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Bokuto could say his life was really fine. Not perfect, but very comfortable. He wasn’t the smartest at school, but he had good marks enough and his teachers liked him. He wasn’t the most awesome guy, but he liked how he looked and, even if some mean people were mocking his bicolored hair from time to time, he wouldn’t mind as he thought it looked pretty on his two sisters, so it had to look pretty on himself too. He was charismatic: since he was a child he always had plenty people around him, and now he had some real friends he couldn’t live without. Mostly, he was lucky enough to discover something he was deeply passionate about and he could enjoy almost on a daily basis: volleyball. His dream was to become a professional player. As for now, he had a lot of fun playing in his school team with his best friend.
But sometimes, when he got in a low mood, he thought all the above weren’t enough. There was something he wanted more than anything. Something he wanted as much as becoming a professional volleyball player: he wanted a soulmate. A real one. Not only someone he would feel very comfortable with. No, he wanted THE one. The one who would get everything he writes marked on their skin, the one who would be destined to him. Someone who would endlessly love and support him. He wanted the universe to have someone like that in store for him.
He knew not everyone was lucky enough to have a soulmate. Sometimes even people having one would end up in different countries or never even meeting. But there were also lucky bastards, as his best friend Kuroo, who got one before he could even know what a soulmate was. Usually for people having one, the connection would start to show between 15 and 20-year-old. But for Kuroo, it happened in kindergarten when he was only 5 and his soulmate was 4. Since this time the two of them have been inseparable and started dating before high school. Bokuto wasn’t someone to be easily envious, but about this, he was very jealous of Kuroo and Kenma.
Sometimes, when he was sure nobody was looking, he would eventually start writing questions on his skin. Waiting for an answer that never came. He would also write on himself more than it was needed, to the point it became an habit of him. Meetings, phone numbers, exams… he would write all those stuffs on his arm, writing it down in his planner only before taking a shower.
But it seemed pointless as no one ever answered to him; moreover, nothing that wasn’t his ever appeared on his own skin no matter how many times he checked. Every time he would undress he was looking, searching for a proof someone, somewhere, was his soulmate. When he was in a great mood -like he was most of the time- he wouldn’t get affected by the absence of anything. But there were times, when he was feeling more depressed, this absence of anything would tear him down. During those times, even volleyball wasn’t enough to get him out of it and it passed only by itself after feeling dejected for a while.
He could eventually get to the point of being convinced that this behavior was the reason why he didn’t have a soulmate. No one could bear those mood swings; the universe just didn’t find someone who could handle him when he was at his lowest.
Those past days were extremely boring for him as it was raining nonstop since few days and the school gymnasium was under construction, so the students weren’t allowed to practice. He was usually someone to love rain. Jumping into puddles, the nice sound of the rain rebounding on umbrellas, the flowers that would bloom only after a great shower, snails going out of their shell, the feeling of drinking something warm while drying… A lot of things were usually making rainy days charming into his eyes.
As for now, the lack of team practice was hard to deal with. He tried to go for a run, but alone, he came back home, soaked, after only 45 minutes. The rain was too heavy moreover, with the beginning of warm days, the feeling of sweat mixed with water on clothes was very unpleasant.
He sighed loudly while undressing himself in the bathroom, he didn’t even need to clean his arm as nothing was written on it. Nothing was planned. Sulking, he let himself go into the hot water of the bath, trying to let the warmth melt away his grumpiness. Closing his eyes, he gave himself up to the bathtub, almost falling asleep. Only until one of his older sister yelled at the door because she was waiting for the bathroom too, her brother taking too much time for her liking. Reopening his eyes, he was ready to bite back when he noticed it. On his forearm. Some ink that definitely wasn’t here when he got into the tub. Could it possibly be… Rushing like he never did in his life, he put a towel around his waist and run to his bedroom, still half wet and sopping hair dripping water everywhere. He sat on his bed and took a deep breath before looking at his skin again. It was for real. Retracing it with the tips of his fingers he admired the pretty drawing of hydrangeas flowers spreading on his inner forearm. Someone decided to draw this pattern on their skin and that exact someone was nothing less than his very own soulmate.
Heart going back to a slower pace after a while, a huge smile was plastered on his face from one ear to the other. He could even feel a faint blush spreading on his cheeks. Finally going at his desk, he took some felt pen and started to put colors on the flowers. His heart was pounding fast again. Even more when he quickly saw some more details being added in answer to his coloring. Bokuto going on with the painting, the other was responding with more lines, playing a four-handed partition together.
After almost one hour the whole forearm became a piece of art, most of the skin being covered in a colored drawing. Someone else’s scenery with Bokuto’s colors.
