Armed with the knowledge that the possibility of entering the world of the living was real, Dream only had one thing at the top of his priorities.

"Teach me."

Sapnap turned to him, "Teach you?" He sputtered, "Dream, I don't even know how I did it. I'm sorry if I got your hopes up." He said as he watched his friend's face fall. "Oh no. I didn't mean it in a-"

"I know." Dream sighed, looking over at his old guitar which now belonged to Wilbur and ran his hand across it, "It's just been a long time."

Sapnap nodded in understanding, "Time goes by slowly here, I know. I've been here longer."

There were no clocks or calendars, so it was up to them to rely on their own memory to estimate what the date was. Time was non-existent, but they held on to the hope that they still had a sense of when it was.

He remembered the lyrics he had sung to George once over the phone,

"and time goes by so slowly, and time can do so much."

Sapnap noticed his friend falling into deep thought, and immediately knew it was about George. He had put his hand on Dream's shoulder and took a deep breath, "The last thing I remembered before I saw Darryl was thinking of the memories I made with him. Then when I opened my eyes I saw him."

Dream looked up, "Oh." He said, "It must have been a hallucination, then."

Sapnap's brow furrowed, "Why would you say that? I thought you believed me now."

"Because," Dream explained, "all I ever do is think of the memories I made. All I ever do is think. It should have happened to me already at this point but it hasn't."

Sapnap tried to assure his friend, "Well then maybe I'm wrong. Maybe that wasn't the reason I was able to get in his world."

"Then what would the reason be?" Dream asked.

"Depends." Sapnap said, "Who do you want to see first?"

---

They were now standing in the upstairs bedroom of his childhood house. In front of an old telephone.

"You're choosing to see Wrong Number over your own family?" Sapnap asked in disbelief, gesturing to the old house.

Dream shook his head, "Most of my memories are here. From when I was a kid, to when I brought Wilbur and Dave here to see my childhood house, and when I accidentally locked Drista in the car with a spider in the driveway. I have more memories here than just George."

Sapnap nodded in understanding slowly, "Okay. Well, go."

"Go?" Dream said sassily, "What do I even do?"

Sapnap gestured wildly, "Well I don't know. Do your 'trying to see into the living world' thing."

"Wh- How?"

"I don't know, Clay." He said in an obnoxious tone, "I'm not the all knowing king of the ghosts."

"You're the one that was able to do it." Dream put his hand on Sapnap's shoulders and shook him crazily, "Please?"

"Such a wild child." Sapnap sighed, "Just think of the memories I guess."

"Think of the memories I guess." Dream mocked, and Sapnap rolled his eyes with a smile.

"You know," Sapnap began, "I thought you'd die and we'd have this cute reunion but here we are. You're still such a sassy pissbaby." He said jokingly, and Dream shook his head with a laugh.

Dream closed his eyes and started thinking. He thought hard about all the memories that were made in the house. From getting into fights with his sisters, to bringing Sapnap in for the first time, breaking his window with a baseball.

He opened his eyes and expected to see something real, but instead was face to face with Sapnap.

"Hey, mamas." He smirked, and Dream pushed him away.

"I hate you. Get away, let me think." Dream scolded while Sapnap was on the floor laughing himself off.

"Okay. Sorry, sorry." Sapnap apologized but was still grinning widely.

Dream continued his thinking, working his way up every year he had lived in that house. He thought of everything from the smallest events like his birthday parties, to when his father finally was kicked out of the house.

He opened his eyes but saw nothing. All he saw was Sapnap holding something invisible in the corner.

"Sap," He called, and Sapnap turned to him, "What are you holding?"

"It's Patches' stuffed rat toy." Sapnap said, "You probably can't see it since it's not important to you."

Dream looked at him skeptically, "And why is Patches' toy important to you?

Sapnap smiled, "She used to hate me, but when I got her this toy she started trusting me and played with me."

