Chapter Text
Hob nervously polished the glass for the umpteenth time. Outside the sun was shining, the birds were singing and in here he was, just feeling so bloody nervous.
Today was the day.
100 years.
Any moment the door would open, he would walk in and Hob... Hob didn't know, what he would say. Better to wait and see, he guessed.
As he reached for the glass on the counter again, ready to polish it until the walls grew thin, the bells over the entrance jingled and Hob instinctively took a deep breath.
Here went nothing.
He raised his head, ready to see a figure dressed in elegant white robes, tall and foreboding, yet with an innocent look on his face no adult ever had.
It wasn't him.
Instead of a floor-length white coat, the man in the doorway wore a simple black coat over his shirt and jeans of the same colour. Unruly strands of hair hung over his eyes, which seemed of a dark blue in the first moment and at the second endless like the night sky.
Hob gasped. His hand gripped the edge of the counter, the soft wood giving him more than simply something to hold onto.
It was him.
It was him.
It didn't take more than a second for the other to notice Hob and to walk over to him with a smile on his lips so thin, that you could only notice it, if you knew the man.
And, by god, Hob knew him.
“Hello, Hob Gadling”, the one he had once called his stranger, later called his friend greeted him.
His voice was soft as ever, with a rumble so deep like shifting mountains. It almost took Hob's breath away, but his curiosity won in that very moment.
“H-How... How are you... here?”
The man's smile grew a tiny bit mischievous.
“Is it not customary anymore to greet someone, when you haven't seen each other... in quite some time?”, he asked.
Hob shook his head in disbelieve.
“It... still is. Hello... Dream. Uhm... don't take this the wrong way, but... how are you...” He helplessly gestured towards the Lord of Dreams. “How are you... uhm... alive? Is that the right word? I mean... I...” He gripped the counter a bit harder. “I've been... to... to your funeral. I've met this... this other Dream, who was you... except... he wasn't.”
For a moment Hob needed to avert his eyes and blink back the uprising emotions.
Good gods... the funeral. Hob hadn't thought about it in... ages? Didn't want to. Would have been happy to never think about it ever again till the sun exploded.
“...I thought, I'd never see you again”, he whispered.
All noises in the pub seemed to die away, his paper-thin words echoed in the still air like a scream, loud enough for everybody to hear.
And nevertheless Dream smiled at him.
“Hadn't you said yourself, that this is, what I 'always do'? I've said my farewells... and I've returned.”
“Yes... but how? Your siblings... they told me – told everyone – that you were gone for good and...”
The words stopped right in his throat as Dream took a step towards him, now close enough, that Hob could've just reached out and touched him.
And yet... he didn't dare.
“There are many things in this world, which are not as permanent as you'd think them to be. My... death is one of them”, Dream answered, the smile unwavering and small on his face. If anything, it only seemed to grow a bit more.
Something stirred in Hob's chest, something so brittle and very breakable like the glass next to his hand.
Hope.
Was this real?
Was he really back?
He was Dream of the Endless. If anyone could come back from being dead, it was him, right?
...right?
The hope in Hob's heart shook and rattled like a thousand fragments.
He forced a smile on his face and gestured towards an empty table at the side.
“Please, my friend, sit with me. Have a drink and... tell me everything about your adventure. For once, I'm the one, who wants to know, what you've been doing these past 100 years.”
They sat down opposite of each other and Hob stole a second to wave at a waiter, ordering them wine.
“To celebrate your... re-birthday, I guess”, Hob laughed shortly, toasting towards Dream. “It's good to have you back.”
Sitting here, drinking wine, Hob felt himself relax a bit again.
Dream would tell him, what had happened and then they could laugh about it. Hell, he might even joke about the tears he had shed for the Prince of Stories, when he thought that their story had ended.
Silence fell around them, stretching its invisible wings, suffocating the whole room with anticipation.
He could hear Dream take a deep breath, probably to organize his thoughts before he spoke them out loud. That's what he would do. Tell Hob his story.
The smile on Dream's face shifted a bit and... Hob barely trusted his eyes, but it looked a bit... warmer.
Not that Dream had ever looked cold or unkind. Well, at least not since 1889 and yet... this smile made Hob's heart beat faster. Louder. So very loud.