Looking at his arm, that made no doubt to his mind that this person was his true soulmate as the result of their combined work was perfectly harmonious.
But sensing something very delicate was going on, Bokuto decided not to break the poetry of this first meeting. He didn’t ask any question, didn’t add anything despite his burning curiosity. Instead, he finished getting ready to sleep, took a picture of his arm to be sure it wasn’t a dream, and went to bed straight away. His mind playing a lullaby soothing his heart, slumber quickly following.
When he woke up the next morning, the lines were gone. Only the coloring remained as he didn’t wash off his arm. Not dwelling on that, he got ready as fast as usual, and finally cleaned his arm. Looking at the blank space on his skin, that’s when he decided he waited long enough. With a black pen, he wrote on the wrist as a bracelet “Have a nice day!”. Part of him was waiting for an answer, but another part feared it was only a mistake. The lack of response that followed all day long was in favor of the second option. The boy tried as hard as possible to change his mind. He went to the cinema with friends, they spent a lovely day all together, eating and laughing too much. But nothing new appeared on his skin. When he came back home; after dinner; after his shower. Nothing. To distract his mind, he went to one of his sister’s room before going to sleep, chatting about their day as they were usually doing.
In the end, maybe he shouldn’t focus that much about wanting a soulmate. After all, he already had so many amazing people and precious relationships in his life. His volleyball team was beyond expectation and his family was the nicest. Maybe wanting more would be too much to ask for.
Feeling better, he went to bed, stretching out his arm to switch off the light. That’s the moment he noticed something new on his wrist. Not sleepy anymore, he jumped sat on his bed, to read whatever was written. In a delicate handwriting, sort of an answer to his morning message, a goodnight message: “Hope you had a nice day.”
Too scared his unknown, and rather mysterious, soulmate would vanish again, he quickly grabbed a pen to start a conversation.
“I did! Hang out with friends all day long. That was fun!!!” Realizing this wasn’t asking for any answer and not ready to let go, he shortly added “How about u?”
“It is raining too much to do anything.”
Bokuto’s heart filled up with hope. It was raining for him too. Maybe they weren’t living far away! “Yeah it’s raining like crazy here too! But there’re still things to do during rainy days!”
“I am stuck at my grandmother’s house, there is nothing to do when we can’t go out.”
They had a grandmother… They were stuck at her house. Bokuto quickly came to the conclusion they also were a student and had holidays. “Can’t u watch TV?”
“She hasn’t one.”
“Oh that sucks… Read a book?”
“Already read everything I had.”
“Then write to me! It’s late now, I’m going to sleep. But tomorrow u have to answer all my questions! It’ll keep u busy for hours I promise”
“Fine.”
“Good night soulmate!!! Sweet dreams!”
“Good night”
Bokuto was delighted. He did have a soulmate. He was one of the lucky ones. Despite the fact he said he was going to bed, it was impossible for him to sleep as his heart was beating too fast and his mind running without giving him any break. What questions could he ask? More exactly, what would he ask first? There were so many things he wanted to know about them. He wanted to know everything. He thought about texting his friends to speak about that with someone. But more than that, he wanted to cherish the moment and keep it warm in his heart.
After a short night of sleep, Bokuto was already wide awake at 6 am, ready to write some greetings on his skin. Then he decided to go for a run, stopping on the way to buy some snacks so he could stay all day in his room, talking to his soulmate, without dying from hunger.
When he came back, after he took a shower and eat his breakfast already two hours had passed. But once again there was no answer. It crossed his mind that maybe he was wrong, they were living far away and the rain would have stopped for the other. Meaning they weren’t bored anymore and wouldn’t need Bokuto to stay occupied.
Not knowing what to do to the point of doing some homework, he got an answer late in the morning. “Sorry I’m not an early bird, I hope you weren’t waiting…”
Throwing away all his school stuffs, except for a pen, he sat on his bed all excited. “That’s ok! I did some homework” and after that he drew a sad owl’s face.
“Am I disturbing you from your work?”
“No u’r not!!!!!!!!” He didn’t need anyone to distract him from it anyway, but that, he kept it for himself. No need to show his bad side so soon. “Let’s the questioning begin! U ready?!”
“Yes”
“’kay so an easy 1 first! Do u like sport?”
“Yes I do”
“Yay! I love it too! I play volleyball in a team. I’m the ace!”
“I’m playing too. Congratulations for being the ace.”
“!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Volleyball????????? U too??????????”
“Yes, I’m a setter”
“Wow so cool!!! What’s about food, what’s u fav?”
