ALL OF THESE STARS WILL GUIDE US HOME

[Tyzula Soulmate AU]

Protection

The girl with gold eyes stood on the other side of the room.

I was surrounded by guys, which was pretty normal. My new pink sundress made a splash—at least, what was under it did—but she was not looking at my clothes or my body. Her cold expression analyzed me like a textbook and her molten eyes pierced through my like Superman's x-ray vision.

I knew I had seen her before, somewhere, at some point in time. Maybe school, even though I was friends with everybody there.

After that, I lost track of her. Until the host of the party wanted to hold me hostage.

"I—oh—I." I smiled at him like a fool. Nobody ever taught me how to not be sweet and good.

Somebody grabbed me by the wrist and almost got punched in the face, but soft, familiar lips pressed against mine.

"We are going home. You should probably put on your jammies and get into your racecar bed, little boy," said Mystery Girl.

When we left the party, I was going to thank her, but she did not take me home like I thought she would.

She was gone.

Sneeze

I hated libraries. They made me feel all funny and irate, and usually I was just chipper. Everything was super fuzzy and I was pretending to read a book.

When I looked up, I thought I saw golden eyes, but that couldn't be.

Yeah, she didn't go to school with me, I thought. I looked for her on Monday after thinking about her all night Saturday and all day Sunday.

I sneezed.

When I looked up, I knew I saw her.

I knew I did.

Solstice

"There's a lunar eclipse tonight too. It's the darkest night of the year," said Suki. I pretended to listen, because I saw the girl. I saw her. She was walking with some pale goth girl I'd never hang out with in any universe, or so I thought.

She turned and looked at me.

I saw waves of flames that were hot enough to turn blue.

My knees buckled. She was gone.

I turned back to Suki, smiled wide, and nodded.

Beautiful Disaster

I needed a ride. The rain soaked through my perfect outfit. My hair was a mess. Nobody picked me up from cheerleading practice and I was just smiling and striking up conversation with anyone and everyone, trying to convince myself that my parents didn't forget me again.

"You look stuck," said a voice I knew as well as my sisters' or mother's. "Do you need someone to take you home for real this time?"

"Yeah," I said, grinning brightly at her.

"My driver awaits," she said.

I sat down. I never had a lot of money, even if I lived in such a rich area. Having so many kids did that kind of stuff. It also made you forget to pick up your kids who can't drive yet.

"You look so familiar," I chirped, snapping my seatbelt on. "So familiar. Where do we know each other from? I don't mean to forget, because you're so unforgettable."

"I was about to ask you the same thing," she said.

When we reached a mansion, she invited me to come with her.

Pretty Lights

"I love stars," I said, gazing up.

No moon. Black skies. It was already night before it was even afternoon.

She was not paying much attention to them. "Where do we know each other from? I tend to recall things like that."

"Things like what?" I asked innocently. I batted my eyelashes for good measure.

"Attractive people who give me memories from a life I never had," she said.

"You sound like a poet! That's such a pretty thing to say," I gushed in earnest.

She seemed kind of perfect. I'd never met someone kind of perfect before.

Ice Princess

I studied her beauty queen crowns, her trophies from everything imaginable, her bedroom with old, expensive books and gold surfaces. The only thing that seemed to have personality was all of the dragons. Dragons of all kinds, but none of them looked really friendly.

"I love dragons," I said. I didn't know if I meant it or not. Did it matter?

"I am partial to them," said golden-eyed girl.

"What's your name?" I whispered, blushing. I'd never forgotten a name, much less forgotten to ask for one. I felt like such a bad friend.

"Oh, you have to work harder than that to find out," she said.

Comfort

"Any luck?" she asked.

I shook my head. No one answered the phone. I was stuck with her, but that didn't seem like a super bad thing. At the moment I was totally fixated on a blue lava lamp in her bedroom, sitting on the comfortable mock bed set up beside hers.

"But I don't know if I'd say I'd be lucky to get a hold of them. I really do love how…" I blushed. Wow, I'd never wanted to stop flirting before. I just felt dumb. "How comfy this is. I share my room with three other girls. This one is as big as half my house."

Golden-eyed girl just smirked at me.

I knew that smirk somehow.

Innocence

"Are you a virgin?" I asked, nervous to do it. My hands shook out of control when I took any initiative. I still didn't even know her name, but I knew she was the one for me. We kept running into each other, after all.

"Of course not," she said. I wondered if she was lying.

