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In the old days, when it was still useful to wish for what your heart desired, there was a King, old and wise as all kings should be. He resided in a magnificent castle, towering over the kingdom with its grandeur and elegance, alongside the Queen and Princes - two boys, both of them smart, loud, and boisterous as all happy boys should be.
The younger, though, had always been different: way too curious for his own good, the boy did not know the limits of his own little body, the boundaries between dream and reality no more permanent than a line drawn on sand. The prince was a brilliant child, and it pained the King to see him get himself hurt over the smallest of things - a scar was left on his calf from when he had climbed up a tree to look for a robin’s nest and fallen off the branch once it had given up under his weight. Even after the boy had healed, the King couldn’t forget his Queen’s haunted eyes as they had held vigil over their son’s bedside, nor the way the fever had painted his pale cheeks way too red for anyone’s comfort.
So the boy had been raised under the watchful eyes of the castle staff, sworn to be kept safe. The Queen fell ill while the older son went off to a distant land, chasing adventures that promised riches they had no use for, only making the King’s protectiveness into something bigger. Away from the court and the thriving streets of their kingdom, the little prince was kept inside the walls of the castle, where he spent his days wandering through the lush gardens, studying the intricate details of each flower and listening to the sweet melodies of the birds as they sang their songs.
But, despite his isolation, the Prince was never unhappy.
Prince George grew up surrounded by books and nature and the type of love that felt stifling, and then lacking as he grew to be way too similar to the Queen’s looks - too much for the King to handle. The boy loved his peaceful life among the gardens, and he learned much from the world around him - he kept a journal all through his young years of the plants and animals he could find, making up for the lack of variety with the help of his imagination, spinning tales that lost their shine the longer he spent reading his brother’s letters about distant kingdoms and mountains so tall they almost pierced the sky.
As he grew older, Prince George also grew bored.
One of the few comforts he had were the afternoon naps he took under the big willow tree by the old well, curled tight around himself as he dreamed of open skies and an endless field of green he could lose himself. In his dreams, everything was full of colors he couldn’t ever find in the real world, an angel made of starlight keeping watch over him as he played around a field of poppies.
Make me fly, George would ask, and the hooded figure would grant his wish with a woosh of its copper wings, flinging George high enough he could glide between the fluffy clouds.
I want to be stronger, George would ask after a petty fight with his brother before he left for some stupid, faraway kingdom. The angel would snap his fingers and cover George in a shower of golden sparks that would solidify into sturdy armor, shimmering purple in the sunset of his mind.
After another fruitless talk with his father, George would ask Set me free, only to wake up in the same garden he had fallen asleep in, face still moist from his angry tears.
The summer after his sixteenth birthday, he met a weird little creature by the old stone well.
This would prove to be all he’d ever wished for.
The day had dawned bright and hot, as summer clung stubbornly to the land. George walked down the known path from the castle to the well, kicking stray stones on his way. The King had, once again, denied his wish to go outside. There was supposed to be a festival happening during the weekend, and all the excited talk from the maids had him curious to see what the fuss was all about - but, according to the King, there would be way too many people gathered. George’s poor constitution would never be able to handle it.
With a groan, he collapsed onto the soft grass, huffing a curse under his breath. One of these days.
Mindlessly, he pulled out some marbles from his pocket, rolling them against the grass. They had been a present from some distant relative years ago, and with George’s fondness for useless trinkets, he had latched onto them. They were pretty, too, trapping the stray beams of light and refracting them back onto the grass in pretty patterns, the pink quartz brindled with gold glimmering under the morning sun.
One of them rolled out of his reach when he pushed too strongly and disappeared behind the curve of the well, and as he reached out to try and pull it back, he almost jumped out of his skin when his fingers made contact with something squishy and warm.
“Hey! Why did you poke me?” something chirped from behind the well, and in the time it took for George to blink, a strange little creature came bobbing towards him.
It was all white, body shaped like a cylinder with a round head stuck on top, no taller than George’s palm spread wide. The little creature had a fierce scowl on its face as it stared him down. “What? Aren’t you going to apologize?”
George only blinked, utterly confused.
The blob huffed, wiggling until it was able to climb a tiny rock, perching itself on top of it. “You’re very rude.”
Finally recovered, George rolled to his side and raised himself onto his arms, slowly approaching the thing with caution, like he usually would a stray animal or a hurt bird - only to have the little thing chirp indignantly at him.
“I’m not a cat! Don’t pstpstpst me!”
“What are you?” he blurted out, amazed at how he could see tiny little fangs when the blob bared his teeth at him.
