#— phantasma. | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

sirhamburrger · 9 days ago

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KINTSUGI (m. bachira x reader)

━☆ (soulmate au, for day four of @phantasmaebg) ━☆ in which you find him when you least expect to. ━☆ wc: 2805 (am i insane for this) || tags/cw: f!reader, reader is lowkey not listening but very much judging, bachira is a stoner confirmed, mentions of substance use (alcohol, drugs), nothing too specific, photog major reader and art major bachira || event m.list ━☆ day five ends in ten minutes... yeah i'm skipping that

there are only two undeniable truths in this world, as far as you know.

number one: everybody has recurring visions of the moment they’ll be the happiest with your soulmate.

it’s always been like this, ever since the beginning of time. cleopatra and marc antony. frida kahlo and diego rivera. johnny cash and june carter. they knew, because it was foretold, written in the stars. the revelations come in daydreams, fantasies, trances, dreams. it’s different for every person, supposedly.

number two: you’ll never find your soulmate.

you’ve long since given up waiting for them. you think you might be a cupioromantic - aka you want a romantic relationship, but have never truly experienced romantic love. not uncommon, but you feel… unlucky, almost.

for the past seventeen years, or for as long as you can remember, you’ve never experienced one of these visions. passing thoughts about guys in your classes, and eyebrows raised when you see a particularly attractive actor on-screen, but none of the euphoria that people say is supposed to accompany it.

middle school and high school was when you felt the most left out of all of it. friends and classmates finding their soulmates left and right, squealing in delight when they happened to catch sight of someone who looked like the people in their dreams.

these truths have held true for you, for seventeen whole years. so understandably, everything comes crashing down when you have your first dream about him. you dream it the night after, too, and on the nights that follow.

it’s always the same. the two of you are on some sort of grassy knoll; his hair is mussed, deep brown and bright yellow mixing, as he stares up at you from where his head lies in your lap. late afternoon sunlight spilling across his features, he looks like a veritable work of art, an angel. he opens his mouth, but no sound comes out -

you wake up.

sitting bolt upright in your bed, you deflate in disappointment.

you don’t stop thinking about him on the walk from your dorm to your first class of the day. they’re the same questions from a week ago - is he your age? older? where is he from? if you know what he looks like in your dreams, why does your mind go blank when you wake up?

and most importantly: does he dream about you every night, just as you dream about him?

you don’t know if you can say for sure if you love someone just by dreaming about them, but you will anyway. because you already know you love him, wherever and whenever he might exist.

you might never find him, because you don’t even remember what he looked like in your head. and for this, you feel broken.

---

meguru feels her again tonight, when he's blackout drunk at a gatsby-esque party hosted by rin itoshi so he can get the attention of a girl in his psychology class. the couch he lays on is pristine, but probably won’t be for much longer.

he does not dream; if he does, he forgets it. visions of his soulmate, his other half - they come only when he’s out of it, only when he’s drunk, or high, or depressed.

and it is always the same.

it’s the feeling of soft warmth on his face, like gentle sunlight. a soft, calming chuckle. light touches on his hair, brushing his locks out of his face. it’s the feeling of being adored and cherished.

it’s the feeling of being loved.

he’s fairly sure he hasn’t known it before.

meguru dimly registers isagi calling out to him. yelling something about yet another round of beer pong. with that, he stumbles towards his friends and the promise of more alcohol, because he’s too drunk and full of an inexplicable euphoria to deal with this right now.

---

your first class of the day is portraiture 302 with professor anri teieri.

you flash a tiny smile at your classmate shidou, too tired for anything else. setting your things down at an empty seat, you pull your laptop out as people start to trickle in.

it’s still starting up when someone sits down in the seat next to you.

“hey,” he says cheerfully. a bit too cheerful for your taste, seeing as it’s eight-thirty in the morning. “all the other seats are taken, so.”

“sure,” you mumble, jamming your thumb into the space bar repeatedly as if it’ll speed things up. you feel his eyes on you, silently judging, maybe, and look up -

oh.

he’s one of rensuke kunigami’s friends. even within the friend group he might be considered an oddity; not all that forward like isagi, or as flirty as chigiri, or as gentlemanly as kunigami. he’s just… there.

he’s a real character, too, or so you’ve heard. famously wild at rin itoshi’s parties, though the version of him you see at present seems much more subdued. he plays soccer for the university, and he’s an art major.

and honestly? he makes you a little uncomfortable. not bad-looking, but there’s a scary depth in his eyes that makes you think he’s seen more than he should, knows more than anyone else does.

in short: you think meguru bachira is a weirdo.

which begs the question: why is he even here taking this module, since he’s not one of your photography coursemates?

