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George yells carelessly as they speed down the block, the night nips at his skin gently, blowing cool air over heated porcelain cheeks. The streetlights drape the velvet darkness of night with tangerine, the stars twinkling in the night sky, overshadowed by the glare of the city.
Dream spares his best friend a look, a steady hand on the wheel. He thinks that George looks the prettiest like this, under orange beams and his hair windswept, a grin so wide on his face that Dream’s sure that it’ll hurt. But for now, George is happy, and that’s all that matters.
“Love me, love me!” George screams as they pass under a familiar sign, singing to his heart’s content, not knowing how much it makes Dream’s heart overflow with a feeling so other, that he wonders if he’s ever felt this way before.
“Say that you love me!" He thinks of earlier this morning when George absentmindedly said I love you, giggling when Dream spat out his water and blushed a vivid scarlet, sputtering over George’s laughter. He likes it when George laughs, likes the way his eyes screwed prettily, the way his grin broke through any veneer, the way he struggles to breathe in a fit of giggles.
Had it been any other to do that, he would’ve swiftly spat on them. But George isn’t a stranger to Dream, he’s George. And that fact alone makes Dream’s weary heart ache longingly. He can do it now, place a hand over George’s, see the way his palm swallows the brunet’s much smaller one.
He could see George fluster and turn his head away, forcing himself to stare at the window than at their intertwined hands. For a moment he thinks of doing it, of leaping through meticulous hours spent during sleepless nights, eyes staring at the ceiling as a familiar lilt flowed from his phone’s speaker.
“Fool me, fool me! Go on and fool me!” Dream thinks about it often, how good it’d feel to be able to caress his hand, play with his hair under the starlit night sky, bathed in tones of indigo, the wind nipping at their flesh, the slide of their lips together.
He feels heat creep to his cheeks, hot and heavy against him. It’s selfish, to want your best friend with you all the time, to feel his breath against your neck, his silken hair pressed to your chin.
Because Dream knows that this isn’t permanent and that George will go back to London, back to their calls, longing for the warmth of a boy who wasn’t there, back to staring at his dull ceiling.
So he does, inching his free hand until his pinky ghosts against George’s. It’s nothing magical, no sparks fly through his veins, but a flowing heat spreads to his soul, a brilliant blaze burning away his glacial doubts. Despite knowing George is straight, Dream pretends that this one time, George is his. Only for tonight, under tangerine lights. And when George turns his head quickly to Dream, eyes wide and pretty lips parted, Dream thinks that maybe he is his after all.
He doesn’t do anything more than that, fearful of shattering what little solace he found cradling the brunet’s dainty hand. Dream couldn’t handle it if they were to drift apart, the icy terse smiles and taut grins. No. George is his best friend first, his crush second.
God. It felt odd to admit it.
“Just say that you need me." George doesn’t pull away though, lacing their fingers together with a coy smile directed at Dream, giggling softly as Dream coughed, thankful to whatever gods existed that he couldn’t see the vivid hues of scarlet of his face.
“I can’t care about anything but you!” Just for this night, as they drive around Orlando’s humid expanses, it’s just the two of them, basking in the shared comfort of each other. Just George and Clay, not GeorgeNotFound and Dream. They don’t have to anxiously stare at a blue-lit screen, they’re here, their hands intertwined in a dance of complacency.
He parks the car in front of a familiar body of water, a lone tree standing tall amongst the flat grasses of the lake. They sit in silence for god knows how long, the car engine still running. Dream runs a hand through his hair, the darkness enveloping them turning brilliant gold to ochre.
The song plays as white noise whilst Dream cleared his throat, finally mustering up the courage to meet his mahogany gaze, stripped away of its coquettish glint.
“I used to hide here when I was sixteen,” He says to break the silence, eyes flitting to George as the brunet hummed, “I wasn’t a good kid, you know. I told you that a million times.”
