Chapter Text
But still, maybe I can
Be a bright light in this world
Maybe after all of that pain
I can shortly shine a light
So I couldn’t give up
I couldn’t fall asleep peacefully for a single night
Because maybe if I keep trying to get up like this
I will find myself
To my youth
BOL4
The soul, seen as an individual consciousness that is part of everything is not born with the characteristic of being permanent and immutable, it originates from the experiences of reality collecting the feelings, senses and memories like a stream of water flowing in an infinite cycle that may or may not find a specific causal at some point, of having a destiny.
Nanami Sai, at thirteen years old, was not able to understand concepts as complex as the soul, no matter how hard he tried reading the old theology books in the mansion's library. Contrary to them, in fiction everything always seemed so easy, the soul made each person an individual and the mark that intertwined the destinies of two individuals appeared at the age of thirteen, almost always leading to a romantic relationship. Miss Hana's favourite film was about two classmates who shared soulmate marks and despite their clear interest in each other they didn't know it during their school days, the second world war and its ravages separated them for ten years until they met again, fell in love and discovered they were soulmates.
‘Their marks lead them to find the people they were meant to become, not who they were during their teenage years, that's why it took them so long to be together’ said the nanny with tears in the eyes during the end credits of the film, answering the little Sai's questions before looking at the time and pursing her lips, uncomfortable at having to drive him to his topology classes.
Growing up in that mansion that felt more like a cage, unable to feel any attachment to the women who cared for him and his younger brother because they were changed regularly, nor receive any affection from their relatives who thought of them as nothing more than a constant uncomfortable reminder of their father; Sai used to fantasise about the moment when he would turn thirteen and the mark that bound him to a person he could love and would love him back would finally appear on his skin.
Checking his body in front of the mirror as soon as he woke up became a routine he performed every morning, excited beyond belief by the expectations.
Excitement that waned as the months went by and once the summer of his fourteenth birthday arrived, his excitement turned to fear, desperately searching for answers as to why his mark had not yet appeared. To his misfortune, the only books on the subject that he could access due to his family's strict restrictions, those on theology and philosophy, were too advanced.
As in his nanny's favourite film, he might not find his soulmate until he became the person he was destined to be, something he could understand about how the soul was shaped. But the mark usually appeared on those destined at thirteen and he was about to turn fourteen, so was he never going to get one?
On the morning of Tuesday 31 July 2007, before going to the mirror, Sai's mind wandered.
“Assuming that the age range for a living person with a soulmate is 0 to 80 years, if I am older than my soulmate, then I must be 0 to 13 years old, then 13/70 = 0.18571 chance of having a soulmate, of which I must still consider that approximately 30% of the population has a soulmate, then 0.18571 x 0.30 = 0.05571. In other words, my chance of receiving a soulmate mark after the age of fourteen is 5.571%.”
Mathematics is the alphabet with which God has written the universe, Sai knew that perfectly well and that number was terrifying.
Once in front of the mirror he looked at his shaking hands, there was no change in them.
He slowly took off his pyjama shirt, there was nothing on his collarbones or his shoulders or abdomen… he turned around and there was nothing on his back either.
In desperation he took off his pants, it was unusual to have marks on the legs, but it could happen.
Nothing.
There was no one destined to love him in this world and before that thought had finished crossing his mind his eyes were already filled with tears and his weak legs made him fall on the expensive carpet of his room, shaking, crying and babbling incoherently that his mind couldn't even think of.
“Sai! I woke up early to be the first to come and wish you a happy birthday!“ Ryusui's boisterous voice startled Sai, entering his room like the blond whirlwind of life he was.
He expected to find his older brother half asleep or if he was already awake a shout for him to learn to knock before entering, but not at all to see him like this.
“Ryu-Ryusui?” Sai whimpered, seeing him through his blurry eyes.
“What happened to you?” He asked, running up to him and looking at him cautiously for injuries or any indication as to why he found Sai in such a bad state.
“There's no- I don't have… a soulmate…”
“A soulmate? Like those with the marks in romantic movies?” Asked Ryusui who, at eight years old, couldn't care less about the subject.
He nodded and Ryusui pulled up Sai's pyjama shirt from the floor so he could explain things in a more decent state.
“The mark that links a person to their soulmate appears at thirteen, I turned fourteen today,” he muttered reluctantly getting dressed.
“Oh yes, I remember from that movie you were watching with Miss Hana last week, I understand why she was crying so much, missing so many planes is a shame.”
“She wasn't crying about that,” Sai denied in a tired voice, it was still early and his heart was already hurting too much to have to put up with his younger brother.
