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Barbara Lee Fields was 8 years old when she first learned about soulmates. Her best friend, Sharon, had experienced her older sister finding her soulmate the day before, and she didn’t spare any details when explaining everything her parents told her to Barbara. When your soulmate is born, or when you are, a symbol of something you and your soulmate have in common appears on your skin. However, you don’t know who your soulmate is, even if you’ve met them, until they say ‘I love you’ for the first time, and your mark will burn until you touch each other. Only after you’ve touched does your mark turn gold, and your bond to them is sealed. Barbara listened to Sharon explain this with bated breath, needing to know everything. Later, when Barbara had gone home, she scoured every inch of her body that she could see for her mark, but her skin was unblemished.
—-
It was the summer of ‘80, Barbara and Sharon were outside in the late evening, enjoying the last of their time together before they parted ways for college. Barbara got up to dance when she heard her song on the radio, her daisy dukes riding up her thighs, and Sharon stopped her instantly, seeing it happen.
“Bee, look at your leg! Your mark!” Barbara froze, her eyes landing immediately on the small blueberry on her upper thigh. On August 20th, 1980, at 6:29 pm, Barbara’s soulmate was born.
“My soulmate is 18 years younger than me?” Barbara wanted to be happy- she really did, but she had made up her mind at the age of 14 that she would never have a soulmate. She had shut off the part of her brain that allowed hope for herself and just wanted someone with whom she could start a family with. Her having a soulmate who was 18 years younger threw a wrench in those plans. The age gap was far too large. If she were to marry a man that young, she’d be labeled a cougar, and by the time they found each other, she’d probably be way past the age of starting a family. That night, Barbara sat alone in her boxed-up room and cried in a way she hadn’t in 4 years, mourning the life she’d never have.
—--
1985 brought Barbara Fields 2 very important things: a degree that said she could educate the young minds of the future, and a new last name. She was now Mrs. Barbara Lee Howard.
Gerald was tall, dark, and handsome. He was caring, fun, and completely gay, but he loved her enough. They met on campus in their sophomore year, becoming fast friends. Barbara didn’t mind that he was gay; she had known plenty of gay people who chose to live quietly with a wife as a beard. He promised her security and a family, and she jumped at the chance. He never asked about the blueberry on her thigh, and she never asked him about the boat on his shoulder- a silent understanding between the two of them that it didn’t matter.
Their first child, a beautiful little girl named Taylor, was born in 1994 with beautiful brown skin and a teddy bear mark behind her knee. Barbara tried to ignore the slight twinge of jealousy in her heart as they laid her daughter on her chest. She hoped her daughter’s soulmate was closer in age so that she could experience what her mother and father never had the chance to.
Their second child, another girl named Gina, was born in 2000, coming out the same as her older sister, a music note on her side right under her ribcage. This time, the jealousy didn’t sting as much.
The green-eyed monster didn’t rear its ugly head until a 15-year-old Taylor burst through the front door of their home with a 16-year-old boy on her arm with both of their marks turned gold. Barbara gritted congratulations through her teeth, plastering a fake smile as she broke on the inside. That was what she wanted, right? For her little girls to experience what she couldn’t? So why did it hurt so bad? When Gerald went to bed that night, he wrapped a sobbing Barbara in his arms, letting her cry her frustrations out into his chest as he held her.
—-
“Bee, did you ever consider that you might be gay, too?” Gerald had asked the night an 18-year-old Gina introduced them to her 20-year-old female soulmate.
“G, I’ve been gay for almost as long as you have,” she admitted nonchalantly. It was true, about 3 years into their marriage, a fine Italian redhead who worked with her at the school where she taught had turned her head. Instead of pursuing her, she made her a best friend instead.
“Melissa?”
“You know it.”
“Do I need to be worried?”
“Not in the slightest, her mark is a wooden spoon.”
“You’ve seen it?”
“It’s behind her ear.” A touchy beat of silence passed through them. “I’m not in love with her, Gerald. Our family is safe. I told you I wouldn’t leave unless I found them, and even then it wouldn’t be without a lot of convincing.”
—-
2019 brought a new principal to Abbott. A loud, irresponsible young woman with a sugar and caffeine addiction and an affinity for blueberry pop-tarts. She was witty and sexy, and Barbara didn’t know what to make of her. Barbara soon found out that the woman was terrible at her job and decided that was enough to support her disdain against her.
However, a year later, Abbott got new staff members who challenged all of the existing staff- Babrara included. Over the years, these challenges weren’t just making them better teachers, but better communicators, better lovers, better friends. The shortest one had stolen Barbara’s heart completely, her maternal instincts telling her to protect her with everything she had, the other two filling in as sons she never got to have.
—
“Barbara,” Janine called in a sing-song voice over the phone.
“Yes, sweetheart?”
“Jacob, Gregory, and I are throwing Ava a birthday party this year, It would mean a lot if you were there. And if you could convince Melissa and Roslyn to come too.”
