When Chaeyoung was 6, she learned about soulmates. She was confused, at first. What do you mean, I’ll truly love only one person in my entire life ? What do you mean, it could be anyone ? What do you mean ?

It was a really curious thing. her parents took the time to explain everything to her. They loved the look in their little girl’s eyes. Curiosity. Maybe that was the only word that could describe Chaeyoung perfectly, after all. Always reaching for things she found interesting, picking up books at the library she couldn’t even read yet but she liked the cover of, constantly asking questions. 

But the look on her face when they told her how to communicate with her soulmate was worth all the unnecessary questions they had to go through from the first time their daughter started to talk with full sentences. 

« See, you send paper planes ! From anywhere, and your soulmate will get them. »

« Every time ? Even when it’s raining ? » 

« Yes ! » Chaeyoung clapped her hands. « Let us show you. » her mother pulled a box between them, and opened it like it was a treasure chest. Chaeyoung laughed excitedly at the sight of a thousand, maybe more, paper planes filling the box. Her parents had kept all the planes they had sent to each other, and it was a wonderful thing for Chaeyoung. 

They decided to send Chaeyoung’s first plane from the hill at the park the little family loved to go to. Chaeyoung was excited, and she almost threw it before reaching their destination. The sky was clear, and they watched the plane fly away, Chaeyoung’s ‘woah’ being the only thing that disturbed the moment.

« Magic ! » the little girl yelled when it disappeared far away from their sight. 

It was, really.

— 

Chaeyoung waited, and waited, and waited for her soulmate to send a plane back to her. It never happened. Or rather, it took a very long time. 3 years exactly. She was going back home from school with her friends when she felt something hit the back of her head. She turned around, and found a pink paper plane on the floor. She squealed happily, and opened the plane, her friends also curiously looking at it over her shoulders. 

She furrowed her brows as she tried to understand what was written on the paper. It looked a little like Korean, but she couldn’t understand it. She scratched her head, and started walking behind her now disappointed friends. She could understand their reactions. 

Her mom worriedly asked her what was happening when she heard her throw her bag in the hallway. 

Chaeyoung showed her the paper, clearly pissed. She complained about not receiving an answer to some stupid doodles she did when she was 6 and finally receiving something she couldn’t understand. Her mother calmed her down and told her that her soulmate might be Japanese, judging from how it looked. 

« Japanese ? As in from Japan ? » Chaeyoung genuinely asked. Her mother laughed. 

« Yes, little idiot. Where else ? Come on, your father speaks Japanese. He will translate that. » 

« He does ?! How come I only learn this today ? This is awesome ! » Chaeyoung ran to her father’s desk room, the pink paper above her head as she waved her arms around in excitement. 

He happily translated it for her, and the letter left the young girl grinning during the entire evening, and the days after. 

Her soulmate had apologized for replying this late, something about her parents never telling her about soulmates. Chaeyoung was worried about that. Why would they hide it ? The letter continued with them telling Chaeyoung that her doodles was funny and that they would gladly like to see more in the future. It ended with them apologizing again, and a little flower on the bottom. 

Chaeyoung decided to wait a few days before sending a paper plane back, teasing her soulmate a little. 

—

When she turned 13, Chaeyoung received a gold paper plane from her soulmate. 

During the 5 years they had been exchanging paper planes, their relationship grew a lot. Chaeyoung had learned Japanese with her father and they had decided to communicate with it. Sometimes, her soulmate would send her a few words in Korean, and Chaeyoung really appreciated it. 

She learnt that her soulmate was a girl, a few years older than her, into video games and dancing. They didn’t shared many interests, but Chaeyoung liked to learn about her soulmate favorite games, how her dancing lessons went, how school was going. 

They began exchanging paper planes on daily basis when Chaeyoung entered middle school. Since the girl was a few years ahead of her, she helped her a lot when she needed. 

So when she saw the gold plane enter her room from the window after she had woken up, she screamed. What could be better than birthday wishes from your soulmate ? Chaeyoung would tell you about the cake her mom cooked her every year, but now it was out of the picture. 

She unwrapped the plane and took in the sweet scent her soulmate had added to it. The letter was really well decorated, glitters spread around, the pretty handwriting shining. Chaeyoung smiled grew wider as she read it. 

