marblehazel

[marblehazel]

Deeper

dbf!Joel Miller x f!reader

Part Two of Sitter

After nine months of no contact since the night Joel spent at your house, you run into him again over winter break.

Tags: Explicit MDNI, no outbreak, age gap, hurt/comfort, lots of feelings and tensions and arguing, which eventually lead to, car sex, unprotected penetration, fingering, first kiss (yay?!!)

Word count: 8.1k

You wake up disoriented.

The first thing your brain registers is how hot your face feels. After blinking a few times, you squint and look around. Sunlight is pouring through the window to the room, hitting you with what feels like a gigajoule worth of heat right on your cranium. You yank the blanket that is covering you away, cursing at how hot and sweaty you are under.

Supporting yourself up with your elbows, you plant your feet on the floor before sitting up straight, stretching your back and arms and groaning while doing so. You scare yourself hearing how nasally your voice is. Your mind runs, dissecting the events from the previous night.

Oh, right. You were sick last night. You slept in front of the TV after taking some medication. You remember the ache in your muscles and joints, the debilitating fever. How you embodied a person in Victorian times on their deathbed, pale and sickly, and all they wanted was to see the garden for one last time. You touch your forehead, and then your neck. Seems like the fever has gone away, leaving your skin sticky with sweat. Your nose isn’t stuffy anymore. And the sore throat is almost gone. You should send a love letter to Vicks headquarters.

While rubbing your face, you are hit by the sudden realization of this strangely vivid dream you had about Joel. It was definitely a wet one, on top of how it was obviously strange and came out-of-nowhere. The kind of dream only fever and probably too much Benadryl can produce. You remember that in the dream, you were watching TV with Joel, and it escalated to going down on him before he went down on you. Fuck, that was embarrassing. And so… porn-y. Straight out of a cheap adult video production company. Ooh, look at me, I’m sick and I’m alone and my dad’s hot friend came and ate my pussy out. What’s next, a plumbing guy? A pizza delivery boy?

Going upstairs is a chore. Your joints are stiff and the knob of the upstairs bathroom’s door gets stuck from time to time, and apparently today is the time. After almost kicking it down, you run the tap and give your face a good wash with cold water, resuscitating your brain cells from doxylamine-induced coma. After that, the very much needed teeth brushing.

You glance at the mirror, cringing at how disheveled your reflection looks. Maybe you should take a hot shower while you’re at it. Toothbrush still in mouth, you run your fingers through your hair, feeling the oily scalp under your fingertips.

And that’s when you find the proof of Joel’s visit. His release, not even fully dried up, is lodged between the strands of hair near your forehead. You pick at it and bring the sample to your nose, half hoping it’s snot. One whiff and it’s confirmed. The dreamy sequence of Joel Miller eating you out was, in fact, not a dream.

The realization hits like a truck. Your body is ahead of your mind and before you realize it, you’re already halfway downstairs, almost tripping and splitting your skull on the staircase. You turn the living room upside down, trying to find your phone. Eventually, you find it after digging in every crook and corner of the couch. It’s dead. You quickly plug it in and wait for the home screen to appear. 4 missed calls from your father, 2 from Amy. A bunch of texts.

Dad

Sweetie? I was asleep. I am so sorry you’re going through it alone. I called Joel. He should be on his way.

Is he there yet?

Didn’t hear from Joel and I can’t reach you. Please call me ASAP.

I hope you’re just asleep. Rest up and text me when you’re finally awake, okay 👍

Sweetie?

Amy

Your dad and I are worried sick. I hope you’re feeling better! Say hi when you’re up

Make some lemon ginger tea if your throat still feels awful

Ignoring the fact that you are pretty much shaking, you scroll until you find Joel’s contact, checking if he has left any message before leaving. The last conversation was from him last year on your birthday, to which you said thanks with a bunch of emojis. Nothing new. You check around the house, thinking maybe Joel left a note. Also nothing.

The house is eerily clean from his trace. In the kitchen you find everything is where it should be, and he even took the trash out. The front lawn seems unchanged, too. No tire marks on the driveway, no flattened grass, no dried mud in the shape of the sole of his boots on the porch. It’s like he was never here.

If you hadn’t found the remains of his semen on you, you would totally believe last night was just a dirty fantasy that somehow managed to override your brain while asleep.

You’re not sure what to do, or even how to feel. Guilt? Disgust? You guess it wouldn’t have bothered you that much if not for the fact that Joel tried his best to pretend he never visited. It makes your stomach churns.

Your phone rings. Dad.

“Sweetheart?”

“Dad,”

A relieved sigh from the other end. “How are you feeling?”

“Better. I can run a marathon.” you let out a breathy laugh. “Sorry I left you worried last night. I took some NyQuil and slept,”

That was technically not a lie.

“Yeah? I figured. Did Joel come? He said he would check, but we haven’t heard anything—”

Fucking pussy, you mouth. “Uh, I was probably asleep when he came. If—he came.”

Not only did he come figuratively, he also came metaphorically.

A faint ding sound, and your father pauses to read the notification. “Ah, there he is! Sorry… Car broke down… Phone died… Couldn’t find the damn charger. Ha!”

You chuckle dryly, heart sinking. “Yeah, it was storming last night, too, so…”

“Ah,” he gasps. “Well I sure do hope he wasn’t in the middle of the road when his car broke down! Did I tell you about that one time a chair—“

You can’t hear anything past that.

.

Joel is scared.

He hasn’t stopped thinking about what happened since the second he left your house. He doesn’t even remember driving home. One moment he was grinning as you skipped your way to the land of dreams, the next he was pulling on his jeans with shaking hands, and then he was standing in the middle of his kitchen staring at the microwave clock, heart thundering like he just ran ten miles.

What the fuck did I do? It plays in his head on a loop, over and over again. Not the way your mouth felt, not the way your voice cracked when you begged, not even the way you looked up at him with those wet, feverish eyes like you needed him more than air. No. None of the good stuff. Just the guilt. The sinking, oil-thick weight in his chest when he looked down at you and remembered who you were. Who your father is. What you meant to him before last night blurred all the lines.

At work, he drops a box on his foot. Snaps at someone who didn’t deserve it. Spends a full ten minutes staring at a power drill someone hands to him to fix, unable to remember what the fuck he’s supposed to be doing. His head isn’t screwed on right. It’s full of images he doesn’t want to replay, and feelings he doesn’t know what to do with.

You text him mid-afternoon.

Thank you for last night. I hope you have a good day at work.

He sees it pop up on his screen while he’s staring blankly at the schedule of the construction, unable to assess whether it’s on track or not. He doesn’t open the message. Doesn’t reply. Can’t.

Another one comes two hours later.

Can we talk? I was thinking maybe dinner. At my place, or yours, or anywhere you want. Please?

He turns his phone off and tells himself it’s the right thing. That not answering is kinder than… indulging you. That if he keeps quiet, maybe it’ll just fade. Maybe you’ll forget. Or at least catch the hint.

He spends the rest of the day in silence. Takes the long way home. Opens a beer and leaves it on the counter untouched. Stares out the window until the sun goes down and he’s just a silhouette in his own house. Feels like a coward. Because he is.

He knows he should regret it because it was wrong.

He does regret it.

But with each minute passing, it comes to his mind that he doesn’t regret making you come apart in his hands as much as he regrets—and realizes —how badly he’s wanted it for longer than he should have. How despite him trying so hard to deny and fight himself on it, the first word that came to his mind when you looked at him like that last night, all flushed and needy and trusting as he spent himself on you, was ‘finally’.

Back at your place, you sit curled on the couch with your phone in your hands, screen glowing against your knees. You check it every few minutes. Nothing. You start composing a message, delete it. Try again. Delete that one too. Eventually, you just set the phone down and bury your face in your hands.

You don’t even know why you’re crying. Maybe it’s the way he left. Or the way he’s pretending it didn’t happen. Or maybe it’s just that being sick and alone is already shitty enough without adding heartbreak to the list.

Heartbreak? You laugh at your own thoughts, but nothing comes out of your vocal cord.

You eat some stale bread over the sink for dinner that night, tears still running down your cheeks.

.

You make up your mind around noon, halfway through a cold cup of tea you never meant to finish. The ache in your chest hasn't dulled, not even after crying yourself to sleep and waking up three separate times just to check your phone like some pathetic addict. No new messages. No missed calls. You drive over to his house like a goddamn lunatic, cursing yourself when you keep checking yourself on the rearview mirror like Joel would care.

You wait. Hours pass. The sun shifts. You scroll. You text Amy some bullshit about feeling “a little better.” You rehearse what you're going to say and then un-rehearse it because you know damn well you’ll go off-script the second you see his face.

Every truck that drove by had your heart in your throat, but none of them were Joel’s until now. You see the familiar beat-up Ford come up the street, slow into the driveway. Your whole body goes still. His expression passes through surprise, confusion, resignation. Then he gets out, slams the door, and approaches.

“What are you doin’ here?” he says, cautious. Almost gentle.

You shrug like you just happened to be in the neighborhood. “Thought we could talk.”

Joel doesn’t say anything at first, just exhales through his nose and unlocks the door. “C’mon in.”

The house is dim, cooled by the late afternoon. Lived-in, but quiet. He toes off his boots at the entryway. You follow suit.

“Been out here long?” he asks, not looking at you.

“Just a bit,” you lie.

He nods like he knows you’re lying. Heads to the kitchen, opens the fridge.

“You hungry?”

“No.”

“I got leftovers. Chicken and rice. You could eat.”

You smirk, bitter and tired. “I gotta say, you have a very interesting modus operandi. Feed me, eat my pussy, then act like I don’t exist, and then feed me again. By the pattern I guess you’ll eat my pussy again after this? Can’t wait.”

Joel closes the fridge, slow and quiet. Doesn’t move. “Quit it, kid.”

“Quit it, kid,” You parrot him, leaning against the counter, trying to keep your cool. “Oh sorry, you know, for having the balls to talk to your face.”

His face doesn’t shift, not even the tiniest bit, and it only pisses you off more. “The way you were just, gone, and all. Didn’t even leave a note or something. Lied to my dad, saying you didn’t even come over. Like it was so disgusting you don’t even want to remember. Like I was disgusting.” Each word is delivered sharper than the last without you meaning to.

He sighs. Deep, guttural. Like this whole thing is dragging something out of him he’s spent years trying to bury. He finally looks at you, and you wish he wouldn’t. There’s too much in his eyes. Grief, guilt, something like longing, but dulled at the edges.

“It was a mistake,” he says, low.

You hold your arms across your chest like they might catch you if you fall. “You didn’t stop me. You could, but you didn’t. You wanted it as much as I did, Joel.”

“I know.” He takes a small step toward you, then stops himself. “And I ain’t proud of that.”

“Why?” Own it, Joel, don’t take it back, you want to say, but your voice cracks before you can voice the rest of it out loud.

“Because you’re you,” he echoes, pain blooming in every syllable. “Because I’ve known you forever. Because I used to sit on that porch with your dad talkin’ about you. Because I care about you and that means I shouldn’t want you the way I do.”

You blink fast. The weight of it lands too heavy in your gut, and you both stand in silence for what feels like years.

“You know,” you say, forcing levity. “It’s not like I was about to ask you to marry me.”

Joel exhales through a tired, pained laugh. “Didn’t think you were.”

Joel looks at you for a long, long moment. And when he finds you silent, processing, his voice softens again—dangerously soft, like the floor’s about to give way.

“You’re beautiful. You’re strong. One day you’re gonna have someone who sees you and knows exactly what you need and gives it without all this…mess.”

“But it won’t be you.” you look at him, fighting the feeling of barbed wire closing around your throat.

“No. It won’t be me.”

The way he said it. Soft. Like he was trying not to scare a stray duckling away. Like he was mending pieces of a broken vase and loud noises would make it shatter again. He knows you. You know he’s not trying to hurt you. But it still stings, opening an old wound somewhere that you can’t locate.

The silence after that is unbearable. You hate that he said it kindly. You wish he’d screamed, or thrown something, or just been a dick so you’d have a reason to stay angry. But no. He just says it with that same sad softness that makes your chest cave in.

You force a brittle laugh. “Well. I guess I’ll go let someone else ruin my life, then.”

Joel’s mouth twitches like he wants to say something, but he doesn’t.

You move to the door. “Take care, Joel.”

“You too, kid.”

“And. Sorry.”

“Oh, don’t. My fault as much as yours.”

“Yeah. I hope you, uh, go find someone that’s not… uh,”

“My friend’s kid?” Joel cuts, filling in the blank.

“Yeah,” you laugh dryly.

“Right,” Joel concurs. “Someone that’s not, uh, affiliated with me, I guess.”

.

You don’t see Joel again after that. You don’t tell a soul about what happened, either.

After that conversation with Joel, you drive your blue Pontiac Vibe back home, all teary and snotty. Two days after that you spend in front of the TV, eyes pointed at the screen but mind elsewhere. Your tears dry soon after, and you ridicule yourself for reacting so strongly over the whole thing like you are going through a divorce or something. You blame it on the hormones.

