Chapter 1 | The meeting

Rin's POV

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BEEP BEEP BEEP I heard my alarm go off and reached over to turn it off on my phone when I realised I was on the edge of the bed, I fell off of the bed with a violent 'thunk' and groan. God, another day of work... I get up and shut off the alarm, rubbing my eyes in the process. Time to get ready for work I guess...

I get dressed in my all black attire of ripped jeans and a long sleeved shirt, along with my black socks and converse. I brush my hair and then put it up into my normal top knot. While trying to brush my hair out I succeed in knocking over my deodorant and making it fall on my toe. Just great...  today is going to be horrible and I know it. Well, might as well get a coffee since I haven't had one since yesterday, even though I wasn't working that day since it was Sunday... I sigh as I pick up my deodorant and take the cap off to apply it to my skin under my shirt. I walk out back into my room from the bathroom and grab a light coat since it wasn't too cold.

I walk into the living room of my decent sized apartment to get my keys off of the table, I get my house key, the tattoo parlor key, and my car key and head out, locking the door from the outside. I look over to my 2016 black Chevy Tahoe and unlock it, I walk over and open the door, getting in and buckling up. I drive to my normal coffee shop to see that it is closed... crap.

I look on my phone to see where the nearest coffee shop to my work was and I find the "Primrose cafe" and decide to drive to my work, park my car, and walk to the Cafe since I haven't walked to a Cafe in a while since I have my car. I take my  phone, keys, and my wallet and head off to the Cafe. People look at me strangely as I walk down the street to go to the Coffee Shop since I'm smiling and humming along to a song I wrote. I'm happy because I can get my caffeine, and I don't open today, Mikey does. I notice that my right sleeve rolled up a little to expose some of my colorful tattoo and roll it down again.

I finally reach the Primrose Cafe and open the door, taking in the amazing coffee smell and smile a bit wider but keep my head down "Hi! Welcome to the Primrose Cafe, how are you today?" A bubbly person with blue eyes and a lopsided grin said to me "I'm doing just great, how are you?" I said, chuckling as he smiled brightly "That's great! I'm doing just fantastic, thank you for asking!"

"No problem." I say, still smiling because of this very happy person. I glance down at his wrist to see that he has a tattoo that looks oddly similar to mine and walk up to the front since no one is in line and get a closer look at it, now that I think about it, that tattoo looks exactly like mine! Oh my god... "So, what would you like today sir?" I shook my head to clear my thoughts "Umm... a double shot Espresso con panna please." "Okay, that will be $2.35 plus another dollar for the double shot, so $3.35 is your total! What is your name?" "Rin Brooks" I say and hand him the cash "Nice to meet you Rin, I am Dillon Truman." I nod and smile at him, I go over to where you pick up your coffee and wait as Dillon does his thing.

I watch Dillons every move, not creepy at all. Nope. Yeah... it's creepy. He writes my name down on the cup and I can tell that he writes something else down on there too. I wonder what he wrote, maybe his number? Nah, definitely not. Why would he give me his number? Well, he IS my soulmate so why not?

Dillon walks over to me with the cup in hand "Here ya go Rin! You look like an interesting person and I hope that we can talk more!" He says, full on smiling like a goofball. I take the cup and smile back "Yeah, same here Dillon." he looks a bit confused "Something wrong?" he shakes his head and chuckles "No, I had seen you stare at my 'soulmate-finder' tattoo and was just a little confused at why you did it." I nod "Oh, I'm a tattoo artist and the tattoo looked really nice, sorry if I creeped you out a bit." I rub the back of my neck, I can't believe I just halfway lied to my soulmate. God. I'm a bad person. He nods and smiles. "It's fine, the fact that you are a tattoo artist is cool, where do you work?" "I work at the River Brook Tattoo parlor, we do tattoos, piercings, and more."

He nods with a thoughtful look on his face "Who owns the place?" "I think you might know him." I say and look at him "I know a lot of people, so probably! I hope he's nice to you." He says with a smile "He isn't the nicest to me, but I'll survive. He's nice to everyone else that he opens up to and cares for though."

