"On the day of your sixteenth birthday, the first ever words your soulmate will say to you will appear on your arm. It will be permanent like a tattoo, and only fade once you've met them."

It was nearly midnight, and the party had been going on for seven hours now. Nearly everyone had come round after school to the Joku estate, everyone desperate to be invited to the big party.

Soulmate reveal parties weren't highly common, but for the richer or better off, they liked to make a big and fancy deal about the whole affair, throwing house parties with all their mates to create a huge climax to the big reveal of the magical words that would embed theirselves onto your wrist and stay permanently until the day you finally meet your soulmate.

Most of the people around were admittedly Dream's, the boy being rather popular in his year. They were mainly boys, but the few odd girls had managed to get an invitation, hoping that the words on Dream's wrist would be the corresponding words to their own tattoos. Too bad Dream was gayer than King Edward the second or that fricative tiktok boy in your school (everyone has one). Though to be fair, he did hide it quite well.

Nightmare had a good lot of his 'irresponsible group' as his mum liked to call it, the boys having a reputation for leading her boy 'astray'. God forbid what she'd do if she found out he was really the ringleader. Plenty of girls had flocked to the party for his benefit too, all of them discussing the likelihood of whether the words on Nightmare's wrist would be plausible for something the emo teen would say. So most of the ones with messages such as "you look pretty, doll" we're quickly discarded, whereas "shut up" was highly popular.

He'd been amongst the action of the party for a good few hours now, but his bad habit of getting bored of events quickly lead him to sitting down in a 'quieter' corner where only a few people milled about sat around on the large spread couches.

Pointlessly stirring at the glass half full of beer in his hand, he watched as the honey coloured liquid crept up the edge of the glass in a fruitless attempt to escape before being dragged back down by gravity to collapse into swirling ripples with fizzling bubbles that, by now, was making his chest feel funny. He'd been careful-ish with his drinks, now being on his fourth. He wasn't a light weight, his dad had given him enough sneaky cans while his mum was off at work to get used to it. And it's not like he constantly met up with his gang to lie about their ages at shops and pubs to get some cheep shit. On more than one occasion it had turned into theft as they had to make a run for it - fake passports didn't always cut it.

He stayed silent in his solitude of solo-living for a few minutes before he found himself in the company of another presence.

Glancing up with a dull stare, his pupil rolled up to focus on the slim figure of another boy. Killer, that was his name. He didn't know what to think of him, really. They weren't explicitly friends, and the skeleton was in the year below him. So they didn't talk much. He was the kind of kid that could do fuck all in class with a 'I couldn't give two shits' attitude but then still pass his grades with flying colours - a bit like Nightmare. It might look like they were half asleep or messing around, but they knew all of it.

He stood in front of him with an empty glass in one hand and a half burnt out cigarette in the other. It's slim body shrivelled and glowing red. Little wisps trailed from it and they snaked around in the air like pythons as the boy sat down next to him on the sofa with a deep sigh, smoke pouring from his mouth after. Yes, he was far to young to smoke, but abandonment from his parents and death of his brother had left him in a crappy foster home that practically left cigarettes around for all the kids to grab and play with. His excuse was "better me than the little ones".

"Put that out." Nightmare hissed, swatting away at the smoke. "You'll get that smell all over me and my mum will stab a pair of her premium special edition chopsticks through my skull."

"Aww, don't want mummy to think you smoke?" He sneered and would have rolled his pupils if he had them, but put out the cigarette anyway - on his own wrist, much to Nightmare's slight disgust. It was a revolting habit Killer had built up for himself, saying the pain stimulated him. The marks went all up his wrists and arm - which would make it difficult for his soul tattoo when he got it - and seeing as skeletons couldn't really bleed, it was his 'best alternative'.

Once dropping the crumpled cigarette into his empty glass and making Nightmare twitch once more with annoyance he turned to look at him with a deadpan stare. "Two more minutes."

"Huh?" He took around three seconds to resister what he was on about. Two minutes till you stab someone? Two minutes before the poison sets in? Two minutes before the bomb he'd planted in the living room went off?

"Your tattoo."

Oh-

"Right- yeah." He looked down at his arm and tugged his grey hoodie sleeve up to stare at his darkly slick bones. Still blank.

"Yo, will you even see the words?" Killer peered over curiously and stared at Nightmare's slime covered bones with an amused expression. "Or will you have to like, I dunno, scrape it away?"

