#i've never latched onto the soulmate AU but i am obsessed with it in the context of the twins for whatever reason

[applesontheground]

burn down to me 🕯️

@aggravatetheaxe gave me feelings with his “vincent is three” post and i translated those feelings into another soulmate au thingy. blame jack for making me unable to write this AU as the horror story it probably should be and making it all soft again because vincent deserves to be loved as he is for fuck’s sake.

also i always try to keep reader’s appearance as neutral as possible but for this fic i imply multiple times that they have longer hair!

SFW | Word Count: 2,233 | Vincent Sinclair x GN Reader

contains: canon typical, soulmate AU (one person’s scars show up on the other)

🎼: x

The art was reaching out, lunging into your chest, and holding the thumping organ that it found gently against your ribcage. Captivated by you and captivating you all the same. The imagery of still life and broken expressions depicted within the slew of paintings on the walls were resonating in a way you couldn’t even put into the hand gestures that you often resorted to over spoken word. If you let yourself stare too long, loving every curve and color that you found with an intensity you were struggling to keep in control of, you might just start to cry.

Deep down, you were sensitive; almost as sensitive as the swirls of scar tissue covering the left side of your face, shrouded in the curtain of your [y/h/c] hair.

You weren’t ashamed of how you looked – the left side of your face caught fire with this violent twist and pull of raw tendon and scarring beyond anything that could even remotely be prepared to resemble the other side of your head – but everyone sure wanted you to be. You could do without the stares that you often found yourself under, always with the look of scorn or pain rather than something softer, which maybe was to blame about how beside yourself you now were as an adult. It was hard to be anything but when not only you a good portion of your most crucial vessel of expression covered – but it had taken the better half of your voice, as well.

The only thing that kept you so empathetic was knowing that they were given to you by someone you were connected to – in one way or another. At least, that was what your parents often told you when you went to them that lost expression, wanting some kind of answer about what to do with the “gift” you had been given.

You love it, [Y/N], the words from your father echoed in your head. You love it as you would love them. Them being the “soul mate” that you weren’t even sure you wanted to meet. Just because you were considered incomplete didn’t mean you were in the reality of it all. You felt as though you had managed thus far without the need for the confines of such a strong companionship, marred or unmarred, or whatever the hell they called it just to get you to keep to yourself again.

A scoff of rubber against the floor made you turn your head, staring with your better eye. There wasn’t a single moving body besides you, your friends having long left you to the confines of the wax museum. They had easily grown tired watching you circling the floor with your recognizable, respectful fascination. This hadn’t been why you were here, after all. Back at the wash out in the road that had been the sole sign to welcome your party in, your car was still sitting with a flat. That could only get you so far, and you guys knew you would need help from whatever lay in this little forgotten part of the forest that had given way to a lick of civilization if you were to keep on your way.

They had all seen enough after a skim through of the main level, telling you to catch up with them at the nearby gas station when you were finished. You couldn’t explain the emotion that came over you to see them leave, shutting the heavy door behind them and closing you in the dim light of what the signs had advertised as Trudy’s House of Wax.

Was it fear?

No, you couldn’t say that was what this pounding in your chest was. You were still enamored with everything you had found in your solitude, maybe even more so without the company keeping you aware of your own movements and desires that worked against their flow. You couldn’t help but to notice the dust that settled on every stroke of molding in the wax-made figures and against the grain of the paintings, the two most prominent mediums in here. You were still trying to fathom the fact that even the floors were coated in a matte gloss of wax, wondering how deep this artform had seeped into the cracks of the place. You also fawned over how nearly everything was kissed with the name of the artist on most pieces in little corners and flat backsides, only caught by an unrelenting gaze should they go searching. Vincent, Vincent, Vincent...

Another shift in your good eye’s peripheral made you falter again, and this time you turned around completely, trying to listen closely, even moving your hair out of the way. You didn’t see much out of the left eye, but by God would you try. You strained for another long pause, but instead simply found the gust of a curtain rather than another presence.

Was it love?

...Love was such a strong word, you mused in the confines of your head as your eyes traced back along the walls of the ballroom, finding yourself stepping towards an old-fashioned sofa with two wax bodies falling onto it. They were caught in a frozen moment of affection, the man’s hands reaching out but not quite touching the woman’s sides as she was well sunken into the cushions and welcoming him to join her. You circled it calmly, taking in a whole new set of detail and artistry with a curious tip of your neck.

A rasping breath falling over the silence made you snap upright, and a rush of shock gripped you as quick as the sound had hit your ears. Even if that would be the last disturbance while you were there, you were beginning to believe that you weren’t alone. Your eyes darted around again, unsure if the sound had come from the statue itself now. You dumbly stared at the two people in disbelief, wanting to hold onto the assurance that it had just been something your mind had thought up to adjust to staring at hands that never touched and faces that never twitched.

