Chapter Text
When you were younger, you dreamed of the day you would finally get your "soul mark."
Like the storybooks you read before bedtime, you wanted to find your other half, the person who would be by your side forever and ever, and who would love you just as much as you love them.
In your young, naive mind, you never once thought of the possibility that you might never get your soul mark. And as each year passed by, closer to that unsaid deadline, you reasoned that your soul mark would magically pop up somewhere on your body and all would be okay in the world.
Man, were you horribly disappointed.
When you turned 20, you realized that obsessively checking your body every day for a soul mark was silly. The chances of a soul mark, of a soulmate, was slim to none at that point. Your fairy tale dream had shattered long ago, but the sting of affirmation was hurtful nonetheless.
Everyone and their mother typically received their fated mark before they turned 18. Any later than 18 was certainly possible, but incredibly uncommon the older the person got.
Of the handful of cases where a soul mark developed past age 20, each had been documented in full detail, but no definitive reason or cause could be found for the late blooming marks.
It was just extremely rare for a person to get their soul mark after 20, nearly unheard of, and the likelihood of you being one of them was astronomically low. You've heard of only one case in the past ten years where someone older received their mark. The lucky person being a woman in her mid-40's, mother to two, and happily married to her soul mark-less husband of 17 years. Suffice to say, the cheesy film based on that fiasco definitely deserved the rotten potato it got from critics.
In the world you grew up in, a soul mark wasn't necessarily important. All it did really was tell you that another person, out in the world somewhere, shared that same mark. The mark itself was unremarkable, and often looked like a variably colored blemish of either blurry numbers, letters, or shapes. The presence of one didn't define you as a person, it didn't dictate your intelligence, or even your probability for success in life. It didn't determine whether you would be happy in life.
You just didn’t believe in the idea of two people being perfect for each other just because some blemish on their arms looked identical. If you did believe that, then what hope did you, a mark-less person have?
No matter what you were told growing up, you could and would be happy without that stupid mark.
Honestly, you can't count the times you'd cried from the mean remarks and jokes, or all the times you felt worthless and less than because of the absence of a blotch on your skin. The memories of your pitiful child-self fueled you now, though. Your resolve was unwavering. You were determined.
Fuck all of that soulmate bullshit. If you wanted happiness you were going to grab it by the neck and put it in a choke hold!
There was nothing stopping you from having a relationship with someone! You weren't even the only "soul mark-less" person in the world, plus some soulmates never even ended up meeting in their lifetime. There were even some couples that had horrendous compatibility in the romantic department and stayed friends. You had options. Were they perfect and almost guaranteed like your soul marked peers? Well, no, but...
...
At least you’ve got your dog, Buddy.
Oh.
Buddy seems to be humping that neighbor lady’s dog again. You really are forever alone, huh.
Wait a minute, you should probably stop him.
“Buddy, no, we talked about this. You can’t hump just any girl you see, you gotta buy her dinner first!”
You try in vain to pull Buddy off Mrs. Wilson’s tiny corgi. It’s difficult, seeing as he’s a fully grown golden retriever, yet here you are still tugging at his harness with your weak arms, hoping he’ll get the idea and back off.
When you finally detach your neutered dog from the corgi, you profusely apologize to Mrs. Wilson. Her only response is to tsk, and walk away with her little dog. That uppity bitch. Buddy's a catch, compared to her poofy corgi.
Also, you were in one of the off-leashed dogs’ parts of the park. What did she expect for you to do? Keep Buddy, who is usually such a good boy, tethered to you? Damn right that’s a no, your dog deserved to frolic alongside his other cute fur ball companions.
You end up leaving that area of the park shortly after anyways, overhearing that smug hag gossip about you and Buddy to the other patronizing biddies.
Walking around Central Park with an excitable dog sure had its moments, though. Like when Buddy sees a squirrel and just has to chase it, or maybe he poops next to someone sitting down on the grass, which was always a fun conversation starter.
Regardless, he’s a great dog, such a good boy, too. No matter what.
