Work Text:
It was a cool day in early October, George remembers, when he was working as a receptionist and a guy came through the door who caught his attention like a moth to a lightbulb. There were plenty of guys who came through his workplace, all of which George never looked twice at on any given day, but this guy was somehow a little bit more unusual. This guy had a shirt that looked like someone glued it onto him and a mouth with just enough mystery to make him more than just a pretty face, and he came into the dentist’s office George worked one quiet Thursday afternoon.
So George put down his cold coffee and got straight to business. Not business as in, well... He did his job.
“Hello, sir,” he said, hoping the awful white neon lights didn't wash him out too badly after his day at work so far, “Do you have an appointment?”
“Uh, yeah,” he said with a distinctly American accent, “It’s at four-thirty, under ‘Dream’.”
“Dream,” George repeated, making a show of going through the list like he was a bouncer to a club or something, anything, more exciting than being a receptionist. “Yep, here you are. Would you like to take a seat? I’ll just check you in with Dr. Watson and she should be out shortly.”
The guy, Dream, nodded and said his thank-yous, but George couldn't help but notice how tightly he was gripping his bag as he went through to the waiting room. Whatever, it wasn't his job to get nosey with other people’s business, even if he did look apprehensive. He just needed to finish work and get the bus, then the other bus, to his evening class.
Speaking of which, as a self-proclaimed ‘bisexual disaster’, he’d almost opted out of going to the third week of his evening art classes, even if they were expensive, due to the fact that they were sketching live models. Live nudemodels.
Dr. Watson came out a couple of minutes later, and through the doorway to the waiting room, George could see the man pick himself up and follow her into the consultation, letting the soft-close door slide to after him. He might not be nervous at all about the appointment, George couldn't help but think as he turned back to his work, but maybe just something else was on his mind. It wasn't his place to wonder.
The office was quiet at that time of the day, with the majority of people booking their appointments either immediately before their nine-to-fives or during their varied lunch breaks, which just left George with the latter end of the shift. There was no sun coming through the windows, as the golden hour light was obscured by the other buildings around them, all tall and imposing, some a few hundred years old. Such was the trouble with London – buildings, people, cars and trains all struggled to exist in the same ever-changing city, scattering pigeons at the slightest wrong move and inconveniencing office workers when doing the right ones. It was a bit like ballet, some days, with the dance and precise movements it took to get on the tube. Other days it was more like wrestling. George didn't particularly like either, which is why he purposely volunteered for the later shift at the office, getting out of there at around seven every evening that he worked, which was late enough to avoid most of the stressed-out commuters.
So he waited, typed a little, organised some cells in Excel, and thought about the man’s – Dream’s – arms a little bit too much.
And speaking of the man, he came from the waiting room looking no more relaxed than before, but did seem to carry himself a bit more easily, with his shoulders down and strides long (or as long as they could be inside).
“Hello,” George said again, turning away from the document he wasn't paying attention to anyway, “are you all done then?”
“Yep, I am. Just a check-up for right now.”
“Good, good. Would you like to book another check-up now for six-month’s time?”
“Uhm,” the guy seemed to pause, “I need to book one for sooner. Dr. Watson has said that you have a slot this time next week?”
The guy (George had to keep reminding himself not to call him by his first name. He tended to get attached too quickly) bit his lip as George checked the system, pulling up the Excel document with all of their dates and times on it, and as he had said, Dr. Watson was free.
“Yep, we do have one for then. Would you like to book it?”
“Please.”
“And what exactly is the procedure? We need to know so that we don't over book, unfortunately.”
“It’s fine, it’s, um.” The guy went from one foot to the other, “For a filling.”
“That’s all good then,” George made a show of clicking his extra-clicky mouse a few times for added effect, before he turned and smiled at Dream, “So next Thursday at 5.30pm. I’ll just need to take your phone number since we don't have it on file, and we’ll message you again with the date.”
He rattled off a string of numbers, which George typed into the system with a practiced movement that suggested he was used to receiving the numbers a bit too quickly, and then the guy did something unexpected.