Your father and Amy come back home later that week, all tanned and radiant. They bring back a vintage jewelry dish for you and a leather wallet for Joel, plus a couple bottles of artisan wine. Your father suggests inviting Joel over for dinner before you go back to school, but before you get to find a convincing excuse to not have to participate in said dinner, Joel declines the invite, saying he is busy handling a big project. While setting the jewelry dish on your vanity, you lament how you should’ve probably gone to Italy instead of staying home.

That weekend you drive back to college. Nothing really changes. Same old routines of going to class and the library, occasional hangouts with friends. By three or four weeks, you have forgotten how seemingly serious the whole ordeal was. The days stretch out, lazily unfolding into summer.

Your father proposes to Amy in July. They send you pictures of the ring and them smiling. Amy cries tears of happiness on the phone, and you discuss the best time to hold the wedding and where, what color and theme, which friends and acquaintances should get invited, and if you’d bring a special someone. You laugh it off.

One day late summer your father sends pictures of him and Joel fishing. Joel is wearing a baseball cap in the picture, biceps flexing as he’s holding the biggest bass you had ever seen, its green scales glistening under the sun. God, he is insufferable. Isn’t bass hard to catch during this time? Even a fish finds Joel irresistible, it seems like. Your father puts his classic goofy smile while having his arms out, holding a phantom fish. In the other picture is Tommy with a catfish. “Day out with the boys 👍” your father captions.

.

Summer goes by, and fall doesn't stay long. You don’t go home for Thanksgiving, opting to take a few small jobs around the school while taking care of your roommate who landed on her ankle wrong trying to copy a girl from the cheer team.

When winter break starts, she’s picked up by her family and you drive back to your hometown, the two hour trip spent singing and pointing at things around the highway to yourself.

You hug your father and Amy first thing after stepping out of the car. The first meal you have together is warm, fun, familiar. You do the dishes and plan to catch up with old friends in town before Christmas.

The next day, you go out to go Christmas shopping. You have secured a really nice silk scarf for Amy after seeing a same one worn by a friend in school that you think would totally go well with her purse, but nothing yet for your father. He’d be satisfied with a tie or a pair of socks, but maybe you’ll get some air dry clay and sculpt something to keep on his nightstand.

After copping some art supplies, wrapping paper, and ribbons from a chaotic Hobby Lobby, you walk around the mall and get a few books your father might like. Next stop is a makeup store, and you swatch some lipstick on the back of your hand before checking out two, one for yourself and one to fill Amy’s stocking.

You catch up with an old friend in the afternoon, drinking smoothies instead of margaritas because she’s apparently pregnant. Baby Daddy? Your crush in middle school. They didn’t know each other until last January, when she hit his truck trying to parallel park and exchanged numbers to give him her insurance information and they allegedly “fell in love at first sight”. It’s not like you and this guy had ever progressed past stealing glances in the hallway, but it still hurts your ego and quite possibly starts a premature existential crisis. Quarter-life crisis, if you will.

You say goodbye and decide that you need a drink. In the area is a sports bar, and for a brief period you think any kind of bar will do as long as they got liquor. But inside the bar there are far too many people occupying a limited space waiting for the game to begin on large TVs mounted over the bar, and it doesn’t seem suitable to drink and maybe cry while people are cursing over a missed field goal. You quickly go back to your car, feeling suffocated, and flee the scene.

The road was surprisingly clear, as is the sky, but the radio plays the most obnoxiously ill-sounding songs that get to your temper. You smash the buttons, almost hitting the curb. Twenty curse words don’t satisfy you and you turn the car and rear into an empty parking spot in the back of a bar that looks quieter than the one you previously visited. You ditch your sweater, leaving out a padded tank top that shows your outline in the best way, thinking maybe you can at least get somebody inside to notice—maybe even fuck the feeling of being left behind out of your brain in the parking lot. Anyone. Anything, really. Maybe the universe will feel bad and throw a fall-in-love-at-first-sight there for free, too.

Your eyes sweep the vicinity upon entering. It’s quiet inside. Even the jukebox is playing on a low volume. Under ten people are scattered around the tables and bar, some of them conversing, a tall man playing pool by himself, the bartender straightening bottles on the shelf.

A familiar figure is sitting alone on the stool by the bar, his shoulders stretched to the front, posture almost slumped, but it doesn’t hide the broad that his frame is. Your heart sinks when you realize who it is.

“Joel,” You call from behind him. Upon hearing his name, he slightly turns his back and his eyes find yours.

“Kid!” He raises his eyebrows in surprise, teeth showing behind his almost-too-long beard that he likes to grow out every winter. He stands up and almost opens both of his arms to embrace you before he visibly realizes something, pulling you into a side hug instead, giving a couple pats to your arm.

“Been a while,” he says as he sits back down. You take a seat on the dark wooden stool beside him, placing your purse on the bar.

He asks what you want to drink and gestures to the bartender after you tell him you’ll have what he’s having. He then slightly faces you before asking when you arrived in town.

“Couple days ago,” you fidget with the bottle just set in front of you. It’s cold under your fingertips, and you can feel the condensation forming. “You looked so gloomy. Can’t find someone here that is not affiliated with you to take home?” You gently nudge his shoulder, teasing.

Joel chuckles, shaking his head before taking another swig of his beer. 

“Eh, just usual shit day at work,” he shrugs.

“People still renovate this time of the year?” you furrow your brows.

“That’s the thing—They’re pushin’ for everythin’ to be done in one night before family comes over like I'm a genie in a lamp.”

You chuckle sympathetically before taking a sip of the beer. The smooth rounded glass mouth touching your lips, your lip gloss staining the already foggy surface. You feel Joel staring, and you would prefer it if it wasn’t true. But you don’t check to confirm. The carbonation is sizzling weakly on your tongue. Hops and malt are not exactly your favorite. But what wouldn’t you give to appear more relatable in Joel Miller’s eyes? When you set the bottle down on the bar, Joel is looking at his own bottle.

“How’s the old man?” he asks, shifting in his seat.

“Oh, the usual.” You smile. “Did Dad invite you over for dinner on Christmas Eve, yet? If not, you’re invited.”

Joel smiles. Your father did, and he said no, but he lets himself enjoy your courtesy, avoiding declining your invitation blatantly. He then asks if you’re on track to graduate next year, to which you spoil him with the stories of things that had happened to you during the nine-months of no contact with him. He listens intently, chuckling as you go, at one point supporting the side of his head using his hand with elbow on the bar. You look so lovely under the warm overhead light, and Joel suppresses the urge to focus on how your eyes gleam instead of your story.

You don’t change at all, he thinks. Still as sweet as ever. He’s amused by how you seem unaffected by whatever happened between the two of you. The cheerful optimism, almost naive way of thinking that is only wasted on the youth. Or maybe it just didn’t mean that much to you, he reckons. 

Somehow the thought breaks his heart.

In this new angle his eyes catch the pool player eyeing you before moving to him. Joel’s pretty sure the stickman furrows his brows before looking at you again, an unreadable expression on his face. Like questioning.

Like accusing.

Suddenly he becomes hyper aware of how this looks again, of his age, of your age, of how he’s betraying the only person he can call a friend, of how he’s ‘preying’ on the young or something. His shoulders are getting tense, his spine leaning ever so slightly away from you.

He’s being paranoid. He’s not even touching you. The last time his skin touched your skin was almost a year ago. But he can’t help himself.

“…and they said they are probably gonna get married next year when the baby’s here, and it’s not like I’m angry, or jealous, you know? It’s just—“

“Sorry, I’m gonna, uh, use the restroom.” he clears his throat before scurrying away. You mutter a quick ‘okay’ before fidgeting with your bottle again, wondering if you killed the vibe by telling him the old friend old crush situation. Maybe that kind of story is best reserved for a person like your roommate and not a fifty something year old contractor that you fucked once. Well, you didn’t exactly fuck him. But.

You sigh and stare into the neck of your bottle. The soft hum of the jukebox continues, a Teddy Pendergrass song now drifting in like fog. You tap your nail absent-mindedly against the glass, annoyed at yourself for rambling, for oversharing, for hoping too much again. Not to mention how acutely aware you are of how cold your shoulders feel now, how your exposed arms—meant to be a silent dare to the universe—now just make you look lost. Just a sad and lonely fool looking for some quick-relief, when you know deep inside that’s not what you want at all, now that you’ve seen him again.

You feel... stupid. Joel might not even come back—he probably has left the bar now for all you know, not being able to handle this again. You reach for your purse, pretending to search for something to stop yourself from thinking.

A voice interrupts.

“Trouble in paradise?”

You turn slightly. The pool player—tall, maybe late twenties, shaggy hair and a smirk that tells you everything you need to know—has approached and is now leaning one elbow against the bar. Too close. To think that you would’ve been waiting for this moment if not for meeting Joel…

And, god, he’s not it. Not even close. All you can see now is how un-Joel he is. You’re offended you almost let yourself settle for this. You straighten a bit. “Excuse me?”

He gestures loosely toward the empty stool beside you. “Mind if I sit?”

“I do.”

That makes him chuckle, but he sits anyway. “Didn’t mean to overhear, but sounds like you and your... old man had a disagreement.”

You blink slowly, then roll your eyes. “He’s not my dad.”

“Oh,” the guy replies, his eyes shifting a little like he’s just caught the scent of blood. “So... that older guy isn’t your father. Interesting.”

“Not really,” you say coolly. “He’s just someone I know.”

“Sure. Someone you know.” He lets the words hang in the air, thick with implication. “Well then. I was gonna say, it’s a shame someone like you is wasting your night sitting next to—what is he, your boss or somethin’?”

You push your bottle away, now entirely uninterested in the drink or the conversation. “Do you want something or are you just trying to see how many wrong assumptions you can fit into a minute?”

He leans in just a touch, eyes gleaming like he thinks this is all flirtation. “How about we step outside? Get some air. I know a place not far from here where you can actually hear yourself think.”

“I don’t need air,” you reply evenly. “I need you to get lost.”

The guy’s smile falters for a second, just enough to show what’s underneath—the entitlement, the ugly little bruise of a rejected ego.

“You sure? Doesn’t look like that guy’s coming back anytime soon.”

You don’t get to answer.

“She said she’s good.”

You both turn. Joel’s standing just behind the man now, tall and still, a hand resting loosely at his side. His expression is deceptively calm, but his eyes are hard, unblinking.

The pool guy sizes Joel up for half a second, like he’s thinking of saying something else—but he doesn't. He just shrugs and backs off.

“No harm meant, man,” he mutters, walking off toward the tables again.

Joel waits until the guy is fully gone before he turns to you. “You alright?”

You nod once, your face hot. “Yeah. I was fine.”

Joel doesn’t say anything. He just settles back onto the stool beside you and places his bottle down, fingers wrapping around the glass with a quiet tension.

For a moment, neither of you speak.

You glance over. Joel’s jaw is clenched. His thumb moves idly over a drop of condensation on the bottle. You want to say something to lighten the moment, but your throat is tight. There’s something about the way he’s sitting—close but not too close. Like if he touches you he’ll lose the reins completely. But still, he stayed. Still, he came back.

“Thanks for stepping in,” you say softly.

Joel turns his head to you then, eyes meeting yours with that unbearable softness he reserves only for the moments where he’s too tired to hide it. He looks like he wants to say something but doesn’t trust himself to do it.

“I’d do it again.” he says.

The jukebox changes to a quieter track. You wonder if he knows what he just said. If he knows what he means.

“Ain’t you cold in that?” Joel gestures toward you with the heel of his bottle. He takes a quick gulp right after, like the words tasted too vulnerable coming out and need to be drowned fast.

You blink at him. “Oh—this?” You look down at yourself, arms bare, chest rising in the tight tank top. Suddenly you feel exposed, and not in the sexy, power-holding way you imagined when you ditch the outer layer of the outfit. “Left my coat in the car. Thought it’d be warmer in here.”

Joel’s mouth presses into a line. He nods like he accepts that, but it bugs him. You can tell. He drains the rest of his bottle and taps the bar for the check.

You step outside a few minutes later together, the door shutting behind you with a low mechanical thunk. The cold hits instantly. You cross your arms in front of your chest, trying to fake composure, but it bites through the fabric quick. Joel walks beside you in silence, hands deep in his pockets, his boots heavy against the pavement.

“You sure you’re alright to drive?” he asks, voice low.

“Yeah. Only had the one.” You shrug, still not looking at him.

The parking lot’s near empty. His truck and your car sit apart, like siblings who got into a fight and were told to face opposite corners. Nine months, wasted down the drain. You could’ve lived a very different life if he didn’t push you away—maybe today would’ve been an illicit date instead, your arms linking, his jacket on your shoulders. Alas.

“Guess this is where we say goodbye again,” you mutter, half-laughing, but it lands bitter and brittle in the cold air.

Joel exhales, annoyed. “Don’t start.”

“What?” You turn to face him now, jaw set, but the disbelieving scoffs can’t stop making their presence known, and you’re halfway to freeze to death yet the glacier encasing your anger, your sadness, is melting down out of nowhere. “You don’t like hearing how it felt like shit?”

Joel blinks. “That’s not what I—”

“No, I know what you said,” you snap, stepping closer, heat rising in your throat. “You said it wasn’t right. You said it shouldn’t have happened. I heard you the first time, Joel, pretty much the only thing I could think about for the past nine months, by the way.”

