Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

George met Dream the first week of their freshman year.

It was pretty easy for them to find a place in each other’s lives. Dream was easy to talk to, even easier to be around, and even easier to keep around. He was like a strangely sweet pest, something that kept coming back but never in a way that was unwanted.

Dream was one of the best people George met in college. Right up there with his roommate on the list of people George wanted to keep around for as long as humanly possible, Dream sat pretty in pleasant conversation and easy-going existence. There was no one else George would rather spend his time with—even his aforementioned roommate, who he was practically forced to spend time with—and he was alright with that.

He still has other friends. Dream is just his best friend.

But there’s an issue with the two of them being friends. Something not-so personal, something not-so internal. If anything, maybe it’s a problem with who George and Dream are friends with and not with the two of them at all.

If it were a problem with their friends, though, then maybe it wouldn’t be all of them.

George shakes it off. He refuses to let this be an issue of his own; the issue is that everyone thinks him and Dream are dating.

And they’re not. Dream is just his friend, just as he’s only Dream’s friends. It’s nothing more, and it will never be anything more, and neither of them want it to be anything more. It’s even a conversation they’ve had before—perhaps more than once, and perhaps that already set them apart from other pairs of so-called best friends—and they both agree they don’t like each other like that. They might hang out every day, and do everything together, and text each other all the time, but they’re just friends.

The issue is everyone else. The issue is setting expectations between two male best friends who both happen to like men, the issue is everyone else thinking they’re going to end up dating each other and not the strangely close relationship they’ve formed for themselves in the past not-quite-year.

They’re just friends. Always have been, always will be, forever.

Even if George is hearing the same thing for the nine thousandth time since he first introduced Dream to his roommate. Even if he’s sitting outside their residence hall with a displeased look on his face, the same-old teasing is starting to get old.

“So even after a dramatic reunion to kick off the fall semester, you still aren’t dating?”

George scoffs. Karl’s over-excited words are still sitting in his head, finding their place right next to a steady replay of his and Dream’s so-called dramatic reunion from a few short days ago.

After moving into his and Karl’s dorm, George had rushed outside to wait for Dream. He lived a little farther away and was arriving later than George, and after an entire summer spent with infrequent phone calls and more frequent texting, it was safe to say that George had missed his friend.

But he missed all his friends. He missed Karl enough to hug him when he first stepped into their room, and that was saying something.

He missed Dream enough to hug him, too. And apparently, Karl had taken it upon himself to watch George run up to Dream in the parking lot from their dorm room’s window, and apparently, the reunion was rather dramatic.

George didn’t really see it.

“We’re not dating,” George insists, and the words are starting to get tired on his tongue. Even after three months of seldom having to say it at all, he thinks he’s already losing his mind. “We’re just friends, Karl. Does that mean we’re not allowed to hug?”

Karl laughs, loud and halfway to accusatory. It’s a strange sound, something about it bordering on paradoxical. “You’re just not much of a physical touch guy. Neither of you are.”

It’s fair enough, really. It took George about a month and a half to come around to how touchy Karl was with him, but to be fair, it took just as long—if not longer—to get to a similar point with Dream.

So that point didn’t really mean anything.

“We’re still just friends,” Dream interjects. “When will you stop bothering us about this?”

George turns to look at where Dream sits beside him, reading the defeated look on his face clear as day. Both of them are tired of this conversation—they’ve discussed that in their shared solitude, too—and their answers are all-too practiced.

Even those answers. The “when will you drop this.” George is starting to think all their friends have the questions well-rehearsed, too.

“When you two finally figure your shit out and get together.”

Both of them scoff. Karl just looks between them like he’s expecting something, leaving their conversation off on that note as he gets up to go to class. The world falls silent for a moment, nothing but the sound of birds hidden in the trees and passing chatter to keep the two of them company.

Silence is a normal thing to sit between them. George finds that silence with Dream is a little different than silence with anyone else; more comfortable. He basks in it just as well as he basks in the soft sunlight, late-August warmth painting his skin a dirty red.

He looks at Dream again. Verdant eyes cast down, squinting slightly at a phone screen surely washed out by the sun. George wonders what he’s up to, and he doesn’t ask, and Dream doesn’t pick up on the silent questions. He never does, but George never expects him to. It’s an agreement of sorts, but it’s something they’ve never spoken about.

Not like feelings, or year-old questions, or tired-run answers. George isn’t sure when he started separating all the things between them out into categories. He isn’t sure how many categories he has, either.

He tries not to dwell on it. It’s not too difficult to take his mind off things.

The easy wind brushing past them and the distant chirp of unseen birds serves as more than enough of a distraction, nonchalance flitting baby pink through the crisp summer air. Dream starts humming, and George thinks he does that without realizing, a tune skimming halfway to familiar off the tip of his hidden tongue.

It’s quiet. A different kind of quiet than they shared with Karl across the picnic table, a different kind of quiet than what sits familiar between the walls of now-old dorm rooms. George revels in it with his tongue between his teeth, silence skating as familiar as golden honey down the raw back of his throat.

Dream hums an increasingly familiar-sounding tune. It buzzes with all the silt of a honeybee, though it coasts with no semblance of change. George doesn’t think he really needs change, anyway.

This sweet redundancy is more than enough for him.

Soft like there’s something to interrupt, George asks, “Do you have class soon, too?”

Dream looks up rather sharply, a well-hummed tune dying quickly between his lips. Blinking, he seems to process it, a slight purse crossing his lips in thought.

With a soft shake to his head, he answers, “Not for a while.”

Umber eyes dart around their shared space. George plays catch-up with himself when he doesn't think through the rest of their conversation, trilling birdsong drawing quieter and quieter the further into his head he recedes.

“Did you want to go to the bookstore?”

When the question finally lands, it sticks easy. Perhaps he’s practiced asking that very thing a thousand times before, and perhaps the curl of it still aches with last year’s elegance on dutiful repetition.

Perhaps Dream’s smile stretches all the same.

“Yeah,” and he’s already standing up, “let’s go.”

The bookstore is only a short walk away from campus. It’s one of the first places Dream and George went together, a mere few days after they first met. It was George’s idea, though he only knew of the place from overhearing other people’s conversations.

He’d offered it up when they both grew tired of the campus library. He still doesn’t think Dream has beat himself on agreeableness since, even when he’s getting up from picnic tables halfway through his own sentences or talking while he rushes forward on the sidewalk.

It never stops being endearing, though.

“Karl’s stupid,” Dream mutters, kicking at a rock to skitter down the empty sidewalk.

George huffs over a laugh, a reaction he’d probably have even without the context swimming heavy in his head. “He’s an idiot,” he says. “A very persistent idiot.”