“If you want,” he said carefully, “you can message me for non-dental inquiries.”
George turned and looked at him, but he saw nothing ingenuine in the other man’s eyes. He blinked, and without looking away, he fumbled for a notepad. He scribbled down a string of numbers, ones that differed from the phone number on the system, and ripped the page out.
“Technically it’s illegal for me to contact you privately using a number I got from you at work,” George said as he pushed the piece of paper over the counter, “but it’s alright if I do this. You’ll have to contact me first, though.”
The guy swallowed heavily and picked up the piece of paper, folding it before he put it into his pocket.
“Thank you,” he said, with a slight, charming smile, “have a good day.”
“You too.”
As soon as the door closed behind him, George wiped his hands on his trousers frantically. He just hoped the piece of paper avoided the sweat more than his trouser legs did.
When Dr. Watson and the rest of the staff handed over the keys to the cleaner for the night shift, George didn't hesitate in leaving her to it, packing up his water bottle, favourite pen, and draping his coat over his bag before he left to catch the first bus of the evening – his tin of charcoals rubbing against his leg as constant reminder of what was in store for him later that evening.
So he took the bus, wiped his sweaty hands against his jeans, listened to ‘Black and Blue’ by Chase and Status a few too many times, and struggled to get the knot out of his headphones, before he got off the bus and waited for the next one, admiring the sunset as he stood with a group of other commuters who had congregated around the bus stop’s sign like moths. He twitched as the song faded out and the opening melody to ‘All These Things that I’ve Done’ came on instead. Everything was moving around him, with people brushing past to get further down the busy road and others going in and out of the city centre’s buildings, cars going past at ten-miles an hour due to the traffic. He could see the bus over yonder, stuck behind an Audi, and everyone else waited intently for it to arrive.
He was in a hurry too, but ultimately he was just going to have to get there when he got there.
He skipped ‘Poker Face’, and ‘Boulevard of Broken Dreams’, before settling on ‘I am your skin’ by The Bravery, watching the sky go darker without the usual colours, which were too obscured by the high buildings to be seen. The next bus came, and he managed to shove his way in early enough to get a seat, so the journey wasn't so bad, even if the person next to him did have some pretty bad hygiene issues. Having a seat cancelled it all off, and eventually as they reached the other end of the bus line, the buildings stopped being so high and the pavement started to contain some greenery again. The sky had just turned to twilight as he stepped off the bus and into the desolate half-suburban street that marked the first part of his walk. He wore his coat now, the ends of it weighed down with his hands stuffed into the pockets, and his phone held in his palm, grounding him.
It reminded him a little of what Daniel must have felt when he was thrown into the lion’s den – like a damn fool, but at least a brave one at that.
His phone didn't buzz for the entire trip, but the night was still young yet. There was time, plenty of it.
Still, he arrived on time to his evening class and in sort-of good spirits, having enough time to grab a cup of coffee from the big thermos near the door before finding his usual seat in the group. There were around ten of them total, talking as they waited for the instructor to come in and brief them on what they would be doing that session – as if they needed a reminder – and George took the time to set up his pad of paper and charcoals on the easel.
“Are you looking forward to this?” George couldn't help but ask Prisha, who sat next to him at her own workstation, pulling gouache from her satchel.
She looked over at him in a knowing way, the sort of way that he expected she gave to her kids when they were trying not to give something away but were failing horribly at doing so.
“I am,” she said, “It’ll be interesting seeing how skilled I really am at drawing people. Are you?”
No.
“Yeah,” he said, his voice sounding not quite himself, “yeah. Um. it should be cool.”
George snapped up as the instructor entered the room, thankfully alone for the time being, and started talking about the techniques, and beside him Prisha started laying down her gesso for a clean base. Almost to distract himself, George fiddled with a piece of charcoal reserving himself for the mess they would make of his hands later. He’d probably get the dust on his shirt too, he realised. He knew he shouldn't have worn white.
Then the instructor disappeared into the adjacent room, one which was separated from theirs with only a screen, and he produced the first of the people their group would need to draw.
George swallowed.