“How did you find out Ava’s birthday? She won’t tell anybody.”
“Her dad mentioned it to Gregory during another emergency haircut.”
“Well, when is it? And what day is the party?”
“Her birthday is August 20th…” Barbara’s heart clenched. She absentmindedly grazed her fingers over the spot on her thigh and tuned out the rest of Janine’s sentence.
“I’m sorry, baby girl, could you repeat the party day for me?”
“The 24th.”
“Great, I’ll talk to Mel and Roz, and I’ll be there.”
—
Her 45th birthday. Ava had turned 45 years old. Barbara felt like she was going to be sick. She stood at the party, clutching the plastic glass in her hand, wishing she had let Sea Barbara convince her to get the spiked punch option.
“I can’t believe Ava’s 45! She acts like she’s 30,” Melissa commented casually from beside her. Barbara turned to look at Melissa, hoping that the other woman could read the expression of terror on her face. “Shit,” Melissa muttered, putting the pieces together. “It can’t be her, though, right?”
“I don’t know. Her being 45 makes her birthday August 20, 1980. That’s the day I got my mark.”
“Well, we don’t know what her mark is, and I’ve never heard her utter a word about blueberries except for-”
“-Her pop-tarts.”
—
Gerald Howard was sitting up in their bed scrolling on his phone when Babrara stumbled in from Ava’s party, not missing the haunted look in his wife’s eyes as she went through the motions of her evening routine. When she came to bed, she sat straight up in the bed beside him, her hands folded on her lap and a tear rolling down her cheek.
“I think I found her.” Gerald set the phone down to give her his full attention.
“Are you sure?” He pulled her gown up slightly to get a peek at her mark; it hadn’t turned gold.
“No.” She put a hand on his that rested on her thigh. “G?” She turned to him and let the tears flow. “I’m scared.” And once again, Gerald fell asleep with his crying wife in his arms.
—
Ava stumbled into the teachers’ lounge on September 15th with the grossest hangover she’d had in years. She didn’t utter a word and collapsed in front of Melissa and Babrara at their table, her head down and arms crossed around it.
“Couldn’t hang last night, Ava?” Melissa taunted. Barbara rolled her eyes and got up to grab Ava’s mug from the cabinet, pouring coffee in it and adding half the canister of sugar. The last thing any of them needed was a hungover Ava.
“I hate being this old. I didn’t even drink that much.” Barbara stirred the coffee until the sugar was gone and sat down at the table.
“Welcome to upper middle age, sweetheart.” Barbara took the hand closet to her and put the mug in it, and Ava groaned, sitting up slowly and taking a sip.
“Ugh! It’s perfect. I love you.”
As soon as the words left Ava’s lips, the mug in her hand dropped in her lap, her hand going immediately to her thigh. Barbara’s hand was also on her thigh, the burning sensation of her blueberry hitting her hard.
“No,” Ava said, getting up to run out of the lounge.
“Ava, wait, please,” Barbara pleaded, her hand instinctively wrapping around Ava’s wrist to get her to stay. The burning stopped, and Barbara could feel her mark change. She could feel her heart change. She could feel her brain change. They had completed their bond.
“Not here. Let me change and meet me in my office.” Ava didn’t even look at her. Barbara let go of her and clutched Melissa’s hand, needing something solid to hold onto before she lost her mind.
—
Barbara sat across from Ava in her office, a charged silence between them.
Will you stop thinking so loud? I do still have a hangover.
You can hear me?
Um yes? Do you know how soulmate bonds work?
Not completely. I never bothered to learn about what happens when you complete it. I was 8 when I learned about soulmates, and since I didn’t have a mark, I didn’t bother.
“Telepathy. The ability to feel each other’s pain and heal it through touch. Sickness and chest pain occur when separated for long periods.” Ava listed off from memory.
You studied bonds?
I’ve been waiting for you for 45 years.
Ava, this scares me. I’ve known I was attracted to you, and we’ve become really close like everyone else, but you can’t possibly want me.
Don’t tell me what I want, Barbara. There's a reason you hold a lot more weight around here with me than the others do.
“Show me?” Barbara asks timidly. Ava doesn’t have to be asked twice before getting up and pulling the shades. She perches on the edge of the desk in front of Barbara and leans down, cupping Barbara’s cheek.
“I should have known when you told the crew your favorite word was blueberries.”
“I should have known when you said your favorite food was blueberry pop-tarts.”
I’m glad it’s you. Ava pulls Barbara’s face to hers and kisses her square on the lips.
—
2026 brings Babrara yet another new last name. Mrs. Barbara Lee Coleman had a nice ring to it. They don’t have a wedding; Barbara has already been there, done that, and Ava didn’t want the fiasco. If she wanted a party, she could throw one any time. They did go to the courthouse after a year, registered their bond, and got their marriage license.
That night, the two went home and sat in the middle of their bed, taking forks to a blueberry pie and sharing blueberry flavored kisses.
I’m glad it’s you .