He closes his eyes briefly, like he’s trying to shut it out. “Shut up, for god’s sake, just, cut it, it’s not—” He stops himself, lips pressing into a hard line.

“It’s not right? Yeah, it’s not fucking right alright, Joel. Sorry I manipulated you into agreeing to get your dick sucked or something. My fault.” You throw your hands in the air, desperate to leave, to drive and step on the gas, yet your feet are unbudging.

“Kid,”

“I’m not a kid!” you snap, eyes burning. And you fucking hate how much you’re the only one ‘furious’ and ‘emotional' here, essentially proving yourself to be as immature as Joel probably thinks. It makes your head spin with rage. He says something, but you keep shooting. “Stop calling me that. I came into that bar tonight thinking maybe, maybe, I could move on—and then I saw you, because of course, of course of all places and all fucking time in the entirety of Austin County you had to be there—and I knew. I can’t.” 

“You’re bleeding,” he says again, clearer, louder.

You blink. “What?”

“Your nose. It’s—shit—” He fumbles in his coat pocket and pulls out a napkin, stepping forward to press it into your hand. “Here.”

You touch your nose and wince at the warm stickiness trickling down your lip.

“Goddammit,” you mutter, tilting your head back, suddenly humiliated. You swipe at it, annoyed, feeling foolish and hot all over. The cold, maybe. Or your body just caving under the weight of it all.

“Get in the truck,” Joel says.

“I’m fine,” you mumble, eyes stinging.

“Get in the goddamn truck.” he says again, and you finally move.

The inside of the truck is still warm. You climb in stiffly, heart still pounding from the fight, blood still trickling into the damp napkin. Joel gets in a second later, slamming the door, rummaging through the console for something better than the now-soaked paper.

The silence is thick.

You sit there, breathing hard, your throat tight. Joel shifts in his seat, jaw ticking, hands clenched on the wheel like it's the only thing keeping him tethered. You dab at your nose with a fresh tissue, watching the red smear dull across the paper. You're still simmering, blood still hot, even as your face feels cold and clammy.

“I’m sorry, Joel,” you whisper, voice hoarse. “But you can’t blame me for feeling.”

He turns then. Slowly. Like if he moves too fast, he might break something. His eyes are molten, locked on yours, full of restraint barely holding.

“You think I don’t feel?” he says, voice low and rough, like gravel sliding down a slope. “You think I don’t—every fuckin’ day—I try not to think about it. About you.” His chest rises like he’s swallowing a scream. “You walked in that bar tonight and I swear to god—”

The air goes taut.

Something in him snaps.

One hand reaches across the console, rough fingers curling around the back of your neck, the other on your thigh, hauling you over the center divide like the whole world is breaking under him and you’re the only thing he needs to hold onto.

And then he kisses you.

His mouth crashes onto yours with months of hunger behind it, years of guilt and need unraveling all at once. It’s not careful or measured—it’s needy, punishing. Teeth clashing, lips bruising, breath stolen. You gasp into his mouth and clutch the front of his jacket like you’ll die if he pulls away.

Your legs are halfway in his lap now, the cold forgotten, the bloody napkin crumpled under your thigh. His hand tangles in your hair, tilting your head just how he wants it, deepening the kiss until your moan slips free—and he lets out a low sound from his throat, like he’s been starving and just remembered what full tastes like.

When he pulls back, just barely, your lips are slick, swollen. You chase him, whimpering, desperate for more, but he’s just looking at you.

“This is wrong,” he murmurs, voice shaking.

“Then stop,” you whisper back, eyes locked on his.

His breath stutters. His mouth opens. But the words don’t come.

Because he can’t.

The second kiss is worse—worse because it’s better. Hotter. Deeper. There’s no hesitation in it now. No breath between. Joel’s hand cradles the back of your head as your mouth parts under his, teeth catching on his lip before he swallows the sound you make. It’s a kiss meant to punish both of you—for the months you lost, for the things unsaid, for the heat neither of you dared acknowledge until now.

You shift closer, knee on the seat, hands fumbling for his jacket to drag him closer. Joel grunts, half in surprise, half in surrender, pulling you practically across the console. His large hands span your back like he needs to anchor himself to your body or else spin out.

When you roll your hips forward, testing the waters, he chokes out a low, broken noise that sounds like something breaking in his chest.

“Jesus, kid—”

“I’m not a kid,” you breathe. “Not with you. Never was.”

He exhales sharp through his nose, forehead still pressed to yours like he’s trying to restrain himself. But the restraint is dying fast. He palms your waist, thumbs dragging along your ribs like he’s memorizing them.

You kiss down the side of his jaw, your breath warm against his scruff, the beard tickling your lips. He smells like old leather and pine, like beer and smoke and winter air. It’s dizzying.

“Fuck,” he murmurs when you nip at the sensitive spot beneath his ear. His fingers twitch on your skin. He grabs the back of your neck and pulls you back in—no more space, no more questions. Just mouths and hands and breath. The kind of kiss that’s nearly a collision, like two storms crashing into each other.

You don’t even remember when your legs end up straddling him in the seat, your thighs bracketing his, but suddenly he’s beneath you, hands gripping your hips tight enough to bruise, and you grind down on him with a gasp you can’t swallow.

Joel curses, low and rough and reverent. His head falls back against the seat as your lips trail down his throat, and he lets you, lets you taste him, own him, just for a moment. His hand slides down your lower back, wiggling its way through your almost-too-tight pants, trembling just a little as it curves over the swell of your ass. You reach down to unclasp the button and give him more space to work with.

His mouth finds yours again, sloppier now, breathless. Your nails scrape his chest through his flannel, and he groans into your mouth like it’s killing him. And maybe it is.

You rock against him again, slower this time, deliberate. Joel exhales like he’s in pain. Not from you, never from you—but from everything else that makes this wrong when all of it feels so, so right.

You tilt your hips again, more confident now, and feel the press of him through his jeans, thick and straining. Your tank top clings to you in places now, damp from the heat growing between you, and Joel’s hand slip up beneath the hem, palms callused and warm as they coast up your spine and then over the swell of your chest, the other still fondling your ass. He breathes in sharply as his thumbs brush your nipples, and you arch into him like a lit fuse.

It’s quiet in the truck except for the rush of your breath and the sharp inhale he takes when your hands find the waistband of his jeans. Your fingers tremble only a little as you pop the button and lower the zipper. You feel him hard against your palm, feel how he flinches when your hand grazes him through his briefs.

“Jesus,” Joel murmurs against your shoulder, voice hoarse. “You don’t know what you do to me.”

You smile into his neck, nipping lightly at the stubble there. “I think I do.”

His laugh is strained, like it’s breaking on the way out. His hand dips lower, over your ass, fingers curling under the waistband of your pants. “These gotta come off,” he mutters, more to himself than to you.

You rise up just enough to shimmy your pants down—tight denim making the motion graceless, awkward even—but Joel helps, dragging them over your thighs with a touch far gentler than it has any right to be. You tug the fabric from your ankles and throw them to the backseat. Joel reaches down, kissing your lower abdomen as he pulls your panties down, almost impatient.

“Jesus,” he says again when you’re bare from the waist down, pulling you back into his lap, one hand palming your breast through the thin cotton of your top, the other settling between your thighs like it belongs there. You’re already soaked, and he groans when he feels it, followed by your own gasps and restrained moans.

“You’re killin’ me,” he whispers against your collarbone, and then you kiss him again—messy, open-mouthed, full of teeth and need. He kisses you like he’s starving. Like he wants to memorize every corner of your mouth. Like he doesn’t want to ever come up for air.

You both know this can’t last. That this little world, this heat and ache and dizzying need, exists only for now. That when it ends, things might not be the same. But none of it matters when he finally pushes his briefs down and you both freeze for just a moment—because this is the point of no return.

You meet his eyes. They’re wide and dark and a little scared, same as yours.

Then you sink down.

A gasp breaks from both of you, raw and involuntary. His hands clench hard at your hips as your bodies connect, slow but sure, the stretch pulling a sound from your throat that you try to smother against his shoulder. Joel swears again, under his breath, grounding himself in your skin, your heat.

He buries his face in your neck, breathing you in like a man on fire finally finding water.

You move in a slow rhythm. Not rushing, not taking, just being. Registering the shape of his cock inside you and the sweet symphony of squelch every time you sink back into him. His hands map your torso, breath uneven like he’s three inhales away from dying, but he’s smiling.

“Can’t believe you’re here,” he mutters. “Can’t believe I’m…”

You shush him gently, fingers threading through his hair, tugging. “Just feel. Don’t think.”

But he does think. You can feel it in the way he holds you, in the way he kisses the base of your throat like an apology and a promise all in one.

He doesn’t last long. The build-up, the months of repression, the way you move over him, how warm you are, how soft. It’s all too much.

You feel it before he does: the subtle tremble of his legs, the catch in his breath. He comes with a low, guttural sound against your neck, holding you to him like the act alone might stop time. It’s filling you up, warm and strange and by all means should make you panic, but it doesn’t. Instead, you impossibly feel the organs inside your ribs soften, the muscles of your walls clenching around him greedily, as if trying to hold onto him forever.

You go still, still joined, breath shallow and skin damp. His eyes close, jaw tight.

“Shit,” he says, guilt setting in immediately. “I—I didn’t mean to. I didn’t…”

“It’s okay,” you murmur, brushing sweaty hair from his forehead. “It’s okay, Joel.”

He doesn’t look at you as he lifts you up and turns your back to face him, your cunt already missing his softening cock. You position yourself on his lap, cheek touching his equally sweaty cheek as he holds your frame with one arm in place, the other reaches down to the still pulsing, overall sensitive skin.

“I got you,” he whispers, voice strained, remorseful, full of something you can’t name.

His fingers are slow and sure, working with grit and determination despite the narrow space and nearly awkward angle, and you reach to grab his arm.

“Joel, Joel,” you whine. The pleasure builds up, stronger this time, like it’s an arm reach away. He pins you into place, the pad of his thumb not losing its steady pace on your clit, the others somehow pushing, slightly curling inside you, covered by his own spend and your juice. You buck your hips forward, swallowing screams, it feels hot, hot, hot, your legs twitching and kicking and—

It’s like a blitz, showering you with bliss and pleasure and your body arches, chasing it like a bow.

The next thing you know, you’re limp against Joel, sweat and cum pooling on the seat.

.

“Safe trip, sweetie,” Amy hugs you one more time while your dad asks if you didn’t miss anything for the fourteenth time.

“Yes, Dad,” you sigh. “Print a checklist next time so we can both check and spare me the headache and anxiety, okay?”

You kiss his cheek and pat him on the shoulder. “Bye, guys.”

You’re releasing the clutch when you hear your dad shouts again, “Did you say goodbye to Joel?”

“Do I have to?” you laugh lightheartedly, putting your best acting attempt to look nonchalant.

Your dad shrugs. “He did give you a nice Christmas present. Be nice.”

“Yeah, alright.” you tap the steering wheel. “I’ll send him a text.”

.

The sun’s barely up when Joel shuts the trunk of your car.

Your duffel sits heavy against the bumper, almost not being able to zip up from yesterday’s clothes you crumple on top of the folded pile. The car breathes cold in the early morning air, engine idling low, your playlist queued up but not playing yet. It’s quiet. Too quiet for a goodbye, but maybe that’s the point.

You hand him his coffee back and he leans against the side of his own truck, arms folded. He’s got his jacket on, but his collar’s still turned wrong. You almost fix it, but you don’t.

It was definitely a crime to say goodbye to your unsuspecting parents and drive your car straight to Joel’s driveway, but you don’t really care about that right now. Neither does Joel, apparently.

God, you can still feel the ghost of his hands, how they held you close this morning, the fine arm hair you traced under your fingertips.

“You got everything?” he asks.

“Yeah. Got what I need.” you nod. “But if I did, I’d have a good excuse to come back.”

He chuckles. Finally, he sets the coffee on the truck bed and steps toward you.

“You drive safe, alright?” his voice is soft and almost impossible to hear as he pulls you for a quick hug.

“I will.”

His hand hovers near your waist for a second too long, like maybe he wants to pull you in again, kiss you senseless in the driveway—but doesn’t. Instead, he just looks at you like he’s memorizing something he can’t say out loud.

“Call me when you get there,” he says.

You smile. “You know I will."

[marblehazel]

Teething

dbf!Joel Miller x f!Reader

Joel was crowned as The Trusted Adult to accompany you to your wisdom teeth extraction appointment. Chaos ensued.

Tags: no outbreak, age gap, most likely exaggerated effects of sedation, sexual themes

Word count: 3.1k

The skies were painted with shades of copper and lilac when you arrived home. A familiar pickup truck was parked in the driveway next to your dad’s mud-caked F-150, and you slipped your way between the space between the two to get to the backyard through the narrow passage on the right side of your house, sticking twigs of overgrown shrub brushing against your arm. Your dad hated garden work, and it was not like you hated to prune and trim the green galore by yourself—you just hadn't found the time.

Laughter bounced against the pillars supporting rusting canopy adorned with vines and wildflowers, echoing around the tiny outdoor dining area. Around the table were three men you could discern blindfolded: your dad, and his friends, Joel and Tommy. The three looked pretty scruffy, which was not unusual. On the table were cans of beer that you just knew would leave more water stain on the undone finishing of the wood.

