soulmate AU except it's not an AU

Year Written: 2017

Word Count: 6,500

Quick Description: Soulmates & Age-Gap Relationship

© Christina Hadfield

Kiss your soulmate and it feels warm. Not your soulmate, the kiss is cold and your soulmate feels the cold on their lips. There are abnormalities where some people have more than one soulmate and some have no soulmate. Some people don’t believe in the concept of soulmates.

Anyway.

It’s been over five years since I last saw her, pushing six now. And I’ll never forget the last time I did see her. It was my eighth-grade year, skipping out of class two weeks before the rest of the school with a set graduation date, our last day a half day of year book signing and sentimental goodbyes. Clinging a notebook to my chest, I followed the rest of my class out of the room as they skipped towards the exit to find their freedoms.

In the hallway, I stopped, watching the giggling fit of my peers prancing along before me. I turned, glancing back over my shoulder at the doors to the choir room. There, in all her glory, she stood, leaning against the door frame with a smirk on her face. Our eyes locked and she waved. I smiled and waved in return. Then she motioned with her hand for me to get going, to follow my class on our way on wards and up. She was right to push me on like that, like a parent eager for their child to succeed, so were my private school teachers who viewed their students as kids of their own. And so, I turned and never looked back.

Except that I kind of always wished I had looked back, because that was the last time I saw her. She did not come to our graduation; no one knew why. Some speculated rumors surfaced, sparked from teachers. But one that always stuck with me was from Conner, a more popular boy in my grade.

“I heard she found her soulmate last night and couldn’t be bothered to leave his bed to send us off.”

That wasn’t true, of course. Well… it might have been, but finding her soulmate wasn’t the cause of her disappearance. I had cousins still at the grade school who told me she had left school. Apparently, she got a job at the public high school not five minutes from my house and left almost immediately for pay benefits. I couldn’t blame her for taking the money. Private school couldn’t afford to pay their teachers that high, and although she had the heart to teach for less, fresh out of college on minimal pay made it hard to get by.

I didn’t blame her, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t jealous of the public high school students that got her as a teacher. If I wasn’t going to the private high school, I would have been right there, in school with her once more. But I wasn’t.

Four years of high school went by with straight As and competitive scholarships to show for it. Three hours out of town in the big city was where I chose to go to college, to a private, expensive, preppy university that pumped out dozens of the most successful people the nation ever saw. My best friends did well in their own way, found colleges that suited their own needs and we all spread out across the state.

College was different, but it was good for me. Time away from my parents gave me plenty of time to explore, to look for my soulmate, but even then, I wasn’t looking that hard. Finding my soulmate would be nice, a welcome addition to my life no matter where I was, but also wanted time to just learn and test, away from my soulmate.

The cold kisses never felt right. They always seemed to last too long, my partner far more invested in it than I was. Dating never worked when the kisses were cold and I never really wanted it to. Despite my experimentation, I never felt the lingering ghost of cold on my lips that you were supposed to feel when your soulmate kissed someone who wasn’t you.

I could be an abnormality. Some people don’t have a soulmate, and some have more than one. In a way, it didn’t really bother me. I was a loner by nature, never keeping more than three friends, and I didn’t need romantic affection to feel fulfilled. My friends didn’t like my pessimistic idea of being without a soulmate; they simply suggested that maybe my soulmate was younger than me, that she wasn’t old enough to be thinking about experimenting around and kissing yet, that in time it would come. But after nine years of never feeling a cold ghost kiss, I was pretty convinced that I was just an abnormality, even though I never went to the health center to get tested. I’d rather never be one hundred percent sure than know I never had a soulmate.

Freshmen year of college I returned home for every free day off school I had, reconnecting with my old high school friends. But sophomore year I felt more commitment to the city and less commitment to my parents and old town. The first time I returned home sophomore year was for winter break, a full month off school, and within the first week I felt suffocated.

I returned to our old high school with my friends to visit teachers and classmates. But everything felt empty and basic. Memories of ghosting existences floating through the halls. My favorite teachers were all nice, but catching up felt forced, too structured like adult conversations always felt. I bumped into an ex that was still at school there, younger than me, and she darted past when she saw me. We weren’t soulmates. We fumbled with the idea of making it work but it would never be possible.

