Work Text:
Karl loves stupid ideas. Sapnap loves to tell him he’s an idiot.
“I think out of all the dumbass shit you’ve said, somehow, that’s the dumbest.”
To be fair, his idea is pretty stupid. And even for a boy with a penchant for making a fool of himself, this level of idiocy feels spectacular; Karl loves it. And no matter how much Sapnap can tell him not to, or that it’s ridiculous, he is going to do it.
For whatever reason, once Karl is set on doing something, he’s set. Everyone else is just doomed to watch him either succeed or fall apart.
“What?” Karl pries, his disbelief unearned. “It’s not that bad of an idea, c’mon.”
“No, it’s that bad,” Sapnap insists. “And when Dream gets here, I’m making you tell him, ‘cause I know he’ll agree with me.”
Karl huffs. “I was gonna tell him anyway…”
Sapnap only laughs at him, bitter without resentment. And Karl drinks water from his water bottle with a pout, crossing his ankles definitely where he leans against the wall. He sits and mulls it over, lets Sapnap kill time on his phone, and he waits for Dream to get there with impatience behind his stance.
It takes him two minutes to show up, meeting his two friends in the hall where they always stand. Sapnap doesn’t let them waste time.
“Karl, tell him.”
“Tell me what?” Dream asks, confusion evident.
“I have an idea,” Karl says, rushing to speak before Sapnap can beat him to it. “And Sapnap thinks it’s stupid.”
Dream laughs. “Sapnap thinks a lot of things are stupid.”
With red-turning cheeks, Sapnap hits the blond on the shoulder. “Hey!”
Karl shakes his head, turning his attention back toward Dream, who rubs his shoulder in faux pain.
“You know George, right?” Karl asks, clarifying.
Dream raises an eyebrow. “George Davidson?”
“No, the other George,” Sapnap retorts, sarcasm thick through his tone. Displeased, Dream elbows him in the side. “Ow!”
“Yes, him,” Karl mutters, stifling a laugh. “Well, I bet that I could get him to kiss me before we graduate.”
Unsurprisingly, Dream looks at him like he’s a total idiot. It’s probably because he is.
“George doesn’t have much of a reputation for kissing people,” he says, disbelief unfeigned and rampant. “Or… liking people at all, really.”
And that much is true: George has never been a very outgoing person. Karl has been aware of his existence since they were freshman, and he was always the kid who didn’t talk much, more wrapped up in his work and getting good grades (he was on track to be the valedictorian) that he didn’t pay much mind to anyone.
Which is exactly why Karl is so set on kissing him. Not Punz from AP Lang, or the cute boy from statistics, or anyone else for that matter. He wants to kiss George—or, he wants George to kiss him—because he was someone known to do everything aside from that.
Not for any other reason. Definitely not.
“Exactly!” Karl exclaims. “I think that I can win him over with my amazing wit and charm, and then he’ll kiss me.”
Dream rolls his eyes. “Yeah right.”
Karl raises a brow, challenging. “So you don’t think I can do it?”
“No,” Dream mutters, scoffing.
A grin splits its way across Karl’s face. It wasn’t that he predicted this, per se, but he’s been friends with Dream for long enough to learn the way he responds to things. Especially things like needless bets and the promise of potential money.
“So let’s bet, then,” Karl says, cocksure and unafraid. “Twenty bucks says I can get George to kiss me by the end of the year.”
Dream squints at him. “Fifty.”
With a grin, Karl holds his hand out for Dream to shake. “Deal.”
And he takes it, a firm handshake solidifying their bet into place. Fifty bucks says that Karl can’t get George Davidson to kiss them by the time they graduate, all or nothing.
Shaking his head, Sapnap mutters, “You guys are idiots.”
And that was how, in the morning on the first day of senior year, Karl decided that George absolutely needed to kiss him before May.
Some things are easier said than done. And when it comes down to getting one of the quietest people in school to kiss someone, it’s a lot easier to say than do.
Karl’s learning the hard way that this was difficult.
