𝐈𝐍𝐅𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 // 𝐃𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐦𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐟𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝

Omniscience

AN: I apologize for how dramatic I wrote this long chapter, along with how many big weird words I used, when there was always a much simpler substitute I could've written instead. Felt like being an annoying author and flexing my vocab, I don't know. Pull up a dictionary if you need to ahahaha- Anyways, I know it's really hard, but do try to enjoy :)

-Omniscience-

George's POV:

Promises are the sweetest lies.

And I could shamelessly admit I'd lied. Oh, I'd lied. You could gloss over the hard, bitter cold truths and say to the new scars, shout to the new cuts; You did your absolute best, and you tried really hard to keep that promise!

But it'd be a lie.

Just another addition to the tangled knot amassing by the second. Every tick of the clock was another snap of the brittle promise, another break, another crack. The promise I'd made? Oh, it was nothing but static, nothing but faint background noise. A little feeble something so far away that it did nothing to hinder another flick of my wrist, another slice of the blade, another drop of blood falling.

Promises languish by the second.

As the days passed and my promise weakened and became frailer and more delicate, Clay's words remained a garbled echo in my head, a ringing in my ears. A muffled, broken record.

"Promise me you'll never do this again. I mean, not hurt yourself again." "I need a promise, please."

I regret saying I'd try. I regret making a promise I knew I could not keep. I regret taking on an inundating oath that would break me if I didn't break it. I regret many things. But regret does nothing.

I'll try, I'd said.

Yeah, right.

I hoped Dream didn't question my choice to wear a long-sleeved shirt to the beach. I hoped he didn't notice the mess of hastily-done bandages underneath the haplessly thin fabric of my shirt. I hoped he never noticed the slight metallic tang of blood perpetually tainting the air in the bathroom. I hoped he never found out about my broken promises. But hopes, especially mine, never seemed to come to fruition.

As I walked along the rough, sandy planks of the boardwalk, my fingers intertwined with Dream's, I found myself constantly glancing to the side. To see if any hint of intuition ever surfaced in his green eyes, to see if any knowledge of what I'd done ever presented itself in his face. Too much of my failures were much too obvious, and I hoped his deglutition of my deceptions and excuses was true, and not surface-deep like my conscience lamented.

There was just too much to hope for, and too much to risk if my hopes flew astray.

"Do you plan on going in the water?" I heard myself quietly ask Dream, a question I already knew the answer to. I felt the hold of his fingers clench slightly, as if the thought of the water was slightly abhorrent. His jaw tensed, and his eyes tightened as his gaze flicked to the ocean.

"No." He answered quietly, the juxtaposition of his quiet, faint voice in stark polarity with the vociferous steeliness in his demeanor.

Unease stirred in my stomach, but it was no new discomfort, no new feeling. Dream had made it pellucidly clear that he had no intention of ever stepping foot into the sea. For someone living in a seaside region, he had an unusually potent contempt for the ocean. Perhaps it was a phobia. Perhaps it was something else. Regardless of the reasons, it was nothing new that Dream hadn't touched the ocean water for as long as I'd known him, or as long as anybody had ever known him.

"I thought so." I mused simply, casting my eyes downwards. Dream cleared his throat and forced a grin, his features still bearing a whisper of something that looked like sorrow, like a roiling melancholy.