Author's notes: English is not my first language, so I'm sorry for all the mistakes you'll probably find.
A mark, it's just a mark
Part 1 : The beginning
He knows before even seen it.
There is an annoying tingling feeling between his shoulder blades, something he hasn't feel before, and he just knows.
It makes him mad.
"Elizabeth Scott?" He asks to the brown haired girl waiting in the hall right outside the principal's office. He doesn't even let her say a word before he keeps talking. "Donald Ressler, school council. Come with me."
She collects her bag from the floor and follows him.
"I was supposed to meet principal Cooper now," she says confused, trying to keep at his pace.
"Change of plans. Mr. Red sent me to pick you up, his class is about to start."
He hates Mr. Red, there is no other way to put it. He's in the school council, yes, but that doesn't mean he has to be Mr. Red errand boy. And who is this girl anyway? They're in the middle of February and the school doesn't usually accept new students so far into the year.
"Mr. Red?"
"The literature teacher," he answers, stopping in front of the class door. "This is it."
She adjusts the bag on her shoulder and sends him a bright smile.
"Thank you," she says, and then she stretches out her arm, her right hand waiting for his. "And yes, I'm Liz Scott, nice to meet you."
He looks at her hand and then he sees it, there on the inner part of her wrist, the same mark he has on his back between his shoulders.
Fuck.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.
"Ressler," he says holding her hand (not because he wants to but because it would be rude not to do it). She seems a little taken aback by that and he clears his throat. He knows he shouldn't be so harsh with her because it isn't her fault, but he can't help it. "Everybody just calls me Ressler."
She nods and sends him another smile, and Ressler feels like the worse person in the world. Liz seems nice, really nice, but he hates her. Her and her bright hair, perfect smile and beautiful blue eyes like a clouded sky before a storm.
He doesn't know how the whole thing started centuries ago and he doesn't really cares, but this is how it works.
At some point during puberty everybody gets a mark.
(There are some people, rare exceptions, that never get a mark. And as much as Ressler hates his, the world is worse for those who don't have one.)
You wake up in the middle of the night with a burning feeling, as if a branding iron is pressed against your skin. Your whole body feels on fire and your skin hurts with the lightest touch, you cannot sleep but you can't stay awake either. There is a moment when you feel like you're been torn apart, like someone is ripping off your soul away from your body, and is the most excruciating pain you're ever going to feel. Once everything is finally over and the pain is gone, you wake up from a displeasing slumber just to find out that you're never going to feel whole again, not on your own at least. There's a hole in your heart, like you're missing an important piece of your soul, but at the same time there is an anxious and hopeful feeling in your chest. Because it's not just that you are missing a piece, you have something new inside you, something that belongs to you and at the same time it doesn't.
That's when you see it, a little mark somewhere in your body, still red and sore like a brand new sacr. And you know it's out there, you can feel it pulling you towards it.
You have a soulmate.
And it's complete and utter bullshit.
Every time they share the same air his eyes automatically find hers and that bothers him.
He's not suppose to do that.
"She's nice," Meera tells him one day when she catches him glancing at Liz.
He looks away and focus on his homework, trying to block the sound of Liz's laughter from his head. It's annoying and doesn't let him concentrate.
"Who?" Ressler asks nonchalantly and he can feel Meera rolling her eyes.
"Liz, she's in my biology class with Mr. Barnes."
"The new kid?" asks Aram while he opens another bag of crisps. Ressler frowns when the crips get all over the table because the last thing he needs is to handle Mr. Red a paper full of grassy stains, but doesn't say anything and eats one of them.
Meera and Aram are the only true friends he has left after the whole Audrey debacle. Not that he cares about his lack of social life, he doesn't have time for that anymore between the team and homework, but it's nice to know that at least two people in this world care about him.
"Mr. Red personally asked for her to be transferred here, that's how she got in," Meera continues. She helps in the principal office sometimes and always has information about everybody.
"What?" Ressler is surprised. He noticed some things, like how Mr. Red keeps calling her 'Lizzie' even though she told him a thousand times to call her just 'Liz', but he never thought they knew each other. He just thought that Mr. Red was messing with her, like when he calls him 'Donald'. "Is she her niece or something?"
"I don't know, it doesn't look like there is any connection between them according to her file."
"Maybe he's friend with her parents," says Aram, but Ressler isn't listening anymore.
He's not listening because he doesn't care. He has other things to do and this chit-chat is distracting.
Liz means nothing to him and that's all he wants and needs to know about her.
Nothing.
(And no, his eyes are not fixed on her again.)
She's dating Tom Keen.
Tom Keen, the perfect student.
Tom Keen, who has the same mark as her (as them) on his left forearm.
Life is shit.
It's not like he cares about this stupid soulmate bullshit, but it annoys him anyway. No because he wants to be with Liz (he really doesn't, he knows who his soulmate is and he screwed things up) but because destiny or whatever is in charge of this bloody marks obviously made a mistake and now he's wrongly branded for life.
Branded as someone who shouldn't be with Audrey.
Branded as an unwanted vertex in the Elizabeth Scott and Tom Keen perfect romance story.
(Not like they know. Not like anyone knows.)
He takes another bit to his tuna sandwich, his eyes fixed on the happy couple, a hand absently scratching that place on his back where he has the mark.
Fuck it.
Later in training Coach Garrick ends up sending him to detention when he punches Lorca in the face, but it's worthy.
And no, the fact that he thinks that Tom is an asshole has nothing to do with this.
No.