Chapter Text
"Did anybody ever say no to you?" it wasn't hard to get out the words he'd been practicing for months. The audience was cheering and adrenaline rushed through his body in waves; no matter how many concerts they'd done, Wilbur still always found it so amazing and exciting to sing to such a large audience.
He practically shouted the lyrics as sweat ran over his forehead. One of the stage lights seemed to blind him for a moment but Wilbur ignored it, not missing a note with the guitar. The song could barely even be heard over the cheers and screams from the crowd.
When Taunt ended they started a new song, this time a newer one than the years old debut EP.
Mid-singing Wilbur felt a weird sensation in his body. There were shivers that ran down his arms, reaching his fingers and making it harder to move them. No one in the audience seemed to notice his sudden trouble, though Joe, who was standing close to him, sent him a questioning gaze. Luckily an instrumental part began so Wilbur didn't have to worry about singing, but he frowned and glanced at Joe. It was almost like they were having a nonverbal conversation, Wilbur trying to sign him with his eyes that something was wrong before the other brunette finally frowned and seemingly understood.
The weird sensation formed into a feeling that filled his whole body. The noises in the hall started to quiet down as the rest of the band now looked at him with worry as well. Wilbur's hands slowed down as he stared at the audience with confused eyes. It was suddenly so quiet; he felt like he couldn't move. He tried to move his fingers but they didn't work at his command.
And then there was nothing but still something as he hung on the verge on consciousness, the voices around him quieting down entirely as he stared in front of him, expressionless.
He tried to push the feeling away, but he couldn't help but fall into a trance-like state as his mind slipped away from him.
-
Wilbur blinked. He was sitting on his bed- no, this definitely wasn't his bed, this definitely wasn't his room and this most definitely wasn't even his own goddamn body. He realized that as he glanced down and saw how skinny the wrists were.
Fuck, fuck, fuck. Wilbur knew what had happened. They had swapped; his and his soulmate's first swap had happened in the middle of his band's concert. And the swaps usually lasted from 30 minutes to two hours.
Fuck.
Well, there was nothing he could do anymore, so Wilbur pushed the worry and annoyance out of his mind and took the time to glance around the room he was in. There was a big setup on the table next to the window that shined yellow light through. Wilbur stood up, walking to the window to look out of it. Based on the building and the trees he came to the conclusion that he probably was still in Europe or at least far over the equator, and if he was lucky, maybe even in a country that he could speak the language of. Usually soulmates lived close to each other, but it was based off of where they were born, so it was likely that one of them would move away and live on the other side of the world.
He glanced down to see what he was wearing; nothing too abnormal, a blue hoodie and jeans. There was a mirror in the room that showed a blond, skinny but tall boy staring back at Wilbur. While his facial features were developed, it was still quite clear that this wasn't a fully grown adult, so Wilbur assumed the teen was something from the ages of 15 to 19.
He wasn't too surprised. While it was a little frowned upon by some people, it actually wasn't that unusual to have a big age difference with your soulmate. And even in the worst case where this could be eleven or twelve years, as Wilbur was 26, even Wilbur himself knew a few people with more than that.
It also wasn't rare to be the same gender as your soulmate; Wilbur believed reading that the change wasn't quite 50/50 but definitely at least 30/70. Despite that there were still homophobes saying it was unnatural; Wilbur didn't understand why, it was their souls, after all, why the fuck would it be unnatural? Whatever, he already got enough of shit for being openly bisexual, it wouldn't make a difference now that he knew his soulmate was a guy too. Wilbur just hoped that the boy's parents or friends or whoever wouldn't be mad at him for it.
He stared at the mirror for a while, lost in his thoughts. He felt smaller in the boy's body than he did in his own, but he definitely was pretty tall as well. Not nearly as tall as Will, and he was really skinny too, at least in comparison to his height. Despite the lingering disgust he felt while thinking it, Wilbur had to admit that the kid was pretty damn cute. He imagined how small his wrists would fell wrapped around Wilbur's hand. He seemed -and felt, to be honest- damn weak as well. He wouldn't have change against Will if he was pinned to a bed.