Tommy said something about a boat, and your dad and Joel burst out laughing again like they just heard the funniest joke in the world, and you could swear you could feel the ground vibrated underneath your shoes. Your dad said something then, about sinking and anchor, maybe, and Tommy smacked his can on the table as the three of them erupted into another laughing fit. They didn't register the new addition of their little late-afternoon get-together until you put both hands on your dad’s shoulders, kissing the top of his head. He smelled like sawdust and smoke.

“What’s so funny?” you grin.

“Sweetheart!” your dad jolted, slightly twisting his torso to see you. “We were just chatting about fishing. How was today?”

“Hi Joel, hi Tommy," you smiled at the brothers, greeted with a polite nod from Joel and a cheerful 'hey' from Tommy. “today was okay-ish.” you patted your dad's shoulders once more before letting go and starting to make your way towards the backdoor, leaving the men to their football talk and fishing jokes alone. “I'm gonna take a shower. Have fun, guys.”

"Aw, shoot—almost forgot!" your dad said, clapping his hands once. "Sweetheart, I’m real sorry, but I don’t think I can take you to the dentist Thursday. They need me over in Georgetown to look over somethin’—"

“Aw, Daaad,” you groaned, although your face showed nothing akin to annoyance, just sorry for him. You knew how much your dad overlooked his back pain, especially for work, and these frequent trips requiring a lot of driving didn't help. “I’ll see if my friend can take me, okay?”

These friends of yours... you’d have a bigger chance of losing your teeth in a car crash before you could even step into the dentist's office. You shook the thought off. Let's think about that later.

“What’s goin’ on?” Tommy asked, brow scrunched. “You alright?”

“I’m getting my wisdom teeth removed,” you pointed at your cheek, the approximate area where your upper right molar was growing sideways. “One popped out and it’s growing weirdly, so I got an x-ray. Turned out all four of them are developing in such shitty angles, so, they’re taking 'em all.”

“All at once?!” Tommy gasped, to which you nodded as you purse your lips.

“More cost-effective, or whatever.”

“Ouch. That sucks.”

“I’ll take her,” all eyes went to the source of the voice: Joel. He was staring directly at your dad. “I’m free Thursday.”

Your dad blinked, a little surprised. “Shoot, Joel, that’s real kind of you, but you don’t gotta do that. I mean it—I appreciate it, more than you know, but I don’t wanna put you out.”

Joel shrugged slightly, tone steady. “Ain’t no trouble. Got the day open, figured I could help.”

You practically bounced in place, cutting in before your dad could say anything else. “Yes! Please, Dad, can he? Joel’s like… perfect for this. Besides, you know my friends, we'd crash into something and you'd have to pay for the damage."

Your dad chuckled, shaking his head. “Well, I won't stand in the way. Joel, you sure about this?"

Joel was only halfway to a nod when you shouted, “Really?”, prancing your way towards his seat and kissed his cheek. “Thank you, Joel!”

The man raised his eyebrows and cleared his throat while Tommy laughed. Your dad shook his head slowly at your endearing antics, his eyes meeting Joel’s as they silently said ‘Thank you, and sorry’.

The next time Joel’s gray Ranger pulled up in front of your house, you had been waiting on the porch with a smile worthy enough to be a toothpaste ad.

.

The fog in your head started to clear just enough to let you notice the figure sitting by your side. Joel’s broad shoulders took up half the room—or at least it felt that way in your dazed state. His arms were crossed, and his brows furrowed as he watched you with what looked like mild concern. You blinked a few times, your vision wobbling like you were looking through a fishbowl. You couldn’t really register where you were or how you ended up here yet.

“Hey,” he straightened his posture up the second he realized you were awake.

“Whoa,” you slurred, pointing a wobbly finger at him. “You look good.”

Because he did. That was the first thing you noticed about him. You couldn’t remember if it was exactly true, but a voice in your head told you that Joel always looked good. You believed it. And he did right now, with clothes all ironed, beard trimmed, hair combed. Joel wouldn’t admit it, but he’d even put some styling powder on his hair today.

His lips twitched, and he scratched at his beard, unsure of the appropriate response to give. “Uh, thanks. How are you feeling?”  

You ignored the question. “Does my dad know you’re here?”  

“Yeah,” he said slowly, leaning closer. “He was there when I said I’d take you here, remember?”  

“No.” You deadpanned, voice thick and blunt. Your tongue scraped against your gum, and it touched some soft, fibery, wet cotton balls. You almost gagged.

Joel sighed. “Alright. Uh, pain anywhere? Are you comfortable?”  

You tilted your head, as if trying to access some hidden inner truth. Then, with startling conviction, you announced, “Sweaty.”

He quickly raised from his seat, reaching for a handkerchief in his pocket to wipe your forehead with when you suddenly choked into tears. You could barely get the words out through the swollen jaw, numb tongue, and spiky throat. “I miss my daddy…”

You felt like the saddest child in the world. You didn’t know where your dad was, but most importantly, your brain wasn’t able to assess where he might be. But he wasn’t here. And that alone was enough to send you spiraling into agony.

Joel looked around awkwardly, clearly out of his depth. “Sweetie,” he said, reaching out to pat your cheek gently. “I’m here.”

You blinked up at him with wide, glassy eyes, your bottom lip trembling. “Where is he? Did he sell me to you?”  

“What?” if only you were sober enough to see the expression on his face. 

Tears continued to pool in your eyes, spilling down your cheeks. “What am I supposed to do, being sold to a person like you?”  

“Person like me—What’s that supposed to mean,” Joel withdrew, seemingly offended momentarily before he realized he was talking to a group of at most six brain cells, half of them blackout drunk.

“Hot,” you sniffled. “Hot like you.”

Joel freezed. His jaw worked soundlessly for a moment before he muttered, “O…kay. Uh, let’s call for a nurse, okay?” He stood up and looked toward the hallway.

“I don’t even know how to be a housewife!” you lamented, gesturing wildly toward a painting of sand dunes on the wall. “You’re going to dump me in the middle of a desert!”  

“Honey,” Joel said, his voice strained but calm. “Nobody is dumping or selling anybody, okay? Just—wait here. I’m gonna go get a nurse. I’ll only be gone for, like, five seconds.”  

You watched him disappear behind the wall, your lips quivering as you began counting on your fingers. “One… two… three… four… five…” You looked up at the hallway, waiting for Joel to come back as you realized how alone you were in the room. You didn’t want to be alone. The fluorescent light was hurting your eyes and the air smelled like a dentist’s office. You were in one, but you didn’t really register that. Panic set in like a tidal wave. “Joel?” 

“Joel! JOEL!” You thrashed in the chair, trying to swing your legs over to touch the ground, ready to bolt after him like some kind of lovesick lunatic. It was hard, like you were learning controls for a video game for the first time, and your limbs didn’t move the way you wanted them to. Joel returned with a nurse moments after. She was holding a clipboard and if not for the mask hiding her expression, Joel would have seen that she was wearing a smile that looked dangerously close to a laugh.

“You’re back! I thought you were leaving me…” your voice cracked as you reached out toward Joel with snot running freely down your upper lip. “I’ll be a good wife from now on, Joel, I promise.”  

“Oh,” the nurse said sweetly. “Sounds like someone’s still a little loopy.”  

Joel ran a hand over his face, mortified. “Sorry about that.”

“It’s alright,” she smiled at him before checking on you. “Definitely not the worst I’ve witnessed. You’ll be okay, won’t you, sweetheart?”

You nodded.

She asked you to open your mouth, and you attempted to talk to Joel the entirety of it, moving your heavy tongue around, making barely coherent noises. At one point you reached for his hand and he took it.

“Hoew, wa ho hayhee hee hahee?” which would translate to ‘Joel, was our wedding in Bali?’, like Joel would’ve been able to decipher it. He just played along in hopes to shut you up.

“Yes, yes, of course.” he cupped your hand in his.

“Okay, now bite down with pressure, okay?” the nurse said softly after pulling the blood-soaked cotton balls out and replacing them with new ones. You did as she said. “That’s good. Thank you.”

“No, thank you.” you smiled at her. “You’re so nice.”

“And you’re so nice, too.” she said as she gathered her clipboard and metal tray. “We’re all clear here, you are free to go home. If you prefer to wait out until she’s not so disoriented anymore, please use our waiting room since we have to clean this one before the next patient.”

“Thank you.” Joel nodded politely at her.

“Any more questions you’d like to ask the doctor?”

“I think we’re all covered. Thank you for everything. Let’s go, sweetie.” he helped you stand up, and the second he let go your body leaned, craving to touch the floor. Both him and the nurse reached out to you, crashing their heads in the process.

“Ow!” she yelped.

“Sorry, sorry. I got her. I’m really sorry.” he slightly bowed down as he held you steady, one palm planted on your ribs just below your breasts.

“Sorry,” you parroted, utterly oblivious to what just happened.

“It’s alright,” she laughed lightheartedly as she reached down to fix your shoelaces. “There you go.”

“Thank you again. We’ll stay out of your hair now.”

.

After what felt like eighty years, Joel finally got you on the passenger seat. He could feel his lifespan shortened significantly, and his back hurt so much trying to crouch to your level as he guided you across the parking lot. He should’ve just carried you—would’ve been much quicker and better for everyone involved.

You touched the dashboard, feeling the texture underneath your fingers like it was the first time you got in a car. Joel closed the door next to you and scurried his way around the car hood to the driver’s side, sighing when he got in.

“Joel, what’s your favorite pie?” you asked as he leaned over to put your seatbelt on, hand fiddling with the belt when it got stuck and you instinctively ran your fingers through his hair. 

“Pecan,” he muttered, body getting tense under your casual yet intimate touch.

“Oh, I had pecan pie at my house recently.” you withdrew your fingers as Joel straightened up and put his own seatbelt on. “We’re like, soulmates, or something.”

Joel started the car. “Yes, that was me. I brought the pie to your house.”

“Wow, you’re so kind.” you smiled, eyes tearing up, as if bringing you pie was the equivalent of saving all kittens in the world. Joel rolled his eyes and shifted the gear from neutral, and the two of you slowly moved out of the office parking lot to the road.

You cupped your own swelled cheeks, feeling the spherical cotton balls nested between your jaws. “I don’t like these, Joel.”

“Yeah? Wanna take them out? Do you think the bleeding has stopped?” his eyes ran between you and the road in front of him back and forth, getting ready to merge onto the highway.

“My mouth is so full,” you whined, and you fished one cotton ball out, all wet and slightly red, before rolling the window down and throwing it out. It bounced on the dry concrete behind you briefly before it got run over by another car.

“Hey, no littering! And keep your arm inside, my fucking god, d’ya wanna lose it?” Joel yelled, one arm leaving the steering wheel to pull your hand into the car and close the window back up, almost taking up the lane next to you. A semi-truck passed through and the driver honked their horn, deafening. You snarled at it while Joel mouthed a quiet ‘fuck’.

“I still got more inside,” you pointed at your open mouth, like Joel couldn’t tell from your slightly muffled voice still.

“I know, but either keep it in your mouth until we get home, or find some—I don’t know, plastic bag to keep it in, alright? Try the glove box.” he points at the compartment in front of you. You fiddled with the handle, and when it opened it revealed a little toolbox, a pocket knife, a folded map, and two dusty condoms from God knows when.

“Joel, what is this?” you pinched one out for Joel to see, voice thick with betrayal. “You’re cheating on me.”

Good fucking god. Joel snatched the thing out of your hand, shoving it back into the glove box before slamming it closed. He shouldn’t have been panicking like you were actually his bride and he’d been two-timing you after work, because you weren’t, and the only thing that had been in touch with his dick in the past six months was his fist. “I don’t know how it got there. It’s from a while ago.”

But the damage had been done. You covered your face with your hands, eventually took the remaining cotton balls out and let them go onto the floor mats. Joel winced.

“What should I do? Is my blowjob not good enough?”

Joel was the most uncomfortable he had ever been his whole life right now, and he once witnessed his friends’ parents hitting it crazy style with the same banana pudding that was served at dinner smeared everywhere when he was there for a sleepover, so that was saying a lot.

“You have never—what are you fuckin’ doing?!”

You had leaned over as much as your seatbelt allowed you to, fingers reaching to unbuckle his belt. “I’m gonna show you how good I c—”

Joel lost control of the steering wheel as he tried to shoo you away, but you latched your palm around his bulge like leech. He accidentally turned the truck too much to the left, switching lanes without warning, and abruptly hit the brakes for a split second when he thought he was going to crash into a Camaro, almost slamming you forward if not for the seatbelt. Three cars honked at the two of you as they passed, one was generous enough to give you the finger.

He pushed you back to your seat, both of you huffing and puffing. There was silence for about thirty seconds until Joel composed himself.

“What the fuck did they put you under, because I need some,” he muttered under his breath before speaking clearer. “Put your hands on the dashboard. Now,” he commanded, eyes flicking between you and the road.

“Why?” you mumbled, your fingers twitching like they might reach for Joel’s belt again.

“Because I said so,” Joel grunted, shifting in his seat to try to hide his hardening length, jaw tense as he kept one hand firmly on the wheel. “You wanna be a good wife, don’t you?”

