Chapter Text
He hasn't been this bad in a long time, George realizes distantly.
He's been sitting at his desk for hours, staring at the document in front of him. Unable to bring himself to type something, anything, to fill up the empty space.
His vision blurs as his eyes unfocus, and his mind wanders, idle.
When Sapnap bursts through his door, he startles, instinctively closing the blank document in shame.
"What's up dude? You look kinda upset." Sapnap squints at George, scrutinizing him.
“Nothing, nothing,” George says, attempting to wave away his concern. “Just a project I need to do.”
“Oh, how long have you been at it? I bet you need a study break.”
“Not that long…” George trails off as he actually looks at the clock, registering the time. He’s really spent two and a half fucking hours staring at that document? “I really need to get this done, sorry. Maybe we could hang out another time?”
“No worries,” Sapnap tells him. “Just don’t overwork yourself, buddy.”
As Sapnap exits, George huffs out a sigh and reopens the abandoned document. Where can he even start? George types, reads, deletes it. Starts to type, deletes it. Thinks of something to write, and violently shakes the thought from his head. Why can’t he do this?
Tears begin to prick at George’s eyes and he’s silently thankful that his roommate is always at his partner's room. He wraps his arms around himself, pressing his fingers into the fabric of his hoodie in an attempt to ground himself.
“Just a few paragraphs for today.” George whispers aloud. “Just get through that. You can do it.”
He repeats the previous cycle, typing and erasing, typing and erasing, until he’s left with a few bland, impersonal paragraphs that reveal nothing under the surface level. Nothing that the professor actually wants. His skin crawls with his discomfort, but at least there are words on the page. At least he can say he’s started the project.
It’s 2 AM. George has a morning class today.
He deletes the document.
--
It’s 7:55, George had pressed snooze a few too many times, and was now running late to class. No time to grab coffee then. Glancing mournfully at the Coffee Bean on the corner, George continues his journey to his Programming class.
By his calculations, he would arrive just as class started, since the professor usually walked in around 2 minutes late and took a couple more minutes to set up her lecture. He can afford to slow his speed walk to a more casual stoll, afford himself time to think after a sleepless night.
Maybe I need to take a different approach to the assignment, George mused. Would it be easier for him to just push away all of his walls and boundaries, to pour all of his angst and hurt onto a page? To hold nothing back, shove away his anxieties, and turn in a document filled with his uncensored past?
The thought makes him shiver. No. He’d never allow himself to bare his soul like that. George sighs. Back to the drawing board.
By the time he walks in, the professor is almost done setting up and he grabs a seat next to Dream. Sapnap, who sits on Dream’s other side, waves and smiles at him.
“You’re late,” Dream notes, passing him a cup of coffee. “Sapnap said that you had a late night.”
George nods, taking the cup gratefully. “Just working on an assignment.” he affirms.
“I hope you like your drink.” Dream says. “I wasn’t sure how you usually take it, so I just made it the same way I make mine.”
George takes a tentative sip, careful not to burn his tongue. It’s a bit sweeter than he usually makes it, but it’s still good. “It’s good,” he assures Dream. “Thank you.”
Dream smiles at his words, cupping his own drink to warm his hands. “I’m glad you like it.”
The rest of the class passes mostly uneventfully. George jots down a couple of notes, and Sapnap is occupied with a plugin he’s trying to code. Dream is pages deep into articles about the YouTube algorithm.
George’s fingers tap against the desk repetitively, and when Dream glances over, he pushes his palm against the table, flattening his hand. He didn’t mean to annoy his friend.
Instead of questioning him or asking him to stop, Dream pulls a fidget cube out of his bag, fiddling with the buttons for a moment before handing it to George. “Here,” he whispers. “I always keep one on me.”
George’s eyes crinkle as he smiles at Dream, taking the cube from his outstretched palm and thanking him. He’s never had a friendship like this, where people never demanded anything from him, where they knew him without having to say a word or ask questions. Where they bring him coffee and allow him to borrow their belongings. George revels in the newness, the unfamiliar feeling.
A voice in the back of his mind asks how long it will take for George to screw it up.
--
They’re hanging out on stream again, Dream speedrunning Minecraft while George and Sapnap lurk on Discord and shout out suggestions. The chat is speeding by, excited by their presence. Some of the donos are bold, flirting with Dream, and George brushes away his irrational jealousy.
He’s caught off guard when Dream says offhandedly, “George, why don’t you stream? You have a great personality, and I know that people would watch you.”
George swallows, acutely aware of the thousands of people watching now. “It seems like it takes a lot of dedication,” he says carefully. “I don’t really have that kind of time right now.”
“Okay,” Dream shrugs, continuing the stream like normal.
This is what George appreciates about him. He never got hung up on things when George made an obvious attempt to dodge a question, he let George tell him on his own time.
He lets the flow of the stream take over him, laughing with Sapnap and Dream, throwing in a witty comment or two. At some point, Dream stops speedrunning and they all log into a survival server together.
