And you decided whether you saw beauty or destruction

Shared pain

(Soulmate au)

This one's for "Q" on ao3 who requested the shared pain soulmate au. Fun!

It was in the middle of spring, sunny, with a soft wind, Connor remembers because he had opened his window to smoke. It was a quiet day.

Later, much later, when he met the person at the end of his connection, he would realize how fitting that was.

It happened because it was the break, and that meant his mom was forcing everyone to have lunch together, besides the usual family dinner. It happened because Larry always had to press Connor's buttons, like he needed the fights to keep him breathing.

One moment Connor was screaming at Larry, the next he was on the floor, curled up in absolute pain, clutching his left arm to him. Everything hurt like hell, and it felt like someone had punched the air out of his lungs; he doesn't remember his parents picking him up and driving him to the hospital, or the terrified expression on his sister's face.

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There's nothing wrong with him physically, and here Connor wants to stress that physically, because he's pretty messed up otherwise; actually the physical part isn't true either, he has very unhealthy habits and he knows it. The point here is, that there's no reason for Connor to have suffered so much pain all of the sudden, not his own pain at least.

The doctor explains to both Connor and his mom, who has been at his bedside since he came to, the fact that Connor had been victim of his soulmate connection. You're meant to feel your soulmate's pain as if it were your own.

"They probably had a nasty fall"

Cynthia gasped; Connor's hand went for his arm on instinct.

"Does it still hurt?"

"It's fading"

The doctor smiles softly.

"That means they're healing, if they were dead it would've stopped hurting immediately"

He felt relief wash over him at that... relief? What was he relieved about? He couldn't have a soulmate; a broken bone would be nothing to the destruction Connor would do to them.