Chapter Text
Marinette grew up with intricate black swirls on her chest. Ever since she was a child she would trace her fingers over the wild loops and swirls till she learned them by heart. The first clothes she ever designed were her attempts to utilize the never-ending beauty and grace she saw in each curve. She had other soulmate marks too of course. Wrapped around her left wrist was a thick black line and the top of her right thigh featured a small group of irregular spots, but the mark across her chest was her favorite. Her intuition told her strongly that whoever it was that matched that mark would be someone very special. She told herself that was silly, of course they would be special they were one of her soulmates, but it felt different. Sometimes at night she wondered what color it would be and dreamed of the person who would activate it.
Adrien was glad that the marks on his shoulder and back were small. The intricate pattern across his chest was large but usually covered by a shirt in his photoshoots, so he only had to sit through the time it took to cover the others with makeup. He knew that prospective models often could be completely shut out of the industry based on how large or obviously placed their soulmarks were, on if it was decided it would take to much time and money in covering them. He knew that his chest mark was the reason he didn’t often have to do any swimsuit or shirtless shots. If that mark hadn’t already been his favorite, that alone would have done it.
Truly though, Adrien didn’t like hiding his marks, he loved them and wanted everyone to see them. Whenever he felt alone he would look in the mirror and feel comfortable in the fact that somewhere someone looked in the mirror and saw the same black tattoo, waiting to be colored in. He would wonder, if he let the press get images of his marks and his soulmates came forward, who would they be? What color would their touch paint his skin? What color would he make theirs? But then he’d remember the time a paparazzi had just managed to capture the top tip of the mark on his upper back, the one that peaked onto his neck, and how hundreds of fans had harassed him claiming to be his one true love.
He could wait for his soulmates, he knew he’d find them in time.
For Alya, soulmate marks were an endless puzzle. Every night she’d slowly look over her still-dark marks for any hint of color telling her that she’d touched one of her soulmates that day. If she was in public, no matter what she was doing, she’d be almost unconsciously looking for a thick snake-like coil of black tapered on each end on every stranger's left wrist. On hot days she’d watch for the strange three bladed fan shape that decorated her left calf or even the strange sunburst like shape on her torso. By the time she was thirteen Alya had become frustrated. Her mom and Nora would remind her that it was extremely common for people not to have met any of their soulmates at her age, but that just made her more frustrated. She wanted answers, she wanted to know.
When she was getting ready to move to her new school she made a promise to herself. She started learning about web design and journalism, she read every tip she could find about how to build blogs and how to market herself. Alya had a mission: no matter what she’d have met her soulmates by the end of the year.
“Less three percent of people have soulmate marks with as much symmetry as you do baby,” Nino’s mother would say with pride. “You know what that means right? It means your balanced, in your soul. I knew from the minute I had you that you’d be a sweet boy, and when I saw those marks I knew you’d be a happy boy. Two perfect black circles on each shoulder and then that sun riiiight over your belly button. That’s when I knew my son would be a wise boy in his time, a reasonable and happy boy.”
She’d say this so frequently that Nino felt he could say every word by heart. He never complained though, because he was pretty sure that those marks and the superstitious nonsense about him having a ‘balanced soul’ were part of the reason she let him be so adventurous in his hobbies. She trusted in him to understand what he was getting himself into (like when he tried skateboarding), when to keep pushing (like when he didn’t immediately perform on ollie), and when to move on (like when he tried to grind down the rail of some stairs and ended up swan diving into the Seine). When he told her, at twelve that he wanted to do go into music professionally he thought that would be too much, that she’d tell him that his soulmarks lied and not a chance. Then the next day she came into his room with six double-sided pages of notes about the music industry to review with him. His mom says that Nino doesn’t worry about his soulmates because he knows that they will come eventually, and he is too balanced to worry about it until then.
Nonononono! Marinette was already running late and it was only the first day of school, but it wasn’t like she could just leave that old man to get hit. She held the box of macaroons carefully as she stumbled into class. The only seat left was in the second row, right next to and behind two kids that she didn’t recognize at all. Slowly she approached the seat, surprised that Chloe seemed too distracted by the boy in the front row to try to trip her. She didn’t even send a glare her way! Marinette felt a surge of hope for the coming year and approached the new girl with a big smile.