“Nanohana no Karashiae”
“That’s very specific. Mine’s yakiniku”
“But I do enjoy onigiri too, it’s very convenient to eat.”
“Do u have siblings?”
“No I’m an only child. What about you?”
Bokuto couldn’t help but notice this time they returned the question. The more the conversation pursued, the happier he got. Past lunchtime they already knew a lot about each other’s and had to switch writing on their stomach because their arms were full of scribblings and doodles.
They were about the same age as they were both going to high school, both played volleyball and were regular player in their team. His soulmate liked the sea and reading but hated being cold. They also seemed very polite and calmer than himself.
The sunset started and they didn’t have a lot of space left on their skin, so Bokuto opted for asking some last questions. Things he really wanted to know before saying goodbye.
“Since when did u know I exist?”
“Something like 6 months ago. It started on December 6th.”
“U remember the exact time???”
“Because it was the day after my birthday.”
“Why didn’t u write something back?”
“I didn’t know what to think about it.”
“’bout what?”
“Fate. Soulmate.”
“Me I really wanted to have 1! Can I ask u a last question?”
“Go ahead”
“What’s ur name? I don’t want to refer to u as “my soulmate”, that doesn’t make u real!”
“At one condition”
“I’ll give u mine too!!’
“That’s not it. You must promise you won’t search for me. Never use it as a clue to go after me. If it’s really our destiny to meet, we have to let the universe end its work without interfering.”
“I promise! If u want give me your first name so it’ll impossible to know it’s you if I see ur name!”
In a very neat and pretty calligraphy, appeared the name “Keiji” on his left collarbone, the last available place apart from the face. On the right collarbone, Bokuto added “Koutaro”. And as a final mark he drew a heart on his cheek. Answered by a “Please wash yourself” from his soulmate on the other cheek. Something he obviously didn’t before the next morning.
Akaashi didn’t want a soulmate. He wasn’t believing in it. Of course, he scientifically knew it existed, this link between two people as anything written on one’s skin shows on the other. But he didn’t trust the human nature enough to think this bond was beyond anything else.
There were all those people who knew they had one, but who would never even want to meet them. All the people who were in love before having a soulmate and this connection destroyed everything. All the people who took this soulmate love for granted and took that as an excuse to do everything they wanted. Also, the one whose souls were connected but who lied so much to themselves they ended up becoming someone else, and even if the souls were mating, the humans weren’t. Some couples deeply loving each other and committed to their relationship were happier than true soulmates.
He knew that all too well because of his parents. True soulmates. When they realized, they had a soulmate they just exchanged a meeting point on their skin and got married shortly after. But they had so much faith in this bond, they didn’t care about making it work. They didn’t put any effort in their relationship. Of course, it didn’t work. They tried to have a kid, to be a perfect family and fix everything. Because they were unable to re-evaluate themselves so kid had to be the solution, right? It worked for a while, but Keiji hasn’t finished elementary school yet, it stopped working and they couldn’t live together without yelling or ignoring each other.
For sure in a world with only the two of them it would probably have been perfect, but they both changed their true self to fit in the society and the current version of them weren’t getting along. For their son, it was a very pathetic show to watch. That also killed all his dreams and hopes about love, even more about soulmates.
So, on the day following his 17th birthday, when he woke up with a whole unknown planning in a messy handwriting on his arm, he wasn’t excited at all. He didn’t even try to reach out. Whoever they were on the other side, he didn’t wanted to give a chance to this bond. Nothing in his life changed. He went to school, played volleyball for extra hours because he didn’t want to come back home to an either empty or full of screams house. He didn’t tell his parents he also had a soulmate, they never saw his arms anyway.
Some of his volleyball’s friends told him to try talking with his soulmate. But they knew nothing about it as none of them had one. He didn’t need any advice, didn’t even ask for their opinion in the first place.
At first, he wanted all of this to disappear. From times to times, it did. Then all this blank space on his skin made him anxious. Did something happen? That’s when he realized, even if he didn’t want to reach out, this presence was comforting to him. No matter how loud the world would scream, he wasn’t alone. Maybe it was selfish to keep this for himself. He was acting like a ghost taking advantage of someone alive who couldn’t see him or even knew he was here.
But those thoughts were quickly chased by the end of the school year and the hard exams time. He didn’t have a single moment to think about anything else than school and volleyball if he wanted to have good grades and stay a first-team player.
Then, the summer holidays begun and he got stuck at his grandmother’s house. He wanted to escape his parents for a while and offered to stay for a month with his grandmother in the countryside.
