Chapter Text
As soon as George’s plane touched the ground, they were texting non-stop. Spending a whole week basically attached at the hip made it very difficult for them to go without the other’s presence for a long time. They’d have to get used to that.
Once George had gotten in the taxi back home, Clay had called him to make sure he got home safely, but of course, he hadn’t hung up as soon as George walked through the front door. They talked about everything and nothing while George unpacked his bags, laughing with each other. George was obsessed, but it seemed like Clay was too.
“Oh my god, George! Look at this adorable kitten! She’s at my local animal shelter, and she’s up for adoption.”
George picked up his phone and checked the photo that Clay had sent him. “She really is cute! I bet she’ll get adopted really fast.”
There was a panicked noise from the other end of the phone before Clay said, “You’re right, George! I have to act now!”
“What?”
Lots of shuffling and one yelp later when Clay stubbed his toe in his haste, Clay answered George. “I’m going to adopt her right now. I can’t have anyone else snatch her up before I can.”
George simply sighed with a smile, used to Clay’s impulsive decisions.
Of course, Clay stayed on call with him the entire way, excitedly chattering about his new soon-to-be kitten while George finished unpacking. As soon as he was done, he relaxed on his bed, watching as Clay turned his video on, smiling widely as he walked through the front door of the animal shelter, immediately making a beeline to the beautiful kitten.
“Hi there, cutie!” Clay cooed, making kissy noises as he wiggled his fingers in front of her face. “Do you want to come home with me?”
“Okay, now it really feels like you’re replacing me with a cat,” George quipped, a “fake” pout on his face.
“Awww, don’t be jealous, Georgie. I could never replace you.” Clay winked at the camera before reaching into the pen and picking up the kitten gingerly. He booped their noses together and grinned when the kitten started purring. “George, help, I love her! I think I’m going to name you Patches, sweet girl.”
Clay took the kitten with him to the counter and asked to adopt her. While he was waiting, he picked out some toys, cute cat clothes, and costumes to put on her, giggling when he thought about what she would look like.
George smiled to himself, finding Clay’s excitement terribly endearing. He knew Clay would not slack off in the pet department at all. He would love and cherish Patches so wholly that she would never doubt how much he cared for her.
Just like with him.
Well, to be fair, George had been quite dense and had not correctly interpreted Clay’s affections, but that was all the more reason for him to know just how perfect of a cat-dad Clay would be.
He got to watch Clay take Patches to his house and get her accustomed to her new home. Not wanting to scare her away, Clay held her close to his chest and walked her around each room, taking slow steps so she could curiously take in everything with flitting eyes. Once she was calm enough, he set her down and let her explore on her own, following a ways behind to make sure she didn’t get into any trouble.
Patches eventually tuckered herself out, so Clay picked her back up and settled into the couch in the living room, laying her on his chest close to his heartbeat as he talked in a hushed voice to George, scared to wake her up.
George couldn’t help but just watch him fondly.
Yeah. This was definitely the man he fell for.
Eventually, they had to part ways, George nodding off every couple of minutes from the jetlag. Clay said goodbye with a sloppy kiss to his phone camera, making George snort. They had already made plans to play Minecraft the next day anyway, so they wouldn’t be apart for long.
***
“Clay, stop! Oh my god!”
A wheeze crackled through George’s headphones as he frantically pressed his spacebar, sprint-jumping away from Clay’s Minecraft avatar as fast as he could.
“C’mere, Georgie! You can’t run for long,” Clay sing-songed.
“Get away from me, you menace! You can’t even let me get a single log?”
“All’s fair in love and war, my dear Gog.”
“This is Minecraft !”
“Yeah, and you’re going to lose if you don’t get it together. I’m literally right behind you!” George whipped his character around quickly, frowning when he heard Clay wheeze. “Oh, I totally got you! I’m not behind you, you idiot.”
George sighed in relief, turning back to mining a log before he cried out in surprise, getting hit three times before the screen went red, showing a message that said “You died”. “Clay, what the hell?!”
Clay laughed so hard he almost choked. “I said I wasn’t behind you! What did you expect?”
With a pout, George leaned back in his chair with his arms folded. “You couldn’t have gone even a little easy on me?”
Clay tsked, “Oh, come on now, George. We both know you’ve been playing Minecraft just as long as I have. It wouldn’t make sense for me to go easy on you just because you act all babey.”
George rolled his eyes. “Alright, fine. But I’ll get you next time.”
Clay hummed and George could hear him lean closer to his microphone. “I don’t know. I think next time we should play on the SMP. On stream.”