“- peers from the art department will be joining us for the next two months as we study composition and portraiture in greater depth -”

okay, well, that doesn’t mean you have to talk to him -

“- pair up with someone from a different major for your graded project -”

still, doesn’t have to be him -

“- these are your assigned pairings. try not to get on each other’s bad side.”

and you don’t even have to look at the projector screen to know the cruel fate the universe has bestowed upon you; all you do is notice bachira’s pleased reaction.

he starts, “i’m looking forward to working with you -”

“okay,” you say bluntly, turning your attention back to your laptop. you feel a little bad for the way his smile fades slightly when you cut him off, but you’re not about to apologise.

at the end of the lecture, he hands you a slip of paper with his number on it, tells you you can text him if you want to work on the project. his voice sounds small, and you feel a strange pang in your chest as you watch him go.

---

lately your dreams have been shifting, changing.

no longer are they impressionist paintings of quiet moments spent together in mother nature - they are pop art, abstract-expressionist, surrealist. which, quite ironically, are terms that bachira would use.

lingering touches in dimly-lit party venues. stolen kisses in secluded corridors. the high of alcohol and weed and who knows what else - they coagulate into a single stream of thoughts that have you seeing bright colours behind your eyes. though, they always return to the very first dream you had of him.

you wonder, is bachira’s party animal stoner personality rubbing off on your subconscious mind?

in any case, you're currently keeping your interactions with him to a minimum. you talk for no more than one hour a week, then go your separate ways once more.

the project itself is deceptively simple: create a likeness of your partner in any form you want. and you plan to do well on it. right lighting, right composition, right everything - and bob’s your uncle.

but bachira can’t seem to get a grip. you’ve come to realise he’s flaky, fickle-minded. it’s like his thoughts are bouncing off the inside of his skull like a pinball machine.

all his drawings and paintings bear a resemblance to you; charcoal captures your hair, acrylic your features. but when he’s finished he always insists they don’t look right, like something’s missing. and strangely enough, you find yourself agreeing with him.

you feel like with those scarily knowing eyes, bachira truly sees through you and into you. like takeichi does to yozo oba in osamu dazai’s no longer human. except bachira isn’t nearly as unattractive.

because with each dream you have of your soulmate, details of meguru bachira start to creep in. hands, slender but still larger than yours. the shape of his lips, perfect and pink.

the euphoria just makes it all so much worse.

so now you wonder if your fate with your soulmate is to be kissed up against a wall, drunk, until you are breathless.

---

meguru doesn’t understand why she’s doing her damndest to avoid him. it’s not like he’s done anything particularly wrong, at least not to her face. sure, he’s been a little much at times. but he’s been nothing but nice to her.

so why the cold shoulder, then? why the stiff smiles and the distant glances?

he doesn’t understand, but then again, he’s not sure he understands anything anymore. ever since his dreams have changed for the first time in ten years, he’s been walking around in a haze, trying to balance the his waking life with the dreamlike euphoria that drips from the edges of his consciousness.

every vision he sees starts to feel more and more like her. and when he looks at her - really looks at her - he starts to feel as if maybe, just maybe, he knows her better than anyone else.

but that thought scares him too much to admit, so instead, he swallows it down and pushes it to the back of his mind. better to focus on what’s in front of him. better to focus on the work that still doesn’t feel quite right.

one night, after a particularly frustrating session in the studio, he finds himself alone with her, just the two of the under the dim lights. his fingers grip his paintbrush, so hard he thinks it might snap.

“you’re avoiding me,” he says finally, point-blank. “why?”

she shrugs, but he notices her stiffen in her seat. “it’s not like that.”

“not like what?” he presses. “you’re trying to keep your distance, and i get it. i’m not... i’m not normal. i know that.”

she blinks hard. swallows.

he watches her, waiting for a response, and the tension between them grows thicker, more charged with every passing second. finally, she manages to speak, though her voice trembles slightly.

“i don’t know what you want from me.”

“i don’t want anything from you,” meguru murmurs. “i just… i don’t want to keep pretending i don’t feel something strange. i’ve been seeing things lately, and i -”

“don’t drag me into your delusions, bachira,” she snaps.

he sees her cold exterior fracture for a second, and he knows. he knows that she knows. his breath hitches in his throat, his eyes never leaving hers.

“maybe you should stop pretending you don’t know exactly what’s happening.”

it’s terrifying.

meguru doesn’t understand why she’s avoiding him, but maybe that’s okay. because in this moment, with the air thick with unspoken truths and something more between the two of them, she doesn't need to understand. not yet.

