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Any day that Dream appears at the New Inn is a great day, as far as Hob is concerned. It happens often now, a handful of hours sprinkled throughout the week that Lord Morpheus can pull himself away from his duties to see his lovers. It’s not enough, it’s never enough, but it is vast compared to the centenary meetings they had restricted themselves to for six hundred years.
It is a Friday afternoon. Calliope has been out for a couple of days, but that is not a cause for concern. She is a Muse and she has a purpose to fulfill. Although the ache is sharp when they are gone, Hob is content to be a lighthouse for them. Steady and unwavering in a universe full of change.
Hob is in the middle of grading exams (On real paper still. With blue ink instead of red, because he swears it keeps his students from spiraling). He knows that doing work on the couch is bad for posture but, well, it’s not as if he’s going to develop scoliosis at this point in his immortality. He’s in the middle of correcting a horrifically inaccurate take on 16th century expansionism when he feels the familiar gust of Dream’s arrival.
“Hob.”
The Lord of Dreams dropping himself into the middle of Hob’s flat instead of walking through the front door is not an unusual occurrence, if occasionally cause for exasperation. What is peculiar is the troubled look on his features when Hob glances up. And the way he stumbles a little to the side like he’d been drinking for hours.
He also doesn’t tend to leave actual sand all over the carpet.
“Are you hurt?” Hob is already on his feet - the soldier instinct to find and plug bullet holes strong despite all the years he’d racked up - but the Endless halts him with a shake of the head. Is it even possible to injure Dream? “What happened?”
“No. I’m fine.”
Dream’s voice doesn’t sound overtly pained and Hob relaxes a bit. Still, it doesn’t sound right either. His usual timbre is off.
Hob is startled, but not frightened, to see the pinpoints of stars in the dark pits of Dream’s eyes.
“Alright,” he murmurs then, slower. This was new. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. The Dreaming is stable, as is the Waking World,” Dream says the words slowly, impassively, like he’s trying to convince himself of the fact. That is suspicious, but Hob hasn’t seen anything intensely out of the ordinary on the news today. Besides, Matthew tends to come gossip whenever anything is amiss within The Dreaming.
(Hob is friends with a talking bird and it’s somehow not the weirdest thing that’s happened to him. He doesn’t really care to reflect too much on that.)
Hob turns to close his laptop and set it on the coffee table. Pushes his folders of unscored exams to the side. Offers his love a lopsided smile.
“Come here, dove.”
“Why?” The Dream King’s nose lifts in impudence, but Hob is well attuned to his bullshit by now. He can see the cracks in his lover’s facade.
“Because you’re upset?” Hob arches a brow and tilts his head, as if he is explaining the concept to a curious child. “Because that’s the whole deal with this, remember?” He makes a vague gesture to the flat around them, at one of Calliope’s blouses draped over a kitchen chair, at the small collection of books Dream keeps bringing Hob to borrow from Lucienne’s library. “You don’t have to be upset all alone.”
The crack widens, just a little. He can see it, but he has had over six-hundred years to perfect his patience.
“I’m not,” he insists, and the well of worry in Hob’s chest grows. Dream never feels the need to repeat himself like this. “The realms are…are fine. ”
“Of course they are,” Hob gives him that with a reassuring nod, though now both eyebrows are raised in puzzlement. “That… that doesn’t mean you are, my love.”
At first, it looks like Dream will refuse the invitation, which isn’t entirely surprising. His mouth curls up in disquiet. Hob is about to come to him instead (because he’s not actually cruel enough to withhold obviously needed comfort just because his boyfriend is painfully stubborn) when finally, Dream takes a hesitant step forward. And then another, and Christ, he’s fucking shaking - it’s not big exaggerated tremors that move his slight frame, most wouldn’t even be able to notice it, but Hob can see the tiny quivers in his shoulders. It’s enough to know that whatever it is, he is hurting.
Dream stops short right in front of him. His fingers clench into fists of discomfort, and then Dream is suddenly tearing at his own clothes. He pulls at the neck of his shirt as if the fabric was burning him and this close, Hob can see that the Lord’s chest is heaving.
“Dream? What are you..?”
“I need it off, ” he grits out, sounding more distraught than Hob had ever heard him. Perpetually graceful hands scrabble against the buttons of his coat. Ineffectively. “Hob..I ne…I need.”
And Robert Gadling is so far from an expert on the Endless, but he does know the brews of a panic attack when he sees one.
“Okay- okay, slow down,” Hob springs forward and pulls Dream’s hands away so that he can take over. He pushes buttons through their fastenings. “I got it, sweetheart. Just hang on a second, okay?”
Dream’s clothes come from The Dreaming. Hob had seen the fabric simply melt away at the Endless’ will on more than one occasion. He isn’t sure why Dream seems to be incapable of that now, but it is not the time to ask questions. He eases the coat over Dream’s shoulders until it falls inside-out and the galaxy is pooled on Hob’s living room floor.
Without the coat to conceal it, the shaking only looks worse now. That’s okay though, he can deal with that. He expects to see relief at the loss of the layer, but then Dream gives another grunt of agitation.
Right, shirt next. Hob tugs up on the hem of Dream’s top and coaxes his arms through the sleeves until it too joins the growing pile on the floor.
He probably could have tried to be more gentle but with Dream’s apparent urgency, Hob goes for swiftness. A moment to kneel down and untie boot laces. A hand tugging on the back of Dream’s calves to get him to step out of the shoes. Quick work of a belt and the shimmying of dark trousers. He tosses the offending articles away, as if their mere presence is a threat.
“There you go, love,” he murmurs once all the layers are gone. Dream had stood bare before him many times, but this is by far the most unique circumstance. “Better?”
