Chapter Text
Anthony Lockwood is five years old when he gets the first message on his skin. He can’t quite read it, because soulmates aren’t allowed to write their own names for the other person to read. No, the universe must’ve thought that would be too easy for everyone to track down one another.
Not that he understands this. He’s only five years old, after all. But what he does understand, however, is something big just happened. He has a soulmate! He runs to his big sister Jessica’s room, excited to show her. “Jess, Jess!” he shouts, completely ignorant of the fact that she’s admiring the notes on her own skin, “look what came in!”
The Lockwood siblings sit there and watch as somewhere out there, a very baby-faced four year old Lucy Carlyle is tracing her full name on her forearm for the very first time. All Anthony and Jessica are able to make out, though, is the first initial of her first name. L. Anthony can feel the indentations on his skin, like his soulmate is still writing. It’s very shaky and done with what appears to be a blue crayon. Jessica smiles. “They must not know that you can’t tell your soulmate your name until after you’ve met,” she says softly. “Would you like to write a message back to them?”
Anthony nods eagerly, and Jessica lets him pick out a crayon. He picks bright pink, his favourite colour because it’s Jessica’s favourite colour, and thinks long and hard about what he wants to write. He decides on a simple “hello.” H E L L O he writes out painstakingly; he hasn’t really mastered when to use upper and lowercase letters yet. He watches raptly as it stays on his skin, until a response finally appears in the same shade of blue. Anthony decides it’s his second favourite colour.
HI, his soulmate writes back right away, IM L… and here the message trails off again. Evidently, his soulmate is hell-bent on telling him their name. “Here,” Jessica says, gently taking Anthony’s hand, “why don’t we let them know they can’t do that? I’ll help you write the letters. It should work as long as your hand is the one touching the crayon.”
And so Jessica and Anthony carefully write out a message: you can’t write your own name . It’s a bit shakier than Jessica’s handwriting, but miles better than what Anthony would’ve been able to do on his own.
A reply comes quickly. thats stoopid, his soulmate writes back. how old are you? im 4
I’m five , Anthony writes back. It’s very nice to meet you, Jessica makes him add. “Mum and Dad surely raised you better than that,” she chides playfully as she ruffles his hair. “In fact, why don’t you go show them?”
Jessica and Anthony bound down the stairs to the library, where Celia and Donald Lockwood are preparing for an upcoming lecture for a society Anthony can’t quite pronounce just yet. “Mum, Dad!” he shouts excitedly, breaking the silence that had engulfed the room, “look!” The whole family watches as Anthony’s soulmate writes back. its nice to meet you to.
Anthony Lockwood is six years old when his parents die in a car crash. He knew before Jessica did, because he saw their death glows in the garden. He has a fairly good understanding of death at this point. It’s hard not to when the entire nation is suffering from the Problem, and his parents
are
were the foremost paranormal researchers in all of Great Britain. He feels numb. He should tell his soulmate all of this, he thinks to himself as he and Jessica walk away from their parents’ graves, but he’s not quite sure how.
Anthony and Jessica share a bed now most nights. Jessica’s only twelve, but decades of lax child labour laws and the government’s unwillingness to take another set of orphans into foster care when they have a perfectly good townhouse to live in means that the two are basically left alone for the most part. She tries her best for Anthony, but they both know there’s no replacing Mum and Dad. Anthony can’t figure out how to stop her from crying herself to sleep each night, so he tries to cheer her up by telling her what his soulmate writes to him.
In the year since they started communicating, Anthony’s found out that his soulmate is a girl, her favourite colour is blue, and she has six older sisters. The conversations are still rather basic at this point, but they always manage to cheer him up even a little bit. He’s taken to calling her “L,” and she calls him “Big A” to his annoyance. He’s not quite sure where she came up with that nickname. He lets her do it, though. He’d let her do anything as long as it meant she’d keep writing to him.
Again, he’s six at this point, so he doesn’t think this exactly. All he knows is that nobody else in the world, not even Jessica, is allowed to call him anything other than “Anthony,” but he’ll give L a pass because she can’t know his actual name just yet. He just hopes she’ll call him “Anthony” when they finally meet in person.
Anthony’s not sure how to put all of his emotions into words just yet, so he takes to drawing on his skin to communicate with his soulmate instead. Jessica lets him use all of her crayons, and so his drawings are colourful and lively. He draws her pink hearts, yellow and white daisies that he sees in the park Jessica takes him to after lessons, and even a rainbow once or twice. L sticks to the same blue crayon she’s always used, and Anthony wonders to himself if her older sisters won’t share with her like Jessica does with him.