For one, he can barely even convince George to talk to him, let alone get anywhere close to kissing. It feels like a lost cause, but Karl isn’t someone prone to giving up, so he promises himself he’ll persist.
And besides, it’s still only September. Karl has until the end of the year to meet his side of the bet, which is more than enough time to get George to warm up to him. He would have to act fast, though, as warming up was surely another thing that would take some time.
Karl has all the time in the world. Which is exactly why he’s acting as if he doesn’t.
For one, Karl learned on the first day of school that he shares exactly two of his seven classes with George: AP Computer Science and AP Literature. It’s no real surprise to Karl that the only two classes he shares with George are his only two AP classes, but either way, it feels like a perfect opening.
But after two weeks of failed attempts at striking up conversation during class, Karl turns to what he knows best.
“Hey, George,” he opens, feeling bad for interrupting the brunet as he types away on his computer. “I’m really confused about the work in this class, do you think you could help me?”
George looks to his computer screen, filled with code Karl can barely understand, and then back at Karl. He wears little to no expression on his face.
“Um, I’m kind of working on my own stuff right now.”
Karl should’ve expected that much. The small tinge of expression on his face is probably displeasure, the more Karl looks at it.
“Well, yeah, but like, maybe after school?” he tries, knowing that even then, his attempts are in vain. “I just really don’t get it and you’re like… really smart, so I thought I’d ask you.”
Is this flirting? It feels like flirting.
“I don’t know,” George mutters, shrugging. “Maybe.”
“Really?” Karl tries not to sound too excited. “You know, they say teaching someone else how to do something helps you improve, too.”
Karl swears he sees a smile tug at the corner of George’s lips, but it never fully shows.
“And who is ‘they?’” the brunet asks, slow and sardonic.
Pursing his lips, Karl considers his answer; he hadn’t been expecting this question. “I don’t know, like, really smart people, probably.”
George huffs, and it sounds something like laughter. “Then, sure. I’ll help you out.”
“Thank you, George!” Karl exclaims, perhaps a little too excitedly, reaching to touch George’s shoulder before reeling back.
With George already shrunk into his seat, Karl tries not to cringe at his own overeagerness.
“No problem, uh…” George hesitates, still tense in his seat.
“Karl.”
George nods, confirming. “Karl.”
They meet after school two days later. George is just as closed-off as he always is, offering little more than the bare minimum of what he has to in order to help Karl better understand the material. Which, to be fair, Karl really does need help on, but it’s still not quite what he wants.
He spends as much of their shared time in the computer lab as he can trying to inch his chair closer to George’s, but for every bit of space he seems to gain, George takes it back. Whether intentional or absentminded, it doesn’t matter, because he always ends up right where he started.
And he says all those embarrassingly-toned things, all but batting his eyelashes as he speaks with an elbow propped against the desk. When George types and Karl he watches, he makes his voice sickly sweet, compliments falling from his tongue with notes that say he’s planning for this.
“Wow, you’re, like, really smart, George.”
It goes right over his head.
“Thanks.”
And he mutters, flippant, seeming to barely register Karl’s presence. When he finishes a line of code, he just turns the screen toward Karl and asks if he understands, a quirk to his brow that Karl thinks is cute enough to count as distracting.
Because the only reason he wants George to kiss him is for the bet, right?
When they’re an hour in and Karl has made no progress—he neither understands computer science better (he’s too distracted to learn anything) nor is he any closer to George than he was before—they trade seats. And George tells Karl to do exactly as he’d shown him before, when Karl was more focused on the focused lines to George’s face than whatever he had been typing.
Unsurprisingly, his code doesn’t work.
“I messed it up,” Karl mutters, shoulders sagging where he sits.
“Hey, it’s okay,” George reassures, surely the most feeling Karl has heard in his voice since he’s known him. “Here, let me look at it.”
When George’s chair creaks, Karl goes to stand up, too, but George doesn’t go for his seat. Instead, he stands behind Karl, reaching over his shoulder to grab the mouse where it was left and manipulate the cursor to his liking.
Karl sits in front of him, tense. Maybe George feels better with a barrier between them, or maybe he really is just that focused on the task at hand. Either way, for once, Karl feels like the one who’s being played with.
