Adrien stared down at the stack of bills in his hand with a faintly annoyed expression.
“I mean,” said Chloe, “what can you really even do with $400 dollars?”
“I know,” said Adrien, trying not to be too abashed over it.
They were out in a park, a warm spring afternoon. The university semester at was winding down, only one project total separating them from break.
“Like,” said Chloe, “it’s not enough for a proper shopping trip. We don’t have enough time to get reservations anywhere fun. Hmm…”
“Well,” said Adrien, slapping the bills gently against his hand. “Maybe we do some back-alley gambling, get enough money to do something worthwhile.”
Chloe snorted. “Yeah. Right.”
“Y'know,” he said, “worth a shot.”
He gazed around them, looking for some kind of inspiration.
Street food, all far too low quality to interest Chloe (though he might quite enjoy it), a number of entertainments clearly meant for children, and…
Oh hello, Marinette, fancy seeing you here.
For an instant, he wanted to stand up, go say hello to her, maybe ask her for something to do, but, well… Though they weren’t so actively hostile these days, Marinette still didn’t get along with Chloe.
The idea popped into his head.
“Okay,” he said, “I do have an idea.”
Chloe glanced up from her phone, which she’d been staring studiously at, presumably annoyed by something on it, by the way her face was tinted red.
“Okay, start with this. Do you have a crush? Like… Someone who’s… Let’s say… Not too far from here? You could probably find them pretty easily?”
Chloe bristled. “What kind of a question is that?” She looked askance, back and forth as if looking for eavesdroppers. “I mean… Yes, but like…” She shook her head.
He put up his hands. “Okay, okay, fair. I’m just thinking, you remember truth or dare?”
“I… Yes?” Chloe blinked, scoffed. “Actually, I seem to recall introducing you to that game.”
“Right. Well… What if I gave you a dare, and added some stakes to it?” He slapped the money against his palm.
“Isn’t that just paying me to do something stupid?”
There was a long silence, as Chloe seemed to weigh the relevant quantities of boredom that might yet await her.
“Okay,” he said, brightening. “Well, I’m thinking… 100 dollars if you ask your crush for a kiss. 300 dollars if you ask an enemy for one.”
Chloe stared at him, face going slowly red.
“And…” he added, mind slowly clicking through some of the risks. “You can tell them its on a dare after they say yes or no, but not before. To be clear, on the lips.”
Chloe floundered, seemingly unable to muster a proper response.
“Now,” he finished, “you said you could probably find your crush, and I’d definitely accept it if you said Marinette was your enemy, so I know you could do either. Or both, actually, I was thinking if you pull that off you’d get the full 400.”
He could see the gear turning in Chloe’s head as she thought it through.
“You can say no,” he said, mildly.
“You know what?” she said, standing, “no. You’re gonna be down 400 dollars.”
Marinette had seen them, of course; despite not being related by blood, they had both managed to inherit the same golden hair, and it made them more than a little hard to miss.
Still, she’d passed them by; Chloe was Chloe, and she’d probably be in a foul mood if they had to so much as interract; it’d be awkward, and it’d force Adrien to think about how they didn’t get along, and then he’d be sad, and-
Marinette cut off the catastrophe before it managed to hit the part of her brain that didn’t care if it was real or not.
Anyway. All she had to do was keep up a leisurely pace, and-
“Dupain-Cheng,” came Chloe’s voice, with all the casual nonchalance of an anime protagonist greeting the villain who had destroyed their hometown.
“Chloe,” she said, in a tone of pleased surprise that didn’t reach her eyes. She let it drop. “What.”
Chloe’s expression was inscrutable, but even through her makeup, her cheeks were clearly red.
Chloe realized, now that she was here, that she hadn’t actually planned this far, and that, in the past year alone, Marinette had managed to grow significantly more intimidating. (Which… Damn her. She had no right to be so… Hhhrrmmgmm)
“I…” she said, (Good start. Now to keep it rolling…) “…had an idea…”
‘An idea.’ Yeah. Great. A+.
Marinette seemed a bit less hostile, and a bit more confused.
“I thought… You could kiss me.”
And there it was. She’d done it. Just hold on until after she’d said ‘no’ before explaining, and she’d be free and away, no problem.
Marinette blinked, finding herself mentally three steps to the left, and mirrored vertically from where she’d expected to be.
“I said,” said Chloe, every word seeming to require an inordinate amount of effort from her, “That you could kiss me. I… I am asking you to do it.”
‘What’ queued up at her mouth again, but, better still-
“I…” said Chloe, “think, it would be a good idea.”
Marinette’s brain hummed. Chameleon would have picked a better disguise, didn’t have a recent reason to target her. This was so far out of left field that any halfway canny Akuma would have known better. This had to be Chloe, and something was clearly up. This wasn’t a scheme to get the better of her, or Chloe would be acting more self-assured. Then… Of the remaining options, that meant this had to be something serious, didn’t it? Otherwise Chloe wouldn’t be doing something so strange, surely.
Come on. Come on, it would be easy. Just say ‘no, leave me alone, what are you talking about.’ It was that easy. That was all she needed to do, and Chloe would be able to relax, laugh about it, say that she’d made her an easy $400, so thanks for the easy cash, Dupain-Cheng.
Her mind slammed into a wall.
“I’ll do it,” said Marinette, and her expression was neither pleased nor angry. She seemed strangely grim about it.
There was a moment of silence as…
“Am I… Are you going to…” said Marinette.
“Uhhh…” said Chloe, and found that other words were being crowded out of her mind by a single, impossible thought.
She was going to kiss Marinette.
She stepped shakily forward. Marinette’s eyes were searching, her expression worried.
“Are you okay?” she whispered, placing a hand on Chloe’s arm. It burned.
“Fine,” Chloe managed, and they were quite close, now. A strand of wayward hair hung over Marinette’s forehead.
“Well…” said Marinette, “Okay.” And she leaned forward.
As Marinette’s lips pressed against hers, Chloe realized she was dead. She didn’t have a body. She barely had a mind. The reality around her didn’t exist, because it couldn’t exist. She had died, probably killed by some Akuma or other, and this was just the last thought she had as she sank into oblivion.
A second passed, then two, and Marinette slowly pulled away.
Chloe’s arms had come up somewhere in the process, and her eyes, as she slowly opened them, were glossed over, her breathing slow and shallow.
The moment stretched out.
“Did that… Help?” said Marinette, carefully extricating herself.
Chloe blinked, stepping away.
“No,” she said, shaking her head as if trying to shake off sleep, “thank you.”
Chloe stepped slowly backwards.
“I’ll just… I’m just going to…” She narrowly avoided tripping over a bench, and turned on her heel, stepping swiftly away.
Marinette stared after her, and slowly shook her head.
Still couldn’t have been an Akuma, right?
As Chloe marched back up to him, Adrien found himself wondering if clapping was the right response here, or whether it would sound too sarcastic.
He was saved the effort of answering the question.
“Money. Four hundred dollars. Now,” said Chloe, the words coming out as a command.
Adrien blinked. “I mean… I said 300 for your enemy, but-
“Adrien,” she snapped, “that was the single most mortifying thing that has ever happened to me, and I am not going to make it worse by explaining to you why you need to give me the full 400 right now.”
There was a long, long silence.
He silently placed the entire stack of cash into her waiting hand.
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