“It’s so weird, though,” Dream remarks, voice as absent as his attention. “You and me?” his face twists, “together?”

And even if the blond’s tone morphs close to disgust, George doesn’t feel offended. Instead, his nose scrunches, a taut kind of agreeance thinned out in lines across his skin.

“No, yeah,” he agrees, messy. “Ew.”

Dream turns to look at him, mock offense skating against the corners of his lips. “Hey,” he huffs, rattled, “I can’t be that bad.”

It’s slightly sarcastic, a conversation they’ve had a thousand times before stroking hot with perceived normalcy. George has defied these same allegations before, and he’s watched the feigned displeasure morph his best friend’s face away from recognition, and he’s tinted dismal all the same no matter how many times they repeat themselves.

Perhaps they’ve even had this very conversation in this very place before. Along the well-worn sidewalk, halfway to the bookstore they might as well live at, burdened after defiance without belief.

George thinks his answer is as rehearsed as the rest of him. “No, you are that bad,” he insists, slightly bitter in formality. “You’re gross.”

He tastes the lilt along the backs of his teeth. It’s sour before it’s sweet, mottled icing sugar already heavy by the time Dream’s face is twisting up again.

“I’m gross?” he echoes, and George can no longer discern his mirth from his honesty.

But George wouldn’t quite know how to deal with the latter. He never has, and he thinks Dream knows this, though he still watches for the familiar glint behind green eyes before he answers with drooling sarcasm.

“I’m kind of offended that so many people think we’re dating.”

He’s not.

He’s just very, very tired.

“Now you’re just hurting my ego,” Dream huffs, something high-pitched and juvenile about the way he complains.

George can’t help but laugh. “You need to be humbled.”

Dream rolls his eyes, letting the thought die in threes as he reaches for the handle of a familiar door. A silver bell rings as it’s opened, glass panes and old books welcomed thoroughly as they follow each other over the invisible threshold.

The shop is quiet, other college students flecked between the shelves with distraction and seated spectacles. Dream and George seem to be the only people traveling together, though that tends to be the case, bookstores usually full of people who prefer their solitude over inelegant conversation to murmur between yellowed pages.

The air smells of dust and wilting literature, something George wishes he could bottle up and take home with him when he leaves. Though he knows the candle shop down the street sells something with an old books scent, it’s never quite the same as the real thing, always distilled by wax or awkward tones of vanilla that keep him wondering how anyone thinks it smells right.

He’s not allowed to light candles in his dorm, anyway.

Dream wanders toward a bin of loose books, silence beckoning George to follow. They’re old and used and some have writing in the margins, the penmanship of strangers calling back unfamiliar. George flips through a book with a title he doesn’t recognize, setting it back down before he even gets a synopsis.

“It just doesn’t make sense,” Dream huffs, and it takes George a moment to pick their thread from the sidewalk up again. “Am I not allowed to have friends?”

A scoff lists off George’s lips, rich with age-old sarcasm. “No.”

Defiance better made in silence, Dream knocks his shoulder with an old paperback. George elbows him lightly in the side.

“But no one asks if I’m dating Sapnap,” he continues, dropping the book back into the bin. “Why is it different with you?”

“I don’t know,” George huffs, “You’re asking the wrong guy.”

Pausing as he rifles, Dream turns to look at George. “And who’s the right guy?”

“Anyone who thinks we’re dating,” he deadpans.

In the angles of his face, Dream considers it. George figures it goes without saying that anyone who thinks they’re dating is all-encompassing enough to stand in for any of their other friends. And even if they don’t really think they’re dating, they think they should be, and perhaps that’s worse than baseless assumptions.

Karl even said once that George acts like he has a crush on Dream. He doesn’t.

“I refuse to talk to any of them about how little we’re dating,” Dream argues, and George would be inclined to agree.

Instead of saying so, however, he stands and considers what he’s been told before. He leaves out the things he doesn’t want Dream to know—like the aforementioned acting like he has a crush on him—and instead settles for words he’s better practiced with.

Lithe fingertips trail over dusty books. George pauses on titles he recognizes, and he wonders if he already has them in his room.

“Well,” he mutters, spinning out on distraction, “Karl said it’s because we’re touchy.”

It’s an insistence he’s had even before this afternoon. That they sit too close, or they walk until their shoulders bump, or they hug with something more than just I’ve missed you.

Honestly, George thinks it’s bullshit. But no matter how many times he tells his roommate exactly that, he never stops hearing the same thing.

“Karl does not get to speak on anyone’s touchiness,” Dream argues, sour cherry-lime lining the back of his salted throat.

A laugh whispers past George’s lips in breath. “Fair.”

He can’t quite remember any more of Karl’s arguments—truthfully, he doesn’t really care to. Whatever he said was something George would never get behind, anyway, so he doesn’t reel too tightly trying to remember something idiotic.

Instead, he digs through the bin of old books with a little more fervor. He picks up a copy of Pride and Prejudice even though he’s read it a thousand times over. It’s dustier than his own, perhaps a little more annotated, penmanship cursive and in four different colors where it flashes beneath rubbed-out page numbers.

It hits the pile of paperbacks with a quiet thunk.

“Uh…” Dream starts, thinking—it’s enough to steal George’s attention back away from the books. “Punz told me once that it’s because we hang out together a lot.”

And that much is true—they do hang out together a lot, just the two of them and no one else. But George can enjoy someone’s presence without wanting to date them, can think Dream is nice to talk to without an ulterior motive; it’s not a particularly novel idea, hell, it’s the same way he feels about Karl.

So he argues—with a man who’s not present—“Punz and Foolish spend a lot of their time hanging out.” He turns to look at Dream, offering a question he already knows the answer to, “Are they dating?”

Dream blinks, a tick of displeasure between his eyes when he can’t seem to picture it. “No.”

George turns his attention back down to the paperbacks. “So Punz is an idiot.” Belated, he adds, “or a hypocrite. Maybe both.”

Dream laughs, but he doesn’t say anything. Instead, he rifles through the books the same way George is; directionless, unsure, looking for something he can’t quite name. Books tumble over themselves and bend even more at the covers, titles lined with creases and pages torn at every edge.

Perhaps their poor condition is endearing, or perhaps George just likes books too much. He thinks dog-eared pages are only sweet when someone else does it, and that messy annotations swallowing the edges of printed words are only okay when in someone else’s handwriting. Even Dream tells him the attitude is strange, but he remains unfazed, palms grasping for anything well-worn and appearing distinctly read.

He always prefers to read something well-loved. Then the book must be good, right?

But even with that, George is still apt to defy when Dream says, “You should read Normal People.”

