trigger warning- if ye gets triggered by self-harm and/or thoughts of suicide, then i most strongly advise ye to not read this one-shot.

but then again, who actually pays attention to trigger warnings? and if you do get triggered by self-harm and/or suicidal thoughts, then why are you even reading this?

and i'm not encouraging self-harm or anything in this. it's just pertinent to the story line.

Will clutched the top of his arm, gasping in pain. For a while now, it had been happening almost every day around this time.

It was one of the never-ending struggles that came with having a soulmate. The flashes of physical pain were bad, but they were nothing-- absolutely nothing-- when compared to the overwhelming rush of emotions that he felt at the randomest of instances. But to him, the worst part was knowing that his soulmate felt such pain and sorrow and that there was nothing he could do about it.

To have a soulmate was rare. To meet your soulmate was even rarer. And by the time most met their soulmate, it was too late.

☉

Nico leaned back against the door of the bathroom stall and slid to the bathroom floor, staring intently at the ceiling lights. He rummaged through his bag, pulled out a compass kit, and removed the compass from it.

He took the sharp point of his compass and started using it to scrape against his skin, scratching harder and harder each time.

You're just a failure. A pathetic, stupid emotional wreck. That's all you are.

☽ ☾

Will winced in pain.

☉

Why am I here? No one loves me. No one cares for me. I'm just a waste of space. A loser. An idiot.

☽ ☾

A wave of desperation passed over Will, who shut his eyes and put his hands over his head, trying to block out all the misery.

☉

You're just a little nobody that no one wants around. The only reason people hang out with you is to take advantage of you. And if they knew you liked boys....

☽ ☾

"Mr. Solace," the teacher asked kindly, tapping Will gently on the shoulder. "Do you need to go to the nurse's office?"

Everyone around him giggled.

"He's not the one who needs help," a student called out. "It's his soulmate."

☉

Nico shrugged his hoodie back on and swung his bag around his shoulder, heading out. Smile. Everybody loves you. No one can suspect a thing.

☽ ☾

Tears started to pour out of Will's eyes. He felt as if he were being drowned into an ocean of struggles and siffles.

☉

"Hey, Nico. My man," called out one of Nico's friends, lightly punching his arm. Pretending like that didn't hurt, Nico smiled and eased into a chatter.

☽ ☾

Will stepped out into the hallway where a crowd was starting to form around a few of the more popular guys. Those boys, especially Nico di Angelo, always seemed so happy and got along quite well. So what had changed? Will shrugged it off  and walked away from the scene.

☉

Nico felt a punch to his gut.

"Say that again. Say that we shouldn't rid the world of gays again."

Until today, Nico had ignored all of his friends' snarky comments. And when he openly disagreed with one of them, he ended up on the ground of the locker banks, being kicked and punched and hit.

He felt a sharp pain in his lips and put a hand to them. There was no blood or anything. He wasn't even biting it.

With a start, Nico realized it was his soulmate. His soulmate, who must've been feeling exactly what Nico was feeling.

Who is my soulmate, anyway?

"The world deserves to be rid of gays," Nico muttered.

"Say that again. Louder."

"The world deserves to be rid of gays. Because they're just a waste of space in this world. Because they don't deserve to live."

Nico's friend smiled at him and helped him up onto his legs, as if nothing had just happened between the two of them.

☽ ☾

Will couldn't help but wonder for the rest of the week, who could my soulmate be?

☉

"I'm sure you can survive the rest of the school day without sleeping," someone tells Nico.

"With great power comes the great need to take a nap," (riordan) Nico retorted.

☽ ☾

As soon as Will felt a pain go up his arm, he asked to go get a drink of water to avoid the stares of all his classmates as he suffered the torment his soulmate had to go through.

"Take how much ever long you want," the teacher whispered to him, sensing Will's discomfort in the classroom.

Will left the classroom to head to the water fountain. As soon as he reached there, he collapsed onto the ground.

Will wondered whether it all felt painful to his soulmate as well, or if it was just him. Even soulmates had different perceptions on pain.

☉

Nico washed his face, hoping it wouldn't look as if he had been crying. Because if people knew that he had been crying in the bathroom, they might've wondered what else he had done in there.

☽ ☾

The pain had ended. Will got up and decided he might as well drink some water before heading back to class.

He heard someone come out of the boy's bathroom and looked up.

Nico di Angelo was walking out, a grin on his face, his backpack over a shoulder, smiling as if he hadn't a care in the world.

One thing Will did notice was that he was gripping one of his arms very tightly, as if he were in pain. He was gripping it exactly where Will was feeling a painful sensation.

☉

"Nico," a voice called out.

Nico turned around to see a boy near the water fountain.

The boy kicked himself on the leg and Nico felt a sharp pain go up his leg.

"Ouch," Nico muttered. A moment later, his eyes widened, realizing what had just happened. He took off, running to his next class.

☽ ☾

Will looked around surprised and headed back into the class, where the teacher greeted him with a warm smile.

☉

His soulmate was a boy. His soulmate was a boy. His soulmate was a boy.

No one could find out.

☽ ☾

Why had Nico gone running away? That was the only question lingering in Will's head for the rest of the day.

☉

Nico learned a lot over the next few days. The boy was Will Solace. He had been acting differently in class due to his bond with his soulmate. And once you met your soulmate, from then on, every time you came into contact with them, the fact that you were soulmates would be obvious.

This just meant he had to stay as far apart from Will as possible.

This just meant that he had to avoid Will for as long as he could.

This just meant that he had to defy the odds and never interact with his soulmate again.

☽ ☾

The semester ended without Will and Nico crossing paths once. Whenever Will walked near Nico, the other boy headed off in another direction. It was almost as if he were aghast at the idea of having a male soulmate.

Is it me he hates?

☉

Every time Nico dashed away from Will, he felt a wash over of pain coming from his soulmate. He didn't want it to be this way. He really didn't. But it was the only way.

☽ ☾

For Will, the pain never stopped. It only grew. It grew and it grew and it grew.

☉

For Nico, the pain never stopped. It only grew. It grew and grew and grew.

☽ ☾

The pain became unbearable for Will one day, to the point that he stormed into the boy's bathroom where he suspected Nico would be. To his surprise, he found Nico sitting on the bathroom floor, rocking himself back and forth, his hands over his ears.

That day, he helped Nico up. When he took Nico with him to the nurse's office, it was evident from the radiation between the two of them and the way that they looked at each other that they were soulmates.

They made each other whole.

how did you guys like my pathetic attempt at a soulmate au? i tried to make it as uncliché as possible, but soulmate clichés are as cliché as you can get.

and if you cry while reading a chapter, then tell me, because i like to know these types of things. idk why, but i feel an odd sort of satisfaction when someone cries while reading my writing. this applies for every chapter.

and omgs this is over 1k words!