Title: Unrequited
Genre: Soulmate AU
Pairing: ChaeKyul (Chaeyeon & Jieqiong)
Words: 1500+

Jieqiong has always wanted to meet her soulmate, but it turns to be nothing like she expected.

Just a quite author's note! This is the start of a three-part story that I've planned and written during hiatus. They'll be relatively shorter chapters (under 2000 words) but I think it's better to cut it off into three parts for organization.

Just a few things to keep in mind for this soulmate AU in case anything is confusing below.

Soulmates are connected with a red string that everybody can see
Soulmates can sense each other's emotions (sort of like a gut feeling)
Soulmates cannot lie to each other (they also cannot stay quiet and not talk if directly asked a question)

Jieqiong has always been fascinated with soulmates. Looking at the red strings that were tied around the little fingers of her parents, along with the countless others that had connected couples all around her, Jieqiong’s heart raced with joy and anticipation as she thought about one day meeting her own soulmate.

It was her favorite bedtime story as a child; how the gods tied the ‘red strings of fate’ around the fingers of people who were destined to meet; destined to fall in unconditional love regardless of place, regardless of time, and regardless of any obstacles that stood in the way. Two soulmates linked together shared their feelings – one soulmate could sense the emotions of the other. Soulmates were also linked to their rudimentary thoughts, meaning it was impossible for one to tell lies to the other, resulting in a true, genuine and sincere love.

It warmed her heart that someone out there was linked to her, like fate, and that one day she would run into them and their lives would change forever. It made her smile whenever she thought about what her soulmate was doing at the present moment – what they were thinking, what they were wearing, if they were wondering what she was doing too.

She was, at her very core, falling in love with the very idea of falling in love.

Hence why it meant so much to her when her best friend since childhood, Eunwoo, had stumbled upon her soulmate. It was around the start of junior high school and as Eunwoo puts it, it was like ‘destiny’ as she met eyes with a school senior, Nayoung, who just so happened to be her soulmate. (Though Jieqiong later finds out that Eunwoo had actually gotten lost during the first day of school and was on the verge of tears by the time Nayoung had found her).

Nevertheless, Jieqiong was more than thrilled for Eunwoo, and she remembered bombarding the latter with an endless amount of questions later that same day as they hung around Jieqiong’s house.

“What’s her name? How old is she? What’s she like? Is she nice?” A thirteen-year old Jieqiong asked without taking a breath. She was quite literally shaking with enthusiasm as she playfully hit Eunwoo’s back to relieve some of her excitement.

“Jeez, Jieqiong,” Eunwoo replied. Her voice was tinged with a hint of surprise at Jieqiong’s spirited attitude. “I just met her today. I don’t know everything about her-”

“Do you like her?” Jieqiong interjected. Her eyes glistened with curiosity as she grasped Eunwoo’s shoulders. “Does she like you? How tall is she?”

“Jieqiong-”

“Oh, oh, oh!” Jieqiong exclaimed. She feverously waved her hand in the air, as if she had finally settled on a single question for Eunwoo to answer. “Does she like strawberries?”

“Done?” Eunwoo raised a brow, a smirk slowly forming with her lips. Jieqiong nodded feverously, eager to hear Eunwoo’s response. “Her name is Im Nayoung, but she’s older than us so she’s our unnie. She has this reputation of being emotionless and all, but she’s really nice. Yes, I’m pretty sure we like each other, at least I think so.”

Jieqiong kept her gaze on Eunwoo’s eyes, waiting for her to answer all of her questions.

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