He frowns a little "Well, who is it?" I look down and sigh "It's me, I own River Brook Tattoo Parlor." he chuckles a little and I look up "No you're not, you said your boss wasn't the nicest to yo- oh.." he realises what I meant "Well, I'm sorry that I don't look like the boss of anywhere. Yes, you've guessed right, I have depression and anxiety. It's a double whammy. I'm the owner of River Brook Tattoo Parlor, it's nice to meet you Dillon Truman, but I have to go on my walk back to work." I smile and turn around as I take a sip of my coffee and sigh in bliss "Wait! You walked here?" I turn around "Yes, I did, I walked here from the parlor. You should visit sometime." I winked at him and walked out of the Cafe, but not before I had seen my bubbly Dillon blush. Did I just say 'My'? Yep, I did.

I hum my way back to the parlor while occasionally taking a sip of my beverage. I wonder how Dillon is... he seemed a bit flustered when I left, interesting. I feel my face heat up at just the thought of him. No! I can't be thinking these things right now! I shake my head to clear my thoughts and keep walking.

I find the doors already opened and Mikey's face pops out from behind the corner of ."Hi, Welcome to the River Brook tattoo par- oh, hi Rin, you look happy. What's with your weird happy aura? You are usually not smiling unless it's a fake smile at a drunken bottle blonde." I shrug "I mean, I just met my soulmate, don't know why I would be happy, do you?" I ask sarcastically and he gets visibly excited "Who is it? Who is this emo punk that wants to take my best friend?!" he asks me overdramatically. I chuckle and shake my head "He definitely is not emo or punk, his name is Dillon Truman. Works at the Primrose Cafe, very bubbly, and cute.." I blush lightly and he gasps. "I've never seen you blush! He definitely must be the one, even though I didn't know you were gay."

I stare at him in disbelief "You didn't know I was gay? Dude, I'm as straight as a wet noodle." He blushes from embarrassment, most likely. "Sorry about that, I didn't really think about it" I nod "It's fine Mikey."

Mikey sighs in relief and I chuckle "You weren't going to get fired or anything for it, it's no problem really." he looks at me and smiles. "Well, I'm looking forward to meeting this special guy!" I can tell that he is really excited about this, it's amazing how someone could be so supportive. "Wait, what even IS your tattoo?" I roll up my sleeve and he laughs "Seems pretty gay to me, and also you should ask that guy out sometime since I know you'll be going there instead of The Wayside Cafe." I nod 'maybe I SHOULD ask him out...' I take a sip of my coffee and sigh, I look at the cup and see him number written on the side with a 'call me!' and a smiley face written as well. My heart skips a beat when I see it and quickly enter it into my phone. Mikey looks at me with a goofy grin "Someone's in loveee~" he coos and I roll my eyes.

Mikey has already opened the shop up while I was gone and I set my empty coffee in the trashcan. We lounge around a little and talk until the first person arrives, it's a man who wants a bear tattoo on his ribs. Those things hurt! I tell him how much pain he'll be in and how long it will take to heal. "That's fine with me, I can handle it."

Well, the man was wrong. He cried like a baby and I had to keep him still. When it was over I handed him some tissues, another person walked in before I finished so Mikey went to work on the person. The guy paid us $450 as we quoted him and told him how to take care of it. He left and Mikey rung up the other guy who wanted a spider on his neck. We gave him the speech that we always do and then lounge a bit more, then the next person walks in. A girl named Cherry, she was definitely not dressed for the colder weather with a crop top and a skirt that could be used as a headband. She walks up to the counter swaying her hips. "I'd like to get a butterfly right-" She points to a piece of her exposed hipbone "here."

I mentally roll my eyes 'Stupid sorority girls...' I think to myself. "Do you want it colored or in just black?" She says she wants a pink butterfly 'I take that as a yes then.' I go to the back with her to show her some designs and she flirts with me a bit.