“See? It’s right here,” George explains, fingers tap-tap-tapping on the keyboard to correct Karl’s error. “See? All good now.”
And when Karl blinks as George straightens his back, he finds that it is, in fact, all good now. It would probably be more helpful if he actually processed George’s correction, but he isn’t about to admit to being distracted.
“Thanks, George,” he says in earnest, turning to look over his shoulder at the brunet in question.
George only shrugs. “Yeah.”
Karl smiles at him, heart beating faster in his chest. “Do you wanna be done for the day?”
“Sure,” George mutters. And as he takes a step back, his brows furrow, regarding Karl with a curious glance. “Wait, are you expecting to do this again?”
Karl shrugs, hand gripping tight to the back of his chair. “A little more help wouldn’t hurt.”
Calculating, George purses his lips. Karl watches him with a little too much intent, both awaiting an answer and observing the lines of his face. Words come in passing.
“I’ll see if I can fit you in my schedule.”
Karl laughs. George doesn’t, picking his bag up from the floor and walking out of the computer lab.
They’re in lit when Karl speaks to George next.
It’s a week and a half after quote un-quote “tutoring” in the computer lab. Karl ended up asking Sapnap for help with coding when he didn’t want to bother George. (He neglects to tell Sapnap that he’s his second choice, already hearing the way he’d tease).
But now, he feels like he’s losing time again, getting closer and closer to October with minimal progress. He tells himself again that he has all the time in the world, and he tells himself again not to get too comfortable.
And it’s his still-present time frame that makes him approach George, the class being left to independent reading time for the remainder of class. It leaves George in the back row, actually doing as they were asked, and Karl bored at the front, so he wanders all the way back to where the brunet stares down at a book he’s surely read before.
“Hey, George,” Karl greets, sliding into the empty seat beside him.
George looks up, startled. “Oh,” he mutters, pressing a palm flat against his book. “It’s you.”
Karl doesn’t ask what that’s supposed to mean. “How are you?”
“Good,” George mutters, shrugging. “Busy. Very busy.”
“Well, I assume,” Karl says, a polite yet nervous laugh on his lips. “Are you doing college applications already?”
Surely, he has to be. If Dream and Sapnap are filling out college applications, then George is, too.
“Yeah, a few,” he answers, vague.
Karl doesn’t ask where. He doesn’t expect an answer.
Instead, he lets George think he’s done. It isn’t entirely intentional, for he just can’t think of the right way to say anything, but George is already turning his attention back to his book while Karl just sits there.
Distant chatter filters through Karl’s ears, and he settles on his words after far too much consideration.
“We should hang out,” he proposes, a statement rather than a question.
George looks up at him, brow raised. “Why?”
Karl shrugs. “Because I like being around you.”
This is definitely flirting.
“What would we even do?” George questions, more accusatory than curious.
In all honesty, Karl didn’t think he was going to get this far. So he has to think for a moment, considering George’s nature, and the moment he does, the answer becomes obvious.
“We could study together.”
None of the confusion on George's face fades. “For what?”
“I don’t know,” Karl begins in earnest. “I have a statistics test this week, and you can study for whatever you have coming up. Or work on applications.”
George huffs. “So what’s the point of studying together if we’re not studying the same thing?”
“I like being around you,” Karl repeats, but he knows that won’t be enough to convince him. “And we can hold each other accountable! If I get distracted you, like, yell at me. Nicely.”
George nods, slow and hyperbolic. “Yell at you nicely.”
Karl giggles. “Yeah.”
They’re quiet for a moment. George seems to be thinking, so Karl lets him have his silence, trying not to watch too intently as he waits for him to speak. He glances instead at George’s book, though his pale hand covers too many of the words for Karl to get much of anything out of it.
Finally, George mutters, “Okay.”
Karl can’t help but feel startled. “Really?”
“Only if I don’t have to leave my house,” George concludes, sparking a light behind Karl’s eyes.
“So I get to come over?”
Is this flirting?
