Second Chance
Pairing: Luka Couffaine x fem reader
A/N: English isn't my first language, too much thoughts about Luka in season 6 and I wanted to sublimate them. Please, enjoy.
Luka didn't know or notice when his heart stopped hurting. However he could finally breathe freely, seeing her smiling during the sunset.
Luka didn't know when it had started. He encountered her on the secluded part of the beach IrupƩ recommended to him. The place was already taken when she showed up. Her appearance displayed she wasn't local. A filled-to-the-brim bag kept trying to slide off her shoulder. A simple caftan covered a swimsuit with a multicolored geometric pattern on the exposed straps. Even in unadorned clothes, it seemed she looked neat and comely. She was breathingly beautiful.
It was obvious she wanted to spend some time alone, and his existence caused her to awkwardly avoid his sight and shift from one foot to the other, reckoning what to do next. Something got him, and he said:
"I'm Luka."
Abruptly she lifted her head and met his eyes. Those glassy eyes made him catch his breath. He suggested her to sit nearly and got a polite decline and a faint smile. But at least she said her name in the end.
He assumed this encounter would easily be forgotten, although he didn't notice his sleep became placid and soothing with bright, delightful dreams.
Luka visited that part of the beach more frequently, dreaming about crossing paths with you again. He even prepared a bigger blanket and some snacks, like lurking a wild cat.
But nothing went right in his life. You find each other by chance after his conversation with Ladybug. Luka was sure she used a snake talisman to say something she thought she shouldn't. This disrupted barely founded harmony in his heart. He didn't feel safe anymore; that awful, sticky, consuming swamp caught him, and he didn't intend to have any freedom in the foreseeable future.
She literally bumped into him while turning the corner of a building with a cafƩ on the ground floor.
"S-sorry," she mumbled, rubbing her sore forehead. The first thing she saw was a hand with a snake-shaped bracelet. Something is strange with it ā the metal she's never seen ā it's none of her business. What she couldn't ignore was his expression of pain and desperation. "Are you okay? Umm, Luka?" she inquired timidly.
These words do something to Luka. Just some polite phrases made him fluttered. He couldn't resist a small smile and nodded, "Mhm, just a really hard day, more difficult than in the near past."
The look was redirected to the path where Marinette left. Eyes held comprehension without further questions. That intrigued him, it was the first person who listened to him, not the other way.
"What do you think about meeting again? Not by chance."
They spent time together more frequently and didn't analyze it, just enjoying the process. They shared their past, humor, and stories. She surprisingly loved the teasing jokes, "Soooo, do you like Blue Lagoon due to, well, your eyes? "What an arrogant person," and threw up her hands in fake disappointment. He laughed loudly and replied with a playful short melody. Lately it was so easy to create that weeks felt as short as one minute. The new song's motif had a deeper, crystalline, and serene atmosphere.
After that, something started to change in him. With each next morning, waking up was easier, and appetite returned completely. Even Juleka noticed his high spirit and hoped coming back to Paris wasn't a pipe dream anymore. Anarka at the same time, knew something had happened, there was no chance these drastic changes could surface from nowhere. Though Luka didn't give her a specific answer, as he was afraid something awful would happen if he told her about her.
Days went on. Luka comprehended you would have to return home sooner or later, but he still hadn't prepared himself for that moment. The desire to persuade you to visit him in Paris or let him leave with you.
Unfortunately, the realization came too late.
He understood that his love for Marinette was like he was seeing her from bottom to top with eyes full of admiration. On the other hand with her, he felt like a flower in the rain, greedily absorbing each emotion from her.
And the more Luka spent time with her, the more he was conscious about his own feelings. He was able to watch himself in the past from the third point of view. How his love for Marinett turned into an obsession with love as a concept. How he left his mom, Juleka, his friends, and dreams. He was ashamed.
"Like I needed to love someone," ironically he finished his thoughts.
He understood he was the one who made his own life miserable. Thought he had to sacrifice himself for others' happiness. Chose the easiest way.
Luka was devastated when he heard your reply to his compliment, "Um, thank you, but I think I don't deserve such beautiful words." A forced smile and eyes with no light in them spoke for themselves: she was ready to do everything to help and didn't even believe somebody would do that for her.
He had to do something, he wasn't ready to let her go. He wasn't going to just wait, he had to take action and make her fall for him too. Firstly, he should ask Ladybug for a recipe for an "astro power snack."
Happiness wasn't his goal, and somehow it reached him unintentionally. Well, part of it, another part he was ready to work for. She was his salvation after all.
pt. 2?