My friend brought up Miss Wellington and how she was the best teacher we’ve ever had, counting since preschool all the way up through high school. We knew she was still teaching over at the public school.

“We should go visit her, while we’re in town,” I suggested, since we went to our old high school to visit our old teachers. We had gone back to our grade school when we were in high school to visit teachers. I never saw the problem with it. But my friends were vehemently opposed to the idea, so I laughed it off like a joke.

Winter break flew by and in two days I would be leaving town, staying in the city until summer started. I thought it wouldn’t be a big deal, just leaving like I always had and always would until I lived permanently in the city. But the memory of Miss Wellington kept haunting me.

I decided that morning to do something stupid.

Stupid decisions were rather common for me at this point. Never miscalculated, I always went into them knowing they were dumb, but I knew I would never be sated until I did what I wanted. If I didn’t, the what ifs would haunt me until I broke, so I always did things I wanted, so long as I contemplated the full aspect of what I was doing. These stupid decisions ranged from leaping off a deck, leaving with a broken arm, to crossing a roaring river and almost drowning, even to giving myself a tattoo on purpose—which, no matter what anyone said, did look good and I was damn proud of it.

I woke up that morning at ten, my sleep schedule completely ruined over break, and got dressed. After breakfast, it was almost eleven, and before I could talk myself out of my stupid decision, I was up and out the door, driving to the public school in my district.

Despite living only five minutes from the public high school for eighteen years of my life, I had only passed by it a handful of times. I had an ex that lived just beside the school, she was the only reason I ever went down the street. I didn’t even know where the front entrance was. I circled the building once awkwardly, ending up on a dead-end street that required a backwards escape, before finally parking in the only lot I could find.

Hopefully, it was about lunch time. It had been a long time since I last went to a high school and knew when a specified lunch time was, but between eleven and noon felt reasonable. I was hoping it was lunch time so I wouldn’t have to disrupt any classes.

I went up to the first door I found and it was locked. I figured it would be. So I went down the building a ways until I found another door. These doors, too, were locked, but looking inside I could see what appeared to be a main office. There was a call button for an intercom on the wall beside me, so I pushed it and patiently waited, but nothing happened. I knocked at the door, looking inside at what I could only assume was a receptionist, but her back was turned to me and she didn’t even stir.

With a sigh, I pulled out my phone and searched up the school on the internet. After finding a phone number for the school office, I called, still looking around inside the windows of the doors. I watched the receptionist just inside answer the phone right as I called.

“Hello, thank you for calling Fort Renard’s High School. This is Jessica Mews speaking, what can I help you with?”

“Hey, Jessica. I’m outside of the school right now, I was wondering if you could let me in,” I answered. The receptionist turned, making eye contact with me from her desk, but quickly turned her back to me once more.

“I’m sorry, but visiting hours are over for today. If you need a time other than our scheduled visiting hours, please contact our principal and schedule a meeting.”

“I know,” I answered quickly. I had to think up a lie and fast. Luckily, I knew the name of one student attending the public school. I knew her because she was dating my cousin. She was a sophomore there still. “I have a lunch meeting scheduled with Miss Wellington,” I stated, careful to not reveal too much of my lie at one time. That was one of the keys to successful lying.

“A lunch meeting…” Jessica repeated me. I watched as she tapped her pen to her desk in thought, listening to the sound through the phone. “Hang on one second.” There was a buzz and a click as the doors before me unlocked. “Come into my office, will you, Miss… um…”

I looked over and made eye contact with the receptionist. “Just call me Natalie,” I answered before hanging up and entering the school. Once in the receptionist’s office, she motioned for me to take a seat in front of her desk, which I did.

“You said you had a lunch meeting with Miss Wellington, is that correct?” she asked and I nodded. “Funny, Miss Wellington didn’t mention anything to me.”

“It was kind of made on short notice,” I explained.

“I see,” she stated. “What’s the reason for this emergency meeting?”

“It’s about my sister,” I continued with my lie. “I’m her legal guardian, ever since our parents died, and there were some… complications here at school. I work three jobs, weird hours, so we scheduled this spur of the moment to work with my schedule.”