“Yeah,” George says, nonchalant as if it doesn’t matter. Maybe it doesn’t. “Hang on.”
George reaches into his bag for a slip of paper and a pen. He scribbles something out in quick, messy handwriting, tossing it onto the desk Karl sits at.
“Here’s my address,” he explains, “it’s walking distance. You can come today.”
Today? Karl blinks, haze flicking between the hastily-written address that sits before him and George’s nonchalant existence. His attention has returned to his book, as if he doesn’t know how much he makes Karl’s fingers shake.
He probably doesn’t.
“Why don’t we walk together?” Karl asks, voice smaller than normal.
Without hesitation, George answers, “Alright.”
Karl picks up the slip of paper from his desk, shoving it into his jeans pocket haphazardly. He glances down at George for another fleeting moment, all his attention given to the book laid out on his desk.
For a bet. No other reason.
“See you after school, George.”
George doesn’t look up from his book. “Mhm.”
Later that day, in last period, Karl sits next to Sapnap. Neither of them are doing the work assigned to them, worksheets blank and pencils held between fingers as more of an excuse than anything.
It takes everything in Karl to not jump out of his skin in excitement. He keeps glancing at the clock like there’s something to be waiting for, because there is, and he lets his tongue run away from him when it’s the only thing he can think about.
“I’m going to George’s after school today.”
Sapnap looks at him, startled. “You’re what now?
“Going to George’s,” Karl repeats, stern as if his heart isn’t beating out of his chest. “To study.”
Sapnap huffs. “And was that your idea?”
“The study thing was,” Karl admits. “The going over was his.”
“He’s not gonna kiss you.”
Karl rolls his eyes. “Well, duh, not yet.”
“Not yet,” Sapnap echoes, disbelieving. “Okay.”
“I have until June!” Karl defends, though even he sees the cracks in that argument.
“You’re gonna be out fifty bucks,” Sapnap sing-songs, taunting.
“Have a little faith in me, Sap,” Karl says, all but whining in complaint. “I’m incredibly charming.”
Sapnap scoffs. “Sure.”
The rest of the day passes without a hitch; what little of it is left. Karl manages to get half his assigned worksheet done before the end of class, and when the bell rings, he practically runs for the door. Typically, he walks with Sapnap, but when they aren’t going to the same place anymore—which is usually Sapnap’s car, or very rarely, Karl’s—he doesn’t bother to wait up.
He finds George standing aimlessly by the front door, and when Karl slides up next to him, he starts walking without a greeting.
So they walk in silence.
Karl falls into step behind George’s heels, following his silent instruction. George takes out his phone and strolls distracted, though he still looks both ways before they cross the street.
And when Karl thinks about talking, he stops himself. He instead lets their walk continue in silence, content to follow behind George until they reach a house he seems to recognize. When George turns to walk up his driveway, Karl follows, and they both slip through his front door without a word.
George heads up the stairs across from the mudroom. Karl lets the brunet lead him to what he presumes to be his bedroom.
The walls are painted blue and the bedsheets are striped, unkempt. The floor is cleaner than Karl’s own room, a desk shoved into the corner with two monitors and a few too many books. Karl stands like an idiot in the doorway for a moment while George wanders over to his desk.
“You can sit on my bed,” he calls over his shoulder, casual. “And shut the door behind you, too.”
Karl nods, though George can't see it when his back is turned. “Okay.”
He closes the door, as requested, finding his way to George’s unmade bed. George takes a seat at his desk, powering on his computer while he rifles through his bag. Karl watches him, unzipping his own backpack slowly, but his hands fumble over it when he lets himself be distracted.
He doesn’t say anything. As a blue light spills over George’s face, Karl directs his attention to the workbook he’s pulled out, and he makes himself practice statistics problems when he doesn’t really want to.
In all honesty, Karl never studies. Being in George’s room really does him a wonder for accountability, but it has nothing to do with George keeping him on track; it has everything to do with not wanting to feel caught.
If he doesn’t study, then why are they here? It was his idea to do this, anyway.