It was easy to block out the thoughts with the first two models, the first being an older man, perhaps around 40, who was turned completely away from him and was easy to draw because of the softer angles. The second model, a woman who looked like an English teacher and had her dark hair up in a bun, was slightly more difficult due to the pose that the instructor asked her to hold, with her knees drawn up and arms out in front of her. Her elbows in particular were a struggle – wrinkled in a weird way but sharp at the same time.
And while George was able to put aside his usual objections to nudity for the sake of improving his people-drawing skills (which were, by his own admission, rather poor), the last model tested his restraint.
With all life drawings, be it of fruits, animals or people, you need to look at the subject more than your paper, only flicking your gaze back to make sure that your piece of charcoal or pencil or whatever was in the same place you left it. George was fine with that too – getting in the headspace wasn't always easy but once he was in it, it was easy to view the subject as exactly that; a subject. But as the woman donned her robe and left the room, the sound of rustling papers filled the room as they all turned to their next sheet of A3 paper. No one else seemed bothered either, just taking it in stride as they all should. George was no different. He was calm, cool, collected.
And then he stepped through the door.
Light hair, dark eyes, with a figure so cut that George would probably remember him for a long time afterwards, and that was when he still had the robe on. He didn't seem confident, but not exactly shy either, like he was there by his own volition but hadn't asked to be involved, and the slight stoop to his mouth as it curled into a half frown was hypnotic. The instructor told him how to pose – a classic elbow-on-knee like the pose of ‘The Thinker’ – and he disrobed.
Yep. Uh-huh.
That, well, that was something George had too. And he had a thin trail of hair going to– well.
The handsome stranger got onto the stool at a 90-degree angle from George, giving him an almost perfect side profile, with one leg raised to hide his delicacies from the person on the opposite side, and with the leg on his left lowered and sticking out, giving George a better view.
And so, in order to maintain his herd immunity and his dignity, he put his piece of charcoal to the paper and got going.
A swooping line here, a curved rectangle for his torso, the slight definition of his brow, the wonderful straight line of his shins, and the curl of his hair as he blew it out of his face. The impression of him made it onto the paper, and after the outline was done, George refined the details and twisted the charcoal so that he had a more defined edge to draw with.
He was slender, tall, a little on the skinny side if it wasn't for the muscles peeking out under the curve of his lower stomach. The guy was the youngest of the three models so far, maybe around the same age as George himself, but when it came to body types they were hardly alike.
Five, then ten minutes passed, and the instructor called for them to stop while the guy put his robe back on. Without another glance, the handsome stranger left through the screen, looking like he had just faced one of his greatest fears and came out on top, but before George could think anything of it, the next model came through the door.
She was older, pretty nondescript, but he had some trouble with her shoulder since it was moved in a weird way from his perspective, and being able to move on from someone easy to draw (and easy on the eyes) to someone much harder was a good distraction from the whirlpool of ‘oh god that guy was attractive’ thoughts.
Eventually, the class came to a close. They received some critique of their work (George's was too smudge-y, which, yeah, it was charcoal), then the class packed, said their goodbyes, and scattered in whichever way they took to get back home. George, alone, walked back to the bus stop.
He stopped short.
It was the guy.
Mr handsome himself, but now he could connect the body to the face. He was at his workplace earlier, and now here, modelling. Dream.
Huh.
He shifted from one foot to the other, biting his lip and looking at the guy as he slouched on the bench at the bus stop, looking in the other direction to the way George was coming from.
It was the kind of scene you’d see in an Edward Hopper painting – a solitary figure under the streetlamp, looking away from the observer with tall hedges behind him, enclosed on all sides by off-coloured darkness. Lonely, it screamed, but the guy didn't look like he was debating something internally, more so that he was just between two places, hanging on until he got to his destination. In wait.
Feet stuttering, George picked up his walk again and kept moving towards the bus stop, because regardless of how handsome the stranger (model? He might just call him a model, since it felt weird to call someone a stranger when he’d seen them naked, and it still felt odd to call him Dream when he didn't know George’s name) was sitting.