He’s been telling him exactly that for as long as George can remember. He’s not quite sure what it is about Sally Rooney that makes Dream think he’ll like her so much—not like he could know, he’s never read her work—but it’s a book Dream has been recommending since two days after he finished it during freshman year.

Ever-defiant, George scoffs. “You said that last year.”

“And I’ll keep saying it until you fucking read it,” the blond persists, something strangely endearing about the way insistence curls off his tongue. When George gives him an unconvinced glance, he offers, “I’ll even buy it for you.”

Umber eyes fall to where a copy of the book in question is held between Dream’s careless fingers. It’s in alright condition, perhaps creased at the spine—it can’t have been read more than a few times.

George takes it from his grasp anyway. “No, you don’t have to buy it for me,” he argues, slightly offended. “I’ll pay for it myself, idiot.”

As he turns the book over in his hands, Dream’s eyes brighten predictably. “So you’ll read it?” he says, hopeful—it’s foolish the way it makes George’s heart stutter.

Dream is far too old and far too tall to get away with acting like this. Like a child, George’s mind supplies, but he betrays himself in thinking his friend resembles a puppy.

“I’ll buy it,” he mutters, resigned.

“So…” Dream starts, the same juvenile glint to his eye. “So you’ll read it.”

A wicked grin cuts over George’s lips. “No promises.”

(He’ll read it).

But as if he still needs to bargain, Dream starts, “I’ll read the… that book you wanted me to read last year.” He snaps a few times, recalling, the gears turning in his head obvious even from where George is standing. “About the couple—”

“Under the Tuscan Sun?” George interrupts, finishing, for it’s the only book he can recall practically begging Dream to read last year.

“Yes!” the blond exclaims, looking a touch too excited for someone who had denied the same book so fervently.

“You’re an idiot,” George remarks, though he’s not sure what for.

Instead of dwelling on it, he returns to digging through the paperbacks with his one free hand. He looks for any one of the familiar covers, wondering absently if he’ll even find a copy at all. Miraculously, one is sitting buried beneath the rest of them, torn at the cover’s edges and creased at every corner.

“Look,” George starts, holding the book out to him, “they even have it.”

Despite taking the book from George’s grasp, Dream jokes, “You’re not going to lend me your copy?”

A scoff cuts past pink lips. “You’re not lending me your copy of Normal People.”

Wordless, Dream knocks George’s shoulder with the wrong side of his paperback. George hits him back, a playful scowl knitting his face taut. They settle with the knowledge they’re in public, an awkward stare from a stranger putting a halt between their hands.

They pay for their books quietly. By the time they get back outside, Dream mentions having class soon, but they still head back to campus without much rush. They part ways near the quad, leaving George to finish his walk on his own, finding himself in his empty dorm room before long with the lights dimmed down to pink.

He sets his not-so-new copy of Normal People down on the edge of his desk. It only sits there for a minute before he starts reading it.

Chapter Text

Dream is in a band.

He’s been in a band for as long as George has known him. It’s always been one of the first things about himself that Dream introduces—“hi, my name is Dream (not actually) I’m a music composition major and I’m in a band!”—and it’s always been something that sticks with George rather deftly. He assumes it’s because he doesn’t have any other friends who play in bands—aside from the other members of Dream’s band, but George is apt to call them acquaintances—so it feels unique.

And admittedly, George had been a little suspicious of their music at first. It’s four college students making music in a basement, can he really be blamed?

But even with all the innately basement-band sound, George finds that he actually enjoys their music. He doesn’t have to lie, he doesn’t have to bend the truth—he likes it. And he listens to their songs a little more often than a cares to admit, earning him plenty of teasing from Karl whenever his answer to “what are you listening to?” is “Dream’s band.”

Though enjoying Dream’s music gives him reason to come to their practices, where he promises not to be a distraction because he just likes to sit and listen. At first, it was an idea of Dream’s, who asked if George wanted to come sit in at a band practice so they could hang out right after (he said it would be less of a hassle, but George is pretty sure Dream just wanted him to be there). Now, though, George is the one asking if he can tag along.

All their rehearsals are hosted in Foolish’s—the drummer’s—basement, for he’s the only one who lives close enough to campus for it to be manageable to host. It’s close enough that George can walk there from campus, close enough that he asks if he can come by when Dream says he has band practice that night. He says yes, of course, and texts his bandmates to tell them in advance, but it hasn’t been asking for permission since the first time, back when George was still being dragged there with quiet protests.

George likes to show up a little after they start, music echoing up the fleeting stairs while Foolish’s parents greet him with familiarity. He heads down into the basement as soon as he can escape the niceties, finding the band set up to their typical standard; the four of them filling the empty space of the basement’s single room well, pushing couches and dusty coffee tables up against the rough walls.

The whole thing is quite loud, half-rehearsed music bouncing off of concrete with the assistance of oversized speakers. George takes his typical seat on one of the dismal couches, crossing his legs up under himself while they play out the rest of their song—it’s one he’s never heard before, so he assumes it’s new.

None of the band members acknowledge his presence, though he doesn’t expect them to, seeing how they’re mid-rehearsal. George just sits and watches them play, pretends he doesn’t hear the notes that sound like mistakes, pretends their songs are flawless even when the imperfections are part of why he loves listening to them so much.

And, most certainly, George is not staring at Dream. At least, not for any reasons other than because he’s standing in the middle, or because he’s the one singing, or because he’s a really good performer.

George doesn’t watch the blond’s hands shift up and down a taped-together microphone stand, and he doesn’t admire the soft shut to his eyes, and he doesn’t focus on the sweat beading beneath his brow or the way his hair looks all messed up the way it is. George is also paying plenty of attention to Foolish on the drums, and Punz on the bass, and Sapnap on guitar. He’s not favoring anyone, or anything.

He’s just watching the band play, as any other spectator would.

Totally normal.

As they finish out the song, George has to come to terms with the basement’s newfound quiet. It’s certainly not silent, messy chatter between bandmates taking the place of miscalculated notes, but it’s a lot less noisy than the music. Blending voices in a near-empty room don’t put a ring in George’s ears for hours after the fact.

“That sounded—”

“Foolish, did you hit your cymbal in the wrong place?”

“I hit like a thousand wrong notes.”

“Punz nearly—”

“Dream’s voice kept cracking!”

“Hi George,” Dream interrupts, waving absentmindedly at his friend on the couch.

A smile breaks across George’s lips. “Hey.”

The band’s mindless chatter peters out with a hiss, attention falling to where George sits in silence. All the eyes pointed at him start to make his skin crawl, hands fidgeting where they rest idly in his lap.

“When’d you even get here?” Sapnap questions, raising an eyebrow slowly. “I didn’t see you come in.”

