Work Text:
It was the 1st of November. Which meant it was George’s 24th birthday. It started off like any other day, with George waking up at 11:30am. His folks would be out for the weekend, something about business, so that meant he would have the house to himself.
Well, the house to himself and his two pets.
He checked his phone as he got dressed, scrolling through Discord and Twitter. He had a bunch of notifications from fans and friends wishing him a happy birthday, and he liked a couple of them. It was great that he got to see how many people liked him, and how many people he had impacted.
But, one thing struck him as odd. George hadn’t gotten any messages from Dream. Every one of his other friends has sent him a message, including Sapnap, who decided to message him the moment the clock struck 12am.
He shrugged, he didn't want to seem clingy or anything, and it was probably just because Dream has fallen asleep or something. There was no competition to see who could message him the soonest, but it was a bit abnormal.
He checked Twitter, nothing. He checked Discord, also nothing. Nothing from Snapchat, iMessage, not even Instagram. He sighed, forcing himself to put his phone down. It’s fine. Dream probably just fell asleep early, and hadn't woken up yet. (Nevermind the fact that Dream and George were on the same sleep schedule, he didn’t want to think about that now).
George decided to just get some work done for today, and maybe, if he had time later, he’d do a small birthday stream. Maybe then he could talk with Dream.
He got ready for the day, putting on a light sweater over his t-shirt, and fixed his hair a bit. One of the things he liked about his hair was how low maintenance it was, just one quick brush and then done.
His cat greeted him at the bottom of the stairs, probably waiting for him to feed him breakfast. George did just that, putting out one bowl of pet food for his cat, and a slightly larger portion of food for his dog. He would only have to feed his cat twice a day now, since he was getting older.
After feeding his pets, George decided he may as well get himself something to eat too. He wasn't that much of an expert with the stove, so he decided to treat himself to a bowl of cereal, rather than risk burning his eggs (or himself).
Pouring the milk into his bowl after the cereal (because he wasn’t a heathen) he kept glancing at his phone, waiting for it to light up with a message. When it didn’t, George hummed disappointed, before feeling something cold hit his socked feet.
He has spilled his milk to the point it had dripped out of the bowl, onto the table, then onto the floor. George cursed to himself, quickly capping the milk to put it away, and gathered some paper towels. No use crying over spilt milk, after all.
He pushed his cat gently out of the way, who had suddenly become transfixed with the white liquid on the floor. Using a paper towel, he quickly cleaned it up, wiping down the kitchen table, and pouring out some of the excess milk from his bowl into the sink.
Finally, he sat himself down, and began to eat, His cereal was soggy now, having spent so much time absorbing the milk, and while there was nothing George could do about it, he continued to eat it anyway.
He held his phone in his hand while he ate, mindlessly opening, closing, and re-opening apps on his phone. After some time, he felt his spoon scrape the bottom of his now-empty bowl, indicating he had finished eating.
Still no new messages.
George was getting obsessed, he could admit. But anyone would be, when you haven't gotten a happy birthday from your best friend. God, he felt so selfish and whiny for those thoughts, even though he knew that it wasn't too much to ask for.
Maybe I should send him a message first, George thought to himself. Nothing too crazy, just a simple ‘hello!’ or even a bold ‘it’s my birthday!’ text.
He opened his messaging app, and clicked on Dream’s contact. He began typing then stopped himself, before deleting his message and re-typing a new one. This process continued for about five minutes, before George decided on a simple ‘good morning :]’ text.
George looked at his message; ‘delivered’ it said. He stared at it for another five minutes, waiting for it to change from delivered to read. It didn't happen.
Well, he wasn’t going to get anything done today if he just kept staring at his phone, so he put it in his back pocket. George decided to busy himself with household chores, getting some of his clothes washed, putting away some clean dishes, and even cleaning up parts of his room which had been neglected for a couple weeks.
By the time he had finished, the clock in his room read 3:26 pm. And still no new messages from Dream. It didn’t even seem like he had read George’s message, did he have that feature turned off?
