People don't always have to like their soul mates, right?
Because that's what happened to Kathryn.
Since she was a kid, Kathryn has always been intrigued of the fact that people already knew who they're going to end up with for the rest of their lives. It was a fact kept in dainty colour-coded folders in the hall of records in every city in the country. Something to be looked up to from time to time just to be sure your proponent match doesn't change.
Life-companion matching dated centuries ago. It was developed by scientists of the new millennia to answer man's greatest dilemma at the time; love. Somehow these funny little scientists have come up with a way on their chemistry sets to determine a person's mating preferences through genes, brainwaves and hormone-secretion. But they did more than that. They also figured out how to track your exact mate that will go with what they call your "love pattern."
From Kathryn's science history class, she found out that long ago, before the terrific discovery of love patterns, her ancestors had so much difficulty finding their partners. They had this funny ritual of 'courtship' where men or women persuades his/her potential lover by giving gifts and dotes only to find out they weren't meant for each other. Because they weren't sure if the one they fell in love with was really the love of their lives, people usually cheated (the idea of infidelity freaked Kathryn out as well as the idea of polygamy). They also had this law about annulment and divorce (which also freaked her as well since marriage is a cul-de-sac and no sane person would want to get away with it). All these ancient problems were punctuated with the discovery of love patterns. Since then, most people have been completely happy with their love lives. Of course not everybody, but she didn't know she'd be one of those discontented ones.
Eleven years old is the first step of the journey people liked to call the "love path." At this age, human body secretes its first hormones which would determine a child's sexual orientation and mating preferences. Kathryn remembered how nervous she was when she showed up in front of the health building along with other eleven-year-olds for the Ticking. Her older siblings Tin, Kaye and Kevin teased her to prepare because there's going to be a written exam about how she wanted her life-companion to look like. Of course it wasn't true. She was only asked to open her mouth as the nurse swabbed a cotton bud on the inside of her cheek, which would be brought for genetic analysis. Then she was asked to lay down naked on a steel bed, which by the way she thought must had little electric currents with the way her skin tingled, and put on a light metal cap that had wires connected to it. It was a little weird for her, but what terrified her the most is the name of her life-companion, if she's ever going to get one.
To be honest, she was afraid she wouldn't get a match. She wasn't exactly the pleasant type like most of the girls she knew. She was never adorable since she was little. She'd resented anything pink, purple and fluffy. And people say she had a way of spitting names instead of saying them. She predicted she'd never get a match and live alone in one of the old maids/bachelors quarters in the city, probably spending the rest of her life trying to create a map of Atlantis (she loves cartography) in between poker games with her good old amigos and amigas. She kept trying to convince herself it was a happy way of living, she'd have a lot of time for herself and her maps, but she couldn't explain the nagging feeling of anxiety and something else that comes with the thought of it.
But all these, including the future map of Atlantis, came to a halt when she was Ticked. Kathryn's going to have a life-companion. She wouldn't live alone. Someone was meant to be with the stupid girl whose passion lies on spring rolls and map-making. And his name was Migo Daniel Ford.
Ever since that day, she had tried to research so much about that Migo Daniel, but to no luck. She would not admit it, but she was kind of obsessed in knowing how he's going to be. For all she knows maybe this Migo Daniel was way older or way younger than her, she didn't mind though, but the thought of dating a guy that's old enough to be her father or too young he's just beginning to toddle kind of repulsed her. If anything, she was hopeful Migo Daniel would be one fine guy, since her siblings came up with decent mates and her mother told her it's a hereditary thing.
