Betas: SomberFilledWithSullen (Ao3), Nature Wolf (Ao3), Rescue Wolf (Ffn) GoldWolf4 (Wattpad),
Thank you to SeasOfSilver on the "Lovesquare obsessed" server for their help with chapter 3!
Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by (c) Thomas Astruc, TS1 Bouygues, Disney Channel, Zagtoon, and Toei Animation. No money is being made, and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended.
WARNING: THIS STORY IS SET AND THOUGHT TO TAKE PLACE AFTER S5 EP9 ELATION. IF YOU HAVEN'T WATCHED THE EPISODE, YOU CAN STILL READ THE STORY, BUT IT MAY MAKE LESS SENSE, AND IT MAY GIVE YOU A SPOILER OR TWO. SO PLEASE DO WATCH ELATION FIRST. IT'S SUCH A GREAT EPISODE; YOU MUST WATCH IT!
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Chapter 1 — An Unfortunate Misunderstanding
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"Happy Christmas, Minou!" Ladybug smiled as she opened her yoyo and, in pure Mary Poppins fashion, she managed to take out of it a medium-sized present all wrapped up in Christmas paper.
Chat Noir's eyes widened. "How did you manage to do that, LB? I understand keeping the Miraculous in there, but something as big as that? It must be three times the size of your yoyo." He kept looking at it as if the present would disappear if he dared touch it. "Mh, maybe more than three times."
"It's much bigger inside, as Bunnyx would say." Then she looked at him expectantly, but Chat Noir kept darting his gaze between the yoyo and the gift. She sighed. "You know, Chaton, it won't bite you if you touch it." With a swift gesture, she placed it in his lap and smiled softly at him. "Open it, come on!"
The boy kept looking at the present with his eyes wide. Then, he turned towards her and cringe-smiled. "Last year, you said we shouldn't exchange presents, so I didn't bother to get you one this year." He looked at the present with a frown, the top part of his mask furrowing and adding to his gloomy overall appearance. "And I should have."
Ladybug put a hand on his thigh. "Nah, don't worry, Chaton. You're right; I did tell you not to exchange Christmas presents last year, but—well, I think we only need to make sure nobody sees it."
"So that means that I can buy you a present too?" He squealed when Ladybug nodded. "Okay, thanks! Luckily it's still not Christmas eve; I have—" He counted on his clawed fingers "—ten whole days to get you something." He shot her a happy grin. "Now...are you sure you want me to open it now? It's still ten days to Christmas!"
"Uh-huh. I need to check if it's okay."
Her smile was very stiff, which felt suspicious to him, but he shrugged it away, too excited to open his gift. He carefully took off the gold ribbon from around the paper and then tore the Christmas wrapping, revealing an exquisite jacket, perfectly lined and looking very warm and cosy.
"This is gorgeous, M'lady; thank you so much!" He spent some time admiring the patchwork, the finish, the little cat decorations on the buttons and the straps, and how it was all colour-coordinated with his signature colours. "It's purr-fection!"
Ladybug gifted him an extra present by literally beaming at his praise. "Did you notice the little paw-prints as buttons?"
"Uh-huh, I did! And the cat-heads on the strings. Where did you get it?" he asked mindlessly, too busy checking all the handiwork to look at her.
She looked at her thighs. "I mad—uh, commissioned it."
Chat Noir's ears perked up. "You made it?" He turned to look at her and saw the flash of panic in her eyes but chose to ignore it. "Wow, you're so talented!"
"N-no, I didn't make it; I commissioned it!" She put her hands up and frowned at his sceptical look. But he decided to accept her correction not to embarrass her further.
"You chose a talented person to commission it to, then." He gave her a fond look, his hands clutching the jacket to his chest. "Thank you, Buginette, this is the best Christmas present I've ever got!" That said, he hugged her tight.
"You're welcome, Chaton. Why don't you try it on so I can check it fits you?"
Chat Noir put it on, and the jacket fit as if it had been made on his skin. It was so comfortable and warm that the boy didn't want to take it off. There was just one little problem. "How can I hide a coat? It's not supposed to have anything over it!