"So... do you like raisins?" I look at her confusedly, I say yes not understanding what she means. "Well, how do you feel about a date pretty boy?~" I understand now "Umm... I'd rather just date a person who is my soulmate since you'd just leave me after a one night stand." She scoffs "How do you know that we don't have the same tattoos? Yours isn't even showing!" I sigh again "I know because I've already found my soulmate, just today actually." She shows me her tattoo, It's a purple star with a rainbow eye in the middle. "You sure about that pretty boy? I might be the one.~" I get a bit agitated and look at her and show her a design of a pink butterfly "Do you like this one?" She looks at it and nods "It's super cute! Not as cute as you though~"

I put on my fake smile "Thanks, that's good that you like it. My friend Gee designed it." She nods "When can we start, pretty boy?~" I'm pretty sure she didn't mean the tattoo by any means, I take a deep breath in to try and not murder this girl. "We can start as soon as you'd like, and my name's Rin by the way." She responds with an "Okay" and dragged me to one of the rooms with the sketch.

During the tattoo, she kept making highly inappropriate comments and touching me along the way when I told her to not move or it might mess up the tattoo. She finally stopped and I finished the tattoo quickly and effortlessly, I set her up to go, give her the speech, told her the price, and she paid the $100 fee. I got her out of there as soon as possible. It is about closing time so I just sit in the back, not thinking that there would be any more customers. It was about an hour from closing time and I heard the door open so I walk out of the back and I go to greet the person "Hi, welcome to R-" I stop as I see Dillon standing there. "Oh, hi." I smile and I can feel my cheeks get warm.

"Hello! I just wanted to stop by, and maybe get a tattoo..." Dillon sorta trails off and I see him grab his tattooed arm and smile at me. "Oh, okay. Umm.. what kind of tattoo do you want to get? Or would you like to look at some stencils?" He laughs "We could just talk, for now, it doesn't have to be just business." "Oka-" I was cut off by the ringing of the doorbell again to see Gee walk into the shop.

"Oh, hey Gee! Do you need anything?" I ask him, he shakes his head 'no' "Just here to pick Mikey up is all." I nod and point to the back of the room where Mikey was and he walks back there. "Sorry about that." I say awkwardly "It's fine." He smiles at me and I smile back. "Lovebirds, we're leaving!" Mikey says from the back of the shop about to exit "Oh shut up!" I roll my eyes and look back at Dillon "So, did you have anything in mind for a tattoo?" He thinks for a second about it, I can see how his head tilts right a little when he thinks. "Yeah, I do."

He shows me a picture of a Minecraft heart and points to his wrist. "I want a medium size heart on my wrist like this." I nod at him, then I realize that I have a tattoo exactly like that on my right wrist, and he wants it on his left wrist so that it wouldn't be with his dragon one.

I put mine on my left wrist like he wants his. I chuckle a little and he notices, "What's so funny?" I pull up my right sleeve a little to expose a Minecraft heart. "You want one like this?" He looks up at me in practical awe "Yes! Exactly like that! We could be twins." He is definitely very hyper, I can tell you that much. 'He wants to match with me... oh my god! We could have another matching tattoo together!" I felt my face heat up and I look away for a second to try to get my cheeks to calm down. I can tell that he is extremely excited by the fact we could be tattoo twins. I chuckle and look back at him. "So, you do want to get a tattoo like this?'' He nods really quickly. 'So cute...'

"Okay then, would you like to do it now or when I'm off the clock?" He looks around "W-would now be okay?" He seems a bit nervous so I give him a sympathetic smile and pat his shoulder. "Of course it is okay to do it now. Since it is your first trip here AND you are very nervous, it's free. Just don't tell the boss." I wink at him and put my finger on my lips. I can see his face turn a light shade of pink.

"I-I could just pay you, if I didn't, that would be rude." I put my hand on his shoulder and look him in the eye, "Seriously, it's on me. You don't need to pay anything, and it's not rude unless you reject my offer." He huffs a little like a little kid would and crosses his arms "Fine, just this one time." I smile at him and he smiles back "Wait-" I look at him confusedly "I know how I can pay you!" I sigh "Seriously, it's oka-" I was cut off by him hugging me and I freeze up for a second, no one has ever wanted to hug me besides Mikey and Gee really since they are my friends. I relax after a second 'This is nice...'