“But in the movie the mark of that beautiful woman appeared at fifteen and in the pilot at thirteen, maybe your soulmate is still, uh… twelve…“ he did his math slowly with their tiny fingers.
“The chance of that happening is only 5.571%.”
“Is that bad?”
“It's almost impossible.”
“But not impossible!” He laughed at the top of his lungs, snapping his fingers. “Cheer up a bit! I bet your soulmate right now is enjoying their summer holiday from elementary school, they could be one of my classmates.”
Sai thought about it for a moment, finishing dressing. He still wasn't entirely convinced, but it was true, there was hope.
“I don't understand,” Ryusui continued, sitting down on the desk across from him, searching his hands for something unusual. “Those marks look cool, but is having a soulmate important?”
“It's a person who's meant to love you and who you're meant to love, it's very important.”
“It doesn't mean that without the mark you can't love, on the contrary, maybe you can love many more people.”
“No… it's not that...”
“I desire a magnificent mark! But if I don't have it, then all the people in the world will be mine!”
“You don't understand anything!” Sai shouted, jumping to his feet, running away to lock himself in the attic, slamming the door to his room and then the trap door on his way.
Puzzled, Ryusui looked at the gift he had left behind on the desk.
“I don't think a DS Lite is what you desire right now.”
Japanese children studied as part of their basic education the writings of the historian and poet Yamanoue no Okura, who lived through the great Tenpyō epidemic, describing with deep sorrow the horrors that the terminally ill smallpox patients went through, fearing that his soulmate, whom he had not yet met, would succumb to it and thus they would be unable to meet during that lifetime.
Fate had proved to have a twisted sense of humour in that his soulmate was born over a thousand years later, the Empress Teimei fell madly in love with him through his writings and after a long investigation of the poet's life discovered that the two shared exactly the same mark, making famous the myth of the withered mark on the empress's arm, a Confucian wooden bell and a traditional crown, distorted, more like a burning iron scar than the usually precious, subtly coloured shapes engraved on the skin.
Such were the marks of soulmates where one of them had died. Asagiri Gen had seen it firsthand in his mother, who lived stigmatised by the terrible scar of birds flying in opposite directions on her shoulder, the memory of an old childhood friend with whom she was deeply in love, who died in an accident before them came the age of receiving their marks. His mother, like many others who lost their fates or failed to find them in their youth, ended up marrying another person without a soulmate, continuing with the everyday life expected of her. Despite this, her story was not about the worst tragedy in a person's life, finding a soulmate did not always guarantee happiness for the couple, or even that they would fall in love with each other, sometimes they were simply inseparable partners or just lovers. With that and the fact these marks were present in only thirty percent of the population, it became difficult to find couples who were happy together.
Having heard and seen all sorts of stories pass before his eyes, Asagiri Gen never knew exactly what to expect from his mark when it appeared during the spring of his thirteenth year.
The mauve silhouette of a purple nightshade flower with the symbols less than (<), slash (/) and greater than (>) outlined in bottle green within it seemed to him the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, letting him know that there was someone who possessed an equal and was destined to love him, no matter what, no matter if they were unable to meet or if they born thousands of years later.
It was clear to him whom the flower represented, fascinated as a child with magic, he learned of the language of flowers at an early age. He, Asagiri Gen, was the purple nightshade flower, a liar. Knowing what the other symbol stood for was a little more difficult, especially since he was terrible at mathematics and it looked like something related.
“It means the logical closure of any kind of hypertext-based language, such as HTML or XML, and there are two types: the first explicit, which reads <any> <\any> or the improved implicit version, which reads <any/> and is widely used for the design of various documents,” he read in a low voice, barely audible to himself in the library.
The longer the text went on, the less he understood it. Gen frowned and opened another tab on the computer browser.
“Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It defines the content and structure of web content. It is often assisted by technologies such as… It's something to do with computers!”
“Shh,” the librarian looked down disapprovingly at him from her desk.
Whatever, Gen didn't need to know anything else at all. He closed all the open tabs and headed for the exit, feeling immensely happy to have the first clue about his soulmate.
If they liked computers enough to have their soul represented in a programming symbol, then they must be someone very smart.
Just the kind of person Gen had been interested in up to that point. He had once heard that the attraction between soulmates could be immediate, as if the world shine only for his destined person and everyone else seemed like vegetables in comparison. He hadn't experienced anything like that so far, but if he had to choose, he'd rather talk to someone who actually had something to say.
That could be the case with Rintarou, one of his classmates who, as fate would have it, was also in the library looking for a book on the shelves at the entrance. During the last evaluations he scored the best grade of his level and although it was notorious that he didn't like Gen because whenever the teachers assigned teamwork, he always managed to get into Rintarou's team and then do nothing, Gen was a faithful believer in the ‘enemies to lovers’ trope. Besides, it was common knowledge that the nerd had a mark under his clothes.
