Chapter Text
The morning sun made delicate warm shapes across the kitchen counter. Dream’s bare feet stuck on the tile floors, humidity seeping in even before the day’s heat had the chance to build up. Dream loved his kitchen, loved cracking eggs into a sizzling pan and watching the oil spit on the stovetop. He kept a strict morning routine, the steps worn and comforting, but recently things had begun to change.
When he opened the fridge, George’s 2% milk sat next to his water bottles. In the cupboard, George’s mugs filled the already cluttered shelf to bursting. As he flipped his omelet, George’s shower water drummed against the ceiling.
George’s presence was everywhere Dream turned. It had been jarring at first, but it was slowly becoming just as right as Sapnap’s soft humming and everything else that made this place home. After only a week, Dream was starting to feel like things had never been different.
It was always when Dream sat down at the kitchen table with his meal that the house began to wake up. It used to be just Sapnap with his Keurig coffee maker, the smell getting less and less offensive to Dream the longer they had lived together, but now it was also George’s bowls of cereal and curled damp hair smelling of citrus and discussions of the funny tweets they had all seen when scrolling on their phones the night before.
The house was so much more alive with George, something that Dream hadn’t known he had been missing. The days felt shorter and more memorable at the same time. The rooms were fuller. The laughter was louder.
At the moment, the kitchen was starting to feel a bit too full and a bit too loud as Sapnap’s shout blasted in his eardrums. He was looking at something on George’s phone, George’s eyes rolling and the flush on his cheeks from his hot shower getting even rosier. Dream loved the new vibrance that George brought to the house, but he did miss the peacefulness that mornings used to have.
“I mean, it’s only a matter of time before Dream tries to kiss you,” Sapnap said through giggles.
Dream almost choked on his eggs. “What?”
Sapnap took a hold of George’s phone and angled it in his direction. “People on Twitter are placing bets on how long it will take you guys to make out now that George is here.”
“Why do you think it would be me?” Dream asked. “Why not George trying to kiss me?”
“Come on, Dream.” George’s eyes were teasing. “We both know it would be you.”
“What is that supposed to mean?”
George took a bite of cereal, his lips curling up at the edges of the spoon. He spoke from behind his hand. “You’re a simp.”
Sapnap nodded gravely.
“I am not.”
“It’s true, I’m sorry. The doctors gave me the results this morning.”
“You’re such an idiot.” Dream felt his cheeks being pulled into a smile against his will. “You know what, I’ll bet $1,000 I can get you to try to kiss me before I do. I’m not the simp here.”
George stared at him a moment. “Fine. I bet $1,000 I can get you to try to kiss me before I do. How about that?”
Dream had to fight to keep the surprise off his face. That was not the answer he had been expecting. He had been joking—George was supposed to scoff and brush past the challenge, not accept it.
“I bet my entire life’s savings that you’re a bunch of idiots,” Sapnap said.
They both ignored him.
“Well then,” Dream said. He was too competitive to back out now, and he didn’t like the cocky look in George’s eyes. “I guess the bet’s settled. You’re going down, George.”
George smirked at him. “Yeah, we’ll see about that.”
––
That night, when Dream went to George’s room to ask for the flashdrive of their recent recording, he found George sitting at his desk in the near dark. The lights in his room were off, the only illumination coming from the bluish glow of George’s monitors. Everything was thrown into shadow—the queen-sized bed Dream had bought months in advance, George’s half unpacked suitcases, the mess of chords that grew like vines over George’s desk. The room had the same citrus scent as the bathroom after George’s showers and it made Dream want to lie down on the carpet and roll in it.
“Hey, George,” Dream stepped just over the threshold of the doorway. “Do you have the flashdrive I asked for?”
“Yeah, here.” George held it out to him, but he didn’t stand from his chair.
“You really are the laziest,” Dream said, but he didn’t mean it. Stepping into George’s room filled his stomach with warm honey.
George blinked up at him, his brown eyes huge and round. “Yeah,” he said. “Sorry.”
“It’s okay.” Dream took the flashdrive from George’s cool fingers. The light from the monitor bathed him in silver, painting over his face and the thin crescent of skin that his baby pink shirt exposed.
“Is there anything else you wanted?” George asked, and there was something strange about his voice. Dream watched in astonishment as he bit his lip and blinked at Dream through his eyelashes.
Dream was almost offended by the display. “Is this for the bet? Stop using your pretty privilege on me.”
“So it’s working?” George flashed a sharp little smile.
Dream scoffed. He had to admit that George was beautiful, but it was from a completely objective standpoint. He had that perfect ivory skin that made the pink of his lips look almost obscene, and when he blushed it was a display of spring in bloom. He was a sculpture if Dream was honest, marble carved skillfully enough to look soft to the touch. And his eyes , they made Dream catch his breath. There was something alluring about them, something wicked and dangerous that made you lean in anyway.
