Page 1 of I've Walked Where You've Been
CHAPTER ONE
When Matty was really little, he didn’t think about soulmates. Why would he? Matty knew that they happened to everyone, that one day you’d lock eyes with your soulmate and justbond, a link forming instantaneously that science still struggled to explain. But that never happened to anybody younger than sixteen, and rarely when younger than twenty-five.
Or at least that was what Matty had thought. What most people had thought, actually, until Matty became one of those freak cases that bonded earlier. Earlier than twenty-five, or sixteen, or even ten.
When Matty was nine years old, he locked eyes with a kid as he was crossing the street and felt a bolt of lightning hit him, crashing through his skull and right into his soft and still half-formed soul.
It’d been excruciating. Not because it was painful physically, but because it had been utterly terrifying to feel his mind suddenly stretched beyond the safe limits of his own consciousness, suddenly linked to some stranger on the street.
That was how Matty met Ethan, if ‘meeting’ included glancing at someone and then being tied to them for life.
Those first few hours had been chaos. Despite all the obvious signs—both of them collapsing at the same time, both of them straining against their parents’ arms to try and crawl towards each other so they could touch—nobody really accepted what was going on until the doctor confirmed it.
They weren’t the first case of ‘child bonding’, apparently, but definitely one of a few. There wasn’t much information on the phenomenon, but from what the other cases had shown, the bond was practically identical to the adult version, with the exception of bonding sickness being more severe up to the age of twenty.
That little fact, thrown out there carelessly as if it wouldn’t matter to Matty at all, would have to be explained again and again to him until he fully understood it. Until he fully came to realise that he couldn’t be away from Ethan for more than a few days without touching. That they couldn’t go on holiday, or live in different cities, or choose different universities when the time came.
That Matty was very muchchainedto Ethan, and that trying to escape would only debilitate them till one of them died—or both of them, if they were lucky enough for it to happen at the same time.
Matty had struggled to accept anything at all. It was dizzying, sitting in that doctor’s office, crammed in with both of his parents, and Ethan, and both ofhisparents. Having Ethan crammed into his head—feeling the panic and confusion, thepresenceof him, like something breathing down his neck.
Matty had managed not to cry. Ethan had seemed to barely even try to restrain himself, sitting on his mom’s lap and sniffling into her neck, his hand limp and clammy in Matty’s.
They’d all gone to Ethan’s house after. He wouldn’t know it then, but when he was older and looked back on it, he’d resent that it wasEthan’shouse that they went to. That it was Matty who’d always been one step behind.
Their parents had talked as Matty sat there numbly, grateful that Ethan wasn’t crying anymore, that he wasn’t filling Matty’s head with noise and pain.
He didn’t speak a single word to Ethan that day. Ethan was in his head, after all. What more was there to say?
Although their parents told them they’d have to see each other daily at least for the first couple of months, Matty and Ethan managed to separate. Neither of them said anything, but Matty couldfeelEthan’s discomfort at the idea, like a hand pushing Matty away.
The ride home had been silent, too. It was only when they were home that Matty’s parents sat with him on the couch and let him cry.
“Honey, it’s going to be okay. I know it’s a lot right now. That was scary, huh? We were scared too. But, honey, you just met yourbest friend,” his mom said, stroking his hair.
“He’s not my friend,” Matty grumbled, scrubbing at his face.
“Not now, but he will be. He’s going to be the person you have the most fun with. The person who understands you the best, who loves you more than anybody else. Except us, of course.”
Matty wrinkled his nose at the word ‘love.’
“I don’t want to get married. That’s gross.”
His dad laughed. “You don’t have to get married to him. It might be a friend-bond. If itisa romantic bond, you won’t have to marry him anytime soon, trust me.”
“Not ever,” Matty muttered.
His mom wrapped her arms around him. “You don’t have to worry about that now. Right now, all you have to know is that you met someone who is going to besomuch fun. All that trouble you like getting into? Now you have a partner in crime. Forever.”
Matty looked at his mom, sniffles quieting down.
That didn’t sound so bad. Hedidlike getting into trouble. Notrealtrouble, but finding new things to do, getting messy, going off with friends and exploring a little beyond where their parents told him to stay.
His mom saw the interest in his face at once and laughed. “See? Not so bad. Although if we’re lucky, he can keep yououtof trouble.”
Matty wrinkled his nose. That didn’t sound fun at all.
But if Ethan were someone he could count on? A friend he knew would stay forever?