She cringed again. "Whoops!"
"Whoops?" Chat Noir blinked. "Do you mean that you hadn't thought about it?"
Ladybug blushed. "I wanted to make something that would keep you warm, but I forgot to consider how revealing that would be if I saw you as a civilian." She put her hands to the side of her head.
"Yeah," he conceded. He clutched his fingers on the coat's arms, though, and didn't take it off. "But maybe if I'm careful and don't use it under the public eye...leave it to me, Buginette. I'll wear it only when I'm out for—uh—family reasons."
"Are you sure?" Ladybug gave him a doubtful look, but he smiled confidently.
"Positive." He stood up, still wearing the jacket, and bowed theatrically before picking up his baton from the small of his back. "Now, if you excuse me, LB, I shall head home." He extended his baton and turned around to look at her again. "See you soon?"
She nodded, and a tentative smile popped on her lips, so Chat Noir did a two fingers salute and head off.
Ladybug sat on the rooftop for a long time, looking at the City lights flicker in the darkness and the Eiffel Tower shine reassuringly in front of her. She sighed.
Tikki had loudly protested when Marinette had told her what present she planned to give Chat Noir for Christmas. Alya had tried to dissuade her too. And Marinette knew very well that they were right: she'd been the one who had kept following the identity rule that Fu had established, after all. She knew how dangerous it would be for them to reveal themselves. She knew that the less they knew about each other's civilian lives, the more inconspicuous and anonymous their civilian self would be, the safer their secret was. However, she really wanted to give Chat Noir a present that would wrap him into the warm hug she so desperately wanted to give him in person, and she had spent ages designing and making the jacket in a way that would wrap around him like a second skin.
Besides, her chances of seeing his civilian self wearing the jacket were slim.
Right?
After all, he could live on the other side of Paris, she reasoned, trying to ignore the little voice in her head that screamed at her that Chat Noir was always there around the same time as her during akuma attacks; the odds that he'd live far were quite slim. But yes, she'd ignored that little voice, Tikki's voice of reason and Alya's complaints; she'd worked hard for weeks to create the jacket she'd just given him. And she was delighted with the result: the jacket fit him like a glove.
She also ignored the nagging feeling when Alya pointed out that she was using Adrien's measurements to make the jacket. Which fit Chat Noir like a glove.
So what? Adrien looked a similar build to Chat Noir, so since Marinette had his measurements, she had decided to use them. And so bloody what? They had the same measurements. No biggie. She was sure many boys in Paris had Adrien's same measurements.
And were also blond like him.
With the same mesmerising green eyes as him.
ARGH! Ladybug shook her head and stood up from the roof, unzipping her yoyo to head home.
§§§
Adrien had spent a long time looking at his new jacket when he arrived home. He loved it—how it was so warm and perfectly fitting. It nearly felt as if he'd been wrapped in a warm hug all the way home. Obviously, that wasn't the feeling Ladybug wanted to give him, but he couldn't help but keep the jacket on for a long time after he detransformed.
"What are you going to do with it?" Plagg asked, raising an eyebrow.
Adrien sighed. "I don't know. I can't wear it to school or in my normal routine, just in case Ladybug would see me wearing it, or a paparazzi would take a picture of me wearing it, and Ladybug would happen to see it. So I suppose I'll just wear it in my room."
Plagg snorted. "What a waste of a jacket." But Adrien shrugged. There was nothing he could do about it, and the chances of him needing an extra jacket in any setting were slim.
Until the moment when, of course, they weren't.
He had to follow Nathalie in a series of meetings with Bob Roth to discuss the sponsorship of some new features of the Alliance ring. Although Adrien wasn't a model anymore, his father wasn't feeling very well at the time, so he asked Adrien to take his place as a member of the Agreste family. Adrien had accepted, but when he returned from the first meeting, he was frozen to the bone.
"I don't understand why someone as rich as Bob Roth can't turn the bloody heating on," Plagg commented when he got out of Adrien's pocket. "I'm so frozen over that my whiskers have frost on them!"