Thinking for a second, George tentatively agreed. “Alright. But I have some conditions. Number one, we make a house together. Number two, no flirting. And number three, Sapnap and Bad need to join us.”
“You mean I don’t get you all to myself? I thought you loved me.”
George huffed, “See, this is the thing you can’t be doing on stream.”
“This isn’t flirting. We’re friends too. Friends can love each other.”
“We’re literally dating, you moron. Any confession of love towards me is flirting.”
Clay, wanting to get in the last word, spluttered, “Well, you can’t call me Clay! You’ll slip up. I’m Dream now, and you will address me as such.”
“I don’t slip up! I can call you Dream!”
“Prove it.”
After another few minutes or so of arguing, the two men relented, saying goodnight before taking their phones with them to bed so that they could sleep call. It almost felt like that week in December all those months ago. Only this time, they only had stuffed toys to cuddle rather than their partner’s warm body.
***
The next day, they were back online, finding the best time for the both of them to stream so that the rest of their friends could join them.
Clay joined the SMP first, starting his stream and waiting for the notification to go out to his followers. He jumped around the land around where they were planning to build the community center. When people started filling the chat, he greeted them all, DMing George at the same time to get him online and streaming as well. As soon as his followers saw “GeorgeNotFound has joined the game” appear at the bottom of Clay’s screen, they all went wild spamming “George” and “gogy” in the chat.
Clay laughed, saying, “All right, guys, I’ll call him. Maybe we can build something together today.”
George answered after a few rings, yelling, “Dream! Hello!”
Clay responded with the same enthusiasm, “George! Hello!”
They both giggled with each other before getting started with what they really wanted to do. Jumping around and playfully hitting each other, Dream explained to George what his plan was for that stream. Chatting, they started grabbing the resources that they needed. Of course, Dream couldn’t help but push the line of flirting just a little bit.
“Oh, wow, George. You’re getting a lot of wood.”
There was a long silence where Dream could just tell that George was staring unimpressed at his camera.
“That’s because I’m using an axe, Dream. It’s faster that way.”
Dream snorted before deciding to let it be. Once he had a good amount of resources that fit his idea, he started building, explaining to George what exactly he wanted it to look like. They worked together in harmony, sometimes knowing just what the other wanted without speaking.
Eventually, Sapnap joined the server to help them, teasing them about how they worked like an old married couple. Dream had the benefit of streaming without a camera, so he didn’t have to fight his blush. Because that was his plan wasn’t it. His grandpa wanted it, he wanted it, his parents wanted it. If George wanted it, they’d be set.
Instead of saying all that, Dream just laughed, playing up the bit with George for their audience. Of course, Sapnap knew that the two were dating; Clay had told him about what happened immediately after leaving the airport. Sap’s main motive was making George flustered in front of his fans.
By the time they had streamed for almost 3 hours, the community center was finished. The shell at least. They still needed to fill the rest with beds and chests and supplies. Sapnap headed off first, followed by George. Then, Dream said goodbye to his fans before logging off for the night.
He was so happy with how the stream had turned out. It had felt like such a long time since he had seen his old friends after he went off to college, but now that he was streaming, he got to talk to them almost every day. It was almost like a dream come true.
Clay went right to sleep soon after, wishing that he could talk to George for a bit, but the other man had other stuff that he had to do. Maybe the next time they streamed, Dream could turn up the flirting a little bit more. He loved seeing George flustered. It was really great to see how much their fans loved their dynamic together because it gave him an excuse to do more video and stream stuff with George.
He was so, so happy.
***
Clay had a plan. It had been almost a year and a half since he and George had started dating. They had spent Christmas together with George’s family this time, and Clay really loved them. It just emphasized how much he wanted to make everything official. He knew George loved him. They wouldn’t be dating if he didn’t, but Clay was scared that he just loved him more.
He had been planning this for a few months with the help of Sapnap, Karl, and Bad, so Clay knew it would go really well. It was just the timing. Clay and his friends had spent their free time outside of streaming and day-to-day life working on a Minecraft server that would fit what Clay wanted. Everything was set up just how he wanted, and Sapnap was on his way to his house at that moment.
“Hey, man! Are you ready for this?” Sapnap called as soon as he walked through the door.
Clay smiled shakily. “I better be. We’ve been working on this forever. Do you remember the plan?”
Sapnap rolled his eyes. “Yes, dude. You made me run it through with you like… 50 times! I know what I’m doing.”