You blinked slowly. Joel was right, you wanted to be a good wife.

“Yeah,” Joel continued, eyes narrowing slightly, still focused on the road. “Only good wives put their hands on the dashboard.”

“Really?” you laughed, the sound drifting lazily out of you. But you planted both palms on the dashboard anyway, sunlight pouring on the back of your hands, warming them up. 

“Yeah—yeah,” he muttered. “Look it up.”

“I can’t, my hands are on the dashboard,” you frowned, chin pointing towards your splayed fingers.

Joel rolled his eyes, letting out an exasperated sigh. “You just have to believe me, then.”

You thought of it for a second before nodding. “Okay. I believe you.” 

He glanced at you, eyebrows lifting. “You should. You’re my wife.”

Your head tilted, a lazy grin spreading across your face as you processed the words. You’re my wife. Somehow that was the most beautiful string of words you had ever heard. “Am I a good wife?”

“Sure. You got your hands on the dashboard. Guess that makes you a good wife,” Joel said. Your loopy grin was infectious despite his best efforts to stay stoic.

“I’m a good wife,” you repeated to yourself, beaming.

There was a beat of silence before you leaned slightly toward him, eyes bright, head swaying with the motion of the truck. “Are you a good husband?”

Joel’s grip on the steering wheel tightened for a split second, his gaze flicking to the side, then back to the road. “...I don’t know. Do you think I’m a good husband?”

“Yeah,” you said immediately, so sure of yourself as you gathered the evidence in your hazy brain. “You took me to the dentist. You got me pecan pie.”

Joel scoffed, his hands tightening on the wheel. “Driving and pies, guess that’s the key to a successful marriage.”

.

By dinner time you were already out of your groggy state, although the pain started to creep back in despite the painkillers that you just sat in the living room with a frozen pouch of CapriSun pressed against your cheek. Joel hadn’t said much but he did stay until your dad got home.

He had hoped you blacked out and didn’t remember anything from earlier. He wasn’t sure if he could live knowing you were able to remember that you were so eager to put your mouth on him, on top of you calling yourself his wife, on top of you casually admitting you found him hot.

And because he got hard in the car. He didn’t know if you saw it but for his own peace he would like to believe that you didn’t.

Joel was a little bit grateful that Tommy wasn’t there because he would never let this die.

He would never let this die himself.

When your dad set some burritos for Joel and applesauce for you on the counter, Joel was ready to go home and get drunk while pondering in the shower.

“You’re leaving already?” you licked the applesauce, tasting it innocently, and Joel had to remind himself that licking applesauce was not a sexually enticing act.

“Yeah, working early tomorrow. Get well soon.” he stood awkwardly as he pocketed his keys.

“Thanks a lot, man,” your dad got up to give Joel a hug with his back facing away from you, and you stared Joel dead in the eyes as you mouthed playfully: ‘Husband.’

His lips twitched. Seemed like he would never know peace ever again.

[marblehazel]

A Lesson

raider!Joel Miller x f!reader

Joel just wants you to listen to him for your sake, keep yourself out of trouble while he’s away for the day. But of course you have to slip up, putting yourself in danger. Now he’s going to teach you a lesson.

Tags: Explicit MDNI, pre-boston qz, established relationship but questionable dynamics, d/s undertones, dubious consent (!!!), punishment, degradation, face slapping, pussy slapping, fingering, orgasm denial

Word count: 3.5k

a/n: This piece contains descriptions of murders and dead bodies (brief), and physical abuse, mainly slapping. Joel also says cruel things in this, not directly calling you names, but there are derogatory lines. Please take care of yourself :)

You’re fucked.

Your life flashes before your eyes. The sins you’ve committed, the chances you didn’t take, all pounding at the door of your consciousness. You can feel death closing in, its cold embrace beckoning. If you had one chance to go back in time, you would give anything to go back to exactly thirty six minutes ago. Not an hour ago, not before the outbreak, just thirty six minutes prior to this second. When you still had the choice to be a good person, or a surviving one.

Joel’s been gone since the crack of dawn. He’s meeting up with some raiders—a trade, a few miles north—and scouting out a safer route for the two of you to head north. You can’t afford to stay in one place for long, not with the way things are going down here. The farmlands used to offer more, but they’re nothing now. You have to keep moving.

Joel would’ve taken you with him, but it’s not about easing his own mind. It’s about keeping you out of harm’s way. He doesn’t trust the people he’s meeting—not enough to risk you. Not with the way things are. You never know who’s looking for a fight, or what kind of deal they’re pushing. There’s no room for mistakes, not in this world. Not when every day is a damn gamble.

Before leaving, Joel orders you to stay low, keep your presence unknown inside the farmhouse you have been staying at for a week, and kill anyone who dares to approach the doorstep. You say yes, of course.

But, as usual, you always have to blow everything up.

It isn’t long before you see her. A girl, maybe nine or ten, walking toward the farmhouse. She looks exhausted, her steps sluggish. She doesn’t look like she’s infected, at least not yet. Her clothes are torn, and there are smudges of dirt on her face. You hesitate, instinctually reaching for your knife and the gun Joel had left you.

But as the girl comes closer to the porch, you get a good look at her eyes. There is something fragile about her. Maybe it’s the way she winces at the sun or the way her shoulders slump, as if the weight of the world is crushing her. The girl reminds you of yourself. Lost, vulnerable, a survivor in a world that doesn’t give a damn. You can’t help but feel the urge to help. To give her a chance.

You let her in. And that is your first mistake.

She appears to be mute, silent in the face of your questions. As you check her over for bite marks or concealed weapons, she does nothing but stare at you with wide, exhausted eyes, as if she might faint at any moment. You grab one of your clean shirts, handing it to her with a silent offer of warmth, trying to figure out how to communicate. You aren’t sure if she’s deaf too, but you ask anyway, in every way you can think of. Gestures, simple words. But she remains silent. Only stares.

You give her a few crackers, still pushing for answers. Who is she? What is she doing here? The questions hang in the air, unanswered as the seconds tick by, and the next thing you know, the door slams open.

A man and woman are upon you in an instant, knives drawn. Their words are sharp and demanding: supply, weapons, food. You barely have a moment to react before the girl shifts, hiding behind the woman, and she runs her fingers through the kid’s tangled hair. It dawns on you. The girl is only a bait.

So, you’re fucked.

Your instincts kick in first. As the man lunges for you, you grab the gun, hammer already cocked, your heart pounding as you aim. The gunshot rings out, the sound deafening in the tight space. It hits his shoulder, blood spurting in a quick spray as his scream fills the air.

Before you can get another shot off on the woman, her fist collides with your temple, sending you reeling. The world tilts, your vision blurs, and for a moment, you thought the darkness might swallow you whole. You’re a goner.

But then there is a crack, a gunshot that isn’t yours.

The woman drops to the ground, her body slumping lifelessly as Joel emerges from the shadows, his presence cutting through the chaos like a knife. His gun is steady in his hands, his eyes cold as he surveys the scene. The man, still clutching his shoulder, barely has time to react before another shot rings out, and he crumples.

The girl tries to run—tired, slow, desperate—but Joel is quicker. Another shot, and she falls on the porch, lifeless before she even has a chance to flee.

Joel’s eyes locked onto yours as he steps forward, his movements sharp, calculated. No words were needed between you. He has seen enough. There was nothing left to say.

.

The next hour is spent lining the bodies inside, checking their pockets and if they still have some friends around the farm waiting to strike. You find a bag with not much in it in the back of the house, some jerky and a half-empty bottle of water. They were desperate. 

You ask Joel if you should dig a grave for them, even a shallow one, at least for the little girl’s body, but he doesn’t answer. The farmhouse feels suffocating, the air thick with the metallic scent of blood that hasn’t yet had a chance to fade. The bodies lie there, still and turning cold, while the bloodstains seep into the floorboards. The room, once perhaps a place of quiet refuge for you and Joel, even for a brief period, now reeks of death. Every corner holds the memory of what happened. What you allowed to happen.

“We’ll stay in the barn tonight,” Joel mutters, his voice low, as he gathers your things. His hands move methodically, purposefully. His eyes don’t meet yours. “And we head north first thing in the mornin’.”

You follow him wordlessly, the weight of the day pressing down on your chest. As the barn door creaks shut behind you, the cold air rushes in, but it doesn’t seem to touch the heaviness in your chest. You don’t let Joel see the tears pooling in your eyes, but you can’t help the tightness in your throat as you turn away from the farmhouse.

The barn is cold and messy, layers of dust covering everything inside, but it’s a roof over your head and walls closed around you, and that’s enough. Joel rustles through the hay, forming a thin, uncomfortable bed. You’re about to lay down when his voice cuts through the silence.

“Who allows you to lie down?”

You freeze, a sharp chill sweeping through your body as his gaze locks onto yours. He steps forward, the space between you vanishing until his towering frame looms over your trembling form, casting a shadow you can’t escape.

“What did I tell you about stayin’ low?” His voice is sharp and low, an edge of fury curling beneath each word. “What did I say?”

The shove comes without warning, light but firm enough to send you sprawling to the floor, your body colliding with the ground before your mind can catch up. Before you even have a chance to process it, he grabs you by the collar, hauling you up like a ragdoll, his grip like iron.

“You think this is a game? That I’m just here to clean up after your mess every damn time?”

Then his palm connects with your cheek, a slap so hard it rings in your ears, leaving a sting that lingers, deep and raw.

He’s never slapped you before. In fact, he’s never laid a hand on you with the intention to hurt—until now. The sting of his palm shocks through you, and you can feel your breath catch in your chest, panic creeping up your throat. You start to hyperventilate, the air too thin, too tight, but before you can steady yourself, his hand crashes against the other side of your face, the back of it leaves a burn deeper than the first.

“What’s next? You gonna invite a horde of infected to this goddamn barn?”

Your heart pounds in your ears. Before you know it, tears are rolling down your cheeks, but from the slaps or the words, you can’t be sure.

“I was tryin’ to get us outta this bleak, shithole of a place, and you can’t even follow a simple order?” His words are harsh, each one a jab that sinks deeper into your gut. But he isn’t done yet. He forces your cheeks together with one hand, the pressure so brutal it feels like your jaws might snap. Your lips tremble, slick with tears, unable to escape his grip.

“Maybe I should leave you to die out here. Teach you a goddamn lesson.” You flinch at the venom in his tone, but it’s the next thing he says that truly breaks you. 

“You’re a goddamn liability.”

Joel still goes on, something about how he has to worry about you all the time, but you barely hear the words anymore. You don’t even feel the cracking twinge of your muscles when your body hits the floor again as Joel lets go of you. Seems like your legs stop working altogether.

He crouches next to your splayed body, and you instinctively defend yourself using your forearms in front of your face. “I’m sorry!” you choke on your own words. “Sorry, Joel, I’m sorry.”

“‘S a bit too late for that.” Joel scoffs, his hand pushing your forearms apart, revealing your teary eyes and quivering lips. “Quit this.”

Your trembling pupils find his eyes, and under the dim light of dusk filtering through the barn, for the first time since he arrived you see fresh little cuts on his face. Some bruises on his jaw and neck, hues of blue and purple. The trade didn’t go smoothly, it seems like, and when he came home he had to deal with your bullshit. Of course he’s mad.

He nudges your crotch where your pants are stained crimson of the woman’s blood. “Is this the only thing you’re good for? Pussy?”

The words stings. Far worse than the slaps, the shovings. You know it’s not true. You know Joel knows it’s not true. But he’s angry right now, so you swallow it.

“Take these off,” he tugs at the fabric. “Reeks of blood.”

You comply, quickly pulling your pants off, movement stuttering. Under them are your panties, and while they’re pretty much clean despite how much you want to wet yourself, Joel yanks them down your legs, too, the stitching rips from the force.

“This is the only thing valuable of you, huh?” he hurls the fabric to your face, the fiber absorbing your tears and sweat before you toss them to the ground, shaking.

“Is it?” he presses a palm to your chest, denying you of air. If you were a little bit more fragile he would’ve cracked your ribs. You shriek, nodding out of fear, just so he’d stop.

“Yeah? Fuckin’ say it then. Do I really have to do all the work around here?”

“Yes, Joel,” you cry, desperate.

“Yes what?”

“I’m— I,” the words are stuck in your throat. You don’t want to say it. You don’t know how to say it.

He lifts the hand from your chest and slaps you again, softer this time, like how you would wake a person. “You’re what?”

“I’m only good for my—“ you stutter, and even though you’re sure you’re already crying, you break down sobbing, and almost intangibly continue, “Pussy,”

“Sounds like right to me,” Joel nods, satisfied. “Cause surely there ain’t nothing up there.”

Another sound of hefty thwack fills up the room, but it doesn’t come from the skin of your cheek this time. Joel just struck your cunt with his open palm.

If it weren’t just you and Joel within a mile radius, the yelp you let out would’ve had raiders—or worse, infected—running. The sudden pain has you fight with all your might before you know it, hands swatting against Joel. But he’s so much stronger than you. Even when he isn’t pissed off.

“Keep squirmin’,” he says, his voice low and dangerous. “See what happens.”

Another slap. His calloused fingers do nothing but worsen the pain. Your tear ducts flood your temple, the salty fluid collecting between the curves of your helixes.

