Chapter Text
The first time it happens Andrew was sitting in an overcrowded room, trying to ignore the other sleeping children. He’s staring at the book in his hands, making out the words by the light filtering through the blinds, when he notices him.
The thing about having an eidetic memory is that you never forget a face, and this boy had never been to the house before. He also wasn’t sleeping.
Standing in the middle of the room was a young boy, maybe around Andrew’s age but shorter. He had a head full of curls that was plastered against his forehead, the most shocking part were his eyes, even in the dim light Andrew could see the icy blue stare fixed on him. The kid was soaping wet and shivering but he didn’t move, and Andrew didn’t try to approach.
After a few seconds Andrew blinked and the boy was gone. He went to sleep, considering that this hallucination was proof that he was more tired than he thought.
Nathaniel came back gasping for air, his lungs and throat hurt and he was freezing.
when he tried to sit up he was pushed back by his mother’s hands. Nathaniel looked up to her and noticed she was crying. His mother didn’t cry, not unless his father was there… That’s when he remembered what happened
His father had gotten angry at him, and pushed him into the half-full bathtub.
Nathaniel leaned over and started throwing up the water as his mother calmed down, choosing to start reprimanding him instead.
Faint memories of a blond boy, lit by moonlight, fading to the back of his mind as he came to terms with the fact that his father had finally killed him like he said he would.
The weird vision wasn’t really important right now…
Nathaniel is sitting in his room, trying to become invisible when he sees the moon-lit boy again, with more light this time around. Which strikes him as strange since he didn’t think he was dying right then.
The boy is crouched at the end of his bead, curled up tight with his hands covering his ears. There’s so much tension in his body that he’s starting to tremble.
In a whisper, as to not startle the scared angel, Nathaniel calls out to him,"Are you okay?"
The trembling stops instantly and the other kid lifts his head, pinning Nathaniel down with his hazel eyes. "Who the hell are you?"
"Shouldn’t I be asking you that? Since you are in my room?"
Andrew looks around himself, suddenly noticing the huge space he was in instead of the small cupboard he had gotten into.
Later, he’d blame his surprise on the sound he let out.
Nathaniel startled and hurried to hush him down, "We can’t make any noise or he’ll hear us!"
Andrew was busy surveying his new surroundings to look back at the other, but at his words he immediately tensed back up "Who?"
"Father. Who are you? The son of one of his men? He’s going to be angry if he finds you in the upper floor, you know?"
The blond frowned at him like he was saying nonsense. "I’m Andrew, and I wasn’t here a second ago."
Nathaniel guessed as much, considering he hadn’t seen him, "I’m Nathaniel, you can stay if you want to."
Andrew looked back at the kid, noticing how he was still whispering, half buried in the covers like he was trying to hide away. He had seen that image too many times not to recognize it.
"I think I will, for a little while."
Nathaniel smiled when he heard this, happy to have someone to share some of his time with.
Andrew sat on the bed, positioning his body so he’d be able to watch the door at all times, if this “father” came back then he’d have some time to run.
Nathaniel asked his mother about soulmates exactly once. Whatever information she had wasn’t worth the beating he got.
"You must never speak to them, Nathaniel, do you hear? Never contact whoever is on the other side and block them if they try to contact you."
Scared, the boy promised he had never seen anybody or gone anywhere so she would calm down.
Andrew decided that talking to adults was worthless from the start, and went to his school library to get the answers he needed.
All kids grew up knowing about soulmates, hearing stories of brave knights that were visited by trapped princesses asking for help, or the thief who found himself in a palace in front of a beautiful lady, even the one where a woman saw a beast and guessed his true face in the cursed features.
But he was looking for actual facts, not silly stories about how finding a person can solve all your problems. He found a book in the highschool section titled "About soul-bonds and visiting", it was huge and had a few words Andrew didn’t know yet but he was determined to read it all.
As Andrew sat in a corner of the library, hidden away from annoying teachers and loud classmates, he switched between the tome and a dictionary, slowly making his way through. When he was about to finish the first chapter Nathaniel appeared. The boy didn’t say anything, he just darted a quick look around and sat on the chair opposite Andrew’s. Andrew didn’t know why he was here, but he could guess by the way Nathaniel was holding his ribs, keeping his face down so that his black eye wasn’t as prominent. He didn’t ask and the other didn’t offer any answers.
It wasn’t like Andrew could help him, they’d tried touching one another but their hands went straight through, so Andrew contented himself with distracting the younger boy by reading to him outloud.
"One of the known triggers for early visiting is extreme emotional or physical distress. This is when one’s soulmate has gone through a traumatic experience and the body automatically reaches out to..."
They spent the afternoon like that, Andrew reading and Nathaniel listening, when the librarian came by to kick him out Andrew lifted his head and Nathaniel was gone.
He knew they’d see eachother soon enough though, “extreme distress” sounded like something both of them knew all too well.