The thing stared at him for a few more moments, clicking his tongue before chirping, “I’m Dream.”
“Dream?”
Dream nodded, swiveling his little head around like he had grown bored of their conversation. There was a green smudge on the back of his head, and George wanted to reach out to clean the moss, but before he could even think of doing anything about it, the little blob spoke again, “I’m looking for the prince.”
That had George raising his eyebrows in surprise. No one was ever here for him. He didn’t even know if he was allowed visitors that weren’t part of the King’s dwindling court. “Why?”
“Need him to kiss me,” the blob said and George - he had to laugh.
“What? That’s so - ludicrous,” he laughed, giggles bubbling up his throat. This little thing wanted to kiss him? “Oh my God, what the hell.”
“I’m serious!” Dream trilled, cheeks staining a peach color from his anger. “You gotta help me - he needs to kiss me so I can become human again!”
George was stunned.
What?
“What ?”
The blob stared up at him, barely blinking those big eyes of his.
“I’m not lying! C’mon - tell me. Where’s the prince?” Dream insisted, spinning around his axis like he expected the prince to be hiding just behind his back.
This was - surreal and didn’t even begin to cover it. Had George finally lost it? Without a single warning, it seemed that all those years of loneliness had finally caught up to him: it made sense his mind would finally snap and come up with - whatever the little creature was, just so he had some company.
He blinked in stunned silence. There wasn’t much to do other than get up and leave. George would not deal with this right now.
The little creature’s voice rang in the quiet air as Dream tried to follow after him, but it quickly disappeared into nothing once George was safe inside the castle walls. He didn’t look back once, almost entirely convinced he would look back and only see an empty hallway.
It rained the entirety of the next morning and George was only able to get out of the stifling rooms mid-afternoon, with the sun shyly peeking out from behind the fluffy clouds.
The soil was soft under his pristine boots, his steps smudging the dark leather of it with brown and green as he walked around aimlessly. With fingers brushing the well-trimmed hedges that lined up the path to the greenhouses and servant's quarters, he chose to hide away in one of the many groves that lined the East side of the gardens, careful to be quiet so as to not alert any of the gardeners milling about. Inside, there was a low gurgle of water coming from the small fountain that was placed smack in the middle of the clearing, shells detailing the outside in swirly patterns, and he let himself fall onto one of the benches, shivering at how cold the marble felt under his bum.
The day before had been one of the weirdest of his life, and he had done his utmost to convince himself he had hallucinated the whole thing.
Magic wasn’t uncommon, but - as many, many other things of life - George had never had a first-hand experience with it. He had kind of imagined his first brush with it to be more impressive than a tiny little blob, so he chose to believe that he had probably fallen asleep without realizing it, and dreamed the whole thing.
That explanation had been sufficient enough up to the point he heard some shuffling nearby.
“You are the prince,” the tiny voice came from beneath the stone bench, and lo’ and behold, Dream’s white head poked out from the shade, black eyes narrowed at him.
“You’re back.” You’re real , George wanted to say, but that sounded a bit rude, even if the blob was giving him the nastiest side-eye he had ever gotten in his sixteen years of life.
“Why didn’t you tell me you were the prince? You just - ran away , who does that?”
George shrugged. The blob was trying to climb the bench and clearly struggling, so he reached out a hand and plucked him up - Dream had the consistency of a child’s doll, soft and malleable. Still, his lungs seemed to be made out of steel from the terribly loud screech he let out, immediately twisting out of George’s grip as soon as he could.
“That hurt,” he sniffled. His lips curled into a tiny pout, way too cute. “You’re so mean, my Prince.”
“Do not call me that,” George shot back, crossing his arms over his chest to have something to occupy his hands with. I’m not yours. It’s enough I’m already my father’s. “I’m just - just call me George, it’s so weird to hear it coming from you.”
Dream repeated his name under his breath, the anger dissipating into awe, visible in his tiny features. If anything, the little creature was quick to anger and even quicker to move on, emotions flaring up like bubbles in boiling water. “So you’re really him, huh? Why didn’t you kiss me yesterday?”
“Do you not realize how weird of an ask that is?” George stared at him. He blushed at the mere notion of kissing a random stranger.
Even in his isolation, he knew what a kiss meant, especially a first one - they were way too special. It was childish of him, but he had always hoped his first kiss would be bestowed upon a knight or a princess. A whole library’s worth of fairytales lived inside George’s closed-off heart, and Dream couldn’t be further away from the image he had always pictured: someone kind that would come knock on his window during the small hours before dawn, take George into his arms and whisk him away from the boring life he led, sealing the promise of a happy ending with a sweet kiss.
