And just like that the two boys grew up. Emery didn’t exist without Samir and Samir without Emery. Every one in the town knew it, and it was so rare to find one of the two boys without the other that more concern was warranted when they turned up without each other rather than with. There parents certainly never expected just one of them home from school. It was either both of them, or neither of them. Each set of parents doting on the boys like they were their own; each parent ultimately having a stake in raising them. And really no one in the town was surprised by how close they were. Two kids that had tied that young? It was the dream wasn’t it? To get to grow up with your soulmate, experience everything with them? To not have to spend years waiting and wondering and worrying. To know they’d always been with you. It was certainly all any of the adults talked about around the two boys.

So the pages kept turning in their story. One day, they were seven and swinging from the monkey bars and running around the park, parents watching from a distance grins on their faces. Emery fearlessly leading them forward into adventure. The next, they were charging headlong into the woods, parents no longer watching them as closely as they once had, trusting the two boys to keep each other safe. And wherever Emery lead, Samir was sure to follow. It was always, Emery who moved forward first, who proposed some crazy idea. It was always Emery that got them into to trouble. Like that time Emery had decided to try and jump across a small ravine, nothing too deep, and fallen and broken his wrist. Or the time they’d both been grounded for a week when they’d gone missing for several hours, causing both their parents to freak. It’d been Emery who’d been behind that too, leading them farther away from their houses and causing them to get lost. And for every bit of trouble Emery got them into, Samir always got them out. Kept them safe.

It was clear exactly why’d they’d tied. To everyone who looked at them, it was clear the two boys balanced each other. The idea soulmate match. The stuff of storybooks. At least that’s how it seemed.

And it was those storybook stories that Emery learned to love more and more as he got older. His childish delight in them never subsiding in his heart. The stories of soulmates defying the odds to be together. Or finding each other in the perfect moment when they needed each other most. The prince saving his princess, or vice versa, and then discovering they’d been tied all along. Sometimes, Emery even imagined a storybook of their own. Two little boys who one day brushed against each other, and grew up to take on the world together, the red thread always dangling between them.

Of course, they were living the perfect love story weren’t they? That’s what Emery kept hearing. Every where they went, every new person who learned they’d tied so young. That it was so amazing that it’d happen. That they were so lucky. And well, Emery didn’t see any reason not to believe them, because every moment with Samir was absolutely amazing. That warm, bubbling, overflowing warmth field his whole body, making every touch and moment more. And honestly, as they got older, Emery couldn’t wait for whatever future they’d get to take on together.