The next time you let your eye drag away from the scene, there was a body standing right over you. The sharp unsheathing of metal made you stumble back, a hollow gasp that became a groan of shock on the back end as you darted away, turning to size up the very real man standing inches away from your face. You had half believed this wasn’t the case at first; the unrelenting expression on a mask plastered to his face had fooled you for half a moment. You caught sight of his real skin, and his real left eye, underneath the shell. There was nothing on the right side besides a deep, dark socket -- almost unnatural with the way it sat behind a few stray strands of long, jet black hair.

His arm had reeled back when you’d spotted him, possibly to lunge, but the wavering stance was becoming rigid as he took in your terrified expression. The half that moved, that was. He stifled a noise underneath the wax, and before you could try to sign or speak to him, he was advancing again with powerful strides. You didn’t even get a chance to back away or turn to run as the hand that didn’t hold the weapon clasped around your wrist, pulling abruptly and ignoring the way your feet refused to lift to his force, skidding over the lumpy surface of the floor. Moving you by sheer tugs of your arm, you were almost up against him in seconds, breathing heavy and whimpering noises of discomfort.

His hand flew not to your face, but his for a half second. It brushed the cheekbone of the wax skin, frozen right under his eye before it could go any further. You watched with a shaking gaze of your own, trying to thrash in the grip he had on your wrist. You bore into each other’s bewildered stares, and his hand fell away from the mask to come to your shoulder. You immediately groaned in fear again, trying to roll out of it but unable to go anywhere with the way his hands held you. So tense, so rigid -- but his fingertips were raised to avoid sinking nails into your flesh.

He wasn’t hurting you. The knife had been long returned to the sheath as his eye ran over every sharp curve and scarlet color of your face. You blinked away a wave of tears, and when you moved to duck your head down finally in recognition to how he stared, he was suddenly clasping the wax around his face again, this time carefully pulling it from where it had been embedded into a spot just before his ears. You froze as it fell away, seeing how he gripped it around the bridge of the nose, index and thumb hooked through the eye sockets, showing it as a vacant shell giving way to the man before you.

“O-oh…” The word fell from your stiff vocal cords, but you could care less how it sounded. You could now see his true face, the one that showed a very human, very honest expression of terror. It was like looking in a mirror, his one eye glassy as he fought the salty waves that were threatening to spill over, ready to join yours at the drop of a hat. As if you could’ve missed it, he brushed his long dark hair away from the other side of his face, revealing familiar scar tissue. It made your hands fall to your sides as you mouthed the words, trying to speak despite the pain from your throat. “It’s…it’s you.”

Fingers were gently ghosting over the side of your neck, warm and sending nerves up and down your spine. Knowing where they were tracing up towards, you forced out a grunt of warning. Don’t. It wasn’t a scary sound, but he still flinched. You shook your head, not caring that these were scars given by him to you. You still didn’t want him touching them. Anyone that tried to got that noise out of you, and the hard stare that he also wasn’t being spared from.

Instead, his hand lifted to your head, stroking down the length of your hair, still watching you with a demanding expression and an admiring deep blue hue in his eye. You weren’t comforted, but finally stopped glaring and sighed, doing your best to catch your racing heart.

He just couldn’t help himself, instead choosing the unscathed part of your face. His thumb traced under your eye, smudging the few tears he found away and gently moving to hold the side of your face in another attempt to soothe. His mouth was moving, not speaking the three words aloud but ingraining them into something you could recognize from a lipread of a repeated pattern.

I love you, I love you, I love you...

Your lip started to quiver, shaking your head at first. His hand went over your head again, fingers now letting themselves push into your roots and feel it on a deeper level while he rose his eyebrows and nodded at you. There was a sickening sense of a rushing intimacy to it, like he was only saying it because he knew what it meant to share such a marred appearance, and he wanted it to be mutual. You looked down at the mask again, realizing there was a different outlook along with a different response to each other’s unwavering stares.

He was covering them. You couldn’t care enough to do so, except for sometimes let your hair fall over it when the attention it garnered became too much.

He cleared his throat, scratchy and pained, and you were about to tell him not to but he did it anyways. “...Love you.” He hummed. Your breath hitched, but the stubbornness couldn’t compare when he gave you that nervous frown, breathing deep to try and stay calm, as if you held his very heart in your hands.

You crept up to him, chin finally sliding over his shoulder while your arms carefully pulled around his torso. You didn’t feel like you could return such a strong display, but you knew how it felt to feel like you were always going to endure the lone road ahead. Even if something happened after this, whether you work with it or try to escape it, in this moment you two were connected. You could manage to hold the poor guy, because with the sharp edges and absconding masks, he seemed like he needed it.

He sniffed, hands holding the back of your head as he let himself press flush against your body, the same strength that was impossible to escape but cradling your form like you’d break if he didn’t stay aware of every breath and every twitch under his hands. Warmth was blanketing you, emanating from the broad chest and the warm wool of his sweater while he leaned into the embrace, and you just might’ve kept your composure if he hadn’t whispered it again. “Love you. I always have.”

A pang in your stomach made you finally suck in a breath, and let out a broken whimper into his shoulder, grip around him growing as tight as you could muster.

Such a strong word indeed.