“Oh, not long ago,” George answers, laughing softly. “You were in the middle of playing, so…”

Sapnap nods in affirmation, strumming a note out on his guitar to fill the silence. The sound of it is a loud sting through scattered amps, pulling a flinch from George’s tense shoulders. His attention only remains steady long enough to see Punz swat his friend on the shoulder.

Dream turns to face the others for a moment so they can restart the song, presumably trying again in an attempt to nullify previous mistakes. As they loop the beginning for a brief period, George pulls his book out of his bag, sinking down into the dented couch cushions as he attempts to read through the noise.

It’s something he’s used to, so it’s not too big of an ask. The repetition of the notes becomes familiar, pages turning beneath George’s fingers as his focus slips between the two stimuli. He doesn’t really notice the sudden lack of all outside noise until Dream is speaking to him, standing right in front of the couch; he’s close enough to flick the cover of the book in George’s hands.

“You’re reading Normal People,” he observes, meeting George’s eye as the brunet aims his gaze up sharply.

“Oh, yeah,” George mutters, tipping the book towards himself to look at the cover. As if he doesn’t know what he’s reading. “I finished my other book last night and this was sitting on my desk this morning, so…”

“Oh, come on, Georgie,” Dream pouts, exaggerated. “Just say you’re reading it because I told you to.”

George scoffs. “You know I’d never lie to you.”

It earns him an over-dramatized eye roll, just enough theatrics to draw laughter through the line of his lips. George sinks back against the couch cushions, watching distractedly as Dream steps over cables and forlorn instruments with words beneath his breath coded in frustration. Pages full of recommended sentences can only hold the brunet’s attention for so long, especially when he feels three sets of eyes on him watching him do nothing but breathe.

He peers up at the others over the top of his barely-read book. Sapnap is frowning at him, having taken the front of the band’s well-rehearsed setup given Dream’s temporary absence. There’s something intimidating about a man who barely knows George at all, something intimidating about being watched so intently and with so much observation.

As if he’s trying to peel George open, page by rind by sentence, tracing fingertips along the folds in well-loved novels that crack a spine in two. George eases his thumb between the pages in lieu of finding his bookmark, settling the novel down into his lap as the confusion rises bitter to the tip of his argent tongue.

“What?” he asks, and it feels slightly rhetorical.

Sapnap narrows his eyes. At his left, Punz stares at the guitarist, and he says nothing to anyone in the room. Foolish is clicking his sticks against each other, and aside from the low hum of a distant radiator, it makes for the only noise in the hollow room.

George gives Sapnap a shrug. Through the quiet, he begs, why are you looking at me like that? The answer Sapnap finally utters is just another tired question.

“Are you guys dating?”

Without missing a beat, George scoffs. He rolls his eyes so fiercely it makes them ache, slips of pounding scarlet wavering in the corners of his vision. And he almost wants to start yelling, for he is just so tired of this question; no, they’re not dating, and no, that will never change.

Hasn’t George said so enough already?

Perhaps he can spare one more repetition. Though the taste of blood cut free by broken records is almost as tiresome as the tune itself, George forces his throat to shift in a swallow of all things carmine.

“No,” he huffs. “Now stop asking.”

He says that every time, too.

No one ever stops asking.

As though he lives to do nothing but prove George’s point, Sapnap defies that very request. He gives a disbelieving scoff of his own, kicking at all the wires where they wrap around the floor in uneven circles and messy not-quite patterns. It’s not nearly as interesting to watch him struggle over cables as it is to watch Dream.

“But you two act so much like a couple,” Sapnap argues, a touch too confident for George’s liking. “You go, like, everywhere together. Every time I ask, ‘Dream, do you want to hang out?’ it’s, ‘no, I have plans with George today!’”

The high-pitched voice he takes on to imitate Dream sounds nothing like the blond in question. George would know; he listens to that insufferable voice every day, even when they’re miles apart.

He’s surprised he hasn’t grown sick of it yet.

“Yeah, we hang out a lot,” George acquiesces, shrugging. It’s not a difficult confession; it’s just true. “That doesn’t mean we’re dating.”

From the background, Punz sits himself down on the edge of one of the amps. It distracts George from Sapnap’s relentlessness for a moment, gazes set to freckle-pale cheeks and the way they turn vaguely pink beneath the onslaught of attention.

“But you are all he talks about,” Punz says. “And it’s nothing against you, but it gets really old after a while.”

The admission of it makes George’s cheeks tint pink. Surely, Punz is being hyperbolic; Dream has plenty of other things to talk about. Just as George discusses plenty of matters that have nothing to do with Dream—he’s only talking about him now because Sapnap brought it up.

If it were up to George, he would still be reading in the static basement’s relative quiet.

“Well,” George mutters, “I’m not sure what to say to that.” Even still, he shoots a glare through the thick cemented air, and it lands on Punz’s grin. “But we’re not dating,” he repeats. “Both of you are stupid.”

Looking mock offended, Sapnap gestures behind him. “What about Foolish?”

The man in question glances up at the mention of his name. Both his sticks are still clicking together awkwardly, the distant “huh?” playing against his lips tittering off beneath the smatter of wood-on-wood.

“Foolish isn’t dumb,” George answers. What he really means is, “Foolish is the only one of you who doesn’t play into this bullshit.” Insistent, George reiterates, “You two are idiots.”

Punz chuckles. “And you have a massive gay crush on Dream.”

Trying to outrun the red in his face, George exclaims, “Shut up!”

Laughter is already filtering past his ears, which does nothing to distill his taut embarrassment. Strokes of shattered scarlet are alive beneath his skin, and every last inch of it dares to burn where the color sits beneath his freckles. George huffs, flicking at the pages in the book still cradled against his lip.

“I do not,” he insists, sounding a little too breathless. “He’s my best friend. That’s it.”

Sapnap scoffs. Sarcastic, he mutters, “Sure.”

George sinks back further into the couch. Quietly, he can hear Foolish telling them to lay off, and Sapnap returns to his place with an air of resignation. Feigning ignorance, George sinks back into his book, and he fails to ignore the way Dream’s likeness is hidden between every line.

The worst part is the fact that he can admit, he sees where they’re coming from. They do hang out all the time—perhaps a little too much—and Dream is the only person George gives into as easily as he does; which, suffice to say, is still not very easily.

But that doesn’t mean they’re anything more than just friends. They’re just close, but they’re platonically close, and the smile Dream flashes George as he comes back down into the basement means nothing outside of friendship.

Right?

There’s still a soft ringing in George’s ears even hours after the fact.

It’s never something he notices until long after they’ve left the basement. Usually, it’s something he doesn’t even notice until he’s parted ways from Dream for the rest of the day, which tends to be the first time he’s graced with a proper silence that allows him a means to hear the slow hum in the back of his head.