He just didn’t plan the rain. He’s been there for two weeks already and it was raining nonstop. After the second hike in the rain he caught a bad cold, so he wasn’t allowed to go out anymore. He read the three books he brought with him. Read the one his grandma was reading. He even followed her to her origami club an afternoon. It was full of old ladies who couldn’t stop pinching at his face and telling his grandmother about how pretty he was. He swore to himself he would never go there again.
An evening, not knowing what to do with himself he just sat on the balcony of the guest room he was occupying, looking at the garden in front of his eyes. The only good thing about the rainy season were the hydrangeas. They were in full bloom and the ones in his grandmother’s garden were gorgeous. Without thinking, he grabbed a pen and started to replicate some part of the garden on his forearm.
He forgot about this soulmate thing as nothing was written on him for days already. To the point he was surprised when he noticed the petals being painted in blue. Caught in the moment, he put aside all his doubts about soulmates and just answered to the colors by adding more details to the drawing. He stopped only when it got too dark for him to see what he was doing anymore.
Lost in thought he stayed outside for a long time, distantly staring at the perfectly harmonious art piece of his skin.
Looking up at the sky, hoping to see some stars, he only saw a cloudy night promising more rain for the following days. Sighting, he got up and straightly took a shower to wash his skin, deciding to forget about it. But of course, it wouldn’t take off the colors…
Of course, he would also get a new message in the morning. Now that they knew he was here, there was no going back… He wasn’t the only one to decide anymore. Luckily for him, his grandmother asked him to help cooking some pies for a charity event going on. This way he could distract his mind from all of this and the new message on his wrist. To his own surprise, when they were done, she was the one holding his hand and pointing at his wrist with a mischievous smile “Keiji I know you’re a nice kid, don’t be rude with someone caring about you. You are nothing like them.”
Caught unawares, Akaashi couldn’t come up with any answer and just politely thanked her before going back to his room. He never told her what was happening with his parents and they were all very good at keeping a façade outside of the house. How could she know? More importantly, she was right. He wasn’t mean, never intended to be. Not answering to a nice message wasn’t like him. Still a little unsure, he answered with an evening message, putting a lot of efforts in his handwriting to make sure his hesitation wouldn’t be too obvious.
At first, he kind of clenched teeth at the profusion of exclamation marks and use of abbreviations in the answers. But that was also matching the idea he got of them with everything he previously witnessed on his arm. He even came to find it sort of cute. But now there was no way to keep ignoring them. Thoughts starting to overflow to the promise of talking more the following day, he tried to calm himself in a night bath. There was no harm in getting to know each other. After all, if they had met at school, he wouldn’t have run away. Knowing they were soulmates was just a label, not a commitment.
Struggling to fall asleep, Akaashi didn’t woke up before late in the morning. He already had message on his wrist and the ink didn’t seem fresh at all.
Talking with his soulmate was easier than he thought. They were really nice and never tried to ask for more than he was willing to give. He loved the honesty and surprised himself at wanting to know more about them.
When they stopped writing to each other it was already dinner time and Akaashi was starving. But he couldn’t go to his grandma with a heart on his face… He stood up to look at himself in the mirror, covered in ink. He retraced the name on his collarbone “Koutaro…”. Ashamed of his own action, he ran into the shower to clean, at least half, of this mess on his skin. Grabbed some things to eat, excusing himself to his grandma, he avoided her seeing his left side of face and rushed back to his room.
The rest of his stay at his grandmother’s house went almost the same, talking with each other for a big part of the day. He already knew a lot about Koutaro. He was a guy, one year older, very energetic, wanted to be a pro volleyball player, loved owls, would use words in incorrect way, and a lot of others small things.
Before the end of their summer holidays, they also established their own version of the Ten Commandments as school would start again:
Rule number one: Anything related to school work was prohibited as it could be taken as cheating by the teachers;
Rule number two: When they had volleyball match they would not write anything on visible part of their body (arms, legs, neck, face);
Rule number three: They also had to warn each other if anything important, in which it could be embarrassing to have written message on their skin, was to happen;
Rule number four: Writing on face was prohibited;
Rule number five: Rule number four could be broken in case of extreme emergency;
Rule number six: They should never search for each other, if they had to meet, it had to be fate;
Rule number seven: Getting tattooed was out of question;
Rule number eight: Everything obscene was prohibited;
Rule number nine: Avoid letting anyone else writing on them as much as possible;
Rule number ten: Any very personal information would have to be washed as soon as possible.