No, no, no, Wilbur, don't go down that path.
He walked to the door and opened it carefully, glancing to the hallway before he stepped out of the room. He slowly walked down the stairs. Maybe there was someone home?
He realized he was right when he noticed a woman sitting at the table, reading a book and sipping something from a mug. She raised her gaze and locked eyes with Wilbur- or, who she though was her son, or at least Wilbur assumed that this was the kid's mom- before smiling.
"Hungry already?" the woman asked. Jesus fuck, Wilbur couldn't believe how lucky he was. They spoke English. And even from the two words Wilbur noticed that the accent was not only thick but also really familiar.
Nottingham. Fucking Nottingham.
"Hey, uhm- no. We swapped", Wilbur explained, staring at the woman. His mind was too full of thoughts for him to speak politely, but the woman's stunned expression told him that she didn't even seem to notice. "Nice to meet you", Wilbur said.
She stood up from the chair, walking closer with the same surprise still on her face. "Well nice to meet you!" she spoke, clearly unsure of how to act. She handed her hand out and Wilbur shook it. He imagined it was probably weird to shake your son's hand like it was the first time you've met him.
"Uhm", Will said, stunned as well from the situation. "I'm Will Gold, 26, live in Brighton", he said while shaking her hand. Surprise flashed through her expression again when Will told his age, but thankfully, she didn't hold on to it.
"Amy Simons, it's great to meet you.. Your- your soulmate, he's Thomas Simons, 17. And we're in-"
"Nottingham", Wilbur decided to ignore that the kid was, indeed, underage and cut her off. Based off of her expression, he knew he was right. "I car hear that", he explained jokingly. Luckily Amy laughed.
"Where were you when you swapped?" she asked as they sat down at the table.
"Uh", Will began. "yes. So- I'm a musician", he said, glancing at Amy. Her eyes widened slightly as she raised her brows. "The lead singer in the band, actually. Tom's in the middle of our concert right now. In London."
Since Amy's eyes widened even more, a stunned concern filling her gaze, Wilbur quickly chuckled and said: "But it's fine- my bandmates are there, they'll take care of him. He'll be fine."
Amy stared at him for a few seconds before gently shaking her head and turning away from Wilbur. "Well that's good.. What's your number? I should probably save it, I don't know if Tommy remembers his own", she said jokingly. Ah, so he's also called Tommy. Good to know.
"Yeah, oh course."
Wilbur gave Amy his number, luckily he remembered it so he didn't have to give his Twitter or something.
After a few minutes they decided to call Wilbur's phone.
The call rang a few times before it was picked up.
-
Tommy blinked. Slowly but surely noises that weren't there before started to louden all around him.
Holy shit. He had just been chilling on his bed and they'd swapped for the first time, and now.. Wow. Tommy had always mentally prepared himself that he'd be swapped into a science test or something, but looking around him, the dark hall, colorful stage lights, the huge crowd in front of him; he had never in a million years been preparing for something like this. He had a guitar in his hands, but Tommy had no idea what to do with it.
"Holy fuck.." he said at the sight, the microphone picking at least part of it which made some amused noises come from the audience. The voice was a man's voice, quite deep but also soothing. As the glanced down Tommy realized that the man -his soulmate, he reminded himself- was also really tall, like really fucking tall, and in a pretty good shape but still lanky, at least considering how tall and big he was. He didn't see his face, but based on how fit he felt in the man's body, Tommy assumed that he was probably in his 20s, possibly even 30s.
Someone walked next to him, a man who was holding a guitar as well. He had curly hair and a beard; he was tall, but not as tall as Tommy's soulmate.
"Did you swap?" the man asked. Tommy's eyes widened from a mix of surprise and overwhelming relief to the fact that they spoke English. And even better; British English.