George felt a pit drop in his stomach, was Dream okay? Did he get into trouble, or was he hurt? Here he was, all worried about himself, when something terrible could have happened. Maybe he was just asleep and George was annoying him, maybe Dream has tried to read his message while driving and-
George slapped himself in the face, hard. He had to snap himself out of those thoughts before he started getting upset, that wouldn’t be helpful to anyone. Instead, he inhaled slowly, putting his hand over his chest as he tried to calm down.
With a slightly shaky hand, he decided to give Sapnap a call, the discord tone ringing for only a couple seconds before his Texan friend answered.
“Hey George, happy birthday!” Sapnap greeted, as George held his phone up to his ear. “What’s up, man? You feel any older?”
George let himself smile. “Haha, not yet.” He joked, faking a casual tone in the hopes that he could trick himself to stay calm. “Hey, you haven't happened to have heard from Dream at all today, have you?”
Sapnap hummed for a second, as if trying to recall his day so far, before shaking his head. “Nah man.” He answered. “ Then again, it’s only, like, 9:30 in the morning here, so I just woke up. Why do you ask?”
George felt his heart drop lower into his chest. “Oh, no reason”, he began, before scratching at his arm anxiously. “It’s just that I haven’t heard from him at all today, and at first I thought he was still asleep, but then I remembered we follow the same sleep schedule, so that couldn't be it. So then I figured, maybe he was just ignoring me, but that doesn't seem like something he’d do, so then I got worried that he might be hurt, and so I called you an-”
“George!” Sapnap interrupted, cutting off his anxious ramblings. “I’m sure Dream’s fine. I don't think he’s hurt, and I also don’t think he’s ignoring you.” The Texan insisted, using a calm and even voice.
George swallowed roughly, making sure to try and breathe at a steady pace. “Yeah?” He asked quietly, his voice cracking slightly.
“Yeah man, don’t worry about it.” Sapnap confirmed. “I’m sure he’s still sleeping, or maybe he’s just busy. But I don’t think Dream would ignore you, and there’s no way he would forget your birthday.”
“You sure?” The Brit asked, before immediately feeling guilty. He felt ashamed that he even doubted his and Dream’s friendship that much, where he would dare think his friend would forget his birthday. God, he really was awful.
“I’m sure I’m sure.” Sapnap insisted gently, his smile audible through the phone. “I bet he’s just working on this big surprise for you, or something.”
George smiled at the thought; maybe Dream was doing something for him as a birthday gift. Or, maybe he was just exhausted. Either way, the idea of those scenarios calmed him down. “Yeah, I’m sure you’re right.” He said into the phone. “Thanks for that, Sapnap.”
Sapnap laughed on the other line. “Yeah of course man, call me if anything comes up, I’ll try to get through to him on my end as well.” With that, and a couple farewells, the call ended, and George relaxed slightly.
Dream was fine, and he wasn’t ignoring George on purpose, probably.
George decided to turn on his computer, and join the Dream SMP for a bit. It had been a while since he joined off stream, and maybe he would run into Dream there. The opening screen loaded, it’s light shining against the brunette’s face.
His character appeared in the world, and he moved his mouse around to get a look at his surroundings. Nothing seemed to have changed around him, besides the occasional new build, or giant, inconvenient hole (how did that even get there).
Opening up the player screen, it seemed like only he and Technoblade were on right now. George opened up the Minecraft text chat and typed out a message.
||GeorgeNotFound|| Has dream been on at all today?
He waited patiently for his friend’s response, and blinked when he saw the quick reply.
||Technoblade|| not since ive been on here
George sighed, before typing out his next message. If Dream wasn’t on now, maybe he had been on the server earlier.
||GeorgeNotFound|| How long have u been on here?
||Technoblade|| like 14 hours mayb
George’s eyes widened, he knew Technoblade was a hardcore player, but he didn’t think he would spend that much time on the server.
||GeorgeNotFound|| wow
||Technoblade|| wanna join vc2?
||GeorgeNotFound|| nah, i just wanted to check if he was here, im gonna get off in like 5
George felt a little guilty for saying no, but he didn't want to get too distracted. Plus, if Dream saw that he was on, he may not work on George’s surprise (if there even was one).
||Technoblade|| ok
||Technoblade|| happy birthday btw
||GeorgeNotFound|| Thank u :]
He opened his menu screen and closed out of the game, sighing as he slumped back into his chair. Well, unless Dream had worked on his surprise before the fourteen hours Techno had been on, then it was likely he hadn’t been on at all today.
