Two strings. Something only talked about in the fan fictions Zoey read, or in the drama shows where people ultimately admitted they were lying. It’s supposed to be a falsehood, a joke, a good story to tell to make a universe assigned soulmate seem more romantic.
But for Zoey Choi, it’s not a joke. Not a bit. Not a story. It’s her reality.
And she truly has no idea what to do about it.
For as long as Zoey can remember, she’s always had two strings tied around each hand.
The first, on her left hand, is a deep purple. The same shade as the flowers she never learned the name of, wrapped precisely around her ring finger.
The second, on her right, is a violent pink. The kind you’d see from graffiti or dyed hair, wrapped tightly around her middle finger.
When she gets bored, Zoey likes to twist the strings around one another, tugging them both at the same time so the two people on the other end notice. Thy end up tugging back, unraveling what she’d done.
If felt nice, knowing at least two people cared enough to acknowledge she existed.
When Zoey had first told someone else about the two lines, it had been her then -now ex- best friend Magdalene. Magdalene had told her to be serious, and Zoey had told her she was. Magdalene had changed the subject, so Zoey assumed that was the end of it.
But the next day at school, everyone seemed to know. Zoey Choi thinks she has two strings. Names had started to float around the hall after that, ranging from simple teasing to straight up slurs. Zoey tried to ignore it, and she was able to for a little while.
Until Magdalene started destroying her notebooks. The ones that held lyrics about how she feels, the sketches of herself and two mystery people, and the occasional drawing of someone’s torso, arms crossed, as strings of purple and pink wrap around their forearms.
Zoey had to move schools after they continued for three weeks unabated.
She never did tell anyone else about it. Her parents assumed it was just a ploy for attention, so they didn’t bring it up again. Her “friends” didn’t contact her once she left school, so Zoey became a very lonely girl.
As the years drifted by, her only comfort was the strings, on her ring and middle fingers, connecting her to the two people who would someday accept her fully.
Or, so she hoped.
It wouldn’t be until she turned twenty that she moved to Seoul. She had accepted a scholarship to attend the university there, wanting to escape the crushing loneliness that surrounded her at her hometown. She played with the strings while she flew, humming quietly in delight as they reacted every time before responding in kind.
Her mind drifted back to last year. The two strings had tugged in sync for a few moments, paused, before doing so again. She’d tugged back in equal joy and sorrow, because that meant the two people on the other side had met each other. She could only hope that when she found them or they her that she’d be included in their hearts.
She had no way to know she had already taken a place within both women’s very souls.
When she had landed, Zoey could we the strings more clearly then before, but she simply attributed it to the lingering drowsiness from the flight.
Her arrival was with no fanfare, no friends or family to greet her, but that was expected. No one had seen her off, either, both of her parents claiming other responsibilities were keeping them. She wanted to be angry, but could only feel resigned. She knew they wouldn’t come, not even if she broke her arm again.
And so, Zoey entered the university. She had hoped to make connections, make friends, while she were here. But everyone was off put by her lack of manners, how American her accent was, the way she would get too excited about something.
Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
All Zoey felt like she could do was wrong.
Until she saw them.
Two beautiful women attending the same uni, who walked right by her without noticing.
The taller of the two, whom Zoey learned was called Mira later, screamed the kind of danger one would associate with a lioness. Sharp looks and sharper words kept people away from her, and she didn’t hesitate to fight people physically, either.
The other, Rumi, was dangerously the way a tiger would be. Lithe, powerfully built but in an elegant way, as if she could dance through hoarde’s of demons like the legends of old. Her voice was beautiful, ethereal, and Zoey was the sole enjoyer aside from Mira.
Because the two women lived next door to her.
Now, you probably guessed who the two strings belonged too, right? You’re probably wondering now why Zoey, the sweet girl who’s been hurt so much, can’t see it?
You see, the strings could only remain visible from a certain distance. Zoey knows the two other parts of her soul are here, somewhere, but she cannot follow the strings anymore.
Because a soulmate is not a soulmate simply because of what the universe says it is. A soulmate is the person with whom you will become closest too, and whether it’s platonic or romantic does not matter.
As for our Zoey, she doesn’t know her soulmates are next door to her. And they do not know it’s her, either.
The two girls grew up in different houses, yet somehow lived terrifyingly similar lives. Pressures from all sides, near impossible demands, and a very dangerous marriage for one of them that would’ve been finalized if not for them meeting one another.
The two girls had run away that night. They know they belong to each other, their strings manifesting again after their first kiss, yet they also know this impossible truth.
Rumi has two strings. One is a sharp pink tied hesitantly around her pinkie, the color reminding her of the blade her mother had gifted her before her death. The other is a deep teal, tied chaotically around her index finger and reminding her of the ocean.