He’d run away here, fleeing from the scrutiny of his teachers, of his parents. Here, Dream was safe, nestled in the embrace of the humid earth. He was free. And now George was free with him too if he chose to be. Dream’s parents eventually found him, when he recklessly took their car and accidentally drove it into the murky waters. That earned him a scolding, he chuckled at the memory.
“Why are you laughing?” George asked, voice soft and slightly hoarse from earlier.
“Nothing. Just remembered something.”
“Hm.”
A pregnant pause ensues.
“I’m glad you’re here, with me.” For a second Dream fears he’s bared too much of his heart away, the cold grasp of dread striking his heart, that George would laugh and call him stupid. That stops when George smiled and tightened his hold on his hand, smiled his pretty smile and played with Dream’s thumb, eyes fond and pretty cheeks flushing. Dream feels his heart burst from the sight.
“I am too, on the record.”
“On the record,” Dream wheezed, “It’s for the record. God, you’re such an idiot.”
“Shut up! We were having a moment, Dream! You’re so annoying.” George scoffed playfully, yanking his hand away and crossing his arms petulantly. Dream chuckled at him fondly, gaze too intimate, too raw, too vulnerable. George cleared his throat and looked away, towards the void before them, waters blackened by night with only a tinge of flickering tangerine from the streetlight.
“This is nice.”
“Yeah.” Dream replied, soothed by the comfortable lilt in George’s tone.
“Do you,” George paused uncertainly. “Bring many people here?”
The implication that Dream would dare taint his sanctuary with other people deeply offends him, causing him to immediately disprove the brunet. Perhaps a bit too abrupt since George raised a brow at him, a teasing smile creeping into his face.
“Oh? So I’m the only one you’ve brought here?”
Dream frowned, flicking George’s shoulder with his finger. “Yes?”
“I don’t know, Dream, kinda sus.” He quipped, a cheeky smile blooming as Dream groaned and covered his face with his arms. God, why did he have to be so… George? Why did he have to fuel the flames of Dream’s fluttering heart with gasoline-slick words? To watch the flames of infatuation burn away his dignity?
“I hate you.”
“No, you don’t! You love me.”
“Do I?” Dream pretends to ponder, mockingly humming whilst George rolled his eyes.
“So you hate me? How can you hate me, Dreamie?”
Dream could never.
The flood ravages whatever gates he’s built.
“I could never. How can I hate you? Your smile, the way your eyes shine whenever you talk about something you’re passionate about, the way you bite your lips when you’re nervous, you fumble with your hoodie. How can I hate your laugh when it makes me so-”
He squeaked, heat pooling in his cheeks mixed with shame, catching himself before George found out that Dream paid more attention to him than he thought. How would he react if he knew how many nights Dream spent staring at his ceiling wondering if George would ever truly be his, if he knew just how much Dream longed to wrap his arms around him.
“Fuck. I didn’t mean that. I’m sorry if y-” He doesn’t finish his stammering apology before George slots their lips together.
It sends tingling adoration to his spine, his hackles rising as he sat there in shock. George tastes like strawberries, like golden mornings and milky nights, like forevermore, like a promise of next time. His lips are a vice, luscious and soft and delicate. He melts into the kiss, a hand finding itself cupping the brunet’s alabaster cheek, flushed red under dim light.
His heart is indeed full, full of love, full of youthful lust, of infatuation, of George.
They pull back, faces flushed and lips slick with each other, panting into the crisp Floridian air. He rests their foreheads together, sharing their breaths. It’s all so intimate that he closes his eyes and bask in George’s vermillion lips and scarlet breath.
"For the record, I don't hate you too, Dreamie." George whispers.
Dream dares to meet George’s eyes, stripped of their teasing gleam, replaced by a languid look of something Dream wishes to see in perpetuity, of golden afternoons spent in his bed, the light casting George in gilded majesty.
But for now, they’re under tangerine streetlights. And fools in love.