This is my first time doing this. And honestly, I’m scared, but everyone gotta start somewhere right?
Grounded is based off of my own soulmate au. If you want some background on it click the link.
Grounded is from the point of view of Virgil and will end up as CALM/LAMP.
Virgil’s daily life was hell. Living in a house where his parents resent him is not an easy task.
“Sam, sweetie, come to the table, it’s time for dinner!” A rather low woman’s voice, his mother, called.
“Coming mom!” A high pitched girly voice, his sister, responded.
He could feel his stomach growling. Although he is starving, going downstairs is a bad idea. He would have to wait till all other family members were asleep to get food. If he was seen getting food from the pantry, his mother would screech, “You already had food today, you don’t need anymore you pig!” Then he would get beaten, or something similar.
Virgil and his family lived in a two story house with two bedrooms upstairs, along with a bathroom, and down stairs was a bigger bedroom, bathroom, kitchen, dinning room, and finally a living room. Although, this is a pretty big house for a family of four, the boy of 10 years, can’t remember how most of the house looks. He gets locked in his room most of the time by his so called “parents”.
They never wanted a boy and they took that out on him. He isn’t allowed out of his room unless his mother or father want him to do chores, beat him for one reason or another, or just to give him the bare minimum of food to eat. Samantha, his sister and his parent’s favorite child, is normally the cause of his beatings. Many times he was beaten for something their precious little Samantha did. Once, Samantha broke a rather expensive vase and blamed it on Virgil. He was beaten hard enough, that he was sure he had a few broken bones. He was then locked in his room for the rest of the day without food.
Today, it was about 6:00 p.m. His sister, mother, and father are downstairs eating dinner. Virgil is up in his room, not allowed to leave. He already got his small portion of food today, but his stomach is practically yelling at him for more food. To get his mind off of his stomach, he grabbed a piece of lined paper and a pencil from his desk, the one piece furniture his room holds other than an old bed, and plopped down on his bed. After thinking for a bit, he started to draw. He loved drawing even when his family constantly bullied him for it. It helped get his mind off things. One of his favorite things to draw, though, was his soul wings.
He has no idea what they’ll look like, but he loves coming up with new ideas about them. He frequently looks at his back and touches the soulwing marks that reside there. These marks bring comfort to him, because they prove that there is at least one person in the world who won’t hate or torment him. He’s different from other people when it comes to soulwing marks, however. He has four.
Usually people only have two, one that represents you and one that represents your soulmate. Then when you and your soulmate touch, your wings would start to grow. They would grow fully in about four days. There are all kinds of wings, but feathered are the most common.
Virgil likes to think that since he has four marks, he has three other soulmates. He loves this idea. His family on the other hand, calls him a freak for it. There has never been another person who has had four marks. So, bullying doesn’t only happen at home. School is a place Virgil really doesn’t like to go to. All the kids there act as if having four soulwing marks, makes you inhuman, somehow. They exclude him from everything they possibly can and make his life at school almost as bad as his life at home. All the adults turn a blind eye to this, sometimes they even join in on the fun.
Even through all this, Virgil doesn’t blame his soulmates. He still loves his marks.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Eight years later, his parents kick him out. Since he is now legally an adult and finished school, they have no reason to keep him inside the house. Virgil was expecting this. He had a few part time jobs that he used to save up money. Using this money he moved into a small apartment he found online for cheap.
After walking all the way there, he made it to the apartment complex. After talking with the landlord and officially buying the apartment, he enters the place he’ll be staying in for quite awhile.
‘At least I’m glad I don’t have any luggage.’ It was just a single room with a bed, a small desk, and bathroom. His room is located on the third floor of the surprisingly clean apartment complex, that has four floors in total. The one thing that he did own was a cheap smart phone that he has been paying for himself. The phone was bought to help him get and manage his many part time jobs, along with finding this room to stay in.
After getting settled in, Virgil took a long warm shower, so he wouldn’t have to take one in the morning. 'I have to go to McDonald’s around 8 a.m till about 1:30 p.m, if I don’t have to do overtime, then Walmart from 3:00 p.m to 9:00 p.m.’ He starts to finish up and turn off the shower. 'Luckily, I get paid tomorrow so I can buy some food and hopefully make it to next paycheck.’ Keeping this in mind, he stepped out of the shower, dried himself, and put on his black boxers and purple t-shirt. He then set his alarm for tomorrow and got himself comfortable on the stiff bed. After laying down, the exhaustion of being kicked out and walking all the way to the apartment caught up to him. He fell asleep quickly.