“But I told you. I wanna be human again,” Dream insisted, finally managing to hobble his way onto George’s leg. He stood tall, looking George straight in the eye. “C’mon, kiss me. Kiss me.”
“No, go away. I don’t - My kisses are important . I don’t go giving them out like that.”
In truth, George had never kissed anyone before - there was no one, really - but he figured it was better to lie than admit the truth. Dream seemed to have the kind of stubbornness that would have him keep insisting on the kiss, and George would rather avoid any more talk about it.
At least his words seemed to placate the little creature, who finally stopped trying to climb up his shirt. Instead, Dream fell onto his lap with a huff, a thoughtful look crossing his round face.
“Alright,” he said. “What do I have to do to earn it?”
The question took George completely off-guard. What was a kiss even worth if there was no love?
For starters, he imagined Dream would need to be human , but it felt a little too cruel to say it so bluntly. George didn’t buy the little creature’s story, but calling him out didn’t feel right - it was clear the blob believed his own story, so in a stroke of mischief born out of years of solitude trapped inside the stupid castle walls, George decided to string him along and see where that would take him.
At least, it would be good entertainment, right?
“Come back tomorrow,” he answered, a grin forming on his lips. “Then we can talk about it.”
Dream came back the next day, and the day after that, and all mornings during the week he joined George in his early walks and late afternoon strolls, always full of so much energy George had to wonder how exactly it all fit inside such a small body.
At first, George asked questions about the alleged curse and his previous life, trying to find the holes to sink his fingers into and undo Dream’s story, but he didn’t really find any. Dream was a little vague in how he had gotten cursed - a witch had been angry at him for trespassing into her property, even more so when she noticed he had hunted game inside her supposedly sacred land - but the rest of his tale was solid enough to get George wondering.
“How do you know a kiss will turn you back?” he found himself asking one day, Dream fit snugly inside his coat pocket as George reached for a pear from the orchard, distractedly looking down at him. “Did the witch tell you that?”
“I mean - that’s gotta do it, right?” Dream shrugged, mouth curling into a frown. “Everything else failed. I’m sure this is the answer.”
George didn’t comment on it. He had years of waiting for the day his father would surely stop being unreasonable.
According to Dream, he lived a couple of towns over with his mother and sister, in a cozy little house with a nice garden and a river that provided them with enough fish that food wasn’t such a concern as it could’ve been during the colder months. If his stories were to be believed, Dream was a skilled hunter and an even better tracker, and even if his tales of grand chases and witty maneuvers had George cocking his eyebrow in slight disbelief, there was something to Dream’s voice that had him captivated - the peaks and valleys of his timbre and how the emotion easily bled through whatever he was saying; how his choice of words, while not polished, were more than enough to paint a beautiful image of the world outside that left George aching for more.
There was adventure and excitement and hurt and so much joy in everything the little blob told him George couldn’t help but believe him. More than anything, Dream’s presence was a reminder that life was abundant outside the walls, while everything George had was stale.
“Tell me about you!” Dream chirped one morning, rolling on his side against the grass with a little laugh. “Being a prince sounds so cool.”
“I don’t know about that,” George shrugged, fiddling with his fringe. “If you haven’t noticed, nothing really happens here.”
Talking about himself was both uncomfortable and weird . George didn’t like feeling seen - he was self-aware enough to recognize the pitying looks from the castle staff, and he absolutely didn’t want to see that sentiment reflected in Dream’s earnest gaze.
Somehow, during their brief time together, genuine curiosity had blossomed between George’s teasing remarks, and now he - pitifully enough - found himself enjoying the blob’s company.
How pathetic.
“C’mon, George - you know so much about me. Don’t gatekeep,” Dream cajoled, bumping his warm head against his knee.
“I’m not!” George huffed, poking a finger against Dream’s torso. “And it’s not like I know everything . You haven’t told me what you look like yet.”
That was not what he had meant to say, and he felt his cheeks grow warm at the way Dream looked at him. “Why, George? Are you curious?”
George squirmed, sending Dream a dirty look. “It’s not like I actually believe you’re a man-”
“Okay, no - shut up - Of course I am,” Dream cut him off mid-sentence, little fangs biting the edge of his mouth as he thought about how to describe himself. “I’m like - really good-looking. My hair is very light - blonde, you know? Almost like gold, like in the stories. And I’m also way taller than you.”
With a very inelegant snort, George rolled his eyes. Dream was such an idiot. “Yeah, right.”