So in truth, it actually works for something. He’s actually studying for statistics—a subject that is not a strength of his—and it’s all because he bet his friend that he can get George to kiss him before the end of senior year.
God, how did he end up here?
“How was your little study date with George?”
Karl huffs. Sapnap stares at him over the lunch table with a grin, a straw caught between his teeth.
“Study date?” Dream questions. “You went on a date with George?”
“It was not a date,” Karl defends. “I just went to his house and we studied in his room. We, like, barely even talked.”
“I can’t believe you studied,” Sapnap insults.
Karl sputters. “Hey!”
He doesn’t have any better of an argument.
Dream grins at him, shrugging. “Let us know how many study dates it takes to get your kiss.”
A lot, probably. But Karl already knew that.
Which is why he needs to make progress, and he needs to make progress fast. He goes to George’s house again to study a couple weeks later, but they still don’t talk, sitting in the same places they did the first time without a word uttered between them. Karl studies statistics when he has another test coming up, and George does whatever it is he’s doing on his computer.
Karl doesn’t ask what he’s doing until the third time.
It’s mid-November. Karl never asks about Thanksgiving; he doesn’t think George celebrates it. But still, he’s desperate to start conversation, and he grapples for anything to say.
“What are you working on?”
It feels weird and invasive, somehow. Maybe it’s because they don’t usually talk.
“Computer science,” George answers simply.
Karl knits his eyebrows together. Computer science is probably George’s best subject, so he wonders—“You need to study for that?”
George makes a tch-ing noise through quirked lips. “Well, no,” he says it like it’s obvious. “I’m just coding.”
Somehow, Karl hadn’t thought of that. Probably because he would not ever code if he didn’t absolutely have to.
“Oh,” Karl mutters. “So you code for fun?”
“Yeah.” George spares Karl a glance, though it’s fleeting. His fingers fly across the keyboard while he speaks, practiced and easy. “It’s what I’m majoring in.”
“That’s cool!” Karl exclaims, grinning. And though George never asked, he adds, “I wanna do music.”
George looks at him curiously. “You’re a musician?”
Karl scoffs. “Musician is a strong word.”
George laughs at that, open-mouthed and unapologetic. Karl’s first instinct is to laugh, too, and it takes him another moment before he’s struck by the fact that he’s never heard George laugh so genuinely before.
He grins a little wider as the noise subsides.
“I just play piano,” Karl explains, quiet-voiced.
“Huh,” George murmurs. “I didn’t know that.”
With a shrug, Karl says, “I do it more outside of school, anyway.”
It becomes a little bit more like that. Karl keeps going to George’s to quote-un-quote study, and they keep talking about all the things they don’t usually get to. Karl learns that George used to play drums, he’s been to six countries, and he’s never been in a relationship; but he used to get notes in his locker on Valentine’s day.
“I think when I never answered any of them, people gave up,” George had said. “I mean, I wasn’t answering them for a reason.”
They had both laughed. Karl wondered if this was really going to work.
Maybe he’s getting distracted trying to be close to George, but he tells himself that there’s no way George is going to kiss him if they’re still practically strangers. And besides, he’s having fun, so if he owes Dream fifty bucks by the end of this then he’ll call it worth it.
Time passes. Karl gets George a set of nice pens, and George gets him some sheet music. They’re songs Karl has never played before, and he wonders how George managed to guess so well.
He doesn’t ask.
They don’t talk much over Christmas break, with George heading back to the U.K. to see his family while Karl stays right where he is. They text a few times but George says he’s busy, so Karl just waits for the new year with a little less patience than he thought he’d have.
When he’s hanging out with Sapnap and Dream on New Year’s Eve, though, the topic comes up against his will.
“Times ‘a ticking,” Sapnap taunts, tapping a non-existent watch on his wrist. “You’re not gonna get that kiss at this rate, Karl.”
“I will,” Karl quips back. “Have a little faith in me.”
“You said the same thing, like, two months ago,” Sapnap retorts, laughter on his lips. “I’m trying, Karl.”
