Speechless

Chapter 4

Phil

To say that he was surprised would be an understatement. He was absolutely stupefied and, to be honest, a little bit scared.

First of all, he was just astonished that he actually now had proof that he had a soulmate and that he could now proudly show his mark off every time one of his infamous bullies made a snide remark about him being a freak and said that he couldn't possibly have a soulmate.

Secondly he was a bit scared because how in the world could "oh my god, shit, I'm so, so sorry!" be caused by a good thing?! His soulmate will be saying how sorry they are to him, while cursing at the same time. It didn't exactly sound like a fun adventure would be in the cards when he meets his soulmate for the first time, but at least he'll get to meet them.

***

As soon as the last bell rang, signalling the end of English and school, Phil practically bolted out of the class room to try and find Peej before he left the school grounds.

He clung onto his journal as he ran through the school corridors, his school bag swinging wildly from his shoulder. Just as he got out the main doors of the school, he could see Peej and Chris talking to each other just down the road, waiting for their bus. He slowed into a fast walk once he realised he had plenty of time and tapped Peej on the shoulder.

Peej stopped talking and turned around to see what had tapped him on the shoulder when he saw a rather puffed out Phil. "Oh, hello! How-"

Phil held up a finger to stop Peej from talking any more, before opening his journal and practically shoving it in both of the boys faces.

"Wow, okay slow down there" Chris laughed as he took the journal out of the taller boys hands so he could read it properly.

Both Chris and Peej looked at what Phil had written before looking up at Phil with wide eyes.

"Wait, really!" Peej asked the raven haired boy, who was anxiously wringing his hands together. When he had seen the boy in the morning to give him his present (a jar of hard boiled sweets), he didn't have any sign of having a mark on him.

"Let's see it then!" Chris said excitedly

Phil pulled up his left sleeve and smiled as both of the boys in front of him chuckled slightly at the words written across his wrist.

***

Twenty one years old

Phil was now studying for his third year at the University of Manchester. He had an interesting life at the moment, he was living at home again after living on campus for a little while, but he was enjoying his classes in English Language and Linguistics as well as his class in Video Postproduction, though these aren't exactly the easiest subjects when you can only write to communicate. His brother was now moved out so it was a little quieter at home, but he came to visit often. He hadn't found his soulmate yet either.

Dan

Seventeen years old (11th of June)

As soon as Dan woke up on the morning of his birthday, the first thing he did was check his arms, there wasn't anything there yet, but he knew it could take some people longer for it to appear. He had been more excited for this day than he would like to admit, but he'd toned his excitement down as it didn't exactly help to stop the boys from school beating the shit out of him.

***

After his morning breakfast and being able to go into school late since he had a free lesson, he decided to walk to school seeing as it was a nice day and just wanted to enjoy the silence while it lasted.

***

He must have been walking slower than he thought, because before he knew it, he was ten minutes late for maths.

'Big breath, you'll be fine' Dan thought to himself as he walked into the class, just in time to be greeted with his friendly neighbourhood bully, Jayden, who also must have been running late.

The teacher let out a huff as he looked towards the two boys from where he was writing on the white board. "And why are you late Mr. Howell?"

At this point, Jayden decided to chip in with a smirk on his face "I know why he was late, he was too busy being a gay lord!"

Due to being so stunned from the sheer stupidity of the comment, all Dan could do was roll his eyes and just look extremely unimpressed.

"What?" Jayden asked as Dan just shook his head and sat down at his desk. He couldn't be bothered to deal with this amount of stupidity before noon.

***

Dan spent the rest of his day at school vaguely listening to the teachers and chatting to a few of the nicer people when recess and eventually lunch came around, but he couldn't help but become agitated as the hours in the day passed and his soulmates mark still hadn't appeared on his wrist yet.

***

It was currently eleven thirty at night and now Dan was starting to panic, sure some people get their marks later in the day compared to some others who practically woke up with the thing, but this was cutting it a little close wasn't it? His mind started to wonder as he remember the times his teachers had shown them studies and made them do assignment on the people who never got their speech marks, and why they thought that could be, but not even once did he consider that it could happen to him.

'It is really rare that someone doesn't get their speech marks, so maybe it's not too late yet. I'll be fine, it'll come within the next half an hour surely...'

As comforting as these thoughts may seem, he couldn't help but to remember the look on both of his parents faces when they realised that he still didn't have a mark. As much as his parents had tried to hide their thoughts with an overly exaggerated, fake smile and an "Some people are just late bloomers", their façade was completely see through and he knew they thought he would be the one in the one in a million chance of not having a soulmate.

***

The clock finally clicked over to twelve and as it felt like a black hole of the abyss had swallowed him whole, Dan knew.

No. Yesterday was not a good day.