No, she was flawless. I knew she was perfect and so no one could resist her.

"Do you wonder what our first time would be like?" I asked.

She smirked. The golden eyed girl's words were so beautiful.

"I imagine the night before a battle. You are the scared one, of course, and I am the one going off to war. And you tell me you have always loved me and I tell you that you're an idiot to think I would ever die. Yet, you say you want to give me something to come back to," she said, and I could see it when I closed my eyes.

We would be tangled in red silk.

Because I Love You

My ex-boyfriend was begging for me.

Across the room, I saw the pale goth girl who was always around the golden eyed girl. I kept thinking about her, wondering if we could be friends, if I could know the one I was so into.

"Because I love you, Ty Lee," he said, kneeling in front of me. Heat surged at my center when his breath hit it, but I did not want him. "I love you."

"I'm…" I blushed. "I think you're great, but we should see other people."

I grabbed my pink backpack and ran to go befriend the dark-haired girl.

She was gone when I got there.

Goodbye Kiss

The carnival was in town. I laughed to my best friend Suki, "I always wanted to join the circus."

I saw the golden-eyed girl in front of me. She was leaning against a knife throwing game, watching the dark-haired girl defeat something I always thought was rigged.

When I looked at them, I had a memory from a dream.

The circus was in town and I was going to vanish with it. I thought about that all the time. Being in a world where that could happen.

But I snuck up into her window and I kissed her goodbye.

We were young, long before I knew her now.

Our goodbye kiss hurt worse than any injury I've felt in gymnastics.

Rescue Me

"This is boring," said the dark-haired girl to me. "Rescue me?"

I stared at her, my mouth wide open and my eyes bulging. I did not even notice she was nearby. Wow. I was amazed.

"I could rescue you," I said hastily.

"Whatever. You just keep staring at me so I figured you would probably murder me on our ride home but no one else is offering it," coolly said the dark-haired girl.

I had a trillion questions about the golden-eyed girl as I drove the dark-haired girl to her mansion in the hills. However, I just blathered about silly things. She rolled her eyes and gave sarcastic, dry remarks I thought were so fun.

"There's a New Year's Party tomorrow night. You know where," said the dark-haired girl.

I knew deep in my core who would be there.

"Bye!" I said, waving as she left.

I thought maybe we were friends now.

Mistletoe

"It is a New Year's party," said the golden-eyed girl. "How is this mistletoe still up?"

We were at another party, and I ran into her beneath it. "We keep running into each other at these parties."

"Well, it is my house," she said, smirking.

"B-but, you took me to another one," I stammered. Nobody had ever made me do that before.

"This is my mom's house. She lives here with my brother. I live with my father," she said.

I kissed her.

It felt like a burst of sunlight lit up my body, engulfing me in déjà vu that made no sense.

Peeking

The golden-eyed girl spilled a drink on her clothes and was up in her bedroom getting undressed.

"No peeking," she ordered. The childish words sounded silly on her silver tongue.

"I promise," I whispered, setting my hands over my eyes.

I kept them closed as she stripped naked, and couldn't resist breaking my promise for a fleeting second.

She was so beautiful.

From her smirk, I knew she knew what I did.

Follower

The golden-eyed girl sat on the couch beside me. It was nowhere near midnight.

"You stick around me. You're like a puppy dog," she mocked.

"I bet a lot of people are like that with you," I said sweetly, blushing.

"Well, yes, they are."

"You've got something special. I'd follow you to the ends of the Earth, to Hell and back, and I bet anybody else you ever talked to would," I said.

"I would think you are trying to seduce me, but you look so honest. Perhaps you're just stupid." The golden-eyed girl kissed me. "Thankfully, I'm not attracted to your intelligence."

I smiled, floating on Cloud 9.

Ache

I tripped fetching drinks for my princess.

The mess didn't get more than on my fingers, and I licked them clean, but my knees hurt so bad. I didn't cry, because I tried to keep happy. Four boys stopped what they were doing to help me up and ask if I was okay.

When I saw the golden-eyed girl, she was glaring.

At first I thought it was because I dropped her drinks.

Then I saw that she was jealous.

Not envious. Jealous.

She liked me back and despite the ache in my knees, I was ecstatic.

Lie to Me

"I love you, I think," I said, under the loud music. She heard me, thankfully.

"You don't even know my name," she replied.

"Do you believe in soulmates?" I asked breathlessly. "You don't have to know your soulmate's name in order to love them."

