Chapter Text
“Tell him to quit it with that goddamn horn, would you?”
It’s not often that my dad is home when I catch a ride with Dream. This is a good reminder as to why. He hates Dream. Hates the piercings through his bottom lip and the bridge of his nose, hates the open maw of a lion tattooed across his throat, hates the way he reeks of american spirits and $10 vodka. Hates Dream.
I think it’s funny.
I remember the day I met the guy, the first time I worked any time past 2 pm at the terrifyingly disgusting coffee stand at my local mall. There are not many good jobs around for people who opted out of college, but the gig I’ve got is good. Slightly above minimum wage with a boss who cares but also doesn’t and the luxury of having a somewhat decent schedule not long after my training finished. Dream came up, confidently ordered a red eye with no room, and waited while I made it for him.
Took it, sipped it, and handed me a beat to hell card to pay for it. Which declined. Second try, same thing. And rather than take away the coffee from the guy, I typed in my employee number to comp it as “my own,” handed him back the red piece of plastic, and sent him off with a wave.
He came back later during his break to say thank you, and somehow in that conversation, I landed his Snapchat and an offer to go to some bar basement concert for his friend’s band. And the rest is history.
Now, most days of the week, I climb into the shotgun seat of Dream’s beat to shit Toyota corolla from before either of us were alive and commandeer his aux cord and vuse battery. Today is no exception.
“Well, you look like shit.”
“Fuck you.”
I don’t, really. I’m wearing the tiny black dress that I basically worship at this point with a star-studded mesh shirt over top and slip-on vans that Dream discounted for me at Zumiez.
“Tom is home, and he’s grumbling about you again.”
“Good, I fucking hate Tom.”
Dream has met my father a handful of times, and like I said before, he hates Dream.
“I’m doing my makeup, so don’t crash the car till I’m done.”
There’s no response, but the usual lurch backward when he starts reversing down the driveway is less pronounced.
We’re going to some bar, and then probably a couple more afterward, because we’re degenerate 22-year-olds (at least, I am in the great state of New Jersey) the day after payday. I’ll probably end up crashing on his couch to save myself the “coming home at 4 am” lecture I’m bound to get otherwise.
“Are my shoes still in your backseat?”
“Fuckin- let me check.” And then he’s literally halfway in the backseat before I even get my hand on the wheel to keep us steady. He digs around for a moment, rustling the trash from nearly every place in the mall food court. “Here.” He drops the platforms I left in here from the last time we did this in my lap as he falls back into his seat, one hand curled lazily around the wheel.
“Thank you.”
“Yep.”
We park on the street outside Dream’s apartment, a three-level building downtown with a unit on each story. Dream’s in the basement. There’s supposed to be other people meeting us at Level, the bar we go to nearly every weekend because it’s seedy, and they’ll take the $50 fake ids that most of us are rocking. But until 8 when we’re meeting them, I’ll take Instagram pictures in front of the graffiti on the side of his building, and then we’ll watch a show or two before we go out. Saturday traditions.
“You gonna be in them this time?”
Dream shakes his head but does take my phone so that he can take the photos.
“You think your legs are long enough to go like, wall to wall?”
“What?”
“Fuckin, put your back up and put your feet on the other wall.”
“If my pussy is in any of these pictures from this pose, I might have to kill you.”
“It’s not.”
It’s not. I post them with a caption from Spiderhead because I’ve been listening to it too much lately, and it’s on my mind. We sit on his couch and pass a peach mango disposable between the two of us while the tv plays.
I’d never been a smoker before I met Dream. Sure, I’d been roped into a drunk cig here and there, but I didn’t have easy enough access to get into it. Now, he and I go through enough to be familiar to the clerks at most gas stations within walking distance of his apartment. I remember the first time we smoked something other than ciggies together when I wasn’t doing all that good job of ignoring the fact that I was catching feelings, and he taught me how to hit shit and gave me endless “god, what could that mouth do” thoughts.
Now that I’m more in control of it, I save those for later.
“You gonna drink tonight?”
