"You don't say much," Renjun notes. He leans his elbow on the open sketchbook, pencil hanging limp between his fingers as something to fiddle with, to quench the awkward twitch of his hands.

The other boy opens his mouth, eyes wide with surprise, and points to his chest. "Me?"

"Who else?"

"Oh. Right. Um..." The stranger trails off, picks at a dried paint splatter on the table with a faint frown. "I'm just tired, I guess. I didn't mean to be rude. Sorry."

"What's your name?"

"Mark."

"Mark?" Renjun repeats, commits the name straight to memory. He likes the way it rolls off his lips.

"I'm from Canada." He explains, shying away from Renjun's raised eyebrows.

Renjun nods. The silence strings out as Mark licks his lips, and his chair creaks when he shifts around to cross his legs the other way and sit on his hands, like a child picked on by the teacher just when he wasn't listening. His glasses frame his wavering gaze, eyes never resting, never able to focus on a single detail, instead flicking across all the art supplies on the table.

"I... well... I study literature, actually. Second year." Mark speaks after a minute.

"Then what're you doing here?" Renjun asks.

Mark shrugs. Renjun doesn't push, but the stutter in the other's movements when he presses the pencil into the corner of the page tells him that maybe Mark doesn't know either.

The bustle of students fades from the corridors, and the scratching of the pencil fills the quiet as the elder sketches a vague approximation of a tree, all messy leaves and spiky branches and a lopsided trunk that is just as undefined as the confidence in Mark's hand. A diseased tree, Renjun notes with a curious gaze, relieved for the distraction that meeting the new boy has provided. Mark sighs through his nose, scratches his head, adjusts his glasses, glares at his drawing some more.

"I suck at art. God."

Mark looks at Renjun, who looks back with a smile teasing the corners of his lips.

"Artist's block is shit. I get it."

"So..." Mark starts, and Renjun hums when he watches the other's gaze trail over the scattering of art supplies on the desk, all untouched since he sat down. All untouched for too many weeks. "So, are you an art student, then?"

"It's complicated," Renjun mutters. Mark's mouth remains open, a fragment of a stutter escaping his throat, but then Renjun leans back and twirls his red mechanical pencil between his fingers with a playful grin. "I am. But I'm so behind on work it's not even funny."

He proceeds to tell Mark about the upcoming project. The World Through My Eyes. Renjun scorns the given title, curses how they're never straightforward, and rubs his cheeks to ward off the stress that creeps back into his head while he explains that he's behind because of recent laziness.

"It was my birthday yesterday, you see. And I-"

"I'm sorry I missed your birthday, dude," Mark says, rushed, forced out by the instinct to be polite. Renjun stops mid-sentence, then turns to look at the elder, amusement climbing through his features. He places his pencil down, but only picks it back up when it tries to roll away.

"We only just met."

"Yeah, but... I feel bad?" Mark tries again.

Renjun bites his cheek to muffle his laughter. The earnest shine of Mark's eyes speaks truth, and he would feel bad teasing him. They have yet to know each other, and he learnt the hard way not to test people's boundaries too soon. Mark seems sweet, too pure to tease so early on.

"Don't. How were you supposed to know an irrelevant first year's birthday?"

"You're not irrelevant," Mark replies. His voice shrinks, as though embarrassed to give reassurance, and then heat rises through Renjun's cheeks at the realisation that he rambled on for far too long about all his stress.

It's not often he'd admit such a thing, but Renjun enjoys chatting with Mark. And not just because it's yet another convenient excuse to not brainstorm for the assignment. But it's because Mark listens. He doesn't interrupt with snickers and sarcasm like his dormmates do. He fixes his gleaming eyes on the younger as he rants about his stupid hangover and drained back account and slipping grades. When he does speak, Mark's voice is tender, rhythm soothing in its understanding, and thick in its innocence, a combination Renjun doesn't think he's ever found in a student's tone before.

