Marliza Soulmate AU

Chapter 1

     The first time your soulmate touchs you, their touch leaves a permenant tattoo. Most people, when they meet someone, will do something romantic, like a peck on the cheek. Eliza had even heard of couples drawing hearts on eachother's arms, or something. Which was great if they're your soulmate, but very unfortunate if they're not. Especially when you don't bring it up for years.

     Eliza and Alex had known that they weren't soulmates for ages. It's very difficult to date somebody without accidentally brushing into them. But they'd been keeping up the illusion for so long , it just felt inappropriate to tell everybody now. Really, Eliza probably should have brought it up after their first few dates. But she didn't, so they'd kept up the rise. Really, Alex probably should have mentioned it when they moved in together. Then Eliza could have casually brought it up in conversation after they got engaged.

      So now Eliza was waiting in the dressing room with her sisters, about to be married to a man who was most definitely not her soulmate. Angie and Peggy had spent hours burning her hair with curling irons until the air smelled putrid, and then had used all of New York's supply of Bobby pins. In the end it had looked horrible, but nobody was going to mention it. It seemed like their was a common theme in Eliza's life right now.

     "Eliza, excited for your big day? I can't believe you've never touched Alex before. That takes some dedication and effort. It's very romantic though," Eliza's sister, Peggy, said from behind an enormous white dress. Peggy's soulmate was purely platonic. It had actually come as a surprise for everyone when Lafayette and Peggy had gotten matching orange palm prints on their hands from a high five. For one thing, Peggy was aromantic and very proud of it. And two, they were highfiving because Laf had just run into his soulmate. Literally. He and Hercules had matching yellow splotches on their chest from their very low speed collision.

     Luckily for everyone involved in the Peggy/Laf/Hercules affair, it was quickly remembered that there were platonic soulmates.

     Eliza's other sister, Angie, appeared from behind Peggy, wildly waving around a set of brushes and an eyeshadow palatte. Of course Angie had already found her soulmate. That was just the kind of person she was, quick and efficient in everything. Even though she was only 25, the oldest of the siblings, she had already married her soulmate, Theo. She even had the bright red soulmark on her lips to prove it. Right now Theo was eight months pregnant with a daughter, who they had already planned to name Theo Jr. And that was only half of her life, the other half dedicated to the restaurant she owned with Theo.

     "Eliza! Get over here! We have an hour until the ceremony and you're not even in your dress or make up!" Angie called, beckoning her sister over with a tube of lipstick pulled out of nowhere. Honestly, this entire wedding was messing with Angie's sensibilities. Eliza had never seen her so flustered before.

     Eliza sighed and went over to the chair her sister had pulled out, and sat down, ready to be subjected to whatever form of torture her sisters had devised.

     Before she knew it, Eliza was standing at the end of the aisle, her chest tucked into a dress that was several sizes to small. She was scared to move her face too much, for fear that all the makeup Angie had put on might just fall off. Of course, that wasn't what was making butterflies fly around on wings of fire in her stomach. No, it was seeing all the expectant faces on either side of the aisle. On one side was her family, her father and mother sitting proudly with all her little siblings. On the other were all of Alex's friends. Eliza honestly still didn't know Alex's entire past, but she did know that he had no real blood relatives.

     Her family was the whole reason she had stuck with Alex this whole time. She knew that her parents wanted their eldest daughters to have 'normal lives'. And by that they meant settling down with a lawyer, or one of their upperclass friends' kids. Eliza did love her parents, but she really didn't want to live the life they planned for her. But Alex was a lawyer, so that was something for her parents, and he was a good friend, so Eliza was happy.

     And now everybody would see that Eliza and Alex weren't soulmates.

     All of this and more was going through Eliza's head as she slowly walked down the aisle, Hercules skipping behind her sprinkling rose petals in her wake. Alex was waiting  at the alter in a slightly disheveled black tuxedo. As she  she noticed Alex's best man, John, had a new dark blue soulmark on his palm, where he had either grabbed someone's hand or high-fives them.

     As she stood across from Alex, she saw him swiftly cover the top of his hand with his sleeve, carefully covering a new blue mark where someone had grabbed his wrist. She almost started giggling right then and there. Her fiancé had found his soulmate before she did.

     The next few minutes flew by before Eliza could fully comprehend what was going on. Before she knew it, the officiant was asking Alex to take Eliza's hands, to prove that they were truly soulmates. A hush flew over the already silent crowd, as breaths were withheld from the weighted air. Slowly Eliza put out her slender hands, and Alex raised his hands, gently resting them on hers.

     As both of them had expected, nothing happened. Silence filled the room, until finally Alex spoke. "Well. This is a bit awkward, though I really wasn't expecting much else. So, Eliza, there's  only one thing I can say to you." He got down on one knee, miming a proposal. "Elizabeth Schuyler, will you break up with me?"

      "Of course I will! I've never liked you as more than a friend!" Eliza tried to sound positive. Wouldn't it be a hilarious story to tell her future kids? How she and her ex-fiancé had turned a botched wedding into a joke? But out of the corner of her eye she could see her parents and her adopted siblings leaving the church. Her heart fell, but what was there to do. You just couldn't control who your soulmate was.