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It was just a dream. That was the undeniable truth. It was, admittedly, remarkably vivid for a dream, and it followed an unusually coherent storyline, and while most of his dreams faded into vague impressions just hours after he woke, Berdly was able to recall this dream beat for perfect beat several days later. But it was just a dream.
So why couldn’t he stop thinking about it?
Most of Berdly’s weekend after the botched study session was spent pondering his strange dream. If he wasn’t thinking―and subsequently blowing off his homework, which was unusual for him―he was laying down (also unusual for him). At one point, his mother came into his room and sat on the edge of his bed, pressed a hand against his forehead, and awkwardly asked if he were “sick or something.”
He wasn’t sick. Just very, very tired. And his neck and back ached in a way that made sitting up for prolonged periods of time difficult. He told her he had just fallen asleep at the library and must have pulled a muscle, but he was fine. (She still brought him aspirin and water whenever she came home from work. It helped only marginally, but the thought was nice.) It was true, because it had to be. Because it couldn’t possibly have anything to do with his dream―with the control plug that dragged his limp body across Queen’s rooftop.
It was harder to explain away the on-and-off migraines, the way his vision would suddenly go blurry even when he was wearing his glasses, and the various cuts and bruises he discovered later. It was especially hard to explain away the burn mark on the palm of his right hand. He almost didn’t notice it, but he was about halfway through his shift with Ms. Boom, feeling as though he might collapse and pass out at any given moment. Ms. Boom wanted him to carry something to her office, and he held out his hand to take it from her, only for her to suddenly pull back, sympathetically hissing through clenched teeth.
“Oh, dear, that looks like it hurts,” she said. It didn’t hurt―or, it hadn’t, until she pointed it out. “Do you need a bandage? How did you do that to yourself, anyhow?”
Berdly stared at the singed feathers. “I… have no idea,” he said faintly. Of course, that was the hand he had used when forcing off the control plug in his dream. The metal had been unbearably hot, and a sharp jolt of electricity had traveled up his right arm at the second of disconnection.
But that was a dream, and this was real life.
… He didn’t have an explanation. So he tried not to think about it. He focused his attention on the rather blatant moral lessons he had retained from the dream. That was the whole point of dreams, wasn’t it? They were an opportunity for the subconscious to communicate freely with the rest of the self, without all the noise of everyday life.
There were a few things he surmised, such as the real object of Noelle’s affections. It was from the moment they were alone on the rooftop, after she had come to her senses and stopped shaking him. She apologized profusely. “You just… said a lot of very… um, frankly, very ridiculous things, and I lost my temper,” she told him. And they had gone to the edge of the roof and sat down together, and she continued talking. She told him she never harbored any secret romantic feelings for him, because she was a lesbian. (Oops.) She told him that she had liked Susie the whole time. (Oooops.) “I wish you would stop assuming things for me like that. Like everybody else does. I wish you would listen to me. And, and quit making such an ass of yourself,” was the last thing she had said. She couldn’t quite look at him anymore.
Humbled, Berdly quietly offered her a better apology. He had come precariously close to messing things up on a permanent level, he realized. Noelle laughed, and she hugged him. It was a wonderfully cathartic moment―for a dream. Right up until the moment that Queen interrupted.
To test his hypothesis that the dream was his subconscious hitting him over the head with a multitude of lessons he needed to learn and learn fast, he called Noelle on Saturday evening, and he asked her upfront if she had a crush on Susie. There was a lot of frantic sputtering and stammering, followed by a long moment of silence. The receiver crackled as she drew in a deep breath. “How… how did you know?” she asked, voice shaky, as if she were afraid of his answer.
“Lucky guess,” he said, because ‘I had a dream that you told me that and after I woke up I realized that it might actually be true’ sounded insane. Then he chuckled. “No, it was just kind of obvious.” Because in hindsight, it really was obvious. “But I didn’t want to… assume.”
“… I appreciate that,” she said softly.
Berdly hesitated then. “And, um, more seriously,” he began, “I was really calling because I wanted to apologize.” And he did, trying not to draw too much on his dream self’s words, because that felt like cheating. Much like she had in the dream, Noelle laughed, and that feeling of catharsis settled between them again. And this time, there was no evil Queen to ruin the moment.
There were other things. Like the fact that he really did need to cut himself more slack with school, and the fact that he was prematurely judging not just Kris and Susie, but everyone around him. Dream-Noelle said he was always assuming things on her behalf, but she wasn’t the only one. And during their Saturday night phone call, Noelle had almost frantically asked him if he also had a crush on Susie, which took him by surprise. He had come to that conclusion in his dream, and he paused to consider the possibility for a moment before discarding it in disgust. “Absolutely NOT,” he had said. “Not my type.” Even if Susie’s real life counterpart was also a gruff, kindhearted gamer girl. But he understood what Noelle potentially saw in her now, and that was the lesson he was choosing to walk away with.
Kris, on the other hand―
No. He swerved away from that line of thought. It left him with a sickening, jittery feeling in his chest, and he didn’t need that. Not now, in the middle of class, when he was already having a hard time focusing on Ms. Alphys’s stuttering―when the real Kris was sitting right behind him. His traitorous mind wandered anyway, and lingered on memories of Kris adorned in that shining suit of armor. They commandeered the energy and attention of the entirety of Cyber World with a quiet, unwavering confidence.