The model only moved to look at him as he took a seat, leaving a gap big enough for two people between them. His charcoal-stained hands gripped the straps of his bag tight enough for the fabric to imbed its weave into his fingers.
His eyes were much more piercing when they were turned directly to George, he realised. It was so easy being an observer that he hadn't realised how exposed he felt in that glance, being observed for a mere moment.
“Uh,” George said, “hey.”
The model nodded at him, and after a half-second pause said back, “Hi.”
They sat together in silence for a minute or so, listening keenly. The breeze brushed the hedges behind the bus shelter, rustling the leaves together and filling the space quite nicely.
“Wait,” the model said, “you’re. Fuck, I don't know your name. The receptionist.”
Awkwardly, George chuckled, “Yeah. That’s me. Um, I’m George.”
“George,” Dream said, sounding pleased to put a name to a face, and George was just pleased to hear his name come out of the other man’s mouth. The way he said it was just so different from the way most British people did, since it morphed and changed its way around the accent.
He really didn't know what to say, and it was fairly obvious that Dream didn't know either, since he bit his lip in the awkward-anxious way he had done back at the dentist’s office. It was… yeah. That was something he wished he could have sketched in better light.
“Sorry, I’m awkward,” he said when he realised he’d been staring, but Dream just laughed in a good-natured sort of way.
“It’s okay,” he said, “what brings you out here?”
“I was at an art class,” George said before he thought better of it, and Dream groaned and put his head into his hands.
“Oh god,” he said, and put his hands through his hair, “was it the one I went to?”
George debated for a moment, but the blush tinting his cheeks in the half-light was too cute to miss out on.
“Uh-huh.”
He groaned again and his head sunk further, going between his knees. George couldn't help but laugh a little too, watching the other man fold in on himself like that, but then Dream looked at him again. If his cheeks were not so red, he might have looked a little intimidating, maybe even slightly coveting, but his eyes still held that awkward, shy look from earlier when they’d exchanged numbers.
Before Dream could say anything though, George felt the need to be abrupt.
“Are you going to ask me if I at least liked what I saw?”
Dream closed his mouth. George laughed a little.
“Okay, yeah, I was.”
They sat in silence for a moment. A car went past on the other side of the road, and the city in the distance was lit up in splotches of yellow against navy blue. If George hadn't known that they were buildings, the whole thing would have been like the cover to a bad sci-fi novel from the 60s, with a mundane setting with alien spacecrafts on the horizon, just out of reach. As it was, though, he and Dream were just trying to find something to say which wouldn't make it all more awkward than it already was. Then, it came to him.
“Yes.”
Dream turned to look at him again.
“Huh?”
“Yes. I, uh. I did like what I saw.”
A slow, easy smile quirked the corner of Dream’s mouth.
“You did, huh?”
“Uh-huh.”
“Well, uh. Maybe I should do private sessions. My friend did only set me up as a model in there for a lost bet, but if I'm something you liked… who knows?”
George could see where this was going, like a straight road going into the woods, but the corner of his mouth still twitched upwards at the obvious invitation.
“Yeah?” he said, raising an eyebrow and Dream nodded, “maybe I’ll have to look into it, then, if you’re going private.”
“Well, you have my number.”
“Technically I don't.”
“That’s technically true,” Dream admitted, and as he finished talking a bus turned the corner up the road, its headlamps bright and the amber light display at the front displaying the number seven. George leaned back in his seat, it wasn't his bus, but Dream stood up.
“I’ll text,” Dream promised with a shining smile, half-visible in the streetlight.
“Okay,” George said as Dream got onto the bus, “I’ll, uh. I’ll see you around?”
“Probably Thursday.”
The door to the bus closed, and it drove away, his last sight of Dream being illuminated by the sickly blue light inside the bus as he went to find a seat, and George was left alone in the bus shelter, hiding from the wind. His hands snaked into the pockets of his coat, watching with a blank gaze for the next bus and with his fingers curled around his phone.
He waited.
Then his phone buzzed.
I don't know if I can wait until Thursday to see you again. How does dinner tomorrow sound?