No More Day Dreaming (DreamNotFound)

Video Calls

Video calling with your boyfriend who now attends on the other side of the world is hard.

Firstly, the timing was way too tight. Between his classes, homework, and getting barely adequate sleep plus top of the time difference, he only had about an hour or two in the morning to call each day with the occasional call at 3 PM. To try and compensate, I would now frequently sleep at 3 AM, waking up at nearly noon. But no matter what, it never felt like a long enough time.

Some days we wouldn't even video call, since we'd use all of the time recording videos. We were gaining quite a fan base by now, so the expectations led to us making a video at least once a week. But because of how long the videos took, we definitely couldn't call afterwards.

And by now, after only a month, not being able to feel George was getting to me. Some mornings I woke up reaching out for him, only to grab my cat sleeping next to me. She would then get angry at me and a run away, leaving me more alone than before.

Despite all of that, I could still admire him from afar. We'd text a lot and send pictures (not like that), which made me feel a little less homesick. I could honestly look at George for hours and not get bored.

Summer became fall and George began complaining of the cold. He teased me, "You're not gonna last a day here in winter, Florida boy."

"You lived here for most of your life too, you know," I snapped back, giggling.

"Yeah, but I still get to call you that now that I live all the way over here." He turned his camera towards the rainy scene outside of his grandparents' house. It was actually the first time I'd seen outside George's room, and so I wasn't expecting to see the rolling green fields being soaked by the downpour.

"Wh- You get to college from there? That's gotta be at least an hour out," I questioned, stroking the cat on my lap.

"Hour and a half," he corrected. "I think I told you right when I started going. I wasn't lying when I said have to get up at six in the morning every day."

I grimaced. "That's rough."

"Tell me about it. And I don't even get to wake up cuddling you. Which, as we've found out, gets really lonely."

"Yeah," I frowned. "I miss you a whole lot."

"I miss you too."

Just then, Patches lept off my lap and ran away. It was probably because she was going to go eat, but I joked, "I think Patches got sick of us and our display of affection."

"We've been dating longer than she's been alive. She has no excuse."

"No need to be rude to her," I fake-pouted.

He had turned the camera back onto himself by now, so I sighed and took in his features. He was so attractive that it was hard to peel my focus away from just how much I loved him.

Another day we called, he was doing some extra tough homework. He wasn't ignoring me exactly, but he was focusing pretty heavily on whatever it was he was doing and took a while to respond. That day was hard, because it was basically a day with no talking whatsoever. Plus, I could barely see his face, since it was buried in his computer monitor.

"Do you want any help, Gogy?"

"Hmm... I don't know if you could. Thanks for offering, though."

"Alright."

That was the only conversation throughout the whole call, aside from the usual "I love you"s at the end.

The weeks started becoming a blur. September flew into October, and soon enough, November came, bringing George's 19th birthday along with it. Luckily, it was on the weekend, so he could call for far longer than usual.

And call for a long time we did - in fact, I was probably on the phone with him for a solid five hours. I began by singing him the iconic happy birthday song ("Your singing voice is so good!") before we moved on to just throwing words of affection at each other and hoping they would make it the 4,000 mile gap.

Finally, I ended scooped up Patches and let her stare at George's face curiously. She didn't seem to understand the concept of him being in the phone screen, so she kept putting her face right up onto it. Needless to say, it was adorable.

Still, I left the call with an empty feeling. Maybe I was just being clingy, but I desperately wanted to have been with him for his birthday. To be able to pepper him with kisses and hold him close and pamper him. But from all the way over here, I couldn't do any of that.

That's why I practically screamed with joy when my visa came in the next week.

I tried calling George immediately, but as I should have thought, he was in class at the time.

George: im in class rn sorry
George: what is it tho
Clay: i got my visaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa
George: AHHHH
George: HHHHHHH
George: so uh

I looked back down at my phone, as I had gotten distracted by Patches.

George: when's your flight?

892 Words