Today, though, it’s a little different. George and Dream are still with each other, but the low presence of silence is stamped between them, distance stretching thin across the width of an overspent dorm room.

George sits on his own bed. Back against the wall, knees tucked up to his chest, and that very same copy of Normal People braced and open against his thighs. Down the length of his half-lofted mattress sits Dream, idling at George’s messy desk, a space cleared in haste to set his own book down against the desktop covered recklessly in paper and half-assed lines of failing code.

They do this all the time. Sit in silence, enjoy the other’s company, and attempt to read. Usually, George is doing more than just attempting, but today, his head seems too crowded for any of the words to retain with the proper intonation. He loses his place too much and too easily, and by the time he realizes he’s read page 106 four times over he gives up trying altogether.

So he just sits there. On his bed, in the silence, staring at the fading sunlight where it eases off his floor. He’s still enjoying Dream’s company, the quiet presence of someone who’s alive offering comfort from down by the foot of his bed.

But he’s not getting very much done.

Distraction comes without deniability. Impenetrably, George hangs on previous conversations and words he thought he could just brush off. It’s what he usually does, it’s what he’s used to—why should today make anything feel different?

Well, he’s still not quite sure why. All he knows is that something’s different.

For some reason, Sapnap’s words sit heavy in his head. For some reason, they dare to challenge everything he thought he knew, and it makes life tough to stomach. For some reason, he’s losing sight of his own disagreements, of his own petty arguments; the same ones he’s rattled off so many times they feel like second nature, the same ones he repeated over and over again to himself at the end of a meaningless summer.

George doesn’t like it. He doesn’t like the challenge put to his predispositions, he doesn’t like the angle-less defenses he’s having trouble putting up, he doesn’t like that he’s second-guessing himself. It’s not an action he’s used to, for it’s not an action he usually does; it’s different, it’s unfortunate, it turns so much like sick.

He frowns in the general direction of his still-open book. All those recommended words stare back up at him, messy and slightly faded by vision’s hopeless blur, and he swallows. It doesn’t really feel like anything.

Still, he challenges himself. George always knew that everything requiring courage was always done by accident.

Him and Dream, they’re just friends.

Aren’t they?

“You okay over there?”

Dream’s piercing voice breaks the unfriendly monotony. George looks up suddenly, hands flattening against the pulled-back pages of his barely-read book. Laughter easy on his lips, Dream is looking straight at him from his laid-back position in an uncomfortable desk chair.

“I can hear the gears turning from here,” Dream jokes, winding one of his fingers up beside his head to gesture. “What’re you thinking about?”

George blinks. For the first time since he met Dream, he knows he can’t answer honestly. That scares him.

“Just class and stuff,” he lies, wearing his best unsure smile. “I’m still not used to being back here.”

An acknowledging hum seeps past Dream’s bitten lips. “I know what you mean,” he says slowly, nodding.

It feels like he knows George isn’t telling the truth. It’s all in his eyes, distant yet telling, windows to the soul parted open and left without blinds. An uneasy breeze sinks in beyond the glass, built on stuttered breaths and a misplaced veneer.

“You’ll get used to it,” Dream reassures, looking back down at his book. “Soon enough, it’ll be like you never even felt that way.”

In breath, George mumbles, “That’s comforting.”

Dream doesn’t hear him.

But George still pretends all his advice can apply to the truth, that he’ll get used to it and he’ll forget and all this awful self-doubt will just go away. Perhaps it’s far easier said than done, and perhaps this would be better if George just admitted that all the teasing was getting to him, and perhaps Dream would agree.

He doesn’t really want to know. He doesn’t want to ask.

Instead, he finds a way to get properly swallowed in his book like he was always supposed to. Instead, he just pushes it all aside, and he hopes that a future version of himself will one day know how to handle all the things he’s currently afraid of.

That would certainly be something.

And as the hour gets later and later still, George grows to expect the end of their reading arrangement. It only comes when Karl re-enters the room, when he glances at the brunet from his place at the still-open door with a pointed look that says more than George is willing to admit.

It’s not something he knows how to deal with right now. Not his roommate, not the tell-all behind his eyes, not the strange sense of questions lingering against his skin. The door shuts with an intentionally quiet click, and the room falls tense given the presence of another person that has nothing to contribute to a well-played routine.

The ringing in George’s ears starts to feel even more like a nuisance.

“Hey, Dream,” Karl says quietly, depositing all his things on a much cleaner match to George’s desk.

“Hey, Karl,” the blond returns, but he’s rising to his feet. “Sorry for invading your room.”

It’s said with laughter. It’s said like the apparent invasion is something that warrants an apology. It’s said like this is something out of the previous ordinary.

Karl laughs quietly, the sound of it glistening with exhaustion. “All good,” he reassures. “It’s George’s room, too, you know.”

As he stretches his arms above his head, Dream laughs. “I know.” He casts a look over at George as if to prove his point. “But I should head out,” he picks up his book, “goodnight, George.”

Stilted, George waves at his retreat. “Night.”

He leaves through that too-heavy door in perceived silence. A book hangs loose from his aching hand, backpack slung over his shoulder with the lethargy of someone who’s tired of it all. It leaves Karl and George alone, which is nothing out of the ordinary, either, but for some reason, it feels like it’s supposed to be.

Karl is still looking at George. Awkward, George shrinks into himself, biting down on the inside of his lip as though muted pain will provide some kind of solace. Perhaps in a fit for his expectations, it doesn’t.

“George,” Karl starts, the grin on his face easing lopsided. “You’re a nimrod.”

The frown on George’s face sticks hidden behind his knees, fingertips threading between thin pages in a whisper. His head is already pounding, and the ringing in his ears neglects to fade, and he knows there’s no real way out of this; he’ll certainly try, as he always does. Learning curves look too much like slopes.

“Don’t even start,” he pleads, the mirth in his tone amplified by a desperate run from the words ‘I told you so.’

“I’m just saying,” Karl says, starting, “that I don’t sit and read in silence with any of my close friends.”

George doesn’t need to see the air quotes to know they’re there. Deflective, he scoffs.

“You don’t read.”

“Right,” Karl huffs. “But your boyfriend was almost an English major, so—”

“He’s not my boyfriend!”

Sudden interruption earns a fit of giggles from Karl where he stands. Perhaps George was a little too defensive, a little too quick. He sinks down against the wall, shaded.

“Okay,” Karl answers, sarcasm thicker than the blood in his veins. “Whatever helps you sleep at night, George.”

He’s starting to think Karl and Sapnap might get along.

And George is only trying to distract himself from the matter at hand.