“Do I always have to fuck your brain out to keep you outta trouble?” he taunts. “What do I look like, baby, do I look like I got a lot of time in my hands? Nothin’ else to do but babysittin’ ya all day?”

Another strike, each one seemingly more powerful than the last. He cups your cunt, the meat of your lips pulsing from the pain under his touch. You’re gasping, hands balled into fists next to your torso.

“Yeah, reckon it hurts, don’t it?” he points at your cunt with his chin. “Maybe you’ll get it this time, since you seem to do all your thinkin’ with your pussy and not your head.”

He strikes again, and this time you scream. It hurts. You can’t see yourself but you’re pretty damn sure the skin of your cunt should be blooming red by now. You reach for his arm, but he won’t budge. Instead, he pins both of arms, folded on top of your chest like you’re praying. Maybe you should be.

“What’s wrong? Can’t handle it, huh? That’s the problem, ain’t it? You’re used to gettin’ what you want, when you want it."

You shake your head. The last part is not even close to the truth. You’ve been fighting for every scrap of life for years now. You don’t get what you want, not by a long shot. You’ve killed. You’ve hurt and been hurt more times than you can count. You’ve clawed your way through an endless hell to get here. But refuting it, setting the record straight, is not your priority right now. You shake your head because you, in fact, can’t handle it.

“Joel,” you beg, your voice cracking. “I’m sorry. Please stop, please, I can’t take it. I’m sorry.”

He scoffs.

“From the day I spared your life, you’ve been nothin' but trouble. Hell, I don’t know what I was thinkin’, lettin’ you stay with me all this time.” he pulls his hand from your cunt to pinch the bridge of his nose, exhaling sharply before continuing, “Lettin’ myself get attached to you.”

He sounds hurt, almost betrayed for a second, but he quickly composes himself and prepares to blow once again. Your knees are close to each other in an attempt to suppress the pain, and he pushes one away, opening you up, just to find that your reddened cunt is slick with arousal. 

He runs his middle finger through your slit, collecting the slippery glaze, and you arch your back because it’s unexpected, but also almost painful.

“You’re wet?” he questions, as if he doesn’t have the proof right on his fingertip.

You raise your head and shake it, mumbling things about how you’re taking this seriously and you are not titillated in any sense in fear of Joel getting angrier. Which is the truth. You didn’t know. You are feeling millions of different feelings, mainly scared, and you are pretty sure aroused is not one of them.

“You learn new things every day,” Joel shakes his head in disbelief. “Here I got a woman who gets off being slapped and screamed at.”

Maybe you are. You don’t know. You don’t have enough headspace to think, not when Joel slaps your cunt again, the blow sends your hips up to the air. You intertwine your fingers together, pressing them so hard your knuckles turn white.

“Poor thing,” he heaves. “Don’t know what to do with herself. Probably needs to come so bad, huh? After a long day of messin’ shit up and almost gettin’ herself dead, now she needs to come before bed? Greedy, greedy little cunt.”

He smears your own arousal all over your cunt, like he’s applying shea butter on sunburned skin. His finger grazes your clit, and you twitch under him, whimpering.

“Sensitive?” he asks, somehow softly this time. You say yes, and he nods in mock sympathies before finding your clit again and pinching it between his thumb and index finger.

You scream. A full-blown scream. You kick your legs, knowing damn well it gets you nowhere. You yell for Joel to stop, to spare you, that you’re sorry, again and again until it sounds like a jumbled cassette tape.

“Let’s get it over with, yeah?” He pats your cunt as your chest expands and shrinks as much as it could under the pressure of his other hand. “Say it. Beg me for my fingers inside you.”

“Please,” you squeak. “Please, Joel,”

He stays still, waiting for you to utter the whole thing. His gaze is relentless upon your mess of a face. You realize this, and begin to gather your words.

“Ple—ease fuck me with your fingers,” you stammer. “I need to come, need you to— to play with my pussy.”

The words might have been forced out of you, but when Joel pushes two digits inside your drenched, sensitive cunt, a little part of you is grateful. Joel isn’t gentle with it, he isn’t tender and loving like he used to be as he pumps his fingers into your walls, but fuck if that doesn’t cloud your brain with bliss-laced pain. Good kind of pain.

This continues for a couple of minutes until he realizes that you are starting to curl up beneath him, the muscles of your calves and stomach tensing up. Just before the swelling pleasure start to leak, Joel withdraws his fingers, earning a whimper in protest from you.

“Joel,” you whine. “I wanna come. Please.”

“Not yet,” Joel pants. The sight of you desperate and struggling seems to arouse him as well, although he doesn’t pay much attention to himself. “Not done with you.”

It’s killing you. But you nod anyway, playing along, relaxing your jaws when you realize you’ve been grinding your teeth forcefully the whole time it made your head hurt. You wiggle your hands, wrists all sweaty and almost bruised in Joel’s grip. Joel notices this and instead of letting go tightens his clutch even more.

His thumb hovers over your cunt, brushing against your sensitive bundle of pleasure intermittently, making you squirm each time it does. Every time you begin to enjoy yourself, he’ll throw a slap, eventually turning the pain into pleasure.

He fingers you again, still with two fingers, and stops exactly when you’re about to finish. The way he accurately reads your body language and knows the precise moment to deny you your release is scaring you. It is as if you’re nothing but an instrument to him. He follows your rhythm and cadence, knowing where and when to strum, but ultimately how to delay the final movement to his liking, building anticipation.

You’re nothing but a puddle of mess and desperation by the time he denies you for the fourth time.

“Enjoyin’ this?” Joel asks as he shifts his position. His legs are killing him.

You nod. You hate this, you want this to end, but you would be lying if you said you didn’t also enjoy this. Being so small under Joel’s boots, kissing the earth for his mercy. Nothing in your brain but him, how you let him treat you as he pleases.

He chuckles. “Yeah, I bet. Only this kind of thing can make you think, huh? The other things just pass by your brain or something.”

Your head inclines again. You both know it’s not entirely true. Sometimes you’re just too pure, too naive for your own good. Always optimistic, always seeing the good even in a pile of crap. Maybe that’s why Joel was drawn to you, too.

Joel is satisfied. He rubs your cunt and inserts two, before eventually working three fingers inside you. He simultaneously curls and pulls upwards, like he’s trying to dig his way up a mine with brute force. He doesn’t stop even after you come undone, writhing, your foot tapping the dirty floor like a rattlesnake.

You squeal, brain failing to conjure the words to ask Joel to stop, but even if you did, Joel wouldn’t have done it. He keeps moving, stirring your insides up, until he hears a familiar squelch building in your lower abdomen. He coerces it out of you, the release spraying onto his forearm, the rest leaking down his hand to the concrete flooring, trapping the layer of dust on it.

You don’t remember when he stops exactly, just when he wipes your tears with his sweaty hand that was used to hold you down.

“Sorry, baby,” he does look sorry, cupping your cheek as he bends to kiss you. “Gotta teach you a lesson every once in a while.”

[marblehazel]

Sitter

dbf!Joel Miller x f!reader

Part One | Part Two: Deeper

You’re spending spring break alone at home while your father is five thousand miles away when all of sudden, you fall sick. Enter Joel Miller: your father’s buddy, sent by him to check on you.

Tags: Explicit MDNI, no outbreak, age gap, no mother in the picture but your father has a named girlfriend (sorry), no bra household, dry humping, footjob while watching SpongeBob, oral (m and f receiving)

Word count: 6.8k

“Dad,” your voice is hoarse like it has just come out from a dying goose, and you spend the next five seconds trying to clear your throat.

“So like, I’m… sick, kinda, but it’s not really bad, so—” A train of coughs that feels like they are going to tear your lungs apart. “—sorry about that. It’s nothing. Don’t worry too much, don’t even think about it. I just wanted to let you know.” Another coughing fit. “Okay. Have fun, I love you.”

You click your phone screen and let the voicemail find its way to your father’s ancient block of telecommunication. It’s 11 p.m. for you, 5 a.m. in Tuscany, you calculate with your fingers. You might be wrong. Either way, your father is probably asleep. He had been away for a couple of days with his girlfriend Amy for her nephew's wedding. And they plan to spend another week there, because it’s their anniversary, and Amy had always wanted to go to Italy.

“Will you be okay?” your father asked, apologetic. He leaned onto your bedroom door’s frame while you were unpacking your backpack.

“Yeah, Dad, what am I, eight? Go.” you laughed lightheartedly.

“It’s just you came down here from school and then I go, you know. I wish you’d said yes and come with us.”

“And third-wheeling you and Amy for ten days?” you giggled. “Dad, it’s okay. Come on. We’ll still have the weekend together when you come back.”

You heard Amy call for your father from downstairs, followed by a question about his dress shirt. You grinned, gesturing for him to go.

“Me and Amy will make sure the fridge is full, okay?” he says, voice fading as he steps down the stairs. You shook your head. You’ve survived on dry ramens and day-old coffees in college. You would be okay. Right?

Loud buzzer sound. The game show on the TV you put on to distract yourself from the fever is not doing a good job. You try to focus, but the noises coming out of it sound muffled, and the colors are just so bright and saturated that they make your head spin. You click on mute before slamming the remote on the coffee table, and it lands safely on some crumpled Kleenex. A thermometer is sitting next to the box, the tiny display screen blank. It’s broken, and you make a mental note to scold your father for always keeping faulty things around the house as if he’s going to fix them. A few bottles of pills you fished out of your father’s medicine cabinet to at least ease your aching muscles are toppled next to a half-empty Nyquil Nighttime Relief bottle with its cap screwed but crooked.

You second-guess your decision to let your father know that you’re unwell. But again, he hates surprises, so letting him know that he might find your rotting corpse in front of his TV when he gets back is, perhaps, doing him a favor.

It’s dark in the living room, and the leather couch is sticking to your sweaty leg. You should probably put sweatpants and a hoodie on instead of biker shorts and a stretched out shirt that looks more like a rag than a proper clothing item. But climbing the stairs now? No, thank you.

You shift your body, trying to find the best position to fall asleep in since the wrong angle seems to block your nasal passage. A groan leaves your throat when you can’t pull the fleece blanket to cover your body. You find out you are sitting on both ends of it. To hell with it.

You blink slowly. The Nyquil seems to start working. Can’t sneeze or cough if you’re knocked out, you think. You close your eyes, the colors from the TV somehow find their way in and flash washed-out red, white, yellow behind your eyelids. You’re too tired to reach for the remote.

Maybe you’ll feel better when you wake up.

You jolt when something cold makes contact with your forehead. Within microseconds, you yeet the thing away hysterically, hitting yourself in the process. The thing flies and lands on the wooden floor with a wet, thwap sound.

“Easy, easy,”

If it was just a little bit not so sudden and confusing and designed to constrict your blood vessels until your organs fail, you would have yelped. You nearly snap your neck trying to find the source of the voice, and your tense shoulders fall as quickly as they were raised when you notice the familiar face belonging to a broad frame standing next to the couch.

It’s Joel Miller.

Of course it’s him. Your father likely has him on speed dial.

He and your father go way back. Went to the same school, crushed on the same girls, hit the same bong, and so on. They were even in a band together. Your father has pictures of them from years ago, with greasy hair, earrings, bass and drumsticks in their hands. Cringe.

Well, just your father. Not Joel though.

You haven’t seen him in like, what, a year? And yet he looks good as ever. Well, Joel has always looked good his whole life. When you saw the pictures of him from high school you thought, Oh Fuck, I Would Totally Have A Crush On This Guy. And then you had to sit in silence and ponder, because, well, you are having a crush on this guy. Sort of. Maybe.

He bends over to pick up the thing you just yeeted on the floor, which is apparently a washcloth, and dunk it in a basin on the side table, which is now clean from all the stuff that was previously there.

“Joel,” you chirp. “Hi.”

“Hey.” he smiles as he squeezes the washcloth. Beads of water come trickling down his knuckles back to the basin, gleaming in front of the still-turned-on TV.  “How are you feeling?”

“I’m okay. What time is this?” you straighten up, rummaging around the blanket to find your phone to no avail.

“One-thirty. Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you. Your old man asked me to check on you." He folds the cloth in two and dab it before stepping closer and pressing it against your forehead, nice and cold. His other hand supports your head from the back, basically cradling your skull.

“Your front door was unlocked when I came in.” says Joel, as if you are capable of digesting any kind of information at the moment. “You shouldn’t do that.”

“Sorry,” you say sheepishly. “And sorry my Dad made you come here. You didn’t have to, it’s not so bad.”

“Come on, it’s only a ten minute drive. ‘S okay. I checked your forehead. Not too bad, but still a fever, y’know. You took the Nyquil?”

The thought of Joel Miller touching your forehead with his palm in the dark while you were asleep somehow makes the neurons in your brain stop interlinking for a second. Were you sleeping with your mouth open the whole time? You knew you did fall asleep that way since you couldn’t breathe through your nose. Man.

“I did.” you nod, shaking the thought away. You feel your lungs tighten, though. Another coughing fit incoming.

“Good,” Joel presses his hand to your forehead again as if trying to make sure the wet washcloth is properly glued onto your face. The soft pressure disrupts your composure and you cough like a machine gun submerged in a container full of Elmer’s glue, hacking up thick mucus up your throat. Joel leaves your side with hurried steps and, within seconds, somehow has a paper cup under your chin for you to spit into.

