Twenty-Eight Days, Twenty-Eight Signs

Chapter One: Eyes

            My alarm beeps from my bedside table. I groan and feebly punch the snooze button. Ugh, why did I even set my alarm for today? It's a Saturda-

Suddenly I bolt upright. It's a Saturday, yeah, but it's also February. My sixteenth February. The February where I'm supposed to find my soulmate.

I scramble out of bed, throwing my covers behind me, and leg it to the bathroom to see myself in the mirror. I squeeze my eyes closed.

The first day is most likely to be something small, something easy to spot but not much help in finding them, like a streak of your soulmate's hair colour or their gender written on your palm. The big things come later in the month, like the string of fate. But I have this month, and this month only, to find them, otherwise we will never meet. It's been like that forever. During the month of your sixteenth birthday, each day presents a new thing to connect you to your soulmate, to help you find each other. After it's over, you're either left with the deepest love of your life or the deepest loneliness you could ever feel.

Unfortunately, I ended up in February, the shortest month of the year.

I take a deep breath and open my eyes. Staring back at me are two heterochromic eyes. One is my normal shade of grey-blue, but the other is shade of brown, like dark, melted chocolate.

I got the most classic one for my first day. This is the thing all the love stories are written about. There's just something beautiful and simplistic about having an eye the same colour as your soulmate.

I stare into the brown eye for what feels like hours, and I can already feel myself falling for this person. There's just so much beauty there. The dark sweetness, the subtle bitterness. The eyes are the windows to your soul, they say. I guess that's true.

I smile at my reflection before heading downstairs for breakfast. Moonlight, I tell myself, you are going to find them this month.

XXX

I gape at myself in the mirror. This is actually happening, Raven. This. Is. Actually. Happening.

My other eye is grey-blue. Not like the normal mix, though. The grey is silvery, almost luminous, and you can almost see it glowing. The blue is . . . well, blue. Not sea blue or sapphire blue. Close-ish to sky blue, but not quite. Mixed together . . . I don't know. It's beautiful.

I glance back at my own eye. Then look back at hers. I stare at it for who knows how long. This is my soulmate. I have a soulmate. I have a soulmate.

My mum suddenly raps her knuckles on the door, snapping me back to here and now. I sigh and open the door.

She squeals when she sees my blue-grey eye and grabs the sides of my face to look at it.

"WOW, YOUR SOULMATE HAS SUCH GOREGEOUS EYES! YOU'VE GOT TO FIND HIM, SWEETIE! RAVEN, HIS EYES ARE SO . . . I CAN ALREADY FEEL HOW MUCH YOU'RE GOING TO LOVE HIM!" she shrieks.

Her, I silently correct in my head. My soulmate is definitely a girl. How do I know this? I just do. I'm gay. My soulmate is definitely female. I can feel it.

I've known that I'm gay for ages. I've had too many girl-crushes to track. Who knows, they could've been my soulmate when I'm older. It's also completely possible to even be in love with someone who isn't your soulmate, but they will probably not love you back.

The aromantic people have platonic soulmates, actually.

Anyway, my mum is screaming and rushing to take photos, my dad and little sister rushing in to see. I grit my teeth and wait until the hype dyes down before quietly escaping to my room.

Nobody knows I'm gay yet. My family are homophobic. Like, really homophobic. They shoot disapproving glares at any same-gender couples and yell garbage at them about corrupting their daughters' innocence. I couldn't tell them. But hopefully, if I can find my soulmate, they will finally see that love is love.

In my room, I immediately put my headphones on and retreat into my own thoughts to the sounds of Fall Out Boy. I hope she likes rock music. That would be an instant good point with me.

I pull on black jeans, a black T-Shirt and a black hoodie baring the faded emblem of a band I saw ages ago. I don't bother to brush my messy black hair.

I pace around my room. I can't start too much on my search yet, because the eye can't give me enough information. Instead, I grab a pen and paper and head into the bathroom to see her eye in the mirror again. I try and find the words to describe every inch of it.

'Trade baby-blues for wide-eyed browns' Patrick Stump sings from my headphones. I smash the pause button. I don't want to trade her grey-blue eye back for my brown.

I leave my paper and pen abandoned on the tiled floor and just gaze into it. I could gaze into it for years. I'm a tough punk rock girl on the outside, but on the inside I've always been a hopeless romantic. And this is probably the most hopelessly romantic thing that will ever happen to me.