Archive of Our Own

Embarrassing as it is to admit while he’s actively tugging Dream along behind him, George is…honestly surprised he got this far. Never did he actually expect to find himself in this position: grip strong and sure around Dream’s hand and relief deep-set in his bones. The extent of his hastily-enacted and fury-driven plan was to hunt Dream down and demand answers—and George fully presumed he’d fail, at that!—but he hadn’t dared be optimistic about his chances to make Dream talk.

Void, he anticipated a fight more than he believed in the chances of his success. A screaming row between himself and the solid brick wall shaped like his best friend. Empty but impassioned threats made with raised weapons amidst a building, burning resentment and heart-shattering desolation—

(am i not enough for you, why am i not enough for you, i swear i’m trying please let me be enough for you)

—that would leave him standing alone when Dream turned away from him. Again. On slow steps he would return home by himself to a dark house, stand behind his door on trembling legs with tear-laden lashes and likely drift into his room to howl his grief into his pillow. Mourning his loss in stolen, private moments to mask his own ugly weakness (who else would mourn his lost dream?). An armor then crafted of spite and anger and sorrow and indifference, shielding his pain from the world so he could pretend it was fine. Everything had to be fine, right? George needed to be fine because if it wasn’t, if he admitted he wasn’t, then that meant Dream’d won something from him that he’d never be able to get back without concessions he’d never want to be vulnerable enough to make.

His gambit had a snowball’s chance in the Nether to work out, he might say. And that would be optimism speaking. So now that it somehow and miraculously has, he’s more than a little frazzled because his initial goal had most definitely not accounted for this outcome—this turn of good luck, this cloud-soft victory.

Don’t get him wrong! As he leads the way back home, Dream’s hand held tight in his own, a bubbly whorl of incandescent happiness fills him from his toes all the way to the tallest flyaway wisp of his hair. This is exactly what he wanted, truly, at the heart of him.

He just…it just…doesn’t feel real. He thought he would be going home alone, the shattered shards of their friendship left to rot where they lay. He’d even almost come to terms with it. Dream’s stubborn silence would surely overrun his last-ditch desperation—rebuff his frantic lunge across the chasm yawning between them. Send him spiraling into an abyss, his last attempt to reach out harshly slapped away: a rejection of his words, his open hand, his heart (and soul and love, so much love, destroyed, ruinous crags amidst the blackened battlefield that shares his name).

And then Dream…didn’t. Oh, he tried to brush George off at first—his explanation another weapon aimed at turning George away—and then tried to say a very final goodbye but—

(relief, wasn’t it? A tired, hopeful relief buried beneath Dream’s prickly exterior. Expressed so softly as to go unheard, as if Dream were afraid to admit his desire to, just once, be asked to explain himself and be allowed to speak. Relief and surprise, George thinks—surprise that he’d not just shouted and demanded answers but that he showed up at all, that he listened, too)

—the minute that call to wait and George’s core truth emerged, so painful and sincere (come home with me, please) Dream not only stopped but relented.

Dream did not walk away, did not reject his outstretched hand. Dream gave in, turned back, reached out to take his hand.

That speaks louder than any screaming row could ever…and not just in volume. It tells him that Dream wanted someone to follow, to ask, to listen—to ask him to come home. It tells George that whatever lonely, self-destructive path Dream was so set to walk carried an unyielding burden of doubt. One not yet suffocated beneath the heels of Dream’s determination. A path which itself bore cracks and holes—a teetering house of cards shored up by carefully woven plans dependent on no one looking too closely. On no one (but perhaps especially George) caring to look closer, to ask questions, to consider the discrepancies, the misdirection, the masks.

If no one asks (if no one listens) why bother? Silence is kinder than speaking without being heard.

Had George fallen to his own anger and to Dream’s acidic rejection of his presence (so very performative in its twisted-up desperation) and not spoken those crucial words, had Dream not turned back to him as if it George’s plea was all Dream had been waiting for, voice scraped pained and raw…. His impression is that whatever hidden hopefulness remained in Dream’s heart would have closed off. Perhaps permanently. Much like himself, Dream would undoubtedly present an even stronger mask to the world to hide that wounded vulnerability and George would get no second chance (and to hide his own hurts he would pretend not to want that second chance).

They both certainly know how to lie to each other and themselves, after all.

But Dream still had hope to spare and George did push past his ire and his emotional hurdles to speak true, so now he has Dream just like he always should.

(he will not have to mourn an unfilled grave)

He keeps himself facing forward—watching Dream from the corner of his eye—half out of fear that if he looks then his best friend will vanish into the night, mist-like as a fading memory. What isn’t tied up in that heart-seizing dread is more of a desperate desire to hide his internal panicked confusion from Dream’s sharp gaze, something a bit less difficult given the darkness and his stubborn refusal to turn his head. His confidence may have gotten him to this point, sure, but it’s gone up in smoke now that the immediate crisis’s aftermath is finding himself taking Dream home instead of returning alone. Which is unfortunate since he knows he’s not completely in the clear yet; should he notably falter there’s a chance Dream can still be spooked off if he’s not careful.