“Hi, I’m Marinette. Do you mind if I sit here?”
The girl looked up from her phone at her with a friendly smile, “Not at all. I’m Alya, I’m new this year.”
“Well, it’s nice to meet you. Would you like a-”
Before Marinette could finish she was cut off mid-sit by Alya suddenly shooting forward and grabbing her wrist, causing her to drop the box and fall into the in shock. She suddenly felt the eyes of the class turn to look and tried to fight through the battling embarrassment, surprise, and confusion.
“Look! We have matching soulmarks! Oh my god, I was so determined to find my soulmates this year, but I didn’t think it would happen this soon! This is so amazing. I need to text my sister about this. Wait, what color is it now?”
Mari looked down at her wrist in shock, and sure enough, the black lines were fading into colors. As she watched the solid black became alternating orange and purple, almost like two colored ropes twisted together coiled around her wrist.
A glance up revealed that Alya’s arm matched her, except instead of purple and orange hers was pink and white. Alya was looking at Marinette’s wrist too, practically bouncing in her seat in excitement. Slowly Mari felt the shock leave her body as if Alya’s excitement was contagious, and with a matching smile on her face Mari turned to all her watching classmates and thanked them for their congratulations. Her face felt like it was on fire and she knew she must be blushing like wild, but she didn’t think she’d ever felt happier.
Adrien clapped along with the rest of the class as the girls behind them (Marinette and Alya, Marinette and Alya, Marinette and Alya, he can do this) celebrated activating their soulmate marks. He noticed Chloe and her friend (Sabrina, he’s three for three) didn’t clap, but he ignored it. Chloe could be difficult sometimes, but she was his oldest friend, even if she was always saying that his soulmate marks must be broken because they didn’t match hers.
When everything died down a little he turned around to introduce himself, and his breath caught. The girl on his left had the sweetest smile, and her eyes sparkled, and suddenly his words were stuck in his throat.
“Oh hey, you’re new too, right? I’m Marinette, but you can call me Mari. Would you like a macaroon?”
She was so nice too! Dumbstruck, he nodded and reached for the open box she held out to him. Holding one, his need for manners knocked some sense back into him, “Thank you, this is really… it’s really nice of you. My name’s Adrien, and yeah this is actually my first day in school ever. Congratulations again, by the way.”
“You’ve never been to school before? I mean! Sorry… I didn’t mean to make fun of you or embarrass you… I just meant… Unggggg I’m making a mess of this...” Mari hid her face in her hands.
Adrien thought he heard Chloe laughing to his side but before he could see why, his seatmate (Nino. He is killing this) spun around and piped up, taking a macaroon from the box Marinette wordlessly held towards him.
“Chill out Mari it’s OK.” He turned towards Adrien to continue, “Don’t mind her she gets embarrassed kinda easily but she’s the sweetest girl you’ll ever meet. I’m serious, I’m pretty she’s actually a young angel who has to earn her wings by living out a mortal life with no memory of heaven and by being the nicest possible person.”
Alya, who had been listening closely while texting on her phone, looked up at that, “You’ve really thought that one through.”
Nino shrugged, unconcerned, “I’ve known her a while. You’ll come to see don’t worry. Besides, have you tried her families baked goods? Pure heaven.” Mari blushed and giggled a bit but Nino continued. “Adrien, Alya, as you meet the many students in this class some of them will tell you to talk to them if you need anything, but I’m going to tell you right now, Marinette Dupain-Cheng is the one to go too. A word from the wise.”
When Adrien looked back at Marinette her face was covered by a cute red blush, but she rolled her eyes good-naturedly at Nino and smiled slightly. “Ignore him, he’s just trying to sweet talk me into giving him some free food, he does this all the time. He was right though that if you need anything, talk to me and I’ll help out however I can.”
Before anyone could respond the teacher at the front of the room called the class to attention and Adrien spun around. He was so excited to learn, he almost was able to distract himself from the memory of the kind beautiful girl behind him.