“He’s just my friend,” he repeats, an insistence that fills his mouth full of blood. “Am I not allowed to have friends?”

And acting too close with a supposed friend is something that feels rich coming from Karl, a man who has asked George to cuddle in the winter and kisses his high school friends on the cheek. But all the kinds of affection Karl has insisted between Dream and George have been anything but physical touch—because George isn’t fond of it—but that doesn’t mean they’re dating.

If Karl can cuddle with his friends, can’t George spend quality time with his? Platonically?

“You’re allowed to have friends,” Karl dismisses, far too easy. “Hey, I’m your friend. But friends don’t give each other heart eyes and read books in silence.”

George scoffs, rolling his eyes unseen. “We do not give each other heart eyes.”

Admittedly, he barely even knows what that means. He doesn’t bother asking.

“You do,” Karl corrects, unwavering. “If you asked any random person on campus, they would say you two are like, in love.” Casting a pointed glance over his shoulder, Karl adds quietly, “You are, by the way.”

George huffs. “Are not.”

And they aren’t.

They’re friends. And George doesn’t fall in love with his friends.

But Karl will always prove to be too stubborn. He’s even more stubborn than George, who used to be known for fighting battles that were never worth it. When he met Karl, though, he learned how to relent when he would rather roll over and forget the world than put up with his roommate’s impenetrable diligence.

Perhaps it’s admirable. Perhaps it’s terribly annoying.

“When I give my best man speech at your wedding, it’s starting with ‘I told you so.’”

Definitely annoying.

Chapter Text

The stipple of ivory keys is a sound that George will never tire of. And as long as he’s free enough to follow Dream down to the music building where he just sits to practice, he will; it’s almost the same as band practice, where George just sits and watches the blond play music idly.

It’s good company.

George brings his books with him again, but he proves once more to be a touch too distracted to read. Sitting by and watching Dream play has always been more entertaining, and it’s something he can only do right here—unlike reading, which he can and does do anywhere on campus.

But he comes to the music building to listen to Dream play. He comes to the music building so he can sit and feel a little more intelligent than he is in truth, acting as though he’s someone who enjoys classical music and piano notes in all of his spare time rather than just the moments spent between these walls.

It certainly helps that Dream is a talented pianist. He’s talented in a lot of things—namely every instrument he’s ever set his hands on—and that’s why he majored in music. He was nearly an English major, but he figured he had less interest in doing that for the rest of his life than he did composition.

His path proved to be on the contrary of George’s, who’s known he wanted to major in computer science since he was teaching himself to code at age nine. When they met, the first thing they talked about were all the majors they considered over the years.

Dream’s list felt infinite. George’s did not.

But he was happy to see Dream in music, as it always seemed to be something he was truly passionate about. Between band practices in Foolish’s basement and hours gone to waste on the piano, it seemed to be the place where he belonged; and George just had a penchant for watching him.

He only knew where music classes were held because of Dream. George was a self-proclaimed terrible musician, and the one time Dream made him pick up his guitar freshman year he’d made a complete idiot of himself. His attempts to learn piano proved to be an even greater disaster: there were far too many keys, and all of them looked exactly the same, and nothing made sense.

George just quit while he was ahead.

Though, as if he isn’t aware of all of that and more, Dream still turns to look at George across the tile flooring. He’s hopeful, a glimmer to his eye that comes from someplace other than the gaudy fluorescent lights, and it’s a look that sparkles a little too good on him for George to keep his confidence.

“George,” Dream calls out across the room, earning a piqued “hm?” in patient response. “Can you listen to this for a second?”

George closes his book on his thumb to prove Dream has his undivided attention. “Yeah, sure.”

And Dream plays a string of notes George could never name, fleeting melodies spinning high up into the air to press wrought against distant ceilings. There’s a meandered beauty to it, and perhaps the fact that George can’t understand makes it even more beautiful, for he’ll never find the imperfections or the mistakes that a professional might sit and look for.

Instead, he just hears Dream. Dream’s talent, Dream’s hands, the notes that his best friend plays. They stick to bones and fingertips and tall white walls, and they never dare to falter. It’s mesmerizing.

As the run closes out on a whisper, Dream looks across the room expectantly. George isn’t sure if he’s supposed to clap or offer his compliments or say nothing at all. He waits for Dream to speak first.

“Did that sound good?” he asks, nerves blazing in the undertones of his voice.

Yes, it sounded really good, and would you play it for me again, please?

George has never been very good at complimenting people.

So he laughs instead. “I don’t know, Dream, I’m not the music major.”

The blond shoots him an over-exaggerated pout. His hands still rest idly on the keys, head hanging slowly with the sorrow of a puppy left by obligation at a closed front door.

“It sounded good, Dream,” George insists, and he means it. “I just can’t give you a very meaningful compliment. I suck at piano.”

Dream huffs out a laugh. “True.”

Even with the self-given title, a frown crosses George’s face. “Hey,” he whines, exaggerated. “Don’t be mean.”

Scoffing, Dream counters, “You couldn’t point to middle C if you tried, George.”

“And you don’t know Java,” George mutters, words half-lost beneath his breath.

Dream frowns like he heard him, and he returns to practicing. Notes are both quick and slow, and their spacing is uneven, and it’s a tune George fails to recognize. He has a habit of missing the mark on guessing song titles, but admittedly, he doesn’t know very many songs. It feels disingenuous to confess to not being much of a music person, but before he met Dream, he really wasn’t.

Perhaps that’s why he’s so awful at playing instruments. On the contrary, Dream has an entire lifetime’s worth of practice, and he’s barely nineteen. For a moment, it doesn’t feel fair; then again, Dream is a complete idiot when it comes to coding, so it’s only a matter of chosen preference.

However, George doesn’t like to let it slip that Dream made him into a borderline music fanatic. He already knows what kind of teasing it would earn him, and he gets more than enough of that as is. Telling someone like Karl that Dream altered his interests enough to make him buy nice earbuds and start walking with a playlist would only cause him more trouble than he needs.

He also has no intention of admitting to anyone that he finds Dream attractive when he plays piano. He insists to himself that it’s all superficial—he can appreciate the attractiveness of his friend, and it doesn’t have to mean anything, right?—but even he has trouble believing that.

For he hasn’t always felt that way. The first time he accompanied Dream on a practice trip to the music building, it never crossed his mind that he looked attractive when he played.

It was an acquired opinion.

And George couldn’t pinpoint exactly when he dared to acquire it.

But it was still superficial. Aesthetic beauty, and outsider perspective; it doesn’t have to mean anything, and it doesn’t. That’s the end of it.

