Title: cut and color, carat and stick
Fandom: Miraculous Ladybug
Rating: Teen
Length: 1.8K
Characters: Adrien (as Catwalker)/Marinette (as Marino)
Content notes: Time to play games with gender presentation!
Author notes: Also for a prompt for mlwritersguild.
Summary: The fun thing about masquerades is it's unclear who isn't a stranger.


"Hey Marinette, are you planning on entering the Heroes' Day masquerade gala costume contest?"

"I thought about it, and then I thought about how much Le Monarque likes dramatic gestures, and I decided I'm only going if the plan is to guillotine him."

"…Oh. Yeah. Yeah, good plan. Okay."

"You sound disappointed?"

"Have you seen what the prize for the winner of the lycée bracket is?"

"I haven't looked. Alya told me it was a kiss from Rayonnant-Aérien-Envoûtant Adrien, but—oh. Oh she was not messing with me."

"I wouldn't mind if it was you."

"—You wouldn't mind. You wouldn't mind, if. Did your father even ask if you were okay with this?"

"Does he ever?"

"…You know what, he caused this problem for himself, he can solve it without you. All the costumes have to have masks, it says. So if you enter, he'll have to either make the hologram you do the kissing or come up with a real prize."

"You're a genius. I love—that. I love that idea."

---

"Marinette, help, I don't think I can buy all the base pieces for my costume, I don't think what I want even exists!"

"What are you picturing?"

"Two columns of buttons on the torso, and the closure is either one of those columns or an invisible zipper right next to one of those columns."

"So a double-breasted waistcoat?"

"…Now I have a better idea!"

---

"Help me, Marinette, these instructions are clear as mud, you're my only hope!"

"What are you trying to do?"

"Magnetic snaps, so I can change out the decorations if I want to, or have one that's attached on both sides when this is buttoned up but only one side when I'm getting dressed. But how am I supposed to sew these on?"

"Let me see? —Oh. That kit is for leatherworking. You're supposed to use a hole punch and a mallet. If you're working with fabric, you want snaps like these. Two pieces per snap instead of four, and with the holes for the thread. Here, I've got plenty, I'll bring you some."

---

"You don't have to go through with that dare."

"Alix isn't here for Kim to work off his chaos gremlin energy with. It's fine."

"It's not fine. You don't have to kiss anyone you don't want to."

"Maybe I want to kiss a stranger."

"…oh. Okay. If that's what will make you happy then you should definitely…do that."

"Don't worry, if he gets handsy, I'll punch him."

"No, tell me and I'll punch him. Uh. Speaking of Kim's dares."

"Why, what did he dare you?"

"Well, first he dared me to kiss a stranger…"

---

"I hate lace. Lace is the worst."

"Persuading the convinced there. It's pretty enough, but the texture is just. No thank you! I don't know how anyone works with it, I really don't know how anyone wears it—I mean, I know why people want to wear it, the whole peekaboo skin effect, but I couldn't without an underlayer, which I guess would have to be a contrasting color or there wouldn't be any point to the lace at all—are you okay? You're breathing different."

"I'm. I'm fine. It must just be hot in here."

---

"Hey, for purposes of Kim's dare, would Chat Noir count as a stranger?"

"No. Absolutely not. Tomorrow you get to either bring me coffee or be my pillow, because I'm not sleeping tonight now you've reminded me of that nightmare."

"…sorry, I didn't think you'd think the idea's horrifying…"

"No no no! It's not! He's not! That's the problem! I'm not going to kiss him, he's not going to fall in love with me, he's not going to be akumatized, it will not be a problem! There will be no chat-astrophe!"

"But you'd like to."

"…yes. Yes, okay? If he asks after Le Monarque's been deposed, yes."

"May I tell him that?

"Please no."

---

"Father is insisting on photographs of me on the way into the gala. With my date. My choices are Chloé and Lila."

"—what."

"He said it has to be someone already affiliated with the brand. Which, you are more than Chloé is, which I told him and he ignored me. And there's no point asking Kagami to take pity on me, she apparently doesn't count either, never mind how closely Tsurugi-san has been working with him. Oh, and there is absolutely no way I will be able to wear clothes of my choosing."

"…I could bring it to the venue for you? And arrange a distraction so you can sneak away?"

"I thought you weren't going unless the plan was Le Monarque's public execution?"

"If he shows up, I will be happy to arrange that."

"Marry me."

"What?"

"What? —Oh. Marinette, for me?"

"Excuse me, I'm going to die of embarrassment now."

"I'll join you…"

---

---

Cameras flash at the entrance to the gala. Adrien and Lila, both wearing bone white—Oh, how chat-grined I was that you weren't there!—breathe. Breathe.

Lila's smile is too innocent and Adrien's too polite to be real. Not that anyone else would notice, Marinette is certain.

Five… four…

"Lila Rossi! Nadja Chamack. Don't be bemused, it's just the news! Aren't you concerned that being seen with the son of Gabriel Agreste will make it seem as though your success is because of his connections, not your own talent?"

(Clearly, coupons for free babysitting are a very effective bribe.)

