#five-and-dimes

[bookdragonfruit]

Here's some fanart for @five-and-dimes 's Safe in the Palm of Your Hands

[cuubism]

It is beyond difficult to choose just one, but if I must, I have been dying for more “Good Horses” 👀

🤘Dimes

@five-and-dimes gradually it ekes closer to completion 🥺

[ make me work on one of my fics if you want ]

--

Hob treated him kindly. Hob had always treated him kindly, even when he didn’t know him. Why, then, should he not expect better from his own family? Why should he not demand better, or—

—or leave?

Somehow that was more terrifying to contemplate. But Dream breathed easier, having allowed the thought in.

Suddenly, he didn’t care who knew what. His family’s opinion of him could hardly get worse.

“I have a boyfriend,” he said, and Desire choked.

“You have a what.”

“A boyfriend,” Dream repeated. He liked the feeling of calling Hob that.

“You have a boyfriend? Where did you even get it?” Desire demanded. “Off the side of the road?”

“Yes,” Dream said, amused to think how true it was. “Essentially.”

“Wowza. Secret midnight trysts with a mysterious boy?” Desire whistled. “I’m kind of impressed.”

“I live for your approval,” Dream said dryly.

“Well, thanks for helping to make the family more disreputable. I was getting a bit tired doing it all myself.”

Dream surprised himself by laughing. “That is not my purpose in seeing him.”

“No, just a nice side benefit. Do Mother and Father know?”

“Of course not. And if you wish to preserve this… meager truce, you will say nothing.”

Desire scoffed. “Far be it from me to intervene the second you get a little daring. Keep going to have sex with your boyfriend, I’ll even help you get out of the house.”

Dream blushed. Dammit. “That’s not what’s happening.”

“Uh-huh. Sure. If I had a secret boyfriend, I’d be fucking him, so really you’re wasting the opportunity.”

“Desire.”

Desire grinned, though it was less wicked than their glee often was. “You have a picture?”

Dream only had one photograph of Hob on his phone, he’d always been too nervous to risk saving more. And either way, he hardly had access to it now. But, feeling surprisingly bold, he took out his sketchbook and showed Desire the most recent drawing he’d done of Hob.

He half expected Desire to snatch it and run to Mother, as they would have done as a child. Instead they just took the sketchbook and studied the drawing. It was a rather good likeness, Dream’s best yet. He’d gotten Hob to sit for the portrait, and had managed to capture the exact way the sun caught in Hob’s hair, and glinted in his eyes.

“Cute,” Desire said appreciatively. “Not what I thought your type would be.”

“What did you think my type was?”

“Someone more like you, I guess.”

“That would be boring,” Dream said.

Desire gave him a sidelong look. “Obviously.”

Dream smacked their arm, but Desire only grinned, unrepentant.

[embroiderling]

🐄 (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*.✧(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*.✧(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*.✧(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*.✧

Hiii! Thank you for the ask! Here more cow!Hob/cat!Dream.

Original art by @five-and-dimes

[magnusbae]

I mean, I can't NOT prompt "Emotions are a luxury I don't have time for." with Dreamling 👀

🤘 five-and-dimes

OKAY ADMITTEDLY it does fit Dreamling very well doesn't it—? I was going to give half an hour per piece and accidently digressed way too much with this one..... whoops...? Thank you for the prompt dear 🥰💖

Dreamling || 1,174w || lowkey hurt/comfort but with ~hope

▾▾▾

“Don’t you feel anythi— fuck.” Hob stops, forcing the words back down with a thick swallow. He cannot afford himself to speak in anger, no matter how badly it burns in his veins, no matter how scourged by Dream’s aloofness he is. It doesn’t matter that he should have the right for anger. Dream is simply not a being you could, or should, be angry with if you hope to keep him in your life.

Angry or not, justified or not. Hob wants him in his life, very much.

“Dream, listen.” Hob starts, running a hand over his own face, nails scratching uncomfortably over the side of his cheek. “I get it, okay.” He really doesn’t but this is not the point “but seriously, you do have feelings, I know that you have…” his voice wavers and he gestures at the space between them, unable to voice it lest Dream would flee again. “Please.” his voice strains with the burden of it all. Wanting so much, needing so much—being forbidden from even voicing it, let alone having it.

"Emotions are a luxury I don't have time for.” Dream’s voice is deep, booming, as aloof as it could possibly get. He sounds like he’s reading a ready-made script, like he’s following the lines long since prepared.

Hob recoils, physically takes a step back, wants a distance between himself and Dream’s rejection. He should have expected it, in fact, he assumed he might get worse and yet— “Bulshit.” The short silence that follows is pregnant with tension, both momentarily silenced by Hob’s boldness. Hob is as surprised by it as Dream, apparently is.

Dream comes around first, eyebrows knotting, storms cracking in the depths of his eyes. His lips thin, the corners tug down and then he opens his mouth to deliver what Hob is sure would be either a really bad reprimand or his final words to him.