The marks were not usually kept strictly secret, but Japanese tradition indicated that soulmates have to fall in love before discovering that they were destined to meet through the mark. It was the perfect fantasy, one that Gen wasn't willing to wait for if something happened to his soulmate afterwards and he ended up finding out through the loss of his mark. If there was one thing he had learned well from his mother, it was that youth could be fleeting.
“Hey, Rintarou!” He called out to his classmate, at the sight of him Rintarou pursed his lips and couldn't hide the annoyance at the sight.
They would work on fixing that, if he was Gen's soulmate then he was destined to overcome that displeasure. For starters, Gen could stop cajoling him into helping him with homework.
“You're pretty good with computers, aren't you?”
“Yes...” he replied uncertainly, trying to see what he was getting at.
Gen reached into his backpack for a pen and drew the programming symbol </> on his hand and showed it to him.
“Do you know what this means?”
“It's the logical closure of any kind of hypertext-based language,” he replied as if quoting from a book by heart.
And coldly. As if that symbol meant nothing to him.
That was discouraging, but Gen wasn't about to give up. So he insisted.
“I know you have a mark under your clothes.”
He said bluntly, finally getting a reaction from his classmate. The surprise in his wide eyes and the small blush on his cheeks seemed kind of cute to Gen.
“I have one too, do you want to see it?” He asked, smiling coquettishly.
“Ah? But… you… Are you sure? It's not usually done like that.”
“No, but I'm not willing to waste my time,” he explained. “My soulmate is a smart guy and I need to know if it's you.”
The boy then clutched his clothes to his chest, frightened.
Very close to where Gen's mark was.
“Well… I want to see it. But not here, I requested a classroom to study with some classmates and I don't think they're here yet.”
“Let's go,” he agreed hopefully.
As they walked up to the first floor of the library, Gen noticed the boy's hands clenching the straps of his backpack with nervousness. Maybe he should have said something to help him calm down, like accepting his own fear in front of him or reassuring him that he wasn't expecting anything immediate from him if they turned out to be soulmates, but his own nervousness overshadowed any logical reasoning he might have had at that age. Gen just wanted to prove his soulmate existence, to find who's his destined person and to be able to love him in life.
The small classroom seemed to be set up like in romantic anime, the evening light illuminating the place in a pleasant shade of orange, as well as the external scenery of the blossoming trees and the blackboard stained white by chalk smudges were all classic elements in that ideal setting for a romantic confession.
But for some reason it didn't feel that way.
If Gen wasn't going to follow the tradition of waiting to get to know each other better, at least he should have the courtesy to show his mark first, no matter how much he wanted to cajole Rintarou into doing it himself or both do it at the same time.
As soon as his fingers touched the first button of the shirt, all the determination that led him there faltered. This could be a pivotal moment in his life, the story of how he found the love of his life and companion, yet despite the romantic setting, Gen didn't feel his heart pounding with the affection he was supposed to have for him.
He took a deep breath, convincing himself that it was only anxiety over expectations and once he recognised in Rintarou his soulmate he would be able to see him as the most amazing human being in the world, he would hug him tightly, maybe they would have their first kiss and leave there knowing they would love each other till death do them part.
He opened the top three buttons of his shirt, just enough to reveal his mark.
Rintarou's expression immediately changed to a relief that Gen felt like a slap in the face.
“No, mine is very different,” he confirmed, taking off his waistcoat and opening his own shirt with a confident smile that Gen wished he could wipe away. At the centre of Rintarou's chest lay a staff with an atom for a pommel.
“Are you so proud of a dull mark like that?” Gen sputtered tactlessly in disbelief.
“And what's wrong with that? The staffs represent health professionals and the atom something to do with science. We'll be a stable couple.”
“And a boring one, you may realise that you are destined to the end of your lives for have been too introverted and focused on your careers to pay attention to the people around you.”
A situation that occurred all too often in Japanese society, where young adults were keener on their careers than on finding love.
“What about you? That must be the strangest and most incoherent mark I have ever seen. Why are you depicted as a flower and how can a computer scientist fall in love with you?”
The words spoken with such sincerity touched something deep and very sensitive inside the young and inexperienced Gen, unable to hide his pained reaction, evident even to the emotional idiot that Rintarou was.
“I'm... I'm sorry,” the nerd muttered, feeling guilty.
“I thought you'd be my soulmate and you ended up insulting me like this,” he whimpered, exaggerating his true sorrow.
“I didn't mean to hurt you!”