It's even less often that Renjun admits such a thing, but he likes Mark.

"Try this," Renjun says, and reaches to pluck the pencil from Mark's unsteady hand and pull the drawing towards himself, ready to teach him a technique that won't crumple the paper.

As he does so, his pinky finger touches Mark's thumb. A split second of contact. A single, short moment, brief, insignificant. A mere graze that would go unnoticed if it weren't for the spark that shoots through Renjun's finger, up his hand and arm, and deep into his chest. His heart clenches, seized by a sudden lack of blood that becomes an overwhelming rush of blood the next second, heat surging through his body and across his skin for that brief moment, until it's over, and he's left breathless, blinking down at the pencil in his hand.

"You good?"

Renjun swallows, grips the pencil tight, and accepts the concern in Mark's eyes, doing his best to smile back despite the muddle of confusion and fear. Alarm bells fire off, but he dismisses them all.

"Yeah," Renjun says. The breathlessness makes Mark frown harder, so Renjun is quick to shake his head and get back to giving him advice on colouring the tree trunk.

He explains the strokes he's using as he goes, but the words tangle and he trips a few times, tongue not obeying. Mark still nods and listens, then his left hand finds the vial of dust around his neck when their eyes meet. Yet another brief moment, and yet another moment that strings out a second too long, just long enough for Renjun to stutter, for time to drag, for Mark's fingers to curl around his soulmate dust, entire fist squeezing it tight as though wishing it would shatter in his palm, and Renjun passes the paper back to Mark, placing the pencil on the table this time.

Because it can't be. Mark can't be.

Mark thanks him, but never has time to finish his drawing because he has class. Renjun would scoff at the excuse if it were anyone else, deeming it too convenient after what just happened, but the elder appears unruffled with not a trace of a lie in his expression as he checks his phone, cleans his glasses, and holds out his hand for a fist bump. Renjun looks at his fist, then never returns the gesture, leaving Mark to bid a cheerful goodbye to hide his disappointment. He's gone by the time Renjun raises his own hand for a wave.

Renjun fiddles with his vial for the entire walk back to the dorm. The glass warms from the friction, while his other hand clutches the tote bag that feels heavier despite the lack of new drawings. He relives the sparkle of Mark's eyes. The nervous twitch of his leg. The flapping of his hand when he laughed at Renjun's jokes about his professors. A strange boy, but a new friend, Renjun hopes. If Mark doesn't hate him for not giving him a fist bump. Although he doesn't seem the type to get mad at anything.

The clouds have thinned to allow the sun to bless the city with some light, but Renjun still pulls his hood up, tucking his necklace under the sweatshirt to fiddle with the keys in his pocket instead. As the metal digs into his palm, curiosity bubbles through him, desperate to sit back down next to Mark and ask him a million more questions. Renjun doesn't want it to be another fleeting conversation. He's had too many encounters with students in the library in the dead hours of night, those with only one digit where everyone buzzes from lack of sleep and three shots of espresso too many, and they always lead to oversharing, and end with zero completed assignments and the unnerving knowledge that a random student knows his entire life story, never to meet again.

Renjun climbs the stairs, the stuffy elevator not worth the relief for his legs, and enters the quiet dorm. Kicking his shoes off, he calls out, but only Chenle shouts back, then the whirring of the fridge when he rummages through the shelves for leftover pasta. He doesn't bother heating it in the microwave. He carries it to his room and places the Tupperware on the desk by the window. Once his hoodie's pulled off, Renjun flings it onto the bed. He faces the mirror to brush his hair down, but his hands don't make it that far. Instead, they fly to his soulmate dust.

Because it is.

Mark is.

"What the... no," Renjun whispers, but the words burn his throat, loaded with the sting of denial when he shakes the little glass bottle, yanks the string, winces at the cramping of his heart.