“I’m not sure yet.” There are some nights where I’d rather enjoy the pulse of bass deep in my bones, prefer dancing to downing cheap shots of bottom-shelf liquor. Never sure until I’m there. For now, I’m content with the body buzz from the nicotine.
When we leave, I’m reminded of how Dream constantly pokes fun at how much I love downtown. Shakes his head at me skipping through the sidewalks while people stare from behind the cigarettes they’re pulling on. He’ll grab my wrist to stop me incessantly pressing the crosswalk buttons just to hear the silly little “Wait!” that never fails to make me laugh. He’s spent his entire life in a city my parents kept me from, and the silly little things I do hold no wonder for him like they do for me.
“You’re acting so fucking high right now, idiot.”
I am, on the life that exists in the night of the city.
“High on life,” I say, cheesing hard.
I remember the first night we did this, a few weeks after we met, when Dream told me that he thinks I’m the single most innocent person he’s ever met.
“I’m not innocent, I have more hoes than you do,” I said, bumping into him.
“Not like, that kind of innocent. You just, you act like all this shit is so cool.”
“It is cool.”
“It’s shit.”
“To you, maybe, but I’ve never gotten to experience a place like this.”
He was quiet for a while after that, and I thought I’d done something to supremely fuck up our budding friendship. Knowing what I know now, he would never, but then, I was terrified. But when he finally broke the silence, it was with an offer I couldn’t refuse.
“I’ll show you the life, then. Shit cars and shit apartments and shit jobs. You in?”
“I’m in.”
It’s kind of a strange friendship between the two of us. Dream, despite the fact that he’s most parents’ worst nightmare for their kid’s best friend (and fat fucking crush), is one of the most genuine people I know.
Thirty minutes down the road in sunny suburbia, there’s really nobody like him, with everyone too preoccupied with what others think of them to be anything other than cookie-cutter kids. Dream’s real, and that makes me feel like I am too. It’s-
Refreshing.
So we go to Level and hand over New Jersey IDs even though this is Orlando and we’re regulars and nobody cares. And we dance because nobody is watching and ask them to play “Pursuit of Happiness” because it feels like an anthem and scream ourselves hoarse when they play it. We meet friends who are in the same boat as Dream, shitty city kids with marlboros hanging off their lips and liquor-soaked tongues and we have fun.
The dance floor is packed, bodies pressed tight to each other, and yet I don’t care, simply content to match the energy of the people around me. Kenz and Theo are out there with me, and we’re laughing and taking silly videos and having a good time.
Eventually, I do care about the rising heat on the dance floor, finding Dream to whisk him outside and split a cigarette.
It’s much cooler in the air outside the club, the cold air a welcome relief against my burning skin. Dream lights the first and takes a drag, smoke curling out of his mouth when he passes it to me.
“Having fun?” He asks, puffing out clouds.
“Yeah, tonight’s a good night.” I take my own hit off it. It tastes like menthol and sticky tobacco, just what I needed.
“Seems like it. You looked good out there.”
“We gotta get you to come dance. It’d be fun.”
In the history of Dream and I going here, he has never once come to dance with me. And it’s not for lack of trying.
“I can’t dance.”
“I’ll teach you.”
“I don’t want to learn.”
“Dream. Come on. You’ve taught me lots of things, let me return the favor. You’ll have fun, I promise.”
“You’re not gonna drop this, are you?”
“Never.”
“Fine. One song.” He drops the cigarette, stamps it out with his foot, and follows as I pull him back inside. Kenz and Theo are in the corner trying to eat each other, Richie chatting with Nate and Bear at the bar, and so now is the perfect time for this.
I hear the telling “Na-na-na”’s at the beginning of Rompe playing and hurry the two of us to the center of the floor. Dream looks nearly nervous, but I slip an arm over his shoulder and encourage him closer.
“Just let me move you, you don’t have to do anything but go with it.” He doesn’t respond, but I can tell by his undivided attention that he’s listening.
He just kind of stands there as the drums kick in, my hands linked behind his neck, hands awkwardly by his side, swaying while I move him to the beat. We’re pressed close, lacking space and I’m loving it.
“You seem scared.”
“Don’t want to fuck up.”
