Tori Vega lived in a world hued blue and grey. She always had, as far back as she could remember. She was okay with it, happy with it even. She was still young, she had all the time in the world to meet her soulmate. Most didn't meet theirs until later in life, anyway. Her parents hadn't met until they were almost thirty. She had time.

She had grown up with stories of people meeting their soulmates, their hands brushing and their vision exploding with colour. She'd fantasised about it since she could understand the concept; how one day she'd bump into the man she was destined to spend her life with and everything would fall into place. She'd see the world in the way she was supposed to. The thought of it excited her, it always had. She liked the idea that there was someone in the world who was made for her, and only her.

She never dreamt the day she met her soulmates would be the first day at a new school. On her first day at Hollywood Arts, something felt off; like the stars were out of position or something terrible was going to happen to her. She'd expected to feel nervous butterflies, maybe a little bit nauseous, not utter existential dread.

She walked through the front door of the building, and the feeling intensified in her abdomen, pain blooming just below her sternum. She told herself it was just stress. This wasn't a regular high school. The place was filled to the brim with other kids bursting with talent. And she was just Tori. She knew she could sing, but she would bet money that so could every person she passed on the way to her sister's locker. They could probably act and dance and play an instrument and write songs and books and scripts. She couldn't do any of that. She was just Tori.

She entered her Improv classroom, her heart beating in her throat. A few people already sat on the chairs scattered around the small room but paid her no attention. New people must have come and gone here a lot. That was showbiz, right?

She took several deep breaths to calm her nerves and turned around to look at the clock. But, instead, she bumped into someone, perhaps the most attractive boy she'd ever laid eyes on, and spilled his coffee all over his pristinely white t-shirt.

"I am so sorry!" she said, using the sleeve of her own shirt to try to clean it, but it only made it worse. The boy pointed this out. He smiled at her warmly, though, and something more pleasant flipped in her stomach. They hadn't touched skin-to-skin yet, but she prayed she'd see in colour when they did.

The pair shared a laugh as girl, a few inches taller than Tori, barged through the door, and almost angry expression on her face.

"Dude! Why are you rubbing my boyfriend?" she demanded, her voice coming across like a bark. She glared between Tori and the boy, something mischievous in her eye. Tori stared at her for a few seconds, taken by her beauty. As much as Tori would have liked it, it did not seem they were going to get to know one another.

"Oh… I- I spilled coffee on-" she started, stumbling over her words. She barely knew the girl and she was already intimidated by her. She was cut off.

"Get away from him."

"Relax," the boy said, walking over to his girlfriend and planting a kiss on her cheek, a hand on each of her arms.

Before Tori could utter another word of apology, the homeless man she had gifted two dollars in the parking lot burst into the room, shouting something about a huge fire. The twelve or so students in the classroom scrambled for the various exits, panic ambling from their lips.

"Kidding! Kidding!" he yelled over the hysteria, stifling a laugh at the redheaded girl, Cat, whom Tori had met in the hallway's piercing scream. "Just wanted to get your blood pumping, which I did!?" He started the lesson and introduced Tori to the rest of the class, her face pink and waving awkwardly. She could only pray her other teachers weren't like this.

She sat down next to a boy with dreads, Andre, and the class continued. Sikowitz introduced her to the practice of improvisation and the girlfriend, Jade, was made team captain of the first group to participate.

"Cat, Eli, Beck," Jade said, pointing to each classmate as she called their name. That same look of devilment glinted in her eyes. "And… Tori."

Her. Tori. her heart leaped to her throat and then shot down to her stomach. She thought she might throw up. She'd learned of improv not even two minutes ago, and she had to perform a scene. She sat for another few seconds, hoping the other girl had made a mistake, or there was another Tori in their class. There wasn't. She was being thrust into this.

They were given the place of home and the situation of big news. Tori had no experience with this, so she obediently agreed to Jade's suggestion of her starting the scene in the hallway. The classroom door shut behind her and she almost bolted for it to get out of this. Maybe she wasn't cut out for this; she should just go back to Sherwood and continue with her biology experiment. She didn't have to perform for peers there.

She didn't hear the start of the scene, all sound muffled by the heavy fire door between her and the rest of her class, but knew to be offended when Jade introduced her as the new family dog. She woofed, then was reprimanded for standing upright and speaking. Real dogs don't say, "yup, I'm the new dog!"

