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“You know, a pretty face won't get you far when you have a shit personality.”
“Oh no, not you.”
Stiles freezes. Knowing something like this was bound to be said to his face doesn't make it sting any less. After all, it has been tattooed to the inside of his right wrist, a brand upon his skin, in elegant script that completely belies the sentiment the words convey, since his seventeenth birthday.
His soulmark. The first words a person's soulmate would say or has said directly to them, black and stark until they share their first touch, whereupon the mark will turn sapphire blue or, in the rare case that the soulmates are purely platonic, a calm brown similar to a henna tattoo in its freshest application.
He gets the shivers and the shortness of breath all of his friends have described upon meeting their soulmates. He also gets a burst of anxiety and a flash of hurt that he is certain neither of friends have ever experienced because they've all met perfect matches that could be compared to angels or saints or the epitome of “good people.”
His soulmate...is an attractive, muscular blond dressed in designer clothes, a sneer curling his pretty lips, disparaging some unfortunate guy who had the misfortune of gracing his presence in clothes that apparently don't meet his standards. And someone who had spoken words that suggested that he would rather be paired up with literally anyone other than Stiles.
He also happens to be Stiles' friend Lydia's ex-boyfriend from three months ago.
Stiles met Lydia in Ancient Latin class in college, a class she didn't even need to take since she apparently already knows the language but which she elected for anyway to get an easy A and to round out this semester's credits to a number more to her liking that she would have without. In her words, she recognized Stiles' intelligence and wit, despite his weird tangents and erratic body language that have a habit to scare most people off, and decided that he would be her partner in class for its duration. She'd also demanded that he teach her Polish since she will undoubtedly have to help him with Latin. Stiles, gay as the day is long, had been stunned by the combination of her beauty and genius-level intellect and saw no reason to deny her.
They became friends. Which made him privy to her secrets, whether he wanted them or not. Which also means he had more information on all two of her exes than he ever would have wanted.
Which also means that he knows far too much about Jackson Whittemore before ever meeting him in person.
He'd seen him around campus, in passing and from afar, possessing no desire to actually come in contact with the type of person he had left Beacon Hills to escape. Lydia deeming him worthy of at least lingering friendship despite their rocky romantic relationship of the past has no bearing on that decision. She hangs out with him even more than before now that she is happily bound in a relationship with her soulmate, something for which she will forever in Stiles' debt since he is the one that introduced Deputy Jordan Parrish to her in the first place.
They are sickeningly cute. Stiles could gag from it, but he fears he'll just contract diabetes from close proximity instead. Allison Argent and Scott McCall are equally sickening, and he fears he is doomed to be surrounded by happy couples with sickening amounts of glucose permeating their relationships.
Just as he is and has always been doomed to a, at best, rocky relationship that will no doubt leave him miserable.
Jackson's expression suggests he realizes what he has just said to his soulmate. His eyes are wide, features slack, that oh-shit-deer-in-the-headlights look criminals usually adopted when Stiles' dad caught them red-handed in the middle of a crime or a lie. It's usually hilarious. It is not right now. Not in this context.
Stiles swallows hard. Without him realizing, his arms have crossed in front of him defensively, his hands gripping his hoodie to still their shaking without being visible from another person's view. In his peripherals, he can see Lydia approaching as swiftly as she can without risking injury with those dangerously high heels of hers in the rain-softened ground of the campus quad. The additional attention causes him to flush further.
This is awful. It's as awful as his nightmares suggested. He'd had the smallest hopes that maybe his words would be the results of a misunderstanding. Like maybe there should have been italics somewhere in there that didn't translate in the chosen font of the soulmarks. “Oh no, not you.” As if maybe he'd overheard a comment or insult and thought it was about him, but the first words directed at him fro his soulmate would be a reassurance that no, in fact, it was not about him.
He isn't sure what he could have done to inspire this sort of reaction from someone he has never officially met. He lifts his head, chin pointed, hoping the obstinance hides his desire to cry. His chest squeezes tight, the warning signs of an impending panic attack he is desperately trying to stave off and squash down until he can be alone to indulge in it.
