jasper fairchild did not believe in soulmates.

not due to any embittered philosophy, or the fact that his childhood trauma read like a soap opera plotline—dead angel of a mother, deadbeat father who wanted nothing to do with him or his sister, rugby-induced ptsd—but because he thought the whole idea was statistically improbable.

he believed in good dogs, navy henleys, and getting through shit one stupid, monotonous day at a time. he had a good, high-paying job at twenty-five, so clearly his priorities and pragmatism worked themselves out.

today, he believed in none of those things. IKEA had sent the wrong screws.

his half-assembled oak coffee table sat at the center of his living room like a corporeal insult, flanked by wood panels and an allen key that had been hurled across the floor roughly seven minutes ago. beside it, his chubby golden retriever puppy, pablo, was cheerfully gnawing on a rogue table leg, blissfully unaware of his crimes.

jasper dragged a hand through the unruly swathes of his earth-brown hair—which hung messily over his eyes—exhaled like a war veteran, and muttered something in swedish that was definitely not real swedish. he heard the door click open, which was the only reason he did not crumple the instruction manual in hand and risk a papercut.

you.

coming back from work, smelling like fresh air and the last remnants of summer, and smiling at the literal chaos zone of his apartment.

“don’t,” jasper warned flatly, not even looking up as he tightened the wrong bolt with the wrong implement, for what felt like the fortieth time in two hours. his biceps flexed under the cling of worn navy cotton, shamelessly betraying the calm of his tone. “if you make a joke about this fucking table i will genuinely walk into traffic.”

pablo barked happily and immediately abandoned the table leg to rush you like you’d been gone a century, wagging his entire body like a furry metronome at your feet, vying to be scooped up. he smelled faintly like his owner's cologne (probably due to attempting to destroy jasper's pillows, before dozing off) and something floral. what a cutie.

jasper sat back, brushing sawdust and dispair off his palms with a sense of finality, and finally met your gaze—his expression unreadable, except for the exasperation that hung just under it. “…hi,” he added, a beat too late. if you were waiting for some emotional sonnet or grand romantic gesture, you were barking up the wrong, mildly traumatised, six-foot-four tree.

you weren’t together, not officially. well, you were, but it's not as if you had updated all your socials to place his name in your biography—what were you, a overdependent, delusional teenager? you'd gotten into a petty argument the day before, and the furrow to his brow made it evident that he still was not over it.

“i’ll fix it,” he grimaced, the freckles on his nose creasing as he nodded at the sad-looking remains of the gutted coffee table. you were dying to make a silly comment about it. “and i’ll… stop being an asshole. eventually.” pablo sneezed, and jasper shot the canine an affectionate scowl. “he says i’m lying.”