The golden-eyed girl rolled her eyes. "I do not believe in those, but I will lie to you and say I do if it makes you stick with me until morning."

"You don't have to lie to me for that," I whispered, transfixed.

Quiet

We snuck outside at 10 PM.

"At last, some quiet," she said haughtily, even though the music was still slightly audible on the snowy front lawn. I stood in the cold and edged closer to her, but she did not hold me or offer me her jacket like most people always did.

"I like beaches way better than snow," I said. My cold sweat was making my teeth start to chatter. "I'd love to go on a beach with you. Way at night, with nobody around."

"No boys around," she snarled.

I smiled to myself when she looked away at the lights on the gutters.

She wanted me back. She wanted me back. She wanted me back.

I was so happy.

Bells

My phone rang while we sat outside on the porch together.

It was my ex. I ignored it.

Metamorphosis

"… and that is why I believe in soulmates," I explained, discussing the metamorphosis of relationships over past lives.

She laughed at me, rolling those golden-eyes I felt I had seen a billion times before, in a billion different universes.

"I believe in you being drunk from this party," she stated.

I shrugged. "That too, but I still love your aura. I didn't know blue could be so hot."

"Well, I didn't know pink could be so sexy," she whispered, missing my point about the fire.

Yet, I did not care, because she kissed me again, this time caressing my face as she pulled away.

Snowmelt

The snow melted in her hands. I thought about fire again, even though I knew she was still heated from the party inside. I watched it, stopping my babbling. I felt so silly going on about make-up and school gossip and other things she did not pay attention to.

I wanted her attention.

I craved it.

I needed it.

So I said, "I'm sorry for boring you. I talk way too much. I'd rather listen to you. You talk so pretty, you know."

"Well, if I wanted you to shut up, you would know," she purred, drawing my in like she was a siren. "I don't mind listening to stupid people sometimes."

"Really?" I asked.

"Only when they are special," she said, smirking.

I never felt more important in my life of being overshadowed by siblings and unfeeling parents and a world that only gazed at my body and then forgot me in the crowd.

Artificial

It was nearing midnight. We should go inside soon.

I asked, as we got up, "Do you mean anything you say?"

"Sometimes," she lightly replied, "but I am a very good liar, and I don't think you'll ever know what I mean and what I don't. I like to keep people on their toes."

I smiled, weak in the knees.

Windchill

We were ice cold when we walked inside.

I stepped closer to her and felt that fire that shone like a beacon, drawing me in and guiding me to certain death.

There were ten minutes until midnight.

My heart raced. I looked at her.

"I think I'm crazy," I said.

"Then we both are. I am certifiably insane for my own reasons, and I refuse to let you drive me crazy," the golden-eyed girl said. "Do not make me regret letting you follow me around for a few days. Do not make me regret being here with you tonight."

"I won't. I promise I won't." I grabbed her hands. She pulled away, but I still adored the warmth. "You're not somebody I could hurt."

"You don't know me," she said.

"I don't have to," I replied. "It doesn't matter what you do or what your name is or who you are. I can't get you out of my head."

She laughed at me. It was cruel but it sounded sweet to my ears.

Impatient

One minute until midnight.

I stared at her and worried she was Cinderella and would vanish. No, no, she was Princess Charming. She was something else, something from another world.

I couldn't explain her and couldn't explain what she did to me.

It was more than magnetism or two hot people wanting to have sex.

Ten.

Nine.

Eight.

I was getting impatient.

Seven.

Six.

Very impatient.

Five.

Very, very impatient. I grabbed her hand. She didn't pull away this time.

Four.

Touching her skin made me feel overwhelming sadness. We were a tragedy once, weren't we?

Three.

I could feel it. I could see deaths. I could see betrayals. I could see pain.

Two.

Soulmates like these only happen when love doesn't have its happy ending. We never had one. I bet we had a thousand meetings where we broke apart and lost our love somehow.

One.

I couldn't breathe.

Then I kissed her, almost a moment too late.

The One

I wondered what kinds of tragedies we suffered together in our other worlds and other lives.

Love could repair itself over time, or so I believed. If she was the one, like I knew she was, then maybe this would be the life where we didn't fuck up what we had together.

Only, she was gone at midnight.

I ran to look for her, panicked.

Maybe this was not the reincarnation of our love that would work out.

I ran, and I ran, and I thought she was gone.

Then I saw her leaning against her bedroom door.

"You took your sweet time," she chided.

I smiled.

This would be the life where we weren't a tragedy.