So the next time he had to meet Bob again, Adrien went prepared, wearing the jacket Ladybug had given him as a Christmas present. After all, she wouldn't have seen him unless she were Bob Roth (and Adrien was more than one hundred percent sure that wasn't the case). And he would really benefit from a warm hug as he wasted his afternoon listening to Nathalie and Bob discussing the terms of their contract.
Except that this time, Bob wasn't alone—his son XY was with him. Of course, because XY was there, the heating in the office was on; after all, the last thing Bob wanted was that his son would catch a cold and compromise his–ahem–beautiful voice. Soon, Adrien started feeling sweaty. So he took the jacket off and put it on the back of the chair he sat on, not thinking anymore about it for the rest of the day... until he was back in his room and realised that he'd left his jacket behind.
"Don't worry, I'll get it back tomorrow when Nathalie and I go to Bob's office again," he reassured himself more than Plagg.
But unfortunately, this wasn't the case. When Adrien returned to the office the next day, his jacket had disappeared. He looked everywhere; he asked Bob's assistant, the receptionist of the building, and even the janitor. Nobody had seen it, and nobody remembered having even spotted it at the back of Adrien's seat.
Adrien was devastated.
When he returned to his room, he lay on his bed, chest and head down, hiding his face from the world. Plagg ate some of his cheese and then reached out to him and gave him a couple of pats on the head.
"Now, now, I'm sorry, Adrien. It was a nice jacket, even if you could never use it." It took quite a while before Adrien finally rose from his bed and dragged his feet to his desk to do homework.
§§§
"What? Luka and Jagged Stone on tour together?!" Marinette shouted. "To advertise Kitty Section?!"
Luka had asked Marinette to go with him to a meeting with Bob Roth. For support. Never would Marinette have imagined that the subject of the conversation would be Luka leaving.
"Yes, exactly. Father and son on tour. It's going to increase the sales of the first album of Kitty Section by at least 300%." Bob grabbed a cigar from a case on the top of his desk and carefully lit it with a lighter, taking a drag and releasing a white cloud of smoke as he exhaled. Then he shot them a cunning grin.
Luka and Marinette looked at each other, the dazed expression on Marinette's face changing into a frown. "How long will the tour be?"
"Let's see...it's going to be a 'round-the-world tour, and it may take anything between six months to a year, depending on how many countries Jagged and Luka wish to explore."
"A YEAR?" Marinette's eyes widened. She turned her head to look at Luka, and the boy looked back at her with a similar frown before shooting a desperate look at Bob.
"But Kitty Section isn't just me; it's a band. If I go, then all the members should go too," Luka argued, but Bob raised a hand.
"What part of 'father and son tour' don't you understand? Am I talking to an idiot? Your band will benefit from this; it's all free pub—"
Bob started getting agitated, his voice raising and his face gaining a much darker, almost crimson colour. He shouted so loud that, to Marinette's utter disgust, bits of his spit flew in her eyes. But as his voice raised to a decibel that started getting painful for the two teens' ears, the door of Bob's office opened and XY came in. Bob turned around, and his expression changed when he saw his son.
"Oh, that's you, my boy. Come in!" he said in a soft tone that hugely contrasted with the spite of his previous shouting fit.
XY smirked. "Hey, dad..." he said, shooting a loathing glance at Marinette and Luka.
"I'm in a private meeting, but it's okay. Anything you want to discuss? A new melody you thought about?"
XY released a low-tone laugh—an irritating one if you asked Marinette. "You know I don't do creative, dad. I forgot my jacket. I'll take it and get out."
"Okay, keep warm. If you damaged your voice, it would be a tragedy for my wallet!" said Bob, folding his arms over his chest. He waited for his son to walk to the side of the room and pick up the coat he had left behind.
But when the boy put it on, Marinette felt her mouth dry. Very dry. So dry that she thought she'd never really felt her mouth drier.
That was her jacket, the one she had spent weeks designing and stitching together. The one she had just presented to Chat Noir!
Her heart stopped. There was NO WAY!
