Marinette droopily shoved a spoonful of yogurt into her mouth as she stared at pictures of her crush, Adrien Agreste, that were saved onto a super confidential file on her computer to hide from her parents in case they decided to snoop around. She hadn't yet gotten dressed for school, she was just having a 'quick' morning breakfast as she daydreamed about a particular blond boy.

"He's so handsome." she mused out as a stupid lovesick grin wiped onto her face as she tilted her head slightly, "As handsome as a prince."

"Seriously, Marinette?" Tikki mentally facepalmed as she zipped over to her owner and sat herself down on the desk surface before her, "You're going to be late for school. I know you don't like Mondays, but you better hurry up."

"My prince," Marinette uttered hopelessly as she placed a soft and tender kiss on her computer screen, inhaling sharply as she forced her hand to click the exit button on her computer mouse. Ah, how the bluenette thought her enormous crush on the model would become better-controlled over the months, but no, it only seemed to get worse as she began to become desperate.

She sometimes wished she would have those happy and magical endings like in fairytales where the prince and the princess live happily ever after without any problems, but no, life just wasn't the same as fairytales, life was much more complicated than that. You couldn't just have a happy ending without suffering, Marinette used to believe in happily ever afters, but seeing her hopeless love towards her crush spark no interest to him made her forget why she ever did.

If only the world was as simple as it should have been, things would have been so much easier. Love would have been much easier.

As the bluenette acknowledged that she was yet again lost in thought that day, she forced her brain to stop processing the hopeless thoughts and shove them at the back of her mind for midnight patrols and began to make her way to her closet miserably, practically dragging herself on the way there.

Marinette absolutely hated Mondays, they were her worst nightmare, since usually, everything was due that day, also on the account that it was the first day of the school week. School was pretty easy for her since she was a fairly good student and listened almost all of the time when she wasn't busy staring and outlining every strand of Adrien's hair. Everything seemed to revolve around Adrien those days, her secret duty as Ladybug also being greatly affected by her crush on the teenage boy.

What was she even trying for? Trying to get rejected? Was she trying to get her heart broken? Trying to make a total fool of herself?

Marinette was a girl who used to believe in happily ever afters. She was the type of girl who used to be naïve. Marinette was the type of girl who had fallen into an endless pit of Adrien's faces surrounding her, and there wasn't one thing in the world that could make her fall out of it.

—

Adrien was practically tugging at his hair as Plagg silently watched his owner have a mini breakdown.

"I can't do this!" the blond wailed as he threw his hands up in the air, only to bring them back down at his sides, "I can't possibly be having a photoshoot with Ladybug! I'm going to probably slip up and admit that I like her if I get too close to blushing."

"Correction, you will slip up and make a fool of yourself anyway." the black creature cackled maniacally, only to be silenced by his holder's death glare, returning to his cheese stash to find a good piece of Camembert.

"Why did my father agree to this?" the teenage boy combed his hair back as he grabbed the phone out of his pocket, only to be receiving millions of messages, emails and updates on his schedule. He groaned before shutting it off again and slipped it back into the pocket of his jeans.

"Maybe to make your hopeless wish come true?"

"Forget it." Adrien rolled his eyes before sliding his school bag over his shoulder, "There's no way I can possibly survive. What's there to survive anyway? A gorgeous-looking woman that I am over the top crazy for? I really am pathetic."

Plagg wiped an imaginary tear as he bent over in laughter, "Couldn't have said it any better myself."

—

The two teens dragged themselves up the school staircase, not even noticing that the other was literally right next to them until a crazy-looking Alya zipped out of the school, quick to meet them. "MARINETTE, ADRIEN!"

"What?" they questioned at the same time, only then realizing that they were in fact beside each other. Nino then came rushing out of the school as well, panting heavily as he chocked out, "Alya! Slow down!"

"I cannot believe it!" the brunette beamed, poking a finger in Adrien's chest, "Mr model here will be having a photoshoot with Ladybug!"

Marinette chocked on plain air, her eyes widening in horror as she realized what this meant, "A WHAT?!"

"Ladybug still hadn't agreed to it, though." the blond sighed, combing his hand through his hair, "I just learned about it today. I have no idea what got my father to arrange such a thing. Probably for the brand..."

"Did you manage to get in contact with her?" Marinette spoke up, Adrien immediately shaking his head.

"No, I think my father wants to wait until another akuma attack to get in contact with her."

The bluenette nodded, a small smile tugging on her lips, "I'm sure she'll agree to it."

"I hope so, it seems that this is really important to the brand."

Marinette nodded, "She'll understand, I'm sure she could spare a little bit of time."

"Thanks, Marinette." Adrien smiled fondly, patting his friend's shoulder thankfully as he walked inside the school with Nino.

"I'm never washing my jacket ever again." the bluenette sighed dreamily, Alya facepalming at her friend's lovesick reaction. The blogger took a breath in, annoyedly exhaling, "Girl, you need some serious help."

The heroine shot her head up, by instinct lifting her arm up to see what time it was, but found that she had no watch around her wrist. She shook her head before grabbing her phone out, a high pitch squeak emanating from the back of her throat as she dashed into the school, a worried-looking Alya following from behind.

"Girl, slow down!" she hurried after her, Marinette taking no opportunity to slow down as she rushed into her locker room and yanked open the locker.

"Marinette..." Alya tapped her foot as she watched her best friend stuff her belongings into the small space, "Listen to me!"

"What?!" the pigtailed girl demanded, whipping her head around to see Alya who was chuckling with amusement.

"Did you forget?" the brunette facepalmed, readjusting her glasses that sat neatly on her nose as a playful smile tugged at her lips, "Today's Monday. So for us right now is lunch break."

"Oh." the girl squeaked, bringing her gaze shamefully down as she was being enveloped in her pathetic embarrassment.

Before they could speak any further, a scream erupted from down the hall, the two girls' ears perking up as they knew what was happening.

"Akuma!!!" someone screamed, followed by distinctive gasps. Marinette knew too well the routine that she was going to be following. It came to her as easy as it was to sing the ABC's.

"I'm so going to go film this for the Ladyblog!" Alya squealed, grabbing her phone out and immediately sprinted down the hallway.

Marinette never fully understood why Alya was putting herself in direct danger just for the sake of her blog. At least she had her to save her, more so Ladybug. The blog was a priority and life to Alya, but her own life should have been more valuable than a blog. No one had ever gotten severely injured because of an akuma attack, but it still was possible. They couldn't think it was some sort of game that was a certain victory for Ladybug and Chat Noir all the time.

Because truth was, it wasn't a game. It was a life-risking job that had to be done. One-wrong-move-and-all-of-Paris-is-dead type of job.

Sucking up her fears, Marinette dashed over to the nearest room, conveniently being the girl's bathroom, ready to transform into her alter ego.

"Tikki, spots on!" she shouted as she locked herself in a stall. A red, spot imprinted costume enveloped the teenage girl, transforming her into her bug-themed counterpart.

She slammed the locker open and zipped out of the room. Now all she has to do was wait for Chat Noir, then they would be starting the real action.

As she started running down the hall, she bumped into someone, having the reflexes that she had, tried to catch whoever she toppled over, but inconveniently sent themselves propelling backwards, landing on the ground with a loud thud.

"Sorry!" Ladybug squeaked, dusting herself off before she laid eyes on the boy before her. She gulped, her throat immediately feeling like dry cotton as she found the sudden pain of speaking, "Adrien Agreste?"