“I've missed you, Hob”, Dream finally began talking. “When I came back, meeting you was the first thing on my mind.”
“You just came back? Like... today?”
Hob took a big gulp of his wine. On the other side of the table Dream had more restraint.
Well, but he wasn't being visited by an immortal and powerful being, who had been dea- gone for a hundred years, was he?
“Yes, today”, Dream said with a nod. “And now I'm here.”
Dream sat his glass down and Hob feared his heart would jump out of his chest, as Dream touched his hand. Hob could barely feel it. Just the tip of Dream's index finger on the side of his hand, and still it send shivers hot and cold down his spine.
“But what about... what about your kingdom?”, Hob asked, his throat suddenly dry as if he had never drunk anything in his life.
“It is taken care of by the other Dream.”
“Ah... so... he still exists.”
“Yes.”
“And... what about the ones, who... who wanted to destroy you? The... What did your sister call them? The Kindly Ones? Ladies?”
“They won't pursue me any further. The debt is paid. I'm free from their wrath.”
“Oh... that's... that's good.”
Hob drank more wine, hoping erase the scratch from his voice as well as the tremble. But how could he, when Dream's hand was now fully lying on top of his?
It was so warm.
Hob had always imagined Dream's hands to be warm, even though the Dream King looked so pale as if he had spend a whole winter's night outside.
He cleared his throat and gathered up the courage to look Dream in the face.
“So, how did you get back then? Must've been something big and... I don't know... shaking the existence at its very core, am I right?”, he chuckled.
To his surprise, the laugh was answered.
“It was. But it is nothing you need to be concerned about, my dear Hob. I am back. Isn't this all that matters?”
“Sure, but now you're here and we have wine. So tell me. If you don't mind.”
Dream cocked his head slightly to the side, almost grinning like a cat, who had caught a particularly big mouse.
“And what if I do mind?”
“Uhm... what?”
Hob's brain flatlined as Dream entwined their fingers and leaned a bit closer.
“I said, I do mind misusing our time sitting here and talking. I am back, Hob Gadling. Do you want to waste any more meetings of ours just talking, when we could do something way more entertaining instead?”
His face was close. So close, Hob could count Dream's incredibly long lashes. Or the stars in his eyes. Oh, he could've drowned in them...
Hot breath met his lips and Hob closed his eyes and... pulled back.
“Is something wrong, Hob?”, Dream asked, a slither of nervousness dancing though his words.
Hob shook his head and still answered: “Yes.”
Something wasn't right.
He just felt it.
In 600, no, 700 years Dream had never been so... so... open with him.
They sat here in Hob's pub, drinking wine and Dream's hand was so warm in his and...
The silence now suffocated him for good this time.
It was all wrong.
Dream never drank, when they met. He didn't eat and he didn't drink and for sure he never touched Hob. Not once in all these years.
He smiled – occasionally – but not like this. Never like this.
Hob opened his eyes and pulled his hand back like it was the hardest thing in the world to do, because in this very moment, it was.
The heat lingered on his skin for a second longer.
“You know... your hand is really warm”, he said with a steadiness in his voice, which surprised himself.
Dream gave him a confused look.
“I am aware of that.”
“It's like I always dreamed your hands to be.”
“And... is this a bad thing?”
Hob chuckled.
“No... no, it's not. It's just... a dream.”
The smile returned on Dream's face.
“This is what I am. I am Dream and I am all dreams.”
Hob shook his head, the chuckle turned into a sad smile as he let his gaze wander over this beautiful face in front of him.
“It's all I ever wanted. You. Here. Alive and... clearly returning my oh-so persistent crush, which I've been harbouring for...” He sighed. “...way too long.”
Indulging in a whim Hob reached out and let his fingers trail over Dream's cheek.
He didn't really feel the skin beneath his fingertips just as he hadn't tasted the wine.
“This is a dream”, he repeated as Dream leaned into his touch.
“Hob...”
“I'd like to wake up now.”
The sun was still hidden behind the tall building of London, only casting the first golden rays into the dwindling night sky as Hob Gadling opened his eyes.
A quick look at his phone brought him finally back to reality.
Outside it was the dawn of the 9th of November 2025 and he was alone in his flat above The New Inn.
And Dream of the Endless was dead.