Karl sighs, but he doesn’t say anything. He tries to pay more attention to the TV, which he can barely hear since Sapnap refused to turn the volume up, but his efforts are in vain.
“You are running out of time, Karl,” Dream interjects, and Karl’s mind runs off on a tangent of of course you agree with Sapnap, you always agree with Sapnap.
He doesn’t argue too intensely. “We graduate in May.”
That’s all he really needs to say.
For Valentine’s Day, Karl slips a note in George’s locker. He doesn’t put his name on it.
And he’s not around to watch it fall to the floor by George’s feet, or to watch him read it. It’s simple, written in handwriting perhaps a little neater than his typical penmanship, and it asks George to meet his secret admirer outside the front gates right after school.
In computer science, Karl gets to hear from George about the note; it becomes apparent that he doesn’t know Karl left it.
“I always hated the little notes,” he complains, frowning at his computer screen. “I don’t think I’ve changed my mind.”
“Really?” Karl pries, and he can feel his heartbeat in his ears. “But do you even know who left it?”
“No, and I don’t really care,” George answers. “If someone wants to confess their…” he grimaces, “love to someone, they should put their name on the note.”
Fair enough.
Karl tries not to sigh or look too obvious. He figures it was a pointless attempt anyway, as George didn’t seem too pleased about the notes when he spoke of them in past tense. Karl figures it was worth the try, anyway—it’s not like he took this dare for any reason other than to prove himself.
Still, he wants to keep a conversation running between them. Because he likes talking to George, and he likes being around George, and he… is totally falling away from the plan.
He tries not to think about it.
“Well, it is Valentine’s Day,” Karl starts, as if George doesn’t know that already. “Is there anyone you like?”
George answers too quickly. “No.”
Karl grins, watching the apples of his cheeks flush pink. George averts his eyes, looking back at his screen, where half-done code sits in wait.
“Your face is red,” Karl says, accusing.
George spins around in his chair, effectively whacking Karl’s shoulder with an extended arm. “Shut up!”
Karl laughs, but he lets it be. A part of him exists in dread; who does George like?
He doesn’t ask. Really, he never asks. It’s almost as if he forgets about it completely, except he doesn’t—he just never talks about it. He figures George doesn’t want him to bring it up, so he doesn’t. They go right back to the way they were before Karl had even asked, study dates and shared conversation. It’s starting to feel more and more like a routine.
Karl likes this routine. Even when the in-betweens are filled with Sapnap and Dream teasing him for not having his kiss yet, even when the time is slipping through his fingers and he isn’t sure if he’s getting what he set after.
He still tells himself that it’ll be worth it, win or loss. But he can’t help but notice that he really wants to kiss George.
It’s spring before he even lets himself think too strongly about it. The equinox has passed, and Karl is sitting on George’s bed, merely pretending to do statistics. As the steady sound of George’s typing fades in and out at his side, words wait on the tip of his tongue, and it takes everything in him not to spill every last secret he has left for himself.
He poses it as a question instead. “Have you ever kissed anyone?”
The typing stops abruptly. “Have I what?”
“Kissed anyone,” Karl repeats, a tad weaker this time. “Sorry, it’s an invasive question, you don’t have to answer.”
“No, no, it’s… okay,” George reassures, though he sounds unconvinced. “I haven’t, anyways.”
Karl blinks at him. “Never?”
“No?”
Somehow, Karl is surprised. And he’s never been the best at hiding his shock, so it all spells itself out across his face. George looks away.
“But you’re so…” cute? likeable? kissable?
Karl isn’t sure how he meant for that sentence to end.
“I’ve never dated before,” George argues, “why would I have kissed someone?”
Pursing his lips, Karl mutters, “I don’t know.”
Neither of them speak for a moment. It feels closer to an eternity, and Karl looks back down at his untouched work, pencil feeling heavy in his hand.
“Have you ever kissed someone?” George asks, voice wavering without confidence.
Karl’s answer comes easy. “Yeah.”
He doesn’t miss a beat. “Who?”
“I had some girlfriends a few years ago,” Karl admits; he can feel his face heating up in anticipation. “And, like, Dream.”