The soulmark on his wrist throbs and burns. Something like a lasso circles his heart and tugs at it, as if to pull it from his chest. Fate and the universe and that stupid little part of him that has always yearned for soulmate connect demands that he reach out and touch.
A second part of him wants to make that touch a slap across that stupid face.
But most of him has absolutely no desire to initiate the bond.
It's something cruel of the universe to pair him with someone who would undoubtedly cause him further misery.
Maybe he was being a little dramatic. Stiles has been known to err on the side of theatrics. At the moment, however, he thinks his trepidation and hurt is warranted. Dread coils insidiously through him and puts him in a chokehold, threatening to strangle him with despair.
Jackson's hands flex. They clench into fists, then release, fingers stretching as if to try to dispel tension from the joints and tendons.
“No, not me,” Stiles murmurs an eternity after those words have been said, and he takes a step back from Jackson. He hadn't been very close to begin with, but he wants even more distance now, given the circumstances. Jackson twitches, as if he wants to reach out and stop him. “One would have thought that with words like those on one's skin, one would have endeavored to do better.”
He feels very little guilt that his words on Jackson's forearm had been snarky and accusing. He would feel worse about them if his own hadn't been instinctive rejection of him as a person.
Would have thought that four monosyllabic words would feel so devastating?
“Never thought it would be incentive to be a dickhead every now and then to elicit that type of a response?” the blond retorts, but it's a weak comeback. Stiles can practically see the gears turning in his head, trying to think of the best way to fix the mess he has found himself in.
“That's one of the worst justifications I've heard for being a bully.”
Jackson scowls, and his hands clench into fists again. There is a tremble in his arms, one that someone might thigh is restraint from violence. Stiles knows better, however, because he has the same quiver. They are resisting the pull, the Fate-driven urge to touch and confirm and seal that first level of bonding, for black to swirl into blue or brown and solidify that connection binding them.
Stiles resists through sheer force of will and the pain poisoning his core.
It takes a special sort of someone to be rejected with their soul words. There is no other way to interpret “Oh no, not you” in this situation.
Lydia arrives, standing between and beside them. “Jackson, what did you say?” she demands, and his glare turns to her, a flash of hurt mixed in with his stubbornness.
“Why does it always have to be me that is at fault, Lydia?” he snaps.
“I already know what your mark says, Jackson,” Lydia says with a roll of her eyes. “I don't know what Stiles' says. What did you say?”
Stiles resists the urge to hunch in on himself as Jackson reluctantly replies: “Oh no, not you.”
Lydia stares at Jackson with a deadpan expression and the intensity of a thousand suns burning in her eyes. It lasts for exactly six seconds. “You panicked, didn't you?”
Stiles frowns, bewilderment bubbling up. His eyes flick back and forth between the two.
Jackson's nostrils flare, and his jaw flexes, like he is grinding his teeth, but his chin lifts a little, the smallest admission. Lydia sighs, exasperated.
“What do you mean he panicked?” Stiles demands in a low voice, skin crawling as more and more attention is drawn, as is the usual reaction when Jackson-and-Lydia drama is involved. He wants to disappear and lick his wounds out of sight.
Jackson opens his mouth, likely to deflect, but Lydia won't be deterred. “Jackson gay-panicked over his words being said by his ex's best friend, on whom he has had a rom-com level crush for the duration of the entire semester we have known each other.”
Stiles stares unblinkingly, uncomprehending. “What?”
“Eloquent.” Lydia tosses her hair over her shoulder, that haughty motion he admires but also hates with a fiery passion. “Jackson has been pining for you for months and hasn't had the guts to approach you—”
“Thank you, Lydia, I think you've humiliated me enough,” Jackson snarls, hissing between gritted teeth. His scowl is truly something to behold when directed at the woman he'd once dated, as if he could strike her down through the power of his gaze alone.
“You're the one that fucked up your soul-meeting,” she replies in her snootiest voice, tilting her nose up at him. “And I don't see you rectifying it.”
