A/N: Hi there. This whole compilation is actually inspired by a Tumblr post I saw, by username krumcake. They talked about how they weren't very interested in Person A and Person B finding each other and living Happily Ever After. They detailed several alternative Soulmate!AU situations. I thought that this was great, and so I tried to write a one-shot story for each situation. This is my (sort-of) finished product. All of these take place in the same universe. The first one will be a normal, Person A, Person B type of story, to get a feel for the world. The summary is a modified version of the last sentence of their post; so I wasn't that deep, they were. Now, without further ado, let's get started, shall we? *Note: this is not one of my top priority stories, (sad, I know), mostly because it is rather long. So, updates nay be spaced out a bit.

No one really knew when it started. Long ago, enough that great-grandparents couldn't remember a time when finding your soulmate wasn't the norm. It had been a compatibility experiment long, long ago, that had been wildly successful, more so than had been expected.

What happened was now commonplace. On a teenager's sixteenth birthday, they would find a name on the inside wrist of their dominant hand. This was their soulmate. After that, however, it was up to the teen to find their soulmate. No one knew how soulmates were chosen, but no one really questioned it either.

The idea is for the Happily Ever After of fairy tales. At least, that's what the storybooks told. Gone was the "kiss of true love" or "love at first sight", or even "Prince Charming". Instead there were the stories of the "perfect soulmate", or the "instant connection", the moment of breathlessness when a person just knew that this was the one.

Unfortunately, life doesn't always turn out like the fairy tales. And more than a few people had to realize, rather harshly, that the storybooks lie. Not all matches were perfect. And not all of them had a Happily Ever After.

But still, a person has to try… after all, who doesn't want a Happy Ending?