some persuasion required

chapter 3

It started off rather tentative.

Neither of the two could really wrap their heads fully around the fact that they were going through with this, that they needed to be genuine about all their intentions.

Because, close friendship or not, nothing about them being something more was given any true consideration. A relationship was not even in the conversation for either Dream or George, not a sincere one anyway. They had always hedged around such things, tipping near but never quite over the line, resting right on the fence but not daring to take one step further. And, sure, many times they had come almost dangerously close to such ends, but never completely there, never seriously.

Maybe that made it all that much harder.

They were so used to them, any Dream and George pairing, the dnf shipping they would even encourage; it was all just an offhand joke. Something to tease each other with, something that had expanded so far it was now bigger than themselves, out of their control.

Something trivial, light-hearted, without meaning.

Something that was nothing.

Until, it had to be. Until they were now here, eyes and hands uncertain, voices strained with an awkwardness that had been awoken from a long-fought dormancy, sitting in a call and just waiting to fall for each other.

No matter how much Dream had impressed upon George the notion of "Just don't think about it" and "It'll be the same as always" and even "I bet it'll be so natural we'll forget about the whole thing", both of them had the visa and marriage and persuasion on the forefront of their minds every time they interacted.

The problem was, really, no matter how many times they had done this before, being on a simple facetime call in the dead of the night, Dream lounging in bed providing his voice and attention and George giving a barely perceptible dark screen in return; neither of them could shake the thought that this felt like a date.

The tension, long silences, the fumbling of words looking for the right thing to say and charm, navigating the possibility of what they could be in nearly every conversation, all of it had the impression of a first date.

Mostly because, well, that's what they had to do.

But it wasn't like there was anything to get to know each other about. There was nothing new left untold, nothing novel about their personal histories or lives, no more to discover in experiences they had shared more with each other than not.

All that was left for them to do was go forward, grow into a fondness that was more than friends and, ideally, quick. They were on a pretty limited time schedule, after all. Their third, basically useless, visa attempt was going to be considered in the upcoming several months to a year as a backup plan.

So, all they needed to do was start the main course of action. To begin the process that would result in feelings, create an application, and end with them together, in every meaning of the word.

Dream cleared his throat, looking up at the gentle swish of his ceiling fan, unsure what his next question was going to be when he opened his mouth and just hoping a topic of conversation would come from it as he mindlessly spoke, "What's the first thing you want to do, when you get here?"

George puffed out a huff of breath, sure he had answered this several times before, not just to Dream, but live to an audience as well, "Do your face reveal, obviously. Disney World. All the videos we planned."

"No," Dream backtracked softly, "Like the very moment you get here, that very day you get off the plane, what's the thing you want most?"

There was only a scoff of a reply that George offered, Dream knowing without seeing that the other rolled his eyes at such an inquiry. George's next words had an air of unimpressed discontent as he shortly gave what he believed to be the quite self-evident answer, "To see you. Obviously."