“Really? Three jobs? That’s quite a lot! What’s your sister’s name?”

“Claudia Rowe,” I answered with the name of my cousin’s girlfriend. “It’s difficult, but I’m just trying to make ends meet, you know. It’s been hard, but I just want the best for my sister.”

The receptionist went typing at her computer, nodding and muttered out a, “Hmm, interesting.” She held out the syllabus of her words, obviously not paying any attention to me, until she found something on her computer and snapped to attention. “Claudia isn’t in any of Miss Wellington’s classes,” she said in a voice that was way too kind.

Okay, so she was obviously not falling for my lies and not believing me at all. Great. But I had more lies under my sleeve. I was not about to leave the public school without accomplishing my mission.

“I know,” I answered quickly. “That’s the problem. There were complications with auditions and some past issues from last year that Miss Wellington and I need to discuss.” I whipped out the ‘need to discuss’ card with as much passive aggression as I could manage at my young adult stage, sitting straighter in my seat and feeling like a PTA mom.

“Oh,” Jessica replied. She sat back in her seat more. “I assume Miss Wellington knows you’re coming then?” she asked. “I’d imagine that you’re having this meeting in the teacher’s lunchroom? Lunch just started five minutes ago, so if you’d like to just head over there.”

“Yes, of course,” I said. Jessica stood and walked me out of her office before pointing down the hallway to the left.

“The teacher’s lunchroom is the first door on the right; you can’t miss it,” she said.

“Thank you,” I stated before quickly taking my leave. The last thing I needed was for Jessica to ask me more questions about this ‘meeting’ and my ‘sister.’

Even though I had no real intention of crashing a teachers’ luncheon, I headed off to the left as instructed to avoid raising suspicion, especially since I could still feel Jessica staring into the back of my skull. Sure enough, the first door on the right was wide open with a good amount of chit-chat resonating from the space.

I slid up alongside the doorway and peaked in, real fast. There were teachers all over, sitting around several tables, and then bam Miss Wellington, her back turned to me. But as I caught sight of her, she turned to speak to one of her coworkers and I panicked, thinking she might see me. I jerked back with a yelp, clamping my hands down over my mouth when I heard the sound that had escaped my lips.

I shook off my nerves and tried to relax. I wanted to see and talk to the woman, yes, but in a room full of questioning teachers… no thank you. I needed to find her classroom and wait there for her until lunch was over. I could catch her during the passing period then, alone in her classroom. Maybe we would even luck out and she wouldn’t have a class next period so we could just talk.

Assuming she was willing to speak to me.

I pushed that thought to the back of my mind. Looking down the hall, I spotted a group of five kids, three boys and two girls. They looked like hoodlums, to describe them best. They were pushing the limits of the dress code, I could tell, with the rips in the boys’ pants and the length of the skirts on the girls. As I approached them, I could smell smoke on them. They were probably hiding in the bathroom smoking during lunch. It didn’t matter though; they could still help me. I had at least two years on them anyway. So I stood up tall and walked right up to them.

“Can one of you tell me where Miss Wellington’s classroom is?” I asked, voice strong and unwavering.

One of the boys stepped up to me and did a once over before tipping up his head so that he was looking down his nose at me. “Why do you want to know?” he huffed.

“Look, I’m new here, just transferred, and I’m just trying to find where my classes are,” I answered with an easy lie, a slight sigh of annoyance to my words.

“Figure it out on your own,” the boy spat, but then he was shoved aside and one of the girls stepped up to me.

“Go down that hall,” she pointed behind her. “Go right, then two halls down, go right again. It’s room 315, sort of in the middle, and on your left.”

“Thank you so much,” I smiled contently, scurrying past the group. I followed the girl’s instructions with no issues and found room 315 in no time. Then I grabbed the door handle of the closed door and went to move inside.

It was locked.

I felt panicked again. I should’ve just waited in the hall, next to the locked door, like any sane person would. But I needed time alone in a room by myself to compose my thoughts, to think of a game plan. I needed a space to prepare to greet her, a space where I had the upper hand. And the middle of the hallway was not the upper hand.