Not only that but as Dream rightly pointed out, they’ll have a lot of hostile and suspicious attention once the server learns their throne room fallout wasn’t the end of their friendship as advertised. Quackity definitely enjoyed egging the whole brouhaha between George and Sapnap and Dream into a very public meltdown that did nothing for Dream’s already tumultuous reputation. And as the server has proven time and time again, Quackity isn’t the only one who’d benefit from or take pleasure in fracturing the Dream Team (but most especially Dream), which isn’t likely to stop once news gets out. George will probably be targeted more than he was before, whether because this turn of events is taken as proof of Dream’s care for him, thus he’s an even easier way to hurt Dream, or of George’s ‘inadvisable’ weakness to Dream, thus his judgment is compromised and it’s for his own good.

Oh no, the big bad Dream must have manipulated poor, hurt George into forgiving him!

As if George’s dramatics weren’t a half-reflexive cover for Dream to safely vanish in the dethronement aftermath. As if George was some beleaguered maiden who knew naught what their prince was truly like. As if George knew fuck-all about Dream. Him, noted Dream whisperer.

He is already somewhat dreading whatever Sapnap will say—something explosive that will set Dream off, no doubt. And that’s Sapnap, aka someone he’s sure that he can Dream can talk around given the opportunity. Mainly because Sapnap knows better and George is aware of all the hurt feelings Sapnap hides with bluster and anger and excessive amounts of sparring and fire. Neither of them wanted to be left behind; the crux of their frustration lay in Dream’s sudden behavioral one-eighty focus on, both in hindsight and in confirmation from Dream himself tonight, pushing them away on flimsy pretext. Pretext delivered to wound in order to dissuade pushback (to keep them safe, in Dream’s own clumsy way).

Which worked to distance Sapnap quite well, inciting their other best friend’s insecurities by aiming for his soft underbelly. Sure, it may’ve almost worked on George too but he is built different. Clearly.

Then there are all the other people who straight-up hate Dream to the point of hysteria, who’d be willing to—like Eret, apparently—take or condone taking troubling actions if it meant getting rid of Dream. People who he blames for his best friend’s spiral into making such bad choices time after time. People who pushed Dream, soft-hearted and earnest and who tries so hard, into corners only to deny him the right to push back. People who demanded things and behavior they had no claim to, people who think Dream owes them something they have never earned. People who came into the world Dream made for him, for Sapnap, for their friends, and twisted it into knives they then launched at Dream’s unguarded, trusting back.

Just because George often found the drama boring and paid little mind to it outside of occasionally stirring the pot doesn’t mean he didn’t see, didn’t hear. He may not speak about it, or acknowledge it, but he isn’t a fool. Yet until tonight, hearing Dream’s words, he forgot, a little, not only how much stock other people put into it, but how much Dream cared. How much of himself Dream put into things and people that have the power to hurt him. People who have used that power (himself included).

People who don’t deserve him.

Tough luck for all those people, George isn’t about to let Dream go again.

Come what may, they’ll have to pry him away with force and he’ll fight tooth and nail to keep Dream. Whatever arguments they have, whatever tactics they pull, whatever they try, he’s not going to roll over and let the server continue to ruin Dream piece by agonizing piece. Not when the burdens of all that’s gone wrong on is not, as many seem to think, laid squarely at Dream’s feet. Not when destroying Dream is a fool’s illusion of ‘bettering’ the server and George suffers so very few fools. The server will just have to fuck off if they don’t like it but he’s more than ready and willing to play dirty if he needs to.

What’s a little challenging the world to protect what matters most?

(an easy victory)

Maybe they’ll realize just what and who George is, then. Maybe Eret will realize assassinating him should have been done to be rid of him not because it would hurt Dream and give them power but because he’s George.

Figuratively shaking his head to clear it of dark, percolating thoughts about taking a leaf out of Eret’s book—but doing it better, obviously—his stride stutters, quiver jostling, at the nearing sound of rattling bones. For a hanging, drawn-out second he finds himself frantically calculating the logistics of trying to fire his bow one-handed, since there’s no way he’s dropping Dream’s hand lest the idiot vanish on him. A spike of anxiety sends his heart racing not at the skeleton’s approach but at the thought of Dream quite literally slipping away. What a time to genuinely wish he had a crossbow even as he frowns at the idea of something else to keep track of, which sounds tiresome.

He could have at least used his compass as a bludgeoning tool or a projectile if he hadn’t put it away already. And then it might’ve broken, leaving him with one fewer method to track Dream down again if he needed to.

