Clay Soot, also known as Dream by his closest companions, died on September 8th, 2020, 9:59PM at 71 years old. His polite request for George to take care of the flowers were his last known words. He was still capable of talking after that, he just refused to say any more, because he wanted his last words to have something to do with George. It was Wilbur who broke the news to George the next day over text, assuring him he wasn't at fault for any of it and that Dream himself knew his time was running out. George didn't know how to bring himself to talk to Dream over the phone knowing his future counterpart had lost his life, until he remembered what Clay had told him the night before he died. "You can't. Tomorrow's the ninth of September, George. I made sure you couldn't call again." George was trying to understand what that had meant, but he knew he was still going to sit for however long it took, just to wait for the phone to ring. He'd have to keep the fact that he had died to himself. He needed to hear Dream's voice again. The Dream that he loved. The Dream that was alive. George was busy in thought, when he heard knocking from downstairs. It took everything in him to get up and push himself downstairs. Not to mention the fact that he had not eaten breakfast yet. He opened the door to Wilbur, who had baggy eyes that were scarred from too much wiping. "Wilbur?" George led him inside, "I'm so sorry." George couldn't even finish the sentence without getting choked up with tears. Wilbur tried his best to smile, "Don't be, nothing's your fault." George couldn't fathom how much grief him and his family were probably in. His heart broke when he thought of Tommy. How Tommy was expecting his grandpa to come back. He couldn't imagine how hard it was for Wilbur as a father to sit him down and tell him the truth. They had just gotten close, too. George helped the man walk inside, his footing had been so unsure and confused, "Why did you come here, Wilbur?" "I have to tell you something, George." He turned to George, trying his best to keep his composure but it was obviously backfiring. "Sure, anything." George sat down in front of him, offering a glass of water and some tissues, patting him on the back. Wilbur thanked him before taking a deep breath. "My dad was a great man." His voice shook, and every bit of him was slowly crumbling like a sandcastle that a million hands were trying to keep together. George nodded, Wilbur had no idea how much he had agreed with him. He listened on, taking a sip of water and trying to keep calm knowing what Wilbur was about to say was something about the man he loved. The man who was gone. "He'd tell us stories," "I remember." Wilbur laughed a little, "they were such absurd stories, but I believed them. Techno didn't, he was realistic, but me? Oh I soaked up every word of his storytelling until I fell asleep." He looked reminiscently in front of him. "The stupid one about him climbing a tree to protest not cutting it down, and how he got struck by lightning after, and all those times he and his friend Nick would go out and set firecrackers into the sky at helicopters." George chuckled along with him, he wondered what other insane things Dream supposedly did in his life. The thought of it warmed and eased his heart a bit. He knew that Dream was satisfied and had lived his life the way he wanted to. "There was a story for every single night." Wilbur turned to look at George, "That was how many he had." "I'm sure he loved telling those stories as much as you loved hearing them, Wil." George comforted. "I did love hearing them. I loved every single one of them." Wilbur's fingers were being more fidgety than usual, "But there was one in particular that he'd have so much to talk about." George was genuinely interested, "And what story was that?" "The story of a boy he used to speak to on the phone." George felt his heartbeat stop for a second. Dream told his kids about him? More importantly, Wilbur knew about the calls this whole time? Wilbur didn't wait for a response, he just continued, "The way he'd tell the story. It felt so real, I just knew he wasn't lying to me. He never did." "T-then what?" "Then I grew up of course. I stopped believing in Santa, then the Tooth Fairy, then eventually all of Dad's stories." Wilbur looked down at his hands, playing with his rings. He glanced at the clock, then hurried his speech, "I met a woman, got married, had a kid, and he knew that. He knew I wasn't his little boy that was in awe of everything he did anymore." George moved closer, every ounce of his body waiting to hear what Wilbur had to say next. "Then five years ago he came here." Wilbur was gesturing with his hands, "And he told me, 'Wilby, do you remember that story I used to tell you?' And I said of course I did. Then he told me that's why he came. I was confused, why would he visit me just to ask if I remembered one of his fictional stories." Wilbur sat in silence for a bit, constantly sniffling and blowing into a tissue. "He told me he was telling the truth. The story was true." Wilbur started messing with his sleeve, "I thought he'd gone crazy. I was about to kick him out of the house but he wouldn't budge, he's so persistent." George knew that. Oh did he know. Wilbur patted his jacket pockets, and took out his old, worn out leather notebook. "He threw this at me before I closed the door on him." He showed it to George, "He said it was proof he was telling the truth." He opened a page and showed it to George, it had a series of dates with little notes on the side. July 31, 2020: George unburies the Time Capsule August 5-13: George repaints the exterior of his house dark gray. I chose that color. August 27, 2020: George unburies another Time Capsule August 28. 