George would just have to wait a little longer.
And that he did.
It was almost 7 in the afternoon, and George was officially in a panic. He had checked back into the server, nothing. He had checked all of his messaging apps, even the ones he hadn't used in years, nothing. He even sent Dream another text to make sure he was okay, and still nothing.
Had George done something wrong? Had he upset his friend somehow. He racked his mind to think of every single small detail he had said in his conversation with Dream only 24 hours ago. He couldn’t remember anything wrong he has said or done, but maybe that was the problem. Was he such a bad person that he couldn’t even be aware of his own mistakes?
George wasn’t sure when he had started crying, but it became obvious when his vision was so blurry from tears that he could barely make out his hand in front of him. The water fell from his eyes and trailed down his red face, as he curled up in a ball on his bed. He hadn't moved in ages, and his legs were beginning to cramp, but he couldn't move.
He could barely even breathe.
He had messaged Sapnap a while ago who, bless his heart, had tried to calm him down. After a couple minutes of talking, George said he was feeling better, and ended the conversation. That was an obvious lie, but his friend was kind enough to know not to pry, and let George have his space.
Now, he just wanted nothing more to talk to one of his friends. But there was no way he could bother Sapnap again. And he didn’t really feel comfortable sharing all of his emotions with anyone else on the SMP. And Dream…
Dream was still gone. And George couldn't figure out why.
This was probably all his fault anyway.
A knock at his front door made him jump, and he quickly wiped the tears from his eyes. It was probably the pizza he had ordered a half-hour ago. George normally would have made himself dinner, but he hadn't felt up to it, and instead ordered food from a nearby restaurant.
He gripped the banister tightly as he walked down the stairs, careful to put one foot in front of the other, as to not fall. George gently shushed his dog, who was yapping slightly at the sound of the knock. He gave her a quick couple of pats, as he dried his face with the palm of his hands. The last thing George wanted was for the delivery guy to see he had been crying, that would be too much embarrassment for George to handle.
Another knock came from outside, as George quickly searched around the house for his wallet. “I’ll be right there.” He told the person outside, cringing at the broken sound of his own voice. George found his money laying on one of his kitchen countertops, and cleared his throat as he grabbed the cash.
“One second.” The brit said again, quickly fumbling with the round door handle. He kept his head down, as he opened the door. George counted the money in his hand, and couldn’t help but notice the delivery man wore very nice shoes. “How much is the total again?”
A laugh came from the person’s mouth, and George froze. Had he already paid online, has he just succeeded in embarrassing himself further? But the laugh felt so… familiar, for some reason?
“George.” The guy laughed, holding out his hand to gently grab the brunettes. “George look at me.”
George didn't move. There’s no way...he had to be dreaming, or hallucinating, or something. There's no way the man in front of him could be…
“Dream?” He dared to ask
He finally managed to look up at the man in front of him. Tall, blonde, with green eyes and a kind smile, and light freckles scattered across his face.
“George…” The man said. The voice was one he had heard for almost four years, one he had heard laugh, one he had heard scream, and one he had heard cry.
“Dream.” George said, more certainly now. The tears he had wiped away were back, but now replaced with happy ones. The brunette gripped his friend's hand tightly, before his wall crumbled, and he tackled the blonde into an intense hug. “It’s really you.” He choked out, burying his head into the taller man’s shoulders.
“I’m sorry I haven’t texted all day, I wanted to surprise you.” Dream’s voice came, muffled from the fabric of George’s jacket. They stood there hugging for what seemed like forever, before they eventually pulled away from each other.
“You’re here!” George smiled widely, so much that his face began to hurt. “How are you here, why are you here!?” He stammered happily, tears still cascading down his face.
Dream gave his friend the most quizzical look, as though the answer were obvious. His friend’s face was red from the cold, and he let out a small chuckle. “Well, it is your birthday, isn’t it?”
It was. And it was the best birthday George ever had.