With an absentminded nod, Clay pulled Sapnap into his office. “Let me just log you on. Don’t do anything stupid. Feel free to raid my fridge or anything like that. I don’t know when I’ll be back, but I’ll keep you updated.”
“Sounds good, bro. See you soon. You can do it!”
Clay gave him a quick nod before grabbing his bag and rushing out the door.
He was about 8 hours into his flight when he got a text from George.
egggrog: hey clay! I just woke up
egggrog: wanna call?
white claystmas: sure! give me a sec
Clay sent a quick text to Sapnap to let him know that the plan was one, telling him to start up the server before calling George.
“Hi, Georgie! Sleep well?”
George hummed. “Yeah, I did. Are you doing okay today?
“Yep!” Clay grinned, popping the ‘p’. “Wanna get on this Minecraft world with me? We can mess around for a while if you want.”
George agreed, and Clay smiled nervously, sending another quick text to Sapnap. They had run through this plenty of times. He could do this.
Sapnap sent Clay the IP address for the server which he passed on to George. When Sapnap gave him the OK, the plan was in motion. Together, Sap and Clay led George around the world slowly. Karl and Bad had helped him add a lot of attractions and fun things they could do together, so Clay wasn’t as worried about the time.
They laughed together as Sapnap and George tried out the archery range (which George completely dominated), the PVP arena (Sapnap had practiced a lot to make it convincing), and a boat race through a forest that Karl had decorated to look like a fairytale. By the time they had finished all the activities Clay had planned, his flight had landed and he was grabbing his luggage.
“Did you have fun, Georgie?”
“Of course I had fun, are you kidding me? How long did it take you to make all that? We should have streamed it. The fans would have gone crazy!” George sounded like he was smiling really wide, and Clay smiled down at his phone fondly as he stepped into a taxi.
He passed the taxi driver a note with the address before continuing. “Well, we could always stream it at a later time. I just wanted you to get the first look at it.”
“That’s sweet of you. So, do you have anything else planned?”
“Yeah, actually I do. There’s one more build I wanted to show you. Follow me!”
The timing had worked out exactly how Clay planned. Sapnap was on top of everything, despite not hearing any of their conversation. He looked out the car window to see that he was only 5 minutes away from George’s house, texting Sapnap quickly.
“You know, I didn’t actually build this myself?”
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I had some help. You know I’m not exactly that great of a builder, but I had a lot of fun landscaping. I had Bad and Karl help me with a lot of the courses. Sapnap had the idea for the PVP arena of course. I think he just wanted to challenge me, but I still like how it turned out.”
“So is the last place you’re taking me another fun activity?”
Clay paused for a moment, fiddling with the small box in his hands. “Well, not really. I thought we could just hang out and chat. I’ve missed you. We haven’t really gotten a chance to hang out just the two of us all casual since we started getting all big.”
Clay could just hear George’s smirk. “Awww, you missed me? That’s so embarrassing for you.” Evidently, Sapnap had gotten them to the build. A gazebo set up in the middle of the forest. Bad had tried to make it as romantic-looking as possible with lights and flowers. “Wait. Clay. What is all this?”
Clay wheezed nervously. “What, you don’t want to get all romantic with me? I thought we were supposed to be in love.” He could just imagine Sapnap shifting and hanging his head in-game, moving away from George and punching at the floor.
“Oh, alright, you big sap. Come and hang out with me under the gazebo.”
The taxi had arrived just outside George’s house. He handed the man a big tip, taking his bags with him as he stepped up to the door.
“George? Can I ask you something?” As the taxi drove away, Clay took the little box out of his pocket and knelt down on the ground outside of the front door.
“Sure, what’s up?”
With a deep breath, Clay rang the doorbell.
“Oh, hold on. My doorbell just rang. Give me one minute.”
Clay heard footsteps make their way up to the door. His heart was pounding loudly in his ears as he watched the doorknob turn. George opened the door, letting out a sharp gasp that echoed through Clay’s headphones.
“George? Will you marry me?”
The man in question opened and closed his mouth like a fish, his hands coming up to his face. When he didn’t answer after a couple of seconds, Clay started to ramble. “The ring was my grandpa’s. It was one of the gifts that he left for me after he passed. If you want a different one, I’ll get you one, don’t worry. I just thought you’d like to formally be accepted into the family this way. With an heirloom. Y’know my grandpa said-”
He was cut off by George pulling him up from the ground and into a sweet kiss. “You’re such an idiot. Of course, I’ll marry you.”
Clay whooped, picking George up and spinning him around before gently putting the ring on his finger. “I love you so much.”
“I love you too,” his fiance murmured back.