It’s almost time for your 2 o’clock nap, when, without warning, Buddy sprints the opposite way towards home, barreling through the park. Your hold on his leash loop isn't strong enough and ends up getting ripped away from you, the force ends up tripping your uncoordinated legs.
As you crash down hard into the ground, the only thought that passes through your head is how much of a bad dog Buddy is at that moment in time. You quickly scramble to your feet, ignoring the sting in your palms and knees. If you had more time to catalog your injuries you’d know that the water running down your face was blood gushing out your nose, mixed with a few tears that you’d never admit to. You swipe at your face and hope you don't look like too much of a hot mess before you take off on your new mission.
“Buddy! Come back, Buddy!” You yell out to your (long gone) golden retriever, who really shouldn’t have been making you retrieve him.
After running around like a mad man in the park, trying to find hide or hair of your shiny yellow dog, you collapse to your knees. This dog was everything to you. Without Buddy, you had no one. You started to choke up a bit, but crying solved nothing. So, once again, you got up on your shaking legs and decided to try to scream your lungs out to find your runaway dog, hoping that this time he'll listen. If you looked like a lunatic when you belted out your dog's name, then you were definitely doing it right.
“BUDDY--”
Just as you finished your war cry, a finger tapped you on your shoulder, spooking a, very mild, shriek out of you.
Your jaw drops (just a tiny bit) when you turn around to see the shoulder poker.
“Sorry for frightening you, ma’am. You’re looking for your dog, right?” You catch his gaze as he looks down at a familiar red leash in his hand, which happened to be connected to a very excited looking Buddy. “He’s been tugging me towards your voice after he ran into me, but we got a bit distracted by a squirrel or two on the way. Anyways, I’m glad that we were able to finally find you.”
Blue-eyed, blond hottie fidgets under your ogling, slack-jawed gaze. You couldn’t help it. Of all the people you expected to see behind you, a gorgeous, blond babe was not even close. And he was sweet as apple pie, to boot!
Despite your strange silence, the lovely Samaritan hands over the lead to you with a knowing smile.
That smile did bad things to you. Very bad things.
It was after a bit more of silence and awkward staring that you remembered to use your words. “T-thanks… Sorry if Buddy bothered you? He’s, uh, normally not the type to run off,” you stutter out, trying to not sound like a dummy in front of this Adonis. Your people skills seemed to escape you in the face of someone so obviously out of your league and is, definitely, probably married.
“Don’t worry about it! He’s a friendly little guy, wasn’t any trouble at all.” The kind man laughs--oh no, that laugh is so heavenly--but he suddenly jumps a bit. He looks a concerned now as he asks you, “are you okay, ma’am, your nose is bleeding?” He quickly reaches into his jacket, pulls out a light blue handkerchief, and offers it to you. Your surprised gaze travels from the handkerchief to his (left) hand holding it, and voila, it's bar one wedding ring.
Your moment of hesitance and embarrassment dissuades you from taking the handkerchief. Instead, you quickly start rubbing your face with the ends of your already blood-stained, long sleeve once again, brushing away what you could of the small drips of both wet and dry blood that had ran down your face.
“Oh my gosh, stupid nose blood…” You can't help the heat that rises up your neck and to your face, mortified by the situation.
You can’t even look the guy in the face anymore, even though his face is worth looking at for hours on end. You quickly flub out a gracious thank you and quick good-bye before running off, with Buddy in tow, back home.
You don’t end up looking back at the tall, buff, Michelangelo sculpted sex-magnet.
You certainly don’t notice how disappointed he looks that you and your dog ran off before he could even say bye.
It's half past nap o'clock when you get home, and the first thing you do is take a long, hot shower after you feed Buddy some pre-dinner treats. Despite giving you battle scars and making you yell out like a madwoman in public, he was a good boy today. He did, after all, fetch you that good-looking guy.
Who you ended up running away from like an idiot. Fuck. You didn’t get his name or either. Now, who are you supposed to call out when you're climaxing tonight?
Gordan Ramsey? Hah, not for the second night in a row... You've got to switch it up, ya know?