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It’s a lazy golden day, with the slightest breath of breeze and a noon that seems to stretch on for hours, which is why Dream should not be surprised to find George asleep on top of the mushroom.
He should wake him up, he - really, really should. George keeps sleeping through the times they and Sapnap and Bad set to work on the community house together, and it’s not fair that George keeps getting out of it just by virtue of running away, picking a roofed forest and curling up on top of a mushroom for a nap. Dream is crouched in a tree next to it, hesitant to move and disturb George - which is stupid. But he’s lying on his side in the sun, sprawled outwards with his limbs going every which way - Dream would call it decidedly un-catlike if he didn’t know better from the way Patches has always acted in the heat - and his tail twitches, faintly, ever so often, and Dream thinks he’s snoring ever so slightly. Or purring. The line tends to grow blurry when it comes to George.
He stretches upwards for the next branch and clambers over onto the top of the mushroom, wavering in balance for a moment until his feet hit the pale brown cap; George stirs a little as Dream’s stumble makes the entire mushroom shiver for a moment, just barely. This, in turn, stokes something warm and loving and golden in Dream’s chest, like hot coals, or high noon - there’s something about George asleep in the sun that always reminds Dream how head-over-heels he is, stupidly so, in a way that is full of hope and breathlessness. Everything’s full of hope, in this new golden world they founded a few weeks ago and are beginning to shape into their own; new places are always alight with possibility. Dream has loved George in all the worlds they’ve been to previously, but something about this one, and its propensity for days that are long and warm and beautiful, with a lazy delight all about them, has him thinking that maybe his love, too, can be shaped into something more than it’s always been. Maybe it can be the foundations for something.
He says, as loud as he can bear to be, embarrassed by how fond his own voice is, “George.”
There’s no response.
Dream tries to muster irritation, even though he doesn’t know who he’s pretending for. Everyone in this entire world - just his closest friends, his oldest ones - already knows Dream can never really be properly upset with George, not when his heart is like a golden sunrise in his chest at the sound of George’s dumb giggles, at the width of George’s smile turned full force in Dream’s direction like a beacon. Even George seems to know he has Dream wrapped around his little finger, though at least he’s still oblivious as to just why.
“George,” Dream says, a little more insistent. He crosses the mushroom cap to stand by George’s side, looking down at him; it almost makes him choked up how much he is in love with him when he sees the way George’s ears swivel in his direction, faintly interested, perking up. “George, you gotta get up.”
George stirs, ever so slightly. Dream can’t fight back the fond smile. He isn’t wearing his mask, though, and when George cracks open one eye to peer up at him he forcibly wrangles his expression back into something more neutral.
“Were you watching me sleep?” George asks, sounding utterly unsurprised, with a small curl to his voice like he’s smiling, warm and lazy.
“No,” Dream scoffs. His voice cracks. “Why would I do that?”
“You’re so predictable.”
“I am not!”
“Why’d you wake me up,” George says, and it’s somewhere between a demand and a petulant whine. Dream’s heart might burst in his chest at this rate. He’s honestly not sure how he’s lasted as George’s best friend for this long.
“You gotta come help with the community house,” he says. It’s a lifeline.
“Hm. No,” George says, and closes his eye.
Dream sighs, trying to play up the tiny amounts of annoyance he does feel. “You’re so annoying,” he says, a last-ditch effort to get George to look up again.
Startlingly enough, it works; George rolls over onto his back, eyes narrowed with irritation but both peering up at Dream. “It can wait one day,” he says, and pats the patch of mushroom to his side. “Come here.”
“I’m not doing that,” Dream scoffs.
“Yeah you are,” George says simply, closing his eyes; his lips are curved into a grin, and he’s not the sort of person who is naturally sunkissed - will probably burn if he’s out in it for too long, honestly - but the golden light is still gorgeous on him. There’s a pang in Dream’s chest.
Instead of blurting out I love you, like he so desperately wants to, he sighs. Unslings his axe from his back and sets it down. Crouches.
George looks sideways at him. “What are you doing?”
“I should really go help build the house,” Dream mumbles. “If you’re not going to.”
“You can take one afternoon,” George says. “We have all the time in the world.”
Dream takes a long look at the way the sunlight seems trapped in George’s eyes, slit-pupilled with a smug glimmer to them, and bites his lip. His heart is warm and painful and ready to blossom, and the sunlight is warm on his shoulders. He shuffles around and lies down on his back, where the mushroom cap is gently warm itself from having been in the sun all day.
“There you go,” George says, sounding pleased.
Dream clears his throat. “Just for a little bit.”
“Sure, Dream,” George agrees indulgently. Dream doesn’t even have it in him to contradict it.
The noon stretches on, endless. Dream huffs out another breath, turns his head to the side only to see George has already gone back to sleep, and closes his eyes.