She dropped to her knees, tears already rising in her eyes; both from embarrassment and the ever-growing pain in her abdomen. She feared her appendix was about to burst. She raised her hand to ask to go to the nurse, but Jade grabbed it and shoved it back to the ground.

Suddenly, the once monotone classroom burst into a technicolour she had never seen before. An audible gasp escaped her mouth when her eyes fell upon the girl who had caused it. Her blue-green eyes and her pale skin, her brown hair streaked with navy and purple and blonde. Her completely black outfit, save or the blood-red Doc Martens. But she didn't seem fazed. Tori's eyes moved from her to around the classroom, the crimson draped behind the chairs and the multicoloured chairs scattered around the room. The ache in her stomach lifted.

Just as fast as it happened, it was over. Her soulmate let go of her wrist and her hand slammed to the floor. Tori didn't listen to the rest of the scene, only woofing when she was sure there was a silence. She stared at the clock above the door, counting down the seconds until she could leave the class and cry in the bathrooms on the phone to her mother.

A shock of iced coffee cascading over her head pulled her out of her trance. She stood up and, without instruction, her legs carried her into the hallway to the entrance hall, where she collapsed on the stairs and openly cried. She hated this. Nothing about this was fair. Coffee dripped from her hair and smudged her makeup and she'd made a complete tit of herself in front of her class on the first day at a new school. There was no way she'd ever be able to show her face here again. She'd have to move to Maine to lose the talks.

This wasn't how she was supposed to meet her girlfriend, either. They were supposed to bump into one another in the street and he'd be tall and handsome. Her soulmate wasn't supposed to be a girl; a mean, horrible, beautiful girl. They were only fifteen, too. They were too young. This was all too much for Tori.

Jade's reaction, or lack thereof, hurt the most. The blank, almost uncaring expression burned holes in Tori's eyes, flickering as she blinked back tears. The other girl didn't care; was unbothered she'd just discovered her soulmate. This didn't matter to her, and it broke Tori's heart.

Andre appeared around the corner less than thirty seconds later and sat on the steps next to her. "What are you doing?"

"I'm calling my mom to come and get me," she said, her tone soft and cracking. She pulled her drenched hair from her eyes and sighed. "And to re-enrol me in my old school."

He pulled her phone from her hands and stuffed into his back pocket, then began his way back to the classroom.

"Hey! Give me back my phone!"

"You're just gonna quit on your first day because of one mean girl?" the boy asked rhetorically, shaking his head.

"You don't get it," she said, ripping her phone from his hand. "Now, if you excuse me,"

Before Andre could respond to her, the boy with the puppet ran up to them, panting, and asked them back to class. Andre promised they'd be back in a second, and then Cat came out.

"Sikowitz really wants you guys back in class!" the small girl said with much urgency.

The four of them argued for a few moments, only to be interrupted by Jade sauntering into view, a smug smirk plastered onto her perfectly proportioned face. "If you people don't get back to class, out whack-job teacher might explode."

Andre, Cat and Robbie walked towards the classroom, walking ahead of the two other girls.

"Why did you freak out when I grabbed you?" the mean girl asked, not at all concerned, but almost confused.

"You didn't see it?" Tori asked, her tone accusatory. Jade had to be bluffing. Of course, she saw it. There was no way she didn't. Every person had one soulmate, and they were theirs. And only theirs. She had to have seen it.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Jade said, definite confusion laced in her voice and on her face this time.

"You're lying."

"I am not a liar. I don't know what you're talking about!"

"The colour! You're telling me you didn't see the colour?"

Jade took a step away from Tori, her confusion morphing to horror. She shook her head, her eye flitting to the ceiling. She mumbled something the other girl couldn't hear under her breath before looking to her again, her face like stone.

"I am not your soulmate. Beck is my soulmate. I don't know who you are and what's going on in your life, but this isn't real. You're not my soulmate and you're not mine. This isn't how it works," she said, her voice low but dangerous. "Now, get the hell out of my school."

Tori squeaked, her head nodding frantically as she stumbled backwards until she was pressed flat against the doors of the school. Her breathing only slowed to normal when the other girl disappeared around the corner and into the classroom. She slipped outside and called her mom to come to get her. She was never coming back.