Dream smiled, and added Patches to his list of things to think about.

He tried for almost half an hour but it donned no results. Sapnap said they should call it a night (even though there was no night in the afterlife), and Dream agreed.

Sapnap went home, but Dream stayed in the bedroom of the house. He stared at the faint remains of the flowery wallpaper, and the barely visible hand prints that were painted on it. He wished he would have explained and been less vague to George before he had passed away.

He put his hand on the hand print and closed his eyes. He would go back just to talk to George on last time.

---

Dream opened his eyes and suddenly the white glow of the afterlife had turned normal. The colors were vibrant again, something he had not seen since he was alive. The house was empty of people, but all the furniture and objects were in place.

Dream had done it. He started laughing to himself, he had done it.

He looked around the house but it was vacant. George must have not been home, and that killed him (well, killed him as much as an already dead person could be killed). He wanted to see George.

On the bedside table was a photo frame that was facing backwards, away from the bed. He tried to grab it and turn it over, but his hand went right through it. He then tried to maneuver himself in the corner to get a look at what the photo was, but he couldn't

"So I can put my hand through things, but I can't walk through walls. Ghost logic is so stupid." He said to himself.

He walked around the house, going downstairs and seeing The Birth of Venus painting still hanging up on the wall, his mother's favorite painting. He smiled as he saw a lot of stuff scattered in the kitchen. He remembered George saying he could be very unorganized.

This was his first time seeing the house when George lived there. This was where those phone calls that made him fall for him had taken place.

He reminisced for a while, but heard voices coming through the door. He rushed to it, thinking George and a friend might have come back home. He walked excitedly but saw no one there.

He turned and saw shadows of legs walking toward the house, accompanied by muffled sounds. He followed the noise, and saw two figures. Two figures that were blacked out and unrecognizable.

"How do you even know it's here?" One voice asked

"Boss said it was here." The other responded nastily, "Now stop asking questions."

They tried walking into the door but triggered a loud alarm. The security system had notified the house that a warning had been sent to George's phone about an unknown entity in his house.

That's when Dream knew that these people weren't good.

One of the figures tried bashing the alarm with his fist, but it didn't go silent.

They instead made over to their van parked outside, trying to start the engine but ultimately failing. Dream had never seen robbers with such bad luck. He couldn't do anything, but hoped that they would give up and drive away.

He was also curious as to what they were looking for.

The driver was punching the wheel of the car, telling it to start, but it wouldn't budge.

"This is what we get for going with your idea, Ranboo." The driver had said, still parked in George's driveway while the house alarm blared.

"I don't want to hurt anyone, Phil." The other, seemingly named R anboo had responded.

"Well we're going to have to." Phil responded strictly, "Obviously we've gotten no where trying to sneak around being nice."

"W-why don't we just take all the stuff in the vault and go? We ain't gotta hurt anyone." Ranboo has asked innocently, but immediately regret it when he saw Phil go mad.

"Look at us right now, dumb kid," Phil raged, "we triggered the stupid alarm because of you, and now we're stuck in this guy's driveway. We're criminals, not school kids. Now toughen up, or boss will make you."

Ranboo had nodded in agreement, and the van had simultaneously finally started. They drove away quickly.

Dream's eyes widened. "No." He said, "No no no."

He ran back in the house, where the alarm had finally ceased it's yells, "No."

Dream remembered something. A core memory he thought he had pushed to the back of his head.

His mother kept all her valuables stashed inside a vault in the wall when he lived there. Maybe tens of thousands of dollars worth of stuff. Something even his father did not know about. His mother had died before she could retrieve the stuff.

Dream suddenly realized what the man Phil had said about hurting people, "We're going to have to."

George was in danger.

He tried to run to Wilbur's house, maybe George was there, but he suddenly was-

---

back in the white, empty replica neighborhood of the afterlife. He tried closing his eyes over and over again, touching the handprint, touching anything, but nothing would bring him back to the living world.