“I am! You’re tiny,” Dream grinned for barely a second, before blushing a little when George cocked an eyebrow, both of them keenly aware that Dream’s current form was smaller than the length of George’s forearm. “No - don’t even. This doesn’t count, and like - I’m actually tall for a blob.”
That sent both of them cackling, laughter bubbling out of George from how absurd Dream was. He had never met anyone like him - kind and funny, with the voice of a minstrel and with an ego so big it was impossible to not want to take him down a peg or two. In their short time of knowing each other, George found himself wondering what it’d feel to challenge Dream - human Dream - who would have arms and legs that he could pin against the grass once he managed to best him in a playfight, who would maybe look up at George and actually see him for who he was, not the tragic little boy everyone else couldn’t look past.
Maybe - if Dream had wandered into the castle on his two legs with his stupid blonde hair and cocky attitude, maybe he would have been able to grab George’s hand and whisk him away as he had always dreamed of doing so himself.
“I have freckles on my face and some on my arms, too,” Dream droned on, bringing George’s attention back to him. Right. Dream was nothing but a little creature, George didn’t know why he was even entertaining the idea he would ever be human. “I’m more - I’m definitely stronger than you, and my eyes are like - green.”
“Whoah. That’s really believable Dream, good job,” he said overly enthusiastic, fake, and sickly sweet, but Dream was undeterred.
“So you’re saying I’m attractive?”
Tired of the subject already, George shrugged, deciding to play another angle. “If - and that’s a huge if , because I do not believe you - who you described actually existed, then… Yeah. That hypothetical person would be kinda handsome.”
Dream’s eyes had a little glimmer to them when he blinked up at him, but thankfully he let George steer the conversation toward something tamer.
“I think we should play a game.”
The day had dawned under rain again, cloudy and so cold it nipped at his cheeks like tiny pinpricks. He had found Dream lounging by the main gate of the castle, shivering and looking so miserable George had no other option but to scoop him up in his hands and sneak him inside, hiding the little creature in the folds of his cloak as he walked the halls pretending this wasn’t probably the most exciting thing that had happened in quite some time.
George’s heart sped up as he passed by servants and walked through the huge, empty ballrooms that made up the first floor, steps echoing in the cavernous space that hadn’t seen a celebration in years. He took a spiral staircase that led him straight to his quarters, the stone walls feeling as alien as his ragged breathing: it was almost like the paintings were staring at him, their ancient gaze following his hurried steps until he finally made it to his room, locking the heavy door behind him with a sense of relief. His heart was beating out of sync, filled with the childish wonder of finally having someone - maybe even a friend - inside a space that was his own, even if his years of sleepovers had been left way in the past.
He carefully placed Dream on top of his blankets and crashed against the mattress, giggling to himself. He had caught his reflection in the small mirror atop the mantle and barely recognized the red-cheeked, wide-eyed boy that stared back at him.
Dream allowed him some time to calm down, amused at this turn of events. If he had any comments about the overflowing bookshelves or the many paintings covering every available surface of the room he kept them to himself, flopping onto the covers with a small little sound.
“What do you say about a game?” George asked once he felt like he had his heartbeat under control, turning on his side to look at Dream.
“How about two truths and a lie?” Dream suggested in his best snake-charming voice, his body starkly white against the royal red of his bedsheets. “If I win, I get to kiss you, because then - I’ll know you, right? Then it won’t be a problem.”
Dream sounded earnest enough, and a part of George - the same one that was thrilled to be breaking the rules like this - was screaming a resounding yes inside his head.
But a bigger part of him balked at the idea. What if Dream somehow managed to win? Deep down, George wasn’t so against kissing Dream anymore: he imagined it would feel like a non-kiss, really, the plushy skin of the little creature more akin to a stuffed doll than anything remotely human. It wouldn’t count.
No. His main gripe was that he knew the kiss wouldn’t work, and Dream - stubborn as he was - would move on to something else to break his curse.
George would be left all alone again.
“I don’t know… You could scam me, Dream,” he argued, baselessly clinging to whatever thread he could to hold down his position.
“Come on , how would I even scam you? That’s dumb.”
“You could ask the maids or someone from the castle - you could go to the town and read stuff about me in the books, maybe even the city papers.”
Even as he rambled off about another million ways Dream could swindle him - each more far-fetched than the other - George could feel his resolve start to crumble. He sounded like a child trying to bargain for an extra cookie after dinner, way too close to how his voice grew high during the endless meetings he had with the King trying to persuade him to let him go outside, just for a little while, please.