‘Dear soulmate, 

Happy birthday ! I wish for you to have an amazing day, and I hope for the best for you. Always.
I also wish I could be with you. I’m afraid it might take a while before we get there.
This first year of high school has been a little tiring, but I go through everyday knowing I’ll receive one of your amazing paper planes.
Please never stop drawing on them. It makes me really happy. You’re talented.
Sana and Momo also wish you a happy birthday. They love your doodles, too. 

Lots of kisses, 

M’ 

They had promised to not tell the other what their name was until they both finished high school. Her mom told her it was ridiculous, but Chaeyoung found it romantic. 

She sat behind her desk and began writing a reply. 

— 

They began to exchange less paper planes as time went by. 

High school took a lot of their time, and Chaeyoung eventually grew bored of drawing and writing everyday. She hated herself for it, but her soulmate didn’t send that much too anyway, so she only sent one every week. She told herself it was enough. 

At one point, her soulmate stopped sending paper planes. She didn’t even notice. She was in her last year of high school, and she thought her other part was very busy with college. She was busy herself. She would never admit it to her soulmate, but she thought that she had fell in love with someone close to her. Someone who was always with her, in real life. Not through letters and pretty papers. She felt as if she was cheating on her soulmate, who she still didn’t know the name of. 

She felt guilty about it for a while, before accepting that she was allowed to love someone else before meeting her soulmate for real. Beside, she learned that the girl she loved, loved her back, even if they were both already in contact with their soulmates. 

During the few months Chaeyoung dated that other girl, named Tzuyu, a transfer student she met in 11th grade, she kept writing letters, adding pictures, folding them into paper planes, but never sending them. She kept them in a box, under her bed. It was like a diary, a secret box filled with secrets and feelings she wished she could share with her soulmate. She promised herself to throw them all from the school rooftop after graduation. 

She cried writing them, sometimes. She cried when she wrote about her grandmother’s death, she cried when she messed up the drawing she had spent a long time on for her soulmate, she cried from how much she missed catching the other girl’s paper planes when they hovered above her. 

But her pride told her to not make the first step. Not yet. 

When graduation day came, she went to the rooftop alone, the box heavy in her arms. 

She settled it in front of her feet, and took a deep breath, looking over the whole schoolyard. She could see tiny people hugging, parents congratulating their child, couples kissing. She knew Tzuyu was probably waiting for her behind the staircase’s doors that lead to the rooftop. 

She ripped the tape that was keeping the box shut, and threw the first plane. It was an important one. It had her name on it, and all the others that would follow were little pieces of her. Everything she had kept shut in her heart, hidden from her soulmate. 

She threw them one by one, feeling her heart lighten as each plane disappeared in the sunset. She cried, too. But from happiness.
She cried from sadness later, when Tzuyu joined her after she was done, telling her how breaking up would be better for the both of them. She knew that. She agreed. 

The next morning, when she woke up, there was a paper plane in front of her. White, simple, a little torn apart. She softly opened it, still half asleep. It was covered with notes about a subject she didn’t quite understand. There was traces of tears, too. And in the middle, one name written in bold, red letters. 

Mina. 

She run her fingertips across the name before falling back asleep, holding the plane close to her chest. Mina. 

— 

She met her 3 years later, when she turned twenty. It happened ridiculously. 

Mina had decided to come to Korea without telling her. The Japanese girl had found a way to contact her friends, and had asked them to take Chaeyoung to a precise place. 

They had left Chaeyoung there alone there, and told her to send a paper plane. Chaeyoung was not one to question her friends’ weird requests, so she did it. She neatly wrote something about the project she was currently working on, softly folded the plane after adding a little drawing and threw it. 

She followed it and turned around as it went behind her, and gasped when she saw it stop above someone’s head in the crowd. 

She laughed and sobbed at the same time as she recognized Mina. She knew it was her. The plane was the only proof she needed. 

On her 20th birthday, she didn’t get a paper plane, but the warmest hug she could ask for and the sweetest kiss she had ever dreamed of. 

—

« Mommy ? What’s this box filled with paper planes ? Is it a project of yours ? » 

Chaeyoung looked up from her sketchbook as a curious little boy stepped into her studio, arms full of planes. She chuckled, and told him to come closer. 

« Story time, baby. We’ll call mom and then I’ll tell you. »