You try to grab the cup, flustered, but he doesn’t let go and instead helps you sit up straight, patting your back.

“Spit.” he says as you wheeze with phlegm in your mouth like an imbecile. You awkwardly grab his wrist for support and spit the mucus out into the cup. Soon you’ll realize how foolish it is to grab someone’s wrist using the same hand you used to cover your mouth while coughing. The string of saliva takes a ridiculously long time to break free from your lips, but Joel is unfazed. He takes a glance at the mucus, likely checking the color and consistency.

“Thanks,” you blink rapidly, still processing.

“You wanna go to urgent care?” Joel asks.

“Nu-uh,” you shake your head. “I’m okay, I promise. I feel a lot better already.”

“It’s probably just a bug,” he pats your back again before walking to the kitchen to dispose of the cup. “How long has it been going on?”

You wait until he comes back because you don’t think you can speak loud enough for him to be able to hear you from the kitchen without tearing your throat apart. Joel thinks you didn’t hear him the first time and is about to repeat his question when you say, “Uh, it got progressively worse last night.” you realize how serious that sounds and quickly add, “But not like, worse worse. I mean, compared to,”

“And before that?”

“Just a scratchy throat.”

He looks like he’s mentally taking notes with arms folded in front of his stomach. It’s the first time that night you take a full look at him under the glow of the muted TV. You can’t really make the colors out, but he’s wearing a dark t-shirt under an unbuttoned flannel shirt and jeans. He’s keeping his beard kind of thin compared to the last time you saw him, but still the same, well-tended mustache that makes a strong presence over his lips. You can’t help but notice the graying strands of hair that stick out among his dark, messy hair, complimenting him so well. You are pretty sure the ratio between light to dark hair has been shooting up this year. You like it.

And his eyes. They’re rich, and dark, and the fact that he furrows half of the time that it creates permanent dents between his eyebrows just makes him ridiculously hotter.

The mucus factory must be working overtime tonight because you can feel the slight slippery feeling of lubrication where you’re sitting. Fucking stupid, you think, read the room.

All of sudden, a lightning flashes, lighting up your surroundings before the grumbling roar of thunder follows through. For a second, you can make out the shapes and silhouettes of everything in the room like a photograph. Joel fits rightly in the left third of this main piece in your mind exhibition. You wish you could take screenshots with your eyes and keep it to admire later.

Joel glances out the window. Heat lightning reveals the blobs of clouds outside, and the strong wind is starting to blow debris to rattle the windows. He shifts his focus on you again. “Did you eat?”

“I’m okay,” you shrug. Storm is coming, Joel better go home before it gets worse.

He chuckles. “Yes or no?”

That chuckle tickles something deep inside of you. You smile shyly. “Yes, Joel. I’m okay.”

Joel stares at you, and you are pretty sure he senses that you did not, in fact, eat dinner. “I’m starvin’, actually,” he gets up and takes his flannel shirt off, and then tosses it on the couch before making his way towards the kitchen. You scream internally at the sight of his biceps like a deranged fangirl.

“Mind if I take a look in the fridge?” he yells while opening the fridge door. Just being polite. He knows your father will let him dismantle the house and take the pieces home if he wants to.

You free the tangled blanket from around your legs, only noticing now how under your old, sweat-dampened, Marlin Club shirt, your nipples are as erect as fireman’s poles. Was it the temperature, Joel, or both, you can’t conclude.

Joel whistles when he finds that the fridge is full. He grabs a can of beer and pops it open, studying the contents of the fridge and thinking of what he can cook for you as he gulps the beer down.

You follow him to the kitchen, jump to sit on the kitchen island as Joel grabs some produce off the fridge and sets them next to you. He looks at you, blinks a couple of times, then occupies himself with the food cabinet over the counter. You try to be helpful by unwrapping the basil and cherry tomatoes.

“So, how’s school?” Joel breaks the silence as he washes his hands. “And don’t just say okay, please.”

“You got me there,” you laugh. “Nothing really amusing, really.”

Then a few more superficial, classic-catching-up questions while you both prepare the pesto. Joel asks about the trip to Italy, how your father mentioned proposing to Amy soon, what do you think about that. You ask about his brother Tommy, work, and the average cost to renovate a room, to which Joel answers in detail really nicely. Then come the usual do-you-remember-when stories, melting down the strange and awkward atmosphere between the two of you. Laughters fill up the room. It’s fun and familiar.

“Did you remember when you used to call me Uncle Joel?” Joel sneers as he tosses a pan to the sink. “You used to be so nice and polite.”

“I was like six!” You snorted. “And you can’t even pay me to call you that again, Joel.”

Then, the once-your-pops-and-I anecdotes. You’ve heard some of them from your own father’s mouth, but you still listen to Joel’s versions eagerly anyway.

At one point, you start to cough again so Joel instructs you to just sit down on the counter. You don’t complain—it means you can just sit back and watch him from the back and imagine how it would feel to run your fingers through his hair.

When Joel stirs the pasta with the pesto sauce, the weather has gone full-blown insane out there.

“You should stay the night,” you try to sound as nonchalant as possible. His presence is sending arrays of erroneous signals to your reproductive organs, which will most likely result badly if he stays, but how can you let him drive home in this kind of weather?

Joel hands you a fork and pushes a plate of fusilli for you to eat. “Eh, we’ll see,” he shrugs. “I don’t mind drivin’ through a storm, but I can’t just leave you alone if you don’t feel well.”

“Dad told me you got a folded chair smashed through your windshield last summer.” You take a bite, the thick sauce coats your tastebuds and you groan in satisfaction, even though you can’t really taste it to the fullest because of your stuffy nose.

“Oh, yeah, that.” Joel chuckles. “I was lucky it aimed for the shotgun.”

He eats standing up across you, one elbow on the counter. When you both finish the meal, he takes your plate and starts washing the dishes. You tell him to do it later, and then offer your help, and he says no to both. You insist on drying the dishes anyway, standing side by side with him.

After the very late dinner, the two of you retreat to the living room. Joel asks you to take some medication again and you decline, stating that you feel better already.

“Headstrong, ain’t ya?” Joel sighs. “Okay, sleep then. Wanna sleep in your bed?”

“Not really sleepy,” you shake your head. “Feel free to take Dad’s bed, by the way. You have work in the morning, right?”

“Nah, I’m alright by the couch.” Joel scoots to make room for his legs and lies on his back, groaning like every other old person when they finally get to be horizontal. His feet are dangling on one side, his head on the opposite armrest. You take the old recliner that doesn’t even recline anymore near Joel’s feet, facing both the TV and Joel at an angle.

The TV is still on, showing the same game show but already on a later season. You unmute it and watch it together with Joel for five minutes before you realize that none of you has laughed yet, and you ask Joel if he wants to watch a movie instead. He says why not.

You open a streaming service and browse for movies on the home page. Joel probably likes action and other classic old man genre types. You pretend to read some of the summaries and see if Joel perks up at one of them, but he doesn’t seem to really care about the TV.

“I don’t know what to watch,” you admit. “Do you wanna pick the movie?”

Truth is, Joel can’t give a single shit about no goddamn movie. He’s been distracted by so many thoughts in his mind. But he gestures for you to scroll back up anyway.  “Let’s see the trending ones.”

You stop at a tally of newly released and currently popular films at the top of the page, giving Joel a chance to read about them before moving to the next one.

“This one looks excitin’.” Joel points at the screen. The poster shows a man in classic Viking attire, staring intently at the viewer with striking blue eyes. Some kind of pelt is draped over his shoulders. His hands are on top of each other, resting on a sword handle, the blade facing the earth. Dried mud and blood are splattered over his face and armor. The Conquest, it says. You don’t recognize the actors listed. The summary says something about revenge, passion, blood, power, blah blah. You click play.

The movie opens with a battle scene. The movie looks like it runs out of lighting budget, and you need to squint to be able to tell what they are actually doing. Nothing can be heard except grunts and blades clashing. You look over at Joel to see his expression, but he’s looking at you. He quickly averts his gaze back to the screen.

Twenty minutes pass, and none of you are really paying attention to the plot. Not until the main guy enters a wooden tub filled with steaming hot water with his asscheeks out, and then a woman enters the scene with nothing but a thin white veil covering her body. She drops the cloth and joins him. The warm light from the torches is highlighting her breasts.

“Woah,” you look at Joel again, but he says nothing, but you can see his Adam’s apple moving awkwardly.

They kiss, and he grabs her bosom with his humongous palms and knead them. Then he buries his face between them, with the woman kissing the top of his head. After what feels like a millenia, he lifts her lower half from the water, and then puts her down to sit on the edge of the tub before performing cunnilingus. She moans.

You start to feel a pool of heat brewing inside of you. This feels invasive of their privacy, somehow, with no soundtrack added, just fire crackling and water splashing and erotic moaning.

Joel clears his throat. “Uh, maybe we shouldn’t watch this,”

“You’re the one who picked the movie.” you say, eyes fixated on the screen.

“Well, it didn’t say nothin’ about eatin’ a lady out in the summary.”

He reaches for the remote and turns the TV off, leaving only the sound of rain hitting your window in your eardrums.

“Hey,” you whine. “That’s not nice. I didn’t say yes.”

“It’s late. Go to sleep.” Joel folds his arms over his chest, partly staying warm, partly because he’s so flustered he doesn’t know what to do with his hands. He then closes his eyes, knowing damn well he’s far from feeling tired let alone fall asleep.

“We’re both adults anyways,” you mutter, but Joel doesn’t move. He’s probably actually tired.

Your gaze is affixed on him. He surely doesn’t look like he’s sleeping in peace right now but he’s still handsome nonetheless. His old shirt is a tad bit too tight around his biceps. You can see the protruding veins beautifully decorating his arms and hands. His legs are slightly crossing with one ankle on top of another, and his breath is steady. He’s gorgeous.

In your wildest dreams, you would jump to straddle Joel, and he would grab your hips and fuck you to death. Is it bad that your immune system is fighting one of the worst battles in your life, and yet your number one priority is somehow to get laid, by this man specifically? It’s both excruciating and foolish. 

The movie you just saw doesn’t help, either. In fact, it makes everything worse. Your mind keeps wandering back to it, the way the man eats the woman out, and then back to Joel, imagining the top of his head would look like when he eats you out. Fuck. You know that if you don’t get to touch this man in the next 30 minutes, you are either going to combust or burn everything in the vicinity.

You close your eyes, try to do the mindfulness practice you once saw in a magazine. Inhale. Hold. Exhale. You repeat “Release me from this earthly desire” in your head like a rookie buddhist wizard trying to cast a spell with a broken wand. You ball your fists in your lap so hard the joints start to hurt.

It’s not working.

Your mind keeps wandering back to different scenarios, different positions, different spots around the house. Low grunts, fingertips pressing your sides, tongue between your lips…

You can’t do it anymore. You need release. You need to at least be able to feel something, a little reward for your throbbing clit. Trying your best to be as casual as possible, you pull your folded legs closer to your body, your left heel even closer to your biker-short-covered cunt, and shift your body weight on it.

The pleasure that has been building up there bursts like a balloon. You sigh.

There are two things that Joel is not: young, and oblivious.

Oh, he is totally aware of what’s happening. You are not doing a good job trying to be subtle. From the non-stop staring, to the constant fidgeting, to the borderline sexual sighs, to the hard nipples, Joel knows you are going through something that is completely different from just being ill.

And he totally understands. He’s been there, done that. There was a time when his back wasn’t hurting and his face hadn’t been ‘graced’ with crow’s feet and age spots yet, when his hormones were at all-time high and his blood liked nothing more than flowing to his cock recklessly at the slightest inducement. He understands what you are going through.

So when you start grinding yourself onto your left heel followed by soft moans, he is not exactly surprised, just mostly in awe of your debauched audacity.

That is too much, even for him. He clears his throat, hoping you’d catch the hint and stop for good. But you don’t, and your eyes are closed and your eyebrows are knitted together in concentration, and your hips are moving slowly, sensually, chasing something, the sight of it stirs something up in his guts.

It is vulgar, and most importantly indecent in every way, but Joel can feel his own arousal creeping up no matter how hard he tries to convince himself that it is not happening.

He calls your name. Your body responds faster than the critically thinking part of your brain and you stop like you just got cursed by Medusa. 

You can physically feel your heart drop to your ass. Your neck moves stiffly to find his eyes like a broken animatronic. “Yeah?” you croak.

“Do you think I don’t know what you’re doin’?”

You blink. Deny? Act stupid? Admit? Deny, deny. Wait, deny? No, act stupid.

“What… Do you mean?” you say, and you realize that you chose the dialogue option that actually sounds the dumbest.

Joel clicks his tongue. “Might as well hump me if you want it that much.”

Wait, what? Your eyes light up. “Really?”

Joel stares at you in genuine perplexity before lifting one hand up to massage his temples. He takes a deep breath, and in the softest way possible—like telling a puppy she can’t eat electronic parts—sighs, “No.”

“Oh,” you cover your mouth. “I thought you meant—“

“Yeah, yeah. My bad.” he sighs again, sounding significantly more frustrated. He then uses his hands to support himself to a sitting position, composing himself.