I glanced both ways down the hall before pulling two bobby pins from my purse and setting to work lock picking the classroom door. I had learned lock picking my senior year of high school just because I thought it might be a handy skill to have. Since learning, I had picked five locks. Three were my own things that I lost my key for or got locked out. The other two were not. Once I had broken into my best friend’s car to pull a practical joke on her. And then there was this, the time I actually broke into a classroom because I can’t do anything normally.

I reasoned with myself: this was not a normal situation. I had never gone to school in this building, Miss Wellington had been my teacher in middle school, not even high school, and furthermore I hadn’t even seen Miss Wellington in over five years (not counting just seeing her in the teacher’s lunchroom). If this had been a normal situation, I would have had no problem with just casually waiting for her in the hall. But this wasn’t normal. It was verging on weird.

I got the door open rather easily, checking behind me to ensure that I was still alone in the hall before slipping into the classroom. I closed the door behind me, hearing it click locked again as I did. The lights were off; I probably should have turned them on, but I was too distracted to think logically.

The room was void of desks. Instead, along the wall stood choir risers for singing, pretty basic, and then music stands which were scattered around rather haphazardly. Miss Wellington had a desk off in the corner. It was scattered with papers, never the most organized person, and on display in the front was a plague with her name: Ms. Wellington. She hadn’t gotten married in the last five years, unless she had so recently that no one had bothered calling her by her new last name or changing her name plate. But even so, she could very well be engaged now. Not that I was checking or hoping or anything. It’s just that she was probably getting close to thirty, if she wasn’t already, and people tended to get married around that time.

The door clicked behind me and I panicked. I dove at the nearest music stand, leaning against it in an attempt to look suave, to settle my thoughts to come up with a reasonable explanation as to how I had gotten into a locked classroom. Just as the door opened, the music stand tipped and shot out from under me, causing me to plummet to the floor as the metal music stand rattled against the floor.

The person who entered the locked room screamed; I screamed. I jumped up to try and grab the still rattling music stand, but in my haste, I only managed to trip over another music stand, sending both that stand and me flying back onto the floor. That fall hurt more than the first, but I managed to pull myself up, right both fallen music stands, and turn to face my company with an exasperated sigh.

It was Miss Wellington, and she had her hand over her mouth in what I could only assume was shock.

I honestly was not expecting to be looking at Miss Wellington, since lunch was only about ten minutes in. I expected a janitor or at worst, the principal. But no, it was just Miss Wellington. Just Miss Wellington who, with her free hand, reached over and flicked on the lights and just continued to stare at me.

I was taller than her, by about three inches, which was saying a lot considering she was wearing heels. It was obvious I had grown a lot in the past five years; she used to be taller than me. Otherwise, she looked about the same as I remembered. Her brown hair was pulled up in a messy bun, a common style for her, and her eyes were still a warm, inviting chocolate caramel color. Maybe she had a few more wrinkles on her face than I remembered, but then again, I did too, to my horror.

Before things could get too outrageously awkward, I started barking out a rambling mess of word vomit, trying to right the ridiculous situation I then found myself in.

“I know your door was locked, and you’re probably like, how did you get in here, which is a reasonable question. I didn’t break in! Well… I did, I picked the lock, but I mean I didn’t break into the school! Because obviously, I don’t go to school here and I never did so I couldn’t just come back as a visiting alumnus, but the receptionist let me in. Which actually, it’s only because I lied and said that I was Claudia Rowe’s sister, her legal guardian, because she’s the only person I know who’s still a student here. I only know her because she’s dating my cousin, but both her parents aren’t dead and I’m not actually her sister. But I just wanted to come visit you before I left town for college again and I didn’t have any way to contact you and I didn’t know what I would say and I…” I choked slightly against my words, clearly out of breath, and gave up. “Um… hi,” I muttered.

Miss Wellington stared at me for a moment more before I heard a giggle escape, one which she half-suppressed with the hand that was over her mouth. That’s when I realized that after her initial scream, the hand over her mouth had not been from shock, but because she was trying not to laugh.

Composing herself, she removed the hand from her mouth and smiled. “Hi,” she grinned, walking past me and over to her desk where she flipped through some papers.

I couldn’t tell if she knew who I was or not. I didn’t exactly look different, but surely, I had grown up and changed quite a bit in the last five years. But if she did know who I was, I couldn’t very well just spit out my name like she didn’t know who I was. I shuffled my feet awkwardly.