His attention snaps to the intrusion, almost dislodging his goggles from his hair, however effort on his part proves unnecessary. A bone-white face shuffles toward them from the left and out of the corner of his eye he notices Dream’s head angle in its direction. The skeleton, arms slightly lifted to aim its bow, pauses mid-motion as if actually an Enderman arrested by eye contact. Dream’s mask tilts. Cautiously, slowly, the skeleton archer lowers its arms and takes several comically large steps backwards before turning tail, fleeing into the trees.

Well that was a bit familiar, if still strange.

“Huh,” George hums, tipping his head back and toward his silent shadow. “Could you always do that?”

Dream echoes his hum, absently reaching out to set George’s askew goggles to rights, “Sometimes.”

George very nearly gasps aloud when Dream’s grip on his hand shifts, gently threading their fingers together (a telling admission of: i did it for you).

“Yeah?” George hopes his pure delight isn’t as visible as it feels—a warm, beautiful starshine supernova betwixt his lungs—despite the almost strangled way his voice came out because of it.

The ghost of a laugh and a smile audible in his tone, Dream explains, “S’a threat level thing. What, you think somebody like Techno is getting bothered all the time by mobs?”

Well…no? Quite frankly it hadn’t occurred to him to think about it in any capacity whatsoever. It is true that Technoblade carries with him an innate sense of a hindbrain-twigging call for caution. An innate worthiness of respect that extends to the warrior’s peacetime conduct. Both of which are fainter but still present whenever Technoblade isn’t in active conflict or otherwise weaponizing his reputation, so he supposes the concept of mobs turning away out of self-preservation isn’t that far-fetched.

Then again he’s friends with Dream, who’s been called unsettling and highly dangerous by people who’ve experienced being at the business end of Dream’s axe. But for him that’s just his best friend who sure, can be scary sometimes, but who is also largely an idiot. An idiot he’s incredibly fond of but an idiot nonetheless (his idiot). His perception of such things is thus clearly warped, making even Technoblade’s intimidation factor barely register for the most part.

…One of these days they’re really going to have to sit down and work through Dream’s rival-crush on Technoblade. He knows Dream tends to have a thing for people who can kick his ass but seriously.

“I guess not,” he concedes, the should-be-funny imagery of The Blade being harassed by mobs failing to compute. “…I glared away some creepers earlier,” he then reveals, unsure if he’s looking for validation or to one-up Technoblade or, well, who knows why.

Yeah, no, he can’t exactly play coy about it; he’s never pretended to not covet Dream’s admiration and praise. It’s not his fault people continue to misunderstand his extremely obvious priorities.

He blinks up at Dream as the latter’s hooded mask cants from its focus on the woods to face him.

“Well, you are a threat,” says Dream, a braided thread of respect and pride and isn’t that obvious? woven into his voice.

And…void help him, there is nothing inherently sweet or emotional about those words. All they are is an acknowledgment that Dream respects him—thinks he’s strong enough on his own to be classified as a threat—which he’s known because Dream does a piss-poor job of hiding it when he’s not actively pushing him away. Not that George is dependent on what Dream thinks of him to function, since he knows his own worth, so it barely matters and barely counts as flattery. And yet George experiences the stomach-fluttering urge to blush and giggle. How. Terribly. Disgusting.

To cover up his own embarrassing flustered response, he finally starts walking again with a derisive scoff, “Of course I am.”

Still, he squeezes Dream’s hand and hides a smile against his shoulder when Dream squeezes back.

As they continue to traipse their way through the trees in the dark, the path dappled by the cool blue-white moonlight, nothing else has the bright idea to accost them. Which is good for any nearby mobs since he’s busy making sure he doesn’t trip on a root, and if they get interrupted again he will have absolutely zero compunction about telling Dream to permanently get rid of it, whatever it is.

Luckily for the continued health of both mobs and potential server members alike, their quiet hand-in-hand walk—unbroken by noise save for the crisp crunch of leaves and grass and the occasional thud of a stepped-on root—eventually manages to breach the tree line without seeing hide nor hair of any living soul.

Capitalizing on the current silence and mildly surprising lack of busybodies running around, George tugs Dream along with the faintest hint of a skip in his step. He scans the surroundings on loop just in case as they close in on his house. The SMP doesn’t really sleep, per se, and it would be rotten luck (if, perhaps, par for the course) to run into someone now when he’s a few dozen steps away from his own private space.

His brows rise at his darkened windows even as he’s thankful to see them unlit. While he wouldn’t want to assume, based on the explosive earlier confrontation over his dethronement and the immediate aftermath…. Well, he perhaps thought Sapnap, at least, would have camped out to be a convenient vent target. They’d been bonding over their confused, hurt bitching about Dream lately so he’d somewhat expected more of the same tonight. George flicks his gaze around the area again, catalogs scuff marks and freshly-worn pathways in the grass.

Or, perhaps Sapnap was here after he left, only to get bored waiting and wander off. Likely in search of Dream one last time too, although noticeably without a compass for guidance. Otherwise they’d have awkwardly crossed paths at some point and as much as he likes Sapnap, he knows that idiot would have ruined this for him. He’d have gotten either to this point or at the very least almost heard Dream’s explanation and then Sapnap would’ve shown up as gracelessly as usual, not read the room, goaded Dream into a fight, and run Dream off again.