Tommy let out a hysteric laugh. It seemed to be enough of telling answer for the man, but before he could say anything else, Tommy had spun around towards the microphone and was now facing the crowd again.
"Sorry guys, I think your guitarist is in Nottingham now", he stated, his accent making the sentence double as funny as it already was. It sounded so weird speaking in someone else's voice, but at least he still had his accent. While some of the crowd seemed disappointed, most of them burst out laughing.
An another man, a shorter one with dark, shoulder-length hair and a cool-looking moustache, walked next to him as well and spoke into another microphone.
"Due to the technical difficulties with our lead singer, I think we might have to stop the gig", he said with an amused expression. Tommy laughed easily so it wasn't a surprise that he burst out laughing at the words, making the other band members giggle as well to the ridiculousness of the situation. The crowd seemed to find his take on the situation quite amusing as well, since it exploded with laughs and cheers.
"Let's go backstage", the first guy mumbled so that the mics didn't pick it up. Tommy, not knowing what to do with it, gave the guitar to the man. The moustache-man went to say something to one of the guards, probably an explanation, and not long after the guard spoke to a microphone explaining the situation and saying you'd get half a price off your ticket if you had the receipt. The drummer joined them as they walked off, the brunette explaining to him in a few words that Tommy and the guy who's name he couldn't pick up from all the noise had swapped.
Tommy felt awkward walking off with all the cameras pointed at him in the middle of the concert and decided to smirk and blow a kiss out with his hand towards the crowd. This caused the audience to cheer even more. Tommy felt relieved that no one seemed to be mad at him for ruining their concert.
Tommy followed the three other men though the backstage area till they finally entered a rather normal-looking room. It had two doors that led somewhere else, two red couches and a few tables. They sat down on the couches. Instantly as he sat down, Tommy noticed even better how much bigger the man was compared to him.
"So- we should probably introduce ourselves", the drummer said, making the others nod. Tommy found out that his name was Mark, the moustache man was Ash and the other guitarist Joe.
"Right. I'm Tommy, Thomas Simons. I, uh", he said awkwardly, not sure what to tell about himself. "I'm seventeen, a guy, and.. I dunno."
Some seemed to be surprised by something that he had said. "You're seventeen?" Mark asked, raising an eyebrow. In Tommy's opinion, it wasn't that unusual to have a bit of age difference with your soulmate, but he figured that maybe they just hadn't met anyone with that much before. Or then his soulmate was a lot older than Tommy had imagined.
"Yeah. Who's this guy? How old's he?" Tommy asked, leaning slightly forward, eager to hear about his soulmate.
"His name is Will Gold, he's 26", Ash stated, eyeing through Tommy. "Also goes by Wilbur. That's his stage name. Wilbur Soot."
26. Maybe a bit older than Tommy had thought, 9 years was quite a bit, but at least it could have been so much worse. "Okay", he replied. "And.. you're a band?"
"Yeah", Mark said. "We're called Lovejoy."
"Right", Tommy answered, leaning to his knees by his forearms as he stared at the floor. "Uh. Where are we?" he asked.
"In London", the older man answered again. "We all live in Brighton though."
Tommy groaned annoyedly. "Well that's even further away, then", he muttered. He'd have to drive for four hours to get to his soulmate. "Tell me something.. about Wilbur. What's he like?"
The band seemed thoughtful for a while, but eventually started to get the hang of it as they told Tommy about their friend. According to them, Will was "questionably weird but also really funny" and a generally nice person with stout opinions but good advice. They seemed to have trouble explaining what this questionable weirdness as a matter of fact meant, but from what Tommy managed to gather, Will seemed like a pretty cool guy.
They didn't really get to talk for too long before someone's phone suddenly went off.
"That's Will's", Mark said, making Tommy aimlessly search his clothes to try and find the phone.
It was in the back pocket. "That's my mum's number", Tommy said as he caught a glance at the screen. Tommy answered the call and Ash said to put it on speaker, so he did.