“Don’t be an idiot,” Dream finally put a stop to his endless excuses, shuffling close to George’s hand in order to playfully bump his head against it, much like a cat would. “I would never cheat on this. I wanna earn your kiss. I know I can do it.”
Seeing that George was on the verge of breaking, Dream pouted at him, eyes huge on his stupid round face. “Please? It’ll be fun.”
“For you , maybe.”
George was screwed.
So, their game started.
George said: I’ve fallen face down onto a birthday cake. I don’t know how to ride a horse. I was completely bald until the age of two.
After a few seconds of deliberation, Dream chose wrong as George had secretly been hoping for.
He didn’t look defeated though. He pulled over a pillow by his tiny teeth and got comfortable, asking George questions about his truth - the cake one - and with some cajoling he provided Dream with more details: the color of his mother’s dress, how sweet the cake had been. “It was - I swear it, Dream - It was sweet enough to almost hurt my teeth after taking a bite,” George giggled despite himself. “It was good, though. Chocolate was my mother’s favorite.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever had chocolate cake before,” Dream replied, eyes round with curiosity. “What does it taste like?”
The question took George off-guard. It reminded him of how the maids used to fumble when he asked what exactly made a rose pink , and why he couldn’t quite see it as clearly as he did cornflower blue. He found himself in the rare position of having knowledge Dream didn’t , thrilled to be able to at least level out the playing field between them a little bit - no one had ever been able to convey why sunsets were so magical, or why red held such importance to the Royal House when he couldn’t even see it properly - so George made sure to go into detail about the cake (fluffy and cloud-like) and all the exotic fruit that had once been delivered to the castle as a gift to the King (citrusy and strong), the textures and flavors and the weight of them against his palm, how amazing it had been to be able to eat so many different things that weren’t confined to the King’s strict diet.
Despite his tangents and weird, seemingly random questions, Dream was a good listener. He made ooohs and aaahs at the appropriate times, bouncing excitedly whenever it was appropriate to do so, and their conversation flowed with the ease of an old river. Hearing the sound of someone else’s voice - someone else’s laugh - echo inside his secluded room was riveting, so distracting that, when George realized, the sun had already gone down and there were three polite knocks against his door, and they both scrambled to hide Dream underneath some spare cushions as the maids came inside to drop a tray with his dinner.
That night, he fell asleep with his cheeks hurting from laughter, mouth parted around a snore that had been either the start of a joke or the end of another story. Either way, the important part was that Dream had been there right beside him, warm little body pressed against George’s forearm and snoring softly enough that it faded into white noise.
For the first time in quite some time, George wasn’t alone.
It went like this:
I still have my milk teeth in. I know how to juggle. The first book I read by myself had a talking monkey on it.
The King taught me fencing. I never opened my brother’s last letter to me. I hate the color red.
In the gaps between their game, George started to slip.
The maids looked at him in curiosity, and he heard the whispers about him being happier than ever before. Instead of bothering the King to ask for impossible things, he spent his days outside with Dream by his side, talking nonsense until the sun went down - he discovered the freckles on his own cheeks after Dream pointed them out and under Dream’s surprisingly patient guidance he learned how to actually skip a stone instead of simply letting it plunge. Sharing his thoughts was becoming easier by the day. Stuff about his favorite character in a book or how much he loved strawberries dipped in honey spilled from his lips without the guise of their game, unfiltered pieces of himself that had been held under the weight of his solitude for most of his life, made precious by it.
No one had ever cared or known him as well as this little creature. George was but a burden to his father and a forsaken memory to his brother, a memory lost in the minds of the citizens that only knew him as a footnote on the King’s reign, easily forgotten. And yet - under Dream’s gaze, he felt not only alive but also important, not lost to the fog or a shipwreck in sea waters. Here, George was just himself .
It was scary, to say the least.
Dream was becoming way too important. In the moments where George’s well of lies felt close to empty, it was when reality came crashing back: carelessly, they raced towards the inevitable moment Dream would realize he was no different than George - trapped and lost, nothing but a boy choosing to believe he would ever be free.
“Have you ever been to a Festival?”
George shook his head. Dream’s question had been a little out of nowhere, but he didn’t mind it as much as he should’ve, already used to the way Dream’s mind shot off like a rocket in unexpected directions.
“They’re quite fun,” Dream commented mindlessly, trying to sneak a peek at the book George was currently reading. “My favorite is actually coming up next moon.”
“That’s the one for Harvest, right?” George snapped his book closed, grinning at Dream’s little pout.