Despite his opinion about soulmates, getting in contact with his own changed Akaashi’s life for the better. They would talk for hours about various topics. Koutaro made everything look so much easier. Sometimes he even started to wonder if that would be that bad to meet in real life. One time, he almost gave up and wanted to write a location and a time on himself, sure the other would be there. But at the same time, it was so scary. Back to his house he witnessed everyday how awful could a bad matching go. The more he cherished the relationship he had with Koutaro, the less he was willing to take the risk to see it ruined. Sometimes it would go to the point Akaashi thought the universe made a mistake and Koutaro wasn’t his soulmate, he just seemed too good for him. Only by the glance of the personality he could get through their skin bond, Koutaro seemed to radiate light and Akaashi got scared to dull this sparkle with his own personality.
Until the light faded by itself.
One day, after school Akaashi came back to an empty home to discover his skin empty as well. Usually when he took his shower after practice, he would discover a lot of new messages and random reminders scattered on his arms. This time his skin was a blank space. Not only Koutaro didn’t write to him, but he also washed everything else. Never Akaashi realized how much involved he was in this until this moment. As quickly as possible he came back to his room and wrote a “What happened?” on his palm. Minutes passed and no answer came.
Since he discovered the existence of his soulmate, Bokuto’s life has been the best. The gymnasium got fixed so he could practice again. Rainy days gave place to a beautiful and warm summer. He met a lot of new friends. Could talk with Keiji on a daily basis. After the beginning of school, he was happy to be in the same class with his best friends again, teachers and schedule were nice. Everything was going for the best.
Until that day at least. An important match was coming, and Bokuto missed everything at practice. He decided to go home before the practice was over and feeling a good for nothing, he scrubbed his skin to erase all his schedule. He just wanted to crawl into bed and sleep forever. Probably that even Keiji wouldn’t miss him as he asked him to never search after him.
Rolled on his blanket Bokuto didn’t realized he fall asleep before one of his sister woke him up by bringing dinner to his bedroom. She forced him out of his burrito-Bokuto-blanket state and made him sit so she could make him eat. As her brother was reluctantly swallowing the food, she noticed different messages of his arm.
“Kou-chan, Keiji seems worried about you, you shouldn’t ignore him”
“I’m worthless of his time. He’ll forget about me soon.” Was all Bokuto could mumble back.
“D’you really think we wouldn’t notice how fast you gobble your diner after checking your wrist and then you lock yourself for hours into your room? He wouldn’t talk to you every single day if he didn’t care.”
“But he doesn’t even wanna meet! Told me if it was fate we just have to wait for the stars to align, or something like that…”
His sister flicked his forehead before standing up to leave “Idiot, not everyone is as easy going as you! Talk to him, he always makes you smile and he’s probably waiting for you now! Good nigh lil’ bro, and don’t forget you’re amazing!”
Feeling a little better, Bokuto looked at his arm, now covered in writing. At first Keiji was asking him how he was doing, but then without answer, he gave him a list of new words to learn. What melted his heart the most was the last message, in a handwriting messier than usual: “Please say something sowlmate”. His sister was right, Keiji must be dead worried for putting an owl pun. And he was probably feeling bad about this because the time Bokuto stopped looking, only to grab a pen, the last sentence was already erased. “Hey” Bokuto answered “Sorry to make you worry…” In short words, he explained how awful practice was: during the warm-up he fall because he badly tied up his shoes, then he missed all of his services and a lot of balls, even hit of one his team mate with a lost ball. Without giving too much details about the time and place he also told him there was this match on Saturday he was worried about because he wanted to win, but he was feeling so useless. They talked longer than usual, Keiji doing his best to cheer up his soulmate. When Bokuto finally went to sleep he was back on track in a very good mood. The magic was done.
The day after, his team was amazed by the very quick change of mood. They were ready to deal for some days with a dejected owl, but it wasn’t necessary anymore.
Nonetheless they got even more amazed the actual day of the match. Bokuto was in higher spirit than ever. While he was changing before the match, something caught his eyes in the mirror: across his chest a huge “YOU ARE THE BEST” was written. Confidence boosted, he played better than he ever did before and, of course, they won.
If he was able to, he would run to Keiji and hug him so tight he couldn’t breathe anymore. But now that he was sure the boy cared about him, he tried to put aside those thoughts and be patient until he would be ready to meet him.
Bokuto couldn’t help but look a little longer at all the setters of the teams they met. But never trying to search further. He promised and he was a man to keep his word. They were still talking almost every day, exchanging more and more things. He knew he had to be patient and they would eventually meet as he noticed Keiji stopped saying as many negatives things about soulmate as he did when they started talking.
But never he thought they would be so close.
One day during fall, Keiji didn’t answer to his writing despite the fact he promised they could talk after school. The exams were approaching and they knew they wouldn’t be able to talk so much during some time so they wanted to make up for it before.