At first the only sounds are the occasional rustle of leaves among the dark forest canopy and the distant sound of insects from the plains not far off - dark forests themselves are infamously quiet - and Dream breathes into the silence, lets his every limb relax. He’s been running around a lot, trying to make this world perfect. It’s his first time being a proper admin. He has to get it right, make sure everyone’s happy. But there’s happiness in this rest, too - in the way the sky yawns above them, impossibly blue, and the pale brown mushroom cap is solid and gently heated beneath his back. His axe is within reach, if any mobs do happen to startle them. Surely it can’t hurt to just spend a little longer here.
A rumble starts up, low and quiet; it takes Dream a moment to realise George is purring.
Fuck, he loves him so much.
“This is really nice,” Dream says, under his breath; he can hear his voice doing the thing that everyone else lovingly bullies him for, the George voice, the way it goes all soft and melty like butter left out too long in the sun. “I missed spending time with you.”
The purring quiets, but doesn’t cease; when George speaks, it’s with a funny rumble to it that must be the effect of trying to keep up both sets of sounds at the same time. “We’re literally not even doing anything, idiot,” George says, and Dream hopes he’s not reading too much into the affection in George’s voice.
“That’s the point,” he says, and can feel the smile sprawl faintly across his face. He bites back the I love you only out of habit.
George sniffs. “Well come on then,” he says, matter-of-fact. There’s a tugging at Dream’s arm, and he blinks open his eyes in surprise; George has grabbed it and is pulling, for some unknowable reason.
“What are you doing, ” Dream says, incredulous, halfway to laughter.
“Where are my hugs,” George demands. “You share my mushroom, you give me cuddles, that’s just - that’s just the rule, Dream, you can’t escape it.”
Dream almost rolls sideways and falls off the mushroom in shock, then considers doing it deliberately cause it would be funny, then decides ultimately that that would probably be a bad idea. “Wh at, ” he says. It comes out strangled. “George -”
“Dream,” George counters. Dream sits up on his elbows and stares at George in frustrated fondness, only to regret it instantly - George has the pleading eyes on, the imploring-beseeching- please look that Dream called puppydog eyes the first time he saw them. (George didn’t speak to him for a week after that.) “Dream, c’monnn, it’s really warm. No one’s gonna see. It’ll be nice.”
Dream breathes in, and out, and counts to ten. George doesn’t falter. Against his better judgment, Dream rolls his eyes - “Fine, whatever,” he says, as if the thought alone isn’t enough to make joy surge in him like it’s gonna fill him up, overflow from his lips, his eyes, too much for his form to contain.
“Alright, get on with it, then,” George says, and tugs again, insistently, on Dream’s arm. Dream thinks about trying to come up with a prayer or a god to address it to - can’t think of anything fast enough, neurons overloaded with George’s name and proximity and presence - and, resigned, slings his arm over George’s shoulders. Draws him closer. They end up spooning, which is so stereotypical that Dream almost wants to sob.
“You’re so annoying,” he mutters again, and freezes when he realises - they’re so close that when he speaks his lips are almost pressed against the back of George’s neck. The sunlight is so bright that it’s difficult to see, so warm that it’s difficult to think. It just slips out. “I love you,” he murmurs, there on the mushroom in the sun.
George pauses, and Dream almost panics, but something holds him there, frozen in place. He doesn’t dare to move. “Took you long enough,” George says, quiet and fond, and Dream blinks, confused, anxious.
A rumble starts up in George’s chest, and they’re pressed close enough that Dream can feel it in his own. “I love you too,” George says, and reaches back blindly, patting around Dream’s face for a minute before finding his target and running his fingers through Dream’s hair. “Dumbass.”
“Oh,” Dream says. He can’t contain his smile. His love is too big for him. “Like -”
“I’d kiss you,” George says, completely nonchalantly, “except that it’s really nice here and I’m too lazy to move.”
“Oh,” Dream repeats. Elation is flooding through him, impossibly bright. The noon sprawls on above them.
They stay there, like that, all afternoon. The sun inches on towards the horizon. Only at dusk does Dream dare suggest they move - George has been slipping in and out of sleep all day, and Dream has been dozing, half-alert, half-enamoured by the sun and the warmth and the fact that he has George in his arms. George protests at the idea, but eventually the two of them manage to straggle to their feet.
Dream’s right arm, the one he was lying on for most of the afternoon, is stiff. He rotates it, once or twice, before realising George is giving him a mildly annoyed look.
“What?” he says.
“I want a kiss,” George says. “You’re busy swinging your arm around -”
Dream drops his arm immediately to his side. George gives a little grin, smug, and moves slowly towards him like he’s intent on having fun with it; Dream loves, and loves, and loves, and he’s okay with being patient.
They nearly fall off the mushroom.
(“When I said go get George I didn’t mean it like that, ” Sapnap says, that night, when the two of them finally make it home.
Dream only grins back at him, giddy.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” George sniffs, and promptly disappears in search of dinner.)