“I’m sorry I startled you,” I spoke up. Miss Wellington was still busy messing with papers on her desk. “I didn’t think lunch was over yet and I wasn’t expecting you back here so soon…”

“Lunch isn’t over,” Miss Wellington answered me. She turned so that she was facing me and leaned against the edge of her desk. “I don’t eat lunch.”

“You don’t eat lunch?” I asked, surprised. “That isn’t very healthy… do you eat breakfast at least?”

“No, unless you count coffee as food.” she shook her head. She was staring at me, rather intensely. I couldn’t figure out what she was thinking from the look on her face. It wasn’t quite confusion, not like she was trying to figure out who I was, but it wasn’t shock or surprise either.

“Here,” I said quickly, digging around in my purse. I pulled out a smores flavored granola bar, my personal favorite. “You need to eat something, and it’s one of those health food bars, if you’re worried about that kind of thing. I swear it tastes amazing though. I know it looks bland, but it’s amazing, I swear.”

Miss Wellington took the bar, cautiously opening it. She looked at the bar, then at me, and back to the bar. Then slowly, she took the smallest of bites. I waited patiently as she chewed, and watched happily as her non-believing expression curved into a smile. “This is really good,” she said quietly, this time taking a much larger bite. Her stomach rumbled contently with the food and I put my hands on my hips.

“See? Your stomach is telling you it wants lunch every day,” I stated.

“Well people want a lot of things in life, but that doesn’t mean they get them,” Miss Wellington said. “You said you wanted to see me before you went back to college, right?” she asked. I nodded. “Where are you going to college, Natalie?”

I smiled the largest grin when she said my name. She did remember me. It made me happy for some reason. Miss Wellington smiled in response to my large grin.

“Um, up state,” I answered. “Up in the city at Webster.”

“Webster?” she questioned, nodding. “You strike me as the type.” There was a teasing, almost playfulness to her words. I scoffed fake offense.

“You grew up there, right?” I asked, remembering a detail she once told us back in middle school.

“I did,” she answered. “The city is nice, but I feel more at home here in the smaller town. It feels like I know almost everyone; there aren’t so many strangers.”

“I get that feeling too,” I replied. “I’m still not sure where I’ll end up spending most my life. It probably won’t be in either city. I’ll probably move out of state.” I shuffled my feet again. “So, um, what sort of things have you been up to, Miss Wellington, since you moved schools?”

“Please, call me Brooke,” she dismissed my formalities. “You’re no longer my student and we’re both adults here.”

“Okay, um, Brooke,” I replied. Her name, though I knew it already, felt foreign on my lips. It wasn’t bad though. It felt nice to call her by her first name.

[insert more awkward pleasantries here, yadda yadda]

The bell rang, causing me to turn a circle in search of a classroom clock. “I wouldn’t want to impose on your next class,” I said, back turned.

“No, please, I’m done for today,” she said dismissively.

“What? Really?” I asked, confused. “But it’s only noon…”

“Thursdays are my short days,” Brooke answered. “I usually spend the time working with kids on their solos for competition, but being just the first week of second semester, we haven’t begun solo work just quite yet.”

“Oh, makes sense,” I said. I looked Brooke up and down once, catching a glimpse of the wrapper from the granola bar I had given her lying on her desk. “Would you like to go grab some real, actual lunch?” I asked suddenly, surprising myself with my own boldness. “I mean, if you can leave campus, that is. And it’s just because you didn’t eat and I know you’re hungry even if you refuse, I just thought—.”

“Yes,” she interrupted me. “Come on, I’ll drive. Just help me carry some binders out to my car?”

“Of course,” I agreed, trailing after her.

[Going to lunch together conversation, weird car ride, yadda, yadda]

“So, um, I noticed you haven’t gotten married in the last five years,” I muttered out, realizing half way through that it might be a sore topic that I shouldn’t be bringing up, but by then it was too late. Luckily, Brooke didn’t seem too bothered by the comment.

“I just… haven’t found the right person yet,” she answered.

