((au where the first words your soulmate says to you are tattooed somewhere on your body but only you are able to see it.))

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"Hey nerd." Jennie says while ruffling up Rosé's hair and taking a seat beside her in the library. Rosé glared at her and muttered a greeting while fixing her hair and going back to doing her homework.

"What's with you? What did Lisa do this time?" Jennie inquired.

Rosé had always been a quiet girl but she's rarely unresponsive unless she's in a foul mood.

"Lisa isn't the one I'm mad at." Rosé whispers back.

"Huh? Then who? It can't be Jisoo. She can murder your entire family and you'll still forgive her and tell her how pretty she looks covered in their blood." Jennie said teasingly, taking out her own home6work.

"It's you, you doy. I can't believe you forgot!" Rosé furiously whisper-shouted.

Jennie knew exactly what Rosé was talking about but feigned innocence because an angry Park Chaeyoung was rare and kinda hot, in her opinion.

"Umm.....happy birthday?"

That earned her a smack in the head with an extremely heavy textbook and a warning from the librarian about being too loud.

"Hey! What was that for?!" Jennie exclaimed softly , throwing a cautionary look at the  librarian.

"You know what." Chaeyoung hissed, not even looking at Jennie now.

Jennie let out a quiet laugh but immediately reined it in when Chaeyoung sent her a scalding look.

"Relax Rosie. I'm just kidding. I know what day it is and I also happen to have something special planned for later." Jennie said with a smug smile on her face.

Rosé looked at her suspiciously and was about to say something but Jennie broke her off.

"However, with the way you're treating me, I'm having second thoughts about actually going through it...." Jennie gave Rosé a sideways glance and saw her face wracked with guilt and sadness and her heart immediately melted at the sight.

"I'm sorry. You didn't even wish me when we met this morning..." Rosé sighed sadly but brightened up the moment Jennie gave her a kiss on the cheek.

"Happy realization day, Rosie." Jennie whispered in Rosé's ear and was satisfied to see a faint blush and a small  smile on her face.

"Thank you." Rosé said gently while looking down. Jennie was grinning at how cute she was being and held Rosé's free hand under the table. One convenient thing about Rosie being a leftie is that they could comfortably hold hands under the table while eating or doing homework, in this case.

What Jennie didn't expect was when Rosé shyly took both their intertwined hands and placed a chaste and soft kiss on Jennie's knuckles and then immediately went back to doing her homework.

"You too." She said so quietly that if Jennie wasn't super hyper aware of Rosie next to her,then she wouldn't even have caught it.

Both of them continued doing their homework in peace, the incident that brought them together on their minds the whole time.

                                     
***

Rosé was 14 years old when she moved to New Zealand from Australia with her family. She wasn't one who cared a lot about what strangers thought about her but she was a tad bit worried about whether she was gonna fit in at her new school, with kids her age all around her.

"Don't worry too much, okay? Just be friendly and smile. They'll love you." Rosé's sister, Alice, reassured her when she dropped her off.

As she stepped into the threshold of the unfamiliar school, a lot of curious eyes scanned her over, scrutinizing the newcomer. Rosé felt a bit uncomfortable with all the attention but she pushed through it and went to the office.

The lady at the desk was extremely nice and helped her sort out her timetable and even insisted on accompanying Rosé to her locker, but Rosé, being the ever-polite girl she was, gently refused.

The eyes on her didn't cease as she was walking to her locker in the hallways and neither when she entered her first class of the day, English.

She sat in a seat at the far back corner of the class so as to draw as less attention to herself as possible. She also hoped and prayed that the seat she took didn't belong to another student. Gosh, that'd be an awkward situation.

She let out a sigh of relief when the teacher finally came in and started preparing for the lesson. She was also glad that she didn't have to go up to the front of the class and introduce herself to everyone. The teacher, Mr. Silver, acknowledged her with a slight nod and that was it.

Just as Rosé made to take her books out of her bag, a loud bang sound was heard and Rosé looked up to see a girl with straight black hair hunched over on her back, breathing raggedly with her hands on her knees.

"I'm not late!" She almost wheezes.

Just then, the final bell rang and she gestured to it as if saying 'See? told you so'.

Rosé liked her already.

Mr. Silver gave her a good natured laugh and told her to go sit down.

Rosé quickly busied herself in arranging her books and other necessities on the desk. Out of her peripheral vision, she saw the girl moving in the general direction of where she was sitting and was almost certain that she'd have to move from her current spot because this was the girl's seat. However, she strut over and sat down at the desk right next to Rosé.

Rosé could sense her questioning gaze but she focused all of her attention on the lesson. She half expected the girl to start asking questions or at least introduce herself but that never happened. Rosé hated to admit it but she was quite disappointed as she was hoping to make a friend in the girl.

When the class ended, the girl was the first one out the door and Rosé was left feeling confused and a bit discouraged.

As she was walking out, a bubbly looking girl with blonde hair and a sunshine-y smile approached her and introduced herself as Lisa.

Lisa helped Rosé to her next class which also happened to be Lisa's next class too. She was extremely talkative and helpful and Rosé was really glad to have found such a nice person so quickly.

As it turned out, the mystery girl also happened to be in the same class. And as fate would have it, the only empty seat in the class was next to her.

Lisa accompanied Rosé to the seat and to her surprise, started conversing with the girl.

"Hey Jen! Why were you late? And its only the first day. You overslept again, didn't you?" Lisa said, playfully smacking the girl, Jen's, shoulder. I wondered if it was short for something.