George is watching Dream and Sapnap fight with stone tools, laughing at Sapnap’s cries of fear. Dream taunts him, and George rolls his eyes, mining some nearby stone. He’s in his own little world, and he jumps when Dream is suddenly behind him, having already killed Sapnap.
Instead of killing him mercilessly like George expects, Dream wordlessly offers him a blue flower, crouching and jumping excitedly when George picks it up. He looks over at his second monitor, where Dream’s stream is playing on mute. Dream is farming awws. Instead of speaking aloud, George just types into the in-game chat.
ty
*kisses gently*
“What?!” George yells into their Discord call. Dream is wheezing, too busy to answer. “Oh my god, what is wrong with you Dream?”
George’s face is on fire, and he lifts his hands to his face to hide.
“Chat, stop calling me a simp.” Dream attempts to say through his laughter. “Guys, I’m not a simp. Watch, see!” Dream jumps, hitting George with his axe. “Listen guys, if I kill him, you can’t call me that.” Critting George one last time, he sees his avatar drop to the ground, still holding the cornflower.
George’s face is still burning. How does this always happen? he wonders.
--
Dream enters George's room through his window, and George almost has a heart attack.
"Holy shit, what the fuck," he swears frantically, rubbing his eyes as if the boy in his window was a hallucination. "How did you…?"
Dream chuckles, swinging the rest of his body through the frame with ease. "Just wanted to keep you on your toes."
"I live on the third floor!"
"And?" George splutters as Dream wheezes, taking a cheap wine cooler from his bag. "Drink with me?" He asks cheekily. "I'm trying to forget my tragedies."
George rolls his eyes, takes the proffered beverage hesitantly. "You’re an idiot, Dream.” he says fondly, examining the glass. He doesn’t usually drink, but would Dream ever lead him astray? He takes a small sip, cringing at the taste, and Dream grins at him.
“I know.”
---
Hours later, they're leaning against each other lazily on George's bed, drunkenly talking about nothing in particular.
"Tell me about your other friends," Dream says suddenly. "I want to know what my competition is."
"No competition." George tells him immediately. "You already win."
"Oh, come on," the younger boy scoffs. "You've known them for years, haven't you? There's got to be some competition."
"They're not really my friends." George admits quietly, alcohol making his tongue loose. "I never really had those. My brother always called them my 'coworkers' or ‘acquaintances’ or whatever. Just because I'm so impersonal with people. I'm actually so bad at making friends."
It hurt, looking back on it. The implication that no one cared about him, the idea that he was so unlikable that he couldn’t even make real friends, the thought that all he did was bide his time with people as a distraction.
It's silent for a moment, and George’s words rush out, like a river flowing through a broken dam, turbulent and unsteady. “I’m not even sure that I know how to make friends. I don’t remember the last time I opened up to anyone. I don’t know how you’re different.”
"That sounds lonely." Dream says comfortingly, rubbing soothing circles into George’s back. He doesn’t know how they got here but they’re closely intertwined, legs tangling together and George’s back is pressed against Dream’s chest.
"It is," George confesses, "I don't know how to describe it really, but I just feel so cold and empty all the time." He takes a breath, thinking. "You help, though. You and Sapnap."
"We help?"
"You warm me up. Make me feel… fuller, somehow." Not as numb, George says internally.
Dream doesn't say anything, just looks into George's watery eyes.
"This is just so foreign to me," he hears himself telling Dream. "I'm not-- I've never opened up to anyone before. I don't tell people my personal shit."
Dream rests a comforting hand on George's shoulder. "You don't have to say anything you don't want to," he says, soothing. "Don't feel the need to stress yourself out."
"I don't want to burden you."
"George. Listen to me when I say this: you will never be a burden." Dream hooks a finger under George's chin, forcing him to look him in the eye. "Let me lighten your load."
George almost starts crying. "Not now," he chokes out. "Not when I'm like this."
Dream nods understanding, pulls him close. "Whenever you're ready."
True to his word, Dream doesn't ask, doesn't pry. He knows that George will tell him when he's ready.
---
George is mortified. Beyond mortified, even. Humiliated. How had he let his years of putting up walls, of not letting anything slip, go to waste so easily? He finds some minute comfort in the fact that he hadn’t let any real information slip last night, just his feelings. He can deal with that.
Over the next week, George distances himself from everyone. He turns off his phone and mutes his discord. He’s never in his room when people stop by to check on him. He keeps skipping his programming class. All the while, his psychology assignment torments him.
He throws himself into other work, desperate to keep himself busy. He’s weeks ahead in most of his classes. He hyperfixates on things that interest him for days at a time. He hasn’t shaved. And, in moments of weakness, he watches Dream’s streams.
God, I’m lonely, George thinks to himself. He’s been hanging around Dream and Sapnap for so long that he’s forgotten what it had been like before he met them.
He shivers, clutches the blanket tighter around him. He’s been spending most of his time in a secluded nook of the library, a place where few care to explore. He’s slept there a couple of times, when he’d been too exhausted to travel back to his own room. At least in the library, he knows he won’t be bothered. It’s plenty warm, but George always shivers.
He misses the sensation of not being cold.