He cannot have it. If only for the simple fact that he doesn’t only want Dream in his life, but factually needs him. He doesn’t know what’s life would be worth without knowing that in the end of every story there will be Dream to share it with, a confidant, a keeper of his journey.

“I think that you’re afraid—” the words rush out without a thought, he steps forward, hurrying to finish before this would blow out of proportion “—because I know that I am petrified.” The words burn true on his tongue, there’s a dull ache in his chest, his lungs feel too full and empty of air. “I am horrified that you might leave, I am terrified that you might not lo— accept this, I am…” he swallows, his throat is closing with the emotion of it all. He cannot stop, not now that he had finally started. “I get it Dream, I know that you are, that we are… different but…. “ His hand falls by his side, no amount of gesturing would express what he feels.

He runs out of words. He was so certain he had them all when this conversation started, now he can hardly even remember what brought it about. He didn’t prepare for it as well as he thought, he doesn’t know how to word it, how to phrase it in a way that would convince Dream to give this, them, a chance. Damn.

His chin drops and he stares at the ground, burning disappointment makes his hand tremor. He closes his fist.

He is no poet, no storyteller, no writer. He is no Dream to pick and choose the right words. He’s only a man. Only a man who loves a being beyond his comprehension, very, very much.

Fuck, fuck it all. Fuck. He is about to lose him, isn’t he?

The pain in his gut is a twisting thing, like a knife slicing through the guts. Shitty death, he’d know. He dares to glance up when Dream doesn’t speak, half expecting to see him gone. Instead, there’s something softer in Dream’s eyes when he meets them. For the first time, Hob’s attention is drawn to the unnatural void in those eyes, the glint of distant stats. This is…

“Am I…” his mind struggles through the spell of dizziness, his consciousness readjusting its grasp of the surroundings. The shadows are longer, the shapes are bent a little too far, the colors are not quite right.

“I am dreaming.” He understands when he finally sees the landscape for what it is, Dream, for who he is. “Oh shit.” His cheeks color red, he is aware of the incredibly uncomfortable material of the shirt he used to wear some few hundreds years ago.

“I yanked you into my dream, haven’t I.” This is, even more than before, not how he had hoped to confess. Not even close.

“Hob,” Dream’s voice bleeds to every fiber of the dream-scape, infusing it with power, making it feel tangible, more clear, in focus. “You dream very loudly.” There’s an odd note to his voice, if Hob was to attempt and pinpoint it, he’d have to admit it sounds like astonishment.

“Sorry,” he answers, abashed. “I, uh, suppose you can’t just…” he gestures at his own head with a motion that resembles wiping chalk off of a board. “Maybe…?” he adds, hopefully.

He doesn’t regrets his feelings. He would, though, like to at least be awake when Dream rejects him, It feels only proper.

The idea of simply not raising it up at all is one that had crossed his mind frequently, and yet he knows that sooner or later he’d slip again, that he wouldn’t be able to to continue pretending like this isn’t an integral part of who he is, like this isn’t something that he feels.

Sooner or later, he’d tell Dream of The Endless that he is helplessly, hopelessly, truly and deeply— in lov…

A finger again his lips distracts him from his thoughts. “Very loudly.” Dream scolds quietly, wistfully. He sighs then, the weight of it almost buckles Hob’s knees. Dream seems to ready himself, like he is expecting a great deal of suffering and is braving himself for it. He looks exhausted. Worn down. Won over.

Hob immediately dislikes that look, it speaks too much of Dream’s past. Too much of what had made Dream as closed off as he is. Too much of what hurt him so badly. Hob wants him to be…

“Very well, Hob Gadling.” Dream’s words distract Hob from his thoughts again “We shall speak of it further in the waking world, according to your wishes.” Dream looks away into the distance, his finger lingering on Hob’s lower lip, it’s cool. “I must go now, so long.”

He does not sat farewell. Hob’s mind centers around it. Between one eye blink and another, Dream is gone, golden sand scattering behind.

“What…?” Hob’s mind is already fuzzing into an incoherent haze of shapes and shadows, only distantly concerned with what just transpired.

Only vaguely he wonders if he should feel loss, or…not?

[im-not-corrupted]

Oh I would adore to hear about bygone sin, I’m obsessed with that fic! (🤘five-and-dimes)

Of course!

Chapter five is actually mostly complete! I say mostly because I haven't begun edits yet, and I'm still incredibly unsure whether it's what I need it to be. But once I finish stuff for the Sandman fic exchange, I'll start edits.

