Rose Colored Boy - dreamwastaken

chapter fifteen

a/n let me know if i should warn about any of this i'm not sure 

"Oh my god, look," Blair said, pulling another box out of her closet. Dream was sat on the floor against the side of her bed. "I think this is from high school, which means it's just going to be sad self portraits and flowers."

Their hot chocolate was sat, forgotten about, on the desk- abandoned in favor of digging through Blair's artwork.

"Oh, nope, this is the haunted thrift store box," she said, and pushed the box towards Dream, who frowned.

"Um, explain?" He peered over the contents, making no move to touch anything.

Blair snapped her fingers excitedly and pulled out an old picture frame, metal discolored with age. "When I was in high school and didn't want to go home from school yet, I would spend hours in the thrift store going through all of the old stuff people left. These are just the ones that I took down when I finished my own stuff."

When Dream didn't say anything, she looked up. "Hey, your house is empty. That's worse than maybe-cursed thrift store decorations."

"No, I'm not judging!" Dream said with a laugh. "Also, it's your house, too, I would love it if you decorated. Even if it means we have a ghost roommate."

Blair looked up again with a small smile. "Like, officially?"

"I mean, I don't know how you plan on making a ghost pay rent, but I guess?"

"No, like, we kind of talked about it, but never said the word roommates or anything and I'm really good at getting my hopes up, so I didn't say anything and I was never sure, but you said 'it's your house too'-"

"Blair!" Dream said, and grabbed her hand for a second. "Of course it's your house too! I didn't realize we hadn't made it official."

He let go of her hand, and Blair tried to ignore how much she missed the warmth by sorting through the old mirrors and paintings in the box.

She looked up again when there was a knock against the open door of her bedroom.

"Hey, kiddos, dinner's gonna be ready soon. Ooh, the haunted thrift store box!" Dorothy said with a laugh. She came in and ruffled Blair's curls as she peered into the box. "I'm surprised you left this stuff behind, you were always so excited when you brought anything home from the Good Will."

"You know shipping across the country is expensive," Blair said quietly, and leaned into her mom's touch. She left out that Adam had always said this was somehow dumb and creepy at the same time, the real reason she'd left it behind. "But I think we can swing it now."

"Good, take your ghosts home, they miss you," Dorothy said and smiled. "Dinner's in ten minutes!" She called as she went back down the stairs.

Dream watched for a moment as Blair carefully arranged the fragile picture frames and such back into the box.

"Can I ask you something?"

Blair glanced up for a second before pointedly focusing on her task. "Sure?"

It was a moment before Dream spoke up again. "I've noticed your family is really... touchy? Like lots of hugs and stuff-"

"Oh, god, sorry, I can tell them to cut it out-"

"No, it's fine, that's not my point," Dream reassured her. Blair arranged and rearranged the last few picture frames again, even though they fit fine the first time. "I just noticed that you're... not."

"Not?"

"Like, touchy. Even with your family- or anyone, I guess."

Blair frowned. Memories flooded through, of hands pulling away, brushing her off, keeping her just out of reach. And they didn't come in waves, now, the recollections of love unreciprocated threatened to drown her like the tide, rising up to swallow her whole.