All George does is sit and listen to piano music while he reads a book Dream recommended to him. It feels a little too much like everything of Dream’s, an amalgamation of his likeness clashing behind George’s eyes. Sable shaded and dirty umber stir until they tear, a world of hurt forgotten in headaches and aching bloody hearts.

Time is finite. As piano notes roll over and pages turn, it passes, and the seconds on a ticking clock fall from the high ceiling in a graceless tumble down to the hard tile floor.

“George,” Dream calls again, and it’s a demand for torn attention.

Pages rustle. George looks up, and his gaze lingers on thick tan hands where they rest against ivory keys. “Don’t ask me if something sounds good again,” George huffs, bloody mirth dragging grins across his lips.

“I won’t,” Dream skitters, rolling his eyes through a world of lilt. “The band has practice in, like, twenty. Do you want to come?”

George pulls out his phone just long enough to glance at the time, a newly memorized class schedule sticking heavy in his head. He frowns down at the screen, fragile numbers blinking back up at him with an answer he doesn’t want to give.

“Can’t,” he mutters. “I have class.”

Dream groans, leaning back on the piano stool. “Lame,” he begrudges, knocking his hands down on a bunch of keys that don’t seem to match—even if George doesn’t know chords, at all, he can certainly tell that’s not one. “Skip class and hang out with me…”

George can’t help the smile that crosses his face, but he’s still shaking his head with flickering eyes. “You’re a bad influence,” he says, even when knows Dream doesn’t really mean it.

The insistence doesn’t last very long, and the two of them resign to leaving the music building. Dream leaves to head for Foolish’s house while George heads to class, already feeling the sinking feeling of dread that comes with how little he wants to be lectured.

It proves to be just as dreadful as he worried it would be. The professor is boring with a monotone voice, and George is tired and thinking about other things; he spends the better part of the professor’s introduction trying to figure out how he could hide his book underneath the table, devising ways to make it look like he’s paying attention without actually paying any attention at all.

He justifies it by telling himself it’s still early in the semester. It’s not like he’s missing anything drastically important—and besides, he’s not going to fail number theory. If he does, well, then maybe the words “I told you so” need to be employed somewhere other than his and Dream’s hypothetical wedding.

A hypothetical wedding that is never going to happen.

Karl has always been an idiot—especially about this—but George feels like he’s been getting increasingly more ridiculous. Perhaps the start to their second year of college changes more about them than he thought it would, or perhaps he’s only more attentive to it now than he was before.

Most likely, it’s that Karl has just gotten more comfortable around George, and therefore more comfortable teasing him. And while George is grateful he has a close and casual relationship with the person he’s forced to share a tiny room with, he still doesn’t appreciate all the prods, whether or not Karl sometimes buys George candy and leaves it on his desk.

Dream also buys him candy, but he has a penchant for hiding it in George’s room and telling him to look for a surprise. When he was moving out at the end of last spring semester, George found a melted chocolate bar under his bed; it only got more annoying when Dream refused to admit he had anything to do with it, because George already knew it was him.

No one else is hiding chocolate under his bed—not even Karl, who, if anything, seems more like the type of person to do something like that.

Again, George tries not to think about it. Not the teasing, not his opinions on Dream, not anything at all, really. The professor is still too boring to relent to, so George settles his chin against the palm of his hand with a slow, lethargic blink, and he considers something different.

(All the ways he could think to hide his book felt too obvious. And he already knew he would get in trouble for reading instead of paying attention, because it happened on the first day).

So he makes plans for what he’s going to do with himself as soon as he gets out of this dim lecture hall. Downtown still sits unexplored for the semester, and it takes George a moment to call upon all the maps he’d memorized last year before he can figure out where he wants to take himself.

He doesn’t want to get coffee alone when he has no homework to do. He doesn’t want to go to the bookstore without Dream. He doesn’t want to spend money on food.

All it really leaves—that George can think of, at least—is the record shop.

So after class, George walks downtown to the record store. And really, window shopping at record stores has to be half the fun of owning a record player. Even before George had gotten his, he would go to the store and just look around, and he’d never have any intention of buying anything because he didn’t have a real use for it.

Records were just fun to look at. George only owned a few, and most of them had been gifts, but he came to the shop decently often just to act like he could shell out forty dollars for an album he barely listens to.

He’s rifling through some of the bins when his phone goes off, two quiet buzzes in his back pocket telling him exactly who it is. Maybe having a special text tone for Dream only gave Karl more reasons to tease him, but Dream was one of the only important people George actually texted, and he preferred to keep him relatively easy to discern.

Scattered names appear to blink against George’s fatal lock screen. He stands with one hand pressing diligently against a record he’s not going to buy.

dream 2:47 pm
| where are you?

It’s simple enough. Really, it looks like all the rest of their text exchanges—where are you? do you want to hang out? are you busy?—as long as they’re within walking distance of each other, they will always make the trip. On breaks from school, when there are states between them, it dares to be, can I call you?

It’s all quite predictable, in truth.

Even still, George frowns at his device. Is band practice over already? He hates when people answer questions with another question.

george 2:49 pm
| record store

He stands and taps his finger against the side of his phone for a moment. He decides it isn’t worth putting his phone away just as a typing bubble appears.

dream 2:50 pm
| On my way!
| i need to turn that off

A quiet laugh hisses through George’s teeth. Grinning, he slips his phone into his back pocket where it belongs, and he returns to his quiet shuffling through records he has no intention of owning. It can’t be very long that he’s waiting there, glancing up every time the shop door’s bell rings with the presence of a customer, but it certainly feels like the moment is stretching thin.

Time will always appear to pass slower when waiting for something. And as George idles in the golden light of the record store, he’s waiting for Dream, and the seconds seem to take a little more than just one tick to pass him by in finality.

He’s already rifled through this entire bin of records. He starts from the beginning again, just because it’s the closest to the door.

And soon enough, when he glances up at the ringing signal of someone new, he sees Dream wander in with thumbs looped down in his backpack straps. He only has to glance around for a second before his eyes meet George’s, and they both smile, distance closing between them as the record bins grow less and less interesting.

Pressing fingers against the corner of the bin, Dream asks, “Are you looking for a specific record?”

“No, I’m not buying anything,” George admits, letting the pressed-tight stack of vinyls fall back against hard plastic. “I just needed something to do after class.”

And this was the only thing I felt like doing alone, he doesn’t say, but I think it’s better now that you’re here, too.

Piqued, Dream queries, “Oh, how was class?”

A lone breath of biting laughter eases past George’s lips. “Boring,” he says simply. “I didn’t pay attention at all.”

Hyperbolic, Dream gasps. The drama of his inhale is enough to draw George’s eye, and he finds the blond standing with a hand over his chest, as if he’s a maiden in a stage play about to fall with too much practice.