The blob settled back against the wooden table they were hanging out at, a little window nook lost in the grandeur of the Palace’s library George had always been fond of. He usually came here whenever he wanted some peace and quiet, a respite from the chattering servants and the bustle of the Castle that always managed to make him feel like an intruder in his own home, but Dream’s chattering voice was just as welcomed here as it was out there in the gardens.
George listened closely as Dream told him about the loaves of bread made specifically for the Harvest Festival, twisted into laurels and warm to the touch, sprinkled with herbs and dried tomatoes and garlic that melted in his mouth. He told George about the fresh wheat crops that looked golden under sunlight, and how the bonfire lit up the entire town square, shooting sparks up the sky like they were tiny stars trying to crawl back to their place by the full moon.
“Huh, it does sound nice,” George said when Dream paused to take a breather. “I wish I could go.”
Dream nodded. George wondered what he thought about his situation - they hadn’t outright talked about George’s inability to leave the castle yet, but there were enough hints to form an accurate enough picture, and Dream was clever enough to figure it out with half the clues he had been given. It was telling that this was one of the few subjects whose walls had remained intact, islands lost in the middle of everything else he was willing to give Dream - they were crumbling, though, and sooner or later George knew years of frustration would pour out of him in a mindless rush that could only be brought on by Dream.
A scary thought, but an exciting one nonetheless.
“Sometimes I wish I was born into a different family,” he muttered after a little while. He picked up a quill, balancing it between his fingers as he unearthed another one of his precious truths. “I guess - life would be easier if I was a peasant.”
Dream made a noise, and when George looked up, he had a frown between his eyes, mouth twisted into a little scowl.
“Come on, you don’t actually mean that,” he said, and when George simply shrugged, his eyes only widened in surprise. “Wait - really ?”
This was a mistake.
“Do not look at me like that. I don’t need your pity,” he said, words coming out harsher than any other conversation they’d ever had.
Almost like a physical reaction, he could feel his walls close up again, and all George wanted was to leave. Dream didn’t understand . This was useless.
“George, come on, I’m not -”
He got up from his seat, palms smacking against the armrests of his chair with a loud noise. “It’s late. Goodnight, Dream.”
“Hey, no - George, don’t -”
Much like that first day, George scurried off to hide away in his bedroom. Dream’s voice called his name from the library, much harder to ignore this time, but soon enough it disappeared into nothingness.
It was time George got used to being alone again.
The next day, George stayed holed up inside his room, nose stuck in a dusty book he caught zero words of. There was talk amongst the staff of a weird voice calling out for him around the maze of corridors that were the West Wing of the Castle, and a couple of Knights were sent off to look for any intruders that could’ve slipped inside. By night, when hunger twisted its claws deep enough in his empty stomach and George was forced to leave the oasis of his room, the kitchen staff was already spinning tales of a pale figure haunting the Castle, way too smart to be caught by the Knights.
In the morning after, George was rudely woken up by a sharp pain on his finger, and he almost chucked Dream against the wall in his sleepy confusion.
“Did you bite me?” he grumbled, blinking slowly at the tiny red marks left on his index finger.
Dream huffed, clearly unamused. “Why are you such a heavy sleeper? I’ve been trying to wake you up for ages now.”
Pulling the blankets up to his nose, George turned on his side. “Go away, Dream.”
“No. Stop being an idiot. We’re friends, you can’t just - ignore me like that.”
That was the problem, wasn’t it? They were friends . More than that: in his self-imposed solitude during the day before, George had come to the realization he was starting to actually like Dream, stupid blob-shape and all. He liked his voice and his hiccupy laugh, and he had spent hours trying to ignore the image his traitorous mind had carefully crafted to taunt him - a boy blonde and tall, with a brilliant smile and the type of booming laughter that would probably shake George to his core, who would tease him and call him an idiot, with arms strong enough to hold George together whenever things got to be too much. In the long hours of yesterday’s afternoon, George had caught himself wondering if human-Dream would have the same little fangs his blob counterpart had, getting so lost in the fantasy that for a moment, he had started to believe Dream’s story was actually true .
He had to put a stop to all of this. Somehow.
The idea took form before he even realized it, spiling from his lips without any conscious thought of doing so. “I’m going to kiss you.”
“Wait - what .” Dream blinked, completely taken aback. To be quite frank, George could relate. “But I haven’t - Are you sick? Did you catch a fever?”
He tried jumping up to press his forehead against George’s, but he batted him away, cheeks flushing. “You can’t catch a fever like that, Dream, don’t be dumb. Do you not want the kiss anymore?”
“Of course I want it!” He was quick to chirp back, face scrunched up in a frown. “But - this isn’t what we agreed on! I have to earn it.”