And then George would have to murder him.

Unless I knocked him out and left him in a bush somewhere, George muses with a roll of his eyes as he comes to his door and opens it. Sapnap means well but subtle he is not.

He leads Dream over the threshold (home, where he should be) and closes the door behind them, shutting them away from the outside world.

(safe and together and sequestered in their own little bubble away from everyone and everything, just the two of them—woven together as a soul-tied eternity in the tapestry of fate)

George reaches over to turn on the closest light, ignoring the tremble in his arms that begs him to burrow into Dream’s chest and hold him close. Soon, but not yet. If he doesn’t wait he’ll never let go again. Instead, he drags Dream toward the table, where he reluctantly untangles their fingers and, after a split-second internal debate, shoves Dream lightly in the direction of a chair. “Sit down,” he orders before he can second guess himself further, ever-aware of the tightrope swaying beneath his feet. “I’m sure you haven’t been taking care of yourself, so you’re going to sit there, eat, and then get some sleep.”

“Am I?” Dream counters mildly, not really to fight him on it…more out of some old, lingering reflexive banter.

The only reason George doesn’t give in to his earlier urge to throw his gauntlets at Dream’s head is the undercurrent of amusement in the question. “Yes.”

With that said and no further rebuttal from Dream, he moves to divest himself of his bow and quiver and then crosses the room to open his food chest.

Oh, he thinks, blankly staring at the sparse contents of said chest. Has he been getting raided when he wasn’t looking? That’s…entirely possible. The SMP has a loose relationship with the concept of theft, so he wouldn’t be surprised. Or did Sapnap steal food before he left? Also possible, in which case he’d know who to use as target practice later.

How else does he only have a handful of water flasks, a few empty bowls, and two pieces of cooked chicken and bread each? Had he just…not been paying enough attention to his own stock? Like a reckless moron he hadn’t even been carrying any food on him when he left, so this paltry offering is everything at his disposal.

Well. It’s not ideal but he has enough for tonight, at least. Morning or afternoon may be a little dicey if either of them have to leave the house, but that’s a problem for future them to worry about.

George suppresses a sigh and grabs everything except the excess of water flasks and—quite smoothly, if he may say so—pops both bread and chicken into furnaces to reheat. Then, as if it were his plan all along, he sets the water flasks onto the table and, bowls in hand, marches for the back door. Halfway through stepping outside he twists, eyes narrowed, to point at Dream, who’s wisely and thankfully for George’s anxiety, obeyed his command to sit, “Stay there.”

As Dream quietly huffs at him, he takes the edge of fondness in the sound as a good sign and continues on his way to his animal pen. He has to rouse his dozing mooshrooms in order to fill the empty bowls with soup, murmuring apologies and giving pats as he goes.

While a meal of bread and chicken may typically be enough to sate hunger, George suspects Dream has been tied up in plots and worries that have distracted the idiot from eating to fullness for too long. It’s exactly the kind of utilitarian prioritizing that Dream’s bleakest mindsets prefer. To that end, the soup will help. And it should also aid in lulling Dream into the sleepy state of the overfed, so the moron will be more likely to not fight him on going to bed and resting. He himself isn’t particularly hungry but with Dream’s bullheadedness an equal serving for both of them won’t come across as patronizing, nor will it trigger Dream’s need to ensure George is well-fed at his own expense.

Although Dream’s fussing is very much coveted and he’s taken advantage of it on many occasions, this isn’t the time. The last thing he wants or that Dream needs is to hide behind a well-worn role. This is the time for George to take care of Dream until the latter is less liable to shatter apart.

He pauses in the doorway, soup bowl balanced in each hand. Dream sits at the table (still there, still in arm’s reach, still a vision that makes him feel dizzy with relief), barefaced, the iconic white mask set to one side, chin propped on one gloved hand. There are purpling crescents beneath Dream’s half-lidded eyes and a thinness to his face that had gone unnoticed earlier in the dusk-dark of the clearing. George’s suspicions are correct, then, about Dream’s nonexistent relationship with self-care.

(how unsurprising now that he sees it for what it is, scales torn from his eyes, left to wonder all the reasons why he did not see it before: willful blindness, perhaps, his best friend’s confidence a smokescreen for his own building doubts, the forgotten truth of the fragility of strength)

Dream looks…ultimately, he looks tired. Tired, but settled, too, netherite greaves gone and boots tucked neatly in the the alcove by the door with a familiar fastidiousness. Settled like he means to stay.

It sets fragile, hollow-boned hope fluttering anew.

George has to force himself to move again, dropping both bowls onto the table and then nabbing the bread and chicken to plate up and bring over. Finally, finally he drops himself into the chair opposite Dream and gestures at the food spread out between them.