She said right person instead of soulmate, and it made me wonder if she believed in the idea or not. I bit at my lip to keep from asking, but my big mouth won out. “Do you believe in soulmates?” I spat out very unceremoniously.

Brooke looked at me intensely before slightly shrugging. “I do, I suppose,” she answered.

“You aren’t an abnormality, are you?” I asked before thinking, and then I grimaced. “I mean, there’s nothing wrong with you if you are! I just mean, some people get tested for that and I just didn’t know if you knew or… um… sorry.”

Despite my awkwardness, Brooke still smiled softly at me. “I have a soulmate, out there somewhere,” she stated. “I’ve felt plenty of cold ghosting on my lips, so I know he’s out there somewhere, kissing other girls. But, well… I haven’t kissed anyone in, oh, it’s been about nine, ten years I’d say. Back in school I was determined to find him, by kissing my way around like some people do. But I slowly got tired of looking, I suppose. If he finds me, he finds me. If not… I think I’m okay just being by myself.”

“I know how you feel,” I answered instantly. “I mean, kind of. I’ve never felt a cold ghosting on my lips from my soulmate kissing someone else. Not once ever. I kind of think I might not have one, although all my friends are quick to assure me that isn’t the case. I think it would be nice to have a soulmate, someone who’s there for you that you just click with. It would be nice to just know my wife is out there waiting for me, but well… if I really don’t have one, I think I’d be okay too.”

“Your wife?” Brooke asked all too quiet.

“Um, yeah. I mean, I guess if I had a soulmate it might be a guy. But I’ve never looked at a guy that way before. I can’t even picture myself kissing a guy to find out that he’s my soulmate! But I guess anything could happen…”

Brooke reached her hand across the table and rested it on my hand. She smiled at me and I smiled back. Being around her felt different; it always had. Even back in middle school when I was much, much younger, being around Miss Wellington always felt different. I listened more closely to her than my other teachers, I put more effort into her class than all the others. I would always go out of my way to try and help her with things just because being around her was nicer, calmer, better, than anywhere else I had ever been.

By seventh grade, she had noticed my attempts to get nearer to her. One day, when I skipped down to her class during our free period, asking if she’d like help filing papers, she just laughed at me.

“I know you aren’t here because you have an affixation for paper filing,” she giggled.

“I… I don’t know what you mean,” young me mumbled.

“You just want to talk to me, but you don’t have any reason to, so you’re trying to make up excuses to come down here and help me,” she stated, and she was spot on.

“You’re right; I’m sorry,” I said quickly. “I don’t mean to bother you.”

“You never do, Natalie,” she assured me. “Come sit by me and tell me about your day? We can file the papers later.”

Since then, just being around her always felt right. We were about as close as a student and a teacher could get. We were never quite friends, but we were much more than strangers or acquaintances. When she fell away from my life, it hurt. But as the years passed, I slowly fell away from all my teachers. Some I forgot easily, like my rotten English teacher or my old History teacher. But others were harder to forget, like my favorite Math teacher, or inspiring Science teacher. My high school teachers were different. Since graduating, I had the phone numbers of my four favorite teachers from high school and we’d text or call on occasion. They made me sad that Miss Wellington was my teacher in middle school, not high school, when it was clearly unacceptable to exchange phone numbers with teachers.

But now I was twenty and sitting across from her at lunch. But she wasn’t Miss Wellington anymore to me. Now, she was Brooke. I chanced the most nerve wracking question I had ever asked. “Could I… have your phone number?”

Brooke looked caught off guard for a millisecond before pulling out her phone and handing it over to me. “Of course,” she replied.

I added my number into her contacts and sent myself a message, because if she never responded, I really didn’t want to go breaking back into a public school just to see her once a year.

When I handed her phone back to her, she said, “When you come back into town, we’ll have to go for lunch again.”

I smiled; she wanted there to be a next time. “We should,” I said, nodding enthusiastically.

[paying the bills. Getting out of there. Brooke drives Natalie back to the public school because her car is still there. It’s just before school lets out when they get back]

She pulled up right next to my car when we got back. We both got out of her car and she came around so she could say goodbye to me. “When are you leaving town?” she asked.

“Tomorrow, late morning,” I answered. “Maybe mid-afternoon, my mom might want to go to lunch before I leave.”

