Who: Tristan and Wren What: Another invaded dream Where: Wren's mind When: Immediately following falling asleep on Wren's bed Warnings: Growing schmoopiness and being adorable
The dream wasn't yet formed around him once he fully slipped into sleep, the space a soft, cloudy grey. He'd been there before, but never for very long. It would only take another moment before he was pulled in the direction of someone's dreaming mind. Lingering in the back of his own mind was the thought of warmth along his side and a comfortable bed under him, worried eyes and a soft touch.
With that thought, the dream began to build around him, surprisingly familiar. His bare feet sunk into the plush carpets, and the air around him warmed to the temperature it had been when he fell asleep. The screen to the sleeping area was up, and he could see the comforter wrinkled as if someone has just been laying there.
In the dream, she was in the living area, and she was dressed a dress of soft sage. Her hair was pulled back in tortoiseshell clips, and there was a dance instructor in the corner, marking off the beats of a waltz. She moved to it, dancing with an imaginary partner, her arms lifted and curved around nothing. The music was soft, and it had a richness it did not have in the waking world. She moved on bare feet, the hem of her dress dragging along behind her heels. She didn't notice his movement, so lost in the movement and the music was she, her eyes closed as she counted along with the beats of the instructor's cane on the floor.
The music was silent in one moment and there the next, much like Wren and the dance instructor. The space of the 'apartment' had expanded to give them room, and to make it possible to dance without running into anything. Tristan fought between being surprised to have fallen into Wren's dreams twice now, and simply accepting it as part of the mystery of what he could do.
His grandmother had taught him to dance, years ago, but he had barely had need for the skill since she died. He hadn't wanted to, really. But the beat and the dance was part of the dream, and even though he had no clue how he'd ended up visiting her twice, he felt the pull to fit into it. He crossed to her, quiet and thus nearly undetectable until he was close enough to catch her hand on a turn. He used her own momentum to send her into one controlled twirl that made her dress flare for a moment. The motion allowed him to step closer and fit himself into the rhythm of her steps. On the next turn, he was leading, and probably with more grace than he'd be able to manage in the waking world.
She smiled up at him, and the dance instructor disappeared, though the tap of his cane remained behind, an auditory reminder of his presence. Tap. Tap. Tap. She moved easily when he led, comfortable in the waltz itself. It had been one of the first dances she'd learned in her lesson, slow and elegant and almost like romance in motion. Wren didn't believe in love, but she believed in the visceral presentation of it. "Whatever happened to not walking into the same person's dream twice?" she asked, and she sounded like candor rather than smugness.
He led them in the waltz, turning when he needed to and keeping his hand on her back to steer her with a hint of pressure. It was different than he remembered, dancing with someone, but that likely had something to do with the fact that he was fully grown now, not a boy about to hit puberty, and that the person in his arms was small and light enough to guide. He probably would have liked dancing more if it had always been like this.
"Apparently there's new rules now." He knew it was something to be concerned about because most dreams weren't simply dancing. A thought sparked the back of his mind as he guided them in another turn. "Also, I may've been able to do this on purpose. I'm not quite sure." He remembered thinking of Wren in the moment before the dream began to form, and wondered if he'd been able to find this dream because of it.
His confession made her tip her head up more, and it made her smile. "You wanted to come here?" she asked, and there was a soft pleasure in the asking. Wren was accustomed to men wanting to see her again, but the fact that he wanted to see her was different. He wasn't interested in paying her for anything, and he wasn't interested in taking anything from her, and he didn't want to change her, and the fact that he wanted to see her again (given that) made her feel sweet-warm.
He scowled a little, fighting back the heat of a blush that he knew would stand out on his skin. This was one of the many reasons he'd given up on relationship type situations. Not that the situation with Wren was a relationship...
At all.
The scowl remained and his voice went rougher than it had in a while, harsh even though he continued to hold her carefully for the dancing. "Well it's better than ending up with that asshole that tried to gut me." He looked away from her face, ears hot and likely bright pink.
