A/N: Thanks for the favs and nice reviews, guys. I had more ideas, so you get more to read! And Adrien is obviously an insecure cinnamon roll, and he must always be protected and nurtured, okay? Hope you like it!

000

"Oh my God." Adrien heard Marinette repeat again. "Oh my God, oh my God, omygodomygodohmyfuckinggod!"

A similar litany was taking place inside his head, and Adrien did absolutely nothing to quash the brilliant smile spreading across his face. He'd finally found his lady.

His Marinette.

It was the best day ever.

And it made so much sense, honestly the fact that neither of them had ever noticed before was rather ridiculous. Marinette, who always mysteriously disappeared during akuma attacks with vague excuses for it afterward. Marinette, who had to make up the Literature exam with him because she'd been fighting that stupid akuma Santa's Helper Monday morning, getting candy canes stuck in her hair with him, not still asleep in bed like she'd told Ms. Bustier.

Marinette, who wore a red sweater and black scarf, looking, if Adrien was completely honest, exactly as he had imaged his lady would look without the mask.

Marinette was practically vibrating in her seat at that point, still muttering vaguely to herself, his pen in her hands shaking rather violently. Adrien reached out a hand and grabbed her shoulder as if to steady her. She stilled immediately.

"Marinette, it's okay. It's okay. I know you didn't want to know, but we do now. It's nobody's fault, but we do, and it'll be okay. We'll be okay, my lady." Adrien didn't let go of her shoulder, his heart racing dangerously. Honestly, with the amount caffeine in his system, coupled with his absolute exhaustion and current excitement, Adrien was probably very close to having an actual heart attack.

Marinette looked up at him, bluebell eyes still wide. "I can't do this right now! I can't deal with this now, you can't be him, he can't be you!" she nearly wailed. "I can't handle this."

Adrien took the hand off her shoulder as though it burned him, and watched Marinette bury her face in her hands.

Oh God.

Marinette couldn't believe he was Chat.

He was ecstatic to find out Marinette (sweet, wonderful, brave, Marinette) was Ladybug.

And she was….disappointed that he was Chat.

Oh God.

She had every right to be disappointed, though. Adrien could be so awkward and cowardly, so naïve and sheltered. He'd only gathered the courage to stand up to his father finally go to lycee and try to be a normal person just last year. God, people were probably more likely to believe he was Draco Malfoy than ever even guess Père's perfect little doll was Chat Noir.

Adrien was unsurprised, but still very ashamed, when the tears filled his eyes and spilled down his cheeks. He was just so tired, and going from unexpectedly and excessively elated to horribly and severely depressed in about two seconds caused a pretty immediate physical reaction.

He still really wished he hadn't started sniffling.

"Oh my god," Marinette whispered, "Oh my god, are you crying?" she asked in disbelief.

Adrien sniffed again, and looked away from her, trying to discreetly wipe his still filling eyes. "No!" he answered, but the sob that accompanied it rather contradicted the word.

Marinette, for the second time in about five minutes, sat there looking at him in open-mouthed shock. "No, no, Adrien, Chat, hey, no, don't cry, please don't cry. Why are you even crying, you can't cry b-because it's g-gonna make m-me cry, too, a-and," then Marinette also dissolved into tears, burying her face once again in her hands.

"You're disappointed because I'm Chat, a-and I'm just stupid Adrien and my dad wants me to b-be perfect and I just wanna be cool and b-brave and impress you and-," Adrien moaned, but he was interrupted.

"You're such an idiot, Chat." Marinette proclaimed, launching herself at him, wrapping her arms around him and holding him tight where he sat. "Such an enormous idiot. I'm not disappointed Minou, I could never be disappointed in you." She sat on his knee to make the hug more comfortable, and Adrien automatically wrapped his arms around her.

"Really?"

Marinette looked up at him, a pretty blush on her cheeks. "Adrien, if you did not previously recognize the hugely massive crush I had on you before this, you really are an idiot. And now I find out you're also Chat Noir, my favorite person in the world? How on earth am I supposed to cope with this? Especially during a make-up exam worth 40 percent of my grade at six-thirty in the morning?