Dream didn’t know when he had started studying George’s face so deeply. He stepped back, putting space between them. “Try harder, idiot.”
George rolled his eyes. “Fine. Will you leave now? I’m working.”
Dream looked at George’s phone where a TikTok of a monkey was paused. “Yeah, okay. I’ll let you get back to ‘work.’”
“Thank you.”
When Dream made it back to the hallway, he had to stop and take a breath. Things felt different with George now, tenser, and Dream didn’t think he liked it. Maybe he was stupid for going through with the bet. He didn’t want to kiss George––they were just friends and he had no plans of changing that. But now that the bet had begun, something had been set in motion that Dream didn’t think they could stop. They were moving toward something, and the momentum was there whether they pushed or not.
It seemed that the only way out was through. Dream needed to somehow seduce George into trying to kiss him, because that was the only way they could laugh about it and move on and get over this weirdness that had seeped into the air. Dream laid awake in bed for a long time plotting ways to do this while causing the least amount of damage possible. He wasn’t too keen on the details, the actions he would have to take in order to make this work, but he was determined. He didn’t let himself sleep until he had a plan.
––
Dream got through a day of catastrophic attempts before he crumbled and turned to Sapnap. It was a gray morning, the rain outside echoing George’s shower running above them. When Sapnap sat down at the breakfast table with his steaming coffee, Dream scooted his chair toward him.
“I need your help coming up with strategies to get George to try to kiss me.”
Sapnap looked up. “I am going to pour this cup of coffee over my head.”
“I’m serious , Sapnap. He’s not cracking.” Dream ran a hand through his hair. He really needed to wash it. “To be fair, he’s always been better at hiding his emotions than me.”
“Are there emotions you’re trying to hide?” Sapnap’s face was carefully blank.
Dream huffed out a breath. “No, you idiot. You know what I mean.” He played with the last bits of egg on his plate, scraping them into a little pile. “Will you help me?”
Sapnap took a sip of his coffee. “I told George this already––I’m not getting involved. You can work out this little mating dance yourselves.”
“That is not what this is.” Dream tried not to think about the way George had looked at him, so open, almost as if he had wanted to be kissed.
“Yeah, okay.”
This was getting ridiculous. Dream couldn’t look at George anymore without thinking about kissing, and that was not the way he wanted to live his life. He couldn’t shake the feeling of dread that grew inside him like a living thing. His interactions with George just kept getting worse, less them , and the horizon that they were rolling toward started to look more and more like a ledge.
––
Dream was determined to get up the next morning and end this, but that night something changed so fundamentally that he didn’t think his relationship with George could ever be the same. Dream was practically asleep, his mind tangled up in the tendrils of half-formed dreams, when a gentle knock echoed on his door and George’s head poked around the corner.
In his foggy state, Dream forgot all about the bet. “George?”
He sat up as George slipped into his room, leaving the door cracked so a sliver of light filtered in and pooled on Dream’s bedsheets. George sat down on the edge of the bed, his body close enough that their hips touched when the mattress dipped.
“George, what’s wrong?”
George, unbelievably, put a hand on Dream’s arm and leaned in until they were breathing the same air. “Dream.”
The bet came back like a stone sinking into the pit of his stomach. Dream tilted his head back until it thudded against the wall. “George. What are you doing?”
George didn’t pull back. “Shh, nothing.”
“Are you trying to play me?” Dream looked at George, the light from the door outlining the little curls around his ears. “I’m not going to kiss you, you can stop now.”
“Oh, but I’m not done yet.” George’s voice was low, dangerous, and Dream found that he was almost afraid. His heartbeat drummed in his ears.
George leaned impossibly closer. They were bare inches apart now, George’s minty breath cooling Dream’s upper lip. When George put his fingertips on Dream’s cheek, something clicked into place deep in his stomach. Dream’s breath came out shaky, his entire being focused on the dark outline of George’s lips in front of him. He wanted to kiss them. He wanted to kiss George . He didn’t know how it had happened, but suddenly he was looking at his best friend and his only thought was that he wanted to devour him whole.
George’s eyes glittered in the dark. They were approaching the ledge, barreling towards it, and Dream was terrified. He put his hand on George’s chest and gently pushed him back.
“Okay, now you’re done.” Dream had to fight to keep his voice level.
George got up from the bed. The room was too dark to see his expression. “Goodnight, Dream.”
“Night.”
Dream watched George leave and shut the door, sealing him in utter darkness. Dream blinked at the black, feeling barely real, like he had blown away from his body and was floating between the stars. The universe around him pounded. Dream had to remind himself that it was just his pulse, thundering under the skin that still held him to the earth.
He had been rewired, reprogrammed, and now that he had felt it he couldn’t stop feeling it. He wanted to kiss George. Fuck.