Silence. You don’t dare to look at Joel, but your cunt keeps pulsing like a metal detector. You understand that the beeping—desire—will not die down unless you get the valuable artefact from the bronze age—Joel—in your hand. Is this time to be bold and brash?

“Joel,” you call, and you can swear that was not a sober decision, but the stage curtains have been pulled back, and you are pushed to the stage to play your part.

“Hm?”

“What if… I hump you anyway?” you stand up, and your knees are slightly buckling but you act tough and bold regardless.

Joel’s jaws opens and stays slightly agape for a while before he says, “That fever is really messin’ with your brain, huh? Sit down.”

“You’re bricked up, Joel.” you accuse. You don’t actually know for sure since Joel keeps a hand on his lap to cover his crotch, but Joel gulps. Gotcha.

“Unrelated to you.” he hisses in defense.

You scoff.

“Joel, please,” you grouse, voice cracking and desperate. “I want this so bad.” you whisper as you take slow, threatening steps towards Joel until your crotch is not even an inch away from his knee. “I want you so bad.”

“This ain’t right, kid.” Joel puts a hand on the outer side of your arm, and it’s worth pointing out that he’s shaking. “You know that.”

Joel doesn’t tell you that he’s battling demons in his head, and he’s currently losing. A million impulses are catapulting burning boulders onto the gate of his conscience, and all he got is one bleeding, sickly troop with a chipped wooden sword. But he puts his best stern expression despite the fact that his body is betraying him.

He could leave now. Push you away. Clear his head. Come back later. Or not come back at all.

But he knows he doesn’t want to. He can hear his blood rushing and his heart singing battle cry. Not to mention his cock, hard and nearly burns a hole through his jeans.

A long pause. You want to push him further, but you know you don’t need to. The black marlin printed on your shirt does a worthless attempt at distracting Joel from your hard nipples, putting him into a trance.

Joel takes a deep breath. He knows he has lost. “You can help yourself, that’s all,” he nods, more trying to convince himself rather than talking to you. “Just to make you shut up and get rest. That’s it.”

That’s an unenthusiastic barf-colored green light, but it is a green light nonetheless.

You put your hands on Joel’s shoulder before putting your left knee next to his right leg and lower yourself down onto his thigh, while your other knee rests in front of his crotch and presses onto his raging hard-on. Your cunt pulsates in pleasure upon contact, and you let out a gasp. Joel anxiously places his hands on your sides to keep you steady, one thumb ‘accidentally’ brushing your nipple, earning a whine. You lock gaze with him, and start moving.

The friction sends buzzes up your head. You make each grind count, and every single one feels like heaven despite the layers of fabric between your cunt and his beefy thigh. Moans and Joel’s name spill from your lips indeliberately, and he tightens his grip on your body until his fingertips turn white as if you would fly away with a gust of wind if he doesn’t. If you weren’t so absorbed in your own pleasure, you would’ve noticed how shallow and rapid Joel’s breath has become. It turns him on watching you getting off because of him, using him, how your eyelids flutter and your pupils are having a hard time staying in place.

Joel wants to break free from his denim, badly. While he consciously thought, planned, and stated that he’s doing what he’s doing only for your satisfaction and be done with it, it isn’t exactly nice having your kneecap pushing button-flies shaped caves on his crotch repeatedly. Especially not when his cock, which probably has its own brain, has been begging to be taken care of, too.

You, on the other side, are having the best time of your life. As your climax is building up in your south region, you smile at Joel, who smiles back. His hand leaves your ribs briefly to brush the hair that is sticking to your sweaty forehead away from your face.

“That feels good, doesn’t it?”

You nod weakly. “So good, Joel, so good,”

For a moment there you consider kissing him. His face is merely two inches away from you, and he looks ravishing, all sweaty and blushing. And how you just want to have your tongue inside his mouth, his lips all over yours sloppily. But that feels like overstepping boundaries, like a whole uncharted area you can’t cross, spreading the flu aside. You opt to put your chin on his shoulder instead, trying to focus on your orgasm.

“I want to see your face,” Joel says in your ear, his beard grazing your cheek. Takes you three whole seconds to process that, and when you do, it tingles your core. Before you can answer, he continues, “You’re so beautiful like this.”

You pull back, meeting his gaze with flushing cheeks. You don’t know what to say, and maybe you don’t have to. You continue to be dumbfounded when Joel stops your motion and helps you to stand up.

“Hold on,” he says as he undoes the buttons of his jeans. “I need to take these off.”

He quickly kicks the jeans off his legs, revealing a dark gray boxer briefs under. A wet patch adorns the bulge right in the center. He then manspreads and gestures for you to come back onto him, to which you comply. “C’mere,” he says, “I need to feel you on me.”

You straddle him, positioning your cunt right on his cock, and on everybody and their mother, it feels good. No, it feels right. Joel lets out a groan that cuts into a gasp when you start to grind. “Fuck, yeah,” he grabs your ass, helping you settle on a rhythm.

The contour of Joel’s cock, albeit still covered by the fabric of his boxer briefs, touches every last nerve ending of your cunt in such a different way that his thigh did. You pick your pace up, getting the pleasure to build up again. 

“Joel, I’m gonna come,” you moan, voice quivering. You rake your fingers through his hair, your noses almost touching.

“Keep going, baby,” he says through a smile. “Don’t hold back. You sound so pretty.”

The encouragement is shooting up fireworks in your lower belly, and you start making more sounds. You’re close. So close.

“Makin’ me so hard all night, you,”

You whimper as you come, hips convulsing. Time slows down, and it feels like your cunt is pulled towards a strong gravitational force within your own body as you are sinking down a quicksand, all while pleasure forces your brain to reboot itself.

“That’s it, that’s it. There you go. You’re so good.”

Joel holds the back of your head while you’re laying on his chest, limp. When you pull yourself away from him, he presses a palm to your cheek, smiling. “Attagirl.”

When you finally gather yourself, you pull away from Joel, leaving a huge wet spot on where you just had your cunt on, and scoot to the spot next to him on the couch. You are about to lean onto his shoulder when he stands up and picks his jeans up from the floor. He sees the wet trail of arousal you left on the fabric in the thigh area and snickers.

“Damn, kid, you’re practically a snail,” he points to it. “Poor thing.”

You wince. “What are you doing?”

“Puttin’ my pants on?” he answers in the exact same tone, fixing the position of his boxer briefs.

“But you haven’t even come yet!” you protest. “What the fuck? Take them off!”

“That’s not what I agreed to, remember? I help you come so you’ll shut up and sleep. You’ve come, now shut up, and go to sleep.” he lays it out like basic math while you press the base of your palms onto your eyelids, confounded.

“You’re a sick person,” you shake your head, and then point to his crotch. “You’re literally still hard.”

“That has nothin’ to do with anythin’.”

You stare at the open space, like you’re trying to break the fourth wall in a sitcom. Can you believe this guy?

“Joel, your line is ‘I’m going to fuck you so hard.’ Now let’s start again from the top.”

Joel, who’s struggling trying to fit his bulge back in the jeans without hurting it, stops fussing with his button-fly shortly to push your head back—softly—to the couch. “Sleep,” he drags his palm over your face to close your eyelids.

“Joooooel,”

“Your line is ‘Yes, Joel, good night.’”

“Yes, Uncle Joel, good night, Uncle Joel,” you mock as you swiftly jump from the couch and pull his jeans down to his ankle and force him to step out of it. You hear Joel yelling hey, hey, hey as he tries to simultaneously fight you and not hurt you. You throw the pair of pants across the room with all your might and it lands with a loud thud.

“What are your pants made of, steel?”

“What is wrong with you?” he takes a step to fetch it, but you stand up and push him back to the couch. Joel is for sure going easy on you, because if he wanted to, he could definitely launch you through the walls. Instead, he just accepts his fate and stares at the ceiling, defeated.

“Nobody sleeps with jeans on, Joel,” you reach for the TV remote again. “Now let’s watch something again and then sleep.”

“We’re not watching the viking movie again.”

“We’re not watching the viking movie again,” you repeat. “We’re watching SpongeBob.”

Joel groans.

“What, you don’t like SpongeBob?”

“Not my era,” Joel says. “I watched Gumby. Tom and Jerry. The Muppet Show.”

“No wonder you act like the heckling old guys.”

“I don’t, but, sure,”

“Oh, you’re more like the eagle. So serious all the time.”

Joel rolls his eyes. You play the first episode of the first season of SpongeBob Squarepants, and the familiar intro begins. You take a look at Joel in the corner of your eyes, how he has one of his forearm on the top of his head, bicep almost as thick as his head. The other hand is resting on his thigh, and you can tell that he’s at least still half-hard. You wonder how he looks under those boxer briefs.

On the screen, Squidward and Mr. Krabs are climbing a post with a sea of raging anchovies under them. Joel’s lips slightly turn upward. Ha, eat that, Mr. Old Cartoon Head.

You shift so that you’re on your back, legs resting on Joel’s lap. He gives you a look, but doesn’t say anything. Minutes later, totally absorbed with SpongeBob pestering his neighbor with a reef blower, he has a hand on your ankle, caressing it without much thought.

They would have written about you in a Greek tragedy the way you’re consumed by greed and lust. When your toes stroke Joel’s bulge, totally by accident and not precalculated at all, you pretend like you’re captivated by the TV. It’s hard and you can definitely discern the ridge of possible veins and the head of his cock.

Joel exhales, sounding so done and tired.  “I know you were going to do this,”

But he doesn’t push you away. And that excites you.

You don’t say anything or look away from the screen, but you keep rubbing the outline of his cock, which is now more visible and grows slightly larger, with the space between your big and index toe. Your brain automatically puts the ice clinking in a vase while SpongeBob is getting dry under Sandy’s treedome as background noise to amplify Joel’s restrained grunts.

You like this. You like having Joel wrapped around your finger. Soon after, you withdraw your legs and sit up, causing him to open his eyes over the sudden halt.

You stare at him, bold. “Would you like my mouth?”

Joel nods.

You don’t even wait for a second. Joel helps you take off his boxer briefs, the length of his hard-on springs out like jack-in-the-box. You admire how it looks, how the tip is totally sticky and glistening, before lowering your tongue. Joal lets out a sound akin to a whimper as you let your saliva ooze down the underside of his cock and quickly retrieve it into your mouth using your tongue. He tastes slightly salty, like sweat. And if you could smell better you’d see how hypnotizing his scent is, like calling you to stick his cock down your throat until the world collapses.

“That’s it,” Joel says, out of breath. His cock is now grazing the soft wall of your cheek, and he wonders how experienced you actually are because you definitely don’t act like an amateur. You use one elbow to support yourself, the other one taking turns massaging his balls and the base of his cock.

The only downside of this is that Joel can’t really look at your face. He craves the sight of you, how your lips are wrapped around his cock, and how your cheek is bulging like a squirrel full of him. One of his hands crawls up your back under your shirt, rubbing it before it finds a new target: your breasts. He kneads on one, thumb flicking the bud. You can’t help but moan and take him deeper, sending vibrations from your throat to his cock.

Joel knows he won’t last much longer, and he would very much like to keep this thing going as long as possible. So he asks you to stop, averting your disappointment by lifting up your shirt and sucking on one nipple. He’s surprisingly tender with it, taking his time. You reach a hand to his cock again, trying to at least get him off with your hand, but he pulls your wrists back and locks them on your sides.

“Joel,” you whine. “Fuck me. Please.”

“No can do,” Joel answers as his lips are trailing down to your stomach, where he peppers kisses all over. You scoot backwards and like reading your mind, he tugs the hem of your shorts down to your ankle before yanking it away, revealing your throbbing, desperate cunt. He then dives down, nose pressing against your mound as his tongue explores the new treasure island.

Just like in the movie.

You try to grab on something, anything, but the leather couch does nothing but squeaks, and Joel instinctively laces his fingers with yours. The view of the top of your head is exactly how you imagined it would be. The moans released from your lips are rather loud, especially when Joel creates a suction cup with his lips right on your clit.

“Joel, Joel,” you grasp his hands with all your might. “This is fucking unfair, I’m so— I’m gonna—”

Before you get to finish your sentence, your body already decides that it’s time for another release. Your heels are planted firmly against the couch as your hips lift to the air, and Joel lets go. He kneels before your cunt, pumps himself to oblivion and comes all over you before you get to collect yourself, staining your stomach and breasts. Later you’ll realize that the first spurt went a little bit rogue and landed on your hair.

“Fuck you, man,” you complain, sticking out a middle finger at him. “I was supposed to make you come.”

Joel rests his head on the couch armrest, eyes closed. “You did.”

“I meant technically,” you attempt to nudge him with your leg, but he dodges and stands up to grab the washcloth he used to compress you with earlier. He then wipes your stomach and breasts with it, the cold water making you squirm.

“What now?” you ask when he hands you your clothes.

“Sleep. It’s four in the mornin’.” he says as he puts his stained, sticky, wet boxer briefs on and sits on the recliner. So you can’t drive me mad anymore, he says.

You whine, but you realize that your eyelids are actually very heavy. “Blowjob first time in the morning?” you offer before letting yourself drift off.

“Thought you were s’pposed to be sick.” Joel shakes his head. But he grins.