”Dream,” he murmured, and he seemed—unsure. Nervous. “I know I asked already, but are you—are you sure you’re alright?” When Dream didn’t reply, he lowered his voice. It was but a whisper, now, shared only between the two of them. Perhaps, in another circumstance, Dream might’ve found it…somewhat intimate. Perhaps. ”It’s okay if you aren’t,” Hob assured him. “You’re allowed to not be okay.” He tensed again. That, there—that was anger, flashing bright red and ugly, but it was familiar. It was heated, melted away the remnants of fear that gripped him when that glass shattered like it did, and he glared up at Hob Gadling, who simply stared back, unafraid. Later, he’d wonder when that had happened. When Hob Gadling became unafraid of him. When they had grown familiar enough to warrant only a soft sigh, one that sounded almost disappointed. For now, though—for now, he allowed himself to ask through gritted teeth, “Why would I not be alright, Robert Gadling?” To not be is a weakness, Dream wanted to add. Do you think me weak? He thought of his hand, bleeding from a knife wound, and the tenderness with which Hob cared for him. He thought of the comfort offered and bestowed upon him as though it was so easy. It was not the suggestion of weakness that inspired anger, not really. It was the knowledge that, in the end, Hob Gadling was right. Dream was weak—he relied so heavily on these meetings that he attended only to repay a damned debt, he sought out Hob’s company not because his presence was owed to the other man but because, somehow, Hob had started to…to represent something.  Warmth. Friendship. Care, which was the most baffling out of all of them. Hob offered all these things easily, simply, as though Dream was deserving of such things. As though he thought him worthy of it. He was not. He was not, but he was too selfish to deny it for himself. Those warm welcomes, the way Hob continued to hold open the door to his apartment above The New Inn even though Dream still didn’t understand what led him to do so, the soft smiles tender touches be was offered—they meant too much, and he was terribly selfish. Too much so to consider letting this go.

[bookdragonfruit]

A Soft Place To Land by @five-and-dimes has an absolute chokehold on me, so I thought I'd make some fanart (instead of doing literally any of the things I needed to do today).

Idk why, but somehow I'm always compelled to put Hob in green and brown... Also might have made him fatter than in the original concept (because that's what I had in mind before I saw the original art for it). I hope I did justice to Dream's smokey eyes (and feather, though it's practically invisible lol).

If you notice any mistakes, no you didn't. (Humans are hard to draw, okay.)

[embroiderling]

🐄 for Make me Embroider prompt!!

Here some cow!Hob and cat!Dream. The original art is from @five-and-dimes . I've just finished the lines on the fabric so I'm sharing this. I'll add some stitches soon (there are more 🐄🐄🐄 in my inbox hehe)

[im-not-corrupted]

So hard to choose just one but I'm dying to know more about the next part of "like atonement for a bygone sin" 👀

🤘five-and-dimes

Oh yes! Chapter five is roughly 4k words so far (and hopefully shouldn’t be much more than that), and features a: yet more misunderstandings from Dream (he’s really bad at this friendship thing) and b: Hob being Deeply Concerned while Dream brushes away his problems. Here’s a lil snippet <3

———

A hand found itself on his shoulder, a sudden pressure that made him jolt in his seat. They didn’t touch him down in Fawney Rig—the cage was always in the way. For one hundred and six years, he was deprived of something as small as touch. He never realised how much he could miss something so simple, something he didn’t let himself have even before that.

You aren’t there, he told himself again, tearing his eyes from the man who knocked over the glass, landing them on Hob. Hob stood before him, leaning over the bar so he could place that hand on his shoulder. His eyes were concerned, brow drawn together in a frown. Distantly, Dream had the urge to reach out and smooth that frown away with the pad of his thumb. It didn’t belong on the fact of one so joyful as he.

”Dream?” he murmured softly, low enough so the word was only heard by the two of them. “Are you alright? You seemed a little…distant there for a moment.”

He blinked. Hob’s face was nothing but earnest, and Dream…didn’t know how to reply to that. He could still hear the shattering of glass. His hands slipped beneath the bar, his nails digging into his palms. He let it sting faintly, a small anchor grounding him where he was. In The New Inn, at one of Hob’s workplaces. Not in Fawney Rig, where he hadn’t been for months now. He got out. He got out.

“I am fine,” he managed. It sounded like a lie even to his own ears—a little too strangled, a little too faint.

Hob’s frown deepened a little. “Are you sure, love? You can go upstairs if you need to? I have some more time here, but I’ll join you as soon as I can, unless you just want to leave entirely?”

In truth, he was not sure at all. He was even less sure that he wished to remain in the Waking—it was too loud, all of a sudden. If anything, he wished to return to the Dreaming, wished to find comfort in his own realm, no longer torn from him. But he could not. He had only been here for a couple minutes at best—not even a full hour. He could not leave now, when he had yet to offer enough of his time, and he didn’t trust himself to remain upstairs if he were to make himself comfortable in Hob’s apartment for a while.

He clenched his jaw for a moment, staring resolutely at Hob. He had a debt to repay, and he would do it. He could cope a little longer in the Waking for the sake of that debt and his friendship with Hob, even if the realm seemed to grate on him suddenly, even if a part of him could still hear Alexander’s voice inside his head and the shattering of glass to accompany it.

He was not there. He got out. That was enough. It had to be. “I am fine,” he repeated firmly.