A barely perceptible nod. They’re getting somewhere.
Hob barely has any time to think about what to do now when he is shoved back onto the sofa and then he has a lapful of Endless. It’s awkward and uncoordinated. Dream’s knee digs painfully into his hip. He clutches at Hob’s jumper so tight that alabaster skin turns to an even paler grey.
“....Please, Hob..” he whines against Hob’s neck.
Lord Morpheus, the King of Dreams, is pleading. Hob just wishes he knew what for.
“Oh, honey,” he breathes and gathers him tight against his own chest. He shifts the other man into a more comfortable position, cradled in his lap with lean legs curled up along Hob’s thigh.
Dream never ever puts up with this many sickly-sweet pet names from him or Calliope, but today isn’t a normal fucking day. “I got you,” he murmurs against raven hair, and suddenly he feels something give in Dream. Suddenly the grip around his waist becomes so tight that Hob feels the wind knocked right out of him. Suddenly, the man (god? More than a god? Otherworldly entity?) is well and truly quivering. Like all he needed was for someone just to take the weight off his shoulders for a little while. “It’s okay.”
“...It’s not,” comes the delayed response, whispered against his neck so soft that Hob nearly misses it completely. He isn’t used to Dream sounding so small. Fragile, though Hob does not dare utter that out loud. He is immortal, but he doesn’t wish to be smited. “It’s too much. The dreamers. They’re so loud. All of them all at once.”
“It will be,” he whispers before even a beat has time to pass. It occurs to Hob that he doesn’t even know what precisely had happened. Maybe it really isn’t okay. Maybe something big is happening between him and his equally strange siblings. Maybe he’d lied and the Dreaming is in danger. Maybe the Waking World is in danger.
But maybe Dream just needs someone to make it stop for a few minutes. Someone to help him turn off the whirlwind in his head. Being Dream of the fucking Endless has to get overwhelming sometimes.
“It’ll be okay, dove. I’ve got you,” he lulls and drops his head to press a kiss to Dream’s temple. “Deep breaths, okay? I know you don’t really need it, but it’ll help. I promise.”
When he feels the Endless suck in a ragged lungful of air, Hob counts it as a small victory.
Eventually he hears the front door click open and the ever-graceful steps of sandals against tile. He knows they must be quite the sight, a naked Endless tucked into the arms of a very clothed, very ordinary human. When Hob catches Calliope’s gaze though, he sees something akin to understanding in her expression. Familiarity. Her mouth pulls into a sad smile.
Right. So this isn’t the first time this has happened. Good to know. Perhaps the world isn’t en-route to implode then.
He watches as she bends down to remove her shoes. Reaches up to take her hair out of its twist. She wanders into Hob’s bedroom - their bedroom - and he can hear the rustling of fabric. Dream does not move from where he’s shoved himself against Hob’s body, but Calliope does not seem to take offense to the lack of welcome.
After a couple more minutes, she returns wearing soft nightwear and carrying a duvet stolen off their bed. Hob lets her settle it over the both of them and helps tuck it more securely around their lover. When she settles against Dream’s other side, Hob leans over to kiss her.
“Oneiros,” Calliope murmurs against a bare shoulder. “The dreamers are safe. Your realm is safe. We are safe. Let your mind quiet.”
Dream relaxes for a moment, then Hob feels him tense up all over again, as if he is stopping himself from accepting the words as truth. That simply won’t do. He smoothes a hand down the Endless’ back, then up again. Over and over, letting his fingers run over each knob of vertebrae. Dream shivers.
“Do not be ashamed, my King.” She pulls the both of them closer. Presses a kiss to Dream’s jaw. Not that he needs reminding, but Hob understands why Dream fell in love with her the first time. Calliope has a talent for calming any storm, no matter how turbulent. “You have many responsibilities, but you are not without needs or limits. Let us do this for you.”
“It’s alright,” Hob echoes her sentiments. After a moment of consideration, he gently shifts until Dream’s head rests against the left side of his chest. His boyfriend had admitted, once, that the sound of his heartbeat is calming. It reminds him of Hob’s humanity. He’d compared it to the sound of wings reminding him of his sister, and Hob had never felt more flattered in his life than to be compared favorably to the literal personification of Death.
The effect is palpable. His lover makes a small noise of cautious content and his fingers start to lose their grapple on Hob’s jumper (the knitted fabric is ruined, but he can’t possibly bring himself to care). Calliope begins to card her fingers through unruly locks of hair. “That’s it, love. You’re okay.”
It takes a while, though Hob isn’t precisely sure how long (minutes? hours?), for Dream to finally relax. He and Calliope switch back and forth between talking to each other about their day - about Hob’s students, about the poetry she has recently inspired, about what they might make for dinner - and murmuring reassurances to their lover. Talking without pressuring Dream to join, but without leaving him out of conversation. And slowly, Hob feels the tension leak away from his body.
Dream does not sleep, not in the way that Hob or Calliope do, but he looks about as close to it as he can get. His head has lolled back to expose a pale throat. His chest is now consistently rising and falling instead of starting and stopping with anxious heaving. His demeanor is more like a languid cat than man at the moment.
Dream’s eyes have slipped closed but even so, Hob knows that the stars have melted back to cool blue irises.
Soon, they would move. They would find him some inoffensive clothes. Hob would cook them dinner, and Calliope would convince Dream to stay for it instead of whisking himself back off to The Dreaming. Perhaps they may even persuade him to slip into bed with them at the end of the evening.
But for now, they sit here, in the middle of Hob’s messy flat. Surrounded by his four walls full of history and relentlessness and life. And they breathe.