He looks in the mirror, but the dust glows yellow back at him. There's no denying it. The colour fizzes through Renjun's vision, intensifies when he blinks in time with the rapid pulse of his heart, shock hitting him yet again. Now, the previous jolt cowers in comparison to the electricity that blazes his entire body. It paralyses him, toes curled into the carpet, fingers stiff around the vial, but then it sends him bolting from his room to knock on Chenle's door.

"What?" The boy calls, the gravel in his voice evident even through the wood. "I'm trying to sleep."

"It's urgent." Renjun's knuckles turn white when he knocks again. "Let me in."

Chenle grumbles something unintelligible but opens the door anyway. He squints at Renjun, disapproval smothering his puffy eyes and cracked lips, and doesn't have time to complain because the elder points to his soulmate dust.

"It's yellow. Why the fuck is it yellow?"

Chenle squints harder to peer at the bottle through his sleepiness, then widens his eyes, expression suddenly alive with glee.

"Oh my God, you've met your soulmate! Who is it? Come on, spill!" Chenle goes to grab it, but Renjun smacks his hand away, wrapping his own around the vial to conceal it from the younger's prying eyes.

"I wouldn't be asking if I knew that, you idiot," Renjun huffs.

Thoughts race laps round his brain and his knees attempt to crumple under the sheer effort each breath requires. Each heartbeat is too powerful. His heart hurts, pain pinching all four chambers one by one, a throbbing no one would dare ignore.

"My heart hurts."

"Because you're supposed to be with your soulmate right now," Chenle says, and rolls his eyes as though it were obvious. It is obvious, but Renjun is very much not with his soulmate right now, so his heart struggles, complains about the distance, lurches to try to break free and find his soulmate.

"I don't know where Mark lives, do I? He's a second-year student, so it could be anywhere in the city," Renjun says. He invites himself into Chenle's room by stepping over the mound of designer sweatpants, and today he doesn't have the capacity to mourn the money they must have cost because he lands face-first on the younger's bed and punches the pillow.

"Mark? I don't know a Mark," Chenle says.

"Neither did I until, like, two hours ago."

"Right," Chenle says, the word drawn-out, judging. "Are you sure it's him?"

Renjun thinks back to when their hands touched, compares it to the mild irritation he felt when a random student knocked into him in the corridor, and groans when he realises there is no other explanation.

"Our hands touched when I took his pencil. I felt the spark."

"The spark?"

"Yes, the spark, Chenle. You know the one," Renjun says and sits up, back against the wall, fingers clasping the golden dust again. "And I liked talking to him. He was so nice."

Chenle stares, a long, steady gaze that doesn't waver, only judges, and Renjun sinks deeper into the mattress, wishing he could slide down the tiny gap between the bed and the wall and curl up and never face the world again.

"I'm so fucked."

"But you just found your soulmate. That's everyone's dream, right? Be happy. Go find your Mark."

Renjun nods, but his thoughts stop, come crashing down all at once, catalysed by the single reminder of Mark's concern after their hands touched. Mark wasn't breathless. He wasn't flushed, didn't falter, didn't stutter, or look away or blink in confusion.

"Right." Renjun nods again.

Mark's apparent immunity to the touch turns Renjun's stomach to rock. His soulmate dust burns in his hand. The sun has been squeezed into the tiny glass bottle and, now that he can't shield himself from a distance like on a sweltering summer's day, it's too hot, the deadly reality hitting him square in the chest as the room darkens. Life would be easier if soulmates weren't a thing. He would still be happy with Jaemin, the two of them destined to be together, and he wouldn't be trembling on Chenle's unmade bed on a Thursday morning. He isn't sure he wants to meet Mark again. The truth grabs his neck, chokes his breath away, and he shivers under Chenle's stare, wishing it were another pointless dream, searching for any sign of connection with the faceless stranger in the corridor.

The truth leads him back to Mark, and it scares him.

𓆩♡𓆪

What do you think so far? Comment your thoughts ^^ And is it okay if I just update whenever and have no schedule? I'm enjoying just writing when I feel like it