboo" or doing anything remotely romantic. She'd never admit to Chat Noir... but Marinette missed it. A part of her missed the embarrassing nicknames and the flirting. That part of Marinette was sad Chat Noir was taken. But most of Marinette was disheartened that things had changed between them. She was already dealing with so much change: her Guardianship, Master Fu's memory loss, Chloe's betrayal, the temporary heroes' identities having been revealed to Hawk Moth, just everything. Dealing with their changed partnership seemed unfair to handle on top of all that. It wasn't Chat Noir's lack of flirting that really bothered her but his new distance. He talked less during patrols, didn't pun as much, was even less reckless(she did like that Chat was more cautious, but that was very out of character for him, which made her worry). But she'd think about helping Chat another time; it was almost time for her date with Luka.

"What am I going to wear?!" Marinette panicked. "It's gotta be perfect! I'll be letting Luka down if it's not!"

"Don't worry, Marinette, Luka loves just how you are! A date isn't the end of the world." Tikki was comforted. Marinette picked out several outfits from her closet and changed. The first outfit was a formal long white dress that covered her knees, and Marinette had her hair in a bun. She twirled to show off the dress for Tikki.

"What do you think, Tikki?" Marinette asked bashfully.

"I think it's a bit too fancy. You're only going to the movies, after all." Tikki said. "You do look wonderful in it, though." Marinette changed into the second outfit. It was a hot pink and purple jacket with shoulder spikes, a black t-shirt with a red skull peeking through, complete with ripped, gray pants and low-heeled boots.

"It's kind of bright and too punk," Tikki said. Marinette added those clothes to the discarded pile. Then she changed into the last outfit. It was a flowy white shirt with vibrant red and pale pink flowers with some gold decorations, powder blue shorts, and brown sandals.

"I think this one looks just right," Tikki said with a thumbs up.

"Thanks, Tikki! You're the best!" Marinette said. "I don't know what I'd do without you!"