There was one moment in particular he couldn’t quite justify to himself. Kris had knelt down beside him after the control plug fiasco, worry etched across their every visible feature. Berdly assured them he was fine, and ended his assertion with a playful wink and a half-delirious nickname: ‘fellow bluebird.’ Kris scoffed and stood up again, turning away―but not before he saw the blush dusted across their cheeks, and―
NO. Berdly pressed down on his pencil too hard, and the lead snapped in half. He muttered a soft curse. One desk over, Noelle shot him a questioning look. He waved her attention away, shifting in his chair and leaning over his woefully blank sheet of ‘notes.’
At least he could ask Noelle for hers later, he thought, glancing her way again. Orrrr not, because her paper looked just as blank as his, save for a few stray doodles he couldn’t quite make out. Whatever; he was supposed to be taking a laxer approach to school; he wouldn’t let himself stress over it.
Not that he was focused enough to work himself up into the throes of an anxiety attack, like he might have a few days ago. His mind was jumping back and forth between his dream, particularly the moment with Dream-Kris―why did he call them that??―and the abominable aching in his neck and back.
He watched Noelle draw a heart on her paper, and he realized that there was no better person to bounce his current dilemma off of.
“Noelle,” he whispered. She didn’t look up from her doodling. He rolled his eyes and leaned over, gently prodding her arm with the eraser end of his pencil. “Noelle,” he said, just a tiny bit louder.
She jumped and her head snapped towards him. “Wh―” She glanced briefly at Ms. Alphys, who was scribbling something on the chalkboard. “What?” she whispered back.
“I need to talk to you.”
Noelle frowned. “We’re in the middle of class…?”
“I know! I mean later. After class. So don’t, like, disappear.”
“Um, okay…” Noelle leaned a bit closer. “What’s this about?”
“Just. Just…” Kris was most likely asleep, but he couldn’t just say it while they were around so many people. “Stuff.”
“What kind of stuff?” Noelle asked, stubbornly prodding further.
Berdly’s cheeks burned, and he could feel his stupid feathers beginning to puff out. “Um. Matters of… romance―”
Ms. Alphys’s voice cut him off. “N-Noelle? Berdly? Do-do you two think your c-conversation could wait until after class? P-Please?”
Noelle hurriedly sat back, her nose momentarily flickering with a faint glow. “Sorry, Ms. Alphys,” she mumbled.
Berdly ran a quick preening hand over the back of his head, smoothing down his feathers. “Sorry, Ms. Alphys,” he repeated.
“Th-That’s okay! Thank you. Now, um, as I was saying…” Berdly quickly lost interest in her words. He glanced at Noelle one more time, just briefly catching her eye. She smiled at him mischievously and waggled her eyebrows, slowly mouthing the words, “You have a crush?”
Berdly ducked his head, partially so she wouldn’t see the silly, embarrassed grin he couldn’t quite keep from forming. He heard her giggle, and Ms. Alphys looked over her shoulder, frowning sternly―or as stern as Ms. Alphys knew how to be. “Guys, please, okay?” she said. “I-I’ll, um, have to separate you two if you can’t s-settle down. A-And I don’t want to do that!” Berdly covered his mouth with one hand and nodded, trying not to laugh himself.
How long had it been since he and Noelle last got in trouble for disrupting class with chatter? Years? Their friendship had shifted into something almost like a business partnership. All homework and studying―stiff, cold, and distant. He shook his head at himself, the giddiness in his chest dying down momentarily as he reflected again on how stupid he had been. He had come so close to losing the sweetest person in the world as his best friend. But his detour into lamenting territory was cut short by a sharp prick in his upper arm.
Noelle had leaned over again to pluck out one of his feathers. When he turned to face her, she brandished it triumphantly. “Who is it, who is it??” she whispered excitedly.
“I’m not going to tell you now!” he hissed back. “Also, ow!? Give that back!” He tried to snatch the loose feather from Noelle’s hand, but she leaned out of reach, giggling again.
“It’s mine until you tell me!” she said.
Ms. Alphys had been in the middle of erasing something from the board, and she slammed the eraser down, sending up a small cloud of chalk dust. “A-Alright, th-that’s it!” She turned around, hands on her hips. “Um. Um… Catti! Switch seats with N-Noelle for the rest of the day.”
Catti glanced up from her phone for a second, almost incredulous, and then she shrugged and stood up. Noelle gathered her materials into her arms, still giggling, still holding Berdly’s feather in one hand. Before she stood up to move to Catti’s desk, she said, “I’m serious! Don’t even think about chickening out. I wanna know!” She smiled at him, warmer than any smile she had given him in a long time.
Berdly rolled his eyes. Of course he wasn’t going to chicken out. He rubbed his arm, a little miffed at losing a feather, but even that irritation faded faster than it might have in the past. The pain was gone already, anyway. Next to him, Catti sat down in Noelle’s chair, eyes trained on her phone, a clawed thumb lightly ‘tap-tap-tapping’ on the screen.
It was funny, really. Berdly had broken his streak of perfect classroom behavior, and his notes on today’s lesson were not only nonexistent―he wasn’t even sure what subject Ms. Alphys was teaching. Just two days ago, the very idea would have been utterly mortifying. But now, it just didn’t matter that much.
Because he had his best friend back.