"Hello?" a voice came through, a very familiar one; his own voice, in fact, despite the fact that the accent was off. Tommy felt a jolt of childish excitement rush through him as a wide smirk spread on his face.
"Hello?!" he said loudly, in the same, comedic yell that he would use in his streams or speak to his friends with. Though this time it was different, obviously, since it wasn't even his own voice.
"Jesus fuck you're loud", Wilbur answered, making Tommy let out a choked laugh.
"What's up?" he yelled again. You could hear the smirk in his voice, but his soulmate decided to insult him once more.
"There's no way you're seventeen. Do you always speak like this?" Will continued. Tommy laughed silently. Despite the words, it seemed quite obvious that the older didn't actually mean any of it; it was like they had known each other for years. Holy shit. Was this always what happened with soulmates? Act like you already knew each other?
"What the hell, man", Tommy laughed. "The fuck's wrong with you?"
"Hey, hey, Tommy", Wilbur said, in a tone that might have supposed to be assuring but sounded more like he was about to make a joke. "Are you- are you alright? All good, yeah? You swapped in right in the middle of our concert", he asked in the same pretentious tone.
"Yeah, yeah", Tommy said. "Was doing a lot better before you called, big man, but sure." If it wasn't for the smirk that laid constantly on his lips as he said the words, the men around him might have even thought he was being serious. It looked like they realized that he was very much joking, though, as the three were smirking and quietly laughing while listening to the conversation.
"Oh yeah? You enjoying the company of my bandmates, Tommy?" Will asked. Based on the tone, Tommy could imagine him raising his eyebrow while saying it.
"Yeah, they're cool", Tommy stated. "Could actually say with quite a bit of confidence that they're a lot cooler that you, Wil-bur."
The sarcastic persona that Wilbur had seemed to crumble a bit under his sass, the man laughing abruptly at his statement.
"I'm sure they are", Wilbur agreed as he giggled. "Ah, hey, mate", he said with an upset tone. "I don't really appreciate you violating my voice like this. Doesn't really sound great to have a Nottingham accent on that shit."
"Really, now? Well how'd you think I feel?" Tommy spoke up. "You and your fuckin'- upper-class English accent. You can't do me like this, man."
Wilbur chuckled quietly before saying: "I think I'll do you however I want."
Tommy had to restrain himself from bursting out laughing. "Well, I think that you're gonna go to J- to the A- to the- I- to the- L if you do that, Will."
Wilbur seemed to be quiet for a few seconds before Tommy realized that he was actually just laughing in a way that made him initially not make any sound at all.
"You're a lot funnier than I thought", Wilbur said after he had calmed down from his laughter.
"What, you though- oh fuck you, thought I'm just really unfunny?"
"Well yeah, y'know, first impression wasn't too convincing", Wilbur smirked. "Took one look at the mirror and though ah, basic white boy."
"What if I wouldn't have been up to your standards, then, Wilbur? Just 'fuck this, you're not my soulmate-'"
"Yeah, yeah, of course", the man laughed. "Would have met up with you once and cut all contact. No unfunny people in my life, amiright?"
They giggled together for a while before Tommy said: "Well- you know Wilbur, I think you're pretty cool as well." He paused for a moment while pulling off a thoughtful expression before continuing with: "Still not as cool as Joe, but maybe you'll get there. See you around, loverboy." On that, the younger boy hung up the call.
The band had been quietly laughing for the whole time. Tommy turned at them while grinning, stuffing the phone back to the pocked as he said that he had hung up.
The whole situation seemed ridiculous; maybe one of the reasons that he'd decided to pull out that persona for Will was how insane it felt that he had actually basically met his soulmate. And it felt even better now that he knew that Wilbur had a really similar sense of humor as he did and seemed overall like a really cool dude as well.
The "questionably weird" part was still mostly uncovered, but at least he could definitely agree with the "also really funny".