"Right-o. I'll go buy a Christmas present now," said XY. He shot a quick look at the two teens sitting in front of his dad and raised an eyebrow. "Did you see a dead cat?" he asked Marinette. "You look like a ghost." Then he laughed to himself—again, that horrible low-tone laugh Marinette would have liked to tear from his throat. "Hehe, did you hear that, dad? I made a joke!"
Bob howled, but he folded his arms over his chest. "Har, har, was a good one!" Then his fake amused expression changed into a frown. "Now, if you don't mind, we're in the middle of an important discussion here!"
"What the heck, dad? Okay, I'll go!" He pouted and made for walking to the door. But before he could close it behind him, Marinette dashed to him and stopped him in his tracks.
"Hm?" the young pop star complained, but Marinette didn't hear him. She looked into his eyes, trying to get any feelings that what she was thinking was true. It couldn't be true. She couldn't possibly believe that it was true. In fact, she remembered when they had faced Jagged Stone akumatised in Guitar Villain, and XY was there when Chat Noir fought with her. Yes, it was impossible. Except it wasn't impossible because if Marinette had managed to pull the act when they faced Kwamibuster, why couldn't Chat Noir? After all, he was a celebrity, and celebrities have many, many doubles!
AARGH! That was a DISASTER!
Marinette still couldn't concoct the possibility that it could be true. Please no. Anyone but him. Marinette couldn't believe that her sweet kitty was such a horrible person. And his eyes were blue, not green. That was reassuring! Could Tikki change eye colour like Plagg? Marinette smiled, though it looked more like a cringe, as she tried to hold onto the tiny little detail that kept her mind from spiralling into panic mode.
"Where did you get this jacket?" she asked eventually. Maybe she was mistaken; it was just a black and green jacket. But when she looked closely at it, she realised, to her dismay, that nope. It was indeed the one she'd gifted to Chat Noir, with the little paw prints as buttons and cat's heads on the strings. It fitted him like a glove too, which was even more worrying. And she couldn't avoid noticing that he got tense at the question.
"Uh, er, I found it. Yeah. What's your problem, huh?" XY deadpanned.
"Yeah, what's about that garbage jacket, son? I thought your fashion taste was better than that, but you can't be amazing at everything!" This sentence earned him a glare from Marinette, but Bob didn't even notice, too preoccupied with checking what his son was wearing.
XY put his hands up. "Yeah, don't worry, dad. It's, uh, private."
"You better. I haven't worked so hard to create your public image to see it destroyed because your tastes in clothes suck. Now, CAN WE PLEASE RESUME OUR MEETING!" By now, Bob was producing sounds similar to those of a pressure pot nearing an explosion.
"Gotta go. See ya!" XY shrugged and went, closing the door nearly to Marinette's face.
To Be Continued...
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Author's Note:
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Hello!
Here we are with another story. This is a Christmas and Birthday present for my very good friend Mystic_Raven20.
What are you saying? Am I mean? *rubs chin* well, I know you probably didn't expect Adrien to lose his jacket. Well, maybe I am mean, but...you know when you read fic after fic with the same trope, and you think that things could go very differently? Well, yeah. That's what happened here. I love twisting tropes, so there it is; now Marinette thinks the unthinkable. What do you think is going to happen next?
Anyway, a little note of reassurance: this time, not only is the story complete, but the recipient has already read it in full, so you don't need to worry; I'll post the following chapters regularly. When? Well, it will depend on how well the story will be received. I plan to update once a week. But if I get a lot of feedback, I *will* update more frequently.
So you know the drill. Comment, comment, comment. Kudos, kudos, kudos. Bookmark, put in your favourites, follow...whatever. Everything is good, but comments are my bread and butter; personally, they're my Christmas present. So...make me happy, let me know what you think about the story, and I'll publish a second chapter during the week. Otherwise, I'll see you next Saturday.
Oh, I beg your pardon, next Sunday, because on Saturday next week I won't be at home so I won't be able to update.
As usual, if you read this and you're not part of our wonderful Discord server already but enjoy reading, writing and talking about Miraculous, please join my favourite Discord servers, Miraculous Fanworks (discord dot gg slash mlfanworks) and Miraculous Discordance (discord dot gg slash QwgKdUhJNJ). I'll wait for you there! <3