#redacted au

Guys soulmate was quiet. Or at least, he assumed that was why they left his arms blank. Most people would write love notes to their soulmate on their own arms, glancing down to see what they would write back. His soulmate never wrote or drew anything except once.

He had been in highschool, bored out of his mind. He reached for a pen, ready to doodle whatever popped into his head, hoping his soulmate would finally respond when he saw it. He watched three little stars being traced onto the back of his hand near his thumb by an invisible hand.

He put the pen down, watching as more lines appeared on his arm- some sharp, some curved all of them done in black ink. He still had the sticky note he had traced the stars onto. He wanted to get them tattooed, but he wasn't mean enough to do that without asking his soulmate first, since the marks would stay on both of them. So the sticky note sat in a box, carefully preserved until he found them.

--

It was a pretty normal day. Guys right arm (he drew on that one so hopefully it would be easier if they ever wanted to draw something) was covered in his doodles, his left arm was blank as always. He was sat in the back room at Maxes, doomscrolling while he ate until Rosa came in.

"Hey, let me know when you're done, I wanna go for a smoke break."

He looked up at her, glancing at her arms, covered in stickmen and flowers. He still couldn't figure out which ones she drew and which ones were her soulmate. "Hmm? Oh, yeah, sure."

She paused before nodding at his arm "When'd you get that done?"

"Get what done?"

"You're sleeve. I'm not surprised you got coloured lines, but I didn't think you'd go for blue."

"My what?" He looked down and sure enough, his previously blank left arm was covered in blue lines, roses and vines now ran up the entire length of his arm. He couldn't believe it, on one hand it showed up so quickly he was impressed, but the more pressing thing in his mind was that they had actually drawn something. Maybe not for him, but it felt like it was. Some of the lines were a bit shaky or blurry, but it was incredible because it was them.

"Looks like a stencil to me. Did you not do that?"

"Nope!" He grabbed his jacket as he stood up "Cover for me till I get back? I'll do all the deliveries, promise!"

"Alright fine. Be quick though."

--

That high was what got him through the day. He was glad he wore a short sleeve shirt, it let him show off what his soulmate did, and what he added to it. He had picked up some cheap, colorful makeup palette and filled in all the lines on his arm, after taking pictures of the entire thing of course.

He was on one of the last deliveries of the night, unfortunately with his jacket on now to protect the drawing from the rain that had started up. Of course it had to rain today of all days.

He knocked at the door and nearly had the wind knocked out of him as he came face to face with the most gorgeous person in the world. Their makeup and hair were a bit messy, but in a way that made them look a thousand times more gorgeous, they looked tired, faint eyebags peaking out (something Guy was not afraid to admit that he found very attractive).

He managed to trip his way through the interaction, probably making a complete fool of himself in front of the most stunning person to ever exist. Everything came to a halt when they took the boxes from him and he noticed their arm.

The left one was covered in thick black doodles, but the left one was what stopped him dead in his tracks. It was covered in roses and vines, each filled in with a variety of colors.

Colors he picked out.

"You're arm..."

"hmm? Oh, yeah. I work at a tattoo parlor. Let one of the newbies use me to practice putting a stencil on. I was the only one with a clean arm, and my soulmate liked the design apparently."

"Can I get your number?"

"That's... A little sudden."

"What...? Oh! Right! Wait a second..." He fumbled to get his jacket off. His body practically vibrating with excitement. Finally, he held the jacket over the arm he doodled on, showing off the matching sleeve.

"That's why."

"Oh. Ok, wow. Wasn't expecting that today... Or ever if I'm being honest. Uh... Do you... Do you wanna come in?"

"Uh, yeah. Just let me call my coworker so I can get her to cover for me."

"Oh shit- right, of course. That's why you asked for my number. You can come back later if you would rather."

"as much as I would love nothing more than to blow off work to hang out with you, I probably shouldn't ask Rosa for anymore favors for the next bit..."

"Alright, well, here" they pulled out their phone "give me your number, I'll send you a text and you can message me when you're done with work. Or, tomorrow if that's better... I guess... I don't know, no one really talks about how to have these conversations."

"Well it makes sense to me..." He put in his information before handing it back.

"Guy...? Very funny. I thought you would at least put it in as soulmate or something if you didn't want to put your name in."

"Guy is my name."

"... I am so sorry for you."

He burst out laughing. He was pretty sure they were going to apologize, but not like that. "Oh thank god my soulmate is funny!"

"Well, I guess I'll see you later, Guy."

"Wait, don't I get your name?"

They smirked at him and his heart skipped a beat. He was surprised he hadn't dropped dead by how irregular they made his heartbeat. "You can get that when you come back."

He couldn't stop the grin that split across his face. "Guess. I'll have to hurry back then. Bye Honey~"

They rolled their beautiful eyes "You better not make a habit of calling me that."

"I don't know, it has a nice ring to it. Maybe it'll stick." He gasped "Like honey! Oh, it's settled now!"

"Absolutely not."

"My Honey!" Their expression softened at that.

"I'll see you soon Guy."