---

on sunday afternoon, bachira brings you to a local park two cities away. it’s where he used to go whenever he was bored, he tells you. he had very few friends growing up.

it’s beautiful, you admit. the perfect place for the photoshoot.

you make him lean on the only tree on the hill for half an hour, before deciding the photo doesn’t feel quite right. with a pang of shame, you realise that’s what bachira means when he says the art doesn’t feel right, like there’s something missing.

because no photo will ever be able to capture bachira’s beauty.

facing towards the setting sun with the little houses in the background? the photo’s too empty. staring right into the camera lens? a little creepy. finally, after a long time of unsuccessful attempts, you slump against the tree, resting in the shade.

“sorry,” you mumble. “just doesn’t feel right.”

“yeah, i get that.” he sits down on the soft grass next to you, and you smell the tea tree shampoo in his hair. “just happens sometimes.”

the silence is nice and comfortable for once, but then you go and spoil it all by saying something stupid like -

“i’m sorry i’ve been avoiding you.”

meguru’s eyes flick to you, the sincerity in your voice making something inside him tighten. he tilts his head slightly, studying you in a way that makes you feel like he’s reading between the lines of everything you’ve said and haven’t.

“it’s okay,” he says softly, like he’s trying to reassure himself as much as you. “i guess… i don’t blame you. i can be a lot sometimes.”

you shake your head quickly, catching his gaze. “no, that’s not it. it’s just…” you trail off, unsure how to voice the weight of everything that’s been pressing on your chest. the dreams. the confusion. the feeling that something inside you has shifted, and you don’t know how to adjust.

“i’ve just been… scared,” you admit, wanting to cringe at how vulnerable you sound. “i don’t even know what’s going on with me. it’s like everything i thought i knew is just… fading.”

meguru watches you quietly, his gaze unwavering. there’s a softness there that you haven’t seen before. the usual carefree grin is gone, replaced by something deeper - something that makes you feel like he’s truly hearing every word you don’t say.

“i get it,” he murmurs. “sometimes the things you don’t want to face, they catch up to you.”

you glance up at him, surprised. “you do?”

“yeah.” he reaches a hand out, his fingers brushing against yours in the gentlest way possible, and to your own surprise, you don’t jerk your hand away. “sometimes you don’t even know what you’re running from until you stop.”

you swallow the lump in your throat. “okay.”

without thinking, you push yourself up from the tree and take a few steps back, your heart suddenly beating faster than before. it’s not just the project anymore - it’s something more.

meguru stands up, his movements fluid, as though he’s been waiting for this moment too. “what are you doing?” he asks, but there’s an edge to his voice now, an unspoken question that mirrors your own confusion.

“come here,” you say before you can stop yourself, your words shaky but firm.

he doesn’t hesitate. in two strides, he’s in front of you, his eyes searching yours for some kind of answer.

and then finally, you do what feels as natural as breathing.

you let your hands rest on his shoulders and guide him to sit back down on the grass. without a word, you slip into the same position as the dream you’ve had over and over again - the same moment that’s haunted you for countless nights -

his head in your lap, sunlight spilling over his face, the world hushed and peaceful around you.

he doesn’t speak. he just watches you with an intensity that makes your breath catch. his lips part slightly, but no sound comes out, and for the briefest moment, it feels like you’re back in the dream, like you’re both somewhere else entirely.

it’s only when you feel the softest weight of his hand on yours that you snap back to reality. he’s holding onto you now, fingers threading through yours, and his gaze is softer than it’s ever been.

“this… feels right,” he says, his voice barely a whisper.

“yeah. it does.”

the sunlight is fading fast now, the sky painted with dusky shades of pink and orange. his hair is mussed, deep brown and bright yellow mixing, as he stares up at you from where his head lies in your lap.

you fumble for your phone, snap a quick photo of the scene with your shaky hands and almost sob -

because you know for certain, now, that this is the dream you had, and it’s about your soulmate, meguru bachira.

because here, in this stillness, you realize that maybe - just maybe - you weren’t running from him after all.

because maybe you’ve always been running toward this moment, even before you knew it existed.

meguru lifts his head from your lap, his eyes searching yours, and for the first time in a long while, you don’t feel lost. not here. not with him. his lips move, forming a question you can’t quite hear. but you don’t need to. not anymore.

you lean down slightly and kiss him, and everything you’ve been trying to understand falls into place. amidst the salt of your tears he tastes sweet, like the dreams, the euphoria, the love you thought you’d never have.

his golden eyes are powdered gold dusted onto the lacquer that fills the cracks in your fragile heart. kintsugi.

and for once, you feel complete.