More than one hour after he was supposed to, Keiji finally answered “Sorry I’m late…”
“Hey hey hey!!!! what’s up??!”
“Nothing important. Some bad luck.”
“U ok????!”
“Yes, don’t worry I’m fine. There was just an incident with my metro line and I couldn’t make it to you in time. I’m sorry.”
“U were in a metro accident?????”
“No, not me. Yesterday the metro line collapsed and from now on it will be closed for some times. This new ride takes longer.”
Bokuto thought hard: during the morning while eating breakfast he saw at the news something similar about a metro line collapsing for mysterious reasons. Luckily it was during night time so it wasn’t crowded, but still some people were injured and someone died, so the News covered it for a long time in the journal. There’s no way a similar incident would happen at two different places, right? So Keiji was obviously talking of the same thing he saw at the News. He asked, just to be sure, and the boy confirmed he was talking about this one too.
“No waaaaaay!!! My metro line usually has a connection with this line!!!”
After exchanging for a while, they realized they were living in very close cities. Still, Keiji didn’t take that new information as a chance to change his mind and offer an encounter. Not wanting to stay uncertain, Bokuto frankly asked. “So we live in the same city but u still don’t want me to know who u r?”
“Correct.” After some time, as Bokuto wasn’t answering, a “but” was added, but nothing followed. Koutaro hopefully asked “But???”
“But I think I owe you a deeper explanation. So” a short pause followed, Keiji seemed to hesitate about what he was about to say “if you want you can give me your phone number and I can call you to explain better.”
As Bokuto wasn’t answering, Keiji started writing “Forget it, that’s stupid” but he couldn’t even finish what he wanted to say. A large number was already plastered in red on his other arm.
“I’ll call you tomorrow, my parents are at home now and it’s already getting late.”
The next day, when Keiji called him, Bokuto was so nervous and happy at the same time he couldn’t come up with anything intelligent to say, and blurted out a very formal “Thank you for having me!” as a greeting. As he tried to rectify it, only doing worse, Keiji lightly laughed. That’s the first sound he heard from his soulmate. In this moment, before even hearing his voice, Bokuto knew he was in love. For real. Beyond this soulmate thing or anything he thought love would be. It was as if his world had a brand-new center of gravity. And he was ready to give Keiji anything he wanted, which seemed to be time at this exact moment.
When he saw the number, Akaashi couldn’t help but chuckle. He was wrong to worry about his offer. He knew how badly Koutaro wished they could meet, there was no way he wouldn’t jump at the chance to know more about him. He saved the number in his phone and tried to put some order in what he had to say. He knew his main fear was to end up as miserable as his parents. But how could he explain how much this situation made him suffer? Also, soulmate or not it was still something scary to meet a stranger and even after talking for months he wasn’t sure to be ready for it yet. Could someone really understand and accept all of this?
During the night, he struggled more than usual to sleep. Scared Koutaro would think his opinion was stupid and just stop wanting to talk to him. That was the main difference between most people’s faith in soulmate and himself: most people thought you were meant to be with your soulmate no matter what, also they would love you endlessly despite everything. For Akaashi, a soulmate wasn’t a pretext to act carelessly and nobody was saved from falling out of love, destiny bond or not.
The night didn’t bring a lot of peace and when he woke up, Akaashi was still very anxious. He tried to write down a list with all his arguments but it didn’t do wonder. The morning was almost already over when he decided to call his said fated one. Overthinking everything, it didn’t cross his mind that Koutaro could also be stressed. So, when he realized it was the case and heard the boy for the first time, tripping on his words, he couldn’t help but laugh and all his worries flew away.
After that, everything went smoothly and they talked for many hours. He could explain it all. Why he was doubting it was really something stronger than everything else. How different a lot of people were from their true self. How he feared getting more pain than happiness with expectations too high. Koutaro listened to all of this, answered to everything, tempered a lot. But mostly, he understood and respected every words he was told. It was the first time Keiji felt at ease enough to talk about his parents, to explain how their existence looked miserable because they hold on too much to something not made for them, only because they believe it’s something meant to be. For the first time of his life there was no reason to keep up the façade of that perfect family.
Akaashi doubted he already speak for so long with anyone else before. At the end, his voice was slightly hoarse and at this point, Koutaro was almost doing all the talking, which seemed very natural for him. Not as if he was just trying to fill the blank.
When they hung up it was already dinner time and they decided to test fate as Akaashi firstly intended to do. If their bond was truly above their own decision-making power, then by a way or another, they would end up meeting without having to plan it before.