She stretched up, and she kissed his cheek. "It's okay," she said truthfully, settling back down onto her heels. The music was softer now, not as prominent in the space, and her hand moved to where she knew his injuries were. "He isn't here." She wasn't sure about that, of course. She had no idea how she would know if he was there or not, but it didn't matter. She wasn't going to let anyone do anything to Tristan, and she knew Tristan wouldn't let anyone do anything to her in the dream.
Most every other person he'd ever given that tone to had pulled away and called him cruel. Everyone except Genny. But now he added Wren to the list, and he wasn't sure how he felt about that. Her touch was as gentle as it had been when they were awake, but he kept his tone hard. "I know he's not here." Though he'd thought constantly about what he'd do if he saw the man again. And the thought of him being in the dreams of anyone he knew made Tristan a little ill, and caused his arms to tighten slightly around Wren. He was a mess of contradictions in words and actions.
When his arms tightened, she pressed her cheek to his shoulder, and she moved from the waltz into a soft sway. The music in the dream changed with it, changed to something classic and instrumental. Her arms wound over his shoulders, and she sighed softly as they moved. "This is safe," she told him, and it wasn't clear if it was a commentary about her waking world, or about the man in the dreams, or maybe both.
The tapping of the instructor disappeared along with the change in the music. Tristan leaned in enough to rest his chin lightly on the top of her head, sighing as he shifted his arms down around her waist, one hand flattened wide against her back. He could feel her breath through the thin fabric of his shirt, and the tiny dream detail made him smile, his harshness beginning to fade with her in his arms. "Mm." It was hard to tell if the sound was an agreement or simply an acknowledgement. "It's nice to think so, isn't it?"
Her fingers tugged on the end of his dark curls, and the sway became even quieter, even stiller. "With both of us here, it's safe," she said with certainty, and she looked up into his face once she'd made the comment. "You said it yourself, that you never see anyone more than once. This is different, and it must be something even he can't get into." She smiled then. "I found someone to give me piano lessons," she told him, "and he ordered me a keyboard I can't take yet, but I"ll have one eventually. Will you come play it?"
He tilted his head into her touch, his hair unruly enough to curl around her fingers. When the music came to a complete stop, fading away, he shifted his weight back and found the loveseat suddenly directly behind him. He sat down slowly and drew Wren down beside himself. "I don't know why it's different though. If it's just this one, or if things are changing..." He glanced down at her and raised his eyebrows. "Someone gave you a keyboard?"
"I'm going to pay it off," she explained, curling up beside him on the couch, her legs tucked beside her. "He's a lawyer, and I think he can get me a job so I can keep it." She gave him a candid smile. "He doesn't like women," she told him; her explanation for why she couldn't pay him in the normal way. She tucked a strand of hair behind his ear, and she considered his statement about things changing, and she was quiet as she thought. "If it's changing, is it us, or everything?" she asked him.
Tristan felt a small smile form at the thought of her working in a lawyer's office, though he wasn't quite sure if he was pleased or amused. He had to admit that the thought of her not having to always to earn her money in her normal way made some part of him settle a bit. "I might come play, if it's a good keyboard." He barely noted her individual touches, all of them blending together in a consistent murmur of contact, though he always leaned into it.
He sighed at the question, not knowing how to answer. "I don't know. I still haven't seen anyone twice other than you." He scowled an annoyed face at himself, but forced out an admission. "So I don't know if it's everything, or just you."
She smiled at his scowl, unbothered by it, finding it more endearing than anything else. "I think you'll be back," she told him, and she stretched up and kissed his cheek as the dream began to fade into so much nothing around them.
He could feel the dream starting to lose its hold, and sighed in resignation. It was comfortable and easy in Wren's dreams, and he didn't want to let them go for someone else's. He hoped that he would wake up instead of slipping into another dream.