“Eat, idiot, before you pass out,” he says, tearing apart his bread to keep from reach over to grab Dream’s hand again. To entwine their fingers. To trace a featherlight path across Dream’s scarred face, cup one cheek in his palm, brush his thumb against a constellation of warm-to-the-touch freckles blooming in starbursts.

To remind himself that this is real.

Thank you for staying, he doesn’t say. Can’t, despite the lingering shroud of it coating the air between them, the words by themselves cheaper than the fullness of his true sentiment. An honesty he can’t and won’t deny even if the words are forever stuck in rooted gnarls at the bottom of his ribs.

There is a soft, quiet fragility in the muted dish clatter and lack of words shared. It grates a little at George’s senses, a weighted gap in the shape of teasing chatter and play fighting that would usually fill the space with an easy companionship that is all the more stark for its absence. An expectation persists for a rambling story, a joke, a swift theft from his plate, a gentle nudge of the shin, a crust of bread flicked in his direction, a smile hidden behind his hand. The embarrassing affection lining every inch of Dream’s face that threatens to light his cheeks aflame each time he glances up to see Dream regarding him like there’s nothing and no one more worthy of the attention.

Instead, the two of them exist in the same space in silence straddling the line between comfort and discomfort. When George gathers the courage to peek past his bangs he finds Dream’s own gaze glued to his meal, each motion economical and expression smooth. He can’t begin to guess what Dream may be thinking; he dares not poke at the edges of what should be before the grace of morning sunlight, before he wakes to find Dream still here.

Only then will he feel like he can breathe again.

At the final clatter of an empty dish set onto the table by Dream’s elbow, George’s fluttering nerves bid him to waste no time. He pushes his chair back and rises, collecting stacked dishes as he does, sweeping over to the counter to place them for tomorrow’s George to deal with. Exhaling to try and lose the tenseness of his shoulders, he then crosses the room to Dream’s side of the table and plucks the mask up from the wood to hold between two fingers. “Come on,” George says, waggling it like a taunt as he walks backward toward his bedroom, “today’s been tiring. And don’t try to lie, I have eyes so I know you’re tired too. We are going to sleep.”

From where he’s twisted around in his chair, Dream cuts an unimpressed glance from his mask to George’s face. Though the sharpness of that glance is sanded at its corners when Dream makes no effort to take it even as he stands and follows (as if magnetized to follow contently in George’s wake).

“Together?” Dream asks, a minute twitch of one brow punctuating the question.

George has a spare room, technically. He also has three beds. Mainly for Sapnap’s delicate sensibilities whenever he gets uppity about George and Dream sharing. Which isn’t always considering Sapnap is a cuddler, but the occasional complaining got annoying enough he just made a third bed and separate room so Sapnap would shut up.

He uses the mask to make a pointed jab in Dream’s direction, “If you think I’m letting you out of my sight tonight you’re mental.”

Dream reaches out to adjust his angle before he backs into a corner, “Alright.”

Squinting a little to judge that ease of acceptance, he nods, turning on his heel to lead the way as he drums his nails against the cool porcelain mask. He barely breaks stride to flick on his dimmest light, lifting his goggles from his hair and dropping both them and Dream’s mask onto his bedside table. The white of the mask and the white of the goggles together soothes a wounded part of him he hadn’t quite realized was aching in time with his heartbeat.

When he turns around after kicking off his shoes, he finds Dream has removed his hoodie to stand in his black undershirt and looser sleep pants. With his hoodie folded over on his arm, Dream is peering at the rather noticeable dent George made in the wall above his chest, barefooted and so very precious existing here in George’s space.

(here, with him, not vanished into the wilds of the server, not alone, not lost to him, but home)

He follows Dream’s example, shrugging off his sweater and quickly swapping his everyday pants for something better to sleep in. That done, he moves over to the chest, depositing his lazily folded sweater onto the top of it and feeling his heart jump in his chest when Dream’s hoodie is set next to it. As he draws his hands away he runs his fingers along them both, incapable of not doing so when the sight—much the same as the mask and goggles, fills him with a cotton-soft cloud of peace, of rightness, of belonging.

This is how it should be, he thinks.

George shifts to look at Dream, unsurprised and yet delighted to have Dream already looking at him. The sudden urge to slide his hands through Dream’s hair is so strong that he’s reached out to gently remove Dream’s hair tie before he can stop himself, watching the way hooded eyes track his movements. The sheer intensity flusters him more than a little, causing him to follow his urge and muss Dream’s hair a bit quicker than he’d wanted. To cover his disappointment he curls his fingers around Dream’s wrist and tugs them over toward the double bed, switching the light off again on their way over.

Moonlight slants into the room through a sliver of his open curtains and his sheets are nice and cool against his skin as he climbs across to his side of the bed, dragging Dream along with him until logistics require him to let go. Pulling the covers up he then rolls over to be face-to-face with Dream, who’s made himself comfortable and appears the most relaxed he’s been all night.

