The Signs of Love

Chapter 1/1

"Thanks, but I'm okay. I just hate when people use the soulmate thing as an excuse, you know."

"She turned you down, huh?" his mother said, as she walked into the kitchen, settling several bags of groceries down on the counter. "Sorry, sweetie."

"She said it was because I wasn't her soulmate. Her tattoo is a line of Japanese kanji," he explained to his mother and Ryan. "But she kissed Robbie Mackers and he definitely doesn't speak Japanese, so he can't be her soulmate either."

"You're just upset because your tattoo is just a bunch of squiggles," Jackie said, as she pranced into the room, and stole a bag of Doritos from the bag their mother just set down.

"It's not a bunch of squiggles," he argued, turning to glare at his sister.

She just shrugged before handing the bag to Crystal who rolled her eyes and said, "fine, dots and squiggles."

His mother held her hand palm up towards the twins, and raised an eyebrow. They reluctantly relinquished the bag of Doritos to her.

"No eating until supper, and leave your brother alone," she said to them, shooing them out of the kitchen. "I know your tattoo is a bit unique, but I promise when you meet your soulmate, you will figure it out. It'll all make sense then."

Spencer thought his mother was still full of crap, until Ryan said, "Maybe you already have figured it out."

"I have?" he said, snatching Ryan's empty can of Pepsi, and placing it in the bag for recyclables. Ryan always had a hard time finding it.

"You said Terri's tattoo is Japanese kanji, right? So, it stands to reason that the first words her soulmate will say to her are in Japanese. Maybe the first thing your soulmate says to you will be in a different language too."

"A language made up of dots and arrows and squiggles?" he said, rolling his eyes because he knew Ryan couldn't see it. His tattoo was a single black dot, followed by four vertical black dots squished together in a neat row with a dot on top that was slightly offset from the others and an arrow that curved and pointed in towards his arm. Following that weird ass symbol were five spread out dots almost in an arc, except the first one of the far left was too far below the others to complete an arc. There was an arrow curving in a circular clockwise direction superimposed over it. Below that, there five dots were squished together. The last symbol was two dots touching each other with two arrows that curved upwards on either side, like a smile. In other words, it made absolutely no sense, and he was pretty sure no language in the history of ever looked like that.

"You never know," Ryan said with a shrug.

"Yeah, sure."

"Oh, my baby. You're only 14, you've got nothing to worry about yet," his mother said, kissing his cheek before he could pull away.

"Ugh, mom, really?" Spencer said, rubbing the remnant of his mother's kiss off his cheek. "Do you have to do that? And I'm not a baby."

"I gave birth to you mister. You will always be my baby," she said. When his mother caught Ryan snickering behind her, she ruffled Ryan's hair and kissed his cheek as well. "And you, I may not have given birth to you, but I have the adoption papers that say you're mine forever."

Ryan offered a shy smile, his cheeks flushing like every time their mother reminded him he was just as much her child as Spencer, Jackie and Crystal. It always reminded Spencer how lucky he was to have his parents, and how grateful he was they adopted Ryan after the car accident that caused Ryan's blindness and killed his mother, a direct result of his biological father's drunk driving. His mother caught his fond smile, so Spencer stuck his tongue out of her.