Even though, they added this new habit of calling each other at least twice a week. Mostly on Sunday night to give each other some cheering up words for the coming week. But about sending each other messages, they mainly kept on writing on their skin without even speaking about it. It was their thing, what was making their bond special. Something they both learned to cherish even if it took more time for Akaashi. Sending regular phone text would destroy all the magic.
Christmas time was already approaching and Akaashi truly wished he could offer something to Koutaro. He wanted to thank his soulmate for being so patient and understanding with him. He was conscious he was the one slowing down their relationship and he wanted to show a little his affection. Truth was he already had two presents. He knew how Koutaro loved learning new words so as he was reading, every time he was encountering a rare word, Akaashi was noting in down in a notebook. The notebook was almost full and he intended to give it to Koutaro. Also, some time ago, as he was doing some shopping, he mindlessly bought a sweater with an owl on it. They never told things to each other as skin color, hair color or hairstyle but they already talked about height and weight so he knew what size would fit his soulmate.
Akaashi didn’t know how to ask for something like that, wanting to give presents to someone without meeting or knowing their full name and address… He thought so hard about it that Koutaro himself noticed something was going on, and one day while they were on the phone he clearly asked what was wrong and what he was thinking about. As usual, Koutaro was just a life savior. While Keiji was struggling so hard with this, his soulmate just offered to drop it in a park near their common metro station where he could pick it up later. Simple as that.
They didn’t want to exchange gifts on December 24th or 25th because the park would be too much crowded and there were too many chances of the package being stolen. Instead, they chose to drop the gifts on the Friday before the Christmas school holidays. First, Keiji would go to the park and drop his present near a hydrangea bushes with a small statue at 7am. Koutaro would reach the metro station at 7.03 and be to the park before 7.10 so he could pick up his gift without meeting Keiji. But as he also had a present, they would do the same in the evening. Koutaro dropping his gift after school at 5pm, Keiji would come to pick it up at 5.05 and they were forbidden to open it before Christmas day.
The day they chose, everything went per their plan. Akaashi was glad they chose to do this in this order because the present he picked up was doing some noise, and going with this at school would have got a lot of questions from his friends.
Since he knew Santa wasn’t real, Akaashi has never been so excited about opening a Christmas gift. During the holidays, he was back at his grandma’s house and when Christmas family dinner was over, past midnight, he quickly went back to his room, pretending to be tired. It was the same room he was in when they first exchanged. There was no hydrangea flower during winter but he could still picture how it was back then.
Koutaro’s present was badly wrapped even though it seemed the boy put a lot of effort to do it nicely. When Keiji tore apart the wrapping paper, there was still a box hiding the present, said box was closed with a bow and a bell. Inside the box was an owl plush holding a heart where it was written “Owl I need is you”.
Usually this kind of cheesy stuffs would have made him laugh but coming from Koutaro, it didn’t seem so ridiculous anymore. Ashamed about his idea of answer before even writing it, he promised himself it was a sort of Christmas gift and he would never do something like that again: blushing as ever, Akaashi draw some heart on his arm with a “Thank you” and a “Merry Christmas”.
As he woke up on Christmas day, Bokuto only thought about opening Keiji’s present. He didn’t want to do this in front of all his family. Careful not doing too much noise to not give clue he was already up, he reached to his closet where the present was well hidden behind clothes so his sisters wouldn’t find it and tease him to death. Keiji’s presents were well wrapped and the paper ribbons were curled nicely.
First, he found the sweater and his heart melted. Then, he unfolded a small notebook covered in his soulmate’s handwriting. He opened it up only to discover so many new words and a small card of explanation from Keiji who found all those words while reading and thought it could make him happy to give him his notebook. At this exact moment, his heart stopped melting: it exploded and Bokuto was unable to keep quiet anymore. Because of that, before he had the chance to answer, his sisters called him to come down so they could open the presents. When he changed, and spotted the hearts on his skin, he was sure Santa was real. There was no other way he could get so lucky. He really wanted to call Keiji or cover his face with hearts but his fated one insisted about being quiet during holidays as he didn’t want his parents to discover he had a soulmate. Keiji told him his parents would probably make everything they could for them to stop talking if they were to discover it, so too scared to loose Keiji before even meeting in for real, he kept on his word and brought all his joy to his own family and Christmas. Once again thinking about how lucky he was to have such an easy-going family. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t picture being afraid of telling anything to his family. He understood what Keiji told him about his own family not being so open-minded, but he couldn’t understand how in the world it was possible. He wished with all his heart he could share some of his luck with the boy, but it didn’t seem like there was any way at the moment.