In the privacy of dark night and the intimacy of a shared bed, George is less afraid to lift his hands to cup Dream’s cheeks. To trace the raised edge of Dream’s most striking scar, the skin beneath his touch warm and soft. An I love you sits on the back of his tongue as his eyelids grow heavy, the day’s toll hitting him all at once.

One of Dream’s hands covers his own, moonlit gaze watchful as Dream briefly presses his lips to George’s palm. “Sleep, George,” Dream murmurs, gently pulling away his hands and then pulling him close so that George’s head rests nearest Dream’s heart. “I’ll be here when you wake.” The reassuring low thump-thump of Dream’s heart and the rhythmic carding of Dream’s hand in his hair with the occasional light scratch lulls him ever-closer to slumber. That unsaid I love you dissipates as, despite his best efforts and his lingering fears, he slips into sleep between one breath and the next.

Sometime in the early pre-dawn he wakes just a smidge, hand outstretched in an empty divot cooling from its previous occupant’s body heat. Still mostly asleep, the half-formed bitter liar and the beginnings of grief that flit through his temporary bout of consciousness are naught but echoes. Before he can really register why he’s woken he’s slipped away again.

His second waking is a fuzzy-headed nudge of a bed dipping beneath someone’s careful weight and the light-handed shuffling of covers. A solid line of heat inches close to tuck against him, an arm curling over his shoulder, questing fingers tracing absent shapes onto his back. His sleep-muddled senses are unable to parse the words—“…l’v…y’u…”—whispered like a benediction into his hair as he falls under once more.

On his third rouse, George blinks awake to the awareness that he’s cocooned in the circle of someone’s arms, cozy and comfortable and drifting along in his contentment. He shifts his head on his pillow and marvels at the sleep-slack softness of Dream’s face a hand’s breadth away from his own, at the spill of Dream’s hair in the rosy morning sun, at the quiet breaths exhaled from Dream’s parted lips—at the rise and fall of Dream’s chest that sings alive, alive, alive.

Faintly, perhaps, he recalls waking—or was it a dream?—to find himself alone, but even if he had, what does that matter when after all is said and done Dream is still here?

George muffles a yawn and a smile into his fist and lets his eyes fall shut, in no great hurry to make himself get up and face whatever the day may bring. A hazy doze settles over him that only breaks when the hand laid on his hip tightens and a leg slides back and forth, brushing against him. Opening his eyes again, he watches the minute twitches of a mellow waking play across Dream’s features, secreting away each passing second close to his heart as a treasured memory.

Dream’s brows crease, face turning to burrow further into his pillow as a subvocal sound of disgruntlement rumbles in his throat. George’s shoulders tremble with helplessly fond laughter, lips caught between his teeth to keep from full-on cackling. His continued shaking jostles both beds to the point one of Dream’s eyes cracks open to glare blearily at him for daring to be so disruptive.

“Morning,” he manages to greet, delighted that noted early-riser Dream is channeling his own typical distaste for waking up.

In response, Dream scowls and sticks his head beneath his pillow, muffling an unhappy groan and a string of unintelligible grumbles into the fabric. Before George can even begin to tease him he reemerges, propping himself up on an elbow with an expression wiped clean of mutiny as he leans over. An affectionate gaze glazed gold in the sunlight studies every inch of George’s face with all the gravitas reserved for the highest art. One large palm cups George’s cheek, thumb slowly sweeping over his skin delicately enough to raise goosebumps along George’s arms, laughter dying as a pleasant shiver runs down his spine.

“Morning,” Dream returns, voice deep and sleep-rough.

Mouth dry, George blinks as Dream then sits all the way up, stretching and sliding out of bed while he’s still busy processing. What a cheating bastard. It’s not a difficult choice to lever himself upright and follow suit, yawning into his hands and rubbing at his eyes as he stumbles to his feet. They swap turns in the bathroom to clean up and then they both wander out of the dim bedroom toward the well-lit kitchen, Dream absently tying most of his hair back as they walk side by side down the hallway.

The kitchen means food, which George’s still half-asleep brain takes a moment to remember is an issue he is not prepared to solve. Except, right as a frustrated sigh threatens to bubble forth when he realizes he has to admit the problem, Dream breezily retrieves food from the chest that absolutely was not there the night prior. Eggs, milk, more bread, pork primed for bacon—all things he hadn’t had on hand.

A question forms…or rather, two main questions form. Did Dream deposit his own inventory’s food into the kitchen chest? If not, did Dream actually leave and just so happen to return bearing food? George considers asking, the burn of curiosity entwined with a need to know if Dream left. And if so, why? And if so, why did he come back?

However personally pressing, his questions are allowed to lie unanswered as he takes in the comfortable way Dream moves around a space that is primarily George’s, beginning to cook with all the effortlessness to suggest he’s always done so. He swallows his desire for answers down, sinking into a chair and resting his head on his arms, his face turned toward Dream so he can continue watching.

