Bare Skin | Yoonmin Soulmate!AU (Hiatus until summer)

Chapter One

Flakes of snow kept falling on Yoongi's glasses, blurring his vision. He was walking towards the café, where he was supposed to meet with his friends and he was afraid that he would be late. He glared at the couple in front of him, blocking the street by holding hands and walking slow, like the entire road belonged to them. He let out a groan of frustration and walked faster, pushing into the man's side to make some space and the woman gasped – like it wasn't their fault in the first place.

"Stupid couples..." Yoongi murmured as he spotted the café. He opened the door, the familiar sound of the bell announcing his presence. He didn't even need to look around for his friends, Hoseok's loud voice betraying their location. He made his way to the table while starting to untangle the scarf that was strangling him.

"Good morning, Yoongi! Glad to see that you have finally left your room." Hoseok said, trying to earn a reaction from the boy, but in vain; Yoongi's face remained stone cold.

"What's the point of me getting out of my house? It's meaningless." Yoongi replied, taking his coat off and signaling to one of the waitresses to come to their table.

Yoongi didn't have to mention it, but everyone at that table knew why it would be meaningless for him. He actually didn't have a reason to – or ever had one. Just by looking at his right arm, a stranger would know why. No trace of ink on his inner right arm. Yoongi's skin was bare.

Everyone grows being told the same story: When you turn eight, a tattoo will appear on your right arm. The tattoo shows the first words that your soulmate will tell you when you first meet. The tattoo will glow after hearing the right words from the right person and that's it. You find your soulmate and you live happily ever after with them. Every child remembers the night before their 8th birthday, staring at their arms excitedly and wondering what their tattoo will say. The pride of going to the school next day, showing everyone your tattoo and waiting patiently to hear those inked words. Everyone but Yoongi.

There was a twenty percent chance for a person to not meet their soulmate during their lifetime. A three percent of the tattoo fading away. There was only half a percent chance for a person's tattoo to not appear at all after turning eight. Yoongi was part of that small percent.

His younger self had been excited about the tattoo's appearance, arguing with his parents that "he didn't need sleep 'cause he was a big boy now" and that he could stay awake to wait for the ink to cover his pale skin. Eventually, fatigue beat the best efforts of his body and he fell asleep, only to wake up to find his skin as pale as the night before. He looked at his arm, examined it, searching for any trace or sign of black ink. He ran to his parents' room, close to bursting into tears and showed his bare arm. His parents tried to calm him down, his father explaining that it may show eventually and Yoongi believed them. As time passed and Yoongi grew, he realized that it was a lie; his tattoo would never show up; more importantly, he did not have a soulmate. Nobody in the entire world could ever understand him, accept him, love him. The universe decided to fuck Yoongi up before he could do it himself, condemning him to being a misfit for the rest of his life.

"What would you like to order?" the waitress asked, snapping Yoongi out of his thoughts. He blinked twice, remembering where he was and why he was there.

"I would like a coffee. Black, no sugar or milk. Just black," Yoongi said, pulling down the sleeves of his sweater, noticing the stare of the waitress and frowning at the pity in her eyes.

The waitress left to take care of their order and Yoongi reached for his bag and took a notebook out, starting to write lyrics down as he let his friends chat around him. It was almost a daily routine, for them to meet at this café and for Yoongi to ignore his friends in favour of working on his music, his friends' chatter serving as a type of background music.