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they were all tired. george had been the end of a rather long stream train, dream had worked through both lunch and dinner putting the final edits on the manhunt, and sapnap had been a part of said stream train for the better part of the day. upon ending his stream george wasn’t surprised when sapnap waddled his way into the brunette’s office, head already foggy and him dripping in fatigue. “hi, pup.” he greeted softly, unsurprised when the younger just crawled onto his lap before responding. “sleepy. wan’ go get dream an’-” in the middle of his sentence he’d yawned, watching as george proceeded to close out of the remaining tabs and put his computer to sleep. “an’ lay down.”
despite being just as tired as the other, george forced himself to wake up a bit more in order to be the reasonable one. “we’ll lay down soon, but we should get dream and get food first because i know for a fact none of us have eaten yet.” both of them internally cringed at their unhealthy eating habits before sapnap allowed the older to carry them into dreams office, reaching for the door knob without knocking. “puppy, we need to talk about knocking before you enter a room.” he said before knocking on the door and waiting for dream’s muffled and rather tired sounding “come in” to reach his ears.
“knocking?” sapnap asked before quickly switching to dreams lap and happily giggling as he was given the kisses he’d been deprived of all day. “why would i knock? like seeing you!” before george got the chance to reply he felt lips on his own, pulling away a few seconds later to respond. “we like seeing you too but you’re supposed to knock because it's polite.” sapnap looked to dream for confirmation and the blonde simply shrugged, already sleepily carding his fingers through the others hair. “dream you’re supposed to back me up!” sapnap giggled at that as he leaned into the others pets. “knocking takes too long! an’ i forget sometimes.” the brunette simply rolled his eyes at that but left it be for now.
pale fingers met blonde hair, almost mimicking the movements the other was making to pet sapnap. “think- think m’ slippin.” truthfully, george wasn’t sure he was good at taking care of them both at the same time after what’d happened with the biting of dream’s penguin but he wasn’t about to say that, especially since the blonde had opened up about feeling like he couldn’t regress anymore without worrying. “thats fine love, we’ll go to the kitchen and i’ll try to make food, yeah?” it was no secret that george wasn’t the best cook in the house, but he figured since they were both small and tired he could get by with making something as simple as mac and cheese before putting them both to bed.
dream requested to be picked up first, leaving sapnap to walk, or a better way of phrasing it would be cling onto the brunette as they made their way into the kitchen. upon trying to set the blonde onto the counter so he could do the same with the younger he was stopped by dream holding onto his shirt for dear life. “nu uh! wan’ daddy hold me.” before george could form a response, sapnap gently tugged on his shirt to gain his attention. “up? counter!” and then before he could even attempt to respond to that request dream had made another one. “wan’ m’ penguin!” before george could even process what was happening the blonde was wriggling out of his grip and making his way towards whichever room it resided in.
instead of going after him, the brunette was forced to tend to sapnap who was still holding onto his shirt and looking up at him hopefully. “right. you want to sit on the counter?” after gaining confirmation that that was indeed what he wanted, the other was sat on the counter just as dream made his way back into the room with his penguin in hand, making grabby hands at george once doing so. he did what the other had asked before running into a problem. he couldn’t safely cook with one hand and the last thing he wanted to do was hurt himself or the other. “dream i can’t cook like this. can’t you sit on the counter with the puppy?”
there was something about being referred to like that. like puppy wasn’t the name he preferred to be called, but what he was. it made sapnap feel all funny and bubbly inside and although neither noticed, he blushed just thinking about it. “nu uh! wan’ be here. can hold on.” as funny as dream holding onto him like a koala looked in his head, george knew it wasn’t safe and had reluctantly attempted to set dream next to their other boyfriend who was too occupied with sleepily playing with his ball to notice. the keyword there is attempted.
“dream…”
“no! s’ not fair! daddy holds sappy whenever he asks.”
that was a low blow and the blonde knew that. he was trying his best with that he could do and when big they both would reassure him that that was more than enough. but they were little now and didn’t realize how it’d affect him. “dream i understand that you want to be held, but i physically can’t cook like this and we have to eat. i’m sure sapnap would play with you until you can be held again, and you both can eat off of the fun plates if you let me do this.” bargaining with dream when he was like this typically worked and this time was no different. eventually he was sat on the counter and began babbling to his boyfriends about his toys while george made them mac and cheese, trying to recollect himself.