(a glowing sunburst fills every corner of his chest so full of joy he’s fit to burst from happiness)

Just as his stomach growls two equally-filled plates and milk are set onto the table, Dream taking the seat next to him instead of across from him. George straightens in his chair so he can pull his plate close, bumping his thigh gently against Dream’s as he inhales the glorious smell of cooked bacon. “Thanks,” he says. “You didn’t have to,” he tacks on, nonetheless pleased at the eggs, toast, and bacon fixed exactly to his taste.

“I know,” Dream replies, a flicker of amusement there-and-gone. “But you took care of me last night, so I wanted to.”

Oh, so he doesn’t need to ask if Dream left, or why. Whatever happened, whether Dream wandered the house or wandered the SMP, what matters is that an underlying purpose existed to return the favor—to take care of George as he took care of Dream. And providing may not be a grand, flashy gesture but it is one that speaks to feelings of genuine thankfulness and love worth more than any towering statue or chest full of diamonds and emeralds.

George nudges Dream’s ankle in lieu of a verbal acknowledgment for the sentiment.

When they’ve both finished eating, Dream stands to gather their dishes and move to the sink to start washing up. Rather than remain seated by himself at the table while Dream cleans, George also rises. He detours for a quick peek at his food chest, nearly dropping the lid on his fingertips when he clocks the multiple stacks of food now filling nearly all of the chest’s formerly empty slots.

What the hell, he mouths, face contorting in pure bafflement and stuck in a cycle of confused gesturing until he gives himself a much-needed shake. Quietly closing the lid on both the chest and the food situation he resumes his initial goal, sweeping into the kitchen proper and hopping up to sit on the counter.

Dream levels him with a look, tossing a towel into his face, “If you sit there, you’re helping.”

His contrary nature has him contemplate jumping off the counter for a handful of seconds as the towel refuses to drop from where it’s caught on his nose. But…he tugs it away and stays put. “Alright, alright,” he huffs, accepting the first clean dish and toweling it dry before he sets it to his other side to put away later. There’s an easy rhythm to it for all of George’s performative whining—a simple joy found in such a domestic routine.

(i don’t mind these sorts of things when it’s with you)

As Dream offers him the last plate and dries his own hands, he then steps into the space between George’s legs to grab the stack of dishes the instant George is done. Having Dream’s solid line of heat so close to him triggers a visceral need to keep Dream right where he is (a spark of fear that this won’t last beginning to catch fire).

The distant clack of dishes meeting the surface of the counter has him belatedly notice his fingers have tangled in Dream’s undershirt, grip so thusly unrelenting that the intent to finish cleaning up has been abandoned. George exhales shakily and yanks his target forward, only managing to unhook his fingers in order to wrap his arms around Dream and hold him close. Dream’s small surprised yelp turns into an oof when they collide, the sound smothered into George’s neck.

“Dream,” George breathes, a tremulous quaver in the shape of it.

There is so much he wants to say crammed into the confines of a single insufficient word. A garbled knot of feelings he is insufficient in word alone to express.

Careful arms wind around him in return as Dream tucks his face further into the safe harbor of George’s neck. He scratches lightly at Dream’s nape, counting the freckles on bare shoulders, and hums approvingly when Dream’s hold finally tightens. George is not glass-bone fragile, he doesn’t need to be held as if he is. What he needs—what he wants—is to be surrounded by strength he has always equated with safety. He needs to be held like he won’t break, like he’s real. His own shakiness is reflected in the fine quivers running through Dream, too, the two of them struggling to find steady ground in a sea of uncertainty. They remain in their embrace taking comfort from each other, the passage of time gone unchecked without the aid of a clock, without outside interruptions—drifting molasses-slow moment to moment.

Once on a more even keel, George slowly pulls back a scant few inches, his hands sliding free of Dream’s hair to cradle Dream’s face. Dream’s own hands slide away from his back to rest on his hips as they meet each other’s gaze. George can’t begin to guess what expression he might be making, more than a little aware that he may be afflicted with the soppiest, tenderest one he’s capable of. He imagines he must be—why else would Dream’s features have adopted much the same? Dream has always regarded him the most tenderly when he forgot to school his expression, George’s own feelings returned a thousandfold each and every time he let them show.

Such a heady feeling it is, to have Dream’s love. Such a priceless, precious feeling.

“What do you want, George?” Dream murmurs, leaning into his touch, eyes half-lidded and cat-like in their curious sheen. Content and at ease here with George, trusting him, unmasked and unarmed and all the more powerful for it—a soul-bared vulnerability on display for him and him alone. A dangerous creature so warm and pliant under George’s gentle hands, beloved and patient as if the space between George’s palms is home.

(to treasure you, to keep you always, to have you safe and alive and happy and with me by choice because you love me

for you to be mine and for me to be yours)

“I want you to stay,” George admits, his own voice quiet. “Here, with me.”