The snarl on his face could only be more complete if he vocalized the noise aloud. Stiles is a little impressed, honestly.
Instead, Jackson turns and takes a step forward, hand reaching out. Stiles doesn't have the reaction time, or coordination—or if he was perfectly honest, the willpower—to dodge him.
Their skin makes contact, broad palm and strong fingers curling around a quivering forearm, just above the leather cuff hiding those damning words, and everything suddenly becomes suspended in time. Warmth washes over him like the rippling waters of sunwarmed waves. Swirling ink turns stark black to shimmering azure, and the ache in his chest subsides, replaced with glowing hope and sparkling desire.
Stiles gasps. His knees go weak, and he stumbles in place. Jackson steps in further, and both hands curl around Stiles' elbows, grasping and supporting as their bodies lean into each other for support. The breathlessness flees, and it feels like Stiles takes his first real breath in his life, eyes wide and incredulous with awe as he stares at Jackson's blue gaze, which are wide with their own sort of wonder.
It's all so bright and overwhelming. It's easily the best feeling he has ever had. His own trembling fingers grasp onto Jackson's tone biceps. He is vaguely aware that there is quiet applause from the audience around them.
They lean closer, blocking it out, breathing in each other's scents and life forces, accepting the miracle as it is as the first thread of their soulbond wraps around them like a firm lasso, twining around them irrevocably.
“I'm sorry,” Jackson murmurs against his skin, the feel of his voice tickling as it vibrates across his senses. “I panicked and reacted because my crush had just seen me acting like an ass, and my crush is my soulmate, and I said the worst thing I could have. I hate that those are the words you've carried, thinking I wouldn't want you when we finally met.”
Stiles shudders and liets out the longest breath he ever has, like releasing the steam out of a container about to bust under the mounting pressure. “The words I said weren't very nice, either,” he mutters, determinedly not acknowledging Lydia's eyes on them or the crowd of people gathered to witness a Connection.
“I at least knew you'd think I'm pretty,” Jackson replies, teasing, a deliberate attempt to lighten the mood. The smile is audible, the relief palpable between them.
Stiles laughs breathlessly. “I've heard you proudly announce you're everyone's type.”
“As long as I'm your type, too.”
“You're perfect for each other,” Lydia snarks, interrupting them before they can get too embarrassing. “Now get out of here and bond.” She flashes the quickest wink ever and flounces off, glaring at least half of their audience into scurrying away. The rest of them wander away naturally now that the “main event” has concluded.
Jackson huffs and adjusts his hold on Stiles to a more tender cradle. “I'd like to go on a date with you. I'd rather learn about you in first-person rather than through the words of Lydia Martin.”
Stiles lips twist with humor, and he puts some space between them so he can meet Jackson's gaze again. “I'll be honest, you've only ever been the asshole ex in my mind. I'd like a chance to learn the real you and overwrite the data currently on file.”
“God, you really are a nerd,” Jackson remarks, and normally a comment like that would piss Stiles off, but there is such a look of gentle adoration on this stereotypical jock's face that Stiles can't drag up words or snark in defense. The smile on Jackson's face is soft, indescribably tender. “Cheeseburger and curly fries?” he offers, giving him a gentle tug in the general direction of the diner that is located off-campus but literally just across the street.
“Lydia's been telling secrets,” Stiles huffs, easily allowing his body to be guided in that direction. It's a little early for dinner, but he skipped lunch and could definitely eat now. He'll just supplement a snack for later when he gets inevitably hungry again before bed.
“Only the ones she thought I needed to woo my crush,” Jackson promises. His arm wraps around Stiles' waist. He curves himself around Stiles, and it tickles something inside him to recognize that he'd doing it to deliver his full attention to Stiles but to also shield him from any prying eyes of nosy onlookers.
“I'm open to wooing.” He somehow says it without stumbling.
As it turns out, much later, Stiles is also open to over-the-clothes groping, and extended making out with his soulmate.
He's sure he'll be open to much more further down the road.
Possibly even as soon as tomorrow evening.