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Everyone is born with a tattoo. Sometimes there are more than one, which means that you have multiple soulmates. Whatever the tattoo is represents a detail present when you first interact with your soulmate. Maybe it’s an image, maybe it’s a word. In some cases, very rare ones, the tattoo is geographic coordinates or a date. Regardless of the tattoo, it’s always relevant to the first meeting of soulmates.
Gary Green is three years old when he finally learns about his tattoo and soulmates. It’s a dark blue chicken on his upper arm, like a shadow. His big brother’s is a squid above his knee with tentacles trailing down to his shin, which is much cooler than a chicken. His mom and dad both have a crescent moon above a cloud, but his dad also has a coin tattoo. When he starts asking questions one week, they sit him down on the porch one afternoon and explain it all to him.
“That tattoo is something that will be there when you meet your soulmate,” his mother tells him. “There will be a chicken there somewhere. When I met your dad, it was night and the moon had just become visible from behind a cloud.”
“But Daddy has two,” Gary points out to the spot on his father’s ribs.
“That’s true, Gar-bear,” says his dad. “I have another soulmate out there. I don’t know what it means exactly, but whatever happens, everything will be okay.”
That’s enough to satisfy Gary for the time being. He doesn’t notice his parents exchange a concerned glance above his head, knowing that she’s been having a few health problems lately and not all soulmates get happily ever after. They can tell Gary that later. Right now, JJ is screaming from the backyard, which probably means he’s stuck in the tree again and they better go before he breaks his arm.
John Constantine finds out about soulmate tattoos early. It’s a lesson that he learns gradually over almost every night when Dad comes home smelling like beer or whiskey. He gets to hear that he doesn’t deserve a soulmate, not after he took away his father’s. John’s still learning not to cry or whine that he didn’t mean to. All he wants is to not feel that pain.
Cheryl fills him in with the questions he has that abuse hasn’t answered. “Yeah, you got a soulmate. I have one too. The tattoo is something around whenever you meet them. But it doesn’t always last.”
John stares at the blue chicken on his arm and wonders when he’ll meet his soulmate. Maybe they’ll be a good person. He doesn’t have a lot of hope though. There doesn’t seem to be much good in the world.
Gary hates his tattoo once he starts school. The other kids use it to make fun of him when he’s feeling anxious. They call him a chicken. When he tries to protest, they don’t listen. The teachers tell him to ignore it, but that doesn’t help too much.
It’s also been hard since his mom died. He misses her a lot. JJ and his dad miss her too, and so does Levi, but he’s just a baby. Aunt Stacy comes over a lot, which is nice. Plus, Dad’s dating someone new, a man who has a coin tattoo. Gary likes him and Dad’s happy, so that’s good.
He wonders if he’ll ever feel that happy.
John finds people aren’t as kind about his chicken, but he learns that a sharp tongue and his fists can set them straight. It gets him into trouble, although there are worse bullies the teachers can preoccupy themselves with. He’s too smart for his own good and he can use that to his advantage. It helps being fast on his feet too.
His father’s not getting any better, but John’s found an escape from him in magic. Not just slight of hand, but real proper magic. Whenever he can find material, he’ll read over it and practice. He’s been getting pretty good on it, maybe enough to make a life out of it.
Maybe his soulmate will be a magician.
Gary starts hiding his tattoo in high school. He still gets teased over it except he’s used to the teasing now. There was a time when he tried to change it by covering it with a black Sharpie to make a new design, but it just made the teasing worse. It also earned him a sit down with his dads about how he was fine the way he was and that he’d find his soulmate one day.
He tries to hold hope, but it’s hard. Some people have already met their soulmates and they haven’t even graduated yet. Not to mention he’s heard what people are saying about his soulmate. His classmates figuring out he likes boys and girls didn’t diminish the teasing.
Maybe it’s better to give up hope.
But maybe things could get better?
John runs away from home before he can finish school. He put up with his father long enough and fought back with a spell, except it went wrong. So he ran until he was three blocks away and cried against the brick alleyway. His dad’s still suffering when he sneaks through the window to take some things with him for whatever’s next. There is no way he is coming back to this house.
For a while, he lives out on the streets. Eventually, John finds what passes for kindred spirits. Other people who know about magic, not to mention demons that plague the world. They know things he doesn’t, ones he wants to learn. So he finds them and is taught.
He doesn’t find his soulmate, but it doesn’t bother him. He killed his mother, why should he be happy with a soulmate?
Years pass and no soulmate crosses his path. He even spent a summer interning on a farm to try and tempt fate, but no such luck. Gary ends up doing research on soulmates, but can’t find a case where soulmates never meet. The closest he can get is meeting a soulmate at their death, so unless that’s how it happens, he doubts he will meet his.
The dreams of finding his soulmate grow more and more distant, especially when he starts working for the government. A soulmate is seen as a liability and people are encouraged to cover their marks or desert their soulmates. Gary goes with the former, thankful for long sleeves.
Perhaps he’s not cut out for a soulmate.
There have been failures before, but never this bad. Newcastle is an utter clusterfuck and John knows that it’s all his fault. He underestimated the demon and it got to Astra Logue. Her screams haunt his nightmares more often than not. John wants to forget it, but knows that he shouldn’t. It’s his punishment, along with the damnation thing.
No soulmate has cropped up yet and he’s been bouncing all over the place. Even in the states, no such luck. It’s probably for the best after all. He’s a depressed chain-smoking petty dabbler of the dark arts. John decides to hell with the soulmate system. Stick a finger up at whoever came up for that idea. Love who you want, matching mark or not.
Yeah, perhaps he’s not cut out for a soulmate.
While the soulmates doubt each other, the universe has had a plan for them since their births.
It finally happens in 2018 because of a lost girlfriend. A storm is brewing outside. Gary Green goes with Ava Sharpe to see John Constantine in order to track down the Waverider. John is in the apartment he won in a duel, helping a woman get her son married. Mid-ritual, the chicken gets scared and escapes his grasp.
He’s just focused on getting the damn chicken back when two people burst in the door. John doesn’t know who they are, but he doesn’t want to let the chicken out of the room and asks for them to give him a hand. Gary is confused, but dives into action and corners the chicken. Once he’s got it, he hands it off to John. As the handoff occurs, they both remember their tattoos and they wonder if this is it, that moment.
Maybe they would discuss it, except there are more pressing issues at the moment.
They can talk later.
Later eventually comes, but it’s nearly a year after their first meeting. Along the way are a murderous unicorn, heartbreak, magic, demons, and reconciliation.
After all, the course of true love never did run smooth.