Dream’s eyes fall closed, a brief flicker of an expression George might call worry minutely hidden within a quicksilver press further into George’s hands. Then Dream regards him through his lashes with a faint, soft awe, “You know it won’t be easy.”

Although Dream does not ask are you sure? it echoes in the space between them—it, and the self-defeatist I’m not worth it that lingers amidst Dream’s self-awareness that it’s him who will complicate things. And perhaps to someone else that would be enough to disengage, to throw in the towel, to abandon. Perhaps to the George immediately post-dethronement it might be persuasive—a cutting of ties, the very same tossed-away dead weight that Dream tried to treat him as. Perhaps it would be poetic…karmic, even.

George is not going to make that mistake. He will not live with those regrets.

(i am surer than i’ve ever been; you are worth the trouble and i will prove it to you however long it takes me)

“Not many things that are worth it are easy,” he shrugs with a wry little smile, tugging lightly at a lock of Dream’s hair he catches between two fingers.

He knows it won’t be easy—of course it won’t, not with things the way they are on the server. Not with Dream’s sabotaged reputation, not with the ongoing drama, not with opportunists waiting in the wings to tear both of them down to craft pedestals from their fallen corpses. It will be difficult, yes, and yet George is also aware that it’ll be worth it—that Dream will be worth it. That he’ll never forgive himself if he doesn’t try, if he doesn’t show the server exactly who he is and what he can do and what matters to him.

Dream makes a low noise of dissent, “…Some things are.”

His interest must show in his face and the tilt of his head, as Dream’s warm hands cover his own and an intent, assessing gaze cuts deep to his core.

“Loving you has always been easy,” Dream confesses, as unselfconscious as he is known to be about this ever-present truth. “Even when it’s hard,” he continues, each word deliberate in its weight, “it’s because I don’t know how I’d survive without you.”

A familiar tightness wells up in George’s chest at the affection clear-as-day in Dream’s words, in Dream’s eyes, in yet more reminders that Dream loves him. That Dream does care so, so much for him—even at his worst, when he’s at his brattiest, at his most contrary, his most difficult, it never reduces his worth. In their confrontation the previous evening he’d jabbed at Dream to cover his insecurities about what he feared was the loss of that care…but he should have known better.

He should have remembered that nothing short of death could erase Dream’s feelings. And maybe not even then.

(i know you’re probably scared…maybe i am too, but—)

“We’ll figure it out,” George promises, pressing his forehead to Dream’s. “Together, okay? I know you think you have to do this alone but you don’t, Dream. Okay? You’re not alone, I’m here. I’m choosing to be here. Just stay with me—trust me—and, whatever happens, you and I can figure it out.”

(—i love you and i swear to you we’ll be okay)

A twist of uncertainty still creases Dream’s brows, so George parries the earlier question, “What do you want, Dream?”

“…I want to,” Dream begins, slowly sounding out each word, “I want to trust you. I want to stay.”

And George can almost see the burden of that admittance leave Dream’s shoulders lighter in its wake. “Then stay. It doesn’t have to be complicated, you know,” he murmurs, “I want you to stay. You want to stay. So stay.”

A choked, desperate whine is abruptly cut off in Dream’s throat and, this close, George can make out the wetness that starts to cling to Dream’s lashes. “You’ll get tired of me,” Dream rasps—a weak rebuttal, one last fumbling, self-hating attempt to change George’s course.

It causes his heart to hurt, hearing the shaky note of vulnerability infused in someone who he’s for so long considered a pillar of strength. It also causes him to hiss, “Never,” and fleetingly smush Dream’s cheeks in lieu of shaking the idiot by the shoulders. “Maybe you occasionally try my patience,” he sniffs with a lazy shrug, aiming for a bit of humor, “but so do most things, and you are by far the least offensive. If I haven’t gotten tired of you yet, I never will. Not in this life, or the next. How could I? You make life worth living.”

That faint, soft awe from before is back and it’s a wonder George’s cheeks aren’t ablaze from his own surprising candor. Patient as he waits to cross this final stretch, leap this final hurdle, he watches as Dream shudders, eyes tightly closed as cogs turn in that mystifying head of his.

Finally, Dream’s eyes flutter open again, a quiet resolution in their depths when Dream meets George’s watchful gaze. “Okay, okay,” whispers Dream into the expectant silence. “I will…I’ll stay. Here, with you—I promise I’ll stay.”

Those words land with a solemn finality, a declaration of purpose, their shape that of an oath sworn duty.

George doesn’t yell or shout or cry or whoop despite the whirling vortex of happiness surging through him, although he is sorely, sorely tempted. A brilliant smile does bloom across his lips, all his thankful fondness as crystal-clear as glass when he can’t help but to lean in to close the gap that has thus far remained between him and the beloved face he still cradles so very gently in his hands.

Whatever challenge may lay in the future they can weather it together.

(you and i will be okay)