“Dream. Nobody’s watching.” I drop one hand from around him, guide one of his hands to rest on my hip and smile when the other follows. He leans forward, breath warm where it hits my ear.
“You’re watching.”
It’s because it’s loud that he does it like that, not because he actually likes me back. I think. But it still has adrenaline rushing, spikes my confidence to follow his lead, brushing my lips against his ears as I speak.
“I’ll close my eyes.”
And I do, letting words I don’t understand or need to fly through my head while I move to the beat. It makes me grin when he starts to get into it, and I’m sad when I realize that the song is ending.
Dream stays. He laughs when the intro to Cyclone starts playing and so do I, because this song is so astronomically bad, but we keep dancing.
“I had to learn the dance to this for high school homecoming.”
“This song has its own dance?”
“Here.” I unhook from around him and turn around, turning back to look at him and fixing his hands, grinding back into him.
“Fuck kind of dance is this?”
“Hey, the girls at my school were all whores at homecoming.”
“Hmm, and what about you?”
“Was I a whore at homecoming?”
He hums, hooking his chin over my shoulder and moving his hand to my hips, keeping me pressed to him.
“No. Just now.” I can feel the smile where Dream’s face is pressed against my own. “Just me and you.”
His hands tighten their grip, pulling me back into him.
“Careful with that.”
“Dream.” It’s meant to scold, to condescend. I’m not innocent, and he knows it. It comes out quiet, whispered. I’m not sure how he hears it over Baby Bash’s blasting voice, but he does, and he reacts. One hand flies from my hip to my face, the other spinning me so we’re facing each other.
“I’m gonna kiss you now.”
And he does.
It tastes like newports and metal, tongue a burning force in my mouth. His snakebites sear my lips. It’s hot. We’re still dancing, if you can call rocking into each other that. Hands finding purchase where they lie and pulling us together.
“Dream.” He’s grinning, pulls me in for another kiss.
“Dream.”
“Huh?”
“We should go back to your apartment.”
Dream makes some bullshit excuse for our friends.
“She’s tired, man.” I hear him defend, but I’m too busy texting Char to see if she’ll cover my shift tomorrow to listen to the entire thing.
Today must be the day. I get him in on it. Laughing at the wait button’s voice. Skipping through the crosswalks. I somehow convince him to give me a piggyback ride through the seedy part of Orlando with a smile. The walk, nearly a half-mile, is done in record time. He even pets the alley cat that likes to sleep on his stairs.
Today must be the day.
I kiss him to be sure.
It’s menthol and honey chapstick and heat.
“Hey,” He says, lips still close enough to touch when we speak. “Are we gonna fuck?”
At first, I don’t answer. Instead, I drag him in for another one of those nicotine-laced kisses. The sting of his piercings, sharp points on the balls, leaves me numb in a wonderful way. He’s addicting.
“Do you want to fuck?” We both pause, Dream going from calm and cocky confident like he usually is to a bashful little smile.
“I do, I really do,” I start leaning forward to kiss him again when he says “but,”
I recoil back into my own space, halfway to physically cringing over the impending rejection.
And then Dream says something I never thought he’d say.
“I’ve never had sex sober.”
Seriously, I think there’s zero chance in hell I would have guessed he’d say that. 1 in 7.5 trillion odds, genuinely. So that means
“I get to be your first?”
He nods, keeping his head hung. He’s probably embarrassed as hell.
“Dream.” He looks at me for a split second before averting his gaze, wringing his hands. “That’s okay. Are you sure that you want to do this?”
“Yeah.”
Have you ever had a head rush? Physically felt the adrenaline pump into your brain and take it over? That’s what it feels like. Dream surges forward, kisses me with a menthol tongue dragging over my teeth. I welcome it.
For the second time in an hour, I guide his hands to my hips, grinning into the kiss when he tugs me further into him. I feel like I could drown in him.
“We should go to your bed.”
For the countless times I’ve been to Dream’s apartment, I’ve never been in his room. Like most of the apartment, the floors are spotless but every surface is cluttered. His mattress is on the floor in the far corner, and he smiles nervously as he leads me to it.
We fall into it together, laughing, loving, and the only thing we’re drunk on is each other.