“Rintarou isn't my type at all and yet I started to get my hopes up thinking you'd be my soulmate, I didn't imagine I'd end up finding out how much you really hate me,” two thick crocodile tears emanated one after another from his left eye.
“I don't hate you. Don't… don't cry please.”
“You don't hate me?”
“No…”
“Then will you do something for me?”
“Yes, anything you want.”
“Would you do my chemistry homework?”
Gen wouldn't be the proud mentalist he was if he hadn't taken advantage of the situation. Because not even a soulmate would be able to change the shallow, manipulative person he really was.
It also didn't change the fact that one person was relieved that Gen wasn't their fated person.
«Will I be a curse to the person who is meant for me?»
Later, walking home, Gen felt the pleasant brush of his clothes against the mark, somehow comforting, confusing him as to whether there was another person capable of loving him as he was or what he wore on his skin held another meaning. Looking up at the sky, he wondered if beyond his small town and perhaps even beyond Japan there was someone waiting for him, Gen Asagiri could not be someone so difficult to love.
One spring morning like any other, waking up with much effort after having stayed up all night playing Luigi's Mansion: Dark Moon, Sai Nanami shuffled through his student accommodation flat, half putting on the first pair of pants and shirt he pulled out of his drawers on his way to the bathroom to brush his teeth. With his eyes half closed and toothbrush in his mouth he was buttoning up his shirt in front of the mirror noticing a hint of mauve on his chest which he scratched thinking it was a loose thread on his shirt, instead the pleasant shiver caused by his touch took all laziness out of him in a second.
“Huh?” He stammered, choking on the toothpaste.
Coughing he rinsed his face quickly, rushing to awkwardly open his shirt back just enough to see through the mirror and then with his own eyes, still in disbelief at finding for the first time on his skin something he never thought he'd have.
The mark of a soulmate.
After so many years of waiting for his mark to appear, clinging to the fact that the likelihood of finding it was almost, but not quite impossible, wondering if anyone in the world could love him for who he really was, without the need to pretend to be someone else or be forced to do things he didn't want to do; and there it was. By the time he was nineteen and already had decided to give up waiting, convinced that he did not deserve to be loved unconditionally.
Sai wiped away the tears that blurred his eyes, his heart in the throat as he gazed at the beautiful mauve flower, undoubtedly adoring the person who had another like that, longing for the moment he would get to know then.
However…
“Does that mean my soulmate is only thirteen?”
He stammered nervously, his mind whirling wildly without being able to come up with any concrete solution, he didn't know anyone that age and the very idea of falling in love with someone even younger than Ryusui was absolutely inconceivable.
Exhaling an amused chuckle he decided not to think about it anymore, after all, soulmates were nonsense and he couldn't imagine what fate had in store for him. Carefully he caressed the edge of the flower of his soulmate's mark, giving himself a moment to enjoy the wonderful news.
“I guess I have time to become the best possible man for you.”
As Gen grew older he understood why the knowledge of soulmates was so valuable and why some people would go to ridiculous lengths to keep it private. As much as he himself did, stuck in the sometimes shallow medium of show business he hadn't felt a special chemistry that told him who his destined IT someone might be in a sea of wary looks and disapproval for his mentalist title, that made him wonder if he hadn't yet found his soulmate because he wasn't the right person yet.
Then, one day during a magic act, everything went black.
His first thought was that the whole thing must be a joke, even if he never gave his consent to the TV stations to take part in the practical jokes of Japanese entertainment, there was always the possibility of being included in one. But as the hours passed he knew it was no joke, not only because he couldn't move his body, he was completely unable to feel it. Eventually those hours turned into days and then months during which he tried to concentrate on his sense of touch, to search in vain for his own hands or at least his nose breathing to no avail, not even knowing if he had the natural human processes of breathing, thirst or hunger. It was only his mind, contained in emptiness.
«Am I dead?»
That must be impossible if he was still conscious, striving during those terrifying years to fight against the boredom, fear and despair of his stone prison, praying that this was not his end; he was barely nineteen, there was so much he wanted to do and see during his life.
He had not even fallen in love.
He had the mark of a soulmate, no doubt someone was destined to love him. How would they do it? Through the traces he left behind? Through his television recordings or his awkward book?
At least he hoped that person could appreciate his true talents hidden behind his TV persona, that they found him attractive, that they liked his haircut…
He always liked to imagine that his soulmate would have a pretty smile.
«I wish… I could have seen then… at least once…»
To be continued…
«How long has it been? A thousand years? Maybe?»
Confined in his stone prison, Sai was unwilling to let himself become exhausted and end up losing consciousness, for that would be the end of his valuable programming knowledge. He had to hold on.
«I have yet to meet my nightshade flower.»