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what was the point?
it was a question sapnap had been asking himself all too often lately.
in the beginning, it was just another intrusive thought. it would pop into his head every few weeks when he saw george and dream kiss each other, but dissipate when they turned to kiss him, too. sapnap knew they loved him, too.
but like all intrusive thoughts, the more he tries not to think about it, the more he does.
he thinks it when neither of them ask about him when he goes quiet during their recordings. He thinks it when there’s not enough eggs at breakfast, so george gives his to dream. he thinks it when he rolls out of their cuddle-tangle at night and they don’t even notice.
what was the point of being in a relationship with two other people, when they barely notice he’s there?
at first, sapnap tried to reason with himself. they loved him, too, even if they didn’t show it like they did with each other. but as time wore on, he started believing himself less and less.
if he had to recall it, the final straw might have been when he locked himself in the guest room all day, just to satisfy a sick part of him that wanted to see what they would do.
apparently it was nothing. no knocks, one text from dream, and nothing else.
sapnap tried to pretend it didn’t hurt. the next day, he pretended nothing had happened. when confronted by george, he laughed and made a joke about being sick so he could see george’s face scrunch as he scoots away. it was a vague excuse, but believable enough.
he used that same excuse to lock himself away for another week. dream and george would text him every once in a while and bring up plates of food, but otherwise left him alone.
in the time that he was isolated, he started thinking a lot more than he would have liked to.
he thought about how his boyfriends went on a date together while he was, allegedly, sick as fuck.
he thought about how he could hear dream and george laughing and flirting in the kitchen while they cooked a meal together, like they had for the entire time he wasn’t there.
he thought about how when he finally mustered up the courage to peek inside their shared bedroom in the middle of the night, they were curled up together, as if there wasn’t an empty spot right next to them.
after that week ends, sapnap finds that the sickness wasn’t just an excuse anymore.
his stomach tightens every time he hears them from across the house. the feeling wasn’t unlike butterflies, but more like an angry hornet’s nest inside of him. he feels bile rise up within his throat often, and vomits after each meal he forces himself to swallow. it hurt a lot.
but it didn’t hurt as much as the time they forgot to bring him a plate.
what was the point? it’s not like they miss him, that much is obvious judging by the guffaws resonating from their personal rooms during each recording. they would be better off without him, they complement one another. even the fans know it, too; that’s why it’s always “dream and george”, and never “dream, george, and sapnap”.
as he throws up, he thinks that it would be easier if he didn’t love them at all.
he throws up again when he realizes that he could never bring himself to stop loving them.
after about two weeks had passed, with piles of half-eaten plates strewn about and suspicious colors staining the sheets (after the times he couldn’t make it to the bathroom or trash can), they finally came to check on him.
“sapnap?” dream’s voice echoes from behind the door as he lightly raps his knuckles against it. “you okay in there? it’s been, like, weeks, dude.”
sapnap can’t muster the strength to get out of bed, so he lets out a raspy groan in response. He hears muffled whispers and the shifting of two pairs of feet, before dream’s voice resounds again, “we’re coming in, okay?”
he probably would have laughed at the looks on their faces as they caught a glimpse of him, if he could.
“shit” is probably a generous way to describe how he looks right now. he saw it in his reflection the last time he looked, the way his skin had gone pale and clung to his bones after days of purging the food it was given. with bloodshot eyes and dark bags hanging below them, sapnap must have looked like death itself to the two.
“jesus christ, sapnap— are you okay?!” george said, stepping forward but almost hesitantly, as if he was afraid that stepping too close would hurt the sickly man.
sapnap let out another groan that tore inside of his tattered throat, closing his eyes. he couldn’t bring himself to look at them, not when they looked so worried and scared. not when he knew he was the one making them feel that way.
it was then that dream snapped out of his shocked daze, stepping forward, too. flies and ants littered the floors, making gross crunch noises as someone stepped on them. sapnap could hear someone make their way to the bathroom and gag before closing the door to it.
a hand pressed itself to his forehead. at the same time, it felt too cold and too hot.
“oh my god,” someone muttered, and it took a while for him to process it as george again. “sapnap, are you— why didn’t you tell us it was this bad? you could have texted us!”
he felt guilty, even though he knew he couldn’t have reached his phone if he tried. it was all the way on the far side of the end table, and sapnap couldn’t even find the strength to roll over, much less reach that far.
the bed dips down behind him, and he finally decides to force his eyes open. dream is next to him, a hand reaching to brush his greasy hair out of his face. his eyes are shining with unshed tears, and when sapnap’s gaze darts to george’s face behind him, he sees the same.
it hurts more to know they’re worried about him than it did when they had forgotten about him.
george leaves for a moment, and sapnap feels heartbroken until he returns with a glass of water. he shakily hands it off to dream, who holds it up to sapnap’s chapped lips.
he’s never tasted anything better, and lets out a whine when dream pulls it away to let him breathe. it gets a small smile and chuckle out of his boyfriend, and the hornets in his stomach turn back into butterflies.
“why didn’t you say anything? we would have helped you.” his voice shakes as he says it, and the butterflies leave as quickly as they came. the air in the room is weighed down by an inexplicable sadness, and so is his heart as a tear falls down george’s face behind dream.
sapnap can’t respond. if he did, it would only hurt his throat further, and he would prefer not to deal with a bloody throat on top of atrophied muscles and starvation. still, he uses all the strength left within him to weakly reach for dream’s hand and smile when both george and dream hold it.
they all break down in sobs after that, and it takes hours before the trio can pull themselves together enough to carry sapnap out of the sickening bedroom and into a bath. while he was ill, he had completely forgotten about hygiene apart from brushing his teeth once or twice, but he knows he probably wouldn’t have been able to wash himself anyway. the feeling of hot water and soap being lathered across his poor body was heavenly, and sapnap had to will himself not to cry just from the feeling.
afterwards, when he was cleaned, they tucked him into their bed and brought him crackers and broth. it was hard to scarf down, especially when you haven’t been able to eat anything without throwing up in days, but easier than a regular meal would have been.
he doesn’t explain that the sickness was, originally, an excuse. what did it matter, anyway, when he had gotten sick from his own envy as a result?
instead, sapnap holds dream and george as tight as he possibly can that night, even though dream snores like a freight train and george eventually has to pull away from the furnace that is three men sharing a bed.
he realizes that they love him as much as they love each other, in the way they kiss him every five minutes the next morning. he sees it in the way dream makes extra eggs for breakfast, and in the way they practically glue themselves to him for the next week.
the intrusive thoughts don’t go away instantly. he finds himself falling back into episodes when dream and george aren’t there to pull him back, but with time, it becomes easier to pull himself back.
he knows there’s a point in it all when he sees dream’s hair frame his face like a halo, and george’s smile crinkle the corners of his eyes.
he knows there’s a point in it all, and he knows he is loved.
so sapnap stops asking questions and loves them right back.