2020: George plants the flowers. I know him well enough to know he'll struggle. George now knew the true reason Wilbur kept this so notebook so close to him, and why he often wrote in it when he was with George. Wilbur took the notebook back, "This one's my favourite one." He showed George. September 2, 2020: I forgot to call George today. Whoever this goes to, please keep him company. George remembered, "Is that why you came to my house randomly with the Apple Cider?" Wilbur smiled, "Yes." He confirmed, "I wasn't initially going to fact check these dates, but I felt bad for him. So, I went on the day you unburied the time capsule, and there you were. I went more and more and saw that each date and event he wrote down had come true. He was telling the truth." George felt his heart warm. Even though Dream never had visited him before, he was always there for him this whole time without him noticing. In little ways, but in ways nonetheless. "May I see the phone, George?" "Oh." George said, "Yeah, it's upstairs in my room." George led Wilbur up the carpet steps to his bedroom. It was messy and he didn't have the energy to clean lately, so he was a bit embarrassed but Wilbur didn't seem to mind. Wilbur kept constantly checking the clock, it was 9:21. "Have to be somewhere?" George asked, and Wilbur shook his head. "I just grew a habit of checking the time." He explained. 9:24 The phone rang. "Is that him?" Wilbur asked. George ran to the phone, longing to hear Dream's voice. Longing to talk to him, knowing there was some version of him that was still alive. He didn't even consider how off it was that he had called in the morning. Dream never called in the morning. "I don't think I should talk to him," Wilbur said truthfully, "I don't know if I can bring myself to, and also it might mess things up, right?" He didn't know how any of it worked, he just assumed that it was safer not to risk anything. George nodded quickly at Wilbur, he didn't have anything on his mind other than answering Dream. He wiped his eyes, gave a huge sigh, and picked up the phone, "Dream?" "Hi, George." "Dream, you have no idea how happy I am to hear your voice." George almost wailed, "It's been so long." Dream was silent from his end for a moment, "Remember that hand print I put on your wall, how you freaked out when I asked if you held it." George was lost, he didn't understand how Dream could start the conversation with such a random line, but he didn't care as long as he could hear his voice. "I do, why do you ask?" "I know you held it, George." Dream said boldly, "I know how you felt. I know how you feel." Dream was wrong. He had no idea how he felt. He had no idea what he had just seen the night before. "How do I feel? Dream, what are you talking about?" George didn't even care that Wilbur was still in the room, he talked as if it was him and Dream in the room. "You falter," Dream continued, "when I say something that goes a little too far. When I call you adorable, when I tell you I miss you.""Dream can you just cut this and get to the point?" George snapped, and Dream's breath caught for a moment, almost as though he wasn't expecting this kind of reaction from George. Dream closed his eyes, his leg shaking rapidly under his desk, "George, I love you." He said. "Wh-" "I love your voice, I love how absolutely dense you are sometimes even though you're one of the smartest people I know, and the way you answer the phone so fast when I call. I love the 'Hello Dream!'s' and the 'Goodnight, Old Man's and I even love how stupidly long you take to say you missed me back. Shoot, I love when you'd tell me I'm full of myself and how much you want me to shut up, but listen George, I don't want to shut up. I don't want to stop talking to you-" George held the phone in his feeble, unsteady hand as his eyes glossed with a layer of salty tears. "-and I just want you to love me back. I don't care if you say I'm full of myself, I know you love me back. So say it, please, George. I need to hear you say it at least once, I know you'll mean it so let's just get this over with." George's eyebrows furrowed, "Get this over with?" George repeated, "Is that what you think this is? You trying to coax me into telling you 'I love you' just to 'get it over with'?" "You don't understand what I did, George," Dream tried to calm him down, "if you don't say it now, you'll never get another chance to." "What are you talking about, Dream? What is this? Why did you call just to tell me this?" George was full of emotion. Between watching Dream before his last moments in life, and being