George sputters. “You kissed Dream?”
“Shut up, it was a dare!” Karl retorts. “Sapnap was like ‘oh, this will be so funny’ well, news flash, it was not funny and I’m gay, apparently.”
And he can just admit to that out loud, apparently.
“Don’t tell me Dream was your gay awakening,” George whispers, as if it’s supposed to be a secret.
Karl hangs his head. “Please don’t make fun of me.”
“No! Freshman year, I had the biggest crush on Dream, and it was how I realized I liked boys,” George explains. “So, uh, same.”
Wide-eyed, Karl stares at him. “Oh my god.”
“Do not tell Dream,” George whispers again, face turned a shade of pink.
“I won’t!” Karl promises. “Do you…” he frowns when he isn’t sure he wants to know the answer. “Do you still like him?”
“No, that was, like, four years ago,” George says, scoffing, and his face turns redder than it already was. “I like someone else now.”
Eager, Karl leans closer to him. “Who?”
“I’m not telling you.”
Quickly, Karl bargains, “I’ll tell you who I like if you tell me.”
Why did he say that? In truth, he likes George, and he doesn’t want to lie and say he likes someone else. Karl figures this was a terrible idea, but he’s already put it out there.
“Okay,” George mutters. “Fine. Just… don’t laugh.”
Karl frowns. “Why would I laugh?”
“I don’t know!” George complains, whining. “This is humiliating.”
“We can say it at the same time,” Karl reasons, which he figures might be better for his own admittance, too.
George sighs. “Okay.”
“On three.” George nods, and Karl starts counting. “One, two, three.”
“You.” / “Karl Jacobs.”
Karl can barely hear George’s voice over his own, but he catches his last name when he stops speaking. He laughs a bit, both relieved and amused, but he only lets one of them show at first.
“Why’d you say my full name?” he questions, giggling, watching as George’s face turns red.
“Shut up, shut up!” he yells, loud enough to tune something out. “I couldn’t even hear what you said and now I feel stupid.”
George is frowning, refusing to look Karl in the eye. Despite being unseen, Karl smiles, soft and wordless.
“I said you,” he says, whispering as if it’s meant to be a secret.
“No you didn’t,” George mumbles.
“I did!” Karl sputters, words a mess on the tip of his tongue. “I really like you, George.”
George finally looks up at him, red-faced and frowning. “Karl.”
Grinning, Karl gestures for George to come closer. “C’mere.”
“Karl.”
“Come here!” he repeats, louder this time, and George listens with hesitance.
He gets up out of his chair, climbing onto his bed next to Karl. Karl throws an arm around him, pulling him closer into his side, setting his schoolwork to the side and letting it fall onto the floor.
He likes having George this close to him. Bodies pressed together where they sat against the headboard, guiding his head to rest on his shoulder. Karl runs fingers through his dark hair, feather-soft against his skin with a whisper that sounds a lot like home.
“I don’t know how to do this,” George whispers, but he rests a hand on Karl’s knee anyway.
“No one does,” Karl responds. “But it’s okay.”
George picks his head up from Karl’s shoulder. He stares at his face, considering, and Karl feels his skin warm up at the attention. He tries his best to smile, but George doesn’t seem to consider it.
“I wanna kiss you.”
Karl sputters. “Huh?”
“Kiss you,” George repeats, and Karl wonders when he got to be so blunt. “Can I?”
Karl’s voice sounds weaker than ever. “Sure.”
George shuts his eyes and leans in. Karl closes his, too, and he waits for the soft press of George’s lips on his own, a kiss that means far more than any other kiss could. And Karl isn’t even thinking about bets, or his idiot friends, or anything else; not when he has George right where he wants him, not when it all feels perfect and harmonious for a few moments more.
He thinks he could kiss George forever.
Both Karl and George wait in the hall the next morning. When Sapnap and Dream show up, they exchange a suspicious glance.
“Hi George,” Dream greets, hesitant, and Karl can do nothing but smile proudly.
George doesn’t answer with a greeting. “Karl said you owe him fifty bucks.”
“Really?”