"Shut up, Manoban. I was just up doing some light reading. Preparing for school and all." Jen says. Lisa snorted at that.

"Pfft yeah right. Light reading? Did you spend all night finishing the last few hundred pages of the holiday book report we're supposed to give in today." Lisa said with a smug grin.

"......maybe."

"What am I gonna do with you, Jennie Kim." Oh. So it was short for something.

Jennie was giving Lisa the puppy eyes and Lisa seemed to be having a hard time contemplating whether to help her friend or not.

"Ugh fiiiiine. You can read mine if you want. Just don't copy everything alright?" Lisa said with an over-exaggerated sigh.

"Really?! Thanks Lisa! My superhero." Jennie said with an adorable gummy smile and Rosé had to bite back a smile of my own.

"Yeah yeah whatever. God, the things I do for you. Anyway, I'll see you later." Lisa quickly said as the teacher walked in.

"Bye Rosé." She smiled at her before leaving and Jennie cast a look at her but didn't say anything this time as well.

The rest of the day went a bit like that. Lisa was really nice and she was super funny. She made Rosé feel at ease in the new atmosphere. Apparently, Lisa and Jennie were best friends and they all had the same classes together.

Even though it looked like the three of them were in a sort of group, it was more like Lisa was the mutual friend who talked to both of them but Jennie and Rosé didn't talk to each other. Rosé was worried that Jennie didn't like her all that much. It didn't help that they both sat next to each other in every one of their classes. It seemed Jennie didn't like sitting next to other kids but was forced to do so as there were no other seats left.

Though her first day was moderately better than she thought it'd be, she was still disappointed by her interaction, or lack thereof, with Jennie.

That night, she went to sleep with a hopeful heart that the next day would be a bit better.

Meanwhile, Jennie lay awake in her own bed, thinking about the gorgeous new girl. Involuntarily, her eyes drifted off to the inside of her wrist, where the first words of her soulmate to her were written.

'Your eyes are stunning.' It read. She thought for a brief moment about Rosé being her soulmate, but immediately let go of that thought, deeming it ridiculous and almost pathetic to think about.

She let out a big sigh and promised herself that she'd stop being a coward and actually make an effort to get to know the new girl tomorrow.

Jennie found herself running to school like a maniac the next day. She overslept again because she spent a good part of the previous night thinking about how to start a conversation with Rosé.

She made it to school with about five minutes to spare, thankfully.

Lisa was leaning against her locker when she came and she raised an eyebrow at Jennie's mess of a self but didn't comment on it.

"Hey, why didn't you speak to Rosé yesterday? I know you're weird around strangers but I promise, she's like the nicest person you'll ever meet." Lisa told her.

"Yeah I'm planning on talking to her today. I mean, have you seen how pretty she is? I'd have made a complete fool of myself if I tried talking to her yesterday." Jennie told her while taking her books out of her locker.

They started walking to class together and talked about what exactly Jennie was going to say to Rosé when she sees her again.

When they entered the classroom, most of the kids, including Rosé, were present. Jennie slowly walked behind Lisa as she made her way to Rosé's seat.

"Hello Rosé! You good?" Lisa asked in her usual cheerful tone while Jennie sat down beside Rosé.

"I'm perfect! How about you?"

They made small talk until the teacher came and Lisa left, leaving the two alone while the teacher started the class.

She assigned the students a work to do in pairs. Normally, Jennie and Lisa would immediately partner up but this time, Jennie saw that Lisa had already got herself a partner. She sent a subtle wink Jennie's way and Jennie knew all too well what it meant.

She turned back to Rosé to find that she was very intently staring at her. They locked eyes and Jennie was almost blown away by how intense Rosé's stare was. She had no choice but to stare back. Then suddenly, Rosé spoke up and Jennie almost went into cardiac arrest.

"Your eyes are stunning!" Rosé exclaimed. Jennie was at a loss of what to say and a hundred different thoughts were running through her mind. She started opening and closing like a fish then figured that she should at least say something.

"You have ink on your face!" She blurted out in a moment of panic.

It was Rosé's turn to become shocked and Jennie could've sworn that she heard a slight gasp come out of .

They both stared at each other with equal amounts of shock and surprise on their faces and then after a few moments, both burst out laughing at the same time.

They got a few curious looks from their classmates so they tried to stifle their laughter and opted for light giggles.

"Thank you. You have beautiful eyes too, just for the record." Jennie said, slightly out of breath.

"Yeah? Thanks. Do I really have ink on my face?" Rosé asked, wiping tears out of her eyes.

"Yeah, here. Let me get it for you." Jennie said while taking her handkerchief out.

"You own a handkerchief?" Rosé said with an amused smile on her face.

Jennie chuckled and gently clutched Rosé's chin and titled it a bit sideways so she could wipe the ink on her cheek.

"Oh yeah. It's a funny story. One time in third grade, Lisa got a C on one of her tests and she started crying. She cried so hard that there were snot and tears and who knows whatnot on her face. Afterwards she asked me for a handkerchief and I said I didn't have one. Then she yelled at me about being a bad friend and I've always carried a handkerchief with me ever since." Jennie finished wiping Rosé's cheek and let go of her chin.

Rosé seemed fully enthralled by Jennie's story, her eyes shone like she was getting an early Christmas gift.

"That's so adorable!" Rosé gushed and Jennie bashfully smiled at her.

After that incident, they both became the best of friends and including Lisa, the trio became inseparable.