Mira has two strings. One is a deep violet purple, like the colors of the sky right before sunrise and after sunset, wrapped carefully around her ring finger. The other is a playful teal, tied haphazardly around her thumb and making her think of the fish she would sometimes see in the water.
For years the two would tug on their strings, enjoying the knowledge that somewhere out there not one, but two people were waiting for them. Once Mira and Rumi met they both talked and realized the same thing, that their third is still missing.
And so, they sent a message. A synchronized pull, a message that they are waiting for her and are waiting together. She had tugged back mere moments later, filling them both with hope.
The day Zoey had arrived, their strings connecting to her had vanished, merely leaving the ones wrapped around their fingers. So, they began their search through the college, checking and re-checking every freshman.
No one stood out until Zoey literally ran into them.
This chaotic American girl who still sometimes panicked and cursed in Spanish slammed full force into both of them while getting to her next class. Mira had been ready to scold the girl who ran into them, but froze as two eyes lined that very same shade of teal met hers.
Mira noticed right after that her eyeshadow, a bright, garish pink on one side and a deep, violent purple on the other.
The three stared at one another for a few more moments before Zoey realized what she’d just done, and who she’d just ran into. She stood, apologizing in shaky Korean, before running away. After a moment she paused, turned, and walked past them, determinedly not looking at them as she went the right way to class.
Mira told Rumi her suspicion. The two agreed to try to get to know her, ad besides, even if she isn’t the one they’ve been waiting for she still seemed… interesting.
They ran into her, metaphorically speaking, a lot more often than they realized they had been after that. They’d see her at the library, studying two separate books at once somehow, or at the park with headphones in going for a jog. One time they even spotted her on the roof across from their building, skateboarding.
But the one place they never expected to see her was outside their door, cheeks stuffed full of shrimp chips.
They had been leaving to go out, hoping to get some takeout, when both of them froze. Zoey froze as well, slowly turning to face them with cheeks as full as a chipmunks.
Mira can’t help it, she giggles at the sight. Rumi tries to stifle it, but another glance at the mortified expression has her giggling too. Zoey finished chewing quickly, mortified, but Mira stops her from running away with a gentle hand on her shoulder.
She apologizes for reacting like that, admitting that she hadn’t expected to find a cute girl in the hall right when they were leaving to get dinner. She fights a grin as Zoey turns red at the compliment, stuttering out a response.
With a quick glance the two women agree; Zoey should come with them. A quick invite is extended, and Zoey does try to refuse, but her traitorous gut gurgled right as she’d tried to.
Zoey glared at her gut. Rumi stifled another laugh.
The dinner that night was a pleasant one. Conversation somehow flowed naturally between the three of them, Zoey’s rambling mixing with Mira’s dry remarks and Rumi’s occasional questions making the hour skip by unnoticed.
When it ended they offered to walk Zoey home. Imagine their surprise when Zoey stopped right next to their door. Mira, ever the bold one, decided to make the first move. A single kiss on Zoey’s cheek.
Zoey, of course, froze for a solid five seconds while her brain rebooted. Rumi took advantage of this and kissed her on the other cheek.
The two wished Zoey a goodnight and left her standing frozen in the hallway. Once her brain finally reset, she quickly went into her room and quietly screamed into a pillow. She had to be quiet, she had new neighbors/crushes.
She could only hope her soulmates liked them when she finally finds them.
The three of them settle into a carefully equilibrium over the next few weeks. Mira and Rumi would more often then not “kidnap” Zoey to go eat with them for lunch’s, and Zoey would invite the two to her room for Dinners she made.
During the day, the three of them would walk to classes together when they could, talking and joking with each other. The three of them clicked in the way old childhood friends do, with a bone deep knowing that something that’s been missing has finally been found.
But something is lurking between the three of them, something that they’ve been tip-toeing around.
The strings.
Mira and Rumi can see the one connecting them still, that remains a constant.
But Zoey can’t see them, or the ones connecting her to them, until they finally choose to be together.
Zoey is scared to tell them. Over the last few weeks, she’s come to realize that the odds of them being her soulmates is fairly high. But previous experience has shown her just how painful it can be to be wrong. She knows them now, knows they would never be cruel to her, but still.
She’s worried they’ll reject her, make fun of her, taunt her about the “fake strings”.
Mira and Rumi, for their part, have been waiting for Zoey to ask them about it. They don’t want to pressure her, and don’t want to make it awkward if she isn’t their soulmate. She’s told them some of what happened when she was in middle school, the awful girl who bullied her, as well as the people pleasing habits she developed in response.
They’re all on the edge, careful not to tip over from friends into something more.
Right up until one of them slipped.
Rumi got a call one night. A number she didn’t recognize, so she answered.
She would never have answered if she’d known who it was.
Gwi-ma’s voice came through, saying she’s a hard woman to find. Rumi didn’t hesitate, simply hung up before snapping her phone in half.