"How should I know, idiot?" He grunted, twisting his wrist back and forth in thought. He knew that one kid in their school - Error. He had black bones, and his tattoo had appeared in white italic writing. So maybe his would be the same.

Killer's shoulders heaved in a shrug and he glanced over at the now soggy wasted half of a cigarette in his glass, clearly wishing he hadn't disposed of it. His supplies were only limited. But his attention peaked to something else and he tipped his head to the side as someone else made their way over.

It was one of Nightmare's more... questionable friends. He always looked like he was debating whether the thigh or the waist would be the most juicy part of flesh to sink his teeth into during every class when he stared at the teachers - particularly female. He was never really quite stable, always making the most inappropriate comments and jokes without ever thinking anything bad of it. Dark humour was what he was famous for.

He trudged sluggishly over to the pair, clearly rather drunk as he gave a messy hiccup, one hand pushed deep in his eye socket and scratching rabidly at the bone inside with a grating sound that could send shivers rippling like lightning down your spine. "'Sup emos."

Plopping himself down beside the two he yawned, showing off his rather unclean teeth that clearly had remnants of the pizzas they'd ordered hours ago stuck between them. Yanking his hand out of his eye socket he peered blearily down at Nightmare's wrist, which was still exposed from his pushed up sleeve. "Mnh, no tattoo yet?"

Shaking his head Nightmare craned his neck back to look over at Dream and his friends who'd gathered in the kitchen like a swarm of bees and were starting excitedly counting down from ten, the time closer than he'd thought.

"TEN!"

"What do you think it will say?" Horror nibbled on the ridge of his index finger and stared at his wrist as if it was a mustard coated hot dog.

"NINE!"

"Daddy?" He could barely suggest the word before he collapsed in a fit of raspy giggles, his hand reaching up to tug on the pointed shards of the splintered hole in his skull.

"EIGHT!"

"No." Killer scoffed and cast a distasteful look towards the older. They'd never got along well - Horror wasn't serious enough for him, always mocking everything. "Don't be stupid just because of your own tattoo."

"SEVEN!"

Grinning widely and flashing his teeth again the cannibal yanked up the sleeve of his dusty grey-blue jacket to reveal his tattoo. His sixteenth birthday had been the week before.

"SIX!"

"Hey, you're kinda hot, mind if I take you home with me?" were the words scribed across his wrist, the curly italic writing making the phrase seem sultry despite it just being ink on bone.

"FIVE!"

"The perfect dream, lucky you." Killer muttered sarcastically before looking back at Nightmare, who seemed deep in thought. His eyes dragged over to the tentacles trapped between the sofa and Nightmare that grew from his back. They were so long that he now had to curl the tips up as he walked to stop the tips dragging. "Do you think it'll be a comment on your appearance?"

"FOUR!"

"Octopus daddy-" Horror snarked back another laugh and pressed the same hand that had been in his skull against his mouth.

"THREE!"

"Shut up Horror." Nightmare snapped, also pretty bored of the boy's jokes now. Plus, all of a sudden he felt anxious. He'd been so relaxed about it earlier, but now knowing that he'd receive the forever binding first words of his soulmate, a little pit was forming in his non-existent stomach.

"TWO!"

Turning to look back over at the group of people surrounding his brother he stared, watching as they all jostled and pressing closer around him in a sea of faces all wanting to see what the tattoo said first.

"ONE!"

The group erupted into yells and calls, all shoving and pushing. Not wanting to miss the moment that the words appeared on his wrist.
He was duly aware of the other's presence beside him, the two of them staring intently at his wrist as if it would suddenly explode.

From behind everyone was shouting, Dream holding up his wrist high and proud for everyone to see with the black spindly writing snaking across his white bone in one small line. So it was a short one.

"Nightmare look!" Horror pointed excitedly down and the octopus flinched, cyan eye narrowed as a sort of light twisted on his wrist. As he could have predicted, they were white.

And there they were. The words that would bind him and his perfect partner forever...

"Look, I've had a shit day, so you can just fuck off."

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Heyoooooo Bacc

They both get pretty shitty messages haven't they lmaosjsusownhzus maybe they'll meet soon?????

And Ngl I love killer. And I hope it's noticeable but I've been trying to make my characters more cannon etc

:3

Next update soon - maybe-

And I love the title oof I'm kinda proud of that one, what a poet I am

-Jess-