Arthur Kirkland may have been English. And he also may have been living in America for the past seven years where they spoke English (a bastardized version he considered but English all the same) but this didn't stop him from being fluent in Spanish of all languages.

Back in England he'd been taught French in Primary school. And then German in Middle school. Spanish had never been an option. Spanish was something that Arthur had decided to learn by himself, a decision he had made himself as a six year old.

Now Arthur Kirkland wasn't very blatant about the fact he spoke Spanish fluently, he kept it to himself and treasured the fact that his learning had paid off, that he had become excellent, because by now 17 year-old Arthur Kirkland who had practiced daily was fluent. Even if for the entirety of his 17 years of existence he hadn't needed to know a single word of Spanish. Not a word.

While Arthur Kirkland was quiet about the fluent Spanish speaking, he at least didn't deny it. What he would deny was that he was hopeless romantic. Because underneath the snarky attitude and the ripped jeans was actually just a guy who was already hopelessly in love with their soulmate. But he would deny that venomously and insist that he had learnt Spanish because it was practical.

He did, after all, want to be able to at least speak to his soulmate.

The word had been etched to his wrist since he was born, a beautiful flowing dark line that swirled into a 'Hola!' With the exclamation mark. Punctuation was generally rare in your soulmate mark, particularly that of an exclamation mark and Arthur happened to be secretly very excited about what that said about his soulmate. Other than the fact that they were very likely Spanish or from a Spanish speaking country or possibly just plain spoke Spanish. Whatever the reason Arthur wanted to be able to share that with his soulmate and thus had come the eleven years of hard learning.

It's not like it was that unusual to get foreign words for your mark. There was the Greek guy next door to him who'd had Japanese scrawled neatly across the whole length of his arm. But Arthur was mostly excited because; A) Spanish was a romance language and he was hoping that his soulmate would be a great lover because of it. And B) because Spain was a sunny country and after having lived for a long time in England with the nearly constant rain and drizzle he considered himself more than happy to uproot himself and settle into a new, warmer, country.

He suppressed the longing sighs of waiting when around people though, after people had noticed that he's curiously dressed smart on the day they had that new Spanish student arrive last term. Not that it had been him, in fact there were rumours that his words had matched up with the feisty Italian twin but the Italian was always seen denying it.

So Arthur had resigned himself to waiting and practising each day and trying not to get too excited whenever a new student joined W Academy because as a multi-cultural school with students from all around the world they're were plenty of people here who spoke Spanish. So Arthur simply joined the school queue and flickered his eyes to the menu where they were advertising Spanish Paella.

When he finally reached the front of the queue, a student volunteer (or possibly detention worker) grinned at him broadly with bright blue eyes and golden hair spooned him a bowlful of Paella and passed it over to him with an exuberant exclamation of 'Hola!'

Arthur paused. He was always very attentive to when people said Hola to him. "Do you even know any Spanish?" He asked glancing critically over the very American server stood in front of him, he was bloody gorgeous but Arthur wasn't going to admit that.

The server's spoon dropped to the floor with a clash and Arthur found himself all of a sudden pulled up and half over the counter by a ridiculously strong American who'd pulled him into a very awkward hug. Arthur's feet were of the ground and his arms were pinned to his side. But somehow he found himself not minding as he could feel the American's grin were there faces were smooshed together.

"Wh-What are you doing!" Arthur suddenly yelled, becoming all too aware, that even he didn't mind this sort of awkward hug that the entirety of the huge student body had turned to look at them.

"You're my soulmate right!" The American exclaimed placing him back down on the ground and tugging at his sleeve, "Look!"

And sure enough there his words were, engraved onto the American's skin. Arthur was dumbfounded for a moment, turning to look back at the American with his mouth agape and cheeks flushing hot.

"Oh man I can't believe I've met you already! I'm so excited! I promise I'll be the greatest boyfriend ever! Oh, wait, I'm Alfred F. Jones! Oh, I really should have said that first! My Mom always told me that when I meet my soulmate I should shake their hand and take things slow and oh my god, I hugged you, I'm so sorry, I should've asked or something first! Mom always said that I had to be polite and answer any of your questions! I'm doing this all wrong aren't I? Can I start over? I'm Alfred F. Jones, American, sixteen, I have a Mom and a Dad and a brother and the only Spanish I know is 'Hola' is that okay? Did I do that ri-"

Arthur finally managed to find his voice as the American blabbered on and managed to twist his tongue in just the right way to say, "You don't speak Spanish?"

Crap. He'd meant to say something nicer.

Alfred cringed and Arthur felt a flash of guilt wash over, "I mean, uh… Can I start over too? I'm Arthur Kirkland, I'm English and I live with my Mum and my brother and I'm seventeen?" Arthur paused hoping that was more acceptable and waited for whatever verdict his Soulmate came to.

"Hey that's cool Man! Can I eat lunch with you? I want to get to know you seeing as we'll spending a lot of time together now!"

Arthur found a smile creeping onto his face as the American scrambled over the server with two dishes of Paella in hand.

Arthur Kirkland had spent 11 years of his life learning Spanish for his soulmate, and however lovable his soulmate was turning out to be he'd be dammed if he Alfred wasn't speaking Spanish by the time they got married. He wasn't going to let all that hard work go to waste after all.

Ok! First drabble done! Originally I was going to post this new year's day but I'm about half an hour late... it's still the first for some people right? This is the start of my drabble list that is probably just going to be updated when I feel the need to write but don't really know what to write about. (When things like that a ridiculously long AU list and a random number generator are perfect.)

As USUK is my OTP they're staring in a story I have planned for them that's going to be more than this random collection of drabbles and I'm really excited to write but I want to get their characterisation right first because I haven't written them much yet - this all about changing that!

I'll probably add some cover art at some point but my that... could take a while, I'm a slow drawer.

I hope you liked the drabble though! - Sekaira