Not being able to share his family, Bokuto just kept being here for Keiji. Months passed with nothing changing between the two of them, only the feeling of trust growing stronger.
The season of the rain was back and soon were to be the summer holidays. He had a volleyball training camp at the beach with his team and another team from the town. Truth is Bokuto hoped it could be Keiji’s school. They were getting along so well, there was no way fate wouldn’t let them meet, but time passed and nothing happened. When his soulmate told him he was going on a trip to Hawaii with his grandmother origami’s club during the summer, no matter how hard he laughed at the thought, he couldn’t help being disappointed by understanding it wasn’t Keiji’s school going with them to the training camp.
The past weeks he couldn’t help but start to fantasies a lot about how their meeting would be. He knew the voice, the personality, even the eyes color: once Keiji was annoyed with his parents for fighting over the color of his eyes, one thinking it was blue, the other green. Truth is it was an intermediate shade between the two. But Bokuto couldn’t put a face over his so loved one and that was disturbing him a lot, to love so deeply someone faceless.
He was very close to break their promise and ask for a meeting before they would go on summer holidays, in different places, where it would be impossible to randomly bump into each other.
But at the same time, he sensed something was going off with Keiji. When he asked, the other just told him something unpleasant happened but he didn’t want to talk about it. Rejected all the calls from the other. It was already a week and Keiji didn’t even bothered to write to him anymore. Even if they never met, Bokuto never felt so heartbroken, it was like some very heavy rocks were attached to his heart and he would drown in no time.
They didn’t talk for almost 10 days already when Keiji tried to call him one evening after school. Bokuto had practice until late this day and he missed the call, seeing it only hours later, on his way back home. Not wasting time, he called back as soon as possible, only to be more heartbroken, but this time by the sound of Keiji’s voice. He wasn’t even sure if the boy was laughing or crying when he told him his parents discovered about them and it didn’t exactly go well. They checked his skin every day to make sure they didn’t talk and never let him use his phone at home. At some point, he was sure he heard Keiji whisper to him “take away the pain” but he couldn’t hear clearly as the rain was pounding so heavily. When he asked him what he could do to help, his soulmate just had time to tell him that his phone battery was dying and he didn’t have a pen with him, before the said phone stopped working.
Two options appeared in Bokuto’s mind. Either he walked back home hoping for the best. But from what he heard, Keiji was outside, under the rain, and if he didn’t have his phone charger or even a pen he highly doubted the boy would have an umbrella.
Second option seemed like the best. It was time to help fate a little and prove that their bonding was so strong that he could manage to find him only with sheer will.
Not hesitating for long, he opted for option two.
Almost at his home station he took another train to go back, and stopped at the station they had in common. Hoping Keiji would be exactly where he wanted him to be. Where he needed him to be. He couldn’t bear with the thought of Keiji being hurt. Those past days he selfishly thought his soulmate changed his mind and didn’t want to reach to him anymore, never it crossed his mind that someone forced Keiji to do so and he was hurt as much as Koutaro.
Not wanting to be slowed down by anything he didn’t bother to open his umbrella, when he arrived at the park where they exchanged gifts, he was already soaked wet. The rain wouldn’t stop and nobody was in the park at this late hour, only one or two persons would haste under their umbrella. Not pausing or looking in distress.
Was he wrong? Was it really possible that this thing called destiny or fate, the thing that bond them together, abandoned him at a time like that? But also wasn’t it Keiji’s fear about the whole thing? Letting everything to destiny and not putting any effort in it?
Going further to the park he took a big breath so he was able to call a loud “KEIJIIIIIIII”.
On his left, between two hydrangeas bushes, a movement caught his eyes. Someone was here under the rain and looked up to him. It could have been anyone, everyone would have looked up to the wet idiot screaming at the top of his lungs in the almost desert park. But the color in the eyes, a greenish blue that caught his, made Bokuto’s face crack in a huge smile and his legs move on their own to reach the boy. Keiji stood up too to meet him. Bokuto put so much force into his embrace they ended up falling backward, only caught by one of the hydrangea bush. Keiji laughed, with that first laugh he heard when he realized he was in love. The one that gave butterlies in Koutaro’s stomach and makes everything spark.
“You found me…”
“I found you!”
Speaking at the same time to say almost the same thing, for one it was surprise, for the other confidence. When they looked at each other faces, it was only relief and happiness.
Bokuto didn’t loosen his hold on Keiji, he may have interfered a little with fate, but there was no way he would let his very own soulmate go now that he finally found him.
And by the way Akaashi was clinging onto Bokoto, he knew he wouldn’t go anywhere.