another revealed truth

validation

trigger warnings listed in opening author's note

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dream has no reason to, but he feels like absolute shit. it was just one of those days where he woke up tired, and his lecture seemed to drag on for ages past the two-hour mark.

it was theory stuff too, which he obviously struggled incredibly with, and it really didn't help with the already horrible feeling settled deep in the front of his chest.

he made the decision to clean their kitchen. he had no valid reason to do so, and it wasn't really necessary since it was hardly messy in the first place, but it gave him something to do instead of sitting around and inevitably falling asleep before four pm.

plus, deep down he's praying that sapnap will get home and notice the effort he put in and say something nice. he hopes some kind words will make him feel less useless and like a waste of space.

he's just finished tidying and wiping down the counters, probably about halfway through his sad playlist, ironically named with the broken heart emoji, when the song cuts off and the audio is replaced by the loud ringing of an incoming phone call.

he puts down the cif that he had been spraying into the sink basin and moves over to the opposite counter to pick up his mobile. glancing over the contact, dream smiles slightly to himself before answering, "hi hols."

he holds the facetime up to show his face, mirroring his sister's smile. "hey," she replies, "dad's here."

she moves the camera, pointing it to the opposite end of the couch where their dad is sitting, attention on the tv until he glances at the phone.

dream tries not to show his half-disappointment, half-annoyance on his face. he can't help but feel a little ambushed, like he's being forced to talk to the older man, but he knows that holly meant no bad by it. she doesn't understand the extent of dream's dislike.

"oh, dream! i haven't spoken to you in ages!" his father chirps, as if that's good. he reaches over, making a gesture for the phone, and dream wants to groan when holly passes it over. dream wonders if his dad ever thinks about why they don't talk much but, then again, he doubts his dad ever really thinks about him.

"hi dad," dream grits through his teeth. even calling the older man dad feels wrong, especially since the only thing connecting them was blood. if society wasn't so tight-assed about the fact that families are supposed to get along then he would happily cut his dad off.

"holly, go out for a minute so the men can talk," his dad says, looking over at the brunette and quite literally waving her out of the room.

dream can only see part of her expression from the angle of the call, but she is quite evidently put aside over being dismissed. it's shitty for his dad to send her out, especially when the call is on her phone, yet she still doesn't even try to argue as she gets up and walks herself out of the lounge.

the brunette girl hardly seems to notice her own sadness as she goes, and dream doesn't know why she's so naïve to their dad's shit behaviour.

his dad looks back at the phone, looking far too proud of himself, and asks, "how's college?"

"good," he answers simply, propping up the phone by the back of the sink so he could share his attention between the older man and his cleaning. he picks up a sponge, not bothering to put on rubber gloves because he wants to be able to end the call as soon as possible now he's being forced to speak to his dad.