Eventually, he does tell her that his parents died. She writes back almost instantly in that same shade of blue. I’m sorry she writes carefully. My dad died too. Mum is angry all the time. My sisters are sad.
At least she still has her mum, Anthony thinks to himself one night after waking up from a horrible nightmare. He can make out a girl with reddish-brown hair wearing a blue jumper walking away from him in the pouring rain. She won’t acknowledge him, no matter how often he shouts her name. “L!” he calls. No response. Anthony doesn’t grasp what L isn’t telling him in the sentence Mum is angry all the time . He wishes she’d write back more often; sometimes it takes her days to respond. He wonders what she gets up to. Not much, she says one November evening. My crayon is getting smaller , she continues, and my sisters won’t let me use theirs . Anthony wishes, not for the first time, that he knew where she lived so he could send her some of his.
Anthony Lockwood is nine years old when his sister dies. He doesn’t talk about it much, not even with his uncle, who smells of tobacco and always has a kind smile for him. The uncle moves into 35 Portland Row with Anthony so he’s not so alone. Uncle Hugo is Celia’s brother, and she never let him smoke in the house, but Celia Lockwood isn’t there to stop him, is she? The entire house, even Anthony’s attic bedroom that he moved into after Jessica died, reeks of tobacco now, but Anthony finds that he doesn’t mind that much. It’s just proof that someone else is in the house with him. He finds it comforting.
He also finds it comforting to talk to his soulmate, even when he shares that his sister has died. L knows how to cheer him up, and he often falls asleep with a smile thinking about her snarky messages and crude sketches. He knows she could do a lot more if she had a proper art kit, and he sometimes dreams that his arms are full of colour from her various drawings. She’s eight now, and tells him she’s going to be an Agent someday. Her spelling’s gotten a lot better, but her handwriting hasn’t. Hi Big A, she writes one Sunday morning when Anthony is out hunting with his uncle, you’ll never guess what happened!
Anthony hides behind a bush and pulls out the pink crayon he’s kept on him since he was six and thinks of a response. What? he writes back; Uncle Hugo is looking for him.
It isn’t until Uncle Hugo is driving him back to London that he’s able to take a peek at his forearm. Mum’s made me join an Agency here, L wrote in her signature blue, but I’ve made a new friend and it’s already loads better than life at home! Anthony smiles to himself. L’s told him bits and pieces about her life ever since he asked her why she only writes with a blue crayon, and he knows her mum is a horrible woman. Does the universe let me write other peoples’ names? L asks, and Anthony isn’t sure.
I dunno, he replies. Let me try: I lost my sister Jessica to a ghost a couple months ago . He had already told her, of course, but he only said ‘my sister then.’
Bollocks, L writes back, censured again. I’ll have to think of J names by myself, then.
My uncle says that’s a bad word! Anthony writes back, before hurriedly rolling down his shirt sleeve so his uncle doesn’t see said bad word. He feels a sensation on his arm and knows he already has a response waiting for him.
Sorry, L writes in a marginally neater script than usual, N’s taught me a lot of naughty words since I moved into the dormitory. She gives up on trying to tell him the names of her sisters and her best friend, sticking with initials instead. Anthony reasons that there surely can’t be that many eight year old girls with six older sisters out there. The universe can’t make it too hard for him to find her, right?
Anthony Lockwood is eleven years old when his uncle dies of a stroke while on one of their regular hunting trips. He starts to feel numb. Barely eleven years old and he’s already lost so many important people in his life; he wonders if he’ll ever get to meet his soulmate or if he’ll lose her, too.
It’s at this time he decides to distance himself from everyone, L especially. This will make it easier when he inevitably loses them, he reasons. He stops going by Anthony and insists everyone calls him Lockwood, but still humours L when she calls him Big A. As much as he’d hate to admit it, he can’t help but smile when he sees she’s written it again.
L’s vocabulary has grown since she joined an Agency, Lockwood muses as his arm is full of colourful language. He starts wearing more button down shirts and whatever’ll fit him from his dad’s wardrobe. Lockwood eventually goes shopping, careful to buy only what he needs because his inheritance will run out eventually. He’s already decided he’ll start an agency of his own one day. Maybe he can somehow get L and her friend N to come down and join with him. I’m a Listener, L tells him one day when he broaches the subject with her, and N’s got Sight and Touch. She’s been nattering on about London ever since I told her you live there . ‘London’ is apparently vague enough for the universe for Lockwood to tell L; he’s already tried ‘Marylebone’ and L just said completely censured, sorry. We’ll find you, though, and Lockwood can’t help but grin at the thought of 35 Portland Row full of life again. He’s gotten rather lonely by himself.