George blinked, cursing Dream’s stubborn heart. He could feel a knot of anxiety tightening around his vocal cords, strangling his voice before he could say something stupid. Sharing his thoughts with Dream had become so commonplace that keeping anything from him required effort now .
Oh, how doomed he was.
“You know what - fine. Fine .” George took a deep breath, kicking down the covers and sitting up straight, gaze intent on Dream. His heart was thumping against his chest, painfully strong like it wanted to crawl out of his chest and find a new home, right beside Dream’s. “We can keep playing this stupid game, Dream, I don’t care.”
“Why are you acting like -”
“Shut up. You want the game, right? I’ll give you what you want.”
He just - Dream wouldn’t be able to pick wrong if everything he said was true, would he? George just had to be honest and Dream would win.
It was almost poetic, really. If George wasn’t so heartbroken right now, he sure would be laughing.
With a deep exhale, he began.
“I’m afraid,” he started, avoiding Dream’s gaze like it was the plague. He could do it.
“I do not want you to leave,” the second phrase fell out of his lips without much of his own input, and the silence that followed was heavy enough that George lifted his gaze, needing to find Dream’s button eyes to feel grounded.
Dream was already looking at him, mouth rounded in a tiny O of surprise, frozen on top of George’s bedsheets. He watched Dream swallow around nothing, muttering something under his breath that sounded way too close to George’s name.
There was still room to make this into a joke, to laugh it off and come up with an absurd lie that would offer Dream an escape from this dumb mess of George’s own making.
He couldn’t though.
At this point, Dream leaving would be more terrifying than Dream knowing , so even if it felt like he was tearing his heart out, George reached deep inside and found the feelings he hadn’t even allowed himself to examine too close yet.
“I think - I might be falling for you.”
He didn’t allow Dream the courtesy of trying to figure it out.
Swooping him into his palm, George brought him up to eye level and smacked a kiss right on the corner of his mouth.
There was a flash of blinding white followed by a woosh that pushed him right back against his bed, a weight settling on top of him that knocked the air straight out of his lungs.
George had barely managed to blink his eyes open when his vision got suddenly filled with a lot of hair - blonde and disheveled, framing a face that was so painfully handsome George wanted to scream.
There were freckles dusted over the boy’s face like stardust had been sprinkled gently over it during the night, skin flushed the softest pink under it. His eyes were round and a little droopy, thick lashes framing golden-green irises that were scanning over George’s face like he had been the one to magically go from a squishy blob to a sturdy man .
This was Dream. And he looked even better than what George’s mind had been able to come up with.
Life was so unfair.
“George?”
Even his stupid voice was pretty.
“Hey - look at me.” George huffed but turned his face back to where Dream continued to stare him down, a surprised smile taking over his face. “You kissed me.”
“You asked me to.”
“I know.”
Dream was so expressive. Like he did when he went up the West Tower to watch the night sky, George had his chin tipped up, seeing emotion after emotion cross Dream’s handsome features, mesmerized and overwhelmed. Slowly, realization dawned on him that this was Dream - blob Dream, unarguably the person he had grown the closest with, the one he had tried to push away with a clumsy confession that was certainly about to blow up spectacularly in his face.
“You didn’t even let me try to guess the lie,” Dream murmured, letting his body fall sideways on the bed, and George followed, much like a sunflower following the sun’s path as it descended over the horizon.
He would follow Dream anywhere, he realized in those delicate seconds where they just stared at each other. Across the Castle Walls and an entire ocean if it came down to it.
Heart beating wildly out of sync, George watched Dream close the distance between them with the simple gesture of tangling their fingers together. Just like he had said, Dream was way bigger than George: his warm hand dwarfed George’s more delicate one in a hold that felt like he was being welcomed home , warm and so gentle George wanted to kiss him again, treat Dream with the kindness he deserved.
Dream’s eyes were scrunched up into half moons, smile the most precious thing George had ever seen. “There was no lie, was there?”
With a slight shake of his head, George tipped forward, meeting Dream’s smile with one of his own. They traded kisses like secrets, muffled giggling escaping from the seal of their lips as wave after wave of relief crashed over him, drowning every single little voice that had been claiming his confession would be his undoing. George’s heart had grown fragile ever since his mother’s passing - his father’s love was an iron cage, his brother’s a distant memory - but here was a boy that had taken the time to learn him, who kissed him so tenderly and laughed so loudly George couldn’t help but try to match him, uncaring about anything else that wasn’t the two of them.