He lets go after a minute or two and smiles at me with an even wider grin than before, while I'm as red as a firetruck. I can see a light pink still across his face, and I have to admit that it's extremely cute. He rubs his arm "So... when are we going to do the tattoo?" I chuckle and point to a room with the stencils in it "After we look for the correct size of the heart."

He nods and grabs my hand to lead me there and I look at him with a quirk in my brow and he looks back at me, "What? Aren't we going?" I shake my head at his childishness and then nod "Yes, we are going." He then continues to lead me to the stencil room and when we get there, I let go of his hand sadly and start searching through the files of stencils and find the hearts and give a few to him "Here they are!" I say with jazz hands and he laughs at my change in tone. He then looks through the few I gave him then pulls up my right sleeve and puts the stencil on it, it looked exactly the same, size and all.

He looks up at me with big eyes and he was still smiling, he points to the stencil. "I want this size of a tattoo, and right in the place you put yours." I am a bit shocked, he actually wants one like mine. The thing is, mine is a half a heart with the fill outline in black. So he looks at mine again and pauses in thought.

I tilt my head a bit "I want the red to be in the opposite part that yours is, so it makes a full heart when they are together technically." Does he seriously want this? Holy cow... "U-umm.." I gulp a bit because I didn't think he was serious until now. He looks up at me with wide eyes and I sigh, I can't say no and why would I? "Okay, so you are 100% sure about your decision?" He nods his head yes quickly again and I get a cup of water from the dispenser and drink it quickly. "Okay then, let's do this." I crack a smile at him and sort of point my head in the direction of the nearest room. "Just so you know, this is my first time getting a tattoo, so I'm a bit nervous." I just smile at him and say "It's going to be just fine."

He relaxes a bit and repeats to himself "It's going to be just fine.." I chuckle "Yes, that is what I said. Don't worry, you're in good hands." 'That sounded a bit suggestional, shit.' He looks down at his feet "Let's get on with it then.'' 'Jeeze, it sounds like we are in a porno..' After a few minutes, my cheeks calm down and he gets settled in the chair.

"Comfy?" he nods to my question. I get my utensils for the job along with having to keep matching the colors to the tattoo and go over to him and grab his arm gently. "Now, if it gets too painful, you can hold my hand. Just make sure not to move, I will be holding your arm and moving it in certain ways so I can complete the tattoo," I look up at him, "Is that okay with you?" he gives me a small 'yes' and I give him a sympathetic smile, I can feel him relax a bit. "You ready?" he nods and I give him a stress ball for his other hand and start the task at hand, I press the machine up against his skin and I can see the stress ball squish in his hand. We make simple chatter and share a few jokes, he ends up holding onto my non-tattooing arm and gets flustered over it. We took a break a little bit through so he could get water then continued on.

He got up after we were done and looked in the mirror then gets my arm with the corresponding tattoo and looks at me "it looks fantastic! Thank you, seriously, I should pay you in some way other than hugs." I chuckle and hug him, "no need, I promise." He hugs me back and I melt as he responds with a tiny 'okay' into my chest. When I release I can see his blush clearly, that's so cute!

Dillon admires the tattoo once again and looks up at me, "what about your other tattoo?" He asks, "you mean this one?" I tug at my collar of my shirt to show a pink, blue, and white snake wrapped around my shoulder. He touches the tattoo and my skin then looks up at me in awe [He seems to do that a lot] and then shakes his head 'no' "I mean your soulmate finder tattoo." My heart stops, then I remember that I put an upside down star in the center of the dragon's forehead so that he wouldn't find out it was me and I pull up my sleeve, exposing the tattoo. He looks at his tattoo and puts ours side by side, then sees the star and nods. "I thought we were soulmates for a second, but you have a star there."

I sigh in relief that my plan worked and I can see a frown fall upon his cute face. "Well, I wouldn't mind if you were my soulmate, because you seem like a very nice guy." He smiles but looks a bit confused, "but I'm a guy..?" I shrug, "And? Love is love dude." He smiles wider, "That is true, love is love. There's no denying that."