“Our little Georgie, not paying attention in class?” he posits, the mirthful shock in his voice just enough to make George giggle. “What has this world come to?”

Huffing despite his matching grin, George jabs Dream’s side with extended fingers. “Shut up,” he scolds, “you’re so annoying.”

Without reason, Dream reaches to jab George’s side back. The brunet stumbles, shooting his friend a displeased look, and he attempts to move on swiftly to the next bin of records down the line as if nothing happened at all. He still shuffles awkwardly beneath the perceived attention his mind is surely fabricating.

The only person staring at him is Dream; George has no reason to be nervous around Dream.

“Was practice alright?” George asks, though he doesn’t spare Dream a glance.

He’s busy staring down at the records between his fingers with played-up interest. He acts as though they look more appealing than they do in truth, because in truth, he’s not even sure which genre section he’s in right now.

It’s more of a fidget than anything.

“It was whatever,” Dream sighs, and he takes up to searching through the record bin in front of him, too. “Punz wasn’t there, so we didn’t get much done.”

Curious, George pries, “Where was he?”

“Don’t know,” Dream shrugs, “Sapnap wouldn’t tell me.”

There’s an awkward amount of tension suspended between them. Nothing about it belongs there, and it feels so devilishly out of place George almost forgets how to breathe. Unsteady, the tendrils of something rotten wrap around his ribcage, and it takes all he can muster within himself to try and distill the grate of their stilted silence.

“Sapnap’s an idiot,” he jokes, for he knows Dream will find the humor in anything given at his roommate’s expense.

And he does. He laughs a little, glancing sideways at George where the quiet between them seems to glisten. Unearned, George’s heart races, and he can hear the sound of it behind his ears.

“You’re an idiot,” Dream counters, which is different from the easy agreement George had predicted before he spoke.

The brunet scoffs. Though his eyes wear half a frown, his lips are curled up in a smirk, mischief and dangerous lilt awake and alive behind sable eyes. Ivory teeth glint without remorse, unstable.

Leaning closer, George taunts, “You’re the idiot king.”

Battling the amusement on his face, Dream flicks George between the eyes. It’s enough to make him flinch, hands faltering where they rest on dust-riddled records. Before George can say anything in protest, Dream interrupts the quiet.

“And the idiot king doesn’t like you anymore,” he remarks, glaring at George with bridled mirth. “He hates you, actually.”

Swallowing the laughter on his tongue, George replies, “Really?”

Dream hums, affirming. “Really.”

George shakes his head, managing to keep silent around the rest of his amusement. He returns his broken attention to the apparent task at hand—searching through bins of records—though he’ll be the first to admit he isn’t really looking at their titles anymore.

Maybe if he was actually here to buy something, he’d be frustrated with Dream’s distractions. But if anything, he misses Dream’s constant non-silence, the quiet of low music playing through the record store not enough to stimulate his racing mind.

So George stops what he’s doing, looking over qt Dream, whose interest appears to be less feigned. He’s as halfway to well-dressed as he always is, bridging the gap between lazy and trying too hard as though he knows exactly what he’s doing.

He probably does, actually. Dream isn’t someone who knows how to play off accidents as well as he plays off cuffed jeans and socks that match t-shirt.

But the distressed denim jacket that hangs from his shoulders isn’t something George recognizes. It’s strange, George figures, because if he had known Dream had such a nice jacket, he probably would’ve tried to steal it already; he’d never seen this one before.

He definitely didn’t have a jacket in the music building, either.

Dream’s only other denim jacket was littered with pins and buttons picked up from concerts, and it was way too heavy for what it was worth. Picking all the pins off would also be too much work for what it was worth, and it wasn’t even the right shade of blue, anyway.

Without thinking, George reaches out to touch the lapel of Dream’s jacket. “Where’d this come from?”

Confusion sticks to Dream’s face for a moment, and he glances down at the article George is talking about—the look on his face says he had forgotten he was even wearing it at all.

“Oh, this?” he asks, flicking at one of the buttons.

George scoffs. “What else?”

Rolling his eyes, Dream says, “It’s Foolish’s.” And before George can ask why Dream is wearing his friend’s jacket—as if he has room to talk—he elaborates, “but he said he didn’t want it anymore, so it’s mine now.”

Thoughtful, George hums. “It’s nice,” he compliments, pulling his hand away from Dream’s collarbone.

“Isn’t it?” The blond turns his arm, as if he has to look at every last inch of the thing; he appears excited, though, and it’s enough to make George smile. “Foolish said it was too small,” Dream recalls. “So, like, not worth keeping around.”

With laughter on his lips, George jokes, “Because Foolish is just too big and muscular to fit into that tiny jacket.”

Against expectation, Dream frowns. Looking down at himself again, he scoffs, “Foolish isn’t any more big and muscular than I am.”

Confusion crawls thick and delicate across George’s tightened expression. It was a joke, he figures, and that much felt obvious given his tone of voice. But even still, Dream looked frustrated, and his face was going ruddy for no discernible reason at all.

“I was being sarcastic,” George defends, the laughter on his lips spinning nervous.

The red beneath Dream’s skin dares to darken. “Whatever,” he huffs, turning away. “So was I.”

Even George knows well enough to see through that lie. It was thin at best, stretching over brightened lights without enough hope to keep it around.

Shaking his head, George mutters, “You’re so weird, Dream.”

He’s weird because George has made jokes like that before. He’s weird because he’s never reacted that way. He’s weird because he’s never been insecure about things like that, and he’s never compared himself to other people, and he’s never acted so offended. He’s weird because it doesn’t make sense.

“Why are you talking about Foolish’s muscles, anyway?”

He still sounds offended. George’s hands fall flat against a pile of records.

“It was a joke,” he says, huffing. “I’ve said shit like that before, you usually laugh.”

Blond eyebrows knit with rough confusion. “When have you—”

“Don’t you remember when I let Foolish pick me up?” George interrupts.

It was in the basement during a band practice. It was when Punz kept making comments about Foolish’s arms. It was when Sapnap said he could probably “pick George up easily” that George had volunteered himself to test that theory.

And now, George looks at Dream’s face, watching for the spark of recognition. When it finally glistens, he still doesn’t look too happy.

Muttering, he settles, “Vaguely.”

“You laughed at it then,” George recalls, shrugging. “But, like, if jokes like that make you feel bad, or something, then I can stop making them.”

“No, it’s whatever,” Dream dismisses quickly, shaking his head. “Sorry. I’m just… I’m being dramatic.”

George still feels confused. Through furrowed eyebrows and steadfast hands, he whispers, “Okay,” but it doesn’t really feel like it is.