Chapter Text
Dream had his life all planned out. Finish high school, knock out an online degree in whatever spare hours he could scrape together, and keep building his channel alongside his best friends Sapnap and George. The three of them had been talking for over a year about finally moving into a house together once their numbers caught up to the dream, splitting rent, filming together every day, turning the thing they loved into something that actually paid the bills. It wasn't a perfect plan, but it was his plan, and for the first time in his life he felt like he knew exactly where he was headed.
What he didn't expect was for his girlfriend of ten months to show up at his door on a random Tuesday night, mascara running, and tell him she was pregnant.
"Elle... what?" Dream asked, running his hands through his hair like the motion alone might rearrange her words into something that made more sense.
"I'm going to have this baby, Clay." Her voice cracked, but she kept going, like she'd rehearsed this in the car the whole way over and refused to let herself stop halfway through. "My parents won't help me if I decide to keep it. So I've decided on adoption. It's already basically set up."
He stood frozen in the doorway for a second, staring at her like his brain hadn't caught up to his ears yet. Pregnant. Adoption. Two words he never thought he'd hear in the same sentence, let alone standing in his own hallway at ten at night.
"Can I have them? After?" The question came out before he'd even really thought it through. He'd never planned on being a father, not at nineteen, not like this, not with a channel barely getting off the ground and a degree he was doing online in his pajamas. But the moment she said adoption, something in his chest locked up and refused to let go. This was still his kid. He'd known about her for less than a minute and he already couldn't stomach the idea of some stranger raising her instead of him.
Elle went quiet, her eyes still wet, searching his face like she was trying to figure out whether he actually meant it or if it was just shock talking.
"If you keep her," she said slowly, "then we're done. I mean it, Clay. I can't do this halfway. I can't watch you raise our daughter down the street from me while I try to move on and pretend she doesn't exist. That's not something I can live with. It's all or nothing."
He didn't answer right away. Part of him wanted to argue, wanted to find some version of tonight where he got to keep both her and the baby, but her expression told him there wasn't one. She'd made her decision long before she ever knocked on his door. This wasn't really a conversation between them. It was more like a verdict he was being asked to accept.
"Okay," he said finally, quieter than he meant to. His voice barely made it out of his throat. "If that's what it takes. I'm sorry, Elle. I really am."
She nodded slowly, almost like she'd expected exactly that answer, like some part of her had known all along that he'd choose the baby the second the word adoption left her mouth. She wiped underneath her eyes with the back of her hand, sniffled once, and stood up off the couch.
"I'll keep in touch," she said, already halfway to the door. "I'll send you the details once there's something worth sending. Hospital, timeline, all that."
She paused with her hand resting on the doorframe, not quite looking back at him.
"I'm six months along, Clay. That's not a lot of time. You should probably start figuring things out soon. A place for her to sleep, a doctor, all of it. It comes faster than you'd think."
And then she was gone, the door clicking shut behind her with a quiet finality that felt so much louder than it should have.
Dream stood there for a long moment, staring at the space where she'd been standing thirty seconds ago, like maybe if he looked hard enough she'd still be there and none of this would have actually happened. Then his knees just gave out beneath him, and he sank down against the wall in the entryway, eyes shut, breathing like he'd just run somewhere instead of standing perfectly still.
Three months. He had three months to figure out how to be somebody's father, and right now he didn't have the first clue where to even start.