But just hearing his voice is enough. The voice of the man who had tried for so long to mold her into the perfect wife for his nephew, Jinu. Rumi starts to have a panic attack right then and there, in the hallway outside her room.
Zoey hears the sounds of strangled breaths and comes out to see what’s happening. She knows the signs of a panic attack, and she knows how to deal with them.
Slowly, she coaxes Rumi through it using breathing exercises and grounding techniques. After a while Rumi asks for a hug, which Zoey gives her. After a few minutes Rumi pulls away, not meeting her eyes. She apologizes about the panic attack.
Zoey flicks her forehead.
At Rumi’s indignant look, Zoey says apologizing for a panic attack is the literal last thing someone should do after a panic attack. Rumi apologizes again for apologizing, earning her another forehead flick.
The levity fades as Zoey asks if Rumi wants to talk about it. Rumi hesitantly says she does.
Back before Uni, back a month before she met Mira, Rumi had been set to marry Jinu, whose soulmate had died recently. Her well intentioned aunt Celine didn’t know this at the time, but Gwi-ma had been the one to kill him.
His name had been Abby, but Gwi-ma didn’t like that a man was tied to another man.
So he’d had it look like Abby got drunk and got into a car wreck. Jinu knew about it, but he was powerless to stop Gwi-ma. Celine had set them up after hearing what happened, since she had known Jinu’s family for years.
That… Demon of a man had made Rumi’s life a living hell for three months. He’d forced her to cut off contact with her aunt under the guise of “preparing to be a wife”, he’d somehow gotten ahold of her bank information and had control of it so she couldn’t buy anything. He restricted what she could eat, wear, her activity’s, everything.
Her only light was the two strings attached to her hands.
The escape with Mira had ultimately been rather anti-climactic. Gwi-ma had taken Jinu out to a business dinner, and security had been unusually lax that night. Later, Rumi would find out Celine had been informed of the truth by Mira and she’d bribed the security team.
She’d heard later that Gwi-ma fired the whole security team, but she hadn’t really cared. All she knew was she was safe again, and Celine had severed all ties to Saja industries. In fact, she’d even managed to get the story out to the press, and the once powerful company fell into near ruin.
Rumi and even managed to get her bank back into her control, transferring all the money into a new account Mira had set up for her.
Rumi’s story ended at Uni, when she and Mira finally kissed for the first time. All they had to do was wait for the third and they’d be-
Rumi cut herself off then, going still. Zoey’s face was unusually unreadable, and when she spoke she caught Rumi very off guard. She asked if they were waiting for their third soulmate.
Rumi hesitantly admitted yes, they were. She waited as Zoey glanced down at her own hands before looking back up at Rumi. She quietly asked what color the second string was for them. Rumi said it was a beautiful teal color, though she hasn’t seen it recently. I vanished the day before they met Zoey.
Rumi takes a risk, then. She asks what colors Zoey had. Zoey stiffens for just a moment before relaxing with a slow breath. She says they were a stark pink and a beautiful purple.
Rumi quietly asks if Zoey is willing to take the risk of being their soulmate.
Zoey says yes.
Mira returned an hour later to find Zoey and Rumi cuddling on their bed, watching an old American cartoon called Winx. Upon seeing Mira, the two jumped her and dragged her to bed.
The conversation takes about an hour in total after that. Mira mildly disbelieving that Zoey thinks that it’s worth trying, even if they aren’t soulmates, and Rumi trying to figure out how lucky she is. Zoey is personally beyond excited to get to date the two hottest people on campus, but she keeps that little tidbit to herself for now.
The conversation slowly ebbs, until Rumi slowly sits up to look down at Zoey sandwiched between them. Zoey is about to ask what’s wrong when Rumi asks if she can kiss her. Zoey’s brain goes blank as Mira sits up and asks the same.
After a few moments of gay panic, Zoey nods.
Rumi’s kiss is firm yet gentle, like a guiding hand on someone’s back as they move across a slippery surface. It’s grounding and warm and so, so good. Then she pulls back, smiling, and then Mira is suddenly there. Mira’s kiss is impatient yet restrained, a fire burning beneath ice that she held back with carefully.
They do this a few times, exchanging gentle and rough kisses and quiet whispers with each other.
No one notices the strings finally connecting the three of them.
They don’t need to see them, after all.
They have been found.
…
Oh. And Gwi-ma? He became a drunken bitter fool that found Rumi’s number because she became the president of the social movement club.
Jinu, surprisingly enough, ended up joining a throuple of his own with a man who insisted his name was Mystery when he first met him and a pink haired man that referred to himself as romance. They’re both dorks, but he loved them both anyways.
—
Hope y’all enjoyed! This one was kicking around in the drafts for a while lol.
