Chapter Text
Peem has decidedly, consciously, and in full awareness proclaimed that he wants to be an artist. Whenever he has proclaimed his claim, there is an audience of raised eyebrows that waits to question him- “But, Peem, you can't see colors yet?”
To which he has a ready answer. It would be pretty stupid if he didn't, considering it took him a long time to convince himself of it too. His answer is plain and simple, regardless of the turmoil behind finding it. He wants practice. The practice of each art stroke, style and sort. Because with practice comes perfection, and that's what his soulmate deserves.
His soulmate deserves to be in the masterpieces, and to create masterpieces, (because only he should be making masterpieces with his soulmate in them) he needs to practice.
“You aren't copying me, are you?” Now that is a new question. However, Peem knows his best friend all too well to not be prepared for this taunt.
“You aren't the only artist in the world, you know wunderkid? No, I'm not copying you. To you, colors are a different branch of art. A bridge you will cross when you get to it. To me, colors are a destination that I will reach when I work towards them.”
“You sure you don't want to be a poet?”
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.
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“Q, come pick me up from school this very instant. Tan's in trouble.”
“On it.”
Chain cuts the call while simultaneously setting up his emergency kit. He should probably rename it as the Save Tan kit by now as he is the sole patient he tends to. This is why I want to be a dentist, he mutters under his breath.
A horn honks loudly outside the school fence, their personal and customized ambulance siren, telling Chain that he now needs to climb over the wired mesh. He does, with the tremendous amounts of practice he has coming into play, to find Q waiting on his scooter.
“What did the brat do this time? Didn't he have his football match today?”
“He did. I don't know what he did, though. All he kept saying was that he ruined it. So I'm guessing he punched someone from the opposite team, and got kicked off of the captain post.”
“Yeah, that's probably it. Though, he does take the captaincy pretty seriously.”
Q takes a sharp turn to their right, revealing a boy sitting on the footpath with his head in his hands. Tan.
“Ai, what did you do now?”
“Q!! My bro. Save me, save me now. I have ruined everything. I have ruined my life.”
“The football team captaincy is not your life, Tan. It's going to be fine. I'll have Pun talk to the coach and we will work something out.” Chain runs a soft hand up and down his friends crouching back. Reaching out to Q, who hands him his kit, he takes out a swab of antiseptic cotton before turning to Tan who is practically in tears.
“Tan, what's wrong? I told you we can fix this-”
“It's not the captaincy, Chain. It's not even football. I've ruined my life.”
“Will you stop being dramatic and actually explain what the fuck you've done?” Q's voice rings with frustration.
Usually he is on the side of the curb, alongside Tan, receiving first aid from Chain. However, ever since Peem had found out about the three of missing out on classes and having Pun cover for them, he had threatened to cut off all contact with them. Now, Q knows Peem is capable of a lot of things. One of them being able to fuck them up, despite his lack of experience, and Q wants that to remain that way.
Tan, on the other hand, is a different story, and in this chapter, he cries on Chain's shoulder for being a different story.
“I punched him. He must be so hurt. Oh my god, I'm such an asshole, Chain.”
“By the looks of it, he punched you back. Why does it matter?” Chain reasons.
“Because he is my soulmate.”
“You punched YOUR OWN SOULMATE??”
“Now you see what I mean?”
As far as romantic meetcutes go, Q knows that this is going to be something they laugh at or cry at ten years from now. However, in this moment, Tan is fucked beyond words either of his two friends can find.
“Please, please, please do not tell Peem. He will kill me.”
“Not tell Peem? Sure, let's not tell the only level-headed person in our friend group, the only person who would know how to fix this.” Q is right, and Tan knows but Peem will kill him before he gets a chance to do so himself. And to be fair, he should probably do it himself.
“Hey! Chain is pretty level headed too.”
“Chain saw his soulmate during third grade class introductions, and still can't find them.”
“Hey, I'm trying, okay? It's not my fault six girls from our class started seeing color that day.” Chain's sharp glare became a distracted look around in justification.
“So did eight boys, and your solution to that is to kiss all of them and take your chances. That's level headed play, at its finest.”
It isn't taking his chances, it is a calculated move. A move that he should make rather fast because Pun will not be convinced of it otherwise, no matter how many other moves he makes. Right now, though, his own plan was the least of his priorities.
“What are we going to do about this now?” Chain asks the other two. The question hangs unanswered, their minds too incoherent to come up with one. Tan gets up silently and dusts his uniform. Extending his hand to Chain, “Aunt Pui's cafe.” he says.
Clambering on, the three ride off to their group's hang out location, and to Peem, because despite the fact that Peem might kill Tan today this is their only safe bet at fixing this.
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.
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“Oh my God, you're the biggest idiot I know. I thought that was Pun but you have proven me wrong.”
Peem's anger was like honey. It usually was just sweet, born out of concern and kindness towards his friends. However, as honey does, if heated it catches fire in ways that should not be provoked. Tan has a knack for not following ‘shoulds’.
“Why did you have to be an asshole to him in the first place? He just asked for the cheer captain's location. You couldn't just say that you didn't know. And him. Punches you just because you're cocky. Made for each other, you two. Truly.”
Well, Tan hadn't realized that. Tan, so deep in his sea of worry, completely let his mind forget about the fact that his soulmate also has just as much of a violent streak as he does.
He also hadn't realized that he saw his soulmate.
His soulmate, with long legs and a lean waist. His soulmate, with a voice that sounds like if Tan heard it on the radio, he would spend hours searching for the song just by the one word he managed to grasp. His soulmate, with hands that could be shown to greek historians and they would be sure that they belonged to their sculptures. His soulmate, with locks of hair that fell into his eyes that looked as if they were drops of the drink his dad made some nights for his mom. His soulmate, with lips that seemed to have been on all the billboards he had seen for lip balms. Lips he just busted open with his unworthy and filthy fist.
Oh god, what has he done?
“How did you know, though?” Q asks after Peem takes a few seconds off from his rampage to drink a glass of water. “Like did you see colors immediately? What are they like?”
And here is another thing Tan hadn't realized. He can see colors. For the first time in his life, he can see the famous thing called color that Chain mistakenly refers to in front of them when he forgets that they couldn't see it yet. The color they call blue as it belongs to the sky, the color they call red as it belongs to blood and yellow as it belongs to the button up Peem has been wearing over and over for three weeks.
He lounges at Chain, “You've lived in this color for so long, and managed to never let us feel less. I'm proud of you.”
Chain pushes him off, “You've gone insane.”
“When was he not?” Peem chimes.