“g-george?” sapnap asked quietly as he watched the other set the now empty box of mac and cheese on the counter. “yes?” now not having to do much but occasionally stir till the noodles were cooked he could afford to turn most of his attention to his boys, making his way to the counter and deciding to stand in between them both instead of one or the other. “um- could you get m’ ears?” even now he got nervous asking them, relaxing a bit more when george reassured him by almost immediately saying of course and leaving the room to find the ears that had somehow been forgotten in dreams room.
“think georgie’s upset with us.” sapnap said to dream softly once the other had left, causing the blonde to stop playing with his toy and frown. “why? did i do something?” upon seeing that he’d worried the other, the younger frowned as well and gently took dreams hand in his own. “i dunno. seems- seems annoyed. said i should start knocking, think he’s upset about that?” dream shrugged in response and instead laid his head on the others shoulder. “don’t like making daddy annoyed. think he’s upset cause of what i said?” sapnap moved as close to the other as he could without falling off of the counter and mimcked the others' shrugging motion.
“why isn’t he talkin’ to us? don’t like it when george keeps things from us.” the blonde nodded in agreement before quickly shutting up once the brunette had returned with the youngers ears in hand. sapnap made sure to thank the brunette immensely as the ears were placed atop his head and then george went back to the mac and cheese, happily listening to his boyfriends converse until he heard something that interested him. “tell me bout the stuffie daddy ordered for you? pretty please?” dream pleaded softly as if sapnap was reluctant to talk about it. “i already told you about it.” what interested the brunette was the way sapnap spoke softly like he didn’t want him to hear what he was saying. “one more time? for me?” the younger found he couldn’t say no, so he began explaining the stuffie once more.
“its a rabbit! looked really soft nd’ the second i saw it i knew i wanted it. george thought should keep looking, but i didn’t wan’ to.” as the conversation progressed the blonde asked questions, treating the toy as if it was a person with the backstory.
“is it a he or a she?”
“or they.” the older cut in, dream nodding and missing the confused expression on sapnap’s face. “what?” george reached up and grabbed the “fun plates” they’d requested, sapnap getting a paw patrol one for obvious reasons and dream deciding on a disney princess one since it had rapunzel on it. “like how you refer to me as he. like, he needs you to both carry your own plates. i think dream wants to know how you’d refer to your rabbit.” the brunette used a real life example, setting them down from the counter and handing them each their respective plate, or so he thought.
“why is m’ plate blue?” dream whined out once they’d reached the dining room since the blonde didn’t like eating in the living room. “oh, maybe i gave you the wrong ones.” george explained before quickly swapping the plates and finally sitting down to eat. conversation flowed in and out, everyone there really being too tired to actually converse till sapnap spoke up. “think- think m’ rabbit is an it.” the blonde attempted to speak with his mouth full, earning him a disapproving look from george till he swallowed his food and tried once more. “can’t do that? can it?” sensing the arising conversation, the brunette jumped in to speak but sapnap beat him to it.
“hey! why can’t it? s’ not really your business!” they were both getting defensive before george could even say anything. “guys lets take a second, yeah?” he suggested, much to the others dismay “but-”
“no buts, i need you both to calm down.”
at the brits' definitive tone they went back to eating until they were able to speak to each other calmly. “think dream is wrong.” he said with a frown, stabbing at his mac and cheese as he spoke. “jus’ don’t understand…” dream replied, pushing his plate away from him and pulling his knees up to his chest. “okay, its fine that you don’t understand. dream, sometimes people use different pronouns to, like, describe how they feel.” he attempted to keep his explanation simple, just needing the blonde to see where he was coming from. “so, if someone used it and its you’d say, ‘it went to the store’ or ‘its room is messy.’ does that help?” what came out of dreams mouth next threw them both for a loop. “does this mean dada wants to be an ‘it’ too?”
hesitantly, the brunette looked over at sapnap who was looking down at his plate, painfully obviously avoiding eye contact. “i don’t know. why don’t we talk about this when you’re big, yeah? it might be easier to explain and sapnap might not be comfortable talking about that right now.” curiosity still plagued dream but the tiredness was quickly curling around him and wrapping him in its warm embrace.