When Dream pulled back, he cupped George’s face in his hand and just looked at him, as if George had been the faceless one up until now. Dream’s eyes scanned over his blushing cheeks, but George didn’t move away - it was only fair to allow Dream this, especially when George himself was trying to etch all the angles of his face into his memory, never to be forgotten.
“You know,” Dream started, dropping a tiny kiss on George’s forehead. “I was ready to get my heart broken when you walked out on me like that. I’m glad - God, I’m so happy you kissed me.”
George kicked his leg, choking on the glowing affection bubbling up his throat. “Really?”
“Yeah, really. I was terrified you’d reject me.” Dream shrugged, thumb caressing the delicate skin under George’s eye. “I had this whole speech prepared about - It’s actually crazy how you light up an entire room with that smile of yours, it always made me feel so happy … No matter how much I missed my home and my family."
Blinking away the stupid tears prickling his eyes, George couldn’t do anything else but squeeze Dream’s hand. This was - Dream was everything.
Like he could understand his silence for what it was, Dream nodded, lips curling into a softer smile, voice growing even softer. “My heart belongs to you, George,” Dream said like it was simple, and as the words settled inside him, George felt like he was crumbling into himself all over again - only this time, there was no despair stabbing at his heart.
George buried his face in Dream’s neck and just breathed, overwhelmed.
In the quiet air of his childhood bedroom, he said to Dream: I love you. Barely a heartbeat after, Dream said it back. No hesitancy, no conditions, only I love you too.
George’s eyes burned, but these tears felt different from all the others that had come before: happiness was a solid thing glowing inside his chest, and when Dream’s arms wrapped around him, he found that they felt exactly as he had hoped for: Warm, solid, and undeniably safe.
In the end, walking out happened in a much less dramatic way than George had ever pictured it.
It was with a letter addressed to the King, written with George’s careful penmanship. It was with a whispered goodbye to one of the oldest soldiers of the King’s guards, the man who had a son the same age as George and was the only Knight he had ever allowed to accompany him on his walks around the property. It was with a basket full of food left by his door - an anonymous act of kindness he had never seen coming - and with Dream by his side, dressed in a blue cloak that sort of matched George’s own.
There was no sound of any alarm bells. There was only George and Dream holding hands as the Knight sneaked them through an old passage between some fallen rocks, way deep into the forest that lined the South gate. On an impulse, George hugged the man before they stepped foot outside - a goodbye he wished he could give his own father, but he knew that the King hadn’t been that for many many years now.
A single tear fell down his cheek when the man turned his back to them, but the only witness to this moment of weakness was Dream, who only pressed a kiss to his forehead while George allowed himself a minute to grieve for a life he would never go back to.
“Are you okay?” Dream asked once they stepped outside, and asked again when they stopped over a little hill, the Castle looking no bigger than George’s fist in the distance.
“I’ll be fine,” George reassured him with a voice that cracked right in the middle, but his steps didn’t waver in leading them down, away from his old life. “Tell me again about Drista.”
With a silly eye-roll, Dream started to talk about how his sister had managed to sneak no less than eight cats into their home without him or his mother noticing, and the story carried them all the way to a small clearing they spent the night on. Dream cuddled him during the night as they made up stories about the constellations, and when morning came, they saw a village in the distance, barely visible through the morning fog.
When they crossed the wooden gate, tired and a little hungry, the sun was low in the sky. After stopping by a small inn and securing a room, they stepped back into the cobbled streets, George having spent enough time indoors to last him a lifetime. There were colored tassels hanging from every single balcony in sight, while garlands of yellow straw and daisies hung from each door they passed on their way to the huge bonfire at the town center, following after the stream of people headed that way as well.
There, they found stalls with food and a small stage where - much to the crowd’s enjoyment - a group of minstrels was playing the type of music George had rarely ever heard inside the Castle walls before. There was hopping and clapping, and the type of exuberant happiness that lacked from the rare dances the King had offered back at the palace. There was so much joy George found himself grabbing Dream’s hand and marching them closer until they were hanging on the fringes of the dancing crowd. When he hesitated to join in, Dream pulled him to his chest, guiding George into a clumsy little waltz that basically consisted of a lot of fumbling and laughter, always keeping him close enough to whisper sweet nothings into his ear.
The entire night tasted like freedom. No one batted an eye at the two boys fumbling their steps by the edge of the crowd. With bright cheeks, George called Dream an idiot but tipped his head up to slide their lips together anyway. And as Dream pulled him even closer to cover George’s face with silly little kisses, laughter spilling out of his lips, he made a wish upon all the stars watching that their future would look exactly like this.
It turned out that life outside was even better than he had ever dreamed of.