"Shit," Marinette continued, looking back at her test and then at her watch, completely missing the awe-struck look on Adrien's face. "Holy fucking shit, we only have half an hour left and I'm not even halfway done with this damn test. Oh my God, Ms. Bustier should be back soon, she's already late. Oh my God, I've forgotten everything, I'm going to fail this, how on earth am I supposed to concentrate on this test right now when I'm practically living through one of Shakespeare's plays?"

And Adrien's grin was back, because wow Marinette really was Ladybug, and Ladybug was Marinette, and he was her favorite person in the world. How could anything else even matter now?

"I hope it's a comedy," Adrien said with a grin, some of Chat Noir's swagger seeping through.

Marinette smirked, "You're gonna have to wait on the wedding for a few years, pretty boy."

Adrien laughed so hard his eyes filled with tears once again and his ribs began to ache, watching Marinette turn bright red and slap a hand across her mouth after she realized what she'd said.

"See, Marinette," Adrien gasped, "you didn't forget everything you studied."

"Dear God, please let all of this be Red Bull induced hallucination."

000

Forty-five minutes later found Adrien and Marinette finally waving goodbye to Ms. Bustier and climbing down the steps of school.

"About time you idiots figured it out," Plagg complained, zipping out of Adrien's bag.

"For goodness's sake, Plagg, be nice," responded the darling little red creature who flew out of Marinette's bag. Ladybug's kwami.

"Tikki, you knew!" Marinette gasped, as Adrien glared at Plagg.

"Seriously, Plagg?"

"Hey, kid, don't look at us. We just give you the powers. The rest is all up to you." Adrien rolled his eyes, and watched as Tikki grabbed Plagg's hand and pulled them both into Marinette's bag without another word.

"Rude." Adrien said, and Marinette giggled, before tripping on the steps and beginning to fall down the remaining stairs. Adrien grabbed her hand quickly to keep her upright.

And then just didn't let it go.

"Do you want to come over for breakfast?" Marinette asked a few minutes later, as they reached the street where their paths home diverged. "Papa promised to have a big breakfast waiting when I got home, and according to Alya I have the most comfortable couch in France, if you want to nap after. I feel like we probably need to talk like normal humans about this sometime."

Adrien smiled at her tiredly. "That sounds wonderful. But, do you think we can, I mean, just for a minute-," Adrien asked, nodding his head to the nearby park bench.

"Oh God, yes, I'm so tired." So Marinette and Adrien sat down on the bench, Adrien releasing her hand only to wrap his arm around her shoulders on the bench. Marinette leaned into it, her hair tickling Adrien's neck as she sighed contentedly.

Marinette grabbed Adrien's remaining right hand, and slipped his glove off to play with his ring. His miraculous.

And as Adrien looked around at all the Christmas decorations and the snow lightly beginning to fall and the earrings on Marinette's ears, he started chuckling to himself.

"What's so funny?"

"Do you realize what happened today? What it is?" Adrien asked earnestly.

"Umm, it pretty much seems like this whole week has been a clusterfuck, honestly."

Adrien laughed even harder. "You sure do curse a lot when you're tired."

Marinette grinned. "I curse a lot always. It usually just stays inside my head."

"But, don't you get it? Us, finding each other. Now? It's a Christmas Miracle!"

Marinette snorted before smiling widely and shaking her head. "Jesus Christ, Minou."

"Hey now, Marinette, it's his birthday. Be nice."

"Adrien, you're ridiculous."

And you're miraculous, Adrien desperately wanted to say. But he smiled instead and quietly accepted his own wonderful miracle.

000

Caline Bustier chuckled as she wrote in full marks and a smiley face on the top of both Adrien and Marinette's tests before stuffing the packets in her carry-on and returning her tray table to the upright position.

She'd considered simply waiving the test for both of them after they missed it the first time; those children were certainly overworked enough as it was. But, she mused, if that episode in the library was how they reacted to learning each other's secret identities, Caline definitely didn't think either of them were prepared to discover their teacher knew they were Ladybug and Chat Noir.

000

A/N: Hehehehehe. Did you see that one coming? Update: If you really like the "Ms. Bustier knows" headcannon, check out my new story Yesterday was plain awful. It's kind of a sequel to this. Fair warning though, the new story is pretty angsty and sad. But with a happy ending, I promise!

Also, I really don't know where all this Christmas spirit in May is coming from. At first it just made sense for the story, but now I'm like nostalgic for Christmas lol. Sorry if I did the same to you.