on the phone with his past self pouring his heart out, he didn't know how to feel. "Fine then, let me make this easier." Dream scuffled a little before taking a deep breath, "Tell me you don't love me." "You wanted me to tell you I love you, now you want me to say I don't?" George wasn't being sassy, he was just genuinely confused. "Can you do that?" Dream pushed, "Can you handle saying that? Which one of those two phrases would be true, and which one would be a lie if you told them to me right now." George was silent. "Please, George. Please I need to hear it." All George could remember was arguing with Dream in the hospital the night before. How he had told him that no matter what, he'd still find a way to talk to him over the phone. That was his first and last memory of seeing Dream in person, an argument. He didn't want another argument with Dream, so he collapsed, "I love you too, Dream." Dream sniffled, his voice uneven, "Thank you. That's what I needed, George." "You needed me to tell you I love you?" Dream didn't answer, he just sat on his stool clutching his phone so hard he thought it might crack into pieces, "I needed closure." He admitted, "Proof that once upon a time, in 1970, George Davidson, a man who didn't even exist yet, had loved me." "How are we going to continue to talk after this?" George asked curiously, "Now that we know how we feel." A single tear fell down Dream's face, "I- I'm sorry George." "Sorry for what? What do you keep apologizing for?" 9:30 Wilbur came up behind George. George had forgotten he was even there. "George, I just wanted to say one thing, and that's thank you." Dream's voice was so broken, and George found something off-putting about it, "Thank you for the late night talks, the stories you'd tell, everything. You changed my life, that's for sure. I just can't have my heart in 2020 when it belongs here in 1970. I'll fall for you more and if I go any deeper I won't be able to get out of it. Maybe, in another life you and I were together happily, the way I want it to be. The way it should be. But it's just-" Dream stopped talking for a moment, giving himself time to cry. "-bad timing." He finished. George was unknowingly crying as well, but he was still confused. Did this mean Dream would never talk to him again? Why would he do such a cruel thing? He didn't know that he just witnessed him die and now this. "Dream, what does this mean?" "I love you." Dream interrupted. "I love you too, but-" "Then that's all that needs to be said." Dream seemed to stop talking, but he said one final thing, "You take good care of those flowers, George."Dream hadn't hung up, but was silent. Wilbur appeared next to him, "George," He said, "I'm sorry, but he had one last request of me." George didn't understand why so many people were being so cryptic to him at once, all he wanted was an explanation. An explanation was what he got when he saw Wilbur pull out a red swiss army knife. And with Dream, with warmth, "We'll meet again." "Wilbur what are yo-" George raised his voice but found himself wrestling the phone from Wilbur. Wilbur grabbed hold of the phone, clutched it in his strong, shaking hand, and with one slash of the knife, cut the cord. There was no explosion, or rip in time, or bright light to indicate any change. Just the cord breaking. The phone fell with a clang onto the floor. It was the end of any more calls from Dream.
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Dream sat on the stool, and he knew the moment the cord was cut. The dial tone just rang loudly in his ear but he kept the phone close to him, almost waiting for one more word, but nothing came. He didn't know how long he sat there, and he couldn't even bring himself to cry. He just held the phone the way he held it when he'd talk to George.
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George fell to the ground, trying to grab hold of the phone, "Why did you do that?" He wailed, trying desperately to put the pieces of cord back together, but there was no hope. Wilbur didn't falter or back away, he just ripped the last page of his notebook out and handed it to George, who's tears fell on it, blotting the ink slightly. To my next of kin, a friend, or whoever I pass these notes onto: I know I have asked for so much from you, but I make one last request. On September 9, 2020, 9:30 AM, I would like you to please severe my telephone connection with George permanently. Tell him I hope he moves on, and that the world will give him everything he deserves. Someone to love him, hold him, and tell him how beautiful he is. That is the end of my requests. Whoever I chose to fulfill them, I want to say thank you, and to have a beautiful day. George read the note over and over again. Dream had no idea what he had just done to him. George had seen Dream die twice. Any version of him, and any connection with him was gone forever. Wilbur helped his friend up and let him cry, comforting him. They had both lost a lot that day.
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The Orange petal of the Calendulas outside peeked out of the dirt. It was just beginning to live, and had no idea how much had just died.