Thankfully for Marinette's heart rate, Adrien has taken off the white domino mask by the time he finds her outside the restrooms. "How did you get in?" he wonders, glancing over the same jeans and T-shirt she was wearing when Adrien gave her both these shoeboxes and this garment bag this morning.

"Natural talent," Marinette lies.

(Ladybug strolled right in, empty-handed. Ladybug is now going to stash her regular clothes in her yo-yo and stroll right back out again, and then detransform and line up as a costume contest entrant. Adrien assured her he wouldn't need Marinette's help to get his costume home again.)

Jaime Bonheur, Marinette Marino writes on the sign-in sheet under Entrant Name, and under Costume Title, 007, drawing each zero as a circle with a five-pointed star inside—if tarot cards can call that a coin, so can she—and the seven like on a slot machine. If she's lucky, Chat Noir will think it's hilarious. Adrien might too, maybe, but he has to find him first, or vice versa—he told her not to peek at his costume, though, so she has no idea what to look for, and all he knows is this was a very last-minute costume—

Black crushed-velvet knee-high boots. Dark gray wool miniskirt with silver lace edging. Dark gray wool waistcoat, similarly silver-edged and falling just past the hips, six-on-two buttons painted metallic silver with four dots of silver fabric paint beside each; two rows of draped silver chain, anchored at the front and back of each shoulder. Dark gray domino mask with an uneven silver line painted just under the top edge. So many silver and dark green highlights through the long low ponytail it's hard to tell there's light brown hair underneath. Stud earrings, green gemstones arranged in heart shapes, matching bright green eyes. Black lace sash. Black crushed-velvet opera gloves. Marino would like to lick the little triangle of breastbone bared between the V of the waistcoat and the curve of the silver chains, or the couple of centimeters of bare thigh—

Reel it in there.

Has Catwalker lost his mind?

—Her mind? Catwalker has more of a chest than Marino himself does, what with the doubled sports bras under Marino's tuxedo. But the Miraculous armor shapes itself to the wearer's wants—

Decelerate.

"May I have this dance?"

Even his voice is velveted.

"…Are you feeling okay?" His brow wrinkles the same way Adrien's sometimes does—

Marino shakes himself. "Yeah. I'm. Dance. Let's. Let's do dance."

---

Okay, so Adrien came over here because he recognized one of the Grand Paris employees who's been seconded to working a house party of Father's, and therefore someone Adrien has spoken with before and liked, even if he's still a stranger by the standards of Kim's dare. But the wirework cocktail-glass lapel pin on his tuxedo jacket contains two red dice with black pips, and he looks very interested in Adrien.

(Well. Not Adrien. Jeanne-Françoise Dupont, if anyone asks. He thought about using one of the middle names from Adrienne Aline Andréa Adèle Angélique Agreste, but… no.)

You're a shooting star I see, sings Rihanna, putting a tiny furrow above the nose of his black domino mask—Adrien is not going to compare him to Ladybug, that would be entirely missing the point—that smooths out almost instantly with a grin up at Adrien and relaxing into the rhythm of the music.

"So," says Adrien, smiling back. "Are you being anyone in particular?"

"Jaime Bonheur," he says at once, with extra wiggle to his shoulders. "Dice shaken, not stirred."

Adrien can't help but laugh. I love good luck—that's brilliant. "I wouldn't bet on the contest judges knowing James Bond from James and the Giant Peach," he answers, leaning just a little on the word 'bet'.

Jaime does a double-take. Then shakes himself again and tries to match Adrien's movements. (Adrien is not going to compare him to Marinette either.) "Maybe not, but Adrien doesn't really want to kiss me, so I'm not really here to win, you know?" (Okay, now Adrien needs his contact info. More friends is always good.) "And you?"

"Mistress 9 from Sailor Moon meets the Gray Cat Miraculous." Adrien tries not to look at one of the spots where the sewing machine didn't quite pin the lace down right. "Except starting with off-the-rack garments."

"Gray Cat Miraculous?" Jaime raises an eyebrow and tugs at one tail of the bow on his sash, close enough they could dance arm in arm. "Isn't Mistress 9 the villain version of the hero who could destroy everything if she needed to?"

No comment.

"I want to learn how to use a glaive like Sailor Saturn's," Adrien says instead. He dares to put one hand on Jaime's shoulder. (Much shorter, dark-haired, confident, makes him laugh—Adrien has a type and is not ashamed to admit it. Even if Kim probably will think Adrien's bi crisis is hilarious. Not that it's a crisis.) "It's got more reach than that cane of Le Monarque's."

Adrien can almost watch the fantasy play out in Jaime's eyes: Adrien as Mistress Patte de velours, swinging the polearm in a way powered by the muscles of the bared upper arms Jaime hardly seems to notice he's touching—both of them in real life still as the eye of a storm—and Le Monarque's head departing his shoulders to arc into a basket Jaime's holding.

Jaime stretches up on his tiptoes to whisper in Adrien's ear: "I don't know if I want to kiss you or keep you."

"Why not both?"

(…That was definitely the snap of someone's photo app, but Adrien will worry about that later.)

---

"…I guess you won the costume contest."

"I won something, all right…"