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It started when he was speedrunning Minecraft one day. Dream was running along by the Eyes of Ender he'd thrown, and- one went down.
He wasted no time, digging under the dirt and falling into a cave system, where he found the fortress. Allowing a small victory cry, he started searching for the portal room. Dream let his mind wander, his thoughts eventually settling on what his friends would be doing right now. And then, inevitably, to George.
George was on his mind a lot, these days. It made Dream happy to think about him, a small warm feeling in his chest blooming whenever he pictured the Brit's face in his mind.
Finding the portal, he put the Eyes of Ender in. Each made a little 'bink' sound, and the portal opened. He immediately jumped in, iron sword and beds at the ready. He loaded in and Dream immediately bridged over and used his bow to destroy the crystals.
Then, his vision went blurry. He couldn't read the words, and the screen in front of him was a smeared mess of void blue and pale yellow. He coold tell he was knocked into the air by the Ender Dragon by the telltale 'smack' and the changing landscape. Unable to tell which keys were which to use the water bucket, Dream only heard the hitting of his character against the ground and the red tint of the screen.
Rubbing his eyes furiously did nothing to help, and Dream stumbled out of his room to the bathroom. In there, his vision cleared up and he saw his reflection on the mirror. Dream washed his face and looked at himself in the mirror. Dirty blond, almost brown hair framed his slightly tanned, freckled face.
Well, he could see again now.
"what the heck." Dream shook his head and went back to his room. His phone vibrated as he got back in his seat, and he picked it up to find the texter to be George.
'call?' The text simply read.
'sure,' he typed back. He pressed the call button, and George answered a few rings in.
"Hi, Dream," George said. "What are you doing?"
"Hey, George. Just speedrunning." Dream answered.
"Oh? How's it going? Did you succeed yet?" George asked. Dream sighed through his nose and said, "I died. It was so weird too, my vision went all blurry and shit."
George made a 'hmm,' noise and Dream pictured his face right there, thoughtful and slightly confused. He smiled giddily. George was kind of cute when- nope, not going down that train of thought.
"are you getting enough sleep, Dream?" Dream heard through the phone. He rolled his eyes. Since when did he ever get enough sleep?
"... No."
he heard a small exhale on the other side of the mic. "you really need to fix your sleep schedule, dude." How could he, when he was up all night coding and thinking about George- wait no, he didn't think about George that much!
"Yeah sure, I'll go to bed earlier tonight." He said.
Like that would fix the problem.
***
It was the middle of the night, and Dream couldn't sleep. Yes, he was tired but it didn't help that whenever he thought of sleep he ended up thinking about George saying he needed sleep, then he just thought about George.
George. With his goofy little smile, the way he would get flustered when Dream flirted with him jokingly, his soft voice... aw hell.
Dream sat up in his bed and put his face in his hands. He liked George.
As soon as he came to the realisation, Dream's head throbbed and his vision became a mess. He could barely see his hands, they were peach-coloured blurs against the pale colour of his bedsheets. Dream was terrified, this was the second time that day it had happened, which ruled it out as a one-time thing.
He pulled the sheets over his head.
'Tomorrow,' he thought. Tomorrow it would be better. He'd also go to the doctor's to get his eyes checked.
***
The doctor had found nothing wrong with his sight, and said glasses or contacts wouldn't help. Yet he still felt wrong, like something bad would happen. Shoving the feeling down, he proceeded into his room again.
Flopping onto the bed, he stared at the ceiling and thought.
It would get better. It would.
... It did not get better. Dream's head started hurting like hell, and he mashed his head into the pillows.
He mumbled expletives as his vision swam, and curled up in a ball. Dream felt something warm and wet on his cheeks, and a quick dab on his face confirmed it: tears.
But these tears looked odd. Even through his weird semi-blindness, they shimmered like stars on a dark night. Dream's sight cleared up enough for him to get a close look at them. He sat bolt upright. "What the fuck," he whispered.
the tears looked beautiful, like stars. Galaxies and constellations glowed in the clear liquid, and it caught the light like a diamond. And that was just on his fingertips.
He dashed to the mirror. ...Holy shit. It was indescribable.
And then his head swam again, and it all went black for a second. Then his vision became completely normal, as if it never happened.
He wiped the tears from his eyes and went to bed.
***
'Hey George,' Dream typed out slowly.
'yea?' Came a reply a few seconds later. Dream sighed in relief. No time to regret his choices now.
'Would you like to come over to Florida?' Send.
The little bubble came up, then closed again. This repeated several times until the text sent, reading 'wait really?'
'yeah. I can pick you up at the airport' Dream pressed send. 'you'll know it's me, I'll be wearing your merch'
'you have my merch?' George responded.
'that's what you're asking about?' Dream rolled his eyes. Turning back to his phone, he waited anxiously for a reply. He'd get to see George. In person.
'i can go'
'aight when?' He typed. A broad grin was on his face.
***
They'd had a good time. Two weeks George had spent at Dream's house. Two weeks that had been the time of his life. It was amazing. A couple times, Dream had trouble seeing but it always cleared up after a tiny bit.
And today George would leave. The two were outside of the car at the airport, the sun setting cinematically, almost as if it was a movie.
"Before you leave for your flight." Dream inhaled deeply. He may look at George in real life for the last time, if this didn't work out. He squashed the paranoid feeling in his chest.
"George- George, you're beautiful. You're kind, funny, and amazing to be around. I want to be with you, George. I love you." He poured out all at once. George looked surprised, and... Sad.
"Dream, I'm sorry." George shook his head. "I- I don't like you... in that way." Dream's eyes widened, and he took a small step back. He was aware that he was crying, the starry tears sliding down his chin and dropping into the pavement like glittering orbs made of space itself.
"Wait, Dream-" Dream started gasping, something was wrong. He steadied himself against the car, sight blurring, fading, everything was grey now. It faded to black, black like the void.
"Dream? Dream!" He could distantly hear his name.
If he'd been able to look at himself in that moment, he would have seen his eyes unfocused and staring blankly at nothing as Dream leaned against the car. Yet, the stars themselves were reflected in them. Endlessly deep, and seeing all, but unseeing at the same time.
Dream felt warm hands on his back, smelled the slightly sweet scent of George's weird soap, heard his voice say he was calling 911.
As unconsciousness seized him, Dream thought, 'I'm glad the last thing I could see was George.'