Brooke bit at her lip and looked down at her feet. She seemed nervous almost. I had never seen this woman act that way before, it confused and intrigued me. She looked back up at me and reached out to touch my arm gently. “Um, you should… text me when you get back to school. Just so I know you got back safe.”

I warmed at her touch and the sincerity of her words. She was clearly straight, older than me, and way out of my league. We would never be soulmates. But then again, maybe I didn’t even have a soulmate. My life so far had just been a collection of amazing, but cold, kisses with pretty girls. Why not at least try for one from the woman I most admired?

I stepped a single step towards Brooke. “Could I… kiss you?” I asked softly.

Brooke pulled her arm away from my arm and immediately stated, in words harsher than they needed to be, “We aren’t soulmates.”

“I know,” I answered quickly. “It doesn’t need to mean anything. It would just be really nice to kiss a woman as beautiful and kind and generous as you. It would certainly make my day.”

Brooke hesitated. “I… I haven’t kissed anyone in practically a decade,” she sputtered out.

“Then you can let your soulmate know that you’re still out here, in case he’s lost hope, so he might someday find you,” I answered.

“Right, and I’m straight,” Brooke went on. “I’ve… um… never kissed a girl before…”

“There’s a first time for everything,” I answered. “I promise you, I’m a pretty good kisser.”

I was standing in her space, inching ever closer as we debated this. I wasn’t going to do anything she didn’t want. But I knew she also wasn’t pushing me back or escaping back to the comfort of her car.

After a moment of silence, Brooke squeaked out, “Just a peck.”

“Just a peck,” I repeated her.

“And don’t even think about trying to French me!” she huffed as I leaned closer.

“I won’t do anything you don’t want,” I answered, a small grin on my face.

I leaned in closer to Brooke, so close that we were breathing the same air, our noses almost touching. But I didn’t close the gap. I needed Brooke to do that, since she was so hesitant about the kiss in the first place. I waited for what felt like forever, thinking that she had decided against it.

But then, at the last minute, she shot forward, our closed lips just barely pressing against each other, and then she jerked back, the air cold between us.

My heart thudded twice in my chest, my eyes diverted towards the ground when we pulled apart. Another thud of my heart and my brain registered the lingering heat that had been against my lips. It couldn’t have been; I had to have imagined it. There was no way there was heat between our lips. We were not, could not, be soulmates.

I looked up at Brooke to see if there was any indication that she had felt the small sensation of heat. I was met with her wide brown eyes, looking downright terrified. But before I could say a word, she had grabbed my jaw and forcefully pulled me into another kiss, this one harsh, open-mouthed, and long lasting.

There was no denying the heat this time. Her kiss felt ever more inviting than all the other kisses I had experienced during my life time, and I finally understood the awe in which people spoke of their soulmate. All my brain could think was, “I need her closer. I need more of her. I need her closer.” So to still my ache, I wrapped my arms around her waist and pulled her closer, so our bodies were flush against each other, and in response Brooke slipped her tongue into my mouth as I let out a small gasp.

We had to breathe, so we pulled apart, taking a step back from each other. Instantly there was cold all around me and I needed her close to me again. I almost reached out and grabbed her, but then I realized that we really needed to talk about this before we got carried away in the sensation. I stilled my arms and searched Brooke’s eyes.

“I um… I might not be as straight as I originally thought…” Brooke muttered, the smile on her face growing impossibly larger.

“Wow,” was all my short-circuiting brain could think of to sputter out. “I guess that explains why I haven’t ever felt you kissing someone else… since you haven’t kissed anyone since I turned eleven…”

Brooke’s eyebrows tipped down challengingly, but her mouth still bore her smile. “Yes, and you, missy, have kissed quite a lot of people.”

“I was only trying to find you,” I uttered sheepishly.

The school bell rang out across campus and some high school students began pouring out of the building.

“Come over to my place?” Brooke asked, watching as kids swarmed the parking lot. I gave her a skeptical look. “Not like that!” she huffed, laughing. “So we can… talk. About this,” she gestured between us.

“Okay,” I nodded. “I’ll follow you?”

“Sounds good,” Brooke nodded, and we got into our own cars.

© Christina Hadfield