Lockwood decides to start an apprenticeship with Gravedigger Sykes, an old family friend. He hasn’t seen the man since his sister’s funeral, but it isn’t too hard to track him down. It’s hard work, but Lockwood enjoys it. Sorry that I haven’t been writing as much, he tells L one morning after a long night out with Gravedigger Sykes, I’ve been bloody busy ever since I began.
Don’t mention it, L eventually responds. She, too, has been busier than ever. The Problem’s become a lot worse up North, and I’m out most nights and training during the day. They’re running us ragged. Lockwood swears he can hear her accent if he really focuses, and he tells himself he’ll get to hear her speak to him in person one day if he’s really lucky. He just hopes that day comes sooner rather than later.
Days go by without them speaking to each other, and while Lockwood can feel the loss at first, he quickly becomes used to not speaking with L as often. She seems fine with it too, or otherwise she’d reach out first, right? He tells himself to focus on the possibility that maybe she has to ration yet another crayon, that maybe she’s waiting for him to write her something first that would warrant a response. Her mother gets all of her meagre earnings, and he knows that nonessential luxuries like crayons can get expensive.
Lockwood is fourteen when he meets George Karim. George comes from a completely normal family, but his Talent is too good to be wasted as a Sensitive or stuck in school all day like Lockwood would be if his parents were alive and insisted that he get a proper education. He’s also recently gotten fired from Fittes, and has been blacklisted from working at every other agency in London. George moves in almost immediately, and doesn’t argue when Lockwood insists on naming their new agency “Lockwood & Co.” He hasn’t met his soulmate, either, but George still sends her sketches and funny insults from time to time. “She doesn’t respond much,” George says one early morning after a long case, “but I know she’s there when I need her.” Lockwood thinks back to the last time he spoke to L. It must’ve been two months at this point. He really should write her, he thinks to himself, and pulls out a worn-down pink crayon when George finally goes to bed.
Hi, L, it’s been a while, he writes cautiously. Lockwood’s not sure what he’s afraid of, exactly. She’s his soulmate, she’s bound to forgive him for not reaching out, and besides, this bond between them works both ways!
It sure has. L’s reply is there for him when he wakes up the next morning, and he kicks himself mentally for not being awake to respond right away. Lockwood knows that L’s sleep schedule is just as fucked as his and George’s are, and he doesn’t know when she’ll be able to reply next.
How are you? He writes and stares at it, willing her to just respond already.
She must already be awake, because it doesn’t take long for her response to come in. How am I? It’s been two months since we’ve talked and that’s all you have to say to me?
Lockwood frowns. Why is she so mad at him for not reaching out, when he could accuse her of doing the exact same thing? You could’ve said something too, he replies, trying and failing not to press the crayon into his skin harder than necessary. How much about our lives are we actually able to tell each other? He continues, frustrated and upset that he could lose the one person the universe set aside for him. He’s cocked it up.
Isn’t it enough that we can talk to each other? L writes. A, you know more about me than anyone else, and I can’t even tell you my real name or from what bloody backwater village I come from. I don’t want to lose you, you dolt. She underlines the last sentence, and Lockwood can feel her pressing into his skin.
I lose everyone who tries to get close to me, he writes in response, so maybe you should keep your distance too. He watches his message slowly fade, a sign that she’s read it.
If that’s what you want… L finally responds after an hour. Lockwood acts as if he weren’t sitting around waiting for her reply, but it’s true. He’s been fixated on his forearm ever since he sent the message, and a small part of him wishes he’d never sent it in the first place.
Lockwood ultimately decides not to respond to this message. He goes downstairs and tells George that he has a solution for keeping each other in the loop when one of them is out on a solo case (Lockwood), or the other is in the archives again (George). Lockwood christens the first Thinking Cloth with the same pink crayon he just used to tell L he doesn’t think they should talk anymore, and he wills himself not to cry. George adds a rude drawing of Inspector Barnes, and Lockwood tells himself it’s a perfectly suitable replacement for writing L.
Lockwood is 15 when he gets the final message from his soulmate. I’ve lost everyone, he reads on his arm one late morning after a particularly long case. I’m coming to London. He doesn’t respond. He doesn’t even know how to respond.
Lockwood is 16 when Lucy Carlyle shows up to interview for the vacant agent position at Lockwood & Co. She passes his and George’s various tests with flying colours, and for that afternoon at least, he hasn’t thought of his soulmate once. She’s wearing a soft blue jumper that he swears is the same shade of crayon L used all those years ago, but he ignores it and holds out his hand for her to shake. Her grip is surprisingly firm. “Welcome to Lockwood & Co,” he says with a grin. He means it, too.
She smiles back at him, and Lockwood forgets about L entirely.